Chapter Text
“Buck, what do you mean by that?”
“I- I don't know. I’m sorry Eddie.”
Eddie pulls his chair out and sits down, Buck does the same.
“Buck,”
Eddie leans on the table and looks up at Buck, Buck looks like he’s trying not to cry.
“…you can tell me anything. I have a feeling you know what you meant by that. But I don’t know what you meant, and I would like to know.”
Buck tries to avoid the conversation, but he only makes it worse.
“Eddie, did you know that you're a sleep talker?”
Eddie's eyes widen in fear and his heart sinks, thinking that Buck doesn't feel the same and he might be uncomfortable around Eddie now, he doesn't want to lose his best friend over a stupid crush.
“Oh.”
“Whoever you're dreaming about is lucky, it's an honor to be dating ‘The Eddie Diaz’. She's a lucky woman. And I think that's my problem Eddie.”
Eddie sits up straight, still looking Buck dead in the eyes. He raises his eyebrows in concern, what does he mean by that? Did he not hear Eddie say his name while he was sleeping?
“Buck-”
“Let me finish, Eds.”
Eddie sighed and listened to Buck speak, his heart racing and his hands shaking even faster at every word that fell from his lips.
“I think I love you Eddie, I think I’m in love with you. I think my problem is, knowing that I will never have a chance. You could never love me. I never realized that I loved you, until I heard you begging your girlfriend to stay the night. And the idea of someone leaving you broke my heart. I- I love you Eds. I know you don't feel the same, and that stings. But I just need to get this off my chest, I really don't want to lose you as a friend, so please don't hate me for this.”
There's tears running down his face, he's trying to avoid eye contact with Eddie, he genuinely seems terrified. Eddie gets up and moves to sit next to Buck on the other side of the table. He’s sitting to look at him and he sets his hand on Buck's knee, leaning in slightly and looking up at him.
“Buck. Why would I hate you for that? ¡Tu eres mi mejor amigo! I could never hate my best friend. And Evan-”
Buck's heart drops at hearing that name. Eddie has only used it once, when Buck said that he should have been the one that was shot. Only when it was serious.
“-what makes you think that it was my girlfriend? You do remember that me and Marisol broke up a long time ago, right?”
“What?”
“Who do you think the dream was about Bucky?”
He winks, trying so hard to be obvious, it doesn't work. Buck is oblivious to everything.
“I don't know, but I wish I was the one you were calling ‘baby’.”
Eddie sighs and face palms, accidentally hits his hand on the table when he tries putting his hand down. “Ow… Buck, did you ever hear the name of ‘the girl’?”
Eddie does the hand movements for quotes and Buck still doesn't look like he understands.
“Eddie, what do you mean by “the girl”?”
Eddie stands up and slams his hand on the table, looking down at Buck.
“Buck, oh my fucking God. You were the one in the dream. I’ve been in love with you for two years. I’ve tried to repress my feelings for so long, and all they did was get worse. I couldn't stand the idea of seeing my parents' reaction to seeing me with a guy. My dad would say something like: ‘You should repent, God wouldn't like this.’
I don't even think God liked me in the first place.”
“Buck, knowing you feel the same way about me, makes me feel.. like God doesn't matter. I should follow my heart. Not anyone else's. Not even God. Buck, the more I repress it, the more I feel, the more I fall in love. I only accepted the fact that the feelings I have for you are normal, a few months ago when I started having these dreams. It doesn't feel fully normal, but… it feels right.”
Buck is just staring up at Eddie, trying to process all that was just said. Buck was about to say something before Eddie got up and went to Buck’s fridge and opened it, grabbing a bottle of maple syrup. He goes back to sit down and he drenches his pancakes in the syrup. Buck just watches him shovel the food into his mouth. He chuckles and Eddie notices and looks up at Buck, he has a maple syrup mustache.
“What's so funny Buckley?” He says it in a sarcastic, yet stern way but Buck can't help but laugh.
“Your mustache is back, Eds…”
Eddie chuckles and licks his lips, getting most of it off but not all of it. Buck notices and runs his hand across Eddie's upper lip to get all of the syrup, leaving Eddie flustered. Buck then licks his finger, realizes what he just did and gets incredibly embarrassed. He just stares at the blushing Eddie in horror.
“I- I don't know why I did that…”
“Buck… I had literally just licked my lip, you literally just swallowed some of my spit…”
“It's no different from when we’ll be kissing.”
Buck shrugs, realizing what he said but he doesn't even care anymore. Eddie just looks at him in confusion for a minute before responding.
“What?”
“What?”
“Buck, what did you say?”
“I said that it's basically the same thing as kissing.”
Eddie raises his eyebrows, trying to get Buck to clarify some things.
“And?”
“...And we'll be doing that a lot.”
“Buck?”
“What?”
“Buck, what are you implying?”
Eddie smirks at him while Buck just sighs.
“I'm implying that I want to kiss you Diaz!”
“What if I also want to kiss you, Buckley?”
“Then why don't we?”
Buck smirks back at Eddie, chuckling at the fact that Eddie is playing along.
“I'm down. …Can I finish eating though?”
Buck sighs in relief, the most he’s done is stab his scrambled eggs a couple times.
“Oh thank god, I’m starving.”
They both chuckle a bit, eating their food and talking like normal, until Eddie brings up the kiss again.
“So, were you being serious…? You know, about the kiss?”
“Yeah, oh no… Were you not?”
“Oh no, I was definitely serious. I was just worried that you weren't.”
“Thank you for getting breakfast, even if it's from a restaurant. I really appreciate Eds.”
Eddie smiles at him, getting up, grabbing their plates and setting them in the sink next to the pan, before coming back and standing next to Buck.
“De nada, Bucky.”
Buck stands up and hugs Eddie, he's genuinely so grateful to have a best friend like Eddie. Eddie hugs him back for a moment before Buck pulls back and looks down, looking him in the eyes.
“So, when are we going to kiss?”
“Right now.”
“R-right now?”
“Yup, right about… now.”
Before Buck can even open his mouth, Eddie pulls him and kisses him. Buck is slightly surprised at how fast everything is happening, but Buck quickly melts into the kiss. He's actually kissing his best friend, neither of them can believe it. Buck runs his fingers through Eddie's hair and pulls away from the kiss.
“Has anyone ever told you that you're really good at that?”
Eddie smiles, looking up at Buck.
“No, they're usually too focused on getting me into bed instead of being romantic.”
“Don't worry, I won't be like that. At least not all the time.” He winks, letting go of Eddie and sitting down in his chair. Buck checks his phone, looking at the time.
“Especially not at 10:37 in the morning.”
“Oh good. No more morning sex, Marisol could never.”
They both chuckle and Eddie pulls up a chair to sit right next to Buck.
“Do you still… Want to spend time together today? It's okay if you don't want to of course.” Eddie sighs.
“Eds, are you kidding me? Of course I want to spend time with my new boyfriend! …Wait, do you want to be boyfriends?”
“Obviously, now what do you want to do? We could go to the gym or play video games together? I'm down for anything.” Eddie smiles at him. He seems proud to be his new boyfriend.
“I was thinking that we could continue watching movies, I was having a lot of fun doing that with you last night.”
“That sounds nice. Shall we go upstairs, ‘baby’?”
Buck melts at hearing that word come out of Eddie's mouth, and actually be directed towards him. He just smiles and nods and they head upstairs and Buck grabs his computer and sets it on the bed.
“What movie are you thinkin’, Eds?”
“We could finish watching ‘Dead Poets Society’, I know you really like that one.”
Before Eddie can finish speaking, both of their phones buzz. It's the 118 group chat, Bobby is inviting them over for a barbeque at 12:00. They both read the message and Eddie looks up at Buck from sitting on his bed.
“There goes our plans. I mean, if you want to go. We don't have to, obviously.”
“Oh, I'd love to go. Plus we still have an hour and a half. We could do both.”
“Are you sure we have enough time? We both need to get ready, I have to take a shower-”
Before he could finish the sentence, Buck tries to convince him to stay.
“You could shower here.”
“I don't have an extra change of clothes?”
“Easy fix, borrow some of mine.”
“Buck, are you sure? Don't you need to shower too? I’d offer to shower together, but I like cold showers, and you don't seem like a ‘cold showers kind-of-guy.’”
“Well, you’d be right, and I’d love to, but no. Don't think we're there just yet.”
They both chuckle before Buck sets the computer back on the nightstand and walks over to the closet and starts looking through his shirts, he holds one up for Eddie to judge if he wants to wear it or not.
“Is this acceptable, Eds? Or do you have a specific type of shirt you want to wear?”
Eddie nods, looking at Buck, who is currently rummaging through his stuff to find clothes Eddie would wear.
“Yeah, that's good. Are you really sure that I can wear your clothes? I feel like I’m invading your privacy or something.”
“Eddie, it doesn't matter. Just… Please stay, alright?”
“Mhm, I’m not planning on leaving you. How long are your showers usually? Whichever one of us takes longer should shower after the other.”
Eddie asks, grinning up at Buck.
“32 minutes, 12 seconds.”
Eddie's face goes from a giddy grin to a look of slight concern at Buck’s response.
“Why do you know that?”
“I listen to music while I shower, I have waterproof earbuds and a specific playlist that is 32 minutes and 12 seconds long and I always get out of the shower once it ends.”
“That’s… impressive?”
“Thanks, it's just the only way I don't end up zoned out, standing in the shower until the water gets cold.”
“Uh, how about you shower first because I need to time this. To see if that's true.”
“Alright have fun with that Eds.”
Buck grabs his clothes and goes into the bathroom, Eddie pulls out his phone and waits to hear the water start before starting the stopwatch. Eddie just scrolls on Instagram for a little while, before coming across one of Buck's posts. He decides to look through his posts, seeing that he's posting more often than previously. He ends up scrolling so far back that it's from before Buck was a firefighter.
‘Wow, he looked so different from now.’ Eddie thinks before he likes the post on instinct. “Shit.” He unlikes it and closes Instagram in embarrassment then collapses on the bed, phone in hand. He remembers that he's timing Buck so he opens up the stopwatch just in time to hear Buck turn off the water. He stops it and to his surprise, it really is 32 minutes and 12 seconds. A few minutes later Buck comes out of the bathroom, in different clothes, his hair is wet, yet his curls are still so pretty.
“That actually is impressive.”
Eddie sits up to look at Buck, his eyes trailing across him walking across the room to put on his socks, Buck sits down, his socks in his hand, he turns around for a moment and throws the extra clothes at Eddie.
“Alright Diaz, go put these on.”
Eddie laughs and grabs the clothes. He goes to the bathroom, undresses, and starts the water, he starts to think about the water temperature, and how Buck likes the water a lot warmer. He turns the knob to slightly warmer and he finds that he actually likes it. He quickly washes his hair and body before turning the water back off and getting out. He puts his boxers back on and looks at himself in the mirror. He fixes his hair a bit and puts the rest of the clothes back on. Buck’s clothes actually look pretty good on him. He grabs his socks and leaves the bathroom, Buck isn't in the bedroom anymore, leaving Eddie curious to where he went.
“Buck?”
“Just down here Eds!”
Buck is putting his shoes on downstairs. Eddie sits down to put his socks on, before grabbing his phone and heading downstairs to put his shoes on as well.
“Are you almost ready?” Buck asks, putting his hand on Eddie's shoulder.
“Yup, I’ll put my other shoe on, then we can go.”