Chapter Text
Buck 0.1, The Runaway
Maddie Buckley (not Kendall, not anymore, never again) stares down at her phone in disbelief when she sees a familiar figure through her doorbell's camera feed.
"Hey, yo, Maddie! Hey! Heeeyyy!!!"
There's a bright, eager grin on his face while he bounces in front of her complex's front gate with excited anticipation. He has a stuffed backpack slung over one shoulder and his phone in hand, and when Maddie doesn't immediately react to his grand entrance his movement slows as his smile falls and his brows furrow in confusion. He looks down at his phone screen, arches back to check the numerous addresses and doorbell cameras positioned next to the secured entryway, then stares at his phone again.
He mutters something about pushing the wrong button while he leans towards the camera, close enough that his face distorts comically in the new perspective. He squints into the lens and lifts a finger to ring the bell a second time just as Maddie finally comes to her senses.
"Evan," she calls. He startles back, jumping from the unexpected voice coming through the comm before him. "What the hell are you doing here?!"
Evan Buckley, unperturbed by her blunt question, beams at her through the one way camera. His blue eyes sparkle with childlike glee when he lifts his arms and shouts, "surprise, sis!!!"
-_-
Maddie last saw her kid brother three months ago on a whim that took her all the way across the country to a town she'd grown up in and long abandoned.
After nearly four years of barely any communication, of keeping her distance under the guise of living a normal, busy adult life—first to prove to her parents that she could make it on her own, then to hide the horrors of her marriage from them—she decided to take the chance and return to Hershey, PA for a surprise visit.
"…Evan…Buckley…"
Maddie had smiled with proud tears in her eyes when her baby brother, suddenly a gangly giant of a teenager, shuffled on stage to a smattering of polite, albeit indifferent applause. She put her fingers to her lips and let out a shrill whistle before screaming his name as loud as she could from the edge of the crowd. Her voice carried across the high school football field where the graduation ceremony was being held despite the unseasonable June chill and drizzling rain.
Evan beamed when he spotted her under her colorful umbrella and waved his newly acquired diploma in her direction. She laughed and waved right back, still cheering for him even while the next graduate was called up on stage.
She had never intended to stay for the entire too long ceremony in that dismal weather, and she certainly hadn't expected him to seek her out before she could duck away.
"I can't believe you're really here!" Evan greeted her with a loving embrace in arms that were strong enough to lift her off her feet and spin her around.
"Of course I am," she said once the spinning stopped and she was returned to solid ground. "I wasn't going to believe you actually graduated high school unless I saw it happen for myself."
He rolled his eyes at her playful teasing with the wide grin still on his face. "Well, I've got the paperwork now to prove it," he told her, gesturing with his rolled up, sopping wet diploma. "See? It's totally legit!"
"Until it melts in all this rain." She lifted her umbrella, needing to stretch her arm high above her head so he could hunch underneath the cover with her. "Where's mom and dad?" she had asked, only so she could avoid them. "I didn't see them in the stands."
Evan's grin fell a fraction. "Oh, they…they're not here."
"'Not here,'" Maddie repeated incredulously, temper rising. "They seriously couldn't suck it up in the rain for a couple hours?!"
"I don't think they even know it's raining," he said with an indifferent shrug. "They're in, like, Europe or something. Pretty sure dad had to go to a work thing that they turned into vacation. They'll be back next month. …I think? I dunno."
Maddie's blood boiled on his behalf. "I cannot believe them," she growled. "It's your graduation and they couldn't even be bothered to—"
Evan took her by the shoulders, grounding her before she could let her anger get the best of her. "Hey, it's cool, Maddie, it's fine, really," he assured her. "I mean, 's not like they ever showed up for important stuff before, not even your wedding, right? Besides, it's always waaay better when they're not around. Mom's been…sh-she's just been a lot since you left."
Maddie frowned, not sure what he meant by the comment exactly and not caring for the overall implication that their parents leaving him alone wasn't an abnormal occurrence. The Buckley parents had always been emotionally distant, but at least they were physically around when she and Evan were kids.
"Who needs 'em, right? I sure don't," Evan continued with a grin. "I'm just really glad you're back now, Maddie, 'cause we have got some serious catching up to do."
She shot him a forced, tight lipped smile that she hoped he couldn't see through.
Evan was the one person she had reached out to from California after she was settled, and even then it was only to give him her new address after swearing him to secrecy. She'd missed the cards he used to mail to her, the simple little joys she received at the hospital she'd worked at in Boston.
But Maddie's brother didn't know what happened between her and Doug, would hopefully never know the circumstances that led to her finally leaving her husband and moving across the country. It's always been her duty as a big sister to protect him from painful family secrets, after all.
"Yeah," she eventually said. "We definitely do."
"Great!" he cheered, then unceremoniously ripped away his graduation gown and balled it up with his cap. He'd been wearing tattered jeans and a t-shirt underneath that Maddie was sure wasn't the recommended ceremonial attire. "Diner?"
He grinned at her, a familiar glowing smile that was as contagious then as it was when he'd been an over excited little boy constantly seeking her companionship in lieu of their negligent parents'.
"Diner," she confirmed with a smirk of her own. "That's the one thing I really miss from out here. Besides you, of course," she quickly added in response to his exaggerated pout.
"What, there's no good diner food in the sunshine state?"
"That's Florida, Evan."
"But they've got sun like twenty-four-seven out in Cali too, right?" He looked up at the cloudy grey sky and blinked against the steady rain. "Sounds nice."
"It is nice," she'd said, her smile no longer meeting her eyes. "Nicer than here or Boston ever was."
He stared at her for a long moment, his own smile falling when he read into her forlorn expression. She could tell that he could tell that something wasn't copacetic with her abrupt move west, but that he also knew better than to ask and potentially bring up unwanted drama during their first real meeting in years.
So, in perfect Evan fashion he masked his concern with a wide grin then held his arm out chivalrously so she could hook hers around his elbow.
"Diner it is," he told her. "But you'll have to drive, my ride won't hold us both."
She raised an eyebrow at him. "Don't tell me you took your bike here. For your own graduation. In the rain."
"Sure did," he confirmed all too cheerfully. "It's not like I have a car, and I think we both know mom and dad woulda killed me if I touched one of theirs while they're away."
Maddie couldn't exactly argue with that.
"Whoa, this is yours?!" Evan called when they approached her grey Jeep, the only car with a California plate in lot full of Pennsylvanians. He circled the vehicle, whistling as he took it in. "Sweet ride, Mads!"
The Jeep was an older model Wrangler that she'd gotten for a steal with the help of a friend at a police impound auction. The car was scratched and dinged and had an undoubtedly shady past, but it ran just fine.
"Glad you like it," she said playfully while he continued his inspection, looking thoroughly impressed. "Get in, kid, I'm starving."
The Buckley siblings ended up in a familiar diner from their childhood and ordered burgers and milkshakes that they dipped each other's fries into while they laughed like they were kids again. They stayed there for hours, until eventually Maddie knew she couldn't safely stick around any longer.
She decided to leave Evan with her Jeep, a fact that had him nearly falling out of his seat in shock. She wouldn't need it to get her back to California. She'd taken public transportation all the way across the country once, she was confident she could do it again.
She told Evan the car was an intended early birthday slash graduation gift, along with her original, last minute present—a few twenties tucked inside of a cheesy card that played a tinny version of "Pomp and Circumstance" when it was opened. He'd been just as thrilled by the novelty card, opening and closing it in such quick succession that she was sure the melody would burn out before he even got it home.
"Thanks, Maddie," he told her genuinely. "But this…this is all…I mean, you didn't even have to give me anything. You just being back home is the best gift I coulda gotten."
She would never forget the moment she saw his heart break, when he registered the guilty look on her face and his sweet smile fell. She didn't even need to say anything for him to read her thoughts, she rarely ever did.
"Y-you…you're not staying, are you?"
Tears welled in her eyes but she blinked them back. "I can't."
He looked crestfallen for all of a second before the sparkle lit in his eyes again. "Then I'll just go with you! Back to California or whatever!"
"Evan…"
"Seriously, Maddie, it's gonna be great," he exclaimed. "It'll be you and me again, just like old times! No mom or dad or—"
"No, Evan," she'd snapped, her tone coming out sharper than she meant it to. He shrank back, eyes wide and lower lip quivering. She took a deep, calming breath through her nose to course correct when she continued in a softer voice, "tell you what, I'll get you a plane ticket so you can visit for the holiday break, okay? We'll spend Christmas together, like we used to."
"Why can't I just go with you now?" he asked, his voice small.
It pained her to see him so upset, it always had. But she'd only just gotten used to her new life in California. Her job as a dispatcher was the perfect new career for her, she'd gotten a beautiful apartment in a safe building, and she had made some amazing new friends, but none of that changed the fact that even after being out of Doug's reach for six months she was still looking over her shoulder and jumping at shadows everywhere she went.
Maddie couldn't expose Evan to that kind of life, not until she was absolutely positive that she'd found some stable ground to settle on. She was running in search of space, a distance from everything and everyone in her past, even if that regretfully included her baby brother.
Instead she'd told herself that Evan needed to find his own way in the world, just like she did. He needed to go to college, get a job, and get out from under their parents' roof all on his own.
Hopefully he wouldn't find a Doug at nineteen and completely derail his life before it could even begin like she did.
"Because you need to at least give school a try first," she eventually reasoned. "It's part of growing up. You'll find your path without me, I know you will. You just need to figure that out for yourself. Okay?"
"B-but—"
"Okay?!"
He swallowed hard and slumped. "Okay, yeah, I…I get it," he muttered unconvincingly.
"Hey." She held out her pinkie for him and his mouth quirked into a hint of his usual bright smile. "The rest of the year will fly by. You'll become a big shot college smarty pants and it'll be Christmas break before you know it."
"Thanks, Maddie." He shook her pinkie then wrapped his long arms around her for another big hug. "I love you."
"I love you too, Evan."
She left him with the keys for her Jeep and got on the first available bus headed west. When she was eventually back in L.A. she made a point to save up over the summer and picked out a round trip December flight for him in early September, knowing it was best to book well ahead of time and not risk the airlines selling out closer to the holidays. She texted him the information and explicitly reminded him that he should keep everything between them a secret, even from their parents. Especially from their parents.
Evan promised that he would with a ridiculous amount of exclamation points and hug emojis.
Not long after that she received a post card in the mail, one featuring the Comet, Hershey Park's oldest roller coaster. Can't wait to see you, Mads, the simple message read in his bubbly handwriting. Love you lots!
She had grinned and added the card to her collection, never thinking that he would show up at her apartment only a week later.
-_-
Maddie finally buzzes him in through the front gate and meets him at her open door. She makes a point to stand in the entryway and raises a stern hand to stop him when he automatically moves to hug her. He flops his arms down with a pout when she leaves him standing just outside of the threshold.
"You are very early," she tells him. "Like, obnoxiously early. Three months early."
"Yeah, I know, I know," he says with a sheepish shrug. He can barely meet her eye when he adds, "I just wanted to surprise you, kinda like how you surprised me before, so…surprise, here I am!!!"
"I can see that," she drawls. "I'm just wondering how you're here, and why you're here on a school night."
"Oh, well, see, I figured those plane tickets you got me would be worth, like, a lot of money on accounta they were for holiday times, so I pawned them and came now instead. To surprise you! Surprise!!!"
Maddie is not impressed by the explanation, nor his clear avoidance of the school night comment. She sighs heavily. "I wish you'd told me you were coming, I could've at least picked you up from the airport!"
He grimaces. "Actually the…uh, the thing is I didn't exactly fly here."
"God, Evan, don't tell me you—"
"Drove across the country in your Jeep?" he quickly finishes for her. "'Cause that's exactly what I did! I mean, that's what you did, right? I just figured if the Jeep made it all that way once, it can probably do it again. Plus I've never really been away from home before so I wanted to make it a road trip and camp out and see the sights and stuff. I mean, Maddie, it was so sick, there's waaay more stars out in the desert than back home. Isn't that crazy? Like, it's technically the same sky, right?! I thought it was pretty crazy…"
He rambles on while the vein in Maddie's temple pulses. She doesn't know if she's furious at him for showing up at her home unannounced despite their already established plans or just terrified over the notion of what might have happened to her reckless and accident prone baby brother along the way. She pictures him parking his Jeep on the side of the road in some desert for the night, stargazing while oblivious to all of the very terrible things that can happen to him as a teenager out on his own for the first time.
"…And I used the plane ticket funds for gas and food so no worries there," he continues when she doesn't say anything. "But holy crap is everything waaay more expensive in California, I dunno how you live out here, you must be, like, a gajillionaire now. I didn't even know nurses could make that much, that's pretty cool. Right, Maddie? …M-Maddie?"
She purses her lips and shakes her head. She says nothing while she returns her glare to the phone in her hands and pulls up her contacts.
"Uhhh, what're you doing?" he asks.
"Calling mom and dad," she answers bluntly, even though they are the last people she wants to talk to.
Maddie's just about to hit the call button and put the device to her ear when Evan snatches it out of her hand. The move is so unexpectedly aggressive that she startles back a step. He flinches just as hard, looking devastated by her reaction.
"S-sorry, sorry, I-I-I'm sorry," he tells her breathlessly in a cracking voice. He holds the phone back out to her with a shaking hand. The contact for their parents is still there on the screen, waiting to be dialed. "Just please don't call them."
She takes the phone back but doesn't use it. "You're barely eighteen, they need to know you ran away from home."
"They really don't," he blurts. "Not like they give a shit anyways."
Maddie's frown intensifies. "Evan—"
"Maddie, seriously, if you tell on me then they'll be super pissed and it'll be a whole thing and I really, really don't want to deal with that right now, okay? I swear I-I'll text them later and let them know I'm okay. Just please don't call them. Please."
Any excitement he'd had for being there is gone, leaving his face pale and drawn and his wide eyes shining. Her brother's never been good at concealing his emotions, and right now he looks a little too much like she felt when Doug first started to show his true colors back in Boston. Evan looks terrified.
Maddie shakes her head of the thought. She needs to talk to her brother, and her parents, and figure out a way for them to finally air the Buckley family's ever growing pile of dirty laundry. But how she'll manage that is a mystery she's not about to solve anytime soon, not while Evan's expressive face is doing his best sad puppy impression.
"Fine," she eventually gives in with a groan, and he slumps with relief. "I just can't believe you thought driving across the whole freaking country by yourself was a good idea."
The smirk is back on his face when he says, "guess I figured, hey, I was gonna go see my big sis Maddie who I love very very much for Christmas time anyway, so why not surprise her early and stick around? I mean, we did pinkie promise on it, you can't take it back now, that'd be extremely uncool of you."
"Yeah, except you're forgetting that I promised you could visit, not stay," she reminds him. "And what happened to giving college a try, I thought you were going to County?"
"I, uh, kinda dropped out?" She levels him a look and he winces. "Or technically never started. All my friends went away to like Philly or wherever and I bankrolled one too many parties over the summer instead of saving for tuition," he admits with a humorless chuckle. "Don't tell mom and dad."
There is so much to unpack here, but all Maddie can do is pinch the bridge of her nose and let out a frustrated exhale. "Damnit, Evan…"
"But this'll be a temporary thing, promise," he's quick to assure her. He holds out a pinkie, an unspoken request he knows she will never refuse. "I'll find my own path, like you said, it'll just be from out here instead of back home."
She sighs heavily but doesn't hesitate to entwine her finger with his. "I really wish you'd've at least told me you were coming first."
Evan grins wide. "Where's the fun in that?"
She rolls her eyes and finally disentangles their pinkies so she can gesture him inside. He only steps far enough to pull her into a one of his big, gentle bear hugs.
"Thanks, Maddie," he says softly into her hair. "Love you lots."
She squeezes him right back. "Yeah, yeah," she mutters. "I love you too, kid."
They hold each other for a long, heartfelt moment until—
"Uh, hey," a voice says, making them both jump. "Feel free to keep pretending I'm not even here, 'cause it's not like that's weird or anything…"
Chimney is staring at the Buckleys from where he sits on Maddie's couch, slowly munching on popcorn. He looks torn between being enthralled by the real life drama that's been enfolding before him and debating whether or not he should attempt to leap out of a window while he still can.
Maddie groans. As nice as the couple's movie night had started out, she can't deny that the evening is ruined thanks to the untimely appearance of her cock blocking baby brother.
She takes a deep, calming breath. "Evan, this is Howard Han," she says, looking from her brother to Chimney. "My…boyfriend."
She realizes after the words leave her lips that she's saying it for the very first time. Chimney beams with loving pride and she smiles softly back.
Evan does a double take, his eyes widening. "Holy shit, this is so awesome, Mads! It's for real, no more Doug?!"
She shakes her head. She has no idea how he knows about her leaving her husband exactly, but at least she can tell by his reaction that he doesn't suspect the ghastly reasoning behind her move.
"It's for real," she confirms, "no more Doug."
"Definitely no more Doug." Chimney pops up from his seat, taking her introduction as the invitation he needed to stay. "And you can call me Chimney," he tells Evan with an outstretched hand.
Evan shakes Chimney's hand even while he cocks his head, brow furrowing in confusion. "…Why?"
Chimney's eyes dart to Maddie and she firmly shakes her head. "It's a long story," he says. "You don't even wanna know."
"Um, 'kaaay," Evan drawls. "Then you can call me Buck."
Maddie raises an eyebrow at her brother. "'Buck'?"
Evan—Buck—stands proud and ignores her incredulous tone. "Yeah," he confirms. "I go by Buck now. That's my thing."
"Since when?" Maddie scoffs.
"Since there were like a ton of other Evans in school. And Buck just sounds way cooler."
Chimney looks between the two, grin widening. "I guess that makes Maddie a Buckette, huh? Huuuhhh?!"
Maddie is not amused and does not rise to his bait. Buck, on the other hand, laughs out loud and claps Chimney on the shoulder hard enough to nearly knock the smaller man over. "I like this guy already, Mads!"
"And I am so glad you approve," she tells him sarcastically, though deep down her brother's endorsement means everything to her. If only she'd listened to him when he'd been a little kid whining about how much he didn't like Doug the first time she introduced her then boyfriend to her family all those years ago.
"How'd you guys meet?" Buck asks.
"On the job, sort of," Chimney answers.
"No way, are you a nurse too?!"
Maddie shakes her head for the both of them. "I'm not a nurse anymore," she tells her brother. "I work as a dispatcher."
Buck blinks at her. "A what now?"
"I answer 9-1-1 calls."
"Oh. That sounds not very fun."
"Sometimes it's not," she admits, "but it feels good to still be able to help people, I'm just not as hands on as I used to be."
"Sooo, basically what you're saying is you thought you figured out what you wanted to do in Boston, but then you moved across the country and found something else that's even better, and you probably wish you'd come out here and found this other path sooner instead of wasting so much time on the first one, riiight?"
Buck looks smug when he says it and she knows that any argument she might have still had for him going home is officially off the table.
"Yeah," she eventually sighs, "that sounds about right."
Buck beams, satisfied with her answer, then all of his attention is back on Chimney. "You're a 9-1-1 guy too?"
Chimney shrugs. "I mean, when you put it like that…"
"Chimney's a firefighter," Maddie explains for him. "He's one of the first responders that I send calls to."
"No way, you're a firefighter?!" Buck exclaims. "That's awesome!"
"Paramedic technically," Chimney corrects. "And yes, it is very awesome."
"Mhmm, and you should probably get home," Maddie says pointedly, "so you can get some rest before your next awesome shift."
"Nah, I don't—" She shoots him a look. "—Yeah, uh, actually that's a good idea. I should. Get some rest, I mean. Long day tomorrow."
"Great! I'll walk you out," she says quickly as she grabs Chimney's arm.
Buck opens his mouth to respond with his farewells but she's already yanking Chimney outside and closing the door behind them before he can.
"There's another Buckley, huh?" Chimney comments while she leads him across the dark courtyard. "That's nice."
"I am so so so sorry," she says the moment they're alone and definitely out of ear shot. "He's not supposed to be here until December, I had no idea he was going to just show up like that! I cannot believe he just showed up like that."
"Hey, Maddie, it's alright, I get it," Chimney assures her. He takes her hands in his and gives her a gentle, comforting squeeze. "Trust me, I've got a kid brother like half my age that I've never even met in person, and if he randomly appeared on my doorstep one day I'd be weirded out, sure, but not enough to turn him away when he needed me, ya know?"
"I know, it's just…" she trails off, unsure how to even put her feelings in words. "I wanted to get away and move on from everything, including Evan. I never even told him what happened with Doug, which just means there's more secrets I need to keep from him if he sticks around." Chimney raises a curious brow at that but she doesn't elaborate, merely shakes her head. "I feel like my life is still a work in progress here and I…I don't think I'm ready for this reminder of the past." Her heart aches even as the words leave her mouth. When she looks to Chimney it's with the sting of tears in her eyes. "Does that make me a bad person?"
Chimney's expression softens and the guilty vice around Maddie's chest eases just a little. "No, of course not," he assures her. "I think you're an amazing person, you're probably the strongest person I've ever known, and, trust me Maddie, I've worked with a lot of beefy firefighters."
She lets out a sound that's half laugh, half sob while she falls into his open arms.
"Seriously though, I hate that what happened to you happened," he continues, voice soft yet resolute as he holds her close. "I just need you to know that nothing from your life before will ever scare me off."
Maddie can't find the words to tell him how much that means to her. She just nods gratefully while he wipes a stray tear off of her cheek with a smile.
"Not even the fact that you're a big sister to someone who is annoyingly adorable."
She chokes out a laugh despite her tears. "He's what?"
"Please don't make me repeat it," he groans. "But as far as first impressions go I think my description of Buck is pretty on point."
"It really is," she says with a smile. "And thank you."
"For what?"
She leans forward to kiss him and feels his lips grinning against hers. "For being your amazing self too."
Then she watches Chimney go with a long sigh before steeling herself to deal with Ev—Buck's sudden appearance. She needs to put on a stern face and lay down some ground rules, needs to make sure he knows he can't just freeload at her place for the foreseeable future.
"Buck," she calls as soon as she's back in the apartment and the door is firmly bolted behind her. "We should talk…"
But the only response she gets is soft snoring. Her baby brother, all gangly six plus feet of him, is sprawled across her sofa, fast asleep. She can't help but smile and run a hand through his mussed hair. He grins at her gentle touch even in his sleep and her heart swells with affection; suddenly she doesn't know how she ever left him in the first place.
"I love you, kid," she whispers. "Just wish you weren't so annoyingly adorable sometimes."