bluflamingo

[bluflamingo]

♠ for Bucktommy pls?

coming right up!

♠ One character adjusting the other’s jewelry/neck tie/etc. [bucktommy | 944 words]

“Evan?”

Buck looked over his shoulder, caught sight of Tommy’s puzzled frown, gave the sauce another stir and then turned down the heat. “Yeah? What’s up?”

“What are you wearing?”

Buck glanced down at his apron. It was… just an apron. One of the aprons he usually wore when cooking. “An apron?”

“No, I mean-” Tommy stepped in close and Buck’s hands automatically drifted down to Tommy’s hips, settling there, warm and familiar, feeling the muscle below shift with each breath. Tommy’s hands came up and Buck leaned in, ready for those big hands to cradle his face, drag him into a kiss. Maybe this was some pick-up line from a movie Buck didn’t know and, honestly, he didn’t care as long as he got kisses out of it.

But Tommy didn’t kiss him. Instead, his fingers traced along Buck’s throat, sending goosebumps down his arms and spine, and that’s when Buck remembered.

“Oh! Right. I, uh, washed your flight suit? This was in the pocket and I didn’t want to forget where I put it-”

He fumbled the silver chain out from under the collar of his shirt, the tag dangling from it still skin-warm. Scrunching his chin down to look at the embossed letters, he wondered if they’d left their mirror-image mark on his skin, wondered if he’d been temporarily branded with Kinard, Thomas somewhere on his chest. He was tempted to check. “So, you’re O positive, huh?” he said instead, deciding that was probably a little less weird.

“Yep,” Tommy said, popping the ‘p’. He tapped the metal tag. “And now you know my Social Security number, too.”

“And that you’re, uh-” he angled the tag. “NO PREF? What's that?”

“No religious preference.”

“Why? I get blood type, but...”

“Same reason it’s got my name. In case I can’t tell them and arrangements need to be made.”

“Arrangements?” Then it dawned on Buck. Right. Oh. “Like-- Like for a funeral?” Just thinking about it made him want to grab hold of Tommy again and never let go.

“H-hm,” Tommy hummed, apparently not as bothered by the thought as Buck was, and that just wouldn’t do. Buck let the tag fall back against his chest to free up his hands so that he could tangle his fingers into Tommy’s shirt, his sides, pulling him closer. Tommy went easily, squirming just a little when Buck’s fingers traced over his ribs. “Menace,” he chided with a soft little smile.

“That’s me,” Buck grinned. Then glanced down again. “So you wear this when you’re flying? I don’t remember seeing it before.”

Tommy shook his head. “I don’t really wear it. Never did, honestly.” He frowned a little, thoughtful, and Buck wondered if this was one of those army things he didn’t want to talk about, but he seemed OK for now and Buck would happily take whatever Tommy facts he could get. After a moment of Tommy tracing his thumb over the letters of his name, he continued, “I laced them into my boots most of the time, back then. Don’t want the chain getting caught in anything when you’re doing maintenance.” He said it with a little what can you do?-shrug that felt like an understatement to the gruesome mental images Buck’s mind was helpfully conjuring up for him from a sprawling selection of calls. People got jewelry caught in spectacularly stupid ways sometimes.

“Yeah, makes sense,” Buck said, blinking away the memory of the guy with all the pendants who’d gotten himself stuck in a rotary saw. “And now?”

“I just keep it in my pocket,” Tommy says. “Right where you found it. Though I usually remember to take it out, too.”

“You also usually don’t wash your flight suits at home, so...”

“That’s a great point,” Tommy said, eyes scrunching at the way Buck knew his face was lighting up with the praise. He knew it was kind of stupid, but it was the way Tommy complimented him, like it was the most natural thing in the world, that really did it for him.

Still, a thought nagged at him.

“S-So you have it on you in case you, uh, crash?”

Tommy shrugged again. “No, it’s more of a…” He looked a little embarrassed, all of a sudden, and Buck was immediately intrigued. Tommy didn’t really get embarrassed much. He knew what he liked and what he wanted and if anything, he got defensive instead of embarrassed about his guilty pleasures if he felt like he was being judged. But this didn’t feel like that. Buck desperately wanted to know more. If he could, he'd open up Tommy's brain and examine every last cell of it under a microscope. But he couldn't, at least not in a way that would be at all good for anyone.

“More of a…?” he prompted instead.

Tommy sighed, met his eyes with an exasperated look. “I just figured, I survived the army with it on me, so, I might as well have it on me now.”

Buck grinned, absolutely delighted, and draped his arms over Tommy’s shoulders, pulling him closer still. “Kinard comma Thomas, are you telling me you have a good luck charm?”

“No. Maybe. Fine.” Tommy huffed a laugh and pulled him in by the waist. “What, jealous?”

Buck pulled back a little. “Why would I be jealous?”

Tommy wasted no time closing the distance, said into his ear, “Well, because that would mean you’re not my only good luck charm, Evan.”

Warmth bloomed in his face, across his chest, where the tag was pressed between them now, and Buck laughed.

“Yeah, I’m so jealous. I’d maim its ankles if it had any.”

[bluflamingo]

hi here's a prompt for you to ponder while i'm teaching my class: ♕ (holding hands)

GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! when i tell you this one prompt in particular has been haunting me since THE MOMENT!!!!! YOU SENT IT!!!!!! why are hands so hard?!?!?! fuck!!!! anyway here's ~650 words of established bucktommy future fic, kid fic, cavity-inducing fluff. AUGH from the nonsexual acts of intimacy prompt list

---

It was only when Tommy thought about reaching for a drink that he realized both his hands weren't his own.

It's movie night on the couch and Evan's in his usual spot on Tommy's right side, mile-long legs stretched out on the rest of the couch. For years now, years, he needed something to fidget with in his hands and when it wasn't his phone or his wedding ring or an actual fidget toy, it was probably Tommy's hand: linking their fingers together, stroking the pads of his fingers, idly flexing his fingers, looking down at the light faded scars here and there.

And now Andy, all of four years old, had picked up on the habit and grabbed Tommy's left hand so he could watch the movie, too. Tommy flexes his right hand to catch Evan's attention, motioning quickly to his other side where Andy was fascinated by an animated movie he'd seen a dozen times already. Tommy stays still as Evan slips his phone out and cranes his long arm to get a picture of Andy and Tommy. He gets the shot, but the little shutter sound also gets Andy's attention.

"Pictures?" Andy asks. He clutches Tommy's hand tighter, excited, because Evan always takes the best pictures, makes the best faces and the silliest sounds, and Andy loves to play along. "Dad, smile, pictures." Tommy puts on a goofy smile as Evan gets a selfie of the three of them.

"Andy, hold up Dad's hand for the picture," Evan says. "Look, we caught him, like a big fish!"

Andy holds Tommy's hand to his chest and leans against Tommy. "We're watching movies and we hold hands with movies."

"We hold hands at the movies, exactly," Evan says excitedly. "Our baby's the smartest kid in the world. The smartest."

Andy preens, makes a little yay sound under his breath as he sits down again and cuddles against Tommy's side. Tommy's never getting that hand back; he's never giving that hand back. He leans down and kisses the top of Andy's head, then leans to his other side and gently headbutts Evan. "That means you're on hydrate-Dad duty."

"My time to shine," Evan announces as he scrambles off the couch and into the kitchen.

"Pause," Andy tells Tommy. "Dad's missing it."

"You got it. Movie: paused."

"Thank you," Andy whispers.

His new thing this week is please and thank you; they're not sure where he picked it up from, but he and Evan are enjoying this period where their son sounds like he wandered out of a toddler finishing school or something. It's too fucking cute.

Evan comes back with an ancient relic from their kitchen, a giant sparkly travel cup with a straw stuck in it. "Dad's gonna be the most hydrated," Evan says as he reclaims his spot on Tommy's other side. "Sip, don't slurp." Tommy shoots him a look as he sips from the straw, and gets an evil flick on his earlobe for it.

"Dads, movie, now," Andy says. "Please."

He's about to press play, but Evan has already settled back into his couch groove next to Tommy—that means he's taken back the remote and Tommy's right hand. Their eyes meet as Evan kisses the back of his hand, reverent as he lingers.

Tommy thinks all of this deserves reverence, this moment so quiet and incredible that it's hard to believe he's living it.

"Oh boy, I wonder what happens next," Evan says as he hits play.

Andy laughs with his whole body, knocking against Tommy's side. "We've seen it."

"Well I don't remember," Evan says playfully. "Dad, did we watch this already?"

"Shh, the part with the whale," Tommy says. Andy holds Tommy's hand even tighter, bending back one of his fingers too far until Tommy flexes and loosens his grip. "You love this part, huh?"

Andy sighs, big and exaggerated like both his dads, his arms swinging up and almost taking one of Tommy's eyes out. "I love every part."

"Me too," Tommy says, glancing at Evan.

Evan meets Tommy's eyes and kisses his hand again. "Me too."

[bluflamingo]

hi hellooo for the intimacy prompts: ♟ Patching up a wound

well hello i'm back and it turns out i did have another one of these! in the same urgent care/dr. donna universe as the other patching up a wound fic. 1.2k, established bucktommy, future fic, set about a year+ after 8x15 (so canon compliant for 8x15). from the nonsexual acts of intimacy prompt list

and this is the last one!!!!!!!!! thank you all for the prompts!!!!! they're all available here and i'll post them to the ao3 at some point.

---

"Hey, you're back!" Dr. Donna says cheerily. "They should have told you at the front desk, though: I don't do loyalty cards. The 10th visit isn't free."

"No offense, but let's not see each other eight more times," Tommy says as politely as he can manage. (He can't manage much.)

Dr. Donna shoots him a wry look. "I don't just do stitches. I showed up for other parts of medical school, too, I promise."

"It's okay, it's me this time," Evan says, proud of his several-inches-long gash for some reason. "I was fixing this wooden post in our garden and, I don't even know, this happened."

Dr. Donna checks out Evan's bicep and winces. Tommy hasn't looked at the wound since Evan yelled in pain from the yard; they immediately covered it with some paper towels before jumping in the car to urgent care, but it's still too vivid in his imagination. "Jeez, it sure did happen. Shirley already gave you a tetanus shot so I'm just here for the fun part, huh?"

"Let 'em rip," Evan says. "Or not, since they're stitches. Hey, do you use the same kind of stitches for everything you sew up or do you mix it up? Like is it your choice or do you have to use a different kind of stitch for—"

Tommy's been doing a great job, he thinks, of Saturday afternoon moral support here at their local urgent care, but he's still not great with the stitches thing, with the doctors thing. People would think, pretty reasonably, that seeing as much trauma and outright carnage as he does on a daily basis for the past 20 years would mean that he's used to it, he's seen it all, and that's true—except. This is someone he loves getting a needle and thread jabbed through their skin several times because he let a particularly large bird distract him from repairing one of their raised garden beds. It's not the same thing.

"Evan," Tommy interrupts. "I love you so much, I do, you're the love of my life and there's no one I'd rather share all of this with, but you have got to stop talking about sewing your skin together before I throw up everywhere."

"Ooh, that'd be messy," Dr. Donna says. She looks away from Evan's arm and asks Tommy, "Do you want to lie down in one of the other rooms?"

"Yeah, Tommy, it's okay," Evan says. "Seriously, she's so quick."

"I'm so quick," Dr. Donna, Evan's new best friend, assures him. "Shirley, get him a compress and some smelling salts, and put him in room 6, huh?"

"No, I'm fine, I am," Tommy says, even though lying down sounds amazing right now. "I'm here for moral support and I'm doing it, right? I'm being so supportive. I just—"

"Tommy," Evan says, his voice gentle. "I promise, you'll be a lot more supportive if you're okay in another room, alright? You're making me nervous."

"Okay," Tommy says slowly. "Okay, I'll go, but I'm not abandoning you, I promise, I'm just—"

Evan tugs on the front of Tommy's shirt and pulls him in for a quick kiss. "You're not abandoning me. I know that. I'll be right out to get you, okay?"

"Okay," Tommy says. "I'll be right in—that room she said. I'm not going anywhere, I promise."

"I know you're not," Evan says. "I know you're here."

---

Shirley takes him to another room and helps him to lie on the exam bed. The lights are dim, he's got a cold compress, and for one reason or another, he's trying to remember Ian McKellen's monologue from The Two Towers. Through fire and water, from the lowest dungeon to the highest peak, I fought with the Balrog of Morgoth…

"Something something, smote his ruin upon the mountainside, ugh, I know that's not all of it," Tommy grumbles under his breath. Suddenly there's a quiet knock at the door and it's Evan, smiling like they're anywhere else doing anything else.

"Shh, you're good, don't sit up," Evan says as he pulls over a stool. "I'm all set. You wanna hear how many?"

"What'd you bet, 12?"

"I guessed 12 and I got 15! Same as you!"

Tommy closes his eyes. "You're so excited about that."

"What? We have matching scars. That's pretty cool." Evan pauses. "I wonder if she gave me an extra so we'd have the same. Dr. Donna wouldn't do that, right? Is that malpractice? I guess it was just a coincidence. I don't really care."

It's a short rolling stool, so Evan stands up and leans over Tommy. He lifts the compress so he can press a kiss to Tommy's forehead, then puts it back. "I'm sorry I got all carried away with gross stuff. How are you feeling?"

"Stupid. Really stupid." Tommy sighs. "I've popped shoulder joints back into place, tied off bleeds with tourniquets and t-shirts and whatever I have, literally held someone's guts together once, and I just…"

"Hey, hey." Evan leans down again and kisses Tommy's lips. "Stop apologizing, you don't have to prove you're a big tough guy. I know you are. Everyone's got their stuff. I can make myself a little sick just thinking about cutting up raw chicken breast. It's gross as hell."

"This isn't gross kitchen stuff," Tommy protests. "You needed me for something serious and I—"

"Chickened out?"

"Once I can stand and open my eyes for more than five seconds, I'm kicking you in the shin."

"Yeah, that's fair." Evan kisses him again. "Tommy, it's okay. When haven't you come through for me when I needed you?"

Tommy tries nodding without making himself nauseated. "Let's make a list of acceptable urgent care conversation topics on your phone, I'll keep some good noise-canceling headphones in the glove compartment, and neither of us will ever get injured again, okay? You heard Dr. Donna, she doesn't do discounts."

"Actually, since she teaches at the medical school, too, she's giving a talk next week or so about some new research in—" Evan catches himself. "Research in medical stuff. I'm gonna go to that and you have the house to yourself."

"Sounds like a blast, send her my best."

Tommy opens his eyes to the dim room and Evan standing over him, looking so soft and concerned. "I'm okay."

"I know you are," Evan says. "And this doesn't count, okay?"

"Doesn't…"

"You didn't leave me," Evan whispers. "I know you never will."

Tommy doesn't have anything else to say, so Evan kisses him again, then presses his ear to Tommy's chest, right over his heart. Tommy lifts his hand and rests it on Evan's head, fingers flexing gently in his curls until Evan stands up again.

"Oh, wait, actually," Evan says.

"You're too excited, please stop this ride."

Evan digs into his pocket and holds up a handful of lollipops. "She let me take one of each of the citrus ones, and a strawberry one. They're all yours."

Tommy sticks them all in his shirt pocket for easy access later. "When you run off with Dr. Donna, remember that I tried to be a good boyfriend, okay?"

"Shut up," Evan laughs, kissing him again. "Redheads… are a little my type, but not as much as you are."

"Are you helping or hurting, Evan? Helping or hurting?"

[bluflamingo]

I miss when I would get Tumblr asks that actually said things and weren't just digital panhandling scams.

[bluflamingo]

Not only have I walked down that exact path, I've failed to photograph the peregrine falcons from that exact path.

Peregrine falcon (not shown)

[Submit a Photo]

[bluflamingo]

Peregrine falcon (not shown)

[Submit a Photo]

[bluflamingo]

sing to me instead

9-1-1 (TV) | buck/eddie | post 8x15 study | 15k | e

He’s in the kitchen with the wives, though even the wives were there too, and the 118 are crowded together, stuffed onto a couch that doesn’t fit four, closer than they’ve ever been in more ways than anyone will be able to name.

Not for the first time in his life, Eddie stands on the outside looking in. He can’t have this again, this family that he fell into - it’s a flash in the pan, lightning in a bottle. His new crew waits for him back in El Paso, a new collection of strangers he can't let himself get close to.

Buck looks up and around, catching Eddie’s eyes when he finds where Eddie has gone. He moves his arm to the back of the couch, fingers reaching out in what looks like an invitation. Eddie stands in the kitchen and begs himself - take it, take it, take it.

[Or coming together and coming apart in the days surrounding Bobby's funeral.]

Read on AO3.

[bluflamingo]

This is just another thing Tommy spends his life burying until he can’t. 

Tommy’s first real memory—one he knows he made himself and not one that was handed to him by an adult—is of watching airplanes leave vapor trails in the sky while his father sneers to someone in the background, “There’s something about that boy that just isn’t right.”

He doesn’t know what his father means until he’s nine years old. He can’t smell his mom’s shampoo anymore, but he can feel something inside him that probably shouldn’t be there. It doesn’t hurt, but it never fails to let him know it’s present, like a hair underneath his shirt. In a lot of ways, it feels like how he’s always aware of where Kenneth Benker is on the playground during recess, how he can’t not notice his perfect smile. Tommy can’t help but know.

[bluflamingo]

Watching the Credits

BuckTommy Movie Star!Tommy AU, 28k Words, Rated M

It's finally done! My goofy lil celeb AU romcom is complete. Thanks for sticking with me all the way through <3

Tommy waits for him to continue, ask for a selfie or an autograph but it never comes. The guy just keeps smiling. Tommy should say something. Anything. He's staring. "I'm Tommy," he blurts out, words foreign on his tongue and Tommy feels a kick at the feel of them in his mouth. He can't remember the last time he actually got to introduce himself to someone. The last time he was able to walk in anywhere without someone already knowing and assuming things about him. Tommy feels giddy and he knows he's probably got the strangest smile on his face, but if he's making the other guy uncomfortable he doesn't show it. "O-Okay. I'm Evan." --- Tommy's a famous action star, Buck is a pop culture black hole and has no idea. What could go wrong?

Read on AO3

[bluflamingo]

8x15 coda redux

after that, there's this. this is rough as hell, gang, and i don't know if i'll ever polish it up. i mostly wrote this on my phone in between pulling up weeds in the garden.

Evan cries on him for several minutes. His whole body shakes with it, and the sound of it tattoos itself indelibly on Tommy's eardrums, overwriting every other horror that's ever jolted him awake from a nightmare before. And then something happens that Tommy's only ever seen happen before in warzones and in the mirror, when he's had a white-knuckled grip on a hand basin, and an even tighter grip on the remnants of who he is as a person.

Evan pushes away from him, sits up, scrubs his hands over his face. His shoulders straighten, his back stiffens, his jaw tightens. He clears his throat and a different person looks at him out of Evan's eyes, made dull by the low light and the things that have happened. They've never knowingly worked a sanctioned scene together before, but he thinks this is what Evan must look like when he takes charge in the field.

In a croaky but remarkably steady voice he says, "I need you to go."

"Evan - " Tommy tries to protest and Evan holds out a hand.

"I need you to go check on Ravi and the others. Ravi first. Then Karen. If I'm not out in ten minutes, I need you to call Eddie."

"I - "

"Tommy." Evan's voice is flat, worryingly steady for a man who was so thoroughly falling apart a couple of breaths ago. "I'm telling you what I need from you. Do it, please."

Tommy does as he's told. 

He finds Ravi and Karen together, isn't sure what he says past Evan sent me. He borrows Karen's phone, his own having been confiscated somewhere along the way, and he counts down the minutes carefully while he keeps one eye on Ravi.

Once ten minutes have elapsed with no sign of Evan or Athena, he scrolls through Karen's contacts until he finds Eddie's number. He doesn't bother to calculate the time difference to El Paso. This isn't a 'wait until a civilized hour' kind of call, and he hates that he's the one making it. Not for himself, but for Eddie, for Evan. He doesn't think he's what either of them need right now.

There isn't enough time for it to be awkward between Eddie answering a call from Karen's number and hearing Tommy's voice.

"Fuck," Eddie says. "Who?"

"Bobby," Tommy tells him.

"Shit. How - how bad?"

"Eddie…"

"You're - you're kidding."

It's a reflex, Tommy knows that. Eddie doesn't think that poorly of him, whatever else he might think.

"I'm really sorry."

Eddie's voice is tinny when it comes next, like Tommy's abruptly been put on speaker. "I'm finding a flight. Everyone else?"

"Physically, yeah. They'll be fine. I think Karen's going to start laying out FBI agents if we don't get to a hospital soon."

"FB - Man, what the fuck happened?"

Tommy gives him as much of an overview as he can, then stops abruptly. There's activity at the main doors.

"Eddie, I gotta go. I'll get Evan to call you from the hospital."

"Okay. I'll be there late evening."

"I'll let them know."

Tommy sees - jesus christ - the body bag, Athena swept away in a huddle of uniformed figures and then catches sight of Evan. He's ramrod straight, phone in his hand, pointing at the screen as he goes toe to toe with someone Tommy's willing to bet has the authority to ruin all their lives. Well. Relatively speaking.

"One button, Major," he hears Evan say as he gets close enough. "You can throw me in whatever black hole you want after, but unless my people are released into medical care right now, one button is all it takes to send all this to the best, meanest investigative journalist on this coast."

"Firefighter - "

"Look at me," Evan says, quiet. "Look at my face and tell me I'm bluffing."

Under any other circumstances, it would be wildly attractive.

The Major turns, already radioing orders, and Evan's left alone for a second. The rigidity in every bone of Evan's body doesn't ease even a little, and Tommy walks up to him with the strange sense that Evan's not there, not in the ways that matter. Not that he's insubstantial, but in that he's too solid to be really real.

"What do you need me to do?" Tommy asks.

Evan, hands on his hips, looking over Tommy's shoulder, eyes moving like he's doing a headcount, so solid he might as well be carved of marble, says, "Come to the hospital."

Tommy goes to the hospital. 

Time passes in the strange expanding and contracting way it does after a loss. Tommy fetches coffees, hands out a vending machine's worth of snacks, keeps himself on the periphery. Once it's confirmed that Hen and Chimney are pulling through okay, once Evan is occupied with Athena's kids, he slips away to the bathroom, locks himself in a cubicle and sobs for five minutes. He can't believe - he can't believe - 

When he gets back to the waiting room, Evan's gaze zeroes in on him immediately, but it's a minute before he crosses the room to Tommy and looks at him intently.

"Where'd you go?" he asks, and for a second, the hardness in his voice makes Tommy think he's mad. But it's not that. It's concern. Concern for Tommy, right now, of all times.

"Bathroom," Tommy manages. "What do you - "

What do you need, what can I do, please please please just tell me how to help you.

Evan reaches out and squeezes his shoulder.

"It's okay," he says. "I know he meant a lot to you too. You should sit down."

"Evan."

"Sit down," Evan says again. "Drink some water. Eat some terrible vending machine snacks. I need to go check on Athena."

Tommy does as he's told.

It takes a long time, but finally, Evan's ready to leave the hospital. Not before he's sent Ravi off with Maddie's house keys to get stuff for Jee Yun and take it to the Lees' place, not before he's had a long phone conversation with Hen's mom, not before he's organized rides for everyone else in their rag-tag group who wound up at the hospital, not before he's worn himself to the bone. But eventually.

"I'll drive you home," Tommy says.

Evan nods, eyes on his phone screen. "Eddie's going to take an Uber from the airport. I can't get hold of Bobby's brother, but I'll keep trying while you drive."

"Okay," Tommy agrees. He doesn't know this guy. He doesn't know this version of Evan - he knew there was steel at the core of him, but he doesn't know this version where everything else has been stripped away.

When they get to Evan's house, he still hasn't managed to get Bobby's brother on the phone, but he's left a calm, even-toned message asking him to call. 

The house is almost unrecognizable from the last time Tommy was here - fully unpacked, fully Evan's in a way that feels startlingly strange. Evan unlocks the door and heads straight for the linen closet, starts putting covers on spare duvets and pillows. Tommy trails after him, helps him make up the bed in the spare room, feeling like he's on the other end of a string tied to the pin in a hand grenade.

"Evan," he says, when the room is done.

"I need to - " Evan starts.

"I think you need to sit down," Tommy interjects.

"No," Evan says, not mad or even loud, but unquestionable. "No, I don't need that."

Tommy feels like he's being turned inside out, like all the things Evan must be feeling are being transferred over to him for want of anywhere else to go.

"Evan," he says again, like it's the only word he knows.

"No. B-Bobby said they would need me. And they do. So I don't need to sit down. I need to - I need - "

"Did he say anything else?" Tommy asks.

It's a risk, but not a huge one, he thinks. In the unlikely event it's a no, Tommy gets an unexpected addition to the list of authority figures he wants to fistfight in an afterlife he doesn't think exists. 

Evan blinks at him for a moment, then looks away. 

"I'm going to do some batch cooking for Athena and the kids. You can help, or you can go to the store, or you can just go."

"Evan - "

"What, Tommy?" The snap in Evan's voice sounds like it hurts. "What do you want me to say? This isn't about me."

And that's just - that's just the wrongest thing Tommy's ever heard.

"Of course it's about you."

"No - " Evan says, pulling out his phone again and scrolling like a message from Bobby's brother will have appeared, despite the fact that he's cranked the ringtone up, and the house is a silent as - well.

"It's about you too. Evan, just stop. What else did Bobby say?"

He's prepared for that's none of your business, he's prepared to be shoved aside, he's prepared even for Evan to throw a punch, although that seems vanishingly unlikely. Whatever else Evan is right now, whatever emotions are running the show, he's Evan.

He's not prepared for the way Evan's face crumples, for the way the phone drops from fingers that seem to have gone nerveless. They were already close enough that when Evan pitches forward, it's directly into Tommy's waiting arms.

"He said - he said - he said he loved me," Evan says, and, well. Tommy feels like that probably went without saying for a lot of years, and he can't imagine how it must have felt to have it said right there, like that. Evan's not crying, but he is shaking, like everything is catching up to him all at once.

"He did," Tommy says. "Of course he did."

"No - Tommy - he said I'd be okay. But I'm not - I'm not - I'm not okay."

"Of course you're not."

"But they need me."

Tommy takes a breath, feels like he's inhaling broken glass. "They're not here. You can be not okay with me."

Evan shakes his head against Tommy's shoulder, tries to pull away. Tommy doesn't let him.

"E-Eddie'll be here soon."

"Yeah," Tommy says. "So let's be not okay until then."

Evan takes a shuddering breath in. Lets out a single sob that shakes his whole body. Weeps.

[bluflamingo]

tommy playing with buck's hair if it sparks joy pls 🙏

well......... i hope this sparks joy for someone. thank you for the prompt! don't ask how playing with buck's hair got us here. established bucktommy, 1.5k, future fic (1 year from now), mention of mcd, discussions about grieving, angst city. kind of inspired by my drabble about buck and his lightning strike anniversary. from the nonsexual acts of intimacy prompt list ---

As thunder rumbles in the distance, Tommy glares out the kitchen window. That's not cool.

Evan hears it, too, and looks up and around like it's coming for him. He can't blame him for thinking that, not in the slightest.

"See what I mean?" Evan asks. "Weather was fine yesterday, weather will be fine tomorrow, but tonight it has to rain, there has to be a storm."

Tommy leaves the vegetables he's chopping and pulls Evan into his arms, kisses his hair. "It'll be okay. We've got a plan."

There's a flash outside the window and then the lights go out.

"Fuck," Tommy mutters, holding Evan closer.

They had taken today and tomorrow off for the anniversary of Evan being struck by lightning/literally dying for 3 minutes and 17 seconds before slipping into a days-long coma that almost killed him (again). The plan had been to spend the day working on a really elaborate several-course dinner, enjoying all that work, and then watching the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy (extended edition) until Evan fell asleep.

Now there was a storm overhead and that plan was fucked. It was raining hard, huge sheets of rain beating steadily against Tommy's house. Evan had kept it together until Tommy rested a hand on the nape of his neck; that got him to give up the ghost and walk into his arms, letting himself be held.

"You don't have one of those big generators that powers an entire house, do you?" Evan asks.

"No, I'm not that much of a doomsday prepper, though maybe I should be."

Evan rubs his cheek against Tommy's chest. "Maybe you should be."

Tommy didn't have a generator, but he did have a huge camping lantern that lit up the living room in an admittedly spooky blue-toned light. Something else to look into: less creepy lightbulbs for his emergency lantern.

"At least we have charcuterie," Evan mumbles, his crackers and cheese and meats untouched on his plate. "And cheesecake."

"That's a pretty decadent meal," Tommy replies. "Nothing says hell yeah I'm alive like charcuterie and cheesecake."

Evan nods as he reclines against Tommy's chest. "Aren't you going to ask me?"

"Ask you…"

"What it was like to die." Evan looks up. "Have you ever died?"

"Haven't had the pleasure," Tommy says. "Do you want to tell me?" Tommy kisses the top of his head, then rests his hand in Evan's hair. "Do you remember what happened?"

Evan wraps his arms around Tommy's waist. He relaxes a little as Tommy touches his curls, relaxes even more as Tommy runs his nails along his scalp. He can feel Evan relaxing bit-by-bit with every stroke of Tommy's fingers through his hair, the gentle touch along his shaved sides. His fingers trace not his ear, but behind his ear, the curve of his neck, his jaw, a long road trip that tickles at the edge of his jaw. Evan loves to be kissed there, but Tommy running his thumb along that spot, the bolt of his jaw, gets him to laugh and squirm. Tommy remembers that as his hand goes back into Evan's hair and starts again: nails along his scalp, gentle tugs on his curls to show Evan that he's here, not alone.

"I remember too much," Evan says slowly. "I remember climbing in the rain, how hard it was raining. I remember this stillness, this pocket in the middle of all that rain. I remember this weird sound, like—tension, electric, all at once. I think I knew it was going to happen before it happened."

"And then…"

"And then everything went white. I felt the shock and it hurt, it hurt, and then… then it was over. Like shutting off the lights."

Tommy rests his hand on Evan's head and kisses the top again, rests his cheek there. His heart hurts. It aches to hear the story, but it aches more at Evan's voice, the fear still in it. It's been two, three years? It sounds like the memory's burned in there.

"I had a dream and Bobby was in it, but he was dead."

Tommy stops. Soon it'll be a year since Bobby died; he didn't know Evan had already dreamed it, or something like it.

"Did you know Bobby was an alcoholic? Other stuff, too? Before he came to LA."

"I knew he was sober," Tommy says. "I didn't ask about the rest."

Evan nods. "Hen and I, he relapsed when I was a probie, and we got him help. We helped him. He was in my dream, though, kind of my guide I guess. He was—if I didn't—if I hadn't been at the 118, he would have died, is how my dream went. He needed me like I needed him."

Tommy's hand opens, making the same trip along the side of Evan's hair, down his jaw and neck, his hand resting on Evan's chest. Evan takes his hand and clutches it to himself as he leans more against Tommy.

"I don't know what to do with that," Evan says quietly. "I know it's just a dream, it's just in my head, it never happened—I never told Bobby about this, not ever. But I guess I think it's true. He wouldn't have lived if he didn't have me to be a menace, to look after, to guide, and now—now I don't have him. I don't know what I'm supposed to do today now that he's not here."

"What did you used to do? When he was here. You told me you went over to Maddie and Howie's, but what about last year when—"

When I wasn't here.

"We had found Maddie after she was kidnapped," Evan says. "And I had just moved all my stuff into my new place, and then—then I saw you again."

Tommy clutches Evan's chest a little. "That all happened around the same time? Maddie's kidnapping, your anniversary, you and me hooking up?" Evan nods against him. "Shit. Maybe next year we just skip the month of March."

Evan laughs and lets go of Tommy's hand, so Tommy rests it in his hair again. "It's tough. But I went to Maddie's anyway, crashed in the spare room. They needed the help with Jee while Maddie was recovering, so I—I had different things to be sick about."

Tommy wraps him up and kisses his birthmark. "I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you last year, not the way you needed it."

"It's okay," Evan says softly. "We made it back to each other."

"We did." Tommy kisses him again. "How are you feeling? What else do you want to get off your chest?"

Evan's quiet again, this time for a while, before he curls up against Tommy's chest again. "I went to church a couple of times after Bobby died. To his church. Went to Mass by myself, just me."

Tommy nods. "How'd it make you feel? Is that something you want to do again?"

"It was quiet and cold, I don't know why they blast the air conditioner like that," Evan says. "I remembered in my coma dream Bobby had his rosary and was praying for me and I wondered if that would help me. I don't know the prayers but I know there's 10 in each set, so I counted off on my knuckles. 10 things I miss about Bobby. 10 things I wish I'd said to Bobby. 10 things I wish he'd told me. 10 things I wish we could still do together. 10 things I wish he'd do for me."

Tommy doesn't realize he's crying until a tear drips onto the hand in Evan's hair. He rubs his cheeks dry and rests his hand in Evan's hair again. "Did you have answers for all of those?"

"Not all of them, but I stayed for a long time counting them off." Evan sounds congested, so he sniffles hard. "You know, this is the least miserable today's ever been. Seriously."

"Because you're not watching The Lord of the Rings tonight?"

Evan laughs. He sits up, but keeps himself pressed to Tommy's side. "I finally—you make me feel—I—"

Their eyes meet, darker blue to lighter blue in this dark and blue-lit room, this pocket of the storm.

"I'm glad I have someone. I'm glad I have you. I love you." Evan's eyes go watery as his lip trembles. "I'm so glad I have you. I'm so glad I didn't die, Tommy. I'm so glad I found you."

And Tommy had never been hit by lightning, but he didn't have to be to understand Evan: a man standing on the thinnest edge of the loneliest cliff, hoping something would pull him back.

"I love you," Tommy whispers, kissing his mouth, his hand in Evan's hair. "I'm so glad I found you."

[bluflamingo]

Buck wakes up with a pounding headache.

The sunlight behind the bedroom blinds is way too bright for 5.30 in the morning. What time is it? Did he sleep through his alarm? Did Eddie get an Uber to the airport instead of waking Buck up?

Slowly he turns onto his back and stares up at the ceiling. Apart from the headache he’s just numb. They buried Bobby yesterday. What does it matter if Buck overslept and Eddie missed his flight?

It’s been a week and Buck still can’t believe Bobby is gone. Maybe that’s where the numbness comes from. The idea of a world without Bobby Nash in it is incomprehensible.

A faint clanging somewhere in the house makes him get up. Slowly, like Buck is under water and moving his legs takes effort. To his surprise he finds Tommy in his kitchen, making scrambled eggs.

“Morning, do you think you can eat something?” Tommy asks, his voice low and calm.

Buck shakes his head, but it’s mostly an expression of his confusion and not a reply to the question. “Is Eddie…?”

“I dropped him off at the airport. He gave me his spare key, I hope that’s okay. You can have it back if you —”

Buck doesn’t let him finish the sentence. Instead he takes two quick steps forward and wraps his arms around Tommy, pressing his face into the crook of Tommy’s neck.

“Hey,” Tommy murmurs as he embraces Buck. “Yesterday was a lot. You’ve been looking after everybody else for the last week, but nobody needs you today, okay? Just let me take care of you, and tomorrow you can put your game face back on.”

“Okay,” Buck agrees, and while the numbness doesn’t quite disappear, it makes a little bit of room for gratitude. “Thank you.”

“Let’s start with some breakfast?” Tommy offers, a little more insistent this time, and Buck reluctantly lets go of him.

It’s a strange day. Tommy seems happy to go along with whatever Buck needs, and what he needs is to be busy. No talking, no thinking about Bobby. So they deep-clean the kitchen and the bathroom, prepare a few meals for the next couple of days before cleaning the kitchen again.

They never kiss, but when they finally sit down to watch a movie, Buck takes a long nap curled up against Tommy’s chest. It’s intimate, vulnerable, and even though things are complicated between them, he knows he’s safe with Tommy. 

But then it’s suddenly evening and Tommy announces: “I should go home, give you some space.”

The words pierce the shield of numbness, and suddenly Buck feels nothing but fear and heartache. If Tommy leaves now Buck will be alone with his thoughts and feelings. If Tommy leaves he might not come back again; they might be done once and for all. 

“Stay,” he chokes out. “Please don’t go, I can’t deal with anybody else leaving me right now. I know we’re not okay. You already did so much, and I can’t —”

“Evan,” Tommy interrupts him and takes his hand. “I’m here as long as you need me, okay?”

Buck nods and swallows down his tears. It’s selfish and needy to ask this of Tommy, but he’s barely holding it together, and he needs to be strong for Athena and the 118 right now. Bobby asked him to. Maybe it’s okay to need Tommy for a while, even if it leads nowhere.

~

The numbness comes and goes. Some days are easier than others. Everything at the station reminds him of Bobby, but he can’t quit just to escape the grief and the memories. Bobby wouldn’t want him to; that seems to be Buck’s mantra these days.

Suddenly Bobby has been dead for six weeks, and it still hurts like it happened yesterday. Hen is officially Captain of the 118 now, and Buck is glad she accepted the position. He couldn’t deal with a complete stranger coming in to replace Bobby.

Buck takes care of everybody, Tommy takes care of Buck. That’s the way things are right now. He wonders when Tommy will realize how unfair the situation is, because Buck has nothing left to give to him.

They’re back together, more or less. They haven’t really talked about it, but Tommy spends most of his free days and nights at Buck’s house. He never gave back Eddie’s spare key.

It feels like they’re pretending to be in a relationship. Buck is a mess and Tommy is just here to support him. They share a bed, but they never go on any dates, and Buck’s sex drive seems to be as dead as Bobby. Is the morbid humor a good or a bad sign? 

Tommy never complains, whether Buck is clingy or distant, cleaning obsessively or crying into his coffee. At some point the other shoe has to drop. Tommy didn’t even want to move in when Buck was okay, and now he’s basically living with a zombie.

~

Jee absolutely butchers the joke she’s trying to tell, but Buck laughs anyway. He laughs so hard he nearly cries, and then he stops himself when he realizes he’s doing it.

It’s been ten weeks since Bobby died, and laughing feels wrong and disrespectful. Athena is grieving. Chim is drowning in survivors’ guilt. Hen is struggling to fill Bobby’s shoes. Ravi believes he should’ve found a way to save Bobby. Even Eddie, who wasn’t even there, seems to think he should’ve done something to prevent this outcome.

And Buck just laughed for the first time in weeks, because somehow life is moving on even without Bobby. He hugs his niece tightly and throws a look at Tommy.

Tommy, who is looking at him like Buck is beautiful, despite everything.

~

Buck comes home after a long shift and finds Tommy folding laundry in the living room. 

“Hey, you don’t have to do that,” he protests before giving Tommy a quick kiss. 

Tommy shrugs like it’s no big deal. “We were out of clean towels.”

Not ‘you were out of clean towels’. We. Like Tommy actually lives here and isn’t just doing Buck’s laundry because he’s an amazing boyfriend. 

Fifteen weeks since the lab. At some point Buck will have to stop measuring time like this, but he doesn’t feel ready for things to go back to normal. He’s not ready for the day when Tommy goes back to his own house and his own life. 

Some days Buck feels like he’s drowning in grief, his own and everybody else’s. But the numbness rarely comes back now, and laughing doesn’t feel quite as wrong anymore. He doesn’t think he could’ve gotten to this point without Tommy’s unwavering support.

“You’re pretty amazing, you know?” Buck asks and pulls him close for another kiss.

~

Daniel Robert Buckley-Han is born nineteen weeks after Bobby died. Nobody is surprised by the name.

Buck is beyond thrilled about the birth of his nephew. But once he hands him back to Chim, he finds the closest liquor store before driving to the cemetery. 

“I’m happy, and I feel like I shouldn’t be,” he tells Bobby’s gravestone between swigs of bourbon. “You should be here. I miss you. There’s so much I want to ask you.”

About life, about people, about staying strong in a crisis. It always seems like Bobby had all the answers.

After a while Tommy shows up and says: “I thought I’d find you here.”

“You know me pretty well.” Buck is doing his best not to slur the words. “I keep showing you all my bad sides.”

“That’s okay, I can see the good ones too.”

“Really?” Buck smiles at him. Maybe they stopped pretending at some point, but he’s a bit too drunk to figure it out right now. 

Tommy sits down next to him. “Really.”

~

“I love you,” Tommy murmurs and places a line of small kisses along Buck’s collarbone. 

23 weeks since Bobby died, 22 weeks since Buck asked Tommy to stay. They definitely aren’t pretending anymore. 

“I love you too, but we still need to get up,” Buck tells him, and chuckles when Tommy lets out a very disgruntled noise.

By now he’s less worried about the idea that Tommy might eventually leave. Buck isn’t exactly okay, but despite the constant grief they’re kind of happy. If Tommy wants to go back to living in his own house, that doesn’t mean the end of their relationship. Whatever comes next, they’ll make it work.

~

26 weeks. Half a year without Bobby and it still doesn’t seem real. Buck hides in his bunk between calls because he keeps crying. Sometimes he wishes the numbness would come back and give him a break from feeling so much.

When he makes it home, Tommy wraps him in a tight hug and tells him a story about Bobby’s early days at the 118. By the end he’s crying again, but something about it feels cathartic. 

The loss will never stop hurting, but at some point remembering Bobby will make him feel more love than pain.

~

“Evan, can we talk?” Tommy asks. “About this?” He gestures from himself to Buck to the living room around them.

Buck freezes in terror. It’s been 33 weeks since Bobby’s death. He’s still not okay, but he will be. If Tommy is sick of living together because Buck is too needy or too caught up in his grief  to be a good boyfriend…

“Are we taking over Eddie’s lease?” Tommy continues. “I can look for somebody to rent my house.”

“Wait, what?”

“The walls, Evan. I know you hate this color. But I’m not spending a whole weekend painting this place if we move out in a couple of weeks.”

“Into your house,” Buck says slowly, trying to comprehend what’s happening.

Tommy shrugs. “I mean, if you want to.”

“But you would also move in with me here?”

Tommy frowns at Buck like his words make no sense. “Evan, I’ve been living with you for more than half a year.”

“Sure, but I didn’t ask you to move in.” Buck struggles to find the right words for what he’s feeling. “You stayed because I needed you.”

“I stayed because you asked me to, and because I love you.”

“And you will stay.”

Tommy smiles at him, warm and fond, like he can’t believe that Buck doesn’t know the answer to that already. “I’ll stay.”

[bluflamingo]

He's drunk when he sends it. Pissed because Buck won't just let this die. Tired of seeing his name flash across his screen, texts full of anger and sadness and hurt.

I suspect you've already met your last and it's not me he sends, and then turns off his phone and reaches for the bottle of whiskey on his top shelf.

---

If he'd been sober he would have known better. It's not even like it's been a pervasive thought - just an inkling at the start of things that seemed to be completely off base once he got to know everyone better, but looking back... He can see it. The built in life. The steadfast support. The knowledge that they'd always, always have each other's back. The kid who hero worshipped him.

The thing is he's fielding texts from Eddie, too, checking in and then circling around to being so goddamn judgmental that it's like they've coordinated their attacks to give Tommy no room to breathe.

He ended it to save himself from slipping so far under the surface he wouldn't make it back.

The fact that he's lost them both to his own fear is icing on the cake for the demon on his shoulder that keeps trying to remind him that once upon a time he'd fully thought Eddie and Buck were amicable exes.

---

He has to blink to figure out who's standing on his doorstep. The mustache is gone.

"If you meant who I think you mean, you're dumber than you look," Eddie says, and shoulders past Tommy before Tommy can even muster an affronted expression.

Tommy wanders after Eddie into his own kitchen, immediately annoyed that he looks more at home there than Tommy has felt in weeks. He'd gotten used to the loft - the space, the echoes, the lights of the city. The smell of his own aftershave on Buck's pillow.

They never spent much time here. The loft was closer - to Harbor, to the 118, to all the things in the city that tempted them out for a night. And staying at the loft meant he wouldn't have the echoes of Buck in every room, around every corner. (The echoes are in him, instead, and he still feels the absence like a lanced wound.) Tommy has always been good at making other people think he's good at putting distance between himself and them.

Eddie digs in a drawer, pulls out the bottle opener shaped like a cow and pops two tops. Holds one out for Tommy and scowls when Tommy wrinkles his nose at the Corona.

"Absolutely screw you if you think I'm driving halfway across town for you just to get the ones you like, right now."

Tommy can't argue that. He takes a drag and swallows. Stares. Is everyone else experiencing whiplash seeing him without the mustache? It looks fine but it'd taken so much fucking work to get used to it and now it's just gone. Clean shaven, an acre of skin he hasn't seen in months.

Tommy blinked and the entire world was different. Tommy freaked and the world changed.

"What are you doing here?"

Eddie's eyebrows both lift, a frank Are You Fucking Serious look on his face that makes Tommy want to take him to the mats and have it out in the garage instead of over beers.

"Buck may be spinning his wheels trying to figure out what the fuck you meant but I know damn well what you were implying."

That seems unlikely. Eddie always seems to be the last person to have a single clue what was going on, with Buck scraping in just before him. It's a tight race.

He used to find it charming.

(He absolutely does not still find it charming, he tells his heart, and wonders if he could hire some tiny asshole gnome to go stomp around in an atrium or two and get it to stop doing what it's doing. Fucking traitor.)

"Do you actually believe that, or is it some dumb excuse because you're terrified of being happy?"

Oh, that's fucking rich.

Tommy opens his mouth to tell him exactly that but Eddie just steamrolls right by him. "You don't have to point out the hypocrisy, jackass. I'm well aware of my own issues. Thing is - you're like, almost right. Buck does make me happy. Next to Chris there's no one else in the world I'd rather have by my side, rain or shine, good or bad. I love him. He's my person."

Tommy rolls his jaw. It's not a vindication to hear it.

"Except I'm not gay, Tommy. And I don't want that. I never have. And neither does Buck, just in case that argument was about to hit the airwaves."

"How do you know?"

Something sparks in the back of Eddie's eyes. Understanding. Triumph.

"You want an itemized list or a demonstration?"

Which is when Tommy knows he's stepped into an absolute minefield. No markers. Just free balling his way through a conversation that could explode with even the slightest pressure.

Eddie's got his phone out.

None of this is ideal.

When he looks up, his eyes land squarely on Tommy, who would like in this moment to be able to curl so far in on himself he gets sucked clean through the other side. "First of all, Buck may have just been improvising his entire journey of sexuality but for once I was trying to get ahead of the curve so that whole starry-eyed newly not straight vision you have of Buck is bullshit. You let him pull you along by the shirt strings for months without pressing pause and then you freak out when he thinks his speed and your speed are the same speed?"

This is feeling a whole lot like an ambush, now.

"Did you ever even try to slow him down?"

Tommy has some choice words that aren't remotely appropriate to say to someone who is at least tangentially still his friend, so he takes another swig of shitty beer. God, this shit is awful.

"You wanna know how I know I'm not his one? How I know he's not mine?"

Tommy really, really doesn't. Honestly he'd like to kick him out.

"Because he went at our friendship at the same warp speed pace he took your relationship and it never fucking scared me."

Proof in the pudding, for Tommy. He's not the sort of jackass who actually thinks he can make a different judgement call on someone else's sexuality than the one they've made themselves, but come on.

"Shannon's been dead for half a decade," Eddie says, voice dropping so suddenly Tommy feels it like an icy draft. "And maybe one day I'll make my peace with that. Maybe one day I'll get out from under it. The point is I've lost them both and the loss wasn't the goddamn same."

"Buck came back," Tommy argues.

Eddie scoffs. Wrinkles his nose. "Jeez, he wasn't kidding about how weird that sounds." His phone buzzes on the countertop, and Tommy wonders what the hell that look on his face means. "Don't change the subject. I'm not here to talk you into anything. I'm just here to drink a beer with you and tell you how goddamn stupid it is to think that an uncertain future with Evan Buckley isn't worth every second of terror it causes you."

"You don't know me as well as you think you do."

Eddie tips the bottle against his lips. Swallows. God, why hadn't Tommy just pursued the self-proclaimed straight guy for a couple weeks before he scratched the itch somewhere else and kept a friend, instead?

"Maybe." Eddie tips his head. "Maybe I do, though. Maybe in the months and months you were invited to all my mopey nights in with Buck and all the crazy crap we end up involved in at the station and all the times you couldn't shut up about him when he wasn't around and all the times I got to see you falling ass over teakettle for my best friend, I learned a fucking thing or two about Tommy Kinard." He wags his head back and forth. "Maybe."

"Is there a point to this?"

Eddie tips his eyes to his phone, and it's probably too late at this point for the suspicion to begin to creep in.

"I mostly just came to confront you about your completely off base bullshit excuses, but there's actually a pretty simple solution to at least one of your multitude of issues, so. Now we're waiting."

Tommy doesn't like the sound of that at all.

"Chris is mad at you, by the way."

It's a distraction. It's fully a - "Why is he mad at me?"

"I should actually thank you, because it's the first time he's actively talked to me in months," Eddie continues, like Tommy hadn't asked a question. "He's pissed because Buck is sad and there's literally nothing in the world that gets a rise out of the Diaz boys like sad Buck."

"You can just say you're pissed at me and go, Eddie."

"Oh I'm angry. Don't think I'm not. Mostly I'm just sad for you. You had six months to get to know Buck and never thought to yourself 'hes going to love me and it's going to hurt' until he skipped too far ahead in the program."

And that's - kind of the final straw. He's let Eddie get his licks in. He deserves it, he knows he does. Honestly it's a little cathartic to hear - to know exactly what Buck has spent his time dissecting post-Tommy. "That's all I ever thought about. Do you think I didn't know going in? I tried to put a stop to it before it even started and he just doubled down! Do you think for a second I wasn't viscously aware that I was setting myself up for -."

No. He's not gonna say it. He's not giving that to Eddie when he couldn't even give it to Ev-Buck. When he couldn't give it to Buck.

Eddie looks victorious anyway.

"And for six months you thought it was worth it."

"For six months I was too much of a coward to stop thinking about it."

Eddie drains the rest of his beer. "I'm not gonna lie. You screwed up pretty bad. Like. Astronomically bad. Giving up your location in a firefight bad."

Tommy does everything he can not to wince.

"It's salvageable, though. If you want it to be. If there's anything I know about Buck it's that second chances are his bread and butter." He's been dancing around saying anything of substance about Buck's feelings, in all of this, but the hints are there. As if the bouts of angry-depressive texts from Buck weren't clue enough.

"And what if it's not what I want?"

Eddie's eyes dart to his phone one more time. "Then you can make it a clean break in about ... three and a half minutes."

Tommy nearly tosses his beer across the room.

[bluflamingo]

post 8x15

-------

Tommy stirs out of a restless sleep by the sounds of Evan rummaging in his drawer. Even in the dark, he can tell that Evan is mostly dressed, like he's going out.

He flicks on the lamp by the bed. Bisexual lighting lamp, painted by the two of them one afternoon when Evan wanted to switch out Tommy's boring beige lampshades. The time on his phone shows 5.53AM.

Too damn early.

"Baby, what are you doing?" he asks tiredly. The pet name didn't register until later; it doesn't matter. Not at this point.

Evan freezes, like he's caught stealing cookies from the jar. "Nothing. Go back to sleep."

"You wanna head home or something?" Tommy sits up and rubs the back of his neck. They've spent every possible spare time they have overlapping together, but maybe Evan is starting to feel smothered. Tommy fights down the thought and the fear it brings. It really isn't about him, not at this point.

Evan's shoulders are tense, and then they slump, before Evan completely curls in on himself. Tommy's so out of it that he doesn't realize Evan's sobbing quietly until he hears the damp sniff, and then he feels like shit for making the younger man cry.

Climbing out of the blanket, he knee-walks on the bed over to Evan and sits behind him, pulling him closer so he can burrow into Tommy the way he has been doing the past week and a half.

And Evan yields to the comfort. His face is wet where it's pressed to Tommy's bare chest.

"I dreamed... I dreamed that he was buried alive," he chokes out, fingers digging into Tommy's sides. He doesn't have to say who 'he' referred to. "I was gonna..."

"You wanted to go and check the grave, make sure this isn't the case?"

"...It sounds stupid now that you say it aloud." Another damp sniffle, another burrowing.

Tommy bites his lower lip and sighs, pressing a kiss to Evan's curls. It's been hard, especially since Evan has been the pillar for the rest of the 118 and for Athena. It's a privilege for Tommy to not only witness but take care of this side of Evan - the one that is hurting and lost and grieving.

He exhales and runs his hand along Evan's spine. "Let me get dressed."

Clearly not expecting that, Evan straightens and stares at him. "You don't have to-"

"It'll bug you and you won't get any sleep until you're sure. We'll grab breakfast from a drive-through and head over to the site. Bet he'd like to watch sunrise with us."

Helplessly gazing at Tommy as he pulls on a hoodie and his faded work jeans, Evan dashes away the tears on his face and manages a small, sincere smile. "There's a bagel place he loves. I'll drive us."

[bluflamingo]

Don't mind if I do! ♟♟♟

oh boy why did this one take so long!! 1k, established bucktommy, bad patient tommy, quick mention of mcd. set about a year after 8x15. also for @setmeatopthepyre who sent in the same prompt! for all that they're disasters, idk if i have another "patching up a wound" in me, lol. from the nonsexual acts of intimacy prompt list

---

"So this is urgent care," Buck marvels. He leans into Tommy's space and smiles at him. "You always take me to the best places for the best new experiences."

Tommy's expression is withering, or it would be if Buck wasn't so brave and strong and in love. But then again, Tommy's the one who sliced his arm open while working on a car in the garage, so maybe he has the right to be a little cranky about it.

"Are you in a lot of pain?" Buck asks. "Does that mean anything? Are you actually gonna tell me if you're in a lot of pain or—okay, jaw-clenched stoicism, I got it."

"It's fine. I don't know why you thought it was too deep for surgical glue."

Buck frowns. "It's way too deep for surgical glue." Suddenly, he beams. "Are you scared of doctors?"

"I'm not scared of doctors."

"I'm gonna ask Hen, maybe she remembers if you are."

"I'm not scared of doctors."

"Hey Hen random question but we're at urgent care and Tommy looks—"

"Maybe I'm uptight because I sliced my arm open and we're at urgent care." Tommy looks over. "You're not actually texting her, are you?"

"Nah, she and Karen took the kids on a day trip somewhere," Buck replies. "Just you and me today."

"No medical vigil for me? I see how it is."

Buck laughs, loud and bright with his whole chest. "I can FaceTime Eddie and see if he wants to hang out with us while you get like, maximum 10 stitches in your arm."

"You're making fun of me. I'm gonna have a scar on my forearm forever and you're making fun of me."

"I'm looking up scar gels," Buck assures him. "Ooh, that's us."

---

"15 stitches," Buck says. "See? I was close."

Tommy's eyes are shut as he nods. "Congrats. Use my phone, buy yourself something pretty."

"Can we get burgers after this? Hey," Buck says, softer. "You're not okay, are you? You can tell me."

Tommy takes a deep breath, holds it, then lets it out. "I'm fine. I'll be a lot better when I'm stitched up and home. It's fine."

They move into a different room with a bigger setup, trays ready to go and Dr. Donna cheerfully waving them over. "I can sit with him, right?" Buck asks, holding up their joined hands.

"Of course, bring all the moral support in the world," she replies. "Never too old or brave or big strong firefighter to have your hand held while someone sews you up."

"It's fine," Tommy says, absolutely not fine. "I've had staples in the field, I've been sewed up in tents in Afghanistan. This? This is nothing."

Tommy's clutching his hand so tightly that Buck can't actually squeeze back, so he rests his free hand on Tommy's instead. "Can you distract me?" Tommy asks. "Now's a great time to read me like, the entirety of an essay on… something. What are you into right now?"

"Can I look up the history of surgery?"

"A couple of little pinches, just ignore me," Dr. Donna says quickly. "Hey, why don't you tell me how you guys met? Got together?"

Buck leans forward to catch Dr. Donna's eye, which he can't do because she's working on Tommy's arm and whispering to the nurse next to her. "Uh, we can't tell you, actually. It's classified."

"Cruise ship rescue operation," Tommy says through clenched teeth. "Lifeboats, remember?"

"Oh, right, that's what they said."

Tommy huffs out a little laugh, squeezes Buck's hand tighter. "You'll never get security clearance for anything in your life, not ever."

"Yeah, probably not. How about, um. Hmm. Oh! Got together. The first time, I sprained my best friend's ankle because I was jealous, and then we kissed and it was great. The next time, we ran into each other at a bar and hooked up, and then we got back together—" Buck pauses.

"You okay?" Tommy asks.

"It's okay," Buck says. "Second time, we kinda did and didn't get back together, uh, after my captain at the firehouse—he was closer to me than my dad—uh, he died, and we just… got back together."

"I'm sorry, hon," Dr. Donna replies. "That's never easy."

"We both lost him," Buck says. "Yeah, so we were putting our lives back together and then it turned out that my sublet—I was subletting a house from my friend who moved back to Texas, the one whose ankle I sprained—well he didn't mention that the rest of the lease was only four months."

"You didn't read the lease."

"He's my best friend, we don't need leases."

"Clearly, you did."

"I don't have a lease from you. Do we need a lease?"

"Not if I'm evicting you today," Tommy replies.

"Yeah, nice try, who's gonna talk to your plants when you're on shift? And your kitchen would be nothing without me, Tommy."

"I guess that's true. I'd have to buy all those spices again and god knows how long that would take."

Buck smiles to himself; Tommy's feeling better already. "Anyway, the lease was up but I didn't know if I wanted to renew because the landlord wanted to jack up the rent by a lot, so Tommy—"

"I came to the conclusion that we were already living together, pretty much, so why not move into my house—"

"House that you own, with a really nice kitchen that could use all my pots and pans. Dishes, too, it's like you never had anyone over."

"My house that I own, and then—" Tommy sighs. "And then I'll see him every day. And every day he'll talk my ear off about anything and everything under the sun, except today—"

"You're all set," Dr. Donna announces. "That was agonizing, huh?"

Tommy looks down at his forearm, then shows Buck. "Staples would have been fine."

"You would have hated those so much more, believe me," she laughs. "Alright, Shirley's going to get your paperwork and then you can get out of here. Follow up with your primary care doctor or come back here. If it starts to take a turn for the worse: I think you know who to call." She smiles and points at both of them. "Burgers. Treat yourself. Extra carbs."

"Are they good for healing? Carbs?" Buck asks.

She shrugs and waves, then leaves again. "I'm gonna look that up," Buck says. "Can I have my hand back?"

"No."

"Big baby," Buck mumbles, bringing Tommy's hand to his lips and kissing it. "I love your big baby parts."

"That's maybe the worst way you could have put it."

"But you love me anyway."

Tommy's lips are a fine line again, slightly turned downward, but then he brings Buck's hand to his lips, too. "I love you anyway."

[bluflamingo]

Shows what I know - this fic is 30,000 words now, and it is NOT a 30,000 word fic.

10,000 words into the "Buck gets sexually assaulted at a club" recovery fic and I'm finally getting to the scene I really wanted to write.

Worryingly, this is is maybe a third of the way through? I do not have time for a 30,000 word fic right now.

[bluflamingo]

This fic is within 10k of my second longest ever fic, and my longest ever 911 fic (both about 40k). It's almost certainly going to be longer than both of them.

Though I guess the time to worry is when it gets longer than my actual longest ever fic, which was 72k.

Worryingly, that doesn't feel impossible right now.