Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Buck’s shuffling around in his sleep shorts and a hoodie, throwing together a breakfast sandwich and listening to a quiet morning playlist his Spotify recommended. He’s got a whole forty eight hours to himself and a plan to finally install a set of shelves on Eddie’s bedroom wall. 

He shakes his head.

On his bedroom wall. 

He takes a bite, humming along to a song he recognizes from scrolling through TikTok, meaning he only knows the hook of the chorus, but it’s nice.

The knock at his door makes him inhale a little bit of egg and cough, eyes watering, and if he chokes on a sandwich because some delivery driver needed his signature he’s going to haunt them .

He coughs, clearing his throat, and calls out, “coming!” but apparently he’s too slow because there’s the sound of a key turning in his front lock and Buck’s coming around the corner to see Eddie.

Eddie who– who looks awful.

“Eddie! I– what– why are you– wait, is Chris–” Buck can’t get his mind around the sight of Eddie in front of him, and he’s cut off by the other man crossing the distance between them and grabbing him hard enough to kind of hurt, wrapping him in a hug that feels like it’s pulling the air from Buck’s lungs while also simultaneously restarting his heart.

Eddie’s shaking and he’s still not answering Buck’s questions, but Buck’s not going to push him away when he so clearly needs to be close, so he just brings his hands up to Eddie’s rib cage and holds him. 

“You’re okay.” Eddie says into the meat of Buck’s shoulder, and that makes Buck frown because he’s pretty sure that’s supposed to be what he says to Eddie.

“Uh, yeah, what– Eddie, what’s happening?” Buck has to ask, “are you okay? Is- is Chris?”

The movement of Eddie’s nod is not something he’s ever felt against his own skin before, and Buck is glad that he’s so relieved that he can’t muster up a blush or goosebumps in response to the touch, “we’re fine– he’s at school, my sister took him this morning.”

“Then– I mean, what’s–” Buck is pretty sure he hasn’t managed a real sentence since Eddie walked into the building.

Eddie pulls back, jaw set tight, “we have to sit down.”

Buck feels his stomach drop, fear crawling all through his guts, “o-oh, okay.” He leads Eddie through the house he knows is too much like Eddie’s was, returning to his breakfast sandwich at the kitchen table, and sits. “What the fuck is going on?”

Eddie sits, but not across from him, in the seat next to him, pulling Buck’s chair close by hooking his ankle over the rung of the chair like he can’t have Buck too far away. “You’re about to think I’m lying to you.”

Buck frowns in disbelief, “what? Eddie I wouldn’t–”

Eddie raises his hand, “you have . For… ten days? I think ten. Some– one was really short.”

“What?” Buck tries to think about the last couple of weeks, but Eddie’s talking before he can even begin to come up with something intelligible.

“Buck, I’m in a time loop.” Eddie says with a certainty that he usually only gives for things like my son Christopher or I hate Uno.

Buck blinks, trying to think of what specialist might be open in an emergency, “okay, so–”

“We do not have to get me to a doctor. I am in a time loop.” Eddie’s brows furrow, “I don’t think– I can’t prove it this time, we haven’t done this version, but– I promise.” He looks at his watch, “in about twenty minutes Bobby’s going to call and tell you he can’t bring his drill over til the afternoon because May needed him to install something last minute.”

Buck wipes his sweaty palm on his shorts, “Eddie, come on. You don’t–” believe in this stuff goes unsaid but heard.

“I don’t. Which means if I say I am then it’s gotta be real.” Eddie holds Buck’s eye contact in that desperate way he does sometimes when he thinks Buck doesn’t get it, “Buck I have lived today for nearly two weeks. We have talked every day of those weeks but every time you don’t believe me and the last few times I could skip this because I could tell you when you were gonna burn your hand on your cast iron, but this time I got here after you’d already done that so–”

Buck looks down at the red skin on the side of his thumb, where he’d seared it an hour ago when cleaning the pan he’d forgotten on the stove the night before, “I didn’t tell you–”

“Buck please . I promise you. I have been through this.” Eddie sounds kind of desperate, and Buck thinks he should just go with it, but time loops are science fiction at best and he doesn’t want to play into whatever’s going on in his friend’s mind.

“We could just go get a consultation–” he begins to suggest, but Eddie’s eyes close in frustration.

“I asked you, a couple of times ago how I could convince you with a secret you haven’t told anyone and I– I don’t want to, but we haven’t had any luck yet and–” Eddie worries at his own lip, searching Buck’s face for an answer, and he must see something that makes him continue, “you told Tommy you don’t sleep with everyone you have feelings for.”

Buck startles back, “how– he said you don’t talk anymore.”

Eddie looks at the ceiling, sighing, “we don’t , Buck. You told me that.”

“Why–” Buck shakes his head, “I wouldn’t.”

Eddie meets his eyes again, deep brown and pleading, “you did. And it doesn’t– Buck I swear it’s okay, I–”

Buck stands, shaking his head, “Eddie I can’t do this, okay? I– I have, uh– plans, and–”

“Your plan today is to hang shelves and watch something called Terrace House which I don’t understand even after the same explanation three times, but Buck you haven’t–” Eddie squeezes his eyes shut and his hands are fists, “you haven’t done either of those because you haven’t made it past four yet.”

That makes Buck freeze, looking at Eddie in shock, “what?”

“It’s been– I don’t know, we haven’t figured it out yet, most of the times it’s the same thing but there were two–” Eddie’s voice breaks and he looks up at Buck, eyes wide and full of fear, “longest yet was til a little before three, but you flatlined on the table so I’m not sure really how much of that was life saving measures by the hospital.”

Buck’s shoulders fall, finally feeling like he understands, “Eddie, you know nightmares are part of–”

“It’s not PTSD, Buck. It’s not. ” Eddie puts his face in his hands, “I thought so too, the first couple of days, that it was my brain making up some horror story, you know? Some worse case scenario. But it kept happening. And the rest didn’t change. My first Uber pick up, the fact that the grocery store didn’t have any leeks, my mom texting me the same annoying article about parenting, and then the call from Bobby–” he sighs, then looks up at Buck again, “Buck I can’t get that call from Bobby too many more times or I might– I don’t know.”

“Fly to L.A.?” Buck tries to joke, “tell me I’ve only got, what, four to five hours left?”

It’s the wrong joke to make because Eddie looks at him woefully, “Buck I’ve told you you’re dying… six times now. I– all I want is to be fucking wrong .”

Buck crosses his arms, looking at the clock, “you said Bobby’ll call? Well, let’s wait til then.”

Eddie nods, all the fight out of him, shoulders low, “sure, Buck.”

Buck sits down again, “maybe you’ve changed the timeline by coming here?”

Eddie’s eyes are sad, “I don’t think so, not if all the other stuff I’ve tried hasn’t done anything.”

“Tell me.” Buck picks up his sandwich, because he doesn’t believe Eddie, but he has to fuel up to figure out how to break his best friend out of whatever this is, “worse case I just have more info to tell your intake nurse when I drive you to the psych ward.”

Eddie laughs noiselessly, “we think you have some– I don’t know, maybe an aneurysm? Something in your brain, but I’ve never made it to tomorrow so we haven’t gotten the tests back, and even when I had Maddie rush you to the doctor they didn’t see anything to worry about on the tests and you went home and still–” Eddie inhales shakily, “that time you went while on the phone with me, Buck. Right at two fourteen. I heard– I called 911 to your house but–”

Buck swallows the bite and it’s not easy going down because the way Eddie’s talking is like it’s real– like Buck is actually going to die .

“I sent Hen the next time, but at around one thirty so maybe you’d be in the scan when it was happening but they– there was a wait and you collapsed in the ER and they tried but they couldn’t find the origin of the bleed because you hit your head so hard, so this time– this time I’m taking you in and we aren’t leaving.” Eddie says it out loud like a promise to himself, “we’re– we’re going to figure this out, okay?”

Buck nods, because Eddie needs it, and Buck will give Eddie anything. 

Buck’s phone rings, and Bobby’s contact appears on the screen, so he picks up, “hey Bobby.”

“Hi Buck! Glad I caught you. I’m going to be a bit later than I thought– turns out May needs some quick help but right after I’ll drop by with my drills and level.”

Buck looks over at Eddie, who just looks resigned, “did, uh, did you talk to Eddie today?”

“No? Should I have? Does he need another reference?” Bobby sounds believably confused, and Buck’s never known him to be much of an actor.

“Nah, I– he just mentioned something about you when we talked.” Buck can’t come up with a reasonable explanation but Bobby knows they talk enough that he won’t question it.

Eddie looks like he remembers something, speaking quietly, “he’s at Lowes, he’s going to ask if you need anything.”

“Okay–” Bobby clears his throat, “I’m at Lowes, so if there’s anything you need for the shelving project speak now or forever hold your peace.”

Buck tries to laugh, “nah, I– I’m all set.”

“You sure?” Bobby sounds worried, which means Buck’s showing his fear that Eddie’s telling the truth, and he should find a way to smooth this over so Bobby doesn’t try and get both of them a consult.

“Totally!” He says brightly, “I tripled checked.”

“Good job, kid. See you later, probably around two?” Bobby sounds like he’s guessing even without Eddie’s forewarning.

Buck swallows, “with May it’s always one more little thing– I bet it’ll be more like four.”

Bobby’s laugh is nice and warm, “when you’re right you’re right. Hope I’m not holding you up too much.”

“Nah.” Buck shakes his head, “I- I’ll think of something fun to do with the day.”

“Great. Bye, Buck.” Bobby says, and Buck’s struck by the idea that if Eddie’s right then for at least the rest of today the man’s going to think these were their last words.

“Love you!” He blurts out, and immediately feels weird about it because they don’t say that.

“You too.” Bobby answers back after only a brief pause. 

Buck hangs up and looks at Eddie, feeling the way his mouth is hanging open a little, “you– you promise you didn’t talk to Tommy?”

Eddie looks affronted, “ that’s the question? I tell you all this and all you want– yeah, Buck, I haven’t responded to any of his messages since you came by after the break up.”

Buck swallows trying to ignore the zip of happiness that sends through his system, then nods slowly, “okay. A time loop.”

Eddie’s whole body seems to relax at Buck’s beginning signs of belief, “you’ll go to the hospital with me?”

Buck sighs, looking around the house he thought he might spend some time tidying, at the shelves in the corner waiting for him, “have I died in the shower yet or can I at least be in real clothes before we sit and wait for a doctor to listen to us?”

“You haven’t died in the shower yet.” Eddie answers, then looks over at Buck pleadingly, “please don’t.”

“You just don’t want to have to restart tomorrow having made no progress.” Buck can’t help but make light because if this is all real then he’s going to die so he thinks it’s okay if he jokes about it a little.

Eddie looks lost and Buck would feel worse but there’s no way other Bucks haven’t made similar jokes and Eddie might have lived this for days but Buck’s processing a lot of information all at once so he lets himself have this.

Eddie’s on the bed when Buck comes out of the shower, looking down at his hands that are twisting and interlocking in worry, something Buck’s only seen when Eddie’s lost. He looks up when Buck comes in, wrapped in a towel, and his eyes widen like he hadn’t considered the possibility that Buck would be undressed. 

Buck gives him a moment to leave the room, but Eddie doesn’t take it, and the alternative is just hanging out while naked which will not go well for Buck. He really doesn’t want to die naked unless he’s ninety five and having weird geriatric sex with the love of his life.

“I– I think we should go to the Craniospinal Center.” Eddie says even as Buck rummages through the drawers to gather enough pieces of an outfit, “they– they know more.”

Buck nods, focusing on being casual and normal as he drops his towel and pulls on boxers, “sure.”

“Great.” Eddie sounds mostly normal, so Buck must be great at this. They used to share a locker room, it’s fine. 

“Do we have to go now?” Buck turns as he tugs on his shirt, grateful for the comfort of its soft cotton. “You said they didn’t find anything when I went too early before.”

Eddie nods, “but that was– we didn’t know what to look for that time– they gave you a full EKG and your heart was fine and they didn’t– we’ll go now and say you’ve been having headaches and weakness in one hand so they have to do a scan.”

There’s a moment where Buck can practically feel Eddie’s guilt like a vice around them. 

“Eddie I haven’t.” Buck assures him, “you didn’t– no one missed anything, I haven’t kept anything to myself- there hasn't been–”

“I know.” Eddie says with finality, “but otherwise you’ll wait too long and I need– we need to know.”

Buck sighs, “okay. Let me take out the recycling and we can go. They come by around noon, so we’ll be out.”

Eddie nods, and when Buck studies him it’s obvious he’s miserable . Buck’s the one dying but Eddie looks like it. 

“I’m with you, Eddie.” Buck promises because what else can he do in the face of all this but give in, “but if tomorrow happens again we need to get you a better thing to convince me.”

Eddie nods, “I think– maybe something smaller? Something no one would know except you. Maybe something you did, well, your last night? Did you dream about anything memorable?”

Buck’s mind flashes to vague happiness and warmth, an arm wrapped around his chest with a ring of words around the bicep, “uh– I didn’t– no dream.” He scratches his temple as he moves into the kitchen and Eddie follows, “I had Thai for dinner?”

“You do that after every hard shift, Buck.” Eddie sighs, and Buck’s never really noticed that, but he supposes he has. He hadn’t even noticed when he added Eddie’s favorite appetizer to the order, so there’s scallion pancakes getting sad and hard in his fridge.

“Okay, uh, how about– I watched two old episodes of Worst Cooks in America and then heckled them?” Buck admits, because no one watches that show.

Eddie laughs, “I know– you texted me a weird video of the screen and some avocado mess. Some girl thought the pit was meant to be sliced?”

Buck feels his cheeks pink, “oh, right.” He looks down at the recycling, “it’s– it’s hard when you know me so well.”

“Yeah. We–” Eddie agrees, “thats why you had the idea of the Tommy thing.”

“Right.” Buck needs to steer the conversation away from that admission, so he hunts through the night before for something he can say that isn’t I dreamed you were here with me because you like me not because I keep dying , “right before I went to bed I did what I do pretty much every night.”

Eddie tilts his head, looking at Buck with uncertainty, “please don’t tell me about your porn habits–”

Buck scoffs, “as if I have one way of doing that. No, I–”  he wants to word this in the least weird way he can, “I watched you and Chris’s little dots on Find My Friends.” He risks a glance at Eddie, who looks surprised, “I like knowing you’re home safe.”

Eddie sits, looking like he’s adjusting to that tidbit, so Buck grabs the paper bag of bottles and plastic casing he’s collected over the past week, and tips it into the bigger bin, wondering what he’ll do if all of this is in Eddie’s head and now he’s admitted that to his best friend. He drags the bin to the curb, glaring at the wheel that’s still kind of wobbly.

It tilts the whole barrel over and Buck barely manages to catch it on his hip, the weight making him twist awkwardly. There’s a couple of cans that rolled off the top and he steps into the street to grab them, wincing at the bruise he knows is going to form on his hip.

He doesn’t see the car– going too fast, electric so the engine’s not loud enough to send the right warning to his brain– but he feels the impact, the shock of it, the pain worse than even getting crushed, but just for a moment.

________

Buck’s shuffling around in his sleep shorts and a hoodie, throwing together a breakfast sandwich and listening to a quiet morning playlist his Spotify recommended. He’s got a whole forty eight hours to himself and a plan to finally install a set of shelves on Eddie’s bedroom wall. 

He shakes his head.

On his bedroom wall. 

He takes a bite, humming along to a song he recognizes from scrolling through TikTok, meaning he only knows the hook of the chorus, but it’s nice.

The knock at his door makes him inhale a little bit of egg and cough, eyes watering, and if he chokes on a sandwich because some delivery driver needed his signature he’s going to haunt them .

He coughs, clearing his throat, and calls out, “coming!” but apparently he’s too slow because there’s the sound of a key turning in his front lock and Buck’s coming around the corner to see Eddie.

Eddie who– who looks awful. Terrified and exhausted and like he can’t quite believe Buck’s opening the door even though he was the one who knocked.

“Eddie! I– what– why are you– wait, is Chris–” Buck can’t get his mind around the sight of Eddie in front of him, and he’s cut off by the other man crossing the distance between them and grabbing him hard enough to kind of hurt, wrapping him in a hug that feels like it’s pulling the air from Buck’s lungs while also simultaneously restarting his heart.

“You can’t do that .” Eddie grits into Buck’s shoulder, warm against the bare skin of Buck’s neck, fingers digging into Buck’s shoulder blades, almost painful, “you– Dios , Buck, I can’t– fuck!”

Buck doesn’t know what’s happening , so he just lets Eddie press the half moons of his nails into Buck’s back, willing to have them forever, “whatever it is, we’ll fix it, okay?”

“The other times– sure, I knew , but I– I was on the phone– and you–” Eddie sounds as lost as he did when he called Buck, begging him to talk to Chris, to help him, and it hurts to hear. Buck wants to do anything in his power to make Eddie stop sounding like that. 

“Tell me, I can’t– I don’t know what’s happening–” he tries to think about anything Eddie could have been doing today that meant he got on a flight to Los Angeles. The night before they’d texted, Eddie had laughed at the video of the nightmare of a chef Buck had been judging, he’d even told Buck to sleep in– that he deserved it after a nightmare of a shift– that he’d wait for Buck’s call so he’d know Buck wouldn’t wake up.

Eddie’s here so that means he took the earliest flight out of El Paso, which means something happened overnight that he couldn’t call Buck about, and Buck’s hands are shaking where he’s placed them on Eddie’s ribs, he can’t imagine the worst but he thinks he’s going to hear it.

Eddie finally pulls back, eyes red rimmed, presses the heel of his palm into his cheek, then swallows, reining himself in, jaw tight. “Go sit.”

Buck doesn’t want to, he wants Eddie to tell him what the hell is going on, but Eddie’s tone leaves no room for argument, so he moves towards the couch he put in the same place Eddie’s once was, and waits for Eddie to join him.

Something about that surprises Eddie, like he was anticipating Buck to go into a different room, and Buck doesn’t know what to do with that, “Eddie, you’re scaring me. Come on, tell me, I can take it.”

Eddie nods, “I know, it’s just–” he moves to sit, knee pressed into the side of Buck’s thigh, “I didn’t think about what it would be like.”

Buck frowns, he can’t think of a time when he’s felt more lost in a talk with Eddie, “what what would?”

Eddie stares at him, eyes tracing over Buck’s face, intense and hungry, like he has to see every microexpression for himself, “I’m in a time loop, Buck.”

Buck is well aware he does not manage to look like he believes the man next to him, “o-okay, we, uh– I can make–”

“You don’t need to call anyone. I am not losing my mind.” Eddie says, voice calmer now than he is settled, which even while Buck’s scared for his friend’s mental health is nice, “you’re really predictable, sometimes. I’ve had to talk you down from this seven times.”

Buck just lets his jaw go a little loose in surprise, “Eddie, you don’t–”

“I don’t believe in this stuff. I know. But I asked you yesterday what I could say to convince you, and you said I could tell you what you did right before going to sleep.” Eddie swallows and it’s a long enough pause that Buck’s mind can’t help but supply the memory of the drag of his own nails across his stomach, the longing for Eddie that he hadn’t acted on, but that’s been getting harder to with every day Eddie’s gone.

“I– I told you?” Buck frowns, trying to think what could possibly have convinced–

Eddie nods, “you said you open Find My Friends and watch me and Chris so you know I’m safe at my house.” Buck doesn’t cling to the way Eddie still doesn't always call his place home, but it’s a near thing.

And then the words hit him, the memory of zooming in as close as he could to tell where their two phones were, overlapped but separate so he guessed Chris and Eddie were in their bedrooms, “I– I haven’t told– how you do? Is there a way you can check that from another phone?”

The idea of that being reported makes his gut clench in worry because if Eddie knew how often he checked– Eddie shakes his head, “I mean, Buck you know I wouldn’t know the answer to that, but that’s not how I know. I know because I have spent two weeks trying to escape this fucking loop and you’ve been trying to help me, and last night you said this would fast track this conversation..”

“Of course I’ve been helping you.” Buck responds because even before he believed Eddie he was always going to help anyway he can, and it hits him that he believes Eddie because why would Eddie lie about something like this. “Okay, uh- do, I haven’t watched that many– should we call Chim?”

“He offers no useful solutions beyond preventing the event as the way to escape.” Eddie frowns, clearly remembering a conversation.

Buck’s brows raise, “wait did you call him first ? ”

“No.” Eddie rolls his eyes at Buck, “I called him on day four when you had– you did research and I didn’t know the movies but I’d heard Chimney talk about one.”

Something little and mean and victorious crows in Buck’s chest, “right, of course. Do you know what the event is?”

Eddie’s eyes go sad, but he nods, “you die.”

It hurts more than Buck expected. “I what?”

Eddie’s focus moves from Buck’s face to his shoulder, like he can’t look at Buck’s face, “usually from something– I think something in your brain? We haven’t figured it out, but not every time. Yesterday it was a car.”

“Shit.” Buck breathes out, understanding Eddie’s distant look immediately, “sorry.”

Eddie’s head hangs down while he laughs a little, “only you would apologize for dying, Buck.”

Buck knocks his knee into Eddie’s, “yeah but I don’t remember it, and you’ve got in there now.” He taps his own temple.

Eddie nods slowly, “yeah.” He inhales slowly, then looks back up at Buck, “we’re going to the Craniospinal Center.”

“Okay. Can I–”

“You can shower, but you should finish your breakfast and answer Bobby’s call before, just no recycling.” The furrow between Eddie’s brows deepens, and Buck tucks away the wish that he could smooth it like an iron with his thumb.

“No recycling.” Buck agrees because it’s clear that Eddie needs the verbal confirmation. “How long do I have til Bobby calls?”

Eddie looks at his wrist, “about fifteen minutes.”

“Okay, do you want anything to eat?” Buck offers as he stands, “I have some cold scallion pancakes that if I throw them in the cast iron should be okay.”

Eddie’s eyes go to the little burn he got that morning immediately, which sends a little thrill of shock along Buck’s spine, “I’m fine– I had a protein bar on the plane.”

Buck moves them into the room where his sandwich is cooling on a plate, “okay, but I bet it’s been since dinner last night that you had anything real. And I don’t like eating alone.”

“I know.” Eddie lets a little smile show on his lips, “if this were the nineties I would have used every minute on my monthly plan just from cooking together in week one.”

“Seriously how old are you , man?” Buck teases, feeling more normal than he has in the long weeks since Eddie left, “go eat, dinosaur.”

Eddie presses his warm hand to Buck’s shoulder, pushing lightly as he heads to the fridge, “I’m not the one too senile to remember you don’t like scallion pancakes.”

“Yeah, but you do.” Buck says as he takes a bite of his sandwich to avoid having to meet whatever expression Eddie’s giving him. He hears the microwave open and close, beeps clear.

Eddie settles in at the seat next to him after not nearly long enough to even heat the food through, but he stuffs them into his mouth anyways, and Buck can’t help but comment, “you sure you had the bar this today?”

Eddie looks up at him, eyes wide in surprise, “huh?”

Buck gestures at the plate, “I bet it’s hard to remember when you ate when all your memories are repeats. Are you sure you ate this version of today?”

Eddie nods, but then frowns, “I– I don’t know. I did yesterday for sure.”

“How do you know?” Buck asks around the bite, curious because how could he not be.

“It was the first time I flew here.” Eddie says, looking down at the plate, and Buck is surprised, he hadn’t thought about the logistics of a time loop, but it only makes sense that Eddie must have been up early, “used the time I woke up at three to buy a ticket and message my sister and get Chris all set up while I’m here.” He stuffs another in his mouth.

“Why were you up at three?” He asks even though he thinks he knows.

Eddie does the little ashamed frown he does sometimes when caught making a choice he knows isn’t great, “I- it’s hard to believe he’s there sometimes, so I wake up and then I check. I always go back to sleep, it’s not insomnia.”

Buck remembers the neediness he’d felt after the tsunami– phone calls and texts and once a drive over so he could check before he’d fucked everything up by calling a lawyer, and nods, “I get it.”

Eddie must believe him, because he returns to demolishing the food.

Buck tries to not think about the fact that this is the best meal he’s had at his table in Eddie’s house– sad leftovers and a cold breakfast sandwich and the spectre of death hanging over him be damned. 

His phone rings, and it’s Bobby. He picks up, “hey Bobby.”

“Hi Buck! Glad I caught you. I’m going to be a bit later than I thought– turns out May needs some quick help but right after I’ll drop by with my drills and level.”

Eddie looks at Buck, voice low, “he’ll be by around two, and he wants to know if you need anything from Lowes.”

“That sounds good.” Buck responds to Bobby because it kind of hurts his head for Eddie to know so much.

“Great!” Bobby clears his throat, “I’m at Lowes, so if there’s anything you need for the shelving project speak now or forever hold your peace.”

“I’m all set.” Buck replies because he thinks that’s what he would say if today was normal, “got all the pieces, no prob.”

“Okay, see you around two.” Bobby replies warmly, and Buck wonders how many times they’ve said these words to each other.

“See you whenever, no rush.” He responds easily because Bobby doesn’t need to be worried for Buck. At worst he’ll die, but Eddie says he’ll wake up tomorrow anyways, so as long as Bobby doesn’t remember it they’ll be okay. “Bye!”

Eddie sighs as Buck hangs up, reading the question in his eyes with ease, “he gets given a couple more little tasks, doesn’t come til four.”

“Does he–”

“Sometimes he finds you.” Eddie nods slowly, “the past few he hasn’t.”

“Good.” Buck finishes the last bite, “whatever one we end on he shouldn’t have that on his shoulders.”

Eddie sighs, “well, the end is you living so that shouldn’t be on anyone.”

“Except you.” Buck frowns.

Eddie’s jaw goes tight, “sure.” His tone is clipped and tight, and Buck doesn’t push. He wonders if there are therapists who deal in trauma inflicted by the universe in other timelines. Probably not. He can look into it while they wait for a scan.

“While I’m showering you wanna see if there’s an appointment at the center? Walk-ins are always slow even on a weekday.” He stands, picking up both their dirty plates.

“I can do–” Eddie offers but Buck shakes him off.

“I’ll get the dishes today, you can do them tomorrow.” He smiles, and Eddie’s eyes go a little glassy like he can’t quite believe Buck would say that, or maybe he doesn’t see Buck, just the broken version of him that never happened to anyone other than Eddie.

Eddie is on the phone when Buck gets out of the shower, so he pulls on clothes and heads out to join him, when Eddie turns he looks all over Buck and his eyes are wild and full of fear.

Buck looks down, then at Eddie, “I was in this yesterday, huh?” Eddie just nods shakily, phone still pressed to his face, and Buck moves as quickly as he can, pulling off the shirt, which makes Eddie’s eyebrows go higher, and Buck realize he is randomly half naked in his kitchen, “be right back.”

He retreats and looks at what he’s wearing for whatever is the polar opposite– a long sleeve instead of short, a dark color not light, joggers not jeans. He steps back out and Eddie’s thanking someone on the phone, looking more okay when he turns to see Buck, who does a little ta-dah hand gesture to break the tension.

Eddie smiles, which is more than Buck thought he’d get. 

“So?” He asks because Eddie’s off the phone which gives them some answer at least.

Eddie looks down at the phone he’s still holding, “right, they can take us in an hour, and if they ask you’ve been having intermittent headaches and some tingling in your extremities.”

Buck nods, “okay.” He thinks about the certainty in Eddie’s voice, “you know I haven’t, though, right?” Eddie blinks, and it’s clear that Buck’s said something like this before, but he doesn’t look like he listened then either, “I haven’t. I wouldn’t– I wouldn’t keep something like that to myself-” the look Eddie shoots him is damning, which Buck thinks he maybe deserves, so he steps forward, trying to drive his point home with proximity if nothing else, “this time. I wouldn’t keep anything to myself this time– I haven’t had any symptoms. I swear . No one missed anything. You didn’t miss anything.”

Eddie hasn’t given an inch as Buck approached, so they’re just standing face to face, and Eddie won’t meet Buck’s eyes, which means he’s beating himself up, which is dumb because Buck’s the one who’s dying today, so he just taps his toe against Eddie’s to break him out of it, “come on, let’s get going– I’ve got symptoms to fake.”

Eddie huffs a noise that Buck can tell is half of amusement and half annoyance, but he shakes off the stillness so Buck takes it as a minor win.

Buck makes it about five minutes into the drive before he has to break the silence because Eddie’s being fidgety and looking everywhere before whipping his head back to stare at Buck, “Eddie, I’m begging, stop looking for ways I could die and distract me. Give me something to think about other than my own death. Talk to me, man. How’s Chris?”

Eddie looks straight ahead for a second, hands on his own knees, “Buck.”

“No, really, come on– what, uh, what’s been happening with him, I-I know he’s back, but how’s it been ?” Buck taps on the wheel, trying to ignore the forty more minutes the map is telling him the drive will take.

He can see Eddie swallow and look out the window, “we haven’t talked, I mean– we talked, it’s just been over a week for me, Buck. Give me a second.”

Buck realizes his mistake before Eddie can continue, “shit, you had to tell him.” He keeps his voice quiet and low, and he can feel the blood drain from his face, memories of breaking down with Christopher after the shooting too fresh even years later. “ Fuck , I– I’m sorry, never mind.”

Eddie’s inhale is shaky when he takes it, “yeah. He- he really loves you, Buck.”

Buck is not in a safe space to cry. He’s driving . “God, Eddie, wait.” He pulls over to the side of the road, glad they’re still on more residential streets, unbuckles his seatbelt and turns, looking at Eddie’s profile fully, “I- I- I’m so sorry .”

Eddie leats his head back against the head rest, closing his eyes, “Buck I just need us to figure this out. I need to stop waking up on this day. Today I told him I had to rush here to deal with some thing at your place because my name is on the lease and I want that to be the words I go back to him with. I can keep that lie up forever even though I promised him I would be more truthful this time. I just need us to do this, okay? I need you to fix this with me.”

Buck watches Eddie’s throat as he swallows, catches the tremble in his lip, the way he looks like he’s barely holding everything together. He’s seen it before, the quiet desperation in Eddie, begging the world to be okay again.

“Yeah, yeah. Of course.” He turns, rebuckling, reaches for the radio, and puts on something quiet and simple, enough to muffle the sounds of the other cars but not Eddie’s obviously counted out breaths.

Buck counts along with him in his head. In 1 2 3 4 hold 1 2 3 4 out 1 2 3 4. After a few minutes Eddie’s breathing returns to its natural rhythm, and Buck can see his hands go slack instead of clutching at his thighs. 

“He officially quit the chess club.” Eddie says into the empty air between them. “Didn’t even want to sign up for something for the rest of the school year because he ‘doesn’t want to get attached’ in case we move.”

“Move?” Buck tries not to let too much hope seep into his voice, but he knows he fails.

Eddie snorts, confirming Buck’s self-assessment, “he’s been dropping hints then taking them back for the past few weeks. Like, ‘back home’ when he means L.A. and ‘if we move’, but then talking about how much he loves his friends he’s made and being excited about some AP course track he could be on. I haven’t sat him down and made him say which way he wants us to go yet because I was waiting until the state tests were all done so I didn’t stress him out.” 

“Say the word and I’ll fly down to pack you back up.” Buck promises, and he’s pretty sure that’s not weird to say, but even if it is he already said it, so he doubles down. “Might need to crash on the floor or your couch for a week, or, well, I’m sure Chim and Maddie wouldn’t mind a live in nanny while I house hunt.”

“ Buck . We’re not going to kick you out. Plus the state tests are next week and he’ll have to finish out the school year after that, so you’d get months of time to shift your stuff around so ours can fit in.” Eddie says it so easily , like living with Buck would be a given, like he wouldn’t mind.

Buck thinks the offer might be because he’s died a lot in the past two weeks of Eddie’s life, so Eddie’s feeling sentimental about him. He thinks he can give the guy a break and start the apartment hunt without Eddie knowing about it. “Sure, okay.”

The song that’s playing changes and Buck doesn’t recognize the next one, but Eddie does, as he looks over at the radio and nods along a little.

“Who sings this?” Buck asks, because Eddie needs the distraction as much as Buck does.

Eddie squints, like he’s reaching for something he doesn’t quite know, “I’m not sure, but it was on a mix CD my friend Tito made as favors for his birthday party.” Eddie mouths a the chorus, “everyone knew it by the end of the month. I think it played at a freshman year formal.”

Buck smiles, “the original viral sensation.”

Eddie nods, “he had good taste– used to hand out mix tapes until he got a CD burner.”

“Aging yourself again, Eddie.” 

Buck tsks, and Eddie snorts, “I’m only a couple of months older than you, Buck.”

“Add half of how every many days you’ve been stuck now, because you’ve been living whole days and from what you tell me I’m only managing half.” 

“Sure.” Eddie clenches the fist on his thigh, then continues, “I haven’t– uh, made it through all of them.”

“What?” Buck looks over at him, “why?”

Eddie screws up his mouth in displeasure, “day five I thought maybe I was in a coma dream so maybe if I broke the cycle I could, you know– wake up.”

“Eddie-” Buck’s heart cracks in his chest at the thought, “you have so much–”

“I’d lived through your death five times, Buck. I was kind of desperate to change the plot.” Eddie sighs, “woke up just fine.”

“Fine but you’d experienced–” Buck blinks, “I, I’ve been dead before Eddie. You’ve almost- i-it’s not something you just wake up and forget feeling.”

“You’ve done it just fine.” Eddie says harshly, “every morning when I call you, or knock on your door– you’re just fine.”

“Yeah, but– that’s just because– I don’t-” Buck sighs because he guesses Eddie has a point. “Just don’t do it again, okay?”

“I won’t.” Eddie laughs and normally Buck loves that sound more than pretty anything, but this time it’s dry and harsh, “just makes the next time I hear about you happen sooner. Spent the next few cycles calling in the cavalry for you. Maddie, Hen, Chim, Bobby– got them all to you before it happened, none of them fixed it.”

“So you came.” Buck supplies. “Can’t send the one eighteen to do an Eddie job.”

Eddie nods, “I’m the one with the history and the information. I can learn what’s wrong, and as long as you don’t do anything reckless I get a few hours with you to find the path that ends this day with you still breathing.”

Buck looks at the map, and they’re only twenty minutes away from the clinic and about three hours from his untimely death. “Hopefully this time they’ll see something meaningful.”

“They will. The time Hen got you to the ER they saw blood, but you’d hit your head really hard so they couldn’t isolate it.” Eddie says it with clipped finality, like he’s having to store it away from his emotions.

Buck doesn’t like the idea of a ticking time bomb inside his skull. At all. “Great.”

“I wish we knew where today .” Eddie says, looking out the window.

That reminds Buck why they didn’t manage to make any progress yesterday, “w-w-what did you do yesterday? After?”

Eddie’s shoulders curl inward, “I didn’t want to– it’s useless to keep telling people, Buck.”

“What?” Buck frowns, because Eddie didn’t even let people know about him, “what if that had been the last–”

“It wouldn’t have been.” Eddie cuts him off with utter certainty, “this ends when you live.”

“So you just– what, went back to El Paso? Or sat in my house?” Buck doesn’t think Eddie would have abandoned him, but he doesn’t know what else– “shit, Eddie you can’t do that.”

“Buck.”

“I mean it– what if it’s like a limited run or something? You can’t keep just… ending your day too.” Buck’s not going to say the words because it’ll mean thinking about them, but he can’t have Eddie keep restarting the clock for both of them. “Promise me.”

“Sure.” Eddie agrees too easily.

“Fuck you, just because I won’t remember the promise doesn’t mean you don’t have to keep it.” Buck points at his passenger, “no more.”

Eddie stays silent, which is usually his way of avoiding lying.

“I mean it.” Buck pushes, because wasn’t it Eddie who made him promise to stay alive for Christopher, who told him he needed to stop trying to sacrifice himself– “you could have, I don’t know– gotten an autopsy, maybe we’d know more–”

“They take a couple days, Buck. It’s a big city. You wait in line, especially if you didn’t die in a crime.” Eddie sighs like he’s run into this exact idea, “even with Athena at my back– she couldn’t get you on the slab til tomorrow.”

“I thought you didn’t break it to anyone yesterday.” Buck frowns.

Eddie nods, “I didn’t. We tried a couple times before.”

“But this would have been a crime– they could have–” 

Eddie’s reply is strangled, but he gets it out, “there was too much trauma, Buck. Can you please leave it?”

Buck falls silent, because that means Eddie saw him– they’ve all seen people too far gone, people broken in ways no one could ever fix, but not one of their own. Eddie’s seen Buck at his worst, but this means he’s seen him beyond that.

He nods, “yeah.” 

“Good.” Eddie’s swallow is loud enough for Buck to hear even with the music on.

Buck’s tactile, and Eddie’s always been willing to lean into his space, to share warmth and support in times of crisis, so he reaches out, palm up, “you can check my pulse.”

Eddie sniffs, “what?”

“Anytime– when it’s feeling kind of like a nightmare– you can check.” He keeps his hand extended across the gearbox, “I checked Maddie’s sometimes after Doug. Once snuck and checked yours after the coma.”

“Where?” Eddie asks, like he’s more bothered by the idea of Buck breaking into his home than being weird about his heartbeat.

“In the bunkroom. I’d woken up from napping and I didn’t want to text Bobby just to be sure everything was real so I checked on you.” Buck wants to pull back his arm and hide because that’s not a secret he’d ever planned to reveal, but Eddie needs to hear it. He kind of hopes Eddie won’t ever bring it up again. At least he won’t ever remember saying it.

“I didn’t wake up?” Eddie asks in surprise.

Buck shrugs, because he’s liked how Eddie’s face had stayed slack and relaxed in sleep as he pressed two shaking fingers to Eddie’s wrist, like he knew even while sleeping that Buck wasn’t a danger, “no. Guess you didn’t notice?”

Eddie’s hand comes out and wraps two fingers and a thumb around Buck’s wrist, resting the fingers on Buck’s pulse, holding the weight with his thumb. 

Buck knows not to talk when people are counting beats, but he thinks Eddie’s just feeling them, not making sure his pulse rate is normal, plus if he talks Eddie won’t get to think so much about how Buck’s heart is going a little too fast just from the contact. “It’s okay to ask me for this, Eddie. Even if I didn’t know this was a time loop I’d give it to you.”

Eddie lets go slowly, “sure.”

They’re at the center, so Buck can’t spend time assuring him before Eddie’s hopping out of the car, and if Buck’s honest with himself he doesn’t know exactly what he just promised but he knows Eddie would never let himself take too much, no matter that there’s no limit to what Buck would give.

Buck has been in a lot of waiting rooms in his life. He’s waited for himself, bleeding and battered but lower priority than a stopped heart, he’s sat with dread in his gut like bile to hear news about his people, he’s even sat before waiting to have an appointment that will determine his future– post physical therapy check ups from his leg. He’s never sat and waited for an appointment with someone by his side like this– Eddie marked as a partner on his paperwork so he can come in with Buck, Eddie who needs this appointment almost more than Buck.

There’s a little niggling voice in the back of Buck’s head that if there’s nothing on this scan he should maybe convince Eddie to head to a psych consult next, because Chim had been certain he’d seen Doug and that had been Encephalitis, so maybe all of this is in Eddie’s head.

He looks over at the clock, it’s just past eleven thirty, so by Eddie’s clock he’s got two and a half hours left alive and he’s about to spend most of that being poked and prodded. He turns his head and looks at Eddie, who’s staring at the seat across from them with the same look he has on his face sometimes when he calls Buck to say he’s going to dinner with his parents.

Buck wonders if it’s the same look he had when going into combat.

“Buckley?” A nurse calls, and Buck stands, following, feeling Eddie at his back like a shadow.

The doctor is nice, appeasing, and friendly. She nods along with Buck’s stammering explanations of his symptoms and offers to book him for a CT scan and an MRI. Tomorrow.

“No, could– I mean, I’m really worried, is there any way–” Buck starts because tomorrow doesn’t really work on their time line.

“Mr. Buckley, I know it can be scary to think you have something happening, but none of your symptoms tell me this is an emergent moment.” She smiles, placatingly.

Eddie swallows, “okay, which ones would be?” She looks at him with concern, but he continues, “like, what am I looking for at home that means I have to take him in?”

Buck feels his cheeks warm at the idea of Eddie calling the house home.

Her face clears up like she understands Eddie’s desperation, “any signs of a stroke, a seizure, loss of consciousness, severe pain and weakness in limbs. If he falls and hits his head at all.” She looks over at Buck, “I’m glad you’re being proactive, but your physical responses are all normal at the moment, and your job may explain the headaches and numbness.”

Eddie is clearly taking mental notes, so Buck smiles back, because looking desperate won’t help their case, “I wouldn’t have come in if I thought it was my job, I barely come in for cracked ribs unless he says they’re bad enough to need it.”

Her eyes flick over to Eddie, “it’s good to have someone in a relationship that is the careful one.”

Buck holds in a laugh, because one thing that’s true is between the two of them neither is very willing to go into the hospital, but they’ll both force the other to. “Sure is. What time is that appointment tomorrow?”

She looks at her screen, “ten, and most MRIs take around ninety minutes, so I’d be prepared to spend a couple of hours here.”

Buck nods because that’s what he’d do if he thought he had an appointment the next day, even though his gut tells him Eddie’s right and he won’t make it there. “Thank you for your time.”

“Of course.” She shakes his hand, “see you tomorrow.”

“Of course.” He looks at Eddie, “come on, let’s get lunch.”

Edide’s eyes are Buck’s favorite shade of brown, even when they look devastated under hospital lights, “sure.”

They head out, and the second Eddie’s outside the clinic he’s making a plan, “we know what to tell them now. Let’s go to an ER, tell them the symptoms.”

Buck sighs, because he doesn’t want to wait around in an ER just to die in an MRI, “okay.”

Eddie’s brows come together, “what?”

“Nothing.” He tries to put on a smile, “let’s go– maybe they’ll be quick.”

Eddie looks at the clock, “there’s one not too far, we could at least get a CT scan in– maybe–”

Buck inhales deeply, because Eddie’s doing all this, sitting through this over an over again for him “you’ll at least get the results. Let’s go.”

Eddie lets Buck drive, which Buck thinks is a little wild knowing Eddie thinks there’s something wrong in his brain, but maybe Eddie hates L.A. traffic more than even Buck knew. “I see once you’re here I’m the Uber driver.”

Eddie grins, the first real smile since before their appointment, “now that it’s my job I really hate driving.”

Buck laughs, because what else can he do, Eddie’s in his passenger seat and the sun is bright and he’s going to die in a couple hours but Eddie’s here and selfishly Buck doesn’t want to die alone. “Do you think you’ll be allowed to go in?”

Eddie turns to look over at Buck, “to your scan?”

Buck nods. 

Eddie shakes his head, “they don’t let anyone. I couldn’t even go in with Chris when he had one when he was six to check on some of his bone growth.”

Buck swallows, “right, of course.”

“We’re gonna find it, and you’re going to live.” Eddie says like it’s a promise to himself maybe even more than to Buck.

Buck thinks about the realities of brain surgery, and keeps his thoughts to himself. He’s never wished Eddie had been a doctor before, but he doesn’t know how they’re going to get someone to operate on him in time even when they do know what’s wrong. Maybe Eddie’s convictions are strong enough that they’ll make it work. People listen to Eddie. 

The hospital isn’t far, so they’re there quickly, and Eddie moves even quicker, making Buck follow. Follow him to the hospital where he’s going to die in less than the time it takes Buck to make lasagna from scratch.

He pauses outside the door, looking at Eddie behind the glass, taking a breath. Eddie notices quickly, turning, and walks out to him. “What’s the hold up?”

Buck licks his lips, “just– taking my last breath of fresh air, I don’t– I never minded the idea that I might die in a hospital, but it’s harder when I know I’m going in.”

Eddie has a flash of pain in his eyes, “okay.”

They stand outside the doors, Buck feeling the sun on his back, taking some deep breaths. “I don’t– I know the time matters, it’s just a lot , Eddie.”

Eddie nods, hand moving to Buck’s shoulder, “I get it.”

Buck leans a little into the touch, “of course you do.” He looks over and sees how tired Eddie looks. “You– Eddie, you know it’s okay if you take a break sometimes too?”

Eddie looks at him, “from what?”

“Saving me. If this is all one loop, you shouldn’t run yourself ragged– maybe take a day where you don’t find out, drive into the mountains and hike or something.”

“I don’t think–” Eddie looks like Buck’s suggested he abandon the world, and Buck needs him to get it.

“Fine, you want to see me alive so bad, then come and take me hiking, or out for breakfast. I don’t care– this trying to fix everything as fast as possible is going to hollow you out.” He looks at Eddie, who isn’t meeting his eyes, but who hasn’t moved his hand from Buck’s shoulder, so Buck lets himself relax into the touch a little, “just think about it.”

Eddie squeezes at the cap of Buck’s shoulder, and that’s as much of an answer as Buck thinks he’ll get.

He allows himself three long seconds of the warmth of the sun, the heat of Eddie’s hand, and the fresh air. “Okay, let’s go get a look into my brain.”

They walk in, and Eddie heads to the desk, telling the nurse on duty that Buck had a seizure, and when she looks at them Buck nods, “I’ve also been getting headaches, numbness in my hands.”

The nurse takes his information and Buck and Eddie sit in kind of uncomfortable but familiar chairs because Buck’s pretty sure the waiting room furniture in all of Los Angeles County is made by the same distributor with different colored plastic covers.

A doctor whisks them away, which means Eddie guessed right for which symptom would be easy to fake and also put them at the top of the triage. Everything in an emergency unit is a weird mixture of fast and slow– they’re taken back, given a bed, and then left– Buck knows it’s normal, but he never sticks around to see patients through, just drops them off and hopes they make it.

There’s some pile up, five victims in need of surgery, and Buck watches as his case moves down the priority list, as time rushes by, as Eddie gets a progressively less calm, as Buck’s minutes tick down.

The doctor comes back, “we’re going to take him in for a CT scan in ten– it should only take about thirty minutes, then we’ll have a better idea of what we’re dealing with.”

Buck looks at Eddie, knows there’s maybe around thirty minutes left until the time Eddie had said it happens. “Well, at least you’ll know.”

Eddie nods, lips pale where he’s biting them. “I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow.”

Buck can feel the tears in his eyes, “I know you will.”

Eddie gives him a half smile. 

Buck shuffles against the hospital pillow, hating the way it feels against his skin. He thinks about the CT scan in front of him, about how loud they are, how overwhelming. “I don’t– I hate the idea of dying in one of those tubes.”

The smile falls off Eddie’s face slowly, and Buck knows it’s because Eddie knows Buck. Knows he hates feeling trapped and helpless. That he wants to move, to do , not to wait while some machine takes pictures of his brain in the hope that they’ll see something clearly enough that Eddie can make a plan. It’s overwhelming sometimes, the way Eddie sees through him. “Buck, you– I’m sorry.”

Buck nods, because there’s no question Eddie’s getting the raw end of this deal, but Buck thinks he’s allowed ot feel a little sorry for himself in this moment. “You gonna keep your promise?” 

“I’m going to learn what’s wrong with you.” Eddie counters, and Buck knows he’s avoiding saying anything concrete.

“Not what I asked.” Buck narrows his eyes at Eddie, “this could just be a bunch of different universes you’re hopping between or something, and I don’t want you leaving Chris behind in any more of them.”

“Don’t.” Eddie says tiredly, “it’s not. I’m not.”

Buck crosses his arms over his torso, “you don’t know that. I get that you want to save me, but I need to know it’s not going to mean there’s more parallel worlds or something without you .”

“Buck–” Eddie sighs.

“C’mon, give me this.” Buck’s not above using his impending death to his advantage, “dying alone will be okay if I know you’re not going down anytime soon.”

Eddie reaches out and drags one of Buck’s hands off his chest, “you’re not dying alone .”

“I-I- kinda am,” Buck looks down at Eddie’s hand on his, almost holding it, but more just pressing them together, “I know, I know you’re here now , but–”

The nurse comes by with a wheelchair, “okay, on you get.”

Eddie turns, looking at the chair, then at Buck, then back at the nurse, “can I walk with him?”

“Sorry, scan rooms are off limits.” She looks genuinely apologetic, so Buck can forgive her.

“It’s okay.” Buck answers for Eddie as he moves to stand, feeling stupid as he moves to the chair, settling down as best he can before looking up at Eddie, “I’ll see you.”

Eddie’s eyes are searching over Buck’s face for something, so Buck tries to smile because Eddie’s there, he’s in front of Buck, and that’s worth a smile.

“Fuck it.” Eddie says, and moves fast enough that Buck doesn’t really get time to react, just lunges into Buck’s space, two hands on the sides of Buck’s head, and presses his lips to Buck’s, just once, then pulls back and whispers, “you’re not alone.”

Eddie pulls away and Buck doesn’t get a chance to respond because the nurse is moving him and he doesn’t– he can’t– he’s frozen in his chair even as he moves through the doors of the back area of the hospital, still feeling the phantom push of Eddie’s lips on his, trying to remember everything about how Eddie’s lips felt but also push the sensation away because Buck didn’t even get to participate . 

“I’ll have you back to him as soon as I can.” The nurse says from behind his shoulder, like she didn’t just witness Buck’s world flip upside down.

“Uh- sure.” Buck manages to croak out eventually. 

Because what was that for? Comfort? Some weird attempt to make the last minutes of Buck’s life better? Eddie sacrificing his own identity so Buck can feel loved for forty minutes? He thinks that makes sense– maybe, in some weird part of Eddie’s mind, maybe it makes sense. Eddie knows him well enough he probably knows what all of Buck’s looks mean, deep down, the way the hole Eddie left in his world only making sense if Buck had kind of built his life around the other man. Eddie knows so now he’s giving Buck what he wants.

The doctor gives him instructions for how to lay down, tells him something about noise and remaining still, but all Buck can think about is Eddie.

Eddie knows so now he’s giving Buck what he wants so Buck can feel some peace or joy or something. Eddie wants so badly to give Buck some little bit of niceness that he kissed him. Buck squeezes his eyes shut tight, because it doesn’t mean anything, not when Buck won’t remember it tomorrow and Eddie didn’t really mean it today.

The scanner is loud, and Buck’s head hurts, and Eddie kissed him so he wouldn’t feel so alone when the fucking time bomb that’s inside his skull goes off.

The scanner is loud and even with Buck’s eyes closed he can’t ignore it. His head hurts and he can feel his heartbeat in the pulse in his temples. Eddie kissed him because he knows Buck won’t remember it.

It’s not the most comforting last thought.

________

Buck blinks awake. He thrown for a second because he isn’t where he should be . He was in a hospital? He was– he’s sitting up and remembering the nightmare in full. He doesn’t usually have full plots in his dreams, but this one was so real.  

Eddie was back. He had a whole story about being a time loop and Buck’s impending death.

Buck shakes his head, because he clearly spent too much time on Chim and Maddie’s couch after Eddie left. In an attempt to get him moving toward leaving their house Chim had forced him into a watch of both Looper and Groundhog Day, and apparently they’ve slowly seeped in and infected his mind. And worse he’s pathetic enough to not even be the main character in his own fucking dreams. Eddie is. Which makes sense, because Eddie would be better in a crisis like that than Buck, but Buck kind of wishes his own brain could be a little more on his side.

Buck lets himself remember the desperate, quiet one-sided kiss Eddie pressed to his lips, and curses Dream Buck for not at least giving something better back. If he’s going to kiss Eddie in his dreams he’d prefer it to be a good one.

He reaches over to pick up his phone, unlocks it, and looks at his messages. The last one is from Eddie with an encouragement to sleep in after Buck’s rant about avocados. Buck looks at his clock, it’s nine fifteen, so he kind of slept in, he guesses. He’d been planning to make himself a breakfast sandwich, which his brain had clearly remembered in his dream because he can almost picture trying to get down bites while Eddie talked.

He hopes the real thing tastes better, although he’s not very hungry with the memory of his own death still fresh in his senses. He massages at the base of his skull, along the neck tendons where he’s been carrying some tension since Bobby had to stop the truck too quickly a couple of days ago, feeling the radiating memory of pain from his dream still sitting in his spine.

Bobby! Buck checks his chat with the man, trying to remember when Bobby’s coming by to drop off his drill so Buck can hang those shelves in the bedroom. It looks like eleven, and Buck has to shake off the memory of Bobby’s call delaying the delivery.

The subconscious builds weird worlds, especially when fueled by a long shift, a brother-in-law’s movie nights, and loneliness.

He sits up, surprised at how sweaty he is from the dream, and decides to shower before making food. The heat of the water is nice and he lets himself luxuriate in it, feeling the aches of the past shifts release and thinking about what he’ll do with his two days off. The shelf to brighten up Eddie’s wall. His wall. And then he’d been considering something like heading to a garden store and getting a couple of potted herbs so there’s something else living in the house apart from him. They’re not pets, but he thinks he can manage to keep them alive and he wouldn’t mind fresh rosemary and basil. Then he’s going to start watching Terrace House because someone he follows has been posting reaction clips and he thinks Eddie and Chris might be willing to watch too if he sells it right.

The dream’s slowly fading away as he towels off his hair, humming a song he doesn’t really recognize, he thinks maybe it was playing on the radio the day before?  Or maybe at one of the calls in someone’s house? He shakes it off, moving into his bedroom and pulling on a pair of jeans and a T, something comfortable and easy to do little things around the house in. He tugs on a pair of socks because Eddie’s house is always cold no matter what Buck does, but so was the loft and Abby’s place before that, so maybe he just has bad circulation in his feet. 

He’s heads into the kitchen to get started on food, connecting to his little portable speaker he got so none of the rooms feel so empty anymore and goes to put on a random playlist, wishing he could remember the name of the song stuck in his head so he could play it, but it’s retreating more and more, just snippets of nothing at this point.

He puts out the eggs, english muffins, cheese, and he’s just opening the bacon package when he realizes he left the cast iron dirty on the stove, so he gives it a good scrub with the square of metal chain link Bobby got him for Christmas and throws it onto the stove to dry out.

He picks up his phone to call Eddie, to chat with him while he makes himself food, but gets distracted by a video Hen sent the group text about some discovery that’s apparently out of Karen’s lab, and he’s a second article and video deep trying to understand the content so he can write a good response when there’s a noise at the door. He can’t be too annoyed at the delivery person for knocking instead of leaving the package there, but he really wishes they would. He can’t think of anything he bought recently that could need his signature, but the drivers on Eddie’s street seem to be more attentive than they were at the loft.

“Coming!” He calls out as he heads to the door with a weird sense of deja vu, but apparently he’s too slow because there’s the sound of a key turning in his front lock and Buck’s coming around the corner to see Eddie.

Eddie who looks bad, but who Buck cannot help but clock is in the exact same thing he was wearing in Buck’s dream.

“Eddie– w-” Buck is overcome by a weird itchy deja vu for the second time, but then the smoke detector in the kitchen starts beeping and he spins, “shit– my pan!”

“What?” Eddie sounds shocked, like he doesn't know Buck’s left the heat on under his cast irons pretty often, but Buck’s focused on turning the heat off and grabbing a cup of water to pour into the center of the pan, plume of steam rising, avoiding touching the pan because it’s still smoking hot as he uses a dishtowel to fan the smoke away from the detector.

“I get the safety but this things’s on a hair trigger, man.” Buck complains for the umpteenth time about Eddie’s landlord’s choice of location for a smoke detector.

“Yeah, I know– Buck, but–”

Buck moves and opens the window, glad that the alarm stops quickly, “good– I don’t know what I would have done if B shift had come.” He turns and looks at Eddie, grinning, and for a moment it’s like Eddie’s not in El Paso, which, “wait, why are you here? Is Chris okay? Are you?”

Eddie looks stunned, mouth a little open, eyes scanning the kitchen they’re in like he’s hunting for something, “you haven’t made breakfast yet.”

“What? No, I was just starting.” Buck puts the dishcloth down on the counter, “Eddie, not that I mind, but why are you here? You– it’s a weekday, where’s Chris?”

“He’s…” Eddie looks at his watch, then at the oven clock like he doesn’t believe it, “he’s at school.”

Buck nods, feeling his pulse calm down because that’s good. “So you just decided to hop on the earliest flight out and come over for breakfast? I mean, I can make two sandwiches but they’re not that good.”

“I–” Eddie’s hands are moving, like he doesn’t know where to put them, “I came to tell you– you have to know–”

Buck’s heart skips a beat, a bubble of traitorous hope for a moment he needs to pop as quickly as he can, “you can tell me anything, Eddie.”

Eddie nods, “I know.” He sighs, “I just don’t– why haven’t you had breakfast?”

Buck blinks, because Eddie’s weirdly fixated on his meal, “I slept in a little. Something you told me I should do today. Wait, is that why? Did you know you were coming here and were you trying to make sure I would still be around this morning?” 

“No, Buck.” Eddie shakes his head, “this wasn’t– I bought the tickets at three.”

That makes Buck raise his eyebrows, because Eddie was thinking about him at three, which isn’t helping him pop that bubble of hope, so he aims for a kind of teasing flirty tone as a reply that they can both laugh off if they need to, “what were you doing at three that made you have to come here? You figure you deserved a day of fun?”

Eddie doesn’t laugh, he doesn’t blush, he just looks at Buck like he’s deciding something, and he licks his lips before replying, “I missed you.”

Buck didn’t expect that, but it makes his cheeks heat, “well, uh, I– of course I miss you too. Every day.”

Eddie’s smile is a little sad, but Buck gets it because there’s no way Eddie can come back, not yet. Eddie shocks him again by making an offer, “you wanna go get breakfast?”

Buck looks at the ingredients on his counter, thinking about sitting in a booth across from Eddie and just looking at him instead of cooking, “yeah. Let me just put stuff away. You thinking Angela’s?”

Eddie’s smile reaches his eyes more, “yeah– could go for some strawberry pancakes.”

Buck tries to not startle as he puts away the eggs. Because usually Buck has to order a couple for the table with the excuse that he’s feeling in the mood for something sweet, but it’s always for Eddie because Eddie always goes for some omelet with lots of vegetables and toast and in Buck’s opinion if he’s at a diner he isn’t going for what he’d make at home. “Well, let’s get you some.”

“It’s a little cool out, you might wanna change.” Eddie says and Buck wants to call him on being such a dad, but he likes that Eddie wants him comfortable. 

“On it.” Buck makes his way into his bedroom, stripping off his shirt and choosing a thin sweater he likes because it’s soft and a nice blue that Maddie has complimented on two different occasions. He calls out to Eddie over his shoulder, “you want a layer?”

“Nah.” Eddie says back, “you had plans to build that shelf, right?”

Buck doesn’t remember telling Eddie that, but he talks a lot on the phone so he probably did. “Yeah. Bobby’s gonna lend me some tools.”

“Yeah? Okay, I’ll text him and let him know he can come by tomorrow– I’m only in town today.” Eddie comes in, holding Buck’s phone, typing something out. Eddie’s known his passcode for three years, just like Buck’s known Eddie’s since the shoulder injury made it frustrating to open. “I’m not mentioning me, though. I just– I wanna see you and if anyone else knows they’ll make it a whole thing.”

Buck nods because Eddie wants to spend the day with him and just him. “I don’t think Hen can do rush orders on cakes but she’d try.”

“Exactly.” Eddie’s face is soft when he looks at Buck and hands over his phone.

Buck looks at it, then puts it in Do Not Disturb before showing Eddie the screen, “okay, I’m all yours.”

Eddie just nods, like he agrees, like he’s happy to have Buck be his. Buck shouldn’t read into it, but he so wants to. Because Eddie flew here. He flew to Buck just to spend a day with him. And that– maybe Buck’s dream was trying to tell him something.

“Pancakes?” Buck asks because if he doesn’t then he’s going to do something un-undoable like kiss Eddie and people can love their friends without being in love. 

Eddie nods, and as Buck walks past him out the room his hand just skims the base of Buck’s back, and Eddie’s touched him there before, a warning that he’s sliding past, an acknowledgement that Eddie’s in Buck’s space, but never just because Buck’s walking by.

It makes Buck blush as he grabs his keys and toes on his shoes. It’s only once they’re in Buck’s car and he looks at the rest of the street that he realizes he forgot to take out the recycling, “shit– the recycling bins.”

Eddie shakes his head, “there’s no way you make enough trash to fill them in a week when Chris and I didn’t most times. Do it next week.”

Buck sighs, “okay, but if it gets stinky I am complaining to you and telling you I told you so.”

“Deal.” Eddie says so easily, “I don’t mind your rants.”

“You’re unique in that way.” Buck says as he reverses out, heading to the diner they’d narrowed down is the best in the surrounding area after a series of weekend taste tests with Chris. 

He can feel Eddie looking at him, “good.”

Buck can’t really process that, so he leans forward and turns on the radio, “so how long do I get? When is your flight out?”

Eddie hums, “late.”

“I’ll drive you to the airport.” Buck offers because there’s no way if he only gets the day with Eddie that he’s letting Eddie get into an Uber.

“Okay.” Eddie sounds sad, which Buck gets, because talking about the end of something while it’s happening is a downer, and Buck really needs to learn to say things at the right time.

“Did I tell you about the guy this week who managed to get himself locked into his own bike lock?” Buck offers, because he knows Eddie doesn’t want to talk about being a driver, and bringing up Chris might remind him of all the reasons he shouldn’t be in Los Angeles. 

Eddie laughs, “no, what type of lock?”

“One of those U shaped ones. He had pretty narrow knees, I guess? But with a bike in there too, and the way cyclers have those big calves, you know? So he couldn’t slide it off, and when he realized he freaked out and dropped the key directly into a storm drain.”

Eddie’s shaking his head, “terrible luck.”

“Thankfully he had a phone, but those things are a bitch to cut off and the whole time he’s yelling at me to be careful with his bike because it cost like six grand! Bobby tried to calm him down, but the guy’s in all this slippery weird spandex gear and yelling at me while I’m just trying to get him into the right position to not endanger him or his stupid overly expensive bike.” Buck waves his hands in the air, trying to express the way he’d been maneuvering the guy, “Ravi ended up asking him about the bike to calm him down, said he was thinking about getting into cycling, and it turns out the guy only started like a month ago. Who buys a bike that’s worth at least a couple months of rent when they only just got into the hobby?”

“You?” Eddie says with a fond tone, “I have a memory of talking you down from a second, better stand mixer.”

Buck stills, looking over at Eddie, “I am a good baker! Some might even say a master baker!”

“You are! And at the time you’d been applying yourself to that hobby for under two weeks.” Eddie says with a wide and unburdened smile on his face.

Buck thinks about the flours in Eddie’s cabinets, about the new tins and trays he’d bought, “well, at least my impulse purchases are at most three figures.”

Eddie reaches out and puts a hand on Buck’s forearm, patting him once, “sure, Buck. I have some idea why you needed me to ignore your credit score.”

Buck splutters in indignation and surprise at the contact, but is saved from having to defend himself by arriving at Angela’s.

No one else wants pancakes at like eleven on a random weekday, so they get their choice of booths, and they slide into the one that they usually like– against the windows so they can look outside, not too close to the bathroom, but with relatively smooth access for Christopher.

Buck doesn’t recognize the waitress, but there’s high turnover at places like this since so many people come in and out of L.A. hoping to make it big. “What’ll you have?”

“Two coffees please. And I’ll have strawberry pancakes with bacon.” Eddie orders, the looks across the table to Buck, “he’ll get the combo plate with poached eggs, sourdough toast, a side of avocado, and bacon. And if you could bring over some Tapatio that would be great.”

The waitress nods and takes their menus like she didn’t just witness the surprising hotness of Eddie knowing Buck’s food exactly and ordering it for him. Buck shouldn’t draw attention to it.

“You got it perfect.” His mouth has never followed his brain’s instructions and frankly it’s annoying.

Eddie blushes easily, Buck’s always known that, but it’s nice whenever he can get a front row seat to it. “Well, I know you.”

“Yeah.” Buck agrees, and if it’s a little breathy it’s because he doesn’t know what to do with his lungs when Eddie’s real and in front of him, which would be embarrassing if Buck felt like thinking about it, but he doesn’t want to because it’ll distract from him looking at Eddie and seeing if anything has changed. “You’re not in plaid.” 

Eddie tilts his head as the waitress delivers the coffee, opening a sugar packet and pouring it into the cup, “huh?”

Buck gestures at Eddie’s chest as he pours some cream into his own cup, and then is surprised when Eddie’s hand grazes across his own as he takes the cream too– Eddie doesn’t usually make his coffee light and sweet unless he’s been through a tough shift. “You– all the times we’ve talked recently you’ve been in plaid.”

Eddie nods, “I wear it a lot down there.”

“Sure.” Buck sips carefully, grateful for the caffeine after the shock of Eddie has worn off a little, very aware his addiction to coffee is something he should try and titrate down at some point but he figures he’ll wait until his doctor tells him he has to.

“I don’t– my parents comment if I look unkempt.” Eddie frowns into his own cup, “they like shirts with collars.” Buck wrinkles his nose, and Eddie laughs quietly because Buck hasn’t managed to hide his distaste for Eddie’s parents any better than Eddie has for Buck’s. “I know. It’s a whole thing. I just– it’s easier if I’m not fighting them on so many fronts.”

That Buck gets. “Well, I like you in anything.” It’s definitely too much of an admission, but Eddie’s been dressing up for weeks just so he won’t have to fight his parents about something new, and Buck feels like he should make it clear. “I mean–”

“Thanks.” Eddie sips while looking at Buck warmly, letting Buck not have to explain himself more, which he’s grateful for because he didn’t actually know where he was going to go with the sentence and he would love to not dig his grave any deeper.

Eddie’s leg finds Buck’s under the table and doesn’t move away, just presses their calves together, hooking his heel behind Buck’s, and Buck is very lucky he doesn’t choke on the coffee he’s sipping because they haven’t– he can’t remember ever doing that with Eddie.

Their food comes out before Buck can think of a non-weird way to bring it up, and Buck remembers he’s hungry because he’d been planning on eating like an hour ago. Which, the fact that Eddie’s only been near him for an hour is baffling because he keeps tilting Buck’s whole world view today, and Buck doesn’t– he can’t really keep up with this many things at once. 

Buck spreads the avocado onto his toast while Eddie takes a bite of his pancakes and makes a little barely audible noise of pleasure that cuts into Buck’s chest with the intensity of how badly he wants to hear more. 

“So, pancakes?” he asks as he stuffs a bite of egg and toast into his mouth, hoping Eddie will understand the deeper question.

Eddie must because he looks thoughtful instead of confused, like he’s making a choice to reply in full, “I don’t love omelets, but I order them because it’s- they’re what I should be getting and they’re fine. I even like the ones here usually.”

Buck nods as he picks up a piece of bacon and takes a bite. He licks the bacon grease from his fingers, and he thinks Eddie tracks the movement, or maybe he just thinks Buck’s being gross. 

“I spend a lot of time doing what I should.” Eddie continues, “and I wanted to– I, uh, it’s okay to not. To take a day.”

“Of course it is. You always deserve that.” Buck presses his leg to Eddie’s under the table, acknowledging the contact. Eddie presses back, and Buck feels his ears getting warm from it, so he gestures at his food. “You want a bite? I’ll trade for some pancake.”

Eddie shakes his head, then looks down at his plate, carefully cutting off a piece of pancake and running it through the swirl of whipped cream, “here.”

Buck reaches out, but Eddie’s fast, and his fork is close to Buck’s face before Buck can take it, so Buck doesn’t know what to do other than accept the bite, and Eddie doesn’t look away when Buck meets his eyes, lips closing around the fork that’s been in Eddie’s mouth.

Buck’s mind cycles through the times in his life when he’s fed a friend and gets pretty stuck on twice when Eddie was shot and shaky from the meds (soup), and then a few times when he was checking a sauce and didn’t feel like relinquishing the mixing spoon.

He’s never– Maddie has been the voice of reason in the past when he learned that some things were unusual that he thought everyone did, and the way Eddie just fed Buck makes Buck want to text Maddie under the table and ask if that’s something friends do.

He’s pretty sure the answer is no. But also, sometimes he’s wildly wrong. 

He doesn’t feel wrong, though. Because for the rest of breakfast Eddie keeps looking at Buck. Keeps smiling when Buck meets his eyes, keeps their feet entangled under the table, puts his hand on Buck’s arm at one point, reaching over the table to make an emphasis, and Buck feels like he’s being overloaded with inputs. 

Because if anyone else was across from him acting like this they would be flirting with him. If anyone else was listening to him tell a story about work and looking at Buck like that he would feel sure he would be taking them home. But this is Eddie and he’s straight and Buck doesn’t– Buck’s his subletter so he doesn’t really– neither of them have a home to go back to. 

Buck spends the whole meal trying to keep ninety percent of his mind on the conversation and only spiral about what Eddie could be doing with a tenth of his brain, he’s not sure he manages, but Eddie doesn’t call him on his awkward conversation fumbles and moments spent spacing out at Eddie’s hands tapping at Buck’s knuckles when Buck puts his hand onto the table. 

It feels like a bubble of possibilities, like Eddie’s being someone new at the diner table across from Buck, someone who looks at Buck with heat in his eyes. 

Too quickly Eddie pays for breakfast, waving Buck off because “I asked, I pay.” And Buck’s said that on dates. And when Buck gets up, Eddie’s close behind, wide palm on the small of Buck’s back again, waving a thank you to the waitress as they leave.

“Anything beyond getting pancakes you wanna do today?” Buck asks as they make their way to the car, bumping his shoulder into Eddie’s, and Eddie leans into the contact, which he’s done before, but this time it feels charged in a way Buck doesn’t know what to with because he knows how to hook up, knows how to tilt his head down and look up through his lashes just right but this is Eddie and if he ruins everything he doesn’t know what he’ll do .

Eddie looks at Buck again with that weight that Buck doesn’t know how to read, “yeah.”

“Name it.” Buck responds because it’s the only thing he can do when Eddie is looking at him like that.

Eddie’s eyes search his face, and then Eddie’s pushing Buck back against the side of his truck, and Buck goes. “I’m– I shouldn’t do this.”

There’s a sun-hot truck door at Buck’s back, and Eddie at his front and only one is making Buck feel like he might melt, so he pushes a little bit, letting his eyes look at Eddie’s lips for longer than could ever be platonic, “what, exactly? Because– I don’t know if- but I think you should do what you want. I just– you gotta be the one who does it–”

Because he’s letting himself look he gets to see Eddie’s tongue wet his lips. Eddie inhales a little, then leans forward and Buck lets his eyes close so he can feel Eddie’s lips on his for real this time, not just in a dream. He dives in immediately because he’s not letting any kiss between them be one sided when he has a choice. His hands move to Eddie’s sides, aware of the way he can feel Eddie breathe. He feels the glide of Eddie’s tongue across his, his mouth still sweet from breakfast, the hint of their coffees on both their lips. Eddie’s hand moves to his neck, spanning from his thumb at Buck’s pulse to his nails at the nape of Buck’s neck. His other hand is on the cap of Buck’s shoulder, holding firm like he’s worried Buck might dissolve under his touch.

It’s not unthinkable, based on how weak he feels in the knees from just a kiss.

“Eddie–” he sighs even as his hands stroke up and down Eddie’s rib cage, “what–”

Eddie leans forward, deeper into Buck’s space, shared exhales between them, “I don’t like Texas. I hate it.”

Buck frowns, brain too fuzzy with the proximity of Eddie to make any connections, “okay?”

“I– I love having Chris home. I love seeing him every day and hearing about who his friends are and even dealing with his teenage moods, but every time I look around to point out something new or to celebrate a little win you’re– you’re not there . So I pick up the phone and I call you and it’s better, it’s closer, but then we hang up and the only thing I ever want to do is call back. The past couple of weeks.” Eddie shakes his head like he’s trying to forget something and Buck doesn’t know what’s been going on except Chris settling in, but he bets that’s a lot for Eddie, and he’s about to speak up when Eddie holds his gaze, honey warm and kind of sad, “I can’t stop thinking about you.”

Buck feels like his chest is full of champagne, bubbly and bright, “you can’t? I– Eddie, one night you fell asleep and I stayed on the call for like two more hours even though I knew it would kill your battery.”

Eddie smiles, pressing another kiss to Buck’s lips, syrupy and slow, like he’s trying to memorize the way Buck feels, or maybe that’s just Buck hoping Eddie feels the same.

“Wait.” Buck pulls back, “you’re not straight?”

Eddie giggles and Buck wants to fucking bottle the sound and pour it into his own ears after every miserable shift, sip it when he’s alone in the house that used to be his favorite place filled with his favorite people, “I don’t think– I like you .”

Buck can’t help the flutter in his heart at the admission, surprising even after he knows that Eddie kisses with as much focus as he gives games of Boggle, so he decides to match Eddie’s confession, even if it feels a little cheap, “I like you too.”

“Yeah?” Eddie leans in, nipping at Buck’s lower lip, “couldn’t tell.”

Buck can feel the blush on his cheeks, “you– shut up.”

Eddie’s smile exposes the sharp cut of his canines, “no.”

Buck clutches at Eddie’s hips, twisting, and presses him into the side of the car, letting his height and bulk be a little more evident, because Eddie’s strong but Buck knows a new way to get him to stop teasing, and using the little gasp of surprise at the new position means Buck can memorize the exact sound Eddie makes when Buck angles his head to deepen the kiss.

“Do– uh,” Buck gasps as Eddie’s hands slip under the shirt at the small of his back, cool against Buck’s skin. “What– we should go–”

Eddie leans his head back against the car door, looking a little disheveled, pupils wide, looking around them like he’s just now remembering they’re in a public parking lot at noon. “Yeah. Uh– let’s–” His hands slowly drag away from Buck, and Buck misses them immediately even as he also puts a little space between them so they can avoid any awkward calls for indecency or whatever. With their luck Athena would definitely be the one to show up.

Eddie looks at his watch, and a shadow Buck doesn’t quite understand passes over his face, and Buck doesn’t want that, so he gives into the instinct he tucks away time after time and brushes the strand of hair that’s fallen over eddie’s forehead back.

Eddie blinks at him in surprise, eyes crinkling up at the side, “what was that for?”

Buck shrugs, stuffing one hand in his pocket, “wanted to do that for years. Probably should have clued me in more than Tommy kissing me did.”

Eddie’s mouth turns down at the sides just the smallest amount like it does when Bobby offers to make cod for dinner.

“You don’t like that!” Buck laughs in shock, poking Eddie in the chest, “ you’re the one who was his friend! We’d only have met through work otherwise.”

Eddie’s nose wrinkles again, “yeah.”

“Don’t worry, Eddie.” Buck grins, running his hand up Eddie’s sternum to his collar, “if I had known it wasn’t straight to check out a guy’s ass anytime he moved I would have come out to the crew on your second shift.”

Eddie’s mouth falls open a little, and Buck should be more embarrassed by that admission, but Eddie looks so pretty when he’s surprised, so he just trails a finger along Eddie’s neck, watches the way his throat moves when he swallows, “you– that long?”

Buck nods and Eddie looks like he’s been punched in the gut by it, which makes him stumble over his assurances that Eddie doesn’t need to match him, “is that– it’s okay if you didn’t–”

“Buck.” Eddie leans in and pulls their foreheads together, all the space they managed to build up gone, “I haven’t worked up the courage to look back at every memory between us because I don’t want to know how many of the things I did without even recognizing how they were about you. This– today has been about you for so much longer than you know.”

It’s Buck’s turn to feel overwhelmed, mouth going kind of dry because he doesn’t really know what Eddie means but he gets it. 

“Can we–” Eddie’s voice is quiet, face still so close to Buck’s, “can we just– can we go home?”

Buck nods and it makes Eddie’s head move too, which feels pretty much like the definition of codependent, so he should apologize to Chim for snapping when the man teased him. “Whatever you want, Eddie.”

Eddie licks his lips again, “not– I’m not ready for– anything really, but I…” he closes his eyes and even close up enough that they’re blurry Buck admires the dark eyelashes, “I just want to be close to you.”

Buck can’t think of something he wants more than to lie down, half on half off of Eddie, feeling his breath and pulse against his body. “Anything. I mean it.”

Eddie pushes Buck back a little, so that they can get into the car, and Buck doesn’t whine which he’s proud of himself for. Once they’re in the car again Eddie’s hand is out, grabbing at Buck’s, and the last time Buck remembers having his hand held by someone’s larger than his he was probably ten and it was Maddie at his hospital bed after he tried to learn how to rollerblade in a pair that the guy who’d lived next door had left out on the street.

Maddie’s hand had made him feel cared for. Eddie’s makes him feel hope.

They drive in mostly silence, Eddie running his thumb over the the bones in Buck’s wrist, and Buck didn’t know that was a place with too many nerves but it’s all he can do to remember which pedal is the brake when Eddie’s thumb callus is a little rough and warm against his skin.

They’re back at the house fast enough that Buck’s pretty sure he wasn’t paying attention to the streets at all, running on automatic.

Once inside the quiet of the house again Eddie crowds him against the wall by the door, kissing him again, slow and deep, one hand flat against Buck’s side, slid under the shirt so Buck can feel how his fingers are a little cooler than his palm, sending goosebumps up his side.

On any other day Buck would happily let Eddie kiss him against a wall for hours, but Eddie put the idea of lying together in his head, and Buck can’t let the thought go, Eddie warm and rumpled in something comfortable, letting Buck stretch out next to him, letting Buck enclose him in his arms. “Bed. I want– I was promised cuddles.”

“Promised?” Eddie runs the bridge of his nose across Buck, a tease of contact, pressing kisses to Buck’s jaw, to his ear, “I don’t remember promising.”

“Eddie.” He drags out the last syllable in a little whine that Eddie should be familiar with, “you left– uh,” Buck tries to remember words as he sucks in oxygen, “you left your sleep clothes in the washer, they’re– I couldn’t send them. So we can–”

Eddie makes a displeased little noise that Buck adds to his catalogue of Eddie facts right alongside the way he looks while changing a tire and the way he likes his tequila shots chased with an orange sometimes, “can I borrow something?”

Buck nods, dragging Eddie down the hall, motivated by the idea of Eddie in his clothes. He pulls out what he wears every night. Some sweats for both of them, a pair of soft plain T-shirts, and looks at the pile, liking how they’ll be a matched pair again, something that hasn’t been true since Eddie’s last shift when Buck had kept his uniform on for as long as Eddie did so he wouldn’t have to miss a moment of them as partners.

Eddie pulls his shirt off smoothly, and for the first time Buck let’s himself look. Lets himself notice the scars on Eddie’s skin, the way the muscles move, the places Eddie is hairy that Buck is determined to feel under his hands one day. He likes how he can see the softness of Eddie too, the way his skin folds when he bends, the reality of him instead of some glossy magazine cover. “You’re–” he stops himself, because he’s stopped himself so many times before, thought of new compliments, but Eddie’s looking at him expectantly and they’re alone in Eddie’s bedroom where Buck’s bed takes up the main wall, “you’re beautiful, Eddie.”

Eddie’s chest flushes when he blushes, another fact Buck can add to his knowledge bank. “Get dressed.” Eddie tosses his dirty shirt at Buck, and Buck balls it up and throws it into the basket behind him before stripping off his own shirt.

Eddie’s looking over so Buck puffs up a little, posing, and he’s rewarded with a deeper flush and Eddie stepping forward, hands out, dragging across the skin just below Buck’s pecs, and Buck would be so okay if Eddie felt like grabbing them sometime because he thinks they’d fit just right in Eddie’s palms. 

“I can’t–” Eddie inhales through his nose, “you’re better than I dreamed.”

“You dreaming about me a lot?” Buck aims for cocky and misses by a mile, landing squarely in breathy because Eddie’s hands are still on him and Eddie dreams about him.

Eddie tilts his head up to look away from Buck’s chest and into his eyes, “sometimes.”

“Just sometimes?” Buck pouts, fluttering his eyelashes.

Eddie pinches at his side, making him squirm, “thought you wanted to snuggle? Stop distracting me.”

Buck snorts, “I was keeping my hands to myself, you came over here all touchy.”

“I–” Eddie looks back down where he’s got his hands resting on Buck’s sides, “I like touching you.”

Buck drops the shirt in his hand and leans in, capturing Eddie’s lips because he thinks that took a lot for Eddie to admit, even after everything they’ve said, “not complaining. Happy to change plans.”

Eddie’s hands grasp a little harder, just for a moment, then they go gentle and release, “I meant it, I don’t– not today, yeah?”

Buck shrugs one shoulder in line with raising one side of his mouth into a half smile, backing off and taking in how rumpled Eddie looks from just kissing, “just putting it out there.”

Eddie gestures at Buck’s chest, “shirt. Put those tits away.”

Buck laughs loudly to cover the flush of interest he feels at the description, “okay okay.” He shrugs on the shirt and then unbuttons his pants, shucking them off and pulling on the sweats without looking over at Eddie because if they’re going to keep this even PG-13 he’s going to need two layers of fabric between his hands and Eddie’s perfect ass and there’s no way that’s happening if he sees Eddie’s bare thighs.

When he’s done Eddie is pulling the covers down, and Buck tries to remember when he last changed the sheets, and is glad to realize it was only a few days ago. He wonders if the pillows will smell like Eddie after he leaves.

Because Eddie’s only here for the day.

He shoves the reminder away, wanting to feel Eddie’s body heat far more than he wants to think about the way Buck’s bed will feel cold after he’s gone again.

Eddie lies down and Buck opts to climb over him instead of getting in on the other side because he knows it’ll make Eddie laugh and the room feels heavy with emotions that Buck can’t confront right now. 

“Buck– oof.” Eddie grunts when Buck lands a chunk of his weight on Eddie’s side, “you– you’re such a labrador.”

Buck woofs jokingly in reply and licks a line across Eddie’s cheek because he can . “Yeah, and you like me, so what does that make you? ”

Eddie makes a worried face, like he’s only now considering the implications of calling Buck a dog, “I don’t– you’re an asshole.”

“Labrador, asshole, still the guy you want to snuggle.” Buck settles into Eddie’s space, tucking his chin over Eddie’s shoulder, resting most of his weight on the mattress, but settling a good amount on Eddie’s left side, arm across Eddie’s chest.

Eddie’s arm under Buck wiggles until it’s wrapped across Buck’s shoulders, pulling him in. “You’re big .”

Buck stills, feeling self-conscious and shifts, ready to roll back and apologize, but Eddie’s strong and his arm presses Buck into him, “wasn’t a complaint. I like– I didn’t know I would like it so much.”

Buck presses a kiss to Eddie’s collarbone, “the first time I slept with–”

“Uh uh.” Eddie cuts in, squeezing Buck’s ribcage, “no mentioning him in this room.”

“The first time I was with someone taller than me I was surprised how nice it was.” Buck stumbles through the sentence, trying to avoid thinking about the fact that the mattress under them probably has traces of Tommy’s cum on it somewhere because cleaning the bare mattress seemed like an insurmountable problem to Buck after their confrontation in Eddie’s kitchen. “Like– like I can’t break them.”

He feels all of Eddie’s laugh, “pretty sure I can take anything you dish out, Buck, even if you’ve got a couple inches on me.”

“I dunno, I got you all laid out underneath me right now–” Buck starts to tease but he’s cut off by Eddie hooking his leg across Buck’s and flipping them with as much ease as he does when picking up someone during a rescue and it makes Buck choke out a whining moan because Eddie hadn’t even had any real leverage.

“You were saying?” Eddie’s smile is wide as he shifts his hands to press Buck’s forearms into the mattress on either side of them, legs bracketing Buck’s hips, and Buck wants so badly it kind of makes him dizzy because Eddie’s so gentle normally, but he’s always known that there’s a predator underneath, poised to strike if Buck did something wrong. Or, he supposes, very very right.

He squirms a little, testing the hold, and blood rushes straight to his dick when he realizes he’d really have to try to get free, “Eddie if you want to keep this–” he swallows thickly, well aware that Eddie can feel how this is affecting him, “anything close to PG-13, then you gotta–”

Eddie’s pupils are blown wide, focused on Buck’s mouth, then his eyes as he talks, “I– I don’t– I want you, Buck, just-just not today.”

Buck frowns in confusion, because he doesn’t understand Eddie’s why but he’d never pressure the other man. “I know, it’s just– you gotta give me a breather.”

Eddie’s grip loosens but he doesn’t move away, leaning in to kiss Buck with a gentleness that feels like it might crack Buck’s chest apart, Eddie puts enough space between them to whisper, “ when we have sex it will be when I’m home . With you.”

That kind of promise makes Buck want to cry, “I’ll be here. You just say the word. Or-or I could come to you, if you need.”

Eddie’s hands stroke along Buck’s arms, then to the mattress so he can push himself up, looking at Buck fully, “I don’t- Texas isn’t– you shouldn’t be there.”

“But if you and Chris are there–”

Eddie shakes his head, “we won’t be– not forever, and I’m not myself there. I don’t want– you shouldn’t have to–”

“I’m not offering because I have to.” Buck promises, “I just– I want–” 

Eddie cuts him off with another kiss, nodding into it like he gets it, “I promise it won’t be forever.”

“I’d wait even if it was.” Buck knows it’s too much, but Eddie should have someone who is all in on him.

“I know you would.” Eddie’s eyes are sad again, “I promise I’ll come back to you.”

Buck doesn’t remember if Abby ever promised like that, but it’s okay, because Eddie isn’t Abby, and Eddie’s never broken a promise to Buck since he’s known him. “I believe you.”

It’s quiet for a second while they just look at each other, in the quiet brightness of the bedroom, laid out on Buck’s bed. Eddie breaks the silence with a yawn that seems to surprise him, as he widens his eyes after and explains quickly, “I didn’t– it’s been a while since I slept well.” 

“I know. Up at three.” Buck smiles, then taps at Eddie’s side, “get comfy. We can nap.”

Eddie climbs off, tucking into Buck’s side, head on Buck’s shoulder. He’s so warm, it makes Buck imagine a future where he won’t need to sleep with so many layers every night. Eddie’s hand settles on Buck’s stomach, and when Buck inhales he knows Eddie can feel it at every point they’re connected, just like Buck can feel the thrum of Eddie’s pulse against his shoulder.

He lets his eyes close, because he didn’t really sleep in like he planned, and this is nice, listening to Eddie breathe. The only problem is he can feel the tension in the body next to him. “Sleep, Eddie. I’ll be here when you wake up. We can order something in and watch Terrace House together.”

Eddie’s breath hitches, “I– yeah. Of course.”

Eddie settles a little, still holding onto Buck like he thinks he’ll slip away. But Buck’s always been able to fall asleep easily, and he can’t make himself stay awake when Eddie’s warm against him and there’s the bubble of a promised future in the air.

__________

Buck blinks awake and apparently they slept for longer than he thought because the light’s different, but he sits up because Eddie’s not there. His side of the bed doesn’t even look slept in, but Eddie’s always been a bit of a neat freak about beds, says he can’t shake the army training no matter how much he tries.

Buck’s willing to learn how to make it to Eddie’s preference.

He sits up, ears perked for any sound from Eddie, but the house is silent. He frowns, getting up, “Eddie?”

There’s no answer, and Buck heads out into the house to look for any signs of where Eddie might have gone. Eddie’s shoes aren’t by the door, his keys and wallet aren’t in the bowl. Buck wonders if maybe he went to grab them food, maybe from the mom and pop place a few blocks away that refuses to get with the times and do delivery. 

He’s hungry, so they must have napped for a while, maybe Eddie woke up hungry too?

There’s no note on the table or the whiteboard on the fridge, but Eddie’s never been the one who uses that, it’s more for Buck so he can remember things he needs when grocery shopping, or quotes from Chris that made him laugh. 

He heads back into the bedroom to grab his phone, sees it’s plugged in, which means Eddie noticed he’d just left it on the dresser, which makes Buck smile.

Opening his phone he freezes. Because the clock says nine twenty and that can’t be right– it’s still light out. He didn’t think that power outages could change clock times. 

The other option is that maybe Buck slept until the next day? But Eddie would have woken him up before leaving, Buck promised to take him to the airport. They had a whole day left. Eddie wouldn’t have just–

He opens his messages, hoping for something from Eddie but there’s nothing new. Then he looks at the notification– it says they last messaged yesterday, the conversation about avocados that feels like ages ago. He checks his messages with Bobby because Eddie had texted him to push it back, but– there’s just the confirmation that Bobby’ll bring over the drill.

Buck’s heart is racing, he opens Google and searches for date and time and it’s telling him the same thing. It’s nine twenty two and Eddie wasn’t–

Eddie never came to tell him–

The whole day–

Buck thinks he might cry. His legs go out from under him and he sits on the edge of the bed, gulping in air, because it had felt so real . He’d had Eddie in his bed. He’d kissed Eddie Diaz and been told Eddie wanted something with him and he knows his mind is cruel to him sometimes but this feels like a new level.

He sucks in a deep breath, trying to forget or remember or whatever will make Buck feel more whole because the house has never felt so empty as it does today and the person who filled it was just in his dream.

There’s a tear on his cheek that Buck pushes off angrily because he can’t mourn something he never even actually had.

His hand itches to call Eddie, but he stops himself because he knows he won’t be able to be normal if he sees his friend’s face right now, not after dreaming so vividly. He’s had fantasies about Eddie before, of course, had them before he figured out that he was bi.

Maddie even told him she’d never thought about Eddie like that, which makes Buck seriously question his sister’s taste because Chim is hot, sure, but Eddie? Eddie’s next level.

Buck lies back with a thump, feeling his heart clench in pain because he didn’t need this. He’s come to terms with who Eddie is to him, with what he’d give up for Eddie. But his mind just making up some story of a day where Eddie came to him, with sweet words and soft touches.

It hurts .

He needs– he needs something else to think about. Food isn’t appealing anymore, his mouth is bitter with the loss, but maybe if he runs until he’s too tired to think of anything but the ache in his joints and the sweat on his skin it’ll wash away the false memories of Eddie asleep on his chest and the taste of Eddie’s lips.

He changes, tying his sneakers tight enough that it makes him feel more grounded, more real. He finds a playlist that’s all kind of angry and loud and can drown out the feeling of reaching out to touch the ghost of an idea.

He runs until his lungs hurt. Until his shins ache and his ears are flooded with the pounding of his own heartbeat. He runs until the only salt on his face is dried sweat, until no one would ever know if he’d cried.

He slows and begins the jog back to the house, winded and tired. The weather’s a little chill, which helps him from feeling too hot, and the endorphins are slowly flooding his system so the day feels a little brighter, the air a little less harsh.

He’s in love with Eddie Diaz, and it hurts, but not as all-consumingly as it did an hour ago. His phone buzzes, and there’s dread for a second that it’s Eddie because Buck’s still not ready, but he’s grateful to see Bobby’s name and face on the screen.

“Hey Bobby, what’s up?”

“Hi Buck! Glad I caught you. I’m going to be a bit later than I thought– turns out May needs some quick help but right after I’ll drop by with my drills and level.”

Buck is struck by a weird sense of deja vu he can’t quite place. “Sure, no problem. I’m free all day.”

“You okay? You sound winded.” Bobby asks, and Buck can’t fight the smile because it’s such a dad question.

“Yeah, just out for a jog. You coming late means I can shower and make something serious for lunch so I can be ready to hang the shelves.”

“Good!” Bobby says the praise so easily, and it makes Buck’s smile grow, “I’m at Lowes right now, so if there’s anything you need for the shelving project speak now or forever hold your peace.”

Something in the phrasing makes Buck feel like he’s heard it before, like Bobby’s– he shakes his head to rid himself of the weirdness, “nah, I’m all set. Measured twice and everything.”

“Good job, kid. See you later, probably around two?”

Buck nods, “for sure. No rush.”

The streets around him are familiar, and Buck knows he’s only a couple of blocks from the house. There’s a weird simmer of hope in his gut, wondering if maybe Eddie’ll be on his stoop when he gets there. Buck wonders if he maybe got the power to see the future in his sleep or something.

There’s no one on the stoop. No shoes kicked to the side of the hallway when Buck enters. 

Buck doesn’t let himself think too hard about being disappointed by it.

The first apartment he’d ever had with no roommates had felt so freeing . Like he could watch movies whenever and leave his socks out and wait until the next day to clean the dishes. Now it feels more like loneliness than Buck wants to admit.

He strips off the sweaty clothes, throws them into the hamper, blinks away the memory of throwing Eddie’s shirt there, and heads into the shower. He lets it get hot, steaming up the bathroom, and thinks about anything but Eddie.

Tries to think about anything but Eddie.

Succeeds at not touching himself while thinking about Eddie.

He dries off an shrugs on some comfortable clothing, avoiding what he wore in the dream so he can tie himself down to reality, and moves into the kitchen to put something in his stomach. It’s aching with hunger now, and he usually doesn’t let himself go so long without food, but it’s almost nice feeling something so intense.

Yesterday, the real yesterday, not two days ago, but yesterday Buck had told Eddie he would sleep in and call him when he was up. Normally he’d follow through, but today he needs more time. Eddie won’t fault him for it. So he leaves his phone on the counter and puts on a podcast about video games that he’s been listening to so if Chris ever reaches out there’s something they can talk about.

He opens the fridge and in front of him there is the box of scallion pancakes he ordered for Eddie.

“I fucking–” Buck sighs at himself, because even when he’s awake he’s making space for someone who isn’t there. 

They’re cold, and kind of sad, but Buck needs them out of his fridge so he puts them on the cutting board and chops them up into smaller pieces, then scrambles a few eggs. He reaches for his cast iron and is annoyed to find it dirty from the day before. He shoves it to the back burner and pulls out a non-stick skillet, toasting the scallion pancakes until they’re pliable and then pouring the eggs on top. He adds a lot of black pepper and lets it sit before he flips the whole mess, finishing the cook and breaking it up with his wooden spoon to dump into a bowl.

He doesn’t eat at the table, just pockets his phone and slumps onto the couch. He’s been meaning to watch Terrace House for a couple weeks now, but it never seemed like the right time for cozy reality TV. Today he needs it.

Nearly three hours later Buck’s head is aching from staring at a screen for so long, and Bobby’s texted saying he’ll be later than he thought, and Buck still hasn’t called Eddie.

He’s thinking about it, but then his phone buzzes and it’s Eddie, and Eddie usually does video calls but this one is audio, which Buck bets means he’s driving. 

“Hey, Eddie. Sorry I didn’t call.”

“You didn’t?” Eddie sounds surprised, which is fair, because Buck always calls.

“No, morning kinda got away from me, then I got sucked into Terrace House.” Buck laughs because Eddie knows him, will get it. “Did you think I had?”

“I assumed.” Eddie sounds truly confused, “I– I had my phone off all morning.”

“Yeah? Why?” Buck can’t keep himself from asking.

Eddie sighs, “just– went into the mountains. Needed a moment.”

“With your phone off? Eddie that’s–” Buck keeps himself from scolding his friend, but only barely, “you could’ve gotten hurt.”

Eddie laughs and it’s kind of dry and weird, “I really couldn’t’ve, Buck. For so many reasons. But I was safe, stayed in my car, just looked at the view and drove.”

“Everything okay?” Buck can’t keep the worry from his tone, and he knows Eddie doesn’t mind that Buck cares, but he’s been dealing with his parents so Buck wouldn’t judge him for lashing out a bit.

Eddie sniffs, “yeah, just– just needed a sec.”

“Oh, well, you can call later–” Buck knows Eddie called him, but he’ll give him an out anyways. 

“No! No, no I called you .” Eddie stops him, “I just– I’m fine. I wanted to hear about your day.”

Buck smiles, “it wasn’t anything remarkable. Still haven’t hung those shelves.”

“Bobby running late?” Eddie guesses, and Buck’s touched he didn’t assume Buck just hadn’t gotten it together yet to manage the task.

“Yeah, says he’ll be here in–” Buck checks his watch, it’s two ten, “maybe an hour?”

Eddie sighs, “sounds about right.”

Buck doesn’t know what that means, but he’s happy to just hear Eddie’s voice even if it brings back the dreamed day before in too much clarity. “I’ll get it done eventually. There’s no rush, it’s just some shelves.”

“Yeah.” Eddie sounds sad again, and Buck wants to help even though he doesn’t know why Eddie’s down. 

“I watched some episodes of Terrace House. It’s just as good as I thought it would be. You’d hate it.” He bites back a wince as there’s a weird pulse at the edges of his vision, wonders if maybe he exhausted his eyes watching TV for so long.

“You did?” Eddie sounds surprised again.

“Yeah, it’s nice. I like the way they’re building the relationships.” Buck sucks in a hiss through his teeth as a spike of pain hits his temple. “Shit.”

“What?”

Buck sniffs from the pain, “just a weird headache. Probably watched too much TV. Maybe they were right when they say it rots your brain. You should tell Chris, might be a good lesson.” 

Eddie’s voice cracks, “yeah, maybe.”

“You promise you’re okay, man?” Buck asks because even if his head is suddenly pounding he’ll still have space to worry about Eddie.

Eddie inhales, “I’m fine. Promise.”

“Okay.” Buck gives in because the headache is really bad. “I– I gotta go, take an ibuprofen or something. This sucks . I haven’t had a migraine in forever, maybe since the lightning.”

“No!” Eddie says quickly, then it sounds like he’s stumbling for words, “a-as a medic I recommend lying down and closing your eyes instead, deep steady breaths for– for five minutes. If it still hurts after you can take something.”

Buck hasn’t heard of that before, but Eddie knows a lot and his head really hurts, “okay, I’ll go do–”

“I’ll stay on.” Eddie says quickly, “that way if I’m wrong you can bitch at me.”

Buck laughs a little, even though the pain is intense. “Sure.” He lies back down on the couch, closing his eyes, pressing his hands to his temples.

“Okay, in for five, hold then out for five, bud.” Eddie’s voice is tiny until Buck turns and clicks speaker so Eddie’s kind of in the room with him as he tries.

The first couple of inhales go fine, but there’s a spike of pain that nearly doubles him over, making him cough in surprise. “Eddie– what–”

“You’re going to be okay. I’m here. Just– just close your eyes, okay? I’m sorry-”

Buck closes his eyes, feeling tears on his lashes that he can’t control because it’s painful . 

“I’m here. I didn’t- you’re not alone.” Eddie sounds wrecked, and Buck just wants to reach out to him.

His next inhale is harder to do, even with Eddie on the phone.

Eddie’s on the phone, and his repeated mantra of “I’m here, Buck. I’m so sorry.” It’s an okay last thing to hear even if Eddie sounds broken about it.

________

Buck gasps awake, and for a second he doesn’t know where he is because the last thing he remembers he was on the couch and his head felt like he was dying.

But he’s in bed, and the headache is gone and there’s sunlight filling the room which means it’s either morning or he only lost like an hour. 

He reaches for his phone to Google whether or not a migraine can erase memories, because he doesn’t remember getting into bed, just Eddie’s voice. 

The phone says nine fifteen. Which– that can’t be right. Bobby was going to stop by, and he wouldn’t have– unless he moved Buck from the couch? And the migraine did erase memories? Buck knows his brain went through some shit after the lightning strike, but it’s never done this before.

He opens his call log to see when Eddie hung up, but there’s no sign of the call.

He opens his texts, expecting to see Bobby’s messages. Maybe even a check in to text him when he’s better. 

There’s nothing .

He opens the call log again and Bobby didn’t call him the day before, but Buck knows they talked. He knows it. Or, at least, he knew it.

Buck has seen Inception because he saw the ads and they made him read about the practical effects and then he bought a ticket and was excited to see that Tom Hardy is just objectively cool. Which, in retrospect means he thought Tom Hardy was hot, and he should probably sit down some day and comb through his own history and figure out what he misread as being a fan versus infatuation. He shakes his head at himself, baffled yet again by his insistence on being an ally for so many years.

He’s never had a dream within a dream before. For that matter, when thinking about it he had dreamed a whole different day before the dream day with Eddie, so that’s a dream within a dream within a dream? Maybe? It makes him scrunch up his face in confusion because that feels like far too much architecture for his brain. He’s usually more of a ‘relive an embarrassing moment where everyone laughs at you’ kind of guy. When he’s lucky it’s ‘dream about your best friend holding you’ or ‘dream that you can fly’ and he heads to Texas. He hasn’t had something this vivid since the coma, which, combined with the headaches must mean–

Shit . Something happened at work, something with his brain, and he’s in a coma again. And this is his brain trying to figure it out.

He hopes someone called Eddie, or– maybe he hopes no one did. Eddie’s busy with his own stuff and doesn't need to be sitting vigil at Buck’s bedside. He’s just gotten Chris home, and dropping everything to run back to California is just another arrow in his parents’ quiver.

Buck should try and get to the hospital, though, find himself, break back into his mind or whatever is needed this time. He’s glad he’s not being followed around by a ghost brother for this go around. The loss of a Daniel he never knew but got to meet hurt for weeks after and he didn’t have anyone to talk about it with. Not in a sensical way, and he wasn’t going to bring it up with Natalia after she kept getting weirdly excited about discussing that trauma again.

He sits down, putting his face in his hands, wonders what is wrong with his wiring to get him to this point twice in his life. After the last one he’d read up on coma experiences and most people don’t report having a whole dream world where they have a new life, which means he’s an extra special brand of fucked up if he’s doing it twice .

He wonders what the accident was that got him to this point. The last day of work he remembers was pretty normal, a bunch of calls, but nothing dangerous beyond an electrical fire they had to track down and Buck had even stayed outside with the family because the kid had been around eight and had looked a bit like Chris at that age, and Buck had needed to make sure he was okay.

Which means it was bad enough that Buck’s mind has erased it. Maybe an accident on the drive home? He wracks his brain, trying to remember the commute back home. He remembers it all, a call with Eddie while they both sat in traffic, Thai food scarfed down for dinner, stupid cooking show, and bed. And this is now, as far as he can tell, the third morning that he’s experienced since then, which means it was something that night– or, that’s the best guess he has.

He sighs, because if it was an incident over night how would have he even been found, there’s no one who would come by until the afternoon when Bobby is planning to drop by. And Buck knows the likelihood of surviving something that happens in his sleep is low, so he thinks maybe it was an accident that happened the real morning of this day.

He doesn’t know what that means for his escape from this, but he needs it to end because if he does wake up with days and days of lives where his heart breaks into smaller and smaller pieces over Eddie he won’t survive the life where Eddie has no idea.

So the goal is to find his body because that worked last time. And it’s the only idea Buck has.

His stomach growls, and Buck really wishes the needs of the body didn’t exist in this dream, because if he spends unknown lengths of time dealing with this same day he’s going to be annoyed at the contents of his dream fridge in around a week because he didn’t go shopping before slipping into a coma.

He decides to make himself a breakfast sandwich just to give himself something concrete to do while he considers where he will need to head. He’s never been great at thinking with an empty stomach, so he can give himself the best chance at success that way.

He notices the dirty cast iron on the stove, and really wishes that he’d cleaned it the night before because if he’s going to live this day in perpetuity he’s going to be annoyed at its existence every morning.

He cleans it anyways, because it’s how he likes to make his bacon and he needs time to think. 

He remembers, in the distant way he always does when trying to remember the minutiae of past days, burning his hand on the pan, so he pulls out an oven mit and puts it out before he digs into the fridge for breakfast.

He’s mid-bacon sizzle when the door knock happens, and– he doesn’t even move towards the hall because Eddie’s going to come in. He just knows it, because his brain is truly cruel, and in the three days he’s been in this situation Eddie’s come by twice.

The door pushes open, and Eddie calls out, sounding confused, “Buck?”

“Yeah.” Buck sighs, because it’s not Eddie’s fault he’s in this whole situation, “I’m in the kitchen.”

Eddie enters, looking so concerned that Buck wants to hug him even more than he normally does, and it’s his dream, so he allows himself the indulgence, holding Eddie tight, impressed by the realism of the body under his arms. He leans back, looking at Eddie’s frown, tries to smile, “hi.”

“Hi?” Eddie looks around the kitchen, “did–” he looks at his watch, “no, it’s the same time–”

Buck turns, flips the bacon, letting Coma Eddie take his moment, because it makes sense that creations of his own mind would be vessels for his own confusion. 

“Buck, we have to go to the hospital.” Eddie says instead of asking any questions. “I can explain on–”

Buck should have guessed that once he started unraveling the fear his creations would want to help him. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Eddie looks gobsmacked, and it’s not a look Buck manages to put on his face often, so it’s fun in its own way.

Buck nods, “can I eat this bacon first?”

Eddie looks at the pan, then at Buck, “uh–” he’s blushing, and Buck doesn’t know why, which is a weird feature of the coma dream, that lack of understanding of the motivations of his own subconscious, but he tries to roll with it like he would if he had another nightmare about being naked at Bobby’s barbeque. “Sure– I, uh, I can explain while you eat.”

Buck raises his eyebrows, a little surprised his brain is going to supply an explanation, but he uses the spatula to remove the crispy strips and the egg he scrambled alongside. He sits down, looking at Eddie expectantly, gesturing at the seat next to him, “hit me.”

Eddie sits, and he’s not quite meeting Buck’s eyes, like he’s avoiding him, which– Buck doesn’t like that at all. “I– you might not believe me, but I promise you I’m serious: Buck, I am in a time loop.”

Buck has a flash of memory that on the first of his repeated days where Eddie said the same thing, and it’s surprising his own brain can’t build Eddie properly. The man would never believe something like that. He takes a stab at his eggs, shovelling some in, “sure, okay.”

Eddie frowns, “no, I– I’m not joking, Buck. I’ve lived this day for the past two weeks.” He swallows, another shadow across his eyes, then looks to the side, “and we figured out yesterday together that you have an aneurysm.”

It’s Buck’s turn to frown, because no they hadn’t. “Yesterday?”

“Well, today. But my yesterday.” Eddie is doing the eye avoidance thing again, and Buck wants to call him on it because why would his brain make Eddie lie to him, “we went to the Craniospinal Center, but they didn’t see your symptoms as emergency worthy, so we moved to an ER and got you a CT scan and–”

Buck puts his hand up, “you said this was yesterday?”

Eddie nods slowly, like it doesn’t feel good, and Buck thinks that’s right at least, because the few times Eddie’s avoided the truth with him it hadn’t been good for either of them.

Buck– Buck should not be using the time to confront his own inner Eddie because this isn’t real but he has to because Eddie wouldn’t do this. Eddie is a good guy. He trusts Buck, confides in Buck. He wouldn’t lie to Buck, not about something important like that. “Bullshit.”

Eddie’s brows go up, “no, I mean it– I can prove it.” He looks at his watch, “Bobby’s going to call–”

“To say he’s running late, I know.” Buck cuts this Eddie off, and is rewarded with a spark of fear in the man’s eyes. “May needs help– he’s at Lowes.”

Eddie’s eyes widen, “how–”

“Eddie, or, n-no, but, sure. I’ll call you Eddie because it’s what my fucked up brain has chosen.” Buck inhales, “I don’t know why, but I remember going to the ER. You– you told me I wasn’t dying alone– you–” He squeezes his eyes shut thinking about the way Eddie’s rough kiss had felt, “you kissed me, and I-I was in the scanner.”

Eddie’s eyes are even wider, “you remember?”

Buck nods, “but that wasn’t yesterday, Eddie. That was days ago because yesterday.” He swallows, remembering the feeling of searing pain behind his eyes, the intense fear even with Eddie on the phone, “ yesterday I died alone on my couch.” 

Eddie’s shoulders sag, he looks down at the table, “no– not, not alone.”

That’s what hurts, the weird confirmation that the Eddie in his mind knows everything Buck does, “ yes alone. You– just because you’re on the phone doesn’t, it doesn’t mean you’re here , Eddie.” He hates how his voice breaks on the word here, but maybe his brain needs him to say these things to Eddie, it feels nice even as it hurts. 

“You’re there .” Buck gestures in the general direction of away, towards Texas. “You’re there and I understand why and I’m not mad about it, even. I just– apparently even in my dreams–” he swallows down the hurt, tries to calm his voice, “even in this fucking nightmare scenario I die alone.”

Eddie’s eyes are bright with unshed tears, “Buck I couldn’t–”

Buck sniffs, “you know all of yesterday I thought the day before was some cruel joke my brain was playing on me? A fantasy that got taken away the second I woke up?”

Eddie blinks, looks up so he won’t cry, “I didn’t think you’d remember.”

“God why is my brain making you like this?” Buck chokes out, “you’re not that guy, Eddie. You– you wouldn’t kiss me just because you thought I wouldn’t remember.”

Eddie swipes his arm across his own eyes, “of course I am, Buck. I’m the same guy who cheated on a perfectly nice woman just because I saw someone who looked–” he swallows, “I’m the guy who ran to the fucking Army rather than deal with the reality of–” he waves his hand, “everything.”

Buck shakes his head, “but you’re not . I know you think you are, sometimes. But you’re the guy who worked three jobs to afford everything for Christopher and who let his son take as much space as he needed and when that space wasn’t helping you moved to Texas. You’re the guy who lets me in after my boyfriend breaks up with me even though you’re having a dance party with yourself and who let me sleep on your couch when my parents were pieces of shit and I know I’m mad that we’re apart but I can’t understand–” he puts his head down on his own forearms. “I don’t know why my brain made you this way.”

He can hear Eddie swallow, “what are you talking about? Your brain?”

Buck laughs humorlessly, “you’re not real.”

“Yes I am.” Eddie assures him, because of course he does. 

Buck shakes his head against his own arms, “no, you’re not. I’m in a coma somewhere and apparently I’m working through the bullshit of my own feelings for you by arguing with you in my own head.”

“Buck, that’s not true.” Eddie’s tone is firm, because even this version of Eddie doesn’t let Buck rest.

Buck looks up, sitting back, “so you” he points at Eddie, “Eddie Diaz. You believe in magic now.”

Eddie makes a face, “I– I don’t think time loops are magic.”

“What the fuck else could they be?” Buck rolls his eyes because why is he arguing with his own figments but it’s hard to not when Eddie seems so real in front of him.

“I mean, you said maybe a fractured timeline.” Eddie looks back down at the table, “on the first day for you, you suggested I was living in, like, new universes or something.”

Buck frowns, “then how am I suddenly in this one?”

Eddie huffs in frustration, “I don’t know , Buck! You weren’t– you never remembered before! I spent ten full days with you not remembering shit, and suddenly you do, I don’t– I swear I didn’t think you would.”

“So, what was–” Buck can’t really talk about the day he spent with Eddie, falling asleep with Eddie on him.

Eddie looks down at his own lap, “I– you’d said I was burning myself out.”

“That’s not normally how people deal with burn out, Eddie.” Buck spits out, a little too mean, but he doesn’t really care because this isn’t Eddie, this is just his own brain, and he thinks Dr. Copeland would probably applaud him working through this shit on his own even if it’s through a weird coma dream conversation.

Eddie’s not looking at him again, “it’s just– I had to collect your stuff, and sit there while the doctor told me about the blood vessel, about how no one could have known, how sorry she was for my loss. What the next steps were for your body.” He squeezes his eyes shut, then looks up at Buck, “and then I came over and you– the morning was different. You hadn’t burned your hand and you– you just seemed, happy to see me? And I–”

Buck is struck by a memory of the conversation with Eddie in front of the hospital, “and I’d told you to take me out for breakfast.”

Eddie nods, just a little, “and you– I thought I could–” he looks over Buck’s shoulder, eyes sad, “I just wanted a good day.”

Buck looks up at the ceiling, because in a weird way it makes sense, “you wanted me to have a good day or you?”

Eddie worries at his own lip, “both of us.”

“So you–” Buck shakes his head, not willing to put words in Eddie’s mouth, “what?”

Eddie drops his gaze again, “I let myself– give in.”

“Give in?” Buck doesn’t need to hear this– he’ll regret knowing anything more because this isn’t real but it feels real, and maybe he could let himself give in. Maybe he can have a taste of hope, his heart’s already broken enough, what’s one more crack?

Eddie’s still for a beat, then his shoulders straighten, he meets Buck’s eyes again, “I wasn’t lying about anything I said that day. I think about you all the time, I call you all the time . You’re– we’re a unit. And I never thought about what that meant. Never let myself because if I open that box then I have a lot to unpack, but– but then you started dying. And my world shattered worse than I’ve ever experienced.”

Buck blinks because he’s seen Eddie pretty deep in the thick of his worst times. It’s almost cruel what his mind has conjured up because there’s no way in hell Buck holds a candle to Shannon.

Eddie continues, sounding wrecked and exhausted, “I told my son you were dead four times, Buck. I picked up the phone to Bobby barely able to get the words out after he’d found you. I listened to Hen sob her apology because she’d tried so hard and they still lost you. I can’t get the sound of Maddie crying out of my ears. So I came here, because I needed to fix it . And then you got hit by a car.”

Buck frowns because he doesn’t remember that. “No I didn’t.”

Eddie rolls his eyes, “you did . I came out that door and saw you on the ground and all I could think was not again. But not because you’d died all those times, but because I couldn’t handle losing you like I lost Shannon. It hit me– I knew, I sat on the curb and couldn’t make myself move because all I could think about was that you weren’t just a best friend.”

Buck stands, pushes the chair back hard enough that it falls, slams into the ground, “I can’t hear this.”

Eddie matches him, standing quickly, in his face, “no, you asked for me to say why. This is why. You know what happens every time you die? The team calls me , Buck. Not Maddie, not Bobby. I’m the first call even when I’m hundreds of miles away. And it’s not because I’m your emergency contact. It’s because we’re us . When there’s a night out they do the same thing. Tell Eddie, he’ll get Buck. Ask Buck, he’ll drag Eddie.”

Buck kind of wants to put his hands over his ears, “Eddie, stop.”

“I am sorry , Buck. I thought– I thought I could let myself have joy for one day. Just- just a taste. I thought I could spend a day with you and not think about how you have this fucking timebomb in your brain that I can’t do anything about. I didn’t– I wasn’t planning on–” he squeezes his eyes shut and there are tears at the corners that Buck wants to wipe away even though he’s mad at Eddie, “I wasn’t going to let myself go where I did, but you looked at me like I made you happy and I have spent years with the two main goals in my life of being keep Chris alive and happy, and I thought I could–”

Buck can feel the fight seep out of his bones, shoulders falling, “you do make me happy, Eddie.”

Eddie shakes his head and scoffs, “right, this is you totally happy.”

Buck kind of wants to scream because it’s not– he feels like he’s talking in circles with himself, “you were there, Eddie. You saw me. You didn’t pull me into the diner kicking and screaming. I was right across from you. Of course I want–” he runs a hand through his curls in frustration, reminds himself he’s okay with how they’ll look messy because the only people who will see him are in his own coma dream, “I’m not having this conversation with you any more. I’m drawing a line.”

“A line.” Eddie looks– some mixture of disappointed and maybe grateful.

Buck nods, “we don’t– no more.” He gestures between them because it feels wrong to use this fantasy of Eddie like that, to play along when he consciously knows the real Eddie would never.

Eddie just looks down at the ground between them, “right, of course.”

And Buck is annoyed because even his mind’s cruel version of Eddie doesn’t have the right to make him feel bad for cutting this off, “you’re the one who–”

“You died on me , Buck.” Eddie whispers like it’s a confession, “I didn’t think about that– I couldn’t let myself.”

Buck freezes, taking in how Eddie’s clearly holding every muscle stiff. “The nap.”

“Yep.” Eddie crosses his arms across his chest, “I got you for one breakfast and a nap, and then you died and you’d made me promise .”

Buck remembers the promise, that Eddie can’t just end his days early to restart.

“I sat with you for a while. I didn’t know what else to do. You– weren’t there.” Eddie looks down at his hands. “I looked up doctors for a while, tried to think what you would do. I-I talked to you, a little.”

Buck’s heart breaks for Eddie, alone in the house with Buck’s body. Even if it wasn’t real, maybe this figment did live a whole day, maybe this Eddie experienced the loss as much as Buck would have, so he gives him grace, “is that why yesterday?”

“I couldn’t do it.” Eddie sniffs, “I drove up into the mountains and just looked at the view, tried to think about something else. I needed to clear my mind of– I needed to try and forget. To give myself a chance to be able to be okay enough to spend a day with you that might be the end of the repeats without wrecking everything.”

“Wrecking–”

Eddie gestures between them, “I didn’t want– I couldn’t look at you and not want– but I didn’t want you to forget.”

Buck thinks that makes some amount of sense, and he can’t really hold this Eddie to some high standard when this Eddie isn’t his Eddie. “But you still called?”

“I promised you you wouldn’t die alone.” Eddie is back to holding Buck’s gaze with intensity, “I drove down from the mountains and I couldn’t– even if you don’t remember you don’t deserve those last few minutes.”

“But you do? Hearing me–” Buck doesn’t like the idea that his own mind is torturing this Eddie with experiencing him die over and over.

Because Eddie is Eddie he just shrugs, “kind of thought I deserved it for not coming.”

“You’re an asshole to yourself.” Buck shakes his head, then realizes Eddie thought they might be close to stopping the loop, which he has to imagine is the key to breaking himself out of the coma. He worries at his lip, “you think you’re that close to solving this?”

Eddie nods, “I know where it is. I know how to get a doctor to scan for it. We can– if we go early enough it won’t have time to rupture.”

Buck wonders if that’s what happened to him, if he’s in a coma from the surgery.

“I just don’t understand why you’re in this with me now .” Eddie frowns, “your first day was three days ago?”

Buck nods, because if his brain is going to solve the mystery using Eddie as a puppet he understands. “I woke up thinking the last day had been a dream.”

Eddie nods, “I was the same on my day two. Felt like the worst nightmare ever– I was so happy it wasn’t real.”

Buck closes his eyes, understanding the feeling too well. “Well, since then I’ve been here for all the hours where I’m, you know, alive.”

Eddie’s gaze goes a little unfocused, like he’s trying to think of something, “what changed, though?”

“Was– was it when you came here? Maybe you being–”

Eddie shakes his head, “there was the first day with the car crash. You don’t remember that at all?”

Buck frowns, trying to think, “no– I mean, I remember you saying not to take out the recycling?”

“That was the next day.” Eddie confirms.

Buck’s phone buzzes, and he knows it’s going to be Bobby, but it still gives him a weird spike of unease when his suspicion is confirmed. He picks up, “hey Bobby.”

“Hi Buck! Glad I caught you. I’m going to be a bit later than I thought– turns out May needs some quick help but right after I’ll drop by with my drills and level.”

It turns out that intense deja vu is weird every time, “no problem, uh– I’m actually going to run some errands, so if you go late you can always bring it by tomorrow.”

Bobby chuckles, “not in the mood for home improvement anymore?”

“No! I am, it’s just– I don’t want you to worry about me. Go help May and enjoy yourself, just try to not go on a Lowes spending spree.” Buck tries to keep his voice light.

“How’d you know I was– man, am I getting to that point of predictability?” Bobby laughs, and it makes Buck smile because it’s been a few days since he really talked to the man, and he misses him in a weird way.

He shakes his head, “nah, I just know where you’d head before helping May with something at her place. Have fun, stop by tomorrow instead, we’ve got forty eight off.”

“Thanks, Buck. I’ll tell her you say hi.” 

“See ya.” Buck hangs up and looks at Eddie, “okay, we have four hours, maybe plus one or two if surgery is slow.”

Eddie’s eyebrows go up, “you’re on board?”

“I think what I need to do is at the hospital, and you want me to go there, so let’s go there.” Buck shrugs, “while we wait in traffic and then for doctors to take us seriously we can try and figure out what added me into the mix.”

Internally he’s pretty sure nothing has changed, but maybe solving Eddie’s questions will help move the plot of this whole nightmare scenario on, then he’s game.

He looks at himself, wishing he could do what he does sometimes in a dream and be just in a new outfit. The past days have felt so long compared to the disjointed non-linearity of  his normal dreams. He kind of hates it. The boring normalcy still so present. Cleaning a dish, eating, changing. 

“If I’m gonna be stuck in a dream I think I should be able to teleport.” He mumbles as he makes his way back to his room.

“It’s not a dream , Buck. It’s–” Eddie huffs in anger, “whatever. If it means you’ll get your ass in the car we can pretend this is your dream.”

Buck throws him a middle finger, “you’re the worst figment.”

“Well I’ve been on this fucking day for two weeks I think I get to be annoyed.” Eddie’s voice is a little muffled as Buck shrugs on a T-shirt from a couple layers down, feeling weird about the idea of wearing the same thing a few days in a row even though they’re clean.

Buck comes back out, “if you’re not a figment then why are you always in the same outfit?”

Eddie frowns, “it’s what I left out.”

“Sure, figment.” Buck grabs his wallet, “come on, let’s go try and save me.”

Eddie breathes like he’s making his frustrated-with-Buck face, and when Buck checks he’s happy to see he’s right, the furrow between Eddie’s brows deeper than normal, and his lips pursed a little in annoyance. Eddie had made the face a lot while he was trying to find a renter, and Buck had committed it to memory well enough that Eddie is doing it perfectly in his coma dream.

He climbs into the car, waiting for Eddie to get into the passenger seat, “am I safe to drive?”

Eddie shrugs, “if not we restart, and I’ll drive tomorrow.”

Buck thinks that’s as good of an answer as anything, even if it’s a bit dark, so he gets moving. “What hospital?”

“Cedars-Sinai.” Eddie says with finality, and Buck raises his eyebrows in surprise because it’s not the hospital they spend the most time at and he’s surprised his body would be there. Eddie must notice, because he answers the unspoken question easily, “they have the fastest response and largest neuro team.”

“Why do you know–”

“You died at 2:14.” Eddie replies, “which left me just under ten hours to research.”

“Eddie–” Buck wants to admonish him, “when have you slept? ”

“I– I think I get the same sleep from the original night? So I’m always waking up at three about five hours in. And I nap on the plane.”

Buck lets himself remember the way Eddie’s body had relaxed next to him when they napped, like the strings had been cut on his marionette. He isn’t sure why his brain has added all these little details to the coma dream, but if– when he gets out he’s going to make sure real Eddie doesn’t have those bags under his eyes.

“Do you–” he looks at the dashboard clock, it’s just after ten. “Do you think this is enough time?”

Eddie’s knee jiggles, a sign he’s anxious that he only lets out when he’s at the edge of everything being too much. Buck’s only seen it a couple of times in waiting rooms and once in the engine when they’d saved a kid from a fire but didn’t know if he’d survive the burns.

“I think so. I mean, if we get you under the knife fast?” Eddie looks out the window steadily like he can’t look at Buck.

Buck just hums, “that means whenever you get to tomorrow I’m going to have a weird shaved bald spot.”

Eddie laughs at that, dry and humorless, “guess so.”

“Don’t think I can rock a buzz cut…” Buck muses because they have to talk about something . “Half the reason I didn’t hack it in the SEALs was the hair.”

“Bullshit.” Eddie is actually laughing now.

“It’s true! Not all of us can pull off the ‘number three all over’ look, Eddie.” Buck flashes back to Eddie’s short stint with a buzz cut, the way he’d been weirdly focused on memorizing the shape of Eddie’s skull. He really needs to sit down one day and write a list of things that should have tipped him off before Tommy.

It’s just a worrisomely large part of that list would be the existence of Eddie and Buck doesn’t need that teasing from Maddie, she’d find out somehow . She has her ways.

“You’ve done worse– I’ve seen the frosted tips photos.” Eddie smiles over, and it makes Buck warm, even though he wants to kill Maddie for that.

“I will find the negatives one day and burn them to ash.” He promises, “but those still looked better than I bet I will all shorn like a lamb. The curls have just gotten how I like them. What if my skull is lumpy?”

“You’ve had short hair–” Eddie sighs through his nose, “I promise you’ll still be pretty even with a weird bald patch, Buck.”

Buck would swear on the Bible and the LAFD manual he hadn’t been fishing for compliments.

“You think I’m pretty?” The question falls from his mouth like a piece of popcorn after he’s stuffed a handful in, messy and unintentional.

Eddie clams up, arms getting closer to his torso, legs losing their wide sprawl. There’s a quiet moment and then he says lowly– like he’s ashamed of it, or of himself, Buck can’t tell,  “you know I do.”

Buck wants to yell and rant and point accusatory fingers at Eddie because no he doesn’t . At most he knows Eddie thinks he’s kind of hot. But he holds himself in, crushes it down, because fighting with the Eddie in his own mind hasn’t gotten him anywhere other than into a car that isn’t real on the way to an emergency room that isn’t real in a hospital that isn’t real where hopefully Buck’s real body is in some upstairs room waiting for him to find it.

There’s a guilty twist in his gut because Eddie needs him to go through with this whole surgery thing, but Buck shakes it off because that’s not what worked last time, so it’s his job to get himself out again.

The parking lot is busy, so Buck opts to park in the expensive lot, reasoning with himself that coma money isn’t real. Eddie doesn’t fight him, which means either his brain is okay with that or Eddie has accepted a whole money doesn’t matter when trapped in a time loop thing. Buck guesses that’s what it is because Eddie bought a day of ticket to save him, and there’ve been more than a few times when Buck’s finger has hovered over that exact Buy Now button.

But also, Eddie isn’t real so his money isn’t real.

It’s kind of hard to keep up the mental gymnastics, so Buck instead looks at Eddie, “what are my symptoms?”

“Numbness in your hand. A bad headache. A seizure this morning.” Eddie repeats them like he’s been cycling through the words in his own mind.

Buck just nods, “okay.”

They climb out of the car in tandem, walking to the hospital entrance, and Eddie’s in pure business mode, moving to the triage nurse and explaining their situation in detail. Buck gets waved over, and he answers all the question to his best ability– he’s never been the best liar, but he can nod along with Eddie.

They’re sent to wait, but the nurse’s face clearly showed considerable worry, so Buck bets they’ll be called in quickly. 

Eddie is focused and intense, looking at the clock on the wall like it’s movement is an affront to him. There’s a scuffle outside, Buck can hear raised voices, and they’re close enough to the entrance to see a woman and a man having a screaming argument, the woman trying to pull away from the man.

Eddie looks over too, concerned, and stands, “stay. I’ll go–”

Buck shakes his head, standing with Eddie, “no way.”

They exit the automatic doors and there’s a security guard trying to manage the scene, but he’s focused on some bystander who is angrily yelling, so Eddie raises his voice, “hey man, why don’t you let her–”

The man looks at Eddie, furious, “why don’t you mind your own fucking business?”

Eddie’s hands go up flat in front of him, “I’m just suggesting maybe to let her–”

They guy is fast , in Eddie’s space quicker than Buck would have predicted, the woman let go and running into the hospital– Buck turns to watch her get to a nurse. There’s a noise behind him, a grunt, and Eddie’s got the guy on the ground, and the security guard is moving in to help.

The noise is muffled by Eddie’s body, but it’s still loud, like all gunshots are.

Eddie slumps, draped over the man, and Buck thinks he’s yelling, his throat feels sore from it, “Eddie! Eddie!!” He moves in close and pulls Eddie back, and there’s a gapping wound in his chest and his eyes stare unseeing into the air.

Buck doesn’t– Buck can’t .

His hands are covered in blood again, but this time Eddie isn’t looking over at him to check on Buck. This time there’s no rise or fall of his chest. No hope for recovery. 

The security guard is trying to do something and Buck looks at the space around him, the front entrance to the hospital, Eddie dead on the ground– no question in Buck’s heart about that.

The fucker who killed Eddie is lying on the ground, screaming swears and Buck sees the guard has kicked the gun across the pavement away from him, it’s within reach of Buck.

This isn’t a real day.

This is a dream.

Buck wouldn’t dream of Eddie dying– it’s a nightmare. He looks at the hospital.

If Eddie is right and this is all a loop and the day ends when Buck lives then this is not the day that is going to be the final resolution.

He grabs at the gun. He’s never really shot anything before. An Airsoft rifle once, a few shooting range birthday parties, a rifle at the ranch in Montana to scare off predators.

This gun is slick with Eddie’s blood, and Buck’s hands are shaking.

The security guard might be shouting at him, he thinks.

The muzzle of the pistol is still warm from where it sent a bullet into Eddie’s chest. Buck closes his eyes and presses it to his temple, hoping he doesn’t miss because he needs this repeat to be done.

Triggers are harder to pull when every cell in the body is filled with terror, but Buck puts a firm hand to Eddie’s shattered sternum so he can be sure the heart beneath is still and squeezes against the metal’s resistance.

__________

Buck wakes up to the sound of his phone ringing. He sits up, hyperventilating immediately because he just had Eddie’s still chest under his grip and the sense memory is visceral enough to make him gag. He thinks one of his ears is still ringing from the shot too close to his eardrum.

He reaches over to the bedside table to pick up, certain who it is, “Eddie?”

“Yeah.” Eddie sounds as breathless as Buck, “guess the surgery didn’t go–”

“Fuck you.” Buck spits out, not letting Eddie continue down that train of thought, “as if I would go through it with you dead–”

“Buck, what happened to the split realities? Making me promise to stick around in case, for Chr–”

Buck’s stomach rolls again, “don’t throw my own shit back at me, I– I’m not, if this is a time loop and not a coma dream I’m not letting the loop where you die be the one I escape.” His voice breaks, “we are both making it to the real tomorrow. Together.” 

Eddie is quiet in response, then there’s a whispered, “yeah, of course.”

Buck’s sitting up in bed now, feeling tired deep in his bones, “you bought your ticket yet?”

“Yeah.” Eddie clears his throat, “you could make the chance better for you to have enough time and go to the hospital now.”

Buck shakes his head to a silent room, because Eddie needs to come as soon as he can, or Buck might shake apart, “no chance. You gotta– I’m not doing this shit alone. I need to see– need you to–”

“Okay. Okay, Buck.” Eddie says softly, and Buck realizes Eddie gets it because Eddie’s heard him die over the phone, seen Buck dead on the street outside his apartment, and then needed to see Buck in the flesh to help wash away the image of the day before.

Buck sniffs, trying to calm his racing heart, forget the way Eddie’s blood had looked on his skin again. He clears his throat, “text me your flight details. I’ll pick you up and we can go straight over.”

“Yeah.” Eddie agrees, “I’ll– I’ll look up another hospital.”

“No, we can get there earlier today, warn the security team to be on the look out for the guy– say we saw something in the parking lot or whatever. We can’t– we still gotta help her.” Buck feels certain that if saving someone is an option they should take it, like it’s a test for how to be a good person.

Eddie hums, “you’re right.”

Buck swallows, “I have to shower.”

He needs to clean off the blood that never touched him, or did but didn’t. It’s not there, but he needs to get rid of it all the same. 

“Sure. I’ll see you soon. Try and get some more sleep?”

Buck snorts, “I think I’m going to try the Diaz deprivation strategy today.”

“Can’t recommend it enough.” Eddie sounds tired , and Buck wants to wrap him in a hug and let him sleep in Buck’s bed again, but that ends in Buck dying so he probably shouldn’t offer.

“We’ll see how it feels after a shift I was supposed to be sleeping in after.” Buck wishes he still remembered the feeling of waking up with nothing much on his mind but breakfast and hanging a shelf.

They sit together in silence before Buck eventually hangs up and his phone buzzes immediately with the text from Eddie about his gate and landing time. He likes it out of instinct and moves into the bathroom, stripping off his sleep clothes as quickly as he can because he can still feel the heat of the blood between his fingers.

Stepping under the spray helps make him feel like he might one day be clean.

He uses the last of Eddie’s body wash that Eddie left and Buck hasn’t reached for because he doesn’t want it to be gone, but Buck thinks it’ll be full again tomorrow.

He shouldn’t buy in this fully with Eddie. Shouldn’t get too deep into this dream. Because Daniel had been convincing too, in his way. But there’s something– his brain wouldn’t let Eddie exist in the coma before. He’d always thought it was because maybe his subconscious didn’t want to imagine a world with Eddie lying to him.

This time the whole dream’s about Eddie. He wonders if that’s because Buck’s life is more fully about Eddie now, or– because Buck’s finally admitted to himself that his world kind of revolves around Eddie and Chris.

It won’t do any harm to see what coma Eddie has for him, since the day restarts whether or not Buck plays along, and he’s not getting that sinking suspicion that Eddie is trying to keep him here in the way that dream was. Also knowing even his dream version of Eddie, his partner won’t let him just wander the hospital looking for himself sleeping in a recovery room.

He scrubs his skin roughly, letting the water get a little too hot, filling the air with steam so he can’t see his own skin as clearly, can’t keep picturing the way his hands had looked soaked in Eddie’s blood.

He can’t imagine– Eddie’s experienced his death for over two weeks now, although yesterday’s today was the first time from what Eddie’s saying that Buck didn’t go first other than the early test for the system.

A horrible itching thought crosses Buck’s mind. He doesn’t know how Eddie stopped that cycle. He doesn’t– Eddie had talked around those methods, but Buck doesn’t know what he did. He can still feel the click of the gun in his own hand. 

He’s not going to ask.

Not unless Eddie’s right and this is a loop.

Which he won’t be.

Buck shuts off the water, needing to do something new. He’s so sick of this day. He just– he wants to put up that shelf. He wants to call Eddie on FaceTime and hear about Chris’s new school drama. He wants to talk to Maddie and make Jee the pancakes he perfected for the Diaz family.

He wants out.

The way out is to follow Eddie. He just knows it. Eddie’s like his guide through this nightmare. 

Buck puts on an LAFD hoodie and some of his softer pants, wanting to feel the opposite of the day before. He thinks with practice he’ll be able to forget, but the best way is to prevent the memories from being too near the surface while they’re still fresh.

It’s four in the morning. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen this part of this day, since all the other repeats he’s woken up around nine. It makes him want to do other things he’s been avoiding. Make his brain invent new things for the timeline, see if he can stretch himself to the point where the dream logic starts filling things in like bad AI generated art– too many hands on someone passing by or something.

He makes his bed, because he hasn’t done that in a while, or, maybe he did it yesterday– the timeline is hard enough to keep track of.

He then cleans the cast iron, watching it carefully and seasoning it fully with his favorite oil. He fishes his phone out of the front pocket of his hoodie, sending Bobby a quick text saying he’s feeling under the weather and is going to take the day off to get healthy before trying any home improvement.

He sits on the floor of his kitchen eating cold scallion pancakes, wondering if the ticking time bomb in his mind is real or if his brain is inventing an explanation for its slow death from whatever happened to him.

Buck read about near death experiences for weeks after the lightning, trying to learn why brains do things like what happened to him, and the only thing he really understood at the end was that even the best neuroscientists in the world sometimes shrug their shoulders and say something along the line of ‘brains are weird.’

He wonders what Natalia would say about this dream he’s invented. Experiencing his own death on repeat, but without remembering much about it apart from a headache. Probably would make him describe every day in detail and he hasn’t even let himself think that hard about the kisses.

Buck closes his eyes, head against the cabinet behind him, feet bare on the floor, trying to figure out if he could ever forget the way Eddie kissed him in the parking lot. It hadn’t felt how Buck’s imagined kissing Eddie before, little daydreams he has to push himself up and out of so he can breathe instead of losing himself in the thought of Eddie.

Buck’s probably thought to himself that he wishes he’d never hooked up with Tommy that night daily since the event. He’s wished he didn’t talk to Maddie about it almost as many times because it means someone other than him and Tommy and maybe Ravi know about how the night went. The conversation with both his ex and his sister had seeped into his marrow, new white blood cells all newly written with the truth he’s been shoving down and away every time Eddie picked up a FaceTime or call or sent a photo of Chris working at his kitchen table.

His brain– or, the weirdness of the universe making his brain do things– had been so cruel to give him the taste of Eddie. Because he wants. He wants Eddie to be in Los Angeles. Wants Christopher filling his room with the noise of video game chat. Wants to share a bed with his partner even if it makes Buck wake up cold because Eddie steals blankets even though he always gets hot at night. Wants to make every dinner with Eddie prepping the easy things. Wants to introduce people to his partner and not have to add work before. Wants to bump their shoulders together with intent at the end of a shift and make out against his car while Hen calls out a teasing whoop as she climbs into her own ride. Wants to throw away the couch he positioned in the living room and replace it with a deep navy one that Buck thinks is perfectly imperfect.

He just wants Eddie.

He’ll take their friendship, of course, because Eddie’s the best friend he’s ever had. Might be the best one he ever will, but if there was any chance at something more Buck would reach for it because he knows they’d be great. 

But this Eddie isn’t real, even if it seems like he maybe wants the same.

Buck wonders if that’s the honeypot of this dream. Eddie being willing to be with him.

But his own brain finds that so unbelievable that he had Eddie fucking run away to the mountains the day after it happened, so apparently even his subconscious won’t stand for Eddie being out of character.

He puts his hands down on an arm braced across his knees, chewing sadly.

Today he’ll go with Eddie’s solution, and if it doesn’t work he’s going to have to start searching through the hospitals for himself, which Eddie will not like.

He wonders if maybe the best method will be asking flat out for Eddie to help him, as a kind of quid pro quo. 

There’s a lot of hospitals in Los Angeles, the idea of getting into all of them and searching is daunting. It’ll definitely take days, so maybe he and Eddie can alternate days where they choose what to do. 

There’s a kind of hopelessness in his chest at the thought– Eddie living over and over as Buck dies. Buck surviving and then waking up to an Eddie who never lived that reality.

Buck’s glad that Eddie isn’t actually going through what his mind has decided to torture Eddie with.

He wonders if he’s way angrier with Eddie than he thought– he’d thought they’d mostly gotten over it, and that there was just a mixture of sadness and longing and pride at Eddie’s successes left in his gut. 

Buck pulls out his phone and looks through everyone’s feeds. 

He doesn’t feel like getting up off the floor, and since his back and leg will only really hurt tomorrow he doesn’t have to.

Eventually he moves from the floor when the chill starts seeping into his ass and if he only gets so many hours each day he’s going to use some of them for things other than wallowing. 

He starts by writing down every thing he can remember from the shift– trying to pinpoint any event that could have ended with an injury. He writes it all down so Eddie can read in the car. Then he opens his phone and looks at news stories from the last twenty four hours, wondering if maybe his mind is seeding this reality with truths for him to find.

Chim would be proud.

Thinking about Chim makes him want to call the man, but he’s been up all hours recently since Maddie’s been sleeping terribly with the baby apparently stomping on her kidneys every chance he gets. Chim would be better at this dream than he is– he knows more about time loops, he’d be able to find the cracks in the fiction.

Buck shakes his head, feeling like it’s been a while since he saw people who weren’t Eddie, which makes sense because it has but also they won’t feel that way, and Buck knows that the difference in enthusiasm wouldn’t feel great to experience at the moment. Even if he’s a little used to it, hence the regular golden retriever comments from his friends.

He then writes out everything he remembers about the first day he remembers, about what Eddie said, what they did so Eddie can compare it to the day before– see where the shift happened to have Buck join him.

It’ll keep Eddie from feeling useless and will give Buck a chance to identify things about Eddie’s story that don’t makes sense.

Once Buck’s done looking at his timeline, checking his texts and camera roll for any details he may have forgotten, he sits back, rolling his neck and rubbing his eyes, wishing he’d gotten more than the five hours of sleep he estimates he had after his last sleepy messages to Eddie and the phone call at half past three. 

He’s functioned on far less, this time weirdness just takes more brain power than the saws and jaws do. He moves to the coffee maker and gets it going, deciding he can help the day with caffeine at least.

By the time he’s had two cups and some toast to join the scallion pancakes he’s feeling more human. He checks over his notes again, wondering if the coffee knocked any more memories loose.

It doesn’t feel like it, so he then he pulls up some articles on brain aneurysms and tries to learn as much about the bubble of blood in his brain that sometime around two fourteen will burst and kill him without any more warning than a headache.

He just wishes he knew where it had come from . He knows, logically, they just happen, but he wishes it had a reason. 

After the third series of articles he’s read give him nothing new he shakes himself out of the research spiral, surprised but also not shocked that it’s already past six. The sun is rising and the house is filling with the pale early morning light Buck now associates more with long nights that spill into days than he does with waking up for school. His parents calling for him and getting mad when he was late to the table even though they knew he had trouble waking up with alarms.

He suddenly wonders if Eddie ever told his parents during those earlier runs, or if Bobby did that. He doesn’t think anyone would have asked Maddie to, she’s had so much happen in the last months, telling her parents they’ve lost another son feels insurmountable. 

Chim might have, he’s on okay ground with Margaret and Phillip.

It’s after nine, they’d be awake now if Buck called them. He considers it, plays out how the conversation would go– his mother complaining about something banal, asking almost no questions about his life, responding with ‘that’s nice’ to any good news, with sighs of disappointment to anything bad. She’d probably ask him about Maddie and not notice in herself the way her tone shifts when she’s talking about the kid she wanted instead of the kid who lived.

He doesn’t need them anymore, has made his peace with it in as many ways as he can, but it still hurts.

He’s glad Jee gets a loving set of grandparents. She’s the kind of kid who deserves it.

He considers baking something– muffins or crumpets or cookies or a bread. He likes the meditation of the measuring, the way things come from his work. But the thought of making something that never gets eaten kind of aches.

In the end he watches the next two episodes of Terrace House and is annoyed for a blink that the spot he left off wasn’t saved. 

He’s surprised his brain is able to create a full season of a television show from scratch, but he knows people do that all the time with fan fiction and novelizations so maybe he’s just learning a new fact about himself. He could write episodes of Hotshots that are more realistic– grittier and more painful, pulled from their lives.

He makes himself another piece of toast and then some eggs because it’s weird he’s only managed a meal a day for the days he remembers and it’s like his brain is catching up with him– not real hunger, but a wanting for the experience of cooking and eating. 

By the time he’s finished three episodes and done the dishes and made a peanut butter sandwich for Eddie for the car it’s about time to head to the airport. Eddie knows the precise minute when he’ll be outside of the gate doors– and Buck won’t be late.

The drive over is uneventful if annoying because morning rush hour traffic is bad even on the way to the airport and Buck has to drown out his inner thoughts with music and a mantra that all of this is not real and he needs to find a way out and not be dragged under by that thought so he can get back to the real Eddie.

To the Eddie who isn’t his but who is his Eddie.

He’s a few minutes early, so he waits in the pick up lane, knee bouncing in spite of himself.

Eddie exits the sliding doors and Buck lets himself a little moment of looking at him. The little bit of hair fallen on his forehead, the tension in his posture. It takes him a second to scan over Eddie’s body and is surprised to see he’s in a new outfit– a dark blue LAFD shirt and the jeans Buck knows are his favorite even though Eddie won’t admit it.

It makes Buck smile, that Eddie heard him when Buck wondered why he’s always in the same thing. Eddie scans the street in front of him, and his eyes land on Buck’s car, and he makes his way over. Buck thinks he’s moving like he’s been on a long shift– a slowness in his joints that Buck recognizes from the end of a call, the slight syrupy movement that screams exhaustion.

Eddie smiles a half-smile as he climbs in, “I like the airport limo service. Nice change.”

Buck throws the sandwich in his lap, “don’t ever say I don’t treat you right.”

Eddie laughs, and Buck can hear the tired edge in the tone. “I wouldn’t.”

Buck blushes at the honest tone because Eddie lets himself be more loose lipped when he’s running on empty. It’s something Buck’s always liked to hear in the locker room after a shift, Eddie bitching about his feelings about the PTA or his landlord or the new layout in the grocery store.

Eddie really hates when there’s a new layout at the grocery store. When Buck had heard he was doing work for Instacart and UberEats and DoorDash he’d wondered what Eddie would do in a completely new grocery store with a list in his hand of unfamiliar brands and a whiny customer in his texts.

Eddie had FaceTimed him and taken him around the shop with headphones in, making judgy faces about salsa brands and chip preferences. Buck had grinned like a fool the whole time.

“Cedars-Sinai?” Buck asks needlessly and Eddie nods as he chews his way through a mouthful of peanut butter. “You remember the guy’s face well enough to describe him to the security guard?”

Eddie nods again, reaching for a sip of Buck’s water bottle, “yeah– you get a good look at the woman?”

Buck shrugs, “good enough. Should we let Athena know?”

Eddie shakes his head, “she’ll have too many questions and there’s no way we can get her off the case if we give her a mystery.”

Buck remembers a Tupperware lid singed in the microwave and lied about, and the subsequent torn open cabinets at both the firehouse and Bobby’s. “True.”

“While we’re waiting I’ll go to the car and come back saying I saw them arguing so they’re on alert. Say I think I might have seen a gun.” Eddie talks and Buck nods along, because it’s as good a solution has they have.

The drive isn’t too long, but Buck still fills the car with talking, “who have you left Christopher with?”

“Adriana. She’s got swing hours at the moment, so she can take him to school and back.”

Buck is glad Eddie’s parents aren’t even the backup option since Eddie moved Chris to his house. “What’s the story you told her?”

“That there’s a water main break and we forgot to transfer the water bill over so I have to be there to deal with insurance.” Eddie clears his throat, “couldn’t have it be someone was hurt or Chris’ll worry, and there’s too many follow up questions if I just say you need me.”

Buck licks his lips to prevent himself from asking for clarification because he’s pretty sure he knows what that means– the couple of times he’s heard about Adriana she’s been obsessed with setting her friends up, and she reads into every person Eddie so much as mentions including, at one point, Maddie.

“You– when this is over, you could come just to come.” Buck suggests timidly, “or– I could visit.”

Eddie rubs a hand in frustration over his eyes, “I don’t want–”

“Me in Texas, I know.” Buck answers before the full rejection can come. “S-sorry I asked.”

“I don’t want you to have to come because I want to be back here , Buck.” Eddie hits the back of his skull into the headrest, “I want to sit down with Christopher and tell him I want to be here, that I hate Texas, that I think the system in California will be better for him for highschool, that the UC schools are better than UT.” He looks over at Buck and Buck has to look at the road because Eddie’s eyes are pleading, “Buck I– I didn’t do that… I didn’t do the other day as some weird charity.”

Buck tenses his jaw.

“I– I did it because I’ve wanted to for weeks and it felt like a way I could let myself have just a taste.” Eddie continues, “like maybe–” he rubs his hands against his jeans, “maybe I wouldn’t be selfish if it was just in my head, like a dream.”

“Selfish?” Buck frowns.

“Telling you. Asking you to put your life on hold in the hope that my kid says yes to coming back, that he doesn’t freak out when I tell him about myself, that he doesn’t try and move out again when he sees what I want with you.” Eddie shakes his head, “I told you before I won’t choose.”

Buck swallows, because he does know that, had heard it loud and clear. “I wouldn’t want you to.”

“I know.” Eddie says like it makes everything worse, “it’s one of the many ways you’ve fit yourself perfectly into my life.”

Buck worries at his lip, “I– you promise it’s not me?”

“Only in the way that I want you bad enough that it’s making me actually have to think about how to tell him.” Eddie’s hands stay in his lap, and Buck wants to reach across the gearbox to grab one, because he knows it would fit in his perfectly. 

Buck stares ahead, trying to absorb the words without shoving them away because they’re from dream Eddie, because he thinks it’s probably part of his journey to help Eddie figure out his shit in here.

“You could, today, if, uh- if you have a lot of empty time this afternoon.” Buck doesn’t like talking about the nothingness that maybe exists in the between time from his death to his waking up. “Like a test run. Get a sense of how he’ll feel. Report back tomorrow.”

Eddie’s eyebrows raise, like he hadn’t considered it, which is more evidence that Eddie is not the type it second guess everything he’s ever said while lying in bed awake. Which, frankly, Buck thinks it unfair.

“That feels kind of like cheating. I shouldn’t get a bunch of goes at coming out.”

Buck pulls a face, “you’re gonna come out to new people over and over and over again, Eddie. Everytime is new. Plus, you know he’ll be fine with that part, so you just have to hope the Buck of it is okay.”

Buck doesn’t feel the confidence he’s putting in his voice, but he thinks that’s mostly because he’s eighty percent sure none of this is real so his advice won’t ruin anyone’s real life.

They park at the expensive garage again, Buck tossing his keys over the hood, “if you need a ride back home tonight.” Eddie makes a face, but accepts them, putting them in his pocket, and Buck can’t keep himself from teasing, “come on, you gotta drive sometimes .”

“I drive for a living , Buck.” Eddie makes the face that Buck knows is him hiding a pout, and Buck can’t help but laugh, because his mind replicated that look perfectly, which makes Eddie move closer to pouting for real.

“Sure, sure, one of us has a broken brain and the other one hasn’t driven a foot since he’s been in town.” Buck says over his shoulder as he walks to the hospital, leaving an offended Eddie behind him to catch up.

Buck very intentionally doesn’t look at the patch of concrete that should have the stain of Eddie’s blood on it, taking a slightly circuitous path to the door that Eddie will notice but Buck’s not going to undo. He’d avoided the street where Eddie was shot for a month because he couldn’t get the idea that there was a shape of the puddle still on the asphalt, and anyways Eddie still gets all squirrely during thunderstorms sometimes so he doesn’t have a leg to stand on.

He looks over at the security guard who was at the scene yesterday and feels the moment when Eddie clocks him too. 

Eddie draws his attention while Buck heads to the front desk to describe his symptoms. They feel easier to discuss when he’s been ‘having’ them for days. Eddie shows up not long after he starts talking, adding to Buck’s story as easily as breathing, their tales in perfect synchronization.

The nurse takes their story, they’re told to wait, and Buck watches the waiting room, wondering if any of the faces will ring a bell, since some of them may have still been waiting yesterday when Eddie and Buck arrived over an hour later. Eddie sits with him, and Buck finally remembers to hand over the notes he’d taken earlier for Eddie to read through while Buck gets his brain scanned and then, if he’s lucky, his skull cracked open.

Eddie’s still looking over the scribbles when Buck gets called in, walking and reading as he trails behind Buck, close enough that Buck can feel his presence. It’s nice, having someone with him for this. He thinks back to Eddie sitting at his bedside, ring pop in his mouth while Buck suffered from boils. Thinks about Eddie letting Buck lean on him when Buck bruised some ribs bad enough to have trouble breathing.

Eddie’s been there, at his side.

They’re led to a bed to wait, and it’s so similar to the first memory of this day Buck has that it hits him harder than other pieces have, so he changes the memory because even if he does it every day Buck still doesn’t like dying.

He reaches for Eddie’s hand and pulls him in, wrapping his arms around Eddie’s shoulders, putting his forehead against Eddie’s chest.

Eddie’s hands come around him immediately, which is at least is how Eddie always is with hugs, so he’s glad his brain kept that real.

Buck doesn’t have anything to say, not really. “Could it have been the hug?”

“Hmm?” Eddie asks as they break apart so he can listen.

Buck gestures widely at the world they’re existing in, “I know you– you hugged me the first morning. Could it have been that?”

Eddie frowns, and clearly considers it before shaking his head, “I hugged you the morning before.”

Buck slumps, hands on the crinkly paper of the hospital bed.

The last time he’d made it this far in the story of this dream Eddie had– “you kissed me.”

Eddie blushes, “I know– we talked about–”

“No, Eddie.” Buck taps at Eddie’s sternum because the man hasn’t backed up much, is still almost in the V of Buck’s legs, “you kissed me, made a promise I wouldn’t be alone.”

Eddie’s brows go up, but not in disbelief, in surprise.

“Had you done that before?” Buck asks, but his heart knows without Eddie’s answer what he’ll say.

Eddie slowly shakes his head, “I-I–” he reaches out and smudges a thumb across Buck’s knuckle, “one here, the day before, but– uh, you were already gone.”

Buck thinks about the hand squeeze he’d stolen while Eddie was bleeding.

“So do you think it was the promise or the kiss?” Buck wonders, “and does it have to be you or could I bring someone in too?”

Eddie is looking at Buck with the look Buck has always sort of felt was just for him. He’s first earned it across Carla’s shoulder, just the barest hint of disbelief and affection. “I– I promised we’d get you out of this together two days before the first time I flew in.”

Buck tilts his head to think, “did you say the together thing?”

Eddie rubs a thumb over his brow, sighing, “I think so.”

“Hmm.” Buck wants to pull his phone out and start searching for ideas, “I ask because it sounds kind of like an oath, which might bond us– but, I think– I don’t remember…”

Eddie looks around them, like he kind of expects this to have been the worst and most elaborate prank ever, “I didn’t promise that day– I just said you weren’t alone.”

Buck bets Eddie remembers better, fear does not make his memory strong, “okay, so let’s say the kiss, then.”

“What happened to not believing the time loop?” Eddie crosses his arms.

“Still don’t, but I’ve decided my brain wants me to solve your problem as a way to solve mine. And if it starts seeming like you wanna keep me here I’ll switch it up.” Buck tilts his chin up, expecting a little fight from Eddie.

Eddie doesn’t fight back, he just smiles at Buck, which is kind of unnerving even if it’s not that unusual if Buck thinks about it.

“Mr. Buckley?” A nurse comes in, “I’m here to take you back for your scan.” She looks over at Eddie apologetically, “we’ll have him back in a flash.”

Eddie waves her off, eyes still on Buck, moving away so Buck can get in the wheelchair the nurse insists he uses.

“Kiss for luck?” Buck says once he’s settled, not liking the feeling of being wheeled in again. “You never know, might be like an Etch-a-Sketch and I’ll go back to forgetting.”

Eddie’s brows come together, like the idea makes him hurt, but he still moves forward and presses a soft kiss to Buck’s temple, he pulls back and Buck has to put on a pout to cover the way the simple act made his hands shake, but Eddie must see it as sadness, “no lips– just in case– I don’t want you to forget.”

Buck opens his mouth to explain that unless they’d weirdly shared exactly an even number of kisses the other day that argument doesn’t make any sense, but there’s a glint of humor and softness in Eddie’s eyes so instead he leans back, “fine, but tomorrow?”

“Buck the first tomorrow we get I’ll kiss you as many times as you want.”

Buck suddenly desperately wants Eddie to be right that this is a time loop, because he really doesn’t feel like he’s made much progress on his goal.

The nurse clears her throat and they both startle, she’s looking back, clearly feeling awkward to break it up, “we really have to go.”

Buck gets rolled back into the scanner, “uh– what time is it?”

“About ten thirty.” She says as she gets him situated.

Four hours. Buck can manage four hours. Even if one of them is locked in a loud metal tube and the rest may or may not be brain surgery.

Forty three minutes later Buck is brought back out to Eddie, and they’re joined almost immediately by a doctor, which is never a good sign. 

“Mr. Buckley, you have a cerebral aneurysm. It is in the right occipital lobe and we are hopeful we can remove it with surgery without allowing it to rupture. We’re going to go in and do a procedure called a flow diversion using a stent, which is where we redirect the blood flow away from the area to allow the area to heal.”

Buck knew the news was coming but it still hits because he didn’t– he doesn’t know those terms, wouldn’t be able to make them up if pressured.  “What are– what are my potential outcomes?” Buck asks because the doctor, who according to her tag is named Dr. Mehta, is looking at him like he should have questions.

She looks over at Eddie, who is sitting up, focused, then back at Buck, “usually pretty good, if we can prevent the rupture. All brain surgery comes with risks, but–”

“I’m a firefighter.” Buck blurts out.

She just nods, “the location shouldn’t mean our path will be too invasive, but we can discuss outcomes once we know more.”

Buck looks at Eddie, eyes wide, then back at the doctor, “I-I want the surgery, of course, but– you’ll tell him, if it looks like the outcome wasn’t favorable? I want him to have all the possible details about how my life will be after.” He looks at Eddie, “it’s important to me.”

Eddie look like Buck just punched him, but he nods after Buck silently begs him with his eyes. 

“Okay, we have some paperwork for your partner to sign–”

Buck waves it over, glad to let Eddie deal with it even if Eddie’s not technically legally anyone to him beyond his medical contact.

Eddie comes over and puts his hand on Buck’s shoulder, thumb near his collar bone, “this time.”

Buck half-smiles, “sure.” He looks up at Eddie, “if not, though– buy a first class ticket tomorrow.”

Eddie’s brows come together, “for a two hour flight?”

“The universe hates us having any money, Eddie. It’ll be like an investment in this going right.” Buck manages to smile more fully, “plus, I bet it’s a nicer nap.”

Eddie squeezes at the muscle under his hand, shaking Buck affectionately, “I can take care of myself, you know.”

“I know.” Buck nods, because he does , “I just like doing it too.”

Eddie leans forward and Buck wonders if he’s going to kiss him, but instead he just presses his forehead into Buck’s, “we know what it is. We’re so close.”

Buck reaches out and grabs Eddie’s hand because he gets to be selfish and needy before brain surgery. “Yeah.”

The doctor returns and Buck’s wheeled into the operating room. It’s cold and kind of dark and the anesthesiologist has to put a heat pad on his arm to get his veins to show up. He scolds him lightly for being dehydrated, and Buck promises to drink more water next time, which makes the guy laugh even though Buck bets he’s head the joke before.

Some other operating room expert comes by with a razor and shaving cream and starts chatting with the nurse that brought Buck in to confirm the site, and it makes Buck want to squirm away because he still hates the thought that there’s going to be a patch of bare skin on his scalp.

The room is getting weird already, walls a little liquidy, sound echoing wrong. Buck doesn’t like anesthesia.

“I know. You said.” The anesthesiologist replies.

The doctor from before, the one who is doing the surgery comes in while he’s getting woozy, and Buck has a sudden surge of an idea, “hey, uh, doctor Mehta?”

She comes over, looking very green and blue in her scrubs, clearly about to go scrub in and get ready to slice open his skull and cut into Buck’s brain, “yes?”

Buck feels kind of bad for what he’s about to do, in a far off way that he can’t hold fully in his mind, “I’m sorry.”

She frowns, but he’s fast, reaching out and pulling her down, pressing their lips together.

The anesthesiologist gasps, as do some other people in the room, and Buck just lays back down, hoping the drugs will kick in fully soon to pull him under.

“I’m sorry Dr. Mehta–” the anesthesiologist is apologizing and Buck’s not sure what for, Buck’s the one that is the creep.

He closes his eyes, and hears his doctor sigh, “that was a new reaction to being put under, but not the weirdest, Billings. I’ll survive. We know from his regular testing that he’s clean, and at least I hadn’t scrubbed in yet.”

Buck kind of wants to interject but his tongue is getting tired and his face is feeling tingly.

He can apologize more if he wakes up. When he wakes up? He’s not sure which one Eddie thinks is right. 

He can apologize better next time.

_____________

Buck wakes up to the sound of his phone ringing. He sits up, groaning because some little part of him really had thought maybe everything would work out. He guesses he needs to try something new, even if it’ll annoy Eddie.

He reaches over to the bedside table to pick up, voice rough, “guess that didn’t work.”

“Nope.” Eddie sounds worse than the day before. “The walls of the aneurysm were too delicate, halfway though the procedure something burst, so they had to try and remove it, but you- you coded twice and they never got you back.”

“Sorry.” Buck says it and means it, because he’d thought that even at his worse he’d never wish this on Eddie, but apparently his brain is still torturing them both.

Eddie just sighs, “it’s okay. Set your alarm for in a few hours and go back to sleep– I’ll see you at the gate.”

Buck wants to fight him a little because it’s not okay, but he really is tired and Eddie’s voice is nice even over the phone. “You buy that first class ticket?” Buck lies back down, putting Eddie on speaker as he sets his alarm for seven and pulls the blanket back up because death has become weirdly exhausting.

“Forgot.” Eddie replies in his lying voice. 

“Sure. I expect a first class ticket at some point, Mr. Cheapo.” Buck puts the phone on the bedside table.

Eddie makes a little noise, “how about this: I’ll fly first class back to El Paso if you live, Buckley.”

Buck doesn’t like the idea that Eddie would only treat himself if Buck lives, “counter offer: if we have to repeat again you buy one tomorrow and I buy you and Chris a first class seat for whenever you come visit?”

There’s a little silence where Buck can practically hear Eddie force himself not to say no just because it would be too expensive for Buck. “Deal.” 

Buck grins, “okay, back to sleep. See you soon. Try and nap in coach, we’re doing today by my rules so wear something covert.”

“What does that mean?” Eddie asks, voice full of concern.

“Not now, I’m sleeping, Eddie.” Buck closes his eyes.

“Buck, what does that mean? ”

Buck makes theatrical snoring noises until Eddie hangs up. 

When he next wakes up he feels a little more human, like he can handle a day of hunting through the halls of a hospital for his own fucking body like a bloodhound. He sends off a quick text to Bobby saying his plans have changed and he’ll hang the shelves tomorrow, and smiles at Bobby’s reply that that works better for him too.

He gets ready, choosing something new to wear because he wants to be forgettable as possible– boring neutral tones and comfortable white sneakers. He makes and packs more PB&Js, and then throws the scallion pancakes into the bag too along with a couple Gatorades because even if he’s not going under the knife today he promised the doctor the day before he’d be better about hydrating.

He’s going to find his body, and if he doesn’t manage that, then he’s going to find Dr. Mehta and see if his theory was right.

If it was he will feel pretty bad if he trapped her in a time loop with them, but seeing as how she’s his brain surgeon maybe she can get them out if Eddie is the one who’s right.

Traffic is the exact same as it was, as is the hugging couple in the truck in front of Buck while he waits for Eddie. Eddie comes through the door in a dark grey Henley and black jeans, and something buzzes in Buck’s chest that he followed the covert instructions even if he didn’t understand Buck’s intention.

He likes how Eddie always jumps in alongside him, even when he doesn’t know why Buck has leapt.

Eddie opens the door, eyes narrowed, “okay what’s your way mean?”

Buck tosses the box of scallion pancakes into his lap, “eat, we’re gonna need fuel while we comb the whole hospital for my body.”

“Buck–” Eddie sighs in annoyance.

“Uh uh, I have gone along with your time loop theory for nearly a week. You owe me a day of Buck is in a coma and we have to break him out.” Buck points a finger at Eddie, wondering if this will be the moment that the cracks start showing and Eddie tries to trap him in the dream.

Eddie’s shoulders just fall and he stuffs a pancake in his mouth, “okay. What hospital are we starting at?”

The fizz of warmth is more intense, “I figure my dream was pointing me to Cedars Sinai through your research so we’ll do that one today. If we don’t have any luck then tomorrow you get a brain surgery day and we’ll trade off til one of us is right.”

Eddie inhales noisily through his nose, the same way he does when Chris is making the case for a later bedtime, “that’s… fair. But, Buck– there’s a lot of hospitals in L.A.”

“Well then you better hope it’s a time loop because this is gonna be a fucking slog otherwise.” Buck shoots him a shit-eating grin because one of his favorite things to do is mildly annoy Eddie, and this is the most concentrated annoyance he’s had since his outbursts before Eddie moved.

He can feel Eddie’s most mild scowl on his cheek, so he just does a little rhythmic tap on the steering wheel and ignores it, liking the way it feels to be in charge for a change.

Buck almost picks a new entrance to the hospital, since they don’t need to be in the emergency area it doesn’t make sense for them to head that way until Eddie shakes his head, “we gotta go save that woman.”

Buck blinks, because even though Eddie doesn’t believe him that this is the way out he’s still making sure anyone they can save makes it to tomorrow just in case.

They check in with the security guard, doing their best to describe the guy, and when the guard looks a little unconvinced Buck leans in and says “he’s got a sixth sense for this stuff– he has a Silver Star.”

Eddie rolls his eyes, but he nods when the guard looks at him, “just gave me a bad feeling.”

The guard promises to keep an eye out and Buck asks for directions to the main lobby, which is outside and to the left. Once back inside Buck walks with confidence to the elevator, knowing most people don’t stop people who look like they know where they’re going, and he’s glad to find he’s right. 

Hospitals have a lot of visitors, and there are doctor offices on the floors so it’s possible he has an appointment. The elevator doors close on him and Eddie, and he looks at the buttons, grateful for some labels, “okay, I think we should look on the recovery floors.”

Eddie nods, “those are on three. I- they sent me to wait.” Buck reaches with one hand to press the button and puts his other out, wrist up, offering his pulse, but Eddie shakes his head, “I know you’re alive because you’re being a pain in my ass.”

Buck laughs and the doors open to a small nurse station where a man is sitting, “hello– can I help you?”

Buck smiles, walking in and leaning over the counter, hoping he’ll catch a name on a loose chart or something, “I-I’m here to visit–”

“Tim in 301.” Eddie supplies, making Buck turn, eyebrows up. Eddie shoots him an unimpressed look in return.

The nurse looks at his lists, “ah– yep. Here’s the sign in sheet, and I’ll print you a visitor sticker.”

Buck takes the clipboard and fills in the required information for both him and Eddie while Eddie spells their names to the nurse so the badges will be correct. It’s nice hearing Eddie spell his name, “E-V-A-N.” Eddie doesn’t call him that, Buck thinks out of a shared understanding that chosen nicknames are to be respected, but Buck remembers the one time he did with perfect clarity. Eddie staring straight forward instead of making eye contact, then looking over with such softness in his eyes, the kindest words Buck’s ever heard on his lips.

 Eddie’s hand slaps a rectangle on Buck’s chest, pulling him from the memory, “let’s go see cousin Tim.”

“It’s just down the hall, first room on the left.” The nurse points as Buck hands over the paperwork. 

Buck waves, “thanks!” he turns as they walk, “how the hell? ”

“He was walking past me yesterday while I was waiting– they wanted him up and mobile as soon as possible.” Eddie says quietly, “now let’s look for you.”

They start down the hall, looking into each room– two beds per space, none containing anyone who looks like Buck. There’s a moment when Buck startles because he sees someone with their face wrapped and he wonders if maybe– but their arms are bare of tattoos and Buck moves on, feeling a strange mix of disappointed and glad.

The floor isn’t big, and since they both have badges and look like they’re moving with a purpose no one stops them as they head down the loop of the hall. They’re back at the front desk quicker than Buck would have assumed they could be, and if the nurse is confused by their emergence from the wrong side of the loop he doesn’t show it.

“All set?” He looks at them expectantly.

Buck is mulling over what he should say, “uh-um, yeah, I just– is there another floor where people could be?”

The nurse looks confused, “did you not find your cousin?”

“No! We did, uh, it’s just–” Buck looks over to Eddie expectantly, hoping he’ll step in and help, but Eddie isn’t any more prepared than Buck is for the next steps. “I– he was in the- uh, a bit ago?” Buck clears his throat, building on the idea that’s almost half-formed as he speaks, “Eddie was in the hospital a few years ago and I thought it was– I thought we were up here, but– this doesn’t look like the floor?”

The nurse nods, “well, unless he was in here for any neuro or cardiac reasons he wouldn’t have been on this floor.” He looks at Eddie, “what were you in for?”

Eddie scrunches his nose like he does when he has to talk about the shooting, but his voice is calm and unbothered, “gunshot wound.”

The nurse takes it in stride, “trauma surgeries usually end up on the second floor in the A wing. It’s laid out more linearly and their wall color is totally different.”

“Oh, yeah– that, that makes sense.” Buck stumbles through the agreement, “I felt like the loop wasn’t how it was. It was, uh, messing with my head.” He scratches at his jaw, trying for aw shucks rather than weirdo.

Based on the forgiving smile he succeeds, “the whole place messes me up sometimes too– sometimes during my shifts in the A wing I walk the whole length of the hall expecting to come back to the front desk for some coffee and then I have to do that weird pretending to have something in the other direction thing.”

Buck and Eddie both laugh, and Eddie puts a hand at Buck’s back, “thanks for clearing that up. We’ll get out of your hair.”

The nurse waves him off, “no problem at all. Have a great day!”

They get into the elevator, quiet until the doors are closed and they’re moving. Buck frowning down at his own feet, “I thought I’d be there.”

“We can still check the other wing– maybe you’re–”

Buck looks at Eddie, mouth turned down on both sides, “it felt like it would make sense that I was in neuro, though. I didn’t– I don’t remember any trauma– why would I be over there?”

“Last time what did you do?” Eddie says as they exit at the lobby level, and Buck knows that he doesn’t believe Buck’s theory, but he’s doing what he always does: he’s listening.

Buck shrugs because he’s not really sure– dream logic had been so much more a part of the fabric of the thing last time. Everything had been a little wrong even when it was built to be nice, like a smile with too many teeth.

Eddie looks torn, and Buck can practically see him debating between encouraging Buck to head farther into this idea and trying to convince him to come to the emergency room and give surgery another go.

“You know any nurses here?” Eddie asks, and it surprises Buck enough to make him go still.

Buck tilts his head in thought, “maybe? I think one of the crew from North Hollywood Medical Center got a shift lead position? Maybe Carmela?”

“She worked ER and trauma ward. Let’s go see if she’s on. We can see if she’ll let us check in on the guy we brought in a week ago.” Eddie ushers him towards the elevators to the A wing.

“Eddie– we didn’t– we don’t have to–” Buck’s moving with him, but with much less certainty than Eddie has.

There’s a gasp and a clatter behind them and to the left, and Buck turns to look. There’s papers on the ground beside a clipboard, but before he can move towards them to help the reason they were dropped becomes apparent.

Dr. Mehta is looking at him, mouth wide open.

Buck waves, “hi again.”

Her eyes go wide, and she looks around the lobby, like she’s checking for something.

Eddie clears his throat, “Buck! He means– uh, hello for the first time.”

She looks at Eddie, shaking her head, still not picking up the papers on the floor, “I– I have to go home.”

Buck puts his hands up, “no no no! You’re okay, uh, do you want to go to the cafe with us? We can explain.”

“Explain what , Buck?” Eddie hisses, and Buck feels kind of bad he forgot to mention the choice he made for the two of them.

Buck inhales, looks at Eddie, looks at Dr. Mehta, and then back at Eddie, mumbling a little because Eddie looks put out. “Explain how she got dragged into our time loop.”

Dr. Mehta’s eyes widen, “nope.”

“What do you mean ‘nope?’” Buck makes a face, “look, I promise you’re in this– and I’ll be back under the knife tomorrow so if you could, like figure out–”

“Nope!” She turns on her heel and walks away, leaving the papers on the ground.

There’s stillness for a beat, the hustle of the lobby still moving around them.

Buck turns to Eddie, “what the hell?”

Eddie’s gone from frustrated to amused, “you would not believe how satisfying that is after the way you reacted the first two phone calls.”

Buck looks after the doctor, “should we follow her?”

Eddie shrugs, “probably not advised unless we want to spend the next four hours being talked to by cops.”

Buck sags, “fine. Let’s– I dunno, let’s go look for me in the trauma ward.”

“Can we get a coffee first so you can explain to me what the fuck you did?” Eddie gestures towards the small cafe in the lobby, “I haven’t had any caffeine yet.”

Buck is reminded that neither has he, and he should have recognized the lack earlier, the way it makes his brain just a little more sluggish, a little less able to handle the complete rejection of the doctor, “yeah- yeah of course.”

There’s no line, so Eddie goes to grab two drinks and Buck takes up one of the small, kind of wobbly, round tables. Eddie’s across from him surprisingly quickly. “They only had hot or iced.”

Buck nods as he accepts the plastic cup of iced coffee, a splash of milk already swirling into the darker brown, two Sugar in the Raw packets offered and waiting for Buck to swirl in.

“I kissed her.” He says at just the wrong time because it makes Eddie cough in surprise, spilling a little bit of his own coffee onto his hand as he plutters.

“What?”

Buck avoids eye contact by using his straw to try and mix in the the grainy sugars even though the reason he likes the raw sugar is the sandy little crystals that he can suck up through the straw and crunch on. “I– I had just gotten anesthesia and she came in to check on me before scrubbing in and I had this thought that there was no reason not to test out the theory.”

“No reason?” Eddie sounds strangled, “what if you’d lived?”

“People do weird shit under anesthesia.” Buck takes a sip, trying to seem cool and collected even as he mostly feels like he should have run the idea by Eddie, “I- it wasn’t thought through, I was just lying there while they got me all ready to go under and she came in and it seemed like the best time, so I apologized and then kinda laid one on her.”

“Of course.” Eddie looks at the table and Buck takes the moment to study the way Eddie’s holding himself. He looks tired, still, but– Buck thinks the progress they made is helping a little, even if Buck’s the obstacle this day Eddie seems more sure that they have a path through, less desperately hunting.

“It worked, though, so–” Buck takes a sip, glad that the station coffee is horrid so he barely notices how burnt it is, “so she’ll know what to do tomorrow.”

Eddie looks up, a small smile growing on his lips and he seems a little lost in thought, “she was clearly frustrated– she said they’d done everything. I bet– I bet you’re right. She knows more now.”

Buck bounces his knee under the table, “we just have to hope I didn’t scare her off.”

Eddie looks over his shoulder at the lobby behind him, “doesn’t seem like it.”

Buck turns and the table wobbles, spilling a puddle of coffee out, but he can’t focus on that because Dr. Mehta is in street clothes and stalking over towards them, which makes Buck wave before he can think about how weird it probably is for her to see someone she pronounced dead alive and waving her over.

To her credit she only blanches and doesn’t turn on her heel, just comes to stand at the side of the table, hands on her hips, looking at the two of them, “explain.”

Buck goes to open his mouth but Eddie’s already talking, “from what we can tell I am over two weeks into the repeats of this day– Buck dies at two fourteen– and yesterday Buck tested the idea that if you get kissed you join the loop.”

Dr. Mehta looks at Buck with narrowed eyes, making Buck blush and mumble out, “sorry again, for that.”

“And you think the way to get out is to save him?” She looks at Eddie again, which is kind of insulting because Buck is part of this too.

“Either that or find my real body in some hospital because I’m still not sure this isn’t another coma dream.” Buck pipes up because his solution is as believable as Eddie’s.

“Another coma– oh, right, lightning strike on your chart.” Dr. Mehta rubs a hand across her forehead, looking at her watch, “there’s no way we get the CT-scan processed and me scrubbed in and you prepped in a few hours.”

Buck and Eddie nod in agreement, and Buck shrugs his shoulders as an explanation, “today is a search the hospital day.”

Dr. Mehta just kind of stares at him in silence like she’s trying to reopen his brain.

“How many goes do you think you’ll need?” Eddie asks and she looks over, then back at Buck like she’s considering her response.

“Now that I know the walls are thinner I’ll plan for microvascular clipping from the start instead.” Her tone makes Buck feel a bit like a specimen. “If you get in faster tomorrow it’ll be better.”

“What do you suggest?” Buck leans forward, “clearer symptoms?”

“What time can you two drive over?”

Buck looks to Eddie, “first flight from El Paso gets him in fast enough for us to be here by nine fifteen or so.”

“El Paso? But you two–” Dr. Mehta frowns, then clearly decides to move on, which Buck appreciates because explaining to his brain surgeon his and Eddie’s whole thing would probably be a but much, “why– can’t you just drive over here yourself, Mr. Buckley?”

Buck shakes his head vigorously, unable to voice why he can’t and already mentally fighting Eddie on this point once she walks away, “we can be here at nine ten if I drive a little more recklessly. Why don’t you post up by the desk and call us straight back when you hear my symptoms?”

She considers this, “okay, tell them you had a seizure over a minute long and it’ll be triaged up so I’ll get the case as soon as the scan is run.”

Buck can practically see Eddie record it to his brain, “we will.”

“See you tomorrow.” Buck agrees, and she makes a face.

“I very much hope I don’t and this is all some horrible dream, but seeing as how I managed to step on a Lego straight out of bed and my phone was dead and the first two patients of the shift were the same, it seems likely.”

Buck and Eddie share a look, “we get it.”

The doctor sighs, “I hate that it seems like you do.” She looks around, “I am going to go get a very nice lunch and hope that the impromptu day off I just took doesn’t get me fired.”

Buck waves as she leaves and she sends him another annoyed look like she very much isn’t interested in his friendship, which is fair but it still stings a little. “I don’t think she likes me.”

“You kissed her and forced her to relive a day until she saves your life.” Eddie says a little snarkily, and Buck can admit when the man is right.

“Pot. Kettle.” He points between them.

Eddie frowns, “I didn’t know , Buck.”

“Still.” Buck takes a sip, “it’s the principle of the thing. And I didn’t know either, I just wondered. ”

Eddie makes a face, “ wondered enough to kiss her.”

Buck blinks across at him, “are you seriously fucking jealous?”

“No.” Eddie says too abruptly for it to be the truth.

Buck widens his eyes, “this is a pattern.”

Eddie takes a sip of his coffee, looking to the side, shaking his head slightly, “don’t think so.”

“It is! On– at the diner you–” Buck thinks further back, “and Nat, a-and Taylor!” Eddie squeezes his cup hard enough that the ice makes a sound, which makes a grin spread across Buck’s face, “you hated Abby too and you never even met her til the train.”

“You’re making me sound like an asshole, Buck.” Eddie frowns down at the table, artfully avoiding Buck’s eyes.

Buck shakes his head, “I’m not making you sound like anything. You’re jealous.”

Eddie’s ears have gone pink, which makes a thrill tingle along Buck’s spine. 

“What happened to thinking I’m your own brain? Can we go back to that delusion?” Eddie mumbles into his straw.

Buck can feel the expression on his face fall, because he had forgotten, for a second. Had got lost in the Eddieness of the conversation, the easy banter he’s missed for weeks, “oh– right.”

Eddie notices the quick change, and Buck can tell he regrets the words, but doesn’t quite know what to say to fix it without setting off an argument. Eddie looks over his shoulder, sighing before he turns back to Buck, “Le- let’s go up to trauma.” 

“Yeah?” Buck looks around them, trying to muster up the certainty he’d felt before that a coma dream is what he’s been experiencing, but the alternative means having to think about what Eddie’d meant by kissing him, which isn’t something he wants to do even while dying, “sure.”

They make their way to the elevator, and Buck finds himself bumping their shoulders together as he walks, “what’s our story?”

Eddie shakes his head, “no clue, you want to text Carmela?”

“I don’t have her number. Guess we just gotta ask if she’s here and hope she’ll wave us in.” Buck sticks his hands in his pockets, “if we don’t make it in let’s find a name of a patient we can use for my next turn.”

“Sure.” Eddie nods, pressing the button to the floor, “keep your ear out.”

Carmela isn’t at the desk, and neither Buck nor Eddie recognize the woman who is, but they move to her anyway, Eddie leaning with a fake smile that Buck is pretty sure most people would buy, “hi, we’re from the LAFD, and we brought in a patient this week– and we wanted to check up on them.”

The woman smiles up, eyelashes fluttering at the sight of Eddie and Buck gets it but she could stand to be more professional in his opinion. “Yeah? Uh– I mean–” she looks down at the records in front of her, “I just got on shift, do you know their name?”

“Honestly? No. My partner here found them unconscious and we weren’t able to get them awake on the ride over– we’re hoping to ask them if they remembered what happened so we have a fuller sense of how the fire started.” Eddie nods over at Buck who smiles when the nurse glances at him but then turns her eyes right back to Eddie, which makes Buck roll his own.

“A fire?” She looks through charts and Buck tries to read a couple upside down, but she’s fast and he’s never been amazing at decoding like that. He catches something like Phillip S, which will probably be enough to get them somewhere. “We don’t have anyone who had smoke inhalation or burns…”

“They wouldn’t’ve.” Buck blurts out, “the fire started in the other room, we couldn’t find a cause for their unconsciousness.”

The nurse nods while staring at Eddie like Buck’s explanation makes any sense, which Buck guesses it kind of does. She is still looking through the files, “I’m sorry but I’m not seeing anyone who was brought in unconscious…” her lips turn down, looking up at Eddie with big wide eyes like she could ever compete with Eddie’s brown ones when he begs, “what firehouse do you work at? I could ask around for anyone who knows? Maybe they’re over in neuro?”

“That’s okay, I know you’re busy.” Eddie smiles in reply like she’s been helpful, which Buck understands she hasn’t been because the patient they’re describing isn’t real, but on the other hand she really has not been of any use. He leans forward, voice quiet and sincere, “we’ll pray for them.”

Buck doesn’t manage to school his face quick enough to not look completely baffled by Eddie, but it’s okay because the nurse probably wouldn’t notice if he started tangoing with a bear at this point.

“O-of course.” She sounds breathless, hand reaching up to play with a little gold cross Eddie must have noticed and Buck only barely manages to stop himself from rolling his eyes again and only because Eddie turns and looks at Buck at that moment and Buck had just teased Eddie for jealousy, he’s not getting caught out so soon.

“Thank you.” Eddie calls over his shoulder and looks at Buck meaningfully.

“Yeah, thanks.” Buck huffs as they get back into the elevator, voice lowering, “for nothing.”

Eddie looks at him with one eyebrow raised, “we were asking her to find someone who doesn’t exist, Buck.”

Buck crosses his arms, “still.”

“You’re ridiculous.” Eddie shakes his head as he presses the L button, “did you notice any names or were you too busy glaring at Tanya?” 

“Tanya?” Buck wishes he had a modicum of a poker face sometimes. “We’re on a first name basis now?”

Eddie looks pleased at Buck’s response, “she had on a nametag.”

Buck does not make a face and repeat Eddie’s words in a tone but it’s close. “Phillip S was the best I got.”

“It’ll work.”

There’s a loud shudder, a metallic scrape, and the elevator stops moving, lights going dim. Buck sighs, because they both know that’s a sign that the power has gone out for the elevator. “Of course.”

Eddie laughs, “come on, it’s not the worst place we’ve been stuck.”

Buck looks over at him, “I hope the cable snaps and we plummet to the ground and get to restart the day.”

That makes Eddie laugh harder, “We’re on like the second floor, so at worse we’d have some broken bones. Plus, I think probably that would have made the news, even if the elevator was empty, especially since I was here at the hospital until the evening yesterday dealing with paperwork and preventing them from calling Maddie. Plus it’s almost eleven at this point, so we’ll be out before you get to restart.”

There’s an ominous creak and the call button lights up, voice crackling through– “our apologies– it seems there was a system reset on this elevator, so we can hopefully get you moving in about an hour, unless you for any reason need an immediate exit, in which case we can call the fire department to get you out?”

“No!” They both say in unison, looking up at the camera, shaking their heads vehemently, and Buck lunges to push the talk button, “we’re not in any rush, we can wait.”

“Okay?” the disembodied voice sounds surprised.

Buck presses the button again, “we’re off duty firefighters– we don’t mind the wait, and we don’t want the teasing.”

“Sure thing. We’ll give you an update in thirty minutes.”

Buck sighs gives the camera a thumbs up while Eddie slides down the wall to sit. Buck looks over and decides to join him, sinking against his own wall, legs out in front of him perpendicular to Eddie’s. “With our luck they’d call the 118.”

Eddie nods, “at least we know we’d hear the end of it, since we’d only be teased today.”

Buck considers that, “but we’d know.”

“Exactly.” Eddie nods, smiling over, and Buck looks around them to avoid staring for too long at his smile.

They sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes before Buck tilts his head back and stares up at the ceiling, trying not to think about their predicament and failing, “you-”

There’s a long pause, and finally Eddie replies, “you gonna finish that sentence?”

Buck wonders if he should, or if he should play it off and act like he’d been about to tell Eddie a story to fill the time, “nothing– just.”

“Doesn’t feel like nothing.” Eddie says after another pause, and his tone isn’t worried, but it’s got a tinge of something in it that makes Buck look at him fully, taking in his body position, noticing how Eddie’s holding himself more tightly than he was before Buck spoke.

“Why’d you pull back?” The question that’s been almost there a few times now tumbles out and surprises even Buck.

Eddie frowns, “when?”

Buck looks at his watch, sees they’re going to be stuck in the box for at least another fifty minutes, “never mind.”

That makes Eddie purse his lips in annoyance, “come on, you clearly have something to say.”

“I don’t, actually.” Buck retorts nonsensically because he’d been the one to speak first.

Eddie huffs out some air, tilting his own head back against the wall and closing his eyes, “fine.”

Eddie knows Buck hates the whole silent treatment.

Buck jiggles his bent knee up and down.

He shouldn’t restart an argument with a figment of his own imagination while they’re stuck in an elevator together.

“It’s just– you wanted me to have a good day, wanted to have some fun.” He starts talking again without even really registering opening his mouth, “why not jump all the way in?”

Eddie squeezes his eyes shut, jaw working. “Because.”

Buck barrels through the stupid adolescent nothing of an answer. “Is it because I’m a guy? That didn’t seem– you said you’re not straight.” 

Eddie’s hands clench on his knees, “I don’t know what I am, Buck.”

“Straight?”

“No.” Eddie answers with finality, looking at Buck, then gesturing over, “obviously.”

“You’ve said that before– obviously.” Buck waves, “but nothing’s obvious over here.”

Eddie shakes his head, “you’re the one who shut down talking about this.”

“Sure, a couple days ago, before you died once and I died twice and now we’re waiting on go number three so give me this. Why did you pull back?”

Eddie looks at Buck, searching his face for something, “because I thought you’d already forgotten our first kiss.”

Buck makes a face, “that’s not a reason. ”

Eddie pulls his knees in a little, resting his arms on them, “sure it is.”

“You thought I’d forgotten our first kiss? That’s it?” Buck looks up at the silver metal of the ceiling, because Eddie’s not making any sense .

It’s still for a moment, the air heavy, but eventually Eddie speaks, quiet and sad, “you only get so many firsts, Buck. I- I didn’t want to be the only person to remember all of ours.”

That makes Buck jerk his head back down to look at Eddie who is staring at his own forearms like looking back at Buck is too hard. 

Because that doesn’t make sense. It had made sense if Eddie was just trying to give Buck some happiness, or if it was to show Buck how unbelievable it would be for Eddie to be into him, or even to torture Buck with some weird kind of cruel version of his best friend.

But that– that doesn’t track.

“Shit.” He manages to squeak out, “we’re in a fucking time loop.”

Eddie looks up, “why is that the thing that makes you believe?”

“Because if you were Eddie from my brain then you’d be Eddie from my brain.” Buck tries to explain, but he understands why Eddie doesn’t look like he’s been clear, so he tries again, “we– that would not have been my first time with inside my brain Eddie.”

Eddie’s eyebrows go up, “no?” There’s a smile growing on his lips.

Buck shoots him a look, “no.” He gestures at Eddie, “you’ve looked in a mirror, right?”

Eddie shrugs, grin growing, “sure.”

“Shut up .” Buck feels his cheeks heat, “you’re hot and perfect and-and, uh, m-my person. I– it’s not weird, brains are uncontrollable.”

“Who said weird?” Eddie is fully smiling now, “I’m just wondering what dream Eddie does to make you blush like that.”

An embarrassing number of images flood Buck’s brain, of Eddie on his knees in his turnouts, dark lashes long and eyes pleading, of Eddie above him, holding Buck’s knee up in his wide hand as he thrusts, of his fingers carding through Buck’s sweaty hair as Buck licks down his chest. All of them send a thrill of heat through Buck’s core, but the one that keeps rising to the top is making him blush not because it’s sexual, but because it’s not.

He’s dreamed about Eddie’s arms around his waist, chin hooked over Buck’s shoulder, laugh warm and deep at Buck’s back while Buck talks and stirs something at the stove. Dreamed about Chris theatrically gagging when he walks in, calling them gross. Of Eddie squeezing tighter and smacking a loud kiss to the hinge of Buck’s jaw, smile in his voice as he says quietly, “don’t listen to him, amor.”

He’s thankfully broken from his memories by the return of the voice, “good news– we figured everything out on our end, and we should have you moving in just a couple minutes!”

“Thanks.” Eddie does a thumbs up at the camera, and then grunts as he stands. He walks over and puts his hand out, “c’mon.”

Buck lets Eddie pick him up, dragged forward into Eddie’s space, and for the first time that he can remember Eddie doesn’t step back to let Buck’s bulk fill the space easily, so they’re almost chest to chest. 

It’s a little close for Buck to be now that he’s ninety percent sure that the Eddie in front of him is real and will remember this whole fiasco once they’re out. “You– you’re real.”

Eddie nods, hand still holding Buck’s, “yep.”

Buck needs to say the words out loud again, “and we’re in a time loop.”

“Day sixteen and counting.” Eddie agrees, still facing Buck, still close.

“And you still let me do this whole stupid thing.” Buck gestures helplessly at the day in general, “when we could have gone into surgery and just been done.”

Eddie nods slightly, “sure, but maybe not, and you’ve gone along with every one of my plans even on the days when you didn’t believe me.”

The elevator starts up and Buck squeezes Eddie’s hand, “you wanna get lunch?”

Eddie’s eyes crinkle up at the sides, “yeah.”

The elevator dings and they’re back in the lobby, and Buck doesn’t let Eddie let go, he just drags him back to the car and winces at the cost of the parking and then they’re on the road together, and Eddie is in his car in Los Angeles .

He’s in California with Buck and not Texas with his son.

“You– yesterday after, did you call Chris?” Buck asks.

Eddie inhales a little sharply, “I– I called him, I just. I don’t– I’m not having the first time I say it to him be when I know he won’t remember.” He looks over at Buck, “I know you said I’ll be coming out forever, but I don’t want him to– I don’t want to know how it will go when I do it. He doesn’t deserve that.”

Buck meets his eyes briefly before returning to the road, “you’re right.”

“Yeah?”

Buck nods, “yeah, Eddie. I’m sorry I suggested it.”

“In your defense you thought I was a figment of a coma dream.” Eddie tosses back.

“Sure, but I was still giving the figment bad advice. What did you talk to him about?”

Eddie hums, “how the day was, how you are.”

Buck blanches, “I assume you didn’t say–”

“I did not tell him you were temporarily dead, no. Said you had picked up a last minute shift and I was waiting for the repair guy.” Eddie sighs, “I hate lying to him but the alternative feels cruel. I know what his face looks like all scrunched up and red at the news, I know how he feels in my arms, I know the echoes of his sniffles. I don’t– I’m not– it’s too much.”

Buck reaches out and knocks their hands together, a mixture of a bump and a brush, “you’re keeping him from being hurt by a worse lie. Because I’m not dead, and he shouldn’t have to think I am, even for a few hours.”

Eddie nods, “I will tell him, Buck.”

“I know.” Buck lets himself believe because Eddie hasn’t lied to him, not really, not about important things. “How do you feel about sitting on the beach with me and some In-N-Out?”

“Pretty good.” Eddie agrees so easily that it makes Buck smile so hard his cheeks hurt. 

It’s not that long a trip, and the drive-thru doesn’t have a horrible line, and in less than an hour Buck is sitting with his pants rolled up at the ankle, bare feet in the sand sharing fries with Eddie. Buck even got a weird little thrill when he decides to not put on sunscreen for once because even when he burns it’s not like it’ll end up giving him skin cancer. It’s pretty perfect for a low key second date, even if Buck’s keeping that label to himself. 

“I missed this.” Eddie says around a bite of his burger.

“I know. In-N-Out’s the only California chain that I really do think beats everything east of here.” Buck wiggles his toes as he eats, liking the heat of the sand under his feet. 

“No, idiot.” Eddie lightly punches Buck’s shoulder, “I mean, yes, but mostly this .”

“The beach?” Buck looks out at the view, “I forget Texas doesn’t have any near you.”

“I can’t stand you.” Buck gasps but Eddie is already putting his burger down on the bag, turning fully towards him, “ you , dumbass. I miss sitting places with you and having them feel special just because you’re there with me.”

“Oh.” Buck swallows a mouthful of fry frantically because he’s let Eddie have too many of the big declarations. “I– I moved into your house because I thought it was my favorite place in the world but it turned out I only really love it when you’re there. I walk weird to avoid bumping the little table in the hallway that isn’t there anymore, and I put my couch where yours was not because the angle’s good but because I knew if I didn’t that when I got home from a shift I’d break my ass on the floor because I’d go to sit on it and it wouldn’t be there. I call you when I get off work because it feels like maybe you’ll be there when I pull in to park.”

Eddie looks sad, which wasn’t Buck’s intention, “I– I promise I’m a whole person even without you, Eddie, no matter what it looked like before you left. I function, I have a family here, a job I love, a house that works for me. I’m not broken without you, but it turns out that when you take away you and Chris there’s a hole in my heart that I don’t have the skills to fix and I don’t– I don’t want to.”

“You’re my people. And I can wait, or move, or call you every day and use my vacation time and fly to you and host you guys anytime you wanna fly over too. I– I can do long distance with you because I know you- you wouldn’t disappear on me.” Buck reaches out, interlaces their fingers, “and I know you’d be here if you had your way.”

Eddie squeezes his hand, “of course.”

Buck is shocked by how he isn’t surprised at all by Eddie’s confirmation, but Eddie’s shown him every day since he left that he still cares about Buck as much as he always did– calling him every time he needs any advice, but also when he just wants to hear about Buck’s life. Eddie has maybe upped the amount they stay in touch, even with the chaos of reconnecting with his son. It makes him feel settled and right, like Eddie is holding onto their connection as tight as Buck is.

“So, we’re doing this.” Eddie swallows.

“If Christopher–”

Eddie shakes his head, “I know what I’ve said before but he’s a teenager. I’m not letting him determine this for me. I will respect his wishes as much as I can, but I am his dad and I am allowed to have things like this.”

Buck blinks, “that– are you sure–”

“They handed me a bag of your things, Buck. And inside your wallet was a photo of us and Chris from a photo booth strip that I have the other half of. You have a note that’s just names of recipes we’ve tried with an emoji rating system. When I’m worried about how to be his dad you tell me how to dad up. The first real progress we made was when I just showed up and acted how I wanted to, not waiting on him to tell me. I won’t– I don’t want to start this without telling him and being up front, but I am not letting him prevent it because he’s fourteen. I have lost you fifteen days in a row and I don’t want to wait.”

Buck swallows, feeling the tears on the edges of his eyes, “you asshole – stop one upping my speeches.”

“No.” Eddie grins, “I’m gonna make you sob at the altar.”

Buck’s mouth falls open, “yeah?”

“Yeah.” Eddie’s eyes trace over Buck’s face. “But I can let you have the better speech at our vow renewal.”

Buck can feel his cartilage melting into happy goo, so he wipes his hands on his thighs to clear off the last of the ketchup and reaches out, pulling Eddie in for a kiss that tastes like In-N-Out burger sauce and fry salt.

When Buck moved to California he’d gone to the beach pretty often, usually just to get out of the crowded house and breathe in salty air, but repeated trips with the sand in his Jeep had made the shine wear off a little, and then the tsunami had made the ocean permanently a little complicated to deal with. Kissing Eddie with one hand braced on the sand and the sound of waves might change his mind about all of it.

If he’s honest with himself he’d probably like the sewers if Eddie decided to kiss him in one.

He pulls, and Eddie follows, straddling his middle as Buck lies in the sand, knowing it’ll be all in his curls, but since he won’t really have to deal with the consequences it’s okay.

They have time until Buck dies, and Buck thinks he’d be pretty okay with spending all of it making out on the beach with Eddie until he’s covered with a layer of sand and sweat.

Eddie pulls back eventually, pupils blown wide, lips red and slick. He looks down at Buck, then around them, “we are not ending this go around in the back of a cop car for indecency.” 

Buck checks his watch, disappointed to learn there’s only about an hour left. “I also kind of hate the idea of being dead on the shore like it’s the beginning of a Law and Order episode.”

Eddie sits back on Buck’s thighs, and Buck can admit that that does not help calm him, as the little noise he lets out probably makes clear to Eddie. Based on Eddie’s little smirk, he noticed.

“Where do you wanna go out today?” Eddie shifts a little, and Buck has to close his eyes to not moan.

“You- fuck, Eddie, uh–” he puts his hands on Eddie’s hips, preventing them from moving which makes Eddie close his eyes too, which Buck files away in the Eddie facts. “Do you have anything you gotta do?”

Eddie looks at him like he’s lost his mind, “no?”

“No research? Nothing that we need for the next go?” Buck squeezes, and pulls himself up so they’re close again.

Eddie looks down at Buck’s lips while he shakes his head, and it makes Buck want to scream to the sky that Eddie thinks he’s someone to look at. “The doctor’s on it.”

“I– uh, you–” Buck’s mind flashes to a scene he’s seen referenced enough times to get the meaning behind it, “you wanna Thelma and Louise with me?”

Eddie’s brow wrinkles, then smoothes as he understands Buck’s idea, “is there somewhere you have in mind?”

“Dana Point has those amazing views– we could just” Buck takes one hand off Eddie to gesture out into the air.

“What happened to the no early ends rule?” Eddie tilts his head, scooting up so he’s on his knees in the sand and Buck already misses his weight.

Buck shrugs, trying not to remember the feeling of being left without Eddie for the few seconds he spent before pulling the trigger, “I don’t feel good about making you keep waiting if we’re getting out tomorrow.”

“Let’s go, then.” Eddie swings his knee over Buck, standing gracefully, and Buck doesn’t think he’s ever looked that cool doing anything, and maybe once he’d have been envious but now he just wants to point at Eddie and have everyone notice how amazing he is. 

Eddie helps him up again, and Buck thinks it might be mostly so Eddie has an excuse to hold his hand. He sets himself a goal for their future: show Eddie he never needs an excuse. Buck will always accept.

The drive is nice, Eddie puts on some music at a volume that normally they’d both think about future hearing loss, and Buck leaves the windows down so they can scream along. 

It’s almost two when they get to the cliffs, and even though it was his idea Buck’s stomach is in knots because every instinct he’s honed in the past years of his life has been to have less of a drive to do reckless things like this. 

“You– you ready?” He asks, a little croak in his throat. They’re parked, facing towards the edge, perpendicular to the road, and Buck’s pretty sure if he guns it forward they’re set. 

Eddie reaches over, “tomorrow you’re getting through this.” Buck nods, and Eddie’s always been able to read him too well, because Eddie unbuckles, “push your chair as far back as it goes.”

Buck pushes the chair back, glad his legs still easily reach the pedals. Eddie reaches over and unbuckles his seat belt too, then climbs over, straddling Buck, back against the wheel. “Hey.”

“Hi.” Buck can’t keep himself from grinning up at Eddie because it’s Eddie.

“Foot to the floor.” Eddie orders, voice deep and husky as he leans in, and Buck can press the pedal because Eddie asked and once he does it kicks Eddie towards him.

Eddie kisses him deep, both hands on the sides of Buck’s face, and there’s bumps, and then a crack of them crossing the barrier, and then the terrifying weightlessness of freefall, and Buck squeezes his eyes shut and grabs Eddie with everything he has because Eddie’s kind of everything he has.

He’s glad the impact only hurts while they’re rolling.

__________

Buck wakes up to the sound of his phone ringing. He sits up, neck kind of aching from the phantom pain he’s still remembering, reaching for his phone as he moves, glancing at the time, noting it’s later than it’s been, “hey Eddie.”

“Hi Buck.” Eddie says Buck in a way that almost feels like babe– it feels new, like he hadn’t heard his name like that from Eddie before. There’s noise in the background, which there hasn’t been before.

“Are you at the airport?” Buck asks, still trying to blink away his sleep.

“I’m about to board. Let you sleep in as long as I could.” Eddie sounds like he’s smiling, and it makes Buck do one of his own.

“You’re sweet. I’ll see you soon.” Buck might as well be kicking his feet he’s so gone for the guy.

“Soon.” Eddie starts talking to someone near him, “here’s my pass.”

There’s a muffled response, and then the sound changes like Eddie’s on the jetway, and Buck has never been so glad he’s certain the plane will land without a problem. “Fly safe.”

“Will do.” Eddie sounds like he’s giving a little salute, and Buck rolls his eyes.

Buck stays on for a beat longer because there’s something he doesn’t want to say for the first time over the phone trying to weasel its way out, and before he can lose control he blurts “bye!” And hangs up.

The flight lands in two hours, so Buck has a little bit of time to get ready and leave before he drives to Eddie’s favorite cafe and picks them up some drinks and pastries. He dresses for the hospital, loose clothes and no extra things in his pockets, but he chooses a nice shade of blue for his shirt because he knows it makes his eyes look bluer.

Buck smiles at himself in the mirror as he brushes his teeth, determined that this will be the last time he sees this day.

Before he heads out the door he makes sure to send Bobby a text, this time telling him he’s not feeling great so maybe the home improvement will have to happen another day.

Bobby replies telling him to rest up and offering to bring over anything if he needs it, but Buck assures him he’ll head to the doctor if it gets any worse.

It feels nice to say something close to the truth this time.

He chugs a Gatorade because he needs to be well hydrated for the anesthesiologist.

Buck goes a little overboard with pastries, but Eddie will be hungry, and the two of them can put away more than most people. He considers getting flowers but he knows from experience that holding a bouquet in a waiting room makes people think you’re waiting on news of a baby and ask you questions, so he restrains himself. 

Eddie comes out of the airport the same time, but he’s wearing a bag slung across his chest for the first time since Buck started seeing him. It makes Buck grin widely, knowing Eddie thinks he’ll be staying the night. 

Eddie climbs in and Buck hands him his iced latte and Eddie leans over and presses a quick kiss to the side of his lips, easy and sure like it’s something they do now.

It makes Buck’s ears go bright hot, and he’s worse when Eddie pulls an eyemask from his pocket and throws it at his lap, “from first class.”

Buck laughs as he pulls out, because he can’t not, and Eddie hums in pleasure about a guava croissant that Buck had taken a leap of faith on, thinking of Eddie’s abuela’s sweet empanadas.

Buck drives as quickly as he can, and they’re at the desk faster than any time before, Buck giving his information and symptoms while Eddie tells the security guard who to keep an eye out for. Dr. Mehta is hovering nearby and she swoops in, “sounds like something we should get a CT for right away.”

The check in nurse looks put out, but Buck is going to bring the whole team as many cupcakes as he can bake once he’s recovered so that will hopefully make up for the mild rudeness.

They’re walking back and Dr. Mehta sounds frustrated, “I have now helped out on the same surgery three times, all of which were routine and in all three the doctor in charge was an asshole about something different each time.”

“Sounds like he’s just ready to be an asshole.” Buck steps into the curtained area.

“He is.” She frowns down at the intake paperwork, “I’m gonna order this, you get in a gown, I’ll be back in ten.”

Buck pulls his shirt off over his head and is pleased to find Eddie openly staring, so he does a little spin, which makes Eddie shoot him an unimpressed look that would be more effective if Eddie’s cheeks weren’t bright red.

By the time he’s comfortably in a gown and Eddie has his keys, wallet, and clothing in the reusable bag they’d grabbed from the car, a nurse is there to wheel him back to the machines.

Eddie stands, puts his thumb on Buck’s chin to tilt his head up, and presses a quick kiss to his lips, “see you later.”

Buck can’t keep the dopey smile from his face, “not if I see you first.”

The nurse seems charmed by them rather than annoyed, and he wheels him down the hall a bit, “how long you two been together?”

Buck considers the question, “depending how you count either a couple hours, a couple weeks, or seven years.”

The nurse seems baffled as to how to respond, “alright then.”

The CT scan isn’t as scary when he knows exactly what it will show. The tech looks nervous through the window, and Buck looks over as he’s being urged back in the chair, “it’s okay.”

He’s left with Eddie for about three minutes, one of which is spent trying to put on the grippy socks to keep his feet warm for surgery. “Don’t tell anyone til I’m in recovery, okay?”

Eddie nods, “what do you– how am I–”

“Say you came to surprise me with a visit and I had a seizure so we went to get checked out.” Buck swings his feet on the side of the bed, “and we didn’t want to worry anyone until there was news just in case it was nothing.”

“Maddie is going to kill me.” Eddie frowns, which makes Buck smile as he nods.

“Yeah, you’ll have to make it up to her by holding my hand in front of her or something.”

Eddie reaches out and holds his hand, and Buck appreciates the warmth in his thin robe, “how would that help her hate me less?”

“She’s pretty invested in me figuring out how I feel about you.” Buck tugs and Eddie sits on the bed next to him.

Eddie leans into his side, “I told my sister this morning I was going to see you. Even said it to Christopher. I think he– based on how he narrowed his eyes at me I think he has an idea of why.”

Buck squeezes Eddie’s hand, “I miss him.”

“We’ll call him when you’re out.” Eddie presses a kiss to the cap of Buck’s shoulder, and Buck is sure the last time he felt like this in a hospital he was holding his niece for the first time. A new life, full of promise. Eddie’s hand in his kind of feels like that too.

Dr. Mehta comes in through the curtain, “okay, I consulted with a couple other doctors just in case, and we have a plan. With any luck you’ll be back at his side in a couple hours.” She looks at Eddie, “I promise you I am very motivated to move on.”

Eddie makes a face, “I am on day seventeen, doc.”

“Well, I’m sick of this day three, so let’s not make it four. Or eighteen.” 

Buck pipes up, “or nine!”

“Exactly.” She’s fast, moving Buck along, and Buck goes willingly, but only after pressing a small kiss to Eddie’s knuckles that makes Eddie blush and wave him away.

It’s a different anesthesiologist this time, but Buck still assures them he drank plenty of fluids this time. 

The chill of the liquid in his veins is weird like always, and the haziness of the drugs is familiar, and Dr. Mehta enters the ER in a mask this time and gestures at her face at him in a clear not this time .

He giggles and closes his eyes and tries to let the feeling wash over him so he can ignore the buzz of the razor on his skull, and not think too hard about how weird he’s going to look.

Eddie said he’d still be pretty, so he’s going to choose to believe that.

_______

Buck wakes up to soft beeping and the smell of antiseptic. He knows before he opens his eyes that he’s in the hospital from the itchy feeling of the pillow, the slight incline of the bed, and the low level noise all around him.

He blinks his eyes open slowly, testing them, and wincing as the movement makes his head hurt, and hissing in pain from where the back of his skull is resting on the pillow, tender and weird feeling.

He shifts his body a little, grunting because maybe the reason he’s woken up is some painkillers have worn off, because his body hurts.

There’s a gasp next to him, and Eddie’s suddenly in his vision, eyes wide and worried.

“Hey Eddie.” Buck says through a dry mouth and croaky throat.

“Fuck you, hey Eddie.” Eddie glares, even as he brings over a cup of ice with a straw, “you are such– you had– you!”

“Me?” Buck asks because Eddie is clearly a little bothered, but he still brought him water, so he can’t be that mad.

“You.” Eddie sighs, putting the cup down, “you had a seizure while they were closing up, some reaction or maybe another little bleed, and then you didn’t come out of the anesthesia easy. You’re putting me into an early grave, Evan.” 

The seizure makes the ache in his joints make more sense, all his muscles contracting.

“Sorry.” Buck apologizes because it’s second nature when Eddie sounds like that, but he likes it when Eddie gets serious enough to use his first name, which distracts him from the facts for a moment, “when– wait, what time is it?”

Eddie looks at his watch, “eleven fifty six.”

Buck can’t keep his smile down, “four minutes til tomorrow.”

Eddie’s eyes soften, “Dr. Mehta said she’d come by and check on you after the change over. She pulled some strings to get me to be allowed to stay.”

“She’s cool.” Buck tries to settle in a way that’s more comfortable.

Eddie moves his pillows around, “sure.”

Buck laughs, “I kissed her for science , Eddie.”

“And she killed you once and then almost killed you yesterday so I get to not want to be friends.” Eddie bitches back as he helps pull Buck’s robe down a little so it’s not bunched up at the small of his back.

“She also saved me.” Buck reminds him, but weakly because he likes Eddie being a little possessive, it’s nice.

Eddie nods, “and for that I’ll get her a gift card.”

“How much?” Buck asks, feeling sleepy but loving Eddie hovering next to him.

“Huh?”

“How much? Just so I know what to spend next time someone brings you back.” Buck grins lazily, putting his hand out on the mattress palm up.

Eddie puts his hand on Buck’s seemingly without thinking about it, “a hundred bucks.”

“That’s what I’m worth?” Buck teases, squeezing so Eddie can’t let go.

Eddie inhales noisily, looking at Buck fondly in the low light of the room, “no, but we have dangerous enough lives and bad enough credit between the two of us that I think upping the number will kick our asses down the line.”

That makes Buck feel warm all over, the easy planning for the future, “when you’re right you’re right. One hundred per near death experience.”

“Deal. We can have a jar at the house.” Eddie brings their hands up to his chin, pressing a kiss to Buck’s knuckles in a mirroring of Buck’s move before he went under.

Buck swallows, “the house?”

Eddie nods, not moving back, just holding Buck’s arm close, “I called Chris when it looked like you’d be okay, told him what had happened, asked if he’d move back when the year ends.”

Buck hears his heart monitor beep faster and he wishes it wasn’t telling on him so hard, “yeah?”

“He said duh , so if you’re okay with–”

“Yes.” Buck doesn’t need to know the question, “whatever you want. I’ll find an apartment, I’ll stay at a hotel, I’ll sleep on everyone’s couch until he’s comfortable.”

“You–” Eddie smiles, shaking his head, “we’re not putting you out.”

Buck really wishes he wasn’t tethered on one hand to an IV bag, “it would be okay if you were.”

“We’ll figure it out. We have five or so weeks until everything is done, maybe six if he has to take an exam to test into the next level of math next year.”

Buck knows he’s going to need PT, “gives me time to be at one hundred percent.”

Eddie nods, then looks down at his watch, “twenty seconds til tomorrow.”

Buck holds on tight, feeling kind of like Cinderella, suddenly worried that everything will fall apart in a few seconds and he’ll wake up back in his bed. 

The seconds tick by, Eddie looking at Buck’s face the whole time, like he can’t believe they’ve made it so far, the final stretch within reach.

“Three. Two. One.” Eddie exhales, sagging in relief like he’d been holding himself together with every stitch of his being.

“I love you.” Buck finally lets the words come out, the ones he’s been holding in for the whole day, or maybe since Eddie kissed him, or maybe since Eddie drove away, or since he woke up from the coma, or since he tried to dig Eddie out from the mud. 

He can’t lean forward, so he looks at Eddie through his lashes and Eddie leans in and kisses him so soft and sweet it makes the breath catch in Buck’s throat, his heart rate monitor beeping faster. 

“I love you too.” Eddie says quietly once he’s pulled back, and even if Buck was pretty sure he felt the same way it’s amazing to hear out loud.

The bright hallway spills into the room, noise and chatter making both of them startle. Dr. Mehta is silhouetted in the doorway, “congrats, we’re at today.”

That makes Buck laugh, “thanks for getting us there.”

“As far as I am concerned I have no idea what you could be talking about because I just had two weird dreams that are a sign I should take a personal day soon.” She crosses her arms, then steps into the room, looking at his chart at the foot of the bed, “looks like your pressure and everything’s been good for the past few hours, you just needed a little extra rest.”

“What’s your favorite cafe?” Buck asks because he knows Eddie won’t.

She raises her eyebrows, looking over at Eddie then back at Buck, “I like supporting local bookstores more than coffee.”

Buck wishes he could nod comfortably, “okay.”

He yawns and it hurts his jaw, clearly he’d clenched it hard during the seizure.

“Rest, Mr. Buckley.” She sighs, “and you, Mr. Diaz, you should try and sleep too. He’ll need to stay one more night no matter what so we can be sure there’s no risk of an infection.”

Eddie nods to the two chairs he’s faced towards each other, “on it.”

She shakes her head, “firefighters, I swear.”

She leaves, and Eddie pulls his chair closer to Buck’s bedside, dragging the second one in too, and settles in. Buck can feel the exhaustion pulling him under. “You gonna be here when I wake up?”

“Yes.” Eddie answers easily, “but the crew is coming in the morning– they did not like the explanation for the record.”

Buck shimmies a little into the mattress, “I think sorry I just had brain surgery gets me leeway for a bit.”

“I notice that that doesn’t help me with the glares.”

Buck squeezes Eddie’s hand again, “just tell them you were too overwhelmed with worry for me to think clearly. And if they give you too much grief bat those pretty cow eyes their way.”

“Cow eyes?” Eddie is clearly holding in laughter.

Buck hums, “a pretty cow. Make all the boy cows go moo.”

“How have you seen Princess Diaries but not Die Hard?” Even with his eyes closed Buck can hear the fondness in Eddie’s tone.

“Just have.” Buck smiles with his eyes still closed, “but I’ll watch Die Hard with you if you think it’s important. I watched that whole Escape from New York so I’d get your costume that one time.”

Buck can hear the little inhale Eddie gives, “yeah?”

“Yeah.” Buck’s breathing is slowing, and the room falls quiet before he turns his head a little, cracking one eye open to look at Eddie, “and don’t think I didn’t notice you recognized Princess Diaries. We’re watching that some night too.”

“Anything you want.” Eddie promises recklessly, and Buck falls asleep with lists of dumb shit he’s going to get Eddie Diaz to do with him, especially since they have so many days ahead.

_________

Chapter Text

Buck has one hand holding up a towel, the other is shifting around a framed photo and some rocks he found on a hike that were kind of heart shaped and smooth and feel nice to hold if he’s having a bad day– his hands are shaking a bit, but not in a way that makes him want to hold the rocks. He’s trying to remember exactly where stuff goes since, at least to his eyes he clearly moved things to get to the box that had been tucked behind the frame for weeks and is now stuffed in the pocket of his pants on the bed ready for him to change into.

He’s pretty sure everything’s just right, so he steps back to check— smiling at the fact that the blue marble doesn’t even roll unless Buck knocks anything because Bobby had installed the shelves so perfectly level while looking for things to do while Buck was going through rehab. 

The marble had been found on the beach, sea glass textured but a pure blue in spite of the cloudiness and Eddie had handed it over saying it matched Buck’s eyes, blush high on his cheeks. Buck had not cried but it had been kind of close and Chris had helped bail him out by pointing at every bit of driftwood and saying it matched Eddie’s eyes and suggesting they bring that home too. There’s a small piece of driftwood on the shelf below that Eddie glares at sometimes.

There’s a framed photo of the three of them in a booth at Angela’s, remnants of pancakes on all their plates, Chris smiling even though Buck knows he was embarrassed that they asked his favorite waitress– the cute one– to take it. 

A group shot of the 118 with Eddie in the middle, swipe of glitter across his forehead like Simba and a rainbow cake in the shape of California in the middle QUEER AND HERE FOR GOOD emblazoned across it. Hen had ordered it for Eddie’s first shift back with Eddie’s begrudging permission, word still new on his tongue. Chris had done a lot of research for him and had gotten kind of excited to go to a pride, and Buck has a new button down in the closet– pink, purple and blue– for the parade in a couple of months.

There’s their medals, crossed over each other and resting on top of the box that holds Eddie’s silver star, because he’s learning to be proud of things in new ways. More photos of the 118, and Jee and Robbie sitting with Maddie, and in all the corners are tiny little things Buck buys in any souvenir shop they pass on long weekend trips with Christopher.

“Amor? Almost ready?” Eddie calls from down the hall, making Buck startle, because spacing out at shelves of knick knacks is not what he’s supposed to be doing. 

“In five, babe!” He calls back, nerves a knot that is suddenly twisting and churning in his gut, whipping off the towel and finishing drying his chest so he can hop into his suit pants and button down. Eddie walks in as Buck’s buttoning up the last buttons and folding up the sleeves carefully, because Eddie had once drunkenly kissed his forearms and looked at him like he hung the moon, and he likes making Eddie happy. 

Eddie’s in a deep plum button down and grey pants, and Buck lets himself take a moment to look, because that’s his man, he can look as much as he wants to and he wants to all the time. Eddie notices because he sees everything Buck does, and his smile goes a little predatory, canines flashing, “you like?”

Buck scoffs, “I like you in even those gross cut offs you wear to work in the garage.” He gets close, hooking a finger into Eddie’s pocket and pulling him in, noses brushing as Buck presses a kiss to corner of Eddie’s mouth, leaning back and smiling as he resists the urge to pull Eddie in for something deeper, “you look beautiful.”

Eddie blushes so prettily, just like he always does when Buck compliments him, hands coming up and smoothing over Buck’s chest, tan skin popping against the color the woman at the shop had told Buck was raspberry, even though Buck thinks it just looks dark pink.

“This is nice.” Eddie says, and Buck hears the on you even though Eddie doesn’t say it, but he knows that’s what Eddie means.

It’s new– being sure of himself in a relationship– knowing Eddie has his back no matter what– it’s been an adjustment, letting himself hear the love in Eddie’s words and not second guessing that he’s reading in too deep. He’d caught himself, a month or so after Eddie brought Chris home, making plans for the three of them without the little voice telling him it was too much. It had made him call Maddie.

She’d laughed at him, but in a nice sisterly way, and had told him that was what it can be like in a good relationship. And then they’d had some wine, and watched a rom com, and had not cried about how they’d both found people who made them feel safe enough to be themselves. 

And if Chimney every tells anyone what he walked in on Buck will release the one man concert of Frozen he recorded Chimney doing for Jee to the group chat, and the man did not hit those high notes in Let It Go. Not even close.

“Let me just–” Eddie moves to the dresser and picks up his cologne– a woody dark scent that Buck got him for his birthday because he liked the idea of Eddie’s new good cologne being something only he ever gets to appreciate. He watches as Eddie puts a little onto his wrists, and it’s a sign of how far gone Buck is that the weird little move where Eddie pats his neck with his own wrists is kind of hot and not goofy– the way Eddie’s neck stretches always makes Buck want to mouth at it, overeager and messy even though he knows it’ll taste chemically from the scent.

He shifts his weight and the box in his pocket presses into his thigh, and making Buck’s heart race to think about. He’s glad he opted for the thin wooden one where the ring comes out like a clam shell that he found on Etsy because he’s not wearing a jacket, so there won’t be any pockets to hide it in. He covers it by grabbing his wallet and sliding it in front, phone in the other pocket. “We should head out.”

Eddie nods, re-buttoning his shirt sleeves, “Pepa called while you were showering and said Chris told her he’s staying the night because, and I quote, we’re gonna be gross.” He shoots Buck a grin over his shoulder as he heads down the hall to the front door.

Buck chuckles as he trails behind, “he isn’t wrong. But it’s a school night, and Pepa is–shouldn’t we–”

Eddie turns, leaning against the wall, holding Buck’s gaze, chin tilted up just a tad eyes half-lidded and seductive, “Buck– our son is giving us an empty house and a skip on school drop off tomorrow for our anniversary. Do not fuck this up for us by being responsible.”

Buck gulps, both at Eddie’s look but also because even months in the novelty of our kid has not worn off, “right, nope, Pepa is my hero!” He bullies into Eddie’s space, hands grabbing Eddie’s side, kiss hungry even though his brain knows they have reservations to make. His partner is the most enticing being he’s ever been around– Buck’s struggled to keep himself from touching even at scenes to the point that Bobby had had to have a talk with him that left him blushing and wishing the floor would swallow him up. 

But at home he gets free rein and there’s no way he’s keeping his hands off in their own home when Eddie’s looking at him like that.

Eddie nips at Buck’s bottom lip, “we have dinner reservations.”

“Uh huh.” Buck chases Eddie’s taste.

“Reservations that, according to the email you had the restaurant send to me, come with a fifty dollar per person fine if missed.” Eddie’s voice is deep and honey-sweet, not really convincing Buck that they should move.

“I’ll work an extra shift.” Buck promises against the skin below Eddie’s ear.

He gets to feel Eddie’s laugh in his throat, “we have all night– I want steak.”

Buck’s stomach rumbles at the mention of food, and he laughs and tucks his face into Eddie’s shoulder, breathing to calm down, “apparently so do I.”

“Then let’s go, amor.” Eddie pushes into Buck’s chest, and Buck is not above a pout, so Eddie gives him an indulgent look, “you can blow me against this wall after we’re all full of steak. I’ll even hold you down just how you like til you’re heads spinning and all you can taste is me.”

Buck can’t help the little keening sound from escaping his throat, because Eddie making dirty promises is one of his favorite things, and Eddie doesn’t know but Buck’s going to be on his knees for him twice tonight. He steps back towards the door that Eddie’s pushing him towards, nodding too much, “right, yeah, okay, yeah.” 

The restaurant’s less than twenty minutes away, but the second they’re in the car Buck has to reach out and place a hand on Eddie’s thigh because he likes the contact. Eddie relaxes into the touch, putting his broad hand over Buck’s. 

“You know– it’s been a year.” Eddie says in the quiet as Buck starts the car.

Buck looks over, “yes, which is why we’re going to an anniversary dinner?”

Eddie rolls his eyes, and Buck loves that the sassiness hasn’t left their relationship at all, “I mean since the whole…” he makes a circle with his finger in the air.

Buck frowns, trying to make sense of the gesture, then it kicks in, “oh– it, uh, sometimes I think– it feels–”

“Like a bad dream?” Eddie fills in, voice kind of thoughtful and maybe sad.

Buck squeezes his thigh, “ no , like– like it wasn’t real? But not, I mean, it was bad because I died, but you saved me.” He looks from the road for a glance, at Eddie’s profile, “not– I mean, you came here and you threw yourself in and you stopped it. And I know it was real but we don’t talk about it, because it feels…”

“Unreal.” Eddie finishes, and Buck nods because it does, they don’t talk about it much because the chaos of Buck’s surgery was a lot, and Eddie had had to explain to the team why he was even there and then there was Buck’s physical therapy and Eddie and Chris moving back and Eddie’s return to work, the loop started to feel like background noise. “I kind of hate that our first kiss was…”

Buck sighs, “knowing us, our first kiss was always gonna be while one of us is dying.”

“Fair.” Eddie laughs, tracing his fingers over the back of Buck’s hand.

“Eddie, I– I’m not saying I ever wanted to be stuck in a time loop where I died over and over again and you– uh you did too, but I– I don’t regret any of it because it got us here.” He squeezes again, “it– we’ve made it through more shit than any couple ever should, and some of that was a time loop and some of it was lightning and a tsunami and multiple earthquakes, so I’m– I’m okay with however we got here, you know?”

Eddie’s hand shifts so his fingers interweave between Buck’s, his voice quiet, throaty like he’s holding back a lot of emotions, “yeah.”

“I’m serious.” Buck thinks about the ring in his pocket, about just how serious Eddie will soon know he is, “the loop– I still can’t think about it too hard because I’ll go into a research binge and never come out and spill everything to Chim some night while on a forty eight with too many calls to sleep and then we’ll both be put in some weird sci-fi therapy. But I don’t– I won’t ever regret the loop because it got you back here. With me.”

Eddie’s thumb presses a soothing line along the side of Buck’s hand, “I don’t either. I would have managed a hundred if that’s what it took.”

“And Annoushka would have maimed me intentionally like twenty times for pulling her in.” Buck shakes his head, “I think we did plenty.”

It makes Buck ache, sometimes, when he lets himself think about the loop, the idea of Eddie’s repeats before Buck joined. 

“Well I wouldn’t want to annoy Dr. Mehta , would I?” Eddie says it like he’s happy but there’s the undertone of pulling teeth.

Buck laughs and the air in the car lightens, “I love how stupid you are about me.”

Eddie makes a face, the same one Chris makes when he’s caught out having half-assed his homework. “I have no idea what you mean.”

Buck turns as he pulls into the restaurant, “I mean that you’re it for me and Annoushka and I text about books because we’re in a book club that you were invited to and turned down because, and I quote ‘it’s good for couples to have separate things’ which I still don’t think is true but if it means I never have to play another pick up game again, then it’s a sacrifice I’ll make.”

“I know.” Eddie’s face goes from a little annoyed to concerned and earnest, “I do– I trust you. I don’t think–”

Buck laughs again, “I know you do, you just hate that she was my last first kiss.” Eddie’s face darkens, and Buck keeps talking, “but if we remember that we had a whole redo of that day, which erased that timeline, then you replace her on that list, and you’ve been my last first everything else.” He leans in and presses a kiss to Eddie’s lips, “and if we don’t go inside in the next five minutes they’re going to give away our table.”

Eddie smiles, “steak.”

Buck nods back enthusiastically, “and cava, because you might not like champagne, but we deserve a celebration and I deserve the way you get all pink when you have sparkling wine.”

“I don’t get pink. But I do like cava.” Eddie’s eyes track over his face, “I love you.”

“Babe you glow red.” Buck smiles right back, “and I love you too. Now get your ass out of the car and into the fancy restaurant so I can sit and look at you in new lighting.”

Eddie chuckles as he climbs out and Buck takes a deep breath, hand on the ring in his pocket. Eddie turns and looks at him through the windshield and cocks his head, and Buck pulls out his keys, stuffs them into his pocket, and climbs out of the car for once utterly certain of his future.