i'll keep it all to myself
7x04 coda (she's back, baby xoxo)
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“Hey, killer.”
Buck winces, mouth already tripping over an apology as he moves into the Diaz living room. “Eddie, I’m so sorry-“
“Buck, I’m kidding,” Eddie interrupts, exasperated and just a little fond. He hasn’t been on the receiving end of that tone in a few days. It’s embarrassing to say he missed it. “Sit down.”
Buck takes the armchair instead of sitting on the couch next to Eddie. He’s not sure why. He never sits in the armchair. Sitting in it now he almost feels…off balance. But then catching sight of Eddie’s foot propped up on the coffee table sobers him immediately and he forgets all about the strange discomfort in his stomach.
Reaching for the cushion behind him, he gets up again. “You should have something under that,” he says, gently lifting Eddie’s leg to place the cushion on the table. He lowers it again carefully, nodding in satisfaction when Eddie’s foot is nestled safely in the cushion. “The table is too hard.”
“Oh sorry, I thought I was the one with real medical training,” Eddie quips but there’s no bite behind the words.
“Yeah but I’m the one with crush injury experience,” Buck says, kicking his own legs up on the table in proof.
Eddie opens his mouth as if to argue back but then closes it again, rolling his eyes, but his lips twitch a bit. Just at the corners.
“Eddie, I really am sorry,” he says, straightening in his seat and forcing himself to meet Eddie’s gaze properly. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I just got so-“
“I know,” Eddie replies, quiet and careful and devoid of any of his earlier teasing. “But you know you can talk to me, right? Like, it’s me Buck. You can just tell me when something’s wrong.”
Buck does know that. He knows he can tell Eddie everything. Anything. The bad and the good.
Which means he should be able to clear this up right away, right? He should just be able to say, ‘Hey, I was apparently working through some latent feelings I never knew I had. And I took that out on you. But guess what! I like Tommy and he likes me back and we have a date Saturday!’
But thinking about telling Eddie that Tommy kissed him makes his chest constrict in a way that he doesn’t expect. So he tucks it up in a neat little box in the corner of his mind for now and focuses on making sure Eddie’s okay. Because he can do that. He knows how to do that.
“I’m an idiot,” he says. “And if you want I will totally give you one free punch so we’re even.”
Eddie huffs a quiet laugh. “I could never hit you.”
“Should I go get Christopher’s Legos instead and step on them with my shoes off?”
Eddie lets out a real laugh then, the kind that makes his eyes close and his head fall back against the couch cushion, and Buck feels so much affection for him well up inside him he’s almost breathless with it.
“You’re an idiot,” Eddie tells him. “And a martyr. Seriously, Buck, I don’t care. I just want to make sure you and I are okay.”
“Of course we are,” Buck says, without actually stopping to interrogate if that’s true or not.
They are, he thinks. The fact that something absolutely life altering happened to him an hour ago and he somehow can’t make himself tell Eddie about it is…inconsequential.
He’s just hedging his bets. Not trying to get ahead of himself before he has yet another failed romance.
“In that case, can you go to the fridge and get us some beers?” Eddie asks, pulling Buck back to reality.
“You shouldn’t be drinking,” Buck says, even as he stands. Maybe they can split a beer. Half a bottle shouldn’t hurt. “Tommy says you’re on pain meds.”
“Oh, so you guys talked?”
Eddie says it unassumingly and when Buck freezes at the dining table and looks over his shoulder he finds that Eddie isn’t even looking at him. He’s leaning forward on the couch, adjusting his leg, but when Buck takes too long to answer he raises his head and gives him an expectant look.
“Yeah,” Buck murmurs, the phantom rasp of Tommy’s stubble against his mouth still tingling and making him want to reach up and touch his lips. That would give too much away though. “We talked.”
Eddie smiles, nodding his approval. “Good. Maybe all three of us can actually hang out together now.”
The thought immediately makes Buck’s stomach swoop with something unnameable but he doesn’t let it show on his face.
“Sure,” he breathes. “Sounds great.”
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