#fire and resqueue

[eddiestightywhities]

same, buck. same.

[eddiestightywhities]

#edmundo diaz's no.1 physical impossibility #don't touch buck

Eddie “Physical Touch” Diaz

[teencopandthesourwolf]

hello tcats

i hope your day is going good

if you do not mind can i ask you a question? i am fairly new to tumblr and not very fluent in English so i fail to understand some tumblr terms. Can you tell me what does the tags "a wolf and his queueman" means? i have seen other variation of this tag such as "i will queue heavily at you" so what does this actually mean?

thank you

hi nonny! welcome to the dumpster fire that is tumblr dot com and the sterek fandom!

oh my gosh ofc i don't mind you asking :) it's lovely that i was the one you decided to ask! like, i wouldn't call myself a tumblr oracle or anything, but i have been around these parts enough to know a bit about a bit, y'know?

so, for whatever reason (if there is a specific reason that i don't know about somebody who does should absolutely feel free to wade in and enlighten us both) the kool kids on tumblr (read: the nerds) use puns as a fun queue tag for the posts they queue up instead of the ones they post or reblog into the void as soon as they see them.

because i have no idea of your level of understanding of the english language, i'm going to post the oxford dictionary definition of the word 'pun' for any further comprehension that might be needed. i hope you don't take offence at this as i'm really not trying to patronise in any way:

so, lots of us on tumblr will choose either just a random pun that correlates with the word 'queue' i.e. my queue tag for my og main blog from 400 years ago was queue queue ca choo, which was a pun on the beatles lyrics coo coo ca choo from their song i am the walrus. i picked it because it was a (fairly) recognisable line and just something puntastic that i thought would be fun and kind of worked (debatable).

OR

lots of us will pick a queue related pun that is specific to our blog i.e. my queue tag from this teen wolf/sterekblog of mine that you mentioned: a wolf and his queueman. this is actually a really frickin terrible pun but one taken from the sterek fandom because it alludes to the phrase a wolf and his human (meaning derek and stiles)... yeah, i told you it was bad!

to further explain, my buddie blog queue tag is fire and resqueue, bc buddie is from the 911 fandom which is a show about—you guessed it!—fire and rescue!

okies, i hope this helps, nonny? sorry if it's actually a shitty explanation; my brain currently resembles that black gooey shit that seeps out of derek when he gets shot with a wolfsbane bullet bc i've sarcastically had a few very fun few days lol

happy tumbling!

cassidy xp

[soundsfaebutokay]

I posted 11,338 times in 2022

That's 4,355 more posts than 2021!

340 posts created (3%)

10,998 posts reblogged (97%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@hockles

@wren-of-the-woods

@felicity-smoak-is-my-goddess

@spoonietimelordy

@theamazingrin

I tagged 11,336 of my posts in 2022

#my faves - 7,483 posts

#resqueue - 5,631 posts

#the witcher - 2,353 posts

#the amazing devil - 1,997 posts

#music - 1,858 posts

#our flag means death - 1,053 posts

#joey batey - 780 posts

#leverage - 677 posts

#madeleine hyland - 634 posts

#the sandman - 551 posts

Longest Tag: 140 characters

#this episode satisfied something in me that kept getting disappointed by recent shows and certain movie franchises *ahem* that never took th

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

The thing I go back to again and again when thinking of Hob Gadling is the word devotion. This man really just…with no hope of reciprocity, not a single bloody hint that the Stranger would ever return to him…he waited. He built an entire pub, made sure the Stranger could find the pub, and made going to that pub a part of his routine so that just in case—just in case!—the Stranger decided to ever show up, out of schedule, he would be there. He'd be waiting. For thirty-three goddamn years! Or, if you're counting how long he's held on to his stubborn loyalty after a pretty devastating rejection, add a century to that number. All this, without any assurance that the friendship he's offering would ever be accepted. All this, for a being who hasn't even told him his name. I've seen gods worshipped with less conviction. It just, it makes me insane.

1,253 notes - Posted September 17, 2022

#4

I get it now. Yennefer and Jaskier are "worst enemies" not in the sense that they hate each other more than anyone else, but in the sense that they are the worst at being enemies because you don't smile like that upon hearing your enemy's voice, you don't tell them "good riddance" with a world of tenderness in your eyes, and you certainly DO NOT RISK YOUR LIFE FOR THEM YOU RIDICULOUS FUCKING BISEXUALS THAT'S NOT HOW ENEMIES WORK

1,359 notes - Posted February 10, 2022

#3

One of the many delights of The Amazing Devil's love songs is that we feel like we're somehow getting a glimpse into real people's lives. There are such beautifully specific details. The guy from Pruning Shears wears secondhand shoes to fancy parties, the couple from Not Yet builds pillow dens. The lady in Marbles works with assholes who make annoying comments, and the guy in Fair likes to eat yoghurt while watching The Office. The couple in Ruin plays the piano together, and so on. These songs are as far away from the generic, manufactured-for-maximum-marketability hits churned out by big music studios as you can get.

The magic of it is that the specificity doesn't stop TAD's songs from being relatable. Far from it. Because even though some of the scenarios are foreign to my own life ("Everyone knows sex is better when you're unemployed." News to me, Joey.), the emotions are always deeply, unflinchingly honest. They feel authentic. These songs aren't telling you to insert yourself into a readymade fill-in-the-blanks love story. They're saying, "Hey you, sitting over there grappling with all the twists and turns of being a human who needs other humans? You are not alone."

1,361 notes - Posted March 5, 2022

#2

The absolute audacity of Mr. Joey Fucking Batey and Ms. Madeleine Probably Fae Hyland to be like, "oh, we're so surprised people responded like that to Farewell Wanderlust, we didn't expect it to be such a hit" like ???? Hello???

You beautiful bastards, did you really give us the line "I'm the hardest goodbye that you'll ever have to say" with Madeleine's voice sliding like that right in the first stanza and expect us not to go feral over it?

Also:

Madeleine listing one heartbreaking thing after another with emotion swelling in her voice

Joey and Madeleine crooning to each other in soft, seductive tones followed by a verse of insanely fire lines like "our gods have abandoned us" and "let us waltz for the dead"

Joey unraveling his own string of sorrows in a voice made of anguish and rage

Were we supposed to be normal about any of those things? When they themselves were far from normal and actually completely savage by the time they really get going in the most furious musical "fuck you" to all the unjust, spirit-crushing bullshit in the world?

I mean—

I promise you I’m not broken I promise you there’s more More to come, more to reach for, more to hurl at the door Goodbye to all my darkness, there’s nothing here but light Adieu to all the faceless things that sleep with me at night This here is not make up, it’s a porcelain tomb This here is not singing, I’m just screaming in tune

Nobody was calm at that point. And by the last no-holds-barred chorus, we were all either crying or roaring or crying and roaring. (Internally, if we had to think of the neighbors or others on the train.) It was an emotional catharsis free for all. Who could be unmoved? Not me, Mr. Joey Fucking Batey and Ms. Madeleine Probably Fae Hyland. Not me.

1,434 notes - Posted January 31, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

It's utterly magnetic when a character's rage is quiet and precise. When they don't scream and throw things but they just b r e a t h e and very very calmly aim their fury like an arrow shooting inexorably towards the target of their wrath. It captures my attention, I lean in close, I wait for the hit. It never disappoints.

37,790 notes - Posted August 28, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[eddiestightywhities]

it's the whole knowing down to the fucking second thing that really messes me up

[eddiestightywhities]

#fake ass smile at his heart being stamped on by a size 12 pilot boot

bro is so jealous all the life has left his eyes

[eddiestightywhities]

Ok, you don't know me, but I have to say that #fire and resqueue has to be one of the the best queue tags ever created for a 911 blog/post

congrats and keep up the good work 🫡

I DO IN FACT KNOW YOU THO, KITTY! mwuhahaha it's @all-or-nothing-baby!! this is my weewoo/buddie brainrot sideblog weeeeeee!!!!! lol

well i must say that i'm made up you're enjoying my puntastic skills, my love; always nice to be appreciated asdgjkskkk

hope you're having a grand ol'day and that you maybe find some other stuff here you like... :))

cassidy xp

[eddiestightywhities]

EDDIE DOESN'T NEED HIM TO DO ANYTHING BUT BE THERE

thinking about buck's "i was just the guy standing there when it happened" after the shooting and buck standing there watching eddie let chris go. like, extremely UPSETTING actually. because in both of those situations there was literally nothing more that he could do. but he's BUCK. he measures his worth in what he can do, not who he is. being there is not enough, it's not enough. except to eddie it is enough, it always has been. eddie doesn't need him to do anything other than be there.

[eddiestightywhities]

adding the most panicked bisexual panic face i think i've ever seen on screen to every single iteration of an eddie entrance post that i see on my dash

I would have watched 911 sooner if I knew they introduced a half naked Eddie Diaz in slo-mo while ‘Whatta Man’ plays and Buck seethes

The reactions from the crew are killing me

Chimney: now that’s a beautiful man

Hen: where’s the lie, and I like girls

Buck: who the hell is that

Bobby: that’s Eddie Diaz, new recruit and top of his class

Bobby looking at buck waiting for the explosion

[eddiestightywhities]

#sometimes babygirl is a man with a beautiful mustache

— op's tag deserved to be captioned

[eddiestightywhities]

the way buck, essentially, already is christopher's stepfather—and literal legal guardian if anything happens to eddie, bc eddie chose him over his own family—plus eddie openly admitting to not enjoying dating because he feels like he has to, and i quote, "perform"

...save us* gay eddie diaz save us*

*us i.e. all us buddies out here + all the the glittery rainbow garments hidden at the back of eddie's closet

the way eddie is constantly looking for a woman to fill the role of christopher’s mom as if buck isn’t right there, successfully baby-trapped and ready and willing to be a stepfather

[eddiestightywhities]

tagging some weewoo buddies... please just let me know if you don't want me tagging you in the future, or if you're reading this and would like to be added to the list! xp

@inell @rosieposiepuddingnpie @sortasirius @angela-feelstoomuch @woodchoc-magnum @kitteneddiediaz @buddiebeginz @watchyourbuck @treasurehuntbuck @daffi-990

Eddie stumbles out of his tangled bedsheets to go take his nightly piss, alarm clock beaming its 4:03AM display directly onto his sleep-wrecked retinas, possibly for all of eternity—because being past the age of thirty is all fun and games.

Bare feet padding quietly as possible for an exhausted still half-asleep in the small hours not far off six foot one-hundred and seventy-five pound guy, he's just passing the living room when he hears... something.

He stops. Listens.

Buck is sleep-talking.

“And, man, I (something something) you. You always listen to me; never make me feel bad for (something something), always make me feel like I'm worth sticking around for, and I (something something) for that, Eddie.”

Buck is dreaming. Buck is dreaming about Eddie. Buck is dreaming about Eddie making Buck feel good.

Eddie smiles, and before even realising what he's is doing he's leaning over his couch and pressing a soft kiss to Buck's birthmark, as if he's done it a thousand times before.

Buck wakes, blinks, smiles back sleepily at Eddie, cute as a bug, then cranes his neck to peck his own soft kiss to the small mole under Eddie's left eye.

With the speed of a gunshot or a lightning strike, Eddie suddenly doesn't know why the hell Buck is sleeping on his couch instead of in his bed, or why the hell he hasn't had the guts to tell Buck that he's so, so in love with him—especially after Buck split with Tommy a few weeks ago and started testing the water with Eddie when Eddie grew a moustache and styled his hair a little differently and suggested they go to that gay club down on Burbank together to drink stupid amazing pink cocktails and dance the night away as if they didn't have a care in the world.

Then, just a fast, he's thinking fuck it, and la vida es demasiado corta, and deciding to remedy the latter (with the hope it might help with the former) by saying, “It's ass o'clock in the morning, Buck, and I really fucking love you.”

Eddie's best friend is at once wide a-fucking-wake, eyes the size of abuela’s best Talavera dinner plates and mouth doing a pretty great impression of a guppy as he gawps up at Eddie.

There's a concerningly long moment, before Buck says, “Oh.”

Like a champ, Eddie chooses to ignore the way his heart is trying to relocate to somewhere in his gut, because he's gotten pretty damn good at that with everything that's happened in his life, and he just smiles again, a little dimmer, a little more tight-lipped, while he nods his head and rolls his eyes in a yeah, silly ol’me, huh? sort of way, about to push himself upright with the hand gripping the top of the couch so that he can drag his sorry ass back to his bedroom and get a tension headache from not allowing himself to cry and getting zero sleep for the rest of the—

That's when Buck reaches out, big hand grabbing Eddie's slim wrist.

Eddie's gaze tears itself away from those beautiful Talavera eyes that are shining brightly in the thick darkness of his sleeping house, settling where Buck's hand holds him in place; where the contact blazes, not like fire but the ever-burning candle flame that's lived behind Eddie's ribcage for the past seven or so years.

“Eds, I’m—I wasn't, like, really awake enough to, uh, to, to, to process that? And the thing is—”

“Hey, no, Buck, it's okay, you don't need to explain, man.” Eddie's heart is falling, falling, falling, right to the soles of his feet. “I shouldn't have just blurted that out at you, without even—

“Eddie.”

“—and I definitely shouldn't have bothered you while your were—”

“Eddie."

“—sleeping, I just—

“Eddie, will you shut up!”

Eddie's jaw clacks closed as he swallows the rest of his words.

“Can you please just listen to me for a sec?” Buck pleads.

“I—yeah, Buck, sure. Sorry. ‘Course. Sorry.”

Buck takes a breath. “You don't gotta be sorry, Eds, I was just trying to say: The thing is, I have said a lot of dumb things in my life—like a lot-a lot—but me saying ‘oh’ to you telling me that you love me? Yeah, no, that has to top the fucking bill. Dumbest thing that ever left these lips.” Eddie can't help the flicker of his gaze at the pretty culprits; it's an involuntary action by this point. “Because,” and Buck is now licking them, tongue lush and wet against plush red, before he's honest to Dios batting his beautiful blonde eyelashes in Eddie's helpless direction. Then he's breathing his next words right into Eddie's mouth as he pulls Eddie into him while leaning up at the same time, fanning the flame in Eddie's chest by telling him, “I love you too, Eds.”

And he's kissing Eddie again, only this time it's on the lips and Eddie is right there with him, kissing Buck back as if they've done this a thousand times before.

When Buck has to pull away, to presumably prevent a crick in his neck (Eddie cannot come up with even half of another good reason), Eddie goes to follow him down, so eager after so long, wanting to cover the entirety of Buck's body with the entirety of his own—only Buck shakes his head, telling Eddie, “No.”

But before Eddie's heart can even think about digging its way down through the dirt to some old and forgotten underground well, Buck is asking, “Can I come to bed with you?”

Eddie has to stop his heart from beating right out of his chest and exploding in both their faces with just how much happiness is bursting its way in there; with Buck bursting in with his love and sharing it with Eddie, just like everything else in their lives.

Eddie feels his cheeks flush when he says, “That's, uh—well. Honestly and truthfully, Buck, you'd kinda be making my recurring dream come true if you did.”

“After you kinda shot mine down in flames by not listening to me—for the very first time in seven actual years—and talking over my heartfelt love confession, you monster,” Buck teases.

Eddie grins at Buck's grin, because it's as infectious and unstoppable as the common cold.

“Firstly, you had just answered 'oh' when I told you I loved you, and secondly, does this monster not get a pass because we just got off a clusterfuck of a twenty-four, and it's ass o'clock in the morning, and I had presumed you were tryna let me down gently?”

“Absolutely not, Firefighter Diaz, because you should never presume with a Buckley,” Buck says with a pointed look. “But, I might let you make it up to me,” he grins again, “by being the teaspoon to my tablespoon in your big, comfortable bed.”

“Yes, Sir, Firefighter Buckley,” Eddie agrees, obviously, right as he bends down and scoops Buck up and over his shoulder and into a very appropriate Evacuation Lift, Buck squealing hilariously when Eddie sets out for his bedroom at a pretty impressive pace, if you ask Eddie.

And as Buck wraps the entirety of his long self around the entirety of Eddie, in Eddie's bed—their bed, now, hopefully—Eddie breathes a full breath for the first time all summer, while allowing himself to love and be loved.

His next big breath comes a couple of weeks later when Christopher comes home, rolling his eyes at Eddie and Buck after they tell him they're together, and merely giving them a finally! in that patented teenage tone, before he's heading to his room to set up his gaming station like he's never been away.

Oh, and in case anyone is wondering, it turns out Eddie really, really loves being the little spoon—almost as much as he and Buck love each other.

.

(unedited; pls be forgiving!)

[eddiestightywhities]

like just—out of nowhere! (not actually out of nowhere as it obviously came from his latent homosexuality plus the fact he saw those pictures of buck from buck's ranch days and subconsciously had the best fucking orgasm of his tragically repressed life and is subliminally chasing that high)

as a fandom i really don't think we talk enough about the fact that eddie canonically called buck cowboy

[eddiestightywhities]

firefam tags! please just let me know if you'd like adding/removing from the list xp

@inell @rosieposiepuddingnpie @sortasirius @angela-feelstoomuch @woodchoc-magnum

“Shit.”

Eddie mutters the curse under his breath when he can't seem to release the clasp on his St. Christopher chain. 

He's plopping down onto his sofa after arriving home from dropping off his fourteen-year-old budding socialite at a friend's house, having kicked off his boots and hooking an arm around Buck's still-crossed-at-the-ankle legs and getting comfy with them now resting over his lap—well, his lap and the arm of the sofa because Buck has the longest pair of pins in the whole damn world.

“Nope, I'm afraid shit can't possibly be the answer to seven down, Eddie, because even though it starts with an ‘S’, and the third letter is definitely an ‘I’, twelve across has got to be skating, which would make the second letter a ‘K’,” Buck says with mock-seriousness as Eddie is still attempting to take off his chain. “And anyways, I don't really think the answer to the clue ‘Dermis’ could legitimately be shit, not by any stretch of the imagination; ‘Dermis’ sounds too… I dunno. Scientific? Medical?”

Eddie snorts his amusement at Buck, and Buck grins back at him with that particular twinkle in his eye that Eddie has come to think of as belonging to him. He really tries his best not to be possessive over his best friend, knows he has no right to anything like that, but Eddie can't help being in love with Buck, no matter how much he wishes he wasn't. 

Eddie's been fighting his desires his entire life, regardless of the fact he knows there isn't a damn thing wrong with being gay. But growing up in Texas? With a family as traditional as his own? It means Eddie hasn't ever felt entitled to getting the things he wants in life. 

Buck must notice Eddie struggling, then, because he immediately drops the pen and crossword puzzle book Eddie picked up for him yesterday at the newspaper stand near the firehouse, and is now swinging his legs off the sofa so he can scooch further up to Eddie, until he's almost on top of Eddie, saying, “Here, let me get that for you, Eds.”

Eddie freezes. He knows he should shoo Buck away like he's supposed to, do the right thing, but ever since Buck started dating Tommy—and ever since Buck broke up with Tommy—Eddie's been pretty bad at being well-behaved around Buck. 

Buck doesn't exactly make things easy, though. Never has, truth be told. He's always been a really tactile kind of guy, and right now his tactile nature is trying to murder Eddie—dead, dead, dead. 

“Lemme just…” Buck's tongue is poking out of his mouth and resting against his bottom lip in concentration—and Eddie knows he should look away but can't—and then he's leaning right into Eddie's space, like he goddamn belongs there and, oh god, Eddie can't take this. He can't. He can't fucking breathe let alone act like this isn't bothering him; isn't turning him on like he's a teenager again; isn't everything he wants and has dreamed of. “Eds, just… lean forward a little would you, so I can—a little bit more, man, c'mon, don't be shy, I just need to…”

Buck really is on top of Eddie now, big arms wrapped around Eddie's head, musky cologne in Eddie's nostrils and warm breath in the shell of Eddie's super-sensitive ear and fuck, he's practically straddling Eddie now, right thigh pushed up against Eddie's junk, oh hell, and Eddie is panting softly and only about two seconds away from moaning his best friend's name like the pathetic hot mess that he is, jesus fucking christ. 

“Got it,” Buck mutters, and just as he goes to lean back, Eddie hears his internal monologue say: Yeah, I've got it real bad…  

And then something just snaps inside of his brain before it's shutting down completely and his heart is in his throat as he finds himself whispering, “Fuck it,” while he grabs onto both of Bucks biceps with purpose because he's terrified that if he doesn't, they might leave him forever. 

“Wait,” he says. Pleads. 

Buck's right thigh is snug against Eddie's left one, the other still in Eddie's lap, his gorgeous face right fucking next to Eddie's, so close Eddie can almost feel Buck's stubble. 

“Eds?” Buck whispers, and his breath is mingling with Eddie's and Eddie hasn't prayed for a long, long time, but he's praying now; praying that he's not about to fuck up the best thing that's ever happened to him; praying for redemption; praying that Buck might want Eddie even just a fraction of the amount Eddie wants Buck. 

His voice breaks when he says the only thing he can. “Don't go.”

Eddie wants this so, so badly, just this one thing, and he's willing to beg if he has to—swears he'll never ask for anything again as long as he fucking lives. 

“I'm not, Eds, I'm…” Buck trails off, frowning a little. He swallows audibly and licks at those sinful lips that are right fucking there and then says, “What, um—w-what exactly do you mean by that, Eddie?” 

Eddie's heart is thumping so hard against his ribcage it feels as if it's going to burst right out of his chest, and Buck has to be able to feel it too because his chest is pressed firmly against Eddie's, and Eddie can't believe he's doing this and seriously might just pass the fuck out any minute now. 

“I don't…” Eddie shakes his head. 

Fuck.

Is he really doing this?

“You don't know? Or you don't want me to go, like, as in go home?” Buck's asking. “Or do you mean, like, go, uh, g-go away from—from right here?” Buck swallows again and Eddie has never wanted anything more than to lick a long stripe up that prominent Adam's Apple of Buck's. “Do you mean don't go from this, Eds? From… from you.” and that last part doesn't sound like a question. It sounds like Buck��gets it, and like he isn't horrified by the idea or amused by it or is pitying or mocking Eddie. 

It actually sounds like Buck might just want Eddie, too. 

Eddie screws his eyes shut, and all he can manage to say is, “Yeah, Buck. The last one.”

Buck is then slowly, gently, sliding his cheek up and down Eddie's, and Eddie finally knows exactly how that stubble feels to be dragging against his own and there is no fucking way on Earth he could hold in the almost sob-like breath that leaves his lips as Buck's line themself up with Eddie's trembling mouth.

He's gripping Buck's arms so tightly he's scared he might leave bruises there but can feel Buck smiling as he says, “Can I, Eddie? Please?”

Is this really happening? 

“Fuck yes,” Eddie urges, and then Buck is kissing him; slowly; gently, and with so much of something that feels like it could be love that Eddie wants to cry. 

Then Buck's pulling away, yet not really away because it's just enough to let Eddie swallow the lump in his throat and try to catch his breath—only he doesn't quite manage to catch the tear that escapes the corner of his left eye, but somehow it's okay because Buck kisses that, too, and Eddie finds himself letting it all go, then, and smiling back at the man he's been in love with for almost six years as he cries, because he can finally feel all the colours of the rainbow on his face. 

“Eddie, you have no fucking idea how long I've wanted to do that,” Buck chuckles, and Eddie leans up to press his lips against Buck's birthmark, smiling like a fool through his tears.

Buck puts his arms fully around Eddie's shoulders and hugs him, until Eddie feels settled enough to look at him without welling up again.

“Skin,” Buck says then, bringing his hands to Eddie's face and holding it, brushing thumbpads along Eddie's cheeks and drying his tears, because he can. Eddie squints in slight confusion at the word, before Buck's revealing the meaning behind it, telling him, “Seven down, Eds, it just came to me: It was the word skin. Yours is—man, it's even smoother than I'd imagined. So beautiful. You're beautiful.” 

“God, I fucking love you, Buck,” Eddie blurts, because he can't help it. “I'm—I'm in love with you, Evan. And I'm just—I am so, so sorry it's taken me so long to tell you that, taken me so long to get my shit together and pull my head out of my—” 

“Beautiful, insanely perfect ass,” Buck laughs, and then he's kissing Eddie again, like they've been doing this forever, and Eddie's laughing, too.

“Stay,” Eddie begs between kisses. “Stay forever, Buck.”

Buck looks at Eddie like a man in love and says, “I'm in love with you too, Eds. So, yeah, sure, I can do forever,” he promises. 

And it's a promise he keeps.

.

happy pride to my beautiful firefam 🌈

(unedited pls forgive me!)

[eddiestightywhities]

weewoo taglist! please just let me know if you'd like adding/removing from the list :)

@inell @rosieposiepuddingnpie @sortasirius @angela-feelstoomuch @woodchoc-magnum

CRACK (TO THE HEAD) WITH A CAPITAL 'C'

(AKA The Written at 4am Buddie Crack-ish Fic Starring: Thirsty Song Lyrics, National Treasure Christopher Diaz, and Way Too Many Feels For Its Own Damn Good)

.

It's Friday morning, two minutes to zero-ten hundred-hours, according to Eddie's Timex Indiglo watch which is never even a half-second out, when he unlocks the door to Buck's place to drop Christopher off for his overnight stay—Chris refuses to call them sleepovers anymore because age thirteen is apparently The Number of The Beast—before Eddie will have to bail pretty sharpish to kick-off his twenty-four shift that begins at eleven.

On entering the apartment, they're met by the sound of raucous, upbeat music.

Eddie scans the loft for his friend and has to do a seriously comical double take when he catches sight of Buck, who has one hand spread palm-down on his the couch cushions, and the other behind his back as he performs shirtless one-armed wonder press-ups (with perfect fucking form, as always) to the punky beat of The Offspring's Pretty Fly For A White Guy that's currently blasting from Buck's bluetooth speaker—riiiiiight as the Give it to me baby! A-ha! A-ha! part of the song hits and the whole scene has Eddie's brain record-scratching and stopping him dead in his army issue steelies.

Dead, fucking dead, ¡Santa María, salva mi alma!

His jaw instantly drops through the floor and into the apartment below without his permission as if there are lead weights attached to his teeth, his mouth now fully hanging open and catching all the damn flies in a completely horrifying display of blatant, lust-filled shock.

Buck is breathtaking at the best of times, but right here, right now, he is heart-stoppingly unfuckingreal.

READ MORE BELOW OR HERE ON AO3

Eddie's bestie (best friend-shaped, Eddie! Buck is best friend-shaped!) is carelessly grunting like some sort of sex-machine that's been built to Eddie's exact specifications, and each grunt is louder than the last with each new, hard push upwards of Buck's swollen-thick torso, glistening sweat beading on his—well, on his absolutely fucking everything, Jesus fucking Christ on a bike, and Eddie's washing machine brain is at once stuck on an eternal spin-cycle and may well break down any second now and have him collapsing like a shabby old rag doll dressed in Eddie's Henley and Eddie's ripped jeans and falling to his now-violently shaking knees if he doesn't grab the fuck onto something, STAT.

He's about to shamefully steady himself with a hand to his son's shoulder when Christopher starts yipping like a madman then joining in with the song lyrics by positively shouting out the chorus.

“Give it to me baby! A-ha! A-ha!” he screams in a deliberate and absurd soprano, and Eddie's mind is screaming in Shut-Down, having first upgraded to an aneurysm, or at least a stroke, and he has to slap a hand over his kid's mouth, pronto, because he doesn't know what the fuck else he possibly could do at this point in the fantasy-laiden world that is currently unfolding before his probably now bloodshot eyes; nothing else he can think of to stop himself from ending up in a drooling heap that will become known as The Reduction Formally Known As Eddie Diaz's Gay Panic when he melts onto Evan Buckley's kitchen linoleum at possibly one minute to ten on a Friday afternoon in June in the year of our Lord 2024.

Eddie just barely manages to squeak out a truly pathetic, “Nope! Nuh-huh! No!” before that particular Cartoon Network-esque slapstick disaster becomes an unfathomable and inescapable reality.

Christopher obviously protests his outrage with a muffled but still impressively indignant, “Daaaad! I'm thirteen YEARS old, not thirteen MONTHS old!” just as Buck spots them both and smiles his big, adorable smile, immediately abandoning his exercises to turn the music off (oh, thank the Heavens!) and jumping up to stride over towards Christopher and Eddie to meet them where they're standing around like kitchen gremlins by the central island in Buck's kitchenette.

Sopping wet, wide-spread sweat patches are darkening the majority of Buck's once-light grey jersey short-shorts (holy crap, they are short and are leaving nothing to the imagination), those unfairly long legs of his slick and shimmering with dewy-fresh perspiration, just like the rest of his devastatingly gorgeous half-naked body, and Eddie wouldn't be joking if he regaled this moment to somebody at a later date (as if he ever would) by telling them that his entire life flashed before his eyes—because it absolutely balls to the wall no fucking shit just did.

He blinks approximately seven-hundred and thirty-three times in the less-than-four seconds it takes for Buck to reach them.

Christopher is flailing under Eddie's death-grip like a traumatised kidnap victim, while Eddie is continuing to freak the fuck out in Narnia like the crazed Closet Case that he is.

Edmundo Diaz—First Responder; Lapsed Roman Catholic—finds himself praying for a natural disaster, or an act of God, or, or, or, just... Something! Anything!

¡Por favor, Dios, por favor!

Resolute to the fact he has absolutely one-hundred percent secured his place in the very lowest circle of Hell, Eddie plasters a surely maniacal pearly-white grin onto his stupid and definitely reddening face, and says, “Howdy!” far too loudly in his thickest Texan accent for some unknown fucking reason—which is far, far louder and far, far thicker than any he ever sported while actually growing up in Texas—because he's clearly gone bat-shit fucking insane. Then he's breaking out into even more of a full-body sweat than Buck who has been working out for what is probably around the half-hour mark or more, by this point, because Sweaty Adonis Buckaroo is now right fucking there right in fucking front of Eddie so fucking close almost close enough to reach out and touch—

Ohshitohshitohshitohshitohshit!

And isn't this just aces?

Eddie thinks, Fuck fucking push-ups, fuck The Fucking Offspring, and fuck fucking Eddie's fucking life so fucking hard, godfuckingdammit.

Eddie is so Bucked.

Buck's smile is turning inquisitive (and somehow even more adorable) at Eddie's clear display of Buck-induced brain damage, before his baby-blues are twinkling with something... Mischievous? Cunning? And then he's answering Eddie's dumb as shit greeting with, “Aloha, cowboy,” his brows snaking up his forehead, tongue lolling out of his mouth to rest on that sinfully pouty-pink bottom lip in a way that is the complete fucking opposite of innocent, leaving Eddie wondering if it's possible to die twice in the space of—well, ever.

(He knows all too well that it is, but he's been Bucked, remember, so how about giving his brain a break, hmm? THANK YOU SO MUCH).

Then Eddie wonders: Is this the ghost of Buck 1.0 that's come to say:

Hi, babygirl, I'm here to Buck you up good, real good, so you better hold on real tight because you're goin' downtown faster than a whore's panties, you slutty little—*GUNSHOTS*

About to possibly kick the bucket for the third time in as many minutes, Eddie realises he doesn't really know what Hawaii could possibly have to do with the Wild West (Aloha Cowboy?) but that he honestly couldn't give any amount of fucks, flying or otherwise, because unless his head has been cruelly hoodwinked with a massive serving of Wishful Thinking, he is also realising that Buck is seriously flirting with him right now?!

He ponders briefly over how hard he actually hit his head when he'd banged it into the doorframe of his truck, maybe five minutes earlier when grabbing Christopher's crutches from the backseat just after they'd arrived.

Eddie then notices Christopher's teenage Smirky McSmirkerson features in his periphery, and also the way his son's own head is snapping between his now fully-loco father and his Buck, and Eddie thinks of tennis matches, and flying pigs, and how stiflingly hot it seems to have become in the loft in the last thirty or so seconds.

Then Buck is licking at those lovely lips of his, turning to Christopher and saying, “What do you say we go out on a breakfast date on Sunday morning, after your Dad has slept a bunch, huh Christopher?”

Only, when he says the word 'date', Eddie doesn't think he's imagining the way Buck's eyes flicker pointedly in Eddie's exact direction.

“Because I'm off the whole weekend,” he continues, “so the three of us could drive the jeep out of town and I could buy you both giant syrupy waffles with maple bacon and Horchata milkshakes from Fosselman's and then... And then we can go visit the the Greek Theatre, and then maybe Griffith Observatory later on in the evening, when the stars come out, and we'll hold hands,”—again, his eyes bore longingly into Eddie's for a split-second that feels like a lived lifetime—“all three of us, like we used to when you were tiny, Chris, you remember that? And it'll be the best day that we've ever, ever had together, I absolutely know it.”

Buck is looking at Eddie again, only Buck isn't looking away this time and Eddie is almost positive that his eyes are screaming: Yes, Eds! Yes, I want you, too, man! So let's do this!

“Ew, no way,” Christopher instantaneously complains—before he's quickly backtracking and amending his statement with, “To the hand-holding, I mean. The rest sounds pretty good, though, Buck. What do you think, Dad?” and he even manages to sound marginally appreciative at the tail end—appreciative for a sharp, snarky teenager, that is.

Christopher then fully turns to Eddie (Eddie who's body is now sans soul) and says, “Can we really have waffles and milkshakes for breakfast Dad? Can we? Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease don't be a major Joy Assassin and say 'It's not a proper meal if there's no vitamins involved, Mijo', because it'll be a Sunday, and it sounds so awesome, like the rest of the day does, too, actually. And you love Buck, Dad, so maybe just you and him can be sappy Sallys and hold hands and be all gross together, and I'll secretly snap your picture when you're mooning at Buck with heart-eyes, like you always do, and Buck will give you heart-eyes back, like he always does, too, except this time you can both do it while you're actually looking at each other, and then I'll send the photo to Aunt Maddie and Uncle Chim who can maybe finally convince you two to move in together and get married like I've been trying to get them to for years, now!”

Eddie doesn't know where the hell the kid got the breath from for all those truths.

Because that's what that was; Eddie's truth, all of it.

But was it really Buck's truth, too?

Like they're rehearsing in a play based on their lives, Buck, on cue, lets out a really happy-sounding gasp that quickly morphs into a happy-sounding laugh, and Eddie bottle-rockets right out of the fucking apartment and off into the fucking stratosphere.

He is very much back in the room, though, when Christopher takes his hand to gracelessly slam-join it with Buck's, which is calloused like his own due to the life-saving work they proudly tackle together day-to-day—always together, every day they can be, always, partners in everything they do—and Buck's hand is big, and warm, too, and all kinds of wonderful, and then Eddie is not only thinking about all the skin and the hot and the sweaty and the gorgeous, but also about how Buck has saved Eddie's life, so many times, now, and saved him in so many different ways from practically the first week he and Chris spent in LA after leaving El Paso, has saved him in every way possible, actually, every which way under the sun and the moon and the stars, even the ones they can't see from Griffith Observatory. And even though Buck has just murdered Eddie twice already this morning in the silly-short space of time he and Christopher have been here, with his push-up grunts and sexy-swagger and his 'Aloha, Cowboy' (whatever the fuck that even means) and, most of all, above everything else, Buck's Over Nine-Thousand level of Adorability, Buck's boundless generosity and kindness, Buck's inherently thoughtful nature, and Buck's twelve-sizes-too-big heart, he is saving Eddie again with the way he's letting Eddie Eddie love, love, love him.

And the fact that he is taking care of Eddie's son today, tonight, is absolutely everything to Eddie. Buck is Christopher's Buck, Christopher's hero, and he's Eddie's hero, as well, and Eddie wants to claim him as Eddie's Buck, too, because Buck thinks Christopher is awesome and always genuinely looks forward to looking after him, to loving him all of the time, just like Eddie loves Chris, and like Eddie loves Buck because Buck cares about Christopher just as much as Eddie does, and Eddie knows—he knows without a shadow of a doubt—that Buck's love for the boy they're raising together is a type of love that no other person, bar Shannon, has had for him, for them, before or ever will again.

There is nobody else like Buck in the universe.

Nobody cares or loves like Evan Buckley, or more than Evan Buckley, and being on the receiving end of that love is worth more than solid gold, or oxygen, or even spicy pepperoni pizza and a cold one after pulling a gruelling shift as a Firefighter on the never-sleeping streets of Los Angeles, CA.

And then just like that, Eddie is able to put a timely yet abrupt stop to any and all of his panic (gay or otherwise) because there isn't a shred of anxiety left inside of him, now, not about this, at least, because he knows he's got nothing whatsoever to be scared of with Buck.

So addressing his son (their son, really) Eddie nods his head emphatically and tells his boy, “Yeah, Chris, that does sound awesome; Waffles and milkshakes and all of it,” and then squeezes the hand in his, Buck's hand, and leans over Buck's kitchen counter and says easily, “I love you, Buck—I mean, I'd love to, Buck! Shit—”

“Swearbox!” Christopher chides smugly.

Eddie pulls a face at his slip-up and at his son, then clears his throat and continues a little sheepishly with, “But, um,” before looking up to remind himself of that adoring that look Buck is giving him, and then saying more decisively,“ But yeah, that other thing, too, actually, because yeah, yes, you know I love you, Buck... At least, I hope you know it,” and then he huffs a little laugh as he adamantly says, “I love you, Evan Buckley,” and thinks 'In for a penny' and strains his neck to reach across and kiss Buck shyly on the cheek.

Only his aim is a little off and he ends up planting a kinda sloppy one right on the corner of Buck's slightly parted lips, but it turns out he's glad about it and is even sort of proud that he misjudged the angle and got to feel Buck's unabashed smile against his own upturned lips, because he's wanted to do that ever since he first laid eyes on the man standing in front of him who is radiating the sun's rays out of his very core, as if he actually owns them and the sun only has them on a loner for sunny days.

Buck is smiling like he's just won the World Series—which is funny because Eddie has just won the Being Gay With a Capital 'G' award, and that means they are both Imaginary Winning Title holders, now.

Except no, fuck that, because Eddie's win isn't imaginary at all, it is very much a beautiful and viscerally Real win, actually.

Real with a capital R, muchas gracias.

Apparently, all Buck has to say about all of this right now is, “Okay, alright, you get your fine ass to work now, Eddie Spaghetti, and Christopher and I will see you on the flipside for sleep and cuddles and, and, and a Real with a capital R adventure on Sunday,” and Eddie is looking at the universe sideways for the first time in the entirety of his non-believing life. “Oh and by the way, honey—and I am so calling you honey from now on, also by the way, just so you know—I absolutely one-hundred percent, honey,” he pauses for second and and winces a bit, “Christopher I will also be adding to the Swearbox for this one... Love the shit outta you too, Edmundo Diaz.”

Christopher just claps and laughs and laughs and claps and then shouts, “My two Dads love each other, universe, did you hear that?!”

Somehow managing to smile even bigger than he was a moment ago, Buck then lightly grabs the now half wolf-whistling, half dry-retching thirteen-year-old matchmaking genius who goes by Christopher Diaz, in a loose headlock and starts scrubbing gentle knuckles through his curls, before literally kicking the happiest man on the whole damn planet out of his apartment with a ridiculously big and adorably bare foot.

“Go! You'll be late! We'll see you tomorrow, honey.”

Eddie (said happiest man on the whole damn planet) waits until Buck's door has closed behind him and then till the elevator door has slid open and shut again before fist-pumping the air like the dorky First Place In The Game of Life winner that he is, smiling what is likely his biggest smile since his darling Christopher came into this world.

Then he pulls out his tongue at nobody at all and thinks, Fuck you, first place is first place; dork or not.

As he leaves Buck's building, he also thinks, I'll have to crack my head on random shit more often, joking with himself and chuckling like a prize idiot as he crosses the side road towards his truck.

Then he's immediately cursing himself out with every swear words he knows, in both English and Spanish, for somehow allowing himself to be pulled into Buck's nonsensical woo-woo Cosmic Universe bullshit.

Vida, vida, vida.

Although...

Maybe—just maybe—he could forgive the slip, just this one time, just this once, when he recognises his chuckle as the being the very same, gloriously happy-sounding laughter that Eddie had unbelievably managed to pull from the chest of the best man he's ever known (who also happens to be the hottest man in the whole frickin universe; cosmic or otherwise).

It's the man Eddie has loved for years who—apparently, amazingly—loves Eddie right back.

Evan 'Buck' Buckley.

Christopher's Buck. Eddie's Buck.

And when he's climbing into his truck and inexplicably clocks his head on the doorframe again, for the second time today (seriously, what the actual fuck is going on here?), Eddie looks around suspiciously and surreptitiously before taking a minute to peer hesitantly up at the sky-blue sky and its cotton-candy clouds and the hot, hot sun with its borrowed rays, out into the universe, or to God, or who—or what—ever is or isn't out there, before finding himself about to mutter a few choice incredulous words from under his breath.

He takes a gulp of air, and says, “Yeah, okay, muchas gracias, oh cosmic powers that be, yada yada et cetera et cetera, if you do in fact exist, not that I really think you do,” whispering the statement and feeling like a first class clown, “But, just in case?” Eddie swallows the lump in his throat and soldiers on. “Just in case, here it is: Yes, I obviously wholeheartedly appreciate whatever it was you might or might not have done for me back there, like, I really, honestly, seriously, do, but just—will you just please do me a solid and...” Eddie can't believe he's thinking this, let alone saying (albeit whispering) it for realsies, “...don't let Buck or Christopher or Hen or Karen or Chim or Maddie or Bobby or Athena or Ravi or, hell, any other fucker on the planet know that I actually said any of this phooey out loud, alright? Not ever. Or Santa Mierda, I will seriously come for you like a rabid Nordic Goat Herder on a mixture of bath salts and crack cocaine and crazy because I would never, ever be able to live this shit down if it got out. ¿Entiendes?”

Completely fucking done with that, Eddie starts up the engine and pulls out of his parking space outside of Buck's building, while annoyingly hoping that the universe understands at least a smidgen of Spanish, and begins the first day of the rest of his life, mumble-humming a not entirely unenthusiastic tune...

“Give it to me baby! A-ha! A-ha!”

.

(this had barely one skim-over edit so please be kind!)