#insp by “good wife” by mika

[disappointmentthemusical]

Eddie was taking his break up with Ana hard.

On one hand, Buck got it. Like, Ana was nice, and she was objectively hot, and she was also the personification of that one Ryan Gosling meme about his sweater being boyfriend material, except her sweater was wife material. She was the definition of perfect.

So Buck understood why Eddie was upset. He saw it as a personal failure – to himself, to Chris, to his parents and society at large – that he managed to fuck up another relationship. This wasn't accurate, of course. Eddie was, like, the best guy ever, and, sure, maybe his relationship with Shannon hadn't been the greatest, but he'd evolved from that place. Fuck what his parents thought. Eddie deserved to be happy.

And Ana didn't make him happy.

That right there was enough, in Buck's mind, to disqualify her entirely. Who cared if she was gone? She didn't make the meals Chris and Eddie liked; she wasn't adventurous, not enough for Eddie (and most certainly not for Chris who would be damned if he didn't at least get to try skateboarding or surfing or rock climbing); she wasn't willing to risk everything – her life, career, status – to make sure the Diaz boys were happy. She wasn't Buck.

And that was the crux of the issue wasn't it?

God, he was such a shitty friend, wasn't he? That as they sat on the couch while Eddie cried into his shoulder, it was all Buck could do not to laugh with relief. Because Ana was gone, and he was still there. He was still there, and he got to hold Eddie as he cried with the knowledge that he would get over this, one day, and Buck would be there the whole way through. He'd be there for the ups and downs and all the vulnerable bits that Eddie showed no one, except for Buck.

"All I want," Eddie said thickly, his voice catching on a shuddering breath, "is a wife; someone to lean on and take care of. Is that so much to ask?"

A wife, a partner, an equal. Buck's heard it again and again, and every time it hurts like a physical blow. Because what's a wife that Buck isn't for Eddie?

They're quite literally partners at work, he cooks meals for Chris and Eddie at least twice a week, and when he's at the house, he cleans and does laundry and helps Chris with his homework. For fuck's sake, the amount of times Chris has slipped up and called him "dad." (And every time, Buck has to take a deep breath to prevent himself from bursting into tears because come on.) He loves the Diaz boys with every inch of his being, and Eddie knows he does. It's, like, a regular topic of conversation among the 118, how Buck should give up on his apartment 'cause he hardly sleeps there anyway in favor of Eddie's shitty fucking couch. Buck could be a good wife to Eddie.

He is a good wife.

But Eddie will never see it, and that knowledge – the knowledge that Eddie is straight and doesn't feel that way about Buck – twists up something mean deep in his chest and weighs like a ton of bricks. He can't breath for how much it fucking hurts. And he can't say anything about it 'cause he can't – won't – risk losing the little that he has.

So this is good enough. This, with Eddie sad, exhausted and half-drunk off top-shelf whiskey that Buck'd been saving, is enough, and Buck will have to be content to love Eddie quietly at his side.

Theirs could have been a could life, he knows. Eddie just never will.