#featuring extensive run on sentences as I grapple with trying to capture their voices
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oops, thought too hard about "I don't believe in magic, I believe in chemistry" "oh, it's science, I see" and "works like magic" and Buck's experience working in construction and I accidentally wrote a 6x17 coda
On the difference between magic and chemistry, and their relationship to thermoset adhesives
6x17 coda, ~860 words
âI have never been so excited to get a call from you,â Buck says, barging into the house with a plastic bag bearing the name of a local craft store on his arm.
âGlad my deficiencies are so thrilling,â Eddie breathes out. Heâs trying to focus on the pieces of the model in front of himâChrisâ drafts are irritatingly well-labeled, which makes how much heâs struggling to piece them together that much more embarrassing.Â
âAh,â Buck grins, quirking an eyebrow as he settles down next to Eddie, drawing the model pieces away from Eddie to sit in front of him instead, âbut it takes real wisdom to know when to call in the experts.â
He plucks the wall Eddieâs attempting to position from his fingertips, flipping it around and slotting it in place, right where it belongs. Eddie has the passing thought that maybe he should feel a little bit like heâs failing, needing Buck to come help him assemble his own kidâs design; he doesnât, though. There was a twinge of itâwhen he was sitting here alone, staring at the pieces laid out on the coffee table, trying to make sense of it allâbut calling Buck never feels like admitting defeat. It hasn't for a long, long time.Â
âSorry to drag you over here. Iâm sure you have better things to do on your 48 off,â Eddie says, not really meaning a word of it untilââShit, you didnât have plans with Natalia, did you?â
Buck looks away from the model pieces for the first time since he sat down, his gaze dropping into his lap. On his next inhale, his face cracks into a rueful smile Eddieâs seen too many times before. Maybe it's a little presumptuous to think he can read Buckâs insecurities in the tilt of his mouth, but Eddieâs pretty sure Buck can read him the same way.
âNo, I, uhââ he stutters out, and Eddie wants to scream at the world for putting him through this, whatever it turns out to be this time, on top of everything else. âI think thatâs probably over. Kameron showed up at my place while we were having dinner, and I had just had to tell her about Taylor, and we had run into Lucy the other night, andâI donât know. Seemed like maybe it was too much for her.â
Seems like I was too much for her, Buck doesnât say, but Eddie reads it in the wobble of his not-quite-right smile and the sadness behind his eyes.
âAnyways,â Buck says with a grin, a real one this time, âthatâs why I was so glad you called.âÂ
Eddieâs heart doesnât skip in his chest, because what the hell would that say about him? Buck barrels on, âKameron showed up at the loft looking for a place to stayâdonât ask, she was freaking out so much she wasnât speaking in full sentences; except, conveniently, to tell me she really needed pickles; but I donât know whatâs happening with her and Connorâand then passes out in my bed, so I was stuck on the couch, and it sucks, Eddie, itâs so uncomfortable.â
âWell,â Eddie replies smoothly, somehowâdespite the fact that heâd barely registered the majority of Buckâs run-on sentence, still stuck on the way his own breath hitched when he thought Buck had meant he was glad Eddie asked him to come over becauseânot important. Thereâs a bigger task at hand. âGlad I can offer you mine, at least,â Eddie says, gesturing at the couch, âfor the small price of helping me put my kidâs genius plans together.â
âLike I wouldnât do that anyway,â and Buckâs smiling so wide as he props the last wall up, it makes Eddieâs chest ache. Why is his chest aching?Â
âTask at hand,â Buck says, nodding down at the levelâs four walls heâs holding in place, âwhereâs the glue?â
âEpoxy,â Eddie says, grabbing it off the table and uncapping it, bringing it down to the point where the balsa walls meet the plastic base theyâre building on, âI ran into Marisol, that woman whose house we helped fix up last fall, at the hardware store. She said this one âworks like magic.ââÂ
As Eddie draws the little tube around the base of the four walls, hands slipping under and around Buckâs while they hold them steady, Buck goes suspiciously silent. Eddie glances up at Buck hovering over him, where he's now leaning awkwardly over the table to reach the model where Buck had pulled it in front of himself. Thereâs a funny look on Buckâs face where it looks down at Eddie, and this time he can't quite interpret the emotion behind it.
âItâs not magic,â Buck says, a little more pointedly than Eddie would expect for his usually whimsical nature, âItâs chemistry. I read about it a few weeks ago, when Chris was building that model water molecule for his science class out of styrofoamâwe didnât know why super glue wasnât working and I went down a rabbit holeâanyways, its,â and he inhales, for the first time since he started talking, âit thermosets, thatâs why itâs so strong. Itâs chemistry.â
Forged in fire, Eddie thinks, and he doesnât know what to do with that.
#featuring extensive run on sentences as I grapple with trying to capture their voices#I havent written in a long long LONG time and never fic so#idk! hope its good!#PSA: this is not the correct order of operations when assembling a scale model#and also I donât actually know the science of epoxy and I wasn't gonna try to figure it out#911 fox#911 spoilers#buddie#buddie fic#bean writes
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