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"Yeah, actually." Buck fiddles with the ring on his finger, all his weight melting onto the bar top. "I have a husband."
Drunk, sweaty and overwhelmed, he finds himself laughing. It's not just the alcohol, but the lights and the swirling room and the masses of people moving on the dance floor behind him, behind him and the stranger next to him that tips a smile in his direction. "Nice," the guy says. It sounds distant. Buck finds himself nodding along, lifts his Appletini in a swoop that sends some of it sloshing over the rim. Oops, he goes, the stranger laughing with him, and he takes a sip and smacks his lips loudly at the sweetness. Nods at the glint in the guy—Thomas, he introduces himself—'s hand, on his ring finger.
"You guys—got any kids?"
"She's pregnant, actually." Thomas lights up, in that slow, three-drinks-in way. Buck does too, clinking their glasses together. The music changes, something slower, something that makes him think of Eddie.
"Congratulations," Buck says. "I love kids."
Thomas laughs, nods, me too, and gushes about his wife and family, Buck humming in all the right places, and Thomas returns the question. The next five to ten minutes go by with a refill set down in front of them and Buck gushing about Chris, he's so cool, we're so lucky to have him, and Eddie doesn't think he's a good dad sometimes, but he is, he really is, and yeah, we've been partners for seven years. I've never been happier in my life. Thomas grins, congratulating him, and he doesn't know.
That Buck's stealing these moments, fragments from a life that will never be his.
That he's inhabiting them for the night like the broken specter he is, stuck and forever left behind.
And Thomas will remain oblivious. Buck's laugh thrums with it all, a fire fueled and flashing over at this moment, until Thomas taps out with an empty glass hitting the countertop, speaking of rejoining his brother's birthday group and waving Buck goodbye with a cheers, man, great talk, and Buck is alone again.
Not for long.
He's wearing the ring when he flirts with the hot drunk brunette that grabs his ass, winding up with against a wall with her mouth pressed to his and fingers curled into his hair, tugging hard, harder, and he's wearing the ring when he sucks off a beautiful dark-eyed man with a Prince Albert in a cramped toilet stall, moaning and taking him deeper than he should, enough that it'll leave his throat hoarse the next day, sore and fucking hurting.
The end of the night finds him in an Uber home, buzzing all over, his heart worn down, shattered, and stomped to pieces. Can't get his eyes off his hand, the stupid prop ring, the whole ride. He stumbles his way into his apartment, the gaping maw in his chest aching with loneliness.
He doesn’t deserve to leave a glass of water and Tylenol in his nightstand. He walks straight up the stairs to his room and drops on the side of his bed, tugging the ring off.
It leaves an indent on his skin, a brand at the base of his finger. The mark goes white when he presses a thumb down on it, then fades back into view.
He tugs the closest nightstand drawer open. In his pocket, a buzz. A text from Eddie.
You doing anything right now?
He doesn't wait—his hand's already tapping the call icon.
Eddie picks up within one ring, and there he is, Buck thinks, aching some more. Eight hundred miles away, Eddie—cheeks rosy and his beautiful dark eyes a little warm, a little sleepy—grants him a smile. "Hey, Buck."
"Hi," Buck says. Eddie's voice is a balm. Eddie's face, a sight for sore eyes, and Buck misses him, and misses him, and misses him, his heart thumping and thrashing against the walls of his chest, jabbing hard against the backs of his eyes and begging him to say something, Eddie, please, and Buck pushes the nightstand drawer closed with a trembling hand. The ring jostles, clinks heavily against the wood inside. "To answer your question, no," he says, arranging his face into a grin, as mild and easy as he can, and thumbs at the indent on his finger again. "Not doing anything at all."