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Everything is going fine, and then, in the way it always falls apart, Buck takes a bad fall. A roof comes down, knocks him through a floor, flat on his back in a musty basement, and because it's just his luck, he falls directly onto someone's amateur woodworking project and the hammer nails him (Get it?) right in the back, with the claw punching between two broken ribs.
No one else seems to think that joke is funny. Buck is pretty sure it looks worse than it actually is. He'd explain it, but breathing is hard because they can't remove the hammer or he'll probably bleed out, so every time he tries to talk, it comes out hoarse and death-gurgly. He has to go to the hospital.
He likes Cedars-Sinai. The vending machines are better there than at First Presbyterian. With a little morphine in his system, the ambulance ride isn't even that bad, although he squeezes Eddie's hand so hard he probably can't feel his fingers every time they go over a pothole.
It's barely surgery, in the grand scheme of things. Buck wakes up on his side, mouth dry as hell, hammer presumably removed, and Eddie is there, brow creased, tapping one-fingered at his phone like the old man he is.
"Eddie," he croaks, and Eddie puts down the phone immediately, reaching out to squeeze his shoulder.
"Hey, how are you feeling?" he asks, and Buck tries to shrug, then regrets it.
"Been worse," he says honestly. "How long was I out?"
"Just a couple hours," Eddie says. He scrubs his hand over his face. "They said you got real lucky that the hammer didn't puncture your lung."
“Yeah, I feel so lucky," Buck jokes, but his heart isn't really in it. "Hang on, how are you allowed back here?"
Eddie flicks his arm. "You made me your emergency contact, dumbass."
The doctor comes in; they do the whole "how are you feeling" and "you're lucky to be alive" routine. It's kind of getting old. Eddie doesn't offer to leave, for which Buck is grateful. "I’m his emergency contact," Eddie says stoutly, and Buck says, "AKA moral support," which makes the doctor smile.
"Thankfully, the hammer was several inches to the left of your spine, so we're not looking at any damage there," the doctor says. "Your lungs seem intact, but tell us immediately if you experience any shortness of breath, wheezing, or coughing."
"We'll keep a close eye on him," Eddie promises. as if Buck doesn't know when he's experiencing shortness of breath!
"Excellent," the doctor says. She consults her chart. "We were also concerned about possible organ damage, particularly since you only have one kidney, but your ribs took the brunt of the impact."
"That's what they're there for!" Buck says cheerfully.
The doctor smiles again. "Exactly," she says. "We'll know more when the swelling from the penetrating wound goes down, but hopefully we can avoid a second surgery for your ribs."
Ha , Buck thinks. Penetrating.
"Wait," Eddie says. "That's not right. Buck has both his kidneys."
The doctor consults the chart again, her eyebrows drawing together. “I’m sorry, Mr Buckley, is there an error in your medical history? I have it right here that you only have your right kidney, is that correct?"
"Ye-es," Buck says, desperately wishing that he was no longer groggy. He can feel Eddie’s gaze on the side of his face and studiously avoids it.
"What?" Eddie says. "How did I not know this? When did you lose a kidney , was this when you were a kid?"
"Uh..." Buck says. "Aha. Last year."
Eddie's face shifts from perplexed to horrified to thunderous all within about two seconds. It would be funny to see his stoicism so rattled under different circumstances. "When I was in Texas?"
It's a dumb question, because when else could it have been? Buck says, "Um, yup. Hey, when can I go home?”
“We’d like to keep an eye on you for a few more hours, but then you’re free to leave as long as no other issues arise,” the doctor says. Her gaze flickers to Eddie, and Buck can see it on her face as she decides she doesn’t want to stick around for whatever he has to say. “I’ll give you some privacy. Press the call button if you need someone.”
The door clicks shut.
“It’s not what it sounds like,” Buck tries. “I didn’t do anything stupid, I swear.” At least, not in the way Eddie is probably thinking.
There was no accident, no stupid stunt. It happens like this.
After Eddie leaves for El Paso, Buck sort of sinks down inside himself. The three astoundingly short weeks it took for Eddie to settle on a place (rental, thank fuck, although Buck hates himself for feeling so relieved) and pack up all his stuff and leave were a whirlwind, and it took everything in Buck to be the normal and sane friend he knew Eddie needed.
It was easier than he thought it would be, actually, because it was so hopelessly obvious that Eddie needed him to be the calm one. Buck has a few moments when he has to clench his fists white-knuckled and dig his fingernails into his palms to keep from saying shit he shouldn’t, but Eddie is so grateful that Buck absolutely, categorically refuses to let him down.
Then Eddie leaves, and the whirlwind dies down, and in its place is… nothing.
There's something wrong inside Buck, he's pretty sure. The kind of endless cavern he's not sure any amount of therapy would be able to fix.
He needs a purpose, he thinks. He was born for something and failed. As an adult, he tried to make himself into something better, and Eddie and Chris left anyway. His sense of self is still all tangled up in them, in the home they let him into, for a little while.
Buck didn’t ask Eddie about the will before he left. He's determined not to, in fact. Because the answer is actually obvious, and he's afraid of it anyway.
The thing is, Buck needs to be for something. It's like he's always known that he never would have existed if he didn't have a purpose.
At work, he feels almost normal. Even when everything on a call is going to shit, it's like Buck can see his next steps laid out in front of him, like ticking down a checklist on a clipboard. Easy as that. Saws, jaws, harness, ladder. Everything is right and tight.
He can feel Bobby watching him, so he makes sure not to slip. He doesn't pretend to be too fine, because he knows that will make Bobby worry more; instead, he picks a discreet issue to complain about in moderation.
"I haven't been sleeping that well," he tells Bobby, and watches Bobby's face crease in sympathy but also some relief. That's good, right? It means Bobby is glad that Buck trusts him. He won’t worry so much if he thinks Buck isn’t trying to hide that he’s struggling.
"Let me know if there's anything I can do to help," Bobby says. "If you need a few half shifts to get some real nights of sleep, I can make the schedule work. Just ask."
"I will if I need it," Buck promises, and tries not to feel guilty watching Bobby's shoulders relax. Because he lied; he's actually been sleeping fine. nine or ten hours a night when he doesn't have a shift, the kind of dreamless sleep where you wake up with a headache from going so deep under. Sometimes long, weird afternoon naps that leave him disoriented until he goes to sleep again. It's waking up that's the problem.
He and Eddie text every day. They call in between shifts. It doesn't do a damn thing to make the itching, restless feeling under Buck’s skin stop. He moves on autopilot for a few weeks, tries not to flinch whenever he looks over his shoulder and finds Ravi there instead of Eddie. He likes Ravi. It's not Ravi's fault.
Ravi, like Hen and Chim, is being a little too nice to him. They don’t keep an eye on him as closely as Bobby does, like they’re waiting for a bomb to go off, but it’s clear they all think he’s about to shatter into a million pieces. Instead, Buck just feels numb. Everyone keeps making noises about “being there” whenever he’s “ready” to “talk”. Talk about what, Buck would like to ask? What is there to talk about? When his shift ends, he goes back to the loft and sleeps.
After a month, his friends make some half hearted noises about how Buck could try putting himself back out there, like it will be any less of a trainwreck this time than it was literally any other time. He thinks they might just be worried that if he has a heart attack, or a stroke, or chokes on bread, no one will find his body for days. It’s been six months now, since Tommy ended things, and maybe they think the moratorium on talking about his romantic life is over now that he’s been single for as long as he was in his last relationship.
“You don't have to go on the apps,” Maddie tells him. They're having a wine night because Chimney is off supervising Jee at another toddler’s birthday party, but just two glasses of white wine have Buck slumping over on the couch until his head is in Maddie’s lap, pillowed by her leg like how they used to take turns doing during long car trips as kids. Buck’s legs are sticking off the end of the couch, but he's weirdly comfortable -- possibly the wine is helping. “I just think you should think about being open to the possibility, you know?”
“What possibility?” Buck counters.
Maddie shrugs. “I don't know,” she admits. “But this is a big city, there's plenty of ways you could have a meet cute that don't involve dating someone you met on a call.”
“Nah,” Buck says. He shuts his eyes. “I know enough people.”
“It's okay if you're not ready,” Maddie concedes. “I just don't want you to be lonely, that's all.”
Buck thinks he's never not been lonely. He thinks he was born lonely, maybe, or maybe he and Daniel were supposed to be really close and he's been lonely since Daniel died. It makes no difference, really, since it's before he could remember. He’s been lonely in every relationship he’s ever been in. Maybe everything he’s ever done has just been a futile attempt to chase that feeling away. And it works, sometimes. He’s had moments when he’s escaped it. Maybe the moments are all he’s ever going to get.
Maddie pokes him. “Wanna hear about the latest drama with Linda’s cousin?” she asks, a peace offering, and Buck opens his eyes and says, “Oh God, what’s Shaun up to now?” even though he’s never met Shaun and barely knows Linda, and Maddie laughs, and the loneliness recedes, for a little bit.
Dating is off the table, but Buck resolves to have a couple wild weekends out, to see if it will help. It's almost scientific, really. Hypothesis: getting laid will help him stop thinking about Eddie, at least in the short term.
Experiment one: The tall blond celebrating her masters' degree graduation. She's going to be an occupational therapist, she tells Buck. That's great, he tells her, hoping silently that he never needs her services because it would be so fucking awkward. He takes her back to the loft, hoists her up on the kitchen counter and eats her out, then lets her ride him on the bed. She doesn't stay over, but she does kiss him and thank him for a good time. She's not looking for anything serious, she says, because right now she's focused on her career. Totally, Buck says, and wishes that watching her leave made him feel anything.
Experiment two: The bartender at a gay bar Buck found on Yelp. He's handsome, stocky and solid in a way that Buck likes, and he laughs when Buck compliments his hair, asks if Buck has been on the curly girl blogs too. He reaches out over the bar and tugs at one of Buck's curls, which bounces because Buck is due for a haircut. The bartender asks what curl cream he uses, and Buck tells him, and then the bartender is on break and pulls Buck into the break room so they can shove their hands down each other's pants. It's quick and dirty, almost teenagerish, both of them laughing when Buck's dick almost gets caught in his zipper. The bartender has really nice hands, sturdy and solid. They don't exchange names or numbers, but the guy does leave a hickey on his collarbone that has Buck changing in the showers instead of the locker room for the next week.
Experiment three: A couple this time, younger than him, which Buck doesn't usually go for. They tell him they got married straight out of college. They were each other's first real relationship, but they don't want to miss out on anything, they want to experience it together. The guy is as tall as Buck, but wiry and lanky, and the girl is short and curvy. They look good together, and Buck wants them to have a good time. He goes home with them, to their condo, fucks the husband with the wife lying underneath him, petting his face, telling him how gorgeous he looks taking cock. After the husband comes, the two of them make out with each other for so long and with such passion that Buck genuinely doesn't think they would notice if he snuck out, but then the wife pulls away and says, "My turn?"
Buck regrets this one afterwards. It’s one thing to have a casual encounter and quite another to be an instrument in someone else's very much not casual encounter. After he's tipped the wife into the husband's arms, both of them sated, he sees himself out, raising a hand when the husband goes to disentangle himself. He doesn't want to interrupt their tender post-coital rituals, and he also can't bear to watch them. They say thank you, and Buck says you're welcome.
It's not a good experiment.
Experiment four: Buck goes back to a formula that works. He goes to a club, finds someone -- just one someone this time -- and gets fucked. It's good, it's excellent, even; the guy is a kind of gym bro-turned-bear with enough muscle and sheer bulk to hold Buck down. He's older, a sort of silver fox, and he seems flattered by Buck's attention.
Afterwards, Buck tells him, half-delirious, cock drunk in a way he hasn't been since Tommy, that his experiment worked.
"Experiment?" the guy repeats, bemused. Buck got his name, this time; it's Paolo. Paolo rubs a thoughtful hand over his beard. "I hate to break it to you, kid, but I think that ship already sailed." He gropes Buck demonstrably, which makes Buck wriggle and snort.
"Not that ," he says. He shoves his face into Paolo's shoulder because he thinks he can get away with it. "For about twenty minutes there, I didn't think at all about how my best friend moved away. Thank you."
"Oh, honey," Paolo says, pitying but not unkind, and sort of pets his head. It's nice.
Buck stops as suddenly as he started. because his seventeenth experiment, with a woman who has sharp sharp nails and piercings in places that Buck hasn't ever seen outside of porn before, means he misses a call from Christopher. He doesn't check his phone until he's back at the loft and finds the voicemail, complete with Christopher's fake-annoyed voice at having to leave Buck a message hiding real disappointment underneath.
It's not like they never talk on the phone, but it's special now, the only time they actually talk instead of texting. For Christopher to call him out of the blue to ask if he wanted to watch a true crime documentary together on a random Saturday night -- it's unspeakably special. And Buck missed it. He agonizes over it for days, even after they watch the documentary the following weekend.
"Dude, chill out," Chris tells him, the fourth time he apologizes for it.
"Okay, okay," Buck says, but he stops going out after that. Maddie is visibly relieved, presumably because Chimney, the traitor, feeds her information. How Chimney knows said information in the first place is a mystery to him, but he does seem to have a gift for rocking up to work and asking, "Late night, Buckaroo?" whenever Buck is least interested in talking about his nightly activities.
Buck comes close, a couple times, to things he won't let himself think about. He crawls into an unstable collapsed building that Bobby says he won't make any of them go into without a second thought, and Bobby lets him, on the condition that Buck gets out the second Bobby tells him to. And Buck does. Bobby seems almost surprised by it. As Buck is leaving at the end of shift, Bobby squeezes his shoulder and says, “I’m proud of you, kid.”
Buck takes the compliment even though he's a fraud. Because when he evacuated at Bobby’s orders, he was moving on autopilot. He was halfway out by the time he realized what he was doing.
Oh, if the Navy SEALs could see him now.
The following week, he tackles Chimney during a rockslide, but he comes out of it with nothing but bruises and a cracked helmet. It was easy, instinctive even, and Chimney would have been hit by a boulder if Buck hadn't.
Bobby gives him a look when he says that, but he doesn't call him on it. Truthfully, Buck wasn't thinking about the boulder. He was thinking that his body is big and Chimney’s is smaller -- easy to shelter underneath his bulk. And that Chimney has Buck’s pregnant sister and beloved niece to get home to.
Bobby relaxes, just a little, when Buck doesn't put up a fuss about concussion protocol. Hen decides he isn't concussed, just banged up, and Chimney pinches his arm and tells him he should watch where he's going. “You got my turnouts all dusty, man,” he says.
Buck even apologizes to Bobby for breaking his helmet, and Bobby sighs and says, “What am I going to do with you, kid,” but it's in the way that implies Buck has bad luck and not in the way that implies Buck was being needlessly reckless, so Buck doesn't push back, just promises to take a hot shower when he gets home and put arnica on his bruises.
He doesn't. He strips down to his boxers and goes to sleep for thirteen hours, and when he wakes up it's because Eddie is calling him. Buck doesn't mention the rockslide and when Eddie teases him for taking a nap so late in the day, Buck doesn't correct him.
Buck is a bad liar. He wouldn't try to deny that. But it's so, so much easier to lie over text, even over the phone. Easier to omit things. Like how one time after a shift he was really tired and just wanted to go home and got in his car and didn't realize he had driven to Eddie’s until he saw the for sale sign. Or how he hasn't been able to make himself do much else but go to work and work out and sleep since he stopped hooking up with random people. He hasn't baked since Eddie left, hasn't even cooked much except when he's helping Bobby at the station. dinners at the loft mostly consist of baked chicken or steamed broccoli or scrambled eggs, like he's twenty again and only knows how to cook three things.
If Eddie was here, he would look at Buck and just know he was bullshitting. Buck wouldn't be able to lie to him. In the weeks before he moved, Buck would stand in the shower until his skin turned bright red from the hot water practicing lines like he was performing in a play.
But Eddie isn't here, and Buck can't burden him with any of this. Can't distract him with worry about Buck, not when his relationship with Chris is on the line. So he's cheerful when Eddie calls and double and triple texts him like normal and doesn't tell him anything that would be worrying.
They have a really bad call. There’s a helicopter crash on a hospital roof, and they get the pilot out just fine, but he wakes up as they get him in the ambulance and starts panicking, struggling against the backboard despite the fractured ribs and tourniqueted leg.
“Sir, you’re going to be alright,” Hen starts, but the guy grabs her wrist.
“Please,” he begs. “Is the heart okay?”
Buck, always the last to catch on, is confused; there was some shrapnel, but nowhere near the pilot’s heart. Chimney is already sprinting back towards the wreck of the helicopter.
Someone in scrubs bursts onto the roof, having heard the commotion, and behind her, a handful of people out of uniform. “Oh God,” a woman says, clutching at the man beside her. “Is that--?”
Chimney emerges, face pale and grim, holding something in his hands. “I’m so sorry,” he says. “The glass shattered, and I don’t think--” He’s cradling it like it’s precious, but even from here, even without much medical training, Buck can tell something is wrong. The heart is sliced open, lying sadly in Chimney’s hands like a burst balloon.
“Oh my God,” the woman says, burying her face in the man’s chest. The husband reaches out towards the woman in scrubs.
“Please,” he says. “Is there any way, is there anything we can do--”
She’s already shaking her head, white with horror. “I’m so sorry,” she says. “Jacob won’t lose his place on the list, but it might take days--”
“He doesn’t have days!” the father cries, voice shaking with emotion, and Buck has to turn away. He can’t watch any more. He has to focus on getting the pilot onto a gurney, sending him down to the emergency room. When he looks over his shoulder, he sees Chimney still standing there, the heart cupped in his hands.
Hen has to take a second, once they’ve handed the pilot off. Buck follows her into the bathroom to hand her damp paper towels so she can take off her glasses and wipe her face with trembling hands. “I’m sorry,” she says shakily. “I’m sorry, I just -- I could only think about Denny, last Halloween, I couldn’t--” She presses the paper towel over her eyes.
“Hey,” Buck says, and it cracks on the way out. “Shift’s over, once we get back. You can call him on the way back, if you need, hear his voice -- or call Karen--”
She nods, and lets him grip her in a quick, hard hug. She does call Karen on the way back to the station, speaking to her so softly that Buck can’t hear her over the roar of the engine. But she looks better, afterwards, a little steadier.
Buck thinks about calling Eddie, then tries not to think about why he associates Hen calling Karen with him calling Eddie. So he doesn’t. Just goes home with this ache in his chest like his heart wants to jump out of it and into that poor kid’s.
That’s what gets him thinking about it. Buck falls asleep after a research spiral and wakes up with the Wikipedia page for organ donation still pulled up. Buck’s a registered organ donor, obviously, but that only applies if he dies. He spends an hour reading about opt-in versus opt-out organ donation, then scrolls back up to read about living donors.
Buck was supposed to be a living donor. He’s read about donor babies too, and knows he might have been called upon to give more than bone marrow if Daniel had lived long enough. A kidney, maybe. But Daniel didn’t. Buck still has two kidneys.
Huh, he thinks.
The idea takes hold of him startlingly fast. By the end of the day, he’s researching recovery times for laparoscopic nephrectomy. By the end of the week, he’s filled out a form to apply as a living kidney donor. Within the month, he’s met with people from a foundation. They warn him it’s a lengthy process and send him home with a lot of documents. Buck reads all of them, and emails them back the next day.
He feels sort of -- giddy about it. Hen says, “ Someone’s in a good mood,” and Chim starts teasing him about having met someone new. Buck doesn’t correct them. He doesn’t want to get his hopes up, even though they’re already fully up.
“Can’t a guy just enjoy the nice weather?” he asks.
“We live in California,” Hen points out. “The weather is usually pretty nice.” But she’s smiling at him, relieved, and bumps him affectionately with her elbow while they’re doctoring their coffee side by side.
The nice thing about shift work is it’s startlingly easy to make all the appointments he needs. And there are a lot of appointments. There are so many tests to pass, but it turns out his kidneys are in prime condition. His blood is O-negative, which is apparently excellent.
When he gets the news he’s been approved, he’s on the phone with Eddie, listening to him talk about how he and Christopher have been setting up Chris’s room at Eddie’s place, now that he’s spending weekends there. The email comes through and Buck scrolls through it, heart racing.
“Buck?” Eddie says, after trailing off. “You still there?”
“Uh, yes,” Buck says. “Sorry, sorry, keep going. I got distracted.” This would be the moment, he thinks, to tell Eddie. How hard can it be to say, Oh, by the way, I’ve decided to donate a kidney ? Pretty hard, it turns out.
“So, we decided on the full size mattress instead of the twin,” Eddie says. “Thrilling stuff, I know.”
“No, that’s great,” Buck says. “Good luck to Chris when he gets to college and has to get used to a twin again,” and Eddie snorts and says that’s what he said, too.
Buck reads the email all the way through again after they hang up. He’ll need to take a month off work, which he knew when he got into this. But suddenly, he can’t stand the idea of bringing this up to Bobby when everyone is so thrilled he’s been doing better. And he is! This is helping him get better.
He’s just not sure anyone else will see it that way.
Bobby pretends not to be thrilled when Buck asks for time off. "Got a trip planned?" he asks.
"I was thinking of going backpacking," Buck lies. "The weather is finally warm enough for it, and I used to go camping all the time when I was younger."
"That sounds great," Bobby says, clapping him on the shoulder. "Don't worry about coverage, alright? I'm pretty sure you have more vacation time saved up than anyone at the station, you've earned it. and God knows you deserve a break."
"Thanks, cap," Buck says. He's done the math already; even if he wipes out a month of his vacation time now, he'll still have a week left over to fly to El Paso for Chris’s birthday later this year. If he needs to. Just in case. Everything he's read says four to six weeks for recovery, and Buck's always been a fast healer.
Committing to keeping it a secret comes with just one problem: the hospital won’t send him home alone, after the surgery.
Buck goes through a lot of options before finally making a decision. An ex isn't ideal, obviously, but he can't think of anyone else who wouldn't immediately tattle to Bobby and/or Maddie.
So he texts Tommy. It's been months, and the last time they talked was when Tommy came to get his favorite sweatshirt and drop off the nice cast iron pan that Buck had brought over to his place after finding out he mostly cooked on nonstick. Six months, and all they had to show for it was a sweatshirt and a pan.
"What's up?" Tommy asks, settling down across from Buck with his latte. He looks good, healthy, the same. Reliable old Tommy. "How are you, Evan? I heard Eddie moved, how's he doing?"
"He's good," Buck says, managing something roughly approximate to a smile. "I’m fine, I just wanted to talk to you about something. Nothing too awful, I swear, but you can say no if you want."
Tommy narrows his eyes at him, but nods at him to continue. "If I still dated women," he says genially, "I'd be worried that you were about to drop the bomb that there was a mini Evan running around somewhere with my eyes."
It makes Buck snort. It makes him remember why he liked Tommy in the first place. It makes him think that there's something poetic about that, like maybe Buck can't gestate a baby, but he can still let the doctors take something out of his body and give someone a new life. "I’m going to need a ride," he says.
Tommy is immediately suspicious. "Don't tell me that I came out for coffee to be asked if you could get a ride to LAX."
"Nothing like that," Buck promises. Even he has too much dignity to ask an ex for a lift to the airport. "I'm getting surgery, and they won't let me leave the hospital unless I have someone to pick me up after."
"Surgery?" Tommy's brow creases. "What happened? Is something wrong?"
"No!" Buck hastens to clarify. "No, I'm perfectly healthy. That's why I’m getting surgery, actually, I'm donating a kidney."
Tommy tilts his head. "And you're asking me... why?" he asks. "No offense, I just didn't think I would crack the top ten choices."
Buck ducks his head, sheepish. "No one really knows," he admits. "I didn't want them to worry. This is something I'm doing just for me, you know? They wouldn't get it, it would be a whole thing."
"So you asked me because you think I won't freak out, but I also won't snitch," Tommy summarizes, which is more or less accurate. "Flattering."
"I don't need a babysitter or anything," Buck assures him. "You can bring me back and dump me on my own doorstep. It's really just a formality, and I really don't want to get into it with anyone from the 118."
"So it's not one of them who needs the kidney," Tommy concludes.
"Nah, it's anonymous," Buck says. "Look, I really just need someone's name to put down for the paperwork. So will you think about it?"
Tommy gives him a long, long look. "You're something else, Evan," he says finally. "Yeah, I'll do it. Mostly because I know it won't stop you if I refuse. Let me know the date, and I'll make sure I have the day off."
"Thanks, Tommy," Buck says. "I really appreciate it. You're a lifesaver."
"It's nothing," Tommy says, finishing his coffee. "I hope that whatever you're getting out of this... I hope it helps.
Eddie texts him the night before his surgery, when Buck is antsy and hungry. He’s not anxious, but he is jittery with a strange, almost manic excitement. How are you holding up? Weather app says Big Bear is getting a lot of rain.
Buck tries not to let it mean too much that Eddie has added his supposed location to his weather app. The sparkling feeling in his chest helps lessen the guilt when he responds, don't worry :) i'm waterproof . Which isn't even a lie.
Ok , Eddie responds, But be careful. Temps are supposed to be low this week at night so remember to monitor for warning signs of hypothermia.
ur such a dad , Buck types back. i'm the expert here. if we were camping together you would be asking ME for advice.
We should go camping together sometime , Eddie says.
Buck stares down at his phone. Eddie says it so casually, but Buck tries not to read too much into it. Maybe he wants Buck to come camp out in Texas or something. Or maybe it's just something to say. He takes a deep breath. ok but be warned , he tells Eddie, i take my camping prep lists so so seriously.
Perfect , Eddie says. I just want to show up and make s'mores. you can do all the hard work.
Buck lets himself imagine it, for about two seconds. Eddie, complaining about the instant coffee. Chris, laughing with melted marshmallows all over his fingers. It's a nice fantasy, even if that's all it is.
holding you to that when I break out the clipboard, he tells Eddie. no complaining.
My lips are sealed , Eddie promises. Then, I'm glad you have cell service out there.
me too , Buck says. now i don't have to download porn if I want to jerk off in the wilderness, i can stream it. modern technology! wait, theres a joke in there i'm missing. river, stream, nature... i'll get it eventually.
And you call ME a dad , Eddie says, following up with an eye roll emoji. Buck tries not to think about it too hard. Dad jokes, that's all Eddie means.
might be out of cell range tomorrow , Buck tells him. don't worry if I don't text you back for a little while.
A pause. Ok , Eddie says. Stay safe . Another pause. Chris says you should try not to get eaten by a bear.
i’ll do my best , Buck promises. At least, he thinks, it is highly unlikely that he’ll be attacked by a bear in the hospital. Although, with his luck -- who knows.
The surgery itself is strange. The doctors have explained it to him about a dozen different times, but the fact of the matter is that the only scheduled surgery Buck has ever had was after his foot was crushed, and every part of him was consumed with fear that something would go wrong. Other than that, it's been emergency surgery. So it's strange to wake up at ten in the morning on the second day of his month off from work, mosey downstairs wishing he could have coffee, and call himself an Uber to the hospital.
The nurses are brisk but cheerful and Buck is an obedient patient for once. The doctor, who Buck met a few weeks ago, is a thoughtful and direct woman in her sixties who reminds him a little bit of Hen. "Ready to rock and roll?" she asks him.
"Let's boogie," Buck tells her, and he sees her smile before the IV starts working and everything fades away.
Buck wakes up, for the first time, alone in the hospital. He feels hazy, doped up, but not in a terrible way. There's a nurse there, checking his chart, who asks him a few questions and assures him everything went fine. "You can take a nap," she tells him. "The anesthesia will need some time to wear off anyway."
“My kidney,” he says vaguely. “I mean, the one that isn’t mine anymore.”
“It’s in transit,” she assures him.
So Buck naps, and has weird dreams about his remaining kidney getting lonely, and he's still alone when he wakes up, but this time he feels clear-headed enough to ask for his phone. He told everyone he would be out of cell range, so he doesn't have many texts, but there are a few.
Maddie is asking in his group chat with her and Chimney if he would make them lasagna for dinner once he's back, since Jee specially requested it. Bobby, a sparse texter, sent him a picture of the chicken paprikash he and Athena had for dinner and said he hoped Buck was eating okay on the trail. It's Bobby-speak for promising to fatten him up when he gets back, and even through the vague post surgery nausea, it makes Buck's stomach growl. Hen sent him an article about invasive species in California that she thought he would find interesting. Tommy wants to know if he's awake yet and how he's feeling.
Eddie texted, Chris is already making s'mores plans, so you better save room in your pack for ten pounds of marshmallows when we go.
When. When. When.
Buck forces himself to navigate back to Tommy's text, lets him know he's done and feeling fine. I'll know tomorrow if I need to stay another night , he says.
The doctor comes in to check up on him, tells him everything went according to plan. Over and done in less than three hours. "I just got word that the transplant surgery was successful as well," she tells him, and Buck feels a sort of calm relief come over him.
It’s the first time he’s felt something like peace since Eddie left. Maybe even since Chris left. He lets his head fall back on the pillow after the doctor leaves.
i can’t wait, he tells Eddie.
He wonders if this is what Bobby feels like when he goes to church. Sort of clean and calm. Maybe it’s the drugs, because Buck can’t feel any of the pain yet, but he thinks even if he could, it wouldn’t matter. He feels like a pumpkin once all the gross, slimy insides have been scooped out. Like there’s a nice, warm candle inside him instead of guts.
Tommy comes to pick him up without complaint two mornings later. It doesn't hurt that he's easily strong enough to help Buck in and out of the car; he can walk alright, albeit gingerly, but the transitions between up and down are fucking hard. Tommy gets him onto the bed and says, "Are you sure you don't want me to stay?"
Eight months ago, it would have been a much harder question to answer. "Yup," Buck says, shutting his eyes. "I meal prepped like crazy, I basically just need to drag myself between the microwave, the bathroom, and the bed."
"That makes me feel so much better," Tommy says wryly, but he doesn't push. It's exactly why Buck asked him; everyone else would have pushed. "Well, I'll go, but text me if you need anything, alright? I don't want you busting your stitches overexerting yourself."
After four weeks, Buck comes back to work. His stomach is still a little bit tender, and his three scars from the surgery are still red and very visible, but they don’t hurt anymore. He’s a little out of shape by his standards, but that’s remedied quickly enough. He’s welcomed back and showered with all the gossip about his temporary replacement, who was apparently a perfectly good firefighter but very, very boring.
“You look good,” Bobby tells him, during a night when they’re the only two still up. “You seem more… settled in yourself, maybe. Lighter.”
“I feel lighter,” Buck says, and he means it. “I hope I didn’t worry you too much, Cap.”
“You didn’t,” Bobby says. He tilts a smile in Buck’s direction. “Which, ironically, worried me a little. I’m glad you figured it out, whatever it was that you needed to. But I hope you know you’re allowed to worry me. You’re allowed to have a tough time.”
“Thanks,” Buck says quietly, because his throat feels sort of tight. He rests a hand over his stomach, the still-healing scars. He does feel, literally, lighter. “Um.” His voice cracks. “I miss Eddie. You know that already. But I just -- I really, really miss him still.”
Bobby doesn’t say anything. He crosses the space between them in a couple strides and hugs Buck. It’s the kind of hug Buck thinks they must only teach in the Midwest, because Buck never got a bear hug like this growing up. It’s the kind of hug where Bobby’s hand ends up cradling the back of his head and Buck can feel himself trembling just a little.
“But,” Buck says, his voice all torn up. “I think if they -- if they never came back, I would survive it. I wasn’t… sure, before.”
Bobby squeezes him a little tighter before letting go. Neither of them are dry-eyed when he pulls back, still gripping the back of Buck’s head. “Yeah, kid, you would,” he agrees.
Eddie and Chris do come back, which is obviously amazing. Buck waits until the second day after they get back, to give them time to settle in, and smiles at all the right points in the stories Chris tells him about his cousins, and overall mostly succeeds in acting normal. He gives Eddie a one armed hug goodbye, and lets go first. Eddie gives him a fleeting look before letting go too, like he wants to say something, but he doesn't argue when Buck says he should get back because there's bad traffic between their places, and he doesn't ask him to stay. That's fine. It's not Buck's house.
Buck knows he can live without them, now. His heart kept beating. His body kept moving. He even smiled and laughed, when appropriate. So Buck, or Buck's body, is capable of surviving being left, even now.
It doesn’t stop his heart from leaping into his throat after Eddie turns to him, stony-faced, after a silent drive back from the hospital, and says coolly, “So. You donated your kidney. You never thought to mention it?”
"I had to," Buck says, with the same helpless insistence as when he's trying to explain why he disobeyed orders to leave a collapsing building. He’s sitting on the couch with a cold pack on his back. "I had to. Or I would have -- I would have--"
Eddie scoffs. "Would still have two kidneys?"
"I would have gone off the deep end," Buck snaps, and only realizes what he's said after Eddie goes ashen, the flush of anger drained from his face in favor of pale horror.
"Buck," Eddie says slowly. "What do you mean?"
Buck clears his throat. "I didn't mean to say it like that."
"But you did. What did you mean?" Eddie demands.
“I mean that I needed to do something," Buck says, "to keep myself sane."
"And you had to give away a major organ to do that?"
"Yes!" Buck says. He feels itchy, hot and prickly all over, but the conviction doesn’t leave him, like it’s filling up the space in his guts where his left kidney used to be. "Yes. If I hadn't, it would have been something worse."
"Like what?" Eddie retorts. His voice has hardened from hurt to sharp, eyes hard. "Like staying behind in a collapsing hand sanitizer factory without a mask? Or ignoring evacuation orders? Or like climbing up construction equipment with a sniper on the loose?"
Buck didn't know he knew about that one. "Yeah," he says. "Yeah, like that. I didn’t do any of those things, Eddie.”
“Do you want an award?” Eddie snaps, and honestly, Buck kind of does.
They've been called to so many jumpers. Overdoses. Not-so-accidental accidents. And every time, no matter how alone the person thought they were, there's someone who blames themselves. A spouse, a friend, a sibling, a parent or child -- God, Buck hates when it's parents and children.
He couldn't do that to the people he loves. Not Maddie, not Eddie, not Bobby, not Hen or Chim. Jee-yun would be too little to understand, but Christopher is well past the age where he could be shielded from the awful truth.
"Isn't it supposed to be my choice, since it's my body?" Buck retorts, and Eddie snaps, "No!"
"No?" Buck echoes. "Whose, then? Yours?"
"Maybe," Eddie says, heated. "Or, no, just -- I can't believe you did this without telling me." He runs a hand through his hair, agitated. "Look, you can't expect me to be thrilled about this. You can't expect me to be happy about the fact that you're clearly -- getting off on giving away pieces of yourself."
"Well, no one wants all of me," Buck retorts, and he doesn't mean for it to sound as bitter as it does.
“Fuck you,” Eddie says. “Fuck you, you know I had to go.”
“I know!” Buck says, hysterical. “I fucking know, okay? Why do you think I didn’t say shit? I was handling it, alright? I needed something to hold onto, and it couldn’t be you, so I found something else. Sue me.”
Buck read somewhere, the first time Maddie was pregnant, that labor is so painful the mind has to forget how bad it is or no one would ever want to have a second child. That was the gist of it, anyway. Buck's brain is really good at that. If you hold on too hard to the physical pain, you'll never convince yourself to get back on the motorcycle, or climb up another ladder, or run into a burning building. Physical pain is so incredibly easy, because as soon as it's over, it's over, and Buck can start convincing himself it was never that bad in the first place.
He thinks that maybe, the price he had to pay for that ability is that he never, ever forgets the emotional hurt. He's forgiven Maddie a thousand times over for not running away with him after she gave him the Jeep, but if he thinks about it too hard, the memory still has the power to carve into him like it happened yesterday. Not because he's angry anymore, but because the feeling lives inside him, the pain way too fresh for something that happened over a decade ago. He knows there's something wrong with him.
Eddie is standing, staring at him with hard eyes, and Buck knows he’s never going to be able to forget how it felt watching him drive away either. But that’s okay, maybe. He takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you. I knew you would tell me it was a bad idea.”
“It was,” Eddie grumbles.
“But I needed to do it,” Buck says. Eddie opens his mouth to protest, but Buck keeps talking. “I needed to -- to mean something. I know it doesn’t make sense to you. But if I hadn’t…” He swallows. “I didn’t hurt myself for attention, okay? I didn’t do anything too reckless. And I only had… some ill-advised sex. Not that much,” he adds, when Eddie narrows his eyes at him. “And that energy needed to go somewhere, or I would have lost it.”
“You sound insane,” Eddie says flatly.
“Stay there,” Buck says, and levers himself off the couch with difficulty to fetch a card from his desk. It’s just a piece of purple construction paper folded in half with some scribbling on the front. Eddie opens it, glancing up at him suspiciously, and then he starts reading and some of the anger fades from his posture.
Buck doesn’t have to read over his shoulder; he has it memorized.
Dear Buck , it begins. We hope you don't mind this letter. You indicated that you were open to being contacted by the recipient of your donation, so we wanted to reach out and say thank you on our daughter's behalf. She's four, and thanks to you, she'll be able to start kindergarten next year.
We don't know your last name, or what you look like, or why you chose to do this, but we owe you everything. Thank you.
“Okay,” Eddie says. “Well, now I’m just going to sound like an asshole.” He sounds genuinely annoyed about it, and Buck manages a smile. “But I’m just -- didn’t you think about the risks, at all ? It’s still a major surgery. How did you even get home afterwards?”
“Tommy,” Buck admits, and then has to snatch the card away before Eddie accidentally crushes it when he clenches his hands. “He did me a favor. As a friend!”
“ Sure ,” Eddie says. He manages to unclench his fists, rubs a hand over his eyes. “But what happens if you need a kidney someday? You don’t have a backup. What happens if I need a kidney? What if Chris needs one?”
It’s a low blow, or at least intended to be one. Buck doesn’t flinch.
“Well,” he says. “That’s kind of the best part. The chances of me matching either of you are pretty low, but if you’ve donated a kidney as a living donor, then you can bump people up the list. I did some reading and -- God forbid anything happens, but Chris is at a higher risk of kidney failure because of his CP, and I probably wouldn’t be able to donate to him directly anyway, but if he needed a kidney, then -- then I would be able to help him get one sooner. I could help you guys, even… even if I was far away.”
Buck is looking down at the card as he talks, tracing his fingers over the drawing on the front, which over time he’s decided is probably some kind of butterfly, but he manages to make himself look back up at Eddie. He’s gone sort of still and unreadable, but the anger is gone.
“I wanted to tell you,” Buck admits. “A lot of times, I almost did. But I just… I didn’t know how to make it sound normal. That I was donating a kidney or that I was doing it while thinking of you--”
“Fuck,” Eddie says, deflated. “I shouldn’t have yelled.”
“It’s okay,” Buck says. “I would have freaked out if you donated a major organ and didn’t tell me too.”
“I’m shocked you managed to keep it a secret this long, frankly,” Eddie says.
“Me too!” Buck says, and then they’re smiling at each other, even though Buck’s painkillers are wearing off and Eddie looks exhausted.
“Can I see the scars?” Eddie asks. Buck wasn’t expecting him to ask, somehow, but he is nothing if not obliging. He pulls up his shirt. The scars are really not that visible anymore, tucked under his belly button. Even when they were fresh, they had seemed startlingly small to fit an organ through.
Eddie crouches in front of him, pushing Buck’s knee to the side to get a better look. It makes something flutter stupidly in Buck’s stomach. This is nothing more than professional curiosity as a medic, he’s sure. Then Eddie reaches out and traces his fingers along the scar next to his hip bone. Buck jumps, startled, and Eddie says, “Sorry,” but doesn’t pull his fingers away.
His face is oddly intent, as Buck watches. His hands are warm. The tips of his fingers are rough. Buck’s heart pounds in his throat as Eddie’s fingers move, stroking down the scar that traces vertically down from Buck’s belly button.
Buck makes a sort of strangled noise in his throat. Eddie ignores him. “You said you did this because of me and Chris, right?” he asks.
“ For you guys,” Buck clarifies desperately. “And -- you were never supposed to know.”
Eddie hums noncommittally. “Don’t do it again,” he warns.
“Can’t,” Buck says. “Only got one kidney left.”
“I wouldn’t put it past you,” Eddie says, and his voice sounds kind of rough. Buck is about to ask if he’s okay, and then Eddie tilts his head up so they’re facing each other again. Buck isn’t quite sure what to do with the expression on his face. “I can’t believe -- You missed us that much?”
“Is that even a question?” Buck says. He reaches out, puts his hands on Eddie’s shoulders as if he’s steadying himself. Eddie is still kneeling between his legs, one hand on his thigh and one on his stomach. “I missed you so much that it felt like I had already lost some kind of important organ.”
“Me too,” Eddie admits. “Only I dealt with it in a normal way, by going to a gay bar and getting so wasted I had to call my sister to pick me up.”
“ What ?” Buck cries, but Eddie is waving him off.
“You weren’t supposed to know about that, either,” he says. “I think we might be crazy. I think we’ve made each other crazy. You’re crazier than me, obviously, but-- But I don't even like the idea of your kidney going to someone else. I don't want to give up any of you. I don't want to share. And I have this stupid feeling that leaving made you think that I'm okay with losing you. Even a little piece of you. I'm not. I know that's crazy, but--"
“Eddie,” Buck says pathetically, pulling weakly at his shoulders. He thinks about a part of him living inside Eddie and goes all shivery inside. Not even in a sexual way, although -- that too. “I’m injured, I can’t move -- you need to get up right now or clarify what you’re trying to say, because -- because I don’t know what you mean, but it sounds like--”
Eddie surges up and kisses him. It’s a rough, desperate thing -- Buck can’t lean very far forward and Eddie is straining up on his knees, both of them clutching each other, but it’s everything. Eddie’s thumb strokes across his cheek when they break apart. “Is that enough clarification for you?” he asks.
“I might need you to explain some more,” Buck says, tugging at him, fisting his hands in Eddie’s shirt. He feels cracked open, more vulnerable than surgery could ever make him.
Eddie clambers up to the couch beside him without letting go of his face, and makes himself very, very clear.