Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

COLLEGE, SENIOR YEAR

Buck

Today will be a good day. 

Buck wakes up sure of it. It’s not something that happens often, especially not recently—these days, he’s usually awoken instead by the feeling of impending doom and certainty that he’s forgotten something. He’s usually right.

Last week, he woke up with this feeling and found out he failed several credits last semester. Then the guy in front of him at Starbucks spilled hot coffee all over his favourite shirt. Then the girl he was seeing (a generous term, but he’s sticking with it) told him she got back with her ex. And then, the nail in the coffin: the cafeteria was out of cornbread.

It was a shitty day. 

The point is that when he gets these feelings, these senses of how his day will go, he’s usually right. And he thinks today will be a good day. 

What he doesn’t expect, however, is to be called into Coach’s office at 9 in the morning. He gets the text at 8:30 and scrambles to get dressed and hoof it across campus to the SMU Mustangs fields, making it just in time to have to bend over and catch his breath when he reaches the office and opens the door without knocking.

When he walks in, it’s not Coach Owen Strand at his desk—it’s Bobby Nash.

“Bobby?” is all Buck can manage, dumbfounded and still breathless. 

“Buck,” Bobby replies with a nod and a small smile. “Good to see you.”

Bobby has known him for a long time. He first started going to 118 Training Camp when he was eleven, and Coach Nash even coached him in his first year of college at Penn State. When he flunked out, he was sure that Bobby would never reach out again—but on his birthday he called, and he wasn’t mad that Buck had chosen to flee to Southern Methodist in Texas instead. Strand, who is a good friend of Bobby's, had been happy to take him in.

Strand was a great coach, but he wasn’t Bobby. Buck’s been playing well, though. Mostly.

The fact that Bobby is here is not a good sign.

The man in question gestures to the seat in front of him. “How are you?”

Buck always feels like he’s about to face a firing squad when he’s called into a coach’s office like this—and usually, he is. Swallowing, he sits down and folds his hands in his lap. “I’m good. How ‘bout you, Coach?”

Bobby sighs. Here we go. “Honestly, I’ve been better.”

In the years since training camp and his first year of college, this has become a familiar phrase. Bobby's kept up to date with all of the goings on of Buck’s life from a combination of Buck himself and (Buck suspects) Strand, and hasn’t been pleased with one or two things Buck has done.

This is how this whole thing usually starts. Coach says honestly, I’ve been better, and follows it with I’ve heard that you or I want to talk about how… then he lists whatever Buck’s most recent transgression is. Missing a practice, or multiple. Failing a test. Using the equipment room for a hookup. Whatever it is, Buck can be sure that he’ll hear about it from Bobby eventually. For once, he doesn’t actually know what it’ll be right away—he didn’t think he’d done anything he wasn’t supposed to recently, but he was pretty close to blacking out at Delta Gamma’s party last week, after all. Still, he didn’t think that that was enough to summon Bobby all the way from Pennsylvania to talk to him.

“You’re killing me here, kid.”

Buck’s eyes flick up. That’s a new one. He’s even more surprised to see that Bobby actually looks anguished, rubbing at his temple with one hand before he straightens and clasps them in a praying motion on the table. 

“Over the years, I’ve tried everything with you. I tried tough love but that didn’t do much, and when you got kicked out of Penn I figured that maybe you’d be better off out of state, away from everything there. I got soft, but that didn’t work either. I know we have this thing now—you call me Pop, and we went to that Springsteen concert together last year—but I’m at a loss. You won’t listen, you keep breaking rules, and one day you’re gonna get a whole lot more than just yourself in trouble. Next time it’ll be your brothers at Kappa Sigma, or your teammates, or Strand or me. Do you want that?”

Buck assumes this is a rhetorical question, but after a few beats Bobby still seems to be waiting for an answer. He shakes his head, and this seems to placate Bobby. 

“You’ve always been reckless, Buck, but something’s come over you in the last year. You skipped out on seeing your teammates graduate in June, Owen says you were off at training camp, and now the Mustangs are looking at a rough season if you keep acting like this. I want to help you here, I do. But how can I help you if you don’t help yourself? What’s going on, Buck?”

This is his chance to say something. He knows that. But he can’t.

He adopts his usual ‘getting told off’ stance, the same one he’s had since he was a kid: head down, sullen and pouty, steadfastly avoiding eye contact. He adds in his trademark shrug, but Bobby’s known him for too long by now—he sees right through it. 

“Do you like playing football in Texas? I know you always say you never want to go back to Pennsylvania, but Boston’s got a pretty good team, right? Your sister’s there, maybe that would—”

“Well, she changed her number, so,” Buck retorts, a little sharper than he intended. “I don’t think she’s in a big hurry to have me in the same city as her.”

Bobby’s expression softens. “But are you sure that—”

“Bobby, I love playing in Texas. I do. And—I don’t have anything else,” Buck says, not having the energy to be ashamed of the way his voice breaks at the end. “Please don’t take this from me.”

“Buck, you’re at risk of being held back a year given how many credits you failed last semester,” Bobby says, and he sounds genuinely apologetic. He sighs, straightening up. “Look, a Head Coach had to leave his job suddenly. I got offered the position, and I’ve decided to take it—Athena doesn’t want the kids to stay in Pennsylvania any longer. Gerard’s coming out of retirement to return to the post here, so you’d be finishing the season with him.”

Buck feels frozen in place. “Bobby, not fucking Gerard,” he whines, well aware that he sounds petulant but unable to change it. “I can’t.”

Bobby hesitates, seeming to be considering something. “Then come with me,” he says after a beat 

Buck scoffs. “Huh?”

“Come with me,” Bobby repeats simply. “I can arrange a transfer and pull some strings. Even though that school is ranked higher than this one, I think you’re a fantastic player that deserves to be on the team regardless. Your previous Championship wins are proof of that.”

“It’s ranked higher?” Buck says, arching a brow. He’d assumed Bobby would be slowing down, not speeding up. 

Bobby is clearly fighting a grin. “Yes. And it’s not far from here. I just need you to trust me, okay?”

“Why won’t you tell me where we’re going?”

“We’re going?”

It’s not a hard question. Buck trusts Bobby implicitly, and the truth is—he knows he’s screwed up. But he wants to get better. “Yeah. We are.”

Bobby doesn’t hide his grin now. “I’m glad, Buck. I’ll start making the arrangements today.” When Buck doesn’t reply, still waiting for an answer to his previous question, he acquiesces. “I’m not telling you where because I want you to keep an open mind, and because I’ve known you for long enough to know that you don’t respond well to change. You’ll just overthink it too much if you know.”

(In hindsight, Buck should’ve grabbed him by the neck and throttled him until he told Buck where they were going.)

Instead he just shrugs and nods. “Okay. I trust you. When?”

“How does today sound? I set up an informal meeting with the team before we start the semester in a few weeks, and made arrangements for you to come along as well just in case.”

Fuck it. “Why not?”

Buck really should’ve asked where they were going.

“Bobby, no—no, I don’t—”

Buck is looking frantically between Bobby and the sign on the highway they just passed saying: Austin—23 miles, but Bobby doesn’t let up or turn around. The evil dick must have gotten Buck that double cheeseburger and fries from the service station knowing the carbs would knock him out for the bulk of the drive, and now they don’t have the chance to turn around. 

“I knew you’d have this reaction when you found out,” Bobby says, sounding only half-apologetic. “I figured if we were on the highway you wouldn’t try to jump out.”

“Watch me.”

“Buck, is it really that bad?” Bobby tries. 

“Yes, Bobby. It is that bad. You were there, you should know,” Buck replies, trailing off at the end. He feels like he’s said too much, like he’s an exposed nerve. 

“You never really… talked about it. Just said it could never happen again. Do you want to tell me what you meant?”

Buck’s mouth clicks shut. No, thank you. Bobby’s using the same gently probing tone he used years ago to get Buck to talk about his parents, and then later about Maddie. It doesn’t work this time, though, because he doesn’t know how to talk about this. 

But he’s going to have to figure it out pretty quickly. 

The UT Austin campus is a terracotta roofed-dream, and Buck sort of can’t believe he’s living in it. The UT tower is a large spike in the cream and red stalagmite landscape, and Buck uses it to orient himself as Bobby winds his way through the campus to the athletic fields, where they park and make their way to the football training ground. 

“Are you nervous?” Buck asks Bobby as they walk.

Bobby looks contemplative. He suits his dark blue Penn track jacket, and although he looks a little older than the last time Buck saw him, he still looks good. “Maybe a little,” he admits. “But it’s a good kind of nervous. The kind that means I want something.”

“The kind that propels you to do better,” Buck agrees, chiming in with an old adage Bobby used to tell him before games all the time. He’s using Bobby to distract himself, he knows, but it’s helping so he decides to power forward. “You’re gonna be great. The Longhorns are lucky to have you.”

“They’re lucky to have you, too.”

The field is massive and covered in white Longhorn skulls painted between the yard lines, but Buck is comforted by the fact that besides this it’s the same as every other field he’s been on. It’s okay. He knows how to do this. All he has to do is be kind, and welcoming, and prove to them that he still knows how to play football despite his bad track record recently. Simple.

Except it’s not, because he looks across the field to where a few of the guys are already warming up and instantly sees him.

Running a veer drill on the other side of the field is a guy not in UT Austin uniform. He’s wearing black basketball shorts and has a short-sleeved gray tee under his pads, but the rest of him is a blur as he moves across the field with an agility and efficiency that makes Buck feel a little nauseous to watch for more reasons than one. 

As the rest of the team watches with fascination, the guy changes direction without slowing in the slightest and darts to the right just in time to leap into the air and reach for the ball like it’s been waiting for him the whole time. Someone lets out a low whistle as the guy jogs over to Bobby and slows to a stop. 

If Buck was back at SMU watching this display, he’d be looking at his teammates with incredulity—his face would say, who the hell’s this guy? But this isn’t his team—yet—and besides, all the players seem to be in awe of him. Their eyes follow him as he runs over, and they trail behind him as the player reaches Bobby and ducks his head to tug off his helmet.  He flexes his fingers as he comes to a stop, and Buck freezes.

Even before Bobby says it, he knows who it is. He’d know that hand movement anywhere.

“Eddie Diaz, it’s good to see you again.”

“You too, Coach. Glad to have you join us.”

“We’ll get down to proper introductions in a minute, but I’m guessing you all know who I am,” Bobby says, which earns a few nods from the group of players gathered around him. “And before I get to know you guys, I wanted to introduce you to a new member of the team - Buck, come up here.”

Eddie’s eyes follow Bobby’s gaze across the players, a jovial smile on his face, but when his eyes drift over Buck they snap back with lightning speed and his smile disappears. “Evan?”

Shit.

Chapter Text

HIGH SCHOOL, JUNIOR YEAR

Eddie

Eddie climbs off the bus with dread heavy in his heart. 

He’d promised Sophia he’d try to let loose and have some fun, but he and his sister both know neither is really in his wheelhouse. He’s known for the opposite, actually—and maybe that’s why his sisters had helped lobby his parents the whole summer for permission to come to this camp. 

Being invited to 118 Training Camp wasn’t the kind of offer you say no to, he’d tried to explain to his parents. It’s more prestigious than prestigious—it’s legendary. Unless you’re a football magnet school, only one student gets invited from each school district, and even then you have to go through a rigorous application process to even have the chance to be considered. 

Eddie had jumped all the hurdles in secret, using his sister’s email to apply and going over to Shannon’s house to do a phone call interview with the camp in LA. It didn’t even matter that he and Shannon had just abandoned their whole ‘will they, won’t they’ dynamic for a firm ‘won’t they’. Shannon knew how important this was to him, and how amazing it was that he’d even been chosen from their district. 

When he finally got the acceptance letter in May, he’d shouted so loud that he summoned his father from the living room and had to lie that he saw a spider the size of his head crawling across his bed. He’d called Shannon immediately, not knowing what else to do, and they spent the next hour talking about all the things he’d have to figure out in order to go. 

The list, as it turned out, was long. But he worked all summer at the grocery store, he cleaned pools, he washed his dad’s car and helped his mom cook every night. He jumped through every hurdle demanded of him, because he finally felt like he’d found something he was good at. 

His dad encouraged him to join the football team as a way of making new friends since they were new, but it quickly became so much more than that for Eddie. There’s a beauty to the symmetry of a game, and Eddie feels like he could see the whole field: where every player will be, including him, and when. Exactly the way to drop his shoulder to shuck a blocker, and how to plant his legs to make himself an impenetrable wall for the other team’s offense. Football is violent—the collisions make him feel more alive than he ever does off the pitch—but it’s also beautiful, like an intricately woven dance. Everyone has  their place and part to play, and Eddie damn well knows his. 

His part is being good. And so when 118 Training Camp called, he came running.

What he hadn’t considered was that coming here as a soon-to-be-Junior puts him at the very late end of the spectrum for attending camp. As in, most of the boys here have been coming for years, snagging the invitations for their school district year after year because of nepotism or God-given talent, Eddie didn’t care which. This meant that they’ve also had their own friends for years.

That much is clear when he arrives on his first day and sees boys already milling about in small groups, talking and waving to one another but mostly staying in their packs as they head towards the dining hall or off to one of the massive fields stretching out to the east.

That’s okay, he thinks. Friends take a second for him most of the time anyway, Eddie reminds himself. He’s come up from behind in a game before, and always wins. 

After getting their cabin assignments and dumping their bags on chosen bunks—top bunk in the back left corner for Eddie—the players are herded into the courtyard for an introduction to the coaches. They meet Head Coach Bobby Nash and his team of other All-Star coaches, including a pair that introduce themselves as Wilson and Han and are apparently going towards the dining hall to get some dinner before their full day of practices start tomorrow. There’s a movie night in here after, Eddie thinks, but he’s pretty sure he’s just going to head to bed. He has yet to exchange a word with anyone, and he doesn’t see himself changing that record before lights out—he’s hopeful that a big cabin of six boys will help things along. 

Eddie can identify the people who, like him, came without a pack quickly. Their eyes flick about too quickly, surveying what everyone else is doing to determine how they should act and where they should go, and few of them make more than perfunctory conversation with each other. 

Eddie doesn’t want to be lumped in with those people. He knows well enough from growing up in El Paso that acting like you’re always going to be on the outside looking in means that you will be, and he’s determined not to spend the whole camp like that. Not after he worked so hard to go. 

So he edges his way closer to the group of three boys having a conversation in line in front of him. They’re from the South—that much is clear from their accents—but thoughts of Southern camaraderie are quickly abandoned when he jumps into their conversation about the best X-Men comics and says, “House of M’s gotta be at the top though, right? There’s no question!”

They stare at him like he’s just walked up and slapped him in the face, then share a dubious look with each other. One of the boys mumbles a half-assed agreement, and then all three of them turn in sync and put their backs to Eddie, pointedly continuing the conversation. 

Right then. 

Eddie finds a table at the back of the dining hall that is completely unoccupied and takes a seat, picking at his lasagna. He hasn’t been hungry since he got up this morning, too filled with adrenaline and endorphins to focus on something as trivial as eating, but now that the adrenaline is wearing off he finds himself left with only exhaustion and the creeping feeling that he’s made a terrible, terrible mistake. 

And then he sees him. 

A chorus of laughs from the other corner of the dining hall is what makes him look up to see a large group clustered around the table, listening intently to something someone is saying in the centre. The voice is lilting with amusement, but Eddie can’t hear what he’s saying over the loud voices echoing through the rest of the hall—only the chiming of laughter whenever the guy says something particularly funny. 

Eddie hacks out a piece of lasagna and shovels it into his mouth, standing. He’s eaten enough. Picking up his tray, he heads towards the washing station whilst resolutely trying not to look over until finally he gives up halfway. As Eddie draws near the crowd parts slightly and suddenly Eddie has a perfect view of the boy everyone is listening to. 

He’s tall and a little bulky but clearly still getting used to both facts, all big hands and long limbs as he gestures emphatically, in the middle of a story. He has a shock of curly light brown hair that he repeatedly brushes back as he talks, and beneath a few errant curls are a pair of startlingly blue eyes, even from over here. Eddie doesn’t notice anything else about the guy—not the sharp, angular shoulders and curved biceps, the full lips pulling into a smirk as the crowd erupts with laughter as he delivers the punchline. None of this occurs to him, of course. 

What he is thinking about is how everyone seems to gravitate towards the guy. It’s actually a little crazy to see in person, the way everyone circles him like they’re caught in his orbit and seem to hang on to his every word. His voice has a melodious, lilting quality to it, like he’s always just about to tell a joke that’ll give everyone stitches from laughing. Eddie has no idea who he is, but it’s clear from just watching the group that every returning player already knows and respects this guy. He’s royalty, apparently. 

And then the guy’s eyes snap to his like they’ve known he was watching the whole time, and his mouth seems to be teetering between a smirk and a sneer. Eddie walks off before he can witness any more—his cheeks burn with the surprise of being noticed for the rest of the night. 

In bed, he tugs the covers up to his chin and listens to the soft snoring of his cabinmates. None of them had been particularly talkative when they arrived back at the cabin late, only discussing the movie for a few moments before falling into silence as they got ready for bed. So much for that plan, Eddie curses himself, and rolls over as the lights go out.

“Can someone get me a pancake if I sleep through breakfast, please ?” a voice suddenly announces into the dark a few minutes later. “I am way too old for this 6am wake-up call shit.” He heaves out a dramatic sigh. “Alright. Good night, guys.”

Eddie recognises the voice instantly. It’s the guy from the dining hall earlier, and it’s coming from the bottom bunk of the bed opposite Eddie. He turns, peering over the edge of his own bed, and sees a long body silhouetted by the moonlight cascading through the window. He hadn’t even seen the guy come in, but… here he is.

“Night,” Eddie whispers back, unable to stop himself from replying but too self-aware to raise his voice loud enough for the boy to hear. 

The boy hears anyway. Eddie sees his head turning in his direction, eyes seeking out the owner of the whisper in the darkness, but Eddie has already turned back to face the ceiling.

He was just—being polite. His parents raised him to be polite. That’s all. He thinks he hears a disbelieving scoff coming from somewhere below him, but he puts it down to the rattling window frames and turns over to sleep.

They’re running drills. Okay. Eddie can do this. 

He’s been playing linebacker since he started a year ago in El Paso, and he quickly became a master at scanning the field, reading plays and directing the defense in the right direction. He knows he isn’t big like the linebackers in the NFL, but he figures that his speed and quick reactions make up for it. He may not have done this read and react drill as many times as some of the other guys who have been playing since they were children, but he knows how to do it, and he did it well enough to get him here. 

At least, that’s what he keeps reminding himself. He has to remind himself often, because when he’s standing next to the other linebackers it’s a distant memory. He’s always had a pretty lean body, but he could stand up easily to the other guys in Texas. East High Raiders? No problem. But the offense here is a different story. 

They’re bigger, faster, stronger. 

Eddie proves himself in the blocking drills and the 1-on-1s easily enough. He even hears a coach whistle when he does a reaction drill, standing him in the centre of the other players and patting each one on the shoulder, rushing them forward so Eddie had to turn in time to fend off the attack. He is ready every time, his shoulder braced, and despite his smaller size he finds himself mostly able to stay upright. There’s a low murmur when he finishes that one, and he’s not sure if it’s coming from the players or the coaches.

But when they get to actually running plays he finds himself, to his surprise, at a loss. The wide receiver is like lightning, and the offensive tackle keeps an impenetrable wall up that he can’t get through no matter how hard he tries. After his first block is easily overpowered, Eddie rolls to his feet and stands, staring at the wide receiver already in the distance. He’s actually stunned. How did he—

Eddie glances back at the place where the wide receiver used to be, half-expecting to see a plume of dust left behind like he’s Road Runner or something. He can’t help but snort a laugh mostly out of disbelief, and the offensive tackle straightens to eye him with reproach.

Because that’s the other thing. It’s clear by now that the players know who he is—no matter what they say, no one loves gossip more than a bunch of high school football players with no phones and time on their hands. Apparently, a new player who’s only a year into playing and got invited here is a big deal. 

(Silently, he cocks his chin up a little when he walks a group of players clearly whispering about him. Damn right, he wants to say. I’m good. )

And the weird thing about the wide receiver is that he isn’t even mad when he slips through the defense for the fourth time in a row. He just watches him run.

Buck

Buck really hates the new guy.

Well— hates might be an overstatement, but the dude irritates him. A lot. He watches Eddie bouncing on the balls of his toes as he slowly circles, listening intently to Coach Nash shouting about not being afraid. Every time Bobby taps someone on the shoulder, Eddie is there and braced for impact. Sometimes Buck doesn’t even see him move but he’s always there and gives as good as he gets every time. He sacks Johnson and fends off a solid rush from Sinclair, and when Bobby pauses and then selects Campbell and Callahan, Eddie simply ducks Callahan and takes Campbell down hard. He does it all with ease, standing and brushing off his pants before quickly crouching to go again.

After a while Campbell gets yelled at for hesitating. Buck hasn’t seen this kind of player in Mike Campbell since they first started coming to this camp together five years ago—hesitating is fear alone, Bobby always says, and Campbell stopped being scared long ago. But he doesn’t put his full weight behind him, and Eddie blocks him without fail, every time.

Buck stares along with the other players as Bobby sends him to run a lap. He glances back and sees Eddie standing, slightly crouched and on the balls of his toes, still ready to go again. Still waiting.

He’s like a robot. 

Buck sniffs. When they start running plays, Buck gets his chance. Eddie is fast, but Buck’s offense knows this one like the back of their hands. They have years of summers playing together on their side, and Eddie is easy to read besides—analytical, methodical, and completely fucking predictable. The offense blocks, and Buck can dart through with the ball tucked under his arm before Eddie can get anywhere near him. The first time he does it he’s slowing down as he turns, and he’s able to see Eddie roll to his feet like it’s nothing and glance at where Buck was just standing and then at Buck himself. 

Yeah, a little voice in Buck’s head says. Try and catch me now. He waits for the hatred to burn in Eddie’s eyes, the competitive fire to ignite for Buck to stoke. He knows how to do this, knows how to be good. How to be better.

Instead, Eddie makes a sound strangely like a laugh and turns to reset without complaint, looking thoughtful. The next time, Eddie makes the same move a little faster but is blocked once more, and still he doesn’t look mad. Eddie pauses when the whistle blows, eyes flicking across the field and the position of the players. This happens again and again, and every time Eddie just watches, assesses, and then adjusts. 

Eventually when they crouch and wait for the snap, Buck looks over and sees the guy smirking to himself. 

Fuck, Buck thinks just as the whistle blows, and sure enough, there he is a second later—Eddie slips between Cortez and Tyler in a moment of perfect timing impossible to make up, slamming them into each other behind him as he powers towards Buck. 

Shit. 

Oh, shit, Buck swears to himself, just as Eddie’s body collides with his and they both go careening to the ground.

Buck moves to sit up a few moments later, dazed but unhurt, and finds a body on top of him. The lump moves immediately, pressing up on his hands bracketing Buck’s head, and then Eddie is grinning down at him, red-cheeked and eyes shining. 

He looks like he’s glowing. It’s sort of hard to look right at. Eddie is radiating unbridled joy for the game, and to Buck’s sickening surprise he knows that this is exactly what he himself looks like whenever he makes an epic play. He understands this joy.

“Not so fast,” Eddie says, breathless and still grinning, and then he’s clambering off of Buck and offering a hand. 

Buck glares at him, brushing his hand away as he moves to stand. When he meets Eddie’s eyes, he still doesn’t see anger at Buck’s brush-off—he sees only curiosity, and a vague tinge of amusement that he doesn’t like. He’s not—Buck’s not entertainment for the new guy.

“I don’t need your help,” Buck mutters, but it comes out more like ‘I don’t need your help.’ His disdain for Eddie made clear, he looks up again and sees what he wanted to see. Eddie’s eyes harden, his jaw clenching as he nods once and looks away. 

“Got it.”

Buck rubs at his chest as he walks off. He doesn’t remember getting the wind knocked out of him, but he still can’t seem to catch his breath.

“Buck, come on,” Ravi says a while later in the huddle. They’ve been running the same plays for hours now, but they can’t get it exactly right—and Buck knows exactly why. 

He’s the problem. That much has been obvious for over an hour, but he’s not willing to change because he can’t stand the look on Eddie’s face every time he tackles Buck successfully or makes a great block. It’s just so smug, and Buck wants to wipe that smile straight off his face. 

Buck’s advantage has always been his agility and speed, but as he gets older he finds more and more that his size is a definite plus as well. He can catch like his gloves have glue on them, but he can also evade defense like it’s nobody’s business and, when necessary, just bowl through them like they’re nothing. Buck knows from his years here that players at 118 Training Camp are bigger than the average high school players in Pennsylvania, but he still has no problem colliding with bigger guys. Bobby had joked once when he was a kid that he was like a bouncy ball, jumping back up to his feet every time he went down no matter how hard he fell. 

He’s had more than a few concussions because of his little regard for his bodily safety, but that quality is what makes him a good player.

Only now he’s just being stupid, and he knows it. If he’s a bouncy ball, then Eddie is an elastic band—Buck keeps waiting to see the same fatigue on Eddie’s face that is written all over the other new guys, one of whom has already thrown up from exertion. Instead, all he sees is a flushed face and sweaty hair slicked to his forehead whenever he takes off his helmet to squirt water over his head to cool down. Every time he goes down, he snaps right back to his original position and waits to do it all over again. He never slows down, and Buck finds himself fascinated by watching him figure things out in real time.

When he misses a block, sometimes Eddie will do it the same way a second time—but never a third. It seems all he needs is a second chance to study the field, and by the time the whistle blows a third time he’s always ready to be exactly where he needs to be. Buck scores a few touchdowns and gains more than a few yards, but Eddie matches him block for goal more often than not. His smaller size to the other linebackers seems to be something he’s able to overcome through sheer force of will, but Buck’s not sure that’ll fly for long with Bobby—he can see him murmuring to Coaches Hen and Chimney off to the side at one point, and knows they’re talking about Eddie. 

Which, he has to admit, just makes him madder. Everyone is so focussed on him. He feels a bit like a feral animal or a little kid whenever he sees Bobby talking this much about anyone that wasn’t Buck. He’d never tell Bobby this, of course—or that he’s kind and pushes him to be better and genuinely wants the best for him in a way his parents never had, which is scary—but he knows it and he knows that on some level, Bobby likes him. It’s enough to get him here, at least, and get him coming back every year. 

He’s reminding himself of this fact as he watches Hen gesture emphatically in Eddie’s direction, cursing to himself about how no one is looking at him and not caring how insolent he sounds in his own head, when a voice jolts him from his spiral. 

“Uh, hey.”

It’s right behind him. Buck whirls around and sees Eddie watching him, lifting a hand in greeting. “I’m Eddie Diaz. What’s your name?”

Buck eyes Eddie warily. Is this some kind of trick? He isn’t sure, but his manners get the best of him anyway. 

“Evan Buckley.”

“Nice to meet you, Evan,” Eddie says, and Buck could swear he hears a slight Texas drawl to his vowels. He finds himself shivering despite the heat, and makes no move to tell Eddie that no one calls him by his first name anymore. It sounds… different when Eddie says it. He can’t explain it. 

Eddie grins at him. “You’re fucking fast, by the way.”

“I know,” Buck says, employing his trademark smirk and wink combination as he squints into the sun. Eddie doesn’t say anything for a long beat, clearly waiting for Buck to keep the conversation going, but Buck’s not feeling particularly charitable today—especially to a robot. He gestures to the coaches who have finished their huddle and are waiting for the boys to reset to go again and sighs. “C’mon, G.I. Joe. Whistle’s about to blow.”

“G.I. Joe?” Buck hears Eddie repeat quietly as they jog to their positions and crouch. His confusion only makes the nickname ring more true, and when they go again Buck makes sure to shoulder-check Eddie hard as he flies past.

A while later they switch teams and Buck heads to the bleachers with Ravi to cool off, finding himself in a group of his old friends from the camp. He’s eager to escape the Eddie-buzz happening around him between the coaches and the other guys on offense, but to his dismay the same thing is occurring among his friend group.

“What’s his name again?” Donovan asks, passing half an orange to Campbell who takes it gratefully.

“Eddie something. Uh… Davila, maybe?” Tyler replies as he tilts his head back to the sun and shuts his eyes. 

“Diaz,” Buck says without thinking, straightening when several heads turn to look at him. He shrugs.  He says nothing of their brief meeting earlier. “I think.”

“Yeah, Diaz,” Tyler agrees. “Hell of a player. Fast feet. I heard he’s only been playing for, like, a year.”

A few of the boys whistle, impressed. Buck snorts. “I mean—sure, he’s got some natural talent, but did you see him standing next to Yates and Davis? He looked like an ant next to those guys.”

The guys are silent for a moment. Then Ravi carefully asks, “well, won’t they just move him to a different position, then? He’s too good to just drop, but the size issue will only be a bigger problem in college.”

And there’s the unspoken agreement between everyone: Eddie will still be playing in college. He’s too good not to be. 

It’s irritating. 

“Where would they move him?” Campbell asks, and Buck can feel Ravi’s eyes flicker to his. They’ve known each other the longest, and Buck knows that Ravi knows what he’s thinking.

“Who knows?” Ravi says finally, changing the subject, and while Buck breathes a sigh of relief he still can’t get the idea out of his head for the rest of the day. 

That night, Buck returns to his cabin to find a bunch of guys sitting in a circle on the floor, playing cards. He’d spent the free hours between dinner and lights out in Ravi’s cabin, lounging with a few friends and debating (as they always did) whether it was worth the risk of calling Ravi’s cousin in New York and having him bring them some weed to smoke in the woods (as they never did). It appears that in his absence his own cabin has grown closer. 

Tyler and Cortez as well as Callahan are all returning players that Buck knows well, but the other six guys are all new—they greet him enthusiastically when he enters, and Buck feels his chest puff out with pride that they recognise him. Only Eddie doesn’t move, eyes fixed on his cards instead of the commotion around him. 

“Wanna join, Buck? Ravi?” Cortez offers to the duo who have just entered. 

“Buck?” one of the new guys echoes, frowning. “How’d you get that nickname?”

“Dude, you’re not supposed to just ask that—” another one hisses, but Buck laughs and picks a spot in the circle, in between the guy who asked about his nickname and Eddie Diaz.

“It’s okay,” Buck says with an easy shrug. “My last name’s Buckley, so…”

“But that’s not how you got the nickname,” Tyler teases, and Buck flushes despite himself. 

“Yeah, it is—” Buck begins, but Tyler is sitting up now. He’s on a roll.

“ No , you got it because of that one time we snuck into the dive bar and there were those girls that—”

“Anyway,” Eddie says smoothly, interrupting with a tone that says he’s just eager to get on with the game but an undercurrent of something more like a warning. Buck sees Eddie looking at him out of the corner of his eye and wonders briefly if Eddie was actually saving him from talking about it, which pisses him off. He’s perfectly capable of managing himself, thank you very much. After a beat it becomes clear, though, that Eddie really does just have no patience for gossip like that. 

You should hear what they’re saying about you, Buck thinks bitterly as Eddie corrales Tyler back into their game of poker without much difficulty. Campbell told me earlier that he heard you ate your twin in the womb.

Eddie glances up, and when their eyes meet Buck could swear it’s like Eddie could hear exactly what he was thinking. He seems amused, but says nothing. Buck declines to join the game even after Tyler and Cortez butter him up, but quickly realises that his position beside Eddie gives him a perfect view of the guy’s cards over his shoulder.

He shuffles closer when things start to get intense. Buck may not be the smartest—his teachers and parents are quick to remind him of that—but he’s half-decent at math and famously either an extremely good strategist or extremely lucky. He’s very good at poker. He makes occasional comments about Eddie’s hand but mostly sticks to ribbing the other new guy, Noah, who is much more amicable and seems to love the idea of the Evan Buckley giving him poker advice on his first night. 

But still, Buck can’t stop himself. A few rounds later he leans closer to Eddie, enough that he could rest his head on his shoulder if he wanted to, and speaks in a low voice by his ear.

“You should fold now,” Buck says. “There’s no chance—”

“All in,” Eddie says loudly when it’s his turn, interrupting Buck to lean closer and push the rest of his ‘money’—a combination of candy, pennies and a few contraband cigarettes that Eddie told his new friends two rounds ago he was given by his dad to ‘make friends’—into the middle of the circle. The boys cheer, teasing Eddie, and Eddie just smiles. Without turning to look at Buck over his shoulder, he says with a smirk that Buck can’t see but knows is there, “watch and learn, boys.”

One by one, each of the guys turn their hands over. Despite Buck’s attempts to help, Sandborn doesn’t have much of anything and is an awful liar, so he’s out, and Cortez and Tyler are famously also awful. A few of the other guys have a half decent hand but nothing amazing, and then finally Ravi flips his over. 

“Full house,” he says, grinning. Ravi always wins poker, and Buck doesn’t even try playing against him. 

Eddie is keeping his hand face down now, but if it’s still in the state it was in only a round ago—

“Royal flush.”

The other boys gape at him, eyeing the face cards staring unseeingly in a neat fan, but Eddie is looking elsewhere. He’s watching Buck for a reaction, and whatever shows on Buck’s face seems to satisfy the new guy—he nods to himself, clearly trying to smother a grin, and turns around once more. 

Who the hell is this guy?

It all goes to shit on day two. 

Buck doesn’t start the day off meaning to be an asshole, but it just happens—he wakes up sore from the paper thin mattress in his bunk and doesn’t have enough time for breakfast, so he has to scarf down an apple right before their morning run that threatens to make a reappearance several times during. He’s tired after spending a lot of the night tossing and turning, and cranky because when he finally did get to sleep he dreamt of faceless guys slowly and methodically cutting his jersey into tatters.

He’s trying to prove himself just as he was the day before, not listening to people and making tactless moves that have even Chimney shaking his head in confusion at him. He’s distracted, and as the morning continues he finds himself getting mad. 

Of course, part of him can rationalise that none of this is Eddie Diaz’s fault. There are several new guys who are fast, capable, strong players, and a few are even gunning for Buck’s wide receiver position—but they don’t bother him, because none of them are Eddie Diaz. Buck decides mid-morning that his annoyance really does come from Eddie’s robotic behaviour. He’s pretty quiet for the most part, only speaking when he’s spoken to, but when they play he’s a machine. He doesn’t bulldoze down the field like Buck sometimes does—so big and so fast that they can’t even hope to not get bowled over—but he instead cuts through each player like his body is a machete he wants to use to slice everyone around him up. He’s all spiky, sharp edges, and something in his demeanour constantly says, don’t fuck with me. 

The point is that Buck can rationalise his behaviour as healthy competition and motivation all he wants, but he knows that Eddie’s prickly vibe is what’s really grating on him. He’s used to making friends everywhere he goes, and people don’t usually start to dislike him until a while into their friendship—that part is inevitable, but he seems to have skipped some steps here. They’re not even friends. 

The boys head to lunch around midday, and Buck feels a little better that people appear to be settling into familiar routines. He sees many of the same guys in small groups that he’s seen in years past, including that one group of nerdy jocks that commandeers the table in the corner to play some complicated card game and the duo that refuse to speak to anyone not from their home state, spending most meals hunched over their trays in frosty silence. 

He sees the coaches falling into their usual routines, too. They usually take lunch out on the picnic benches in the courtyard, enjoying the Pennsylvania sunshine as they rifle through sheets of plays and formations and discuss tactics. 

Bobby even let him join them once—on the last day of camp, when all the other players had been picked up by excited parents or herded into the buses to take them to the airport, but his own parents had still failed to make an appearance. An hour had stretched into two, and finally when he’d been sitting on the front steps of the main camp lodge for three hours, Bobby’s wife and camp director Athena stopped hovering and came out with Bobby to invite him to dinner. Bobby made some chicken and orzo concoction that melted in his mouth—the next year, when Buck was sent to camp three days early because his parents had grown so frustrated with him making a mess in the house and was alone, Bobby showed him how to make it. 

The sight of the group hunched over the table outside is a welcome one that warms Buck from the inside out, and he feels a little more on solid ground than he did this morning. He’ll get lunch—it’s taco day—and have a fry eating competition with Campbell and debate superheroes with Ravi before they head back to training, where he’ll continue to dominate. Normal stuff. 

But when Buck heads over to his usual table, he sees his friends all leaning in eagerly to a story Eddie’s telling. 

“—so… yeah, he said we had a chance at State if we kept playing like that,” Eddie finishes. “‘Course, our quarterback tore his ACL during the final and we settled for silver, but still.”

Many of the boys hiss in sympathy—some at the injury (Buck himself has torn his ACL once, and it was not fun) and some at coming so close to glory and losing. All of them are impressed by the story. 

“Mack Brown said that to you?” Davis repeats incredulously. “ The Mack Brown?”

Buck wants to say something snarky in response, but the Longhorns coach complimenting Eddie like that is so incredible that he literally has no words to make him feel bad about it. He slumps into his seat, conveniently next to Eddie, and when the other boy leans back he can feel the heat radiating from where their skin brushes. 

“He was there to see my buddy,” Eddie says, waving away the awe with the perfect combination of humility and self-awareness that only makes Buck hate him more. How is he so good at this? His arm presses back against Buck’s when he makes the gesture, and for some reason it’s only now that Buck realises that Eddie was the one who smelled good last night. He’d smelled it right when he walked in, and now that their skin is touching Buck smells it once more—sandalwood and sage. He shivers.

“Buck got told he was one to watch by Bill Belichick,” Ravi interjects, trying to help when he sees Buck’s expression, and Buck shoots him a look even as everyone murmurs their approval. 

He’s not against tooting his own horn, but like this it just seems like he’s trying to one-up Eddie. Sure, it’s totally something he would do and has done, but that’s not the point.

Someone graciously changes the subject to how hard the coaches are running the players this year, and Buck allows himself to settle into the conversation. These are his friends, after all. Buck is used to practically holding court at this table. 

He still does. Everyone listens to him, asks him questions and dies with laughter at his jokes. It’s just that Eddie’s right beside him, and they’re turning to him a lot, too. How many practices a week do you have at your high school, Eddie? I’m from Minnesota, so what’s it like playing in Texas heat? Any hot girls in El Paso?

“Stop grilling the guy, damn ,” Buck interrupts after the last one, rolling his eyes. He takes a massive bite of his taco, resolutely not looking at anyone.

“No, it’s okay,” Eddie says after a beat. “I don’t mind. I know I’m the new guy and everything.”

“They’re not asking Sandborn where he’s from,” Buck points out a little louder than necessary, and Noah turns from his table to look up with wide eyes. 

“Oh… no, I mean, I don’t mind—”

“Not everyone makes Cortez and Tyler concuss each other on the first day of camp and fend off Yates in a 1v1,” Campbell cuts Noah off to shoot back, clapping Eddie on the shoulder. 

Buck takes another bite of his taco as the other guys cheer, grabbing Eddie’s arms and jostling him. Eddie’s smiling, but Buck can see a flash of something else as he turns around to weakly shake the hand of the guy behind him. He’s almost… scared.

“Okay, okay, can we chill, guys?” Buck calls out, forgetting he has a mouthful of food. A tiny piece of sweetcorn flies from his open mouth onto Eddie’s bare arm, and the other boy goes completely still. 

The rest of the group freezes as well, all eyes glued to the wet sweetcorn stuck to Eddie’s forearm. Eddie is just staring at it as if he’s worried that he’ll blink and it’ll disappear, but all Buck can think is, I’m glad he doesn’t look scared anymore. 

Slowly, Eddie turns to look up at Buck, and Buck flushes from the eye contact without warning. Without taking his eyes off Buck, Eddie reaches down and picks up the sweetcorn between his thumb and his forefinger, raises it demurely to eye level, and proceeds to flick it back at Buck’s face, hitting him square in the nose. 

What feels like minutes go by with Eddie and Buck just staring at each other. Impossibly, the sweetcorn stuck to Buck’s nose, too, and Buck is trying to glare at Eddie with incredulity but finds it difficult to manage in between almost going cross-eyed trying to see the sweetcorn. 

Eddie snorts. 

Later, Buck will think that was what did it—that fucking snort, like they were sharing an inside joke. With a huff, Buck finally flicks the sweetcorn away only to grab a bread roll and, in a flash, hurl it at Eddie’s head. 

Heat boils in his stomach, red and angry. His vision blurs. 

The rest of it is all Cortez.

“FOOD FIGHT!” he yells, picking up his yoghurt and flinging a globule from his spoon onto the cheek of an unsuspecting sophomore Buck doesn’t recognise. 

Eddie is still staring at him in disbelief, glancing between him and the bread roll that thunked onto the table like a stone, but the room around them erupts. The truth is that it has nothing to do with Buck and Eddie’s rivalry; they’re simply teenage boys, unable to miss an opportunity to throw shit and make a mess. 

But Buck doesn’t move, because Eddie doesn’t. He just looks at the carnage around them, following the arc of a piece of pie with his eyes as it hits Yates on the shoulder, only for Yates to turn and hurl a plate of peas into the air like tiny green missiles. It happens in slow motion, and Buck sort of thinks there should be classical music playing behind the scene. 

And through all of it, Eddie is still. He just watches Buck. It’s like he’s trying to solve an equation. It’s maddening. 

He doesn’t move, even as someone turns the nerd jocks’ table into a ketchup slip n’ slide and skids across to a chorus of cheers. Not even as mashed potato splashes against his head, a misplaced shot from Campbell. Not even as barbeque sauce splatters across Buck’s face and hair.

It’s only when Bobby walks into the dining hall, blows a whistle, and points at Eddie and Buck that Buck can finally walk away.

Chapter Text

Eddie

“You got off light, dude.”

“An isolation cabin?” Eddie says skeptically, turning back to his duffel bag. “We didn’t even start the fight.”

Ravi passes him his football pads, which he kneels to put in their own bag. “The intricacies of it don’t matter,” he says wisely, shrugging. “Food was thrown. In a fight. You were the first to throw the food. Ergo…”

“I don’t think you know what ergo means.”

“ Ergo, you started the fight, and now you gotta pay.”

Eddie sighs. “I just—don’t get what that guy’s deal is,” he says, and Ravi flops back against his bunk. Buck, he means. Evan. 

This isn’t the first time he’s followed this line of thought, of course. He’s pretty sure Ravi’s starting to regret taking a liking to him after Eddie slipped by him so quickly on the first day, because he hasn’t been able to stop talking about Buck and his vendetta against him. 

“He’s an incredible player,” Ravi says again, more patient than Eddie deserves given the number of times he’s said it this afternoon. “When you’re that good, you get protective. Besides, Buck practically grew up here.”

Eddie’s head snaps up. “What?” Ravi blanches, clearly not having meant to reveal that fact about Buck, but Eddie presses anyway. “Grew up here?”

Despite Ravi’s hesitation, he eventually mutters something about open secrets and shrugs. “Buck’s parents are… absent, I guess. He was raised pretty much totally by his sister. They’re really close, from what he says. Anyway, his parents hate him playing football—they’re convinced he’s gonna die or something—so when he started coming here, Coach Nash and his wife Athena sorta took him in. Wilson and Han, too.”

Eddie had heard Buck calling Coach Nash ‘Bobby’ earlier. Him being on a first-name basis with the head coach made more sense now (it’s not surprising with the assistant coaches, who insist on being more like friends than coaches much of the time they’re at the camp).

Things about Buck start to make more sense now that Ravi has told him more about the Pennsylvania native.  His obvious drive to be the best, his attention-seeking behaviour. The way his eyes follow Eddie around like he’s a piece of shit smeared on his shoe that he can’t wait to wipe off, and like something else that Eddie can’t name. 

Still, that doesn’t mean Eddie likes the guy. He hadn’t had an issue with him before—Eddie was more drawn to him than he’d like to admit, watching him command the dining hall like a conductor yesterday—but in the 24 hours since Buck’s done nothing but act testy around him and do everything in his power to inconvenience Eddie. 

Including, apparently, getting sent to isolation. 

They’d received their punishment side-by-side in Coach Nash’s office, saying nothing as the man delivered an eerily calm filibuster on the importance of teamwork and Eddie tries to ignore the mashed potato dripping off his head onto the floor. 

“Now, I know it wasn’t actually the two of you who started the broader fight,” Coach Nash had said at the end when Buck opened his mouth, clearly knowing the boy well. “But you caused it. Your friction is now creating issues for the rest of the boys, and I can’t have that. For the next three nights, at least, you will be sleeping in Orion cabin, located around the bend of the lake. You will both report to me tomorrow morning and at the end of every training day and tell me something you’ve learned about the other: his likes, his dislikes, what colour socks he wears. Whatever. If you don’t report back, you’ll stay out there for longer… and I’ll run you ‘til you drop.”

Eddie could see Buck looking dismayed out of the corner of his eye, but he knew that any semblance of violence would usually amount to immediate dismissal from the camp. He was just glad that he was still here, even if it was with Evan Buckley. 

As if summoned, the boy in question appears in the doorway a minute later with his own duffel slung over his shoulder. “You ready? It’s getting dark, and they only gave us one flashlight.”

Eddie frowns. Last night he’d been able to navigate around the main lodge where the dining hall was located and his cabin by the moonlight. “Is it really that bad? I can see fine around here.”

Buck shrugs. “There’s a ton more trees and it’s right on the lake, so it feels darker, apparently. I’ve never been.”

Ravi looks amused by this fact. “That’s way more surprising than you know, Eddie. Buck should’ve been sent there a million times.”

Buck rolls his eyes, but his reddened cheeks give him away. “Anyway,” he says pointedly, arching a brow at Eddie.

“Oh. Right, yeah,” he says, quickly shoving the last few items in his bag and zipping it up. 

When they step outside, a bunch of the other guys have gathered to say farewell. While they’ll still be at practices, missing out on the moments of touch football in the clearing and poker and truth or dare is a big hit in terms of their experience at the camp. Eddie can only hope that Coach Nash gives in on his punishment a little early and lets them go, because he was just starting to make some friends—now he’s stuck with a big, sulky puppy instead. 

“See you at practice tomorrow, boys,” Buck says loudly, and Ravi steps forward to give him a quick hug.

Ravi says something in his ear that makes Buck snort a laugh but his expression changes when Ravi continues, and he nods when they part. Buck moves on to Cortez and Tyler next, then Campbell, then Davis and Yates and Callahan and Johnson and Sinclair and even new kid Sandborn get individual fist bumps. 

Eddie fights the urge to scoff. Buck’s acting like they’re going off to war. Just how far is this damn cabin? To make matters worse, Buck doesn’t acknowledge him the whole time.

After offering one quick final wave (and an encore royal wave as he shouts things like, “oh, thank you!” and “you’ve been such a wonderful crowd!”—with a Transatlantic accent that Eddie has to admit is impressive to a chorus of cheers) they turn and head into the dark forest.

Buck is silent the whole way to the cabin, but he is careful to keep both his and Eddie’s feet visible in the beam from the lone flashlight, at least. Eddie understands why Buck is so sullen the longer they walk, as the route is laden with tree roots and winding around craggy rocks sunk into the earth. It’s difficult in the darkness, but even in the daytime they’ll have to be careful—it soon becomes clear when they crest a small hill to find no cabin in sight that they’ll have to wake up well before the other players if they want to get to the main lodge in time for breakfast. 

It’s pretty obvious that Buck doesn’t really know the way to the cabin either. They’re following the silver reflective arrows stapled to trees pointing the way far too closely for Eddie to believe otherwise, even though every time he glances over Buck has his chin high in the air and is feigning ignorance to the signs. Eddie sees his flashlight twitching upward to scan the trunks in front of them every few minutes, but he says nothing about it. He doesn’t want to fight anymore tonight.

Finally, after—Eddie checks his watch— thirty minutes , they reach a small cabin facing the lake. It has a narrow beach of dark sand with rocks glistening in the moonlight, and the cabin itself nestles against a jagged boulder that is hard to see with the great oak trees blocking their view. 

It looks like a kid’s playhouse. 

Eddie fights the urge to laugh with incredulity, but a minute later wishes he had let go because there’s nothing funny about the dilapidated outhouse sitting fifteen feet away from the lodge. It looks like something out of a horror movie, and Eddie doesn’t want to get closer to see how it smells. 

The cabin is nothing more than a room with two small windows in the front and two bed frames with thin squeaky mattresses. It’s a far cry from their cabins back at main camp, with air conditioning and electric lights and plush bunks. Buck fumbles for the light switch, and after a few seconds a single bulb flickers to life in the middle of the cabin, illuminating them in a dim yellow glow.

“Do you have a preference…?” Eddie trails off, and Buck walks to the bed on the right without a word.

Eddie is glad he packed a sleeping bag, but is surprised when Buck pulls out his own  and two foam mats. At Eddie’s surprised face, Buck shrugs. “Me and some of the boys do a proper camp out with tents on the last night as a tradition. You learn pretty quickly to bring something to lie on instead of the ground.”

Buck eyes his foam mats, considering, and then sighs. “You want one?”

“Uh…” Eddie hesitates, debating for a moment if this is a genuine gift. “Sure, yeah. Thank you.”

He accepts the foam mat when Buck passes it over and unbuckles the clips, rolling it out on the frame and gingerly lying down to test it out. The mat itself is fine, but it’s only when he lies down that he realises that he has another problem—the massive broken window right above his bed. Pennsylvania gets cold at night, and he shivers in his hoodie when a gust of wind blows in and across his face. 

He sits up. Buck is unpacking his clothes into the tiny bedside dresser, placing a water bottle and battered Walkman radio on top. “I figure we should get to know each other, right? Like Coach Nash said?” Eddie asks.

“Right,” Buck says, sitting down on the edge of his bed. He doesn’t sound pleased. “What do you wanna know?”

Eddie realises that Buck is going to make him do all the work here, but he’s too tired to complain. He just wants to get out of this cabin with its drafty window as soon as possible. “Where are you from? Any siblings?”

“Hershey, Pennsylvania. I have an older sister, Maddie.”

Eddie hums noncommittally. He realises that Buck is rather like a wild animal—he has to approach slowly and with caution so as not to scare him off. “Cool. I’ve got two sisters as well. You close to yours?”

Buck’s jaw tightens slightly. It relaxes after a moment, the corners of his mouth softening as he thinks of his sister. “Yeah. We are.”

“How long you been playing football for?”

Eddie asks the question casually once more, but Buck stiffens. “Since I was seven. I had to forge my dad’s signature so I could play.” He sits down on his bed and levels Eddie with a glare. “How long have you been playing for?”

Oh. I see.

“About a year,” Eddie says, and sure enough, Buck looks scandalised. “So what’s what this is all about, then? You don’t like that I’m a relative newcomer compared to you and your friends?”

“This is about your entitlement ,” Buck hisses, and then his jaw clicks shut. He shakes his head. “You just… you walk in here like you own the place. You have to earn respect here.”

“And I haven’t earned your respect?” Eddie asks, his brow furrowing. He doesn’t name what hangs heavy in the air between them: the fact that he should have earned it given his attitude and talent.

“No. Not yet.” With that, he stands and crosses to the wall in three short strides, flicking the light switch and plunging them into darkness. 

Eddie is silent as he listens to the rustling as Buck climbs in his sleeping bag, wondering if he should speak out and ruin Buck’s mic drop moment in order to get more clarity. If he’s being honest, he doesn’t think he’s going to get any more answers tonight. 

He stays awake long after Buck’s deep breaths turn into soft snores, shivering and burrowing further into his sleeping bag for warmth. It does nothing. He drifts in and out for less than an hour in total for the whole night, teeth chattering and body vibrating with tremors.

 It’s only when the sun peeks out over the lake that he finally climbs out of bed and goes to stand on the shore. His watch reads 6 a.m. Pebbles press into his soles, helping to wake him up as he looks out across the glittering water, and he focuses on grounding himself. 

The previous day and all its chaos with Buck didn’t matter. He had proven himself as a capable linebacker despite his size, and is confident that he’d made at least a few friends along the way as well. He can only hope that this thing with Buck could resolve quickly and allow him to focus on training, but he isn’t sure that Captain Nash will be satisfied with what they learned about each other last night.

Buck and Eddie once again make the walk from the cabin back to the main lodge in silence. It’s easier to navigate in the daytime but still a long way, and Eddie’s heart rate is healthily elevated when they arrive. 

Tyler and Ravi feign shock that they made it to breakfast. “You two didn’t kill each other?” Ravi says, looking flabbergasted.

Eddie and Buck share a glance. They may not like each other, but they had heard each other’s teeth chattering last night—it was a vulnerable moment, and there were some things you just didn’t tell people about another guy. 

“Truce,” Eddie says finally, turning back to the pair with a decisive nod. “Anyone hungry?”

Eddie doesn’t sit next to Buck, but he does sit at Buck’s table without argument, which he hopes Coach Nash sees. There’s a collective intake of breath from the other players scattered around the dining hall—everyone knows about their isolation punishment, of course—followed by an exhale when it becomes obvious that no food would be spilled at this meal. 

Eddie busies himself chatting to Ravi, who he discovers has known Buck the longest as they both started coming to camp when they were kids. Ravi is shrewd, with a dorky, happy-go-lucky personality that hides a sharp intellect and a lot of empathy. He seems to understand when Eddie tells him that he wasn’t sure about being away from home for over a week—especially for something that his parents reject.

“I’m in a similar situation, honestly,” Ravi confesses around a bite of toast. “My parents want me to give everything I do one hundred percent, especially if it’s something I love. I think they just wish I loved something other than football.”

“So they’re supportive, but not really?” Eddie summarises, and Ravi nods. “Same here. My parents come to my games sometimes, but my dad…” he trails off, swallowing hard. “Y’know. Immigrant parents and all that.”

“I do know,” Ravi says. “I get that my family wants me to be realistic, and it’s a fair worry. Have you ever done the math on how many college ball spots there are versus how many guys going for them? Buck showed me once. It’s scary.” He shrugs, leaning on the table. “But we gotta try, right? For the game.”

Eddie grins. He may not have been playing for as long as Ravi has, but the other boy sees in Eddie what’s in himself—a pure love for the sport that can’t be tainted by things like odds. Buck worries too much, Eddie thinks. 

“Buckley, Diaz,” a loud voice calls across the dining hall, silencing all the players finishing up their breakfast. It’s Coach Chimney. “Coach wants to see you in his office. Now.”

For the second time in twenty-four hours, Eddie and Buck walk through the dining hall and to Coach Nash’s office, where they find the door already open and waiting for them. 

“Morning, boys,” Coach Nash says, putting down the newspaper he’s holding. “How’d you sleep?”

“Great,” Buck deadpans. “I nearly froze my balls off, but other than that it was superb.”

The fact that Bobby doesn’t comment on his insolence tells Eddie how well he knows him. “And what did you learn about each other?”

Eddie glances at Buck, who doesn’t look back at him.  “Eddie has two sisters,” Buck states in a monotone. “We good?”

“No, we are not ‘good,’” Coach Nash repeats when Buck turns to leave, a brief flash of irritation crossing his face before disappearing. “What are their names? How old are they? Is Eddie close with them?”

Buck swallows. “Buck also has a sister,” Eddie cuts in, trying to smooth over the situation. “She’s older. Her name’s Maddie, and they’re close.”

Coach Nash’s face softens. “Thank you, Eddie,” he says, before looking at both of them. “But this isn’t enough. This is a training camp, not a high school team, but you have to be able to play with every person you meet. Colleges aren’t gonna care that you guys don’t braid each other’s hair, but you sure as hell better play like you’re joined at the hip. Got it?”

Eddie and Buck nod in unison, numb. 

“Until you two learn to play together— and learn more about each other—neither of you are allowed to practice.” He holds up a hand when Eddie opens his mouth to protest, and sighs. “I know what you’re gonna say, and I honestly don’t care that it’s not your fault. The fact is that you two are disrupting my players, so until that stops happening you’re gonna run drills on this side of the field.”

Eddie’s stomach drops. “But Bobby —” Buck starts, and stops immediately when Coach Nash gives him a look. 

He glances between the two of them once more and then nods, seemingly to himself. “Buck, wait here. I need to talk to Eddie about something.”

With that, he strolls off. Eddie is frozen in place, unable to move as Coach Nash gets further and further away, and he looks to Buck for help. He has no idea what’s going on—he’s never had a coach like Bobby Nash before, and isn’t really sure what to do with it.

Buck knows Coach Nash. “Go,” he hisses, making a shooing motion. He rolls his eyes. “Try not to get me kicked off the team, alright?”

“I’ll do my best, sweetheart,” he says sarcastically, his voice dripping with its Texas drawl that he’s been trying not to let slip out. 

To his surprise, Buck doesn’t punch him in the face like he thought he would—he just stares, his cheeks going bright red before he ducks his head. Eddie turns on his heel and follows after Coach Nash as quickly as he can, his own cheeks flaming at Buck’s reaction. What the hell was that?

Coach Nash, it turns out, has pulled him aside because he wants Eddie to play a new position. 

“You want me to— what?” Eddie asks incredulously. He forgets his whole ‘yes, sir’ attitude as shock takes over. “Dude, I can’t play quarterback.”

Coach Nash’s mouth twitches at the corner. “You want to bet?”

Eddie swallows. “But—but I’ve always been linebacker, I’ve never even tried offense—”

“—and I’d never tried kimchi until my wife introduced me to it, and now I eat a jar a week,” Bobby says with a wry smile, putting a placating hand on Eddie’s shoulder. “Look, I’m sure you already know that your size relative to the other linebackers will be an issue by college, and even worse by the NFL—that’s assuming you want to get to the NFL?”

That snaps Eddie out of his reverie. “Yes, sir,” he replies.

“Good. Well, I think you’re fast and methodical, a quick decision maker. You have a knack for reading the field, kid,” Coach Nash says. “You’re a good linebacker but I think your skills are underused there, and I think you could do some real damage as quarterback. Want to give it a try?”

Eddie is… apprehensive. He’s never done this before, and he knows these coaches are watching him like a hawk—they talk to the scouts, and the scouts in turn are coming to see a friendly match at the end of camp. It matters that he’s able to make this switch, and do it well, because it’s obvious from Coach Nash’s words that he doesn’t have a future as a linebacker. 

Which means…

“Hell yeah, sir,” he says, grinning. 

“Good,” Coach Nash replies, smiling back and patting him on the shoulder. “Now, I need you and Buck to make up—a wide receiver and a quarterback who don’t talk is a recipe for disaster.”

The pair walk back to where Buck is standing, apparently studying the clouds in the sky. His neck snaps down from his craning position when Coach Nash speaks. “So, Eddie is gonna try out being quarterback,” he announces, already holding up a hand to stop Buck’s protests. “I think you’re forgetting who the Head Coach is here, Buck. My decision is final. But neither of you will have any chance at running a play if you don’t get your shit together, okay?”

Buck and Eddie share a glance. It’s like hearing an English teacher swear in the classroom—it sounds weird. “Yeah, Coach,” Buck says, and Eddie chimes in with the same words. 

“You’re gonna run drills until that time,” Coach Nash continues. 

“Until… what time?” Buck asks.

“The time that you two can talk to each other,” Coach says over his shoulder, already strolling off. 

This is going to be bad. 

It’s bad. 

It’s really bad, in fact—so bad that Eddie is currently dry-heaving on the sidelines. The rest of the team has been sent to lunch, but Eddie and Buck have been ordered to stay behind. That’s fine with Eddie. He doesn’t think he could keep anything down right now anyway. 

They’ve been running suicides for hours now, sprinting back and forth and bending to touch the painted lines of the field as they go. Eddie and Buck are well-matched for speed, with Eddie perhaps slightly faster, but Buck makes up for that through sheer force of will and they cross each line together. 

“Coach,” Buck says between pants, pointing to Eddie’s hunched-over position. “Pretty sure this is cruel and unusual punishment.”

“Probably a war crime,” Eddie agrees gravely after he’s wiped his face with his glove. He’s not usually inclined to question authority, but that tends to change when you spend five hours running for starting a food fight. 

Coach Wilson just shrugs. “What’s cruel and unusual is making me watch you two behave like children  last night. I don’t know what your problem is, but you better sort it out—my knees’ll get tired from standing but I’ll bring out a lawn chair and keep blowing this damn whistle.”

Across the field, Eddie can see Coach Nash’s wife Athena striding across the grass with a clipboard in hand. Apparently she’s a police sergeant, but helps keep her husband’s camp running as a hobby. 

“Think she’ll save us?” Eddie says breathlessly, jerking his chin towards the woman. 

Buck follows his gesture and scoffs. “Hell no,” he replies. “She’d probably sit on our backs and make us do bear crawls to the fifty yard line.”

“Y’know, that’s not a bad idea,” Coach Wilson says thoughtfully. “Hey, Ath—”

“ Alright, alright,” Buck says with half a laugh, removing his hands from his hips to give her a gentle nudge in the shoulder. He glances back at Eddie, and in a heartbeat he’s beside him, hauling him into an upright position. Eddie blinks, all the blood from his head rushing to his feet in a dizzying blur, but manages to stay standing.

Coach Wilson studies them for another half a second and then looks down at her stopwatch. “We’re gonna run a route when we’re done.”

“Wait, you mean…” Buck stops, falling silent. 

“I’ve only thrown a ball in drills,” Eddie says, quickly catching on to where this is going. He still feels like he can’t get his breath back. Why did he agree to be quarterback? He has no clue how to do it. “I don’t know if I can actually, y’know, do it—”

“Stop panicking, man,” Buck interrupts, shaking his head. 

“I don’t panic,” Eddie says, well aware that his general demeanour is suggesting otherwise. 

Buck watches him steadily for a moment, then takes a step forward. “Look, I’ll show you the routes I run first. You’ll probably remember all of them after the first try,” Buck adds with a scoff, and then his voice is uncharacteristically soft. “Your new job is really simple, dude: just get the ball to the guys that are supposed to get it, and… try not to get hit.”

They grin at each other after the last part, and then look to Coach Wilson who’s still waiting for a response. 

“More suicides first?” Eddie asks, though he already knows the answer. 

“Yup. Coach was very specific with his instructions. Ready?”

What exactly were Coach’s instructions? Eddie wonders, but ignores it when Buck looks at Eddie for confirmation. He can only blink back, and Buck nods as he pulls on his helmet. “Blow your damn whistle.”

When they’ve done the sprint five more times—and added a simultaneous passing drill when Coach Han arrives, doing it five more times after that—the pair of coaches mercifully grant them a few minutes of rest upon which they collapse on the grass in a heap of sweat and shoulder pads. Eddie reaches out with one hand and fumbles for the water bottles abandoned beside them, chucking one without looking to Buck. 

He knows somehow that Buck is ready for it, and he’s right. Buck catches the bottle one handed, squirts some into his mouth, and nods. “Thanks.”

Eddie nods in response, and they both sit up. Wordlessly, Eddie turns around and hands Buck his bottle, and there’s only a second’s pause before Buck is dousing his hair, neck and lifting his pads up to cover his back in water. The liquid instantly cools Eddie down, and he knows the breeze on his wet hair will feel refreshing once he starts to run. Buck turns around next, and Eddie does the same to him. 

It’s a football thing. It’s the kind of act you do for your teammates, like doctors tying each other’s medical gowns—and it’s nothing, really. But it’s sort of intimate, especially when he runs quick fingers across the short curls at the back of Buck’s head as he drops his hand to make sure it’s properly soaked and Buck presses into the touch subconsciously. 

There’s less than half a second where Buck is actually accepting his touch, but the moment still makes Eddie worried he’s flushing all the way down to his toes. When Buck pulls away, he suddenly becomes very interested in his cleats and leans to check his laces. Eddie, meanwhile, still can’t seem to catch his breath. 

When he glances up, Coach Wilson is watching them. “Okay, you kids have five minutes to talk. Find some common ground,” she says. 

“And here’s a hint,” Coach Han adds, his eyes flicking to the grass beneath their sprawled bodies. “There’s some.”

With that, the coaches walk off, leaving them with only the faint sounds of the wind, the birds in the trees and their own heaving breaths. 

Buck

Eddie leans back on his hands and stares out at the field that’s still empty. “You can run, man,” he says finally. 

Buck studies him, but he doesn’t seem to be bullshitting. He says it like it’s a fact. “So can you,” Buck attempts, and it sounds more begrudging than he intended it but Eddie smiles anyway. 

“Do you think they might kill us today?” Eddie says after a beat. 

“They might kill you when they start us running routes and remember you’ve barely thrown before,” Buck teases, but from the way Eddie’s mouth clamps shut he knows he’s stepped on a nerve. 

“Why’d they do that?” Eddie asks, apparently mostly to himself.

“Because you’re a great decision maker,” Buck says, because It’s a fact. He knows all too well the self-consciousness that comes with being a football player, not knowing if you can do the job. “You see it all so clearly, you act quickly, and—” he breaks off to shake his head, laughing. “I don’t know, man, something tells me you’re going to be good at this whole throwing thing pretty quickly.”

“Why?” Eddie asks again, tilting his head. He looks like an inquisitive puppy. 

Buck rolls his eyes. “I bet you can dance and juggle, too,” he says, and he’s shocked when Eddie just shrugs sheepishly. “Oh my God.”

Eddie grins. “I’m a man of many talents, I guess,” he says, then sighs and turns to face Buck more fully. “Buck, you’re aware we gotta at least get on to play? This is the first actual conversation we’ve had, which doesn’t bode well for me. I don’t know what I’m gonna do if I can't adjust to being a quarterback, and I kinda need you to do that successfully.”

Buck flushes despite himself. “I know. I’m sorry, I… I’m not good with change, and I guess I’ve been—jealous, or something.”

“Jealous… of me?” Eddie repeats with a scoff. “I was jealous of you, seeing you so at ease in this camp.”

“What do you mean?” Buck prompts, but Eddie doesn’t expand. As much as he wants to push, he changes the subject. “Anyway, you can do this, Eddie. Once you learn it, just watch—that’s all you need.”

Buck, as it turns out, is right on both counts. 

When Hen and Chimney come back, they give them a choice: they can stop and go to lunch with the rest of the team, then head to Tactical—a class Bobby designed a few years ago featuring this asshat of a former coach, Gerard, who drawls on and on about strategy and plays for three hours —or they can stay to try a route, the reward being getting to miss Tactical and grabbing a shower to get a brief reprieve from the humidity. 

They both elect to stay.

He runs the route for Eddie a few times to show him—twenty yards then break on the diagonal—until Hen gets impatient and blows the whistle. “Alright, boys, let’s run it!”

Buck has been wondering what to do to help Eddie learn, and in the end he decides to do what always helps him—channel his competitiveness. He looks at Eddie and grins under his helmet. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll slow down so you can actually see me,” he says. “Throw it soft enough that I don’t need a helmet, okay?”

They set up, and Buck dashes down the field. He loves routes like this, where he gets a good chance to break away and push his legs as much as he can before turning at the exact right second to catch the ball. There’s a certain synchronicity to it that he’s kind of obsessed with, but it does require someone who can read his movements perfectly—and someone with a hell of an arm.

Buck is at the 80 yard line when the ball hits him square in the back of the head. 

He turns, shocked, to see Eddie standing sixty yards away. His arms are still paused at the end of the throw, as if he froze to watch the arc of the ball until it hit its target. 

Sure, it was about two seconds too early. But Eddie threw sixty yards on his first try and hit the tiny target of Buck’s helmet with ease, no doubt provoked by Buck’s comment only seconds before.

Buck doesn’t know if he likes being right about this. 

Eddie isn’t perfect after that, but Buck catches half of what he throws easily. The rest are just a little wide or off time, but Hen and Chimney leap on it. They correct his timing, directing him through movements and bad habits easily until Eddie has picked up everything from how to head fake and stutter step to sharpening his wrist movements. He takes corrections easily,  and when Buck jogs back to him in frustration after five misses in a row he just nods and asks how he can fix it. 

It’s obvious that Eddie is naturally good at this, but has no idea how he’s doing any of it—and Buck can actually help here. Bobby taught him something a long time ago, and it’s been his secret weapon. 

“Every player, every play, every step has a rhythm,” Buck says, taking a small step closer and ducking his head slightly to meet Eddie’s gaze. He reaches up to his chest, drumming out a steady beat on his pads. “Like this, right? You gotta feel it. Then you play it, and then it’s like—”

“—A dance,” Eddie finishes quietly, nodding in time with the rhythm. Buck knew, somehow, that Eddie would understand . “I can see all the steps laid out.”

“But you still have to feel it in you,” Buck says as he continues the beat. “Feel the rhythm of the route. One Mississippi. The snap of the ball, and you drop back while the defensive tackle protects your outside shoulder. Two Mississippi. When the line is clear, fake right and then break left around their defensive end.”

Eddie—as Buck somehow knew he would—begins to drum along with Buck against his own chest. “Three Mississippi. Find you. Somehow already all the way down the fucking field.” Even as he makes fun of Buck, laughing, he keeps the rhythm. “Aim true.”

He’s got it.

Hen is watching when they step back, but she says nothing as Buck keeps drumming while they set up for the snap once more. At Buck’s nod that they’re ready, Hen blows the whistle. Sure enough, Eddie moves exactly as directed, lightning fast with sure-footed steps. Buck is running, cutting through the air like it parts just for him as his footsteps thud in time with his heartbeat, and then he turns and holds out his arms and the ball—

Sails right into his arms like it was always meant to be there. 

He doesn’t keep running. He actually stops and stares at Eddie, who is frozen in place too. This goes on for several beats until finally what breaks him out of it is Eddie flexing his fingers once of all things—Buck erupts in celebration, unable to hide his excitement.

“Did you SEE that?!” Buck yells as he sprints back toward Eddie, who is also leaping in the air and running to him. “Holy shi—”

Buck cuts himself off when he sees Hen’s stern look, but he doesn’t feel bad when he sees her mouth curve into a smile. He keeps running until finally he’s back to Eddie, where he grabs him by his shoulder pads and tips his helmet into Eddie’s. 

“I can’t believe—” Eddie replies, breathless. “That was—”

“Hell yeah, dude.” Buck leans back and punches him lightly on the shoulder. “Not so fast, right?”

They grin at each other, both thinking back to their first day when Eddie said those words to him.

Buck claps him on the shoulder. “I think you got it. Coach Hen, has he got it?”

They both turn to Hen, who is still grinning as Chimney tips his sunglasses down to look both of them in the eye. “You both got it,” Hen says.

“Go shower and eat something before second practice starts,” Chimney says, and as they walk away Eddie and Buck can hear him muttering, “rhythm. Huh.”

“I—” Eddie cuts himself off again when the coaches are gone, both of them removing their helmets as he stares at Buck like he’s seeing him for the first time. “Thanks, Buck.”

 Buck doesn’t think he’s ever made as intense eye contact with someone as he just has with Eddie, and he doesn’t know what to do with the warmth in his chest. So Buck, like an idiot , ducks his head to look away. He feels cool without Eddie’s burning gaze piercing him. 

“Shower?” Buck asks.

“Hell yes.”

They begin to talk amiably as they walk to the locker room, discussing their high schools as they go. It’s… easy, strangely enough.

“Where my school is in Texas is way hotter than this,” Eddie is saying. “But the humidity is rivaled by Pennsylvania. I really wasn’t expecting it.”

“Sometimes when I play, the field feels more like a steam room than open-air,” Buck agrees. “Do you play JV?”

“I played a few JV games and was a benchwarmer on Varsity last year, but I’m starting this year,” Eddie replies, sounding heavy. “But our quarterback is really good, so I don’t know if I’ll make the cut.”

“I mean, you can always keep playing linebacker if you have to,” Buck points out, “but I don’t think you’ll have a problem. Once they see you play the position after this week, they’ll be kicking that other guy off the team in a second.”

Eddie snorts and quickly changes the topic to what teams they support. Buck is—obviously and without a doubt—an Eagles fan, while Eddie supports the Cowboys. When they discuss college football, though, they find some common ground.

“Longhorns all the way.”

“Right?” Eddie exclaims, looking pleased. “I thought you’d support UPenn or something.”

“Penn’s great, but Longhorns are built different. Brown’s a beast coach.”

“Better than Bobby?” Eddie teases, just as they reach the locker room and finally get air conditioning.

“No way,” Buck says with a roll of his eyes, already sitting down to take off his boots. “But Bobby doesn’t coach at the college level anymore.”

“Why not?” Eddie asks.

Buck shrugs, though he knows a little more than he’s letting on. “I think he just wanted something a bit slower paced. He’s a consultant and freelance coach during the year, but more of a stay-at-home dad to his stepkids—the summers are his time, though. He’s given his life to the camp.”

“Makes sense,” Eddie says, and Buck glances over. He’s shrugging off his jersey and shoulder pads. Buck follows suit, heading over to the showers to turn them on. “You’ve been coming here a long time, right?”

Buck reads the unspoken question in Eddie’s words. “Bobby and I are close,” he acknowledges, though he doesn’t feel the little feral thing curled in his chest snarling and wanting to hiss, he’s mine. When he turns to walk back to his cubby, Eddie has already slipped his shirt off and Buck politely avoids his gaze. “We spent a lot of time together. Y’know, a lot of the time I come to camp early and stay a little longer too, with him and Athena and Hen and Chimney. All the kids come around for a barbecue on the last day too, it’s awesome. ”

“Sounds like you’re really close with everyone,” Eddie says, sounding fond. Buck flushes despite himself, pleased, and peels his shirt off as well. 

“Yeah, I guess so. Besides Maddie I’m not really—I’m not really close to my family. The 118 family is… it means a lot.”

Several long beats go by. Buck doesn’t look up. “I’m glad you have them, and that they have you,” Eddie finally says. Buck hears him stand from the bench after another long beat, and then gentle footsteps as he pads towards the steaming showers. 

It’s like a spell is broken. Buck grabs his towel and follows Eddie inside. 

“What about your family?” Buck asks. Their task from Bobby to get to know each other seems so far away—now Buck genuinely wants to know.

Buck followed the universal rules between guys showering when he turned them on: as far apart as possible so as to minimize eye contact with any nakedness, i.e. ideally opposite walls. Buck heads to the shower opposite Eddie, stepping under the stream of water that he keeps cold to begin with just to cool off. Slowly, he turns the handle to hot.

“I’m… pretty close with my sisters, I guess. Not so much with my parents,” Eddie says after a deep sigh, no doubt at the water hitting his body. “I got into football because my dad thought it’d be a good way to make friends.”

“Were you new, or just didn’t have any friends?” Buck asks, too tired to soften the question.

Eddie huffs a small laugh. “Both, I guess. We moved to El Paso the summer before ninth grade, and I’m—I’m kind of quiet, since we moved around a lot when I was younger. I’ve always been into sports, though, and did track in middle school, then… I knew I wanted to try football. My parents hated it, said it was too violent, but I think my dad always secretly liked it because—I don’t know, it’s a man’s sport or something.” He pauses. “Plus, my dad was tired of me beating his ass at chess.”

Buck is silent for a moment, unsure of what to say. “Y’know, I think that might be the most words I’ve ever heard you say consecutively,” he decides finally, and this earns him another snort from Eddie. “Does your dad come to your games?”

“Not often. When he does come, it’s usually with my mom, and it’s better that way—he’s way less competitive and into it when she’s around.” There’s silence again, and Eddie clears his throat. “What about you? Do your parents come to your games?”

Buck swallows hard. “No.” It’s all he can bring himself to say, but Eddie doesn’t need more. 

He seems to understand, and swiftly changes the subject. “How about basketball? You into that?” he asks.

 Eddie seems eager. He should say yes, right? Buck scrubs through his hair with the squeaky locker room shampoo, wishing he had his own bottle back in the cabin. “Yeah, uh, sure.”

“Hell yeah, dude,” Eddie says appreciatively. “Knew it. What team?”

“Um…” Buck trails off, and thankfully Eddie interjects. 

“Lakers? I love the Lakers,” he tells him, and Buck hums in agreement. 

He happily lets Eddie ramble a bit about the Lakers and what a great season they’re having, and then asks if Eddie’s into UFC. He says no—it’s too violent, something in him doesn’t like it, he says—but invites Buck to tell him about it anyway. 

They keep their backs to each other the whole time, but when Eddie’s shower turns off first a few minutes later Buck follows, and they head for their towels on the hooks, still talking amiably. It’s weird to Buck how easy it is, but he can begrudgingly admit that he can talk to Eddie like he’s known him for years—it’s even normal for Buck to grab his towel and quickly whip it at Eddie’s back.

If you’re friends on a team, you do this. And Buck isn’t thinking, but— yes, he wants that. 

He flushes down to his chest when Eddie whips him back, just once, and is glad that his back was turned because honestly? He’s sporting a semi at the thought of Eddie seeing him bare. 

He can’t help but preen slightly, because he does know he looks good since getting taller in the last year, filling out—but he quickly and efficiently ties the towel around his waist and heads for his cubby, cheeks flaming. This isn’t that. 

It’s not… anything.

“Hen ran us for hours. I still don’t think I can feel my legs.”

“And then we did passing drills when Han arrived—”

“Because Bobby wants Eddie to play quarterback now, did I say that already?” Buck says through a mouthful of fries. He passes the ketchup wordlessly to Eddie, who nods in thanks.

“Anyway, we ended up staying late to run some routes and we got to miss Tactical,” Eddie finishes, sliding the salt shaker to Buck’s waiting hand.

The boys gathered at the table stare at them. Ravi’s jaw is practically on the floor, and Tyler and Cortez keep blinking like they think Buck and Eddie will disappear.

“Dude…” Noah says, eyes wide. “What happened to you guys?”

A few of the other guys chuckle, glad the new kid broke the silence, but Buck and Eddie just shrug. “We ran. A lot,” Buck says, and he takes a massive bite of his burger. He doesn’t elaborate.

“Okay,” Ravi says slowly, seeming to settle into his seat. “Eddie, how’d you think you’re going to do in the new position?”

“It’ll take some getting used to,” he says after swallowing a mouthful of chicken. “But once I learn all the routes and practice with everyone else, I think I’ll be okay.”

“You’ll be more than okay,” Buck corrects him enthusiastically. “You’ll be the best quarterback in all of Texas.”

“ Hey,” Carlos—a quarterback from Austin—says, flicking a fry at Buck, who just grins. 

The long walk back to their cabin that evening is an amicable one, even if they get sent off before movie night both as part of their punishment and because a storm is expected to roll in that’ll make it too slippery to traverse easily later. 

They talk more about movies and TV shows they love, with Buck going on a long rant about Remember the Titans that Eddie doesn’t seem to follow at all but apparently enjoys enough. Neither of them mention the sharpness in the air around them, a damp smell that Buck knows well from growing up in these Pennsylvania forests—it’s going to rain, and soon. 

Wordlessly, both boys quicken their pace. Buck’s muscles are already numb from the fatigue of the day catching up with him and he trips once or twice, Eddie almost face planting on a tree root as they go. Buck still holds the flashlight, illuminating their path as much as he can as they sidestep jagged rocks and hop over hulking tree trunks. Despite their quick steps, Buck finds himself shivering in his thin hoodie and shorts.

“Fuck, it’s cold,” Eddie mutters, reading Buck’s mind. 

It’s only when they reach the cabin that Buck realises why the temperature is an especially big problem for Eddie: the broken window. The strong wind is already making the glass clatter its protest in its frame, and when they step inside Buck sees that it’s blowing directly onto Eddie’s  bed. 

Eddie doesn’t comment on it. They dress for bed in silence, Eddie pulling on a pair of plaid pyjama pants and exchanging his t-shirt for a hoodie as Buck changes into a similar ensemble. “Well, goodnight,” Eddie says after a beat, turning off the measly light. 

In the darkness, the wood softly creaking as rain starts to patter against the ground outside is enough to make Buck jump. He’s still standing, and he squints into the black until his eyes adjust. Eventually he can just about see Eddie’s form on the other side of the room, his face visible by the light coming in through the open window.

Slowly, Buck gets into his bed without taking his eyes off of Eddie. Even through the sleeping bag, Buck can make out that he’s shivering. They’d heard each other’s teeth chattering a little the night before, but this was different—Buck was almost vibrating with cold already from the gusts of wind and rain coming through the broken window, and knew Eddie had it ten times worse. His sleeping bag was probably soaked by now. 

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. 

Buck listens to Eddie’s bones trembling as the wind blows in through the cabin for what feels like hours but must only be a few minutes. Finally, he can’t take it anymore. “Eddie.”

He has to say it again when a particularly loud gust of wind makes the cabin shudder. When he does, Eddie’s head lifts from his sleeping bag cocoon. “Y-yeah?”

Buck fights the urge to roll his eyes even though he’s in the dark. “Get over here.” A pause. “It’s too cold, Ed. 

Eddie is silent for a moment, apparently fighting the urge to reject the offer, but finally gives in. He says nothing as he clambers out of his sleeping bag and picks up the foam mat, luckily mostly unscathed from the weather’s onslaught.

Buck grabs the flashlight and aims it at the ceiling, brightening the room a little, and sees that Eddie got the brunt of it instead. His hair is slightly damp and flattened to his head, as are his clothes, and his limbs are stiff from cold. He moves to put the mat on the floor beside Buck and begins laying out his sleeping bag, shaking out a few droplets of water as he does. 

Buck flinches back, shaking his head. “No, you’re not sleeping in that thing,” he says, and Eddie jerks up to look at him. The cabin gives another almighty groan. “Don’t be stupid, Eddie. Change into dry clothes and get in here before you freeze to death.”

They stare at each other for a moment, but Eddie is the first to give in. Silently, he grabs a change of clothes from his duffel and gets into them with jerky, methodical movements before coming back to stand beside Buck, looking dubiously at the sleeping bag. 

Buck rolls his eyes again. “C’mon, man.” He stands, sliding Eddie’s foam mat underneath his, then climbs back in and shuffles to one side. Eddie hesitates for another second, then shudders and steps forward. 

Luckily, Buck’s parents hadn’t thought twice about swiping their credit card to get their kid off their backs—Buck’s sleeping bag is the size of the entire bed, which means it’s big enough that Buck and Eddie aren’t touching at every point of their body. Just most of them. 

Buck gets an elbow to the ribs as they adjust, and wheezes out a fuck you to Eddie who just snorts and rolls over. He’s still trembling a little—Buck can feel it, his back muscles fighting off the last of the chill spasms, but as their combined body heat warms their little cocoon they begin to defrost.

Eddie lets out a long sigh. “Thanks, Evan.”

Buck shudders from head to toe. He didn’t know he still felt that cold. After the long day they’d had he’d forgotten that he first introduced himself as Evan. “Of course,” Buck whispers, and then, because he’s an idiot, “it’s—whatever. Eddie.”

Buck can practically hear Eddie rolling his eyes. “Well, thanks again, and thanks for training earlier as well. you’re a badass under pressure, bro. You could have my back any day.”

“Or—or you could have mine,” Buck manages finally. He thinks he can feel Eddie smiling. 

“Well… I gotta get some rest.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“Night, Evan.”

“Night, Eddie.”

Eddie has his back turned to Buck, who still has barely enough space to lie flat beside him. With Buck’s entire side pressed against him, he can feel Eddie’s breaths as they eventually slow and even out. Buck is wide awake. 

For some reason, he’s thinking about the first time he saw Eddie. He hadn’t noticed him at dinner or in the cabin on the first night, and Eddie had been a little late to practice the next morning—he was the last to come out of the locker room, and as Buck stood talking with Ravi and their friends, he’d been prompted to silence by someone’s comment. 

“Okay, that is a beautiful guy.” It was Carlos, Buck thought, but any thoughts were quickly abandoned when he turned and saw Eddie. 

He was just slipping his shirt over his head before following it with his football pads, methodically arranging them to sit on his shoulders right, but Buck was staring. A lot. He turned to Bobby and gave him a look. “Who the hell is that?”

“That’s Eddie Diaz, new recruit. Texas. Some camps in California were dying to have him, but he joined us.”

“What do we need him for?” Buck questioned, scowling as Eddie tugged his jersey down. 

“He just won State with his team in his first season,” Bobby told him with a laugh, as the other players chuckled and shook their heads alongside him. “He could be a real asset, and we have a lot to teach him.”

“Be nice,” Ravi warned Buck, but Buck wasn’t listening. He was still just staring at Eddie. 

He couldn’t keep his eyes off of him—and now it’s worse. It’s worse because now they’re actual friends, with an actual bond, and Buck is actually lying next to him and he can feel his ribs expanding and contracting with each steady breath. It feels far too real for Buck’s liking.

Buck stares at the ceiling for hours, one side of his body pressed against Eddie’s as he tries but is unable to shake the feeling that something is starting.

Chapter Text

Eddie

Oh.

Oh.

Eddie comes to consciousness slowly and then all at once, aware first of a warm pressure on his chest and then of the fact that that pressure is Buck, draped over him like an octopus with his face tucked into Eddie’s shoulder. One leg is hitched over Eddie’s waist, and it’s only then that Eddie realises that he’s hard, his face turned towards Buck’s in his sleep and his dick straining against Buck’s thigh.

And—Buck’s hard too. It takes him a second to notice, but Buck shifts and yup, that’s definitely what’s pressing insistently into Eddie’s hip. 

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. 

Eddie is just trying to figure out if he can safely extricate himself when Buck sniffs against his neck, lifting his head slowly as he wakes up. Eyes still half-lidded, Buck rolls off of Eddie and rubs at his face. 

“What time’s it?” Buck mumbles. 

“Uh…” Eddie blinks, trying to gather his thoughts now that Buck is no longer pressed against him. “Just after 7. I think.”

Buck groans. “M’kay.” He reaches over Eddie and unzips the sleeping bag, and in doing so shifts his hips against Eddie’s side. He stills. “Um.”

Eddie is also frozen, unable to move without Buck discovering that he’s hard, too. After a long beat, he fumbles to pull the zipper down the rest of the way and swings his legs into the cool morning air, the breeze prickling against his skin. 

The storm seems to have dissipated completely, leaving behind only damp earth and the wet smell clinging to the bark of the forest. They’ll have to be careful on their way back to main camp, Eddie knows, but after their performance yesterday he hopes the coaches won’t begrudge them for being a little late. 

“I—sorry,” Buck mumbles. He thinks it was just him. Eddie’s facing away from him sat on the edge of the bed, and he desperately looks down at his cock. Go down, he prays. Please, go down. 

“Seriously, don’t worry about it,” Eddie says with as much force as he can muster, willing Buck not to press the matter. “We’re both guys, right?”

“Yeah, we—we are…” Buck trails off, and Eddie can feel his eyes burning a hole into the centre of his back. He doesn’t turn. 

Carefully, Eddie stands instead and makes his way to his duffel bag. He dresses for the day with quick movements, positioning himself so that his morning wood is hidden from Buck as much as possible as they keep up a steady stream of casual early morning small talk. 

“Think they’ll make us run again today?” Eddie asks, pulling his t-shirt on. 

“Nah,” comes Buck’s confident reply. “Not if we show them how we play. It’s simple, right?”

Eddie straightens, turning to find Buck already facing him. “I throw it,” he says after a beat. 

“And I catch it,” Buck responds, grinning. His eyes flicker downwards, and his smile sort of freezes in place. When his eyes snap back up, they remain carefully on Eddie’s face even as his cheeks redden. “Both guys, right?”

Eddie nods, his own cheeks flaming. Buck turns, busying himself with packing his duffel and saving Eddie the indignity of turning around to adjust himself while Buck watches. They’re both dressed in a matter of seconds, and Buck throws him a granola bar just as they slip out the door of their shared cabin. 

The walk to the main camp is treacherous, as Eddie thought it would be. He’s glad he keeps his football cleats in a separate bag, because by the time they arrive at camp with five minutes of breakfast to spare he’s caked up to his ankles in mud. 

“ There they are,” someone calls from inside the lodge. It’s Ravi, accompanied by Tyler, Campbell and Cortez. “We thought you’d died in the storm last night.”

“We’re all good,” Buck replies with an easy laugh. “We almost died in the mud on the walk here and half our cabin’s soaked, but other than that we made it through.”

Half our cabin. Eddie shivers despite the Pennsylvania heat spiking once again, thinking of the freezing rain and wind that had blown through the window last night. He hadn’t wanted to say anything, but the thought of dragging his mat over to Buck’s side of the room had occurred to him—what he had not expected, however, was Buck offering for him to climb into his sleeping bag with him. 

He should’ve known with Buck—of course he would offer, especially after he saw the state of Eddie’s own sleeping bag. And Buck had been so warm, thawing Eddie’s body from the inside out until he could feel the heat radiating from Buck down to his toes. He had fallen asleep easily after that, instantly relaxed once he was beside Buck. He should’ve known he’d wake up like that.

He should’ve known a lot of things, it seems. 

The boys continue pestering them as they change in the locker room, slipping their football pads on and lacing up their boots. “Did Coach Wilson really make you run until you puked?” Noah asks Eddie, seemingly both horrified and awe-struck. 

“I didn’t actually puke, just… dry-heaved a bit,” Eddie admits after a beat.

“Well, surely that makes up for the food fight and your whole thing on the first day, right?” Ravi suggests. 

“I don’t know.” Buck sighs, crossing the locker room to sit beside Eddie without a word. He crosses one leg over his knee to pull his socks up and then ties his laces with practiced efficiency, one at a time. His shoulder or knee bumps into Eddie more than once, but neither of them make an effort to move. “Bobby’s not an easy man to read, but I know we really pissed him off—I mean, I did, mostly.”

Eddie shrugs, and Buck seems to deflate a little. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough, right?”

They do. 

“Coach Wilson and Coach Han were very detailed in yesterday’s report about you two,” Bobby is saying, sliding his sunglasses onto his nose to protect against the early morning sun. “They were quite impressed. Well done, boys.”

Buck grins, looking at Eddie. “So… we’re free?” Eddie isn’t sure if he means from the cabin, simply from their segregation away from their friends, or from him. 

Bobby shakes his head. “Better,” Bobby concedes. “But not good enough.”

Buck and Eddie share another look. They’re not out of the woods yet. 

It takes them a little while to get back into the swing of things once they’re back on the field. Eddie’s muscles are stiff from the previous day of rigorous exercise followed by holding himself so taut in the freezing rain that night, but as he jogs around the field with the other players he feels his limbs begin to loosen a little until every step is no longer like stepping on glass. Buck seems to feel the same way, easing into a long stride and losing the rest of the pack easily by virtue of his height. 

Not so fast. Eddie picks his knees up a little higher, propelling himself forward, and soon he’s keeping pace with Buck easily, crossing the line and slowing to a halt just as the other guys finish, all panting and out of breath.

“How did you—” Ravi manages, panting and looking disbelievingly to the spot in the pack where Eddie had been before. “No one keeps up with Buck during warm up. Ever.”

Eddie shrugs, fighting a smirk and trying to look as innocent as possible. “Well, looks like he’s got some competition, then.”

The other boys mock the pair as they head over to a morning huddle, where they’re told they’re going to start running some plays. There’s a ripple of excitement through the group—things have been pretty stop-start in terms of actually playing football so far, and they’re all looking forward to showing what they’ve learned over the last few days ahead of the friendly match on the final day of camp. 

“Eddie, you’re going to play quarterback for the blue team,” Coach Wilson says, handing him a blue jersey to put over his pads. The players jeer, several clapping Eddie on the back as he returns to stand in his original spot. 

“Carlos, you’ll be quarterback for the reds,” Coach Han continues. After a minute of handing out positions and jerseys, Coach Han and Coach Wilson each have one jersey left and only Noah and Buck are standing there without one.

Coach Han and Coach Wilson share a look. Fuck, they’re not going to split the pair up just to see how Eddie plays with a different wide receiver, are they? Eddie supposes that would be a strategic move, but can’t see how it would actually help him since he’d be without Buck. 

He’s just gameplanning how to fake an injury if Buck gets picked for the other team when Coach Wilson finally announces, “Buck, get on over to the blues. You’re receiver, obviously.”

Buck beams, catching the tossed jersey in mid-air and moving to stand beside Eddie. He bumps him in the shoulder. “Ready?” he asks.

Eddie blows all the air slowly out of his lungs. “As I’ll ever be.”

Eddie is crouched in his starting position, waiting for the snap of the ball. He gets tunnel vision when he’s like this, able to focus on nothing but the world three feet around him. To his right, he knows, is Buck—and the centre is right in front of him, the ball placed perfectly between his fingers as he waits to snap it into Eddie’s waiting hands. All he can hear is his own heartbeat, even, steady breaths, and the whistle as it blows. 

Eddie moves, dropping back on the diagonal and side stepping a defensive end that somehow already managed to break through the offense. A small switch-step, and he’s moving backwards as his eyes finally lift to scan the field, his arm already twisting back to fire the ball into the air, and—Buck is there, ready and waiting. 

The ball sails perfectly into his arms, and the whistle blows to stop the play. All the players are still, watching Eddie and Buck carefully. Later, Eddie will wonder if they knew something that he was too dumb or too ignorant to know himself—now, though, all he does is flush and jog back to reset. 

A few hours later, Eddie is having trouble dodging a tackle. 

It’s supposed to be a simple play, but for some reason the red team defense manages to break through and tackle him to the ground every time. He can tell the other players are getting frustrated, too, but it wouldn’t be such a problem if he could move fast enough to get out of the way—every time, like clockwork, his feet move like they’re stuck in molasses. 

Buck jogs over. “Remember the rhythm, dude,” he instructs Eddie. “This is our game.”

Eddie nods slowly, and when they next gather in a huddle he just grins and looks at the offensive ends. “Let ‘em through,” he says.

“What?” Campbell questions, brows furrowed. “Why would we—”

“Just trust me, okay? Let ‘em through.”

When the whistle blows, Campbell and the other end keep their word. They sidestep the defense with ease, allowing them to pass, and Eddie drops back and rids himself of the ball just as a linebacker comes barreling towards him out of the corner of his eye. Quick like lightning, he drops his shoulders—and the linebacker’s arms close over where his body had just been, allowing Eddie to straighten and shuck him to the ground like he was shaking off an annoying bug. 

The blue team cheers as Buck runs back to them, ball in hand, but Eddie is still. Only his hands flex as he looks off to the sidelines where the coaches are in intense conversation, and Buck runs right up to him, ignoring everyone else. “Did you see that catch?”

“Did you see that block?” Eddie grabs Buck by the shoulder pads, shoving him backwards. “This is our game!”

Buck catches on as fast as Eddie knew he would, and shoves him back. “ Our game!”

“ Our game!”

“Our game!”

The boys clad in blue jerseys surround them as they push each other, and Eddie collapses into a sea of jubilant cheering football players—but the only one he cares about is the steady presence of Buck next to him, already so familiar after virtually no time at all. 

That night, happy and exhausted and pleasantly full from the massive lasagna dinner they both just consumed, Eddie and Buck are back in their separate beds. Eddie is trying not to think about the last time they were in bed, warm and pressed against one another. He’s been thinking a lot about Buck’s presence beside him today, and he needs to… not do that. 

He doesn’t need a repeat of the shower earlier, where he’d gotten hard at the sight of Buck’s wet curls dripping water onto his chest and taut shoulders, the towel wrapped tightly around his waist—finally he’d had to retreat into a corner and think about his abuela’s underwear until it subsided. 

He isn’t quite sure what to do with all of this. He knows—though he doesn’t quite want to think about it yet—that he doesn’t think of Buck in the same way that he thinks of Ravi, for example, or his friends back home. 

Swallowing hard, Eddie rolls over in bed. This is a problem for another day. At dinner after their ‘getting to know each other’ report, Bobby had simply told them to keep going and then disappeared, which was a clear sign to them that they’re still not out of the woods. Eddie suspected this had something to do with earlier, where he and Buck had gotten so distracted on the sidelines arguing about cooking shows that Bobby blew the whistle to stop gameplay until their talking subsided. It took… a while. 

The point is that he has something to focus on. A task. Just keep things good with Buck, work hard at practice. Communicate with each other. Do friend stuff, like playing cards or talking about music or sleeping in the same sleeping bag for warmth and both waking up hard. Listen to the rhythm. 

Yeah, Eddie snorts to himself, staring up at the ceiling. Easy. No problem. 

“What was that?”

Oh, fuck. Did Eddie speak aloud? “Huh?”

“Did you say something?”

“Oh, just, uh—great job again at practice today.” He feels suddenly shy. 

“You too,” Buck replies, the smile evident in his voice, and all of a sudden five feet is too far apart. 

The next day goes much the same. Eddie and Buck click on the field in a way that the other players can’t help but comment on, remarking on Buck’s lightning fast reflexes and Eddie’s ability to read the field. Eddie is surprised to find that he’s competent at running plays with other receivers or other positions entirely, too, especially once Buck explains it to him in that enthusiastic half-ramble of his that for some reason makes more sense to Eddie than anything else. He begins to feel, he tells Buck, like he could go back to El Paso and actually have a shot at playing quarterback. That’s more than enough for him. 

At one point, they’re running a play and everything slows down. It’s like he has all the time in the world once the ball snaps, and he drops back to scan the field. All of a sudden he can see the route each player is going to run, and the rhythm of the game clicks into place as he watches the players weave in and out in their dizzying dance. Eddie can see it all easily, and when he runs it’s like parting the sea. Where there were once clashing red and blue jerseys, there is now only empty air—it’s like that everywhere he goes, slipping through gaps or bulldozing towards a patch of grass that’s clearly occupied only for them to move out of the way at the last second. He runs confidently, knowing he won’t get hit, that nothing can touch him now, and he makes it all the way to the end zone with ease. 

On the sidelines, Coach Han and Coach Wilson are watching him with their arms folded. “We’ve got ourselves a football player,” Coach Wilson announces after a beat, and Eddie grins.

It’s easy, like this. Football here isn’t like high school. At camp he doesn’t have to worry about anything but the game—there are no thoughts of whether his parents are watching, the calculus test he has the next day or the cheerleader his friends have been trying to convince him to pursue. It’s a simple, uncomplicated routine.

And Eddie loves it. 

In the showers, Eddie keeps his head down. He washes himself quickly and efficiently and then makes a beeline for his towel, ignoring the silhouette of Buck under a showerhead in his peripheral vision. As if sensing he’s being watched, Buck turns his head. 

“Whadya say, Eddie?”

Eddie stares at him blankly. 

“Would you rather fight a bear, a gorilla or a lion?”

Oh, right. It had been Campbell’s turn in their little game before dinner, and everyone had answered. “What type of bear?” Eddie asks, sitting down on the bench. 

“Does it matter?” Cortez retorts, and in the shower Buck snorts. 

“Of course it does,” he calls, his voice echoing against the tile. “If it’s brown, for example, you could just play dead and it would ignore you. But if it’s a polar bear? Good luck. ”

“Yeah, I’m saying no to the bear,” Eddie says with a shiver. “And gorillas are smart as fuck, plus they can throw shit. I’ll take my chances with the lion.”

“I knew you were gonna say that,” Buck exclaims as he steps out of the shower, and Eddie makes the fatal mistake of looking up. He’s already wrapping a towel around his waist when Eddie’s eyes flit over him but it’s enough that Eddie catches a glimpse of hip, and all of a sudden he feels like an eighteenth century gentleman seeing an ankle for the first time. 

He flushes, shakes his head a little, and lifts his gaze finally to meet Buck’s. He’s already watching Eddie, grinning. “You’d show the lion you were the real king of the jungle.”

Eddie rolls his eyes. “I’m more of a silent leader, like a wolf,” he says dramatically, wiggling his brows as the other players groan. “But king of the jungle? That’s all you, sweetheart,” he drawls.

Now, Eddie is making a concerted effort to keep his gaze on Buck’s face—but he has the urge to look down and see if that twitch in the bulge of his towel at his Southern slip-up was a trick of the light. He doesn’t really see it as a slip-up if it got a reaction like that, though.

He dismisses it. He can’t be thinking like that, not when he too is in a thin towel and Buck’s eyes are still on him. It was nothing. 

It’s Buck’s turn to roll his eyes, but he’s flushing too. “Whatever you say, Eds,” he replies as he moves to his cubby to change. “All I know is the only bear I want to fight is Paddington.”

Confused, Eddie blinks back at him. “Buck was scared of Paddington when he was a kid, and now he hates him,” Ravi explains as the other players laugh. 

“C’mon, Buck. You couldn’t take Paddington in a fight, because you’re a teddy bear yourself!” Campbell adds, which earns more laughter. 

“More like a golden retriever,” Eddie mutters, and beside him Ravi snorts. 

“Yeah, Campbell? How’s that bruise on your ass from when I took you down in drills yesterday?” Buck challenges, folding his arms over his chest and cocking a brow. Oh, Jesus. “Still the same size as your massive head?”

Campbell looks scandalized as the other players guffaw. Buck just stares Campbell down, egging him on, but finally Campbell just shrugs and laughs along. “Is my head really that big?” Campbell murmurs to Tyler after a beat, who pretends to consider his head size carefully. 

“Still a sniper’s dream, dude,” Tyler says decisively, and the entire room erupts. 

At dinner that night, Bobby pulls Eddie and Buck aside. “You keep going like this, and you won’t need to be in the isolation cabin much longer,” he tells them with a rare true smile, and then saunters off. 

Buck and Eddie share a look, but Buck’s face is unreadable—Eddie can only hope that his face didn’t show his immediate reaction, which was one that scared him. It was dismay at not having Buck all to himself anymore. 

“Thanks, Coach,” Buck finally says to Bobby’s back, and the spell is broken. Eddie shakes the thought from his head and instead focuses on Buck, who now has a mischievous grin spreading across his face. 

“I don’t like that look,” Eddie tells him, folding his arms. 

Buck shrugs, still grinning. “I have an idea.”

“What’s the idea?”

Buck looks devious. “It involves fire. Also, alcohol.”

Eddie really should’ve guessed that Buck wanted to do a bonfire.

For some reason, he didn’t put it together until Buck gathered their friends at the table and leaned in close to explain the plan to them. There were ripples of excitement, but they were always dampened by the rest of the players shushing them so as not to draw attention from the other guys or the coaches. Eddie listened along intently, even though Buck—as they were increasingly doing these days—had whispered, “so me and Eddie had this idea, and we think that—”

Everyone had been on board, and so after dinner Eddie and Buck had dutifully traipsed back to their cabin to set up while they all played at getting ready for bed and being in their own cabins before lights out. Just after 11, Buck and Eddie step onto the small beach and look out at the water. 

“D’you think they’ll be able to do it? Maybe the coaches decide to do another room check tonight—”

Buck cuts Eddie off with a small laugh. “They’ll be fine. The coaches don’t check rooms after lights out after the first day— they’re probably playing Scrabble at Bobby’s about now.” After a beat, Buck points. “Look.”

Sure enough, a tiny flashlight across the bend of the lake is pulsing in their direction several times before disappearing. That’s their warning—the guys are leaving main camp now, then. Eddie steps back, twiddling his thumbs. 

What else do they need? Eddie is sure he’s forgetting something. They were able to push the two nightstands together into a measly semblance of a table with their beds serving as couches, but Eddie doubts they’ll be spending much time indoors. It’s a perfect night for a bonfire, just a little cooler than usual and with no breeze to snuff the flame out before they can really have a good time. They’d collected the firewood earlier—Eddie had very specific instructions, having grown up camping—and had confirmed at dinner that, along with the bottle of vodka Buck had somehow managed to sneak in, Cortez and Tyler would be bringing their famous jungle juice. According to Buck, it was some tropical concoction loaded with several fruit juices along with triple sec, peach schnapps, blue Curacao and just about every other liquor one could think of. It tasted like ‘licking the ocean in the Caribbean’, according to Buck, and was very strong. 

They don’t have cups, but the boys are bringing mugs. Eddie found his speaker buried in the bottom of his bag and managed to dig out his iPod and get it connected without issue—he just hopes everyone else likes his music. Maybe he should ask Buck if he’s got anything else—what do white boys listen to, Eminem or something?

What else? Eddie scans his surroundings, hands on his hips. He’d stolen some of the mini bags of chips at dinner, and they are now laid on the makeshift table inside waiting to be swallowed down in a matter of seconds when everyone else arrives. Maybe he should’ve stolen something more substantial? What if they get hungry, and—

“Eddie.”

Buck’s soft but firm voice jolts Eddie from his reverie, and he looks over to see Buck studying him in the dim light with his head cocked to one side. “What?” he asks defensively. 

Buck shrugs. “You’re nervous,” he teases. 

“Am not!” he exclaims, but after a beat he deflates. “Yeah. Maybe a little.”

“Why?” Buck slings an arm around his shoulder and leads him to the big rock on the shore to wait, both of them taking a seat and dangling their feet in the sparkling water. “There’s only, like, six guys coming, and you know all of them already.”

“I don’t know them like you do, but it’s not that, it’s—” Eddie breaks off to rake a hand through his hair, feeling embarrassed as he tries to put what he’s thinking into words. “This is our cabin, y’know? It just feels—I don’t know, kinda weird having them here after it’s been just us for the last three nights.”

Eddie is sure Buck is going to laugh at him, but it’s the truth. There’s a ritual to it—they spend the day with the other players and coaches, training, but as soon as dinner is over they have to hike through the forest to their little hut. He loves the way that the wilderness threatens to swallow the cabin whole at any moment, surrounding it with ferns and pine and oak and all manner of creatures scampering by. When he crests the last hill, he always has to scan the scene twice before making out the outline of the little cabin. Sure, the window is broken and Eddie almost froze to death the other night, but it’s theirs. Eddie has grown to like pretty much everything else, from the barebones decorations to their tiny beach that they sit in now. 

To Eddie’s surprise, Buck doesn’t laugh. “I think so too,” he says quietly after several long beats. “Like, no one’s even been here before. It’s just us.”

Eddie looks over at Buck. The moon is full and low in the sky, casting their faces in a soft white light. Buck is already looking back at him when he speaks, playing at lightness. “From the sounds of it, we won’t be here much longer either.”

Just then, they hear the crackling of branches underfoot in the distance. “Better make the most of it, then,” Buck says as he climbs to his feet, offering Eddie a hand. “Ready?”

Eddie takes Buck’s hand and allows himself to be hoisted upright. “Let’s do this.”

A minute later, Eddie can make out the few beams of light coming from their flashlights as they crest the hill, the sound of crunching leaves and soft curses hanging in the still night air. Buck grins. 

“Fuck, dude, that was even worse than you said it was gonna be,” Tyler says when the group reaches them. He has a scratch on his cheek, no doubt from the low hanging thorny branch halfway along the trail. A few more of the boys have similar minor injuries and scuffs of dirt, and Eddie is able to guess at where they obtained most of them. He’s pretty sure he could walk to main camp and back with his eyes closed, at this point. 

“Told you,” Buck replies with a shrug. “Shall we get this party started?”

Their party, as it turns out, is pretty tame. Even though only one of the cabins backs onto the water, they don’t want to draw attention by having a massive fire at the lakeside—instead they make a firepit out of the pebbles just above the shoreline, where they’re partially obscured by the trees, and they keep the music to a reasonable level. 

It doesn’t take much to get the fire started. Eddie and Buck did a good job selecting the firewood, and it catches easily when Eddie expertly makes a ball of flaming kindling with Cortez’s lighter and places it under the triangle of branches. The boys cheer as their faces are slowly lit up by the flickering flames, and one by one they produce their mugs for Cortez and Tyler’s jungle juice. 

It tastes… vile, honestly. The combination of liquors gives it a nondescript burn as it slides down Eddie’s throat, but at least the aftertaste is sweet enough. He thinks generally he has a preference for beer, but hey—when at camp, right?

Buck found his own iPod, and while a few people groan at the constant stream of East Coast rap at first, eventually he settles into more alt-rock tunes that the other guys hum along to while they chat. It’s not a rager, but Eddie likes it more because of that. They’re just a bunch of friends hanging out under the stars. 

“—and then Coach Nash opened his office door, and everything was gone. The entire room was empty. He went outside to find Coach Han or someone, and Buck had put everything on the damn roof   of the lodge instead. I mean everything—his desk, his chair, all his books… Buck even managed to get the damn lampshade stuck up there!”

The entire team is wheezing with laughter at Ravi’s story, and Buck looks pleased. “Bobby thought it was pretty funny, too,” he admits, “but he did make me go up there and get every single piece of furniture down myself. Worth it.”

And the night continues like this, Fall Out Boy crooning tinnily from the speaker while they sing along and swap stories until eventually Eddie begins to feel a buzz from the jungle juice. He finishes his drink and then swaps it for a Coke and vodka—actually a safer, less-alcoholic option to the monstrosity he’d just been sipping—before sitting back against the log he’d dragged over with Buck.

“Is it time for a game?” Carlos suggests, waggling his brows. 

The boys all share a look. “Carlos is infamous for his Would You Rather and Never Have I Ever questions,” Ravi says to Eddie by way of explanation. “He’s been known to start arguments lasting for years.”

“Don’t even start,” Cortez hisses, holding out a hand. “We’re not going over the fucking toe jam argument of ‘05 again. I won’t do it.”

Eddie doesn’t even want to know.

“Are we playing tame, or going risky tonight, boys?” Carlos asks, leaning forward. 

The other boys share a look loaded with information Eddie can’t translate. Finally, Buck nods. “Fuck it. Never Have I Ever.”

They start mostly tame, by their standards. Never have I ever cheated on an exam.   Never have I ever gone skinny dipping.   Never have I ever cried during a movie and lied about it. Buck lowers a finger for both of the first two questions, but looks indignant at the third. 

“I cry openly, thank you very much,” he says proudly. 

Eddie, meanwhile, quietly lowers a finger at the third question. No one asks him to elaborate, too busy ribbing Buck for his ugly tears last year when they watched Up, and Eddie is glad for it—he doesn’t know if he could explain how his dad would have just called him soft if he ever cried openly watching a movie while he was sober, let alone while he’s tipsy. 

The questions get a little spicier from there. Never have I ever dated two girls at once. Never have I ever snuck out to meet someone. 

Eddie and Buck both put a finger down at the latter question, and their teammates whistle. “Storytime, storytime,” the others chant at the pair along with Tyler and Carlos, who all put down a finger. 

“I was buying weed off someone,” Tyler admits, and everyone snickers at the image of Tyler acting like he’s on a stealth mission to get some bud. 

Everyone looks to Carlos next, and he smiles roguishly. “We were on a football trip, and his dad was the coach,” he says, and the other guys wolf whistle. 

Eddie blinks. What?

No one else reacts with surprise. “Were you at a hotel?” Buck asks, sounding fascinated. “ Ooh, did you have pool sex?”

Carlos scoffs. “ No, Buck.” He grins. “Hot tub.”

Everyone cheers, but Eddie’s brain is still scrambling to get back online. He blinks again at Carlos. Gay? Not that it’s—a problem, or anything, he just… hadn’t known. Though part of him wishes Buck had told him earlier, one glance at him answers the question: it wasn’t his secret to tell.

“His dad caught us eventually, but he didn’t care. Besides—the hot tub was amazing.”

Eddie can feel the other guys looking at him, gauging his reaction. He may not have known specifics about Carlos before, but he’d already gotten the sense that some of the guys were fiercely protective of him. He knows he’s being judged right now, and so he straightens. “Cool,” Eddie agrees. “Are you still together?”

Carlos nods, smiling. “Almost a year. I wish we could both come to camp so you guys could meet him, but… well, it’s one person per school district and I’m better, so.”

Buck and his friends laugh, and Eddie laughs along with them, glad to have apparently passed their evaluation. He feels like his heart is going to beat out of his chest.

“What about you, Buckaroo?” Carlos says, laughing a little to himself at his rhyme. “Why’d you sneak out to meet someone?”

Buck shrugs. Eddie isn’t sure if it’s the question or the fire in front of him that’s making him flush. “My parents didn’t approve. We just went to the park to talk.”

“To talk, sure,” Ravi says, rolling his eyes. “You forget how long I’ve known you for, dude. I may live in California and not here with you, but I know what you’re like with girls.”

Eddie has heard of this, too. Whispers from the other guys about how Buck brought a girl to the end of camp barbecue one year, stories of Buck’s escapades during the school year that always seemed to make their way back to the cabins of 118 Training Camp. He swallows hard. He doesn’t really know what to do with the stories he’s heard.

There’s a long beat of silence, and it seems to Eddie that the music lulls as if waiting for Buck’s response, too. “Wasn’t a girl.”

His voice is so quiet that it must blend in with the crackle of the bonfire for some of the guys in the circle, but Eddie feels the hum reverberating in his whole body through where their shoulders have been pressed together the whole night.

(They’ve been doing that a lot since… Eddie isn’t sure. Anyway.)

 He shivers, despite himself, and feels Buck glance at him. 

“A guy, then,” Cortez states, nodding. “Was it, like, a friend your parents didn’t like?”

The music seems to rise in volume once more as Buck leans back against the log and flips the hoodie under his jacket up, folding his arms. “He was a guy on my team at school,” Buck begins, and Eddie recognises it now—the careful nonchalance of Buck’s movements and storytelling, despite how Eddie can feel him holding himself taut like a bow. 

“He was a bit of a rebel, but nothing crazy. We got caught smoking pot once behind the bleachers,” Buck says with a laugh. “My parents just said they didn’t like his ‘vibe.’ Of course, they meant that he was gay, and they weren’t too happy about that.”

The other guys all groan in sympathy. It’s becoming clear that they’re a very progressive friend group, and it’s a fact Eddie appreciates learning. 

“Did you ever…?” Carlos trails off, narrowing his eyes, and Buck laughs. 

“Not, like, actually, but we fooled around once or twice,” Buck says with a shake of his head. He blinks. “I mean—I’m straight, but—well, I’m an ally.”

This is all Buck offers in explanation, and Eddie must be drunk now because for some reason it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. He guffaws along with the other players, using a hand on Buck’s bicep to keep himself upright as he leans away while Buck flicks at his fingers playfully but makes no move to shake him off. 

“Great allyship, Buck,” Ravi says through his laughter. 

“Eddie, it’s your turn.” Tyler turns to face him. “Who’d you sneak out to see?”

Eddie feels hot and cold all over, and can’t figure out why. “Um. My ex-girlfriend.”

The other players stay silent, waiting for more details, but when none are forthcoming they don’t push the topic. “Fascinating,” Cortez deadpans, and smoothly moves on to the next question.

The music turns to something more lo-fi and acoustic as the night continues, and Eddie’s attention slowly drifts away from the conversation and to the stars above him. As his new friends laugh and rib each other the same way they have for years, Eddie suddenly starts to feel very far away—it’s not their fault, not really. It’s just that they’ve known each other for so long, so of course they’re going to reference memories Eddie wasn’t there for or have inside jokes he doesn’t understand. He’s okay with that, really. 

And Buck makes him feel as included as he could possibly be. He leans over to explain relevant information in the stories or asks him a question to include him in the conversation, and is always watching out of the corner of his eye to make sure Eddie’s having a good time.

There’s nothing more they can do, so it’s really none of their fault. It’s just… Eddie. He sometimes detaches from his body and all of a sudden he’s floating above himself, a passenger in his own life. He’s an observer, not a participant—and sometimes the harder he grasps onto himself, the further he slips away. 

He can feel it happening now, and he curses inwardly. Why couldn’t he be alone? He guesses the alcohol isn’t helping matters, and he’s sure when he goes to stand and wobbles before righting himself. “Need to go take a leak,” Eddie says when the others glance over, and they all nod as he picks up a flashlight and heads along their tiny beach for the trees.

Buck must know that he’s not going to the bathroom when he heads in the opposite direction to the outhouse, but he doesn’t call him out on it. “You good?” Buck calls after him, and Eddie glances over his shoulder and nods his confirmation. 

Even though he’s further from the music, the forest around Eddie is still filled with sound. The wind rustles softly through the tall trees, providing a gentle backdrop for the owls and other wildlife making themselves known in the darkness. Eddie can hear crickets—or are those cicadas? He never can remember the difference—in the bushes nearby, and he smiles at the familiar sound as he steps into a small clearing by the water and looks up. 

Away from the fire, the stars are a vibrant mosaic of twinkling light. Craning his neck back so far to look up makes him stumble on the rocky earth and he grabs onto a boulder to right himself, unable to look away. Once, when he was really little, his father showed him the constellations and told him their stories. They’re a little blurrier than usual right now, but he can see Orion aiming his bow and Cassiopeia poised on her throne for eternity. 

Eddie smiles to himself, proud that he recognised the constellations he learned so long ago, and rests his head against a hulking oak behind him. There was a time when looking at the stars made him feel small, but he finds now that it grounds him. He just feels…young. 

Buck

“You okay?”

Eddie seems startled by Buck’s voice and turns to see him stepping over a tree root, picking his way across the forest to him. Eddie’s face is shadowed by the large tree he’s leaning against, but the pale moon and Buck’s sharp flashlight beam illuminate his flushed cheeks and mussed hair, like he’s been running a hand through it. 

“Yeah. Sorry, um—have I been gone for long?”

Buck had watched the spot where Eddie disappeared for only about a minute before deciding to follow after him, and his friends had made fun of him for it when he stood. He didn’t care. He’s pleasantly tipsy, and wants to see Eddie.

Shaking his head, Buck settles against the tree beside Eddie. “Nah, only a minute. Just wanted to check that you were good when you went this way.”

They’re standing on a little outcropping by the water,  obscured by trees but still able to make out the flickering bonfire twenty yards away, and from here they can hear the faint beat of the music and laughter. They’re both quiet for a minute, listening.

“I’m good. I don’t mean to take you away from your friends—“

Buck nudges him with his shoulder, laughing. “Shut up , dude. So, what? Just wanted some quiet, then? I can leave if—“

“No, no, stay,” Eddie says quickly. 

Buck blinks. “Okay, then.” Buck shuffles an inch closer without knowing why he’s doing it, and his question is answered a second later when his shoulder presses back into Eddie’s and he feels a faint thrum of energy through his whole body. He’s been doing this a lot, recently—reaching for Eddie. He doesn’t want to think about why.

“I just…” Eddie starts, then sighs. He doesn’t look over at Buck. “I’m not like you guys. I haven’t had the same—experiences.”

“What do you mean?” Buck thinks of the question they’d all been answering just before Eddie left. Who were you sneaking out to meet? Eddie had said it was his ex-girlfriend, but had never mentioned this girl before. Was he lying just to fit in at the time?

“My ex and I, we didn’t really—we weren’t—” he stops. “It wasn’t like that with us. We met at school when she moved to El Paso, our families go to the same church, and it made sense in theory. But we tried, and we just weren’t… compatible, I guess.”

Buck nods, trying to be encouraging though he’s not sure where this is going. “So that’s why you broke up? You were better as friends?”

“Definitely,” Eddie replies. “We’re still close now. She’s the one that helped me apply to this place, actually—along with my sisters.”

“She sounds like a good friend.”

“She is.” The smile in Eddie’s voice is evident, but it quickly fades as he continues. “Anyway, she’s the only girl I’ve ever dated, so. I don’t know, I just feel kinda—sheltered compared to you guys.”

“Please don’t,” Buck says with a laugh. “I’d rather be sheltered than some of what those guys have done. You’re better off more often than not, trust me.”

“I guess,” Eddie replies, sounding a little dejected. “But that’s why I’m here, you know? To actually experience stuff.”

Buck knows all about having to break free to experience things. His parents used to freak out if he got so much as a scrape on his knee in the playground, but once he turned nine or so that suddenly stopped. They now couldn’t seem to look at him for long, which made him eager to get out of the house—especially now that his parents acted like they didn’t care what he did. He thought that being reckless would get their attention, but… well, all it really did was remind him of why Maddie was and always would be the only person he could rely on.

He really is so glad to have her, even though she’ll be going off to college soon. He knows that she’ll be there, no matter what.

“I get it,” Buck murmurs. “My parents practically kept me bubble-wrapped when I was a kid. So what’s, like, the craziest thing you’ve ever done?”

Eddie is silent for a long moment. “Does this count?”

Buck turns to stare at him incredulously. “ This? A bonfire after lights out? Drinking?”

Eddie shrugs, seeming shy. “All of it. I’ve drank before, but never really been drunk.”

“And are you drunk now?”

Eddie thinks about it. “Maybe? I dunno. I feel warm, and kinda unsteady.”

“You’re feeling it a little, then.”

“You?”

“Same.” Buck looks at Eddie carefully. Now that his eyes have adjusted a little to the darkness, he can see that Eddie is watching him too, his expression almost wary as he allows Buck to stare at him. Shaking his head to snap himself out of it, Buck smiles. “Anyway, I’m really glad you’re here, Eddie. Experiencing things.”

Eddie is quiet for so long that Buck is beginning to think he’s said something wrong when he finally murmurs, “I’m glad you’re here too, Evan. Un-bubble-wrapping yourself.”

Evan.

As if reading Buck’s mind, Eddie says, “oh, sorry. Do you prefer Buck or Evan? I never asked, but everyone just calls you Buck, so…”

And not you. You’re different. I don’t know what to do with that.

“Call me whatever you want,” he whispers, and Eddie stares at him for a beat longer before looking away, the moment dissipating into the air like smoke. 

Buck tilts his head back to look at the stars and almost gasps. With the bonfire and the smoke he hadn’t noticed, but the sky is clearer than it has been in days and he can see what appear to be millions of stars blinking back at him. He’s always loved looking at the stars, even if he has no idea which ones are which—it makes him feel big in an infinite sort of way, like he is the universe and all the stars in the sky. 

Without looking over, Buck knows that Eddie is watching him once more. “Do you know any constellations?” he asks, keeping his eyes on the sky. 

He somehow knows Eddie does, though Eddie has never said anything. “There’s Perseus, and there’s Andromeda,” Eddie says, leaning close to outline the shapes with his finger for Buck to see. “They were lovers. Perseus fell in love with Andromeda one day while flying over Aethiopia and asked her parents for permission to marry her, and slayed the sea monster to save her. The gods put them in the sky to immortalise their love forever.”

Buck feels frozen in place listening to Eddie’s lilting Southern melody explain Greek mythology to him. “Wow,” he manages, feeling suddenly breathless at the sweeping nature of Perseus and Andromeda’s love. He fumbles for something else to say. “I guess that’s it, right? It’s about who you’d be okay living eternity with, as long as they’re by your side.”

The air around them is quiet but humming with electricity, charged by Buck’s words. He doesn’t know where they came from— drunk words are sober thoughts, a voice in his head says—but he knows that Eddie will understand. 

Eddie just hums his agreement, unable or unwilling to say more. Buck keeps looking up at the sky. Eventually, he feels Eddie loll his head to one side so it almost brushes his shoulder. “I wanna get a star named after me,” he says with finality, his grin still luminescent in the dark. “An Edmundo star.”

Buck grins back. “I like that. Maybe I’ll get one too, my own Evan star in the sky.”

They could be next to each other, Buck thinks, unbidden. His heart leaps almost uncomfortably in his chest in response to the thought—this is the kind of thing he’s been trying very hard not to think for the last few days.

(Thoughts of, say, waking up from an incredible dream hard and pressing into Eddie’s hip, and Eddie being hard too. The way Buck had wanted, just for a moment, to reach out and touch him—and the way that moment of indecision had played on his mind on a loop for the rest of the day. He wasn’t sure what scared him more: the fact that he wanted to touch him there, or the fact that he also wanted to trace the lines of his brow, his mouth, to touch just for the sake of touching. Of knowing.)

As Buck looks at Eddie, the silence stretching out endlessly between them, something small and animal inside him dares to imagine that Eddie might be thinking about their stars as well. It’s a flickering flame of hope in his chest, and it’s fed by the way that Eddie watches him back—there’s something in his gaze that Buck can’t place.

He may have only known Eddie for a few days, but he feels like he’s seen every expression imaginable. He knows what he looks like when he’s concentrating on learning a new play, when he’s exhausted beyond belief running drills, when he’s doubled over laughing at a joke. He’s seen it all, and yet there’s been a look crossing Eddie’s face recently that Buck doesn’t know how to name. 

He didn’t dare to, before.

“We should probably go back, huh?”

Eddie’s words jolt Buck from his reverie, and he clears his throat and steps back. “Um, yeah. We should.”

What was Buck thinking? Eddie doesn’t want that, and besides—Buck doesn’t even know if he wants—

It happens in slow motion. Eddie trips over the root of the tree they’ve been standing under, and reaches out blindly for balance as the flashlight tumbles from his grip and bounces on the ground. His hand finds Buck’s shoulder, and Buck instantly moves to steady him. There’s a grunt of pain as they both almost lose their footing, but Buck manages to keep them upright and somehow they end up with Buck’s arms bracketing Eddie’s body against the tree, Eddie’s hands on Buck’s hips. 

“Oh.” Nice job, Buck. “Um—”

Jesus, why can’t he talk right now?

They’re standing so close and yet Buck still feels like he’s drifting forward, sure that he could brush noses with Eddie by this point. The flashlight on the ground means he can properly see Eddie now, and it’s no doubt revealing his own flushed features as well. He doesn’t dare to breathe, but when Eddie tips his head up a little he makes a high noise in the back of his throat that makes Eddie’s eyes darken.

Eddie has that look again.

Now that Buck has his face only inches from Eddie’s, he can name some part of the expression: hunger. Eddie looks hungry, his pupils blown wide and mouth slightly parted. 

It’s because Buck is already looking at Eddie’s lips, thankfully, that he catches them forming the words, “fuck it,” before he’s surging forward.

Chapter Text

Buck

Buck might actually die tonight. If he dies with his lips on Eddie’s, though, he thinks he’ll die happy.

Their mouths meet desperately for only a second. Buck feels Eddie’s grip tighten on his hips as they kiss, but before he gets a chance to reciprocate the pressure is gone and Eddie is ducking out of Buck’s arms, eyes wide not with lust but with fear. 

Buck knows that look. He’s had that look. Without hesitating he grabs Eddie’s hand, stepping in close and cupping Eddie’s jaw to tilt his face up to meet his gaze. “Don’t think,” he says, well aware that his own eyes are wild and he sounds like he’s pleading.

Eddie stares at him for only a beat, panting, before he’s nodding and leaning in again. He seems more aware of himself this time, unsure, but Buck didn’t get a chance to respond before—to show him how he’s been wanting this the whole time without even knowing it. 

With a deft spin Buck is pressing Eddie back into the tree, crowding into his space  and keeping one hand on his jaw as the other slips down to his waist to pull him impossibly closer. He kisses Eddie like the world is ending tomorrow, like he’s a dying man in the desert and Eddie’s mouth is a perfect oasis. His kisses are chaste but firm at first, and when Eddie makes a little gasping noise Buck takes the opportunity and swipes at Eddie’s bottom lip with his tongue to chase the sound down his throat. 

Eddie’s hands are clutching at his waist, his chest, his shoulders, and finally they tangle in his hair. Buck can’t help but moan into Eddie’s mouth and he feels Eddie grin in response, tugging gently at the shorter curls at the base of his neck.

They’re both hard. Buck can feel it when he presses forward and Eddie whines into his mouth, his kisses turning sloppy for a second as his hips cant up. It wouldn’t take much, Buck knows. He’s a teenager, for fuck’s sake—he could probably come just like this, rutting into Eddie against a tree because they’re too turned on to take the time to take their clothes off. 

It’s messy, a clumsy and tipsy makeout in the dark, but though Eddie’s inexperience is clear it makes Buck’s toes curl anyway. He wants more, he wants to touch and touch and touch with no end in sight, and part of him forgets that they’re at a bonfire with their friends sitting twenty yards away. He almost asks Eddie, almost reaches for him, but remembering their friends quickly sobers him, and besides—this is… a lot.

“Fuck,” Buck mumbles when he breaks free for a moment, trying to summon the willpower to pull away from Eddie’s perfect mouth. It’s like an addiction. He knows that pulling away and going back to the party will mean talking about it, and talking about it might mean that they don’t do it again.

But their friends will wonder where they are, and Buck would hate to ruin Eddie’s first time hosting—so Buck just needs them all to leave as quickly as possible, so he can show Eddie what he’s been missing.

It should be easy, but it’s really not. 

Buck and Eddie tidy themselves up in the dim light as best they can, but if Eddie’s swollen lips are any indication he’s not sure they’ll pass the test. Oh well. Buck can’t really bring himself to care when Eddie’s looking at him like that. 

As it turns out, they didn’t need to worry. The boys are all tipsy and in the middle of watching Cortez try to balance his mug of jungle juice on his head when they return, and other than a few nods and ‘hi’s they’re barely acknowledged. 

The night goes on with games and singing and a few more drinks for almost two more hours. Buck struggles to concentrate when Eddie is beside him, pressing up against his side with this little smirk on his face that tells Buck he knows exactly what he’s doing. 

“Buck?” Ravi is saying his name with the tone of voice that tells him it isn’t the first time.

“Yeah, sorry,” Buck says quickly, dragging his gaze away from where his and Eddie’s knees are touching. “What were you saying?”

“I was saying, we think you’ll be out of this cabin by tomorrow,” he replies. “There’s no way that Coach keeps you here after the way you’ve been playing together.”

“It’s been, like, three days,” Tyler adds. “We’ve only got a few more here until camp is over.”

Camp is over. Buck shudders hearing the words. 

“The cabin’s not so bad,” Eddie takes over smoothly, clearly noticing Buck’s space-out. “Plus, I don’t have to hear Ravi’s snoring every night.”

The boys laugh. “Just Buck’s astronaut heavy breathing,” Ravi shoots back, imitating the deep breaths Buck does.

“It’s like a lullaby to me,” Eddie replies with a shrug, teasing.

“Anyway,” Ravi says pointedly. “Mark my words: as of tomorrow, your exile will be officially over.”

Buck glances at Eddie out of the corner of his eye and finds him already watching him, his expression unreadable. Is he happy to be going back to the normal cabins tomorrow? Buck can’t tell. All he knows is that he wants to make their last night alone (if it is their last night) worth it. 

“Can’t wait,” Buck says, and hopes he sounds like he means it. 

Slowly, the other boys begin to yawn while they talk. Conversation is at a meandering pace as they discuss various NFL teams, hypothesize about the drills they’ll be running tomorrow and take bets on whether Hen and team doctor Karen are dating. 

Buck follows along with a soft smile and distracted thoughts the whole time, and though Ravi gives him an odd look once or twice he thinks he goes mostly unnoticed. Only Eddie seems to be attuned to his movements, knowing when Campbell goes on a rant and Buck starts to get impatient that he should be handed the vodka bottle to peel off the label and fiddle with while everyone else talks. It’s little things like that that make Buck’s stomach flip as much as the hand tangles in his hair or tongue in his mouth, and that’s what scares him. 

The yawns finally begin to catch up to the guys. “Jesus fuck,” Tyler says around a particularly enthusiastic one, stretching his shoulders so both make a sickening pop in their sockets that make the other boys groan. “I’m so zonked now. I feel like we’ve been out here for hours.”

“Well, it is almost 3, so we did,” Ravi supplies helpfully, and Tyler’s eyes widen. 

“It’s 3?!” he splutters, making his teammates burst out laughing. Tyler stands, as does Campbell. “Okay, I gotta crash or Coach Han’s gonna pour a pot of water on me again.”

Eddie scoffs, and Buck just nods. “Chimney’s ruthless to oversleepers.”

“Can’t we just sleep here?” Carlos suggests, gesturing to the cabin. “I don’t wanna walk all the way back in the dark right now.”

Buck freezes. Internally, he begins screaming. 

Of course they’d want to stay here now that they’re a bit tipsy and tired. It hadn’t seemed like an issue earlier in the night, but that was before the promise of later was in Eddie’s eyes every time he looked over at him.

When Buck does look over at Eddie he finds him with the same expression, quickly trying to school it into something more neutral as the other guys murmur about whether they should stay here. Off to the side, Ravi is watching Buck.

“People will snitch if they see us coming back in the morning, and if the coaches find out we’re screwed,” he points out, shaking his head. “Besides, have you guys been in that cabin? It’s rough. I don’t know about you, but I wanna do the walk now and sleep on a mattress as opposed to sleeping earlier but on a wooden floor.”

That settles it. Eddie and Buck help the guys gather up their stuff to prepare for the journey back as Buck tries to hide both his relief and excitement, passing along mugs and snacks to pile into the backpack and pouring water on the fire to put it out. The mood is subdued but in a happily-exhausted kind of way as they finally begin to traipse down the trail leading back to the main camp. 

“Bye, guys,” Eddie says as they leave. “Don’t forget to give us the signal if anything goes wrong.” 

“We won’t forget,” Ravi says, eyeing them for a suspiciously long beat before he finally turns and follows Tyler back up the hill until they disappear behind the trees. 

Eddie and Buck are still for several more seconds until the sound of their friends’ footsteps fades into the distance. They share a look. It seems like now that they finally have the cabin to themselves, they don’t know what to do with it—Buck feels suddenly shy, like he’s never done anything before. 

(Not that he really has done anything with a boy besides a heavy makeout session with his friend once or twice. Besides, this feels… new. All of it. It feels sort of like jumping off a cliff with his eyes closed, or blinking and finding himself at the top of a rollercoaster.)

“Should we—go inside?” Eddie says, sounding just as unsure as Buck feels, and Buck nods shakily. 

He can hear Eddie behind him as he walks slowly up to the cabin, trying not to reveal his eagerness by running. He’s holding his breath, and doesn’t realise it until they go inside and Eddie puts a hand on his shoulder, making him let out a deep exhale. 

Buck turns slowly to face Eddie. They put their flashlights on the makeshift table pointing upwards, illuminating the room in a dim white glow, and with it Buck can see Eddie’s wide eyes and slightly parted lips. Buck reads his expression as fear or apprehension, and balks. 

“You know, we don’t have to do anything—” Buck begins, trying to calm him, but he’s cut off when Eddie takes one step forward and crashes their lips together. 

It’s all the same desperation they had only two hours ago in the forest, only now it’s so much more. They clutch at each other like they’re in a riptide and trying not to drift away from each other, all clawing hands and biting kisses. It’s as much a wrestle for control as it is a passionate makeout, and Buck finally gets the upperhand when he pushes Eddie up against the door and Eddie makes that little noise that makes Buck’s knees go weak. 

(He’s not entirely sure he’s the one with the upper hand, when Eddie is looking at him like this. )

“Why didn’t we—do this sooner?” Eddie pants as Buck finally breaks away only to trail kisses down his neck. As he attaches his lips to Eddie’s pulse point and sucks, Eddie gasps and his hand flies to Buck’s hair to tangle in his curls. 

“You tell me,” Buck says, his words muffled against his throat. He can’t seem to pull away. “Pretty sure I’ve wanted to do this since day one.”

“Bullshit,” Eddie says with a strangled laugh as Buck bites gently at the junction between his neck and shoulder. “You’ve wanted to kill me since, like, two days ago.”

Buck pulls back and grins. “A hate-lust, then.” He shrugs, his smile turning wicked. “All I know is we ran sprints and I wanted to lick the sweat off your skin.”

Eddie shivers, pupils enlarging until his eyes are almost black, and pulls Buck back to him. 

They make it to Buck’s bed and somehow Eddie has the wherewithal to grab the other foam mat from his own and bring it over. The action makes Buck’s stomach flip. They won’t be needing the second bed tonight. Once the bed is a little more padded, Eddie pushes buck onto it and climbs on top of him with one swift movement. 

Buck blinks, hands going to rest at Eddie’s waist before he even registers lying down. “That was… hot,” Buck manages, and Eddie laughs and leans down to kiss him. 

Slowly, their kisses settle into a less desperate rhythm. They learn each other little by little: the groan Eddie lets out when Buck pulls his bottom lip between his teeth, the way Buck goes instantly pliant when Eddie wraps a hand around his neck and licks into his mouth and takes. Despite how far away they are from the nearest person, they’re mostly quiet—it’s as if they don’t want to break the spell, unable to resist living in this fantasy for just a little longer. It just makes Buck relish the sounds he draws out of Eddie even more.

Their shirts come off, and a little later more comes off until they’re left in just their boxers. They climb into the sleeping bag, shivering a little with the breeze, but their lack of clothing becomes an instant bonus when their bodies fit together and Buck discovers that Eddie is hard. He can’t help but roll his hips a little, delighting in the way Eddie’s mouth parts in surprise and pleasure, and he does it again. 

Their cocks sliding against one another, even through the thin material of their underwear, makes Buck see stars. He can’t help but do it again, and again, and when he cants his hips upward and to the left Eddie moans. Buck categorizes the noise in his head, and repeats the movement to get the same response. After the third time, Eddie’s hand flies to his waist and stills him. 

“If you keep doing that, we’re not gonna get very far,” Eddie admits, and he sounds way too sheepish given how hot the statement is. 

“Oh? And how far are we going?” Buck asks, seizing the opportunity, and Eddie stills.

And the thing is. The thing. Is. 

They go to different schools. They don’t even live in the same state, for fuck’s sake—unless by some miracle of divine intervention, otherwise known as Eddie coming back to camp next year, chances are they won’t see each other again. It’s now or never. 

(And yet there’s something seismic in their relationship to each other, something larger and completely out of their control. Buck felt it when they first started getting closer—a shift in the ground beneath him, both coming together and sliding apart in tandem. He doesn’t want to think about that right now.)

They don’t have a lot of time, but tonight is infinite. Buck can deal with only tonight right now. 

They don’t talk about it, though they’re both clearly thinking it. Buck just tilts his head and reaches up to trace Eddie’s jawline, waiting patiently for him to gather his thoughts and trying to communicate silently that he’ll take whatever Eddie gives him, even if it’s just this. 

“I want…” Eddie whispers, and then trails off. In the silence of the cabin, even his voice feels like a gunshot. “I just want—to touch you.”

And Buck can’t have Eddie sounding so unsure when that’s what he’s asking for. He surges up to kiss him once, nipping at his bottom lip as he pulls away, and then somehow—in a feat much more graceful than Buck’s usually known for—manages to maneuver Eddie so they’re lying beside each other, legs slotted together. They kiss again, and when Buck pulls away Eddie is flushed. 

“Touch me, then.”

Eddie

Eddie might actually die tonight. 

He’d thought their kiss in the forest was heated, but it was nothing compared to against the door of their cabin. He’d thought that was heated, but it was nothing compared to… this.

This is Buck, breathless and hungry and apparently unable to stop touching Eddie for a second. This is Buck, hitching his leg higher over Eddie’s hip shamelessly and grinning around a gasp when the friction is almost too much to bear. This is Buck, going suddenly very still as Eddie slips a hand down his stomach and dips his fingers inside the waistband of his boxers. 

Eddie pauses for a second, swallowing hard. He feels like his heart is going to beat out of his chest. He’s not entirely sure how they got here, but he’s damn sure he’s not going to stop it. 

“I’ve never…” Eddie begins, voice raspy, and stops again. He can’t seem to form full sentences right now. 

Luckily, Buck guesses what he’s trying to say instantly. “It’s okay. You don’t have to—”

“No, no,” Eddie replies quickly. “I want to. I just don’t know how.”

“Whatever you do, it’ll feel good ‘cause it’s you,” Buck says, and immediately even the tips of his ears turn pink. He clearly hadn’t meant to say that, but Eddie can’t have Buck thinking he doesn’t understand what he means. 

Eddie kisses him, gentle and soft and completely the opposite to their kisses so far. His fingers, still hesitant and lingering at Buck’s waistband, slide further down until they find what Eddie’s looking for. They both gasp at once as Eddie wraps a hand around Buck’s cock—Eddie’s gasp is both incredulity at what he’s doing and shock at the size of him. 

Slowly, he moves his hand, watching Buck’s face carefully for evidence of what he’s doing right and what he could change. It’s an awkward angle, his wrist bending unnaturally when he gets closer to the base, but when he twists to adjust it Buck makes a strangled noise and he can’t help but repeat it just to hear the sound again.

After a few strokes, Eddie begins to find a rhythm. He methodically categorises each noise Buck makes, learning moment by moment what he likes. He learns that he likes variation, a few slow strokes mixed with several quick twists at the head or stopping completely to dip lower to his balls. Eddie doesn’t dare travel down further, though he wonders—is that something Buck wants? Is that something he wants?

He is very decisively not thinking about any of that right now. That’s a problem for later, especially when Buck reaches over and palms Eddie’s clothed erection in response. 

“Is this okay?” he whispers, and Eddie nods shakily. 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s more than okay,” he replies with a laugh. 

When Buck’s hand reaches inside Eddie’s boxers and wraps around him, it’s somehow both confident and uncertain—like he thinks Eddie will ask him to pull away at any moment. Eddie doesn’t want that, though, especially when Buck’s hand begins moving. He and Shannon had only tried this once during their short relationship, and Eddie’s inability to get hard because of his nerves had been part of the reason they ended things. 

Eddie has no issue now. He whines into Buck’s mouth on a particularly sharp upstroke, and Buck groans in response when Eddie twitches in his hand. His fingers withdraw for a moment, and Eddie claws at him. “Why’d you st—” he starts to complain, but stops when Buck spits into his hand while making direct eye contact and quickly reaches back down. The slick makes it so much more, and Buck’s smug expression tells Eddie he knows exactly what he’s thinking. 

Eddie pulls away to do exactly the same, and the smirk slides off Buck’s face as soon as Eddie touches him again in order to gasp. “Fuck,” he murmurs, but it’s a little muffled because his mouth is on Eddie’s again, unable to pull away long enough to say anything else. 

They stay quiet the whole time, only soft moans and whispers of fuck and do that again audible as they methodically learn each other’s bodies. They don’t last long—they’re teenagers, after all, and Eddie doesn’t know about Buck but he’s been hard for the last four hours—and when he starts to get close Buck seems to sense it, biting at his bottom lip and twisting his wrist at the same time. 

That pushes Eddie over the edge. He comes so hard he’s pretty sure he blacks out for a second, panting into Buck’s mouth, but he’s still conscious enough to hear Buck’s muffled groan of oh, fuck, before he’s following after Eddie. 

It takes several long moments before Eddie comes back to himself enough to take in his surroundings, and when he does he sees that Buck is already watching him through half-lidded eyes. Still breathless, he leans in for a soft kiss. It’s chaste but somehow still enough to make his toes curl, and Buck’s dark expression when he pulls away tells him that he’s feeling the same. 

“That was…” he begins, but trails off because he doesn’t know how to finish his sentence. Amazing? Earth-shattering? Awkward and fumbling at times because we’re teenagers but still incredible?

In the end, he doesn’t have to say anything more. “Yeah, it was” Buck agrees, and kisses him again. He reaches over and fumbles in his duffel on the floor until he comes back with tissues, which they use to quickly clean their hands before burrowing further into the sleeping bag. 

Buck hums in contentment when Eddie wraps his arms around him, and arranges himself so that he’s draped over half of Eddie’s body like a koala. Eddie doesn’t protest—the feeling of holding someone like this gives Eddie a sense of power and fragility that he doesn’t quite know what to do with, but he knows he likes it. 

Besides a muffled goodnight into Eddie’s neck, Buck doesn’t say anything more. He seems to like being close to Eddie like this, tucking himself under his chin and placing a brief kiss on Eddie’s collarbone that burns long after Buck’s breaths even out.

Eddie stays awake for a while after that. 

He’s a pretty calm person, usually. He doesn’t panic. But he can say pretty confidently that he’s coming close right now, because what the fuck? 

He feels like a child. All he can think on a loop is, ItouchedhisdickItouchedhisdickItouchedhisdick. Somehow that’s the part he can’t get past. Not the kiss to his collarbone or any of the soft touches or the fact that the dick in question is now pressed against his hip and Buck is wrapped around him tightly. 

He shuts his eyes. He used to ask his sisters for advice a lot when he was younger, but as he got older there were more and more things he didn’t feel comfortable going to them about. Sex, for example. It just felt weird to talk about that kind of thing with his siblings, no matter how open he knew they were with each other—it’s different being a guy, obviously, and Eddie’s never been very comfortable with that stuff anyway. They used to joke that he was going to a monastery, and Eddie supposes now he knows why. 

Which… yup. That’s a crisis for another day. 

He tries to imagine what Sophia would say if he did tell her about this, and comes to a pretty simple conclusion. It’s what she asked him when he confessed he didn’t know how he truly felt about Shannon.

“There are only three questions you need to ask,” she explains. “Do you like her? Does she like you? Does she treat you right?”

The answers are equally simple. Yes, yes, and yes.

He shuffles further under the sleeping bag and tightens his grip around Buck, who nuzzles sleepily at his neck in response. He falls asleep dreaming of blue eyes and a smile so bright it could rival the sun. 

[someone is sent to get them the next morning to go for a morning run, they lie about why they slept in the same bed ?]

“Eds, can you pass the—thanks.”

“Do you want—”

“Yeah, that too. No tomato for you?”

“Leave it on and you can have it.”

“ Aw, that’s sweet. If I get—”

“You get the curly fries and I’ll get the corn, yeah.”

Eddie and Buck’s friends are staring at them. It’s been happening an increasing amount for the past two days, as they shatter expectations and somehow continue to get closer and closer until sometimes Eddie feels like they’re one person. They’re so in sync that it’s scary sometimes, according to Ravi—like right now.

“D’you think they’ll eventually fuse into one giant franken-football player?” Tyler asks, waving his fork consideringly in their direction once they’re sat down. 

The others guffaw, and Eddie flushes. He hadn’t thought their closeness was that obvious—or, at least, that it wasn’t much different from how they were before—but ever since they arrived the morning after the bonfire people have seemed to sense a shift in their relationship, even if no one correctly guessed why. 

They try and keep the physical touch to a minimum, but they’re both extremely tactile people and can only comfort themselves by reminding each other that they were like this before, too. Their shoulders brushing while they walk, play-fighting on the field, giving each other piggybacks at the end of their team runs—all of this is normal behaviour for them, so it seems like they’re safe. 

It’s just that sometimes on those runs Buck will tug Eddie behind a copse of trees and kiss him silly, or they’ll stay late in the locker rooms to press each other back against the tiles as Eddie covers Buck’s mouth so they aren’t heard by anyone walking by. It feels dangerous like this, but in a good way. 

It’s not about how they think the other guys or coaches will react, actually. Eddie would have worried about that had it not been for everyone’s casual demeanours around Carlos, but he knows that they’d be more than supportive. It’s just that they like having something that’s theirs and only theirs, something private that isn’t tainted by other people’s looks or opinions. 

Besides, they’d never hear the end of it. 

The only problem is that they’re back in the main cabin now. Coach Nash had approached them at the end of the day after the bonfire and told them that their good behaviour had earned them their return, sending them off to collect their things and move back in with everyone else. Eddie had been excited to be able to get involved with extracurricular activities like swimming and movie nights now—as well as spending more time with his friends, who he does genuinely enjoy talking to—but it had also made his heart sink, because he wasn’t sure what things would be like with Buck. 

Evidently, Buck was feeling the same way. On the way to their tiny cabin, they talked about ground rules until the end of camp: no PDA, no innuendos or sneaky comments in public, no pulling each other aside during training. Sneaking off was allowed only during their free time, and, worst of all, they couldn’t sleep in the same bed. 

The last one was obvious, but after only two nights together Eddie had become addicted to the feeling of skin-on-skin, Buck’s rhythmic breathing lulling him into a deeper sleep than he’d had in months. 

(He didn’t know what he was going to do when he went back to Texas. That was a problem for later.)

So they assumed their previous positions—Eddie on the top bunk in the corner, Buck on the bottom bunk on the other side. Just from looking at them, no one would assume that Eddie was secretly yearning to clamber under Buck’s covers even just for a moment, and they had to keep it that way. 

It hasn’t been easy, but they’ve been able to find moments of solace to spend time with one another alone. It’s enough for Eddie. 

It has to be enough.

After dinner that night, luckily everyone seems to want to do their own thing. A few people head into the lodge for a movie while others go to the cabin for poker, and while they’re invited to both Buck and Eddie politely decline—they want to go on a walk, they tell them, and then make the requisite jokes about needing to get their steps in now they don’t sleep a million miles away from everyone else. They seem to accept the excuse, and the pair split off from the main group just as the sun begins to set. 

They walk around the lake in the opposite direction to the cabin, exploring the rockier and denser side of the forest owned by the 118. The sun casts them both in a soft yellow glow as they look out at the shimmering lake, and they take time to point out squirrels darting up trees or strange birds perched high on the branches, watching. 

It’s a relaxing walk, but Eddie is thrumming with energy—Buck had found a moment during training earlier to whisper that he wanted to talk about something, and this is the first chance they’ve gotten to talk alone. Eddie’s itching with nerves, but they’re calmed a little when Buck leans down to take his hand smoothly as they walk. He expects the claimed hand to be used to shove Eddie against a tree and kiss him senseless, but to his surprise Buck seems to be content just to hold his hand. 

Eddie waits impatiently for Buck to bring it up. He thinks— hopes —he knows what Buck wants to talk about. Finally, when Buck’s been telling him fun facts about Pennsylvania woodpeckers for the last ten minutes, Eddie can’t wait any longer. 

“So…” he says when there’s a moment of silence, and Buck gets the message. 

“Right. Um.” When Eddie looks over, the tips of Buck’s ears are bright red—a tell-tale sign that he’s embarrassed by whatever he’s about to say. Eddie wants to tell him not to worry, that whatever it is they’ll deal with it together, but he can’t say that—he doesn’t know, not really. 

His thought spiral is cut off when Buck stops in the middle of the forest and crowds Eddie back against a tree. Buck seems to have caught on to how much Eddie likes being caged like this sometimes, especially because Buck’s a little bigger than him—he’s never had that, before, and the idea that he’s trapped and under Buck’s whims turns him on more than it should. 

Buck leans down to kiss him hard, tilting his head to deepen the kiss within seconds. Eddie goes with it willingly, clutching at the forearms bracketing his head and groaning when Buck’s tongue slips into his mouth in a sensual roll. They can’t be making out for more than a minute or two, but when Buck finally pulls away his lips are reddened and they’re both breathless. 

“So,” Buck says with a little laugh, tipping his head forward for a second so his forehead is touching Eddie’s. “I wanted to… um. I was wondering if we could—I mean, only if you wanted, I don’t want to just, like, assume—”

“ Buckley.” Eddie’s voice stops Buck in his tracks. “Come on. You know you can tell me anything.”

Buck lets out a shaky breath and another small laugh, shaking his head. He seems to consider something for a second before pulling Eddie into a hug, tucking his face into his shoulder. Oh . Eddie’s arms encircle him instinctually, pulling him closer, one hand going up to card through his hair. Buck makes a soft sound of contentment. 

He tilts his head up so his mouth is right next to Eddie’s ear. “I want… I want you to finger me.”

Eddie’s brain literally short circuits. He gets confused at first, wondering why Buck wants something that’s only done to girls, and then he realises—he wants to be touched there. He shivers despite himself, and manages to pull Buck’s head away to look at him. He needs to make sure he’s hearing this right. 

“You do? Have you, uh—have you ever done it before?”

Buck shrugs, still flushed. “Once, to myself. I liked it, and I wanted to try it with you. But only if you want to try it as well. What do you think?”

Eddie stares at him for a long beat. It’s not even a question. “Yes. I really, really do.”

The logistics of this prove to be more difficult than they expected. For one, it’s not like their rushed handjobs against the shower tiles or in the secluded woods—they want space where they can lie down, and they need supplies, too. Neither of them brought any lube, for example, obviously not expecting to have sex at football camp, but Buck tells Eddie that it really is crucial for guys. It’s not like with girls, Eddie supposes. 

He has a brilliant idea while they’re walking back to the main camp. Putting his arm around Buck’s shoulder, he leans his weight heavily onto him just as they come into the clearing where the main lodge is. 

“What are you doing?” Buck hisses, just as Ravi and a few other guys chatting outside the cabin look up and spot them.

“Just go with it,” Eddie whispers back, and then raises his voice as he contorts his expression into one of discomfort and pain. “Hey, do you guys know where Coach Wilson is? I twisted my ankle real bad, and—fuck, I think I need the infirmary.”

“Oh, shit,” Cortez whistles, coming to stand with Ravi while Noah dashes off, presumably in the direction of the coaches. “You think it’s broken?”

“No, no,” Eddie says quickly, making sure to put a little more weight on his ‘bad’ ankle and pretending to wince but holding the position. “I can stand okay. Don’t even think it’s a sprain, I just wanna get it checked in case.”

The other players murmur their agreement with the plan, and a minute later Coach Wilson comes out of the lodge. “What happened, Eddie?” she asks as she gives him a once-over. 

Eddie re-explains the story, and after a moment’s consideration she’s taking her place at his other side and helping Buck walk him in. The infirmary is located at the back of the main lodge. It’s nothing fancy, just a storage room and sick room with a bed and cupboards filled with medical supplies, but Eddie knows it’s Coach Wilson’s pride and joy—she goes to medical school during the year, apparently, and both she and Coach Han had gotten their starts as paramedics before becoming first responders on the football team rather than the streets. 

The good thing about Coach Wilson’s interest in medicine is that she keeps the cabinets well stocked for every possible emergency. She and Buck settle him against the bed, and he takes the beat that she’s turned around to scan the room—he knows that lube is usually kept in the first aid kits with the defibrillator, and he spots the labelled cupboard in a second.

The next step is getting in there. He’d been hoping that he could distract her while Buck stole it, but she looks up at Buck quizzically and gestures to the door. “You can’t be in here, Buck. It’s a sick room. I need to examine Eddie in private—you can wait outside, if you want.”

Buck glances over at Eddie wide-eyed, but Eddie just nods his assent. He’ll have to find another way, then. 

When Buck is gone, Coach Wilson pulls up a stool in front of the bed and gently lifts Eddie’s ankle into her lap. “Did you hear anything when you rolled it? A popping maybe, or feel a snapping sensation?”

Eddie shivers. “No, thank God. Is that what I’d hear if I broke it?”

“A tear can sometimes also have that effect, but yes,” Coach Wilson replies. She palpates the area, and Eddie conjures up memories of every time he’s had an injury examined—he hisses as her thumbs press into the spot just below his ankle bone and tries to withdraw, wincing again when she asks him to show her his range of motion. 

“Have I sprained it, Doc?”

Coach Wilson rolls her eyes at the nickname but shakes her head. “No. You were very lucky, Eddie.” Tell me about it, he thinks. “I’m going to wrap it just to be safe, but you should be—where did it go?”

Coach Wilson turns to the counter beside her, but seems surprised to find it empty. It’s then that Eddie remembers rolls of gauze and KT tape on the side when he came in—Buck, that wonderful, sexy genius, must’ve taken it with him on his way out. 

“Huh. I could’ve sworn I put it here, but I must’ve run out,” she murmurs to herself, scanning the table once more. She rubs at her eyes. “God, I’m tired. You stay here a sec while I grab some more, okay?”

It couldn’t have worked better if Eddie tried. She leaves, the door swinging shut behind her, and he leaps to his feet and darts over to the labelled cupboard. He manages to unzip the first aid bag with ease and begins rummaging through it, careful not to disrupt the obviously precise order of things—band-aids and dressings on one side, alcohol swabs in the corner, medical scissors on top—until he finally feels a handful of sachets tucked in the bottom. 

“Hen, I was wondering…” Buck’s voice drifts in through the crack in the bottom of the door, and Eddie curses. He’s talking louder than normal, clearly trying to warn Eddie, and Eddie nearly hits his head in response as he fumbles to get the bag closed and the cupboard shut. 

He grabs three sachets of medical-grade lube to be safe, stuffing them in his pocket and shutting the cupboard. He sits down just as the door reopens and Coach Wilson enters holding several rolls of gauze and tape in her hands. Behind her, Buck is watching him with an obvious question in his eyes. 

As subtly as he can, Eddie moves his head in one slow nod just as the door slips shut and hopes Buck gets the message. “Thanks, Coach Wilson.”

Coach Wilson gives him a look as she settles back in her stool and begins taping up his foot with KT, finishing it up with a few wrappings of gauze to keep it secure. “Y’know, you don’t have to call me Coach Wilson. Everyone calls me Hen.”

“Sorry, Coach Wi—” Eddie stops himself just as Hen shoots him a bemused glance. “Does that ever get confusing, though? Coach Hen and Coach Han?”

She grins. “ Coach Han goes by Chimney, mostly. Long story.”

Eddie shrugs. “I’ll just ask Buck, then.”

Hen snorts in response. “Good luck with that. He’s been trying to get Chimney to tell him where the name came from for years, and he’s never gotten the truth out of him. A year or two ago he started spreading his own rumours, so if you ever hear that Chim dressed up as Santa Claus for a girlfriend and got stuck in the chimney once, it’s a total lie.”

“Got it,” Eddie replies, grinning back. He’s always liked Hen—even when she was making them run sprints in the burning sun for hours—but her maternal nature and sharp sense of humour makes him like her even more. 

Hen gives him a side eye as she stands. “You and Buck are close.”

Eddie silently takes back everything nice he’s ever said about her. She doesn’t phrase it as a question, but watches him carefully for his response anyway. “We are,” he replies, trying to feign nonchalance. “He’s a great friend. Great player, too.”

“He is both of those things,” Hen agrees, glancing once at the door before lowering his voice. “He can be a pretty emotional guy, too, but finds it hard to let people in. I’m… I’m glad he let you in, is all I’m trying to say.”

Eddie thinks he understands. This woman has had more than a small part in raising Buck, and the love she has for him pours through every word—all she wants ultimately is for Buck to be safe and happy and well looked-after. That’s fine by Eddie. That’s all he wants, as well.

“Me too.”

Chapter Text

Buck

Buck’s eyes are glued to his watch. They have been since lights out twenty minutes ago, but he’s pretty sure the clock is only slowing down—every time he looks after what feels like half an hour, less than a minute has passed. He’s pretty sure the universe is screwing with him as some kind of divine punishment for helping to steal medical supplies earlier, actually. 

The cabin is mostly silent, filled only with occasional rustling as his teammates turn in their bunks and snore softly. They went to sleep early, sinking into a deep carb coma from the burritos they had for dinner tonight, but Buck is wide awake and he knows that Eddie is too. 

Finally, the clock strikes 11:30. The coaches are either at Bobby and Athena’s playing cards and having a few drinks or they’re fast asleep by now—either way, they won’t be coming out to check on them anytime soon. The whole camp is their oyster, basically. 

Without making a noise, Buck sits up and slips out of bed. He can see Eddie’s form in the darkness moving down the ladder of his bunk bed, and together they tiptoe to the door and out into the cool night air. 

Eddie had suggested going back to the infirmary—there’s a bed there, after all—but Hen takes the keys with her, and so they’d come up with a different option. They say nothing as they walk, too worried about the boys in the other cabins nearby hearing them, but Eddie grabs his hand as they walk in the direction of the fields. 

The locker room is dark when they enter, and Buck hits the switch on the far side to illuminate only half of the room. It’s not mood lighting, but it’s as close as they’ll get since they can’t risk anything more obvious.

He can feel the sachets of lube burning a hole in his pocket as they stop in the middle of the lockers and finally Buck turns to face Eddie. The other boy looks as nervous as Buck feels, and his hands are shaking when they reach up to cup Buck’s face. 

Buck wraps a hand around his wrist. “Are you sure?” he asks, and Eddie laughs breathily. 

“I feel like I should be asking you that question,” he replies. “But yes, I’m sure. You?”

Buck arches an eyebrow and uses the hold he has on Eddie’s arm to guide his hand down to cup his already growing hardness. It sort of feels like he’s always sporting a semi when Eddie’s around. He wants to chase Eddie’s sharp inhale of breath when he feels Buck down his throat. 

“I’ll take that as a yes, then,” Eddie replies, his smile turning wicked, and presses Buck against the lockers. 

It’s not like they haven’t had alone time today—they’ve had more than usual, in fact, going to the ‘bathroom’ at the same time or coupling up together during stretches just so they get the chance to touch each other a little more. And yet it seems like nothing is enough, because Buck melts at every graze of Eddie’s fingers as they lose their shirts and then their shorts shortly after. 

Buck scans the room in the dimness, trying to focus while Eddie’s lips are attached to his neck. Their inability to leave hickeys on each other’s necks and chests has been very inconvenient for them both, but Buck discovered that Eddie goes a little crazy for marks on his inner thigh and had been all too happy to oblige. 

Through his hazy focus, he finally spots something and his eyes widen. “Hold on, hold on,” Buck says, using all his mental strength to gently pull away from Eddie and dart to the corner. He returns a minute later with a fold-out massage table, and then looks back at the narrow benches. “This might be better.”

“Hell yes,” Eddie says, and helps him set it up. It’s pretty sturdy in the end, actually, and doesn’t budge when they both climb atop it—it’s no wider than the single beds in the cabins, but they’re used to that. Anything is better than lying where Cortez’s athlete’s foot spray has been applied, Buck thinks. 

Their boxers come off not long after. Buck feels nervous and a little shaky, but as soon as Eddie wraps a hand around his cock and Buck does the same he feels a little more comfortable, like they’re on familiar ground at least. Like this, Buck can see Eddie’s lips part as he twists his wrist and bends to kiss him softly, and it helps to calm his nerves. 

“You ready?” Eddie asks a minute later, having retrieved the sachets from the pocket of Buck’s shorts and placed them on the table beside them. Buck nods, and Eddie opens one of the packets and drizzles the liquid over his fingers. 

With wide eyes, Eddie dips his fingers across Buck’s balls and then lower, Buck tilting and his knees falling open to give better access. They reposition themselves so Eddie’s in between them, giggling a little at the maneuvering it takes, but the minute Eddie’s fingers circle his hole Buck stills. 

“Still okay?” Eddie whispers. It’s like he thinks if he speaks in a normal voice than this moment will shatter, and Buck can’t blame him— he feels fragile, like the tiny locker room that smells faintly of lemon and chemicals (and other scents he doesn’t want to think about) isn’t enough to hold everything he feels and any moment the entire place will splinter into pieces. 

Buck nods, but pulls him down for a kiss anyway. They stay like that for a while, lazily kissing while Eddie teases him, circling and applying light pressure but never pressing in until suddenly when Buck has grown used to the sensation he does, and it’s so much even though it’s only up to the first knuckle. 

Buck nods again, and Eddie continues. The second knuckle, then withdrawing. He combines the gentle in-out motion with soothing pets of his free hand along Buck’s side contrasting with the playful nips of his teeth against his bottom lip, and the flurry of sensations is almost too much for Buck to bear until finally he relaxes and Eddie is able to get his finger all the way in.

“More,” Buck whispers, voice hoarse, and Eddie is all too happy to comply. He adds more lube and a second later another finger is pushing in inside the first, and Buck tenses, grabbing at Eddie’s arm to still him. 

He looks up at Eddie with wide eyes. It’s so much more now, the strange pressure beginning to bloom into something else that he can’t define, and he doesn’t know what to do with it. Eddie does.

“You look so good like this,” he murmurs, nosing at his neck to press a kiss there, and then to his cheek, his forehead, the tip of his nose, and finally his lips. “Just for me.”

Buck moans, unable to help himself, and Eddie is spurred on by the sound. After what feels like both seconds and years, he curls his fingers a little. He seems to be searching for something, and it starts to feel a little like a medical exam as he pokes and prods until—

“ Oh, fuck.”

“Yeah, there we go.” Eddie is grinning like the cat that got the cream now, and when he curls his fingers again and hits the same spot dead on, Buck feels like his spine turns to liquid and he begins melting into himself. 

He wishes he could feel embarrassed, but he’s too busy feeling pleasure—it doesn’t take long after that. Eddie seems to grow in confidence once he finds Buck’s prostate, experimenting with long and slow strokes that miss the spot completely until Buck’s whining and then short bursts that press against it everytime. The switch-up makes Buck feel like he’s on a boat in a storm, rocking precariously over wild waves but trusting Eddie completely to take him wherever they go. He never settles into a rhythm, always trying something different, and every movement Buck knows is calculated depending on his response. 

And he has a lot of responses. In their short trysts before this they’ve always tried to be quiet, but Buck’s always been the more vocal of the two. That was nothing compared to this, though—he feels like he can’t stop himself from letting out little moans and noises of pleasure at every thrust of Eddie’s fingers, and can’t help thinking that he’d love to do this to Eddie sometime and see if he can get Eddie to be just as vocal. 

(Sometime. They won’t have time like this again, Buck knows—tomorrow night they’re sleeping out in tents as is their tradition for their last night, and then…)

He jerks back to himself just as a particularly strategic curl of Eddie’s fingers makes him see stars, and he gasps as one leg kicks out unbidden. Eddie grins. “You like that, huh?”

His voice is husky and self-satisfied and so damn hot, and Eddie seems to catch on to that, too. He keeps up a semi-regular stream of speech, a combination of praise and yeah? and fuck s that drive Buck crazy, and when he wraps his free hand around Buck’s cock he goes sailing over the edge. 

He comes harder than he ever has, painting his own stomach and chest in white ropes that reach almost up to his chin as his body trembles through the aftershocks, Eddie still stroking him gently while his fingers move inside of him. One more tiny stroke of his prostate makes Buck shudder violently, and Eddie leans down to kiss him hard to still him. 

Buck makes a noise of complaint when Eddie removes his hands, but quickly takes it back when Eddie wipes him down gently with a towel and then wraps his arms around him, kissing him again. Buck melts into the embrace, hands tracing patterns into Eddie’s back until finally they trail further down and Eddie stills. 

“You okay?” Buck asks, frowning with one hand pauses on his hip. 

“Yeah, I just, uh—” Eddie lifts a hand to run his fingers through his hair and flexes it once, a sign Buck’s come to know well. Even in the dim light, Buck can tell he’s flushing. “That… won’t be necessary.”

“You—just from—” Buck manages, and swears before leaning in to kiss him. “ Fuck, that’s hot.”

Eddie grins, seemingly placated by Buck’s reaction, and they lie there for a few more minutes lazily making out before they begin slowly getting dressed. 

“How’re you feeling about the game tomorrow?” Buck asks as they open the door to the locker room carefully so it doesn’t squeak a moment later. 

“Good, I guess,” Eddie says with a shrug. “Nervous that scouts will be there and that I haven’t had much time in the new position, but…”

“You’ll dominate as quarterback, don’t worry,” Buck replies, grinning. “Your parents coming?”

It’s tradition for the parents of players to come for the final full day of camp and watch their showcase game, most of them staying in the hotel down the road and driving or flying home with their sons the next day. It’s nice, apparently. Buck wouldn’t know.

To his surprise, Eddie shakes his head. “I didn’t tell them that parents come for the last day,” he admits softly. “They wouldn’t come anyway, so it's easier not to ask. I’ll just fly home myself on Saturday.”

Eddie seems uncomfortable with his admission, and Buck can’t be having that. “Mine don’t come either,” Buck supplies, and Eddie looks over. Neither of them mention how Eddie’s parents being all the way in Texas gives them an excuse—Buck’s don’t live more than a few hours’ drive from here, and they’ve never come. “They’ve never even met Bobby.”

It does feel strange that the man who’s become such a massive part of Buck’s life for the past five years hasn’t even met his parents, but he secretly likes it that way. With them not meeting, it feels like he trades his parents off for Bobby and Athena for a while every summer. He can pretend, even for a little while, that they’re his parents, that he has a mother and father that actually want to spend time with him. 

“What about your sister?” Eddie prompts, and Buck smiles. 

“She came last year,” he replies. “I had no idea. She planned it with Bobby as a surprise and everything.” His smile fades as they near the cabin, and he lowers his voice. “But she has this new boyfriend. She’s doing this summer program thing in Boston with him this year, so… yeah. She won’t be coming.”

Eddie nudges his shoulder softly. “That sucks. I would’ve liked to meet her.”

Buck is surprised, but when he turns to look at Eddie he finds that he seems sincere. “I would’ve liked that too,” Buck responds, squeezing his hand once. “One day.”

Eddie

“Rise and shine, boys!”

Eddie groans, covering his ears, but even that isn’t enough to stop the sound of Hen and Chimney clanging wooden spoons against pots outside. Even though he was warned that his day would start like this, it doesn’t stop the sound from piercing his brain. The adrenaline means he’s wide-awake, at least. 

The other boys echo his noises of displeasure as they all sit up, rubbing the sleep from their eyes and slowly beginning to get dressed. As Eddie follows suit, he glances over at Buck.

“Anything special planned for today?” Eddie asks, slipping on a tank top for their morning run. 

“I might have directed my minions to get up early and do something a little special,” Buck says with a smirk, just as Eddie notices that Ravi, Carlos and Tyler are all missing. 

“I’m surprised you didn’t do it yourself, Buck,” Cortez points out. “You’re usually so anal about the last day's prank.”

Eddie’s cheeks flame at Cortez’s choice of words, but he says nothing. “What can I say?” Buck replies nonchalantly. “I’m growing up. Loosening the reins a little.”

As if on cue, Hen and Chimney outside both scream. The boys all rush to the windows, craning their necks to see what the coaches are freaking out about—and it’s then that they see what Buck’s done and begin freaking out themselves.

There are three pigs snuffling at the dirt floor lazily around Hen and Chimney’s feet, all of them with numbers painted in bright colours on their backs. 1, 2, and 4. They look completely calm to be in this new environment, one of them even nudging Chimney’s leg curiously and causing him to practically leap into Hen’s arms. 

“Wait, where’s Pig 3?” Noah asks, his nose pressed to the glass.

Buck’s grin widens, making him look devilish. “There isn’t one.”

Just as Buck planned, the coaches spend most of the morning looking for the third pig. They’re already done with their run by the time they realise there isn’t a third one, and though they pretend to be mad, Eddie could swear he sees Chimney laughing. They threaten to make them run extra laps, but ultimately they keep the day pretty relaxed given the game later. They even let them go swimming before lunch, cannon-balling into the azure lake one after another and splashing each other until they’re all tired and soaked.

Lunch is burgers, and afterwards they all head to the locker rooms to gear up happy and satiated. When they enter, Ravi frowns at the sight before them. 

“When did we get the massage table out?” he asks. 

Eddie shares a worried glance with Buck, who just shrugs. “Maybe Chimney pulled a hamstring,” he says dismissively. “Anyway, who’s ready to get crushed by blue team, huh?”

From beside Eddie, Carlos snorts. “Fat chance. You’ve got a rookie quarterback and we’ve got three All-Americans on defense.” He glances at Eddie. “No offense, Eddie.”

Eddie just smirks. “No offense taken, but I’m pretty sure those All-Americans of yours are gonna be pretty offended in about twenty minutes.”

Carlos rolls his eyes, but twenty minutes later he’s glaring across the field at Eddie and Buck’s team. The combined talent of Eddie as quarterback and Buck as wide receiver with the rest of their all-star team means they score three touchdowns in three minutes, and when Coach Nash finally blows the whistle they’re up by fifteen. 

Eddie can admit by now that Coach Nash made the right choice by moving him from linebacker. He plays as quarterback like he was made for it, reading the field at lightning speed and always sending the ball where it needs to go—and that’s usually right into Buck’s hands. It’s hard not to see the natural chemistry they have as players, moving less as two separate people and more like one player split into two bodies. It’s like Eddie has this sixth sense for where Buck is going to be at all times, and Buck has the same for him. He can throw the ball into open space and know Buck will fill it in seconds, or trust that Buck will keep the lane open while he drives forward with the ball clutched under his arm. 

It’s simple. And Eddie has no idea how he’s going to perform without Buck around. 

He’s run plays with other players, and been reassured several times in the last few days by the coaches that his success isn’t simply due to Buck’s presence—he has natural talent not just in football but in this position specifically, they say, and he’s undoubtedly going to continue that success when he goes back to Texas. (He just hopes that his coach there lets him stay at quarterback.)

It’s just that there’s no denying that Eddie feels more centred when Buck is around on the field. He feels more confident, bolstered by Buck’s cheers and encouragement at every turn, and it was having him by his side that made Eddie believe he could do this. 

Off the field, though? That’s a different story. Buck makes him feel dangerously off-kilter, like he’s teetering on the edge of a tall cliff at all times. Just his touch is enough to make electricity spark through Eddie’s entire body, and he feels like he could explode just from a graze of his fingers. 

Buck is a wildfire, and Eddie is just waiting to get burned. 

“Alright, boys. You’ve been working so hard for over a week, and now’s your chance to show everyone what you’ve got, alright? Your parents, siblings, and friends are all here along with the scouts to see what we’ve been working on, so let’s show ‘em,” Hen says with a grin, putting her hand in the middle of the circle. Chimney and Coach Nash follow suit, and with a cheer all the players put their hands in too. 

There are too many of them to do it properly, and Eddie ends up on the outside with his hand barely reaching the shoulders of the inner circle, but when they shout “118!” and break off Eddie has never felt more unified with his fellow players. This may be his first year here, but the guys around him have gone from strangers to friends to brothers. Outside of just Buck and getting to play nonstop football for a week, he knows he’s going to miss the guys, too. 

Families and scouts started arriving just under an hour ago while the red and blue team finished up their friendly game, and now they’ve redistributed the players (apparently based on some crazy-complicated algorithm Hen came up with based on skill and position to even out the teams) and they’re lining up for the first snap. 

Eddie and Buck have been put on the same team—thank God—and now they stand on the sidelines while blue team sends their defense out. 

As they wait, Buck points to the bleachers. “There’s more of a mix of high school and college than usual,” he notes. “There’s Teddy from De La Salle—best high school football team on the Eastern seaboard, probably—and a few schools out in California. Palo Alto, San Fran, Ojai, and—holy shit, is that Owen Strand?”

The players around them erupt in excited murmurs as they all follow Buck’s gaze to the man in the cowboy hat in the distance, notebook perched on his lap as he gazes out at the players. “Doesn’t he coach Reyes?” someone asks.

“Yeah, that’s Carlos’ coach,” Buck confirms. “Back-to-back State Championships. Rumour is he’s going to Southern Methodist next year to revamp the whole program.”

That’s the dad of the guy Carlos is dating, Eddie reminds himself. He may not have been playing football for long, but he knows who Owen Strand is. He’s almost as famous in high school football as Bobby is, and that’s saying something—Buck explains as the game kicks off that he and Bobby are good friends, and they keep an eye out for each other’s players. 

When it’s Eddie’s turn to head out onto the field, he’s surprised to find his fingers trembling as he clips in his helmet. He didn’t expect to feel so nervous, but he supposes seeing all the scouts in person really puts into perspective how important this is—it’s a pre-season opportunity to make himself known before he starts Varsity next year, and he really doesn’t want to fuck this up. 

As always, Buck seems to know exactly what he’s thinking. “Hey,” he says, clapping a hand down on Eddie’s shoulder. Even through his pads, his skin zings at the contact. “You’re gonna kill it, okay? Remember, your job is simple.”

Eddie grins. He feels better already. “I throw it.”

“And I catch it,” Buck finishes, and his smile could light up the sun. 

It may sound boisterous, but Eddie knows exactly how the game is going to go after that—and he’s right. When the ball snaps into his hands, he can see the entire symphony playing out before he even moves. He’s the conductor, and everyone shifts at his will: lanes clear, defense is blocked, and the ball sails through the air every time. He can hear the appreciative cheers of the small crowd gathered rise as blue team makes touchdown after touchdown, and he wonders dimly if any scouts are looking at him in particular.

The teams are more evenly matched than they were during practice earlier, but blue team still wins by a landslide—their teammates begin to joke that whatever Buck and Eddie touch turn to gold, and Eddie is inclined to agree. When the game ends—to raucous cheers and fanfare from the crowd, who got a much more exciting game than they bargained for—Eddie is sweaty and jubilant as he rushes into the throngs of the 118 players all celebrating the end of a successful camp. 

“Gather up, everyone, gather up!” Coach Nash calls, and the players, families and scouts dutifully form a loose circle around him. “There’ll be time for congratulatory speeches later, folks. In the meantime, boys—hit the locker room and shower up, because you all stink.” The families all laugh. “We’re hosting a goodbye barbecue at main camp in half an hour, so everyone, feel free to stick around. Thanks for coming out.”

Eddie dutifully heads off to shower with everyone else. As they walk, Buck leans into his ear. “Think we have time to sneak off before the barbecue?”

Eddie jumps, not expecting Buck to be so close, and surreptitiously glances around to see if anyone noticed. He pastes on a smile to cover his nerves and glances back at the other boy. “With all the families wandering around? I don’t think so,” he replies. “The locker room and cabin are out, and I’m pretty sure if we went to the woods we’d scar someone’s little brother who’s gone exploring. Too risky.”

Buck pouts, but there’s something watchful in his gaze as Eddie turns away. “We’ll find the time later, then.”

Eddie nods, and jogs to catch up with Ravi to compliment him on his last play. The atmosphere in the locker room is loud and celebratory, but there’s also a tinge of sadness to it—they know it’s the last time they’ll be together like this, and many of the boys drag their feet a little in changing so they can whip towels at each other and lob various insults, sending the locker room into fits of laughter and raucous cheers. 

Eddie joins in, but he knows he’s being quieter than usual from the sidelong glances sent his way every now and then. He reaches into his duffel for his t-shirt at one point and his hand closes around something cool at the bottom of the bag. It’s his cross necklace. He doesn’t wear it while he’s playing sports because he doesn’t want to damage or break it, but he pulls it out now and, after a moment’s hesitation, clips it around his neck. The gold cross is a familiar weight on his sternum, yet after over a week of not wearing it it already feels a little foreign to him. He toys with the cool metal as he takes a seat on the bench, lost in thought, but after a moment Buck easily pulls him into a ‘yo mama’ joke competition that sends the whole locker room into hysterics. 

When they emerge just in time for the barbecue, Eddie is surprised to find Coach Nash talking to some of the parents by the entrance. Spotting Eddie, he quickly says something to the couple he’s chatting to and waves him over. 

“Yeah, Coach?” Eddie says when he reaches him.

“Camp’s over, Eddie, and you’re close to Buck,” Coach Nash says. “I think you’ve earned the right to call me Bobby.”

“Yes, Coa—uh, Bobby,” Eddie replies quickly, flushing. He knows some of the players call him by his first name, but only the ones who have been here a while—he’s all too aware of the honour, and he’s not going to reject it.

“Are your parents here? I’d love to congratulate them on raising such a standout man and player,” Bobby says, and Eddie flushes further. 

“Pretty sure my dad has an itemized list of why you’re wrong, but I appreciate it,” Eddie stammers. “No, they’re not here. I’m flying back myself tomorrow.”

Bobby nods. “That’s a shame. My parents didn’t think much of football when I was a teenager either, you know.”

“How’d you change their minds?” Eddie asks as they begin following the groups of people heading to the barbecue. 

“I didn’t,” Bobby admits. “I like to think God did.”

“You’re—you’re religious?”

Bobby cocks his head. “Catholic, born and raised. You didn’t know?”

Eddie shakes his head, reaching under his t-shirt to pull out the cross chain hanging around his neck. It feels like serendipitous timing, though he knows his mother would say it was something else. “No, sir. Uh, me too.”

Bobby smiles. “When I was in college, my brother came to me and said that our mother had a dream about me playing, and that it felt like a message from God. She finally understood that it was what I was meant to do, what I was put on Earth for. From then on, they supported me 100%. Maybe one day your family will come to the same conclusion.”

The laugh Eddie lets out sounds more bitter than he intended. There’s a pit in his stomach, and it’s growing. “Maybe,” he admits. “But I doubt it, really. I mean, my sisters get it, but—I don’t know. My dad has a lot to say about the right kind of dream, if that makes sense, and football isn’t that.”

Bobby nods sadly. “I understand. Well, I hope one day they come around, Eddie, because you really do have a gift and it’d be a shame for them not to see that.”

It made sense before, Eddie thinks—why Buck is so close to Bobby and everyone at the 118. But now he thinks he understands in a different way, how Buck found something here that was always missing at home. He feels the same way. Subconsciously his hand goes to his cross necklace again, and the metal feels like it weighs a ton.

The barbecue goes off without a hitch. Everywhere Eddie looks he sees families reuniting, players excitedly recounting the camp’s activities to siblings and parents over burgers, hot dogs and the best ribs Eddie’s ever tasted. He has half a mind to ask Bobby for the recipe, but he thinks his dad would be offended if he ever tried to give grilling tips. 

Watching the families so happy together makes the pit in Eddie’s stomach deepen, but it goes away when he sees Buck. That’s the best part, hands down. A few minutes after they start serving food, there’s a commotion by the main lodge and Buck shoots to his feet and races towards where a man stands with two young children. Without breaking a step Buck scoops the kids into his arms, twirling them around as they giggle and pound on his back to put them down.

“Athena’s kids,” Ravi explains from beside Eddie, watching Buck lower the children to the ground and greet the man with a strong hug. Ravi’s parents didn’t come either, and though he knows it makes Eddie a bad person he’s sort of glad that he and Buck aren’t the only ones. “That’s Michael, Athena’s ex, and that’s May and Harry.”

“Michael and Athena still get along?” Eddie asks, scooping another mouthful of mac and cheese into his mouth. Jesus, it’s heavenly. 

Ravi nods. “Pretty well, I think. He and Bobby are good friends, too. Besides, they all love Buck, so.”

After only a few moments, that much is clear. Athena and Bobby head over to the small group and they all greet each other excitedly—even from this distance, Eddie can hear May and Harry eagerly talking over each other as they tell Buck about the game they just played as if he wasn’t there himself. Buck is grinning ear to ear, patiently listening as the kids jostle for his attention, and he laughs when Michael picks Harry up upside down and the little boy continues talking as if nothing happened. 

“You just get better every time I see you, kid,” Michael is saying to Buck as they begin walking back to the long tables set up in the centre of the camp. “Colleges must be chomping at the bit for you already.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that—” Buck begins, bashful, but Bobby doesn’t let him finish. 

“They are,” Bobby cuts him off. “He’s one to watch, for sure.”

“Scouts from UCLA, Michigan and even Alabama were fighting over him in the stands,” Athena adds, wrapping an arm around Buck’s bicep when he graciously offers it to her. “There’s gonna be an all-out war for this kid come senior year.”

Buck ducks his head, clearly embarrassed, and Athena just rolls her eyes. Despite her tough exterior, it’s clear she loves him like she’s his own—and she loves how much her kids love him, too. They’re practically hanging off of him as he finally reaches the table where Ravi and Eddie sit, and he’s beaming with pride. 

“You remember Ravi, Michael,” Buck says, as the man in question leans over to shake Ravi’s hand in greeting. Buck turns to Eddie, who pretends not to notice the colour high on his cheeks. “And this is Eddie.”

“So you’re the new kid I’ve been hearing so much about,” Michael says, turning to Eddie as he takes a seat and reaches to shake his hand too. “It’s nice to put a name to the face.”

“Are you Buck’s quarterback?” the little girl—May—asks, wide-eyed as she stares at Eddie. 

Buck’s quarterback.

Eddie flushes, but he nods. “That’s me. I make sure Buck’s running the right way, and I throw him the ball.”

“Buck doesn’t need help,” May says with a scowl, clearly offended at the shade Eddie threw to her surrogate brother.

“Of course he doesn’t,” Eddie agrees gravely, nodding. “He’s the best player here.”

“You may give our boy a run for his money yet,” Athena says with a smile. “Now, kids. I bet your dad promised you all the burgers you can eat, but for every burger you gotta have two helpings of greens, alright?”

May and Harry both groan, making the whole table laugh. “Come on, guys,” Ravi says, brushing his shorts off as he stands. “I’ll help you fix your plates. The greens aren’t so bad if you put them in your burger, see?”

Dinner with the Grant-Nash family is a chaotic affair, but Eddie loves every second—the love the family has for one another oozes out of every act, from the ribbing jokes they make at Buck to the way Buck never lets any of their cups go empty. He’s constantly grabbing more pitchers of lemonade from the table set up at the back to refill Athena’s glass, who smiles gratefully at him every time, and he even coaxes a slightly over-tired Harry into eating every bite of his collard greens in return for a game of pickup after the meal is over. 

Hen also joins them and introduces Eddie to her wife Karen and their son Denny, who drags Chimney along like a pet. Chimney seems a little relieved when the kids break off to play on their own and he’s free to talk to the adults, all of them settling into a familiar rhythm that makes it clear that this is a regular occurrence for them.

Eddie watches it all with a fond smile on his face, soaking up the family time he’s so unused to. Family barbecues like this at his house are usually filled with snide remarks about how he and his sisters are doing in school and little spats between his parents and their siblings, who seem content to act younger than even Harry when they’re around each other. His family loves each other, he knows, but they often don’t like each other—he decides as he watches the Grant-Nashes that that’s the difference. There’s a genuine enjoyment in the time they spend together, and though May and Harry can barely keep their eyes open towards the end of the meal they still cling to Buck to stay awake. 

When the food is all cleared away, someone clinks a fork against their plastic cup and calls for a speech from Bobby, who stands and walks to the front. 

“Alright, alright. I’m not one for big speeches, so I’ll keep this nice and brief. For over a week, the boys have been working hard at all kinds of skills—catching, blocking, routes, and cleaning up after themselves.” That gets a hearty laugh from the crowd. “They’re still not so great at the last one, but I promise we tried. I’d like to give a big thanks to all of the staff that made camp possible for another great year, from the cooks to the cleaners to my incredible assistant coaches, Coach Wilson and Coach Han!” Everyone applauds, the cheers reaching fever pitch when Michael somehow convinces the small group of cooks and other support staff to poke their heads out of the main lodge and wave. “And of course, my wonderful wife that keeps the entire camp running smoothly without even breaking a sweat.” There’s another chorus of cheers. 

“Finally, I’d just like to say congratulations to all the players. You’ve all improved so much over such a short time that I can’t believe it, and I know you’ll give your home teams a huge boost when you go back, ready to win!” More cheers fill the forest. “With that, it’s time for the coveted award.”

The boys all ooh and aah their appreciation, and Eddie’s brow furrows. “Award?” he mouths to Buck, who just grins.

“Now, you’re all stars in your own right, and each put up a hell of a fight for deserving this trophy,” Bobby says, producing a tiny plastic trophy from his back pocket. “But this year’s Most Improved Player award goes to someone who’s made a real mark on this camp despite this being his first year here.”

Ravi claps Eddie on the shoulder, and Eddie’s heart drops.

“This player switched from defense to offense with a day’s notice, but you wouldn’t know it watching him out there today. He plays like he was made for it, and I for one am honoured to have coached him—and can’t wait to watch what he’ll do in the years to come. Give it up for… Eddie Diaz!”

Eddie is still holding the trophy hours later, flipping it over in his hands.

It’s a cheap plastic thing, but that’s not the point—the cheers of his teammates who seemed genuinely happy for him to win still echo in his ears even as the boys head into the forest and set up their tents for their last night, excitedly breaking out the last of the jungle juice from a few nights earlier. 

The parents said their goodbyes a while ago, some of them making use of the free cabins and crashing there while others headed to the motel just off the main road to the camp. The energy of the evening still hasn’t returned to normal after the chaos of the day, all of them buzzing with excitement as they recount the camp’s festivities and talk about their plans for the year ahead. Buck is holding court by the bonfire, playing some complicated word game with Ravi and Cortez that sends the other boys into hysterics every few minutes, and Eddie sits off to the side. He’s content to listen, just soaking in as much of the 118’s energy as he can before he goes back to the real world tomorrow. 

The real world. 

What even is real anymore? Eddie isn’t sure. 

He mostly sleepwalks through the rest of the evening, more of a spectator than an active player in the celebration, but he’s happy that way. Buck tries to get him involved a few times and he gamely joins in conversation, but he always ends up drifting back into a more passive roll and after a silent conversation with their eyes, Buck clearly stops feeling like he has to involve Eddie in everything. He just watches, absorbing as much of Buck’s social magic as he can. 

Some of the boys head to their tents after a few hours, exhausted from the day they’ve had, and that leaves mostly just the guys from the original bonfire what seems like a lifetime ago now. He feels like an entirely different person since that night, and that’s mostly due to the boy sitting next to him sending shocks of energy through his body where their shoulders are pressed together. 

Buck has taken advantage of the fact that they’re all tired and slumped against a log beside Eddie, his head almost but not quite leaning against his shoulder in a way that’ll seem accidental to anyone that looks over. Eddie knows it isn’t. He craves Buck’s touch as much as he knows Buck craves his—on their last night, it’s taking everything in him not to crawl into Buck’s lap and attempt to burrow under his skin and stay there. As always, Buck radiates heat like a furnace that’s even hotter than the fire crackling in front of them, but Eddie doesn’t move—he’d stay here all night if only Buck asked him too. 

The trophy is now abandoned on the floor beside him as the players begin discussing their plans for next year. 

“My district is shit at football, so I’ve got a good chance of coming again,” Tyler says, and Cortez echoes him. 

“Four years was enough with you losers,” Campbell replies. He’s an incoming senior, so this is his last year here. “It’s been real, but I’m ready to go to college.”

“Have you committed to Arizona yet?” Cortez asks, and Campbell shakes his head. 

“Haven’t gotten a formal offer yet, but apparently it’s coming soon,” he says, and the boys murmur their congratulations.

“What about you, Diaz? Are you gonna make the 118 a regular habit, or what?” Carlos asks.

There’s an unintended double meaning to Carlos’ words that Eddie doesn’t quite know what to do with. He swallows hard, taking another sip of the foul jungle juice. “I hope to come back, yeah,” Eddie manages, steadfastly avoiding the gaze he feels burning into his side. He tries to lighten his tone. “As long as you’re not around to compete for QB, that is.”

The guys whistle, teasing Carlos and Eddie about their friendly competition, but Eddie’s mind is far away. What if this could be his and Buck’s… place? They could escape here each summer, keep doing— whatever they’ve been doing for a week or two, and then go back to their lives. They’d only get one more summer at 118, but—it would be something.

It’s not enough, a tiny voice in his head whispers. A week, even a whole summer is not enough. That could never be enough.

Not when it’s him.

Eddie downs the rest of his jungle juice as his fingers, unbidden, touch his sternum. 

Eddie crawls into the tent a few hours later, a little drunk and with a heavy heart. 

He and Buck are sharing with Ravi and Tyler, so no funny business will be happening here. In a way, he’s kind of glad—but he wishes he’d tried harder to take an opportunity earlier in the day to kiss him one more time. 

They settle in their sleeping bags as they talk quietly about their plans for tomorrow. Ravi’s dad is driving Buck back to Hershey, apparently. The fact that his parents can’t even be bothered to drive out to pick him up makes Eddie feel a lot of things, but the biggest emotion is anger. How can they not want to spend time with him, when he’s— Buck?

Ravi and Tyler drift off to sleep not long after that, but Eddie can tell Buck’s still awake. That’s sad, right? That after so little time he knows Buck’s breathing pattern so well he can basically calculate what stage of the REM cycle he’s in?

Neither of them say a word. Eddie lies there with his eyes closed for a while, hoping in vain for sleep to overcome him, but eventually he realises it’s no use. Beside him, he can feel Buck turn to one side and then sigh and shift to another. Eddie’s glad it’s not just him.

After what feels like an hour, he feels a hand tentatively rest on his shoulder and he shoots into a sitting position, his heart pounding in his chest. Without looking back, he quietly unzips his sleeping bag and crawls out of the tent. He knows Buck will follow. 

He does. After a beat he hears soft footsteps behind him, and then fingers intertwining with his. Hands clasped, they walk to the shore and tuck themselves behind an outcrop of rocks. Even though the moon is full and hanging low in the sky, they won’t be seen by anyone who slips out of their tent for a late night leak. For some reason, the thought of being caught fills Eddie with more terror now than when they got together days ago. 

“You were quiet tonight,” Buck comments as they lean back against the rock, looking out at the lake. Waves softly lap at the boulder they’re perched on, providing a calming rhythm that Eddie tries using to steady his heart. 

“Just—thinking,” Eddie says finally. “I feel like so much has happened since I came to camp, and now…”

“Yeah,” Buck murmurs. “I feel like I’ve lived a whole lifetime since I left home.” Eddie can feel Buck glance at him out of the corner of his eye, but he doesn’t look over. “To be honest, it’s always like that. Being out here, it all just—feels so far away.”

“Like another universe.”

Buck hums in agreement, and then his tone lightens. “Back to the real world tomorrow, I guess.”

Eddie stiffens. He doesn’t mean to, really, but the choice of words makes the pit in his stomach that’s been growing since earlier today deepen into a chasm. Gently, Buck reaches out and cups Eddie’s jaw, turning his head to face him. 

“What is it, Eds? You can talk to me.”

But Eddie doesn’t want to talk. Not when—not when words feel like they might burst the dam Eddie’s been trying to build. 

So he kisses Buck instead. Buck is still for a moment, surprised, but after just a beat he melts into Eddie’s touch, winding his fingers into Eddie’s hair. It’s a softer kiss than they’ve ever shared, but somehow still the most desperate—slow, biting kisses that Buck reciprocates. It tells Eddie he feels the same, like they each want to swallow the other whole just to get a second more of time together. 

The kiss doesn’t go anywhere. They’re under no illusions of where they are, and giving each other a handjob or something is risky, even for them—it also feels too crude for the moment, like it doesn’t truly encapsulate who and what they are to each other. 

Whatever they are. 

Whatever Eddie is. 

Eddie’s kisses turn a little sloppy and even more desperate, like he’s afraid if he opens his eyes that Buck will crumble into dust. He just wants to be here, even if it’s just for a moment. Just for now. 

But of course he has to go and ruin the moment. He doesn’t mean to, really, but when Buck pulls away with the most heart-aching concern etched all over his face he knows he’s crying. He tries to keep going, wiping roughly at his cheek and leaning in again, but their lips brush for only a second before Buck’s pulling back again to look at him properly.

“Eds,” Buck whispers softly, cupping his face in both hands, and that only makes Eddie feel more. Another tear rolls down his face. “What is it?”

He swears he can hear something at the end of Buck’s sentence, a word he was trying not to say. What is it , baby? Maybe that was it. Baby. Eddie chokes back a sob. 

Buck’s quarterback.

Buck’s.

“I don’t know—” Eddie tries, and stops to take a shaky breath. He attempts it twice more before the words come out as more than a croak. “I don’t know how—I don’t know how to be this… there. Back home, in Texas.”

Buck pauses, seeming to take this in for a second, and then he nods. “I get it. I know it’s hard—”

“You don’t,” Eddie cuts him off, unable to hold it in anymore. He grabs his necklace and pulls it out, practically waving it in his face. He can see the moment the cross glints in the moonlight, the moment that Buck begins to understand. “My family… they don’t understand me playing football, for fuck’s sake. My dad, he’d never—” he breaks off, holding back another sob. The dam has well and truly broken now. “I’m not like this. I’m not like you.”

Buck

I’m not like you.

Buck drops his hands from Eddie, leaning away from him. Stupid. He’s been so fucking stupid this whole time to think that Eddie—that he might—

Of course he isn’t like Buck. He’s patient, not impulsive. Smart, not an idiot. Not… 

It’s the way he spits it out, like the words are bitter on his tongue. Not like you. Because you, apparently, are poison to him.

He knows what Eddie is saying. He may not be the smartest guy in the room, but he can understand this. 

(And he does understand. He can read the desperation, the anguish, the fear, plain on Eddie’s face. He’s felt all of those things before, alone under the covers in his room at night as he wonders desperately if he’s always going to feel this. But it’s the way Eddie deflects it back towards him, as if this was all his fault, that makes him feel sick to his stomach.)

“Right. I see.” Those are all the words Buck can manage as the shutter behind his eyes closes, protecting him. He’s never had a good poker face, everyone always able to see exactly what he was thinking just by looking at his expression, but not tonight. Tonight, apparently, he needs protecting—so he shuts down.

“No, Buck, I—” Eddie grabs his arm as Buck shifts away from him, and he stills. Even now, Eddie’s touch burns. “That’s not what I—” he pauses and takes a shaky breath, shaking his head as if to clear his thoughts. “I just mean… we might never see each other again, you know? We don’t live close, and without you—without us—”

Us. 

It’s Buck’s turn for a word to taste bitter on his tongue. He rolls it around in his mouth, toying with it, but won’t spit it out. 

“No, I get it,” Buck replies. He can feel his walls going up, protective spikes protruding from every weak point, but he doesn’t stop himself from getting defensive. He needs it right now. “I’ve just been entertainment to you. Something to occupy your time with, and now you’re going back you need me to know that you’re not like me. Because you’re fucking Catholic, apparently, and just thought you’d take off your little necklace and play at being an atheist gay for a while.”

He’s aware that he spits the word ‘Catholic’, but he doesn’t care anymore. Eddie flinches, and something animal in Buck snarls. Good. 

“You weren’t—I only meant that you’ve always been so, like, open—”

Buck’s done listening to Eddie talk. “Whatever, Eddie. You know, I might be open, but—I don’t have to sleep with everyone I have feelings for, and I don’t have to have feelings for everyone I sleep with.”

The minute he says it, he wants to take it back. Eddie reels back like he’s been slapped, and Buck wishes the moon wasn’t so bright tonight because he can see every second of Eddie processing his words—the surprise, the hurt, and the anger. He doesn’t know how to hold all of those things inside him at once.

(He supposes that’s always been the problem with the two of them, bubbling under the surface. They don’t know what to do with everything that’s happened in so little time.)

“Fuck you, Evan.”

Eddie’s voice is barely above a whisper, eerily calm, but now it’s Buck’s turn to feel like he’s been slapped. It’s like he speaks through a megaphone connected directly to Buck’s skull, and now the quiet joy he used to feel when Eddie called him by his first name is replaced only with the looming feeling that he’s going to be sick. He might actually be sick. 

“Yeah, well fuck you too, Eddie,” Buck retorts. “You’re just scared.”

Eddie laughs, but there’s no humour in it. It’s completely hollow. “ I’m scared?” he echoes, and then shakes his head and stands. Towering over him like that, Buck feels like an ant - and Eddie's the boot. “I’m not the one running.”

With that, he leaves Buck on the shore. 

Buck wants to take his sadness and throw it in the lake, but then he’d still be left with the lake. 

He wants to take his sadness and throw it away, but then he’d still be left with his hands. 

I’m not like you.

The next day, the players watch and whisper while Buck says nothing as Eddie climbs into the taxi waiting to take him to the airport. They expect to see a goodbye, but he and Eddie have said everything they need to say to each other. 

The door closes, and the tether between them snaps.

Eddie

He can’t help it. He turns back in his seat as the cab pulls away from the camp, wanting to get one last glimpse, but Buck has already turned back to his friends.

The bottom of the pit in Eddie’s stomach drops out, and he’s left with a void he doesn’t know how to fill.

Chapter Text

COLLEGE, SENIOR YEAR

Eddie

“And before I get to know you guys, I wanted to introduce you to a new member of the team—Buck, come up here.”

For some reason, Eddie doesn’t put it together right away. Maybe it’s because he’s met a Buck or two in the years since camp—their names always hitting his ears with a simultaneous pulse of shock and something warm and liquid that he can’t, won’t name until he realises that it’s not him —or maybe it’s because he’s been so caught up thinking about the season ahead that his friends had to knock on his door three times this morning before he realised he was late to practice. 

But when Eddie’s eyes fall on him, he knows. 

It’s not that Buck looks exactly the same as he did in high school, because he really doesn’t—soft stubble lines his jaw and his hair is a little shorter, but the biggest difference is his body. He’s grown, is probably a little taller than Eddie, even, but he’s also filled out. A lot.

He’s wearing a pair of shorts and a muscle tee that’s one size too small, making his biceps and pecs bulge out obscenely. If Eddie squints, he could probably make out the outline of Buck’s abs through his shirt— if. Because he’s not. 

“Evan?”

The first name he knew Buck by slips out of Eddie’s mouth before he can help it, and his jaw immediately clicks shut. Buck’s eyes are already glued to him. They can’t look away from each other, even as the other players glance between them with confusion. He looks somehow just as shocked to see him, even though he must have known Eddie would be here. Bobby would have told him… right?

Ever the observant coach, Bobby smoothly takes over. “Eddie Diaz, it’s great to see you,” Bobby says, stepping forward to shake his hand. Eddie blinks back to himself and nods, clasping Bobby’s hand and smiling. He really is happy to see him again, even if it’s alongside… him. 

Eddie had been excited when he found out a week ago that Coach Singh was leaving his post suddenly and had asked Bobby to take over—Coach Singh had been incredible to Eddie, there was no doubt about that, but… Bobby is Bobby. It took less than two weeks for Eddie to realise that man was who he wanted coaching him, and he hasn’t forgotten it in the five years since. 

His position on the team meant he found out before the rest of the players, and he’d struggled to keep it from his friends but knew it was ultimately for the best. Bobby would prove to them that he was the right man for the job all by himself. 

“Coach Nash—” Eddie cuts himself off when Bobby clears his throat. “ Bobby coached me at 118 Training Camp when I was in high school,” Eddie says to the group of players gathered around. “You guys’ll love him.”

His eyes flicker to Buck, but he can’t bring himself to explain how they clearly know each other. What would he say? Oh, and this is the guy that… what? Broke my heart? Whose heart I broke?

“I’ll let the team make their own determinations,” Bobby says with a laugh, “but I appreciate the kind words, Eddie, and I’m honoured to be coaching you all.”

He continues talking, telling them that he won’t be making any major changes to Coach Singh’s lineup yet and explaining how he’ll be moving to Austin by the end of the week, but Eddie’s mind is far away. 

Instead, he’s thinking about that morning. How he woke up feeling like he’d been hit by a bus, and it didn’t get better when the players seemed to catch on immediately to the off vibes between Buck and Eddie. How they’d all asked him what was going on, and when Ravi asked he was the only person Eddie could tell— we had a really bad fight, was all he could say, and Ravi didn’t push. He seemed to know not to. How he’d gotten into that taxi and felt like something was breaking and wasn’t sure if he knew how to fix it.

He’s jerked back to reality by Bobby clapping his hands together. “Right, well I think that’s everything from me. Your wonderful assistant coach Judd will continue your practice, and you’ll meet your other assistant coaches Hen and Chimney when we all start next week.” He turns to Buck, who’s been hovering close to him and generally looking like he wants to die since he and Eddie locked eyes, and lowers his voice a little. “I gotta grab some paperwork from the office and talk to Singh for a minute. Why don’t you get to know everyone a little, and I’ll meet you at the car later?”

“Wait, Bobby—”

“Perfect.” Bobby turns on his heel and marches off across the field without looking over his shoulder, and Buck curses under his breath. 

Eddie has to admit that he feels a little better when a shorter figure emerges from the crowd of players and holds out his arms. Buck’s eyes widen, and he gasps. “ Ravi?!” 

The two men collide in a flurry of laughter and limbs, hugging while Buck pulls back every few seconds like he thinks he dreamt the whole thing. “What are you doing here?” Buck asks Ravi.

“You’d know if you bothered to keep in touch,” Ravi says with an arched brow, and Buck at least has the decency to look sheepish. He opens his mouth to say something, but Ravi just shakes his head. “Don’t sweat it, seriously. Life is busy.” He turns to the rest of the group, one arm still around Buck’s shoulder. “Guys, Buck and I went to high school together in Pennsylvania, and me and Eddie trained with him at 118. He’s the best wide receiver I’ve ever seen—no offence, Paul.”

“None taken,” Paul says with an easy-going laugh, pretending to size Buck up. “I’m looking forward to seeing him prove it.”

“How come I’ve never heard of you, then?” Ryder calls out, raising a brow and folding his arms across his chest. He really is sizing Buck up. “Where’d you play before this?”

“I—uh, I was at UPenn for a bit, then SMU,” Buck says, but he phrases it more like a question. Eddie tries his best to look like he didn’t know this already.

“Oh, so you’re a college hopper,” Ryder shoots back immediately, looking unimpressed, and though Buck hides it well Eddie still recognises the curl of embarrassment in his shoulders. 

“He’s a senior, you idiot, he’s not hopping just to play,” Albert pipes up from behind Ryder, who glares at him. While it’s true that players sometimes take a few extra years getting their degrees or change schools altogether to start over, no one is dumb enough to do that in their final year—especially to go from SMU to the Longhorns. It is, no pun intended, an entirely different ball game.

“Fuck off, Ryder,” Ravi retorts just as quickly, using the arm around Buck’s shoulder to steer him away from the other player. “Ignore him, Buck. Come on, I’ll introduce you to some of the other guys.”

Eddie watches them walk over to Shaun and Kyle, Buck reaching out to fist bump each of them in greeting. He barely notices the people around him until Albert speaks, and he jumps. “So, that’s the infamous Evan Buckley?” he asks, also watching Buck go. “From everything my brother said about him, I thought he’d be taller.”

“Chimney stayed in contact with Buck?” Eddie asks, though he shouldn’t be surprised. He got a congratulatory card from the man when he graduated high school, and Buck was way closer to all of them—obviously they’d stay in touch.

“Of course,” Albert replies. “They still see each other most summers.”

“Have you got the scoop, then?” Lena asks eagerly, leaning in. “Do you know why he transferred in his senior year?”
Eddie has to admit that he’s curious about this one, too. It’s abnormal enough to change colleges in your final year, let alone to play football at one of the best schools in the country—he wonders for a moment if Buck’s parents paid an obscene amount of money to get him in or something, but he somehow knows that isn’t the case. They’d never support him enough to do that. 

To Eddie’s surprise, Albert shakes his head. He usually loves a bit of gossip. “No idea. Howie mentioned he seemed a little— off this summer, but I don’t think he knew Buck was coming here. Or that he was coming here, for that matter. He only told me about it last week.”

So it really was just as sudden as Eddie was led to believe. Why would Buck be off? Did he just finish forcing another boy to question their sexuality before leaving them in the dust?

(Eddie curses himself inwardly. That’s… uncharitable. An oversimplification, maybe. But that doesn’t stop it from being what he’s been saying to himself for the last five years.)

“Guess we’ll have to do some snooping then,” Lena says with a shrug, looking wicked. 

“Guys, we shouldn’t—”

“Come on,” Albert starts, bumping Eddie in the shoulder, but his voice dies out when Eddie misses a step and doubles over. “Shit, shit, Eddie, I forgot—”

Eddie can’t see anything for a moment, his vision whited out by pain for one blinding instant, but just as quickly it dissipates. 

“It’s okay,” Eddie says, his teeth only slightly gritted as pain shoots down his arm. He takes a deep breath, slowly but surely straightening up and rolling his shoulder gingerly in his socket. “Gotta get used to getting hit, right? Just got me in the wrong place is all. Seriously, I’m fine,” he adds at the end with a little laugh when Albert and Lena both haven’t moved. “Come on. I should go drag Ravi away so we can practice before Judd makes us do wind sprints.”

Eddie keeps the smile pasted on his face until he turns away, and only then does he let it drop as he walks towards where Buck and Ravi are huddled with their backs to the rest of the chattering group. 

“—and yeah, Ravi, I get that it’s been a while and you’ve spent the last year with him, but fuck, I don’t want to spend another second with that uptight, repressed fucking—”

Buck finally cuts himself off the third time Ravi wacks him on the arm and turns, blanching at the sight of Eddie right behind him. Eddie knows he shouldn’t be surprised, really, but it stings almost as much as Albert slamming into his bad shoulder. 

“Practice, Ravi,” Eddie reminds him, and Ravi nods. 

Buck watches Ravi leave quickly with a curious expression on his face, but it sours when his eyes flick back to Eddie. “I guess you want me out of here, then?”

“Unless you plan on running plays in that tiny t-shirt and cargo shorts,” Eddie replies, folding his arms, and Buck scoffs. There’s a look out of the corner of his eye from his friends, and he relents slightly. He doesn’t want to have to explain—anything, really. “You can stay and watch. If you want.”

Buck considers this for a moment. “I’ll stay for a little, yeah.” He heads towards the benches, and then turns over one shoulder. “Thanks.”

Jesus. The man sounds like has a gun to his head. “Anytime,” Eddie replies with a sigh, and jogs to catch up with Ravi. 

“Alright, y’all, gather round!” Judd shouts, and the players dutifully head over. “Buck’ll be joinin’ us for practice officially next week, but our gracious Captain—” he pauses, waiting for the obligatory cheers of Eddie, Eddie! to die down before he continues, “—has decided to let him have a look-see, so time to show him what we got, alright?”

Eddie can feel Buck’s eyes burning a hole into his back. He’s far enough away on the bench that he probably can’t hear much of the conversation, but Eddie finds himself hoping he overheard that Eddie is captain.

Judd steps forward. “Let’s start off with something easy, okay, boys?” he says, glancing down at his clipboard and grinning. Eddie may not have been here for that long, but he knows it’s not a good sign. “Wind sprints.”

The players erupt in a chorus of groans, and Judd laughs. “I thought wind sprints were supposed to be our punishment, ” Ravi complains.

“Coach Singh’s parting gift was letting us know that y’all are so bad at sprints that it borders on cruel and unusual punishment. So because I don’t fancy the paperwork that comes with that kind of investigation, we’re gonna do ‘em ‘til they feel like a reward this season, alright? Or are we settling for second place again?”

There’s a chorus of boos this time, which seems to satisfy Judd. “Alright, boys. And girl,” Judd adds, sensing Lena’s glare without needing to look over. “20 yard line, and hop to it.”

When practice ends three hours later, Eddie is sweaty and exhausted. Singh told him during pre-season that he’s still not cleared to throw in games, but he’s started participating in drills and by the time he finishes today his fingers are tingling from the way his shoulder aches. 

It’ll get easier, he reminds himself. Just give it time. 

It’s been his mantra for longer than he’d like to admit. He just hopes that one day he can stop saying it. 

Buck stays all the way until the end, his eyes flicking eagerly between the players as they finish sprints and move to passing and blocking drills, ending with a scrimmage. When practice finally ends, Ravi practically bounds over to ask him what he thought—Eddie can see Buck shrugging and gesticulating wildly with his hands. Thankfully, Eddie is too far away to hear whatever he’s yelling about now. 

He heads to PT after practice, the sun already low in the sky as he crosses the quad. His physiotherapist is nice enough, he supposes, but not exactly chatty—they go through the half-hour of cool down exercises mostly in silence. He supposes the fact that he glares at Tommy every time he asks Eddie to squeeze a ball for twenty minutes might have something to do with it, but Eddie’s more standoffish than usual today. 

Quietly seething through his exercises, Eddie focuses on the pain to distract himself. It’s sharp today, leaving a bitter aftertaste on his tongue like metal—he overworked himself in practice, he knows, but this is his first season back and he’ll be damned if he’s starting on the bench. 

Whenever he gets frustrated with the sharpness of the pain like he is now, he reminds himself that the pain used to be nauseating. In the beginning, laid up in the hospital, he couldn’t straighten his arm or even lift it more than a few inches away from his side. He’s made leaps and bounds since then, he knows. 

(It’s just that seeing Buck makes him feel sixteen again, throwing a ball out of curiosity and discovering that he was made to be quarterback. It was so easy then—and he took it all for granted.)

“Are you okay, Eddie?”

Tommy’s jarring voice yanks Eddie from his daydream, and he turns to see the physical therapist’s brows knitted in concern. It’s only then that Eddie realises he’s been clenching the stupid rubber ball like he’s trying to squeeze the life out of it, and with a jolt of surprise he drops it to the floor. 

“Yeah. Fine.” Eddie’s sullen demeanour and his ball-murdering tendencies clearly say otherwise, and Tommy folds his arms over his broad chest. They may not be close, but Eddie knows Tommy’s a good guy—a soccer player until he busted his knee just before he graduated two years ago, he switched to PT and has a reputation for being one of the best on the team. Eddie sighs, raking a hand through his hair. Jesus, it’s getting long. He needs a haircut. “A new guy joined the team today, and he’s kind of a dick.”

Tommy frowns. “I thought you guys were getting a new coach, not a new player.”

“The new coach brought a new player with him,” Eddie explains, then pauses. “I actually knew them both from a training camp I went to in high school. The coach is a great guy.”

“But the player… not so much?”

Eddie is silent. If he can’t explain what he thinks about Buck to Ravi, then he definitely can’t explain it to Tommy. 

Sensing Eddie’s reticence, Tommy switches tacts as he moves to check the brace on Eddie’s shoulder. “So, training camp, huh? How many years did you go for?”

“I joined late,” Eddie explains. “Super competitive, and I only started playing in high school. I went just for the one summer between sophomore and junior year.”

“But you still remember the coach? Nash, right?”

“Yeah, Nash,” Eddie says, wincing when Tommy removes the brace and re-wraps it. On a normal day, he’d get a scolding for wrapping it too tight during practice, but Tommy seems to be letting him off today. “He was incredible. The kind of coach that sticks with you, no matter how long you train under them, y’know?”

Tommy nods. “I get it. Well, I’m glad you’ve got someone who knows you—it’s a big year for you.” He hesitates. “Does Nash know about your shoulder?”

“I’m sure Singh briefed him on the fact that his team captain has yet to be a starting player here, yeah,” Eddie says carefully. 

The words Eddie chooses are intentional, and Tommy catches on immediately. “So he doesn’t know…”

“No, he doesn’t know—what happened,” Eddie says, swallowing thickly. “I swore Singh to secrecy, and I’m swearing you to it as well.”

Tommy holds up his hands in surrender. “Hey, I get it. None of my business. That’s your thing to tell, okay? But if I find out that this new coach is treating you like just another player because you were lax on the details, we’ll have a problem.”

“I am just another—”

The look Tommy gives him—full of pity and concern—turns Eddie’s stomach. “No, you’re not, Eddie. Not yet. You have to take care of your body, so it can take care of you, okay?”

The cheesy mantra that Eddie’s heard a million times by now manages to put a small smile on his face, and Tommy grins back and holds his hand up for a fist bump. “Saturday morning?” Eddie asks, and Tommy nods, reciprocating the gesture. 

“Saturday morning.”

Eddie is stuck in his own head the whole walk back to his dorm. He’s glad he decided to stay on campus for his final year, really—it’s as close as he can get to the field, meaning he doesn’t need to wake up at 4am to beat Austin traffic for an early morning practice—but he’s less fond of the drunk freshmen stumbling around when it’s only 7 in the evening on a weekday. He has to weave around two girls holding their friend’s hair back while she pukes into a trash can to get into San Jacinto Hall, and he shivers.

He’s so glad he missed that freshman experience. Even if it was for… well.

Something’s happening. He knows it as soon as he gets out of the elevator and sees a group of players—most of them live on the same floor—hovering in a small clump halfway down the hallway. His brows furrow as he nears and realises that they’re standing outside of his room.

He’s roommates with Ravi. Usually the other players let themselves in and out as they please, but as the crowd parts he sees why no one has gone in: all his stuff is piled in a pyramid outside the open door, which has had his name tag removed. Inside, his bed has been stripped—even his mattress has disappeared, Ravi sitting on his bed opposite looking bewildered.

There’s a handwritten sign on the door, and it reads: Eddie Diaz, you have been relocated to room 126 effective immediately. 

It’s even signed at the bottom. - Bobby Nash.

Eddie’s heart drops. 

He ignores Ravi’s worried look and the confused questions from the rest of the players, storming towards the end of the hall. 112, 114, 116…  120, 122…

126.

He knows before he gets there what he’s going to see, but it still makes his stomach lurch anyway. 

Right beneath 126, his name has been slotted in beside Evan Buckley’s.

They’re roommates. 

Buck

“You have to be shitting me. Ravi, you didn’t think to give me a heads up?”

Ravi doesn’t even have the decency to look sheepish, leaning against the door of room 126. “If I did, you’d just go straight to Bobby or drop out or something. Am I wrong?”

“No. I am going straight to Bobby.” He turns to march back down the hallway, but pauses. “Did… what was Eddie’s reaction when he found out we’re rooming?”

Ravi snorts. “You might have to get in line at Bobby’s office. He’s been seething the whole week waiting for you two to move in so he can talk to him.”

Buck curses under his breath, which just makes Ravi laugh harder. Buck glares at him. “You’re such a dick, Ravi,” he mutters. 

Putting a hand to his heart and acting wounded, Ravi says, “no, I just think it’s funny that you two apparently hate each other so much but had the exact same reaction when you found out about this.” He rubs his hands together and laughs to himself. “This season is gonna be interesting.”

Just as Ravi suspected, Eddie is waiting in a chair outside Bobby’s office when Buck arrives. He looks up when the door opens, going to stand, but when he sees it’s Buck he stills and then lowers himself back down slowly like he’s trying not to make any sudden movements. 

Buck expects a ‘hi’ or something, but Eddie seems perfectly content just to stare at Buck like he’s grown a second head. Finally, Buck bites the bullet—because he’s a good person —and sits down, leaving a chair in between them . “Hey.”

“You here for—”

“Yup.”

“Same.”

“Fine.”

“ Fine.”

They’re saved from making any more conversation—or worse, sitting in total silence—when Bobby finally walks in with a stack of papers under one arm and a cardboard box towered high with office supplies in the other. He looks tired, and when he sees the pair of them sitting in the chairs, he sighs and stops. 

“Morning, boys.”

“Coach, I—” Eddie starts, but Bobby shakes his head.

“I was expecting you. Eddie, could you hold—” he hands Eddie the cardboard box and fishes his keys out of his pocket, unlocking the office. “Thanks. Come in and make yourselves at home—not that there is much of a home here yet.”

The office is depressingly empty, but Buck knows that’ll change in no time, especially if Athena has something to say about it. She’d been talking about the importance of feng shui and how the room flow in their new house in Austin was so much better the entire journey, having flown in the night before in order to drive Buck from SMU to UT Austin. The dedication to bringing him was in stark contrast to his parents, who had simply liked his text message letting them know he was switching schools.

“Y’know, Buck, I should thank you,” Bobby says as he puts his things down and settles in the office chair, gesturing to the chairs opposite him. Buck takes a seat uneasily. He feels like he’s about to be told off. “My wife bet me fifty dollars that it would be less than half an hour after dropping you off before you decided to come see me about room assignments, and you made it—” he pauses to check his watch “—thirty-eight minutes.”

“I stopped at Booster Juice before I went up.”

“I should be thanking Booster Juice, then.” Bobby leans back in his chair, looking far too casual given the gravity of the situation. “So, you both are here because you want to switch rooms?”

“I don’t get why I can’t just stay with Ravi—”

“I can’t room with him, Bobby—”

“You can’t room with me? I can’t room with you —”

“Oh, God,” Bobby says, holding up a hand. Both of them are silent immediately. “Enough, both of you. Now, from the outside it seems you guys have had a disagreement about something. The only thing that would have any bearing on whether you two are roommates is if there was an incident of assault or some kind of discrimination. Was there?”

Buck seriously considers lying and saying Eddie punched him in the face or something, but he knows what an accusation like that would do to a football player—they wouldn’t just no longer be roommates, Eddie would be benched or suspended pending the investigation. No matter what he thinks of the guy, he doesn’t want to do that to him. 

From Eddie’s expression, Buck can tell he’s thinking the same thing. 

“No, sir,” Eddie admits, shaking his head. 

“No.”

“Okay, then,” Bobby says with a nod. “You two are a crucial part of the Longhorn’s success this year, so we can’t have you fighting on or off the field. Eddie, was there anything else?”

Eddie opens his mouth, but it clicks shut when Buck looks over at him. He shakes his head. “No, sir.”

“Alright. I’ll see you at practice later today, then.”

Without a glance back, Eddie walks out, leaving only Bobby and Buck in the office. Buck wants to say something, but somehow he senses that that would be the wrong choice—he is right, because when Bobby finally settles his gaze on him it’s with the same look that he had on his face right after Eddie left camp all those years ago: confusion, pity, and warning.

“You may have noticed that a lot of the other boys that live in your dorm don’t have roommates. You are seniors, after all,” Bobby begins, lacing his fingers together and propping them on his desk. 

Buck had noticed that, actually. Albert, Chimney’s little brother, lives alone, as does that asshole Ryder. 

“I made the executive decision that you need a roommate. You never had one at SMU or at Penn, and look how that ended up—maybe having someone else with you will encourage some accountability,” Bobby explains. “You know I love you, kid, but I’m taking a big risk by pulling strings to get you in here. Your football stats might have been enough for you to jump the list, but they’re not enough to make you stay, you get that?”

Buck nods. He doesn’t want to be like that anymore—feeling like a failure, letting his teammates down. He understands why Bobby gave him a roommate, he really does, but… “Did it have to be Eddie?”

“It was going to be Ravi, actually,” Bobby admits. “I know you guys stopped talking as much after high school but there was never any animosity there, so I figured that would be a good fit, but…”

“And then you changed your mind?” Buck asks incredulously. 

“No, I heard about what you said to Ravi about Eddie when you went to watch their practice,” Bobby corrects him, and Buck pales. He’d thought that he’d be safe without Hen and Chimney around to snitch on him, but clearly Judd is both literally and figuratively on Bobby’s payroll, too. “Eddie was good for you before. He made you a better player, and a better person. Maybe he will be again.”

“Bobby, I—”
“Good? Great!” Bobby says quickly, uninterested in whatever Buck was about to say. “Now, on that note—you have to go to your classes, Buck. The Longhorns have a GPA requirement for their athletes, and—”

“Yeah, so did the Mustangs. It was 2.0.”

“Here it’s 2.5. As I said: you have to go. You have enough credits to graduate this year if you really work for it and complete your placement.”

“Placement?”

“You’re a sports science major, Buck. You have to do a placement at Physiotherapy. You’ll meet your mentor next week, okay? He’s a great teacher, I’m told, so listen to him. ”

Buck feels like a petulant child, but that doesn’t stop him from crossing his arms and stomping out of Bobby’s office a few minutes later. 

Eddie is nowhere to be found when Buck returns to his— their —room later, but he’s already staked a claim to the bed on the right side. As Buck unpacks, he can’t help but look over at Eddie’s things. The urge to snoop is intense, but Buck doesn’t do that because he’s a good person. 

He does stroll across the invisible boundary dividing their room in half and have a peek, though.

Wow. Buck really doesn’t remember Eddie being this neat before. Granted, it was five years ago, and Eddie wasn’t exactly a slob even then, but he’s pretty sure the spaces between the stationery on Eddie’s desk is measured down to the millimeter—the corners of his bedsheets are folded together. 

What the fuck?

Unpacking doesn’t take long. His parents turned his room into a home office a month after he went to college and donated everything there, and between the move to Penn to SMU to here, only the basics have survived: clothes (a fuckton of athletic wear, obviously), bedding, a handful of ‘essentials’ that Athena had picked up for him like Lysol and hangers and a fan, and a shoebox that he immediately tucks in the back of his closet without opening. That box is all that survived from his childhood bedroom, and he doesn’t need to look to know every single item in it. 

He also has a Dallas Cowboys poster and a few pictures of his friends—his high school football team, one of him and Ravi at their first tailgate, and a proshot from when he and his girlfriend Lucy won Homecoming King and Queen in senior year. He doesn’t even recognise himself in that photo, but he puts it up anyway. He just seemed so happy. 

There’s this one photo that Carlos took at camp, too, and he sits down on the bed to examine it. It was taken on one of their final days, when they all went swimming in the lake before families came for the game—it’s a landscape shot of the water, all the boys blurs of happy splashing and laughter, but on the left hand side is Eddie. He’s sat beside Carlos, looking at something just out of frame, and Buck’s heart had stopped when he saw it. He’s not one hundred percent sure, but he could swear that it’s him Eddie is looking at. The soft eyes, flushed cheeks, and mouth about to curve into a smile? That’s how Eddie used to look at him.

Until… well.

Buck tucks the photo into one of his notebooks and slots it onto the shelf above his desk. He doesn’t need Eddie seeing it and wondering why he’s kept it all these years. 

Once all his things are put away, Buck looks around his room and wonders when—if—it will start to feel like home. 

His first practice is a shit show.

A few of the players introduce themselves in the locker room while they change, and Ravi keeps up a steady stream of conversation, but there’s no denying the palpable tension in the air—even if Eddie is too moral to say anything, they’ve clearly caught on to their fearless leader’s dislike of Buck.

(Eddie is captain, apparently. When the fuck did that happen?)

Buck is debating superheroes with Ravi—another one of their age-old arguments that eases the tension in Buck’s shoulders because of its familiarity—when he catches something out of the corner of his eye and turns to look. 

Eddie is changing across the room, his back turned as he pulls his pads out of his bag. It was the glint of a buckle that drew Buck’s attention—he has a clunky brace strapped across his shoulder, a mess of straps with a long band that stretches across his back and fastens around his torso. As Buck watches, he lifts the pads gingerly over his head and he can see the way Eddie stiffens at the movement required to get his arm through, pausing halfway before slipping it on and securing it. 

Buck turns away quickly, cheeks flushed, and pretends that he’s been listening to Ravi debate the merits of Black Bolt versus Silver Surfer the whole time. 

Things don’t get better from there. He’s lured into a false sense of security when more players introduce themselves on the field, including Lena and Albert—two people he’s seen Eddie talking to more than once. Lena is a kicker, apparently, and seems surprised when Buck is genuinely excited to be playing on a team with a female player for the first time. Albert is the less reserved of the two, dragging Lena over to talk to Buck when he notices him standing by himself, and even tells him about some social events coming up for the players. 

Bobby walks onto the field, somehow pulling off the garish orange of the Longhorns jacket, and is flanked by Hen and Chimney. Buck shuffles over so he’s on the outside of the crowd, and when they’re close enough and Bobby is gathering everyone he slips away to give them each quick hugs in greeting. 

“—introduce you to your new assistant coaches joining us, Hen and Chimney,” Bobby says, gesturing to them. 

“Yeah, big bro!” Albert shouts as the players clap, making them all laugh as Chimney rolls his eyes. 

“Some of you are already familiar,” Bobby continues with a smile. “But you’ll get to know them very well this season. Along with Judd, they’re who you can go to with any questions or concerns, okay? They are also both trained EMTs, and Hen doubles as our team doctor, so she’ll be coordinating closely with any of you that have injuries or any chronic issues.”

“I’ll be hanging out a lot at PT if anyone wants to stop in, too,” Hen adds. 

“So, let’s get started. Judd, get ‘em warmed up.”

Buck settles into the familiar routine—jogging, jumping jacks, crab walks, stretches—without issue. He knows how to do this, he reminds himself. He may have been off his game for a while, but he’s still very fit—he runs every day outside of practice, pumping his legs until all he can hear is his heartbeat thundering in his ears and every breath feels like a battle. 

He wants the other players to know that he hasn’t just been brought on as some pity case from Bobby. He set records in multiple areas at SMU, and got approached by more than a few high-profile coaches when he went to combines—that was a while ago, though. 

So maybe he runs a little faster than he usually would in warmups, or does ten more pushups than usual. So what? He’s just showing them what he’s made of. 

The problem is, he realises, that he comes across like he’s showing off, not showing them he can keep up. He remembers feeling like Eddie was doing that so many years ago at camp, when everything he did was effortless and felt like a personal attack against Buck—only he’s worse, because he really is trying and everyone knows it. He shouldn’t be huffing by the end of warmups. 

Fuck. 

They move on to drills, but Buck can’t seem to shake his urge to impress everyone. He body checks someone so hard during a shucking drill that he actually flies a few feet in the air before landing hard on the ground, and is so amped up that he almost forgets to check on them.
“Sorry, man,” Buck says, holding out a hand to Kenny. “Got ahead of myself there.”

Kenny stares at him for a beat before standing by himself and walking over to Eddie. They exchange a few words, and then Kenny shakes his head and walks away .

It becomes clearer over the course of the practice that the players look up to Eddie even more than Buck thought they did. They turn to him at the announcement of each new drill to get divided into groups and formations, and many jog up to Eddie after running a route to take his advice with an avid enthusiasm that Buck has never seen towards a captain before. 

They really seem to care what Eddie has to say, and more often than not Buck sees firsthand how the adjustment makes them better players. 

It’s also not lost on Buck that Eddie doesn’t throw much—or play at all, really. He says a few words to Bobby at the beginning of practice and then takes a seat on the bench, occasionally calling players that are standing nearby over to him to give instructions. When they run routes he appears to mark them, going through the motions alongside the other players but not actually throwing the ball at the end of it, instead just mimicking the movement with a hesitancy that reminds Buck about his shoulder. 

Buck wants to ask someone why Eddie doesn’t play, but he knows damn well he won’t get an answer. Everyone on the team worships him, and besides—even if they didn’t, they hate Buck. 

He doesn’t exactly help himself. His half-hearted attempts at conversation are met with polite but terse responses, and his jokes go down even worse. He cracks one about how Ravi plays like he can’t see the ball—he’s long since abandoned his glasses in favour of contacts but told Buck earlier he’d forgotten to wear them today—and the players nearby just glare at him and pointedly turn away. 

It just makes him angrier, which makes him more determined to prove himself. He gets even more aggressive, whooping and banging his chest every time he makes a good play and looking to his new ‘friends’ for support, and he really should’ve guessed that this would just make things worse. 

Stupid.

He goes through the rest of practice alternately fuming and on the verge of tears, unable to decide which he should give in to. When the whistle blows, Bobby calls him over, and he takes his time grabbing his water bottle and removing his helmet before jogging to the bench.

“Hey, Coach, how’d I do?” It’s another bad attempt at a joke, and Bobby just watches him, deadpan. He wilts. “Okay, I know I came on a little strong—”

“You acted like a dog marking its territory, Buck,” Bobby says matter-of-factly, packing his things into his duffel and slinging it over his shoulder. “This field is not a fire hydrant. You can’t just piss all over your teammates and expect them to welcome you with open arms.”

“I was trying to fucking bond,” Buck mutters indignantly, folding his arms, and Bobby scoffs. 

“You were trying to prove you’re better than Eddie,” Bobby shoots back, making Buck stop in his tracks. “But I have news for you: you’re not.”

Buck swallows. He feels sixteen again, watching Bobby pat Eddie on the back and give him an ‘atta-boy’. “He didn’t even play—”

“I know you know he’s injured, Buck, so don’t be an ass.” Bobby sounds exhausted. Buck hates himself for contributing to that. “Eddie got captain after only one year because he demonstrated exemplary leadership on and off the field, and after today I’m certain Coach Singh made the right decision. While I still have no idea what happened between you two, I know he deserves his position—just like you deserve yours.”

Did Buck hear that right?

Bobby sighs. “ I know how good you are. The team doesn’t. That doesn’t mean you have to prove it by knocking over every person you see, okay? You need to play smart, and be more considerate of the people around you. I’m giving you a pass today, but next time you pull any of those stunts in my practice I’m going to make you run laps until your legs fall off. Got it?”

“Got it,” Buck echoes miserably, hanging his head. 

Bobby seems to soften. “You can do this, Buck. You can still be the player I know you are—you can still be Evan Buckley.”

Buck isn’t even sure who that is anymore.

He looks up to watch Bobby walk off and finds Eddie lingering just close enough to still be within earshot, fiddling with the laces on his cleats. When Bobby leaves, Eddie looks up and starts to walk over. 

I’m not like you. 

“And you can mind your own fucking business, Diaz,” Buck snaps, making Eddie halt. 

The Texas sun is beating down on them, making the darkened strands of Eddie’s sweat-slick hair shine like polished ebony in the light as he squints underneath at Buck for several long beats. He seems to be sizing him up, considering him. Finally, he nods—though Buck isn’t sure if it’s meant for him or Eddie himself.

“Suit yourself, man,” Eddie says, and Buck never noticed until now how much deeper Eddie’s voice has gotten in the years since they last saw each other. He shivers despite himself and the blazing sun, frozen as he watches Eddie walk away. 

Fuck.

Chapter Text

Buck 

“Hey, man.”

Buck looks up from the textbook he’s pretending to read to see Ravi standing in the doorway holding a bag of Chinese takeout like a peace offering. “Hey.”

“Can I come in? I brought orange chicken.”

“Of course, yeah,” Buck replies with a grin, shutting the book and standing from his desk. It’s only been a week of lectures, and he’s already tired of kinesiology—it doesn’t help that he’s got plenty of time to study it. 

Ravi takes a seat on the other end of Buck’s bed and begins unloading the containers from the plastic bag onto the comforter between them, glancing at Eddie’s bed with feigned nonchalance. “Eddie not around?” he asks, not looking up at Buck.

“I know he’s in your room, Ravi, I’m not an idiot,” Buck tells him, and Ravi at least has the decency to look sheepish. Buck sighs. “The most time he’s spent in here is when he sleeps, and he only comes in after midnight. He leaves before me for practice, too. Is he just with you the rest of the time, then?”

“Pretty much, yeah,” Ravi admits. “We’re used to being roommates, after all—we’ve already done it for a year.”

“So you—” Buck cuts himself off to lean back against the wall and grab a container of orange chicken, feigning as much nonchalance as possible. “You know him pretty well nowadays?”

“I guess,” Ravi says with a shrug. “We knew each other before, so we kinda stuck together once he came. We kept in contact after camp, too.”

Buck files away that piece of information for later. “He’s only been here for a year, right? Where was he before that?”

Ravi stiffens, a movement so slight it would be imperceptible if Buck didn’t know him so well—some things don’t change, apparently. “Uh, he got a lot of online credits and then did community college for a bit, I think. I don’t know. You’d have to ask him.”

“He got recruited for the Longhorns out of community college?” Buck wants this fact to piss him off even more, but it’s actually impressive. Scouts don’t often look there, and you have to be really impressive to get to transfer part way through your degree. 

“He’s really good,” Ravi replies. 

“Well, I know that,” Buck mumbles. “But he doesn’t even throw right now. When did he get injured?”

There it is. That stiffening of his posture again. “You’d have to ask him that.”

Buck groans. “When will I get the chance to ask him that? All of you get so weird when I ask about his injury. Albert and even Bobby were the same.”

“It’s his story to tell, Buck,” Ravi says, not unkindly. “Either he trusts you enough to tell you himself, or…”

“Right. No, I get it.” Wouldn’t want to betray the trust of your new best friend, obviously. Buck knows he’s being a child, but can’t seem to make himself stop. He sighs. “I just don’t know how Bobby expects us to be friends again.”

“You were super close, once,” Ravi points out through a mouthful of noodles. “He did a lot of good for you, and vice versa. Maybe Bobby’s hoping the same thing will happen again.”

“That’s exactly what Bobby said,” Buck mutters. “Did he—did he ever tell you about…?”

“What happened at camp?” Ravi finishes, and to Buck’s relief he shakes his head. “No. He was just as tight-lipped as you about it, actually, but he was a bit nicer than you are about him.”

He was?

Ravi seems to read his mind, and rolls his eyes. “I’m not gonna play messenger between you two, Buck. Sort your own shit out or punch each other so you can get moved out.”

Buck would be lying if he said he hadn’t considered it. It would be so much easier, after all. He’d be free of Eddie, free to take over the Longhorns like he knows he can. But he doesn’t like violence outside of football, never has, and besides—hitting someone with a bad shoulder just feels like bad karma waiting to happen.

Buck just rolls his eyes instead and passes Ravi the dim sum. They spend several hours together playing video games and talking, and Buck is surprised by the number of times Ravi brings Eddie up in casual conversation. The thing that gets him the most is the fact that it’s clearly not even intentional. They’re just so close nowadays that their lives are intertwined—it’s all, “Eddie loves this game,” or, “the other day, Eddie and I were—” and Buck doesn’t really know what to do about it.

He wonders if Ravi would take his side if he finally told him the whole truth of it; if he told him everything that happened at camp and what Eddie said on the last night. He always used to think so, comfortable in his silence because he was confident in his friend’s reaction, but now he isn’t so sure—and it’s not because Eddie’s poisoned his mind or something.

Well. Maybe.

It’s more just that Ravi now understands Eddie. He’s spent far more time with him than with Buck in recent years, anyway, and Ravi’s always been a pretty good judge of character; he wouldn’t be as close with Eddie as he clearly is if Eddie had behaved that way towards him. 

Ravi didn’t have whatever he and Buck had together, though. 

And it was something, a little voice whispers in his mind. No matter how it ended. 

The next day, Buck checks his schedule for the ninth time. Last night was one of the nights where Eddie didn’t come back to their shared room at all—despite how he feels about the asshole, he has to admit that he sleeps more peacefully knowing where he is. Hearing his breathing from the other side of the room. 

(He doesn’t know why, and doesn’t want to think about it.)

The point is that he didn’t sleep well, which is why he almost misses his alarm in the morning and has to rush to get ready. He opens the door to the Physical Therapy Centre tucked in the recesses of one of the gigantic gyms at 9:05, and the guy leaning against one of the massage tables reading a book does not look impressed.

“You’re late.” It’s not a question.

“Sorry, I—” Buck stops his explanation at the raised eyebrow in his direction and swallows. “Sorry. Won’t happen again.”

“Evan Buckley?” the guy says, checking the clipboard resting on the table. 

“That’s me. Uh, Buck.”

“Buck. I’m Tommy.”

Tommy stands and walks across the room, scanning his clipboard with rapt attention as he maneuvers around the mats and exercise balls with ease. PT is empty this time of morning, and when Tommy speaks again his voice seems to echo against the walls of the cavernous room.

“So, did you do a PT placement at your last college?” he asks. Now that he’s closer, Buck can see that his eyes are kind and not judgmental when he asks the question. 

Buck shakes his head. “No, but I’m a football player, so I’ve been plenty of times. I saw demos in kinesiology classes at SMU, too.”

“You’re the new guy,” Tommy says with a nod. “I’m aware.”

“You don’t sound very… happy about it,” Buck tries in response to Tommy’s blunt tone, to which he cracks a smile. 

“Sorry. Not intentional, truly. I’m a longtime Longhorns fan, so I’ll be rooting for you and the team either way.” Tommy glances at his clipboard again. “So, you’ll be here a few times a week for this semester—don’t worry, we can work around your football schedule.”

After a beat, Buck realises that Tommy has turned and is waiting for him to follow. “Uh—cool, thanks,” Buck says as he hurries to comply. Bobby told him to be on his best behaviour here, so that’s what he’s doing—or trying to, at least. 

Tommy gives him the tour, showing him how to set up for various exercises and where to find fresh towels and stretch bands. It’s pretty easy, all things considered, and when his first patient comes in an hour later Tommy even lets him be the one to wrap her ankle. 

“Pretty good,” Tommy comments as he checks the tension underneath the bandage. He looks up at the girl and smiles. “You know the drill, Sam. Ice it and keep weight off it when you can, and I’ll see you in a few days to get you started on some strengthening exercises.”

“I’ve had more than a few injuries in my time,” Buck says when she leaves by way of explanation. “You get pretty good at KT tape playing football.”

“I remember it well from soccer,” Tommy replies, and at Buck’s questioning look he shrugs. “I was pretty good until I busted my knee just before I graduated, so no pro career for me—not that there’s any money in it compared to football, obviously. That was two years ago, so… here I am.”

There’s something piercing in Tommy’s gaze that Buck hadn’t noticed before, but it’s a look he recognises. And the thing is… Eddie may have been Buck’s first foray into the male gender, but it wasn’t his last. Sure, it was mostly just drunken fumblings at parties—not that it was any different with girls, to be fair—but he’s well aware by now that he swings both ways.

As cocky as it sounds, he never has much trouble finding someone to hook up with when he’s in the mood. He’ll attend a party and by the end of the night he has more than a few offers from boys and girls alike—all they have to do is give him that look and he knows it’s on. 

He thinks he’s getting a similar look from Tommy now, but it’s gone before he can think too much about it. With a swallow, he nods and turns away to examine the free weights on the rack beside them. “So, did you have to do a bunch of rehab?”

“I did,” Tommy confirms. He sounds totally normal—maybe Buck was just making it up. 

( Jesus, he needs to get laid.)

“Are there—a lot of guys on the football team that come here?” Buck asks carefully, still not looking up at Tommy.

“Pretty much everyone swings by at some point, but some of them have more chronic issues that need regular attention, yeah,” Tommy explains, and Buck has to literally bite back the urge to ask what Eddie’s deal is. Tommy wouldn’t tell him anyway, and then he’d just sound desperate. 

He’s saved from holding himself back, though, because just then the main door swings open. Of course it’s Eddie. Of fucking course. 

Eddie has a warm grin on his face when he sees Tommy, but it slips as soon as his eyes flicker over to Buck. He literally stops in his tracks, not moving, and eyes Buck with a kind of suspicion that makes Buck want to yell that he’s not stalking Eddie, he works here, and also why the hell is his injury some kind of big secret?

He doesn’t even get the chance to. Eddie turns on his heel, mumbling something about how he’ll come back later, and disappears as quickly as he came. 

Tommy turns back to Buck with an arched brow, his eyes scrutinizing. “He’s really not a fan, huh?” he says slowly. 

“Camp stuff.” It’s all he can manage, especially when his mind is still zeroed in on the dark circles beneath Eddie’s eyes. 

(Ravi had headed back to his dorm well after midnight last night and Buck couldn’t help but poke his head out to watch him go. He told himself it was to make sure his friend got back safe, but they live three doors apart—really, it was so he could see if Eddie was crashing in his room like usual. Judging by Ravi’s reaction when he opened the door, he was not. He never came back to his and Buck’s room, either—even though he had no right, he couldn’t help but wonder where else Eddie had slept last night.)

Eddie had looked exhausted, is the thing. Buck feels the pit in his stomach growing along with the feeling that it’s his fault.

It goes on like this for another week. Buck and Eddie attend practice together, but besides that Eddie is invisible. He sleeps at Ravi’s and doesn’t eat in the cafeteria, appearing in their shared room only briefly to grab clothes whenever Buck’s at his lectures. Whenever he comes back and the clothes hangers have been moved, Buck curses. He’s missed him again.

He doesn’t like being in their room alone at night, and doesn’t like thinking about why even less. To stay busy once he finds himself heading to Kappa Sigma when he hears of a party. After spending half an hour deciding what to wear he walks over to Fraternity Row, bracing himself as the groups of people thicken nearing the house.

Two steps inside. 

“Is that Buck Buckley?!” someone calls out to his right, and when Buck turns he sees Campbell shouldering through the crowd towards him with his arms outstretched. Several other people turn, following Campbell’s movement as they dap each other up.

“What are you doing here, man?” Buck says when they pull away, grinning. Campbell seems genuinely happy to see him, which—besides Ravi—is a first at this school. 

“I’m Kappa President here, bro!” Campbell says, then turns to the rest of the people gathered around them. It’s only then that Buck registers that Campbell’s wearing a blazer with the Kappa badge on it, along with most of the others nearby—they’re all executive members of his old frat . “Hey, everyone! This is Buck, and he’s a frat fucking legend, okay?”

The guys nearby cheer, coming closer to clap Buck on the back. Clearly, Campbell’s endorsement is enough for them to give him their approval. 

“Buck pioneered the Kappa Sigma Kilo Challenge, and he still has the record keg stand out of every Kappa brother in the country!” Campbell continues, and Buck shrugs, looking down as the crowd continue to shout and dissolve into applause.

Campbell guides him through the crowd and into the kitchen, where only a few people are gathered. Campbell introduces a few as other brothers, but Buck struggles to catch all of their names—his ears are still ringing from the welcome he just received, especially since the journey to the kitchen included several shots offered by Campbell’s exec. 

“I—I can’t believe you’re here,” Buck manages after they’re finally given a second to breathe. For some reason this is harder to process than Ravi being here, but then he remembers. “You don’t play ball here, too, though.”

Campbell’s smile turns down a little at the edges, and he shrugs and rolls his eyes. “C’mon, man. 118 was always the best it was gonna be for me. I’m not good enough to play college, forget about the Longhorns.” He claps Buck on the shoulder. “You, though. You’re gonna go all the way.”

“That’s the plan,” Buck says with a charming smile, slipping easily into the persona he uses for interviews about football. 

“For real, though. I’m surprised I didn’t see you here sooner. Are you a junior?”

Buck shakes his head. “Senior. I transferred my credits from SMU.”

(He might have been a fuckup for the last little bit there, but he did try at school both at Penn and SMU. He somehow had enough credits to graduate this year with semi-decent grades if he works like he used to and fixes his GPA. I’ll be out of college this time next year, he says to himself, and it’s just another thing that he’s too scared to think about.)

“Heard all about you there, man. Watched a bunch of your games, actually, but—you didn’t play much last season,” Campbell says, and it’s not a question but he still sounds curious. 

Buck shrugs. “Had some shit going on,” is all he replies with. In his experience with Campbell, it’s best just to leave it mysterious. It’s how he and Eddie snuck away so often the last few days of camp. 

“Word,” Campbell says, nodding sagely. “I heard all about those parties you threw at the house, though, and—do you wanna join?”

“Don’t I have to rush?”

“You’re Kappa fucking royalty, okay? You transferred your credits, and now you’re transferring your membership.” Campbell pours them both a shot into plastic solo cups and passes Buck one. “Welcome back to the brotherhood.”

They down the shot. That was easy, Buck thinks.

The hangover the next day isn’t as great, but at least he doesn’t have practice. For a few days he hangs out at the frat during all of his free time, helping organise activities and cleanup from several crazy parties despite his head always pounding. It’s a familiar routine, and Buck has to admit—he’s a damn good event planner.

(This is easy. He knows how to do this, at least.)

But Buck isn’t interested in sleeping on the floor of Campbell’s room for the third night in a row, so he trudges back to his building and heaves himself into the elevator, exhausted. They’re doing two-a-days for football now, and his legs are killing him. 

He hopes he’ll open the door to his room and Eddie will be there. 

He isn’t. 

The frat is a good distraction but he has to go back to his room eventually, and every time he curses himself. 

( Why? he practically screams at himself every sleepless night. You’re worried, a tinier voice in his head says. Every time he thinks of Eddie, the first face he sees isn’t the one of barely-concealed disdain and apathy that he’s greeted with now—it’s the smouldering campfire flickering over his face, that shit-eating grin that always made Buck melt. He’s worried for that Eddie.)

Buck even goes back to PT at the same time a few mornings to see if he can catch Eddie, but he’s never successful. Tommy gives him a weird look the third time he does it when he has an evening shift and he just backs out of the room without saying a word. 

So, Eddie’s avoiding him. Clearly. But he can’t avoid him everywhere, because they’re now knee-deep in the training schedule and spend a minimum of three hours together every day. 

The problem is that at practice it’s even worse, because Buck is so close to him that it makes him want to die a little bit. 

He doesn’t know how else to describe it. Their lockers are only a few spaces down from each other, and when Eddie brushes past him once on his way to the shower, bare skin brushing bare skin, Buck leaps at least three feet into the air. He feels like his whole body is buzzing whenever Eddie is nearby, and what kills him even more is that Eddie doesn’t even look over. 

Eddie is just fine without him, and has been for years. He runs the team with the same combination of practiced efficiency and laidback kindness that Buck has always known that he’s capable of, giving orders and shouting praise in the same breath and generally making it obvious that any one of these boys would go to fucking war for him if he gave the command. They group around him in the locker room and on the field, constantly coming up to him and asking for advice—even the other quarterbacks ask for throwing tips, despite Buck having figured out by now that Eddie pretty much never throws anymore.

Because Eddie has changed a little bit, even if it’s not obvious to the others immediately. It’s not even obvious to Buck at first, but as days of practice go by he begins to recognise the shift that he wasn’t able to put his finger on—it’s how he holds himself. There’s something… a tension, maybe, that wasn’t there before. Even in moments where they’re cooling down or stretching before practice Buck can see that his body is drawn taut like a bow, and he’s always the first to react when the whistle blows. He’s constantly just a little bit on edge, and Buck doesn’t really know what to do with that information.

Buck is watching this in action early in the week. The guys are ribbing each other in the locker room as they change, shouting across the room about something—Buck can’t follow what it is—when he sees Eddie out of the corner of his eye. He has his back to the rest of the group even though they’re trying to involve him and keeps one hand on his shoulder brace, not moving an inch. He looks a million miles away. 

Then in a flash, the distant look in his eye is gone and he’s turning around to join in the conversation. “Did you just say you wore your jersey on the plane, Sanchez?”

Sanchez shrugs in response, grinning. “What can I say? I like to represent,” he replies.

“Nah, he just thinks orange is his best colour,” someone else calls out, and everyone laughs. 

“That’s the only way the flight crew’ll know he’s a player,” Buck adds. 

He knows immediately that he’s made a mistake when the entire room goes dead silent in a matter of seconds, several heads turning to stare at him. If he was truly a member of the team, his joke would be taken as exactly what it is: a joke. But he’s not, so it isn’t. It just sounds like yet another insult hurled by someone who doesn’t know them. 

Pointedly, the group changes the topic of conversation and they move on, leaving Buck sat on the bench with only one shoe on wondering how he managed to fuck it up so quickly. 

“You gotta stop doing that, man,” a voice from beside him says, jolting him from his spiral. It’s Eddie, and he’s shaking his head without looking up at him. “You’re not doing yourself any favours.”

“Then by all means, don’t start trying to fix it now. I’m sure I’ll get booted off the team soon enough and you can go back to pretending I never existed.”

Eddie looks up at him at that, jersey paused halfway down his torso as he studies Buck carefully. There’s something in his eyes that Buck can’t name, maybe surprise at the venom in Buck’s voice. “Sure,” he says finally. He’s quiet now. “Because that’ll make it all better.”

Buck stares at him for another beat, noting the sarcasm but unsure what to do with it. “Whatever,” he mutters after a long pause, bending down to tie his shoelace, and he hears a sharp huff of breath beside him and the sound of Eddie walking away. 

So he can’t do anything right when it comes to bonding with the team—but the problem is, he can’t do anything right on the field, either. 

Something in Buck just can’t bring himself to behave whenever Eddie’s on the field. Despite every cell in his body screaming at him to comply and show them all how he can play, how Buck’s actually good— especially when Eddie’s on the other end of the ball—his intentions go out the window when he hears I’m not like you in his head, and then he’s jerking his body right instead of left. 

At every opportunity he tries to turn it into a winning moment for him . He fumbles routes in his attempt to break through a block and score instead of passing or sends smaller players flying instead of holding them in place like he’s supposed to. Everything he does is too much, too big, and it always seems to go wrong, but it’s like he can’t stop himself. 

He can see Bobby watching every time—he can see Eddie, actually, his dark eyes somehow still piercing from thirty yards away in a helmet, and that’s so much worse—but he doesn’t know how to fix it.

About a week after his conversation with Ravi in his room, Buck is playing on the opposing team when he shucks a block and dives straight for Eddie. It’s not what he’s supposed to do, and it’s not the cleanest of tackles, but Eddie is the fastest on the team by a mile and he wants to show that he can catch him. 

He really doesn’t mean for Eddie to fall onto the shoulder Buck knows is injured. They twist, Eddie scrambling for purchase on the ball as Buck hangs on to take him down, and suddenly they’re careening to the ground and Eddie is on the wrong side. Shitshitshitshitshit. 

Buck doesn’t know how he does it, but he shoves himself forward just in time and Eddie’s shoulder hits Buck’s instead of the ground. Despite the cradling of the impact, it still makes a sickening crunch sound when their pads collide—in an instant, several players are sprinting towards them and calling out worriedly.

“Eddie! You okay?” Ravi says, panting as he leans over them and comes into view. His eyes are flitting anxiously between Eddie’s face and his shoulder, judging for injury. 

Eddie isn’t looking at Ravi. He’s looking at Buck. His eyes flicker just once to the spot where their shoulders are touching, Eddie still half-sprawled over Buck’s body, and then back up at Buck. Neither of them move. Buck isn’t actually sure he breathes.

More players arrive, including Lena. “What the fuck did you do to him, Buckley?” she demands, kneeling down to examine Eddie. Albert says nothing but joins her in helping Eddie carefully sit up, both of them looking stricken. 

“His first season throwing,” someone mutters behind them, and Buck looks over at Eddie. 

“You okay? Did your shoulder—”

“Man, what happened?”

“Buckley went straight for him—”

“I’m fine,” Eddie says bluntly, holding up his other hand. Everyone goes silent, just as Bobby and the assistant coaches break through the crowd. Eddie doesn’t look up at them, instead glancing back over at Buck. “Evan got me.”

Buck shivers. Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck. 

There are a few experimental rolls of his shoulder and probing from Hen when she arrives, but eventually they believe Eddie that he’s uninjured. It takes a while for Buck to believe it himself—not when their collision made the sound that it made, that crunch. Buck’s seen plenty of bones break before, and he thought for sure he’d messed up Eddie’s shoulder permanently. 

Eddie is pretty calm the whole time though, wincing only once when Hen tests his range of motion but telling her that it always twinges at that angle. Everyone stays bunched around Eddie, worried for their captain, and Buck doesn’t move either—he stays crouched beside Eddie, waiting to be told to move out of the way, but he isn’t. 

Bobby stands right above him, watching with a carefully calm expression as Hen makes her assessment. When someone asks again what happened, Bobby’s eyes are the first to flick to Buck.

Eddie’s are the second. “Buckley made himself a crash mat,” he says, his eyes glinting, and the players laugh, finally placated by their fearless leader’s calmness. 

It takes a moment but Buck remembers to laugh too, leaning back on his hands. “Excellent reflexes,” he says with a faux-nonchalant shrug, but this time his cocky joke doesn’t go down like a ton of rocks.

Instead, Eddie laughs along with the others. When Hen announces that he really is fine, he just grins and takes Ravi’s offered hand to get up, his gaze going to Buck one more time. Something in Buck’s chest lightens. 

He’s still on the ground and Eddie’s smile is enough to melt him into it, bright like it used to be when he looked at Buck at camp. He blinks and he’s in the water again, pulling himself up onto the dock and looking over at Eddie beside him, sun-drenched and dripping and glorious. 

Massage table, his brain supplies without warning. Isolation cabin. 

Why couldn’t Eddie’s smile have changed, too? 

Instead the familiarity of it triggers a cascade of memories, not all of them safe for work. He thinks about Eddie over him, under him, the taste of him. He finds himself, wildly, wondering if Buck would still be able to pick him up now that they’re closer in height, and this thought is what makes him realise that he’s rapidly hardening and his shorts will do nothing to hide it. 

He scrambles to his feet, brushing himself off, and allows Bobby to clap a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll yell at you for screwing up the route later,” he says quietly. “Good job catching him.”

“Even though it was my fault?” Buck says, because he can’t help himself. Eddie wouldn’t have been in danger of injury in the first place if Buck had done what he was supposed to. 

Bobby shakes his head. “Just… good job.”

Buck’s head is spinning when he returns to his room from practice. Their first game is Friday night, only a few days away, and Buck knows he’s still not in the good books with anyone on the team. Bobby may have (mostly) let his endangerment of Eddie slide, but his teammates are all too aware of all the ways that fall could’ve ended up differently, and have no problem letting him know. 

They ice him out in no uncertain terms for the rest of practice, and Buck pretty much gives up—he knows he’ll do something to fuck it up like being ultra-aggressive again if he actually tries to fix it, so he just lets them ignore him and half-asses everything until he can high-tail it out of there.

He stays in his room for only a few minutes before he texts Campbell and asks what Kappa is doing tonight, to which he’s instantly invited to a gaming session at the house. He heads over feeling a little lighter, comforted by the fact that at least these guys like him, and spends several hours wiping the floor with his brothers on NBA All-Stars.

When he comes back to the room a little after midnight, it’s still empty. Eddie’s bed sheets are so unused that they aren’t even rumpled, and Buck glares at the spot for several minutes before he realises what he’s doing and turns over to fall into a fitful sleep, still thinking about the look Eddie had given him when Buck took the brunt of their collision. 

Buck is brought out of his sleep to see light only just beginning to bloom on the horizon, and then realises what woke him up—it’s Eddie. 

He’s carefully picking his way across the floor and slipping his hoodie off, climbing into bed in just his basketball shorts. It’s clear that Eddie hasn’t noticed that Buck’s awake, and Buck works to keep his breathing even in the silent room as Eddie sits down facing him. He’s surprised Eddie is here, but is more surprised when the other man doesn’t move for several minutes. The window on his side provides just enough light to illuminate his face, and Buck realises that Eddie is still because he’s watching him. He seems deep in thought, pensive, and Buck has the urge to shout or leap out of bed just to scare him—but he doesn’t want to interrupt the moment as he watches the tension slowly but surely bleed from Eddie’s shoulders. 

Eventually, Eddie lets out a soft sigh and slips under the covers. Buck listens for several more minutes, waiting, until finally he hears Eddie’s breathing deepen as he falls asleep.

Buck joins him moments after that. He doesn’t want to think about why. 

Eddie

Eddie’s come up with a good routine. 

He goes to the gym or to PT after late practice. He’s done this for a long time, still needing to work some excess energy off before bed, but now he has the added task of stretching out his shoulder—he might think squeezing a rubber ball is bullshit, but has to admit that he’s made more leaps and bounds in the few months he’s been in rehab with Tommy than he did when… well. Before that. 

It’s good, Eddie reminds himself constantly. He needs to take the time to himself to wind down at the end of the day. It totally has nothing to do with the fact that he’s waiting for Buck to go to sleep to head back to their room. 

It’s not that the spare bed in Ravi’s room isn’t comfortable, because it is—although he knows he has a standing invitation to crash there whenever he wants, it feels wrong to encroach on Ravi’s space after he finally got a room to himself. Besides, slipping in and out of his and Buck’s room just to grab clothes and change gets old quickly. It’s his room too, he decides. He shouldn’t be afraid of it. 

(It has nothing to do with the fact that he hasn’t slept for more than two hours a night for the last week. He used to be able to sleep anywhere. )

The first night he goes back to their room—after what he’s now dubbed in his head as Tackle Gate—he has an internal battle with himself for several minutes. Buck’s treated him like shit since he arrived, and basically tried to kill him today. There’s no reason that he shouldn’t stay in Ravi’s room, or crash somewhere else. He has plenty of friends who’d take him in. 

But he’d seen Buck a few hours ago, stalking out of their building in the direction of Fraternity Row. He’d heard from some guys on the team that Buck was a member of Kappa before he transferred and has now rejoined, and secretly he’s glad—no doubt that Buck is the life of the party there, and he could do with hanging around people who actually like him. Still, he’d looked angry when he left. On edge, maybe. Eddie doesn’t quite know what to do with that. 

He doesn’t know what to do with Tackle Gate, either. The thing is that it happened in slow motion for him—the few steps he took with Buck’s arms locked around his waist before they both went down, the blur of Buck’s body moving beneath him to take the brunt of the fall. He saw the flash of worry turn into determination on Buck’s face before he moved. 

So he finds himself leaving Ravi’s room when the sun is already coming up and tiptoeing into their room, but it takes him a while to decide he actually is staying. He’s tired, he reasons. Buck doesn’t have any lectures in the morning, he’s pretty sure, so he’s confident that he can get out of there without him seeing. 

And he does. His alarm goes off just after eight, and he slips out of bed carefully to head to the cafeteria before his own lecture. Buck is none the wiser. 

Now Eddie leaves Ravi’s room or the gym after midnight, always entering the room only after Buck is asleep, then sneaks out in the morning and busies himself during the day. He tells himself it’s just so he can get some rest—which he does. 

A few times Buck isn’t in bed when Eddie goes in, and he debates going back to Ravi’s to wait a little longer before trying again. He caves, though, and when he wakes up the next morning Buck’s bed hasn’t been slept in. He can’t help but wonder where Buck is even though he has no right to, and the fact that he’s curious puts him in an even worse mood than before.

At practice, Buck is much the same. Eddie is constantly aware of his presence nearby, and more than once can feel Buck’s eyes on him while he talks or plays or watches, but they never talk—Buck just looks, and then goes on the field and steadfastly ignores everything Bobby and the coaches tell him to do. Eddie can tell they’re getting exasperated, but he knows what Bobby knows—Buck is like a puppy, and he just has to be rapped on the nose enough times for him to get the message. 

Eddie’s plan of patience lasts for only three more practices. 

“The game is in two days, man. What the hell are you doing?” Eddie asks him after he fumbles a route for the fifth time in a row. 

“What the hell am I doing? What the hell are you doing?” Buck bites back, though they both know he’s not making sense. Eddie has been running the route perfectly every time. 

“You’re a waste of God-given talent, Buck,” Eddie tells him, and something in Buck’s expression hardens. 

“Well, I wouldn't want to disappoint God, would I?” Buck retorts, rolling his eyes. “I know how much you believe in him.”

Eddie frowns as Buck stalks off, but makes no move to follow him. His head hurts. “You’re more than this,” he calls after him finally, but Buck pauses for less than a second before he continues walking. 

Buck continues to dominate in drills, but every time they get on the field he’s a mess. If he was anyone else, Eddie would pull them aside and talk to them. He might not be one for feelings himself, but he’s pretty good at getting people to open up—he’s found over the years playing football that a lot of players get in their head about things, and that they find it helpful to talk it out with him. He can see in Buck what he’s seen plenty of times before, the fear and the nerves and the misplaced vigor. 

But Buck isn’t like the other players, because he also has this air of anger that Eddie can’t really explain. He knows it’s directed at him, but he also doesn’t know what to do about it. 

Some of the other guys begin to warm to Buck more. Ravi has always been his friend, but now Albert will drift over to their conversation occasionally in the locker room along with a few other players. They’re not close by any means, but they’re not actively ignoring him like a lot of the others seem to be. 

The locker room is… a lot. Eddie can feel Buck’s eyes on him often, and though he tries to keep his shoulder brace concealed whenever possible he knows that Buck is curious about it—he even pressed Ravi for more information a while ago. That’s part of the reason that he’s made a point not to come back to PT when he knows Buck has a shift—if he sees Tommy treat him, he might have more questions, and if he gets answers… Eddie doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know how to reckon the Eddie that Buck knew all those years ago with the Eddie that he is now. He feels like a completely different person, and—well, if he’s being honest, he doesn’t want Buck to feel that too. 

He hasn’t changed completely, though. He sees Buck heading for the shower in just a towel one day, all broad shoulders and rippling muscles, and his mouth goes dry. Sure, Buck was decently big before, but he’s a fucking tree now. He may still feel the same zing of arousal, but if Eddie was the same Eddie he used to be, he’d be climbing Buck like a fucking jungle gym by now. 

Thank God he’s different. 

Twice, Buck shows up to practice hungover. It’s not immediately obvious and he still works just as hard, but Eddie can see the pallor of his face and knows that he didn’t get in until very late—or he didn’t come back at all. He knows that Kappa host some pretty wild parties, but didn’t think Buck would want to participate given their first game is so soon. 

Clearly, he doesn’t know Buck as well as he thought he did. 

A year and a half after camp, Eddie tried calling Buck. 

He’d been thinking about it on and off since he got in that damn taxi, but as pressure on him—at home, at school, in football—rose, more and more he found that the one person he wanted to talk to about it was Buck.

Buck would understand, he thought. No matter what happened between them, he thought—hoped—that Buck would hear him out. 

On Christmas Eve, his parents had a massive fight. He’d just told them about his plans for college, and they blew up at him. His sisters cried, his mom cried, and he even got a little teary-eyed but kept it tamped down because his dad would never let him hear the end of it otherwise. He was in his room and could hear his parents shouting in the living room, making no attempts to lower the volume despite the late hour. 

Even though it was late, and even though it was Christmas Eve, Eddie still dialed the number. He asked Ravi for it on a whim during one of their late night gaming sessions a few months ago, and Ravi had paused but complied—it had sat in the back drawer of his desk until then, but that night he thought he needed it. 

He didn’t get the scrap of paper. He knew the number by heart. 

Ring. Ring. Ring.

What if he didn’t pick up? Even worse, what if he did pick up?

“We’re sorry. The number you have dialed is not in service. If you would like to—”

Eddie was up and rummaging through his drawer in a flash. Maybe he got the number wrong. Digging it out, he called again. 

Ring. Ring. Ring.

“We’re sorry. The—”

So much for that plan. 

That night, tucked in his bed and listening to Buck snore softly across the room, Eddie dreams of the last thing on his mind before he drifts off to sleep: Buck. 

He dreams of the first bonfire they had at camp, where his arm pressed against Buck’s for two hours felt like every possibility in his life branching before him. It’s perhaps the most confident he’s ever felt, even compared to the first time he realised he was actually good at football. He knew Buck wanted him, knew he wanted Buck, and knew that he was going to get what he wanted. 

Besides, Buck had told him the first time they kissed, begged him, practically— don’t think. And Eddie always had been good at following orders. 

That time between where they were waiting for their friends to leave, pausing what they both knew they were hurtling towards… that was something else . It seemed to stretch on forever, but in a way that was practically euphoric. He was somewhere new with new friends, looking up at millions of stars and sitting under them with a group of people he felt no pressure from. They were just there for him, and all he had to do was listen and make jokes and tell stories. Be himself. 

And Buck was beside him, fire-sated and grinning lazily as he listened the whole time. He was quieter than usual, but no one noticed—only Eddie felt the way Buck’s whole body occasionally vibrated with want, the way he pressed closer into Eddie’s side under the guise of being tired. 

No matter what happened after, this moment was perfect to him. 

Certainty. Joy . 

His dreams of just this single moment, something in him letting out a deep sigh, and he drifts back under the waters of dreamless sleep thinking of Buck pressed into him steadily, like a gentle glow, like a heartbeat, like a promise. 

He inhales, gasping. 

He’s surfaced not into wakefulness but war, and his shoulder is no longer glowing. It’s bleeding. 

Screams. Rifle fire. The burn of acrid smoke from the Blackhawk nearby. 

Down! We’re going down!

It all sounds the same to him, a smear of horror across his eardrums. He’s dreamed of this enough to recognise it. 

“We need—immediate air support,” someone—Sanders, maybe?—shouts. “Multiple wounded. We need evac, now —”

He’s firing back, refusing to look down at his now completely numb arm, but suddenly his clip is empty and his gun has disappeared. This isn’t how it happened, but he dreams of it anyway. His gun is gone, his friends are all gone. His arm is gone , too. A mess of sinew and blood and totally useless as he looks back up and thinks half-hysterically, I should tell them I’m just a kid. Maybe then they won’t—

Screaming. It’s his. 

“Eddie!”

Buck

Eddie comes to about as violently as can be expected, given how violently he was dreaming: thrashing, gasping for air, and these small noises that make him sound like a wounded animal. It sounds like something clawing out of him . 

“Eddie,” Buck says again, putting a knee on the mattress as Eddie reaches out blindly. “Eds.” 

His hand is still extended towards Eddie’s uninjured shoulder where he had intended to—he didn’t know, actually. Are you supposed to wake sleepwalkers? He couldn’t think of the words Eddie had been mumbling and crying out, or how Eddie had panted like he was fighting for his life. All he knew was that he needed the wounded sounds Eddie was making to stop. 

Eddie’s hands find Buck’s forearms and his eyes fly open, but it’s like he’s still not fully seeing. “Eds,” Buck says again, leaning down and putting a gentle hand over his chest, and Buck’s voice seems to ground him. Eddie sits up, scrabbling at his bicep, and Buck holds on for dear life.

In the dim light Buck can see Eddie’s eyes focussing and recognises the moment Eddie realises he’s no longer dreaming. He’s breathing raggedly, shaking his head, but he finally stops flailing around and his grip on Buck loosens a little. 

“Eddie, hey,” Buck finds himself saying, over and over again. “It’s okay. You’re safe. You’re safe.”

He has the wild urge to lift his hand from Eddie’s chest to stroke his face, his hair, but this isn’t that. After a few more moments of panting, Eddie finally lets go of Buck and heaves out a breath. 

“Sorry,” is all he can croak out as he turns his head away and shuffles back on the bed, and Buck sits back. As he withdraws his hand from Eddie’s chest, his fingertips brush over the rough skin of his scar.

“Don’t be sorry,” he replies. “Seriously. It’s okay.” 

He tries to make it clear that he really does mean it, but it’s obvious that Eddie wants space. He retreats slightly, but stays perched on the edge of the bed. He can’t get the image of Eddie’s wild fear out of his head, and as he watches Eddie rake a hand through his hair and rub at his eyes, chest still heaving slightly, it’s clear that Eddie hasn’t forgotten it either. 

“Sorry,” Eddie says again, but his voice sounds a little steadier. He still hasn’t looked up at Buck.

“Please don’t apologise,” Buck says, realising he sounds a little pleading. He doesn’t know how to comfort someone from a nightmare—not when he knows, somehow, that Eddie was dreaming not of a made-up threat but of a memory. He pauses. “You, uh—you were talking. A bit.”

It feels wrong not to say anything about it, but Eddie stills all the same. “What…what did I say?” he says slowly.

Buck swallows. “Just something about a Blackhawk.”

That really was all he could make out, but he won’t push more out of Eddie. He won’t pry or investigate or interrogate. Not like this. Not with him. 

Eddie

Fuck. 

The terror still pounding in his heart slowly bleeds away, leaving a different kind of terror that Buck saw him like this—wild-eyed, screaming. It’s been a while since it’s happened, but he remembers all too well the fear on Sophia’s face when she woke him up and he nearly flew across the room. He doesn’t want to see that from Buck, he can’t.

Slowly, Eddie turns his head to look at him. He’s going to have to confront it sometime. Instead of finding fear, though, he finds worry. Concern. There’s an openness to Buck’s features only worsened by his sleep-rumpled form that makes Eddie feel like they’re back in the isolation cabin at camp, whispering confessions into the darkness. He’d thought that the things he was holding back then—the guilt, the pressure—was the heaviest he could manage.

He finds himself, absurdly, wanting to laugh. If only he knew.

Eddie passes a hand across his face and swallows hard, his throat feeling raw. Maybe it’s the darkness that makes it easier to speak, to forget that they’re supposed to hate each other right now. And Eddie does hate Buck. Just… not at this moment.

He knows, too, that Buck will guard this secret with his life. Despite everything, he doesn’t question that.

“Afghanistan,” he whispers finally, and the word scrapes at his throat. “Signed up right out of high school.”

Buck is clearly working to keep his face impassive, but Eddie doesn’t miss the way his jaw tightens. Though Eddie knows he must have a million questions, he doesn’t ask them—and Eddie is relieved. He doesn’t know what would come spilling out if he truly let the dam open up. 

“Thank you for telling me,” is all Buck says in the end. “Do you want to talk about it?”

Eddie is shaking his head before Buck finishes the sentence, because he won’t. He can’t. “Not tonight,” he says hoarsely, and Buck nods and nudges the water bottle on his nightstand towards him. Eddie feels oddly pliant right now as he complies, taking a small sip, and the cool water grounds him as it slides down his throat. 

“Okay,” Buck says, sliding off the bed after a beat. Eddie feels oddly cold without Buck beside him. “Get some rest.”

When Buck climbs back into his own bed, Eddie expects him to roll over and go to sleep without another word—instead, he turns on the tiny lamp above his bed, providing just enough light to see what’s in front of him, and grabs a book from his desk. 

“You’re not—sleep?” It’s not the most eloquent Eddie’s ever sounded, but he ignores it.

Buck shrugs. “Couldn’t sleep before, anyway,” he says, even though Eddie saw the pillow marks on his face when he came over. “Besides—early lecture, so…” He waves the textbook and turns back to the page. 

They may not be able to voice their confessions aloud like they did back at camp, but Eddie knows what Buck is saying: you rest. I’ll keep watch. I’ll be here.

He’d be lying if he said it didn’t take him a while to go to sleep after that. When he does finally drift off, though, he dreams of nothing but the bonfire, the flames crackling and sending embers of promises into the endless night sky.

Chapter Text

Eddie

Eddie can hear the crowd from the locker room like they’re right beside him. 

It feels like his eardrums might actually burst before he gets on the field. It’s obvious that the other guys on the team can feel the energy, too, because they’re more restless than usual—it’s to be expected, given it’s their first game and it’s against Alabama. Talk about hitting the ground running. 

Eddie busies himself going around to some of the younger guys, engaging them in small talk or talking through strategy to calm them down. It helps him, too. Ravi is bounding around the locker room like his ass is on fire, talking excitedly to anyone and everyone.

Buck is totally still. This fact is unusual enough that it catches Eddie’s eye more than once, but he doesn’t look over at him—he hasn’t really known how to talk to him since the other night. 

(Since Buck woke him up and calmed him down. Since he stood guard for him. Since… anyway.)

It’s not that Buck’s been acting any differently than usual, to be fair—he’s still mildly standoffish at the best of times and pretty aggressive in practice—but he also has been staying in most nights and staying up late reading, mumbling to Eddie that he needs to study. 

He also hasn’t brought up what happened. At all. 

So for the most part, Buck’s been his usual self, and that’s why this change catches Eddie’s eye—Buck’s always a bundle of energy, and now he’s not moving. He’s sat on the bench and leaning against his locker, his eyes closed with headphones covering his ears. Eddie can hear the music from here, but he’s surprised that it’s not metal or rap or any of the hype music that he’s used to. Instead, it seems to be some kind of experimental jazz—Eddie catches bursts of trumpet dissolving into a trilling piano, and he fights not to walk over and ask Buck why he picked it. 

Eddie has other things to worry about, anyway. Like winning. 

He focuses on the roar of the crowd for a moment, grounding himself. He might not be playing much today—he’s already been told in no uncertain terms about that —but he’ll be stepping onto the field in a league game for the first time since he enlisted. It’s something he’s been working towards since it happened almost two years ago. After doggedly focusing on it with the same narrowmindedness he used to apply to football in high school, today’s the day he makes it happen. 

Bobby walks in along with the assistant coaches, and everyone quiets down. 

“Alright, Longhorns,” Bobby says with a nod. “First game, and we’re going against one of the greats… but we’re better. Am I right?”

The team shouts their approval. 

“Just like we practiced,” Bobby continues. “I can tell you to blitz the left side and keep the ball moving, but what I really want to say is this: you’ve put in the work. Now’s the time for it to pay off. I want every Crimson Tide player and fan to know exactly what it means to  be a Longhorn, and what it means to step onto our field. This is our field, our time, our game!” 

Eddie’s heartbeat is thundering in his ears as he jogs out of the tunnel, and he’s actually thankful for it because it almost drowns out the raucous noise of the crowd. Many of them have been queuing for hours to get into the stadium, and Eddie knows plenty of alcohol has been supplied along the way. That combined with the heat has made them more than a little antsy to support their respective teams—and, more likely, simply watch a bunch of guys crash into each other for a few hours. 

It’s nowhere near Eddie’s first time running through the tunnel, but this is the first college league game he’s fully playing in. He spent a year on the sidelines hyping up his teammates, and now is his turn to show everyone why he was made captain in the first place. He’s seen the comments online—fellow students and longtime Longhorns fans alike—wondering why a guy like him was chosen. His high school record was impressive, his team winning the state championship two years in a row, and he won all kinds of awards—but then he went to war instead of a college team. 

It’s been three years since he played competitively, and part of him worries sometimes—a lot of the time, actually—that he missed his chance. That he’ll never play like he used to. But now is his chance to prove the fans and himself wrong, and he’s ready. His brace is on tight, his shoulder feels good, and he’s filled with energy that’s only buoyed by the supportive cheers from the stands and the marching band blaring out ‘Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.’

Somewhere in that crowd is his sister, Sophia. She promised him earlier in the week that she’d be there, and he got the text this morning that she’d made the nine hour drive safely. The rest of his family is nowhere to be found, but… well, that’s to be expected. 

He’s distracted throughout the various announcements and stands half-heartedly for the anthem, unable to help but notice the way Buck’s mind is clearly wondering as well. Beside Eddie, he can see the other boy scanning the crowd while a country singer drawls through a truly heinous rendition of ‘Star-Spangled Banner’, and wonders if he’s looking for his family, too. He knows Buck wasn’t close to his parents, but Maddie wouldn’t miss the opportunity to support her little brother in his first game for the Longhorns. He hopes he finds her in the crowd, and that her presence grounds him a little. 

He locks in when the whistle blares and the game begins, the familiar crunch of pads colliding drawing his eyes away from the crowd and to the field. The Tides gain ten yards, but there’s an immediate push and pull evident in the plays—every yard is fought for and just as quickly relinquished as the other team surges forward, and it’s quickly clear that this is going to be a hard won battle. 

The first touchdown comes barely ten minutes in, the Tides breaking through the Longhorns defense and leaving a gap for their quarterback to dart through. He’s in the end zone before most of the Longhorns even know what happened, and out of the corner of his eye Eddie sees Bobby shaking his head and folding his arms over his chest. He remembers that face from camp, but anyone could tell what he's feeing right now—he’s not happy. 

“Eddie, you’re up.” Bobby’s voice shakes him from his reverie, and he stands from the bench. “Next down, you’re going on. Get warm.”

Bobby walks right past Buck.

Eddie steps out onto the field, and everything slows down. The crowd’s cheers turn into a dull roar in his ears, sort of like getting onto an airplane. His focus narrows only to the six feet in front of him as he jogs across the grass with the other players and waits for them to gather around him. 

He glances up, and now he takes in his team. He’s glad to see little nerves, but he also knows everyone is staring at him—wanting to take him in, too. They’re all focusing on him, and Eddie chooses to believe that it’s because they’re waiting for him to tell them the play rather than gauging if he can actually do this.

“You heard what Coach said, boys. Our field, right?” When the team nods, he continues. “Trips right, Z-drive, alert X-fade, on one on one.”

They clap and turn to face the Crimson Tides in perfect unison, Eddie taking his place behind the centre as he scans their formation. 

“Mike 33, Mike 33! Jet left!” he shouts, and the wide receiver, Williams, sprints behind the O-line. He’s quick enough that the Crimson Tides are still shifting to cover him when Eddie continues, just as he planned. “Set… HUT!”

The ball snaps back into his hands, and everything lurches into motion at once. There are grunts as offense collides with defense, knocking them over or shifting them back a few paces so that Eddie can move. He sees his route in his head, drilled into him in countless practices and strategy sessions. This is nothing he hasn’t done a million times before. 

Eddie fakes right and darts through the gap in the defense, clearing enough space to pass to Williams and screeching to a halt just before the linebacker in front of him can close his arms around Eddie’s waist. The linebacker changes direction, heading for Williams, though the receiver manages to make it several more yards before going down. The crowd erupts, but Eddie’s heart is still pounding in his chest. 

He’s done enough rehab and tackling drills since he got injured to know exactly what happens if he gets hit—it’s not comfortable by any means, but ninety percent of the time he takes it without issue. 

It’s just that the remaining ten percent holds so much danger that sometimes he feels like he can’t breathe when he thinks about it. One hit could give him an aching shoulder rippling with pins and needles for the rest of the day, but another one placed in just the right spot could leave him with little or no function in that arm.

(He doesn’t tell many people about that last part. He just tells them to be a little more mindful with him than they are with others in drills, and leaves it at that—the coaches know, though, and every time he gets hit he can feel them holding their breath. He’s pretty sure he does the same.)

So what if he’s extra cautious sometimes? That’s just maximizing the longevity of what is objectively a short career. That’s just being smart. 

That’s just being scared.

A minute later they line up again, and Eddie calls a dummy play. The Crimson Tides are overthinking it now, and fall for it easily—after they surge in the wrong direction Eddie is able to pretty much jog his way to the end zone, the ball clutched under one arm. 

When he reaches the final line on the field he drops the ball and pumps his fists, allowing himself one brief moment of celebration while the crowd celebrates and shouts along with him. Somewhere in there, he knows, is Sophia. She’s probably crying by now, overcome with joy—this is Eddie’s first touchdown in his college career, and it’s something that no one thought he’d be capable of anymore. He knows he’s not playing anywhere near the way he used to, but… it might still be enough. 

It’s a brief moment, but it’s a moment of unadulterated joy nonetheless. Eddie allows himself a second of wondering how the fuck he got here from where he came from, his teammates joining him after a second to jump on top of him, and then they’re jogging back to their positions with a new lightness in their chests. Suddenly, Eddie knows they can win. He knows they will. 

He becomes less sure when Buck walks out onto the field. Dimly, he can hear the announcement of Buck’s status as a newcomer to the Longhorns blaring over the loudspeaker, but it all fades away as he watches Buck jog steadily in his direction, his expression unreadable under his helmet. 

Eddie glances behind him at Bobby, who holds up a series of complicated hand gestures that Eddie reads in an instant: he wants Eddie to throw. Maybe he thinks that the pressure will be what makes Buck finally cooperate with him, and Eddie can’t help but wonder if he’s right—Buck always did play better when he had something to prove. 

“Nice of you to join us, Buckley,” Ravi says when he arrives, grinning. 

Buck grins back, and for a moment he seems like his old self. “Couldn’t let you guys have all the fun, could I?” he replies, and then turns to Eddie expectantly.

“Right. Um.” Eddie takes a moment to collect himself, and then gathers everyone in the huddle. “Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do: trips right, gun 22 Z slant, X bubble, on one.”

The players look at each other excitedly, and then glance with a little more nerves showing at Buck. “You’re throwing?” Ravi asks.

“Got a problem with that?” Eddie replies, arching a brow in challenge, and Ravi laughs and shakes his head. 

“Hell no, Captain.”

“Okay. We good?” Eddie is asking the team, but he’s really asking Buck. For all the animosity between them, Eddie understands the pressure the other man is under right now to do well—if Buck doesn’t want to do this, he won’t make him. 

Buck is the first to nod, and Eddie repeats the call one more time before clapping to break the huddle and taking his place behind the center. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Buck going about his usual routine in the moments before the whistle blows—digging the studs of his cleats into the grass, shaking out his hands, and scanning both the opposition and his own team’s formation. Eddie’s glad to see that he’s paying attention, at least. 

Somehow, Eddie knows how it’s going to go before the snap of the ball. Buck has taken position, but he’s holding himself taut in a way that makes Eddie feel uneasy before anyone moves. When the whistle blows, Buck sprints a few steps and then changes direction to run diagonally, just like he’s supposed to. He’s a blur on the field, already halfway down, and Eddie prepares himself. 

He scans the players and takes another three paces back to dodge the linebacker diving for him, rears his arm back, and then he’s locking eyes with Buck who’s already turning and releasing the ball from his fingers, sending it spiralling through the air. His shoulder smarts a little, reminding him of his weakness, but the ball sails forty yards easily before it starts to come down. He watches it with baited breath, totally frozen.

Buck fumbles.

It’s a bad fumble, the kind where the crowd actually groans in disappointment because it could’ve been such an easy touchdown, and both Buck and Eddie know it. Buck is still for several long beats before he moves, staring at the ball bouncing across the grass as if questioning how it slipped through his fingers so easily. The truth is that Buck overshot it, enthusiastically tracking the arc of the ball and going too long by several yards. Though sometimes a play like this failing can come down to errors by both the quarterback and the wide receiver, there’s no denying here that this is Buck’s mistake. 

After the game, the mood in the locker room is mixed. They won—by ten points, no less, a brilliant catch by Ravi in the final minutes putting them over the Crimson Tides—but the weaknesses in their playing are obvious. If they’re obvious to them, Eddie knows, they’re going to be even more clear to their opposition. 

One such weakness is Eddie himself. He played okay, he thinks, and part of him is pleased given how far he’s come in recent years; but another, larger part of him knows that if any other Captain played like he did today for more than a few games then the team would be in big, big trouble. He has work to do, that much is clear. 

Of course, the biggest issue is Buck. He only played a few downs before being taken off, and though his insubordination was better during the game than it typically is during practice, he still fumbled multiple times and got frustrated easily, attempting to hurl vitriol at some of the other players for mistakes that were clearly his own. 

It’s someone making a comment about this—Ryder, Eddie thinks—that makes Buck snap.

They’re almost finished changing when Eddie hears, “—and Buckley played like his fingers were covered in oil. I mean, did you see that?” It’s followed by a small titter of laughter by another player nearby, but otherwise the group falls silent as Buck’s head snaps up. 

“What’d you say?” Buck growls, his face darkening. 

No one speaks up, but them averting their eyes is answer enough that some of them agree—only Eddie makes a point to keep his gaze trained on Buck, Ravi coming up to clap him on the shoulder. 

“You’re new, man, don’t sweat it too much,” Ravi says gently. “Everyone has off days.”

“I don’t see anyone calling out Diaz for his off day,” Buck says with a bitter laugh, and Eddie stills along with the rest of the team. In the silence, Buck seems to think he should continue. “You’ve got a Captain that can’t even throw.”

Tugging the hem of his shirt down and shouldering his duffel, Eddie clenches his jaw but doesn’t look away from Buck. “Don’t you have a frat party to embarrass yourself at, Buckley?” Eddie asks, his voice unnaturally calm, and he hears a sharp intake of breath and disbelieving scoffs around the room at his clap back. 

With that, he turns and walks out. When Buck first spoke, there was a flash of anger—blinding rage, really—towards him, but after a beat it faded and all that was left was emptiness and the vague sense of pity. He feels nothing at all as he makes his way out of the back entrance of the stadium, tugging at his tie. His mind is totally blank. God, he hates wearing a suit on game day. It feels a little like he’s suffocating. 

He can hear footsteps behind him, and—what does it say about him that even now, after all this time, he recognises Buck’s footfalls?

“Hey,” Buck calls after him, and there’s only a moment’s hesitation before Eddie is slowing down to allow him to catch up. When he does, Buck takes a minute and swallows hard before continuing with a shake of his head. “I’m sorry, for—for what I said in there. I was just…”

“I know.”

Buck pauses. “I told everyone in there I was sorry just now, too, for the record. You’re their captain for a reason, and I respect it.”

Their captain. Buck still doesn’t consider himself part of the team. At least he apologised, Eddie thinks to himself. Progress. 

“Thanks.”

“You played really well today, y’know—considering.” It comes out as awkward as it looks leaving Buck’s mouth, but Eddie appreciates the attempt even if he doesn’t think it’s true.

“Right back at you.”

Buck rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling a little all the same. After a beat, he looks a little shy. “Y’know, there actually is a Kappa party tonight—”

“Oh, I didn’t mean—”

“You’re not wrong,” Buck cuts him off with an abashed chuckle, shrugging. “I mean, mostly. Anyway, Campbell offered to make it the official Longhorns afterparty if you were down. Nothing scandalous—just a bunch of people and a bunch of booze. We don’t have practice again til Monday, so… whadya think?”

Buck lets it all out in a rush, and it takes Eddie a beat to actually understand what he’s trying to say. When he realises, Eddie actually laughs—and the way it makes Buck visibly brighten makes Eddie feel something in his chest he isn’t sure what to do with. “Yeah, I’ll, uh… I’ll ask the team,” he says finally. 

Buck grins. “Tonight. It’s on.”

The party is in full swing by the time Eddie arrives with Ravi, Lena and Albert just before 11, Kappa Sigma swarming with people milling in and out of the massive house. The music is thumping so loud that Eddie can feel it in the soles of his sneakers as they walk up the porch steps, and he shares a look with Lena. 

“If it sucks, we can leave,” she reminds him. “Just give me the signal. But seriously, you deserve a celebration after today.”

Eddie takes a breath and nods, raking a hand through his hair. “Let’s go, I guess.”

Albert and Ravi, having been involved in their own excited conversation, overhear Eddie and pump their fists in celebration. “That’s the spirit,” Ravi says cheerfully, wrapping an arm around his shoulder and pulling him inside. 

The music is even louder once the door is shut behind them, flashing lights making it hard to see the layout of the house for several seconds before Eddie’s eyes adjust to the pink and blue neons. There’s a small foyer in front of them and to the left is the living room, while to the right is what seems to be the kitchen. A grand spiral staircase arcs its way across the room in front of them, no doubt leading to most of the bedrooms, and behind that is a set of double doors leading to the back garden. 

They have a fucking pool? Eddie questions, and then shivers. He doesn’t even want to know what kind of bacteria is in that thing given how many parties they host. Still, the people outside don’t seem to mind, cannonballing into the middle and splashing their friends or playing games of chicken in the shallow end. 

Eddie looks to Lena and together they make a beeline for the kitchen, where an assortment of half-finished alcohol and mixers are displayed on the countertop. Eddie tries the fridge and finds a six-pack of beer labelled: ‘BUCK’S: TOUCH AND U DIE’. 

He grabs two and tosses one to Lena, who laughs. “I’d pay money to see the look on Buckley’s face when he realises.”

Eddie just shrugs in response, and together they head into the living room. He really isn’t expecting it, but as soon as they enter Eddie and Lena are both welcomed by raucous cheers and the announcement of their arrival. Someone in the corner starts chanting ‘MVP! MVP!’ and quickly the whole party follows suit, surrounding both of them with back slaps and congratulations. 

Ravi and Albert already received a similar—though apparently more toned-down—welcome while Eddie and Lena were in the kitchen, and most of the rest of the team are already here. They seem to have been waiting for Eddie’s arrival to actually enjoy themselves, hovering until they saw their captain crossing the threshold. Now, Eddie can see several players engaged in a high-stakes game of strip poker with some of the cheerleaders, while on the dance floor Ryder is grinding against a flushed, pleased-looking girl in a way that is definitely not appropriate for public viewing. Eddie winces and turns away, only to be greeted by a different sight. 

Buck is towards the back of the living room, dancing to the sultry R&B with several of his fraternity friends. He sings along, not even acknowledging his teammates' entrances, but Eddie doubts he’d notice much right now.  Even from here Eddie can see that his eyes are a little glazed over and he struggles to keep up with the words of the song—his body has no problem, though. Although he moves in a more PG version of Ryder’s dance moves, his do a much better job at turning Eddie on: it’s all little swishes and turns of his hips in those sinfully tight jeans, his head bobbing along until he tilts it back to throw down another shot and Eddie watches an errant bead of whiskey trickle down his throat with something like hunger rolling in his stomach. He wants to lick that whiskey off of Buck, he realises, and the thought makes him turn away and take another big gulp of his beer. 

Thankful that Buck didn’t see him, Eddie focuses on his friends for a while after that. They dance together for a few songs, but they’re often stopped by frat guys and other students alike who congratulate them on the game today, and eventually they stop dancing in favour of setting up camp on one of the couches in the corner and talking. 

Eddie is surprised to discover that most of the Kappa guys aren’t at all like he was expecting. Sure, there are one or two that totally fit into the stereotype—Campbell included, who slaps him on the back so hard when they greet each other that Eddie’s pretty sure he’s going to bruise tomorrow—but most of them are friendly and actually seem to have a personality besides beer pong and brotherhood. He actually enjoys talking to many of them, especially Mateo, a freshman from El Paso just like Eddie. 

“I applied to UT three times before I got in,” Mateo is saying, taking another sip from his cup. “My aunt kept telling me to try my luck somewhere else, but I knew this is where I wanted to be.”

Eddie makes a show of looking around the run-down house and then arches a brow. “Here?”

Mateo laughs. “Hey, Kappa’s been amazing so far. All the upper years are nice, the hazing was pretty tame, and once you’re accepted, you’re one of them—none of that ‘first years are runts’ stuff. Built in brotherhood, y’know?”

Eddie has to relent when he hears this. “I feel like that with football, to be fair. I know my team’s got my back, just like I have theirs.”

“Well, you’re basically royalty here,” Mateo replies with a laugh. “Not just for being a Longhorn, but you especially. And that Ravi guy, too.”

“Why?”

“Buck talks about you guys all the time. I swear, I’ve only hung with the guy a few times and I’m pretty sure I know your shoe size.”

Eddie’s stomach does a flip. It feels weird to know that Buck is talking about him when he’s not around—that he’s even on Buck’s radar enough to be worth talking about—but part of him can’t help but wonder what exactly he’s been saying, too. He hasn’t… he didn’t tell them about Eddie’s shoulder, did he?

“What was he saying?”

Mateo must catch the edge in Eddie’s tone, because he shakes his head and steps closer to lower his voice. “Nothing, like, secret. Don’t worry. He just talked about that football camp y’all went to a lot—said you were the best player he’d ever seen, too.”

I’d say the same about him, Eddie thinks, and the thought surprises him even though he knows it’s true. Buck’s recent playing notwithstanding, he’s the most naturally talented player Eddie knows. He knew it from the first moment he saw Buck play. 

“BEER PONG!!” someone yells across the room, which gets everyone’s attention even over the booming music. It’s Campbell, hovering precariously on a table. “Longhorns vs Kappa, why don’t you show us what you’ve got?”

The crowd cheers, and all of a sudden Eddie is being herded along with Ravi, Lena and Albert into another room just off the living room. The dining table has been turned into the beer pong court with a line hastily drawn in chalk and red solo cups littering the floor, everyone moving to form a loose circle as the Longhorns get pushed to the front. 

“Who’s claiming Buckley?” one of the Kappas asks Campbell from the doorway, to which he looks to Buck. 

Buck just grins in response, holding out his hands. “I could play for both teams,” he says, and the crowd ‘oohs’ in response. It’s then that Buck’s gaze finally snags on Eddie, and his confident smirk fades a little as he looks down with flushed cheeks. 

“No, Kappa’s taking him,” Campbell interjects after a beat. “He’s been a brother for longer, so we’re calling seniority. Alright, Buck and I are representing Kappa. What about the Longhorns?”

Someone suggests Eddie, to which Buck scoffs. When one of the brothers sends a questioning look his way, he just laughs. “Eddie’s too buttoned-up for this game,” he says, the alcohol softening the blunt edges of his words. He snorts. “He’s all ‘holier-than-thou’.”

The crowd ‘oohs’ again, but Eddie doesn’t look away from Buck’s burning gaze. He finds himself stepping forward before he can think too much about it. “I think I can manage a win or two,” he says, and Lena whoops behind him. 

As the reigning beer pong champion amongst the Longhorns, Albert is chosen to be Eddie’s second, and they prove to be a formidable team. They land shot for shot points for several rounds, Buck beginning to complain loudly to Campbell that beer tastes sour to him now, but when it’s Buck’s turn to throw after that he sinks both with ease. 

Albert and Eddie clink their cups together and down them in long gulps, crushing the cups between their palms when they’re finished. Buck and Campbell both look on, impressed. 

Eddie doesn’t know how to say that learning to drink in the army is like learning to skydive the first time you’re on a plane. He’s never met anyone who drinks like the guys from his platoon on their off days, and they had plenty of them on his tour. He doesn’t know how to explain that—but he thinks Buck might understand anyway. 

It’s down to the last shot, and Buck and Eddie are in a heated standoff. They’ve matched each other every round until now, but now they each have one cup left and Eddie’ll be damned if he lets Kappa Sigma win. 

Buck goes first, kissing the white ball before letting go, but it bounces against the rim and onto the floor. Campbell—apparently quite good as a frat president but awful as a beer pong player—misses yet again, and so it turns to Eddie and Albert to win it all. 

With a little bow, Albert hands the ping pong ball to Eddie. 

“You’re gonna choke, Diaz,” Buck sing-songs from across the table just as Eddie raises his arm. 

“In your dreams, Buckley,” Eddie fires back just as he throws the ping pong ball, and he barely hears Buck’s surprised laughter because he’s so busy watching the tiny ball sail neatly into the remaining cup. 

Their audience erupts, and Campbell shakes his fist in mock anger before dramatically bowing to Eddie and Albert. “I can admit defeat,” he says, finishing the final beer. “Anyway, we’ll get you back next time.”

“We would’ve won this time if Buckley wasn’t around to fumble the ball for the second time today,” someone by the door mutters, and Eddie’s eyes snap back to Buck. 

The others are too caught up in their debate over whether the Longhorns or Kappa brothers would win in various events to hear the comment, but Eddie knows Buck heard it because of the way his whole body tightens and then sags. He visibly deflates, and in the next minute he’s mumbling some half-assed excuse to Campbell and disappearing into the crowd. 

Eddie cranes his neck, searching, but Buck’s already gone and a shrugging Campbell is pulling him in to celebrate the win with Albert. 

“C’mon, Eddie, I love this song,” Lena is saying an hour or two later, pulling at his arm, and Eddie dutifully follows her into the crowd instead of giving her the signal like he really wants to. 

He has to admit that he likes this song, too, a sultry R&B number that he can only ever mumble the words to but enjoys the beat all the same. He sways his hips and Lena laughs at him, mocking his ballroom-born moves, and then suddenly Eddie feels a presence at his arm. 

He turns around to find a tall guy behind him wearing a Kappa jacket, sipping from a solo cup as he dances. His dark eyes over the rim of the cup are all suggestions and danger, and when he lowers it he says, “wanna dance?”

“Oh, I—I’m straight,” Eddie says, half-apologetically, and the guy watches him for a moment before shrugging and moving on. 

Eddie manages to finish out the song before he gives in to his original urge and turns to Lena, pulling at his earlobe.

He’s enjoyed the party, he really has, but being bro-hugged and shouted congratulations at for several hours takes its toll. He’s tired and not nearly drunk enough for this volume or type of music—rap with a booming bass that makes the words incomprehensible—and he really just wants to crawl into his own bed and pass out. 

(It doesn’t help that he’s just spotted Buck. He’s draped over two guys’ laps, both of whom seem quite content with the massive guy’s position, and the three of them are laughing hard at something Buck’s just said. It’s at that moment that Buck looks up and his eyes find Eddie’s across the room in an instant, then they slide away after what feels like an eternity. A second later a few girls come over to pull the trio towards the dance floor, Buck going easily with his arm wrapped tightly around one guy’s shoulder. He re-enters the crowd, and Eddie loses sight of him.)

Lena frowns at Eddie’s use of their signal. “Really? But I thought you were having a good time, the beer pong—” she starts, and then sighs at his expression. “Why can’t you ever fully let yourself have fun?”

Eddie doesn’t know how to answer that. 

Lena knows it, too, because after another beat she sighs and nods. “Okay. Let’s go.”

They make the rounds and say their goodbyes to the players, many of whom confirm several times if it’s okay that they stay for a little longer. After Eddie reassures them that yes, he hopes they stay and have as much fun as they want, he’s finally released from their clutches and he heads off into the cool fall night with Lena. 

“You didn’t have to leave with me, y’know,” Eddie reminds her after a few minutes of walking in silence, nudging her in the shoulder.

Lena shrugs. “I was tired anyway. Didn’t feel like getting hit on by frat guys without you to laugh at them with.”

They part in the elevator of their dorms, Lena heading to her room on the second floor while Eddie continues upwards. When Eddie steps into his own empty room and shuts the door, turning to look at Buck’s side—unoccupied, of course—the bass of the music at the party echoes in his ears and he feels a faint thrumming in his chest. 

He climbs into bed a few minutes later and turns off the light, rolling onto his side. He knows he won’t sleep for a while, his body still whirring from the adrenaline rushes of both the game and the party, but he appreciates the quiet. 

It’s just that. 

Well. 

Eddie can’t stop thinking about Buck’s face when the asshole by the door referenced his fumble. There was a mixture of anger and embarassment that Eddie had never seen cross Buck’s face before, and he only hopes it means that Buck can change. He needs to change, to fix things and become the player that Eddie knows he can be, to play and know without a doubt that he is the best. Because he could be.

The look on Buck’s face had been a rare crack in the mask he’s had on since he came here, and it’s one he never had at camp. One of the things that had drawn Eddie to him in the first place had been his openness—the freedom of his expressions, how he could never hide what he was thinking. Eddie used to think that training with someone like the two of them had at camp was what made Eddie learn how to read Buck so easily, the same way that he suspects Bobby can see through his facade. 

But what happened to make him like this? Buck listened to—God, he listened to Eddie’s night terror and he told him about his tour, and Eddie doesn’t even know why the guy drinks like prohibition’s starting up again tomorrow and refuses to follow orders on the field. What happened to tit-for-tat? He should ask, maybe all he needs to do is open his mouth and—

Buck’s back. 

Eddie is facing the wall, but he hears the door creak open as Buck stumbles inside and then kicks his shin against his bed twice in the darkness. The first time, Buck snorts to himself and then stops abruptly, clearly noticing Eddie’s sleeping form in the bed for the first time. The second time, he actually yelps, but this makes him laugh all over again until finally Eddie hears him sit down on the bed. Eddie waits for the sound of one sneaker and then two being toed off onto the linoleum, and then the rustling as Buck finally climbs under the covers. 

Eddie’s always had good hearing, and his ears are pricked in the silent room now. He can hear the rhythm of Buck’s breathing, and he listens to him sniffle and turn over, sighing heavily, before finally his breaths lengthen and he falls asleep. 

Eddie stays rigid for a long time, listening to Buck, until finally his body relaxes and he too drifts into a dreamless sleep. When he awakens with a start, he’s not sure what time it is but he knows it’s still the middle of the night—darkness still encases the room, though his eyes adjust so he can make out the form of Buck picking up a book from the floor and placing it back on the desk.

What is he doing? Eddie doesn’t move but watches as Buck changes into clothes from his dresser and then laces up some shoes and slips out of the door. He’s still for another moment after that, unable to move. When Buck went to bed he was piss drunk, so where the hell is he going now?

It takes about three seconds more for Eddie to consider things before he’s slipping out of bed and following Buck. 

It’s not hard to follow him, though Eddie is sure to keep his distance. When he comes out of their building he sees him halfway across the quad and keeps behind some trees, because as much as he himself is questioning what he’s doing right now Buck would have even more questions. 

Buck is a fast walker, and it doesn’t take long for him to reach a familiar set of stairs into some trees. Eddie knows where he’s going now, so he waits for a few beats before following him into the forest and tries not to break any branches with his footsteps. By the time Eddie does come into the clearing, Buck is already set up in the middle of the football field, rummaging in a duffel Eddie hadn’t noticed he was carrying before setting up for a route. 

Ducking under the bleachers, Eddie edges forward until he can watch the familiar adjustments Buck makes. He can’t help but feel like he’s watching an orchestra tuning before a symphony, or an archer shifting finger positions on the bow before letting the arrow fly. A duck of his head, the grinding of the ball of his foot into the soft grass, a roll of his shoulders—Buck has done these adjustments a million different times, and Eddie has watched him a million different times. 

Not just at camp. He’s… watched some footage online. 

Buck takes off across the field and clears twenty yards before Eddie can even blink, zigzagging around imaginary defenders and leaping for the hypothetical ball. Eddie can see the arc the ball would make if he had thrown it from the center, surging precisely towards Buck’s waiting hands. He hits the ground as gracefully as he went up, turning with his momentum and jogging back to the start once more. 

Eddie watches him do it three more times, transfixed, before he processes that Buck passed out in bed, woke up, and decided to train at—he checks his watch and curses—3 in the morning. It’s like a lightbulb goes off in Eddie’s head. Buck wants this. He really wants this. That means that at least some of what he does—his inability to run routes as they’re written, perhaps, or follow any kind of direction—isn’t on purpose, and that means… Eddie can help. 

He’s so caught up in his own thought spiral that he doesn’t realise he stepped out from behind the bleachers in a daze as he watched Buck run until the man in question turns and jumps about thirty feet into the air. 

“ Fuck, Eddie!” Buck exclaims, putting a hand over his heart and bending over for a second. He straightens and frowns. “What are you doing here?”

“Sorry, sorry, I—” Eddie raises his own hands in surrender. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just—I heard you get up and I was worried, so…”

Buck’s gaze hardens as Eddie nears. “Careful, Eddie,” he says mockingly. “Someone’s gonna think you’re gay if you keep following me around.”

Wait. “W-what?”

“You’re not like me, remember?” Buck sneers, scuffing at the grass with his shoe. 

I’m not like you. 

It all comes rushing back to Eddie in an instant, and the worried expression he had before drops. He’s run through that final conversation by the water so many times in his head, and yet somehow his words never hit him in this way—now, though, he suddenly finds himself sitting on Buck’s side of the rock, hearing I’m not like you wash over him, and he thinks he understands. 

“That’s what this is about?” he says, and his voice is barely above a whisper. “That’s what—this has all been about?”

Buck shifts uncomfortably, folding his arms. “What do you mean, all?”

“Your pissed off attitude since you got here—towards me in particular,” Eddie explains. He narrows his eyes when Buck actually looks confused. “Do you not remember unnecessarily tackling me to the ground mere days ago?”

“I caught you,” Buck counters, and when they lock eyes they both go still.

“You did.”

“So was it?”

“Was what?”

“Was this all about what I said at camp?”

Buck is the first to break eye contact, looking up at the sky for a moment before nodding. Neither of them speak for a beat. “That’s how it started, yeah. You said—”

“I know what I said.” Eddie hesitates. “I know what you thought I said.” Buck only blinks at him, and Eddie tries to figure out how to explain it. I'm not like you. “I only meant that—you were so open and honest with yourself, with everyone—and I really admired that. You were comfortable in your own skin. I wasn’t.” He swallows hard. “I’m still not.”

Buck stares back for several long seconds. “So—does that mean you’re…?” Buck stops to wipe the sweat beading at his brow from his sprints with the hem of his tank top, exposing the taut muscles of his abdomen. Eddie looks away. “I heard you tell someone you were straight at the party tonight.”

Eddie blinks in surprise. He hadn’t known Buck was nearby. 

(He doesn’t know a lot of things these days.)

“I told you at camp—my family is very religious. My parents are old school, and they came to this country imagining a better future for their family. They had a precise image for me and my sisters, a whole life planned out for us. They didn’t expect a college football player, they didn’t—” 

They didn’t expect the bullet. They didn’t expect the surgeries, the nightmares, the rehab. The choice between playing football again and losing everything or giving it up and having nothing. 

That hadn’t been where Eddie was going with his explanation, but it pops into his head anyway. Though it’s not the same, when Eddie thinks of his parent's faces if they found out about him and Buck at camp—realising once more that he’s failing to live up to their expectation of the perfect immigrant son—all he can think is that he hates the idea of disappointing them. Again. 

“They didn’t expect me,” Eddie says finally, weakly. 

He’s never felt what he had with Buck with any man since. He doesn’t know what that means, exactly—whether he simply hasn’t met the right guy (not likely), is repressing any feelings he does have because of trauma (…not unlikely), or isn’t actually attracted to all guys, just Buck (likely.) Regardless, he hasn’t felt that way for anyone, so…

“I’d say I currently identify as straight, yes,” Eddie says carefully, and when Buck rolls his eyes Eddie rushes to explain. “But, you have to remember—camp was a lifetime ago for me.”

“For me too,” Buck retorts, but Eddie shakes his head. 

“I know, but—it’s like… there was a line drawn in my life the day I enlisted, and everything is sorted into Before or After. Camp was Before.” He trails off, unsure how to continue. “Does that make sense?”

Buck’s expression softens, and he nods. “It does,” he murmurs. “It’s like the you that was at camp is not the you that you are now, right?”

Eddie can’t help but smile, because of course Buck would understand. “Exactly.”

It’s then that Eddie realises something: Buck hasn’t looked at him differently since finding out about his injury. He’d never really registered it before, but it becomes clear when he talks about Before and After and Buck doesn’t even flinch. Whenever he’s told anyone in the past—his teammates, a few friends from home that wanted to know why he wasn’t coming to the reunion—almost without fail something changes in their eyes afterward. It’s a combination of pity, Eddie thinks, and a wariness that he doesn’t like because it feels like he’s a bomb waiting to go off. 

Not Buck. There’s a reproach in his expression since he came to UT that wasn’t there at camp, but even that is fading now as they finally have it out—Eddie feels like he too is seeing Buck in a new light and understanding why he’s been acting this way since he got here. 

“I’m sorry,” Eddie tells him, and is surprised to find he means it. 

“Sorry for what? You didn’t mean what I thought you did when you made that comment.”

“No, but I wasn’t that nice afterwards, either.”

“Because I was trying to rip your head off.”

“No, it wasn’t—“

“I was brutal , dude—“

“I don’t think—“

“ Eddie .”

“Fine,” Eddie relents, and shrugs. “But you were right about one thing that day—I was scared.”

The grass beneath him is cool and wet with dew as they both take stock of their newfound uneasy ceasefire. 

“I am too,” Buck whispers, and Eddie notices Buck’s eyes track the bobbing of Eddie’s throat when he swallows hard. Without thinking, Eddie takes a half-step back, and Buck nods in response—though whether it’s to Eddie or himself, he’s not sure. 

Eddie’s eyes flicker back to Buck’s duffel, eager to change the subject. “I’m surprised to see you out here.”

Buck laughs humourlessly. “What, because I was so shitty today?”

“No, because I didn’t know you cared this much.”

Eddie’s honest words make them both fall silent, and Buck drops his gaze. “I do,” he says quietly. “I know it seems like I don’t sometimes, but…”

“Why are you here?” Eddie asks suddenly. It’s a question that’s been on his mind since he first saw Buck on the field what feels like years ago now. 

Buck doesn’t seem surprised by the question, but he considers it for a while before he speaks. “I don’t know,” he admits finally. “Because Bobby gave me one last chance, probably. Because I know I can do this, and I need to prove it. Because… I don’t have anything else.”

“Then try, Evan,” Eddie says eventually, and he doesn’t miss the expression that crosses Buck’s face at his name. “You have to work with us.”

“I know, I know,” Buck replies, resigned. 

“I get why you’ve been mad at me, but why are you ignoring everything you’re told? It feels like you’re being contrarian on purpose.”

Buck shrugs, looking at the ground. “I don’t mean to. I mean, I guess I do, but not—not on purpose. Does that make sense?” At Eddie’s blank stare, he sighs and laughs, this time at himself. “Of course it doesn’t. Um… just- the last few months have been tough.”

Eddie waits, but when it’s clear no more information is forthcoming he just nods. “Fair.”

Buck just snorts at the simple reply. Eddie can’t help but wonder why Buck is so hesitant to share whatever’s been going on with him— he told him about enlisting. What is it that’s so bad that Buck can’t say anything, he wonders? Something in Eddie suspects that Buck isn’t opening up because it’s not that bad, like he thinks it’s not worth comparing to Eddie’s story. 

“You can talk to me, y’know,” Eddie manages. Buck only nods. Shivering involuntarily at the cool breeze, Eddie glances up at the sky where clouds are beginning to black out the half moon and tries to think of something else to say. All he can come up with is: “You think too much when you run that route.”

“Huh?”

Eddie waves vaguely in the direction of where Buck had been sprinting. “The jerk route. I see it in you every time, the—the split second of indecision on the second fake out. You ran it right here, not like in practice, but I still saw that moment. So you need to figure out if you’re overthinking it because you’re nervous and it’s a mental issue, because you know you’re not capable of doing it properly and it’s a physical issue, or because you’re perfectly capable but your body is physically making the decision to be wrong.”

Buck nods. “Okay,” he says, and then considers something for a moment before jutting his chin out and rolling his shoulders back. “So help me. Captain.”

Wildly, Eddie thinks of the final day of camp—when he’d turned around in the taxi, desperate to meet Buck’s gaze a final time, and found him already walking away back to his friends. He had been so hungry for that final moment that the burning in his chest when it wasn’t granted felt like punishment for wanting it so much. 

But Buck isn’t turning away now, and Eddie’s able to look at him without his heart aching, and that invisible tether Eddie had been so convinced was severed the day he left camp glimmers softly between them. It’s just like the look in Buck’s eyes as they stare back at each other: steady, undeniable, waiting.

Chapter Text

Eddie 

Gone. 

Eddie wakes up groggily to his alarm and rolls over to find that Buck is, once again, gone. He checks the time: 7:05. He guesses that Buck has gone to the gym, usually preferring an earlier workout—but not when he’s as drunk as he was last night. For a moment Eddie has a wild urge to look for him, but he knows it’s a stupid idea. He’s fine with getting the time to think about the previous day, besides. The game, the party, the field. It’s all spinning around as soon as he opens his eyes.

There’s no doubt that Eddie’s going to carry the elation of winning the game yesterday on his shoulders for a long time—it’s hard not to. There are few moments in life where it’s so definitively clear that you’re a winner, and he plans on savouring it whenever he can. 

He’s glad he got to see his sister, too, even if it was only for a minute. Sophia had to drive back pretty soon after the game to make it to work the next day, but she’d been waiting for him when he came out of the players only section of the stadium. 

“It’s good to see you, Edmundo,” Sophia says into his ear, her arms wrapped around him like a vice. 

Eddie tightens his grip in return. “I missed you, Soph,” he whispers back, and then pulls away. “Thank you for coming.”

“You think I’d miss this?” Sophia scoffs. “I remember forging their name for the permission slip for you when you first tried out for the team. I remember helping you with the application to that training camp. I remember the first time I went to one of your games and actually watched you play. Of course I’m here.”

Eddie pulls her in for a tight hug once more. “Thank you for everything,” he says. “I mean, thank you for driving nine hours to see me, specifically. It was really nice to know you were in the stands.”

He keeps his arm around her as he walks away, taking her to the back exit and showing her the less crowded route back to his dorm. He’s done all his post-game interviews already, but he still gets stopped a few times on his way back by students wanting to clap him on the back or say congratulations. He takes it all in stride, but by the time they get to his dorm room Sophia is staring at him in wonder. 

“What?” he asks, suddenly self-conscious as he unlocks his door. 

“Today might be more consecutive words than I’ve heard you speak in years,” she says, and stops him when he rolls his eyes. “No, seriously. Like, to all your friends we ran into every ten feet—”

“I had friends before!”

“Obviously, but these are outer ring friends. You always had one or two close friends—Shannon, Ravi—but all the people we talked to were people you know much more in passing, and you had a conversation with every single one of them. And even complete strangers!”

“God, Sophia. You’re making me sound incompetent.”

“No, no, just—there’s a new… light to you, or something. I don’t know.” Sophia takes a seat at his desk and studies him. “Interesting. Very interesting.”

Eddie’s brain quickly jumps ahead to the field last night. He still can’t imagine how Buck must have felt all these years, thinking Eddie had scorned him by the water after everything that happened between them. It doesn’t matter that he had misunderstood Eddie, in the end—all that matters is Buck spent years with a different version of Eddie, and Eddie…

Well, Eddie went to war.

And then he was… back, but not the same. He started putting his blood, sweat and tears into rehab because by some grace of God he could still play the sport he loved, and he knew he couldn’t let the opportunity pass him by. He missed it, the team and the common goal and the brotherhood. He didn’t believe in the idea of the team being family before he went to camp, but the brief summer he spent at the 118 changed his mind. He couldn’t overlook that. He found it again as a soldier. When that was gone and he was lost at sea again, there it was, beaming in the distance like a beacon—he’d been laid up in bed for a while, and then a Texas Longhorns ad played on the hospital TV. He was transfixed. 

Longhorns all the way. That’s what Buck had said when they discussed college football at camp. It’s not that he thought he’d find Buck here, it’s just that—Buck had this lifelong passion for football that Eddie didn’t have. He wanted to trust in that passion. He’d always agreed, but if Buck said the Longhorns were the best, then that’s where he’d have to go. And he did. It just… took him a while to get there. 

(Maybe too long, a voice in the back of his head whispers. Eddie’s jaw clenches.)

The phone ringing is what startles Eddie out of his reverie, picking it up to see it’s his youngest sister calling.

“Hey Adri,” Eddie says around a yawn, and his sister’s laugh is tinny through the phone speaker. 

“Eddie!” Adriana squeals in response. “Congratulations on the game. You were amazing.”

“Thank you,” Eddie says, then pauses. “Did you… watch it at home?”

Adriana snorts. “Are you stupid? Of course not. I went to Yasmin’s house and watched with her. I was so mad Sophia wouldn’t take me with her, honestly.”

“You know Mom and Dad would lose it if you went,” Eddie reminds her. “Besides, it means a lot to know you even watched.”

“Obviously I was going to. I wasn’t gonna miss my big brother’s college football debut.” Adriana sniffs, and Eddie has to force himself not to ask if she’s crying. He knows he would get his head bitten off if he did. “Anyway, you were so good, even if that other player on your team sucked.”

“That other player?” Eddie echoes carefully, but he already knows who Adriana’s talking about. 

“The one you threw to—the one that dropped it. The crowd went nuts. Number…. 23?” 

“Buck.”

“Yeah, him. Wait, isn’t he one of the guys you know from—”

As if on cue, the door opens and Buck walks in. Despite how much he drank last night and how late he was up, he looks totally normal—if you count sweat making the hair at his temples curl and muscles bulging from the workout he obviously just returned from as being Buck’s ‘normal’. 

He’s humming to himself, too, but stops when he sees Eddie. “Sorry, I can—”

“No, you don’t have to… it’s okay, uh—”

“Really, I’ll go—”

“It’s just—my sister, she—”

“Oh my FREAKING God!” Adriana screeches impatiently through the phone, and then she adopts the same voice she had when she was five and demanding that Eddie pick up her toy that she threw to the ground. “Eddie, who is that?”

“Buck. He’s, um. My roommate.”

“You could have told me that earlier, Edmundo,” she scolds him, and Eddie can practically see her rolling her eyes. He’s distracted by Buck, who he’s been locking eyes with since he stepped into the room. Buck is still halfway in, like he’s still expecting Eddie to tell him to leave. 

“You can stay, Buck,” Eddie tells him, and Buck settles uneasily onto his rumpled bed, leaning over to untie his shoelaces.

“Um, hello?” 

Adriana’s voice is what makes Eddie realise he’s been staring at Buck’s back and watching his muscles ripple underneath his tank top for far too long to be… appropriate. 

“Sorry, Adri.”

“Do you have to go?”

“I do. I’m sorry.”

“Tell your roommate he needs to catch more.”

Eddie glances up at Buck, but he’s thankfully finished untying his shoelaces and is now pretending to read his kinesiology textbook. He appears not to have heard his sister, but Eddie lowers his voice anyway. “I’m not going to tell him that.”

“Whatever. Can we still talk soon, though? I wanna tell you about my dance recital.”

“Of course. I’ll call you later, okay? Love you.”

“Love you too, dumbass. Call me!”

“Sorry,” Eddie says to Buck when he hangs up, and the other man just shakes his head. 

“Don’t be,” he replies as he stands and begins rummaging in his duffel, pulling out a change of clothes. “How’s Adriana?”

“She’s good,” Eddie says, and averts his eyes as Buck slips his tank top over his head both to avoid the sight and because he’s still processing the fact that Buck remembered his little sister’s name. “She wants to tell me about her dance recital, apparently.”

Buck laughs. “Didn’t she once twerk during a ballet performance?”

Eddie’s brain glitches once again, and this time it takes him longer to recover. “She tried to, but the teacher caught her before she could actually… do it,” Eddie confirms. “Apparently she was doing it constantly in rehearsal.”

Buck is still smiling and shaking his head fondly. “And Sophia? How’s she?”

Eddie dutifully tells him about how she came to see him at the game the day before, but internally he’s thinking two things: the first is why on Earth Buck isn’t mentioning what happened after the party. 

Because he can’t ask Buck the first question, he goes for the second one that’s been plaguing him for a while now. “And how’s your sister? How’s your family?”

It’s like a shutter goes down behind Buck’s eyes. Just as quickly as the grin appeared on his face it disappears, and what’s left is a carefully expressionless face that scares Eddie even more than Buck’s anger. 

“They’re fine, as far as I know,” he says curtly, then glances back at his duffel. “Anyway, I just remembered I left some stuff at Kappa yesterday, so… I’m, uh, gonna go.”

“Oh. Okay. Do you—did you want to talk about last night?”

Buck pauses at the door and looks over at him, the lightness returning to his eyes a little. “No, it’s okay. We’re good, really. I’ll see you later.”

And then he’s gone. 

Eddie wanders into Ravi’s room a few hours later, unable to sit still since he woke up. He just feels… restless today. No reason. 

“Man, I’m so hungover,” Ravi says with a laugh, rubbing his eyes as Eddie leans against the desk. “What time did you get back?”

“Around 1:30, I think. I left with Lena.”

“Just not feeling it?” Ravi asks around a yawn. 

“I just didn’t like… watching it.” Eddie is careful with his words, but after a second he wonders why. “Buck.”

Ravi nods, considering it. “Fair. He can be messy when he’s that drunk.”

“But he was fine later!”

Ravi’s brows furrow. “He came back to your room?”

“Uh… yeah, around 3. He usually does.”

“Hm.”

“What?”

“Just—I left not that long after you, and as I was leaving he said he was gonna stay over at some girl’s. He must’ve changed his mind.”

“Yeah, must have.” Eddie must sound as far as he feels, because when he glances over Ravi is giving him a strange look. For some reason, that dubious expression Ravi puts on has the same effect as the one Sophia used to give him in high school—both of them break Eddie. “We talked about camp last night.”

“Really?” Ravi sits up. “So, are things…?”

“Better, I think. Or—I don’t know. The point is, he started coming back to our room a lot more recently after he—well, I had a nightmare. I told him about my shoulder, and… how it happened.”

Ravi works hard, but can’t completely hide his surprise. “You did?”

Eddie nods. “He helped me a lot, actually. It was nice.” After a beat, he narrows his eyes in Ravi’s direction. “What? Why are you making that face?”

Ravi’s contemplative expression disappears and he laughs. “Sorry. No, I’m happy for you, or—I mean, I’m glad you feel like you can talk to him. I was just surprised, because you’re typically so tight-lipped about it. You didn’t even tell me until the end of last season.”

“I know. I don’t…”

Eddie doesn’t know why he took so long to tell Ravi, or why he told Buck so quickly. He suspects it’s more complicated than that. Maybe it’s that Eddie looks at Buck sometimes, his expression so open and raw, and he feels like he’s back in the cabin in the middle of the woods with no one but the birds and the trees to hear their secrets. 

“Buck and I have a lot of history,” Eddie finally finishes, and Ravi stays quiet. When Eddie changes the subject a minute later, Ravi lets it happen—but Eddie doesn’t miss the way he watches him for a while after that. 

Buck

Hightailing it out of his shared room like his ass is on fire after Eddie asks about his family isn’t Buck’s finest moment, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to stick around to explain the intricate dynamics of emotionally unavailable parents and ghost sisters. 

He goes to the library for a few hours because he can’t think of anything else to do, and ends up completing two assignments after some time being sidetracked by fans wanting to talk to him. He’s not sure he’ll ever get used to that—people thinking they have a right to go up and talk to you no matter what you’re doing just because you’re an athlete in the public eye. He doesn’t mind it, mostly, and it’s a welcome distraction from his statistics assignment. 

Buck goes for a run after that, shoving his headphones in and heading into the forest with Nine Inch Nails on full blast. He does a neat little 3 miles, but by the time he slows to a stop he’s still restless—he could run another 20 miles and still have that frenetic energy in him, he thinks. He was wide awake by six this morning, but despite that and his late night the night before he still feels wired for sound. 

It doesn’t have anything to do with the fact that he’s the worst football player on the Texas Longhorns team. Or that Kappa and team guys alike think he’s a joke. Or the fact that he and Eddie finally talked last night and he had Eddie so, so wrong that he doesn’t know if he should apologise or move schools and just start over, free from expectations.

He wouldn’t, though. 

While Buck certainly fantasized about the idea when he first arrived and, on days like today, allows himself to think it through some more, he knows he couldn’t leave now. He loves the Longhorns—it’s his dream team, and he’ll be damned if he’s giving it up that easily. He couldn’t leave Bobby, either; not after just getting him back. He couldn’t leave the team that is beginning to feel like a team.

He couldn’t leave Eddie. 

He’s able to admit it to himself now, at least, and that’s an improvement from before when he still thought Eddie was a prick and would swear up and down that he hadn’t missed the other man at all. But Eddie has proved himself to be mature, and kind, and caring, and in possession of some of the greatest genes of all time because holy shit, how did he manage to get even better looking over the last five years?

Buck huffs and begins stretching, resolutely not thinking of the images that have been populating his mind more and more frequently of late: Eddie, sweaty and glorious after a hard practice. Eddie, sleep-rumpled and yawning just after his alarm goes off and sitting up in the bed across the room from him. Eddie, looking at Buck like he’s the most interesting puzzle he’s ever tried and he can’t wait to figure it out. 

(That was how he’d looked when Buck disappeared on him this morning. Confused, but contemplative. Buck… he can work with that.)

The sun is scorching his shoulders as he rolls out his neck, but he thinks of nothing as he sets off again. He focuses instead on the rhythm of his feet against the soft earth, the air that fills his lungs and the pounding of his own heartbeat drowning out the music in his ears. This is simple perfection, Buck is sure. Running is mathematical, precise, and Buck knows how to do that. 

(He can do that, at least.)

It drowns out everything else. He runs until he can’t feel his legs anymore and then he runs a little further, only realising then that he’s still two miles from campus and that he’s almost late for physio. Tommy’s unimpressed expression flashes in his head, and he groans, pumping his legs faster.

Buck’s heart pounding as he walks into the physiotherapy centre has nothing to do with running, unfortunately, but it has nothing to do with Eddie either, of course. It’s just a coincidence that his roommate might be here.

“Just the man we were talking about!”

It’s Tommy, leaning against one of the massage tables and (thankfully) looking amused. Eddie glances up when Buck enters, shifting in his spot on the massage table beside Tommy, and Buck doesn’t miss the way the tips of his ears go pink. 

“Am I late, or were you gossiping?” Buck asks, folding his arms and stepping closer with a grin spreading across his face. 

Tommy rolls his eyes. “Like I’d tell you if we were gossiping,” he replies, but he still doesn’t sound mad. Not late, then. Tommy holds Buck’s gaze for a moment longer before flicking to Eddie, something unreadable passes between them. “You sure, Eddie? There are plenty of other patients here that I could let him loose on,” Tommy tells him, and oh. 

“No, uh—” Eddie cuts himself off, looking at Buck. “It’s okay. He can stay and—observe, if he wants. Might be the only time he sees this sort of injury, after all.”

“Eddie Diaz, always sacrificing himself in the name of teachable moments,” Tommy mutters, and Eddie snorts. It’s Tommy’s turn to look at Buck now, glancing between him and Eddie as if considering something. “Alright. Buck, I hope you came ready to work.”

Buck squares his shoulders and says, as seriously as he can muster, “Sir, yes Sir.”

(Eddie’s cheeks are flushed now. Excellent.)

“Are you giving the spiel, or am I?” Tommy says to Eddie. 

“You go ahead. You’re the Jedi Master.”

Tommy laughs then, and it’s so unexpected that it makes Buck smile too. After a beat, Tommy gestures to Eddie’s brace and the other man complies, undoing the buckles and slipping off the straps. They’re all silent, and Buck is waiting for Tommy to begin teaching but he seems to be waiting, too. It’s clear that he doesn’t know where to start, or how much Buck already knows. 

It takes another second, but then Eddie speaks. 

“You know I was shot,” Eddie says quietly, though they’re far from the nearest patients in the massive room. “It was a—a messy injury, I guess.”
When Eddie looks to Tommy to pick up where he left off, the physiotherapist doesn’t miss a beat. “Shrapnel and other debris made it worse. Several tendons and arteries were severed,” Tommy explains, and then gestures to the points on Eddie’s shoulder and names them. “There was also extensive nerve damage. There were a few surgeries to repair it, but because rehab and treatment wasn’t started immediately there was little hope that he’d regain even half of his regular arm function.”

“Why didn’t you do the rehab?” Buck interrupts, looking straight at Eddie. 

Eddie looks away. “I… there were risks involved with trying to regain function,” he says after a few moments, and Buck scowls. 

“What risks?”

“My parents knew that if I got better I’d want to play football again, and—well, obviously, it’s a pretty rough sport. If I get hit the wrong way, or fall on just the right spot, I could lose feeling in that arm completely. Forever.” Eddie takes an uneven breath, rolling his shoulder. “So, my parents convinced me not to get rehab for a while, and when I finally did get sick of feeling so helpless and started training, the period I waited for was almost my downfall.”

“The muscles atrophied enough to cause significant strain on the joints, and aside from just the time period setback, it left Eddie in a more… precarious position.”

“What does that mean?” Buck asks.

“It just means that I have to be really careful when I play football,” Eddie explains, but he doesn’t elaborate further. 

Tommy has Buck perform a range of motion test on Eddie, which he thankfully passes without embarrassing himself too much. He has enough experience that he knows what questions to ask and how to move his arm to test his range—how to generally look like he knows what he’s doing, basically—but it doesn’t stop him from having flaming cheeks the whole time. Bending over Eddie, probing at his flexing muscles and tracing lines of tendons from his chest to his arm—it’s all just… a lot.

“Good,” Tommy says with a nod when Buck lowers Eddie’s arm and nods confirmation that he’s finished. “Nice job. Eddie, can you take him through the exercises you do? I want to see if he can spot any corrections that need to be made.”

Tommy stays mostly silent as Eddie goes through his exercises, only jumping in if Buck doesn’t point out a correction like repositioning his wrist or following all the way through on a movement. Buck gets into a weird rhythm, evaluating each exercise along with its utility and efficacy before analyzing Eddie’s performance of the stretch and correcting or demonstrating the movement where he can. Getting to front-seat-drive like this combined with the quiet pleasure that he gets when Tommy praises his ability to take corrections is a welcome burst of confidence.

It doesn’t go unnoticed. “You’re a pro, young Padawan,” Tommy says, and when Buck grins his brow arches almost imperceptibly. “Has anyone told you that you’re like a puppy?”

“Yes.”

“Yes,” Eddie says, at the same time as Buck. 

They share a look. 

Buck turns back to Tommy and shrugs, hoping him stuffing his hands in his pockets projects the image of nonchalance rather than him taking the opportunity to fiddle with a folded up receipt on the left side. 

“It’s come up before,” Buck says, and then glances at the discarded clipboard with a checklist of the day’s tasks on the counter, eager to change the subject. “What’s next?”

Tommy’s brow is arching in earnest now, and his grin is mischievous enough to make Buck’s cheek flush. “Y’know, you’re full of surprises, Buckley,” he says after a beat with a shake of his head.

Buck grins back, saying nothing. He feels both like he’s found a new friend and that there’s a subtle zing of connection registering in the back of his head. It’s not the first time he’s felt both things at once—he’s been to plenty of parties and made out with plenty of sexually ambiguous fraternity brothers, thank you very much—but Eddie makes him think of the thing he hasn’t had again: that zing of connection with someone he thought he hated.

Buck knows Tommy’s gay—he mentioned it during a session last week—but he also knows that he’s a professional, so he isn’t sure if Tommy is actually making a move or just flirting for the sake of flirting. 

“Do you—”

“What is next?”

It’s Eddie, speaking pointedly over Buck. Buck had almost— almost— forgotten that he was still here, and while he blushes Tommy only looks even more amused. Buck raises his brows at him in silent question, and Tommy just shrugs like Buck did to him. 

“You tell me.”

“What?”

Tommy’s grin is beginning to make Buck feel like he can read his mind. “Functional mobility stretches, or practice fascial release massages?”

“Oh. Um.” Buck glances at Eddie, who is still lying on the massage table looking between Tommy and Buck with his eyes burning. The last time Buck saw Eddie lying on a massage table with that much heat in his eyes was—

Eddie’s eyes snap to Buck’s. Buck knows he can tell what he’s thinking about, and he also knows that Eddie is thinking the same thing. It’s science, really. Natural chemistry. He feels his body reacting, his blood fizzing with the anticipation of knowing all he’d have to do is reach out a hand and touch—

“Functional mobility stretches,” Buck and Eddie say at the same time. 

(Buck doesn’t think he could handle a massage.)

Whenever he convinced Maddie to come to the gym with him, she always complained about the smell. Buck’s always found it rather comforting, though; the smell of metal and antiseptic, sweat clinging to the air. He’s always liked getting to work out and turn his brain off, instead focusing simply on flexing his muscles to perform the movement again and again. Maddie was strong but despised weightlifting, so she complained most of the way through her sets. 

(Buck always kind of liked her complaining, though.) 

(He misses it.)

With a groan, Buck focuses back on his rep. He’s supposed to be turning his brain off, not drifting back to thinking about Maddie again. After a few more minutes of Black Sabbath he’s able to focus on his task, and he’s doing his ninth rep bench press when he sees Eddie walk in out of the corner of his eye and almost drops the bar on his chest. 

It’s nearly two in the morning. Buck knows what he’s doing here, obviously, but still—what is he doing here?

Buck hadn’t seen him since he left his PT appointment this afternoon and assumed he was crashing in Ravi’s room, but apparently not. It takes a moment for Eddie to spot him, but when he does he almost jumps a foot into the air and puts a hand over his heart. The gym is empty other than them, and Eddie walks over and pulls off his headphones. 

“Hey. Didn’t expect to see you here,” Eddie says when he reaches Buck.

“Same,” Buck replies. 

“Couldn’t sleep. You?”

“Didn’t even try.”

They don’t waste time with small talk after that, Buck telling Eddie to enjoy his workout in silent permission to leave and continue. Eddie takes the hint and goes, heading over to the Smith machine on opposite sides of the gym. 

Buck turns the music up on his phone and turns to the free weights rack, beginning his Bulgarian lunges. He’s always hated the exercise, but it’s great for explosive power and—well, it makes his ass look good. 

After a few more exercises and a short break on his phone, Buck heads for the pullup bars only to find Eddie going in the same direction. It’s too late to turn around awkwardly now that Eddie has seen him, so he steels himself and selects the bar on the other side of the square contraption so that he’s diagonal to Eddie. He doesn’t know what he’d do with Eddie in his direct eyeline—something stupid, probably—so he’s glad for the opportunity to focus on his own exercise. 

Up, down. Up, down. Up, down. Up, down.

Buck makes it four reps before he gives in and glances over. 

Eddie’s been matching him rep for rep, the brace on his shoulder shifting along with him as he strains to get his chin to the bar. His hair is mussed over his forehead, obscuring dark eyes filled with concentration. The muscles in his arms and chest are revealed through his thin tank top, and Buck watches his chest rise and fall as Eddie dangles for a second to catch his breath. 

After a beat he’s going again, and Buck could swear that he sees Eddie’s eyes flick over to him just for a moment. Buck accepts the challenge, flexing his back and arms as he wills his body upwards. His chin touches the bar once more, and he locks eyes with Eddie as he does, finding him in the same position. 

Eddie lets go gracefully and falls to the ground, his arms swinging from side to side as he stretches them out. Buck follows suit and watches as Eddie winces at a twinge then straightens.

“Nice,” Buck says, because he can’t think of anything else, and Eddie just snorts. 

The walk back to their dorm is spent mostly in silence, though the inside of Buck’s head is loud. 

It’s hard to believe that just a few weeks ago Buck thought he’d happily watch Eddie walk off a cliff. He may have been lying to himself back then, but he was a good liar—now, even pretending to feel like that feels miles away. There’s a certain quieting that happens when he and Eddie are beside each other, whether that’s working out or on the team. 

When they’re truly clicking… it’s magic. Buck knows it is. He just doesn’t know why he can’t make the magic happen anymore.

But he could . 

Buck has a theory. It’s a theory that is currently untested, but if he’s right…

With a lightness in his chest he hadn’t felt in a while since the night before, Buck turns to Eddie. “Wanna play some football?”

Eddie arches a brow. “Now?”

“What?” A slow smirk spreads across Buck’s face, turning into a wicked grin. “You scared?” Eddie rolls his eyes, but Buck could swear his cheeks are flushed in the lamplight. Buck’s smile disappears a little as he considers his challenge. “We don’t have to, though. I know with your injury, the—PT, the long workout—maybe it’d be too much to throw a route now. We can raincheck.”

It’s Eddie’s turn to grin. “Are you trying to use reverse psychology on me, Evan?” he muses, and the way his Texas drawl comes out on ‘tryin’ makes Buck melt. Despite this he opens his mouth to protest, and Eddie shakes his head to placate him. “I know it was a genuine offer. But still, I… want to play.”

The sparkle of mischief in Eddie’s eyes is what makes Buck surge forward to fall into stride with him in the end. They walk in comfortable silence for a little longer before Buck speaks. 

“I wanted to thank you,” he says. “For earlier, I mean. Letting me assist in your PT session.”

Eddie clears his throat. “Yeah, well—like I said, it might be the only time you see an injury like mine as a physio.” 

I want to see an injury like yours more than once because I want to see you all the time, Buck laments silently, and then coughs when he realises he hasn’t replied to Eddie. “Maybe,” he manages. “Anyway, it was a good learning opportunity, but… thanks for letting me do it.”

Eddie knows what he means. Buck knows that. “You’re welcome,” Eddie says finally. 

Buck doesn’t know how to handle the silence, so he pushes forward with the first thing that comes to his head. “I used to look you up all the time,” he blurts out. 

Fuck. FUCK. 

Buck really needs to stop doing that. 

“You did?” 

Buck chances a quick glance over, but finds Eddie’s face unreadable. He presses on. In for a penny, in for a pound. “In high school especially, y’know. After. Sometimes it was a hate search, sometimes it… wasn’t. Anyway, I remember watching highlights of your game against Crenton in senior year. That final throw? Insane.”

To Buck’s delight, Eddie grins. “You saw that?”

“‘Course I did.” Buck scuffs his sneaker against the grass, bumping shoulders with Eddie as he does and ignoring the zing of electricity at the contact. “I remember being so confused when you disappeared. I had all sorts of theories.”

“Oh yeah? What was your best one?” 

Buck knows what Eddie’s saying. He’s saying, the real reason was shit. Give me a different reality to believe in for a second. 

He can do that. “I think my most likely one was your parents finally snapping and locking you in the basement with a football dangled in front of you like a carrot,” he says, which earns a snort. “Another was you leaving to join a dance troupe.”

“Dance?”

“I always thought you had moves.” Buck curses internally, rushing to move on. “Anyway, it’s impressive that you picked football back up again and worked for it.”

“Thank you.” Eddie’s tone isn’t dismissive, but it isn’t fully genuine either. 

“I mean, you weren’t even playing and you still got Captain.” 

Buck regrets it as soon as he says it, and half a second later he feels Eddie tense beside him. The man beside him opens his mouth, and Buck shakes his head. “No, I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean it like that. I know it was much more complicated than that, and—I know you earned Captain. Truly.”

Eddie nods, his body easing a little, but he still says nothing. Thankfully they’re close to the practice field, and can head towards it without too much awkwardness. Eddie’s still here, Buck reminds himself. He could leave if he wanted to, and he hasn’t. 

“Okay, Buckley,” Eddie says the minute they step onto the grass, a smile curving his lips. “Ready to run?”

They set up for a classic route, one they had drilled into them a thousand times over at camp so many years ago. He knows Eddie is going to call it before he does and positions himself accordingly, grinning at Eddie’s surprised expression. 

At Eddie’s command Buck is off like a shot, bolting straight for several yards before pivoting on his right ankle and veering left. He counts his paces in his head, certain somehow that he can feel the rhythm of Eddie’s footsteps matching his own through the grass, and on the 17th step he turns. 

He angles his torso towards the ball like he was taught, tracking the arc of it through the sky, and no sooner has he opened his hands than the ball has sailed comfortably into them. He keeps running for several more steps, staring dumbfounded at the football clutched in his arms like he keeps waiting for it to disappear. When he finally stops, he turns to find Eddie standing further down the field, his arms up in celebration. 

“YES!” Buck shouts as reality finally catches up to him, spiking the ball against the ground in excitement. 

Eddie reaches him in a matter of moments, and Buck doesn’t have time to process his proximity before he’s being swept into Eddie’s arms and spun around like he weighs nothing.  There’s laughter in Buck’s ear and a sense of weightlessness in his body that doesn’t diminish when Eddie finally does put him down, still laughing. 

“I knew you could do it,” Eddie is saying. “I knew you could listen.”

Buck has to laugh with him. “It’s like you said. My body wanted to be wrong, but tonight I could tune it out. It was just a question of actually… doing it.”

They run a few more routes, and it’s as Buck had suspected when he asked Eddie to come to the field—the twinge in his gut telling him to disobey everyone, especially Eddie, has diminished. It’s still there—Buck still wants to go right instead of left, to run a veer just because, but he’s now able to overpower the stubbornness in his muscle memory with the logic of his mind. 

He knew it was a mental block, he just… he hadn’t realised how tied it was to everything weighing on him, to Eddie. 

“I have another idea, and this one’s even better. Want to throw a little more?”

Eddie narrows his eyes for a moment, then he’s smiling. “Let’s go.”

“Are you ready for practice tomorrow?” Eddie says later as they’re walking back to their room, sweaty and elated.

Buck shrugs, hoping to conceal his nerves. “I think so.”

Eddie, as always, knows what he’s thinking. “You can do the same thing again tomorrow, Buck. Trust me. Maybe you can just focus on—y’know, just the route. You and me. Remember? I throw it—”

“—and I catch it,” Buck confirms, and he’s grinning again. He can’t help it.

The next day, Buck does just that. It doesn’t happen every time, because Eddie’s good but he’s not a miracle worker—Buck’s been a contrarian for so long at this point that his body automatically wants to disobey—but more often than not he makes the catch, and with most of those he clears the end zone in seconds. 

When the defensive line takes the field and they’re walking off, it’s only natural for Buck to grab the water bottle and throw it to Eddie without looking, locked in a heated discussion about a positioning issue for their latest play. They both tug their helmets off and take long gulps of the water, resuming their conversation in between swallows. Eddie turns his back to Buck, and it’s so natural; Buck is pouring the icy water down the back of Eddie’s jersey and soaking his hair, then turning for Eddie to do the same to him.

“Nice work, Buck!” 

Buck glances over to where Bobby is standing with Hen, Chimney and Judd, all four of them looking smug. They’ve been watching Buck with Eddie, he realises, and have noticed that they’re clicking again and that now Buck is playing (mostly) well. 

“Thanks, Coach,” Buck says, raising a hand to touch the back of his now dampened hair. “Wanna see a trick play Eddie and I have been working on?”

The whistle blows a few seconds later, and Bobby glances at his assistant coaches and shrugs. “Show us what you’ve got.”

Eddie and Buck eagerly take their places on the line. They drilled this one over and over again last night, and at the snap of the ball Buck takes off like a rocket. Eddie fakes a pass to the centre just as Buck is doubling back in the other direction, keeping his eyes on the other player even as he does another dummy pass before flicking the ball into Buck’s waiting hands. Buck dodges a defender, shucking another, and then he’s sailing to the end zone without a soul able to catch him. The whistle blows when he crosses the line, and Buck cheers. 

The other players both on the field and on the sidelines are watching them, dumbfounded. Buck thinks for a second that he did something wrong—did he knock someone over too hard on his way past, maybe?—but then the team starts cheering. 

Ravi runs over. “Dude, that was insane,” he tells Buck, breathless. 

“What? It’s a trick play I learned at SMU, it’s nothing—”

“No, not that,” Ravi says, impatient. “I mean, it was a good play, but—do you know how fast that was?”

“What do you mean?”

Ravi glances at his watch. “The entire down was less than eight seconds, and you cleared forty yards in five. That has to be a Longhorns record for a non-timed sprint.”

Eddie reaches them a moment later, looking like he knows exactly what Ravi is congratulating Buck for. “You good, Turbo?”

“Living the dream. Are you good, Rocket-Arm?”

Eddie grins, clapping Buck on the back. “Never better. Again?”

“Again.”

And it goes on like that for another week. Eddie and Buck often go for a run together in the morning before strength and conditioning with the team, but even when they don’t they find themselves walking to classes side by side or ending up in the same cafeteria for lunch, even when Buck’s lecture hall is across campus. 

They just naturally gravitate towards each other. Even when they’re eating with the team or just the other guys from their floor, they’re always sat beside each other, passing food wordlessly back and forth and occasionally finishing each other’s sentences. Buck knows the guys on the team have obviously noticed and are confused by their sudden change, but Buck thinks it’s not sudden at all—they just remembered how much the reasons they should be friends outnumber the reasons they shouldn’t. 

Their closeness is even more obvious on the field. At any given time Buck can simply sense where Eddie is on the field, to the point where Ravi jokes he could probably have Buck shut his eyes and use him as a human radar for the other man. More than one teammate begin talking to Buck more in the locker room and on the sidelines, apparently warmed by his newfound closeness to their fearless leader. 

And yes, it’s not lost on him that Eddie is largely responsible for his shift both on and off the field, allowing him to play better and to stop being bullish and arrogant. It’s helped him get the true friends that he’s been searching for since… well, since he left camp, honestly. He’s had teammates he got on well with in the time since and he made a few friends at SMU, but nothing compares to the glossy memories of that summer in the forests of Pennsylvania. Campbell, Cortez, Tyler, Carlos. Ravi, of course. They became like brothers to him, and he’s been waiting for something like that ever since. 

He knows they’re all different— he’s different—but Lena and Albert begin to fill those roles when they both continue their streak of talking to Buck every practice, and a few times they come with Ravi to Buck and Eddie’s room. Buck’s invited to share their pizza, and then he’s just one of the group, talking and laughing beside Eddie. Buck is quieter than he might have been at camp, more observant, but other than that it feels the same. They could be in a cabin or a dorm, and Buck would be none the wiser. 

More players join the ranks of friendship over the course of the week, inviting Buck for a drink or to come spot them in the gym. Buck doesn’t even care that Eddie is a large reason for them warming up to him—he’s just glad they are. While Kappa was helping him not feel so alone here, having his teammates on his side too definitely helps. 

He feels so good that he writes a letter, slipping it into the post with a skip in his step before practice one morning.

It doesn’t even matter that he doesn’t play during the game that week. He isn’t mad about it—he actually understands. While they’re in the tunnel, Buck stretching as if he isn’t settling in for a long game spent on the bench, Eddie turns to him. 

“You’re still holding back,” he remarks. It isn’t a question. He seems a little confused about it, squinting through the sun beaming in from the direction of the field at Buck. 

“I don’t know why—”

“I know,” Eddie interrupts, shrugging. “Neither do I. We’ll figure it out, though.”

Buck watches Williams stretch to catch a beautiful throw from Eddie and thinks, I can do better. 

He has more to prove both on the field during practice and off before he’ll be trusted to start again, though, so for now he makes do with third string and throws himself bodily into practices. 

Even Bobby notices. On Sunday, the day after the game, Buck gets a text inviting him to family dinner—it’s the first official one they’ll be having since moving to Austin, having made do with impromptu meals with Athena and Bobby (which were always more lavish than whatever Buck would’ve scrounged up from the dining hall, anyway). 

Buck feels like he has something to prove at this one more than usual. So what if he puts a little more effort into his hair and outfit than usual? Looking good isn’t a crime. 

(He also gets to watch Eddie’s face flush as he changes in and out of various jeans and button-up options, spinning for his roommate’s approval and grinning when all he gets is a garbled response. It’s a win-win.)

Everyone is already there when Buck arrives, flowers in hand. Athena beams when she sees him, and he thinks it’s an even better welcome from her than the summer before senior year when he’d announced that he wasn’t coming to camp and then changed his mind and showed up anyway. 

“It’s so good to see you, honey,” Athena says warmly, greeting him with a hug and opening the door wider for him to come in. “The flowers are beautiful.”

“They had to match the recipient,” Buck quips in response, and Athena rolls her eyes and waves a hand. 

“You and Bobby both are cheesier than fondue, honestly,” she complains, but she’s smiling anyway. 

In the living room, Buck greets Chimney along with Hen and Karen. Judd has also joined them with his wife Grace, Buck sees, and he’s pleased about it—he doesn’t know much about the cowboy, but he’s a damn good assistant coach and Buck knows many of his teammates go to Judd with problems or simply to hang out. 

“Hey, Judd, good to see you,” Buck says with a wave. 

“Howdy,” Judd replies, tipping his hat, and Buck resists the urge to laugh. He didn’t know people still said that in real life. “This is my wife, Grace.”

“Nice to finally meet you.”

“I know I just saw you yesterday, but really? No greeting for me?”

Buck turns to see Bobby waiting in the doorway pretending to be put-out. Buck sighs, acting like it’s a big chore and keeping his limbs leaden as he trudges over, but when he reaches Bobby he leaps into a bear hug and relishes in the laugh it tugs from Bobby’s chest. 

Buck fist bumps Harry, May and Denny, and then they’re all filing into the dining room for food. Dinner tonight is luxurious as ever, a glistening roast chicken stuffed with herbs and vegetables surrounded by piles of mashed potatoes, collard greens and corn bread. Buck helps himself to a generous portion of everything and digs in as soon as everyone else is finished saying grace, managing a forkful before he’s interrupted for the first time. 

“Buck, how are your classes?” It’s Athena, spooning vegetables onto Harry’s plate, the kid in question still grumbling the way he did when he was a little kid. 

Buck is sort of glad the question isn't football related. He’s always thankful for Athena’s enforcement of no excessive football talk at the table, which sometimes isn’t easy at a table full of coaches and a player. They all try their best to respect the rule, and Buck gratefully takes the opportunity to talk about something other than the game. 

“Good, actually,” Buck replies. “I’ve always liked Biomechanics, so I like applying it in the rehab technique classes as well. I’m glad I have the foundation science courses done, because I hated those, but I liked math.”

“You’ve always been a math whiz,” Hen reminds him. 

“I need to know plenty of numbers now, so it’s helpful,” Buck says. “Anyway, my placement is probably my favourite part.”

“You’re doing that at the rehab centre, right?” Karen asks, passing the cornbread wordlessly to her wife. 

“Yeah. It’s mainly athletes that come in, but I see a few chronic injuries, too. I like getting to do the whole thing, y’know—assessing the patient, diagnosing the problem, treating them. Watching people squeeze balls or use exercise bands gets kinda boring after a while, but I still like talking to them.”

“They just let you do it all yourself over there?” Chimney says, arching an eyebrow and turning to Judd. “I don’t know if I’d let the kid wrap my ankle.”

“I reckon he’d do a fine job,” Judd replies magnanimously. “Besides, he’s got supervision anyhow.” Judd cuts him a sidelong glance. “You do have supervision, right?”

“Of course,” Buck says, feeling defensive. “I’m Tommy’s shadow. Or, I guess—he’s mine. He watches everything I do and—” Buck breaks off to laugh, thinking of the lecture he got two days ago for sorting the weights into the wrong bins. “He has no problem telling me when I mess up, don’t worry.”

“He’s a good mentor,” Bobby says decisively. “I looked him up when Buck got matched with him. Smart kid, graduated a few years back. Blew his knee out playing soccer.”

Hen whistles. “Tough break.”

“He went and got his qualification, and now he’s one of the department’s best, apparently,” Bobby continues. “You have to appreciate the comeback.”

Buck snorts, and when he puts down his fork it clatters against the plate a little louder than he intended. “That was subtle,” he says. “Yes, Bobby. Tommy did such an amazing thing by coming back from a setback, and Eddie did the same thing and look how incredible he is—”

“—Nobody mentioned Eddie.” Hen looks like she’s trying not to laugh.

Buck chooses to ignore her and continues, locked in a heated gaze with Bobby. “My point is, I get the message. I’m not playing at one hundred percent.”

“I think that’s enough football talk,” Athena interjects easily, leaning for the dish of mashed potato. Buck has to say he agrees. “Seconds, anyone?”

There’s only a moment’s pause before Judd is lifting his plate. “I mean, I wouldn’t say no,” he says, and the tension in the room smooths over. “Compliments to the chef.”

“Thank you,” Bobby says, and then it’s Buck’s turn to suppress a laugh at the brief look of surprise that ghosts across Judd’s face. 

They happily talk cuisines for the rest of the meal, Bobby promising to share the recipe for the chicken with Judd. Buck loves that it feels like old times, the redneck assistant coach a welcome addition that slots in easily with their motley crew. They laugh, poke fun at each other, and flit from topic to topic with all the consistency of a boat with no rudder—and that’s the best part. They talk about anything and everything (except football, though Chimney manages to sneak in a quick debate about the Cowboys before dessert) and the kids at the end of the table are contributing just as much to their debates. At the end of the meal Buck’s arms are being loaded up with Tupperware containers when Bobby pulls him aside. 

“I wanted to tell you that even though I was prodding with the comeback thing, I am proud of the progress you’ve made,” he says. “You’re working hard in school and in your placement, you’re working hard on the field, and you’re spending time with your teammates. You know you’ve still got work to do, but…” Bobby trails off, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I truly am so glad to see the old Buck coming back again.”

“Thank you,” Buck manages after a beat too long, struggling to compute his words. He knows Bobby trusts him, knows he believes in him, but—it’s nice to hear it, all the same. It’s good to know that Bobby sees the change that he feels. “I’m looking forward to getting back on the field.”

“I can’t wait to let you loose,” Bobby replies with a laugh. “You and Eddie are an unstoppable duo when you want to be. As soon as I can trust you one hundred percent to run the plays, you’ll be a permanent fixture on that field.”

“Thanks, Coach.” Buck wants to be a permanent fixture more than anything. 

Maybe Eddie’s around to run drills later, Buck thinks to himself. They could probably convince Stan to keep the floodlights on for an extra hour tonight, if Buck saves a container of food for him. 

“I’m glad to see you and Eddie are getting on again,” Bobby says, and here we go. 

Buck hadn’t been expecting to have this conversation today, is the thing. (He’d sort of hoped there wouldn’t be a chance for Bobby to corner him one on one.) It takes a second for him to find words and he goes for sarcastic in the end, cocking a brow. “Go on, you can say it. I told you so. ”

Buck is well aware that Bobby hoped Eddie would be the thing that helped him the most, and he’s a little annoyed that he was right, to be honest. It would’ve been so much better if he was the one getting to say I told you so.

But Bobby is a better man than Buck is, because he shakes his head. “I wasn’t going to say that. I had my hopes, but I don’t know much about what happened between you and never wanted to intrude. All I knew is that Eddie was one of the things that we would never talk about. I wasn’t sure if being here together would fix things, but I’m happy you two are beginning to work everything out.”

Buck doesn’t know if he and Eddie have worked everything out, per se. He would more describe it as an ever deepening tangle of fuckery.

Chapter Text

Buck

“Okay, let’s go through it one more time. Drinks?”

“Mixers in the minifridge along with our six pack, and it’s BYOB for everything else.”

“Snacks?”

“Chips on the table.”

“Music?”

“Speaker’s on and ready to go. You’re on aux.”

Buck looks around the room one more time. Fuck, he wishes he had a clipboard. “Everything looks good. Who’d you bet is arriving first?” Buck asks, climbing onto Eddie’s bed and cracking open a beer. 

Eddie takes a seat beside him and accepts the offered can, taking a sip before replying. “Ravi, because he’s always early and will steal all the snacks,” he muses. “Or Ryder, because he’s a brown-noser.”

Buck snorts. As if on cue, there’s a knock on the door and a moment later it swings open, revealing Ravi holding a bag of Cheetos and a bottle of rum. “Ugh, I love pregames,” he says, bumping fists with Eddie on his way past as he sets his things down on the desk. “Did you guys see Becker’s outfit tonight? Apparently he lost a bet with Harris and now he’s in a Speedo.”

Buck and Eddie both groan in sync. “God, no one wants to see that.”

People start arriving pretty quickly after Ravi, and after half an hour their dorm room is crammed with football players and their friends. There’s enough space to move through the group—barely—but they’ve also given up and propped the door open, someone bringing over another speaker to run in the corridor so the party can spill outside. 

Buck is glad for it, because the crowd thins enough that he’s able to get through to Eddie. “You wanna do a shot?” he half-yells, and then repeats himself when Eddie furrows his brow. 

Eddie nods, and offers for Ravi to join in return for using his rum. They clink plastic cups, tap the table, and then without talking about it Buck and Eddie link arms, downing the amber liquid in sync. Shaking off the burn of the alcohol, Buck holds out a hand and together he and Eddie do their handshake. 

They don’t notice the cheerleaders watching them until they turn to see three blondes giggling and whispering to each other. The tallest of the three that Buck recognises from games—Kyleigh or Emmaleigh or something—flips her hair over her shoulder and smiles. 

“You guys are like… close, huh?” she asks, but it’s more of a rhetorical question. 

“The whole team is,” Eddie corrects carefully, sounding as wary as Buck feels. “We’re like brothers.”

“I mean, I know,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “I’m Ryder’s girlfriend. I just meant we hadn’t noticed y’all getting along so much before.”

“I guess my charm wore him down,” Buck replies with an easy grin. “I’m very lovable.”

“Yeah, you’re just a teddy bear,” one of the other girls shoots back sarcastically, her eyes burning with a challenge. 

Kyleigh or Emmaleigh glances at her friend. “I’m Annaleigh, and this is Avery,” Annaleigh says, stepping aside to nudge the friend that spoke forward a little. “This is Lucy.”

Lucy is nursing a vodka cranberry and staring back at Buck like she’s in the middle of a contest with him. Her short blonde hair flops over her eyes and she flicks it out of the way impatiently, only for it to fall back into place a minute later—Buck finds the movement endearing. She’s dressed in jean cutoffs and a tank top, an outfit that perfectly encapsulates the cute and sexy energy of a cheerleader as well as the ‘I don’t give a fuck about being here’ attitude that she clearly wants to radiate. 

The three girls drift off to dance a minute later, leaving Buck, Eddie and Ravi to stand in the corner sharing looks with each other. 

“She seemed… interesting,” Ravi says finally, taking another sip of his drink. 

Eddie seems to have no interest in talking about their newfound friend. “Wanna dance?” he asks Buck, who grins. 

“Lead the way.”

The girls have gone to dance in the hallway, most of the floor now involved. Buck can hear at least three different speakers all blaring the same music from his phone, and he only recognises about half of the people currently in his room. God, they’ll be a sight marching towards Kappa for the actual party.

Buck is just thankful that there’s just enough space to dance to ‘Breezeblocks’ beside Eddie, laughing as Eddie mimes the xylophone in the song. It’s so easy to dance, swaying and then jumping as one as the beat picks up.

I love you so, I love you so

Please break my heart

Buck doesn’t look up, because he knows he’ll find Eddie’s heated gaze. He doesn’t know what he’d do if their eyes meet—he can’t be held responsible for that. Their bodies occasionally bump into one another as people move through the crowd and Buck is electrified by every brush of skin and fabric. He’s also steadied by his presence, until suddenly Eddie is gone. 

When Buck finally lifts his head, he finds Eddie being tugged away by an insistent Lena and Albert to watch Ryder do a keg stand in the hallway. He’s helpless to do anything but shrug as he disappears, and Buck watches for only another moment before he’s turning back to the dance floor and trying very hard not to care that his friend is gone—or at least, look like he doesn’t care.

The music is good (all thanks to him) so he sways his hips a little and acts like he intended to dance by himself. When ‘Sexyback’ comes on, most of the guys in the room groan but Buck has to laugh when the girls cheer. While he considers changing it for a second, ultimately he decides to go with it and bops along with the music.

A few more couples take to the dance floor and Buck watches as the guys suddenly become much more in favour of the song choice when their girls start to move. It’s an infectious song, Buck has to admit—he can’t help but sing along a little as he nods his head and lets himself drift to the sidelines while the couples dance. He’s not going to be the guy in the centre trying to form a dance circle, thanks. 

“You look lonely.”

It takes a second for Buck to place the voice over the loud music until he turns and sees one of the girls from earlier arching a brow at him. He strains to remember her name—Lucy. 

She’s still arching her brow, because he still hasn’t answered her question. “I like being on the sidelines sometimes,” he replies eventually, leaning down a little so she can hear him over the music. 

He can’t hear it, but he watches her laugh. “That comment has layers to it, given you’re third string,” she shoots back. Her breath tickles his neck, and he fights the urge to shiver. At his look, she shrugs. “I’m a cheerleader. I hear things.”

“Keep your eye on me, then,” he says, all nonchalant arrogance. “I’ll be starting soon enough.”

Instead of congratulating him or shooting another barbed comment at him, she just shrugs again. It’s almost worse, getting no response to that. 

Lucy puts a hand on his arm, and Buck thinks her brushing past his football status is actually the best thing right now. He takes another swig of beer and leans down at her command. “Wanna dance?”

Buck nods. He’d rather do that than sit on the sidelines by himself anyway. They sway to the music a little when a slower song comes on, and Buck is glad because he can actually hear Lucy speak. He finds out that she’s a junior studying business, and that she’s been cheering for the last two years—his arrival, apparently, is all anyone on the squad can talk about. 

“—and you left a legacy at SMU,” Lucy is saying. “The girls were dying to know why you switched schools.”

Buck shrugs, grinning. “My coach gave me the opportunity to play for the Longhorns, and… who wouldn’t take that shot?”

There’s something glittering in Lucy’s eyes as they talk, even about mundane things like ranking the food in the different dining halls around campus. It’s like a challenge. 

A more upbeat song blares through the speakers a minute later and he and Lucy begin to dance in earnest, twirling around each other and pulling out corny moves to make each other laugh. It’s been nice talking to her while Eddie’s off God knows where—she’s lovely, whip-smart and a great distraction from the nerves of hosting his first pregame with Eddie. Everyone seems to be having a good time so he allows himself to relax for a little bit and actually enjoy the party. 

It’s easy to talk with Lucy and even easier to dance, their bodies moving in sync to the beat. Buck feels like he’s known her for years already, the familiarity between them undeniable even though it doesn’t make much sense.

That’s why he doesn’t pull away when she kisses him. He truly hadn’t seen it coming—although in hindsight, he begins to recognise what the challenge in her eyes was—but it’s easy to put a hand lightly on her waist and tilt his head to deepen the kiss. 

Their mouths slot together, the kiss passionate but gentle as her hands slide up to rest on his chest. It occurs to Buck that she might be on her tiptoes right now to kiss him and that’s what makes him crack open his eyes a little involuntarily, wondering for a brief moment if he’d be able to tell. 

What he finds instead is Eddie standing in the doorway, watching him. 

Eddie

Buck spots him through the crowd of people in an instant, their eyes locking over the heads of their teammates and friends as Buck continues to kiss Lucy. It’s probably obvious that Eddie has been watching them the whole time, and he knows his expression is giving away everything he’s feeling—bewilderment mixed with something else that makes his eyes go round and cheeks go pink. 

While their gaze only locks for a moment, it feels like it’s an eternity. Eddie can’t look away as Buck finally pulls away from Lucy and they smile at each other, him leaning down to whisper something into her ear that makes her laugh. 

Eddie had come to ask him if they should start shepherding people out and towards the party, since it’s well past eleven thirty at this point, but instead found… that. He’d been frozen in place, unable to look away, but now Buck’s seen him and probably knows exactly what he was thinking too, which is—well. That can’t happen.

Eddie turns back to watch Williams attempt the keg stand and suddenly feels far too sober. 

Buck sways back over to Eddie ten minutes later, this time a good deal drunker than he was before. He’s unsteady on his feet and sporting a watery grin that Eddie doesn’t like the look of, and it’s then that Eddie spots the empty bottle of rum discarded on the desk. 

“Hey, Eds,” Buck says when he reaches Eddie, still sipping from a cup. His words run together as he continues. “‘Is…. ‘sit time to go yet?”

Eddie blinks twice and then nods. “Yeah, it is,” he says, and sidesteps past Buck to get to the speaker which he unplugs. Eddie half-steps up on the frame of the bed and raises his voice, cupping his hands over his mouth. “Hey, everyone! We’re leaving for Kappa!”

The music shutting down gets a few sparse boos but the announcement that they’re leaving is enough to perk everyone up, helped along by Lena and Albert beginning crowd control without being asked. God, he loves his friends. 

Buck is liquidy against the desk, but he stays standing until the last guest—Ravi, after Eddie promises for the ninth time that they’re okay—has left. Eddie has the wild urge to ask about the girl Buck was kissing, even though he has no idea what right he has to interrogate him, but he abandons the thought when the door clicks shut and Buck melts onto the bed and shuts his eyes.

“I had too much, Eddie,” Buck whines into the silence, throwing an arm over his face. 

“I know,” Eddie replies with a sigh as he sits down on his bed beside Buck. “I know.”

“When are we leaving?” Buck asks, still not opening his eyes. Eddie’s not sure if he didn’t notice the music turning off and everyone leaving or just assumed the pair would be making a grand entrance later, but he doesn’t ask. 

“I think we’re done for the night,” Eddie says, and when Buck lifts his arm to give him a scandalized look he just arches a brow. “Do you think you can walk without me helping you all the way to Kappa?”

Buck considers this for a second, goes to sit up defiantly, and then moans. “Nope.” He pauses, seeming to think about something, and between one second and the next his face goes white as a sheet. “Eds?”

“Yeah?”

“Think ‘mgonna…”

“Oh, shit.”

Eddie understands in an instant, and at the expression on Buck’s face he moves like lightning. There’s no time for niceties—he barely manages to haul Buck’s hulking body off the bed and get him to the bathroom before he’s throwing up everywhere, half of it missing the toilet completely. 

That’s gonna be fun to clean, Eddie thinks, but he keeps rubbing Buck’s back as it heaves under his touch anyway. 

Putting Buck to bed is a chore, but at least when Eddie wakes up in the morning he’s still snoring soundly. Eddie thinks that’s about right considering he practically had to strap Buck down to get him to stay there, the other man getting a second wind of energy after vomiting that Eddie couldn’t tamp down. 

Just glad that Buck is getting some rest, Eddie leaves him to sleep and heads off to the gym. They have a game today—yet another reason why the party last night wasn’t a great idea, though the team at least promised not to get blackout drunk and were only emboldened by Eddie’s presence, so he doesn’t really have a leg to stand on—and Eddie wants to squeeze in an extra workout to stretch out his shoulder before he plays. 

The gym is moderately busy this time of morning, so he finds a corner with his stretch bands and dutifully runs through his mobility exercises, grumbling the whole time about stupid ex-soccer players and their stupid PT regimens. It helps a little to complain, but he has no one to blame when he turns to the weight racks—he’s been specifically advised against lifting too heavy, actually, and knows he’s probably pushing it with what he’s putting on the bar right now. 

Still, it feels good to push himself. He only does a few reps before moving back to his regular exercises with more reasonable weights, but he’s surprised by the way his body actually complies with minimal complaint when he challenges it because it’s antithetical to most other parts of his life. It’s always nice to actually see and feel the improvements that he’s making, and for once he’s actually confident going into a game that he’ll be able to throw well. He and Buck have been particularly in sync in practice for the last few days, and he’s confident that today Buck will finally get to take the field properly and they can show the Longhorns fans exactly what they both can do. 

There’s a spring in his step as he heads back to the dorm, though he’s walking a little faster than usual because he hadn’t realised that he’d spent several hours in the gym. At this rate, he only just has enough time to grab a quick shower and change before they have to be on the bus—that’s fine. Easy.

Only he gets back to the dorm and Buck isn’t there.

He doesn’t think anything of it when he first walks in, finding the bed unmade as usual and a pile of clothes on the floor beside it that must be his pyjamas. Dumping his duffel on the bed, Eddie ducks back into the hallway and goes to Ravi’s room.

“Hey, Eddie,” Ravi says when he opens the door, sounding distracted. “Do you have a spare tie? I can’t find mine anywhere.”

“Is Buck here?” Eddie is completely ignoring Ravi’s question, he knows, but there’s a tiny pit growing in his stomach that he can’t ignore. 

Ravi furrows his brows. “Uh, no. I thought he’d still be in bed considering how drunk he was last night, but he is Buck, so—”

“Okay, thanks. I’m gonna go look for him.” Eddie turns on his heel and begins striding down the corridor, only just remembering to turn over his shoulder and add, “my door’s open. The ties are on the rack inside the cupboard door—grab whichever one you want.”

Eddie returns to their room first to grab his phone, and it’s then that he notices the crumpled paper on Buck’s bed. Hesitantly, he reaches out and unfolds it. 

It’s an envelope, stained with what looks like water and wrinkled as if it was balled up and smoothed out multiple times. Before Eddie notices the addressee he reads the giant ‘RETURNED TO SENDER’ stamp in the corner, and his heart sinks—he doesn’t need to look to see who it’s addressed to, but he does anyway.

Maddie Buckley.

Buck even put a smiley face on the ‘i’ the way he told Eddie once that Maddie used to. Seeing this makes Eddie’s chest hurt. He can imagine so vividly the secret, hopeful smile on Buck’s face as he drew it that it’s like he was sat right beside him. God, what Buck must be feeling right now. Eddie knows it’s been a while since Maddie’s been in contact and that she hadn’t responded to the messages Buck left for her, but he didn’t know it had gone this far. 

The letter is unopened. Eddie has a sneaking suspicion that this is what has hurt Buck the most. 

Fuck. 

Eddie makes a beeline for the field but finds it empty and is told by Stan that no one’s visited today. He checks Kappa—Campbell hadn’t heard from him since they planned the party the day before—and then the cafeterias—also empty. 

He goes to PT last, arriving in the rehab centre breathless and frazzled. He doesn’t have enough time to shower before the game now, but he doesn’t care—all he knows is that his calls to Buck are going to voicemail and he has to find him in the next twenty minutes. 

Tommy looks up when he arrives, opening his mouth to greet him warmly like he usually does but snapping it shut when he sees Eddie’s expression. “What’s wrong?”

“Is Buck here?”

Tommy frowns. “No, he doesn’t have placement until Monday. Is everything—”

“Fuck!” Eddie bites out, unable to stop himself from kicking one of the medicine balls beside him. Even watching it go flying across the room and bounce against the opposite wall, scaring the daylights out of a beady-eyed junior that Eddie’s never liked, isn’t enough to make him feel better. 

“Eddie…” Tommy sounds rather like he’s trying to calm a spooked horse, and Eddie takes a ragged breath to try and control himself better. 

“Sorry,” Eddie says. “He just—he got some bad news today and he’s disappeared. If you see him, could you—”

“I’ll send him your way.”

“Send him to the bus bay, actually. We have a game.”

“Shit,” Tommy whistles. “The timing’s shit, huh?”

“Tell me about it.” Eddie’s already backing out of the room, his mind whirring through the list of other possible hiding spots. “Call me if you see him, okay?”

“Got it.”

Eddie calls Buck three more times, until finally there are five minutes until the bus leaves and he has to hightail it back to his room to grab his suit and practically sprint to the bus bay. The whole time, he’s racking his brain. There has to be somewhere that Eddie hasn’t thought of already.

Buck’s hiding, that much is clear. But when he’s run off before, he’s gone somewhere obvious, somewhere Eddie could find him—not this time. He doesn’t want to be found. Eddie wishes… he wishes a lot of things. He wishes he was there when the letter arrived, he wishes the letter never got returned in the first place. He wishes he could take Buck’s face gently in his hands and tell him that it’s not his fault, that he doesn’t know why Maddie’s gone off the grid but that it has nothing to do with him. Buck won’t believe it, but Eddie wishes he could try.

Eddie’s suspicions that Buck doesn’t want to be found are confirmed when he arrives, sweaty and flustered, at the bus and finds Bobby standing outside with Chimney looking grim. 

“Where is he?”

Bobby’s mouth is set into a hard line. “We were hoping you’d tell us,” Bobby replies. “He called me ten minutes ago and said he was sick.”

For a moment, Eddie debates covering for Buck—players get in big trouble for missing a game without proper notice, especially for ones they were supposed to be starting in. He doesn’t want Buck to go down for something that isn’t his fault. 

Except it is sort of his fault, isn’t it? He’s the one that decided to miss the game and lie to Bobby. He could have simply explained, because Eddie knows Bobby would understand. He considers telling the coach anyway, but he shuts the thought down as quickly as it comes. Bobby knows about Maddie, sure, but it’s not like there’s anything he can do to help right now—besides, Eddie isn’t sure that Buck would forgive him for airing out his dirty laundry.

“I didn’t know he was sick,” Eddie says finally, aiming for somewhere in between dumping Buck in it and saving his ass.

“Well, it’s not ideal, but we’ll figure it out,” Bobby replies after a beat, zipping up his team jacket. “You don’t know where he is?”

“No, Coach. I haven’t seen him.”

Bobby looks conflicted for a moment, but then he sighs. “Alright. Well, he sounded distant on the phone but not like he was in trouble or anything. I guess we’ll just have to see how he’s doing when we get back.”

Eddie blinks. Even though Buck has yet to play a proper game now that he’s worked on himself, Eddie still considers him such a crucial part of the team that for a minute he’s confused as to how Bobby could consider leaving him behind. 

But Bobby also has a bus full of other players, including multiple wide receivers that are desperate for their chance to prove themselves, and they have a game that they’d have to forfeit if they backed out now. 

It’s a more difficult decision to make than Eddie would’ve thought, but ultimately he realises that there’s little chance that he would find Buck even if he did stay, because he doesn’t want to be found. There’s no point missing a game just to chase a ghost. 

Despite the tether pulling him in the other direction, Eddie allows one moment to curse the heavens and the US mail system before he turns and heads for the bus. 

The game itself is uneventful. Eddie can’t help but think that has something to do with Buck’s absence. 

It’s not just him, of course; the team they’re playing is ranked low in the division, and the Longhorns are able to trounce them with ease. Eddie plays hard as always, though, his mind fast and his hands even faster as he orchestrates plays and dodges defenders. He’s panting by the time Bobby gestures to him and calls for the trick play. 

Eddie practiced it enough times with Williams, at least, but there’s a moment where he has the irrational thought that it’s wrong to do without Buck. Still, he ignores it and jogs out onto the field to call the play, laughing when his teammates make ooh noises at Williams who just nods, wringing out his hands. 

They take their positions. When the ball snaps into Eddie’s waiting hands, he drops back and fakes a pass as Williams sprints across the field and then doubles back. He keeps his eyes on the centre, and after another dummy pass he’s throwing to Williams—who also got caught out by the second fake, and isn’t looking when Eddie passes the ball. He scrambles to catch it and manages to hold on, but the extra time it takes to save it means a linebacker can slip through a gap and bowl him to the ground. 

The ball tumbles out of Williams’ hands as he falls and bounces against the grass as the crowd roars in disappointment. Eddie can imagine how it felt, the anticipation and adrenaline of such a play being let down like that. He feels sort of the same way. 

Buck wouldn’t have dropped it, Eddie thinks, which should be another irrational thought because Buck did drop the ball during his first game, but somehow he knows that it wouldn’t be the case anymore. 

There’s a few minutes just after halftime when the other team comes out swinging, scoring touchdown after touchdown until they’re suddenly neck and neck with the Longhorns. Eddie’s heart is in his throat for a full ten minutes as he watches the quarterback break through the Longhorns defense time and time again, the fans in the stands being vocal about their disappointment every time. 

The Longhorns are trailing by two in the final minute, and they have a chance for one more play. He turns to Bobby on the sidelines, ready for his instructions before he takes the field. 

“I want you to run,” Bobby tells him, and Eddie raises his brows. 

“Me? Run?”

Bobby looks him up and down and snorts. “Yes, you. You’re fast, Eddie, and we need someone who can read the defence as quickly as you do.”

Bobby tells him exactly what play to run, which he relays to the rest of the team when he joins the huddle. They’re all just as surprised as he was to find out that Bobby wants him to run, but unlike him they don’t question it—they just nod and take their positions. 

Eddie forcibly pushes the thoughts of Buck that have been plaguing him all game out of his mind. He’s been able to tune out his worries most of the time, but now he needs them gone —there’s no room for error here.

It starts off as a flea flicker, getting the ball to the running back to make the other team think they’re doing a run before passing back to Eddie who drops back and scans the field. The other team is used to this; they’ve been watching him pass all game, and have no reason now to expect otherwise. 

The players who had been moving up to stop the run begin moving back when they realise it was a flea flicker, the gaps closing, and Eddie waits for another half a second before he makes his move. He darts forward, feeling the air shift when hands close around the empty space his body had been in a moment before, and slips through a gap between two linebackers. 

The left tackle makes a futile attempt to chase him, but the fact is Eddie is too fast—he knows it as soon as he starts running. He doesn’t turn around to look but he knows what’s happening: the guards are both blocking for Eddie, creating the space he just ran through, while his running back is a few paces behind him, shucking anyone who is fast enough to get close while he runs. 

There’s no one that can catch him now. He sails into the end zone with ease, leaping into the air in celebration when he does. It’s his first run in college football, and he takes a moment to appreciate the trust in his speed and agility that Bobby has—especially since he hasn’t seen Eddie do running plays properly since camp. 

He looks out at the cheering sea of orange in front of him and roars along with them, getting the wind knocked out of him soon after when his teammates catch up and dogpile him. They’ve won, and they know it.

At the bottom of the pile, Eddie turns his head to see an empty space of field and wonders if Buck would be there, giving him a hand to pull him out of the mound of pads and helmets. Probably, he’d be right at the bottom alongside Eddie. 

They run out the clock but Eddie’s mind is already on home. Even the cheers of the fans aren’t enough to distract him fully from wondering where his friend might be, and even though he tries to participate in locker room celebrations he knows he’s falling flat and eventually lets himself fade into the background. 

He’s similarly quiet on the bus ride home, his mind whirring. He’ll go back to the room first—maybe Buck will be waiting for him when he returns, having finished spiralling. He’ll say sorry for worrying Eddie—because he’ll obviously know he worried him—and then they’ll talk about it. Buck will tell him everything.

Then Maddie will magically reach out, or something. 

(Eddie doesn’t really know how to fix that part.)

So, first step: find Buck. 

He says goodnight to his teammates and practically leaps off the bus, sparing another over his shoulder for Bobby and the other coaches. He knows Bobby won’t begrudge him for it, because he knows where he’s going. 

Ravi follows Eddie out of the sports facilities and towards their accommodation, but he doesn’t ask about Buck. He just treats it like a regular post-game debrief, talking about how the defense was weak on the left side and debating if he can be bothered to go to his Statistics class on Monday. Eddie appreciates the company, but he knows they’re both on the lookout for their friend, too—Eddie scans everyone that passes by and is probably a little terser than usual with fans that stop to talk to them, unable to stop thinking they’re distracting him. 

Ravi waits until they’re walking up the stairs to their floor to ask the question. “Someone said he was… sick?” 

“That’s what he told Bobby,” Eddie says, which he knows isn’t really an answer. He also knows Ravi will understand anyway. “He didn’t say anything to me.”

“Right.” Somehow Ravi manages to say everything with a single word. 

They reach their floor, and Ravi turns to him. “Let me know if you need anything, okay?” he says, putting a hand on Eddie’s good shoulder for a moment before heading to his room. Eddie continues down the hallway with his heart in his throat, and fumbles for his keys. 

He shouldn’t be surprised when he walks in and finds the room empty, the letter still where he left it before the game, but he is. His heart sinks. He changes into a less conspicuous outfit than his game day suit, and ducks out of his room and back down the stairs in his sweats thirty seconds later. 

He retraces his steps from earlier that day, heading first for the field. He’s pretty confident he’ll find Buck there, but it’s empty; next he tries cafeterias and stops by Kappa, interrupting preparations for yet another party, but strikes out in both places too. 

It’s when he’s walking to PT and passing the Littlefield Fountain, dejected and catastrophizing endlessly, that he spots someone leaning against one of the pillars and his heart stops. 

“Buck?” 

The other man lifts his head in response, and there’s a pause before a dopey smile crosses his face. “Eddie!” he says, raising his arms to celebrate. “You’re here!”

“I am,” Eddie confirms, then gestures to their surroundings. “And why are you here?”

“Wanted to go for a swim,” Buck sniffs. “Too many people around.”

He makes a face not unlike a snarl at two girls walking by that are obviously staring at him, and Eddie grimaces. It’s just past six now, and Eddie didn’t come this way before so who knows how long Buck’s been here—he doesn’t even want to think about how many people have probably seen Buck languishing by the fountain. 

Buck may not be starting, but he’s still a football player for one of the best college teams in the country—he’s not hard to recognise. Eddie prays that no photos, if there are any, make their way back to the Longhorns staff.

He finally manages to figure out from Buck’s lazily garbled speech that he’s only been here for about fifteen minutes, having spent the day drinking (thankfully it seems that this was in the safety of their room and not in public) and hanging around the infirmary (which Buck swears wasn’t for long, because he got told to stop loitering.)

Eddie will do damage control later, he decides. Right now: controlling this damage. 

“Okay, let’s go,” Eddie announces, holding out a hand and then bending down to help Buck up. His grip on Eddie’s shoulder smarts a little and he must wince because even in his drunken stupor Buck notices and hastily retracts his hand. 

“Sorry, sorry,” Buck mumbles, patting him awkwardly on the shoulder and moving to his other side. He pauses to move his duffel to his other side—Eddie distinctly hears the glass clink of a bottle and winces again, but this time Buck doesn’t notice—and then he’s turning to Eddie. “I wanna go home.”

Eddie blinks. It takes a second for him to understand because what Buck says is more like Iwanagome, and when he finally gets it there’s another second of confusion. “Pennsylvania?”

Buck turns to look at Eddie sharply like he slapped him. “What?” He scoffs out a laugh and shakes his head, rolling his eyes. “No . Our room,” he says, like it’s obvious. “Home.”

It’s hard to describe the simultaneous feeling of weightlessness in his heart while at the same time he is punched in the stomach, but that’s what he feels at Buck’s words. 

“Yeah,” Eddie replies, after a beat too long. “Home.”

For the second time in two weeks, Eddie carries Buck back to his bed—this time is significantly harder, though, because now he has to lug Buck’s uncooperative six foot two body across campus and then up three flights of stairs. Buck tries to help, he really does, but he grows more sullen and drowsy the further they walk and by the time they get to the stairs Eddie is practically dragging him up each step. 

Somehow they’re both panting by the time they reach the top, but Eddie is laser focused on his goal: get Buck inside. He thanks God or the universe or whomever that he’s able to get Buck inside without being seen by their teammates on the floor, slipping inside their room and shutting the door with a sigh of relief he does his best to hide. 

When he turns around, Buck is staring at the letter abandoned on the bed with the most dejected expression that he’s ever seen. Eddie takes a breath. Whatever melancholy struck Buck earlier is settling over him again, and while Eddie can’t say he doesn’t understand why he has no idea how to help. 

“Maybe she moved,” Eddie suggests, desperate to cling to the idea that Buck still has someone in his family that cares about him. “Maybe she moved and changed her address and forgot to let you know.”

Buck laughs humourlessly, sitting down hard on the bed. “Like when she changed her phone number and just forgot to let me know, sure,” he replies in a faux-cheery voice. 

“When was that?” Eddie asks. He remembers being told she had changed it, but doesn’t know when. 

Buck sniffs. “Months ago,” he says, and then to Eddie’s unasked question, “didn’t try to write to her til now.”

“Why not?”

“I just—“ Buck bursts out, then stops to reel himself back in. He seems to be debating letting the dam of his teeth break, and finally it does. “She didn’t need me. Didn’t care. So I tried not to need her back… but I do.”

The final pieces are clicking into place for Eddie, but he still doesn’t feel like he has the full picture. 

Once again, it’s like Buck can hear Eddie’s thoughts as he continues. “I thought—I thought eventually she’d call. She’d call if I did something big enough, y’know?”

“That’s why you let your grades get so bad at SMU? Why you started partying?”

Buck nods. He’s on his stomach now, his left cheek mashed into his arm as he turns to look at Eddie and huffs out a laugh. He seems much more sober than when Eddie first found him, but alcohol still softens the edges of his words. “I almost got arrested once, too. Still nothing.”

Eddie sinks onto the bed beside Buck and stares at him. “ Arrested? What for?”

“Story for another time,” Buck says with a dismissive half-wave of his hand. “The point is, I only got off because the officer was a Mustangs fan. I had half a mind to go for his taser or something so he’d arrest me, on the off chance I could somehow get a hold of Maddie using their phone.”

“You would’ve gotten kicked off the team,” Eddie says, stunned. 

“I sorta hoped I would,” Buck admits, then pauses. “I mean, not really. I don’t know what I would do without football. But—I don’t know. Growing up, she was always there to catch me. And then I found out about—”

Eddie waits for Buck to continue after he cuts himself off, but his mouth stays shut. “Oh, you’ve said too much?” Eddie knows he has a mocking tone, but he’s—he’s so tired of this. He told Buck everything —pretty much—but it feels like every time Eddie gets closer to finding out another truth about Buck, he builds another wall. Still, he knows well enough not to yell or push. 

“I just want to help you, Evan,” he tries instead, practically pleading. “You’ve seen me through some—some tough shit since you got here, and I’ve been cleaning up after you for weeks in return. We help each other. QB and wide receiver, man, always.”

Buck is staring at Eddie like his eyes are focusing on him for the first time, and for a long while he doesn’t speak. He seems to be debating doubling down and refusing to share, and Eddie in turn is debating walking out—but then Buck takes a shaky breath and begins.

“I have a brother. Had. I had a brother.”

All Eddie can do is stare back. “You—you never mentioned a brother,” he finally manages, dumbly. 

“I found out about him last year.” Buck stops for a moment to sit up and rub his eyes, leaning back against the wall beside Eddie. Their shoulders are almost—almost—touching. “I was rage-cleaning Maddie’s room after I found out her number got changed. My parents said they wanted to donate some stuff, since she wasn’t coming back, so…anyway, I found this box in her closet full of his things. Pictures, trophies from soccer tournaments, science competition medals, all for Daniel. So I asked my parents about him. My mom ran off crying, but my dad eventually told me more. 

“He was a year younger than Maddie. When he was four, he got diagnosed with juvenile leukemia, and needed—y’know, bone marrow, blood, you name it. No one in the family was a match, so… they had me.”

And then Eddie’s heart stops. 

He only hears the story that unfolds from there in short spurts, unable to comprehend much else beyond the rushing of blood in his ears. He’s angry at so many parts of it—at Buck’s parents for having a donor baby, at the doctors for not somehow fixing Daniel. Because the worst bit is the fact that, after all Buck donated and all the years of pain and procedures and appointments, Daniel died anyway . He’s angry that Buck’s parents didn’t let him play when he was younger because they were afraid he’d get injured and not be able to donate—Buck’s fawn-like recklessness makes a lot more sense now, at least. He’s angry that Maddie wasn’t allowed to tell Buck. 

“I think she tried, once,” Buck is musing. They’re lying head-to-toe on the bed now, having settled in for the story. “It was just before I started junior year, when Maddie announced she was moving to Boston with her boyfriend. I was complaining about our parents—I can’t even remember why now—and she said to cut them some slack, because they’d been through a lot. I said, ‘what, like the store being sold out of their favourite granola?’ And she told me no, that something happened when I was little that they don’t like to talk about. She was about to tell me more, then she just stopped and changed the subject.”

“Sounds like she didn’t want to talk about it either,” Eddie suggests.

“She didn’t know how,” Buck disagrees. “I mean, imagine it. Your little brother dies, and then your other brother who was conceived to save his life is just… there. How do you explain that to him?”

“It wasn’t because you were some—some inconvenience, though. She didn’t want to hurt you. She loved you.”

“No, I know,” Buck says, and then gives Eddie a watery smile. “I know. Just not enough to stay.”

That hits Eddie like a punch to the heart. “I’m sure it’s not what you think it is,” he tries, because he doesn’t know what else to say, but it’s a meaningless response. He might know Buck and all his self-flagellating tendencies, but he doesn’t know Maddie. Given their family he has his guesses as to why she left, but he can’t imagine not coming back for Buck.

The man in question doesn’t comment on Eddie’s weak attempt at comfort, sighing and scraping a hand across his face. “I don’t know, man. The bottom line is, after I found out all that my parents could look at me even less, so. I guess they just don’t know what to say, and—whatever. I just want to see Maddie. I was trying to get her attention with all that shit for the last year, and all I got was crickets. How pathetic is that? The worst part is that ruining things was so easy. I’d skip one class or get too drunk at a party, and then I’m missing weeks and blacking out way too often to be healthy. And I just stopped— listening to anyone. Eventually, disobeying was second nature.”

Eddie doesn’t need to tell Buck that’s not a sustainable way to live his life, always looking for the next ‘fuck you’ he can hurl in someone’s direction, but he already knows that. “You’re getting better, though,” Eddie points out as Buck yawns.

“I am,” Buck agrees, and then laughs again and gestures at himself. “I’m still— this, though.”

“Human?” Eddie doesn’t back down at Buck’s rolled eyes. “No, seriously. You made some mistakes. Maybe you could’ve handled finding out better. But you just found out a lot of your life isn’t what you thought it was, and on top of that you’re on the most publicly visible and well known college football teams in the country. It’s okay to be a little freaked out.”

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“You also had your life change on a dime, and in a way that affects your day-to-day way more,” he points out. “And you’re Captain of that team. How are you not freaking out then too, if it’s so normal?”

“I had my freak out already, Buck,” Eddie reminds him. “For me it was when I didn’t have football. Now I’m back, I feel like I’m on steady ground again.”

Buck’s eyes grow watery once more. “That’s all I want,” he murmurs. “Not to feel like anything good won’t last. I’m tired of it.”

“That’s a you thing, though,” Eddie says. “All about your mindset, or whatever.”

Buck raises a brow at him. He hadn’t been a fan of the three hour mental health seminar Bobby had organized for them at the beginning of the season—to be fair, neither had Eddie, but still. He listened to some parts. 

“I meant that in a good way,” Eddie continues. “Like, you can control your own thinking. You can’t live your life waiting for the other shoe to drop.” He takes in Buck’s quiet stillness beside him. “It’s not sustainable.”

“I think the other shoe did drop,” Buck muses. “But I’m expecting a fucking centipede or something.”

Buck’s analogy makes Eddie burst out laughing with a noise that surprises them both, and they share a look before laughing all over again. It takes a while for it to die down, both of them overcome with exhaustion as the adrenaline from the day dissipates. Eddie knows it’s not even past eight yet, but already he feels his eyelids drooping and knows Buck must be feeling even worse with the alcohol in his system. 

“Anyway, I’ve got you,” Eddie says when they’ve finally stopped laughing. “If your paranoia is right and there is another shoe, or if that’s it. Either way. I’ve got you.”

“I know,” Buck says, and it should sound casual but he’s turned to look Eddie in the eye and is looking at him like—like something. “Thank you. For… everything.”

Eddie knows what everything means. “You’re welcome. And thank you. ”

They lapse into silence, and while it’s not uncomfortable Eddie is in the middle of debating getting off his bed when Buck finally speaks. “So, did you listen to Blonde like I told you to?”

Eddie isn’t surprised by the change of topic—Buck is feeling vulnerable, wanting to reorient himself, and Eddie is happy to comply. “I did, and fuck. Incredible.”

Buck turns fully to face Eddie, who follows suit and crosses his legs on the duvet. “Right?” Buck continues. “What was your favourite song?”

“Top five?”

“There aren’t that many songs, Eds. C’mon, it’s Sophie’s Choice. Top three.”

“Fine. Um… ‘Pink and White’, ‘Skyline To’, and… ‘Godspeed’, I think.”

“Not ‘Nights’? Where’s ‘White Ferrari’, man, or ‘Seigfried’?”

“That’s your three?”

“Yeah, obviously. Wait, ‘Godspeed’, though, and— fuck, ‘Ivy’.”

“Fuck.”

“I know. I forgot about it too.”

“Oh my God, ‘Nikes’.”

“Fuck.”

It goes on like that for hours, trading comments and debating everything under the sun. It feels so easy with Buck, like it always does—like it used to. When Eddie finally realises that Buck has been slowly sinking down into the pillows for the last ten minutes and is now practically vertical, he laughs and shuffles back.

“You should get some rest,” Eddie says, because the moon is now high in the sky and he knows it’s actually appropriate for them both to go to bed. 

“Okay,” Buck says, unusually agreeable in his sleepy state. At his pleading eyes Eddie chuckles and tugs his shoes off so he can slip his legs under the covers, but he suddenly seems more awake as he turns on his side and his eyes fly open. “Wait. I’m sorry.”

Eddie blinks. “For…?”

Buck gestures vaguely at himself and his duffel from the fountain abandoned on the floor. “A lot of things. I hate being so—so—useless.”

“You’re not useless. Not to me, Evan.”

Buck smiles, drowsy but bright-eyed, and says, “right back atcha, Eds.”

Eddie busies himself with turning off the lights to hide his flaming cheeks, but as he’s passing Buck’s bed to go to his own he feels a hand grab his wrist. “Thank you for finding me. You always find me.”

Right back atcha, Eddie thinks, but the words won’t slip past the dam of his teeth. He lies awake for a long time after that.

Chapter Text

Eddie 

You always find me.

The words play in Eddie’s mind on a loop for weeks. The more he thinks about it, the more he knows it’s true: he feels that invisible tether tugging at him constantly, leading him to Buck. 

They find each other with ease on the field, always anticipating the other’s moves. Eddie isn’t surprised in the slightest when Buck begins to train even harder, and it shows in the games—Buck has unlimited stamina, never slowing in the slightest as he weaves between players to get to exactly where Eddie needs him to be. And he’s always there.

Eddie also isn’t surprised when they begin to win. The following week they trounce Clemson 40-24, with Buck performing the trick play Williams couldn’t almost to perfection in the final minutes to a roaring crowd, and the week after that the Longhorns scrape a 26-28 win against Indiana with Eddie and Buck getting the final touchdown with one of Eddie’s best throws of his career. 

The team finally, finally feels like they’re gelled together, and now that they are it’s like a well-oiled machine. They’re unstoppable. Buck slots in with newfound ease amongst Eddie’s friends, and he realises one night as they’re all lying on Buck’s bed playing video games and talking that he’s been by Buck’s side practically nonstop for weeks. Unless they’re at lectures or PT or showering, basically, they’re together.

(Even PT overlaps, because Tommy has Buck treating Eddie once a week now. And showering, too, because—well. Locker rooms.)

(It’s rough for Eddie.)

Maybe it’s because of the glow that Buck emanates that Eddie is able to find him so easily. It’s a new thing—his smile is more infectious, his eyes brighter, and there’s something about the weightlessness with which he carries himself often that makes people stare at him even more than usual. Buck jokes that it’s his football pregnancy glow, but Eddie knows it’s something different—it’s quiet, settled joy. 

Eddie feels that warmth whenever Buck walks into a room, and he can follow the light like a beacon. Buck is his guiding light, whether it’s on the field or searching through a crowded cafeteria for their table.

They’re always together. Because of this it’s kind of a given that they’ll do something matching for the Kappa Halloween party, and they deliver—as Goose and Maverick from Top Gun, of course. The entire night is a blur not because of alcohol but the simple fact of Buck’s dizzying presence, the two of them getting on the table at one point to perform a dance to ‘Danger Zone’ that had the entire house cheering. Eddie distinctly remembers turning to Buck and seeing the glow in full effect, his cheeks flushed and eyes filled with mirth as he tilts his Aviators down and grins as Eddie. 

“This brings a new meaning to ‘other half’,” Lena had said when they arrived, and Eddie thinks only now is he beginning to understand what she meant. 

Eddie might find Buck, but Buck’s the one that saves Eddie. Two sides of the same coin. 

Eddie is having the dream again—the one where his shoulder splinters over and over and there’s nothing to do but scream—when Buck gently shakes him awake. It’s his voice that brings Eddie closer to the surface, his name being murmured coaxing him back to the land of the living. When he finally wakes up, though, he’s still panting.

When his hands flail, looking for something to grab onto, there is Buck.

“It’s me, just me,” Buck says, using the arm Eddie is not currently latching onto to put a hand on his face. Each swipe of Buck’s cool thumb against Eddie’s terror-slick skin brings his breath back into rhythm, and Eddie listens to Buck’s gentle whisper. “It’s okay. You’re here, you’re safe.”

Eddie takes a sharp breath and realises his muscles are clenched so he’s curled into himself, half-sitting up and still clutching Buck’s hand. He meets Buck’s steady gaze, and all at once he exhales and collapses against the bed. 

(He doesn’t let go of Buck.)

After a long pause, Eddie finally croaks, “fuck.”

This makes Buck snort softly. “Wanna talk about it, or do you want a distraction?” he offers, and then as an afterthought, “or I can go and leave you alone.”

“No,” Eddie says without thinking, knowing it’s true. He’s squeezing Buck’s hand, he notices, and while he relaxes his grip he still doesn’t let go. Eddie swears he feels a thumb swipe across his knuckles. “Distract me.”

Buck settles against the wall, folding easily over Eddie’s body, and looks up in thought. The moonlight cascading over one side of his face and bare chest makes Eddie swallow, but his dramatic thinking face has Eddie fighting the urge to laugh despite himself. 

“Okay, I’ve got something. Did you know Judd’s wife gave birth in an abandoned RV during a snow storm?”

The random nature of the comment does the trick for Eddie, who turns and rubs at his eyes, his nightmare temporarily forgotten. “What?”

Buck grins. “Okay, strap in. This is a great story.”

When Eddie awakens several hours later, a hazy grey is peeking over the tall oak trees in the distance and he feels more well rested than he has in a long time even though his shoulder smarts more than usual from lying on it. There’s some kind of pressure on his arm, strangely, so as his eyes adjust he looks down and sees that he and Buck are still intertwined. 

He must not have let go of Buck’s hand the whole time, because he’s still clutching at Buck’s forearm instead. Buck’s other arm is slung lazily over Eddie’s waist, a leg haphazardly tangled with Eddie’s. Buck is snoring softly, one side of his face smushed into the pillow, and it looks like he half-sat up to keep watch for Eddie like he’s done before until he fell asleep himself.

And… okay, it’s not that he’d been ignoring what he felt for Buck, but—Jesus. This is. Bad. 

As in, he’s watching Buck sleep and he’s thinking about how he wants to trace the arch of his brow and curve of his cheekbone with his fingers, then follow it with his lips. He’s thinking about the first time they slept in the same bed, curled up in the isolation cabin during the storm. It was so long ago, but he remembers waking up like it was yesterday—the awareness first of the warm pressure on him, and then of Buck’s face tucked into his shoulder. There were only a few brief moments where he was awake before Buck woke up, and they were mostly filled with panic due to morning wood, but he distinctly recalls those seconds of bliss as he’d watched Buck sleep like he is now. 

He does have the same issue, of course. He’s not cuddling for warmth the way he was before, so there’s a bit of space and he can’t tell if Buck is facing the same predicament. Instead of freaking out when he eventually makes his way into the waking world like he did, Buck just yawns.

“Morning,” he says, like this is totally normal. His eyes are still mostly closed. He stretches his limbs out like a cat and Eddie watches the muscles of his chest and abs ripple, trying hard not to make a noise—this is far from the first time Eddie’s seen Buck shirtless, of course, but it being in his bed is giving Eddie the sudden urge to lick and he needs that gone, now.

Buck rolls over onto his back, and Eddie sees that he’s not the only one that woke up hard—he swallows and looks away, unsure if he should comment. 

He doesn’t have to. Buck’s cheeks tinge red and he glances surreptitiously down and then at Eddie. His eyes flicker a little before his cheeks flush more, and Eddie knows instantly that Buck has seen his own hard-on. 

“Sorry,” Eddie mumbles, deciding to pretend as if he hadn’t seen Buck’s in turn. It’s only fair.

“We’re just guys, right?” Buck says with a wave of his hand, and Eddie swallows hard. 

Yup, totally normal, Eddie chants to himself almost like a mantra. Nothing between us at all. All good. 

God, he’s so fucked.

You always find me.

“Where’s Buck?”

Eddie looks up from the playbook open in his lap to see Bobby hovering in the aisle of the bus, and his heart sinks for a moment. Did Buck get another letter? Is he missing the Boston game too?

And then, all at once, he remembers and feels the tether tug at his sternum. 

“He’s putting his bag in storage. He’ll be here in a second.”

On cue, Buck appears at the front of the bus and makes his way down the aisle, grinning when he sees his coach. “Hey, Bobby,” he says as he slides easily into his seat beside Eddie. “What’s up?”

“Nothing, I—” Bobby stops himself and shakes his head. Eddie doesn’t need him to explain—after the fiasco a few weeks ago, Bobby must’ve jumped to the conclusion that Buck’s lateness meant he wasn’t coming. Eddie knows well the panic his coach must’ve felt for a moment, and tries his best to smile reassuringly at him. “You boys ready?”

Buck grins again, slow and easy. Eddie sort of wants to die. “Born ready, Coach,” he replies.

The ride to the airport is short, but Eddie spends most of it distracted. He’s been thinking about waking up with Buck on repeat for days, yes, and he has big plans for Boston, but it’s not what has his mind occupied—it’s the Longhorns plane. 

He’s been on a plane since he was flown back from the military hospital, but it’s always been a commercial flight—big Boeing 767s chartered for team games, for example. He never liked that, either, but flying smaller private planes feels worse. A private jet is not the same as a Black Hawk, he knows, but somehow that logic doesn’t quite reach his brain. Buck seems to sense his discomfort and keeps up a low but steady stream of conversation, apparently fine with the fact that Eddie doesn’t always reply. It’s something to focus on, something to keep him tethered as memories threaten to surface.

When they’re standing on the tarmac waiting to board, Ravi comes up to join them. “Hey, guys,” he says to them as well as Lena and Albert standing nearby. He looks at Eddie. “All good, boss?”

Eddie nods, grateful for his friend checking in, and feels his nerves settle a little. “All good.”

He rolls his shoulders back, and fights a wince when something behind his shoulder blade pings. Glad that Tommy has finally been officially appointed as the team’s physiotherapist and is therefore coming with them, Eddie makes a mental note to see him when they land. 

In the meantime, he focuses back on the conversation. Ravi and Albert are telling Buck about the last time playing the Boston Eagles in a non-conference game in their freshman year. 

“—I swear, you’ve never seen anything like a Boston football fan,” Albert is saying, shaking his head. “They tried to flip our bus when we were leaving.”

“Someone threw a tomato at Williams. It was perfectly timed—right in the eyes,” Ravi adds solemnly. 

Buck seems delighted by this news, particularly the fact that someone would’ve had to bring the tomato into the stadium. “I hope someone throws a tomato at me,” he says, wistful. “I mean, you gotta appreciate the dedication. I’ve been hit by a flying hotdog before, but—a tomato? Poetry.”

“They used to sell rotten vegetables to throw at performers at Shakespeare’s Globe in London,” Eddie volunteers, and everyone turns to look at him. He flushes under their gaze, managing a shrug. “What? I read.”

Buck grins. He knows Eddie writes poetry, too. He’s never read anything, but he knows about the notebooks hidden in his desk, and the nights he’s spent huddled over a pen and paper while Buck works on an assignment. Buck and Eddie take great pleasure in swapping random facts with one another on the sidelines or during long bus rides, 

They board the plane while having an avid debate about whose team has the craziest fans, keeping Eddie engaged all the way until they sit down in the plush leather seats. It’s hardly a jumpseat, Eddie reminds himself, squeezing the cushioned armrests. This is not that.

He makes the conscious decision to be glad for the fact that they’re flying private, because the luxury is as far away from the Black Hawk as possible—he might still be wigged out about the fact that it’s so small and about flying in general, but the plush interior helps it to feel less like a flying death trap. 

Buck helps too, of course. Eddie must have his eyes closed as they’re taxiing because he feels a firm presence sit down in the seat by his side, their shoulders pressing together. A hand rests atop his, squeezes once, then lets go. He doesn’t have to open his eyes—he knows it’s Buck, finished putting Athena’s bags in the overhead storage and taking his place beside Eddie and across from Ravi and Albert. 

It’s just his presence in the end that does it. Sure, the debate about fans continues long into the flight and after that they turn to movies, music, and everything in between, but the simple fact of their arms pressed together is enough to make Eddie stop thinking—absurdly—if the plane can perform evasive maneuvers. 

He stays like that the whole flight. 

Boston is even busier and more hectic than Eddie expected, filled to the brim with tourists and locals alike all barreling toward their destinations. Many of the buildings are considerably older than that of Austin and much of Texas, so Eddie takes a lot of pleasure in pressing his face to the window of the bus to take in the dizzying mix of colonial houses with skyscrapers. A city of opposites, Eddie thinks. 

He keeps an eye out as they drive toward the hotel, glancing at the writing on the scrap of paper in his pocket.  He’ll have to be stealthy if he wants to enact his plan, but maybe he can sneak out of the hotel later. 

Little does he know, Buck also has a plan. 

They settle at the hotel and enjoy a lavish dinner prepared by the Michelin-rated chefs—Eddie could get used to this whole ‘life of luxury’  thing—and then set up in the conference room to go through game tapes. 

It’s a mind-numbing two hours of strategy and rambling speeches from Judd and Hen about how the fact that it’s a non-conference game should only make the team play harder, because they have nothing to lose. 

When they’re finished, at least, they have the rest of the evening off. Ryder and a few of the other more ballsy freshmen were talking about sneaking off to a club, but the older ones know it’s all wishful thinking—they’ll never get past Bouncer Judd, and they’re too recognizable as Longhorns players for their fake IDs to work in any case. 

Everyone else settles in for a team movie night. Megamind is the team-elected film for the evening, so once the opening credits roll Eddie allows his mind to wander—it’s an unusual luxury, since last time they watched Chungking Express and Ravi quizzed them all after. 

Eddie’s thoughts are occupied with Buck (as always) when he sees the man in question move to the end of their row and slip out the back door. He doesn’t look back as he leaves, and no one else looks over—if not for Eddie’s Buck-radar, he thinks, Buck would’ve made it out completely unseen. 

“It’s a smart plan,” Eddie comments once he’s followed Buck into the hallway, leaning on the wall as the other man jumps and turns with a hand over his chest. 

“ Jesus, Eddie,” Buck hisses. “What are you talking about?”

Playing dumb is less smart. “Judd and the other coaches are watching the movie. Play it right, and you’ll be back before they ever knew you were gone.” It’s actually a pretty solid plan—Eddie had planned on taking his chances once Buck was asleep. 

“Gone where?”

Eddie just arches a brow at Buck’s feeble attempt at subterfuge. “I know Maddie lives in Boston, Evan. You’re looking for her.”

To his credit, this time Buck doesn’t play dumb. He juts his chin out the way he always does when he’s trying to look braver than he feels, and folds his arms. “So what?”

“What would you do once you got out of the hotel?” Eddie presses. “Where would you go?”

Buck looks triumphant, and waves his phone. “I have a list of all the hospitals in Boston. I was gonna get a cab to the first one and go from there.”

“And what, just ask them if someone called Maddie Buckley works there?”

“Kendall. Maddie Kendall.” Buck pauses. “If she’s still married, at least.”

Eddie knows why Buck assumes she’s still with her husband—because if she wasn’t, she would have come home. He doesn’t comment. 

“You’re not sure of her name, or what hospital she works at—if she even still works at a hospital.”

“She’s still a nurse. I know it.”

“It’s been years, man. I know you want to find her, but this is more than a needle in a haystack. This is a needle in a stack of needles.”

Buck groans in frustration and scrapes a hand over his face, turning his back to Eddie for a moment. “But I’m so close.” He’s speaking so quietly that Eddie has to step forward to hear him, and when he does his heart breaks. 

He knows how Buck is feeling, weirdly. It’s exactly how he felt when he joined the Longhorns but still wasn’t able to play—close enough to taste it, not enough to grab it with both hands. 

“I know,” Eddie whispers back. “But this city’s too big, Evan. Besides, if you got caught, the team—“

“I know,” Buck replies, sounding dejected, and Eddie knows he does. The team are still told horror stories about almost not playing in the championship because of some after-hours hotel get-together that got out of hand, and Eddie knows Buck doesn’t mean to jeopardize the team by doing anything of the sort—he just wants to find his sister.

“You’ll see Maddie again,” Eddie says with a sense of confidence he doesn’t fully feel. “Just… not tonight.”

Buck

When Buck was eight, he broke his wrist skateboarding.

He’d been out by himself, which he was not allowed to do, and it was after dark—also not allowed. He shouldn’t have been surprised when the car backed out of the driveway and he went careening onto the curb, and yet he distinctly remembers the feeling of shock as he was going down—there was a crack, and then nothing, and then pain. 

And then Maddie was there.

He must have yelled, and she must have heard it, because there she was. Between one blink and the next she was beside him, kneeling and telling him to breathe, that it would be alright. She carried him back to the house—he was feeling dramatic—and when his parents tried to have a go at him, she yelled at them for not watching him. 

She always said afterwards that she was pulling onto their street after work and just felt something was wrong. She pulled over a block from their house and ran without knowing where she was going, and then she found him. 

(She always found him.)

Maddie cleaned him up and took him to the hospital, sitting by his side for six hours. She even walked up to the doctors when they saw them clearly taking a lunch break and yelled at them because her little brother was in pain and being ignored, getting him home with a splint and a lollipop an hour later and then yelling at their parents a second time for not coming to the hospital. 

Buck hadn’t understood, then. He thought they just didn’t care enough to go with him, but now he knows that—at least in part—they were simply too scared to confront the truth of another child of theirs being in the hospital. 

All he knew is that he was supposed to want his parents there, and he did… until he didn’t. Until Maddie read out the trashy magazine ads in funny voices. Until they played ‘find the cotton ball’ with the tiny paper cups from the water dispenser. Until she sat next to him the whole time, being whatever he needed—making him laugh or keeping him distracted while the doctors poked and prodded at his wrist, for example. She was everything. 

And now she’s gone. 

Actually, now she’s here, but she’s not, which is worse. Buck knows that Eddie is right—he has no idea what hospital she works at and Boston is a big city, the team could get in trouble, blah blah blah—but that doesn’t help lessen the ache of knowing in his bones that his sister is so close. 

He’s imagined seeing her again so many times. Most of the time she’d simply walk through the door to his room unannounced, plopping herself down on the bed like nothing had changed. Sometimes, they’d run into each other on the street of some random city, both of them drawn there by chance.

The problem is that he always has trouble imagining his reaction. He has the urge to cuss her out for disappearing and demand an explanation and to run sobbing into her arms with equal measure, and he doesn’t quite know what to do with that. How does he begin to bridge the chasm that’s been growing between him and his sister for so many years?

He keeps hoping she’ll be at the game today so he’ll get the chance to try, but he knows she won’t be. She never was much into football, and obviously hasn’t shown much interest in Buck’s activities anyway—he knows his eyes will stray to the stands anyway. They always do. 

The locker room is the usual bustle of energy before a game, but Buck is distracted by thoughts of his sister and wondering whether he’d laugh or cry upon seeing her. Most of the guys leave him alone, content to swap stories and theories about how the Eagles will play around him. Only Eddie stays quiet, a solid source of calm in the eye of the hurricane. 

“You good?” he whispers, not looking over. 

Buck nods. He thinks he is. Mostly. 

Eddie disappears to get his shoulder wrapped by Tommy, so Buck turns to Lena and Ravi for a distraction. While neither of them know about his sister—Ravi knows she exists, not that she’s in Boston—they both seem to catch on to the fact that Buck is feeling a little unmoored right now, and gamely entertain him with Lena’s demonstrations of all the ways she could run up to kick the ball when she finally gets called to the field. 

Bobby comes in a minute later to give them his usual pre-game pep talk, presumably with the add-on reminder that just because this is a non-conference game doesn’t mean they shouldn’t try, but Buck stops him. 

“Hold on, Eddie’s still getting his shoulder wrapped. I’ll go grab him.”

Buck exits the locker room and heads to the makeshift treatment room, where the cracked door spills warm light onto the floor of the hallway. 

As he nears the door, he hears voices rise. 

“—I already told you what I think, Eddie,” Tommy is saying, sounding exasperated. “I don’t know why you keep asking me.”

“Because I need you to change your mind,” Eddie shoots back, and his voice is tinged with desperation rather than exasperation. “I need this, Tommy.”

“If you keep ignoring my advice, I’ll be forced to tell B—”

Buck coughs loudly as he approaches, not wanting to appear like the eavesdropper he is. This gives them just enough time to look as if they weren’t yelling at each other only seconds before by the time Buck reaches the doorway. 

“Bobby’s about to make his speech,” Buck says to Eddie, and then looks to Tommy. “Hey, boss. All good here?”

Tommy glances at Eddie and then back at Buck, giving a tight-lipped smile. “Peachy,” he says, and then shakes his head, clearly trying to brighten his tone. He tries again. “So, are you ready for the game?”

In response Buck snorts, adopting his usual cocky persona. “Are they ready for me is the question you should be asking,” he says with a grin. “I just need my quarterback, and then I’m good to go.”

My quarterback. 

Buck’s cheeks burn as soon as he realises what he said, and Tommy smirks in response. It’s been clear for a while that Tommy has caught on to the vibes between Eddie and Buck, particularly as their rapport is so obvious during Eddie’s PT sessions that Buck now runs almost completely solo, but he’s never said anything about it. 

(He hasn’t said anything to Buck, at least, Buck realises with horror. Has he been talking to Eddie? Has he snitched? )

Buck glances worriedly at Eddie to find no indication that he heard his words, and breathes half a sigh of relief. Still, there’s the matter of Tommy. “Uh—I just meant that—”

“Your secret’s safe with me,” Tommy cuts Buck off before he can continue, though he’s glancing over at Eddie as he says it. Buck makes a mental note to ask Eddie about it later. Once again, Tommy changes tact and goes for a lighter tone as Eddie stands and slips his pads and jersey over his taped shoulder. He wolf-whistles. “Looking good, Diaz.”

To Buck’s surprise, Eddie doesn’t balk at the flirtatious compliment. Instead, he just grins in response. “In your dreams, Donovan.”

Buck glances between the two of them, images of them together floating unbidden in his mind. God, did it suddenly get really hot in here? He feels like he might faint. 

He simultaneously feels turned on but also feral at the idea of any man but him touching Eddie. If it wasn’t Tommy, he thinks he might be holding Eddie in his arms and hissing territorially like a cat. He has no real claim to Eddie, he knows—not in any way that matters, at least—but he can’t deny the fact that he would burn the world down before he let anyone mess with Eddie. 

(Buck is aware that Eddie is perfectly capable of handling himself, obviously. The man is a decorated war veteran, star football player, and a surprisingly good dancer—he’s got his bases covered. It's about the principle. )

“Ready?” Buck interrupts the charged eye contact between Eddie and Tommy with a little more force than necessary, but he can’t bring himself to care. He blames the fact that the team is waiting on them. “I think it’s time to go.”

“Right, I’m sure it is,” Tommy replies, looking like he’s trying very hard not to laugh. When they get back to Austin, Buck and Tommy are going to talk. 

Eddie hops off the massage table— Jesus Christ, Buck hadn’t even noticed and now he feels like he’s going to faint all over again—and gives Tommy one last look. “Are you gonna get the thing I asked for?”

Tommy hesitates, but then he sighs. Eddie grins, turning to Buck.

“Let’s do this. Simple, right?”

“You throw it.”

“You catch it.”

They grin at each other for another second before Buck remembers they really do have somewhere to be and leads Eddie back down the hallway. He considers interrogating him about Tommy now, but decides against it—it’s not the time, and they have a whole night in their shared hotel room later besides. 

(No one asked Buck who he was sharing with earlier, he remembers now. They all just assumed it’d be Eddie. Huh.)

Bobby’s pre-game speech is exactly as Buck expected. 

“—so you have to establish rhythm in the first drive, okay?” he’s saying to the offence. “Mix the run and pass to keep their defense guessing. Play fast, don’t let them get comfortable.” He casts a sidelong glance to Eddie and Buck, sitting side by side on the end of the bench. “You two are the spark. Listen to each other. Play smart, and the rest will follow, right?”

Buck and Eddie both nod. They haven’t needed much prompting to find a rhythm themselves when on the field, to be honest, and Bobby knows it—but it doesn’t hurt to remind them. 

Bobby holds Buck’s gaze for a beat longer before turning to the defence. “Hit hard and set the tone. I want them to feel us on every snap. I know we drilled this yesterday, but watch your pass coverage—corners, keep leverage inside. Safeties, don’t get beat over the top.”

He pauses, looking around the locker room. He looks for so long that Buck follows his gaze, wondering if his eyes are tracking a fly or something. “And remember,” Bobby says after another beat, chiming in like he never stopped talking. “What did we come to do?”

“Win!” the team calls back as always. 

“But also—Hen, where are we right now?”

Hen grins. “Fenway Park, Coach.”

Bobby turns back to the team. “Fenway Park. That’s a rarity. Enjoy it.”

The team cheers in appreciation and begin to grab their helmets and file out of the locker room. Buck and Eddie look at each other.

“You ready?” Buck asks. 

“Yeah,” Eddie says after a beat, blowing out a breath. “You?”

Buck nods—he thinks he is, at least—and together they stand and head for the tunnel. Before they can go, though, Bobby stops Buck and asks to speak to him for a moment. 

Eddie shares one last look with Buck, who nods in silent permission to go. With a nod to Bobby, Eddie slips out of the locker room to head after the team. 

“I just wanted to say—don’t think I don’t know where we are,” Bobby tells Buck once they’re alone. “I can’t imagine what you’re feeling, but I know you’ve probably considered looking for your sister. You did the right thing by deciding not to.”

You have Eddie to thank for that, Buck thinks, but he says nothing. 

“The Buck I saw in University Park just a few months ago would’ve gone after her without a second thought,” Bobby continues, and Buck can’t help but think of who he was when he walked into Coach Strand’s office and found Bobby sitting at his desk.

Buck knows he’s changed. He feels it. His liver feels it, because he’s drinking less and training more and generally no longer treating his body like it doesn’t matter. He’s changed in other ways too, obviously. You have Eddie to thank for that.  

“I wanted to tell you that I see how much you’ve grown, and I’m proud of you. You’re finally turning into the player—and man—that I always knew you could be.”

Buck feels his eyes turn unexpectedly glassy, and blinks back the moisture at the compliment. “Uh—thank you, Bobby,” he replies. “That means a lot.”

“Well, I won’t keep you,” Bobby says. “We have a game to get to.”

Athena is waiting in the halls for them both, and offers Buck a warm smile when she sees him. “Hey, Buckaroo,” she says, kissing her husband on the cheek before linking arms with Buck when he offers. “You ready to win?”

“Always,” Buck replies, squeezing her hand. “How was the tour with May?”

May isn’t old enough to be applying to colleges yet, but she insisted on getting a headstart when she got the opportunity to visit Boston University. Athena had been hoping she’d want to stay closer to home, Buck knows, but she’s proud of her daughter for being brave all the same. 

“Eventful,” Athena says with a scoff. “May somehow managed to find drama with the other girls in the tour group. Wanna hear about it?”

Buck knows what she’s really asking. Do you want a distraction?

“Please,” Buck says, and Athena launches into the story. 

By the time they reach the tunnel with the other players, Buck is guffawing at Athena’s retelling of May’s antics. She has a way of warming people from the inside out when she talks to them, Buck thinks. It’s a spell that wasn’t always turned on him; she took a little longer to warm up to him than Bobby did, always convinced in his younger years that he was up to no good—and she was usually right. Nevertheless, Buck got her to come around. Now he get sot experience her warmth.

“I’m proud of you, Buck,” Athena murmurs to him. “Knock ‘em dead.” She kisses his cheek before disappearing to stand with the assistant coaches. 

There is the usual fanfare: the droning loudspeaker announcing the Longhorns before they jog out, smell of stadium popcorn and beer, the biting sharpness of the October afternoon sun giving a literal example of the light at the end of the tunnel.

This may be Eagles territory, but above all that the crowd is full of football fans—they cheer as much for Texas as they do for Boston, and Buck finds himself actually enjoying himself as they jog out to take their places a minute to a roaring stadium of fans. It’s rare that Fenway Park is turned into a football field, but the jut of the diamond shape provides turf for the cheerleaders and mascots to amp up the crowd as they get ready for the first down.

The offense starts, so Buck joins the quick huddle on the sideline. “Alright, we’re going vertical here,” Bobby instructs them. “Buck, straight fly down the sideline. O-line, give him time.”

Buck and Eddie jog in time onto the field, bumping fists as they part ways to take their positions. As Buck falls into a crouch, he feels time slow. The cheers of the crowd become a dull roar and he focuses on the crisp air in his lungs, feeling his heart beat all the way down to his feet, to the grass beneath him. He looks up, sees the defense adjusting, and squares his shoulders. 

“Blue 80! Blue 80!” Eddie yells. “Set… HUT!”

The ball snaps, and Buck takes off. He barrels past the cornerback making a hopeless dive, and he’s a blur by the time the safety notices and tries to change direction to stop him. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Each breath comes easily as his feet pound into the earth, keeping his eyes in front of him because he knows exactly what’s happening behind him: Eddie is dropping back, finding the gap, taking aim—

Buck turns, angles his torso, finds the dark spot in the bright sky arcing towards him, and opens his arms. The ball sails right into his waiting hands like it was always meant to be there. He tucks the ball under one arm, takes one step, two, three, and then he’s over the line and music is blaring to announce his touchdown. 

One down. 

The Eagles play fiercely enough to make Buck feel like he could be playing for the title if he wasn’t standing in Fenway Park, but they’re no match for the Longhorns. They have a few massive guys on their team—the linebacker closest to him has thighs the size of tree trunks—but the Longhorns deftly turn their size into a disadvantage, making the game dependent on speed and agility. 

The Eagles are skilled, but they can’t dodge and change direction like the Longhorns have been drilled to—Buck and his teammates can do quick fake-outs and two-steps that leave their opponents scrambling, and they demonstrate these skills with ease on the Eagles. 

Their defence is no match for Buck and Eddie, especially. The pair each work well with the rest of the team, but there’s no denying that getting the ball from Eddie’s hands to Buck’s pretty much guarantees a touchdown—having that sixth sense of Eddie’s location on the field helps Buck to position himself as he darts around defense and bulldozes a tight end to leap for a particularly difficult catch. He feels the crowd holding its breath as he jumps into the air, dissolving into raucous cheers when he makes the catch and lands gracefully on the ground. 

The Eagles offense doesn’t have a much easier time. They manage a few touchdowns early in the second quarter, but they’re down by ten by the time Buck takes the field again after halftime and the nervous-looking cornerback in front of him is still dripping with sweat and panting. 

This guy can’t be more than 130 pounds soaking wet. What happened to the other one? At least Buck could hit that guy without worrying about breaking him. He hasn’t seen this new guy on the field for more than ten minutes and already he looks like he’s hyperventilating. 

Buck almost feels bad. He considers going easy on him, but then he sees the kid squaring up for a tackle. Your loss, man, he thinks, and when Eddie yells ‘HUT!’ he veers around the outside of the scrimmage, tucks his shoulder, and bowls the cornerback over with ease. If he’s being honest, he probably could’ve gotten the same result from a strong exhale in the guy’s direction.

Buck looks down at the kid, his ears pricked. The Longhorns gained a few yards, and they still have possession so are standing to reset—they have a moment. After a beat, he holds out a hand for the player on the ground beneath him. 

The cornerback hesitates for a moment before taking the offered hand, and Buck hoists him up with ease. It’s a movement he must have done a thousand times, but today Maddie is on his mind. Today, the hand makes him think immediately of the day he broke his wrist skateboarding and between one breath and the next, Maddie was there, holding out a hand. 

She was always there. 

(It was Maddie. Surely she looked him up once or twice over the years. She must know he’s here today. She must.)

Is she here?

The stadium roars back to life as Buck blinks himself back from his daze, suddenly hyperaware of everything going on around him. He’s been frozen to the spot for a second too long, and catches Eddie giving him a look as they reposition themselves. Come on, Buck, he scolds himself. Get it together. 

But he can’t, and sure enough, a few seconds later he fumbles an easy pass from Jones that has the entire crowd muttering in disappointment. It was a quick stutter-step, another move he’s done a thousand times, but his brain is clouded. He looks off to the sidelines, where Hen and Chimney are both whispering into Bobby’s ears at the same time. Bobby nods and looks to him, and he knows then he’s being taken out. 

“You good?” Eddie asks when he comes close a few seconds later, Williams already jogging out onto the field. Buck nods. it was a stupid mistake, and he knows it.

He’s not even mad about coming out by the time he reaches the sidelines, because he knows exactly what Bobby’s going to say. He’s right.

“Just for a second to cool it,” Bobby advises. “You’re jittery.”

“You’ve been playing hot potato football,” Hen adds. 

“I know,” Buck says, and they all look surprised for a moment. He shrugs. “Let me get some water, then I’m going back in.”

He eyes the defense warily as the players collide again a moment later, squirting the water bottle. Eddie is playing smart today, moving at lightning speed and reading the field with ease, but he can tell the Eagles are getting frustrated. Even the Boston referees are calling them for it. 

He needs to focus on the game. This is his priority. Maddie might be here, she might… not, and that’s okay. It’s not his problem right now. He has a game to play, and he needs to be ready. 

It helps to tune back into his senses, grounding him to the stadium. It’s something he likes about football: every stadium smells the same—popcorn and stale beer—and more or less the screams of the fans and droning announcer are familiar every time. The consistency no matter what city or stadium he’s in helps him feel a little more centred, and as he takes in the sights, sounds and smells, he begins to feel calmer. 

By the time Bobby calls him up again a minute later, he’s ready to go. “Put me in, Coach,” he says, grinning. 

Bobby nods, and then he’s jogging back onto the field. He catches Eddie’s gaze out of the corner of his eye, reading the silent question in it. He’s good. He’s ready. At the first snap of the ball, he’s back to having feet like lightning and hands to match—they play a few downs without making a lot of headway, but neither do the Eagles, and Eddie and Buck are playing smart, offensive football. 

At the next huddle, Eddie obeys Bobby’s hand signals and calls for a run-pass option. As they split off, he bumps fists one more time with Buck before they both take their places. Buck drops into a crouch, reminding himself of his route, and at the snap of the ball he darts inside with his mind singularly on the task in front of him.

Buck collides with the linebacker in a satisfying crunch, dipping his shoulder to drive him sideways and seal the edge like the play demands. Behind him, he knows Eddie is faking the handoff and pulling the ball back to throw while the right guard keeps the defense clear—he tightens his grip on the linebacker to do the same, straining to hold the block and push him further back.

But the right guard is Ryder, and Ryder isn’t as good at holding his block. He has a tendency to drive forward too hard on his left side, leaving him vulnerable to getting overpowered on the right. It’s because of this vulnerability that Buck turns his head a little—just to check everything is playing out how he’d imagined in his head. 

It’s because he’s turned that he sees the exact moment Eddie gets hit. 

As he suspected, Ryder isn’t strong enough to keep up the block. All it takes is one back-step before the defensive tackle is brushing Ryder aside like he’s nothing, and—oh God, Eddie’s got his back turned, he can’t even see him coming—

Buck cries out, but that’s all the warning Eddie gets before he’s slammed into from behind. The crunch of collision is less satisfying and more hair-raising, something in it sounding wrong even in the first second. Eddie twists, trying to avoid falling on his bad shoulder as the ball pops out between the two bodies, but the defender has no instinct to place his body under Eddie’s like Buck had so long ago. Eddie falls, with all his might, to the soft earth.

The crowd hisses in sympathy as Eddie falls, but no one save the Longhorns could understand how Buck’s heart is in his throat as soon as he sees it happen. He’s moving before Eddie even hits the ground, making it over just as the ball skitters across the grass and rolls to a stop. A few Eagles follow the movement, looking as if they’re going for the fumble, but the wounded guttural noise Eddie makes as the tackle rolls off of him is enough to make them stop in their tracks. 

Buck doesn’t even glance at the ball as he skids to a stop beside Eddie’s prone body, all thoughts of the game abandoned. Eddie is staring at the sky when Buck reaches him—the first one, though he was far from the closest when it happened—but his eyes focus a little when Buck comes into view. 

He takes a sharp breath that sounds far too ragged for Buck’s liking, tries to smile and then groans in pain. “Fuck,” he mutters, more to himself than anyone else. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

Nonsensically, Eddie moves to sit up and Buck puts a firm hand on his good shoulder to keep him down. “Stay there, Eds,” Buck says, glancing upwards to see Hen jogging across the field with his medical bag slung over his shoulder and Tommy in tow. “We’ve got you. We’ve got you.”

“I’m fine,” Eddie tries, though it comes out more like ‘mfine’ and is ended with another groan of pain. “Is it bad?”

Buck doesn’t answer, resolutely keeping his eyes away from the injury. He doesn’t want to look. “It’ll be okay,” Buck says vaguely. “Tommy’s coming. He’ll get you fixed up.”

Eddie’s good arm shoots out faster than Buck thought possible and grabs Buck by the wrist, somehow finding the one strip of skin not covered by his thermals or gloves. Eddie’s touch burns into his skin. 

“Is it bad, Evan?”

Buck knows what Eddie’s really asking. He wants Buck to be the one to tell him if things are really bad. 

Steeling himself, Buck takes a breath and looks down. He’s surprised to find no blood—given the hit and the sound Eddie had made, he’d half-expected to see a mangled mess of bone—but upon closer inspection there’s an obvious deformity at the top of his shoulder. 

“I think it’s dislocated,” Buck says, and to his surprise Eddie breathes a sigh of relief. 

“Okay,” Eddie replies, again mostly to himself. “That’s why.”

“Why what?”

“Why I can’t feel it,” Eddie responds calmly.

Hen arrives as Buck swallows back the sudden urge to heave and turns to share a look with Tommy, noting that his mentor’s face is more stoic than usual as he shifts his gaze to assess the injury.

“Wiggle your fingers,” Hen instructs Eddie a minute later, her jaw tight and brow furrowed. Buck has been watching her closely for any sign she’s seen something Eddie can’t come back from, but hasn’t found a clue yet.

Eddie hisses, but he’s able to twitch his middle finger. “Can’t move anything else,” Eddie says through gritted teeth. “Does that mean—”

“I think it’s a partial dislocation,” Hen explains quickly. “I’m hoping, at least. Either way, your shoulder’s rotated in its socket, and—best guess—is pinching your ulnar nerve. That’s why you’ve lost sensation.”

“ This one’s the one you really need to work, and given your capillary refill it’s cutting off the artery, too,” Tommy adds. “We have to get you to a hospital as soon as possible to reset it.”

At Tommy’s words, the field flutters into motion. Bobby crouches beside Eddie to talk to him in a low, rapid voice, and the assistant coaches split seamlessly into two huddles to call the ambulance and talk with the referee to figure out how much time they have. 

Buck and his teammates have been kneeling out of respect while Eddie is examined, and when Buck turns he sees that the Eagles have all done the same. Touched, he nods to the cornerback kneeling closest to him. He nods in response. They all know how it feels to be injured or have an injured teammate, and Buck is grateful for the solidarity.

The crowd, who has thus far been rippling with murmurs of worry and speculation, roars to life with chatter when the ambulance arrives a minute later and two paramedics carrying stretchers jog onto the field. Buck makes a mental note to ensure that the team is vague on reporting Eddie’s injury, as it seems like the spectators have no idea what’s going on and Eddie will want to keep it that way.

The paramedics are thorough but efficient with their examination of Eddie, agreeing with Hen’s diagnosis and stressing that time is of the essence. Though he initially refuses pain medication, he accepts it while they’re putting in his IV and splinting his shoulder for transport. He already seems dazed by the time the paramedics announce that it’s time to go.

The entire stadium shows their approval when Eddie is hoisted onto the stretcher, erupting with cheers and applause for the players and the emergency response team. It would be a heartwarming moment, if Buck’s heart didn’t feel like it was frozen in his chest. 

“He’ll need someone with him,” one of the paramedics says, looking between the coaches and Tommy. 

“I’ll go,” Tommy and Buck both say at the same time. They share a look. 

“If that’s okay with you, Doc,” Tommy says to Hen. “Only because I’m the most up to date with his case since I’ve been treating him.”

“No complaints here,” Hen replies. “I know you’ve got our boy.” (And several years’ experience as a part–time EMT, as Buck recently discovered.)

All eyes turn to Buck, who folds his arms. “I’m going too,” he repeats, refusing to plead his case. 

The coaches all exchange looks, but Judd is the first to speak. “You sure that’s a good idea, Buckley?” he asks. “We’re already down our Captain. We don’t need another star player off the roster.”

“Are you kidding?” Buck bursts out. It’s more aggressive than he intended, but he can’t find it in himself to give a fuck. “We’re up by twenty. We couldn’t lose this game if Ravi took a goddamn nap in the middle of the field. He’s my—he’s Eddie. I’m not leaving him, and if you make me, I’ll sit on the sidelines and fucking scream.”

Bobby looks unsurprised by Buck’s outburst. Hen and Chimney, meanwhile, are having another one of their silent conversations. Judd just looks confused. 

“Of course you can go with him, Buck,” Bobby says, the picture of calm in the storm. His gaze is cool and reassuring, the certainty in it steadying Buck. His voice becomes a little lighter. “He needs better entertainment in a hospital than Tommy.”

This is one of the things that Buck loves most about Bobby: the fact that he’s so easy to take cues from. If Bobby isn’t worried, than Buck definitely shouldn’t be worried—this is what he always thinks. If he’s nervous before a game, all he has to do is look to Bobby’s unflappable expression and he knows they’ve got it in the bag. 

“If that’s okay with you, Eddie,” Bobby adds after a moment, and they all turn to the man on the stretcher as if they’ve only just remembered that he’s still there.

Eddie is already looking straight at Buck, appearing woozy from the pain medication with his face drained of colour but still watching him with eyes filled with determination and something else unreadable. They hold each other’s gaze for half a beat, and then Eddie is nodding. 

“Evan,” Eddie mumbles, his gaze becoming glassy again, and Buck is beside him. “Tell them I need to go to Mass Gen.”

“Mass Gen,” Buck echoes in a louder voice, looking up as Eddie falls silent and taking over his friend’s call. “He’s gotta go to Mass Gen.”

One of the paramedics is already shaking her head. “Protocol is the nearest hospital, which is Beth Israel,” she says. “With an injury like this, we have to be fast.”

Eddie grabs Buck’s wrist again, squeezing twice.  Buck leans closer as they walk to listen to his mumbled speech, and then straightens. “He has a complex pre-existing injury,” Buck explains, looking to Tommy for verification. He nods in agreement. “Mass Gen has the best ER for his kind of injury, okay? It’s only a minute further, anyway. And now we’re wasting time talking about it, so please—”

The two paramedics share a look. “Fine,” the woman says finally, turning on her heel and walking away without further explanation. 

Buck and Tommy glance at one another and then hurry to follow behind the stretcher heading for the ambulance. Eddie is loaded into the back—again, to raucous cheers of approval—and Buck is careful to keep his eyes trained on Eddie’s face the whole time, certain a single glance at his injury would send him spiralling. It seems to help Eddie, too, because he doesn’t look away the whole time he’s being carried until they open the doors to load him into the ambulance. 

Eddie’s eyes drift back to the crowd, where thousands of fans cheer and shout their support for him. There was no doubt that he was the MVP of the game even before the tackle, his performance easily snagging the win for the Longhorns. It’s why Buck isn’t worried about leaving now; he knows their team has got their backs.

He spares them one last glance just before the doors are closed, finding Ravi and the rest of the team kneeling beside Bobby and the other coaches with their heads bowed. Swallowing hard, he turns back to the task at hand. 

He and Tommy watch as Eddie is connected to a heart rate monitor and wired to other machines that Buck doesn’t recognise. Tommy is keeping up a steady stream of questions to the paramedics the whole time, inquiring after treatment protocol and asking about something called the ‘golden hour’, but Buck is content to keep a firm grip on Eddie’s hand and watch him like a hawk. 

The paramedic sat with them in the back—Nancy, apparently—busies herself with adjusting the splint and checking the monitor, then lifts her head. “We’re good, TK,” she calls out, and the man in the cab steps on the gas. 

They roll slowly through the busy tunnel and out of the rammed stadium, careful of bystanders, but once they get onto the main street the sirens start blaring and Buck feels them surge forward. TK’s not wasting any time now, apparently. 

Just as the ambulance increases in speed, Eddie’s face grows gaunt and his hand in Buck’s goes slack. Buck’s stomach lurches. “Uh—Nancy, I—” Buck is cut off by the sound of one of Eddie’s monitors chirping in warning, and when he looks back he finds Eddie’s chest heaving in uneven breaths. 

God, Buck wishes he listened to his parents and went to medical school. He glances worriedly at Nancy then at Tommy, trying to read their expressions, but finds them equally focused but calm as their eyes race over the lines on the monitor. 

“He’s going into shock,” Nancy says after a beat. “His blood pressure is crashing now that the adrenaline is leaving his body.”

Buck feels the ambulance increase its speed once more, and vaguely senses Nancy moving around him as she retrieves medication from the cabinet and uses a syringe to push it into Eddie’s IV, but he’s barely paying attention. Instead, he’s clutching Eddie’s hand for dear life and wondering if prayers for an atheist can be heard—especially if they’re for a Catholic.

Please let him be okay, Buck chants over and over again in his head as the monitors continue to beep frantically. Please let his arm be okay. 

Buck knows that those two things are one and the same for Eddie. He needs his arm to throw, and he needs to throw to live. He understands better than anyone that football is a lifeline for Eddie, and he’ll die before he lets anyone take that away. 

The beeping slows, and then the warning noises stop. Buck looks over to see that Eddie’s heart rate is back down to normal, and both Tommy and Nancy’s faces are back to actual calm rather than the practiced blank calm they had before.

“The medication should stabilize him, but he’ll need to go straight into surgery the moment he arrives,” Nancy tells Buck, then takes a moment to listen to her radio when it warbles out a message. “Your friend was right—Mass Gen is the place to be. Apparently, they have a laparoscopic surgery team ready to go. He’s in good hands.”

Buck breathes out shakily, but it’s not a sigh of relief just yet. He doesn’t think he can do that until a doctor comes out and tells him that Eddie is going to make a full recovery. For now, he contents himself with the half-release and focuses as Nancy reminds him and Tommy that they’ll need to stay out of the way when they arrive and let the ER team take over. Buck’s grip tightens on Eddie’s hand.

Eddie squeezes back. When Buck looks up at him in surprise, he finds Eddie already watching back with half-lidded eyes and removing the oxygen mask Nancy put on him when his blood pressure tanked.

“Evan, I—need to tell you something,” Eddie stutters out, his chest heaving. 

“Don’t try to talk, man,” Nancy advises. “You’re not out of the woods yet. Keep that mask on.”

Eddie shakes his head as if trying to clear it and focuses back on Buck. “I need to tell you that—”

The sirens on the ambulance stop as abruptly as they started, and half a second later the doors are being pulled open. “Eddie Diaz - twenty-one-year-old male, partial dislocation of the right shoulder from a football tackle,” Nancy calls out, climbing over Buck and Tommy unceremoniously to unload the gurney from the back and forcing Buck to drop Eddie’s hand. She continues reporting Eddie’s vitals and mental status to the team of doctors that have suddenly crowded the ambulance, and Buck’s vision blurs as he tries to take in everything happening. 

The ambulance bay is a swarm of doctors, nurses and transport staff all talking over one another. The ER staff hurry around Eddie, grabbing his IV bag and the portable monitor before pushing the gurney forward without a second glance behind them. Buck climbs out behind Tommy a beat later, and he realises belatedly that he’s been clutching his stupid football helmet the whole time. He’s still got black under his eyes, for fuck’s sake. 

When he focuses on Eddie, he finds his friend looking around with his eyes filled with uncertainty—when he finds Buck, his eyes widen. 

Buck pushes forward, shouldering past a stocky transport guy in grey scrubs that practically growls at him. He doesn’t spare the guy a second glance—Buck could take him in his sleep. After another well-timed shove, he’s back beside Eddie and leaning over him to check he’s okay, that he’s still there and in one piece.

“You’re good, you’re good,” Buck tells him, patting his hand. He has the urge to grab it again and not let go. “They’ve got you now.”

Then he hears it:

“Dr. Singh is ready and waiting with his team upstairs. We’ll triage in Bay 1, then send him up.”

Every single hair on Buck’s body stands up. He knows that voice. He would know it anywhere—in the dark, in his sleep, in a random hospital three hundred and fifty miles away from the town they grew up in.

“Maddie?”

His sister’s head jerks up from her clipboard to look at him, her dark eyes wide and filled with a mixture of surprise, trepidation, and worry. For a minute she just stands there poised over Eddie, the two siblings freezing his gurney in place. 

“Evan?”

“Surprise!” Eddie says weakly, and then he passes out.

Chapter Text

Buck 

“Evan?”

Buck can’t look away. He can’t even blink, because he’s sure that if he does the ghostly apparition of his sister will disappear into thin air like she did all those years ago. It used to be that he’d look up and she’d be right beside him, waiting with a helping hand, but one day he lifted his head and she was nowhere to be seen. 

What the fuck is he supposed to say? He remembers having this crisis several times before, but he never actually came to any conclusion. Now, confronted with his sister in the ambulance bay of a hospital, only one thing comes to mind. 

“Help my friend, Mads,” he pleads, and they both look down at the gurney between them. All at once, the world that was frozen around them jerks into vivid motion. More hands are grabbing at the gurney and then he’s being wheeled off once more, Maddie at the head of the cavalry as she directs the paramedics and gives orders to the nurses with the calm authority of someone who knows she’s in charge. 

Buck can only watch, frozen at the threshold of the sliding doors. 

“Who was that?”

Buck had forgotten Tommy was even there. He turns and finds his mentor watching Maddie go, looking confused.

“That was my sister,” Buck replies, not sparing another glance as he hurries after Eddie. 

He hears Tommy’s footsteps behind him as he rounds the corner and finds Eddie’s triage room, where Eddie himself is barely visible beneath the tangle of wires and people moving around him. A team moves him onto the bed, others connecting him to monitors and others still properly removing the jersey and pads that were hastily cut through with trauma shears to inspect the injury. 

The whole time, Maddie is right beside Eddie, calling out orders and listening intently to the doctor’s instructions. Buck watches her for a moment, taking in the sight of her in her element.

Despite the number of people in the room, Maddie looks over moments after he appears. “Did he lose consciousness on the field?” Maddie asks him, already busying herself with other tasks as she talks.

It takes a minute for Buck to remember how to speak. “No, but he was dazed,” he manages. “The only time he fully passed out was just now. Is he gonna be okay, Mads?”

Maddie must hear the worry in his voice, because she looks up again. “Dr Singh is an incredible surgeon, and he got here quickly,” she reassures him. “Those are both good things.”

The shock of seeing his sister has made the last few minutes a blur, but as he slowly convinces himself that he’s not hallucinating and she really is there, reality sets back in. Time feels like it moves at a normal rate, though he's still laser focused - he watches as Maddie connects the pulse ox on Eddie’s good hand and then turns back to the injured arm. 

“Okay, there you are,” Maddie says, as Eddie’s eyes flutter open, brought back to consciousness now that his blood pressure is stabilized again. She checks the pulses in his arm and then the blood flow to his hand, explaining what she’s doing each time. “Eddie, can you wiggle your fingers for me?”

Eddie looks down at his arm and Buck follows his gaze, both of them watching intently. Nothing.

Eddie glances up at Buck, his eyes filled with a silent message even as he halfheartedly claws at the oxygen mask back on his face. Be my voice. 

“Eddie has prior nerve damage from a gunshot wound.” Buck takes over, and Maddie looks up in shock. “Afghanistan,” he adds. “The majority of damage was done to the radial nerve, but he has frequent shooting pain through his whole arm and occasional weakness when he’s throwing. Oh, and the shooting pain is sometimes accompanied by intermittent numbness down to the elbow.”

Maddie seems impressed as she continues bustling around Eddie’s hospital bed. “Thank you for your service, first of all,” she says, and a few of the other nurses parrot the sentiment. “No numbness today before the tackle, though?”

Eddie shakes his head. “He was fine,” Buck translates. “He threw two hundred yards before halftime, and didn’t have an issue.” A thought occurs to him. “Oh, and I forgot—he’s on gabapentin, 300 milligrams. He’s supposed to take it three times a day, but he usually only needs it once.”

Maddie casts Buck a sidelong glance, and one of the other nurses snorts. “Your little brother might be following in your footsteps,” he says to Maddie, and Buck blanches.

“I’m studying kinesiology and PT, actually,” he retorts. He knows what he wants to say: he wants to say that physio is his, that it had nothing to do with Maddie and everything to do with his own interests. Who is she to assume she has any influence in his life whatsoever after so many years of silence?

“Good for you, Evan,” she says, far too softly for his liking. Buck is trying to be mad right now. 

“It’s Buck now,” he retorts, ignoring the fact that Eddie has called him Evan multiple times since arriving at the hospital. 

Maddie arches a brow as she takes the brakes off the gurney. “People still call you that? I thought that was a camp thing.”

“Well, Eddie’s from camp, and so is another guy on my team, so,” Buck shoots back, feeling offended by the implication that his nickname is childish. 

Maddie stops in her tracks, looking from Eddie to Buck and back again. “This is Eddie?”

Oh, fuck. Buck had forgotten the months of suspicious looks every time he mentioned Eddie’s name at the dinner table, culminating in Buck breaking down and telling her a lot about what had happened between the two at camp. It may have been in vague terms, but she knows far more than he’s comfortable with her knowing given the fact that she’s currently staring down at the boy in question. 

Buck gives her a desperate look, one that says later, please, and thankfully Maddie is in tune enough with her sisterly instincts to heed the advice. “Alright, we’re moving out,” she says to the team around her, then she looks to Eddie and her voice softens. “We’re taking you up to surgery now. Is there anyone we can call? Any family?” 

Buck is still hovering in the doorway so he can’t see much, but Eddie must say something because Maddie looks up at him. “Ev—Buck has to stay down here, but we’ll keep him updated, okay?”

Eddie lifts a feeble hand, and Buck shoots forward. He slips past the throngs of hospital staff to reach Eddie’s bed and clasps his hand in both of his, squeezing with as much reassurance as he can muster. He doesn't even know if this was what Eddie was asking for, but it's what he needs. 

Eddie moves like he’s wading through molasses and seems more than a little out of it based on the glazing of his eyes, but he still has enough wherewithal to manage a watery smile for Buck and gesture that he wants his oxygen mask pulled down. 

“See you soon, then,” he murmurs, clearly unsure of what else to say, and Buck nods. 

“See you soon.”

And then the team is pushing Eddie’s bed out of the room and back into the hall, leaving a mess of wires and plastic packaging from needles scattered around the floor. He’s there and gone in the span of a blink, and Buck finds the sudden quiet eerier than he expected. 

“Buck?”

He turns around and finds Maddie there, looking nervous. “I have to make sure Eddie’s set up upstairs, but then—can we talk? Please?”

Buck considers being an asshole and saying no just because, his nerves frayed to high hell after the last twenty minutes, but he decides against it. He might have given in if he’d ran into Maddie by chance, but it’s clear based on Eddie’s reaction—or lack thereof—to seeing Maddie that he set it up, and there’s no denying that Buck is thankful to Eddie for providing him the opportunity.

While the circumstances are obviously not what Eddie intended, he’d still made sure to take the chance on convincing the paramedics to take him to Mass Gen on the off chance that Buck would be able to see her. 

He could, and he has, so… he’ll stay. For Eddie.

(And maybe a little bit for him, too.)

“Yeah. I’d like that.”

The other nurse in the ER gives Buck and Tommy—each decked out in their respective Longhorns uniforms—one look and scoffs when they go to make their way into the waiting room. “Boy, you need to change,” he says with a laugh. “C’mon. I’ll find you some undercover clothes, since I’m assuming you don’t have any with you, Mr. Football Player.”

Buck recognises the nurse as the one Maddie talked to the most while they were treating Eddie, the two of them seeming closer than the others. He glances down at his football helmet, still clutched under one arm, and shakes his head—he’s beginning to sweat in his pads and thermals, too, so he’s grateful for the opportunity. 

“Thanks, man,” he replies, glancing at Tommy who nods. “Lead the way.”

Maddie finds him in the waiting room half an hour later, wearing a full tracksuit from the gift shop downstairs and a baseball cap to match. It might not be high fashion, but it’s a lot less noticeable than his football uniform and the cap keeps any of the obvious football fans in the hard plastic chairs around them from spotting Buck’s easily identifiable birthmark. 

He might be beginning to draw attention from his behaviour, though. He’s been bouncing his knee so much that Tommy gave him The Look three times, and by the time Maddie comes in Buck is furiously reading an issue of Cosmopolitan because what the hell is taking her so long?

“She’s here,” Tommy murmurs, tapping him on the arm, and Buck sees Maddie deftly slipping between patients and staff in the busy waiting room. Both of them stand, though Buck is unsure why.

“He’s in surgery now,” Maddie says quietly when she reaches them. “He’s stable, and Dr Singh is confident that he can restore blood flow to the arm.”

“And will his blood pressure stuff be better then?” Buck enquires.

“They think that’ll resolve itself once the shoulder is reset. Someone from Surgery will come by to update you again soon.” After a moment’s pause, Maddie continues. “Buck, could we go somewhere to talk? Privately?”

This is it. Finally.

Buck nods, glancing back at Tommy. He has no idea what’s going on, and Buck hasn’t explained beyond a cursory few words about how they haven’t been in touch in a few years—but still, he hasn’t asked. He’s giving Buck a moment.

He does the same thing again when he shoos Buck away. “Go. I’ll text you if the doctor comes out while you’re gone, okay?”

“Thank you,” Buck says with as much emphasis as he can muster, and then he’s turning on his heel and following Maddie down the hall. 

She takes him to the nurse’s break room, which is currently unoccupied. It’s hard not to notice how the hospital din—announcements over the loudspeaker and the bell of patients being called one by one, the clatter of instruments—is dampened by the closing of the break room door, and it makes Buck frown, suddenly unsure of himself. 

“Are you sure you have time to talk?” he says, glancing worriedly at a group of nurses rushing by. 

Maddie nods, sitting down on the worn couch at one end of the room. “I haven’t taken a break for the last eight hours. I’m allowed to put my feet up for a few minutes.”

Buck takes her in once more. He knows it’s been more than three years since he’s seen her, but he’s still surprised by the fact that she’s aged in that time. She’s always looked young and still looks beautiful, but now she looks her age—there’s something heavy around her eyes, and she holds herself much more stiffly when she settles even as she smiles at him. 

“I just—can’t believe you’re here,” Maddie says, shaking her head. “I mean, what are the chances?”

“Low,” Buck deadpans as he takes a seat in the armchair opposite her. “Eddie made the paramedics take us here on purpose so that I’d run into you.”

Buck still doesn’t know how Eddie found her, actually. He makes a mental note to ask him when he’s out of surgery.

Maddie raises her brows. “Wow. He sounds like a… good friend.” A teasing smirk that catapults Buck into seeing that smile in childhood crosses her lips. “So, Eddie from camp, huh?”

“No.” It’s firmer than Buck meant it, but he supposes he needs it to be for her to get the message. He feels his throat growing tight, and his next words are strained. “We’re not going to—to gossip about Eddie right now. Where have you been, Maddie? You changed your number, my letters got returned. It didn’t feel much like you wanted to see me.”

The words seem to hit Maddie all at once, crashing over her in a wave. She looks down at her hands, then at the door to the staff room. “I’m—I’m sorry, Buck,” she says quietly. “I always wanted to reach out, but…”

She doesn’t elaborate further, and Buck feels something boil up inside of him. “I know about Daniel.”

He hadn’t planned on blurting it out like that, but he’s here now. Maddie reels back like she’s been slapped for a moment, and then shuts her eyes for a long beat.

“How did you find out?” she says, and then before Buck can respond she adds, “I’m sorry I wasn’t the one to tell you. I always—I wanted to tell you so many times. I tried.”

“But you didn’t,” Buck says matter-of-factly. He sighs. “I was cleaning out your room, and I found the box. I asked Mom and Dad, and they told me.”

Maddie seems the most surprised by this. “They just… told you?”

Buck rolls his eyes. “It took a minute to get the whole story.” He feels a muscle ticking in his jaw as he thinks of his parents back home. “I don’t think Mom has looked me in the eye since, and that’s saying something because she didn’t do it much before.”

Maddie wilts. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t want you to find out that way. I always thought they’d tell you when you got older, but then you got older, and… nothing. I hated watching them pretend every day, y’know?”

It’s only at this moment that Buck realises Maddie is not just his older sister—she’s Daniel’s too. Her brother, Buck’s brother, died. Buck didn’t know him, but she did.

“You lost someone, too,” Buck says quietly. “You didn’t deserve to see him erased like that.”

“And you didn’t deserve—any of it,” Maddie replies.

Just like that, the anger begins boiling up inside Buck once again. For a moment he forgets his revelation about Maddie and Daniel, reverting back to a petulant child. “I didn’t deserve to lose my sister, but that happened too.”

“I’m sorry,” Maddie says again. “Things are just a little complicated. At home.”

“With Doug?” Buck can’t help the way that he spits out Maddie’s fiancé’s name, and he notices the way that she flinches when she hears it. His stomach lurches. “Maddie… is Doug—”

“He’s a great guy,” she replies quickly, sounding like she’s on autopilot. “He’s a surgeon at this hospital, actually. Very successful, and very good at his job.”

“That’s not what I was asking, and you know it.”

“Doug is—” Maddie begins, and then stops. “He just likes things a certain way.”

With Buck’s heart in his throat, he begins studying her for any physical injuries. She wasn’t limping and didn’t seem to have any trouble moving around in the ER, nor does she have any bruises on her face, but there are ways of hiding—

“Buck, don’t,” Maddie says sharply, and Buck stops scrutinizing her to find her staring him down. “You’re not gonna find anything. I’m fine, okay? It’s not like that. He’s just a little controlling.”

“Is he why you haven’t called in all this time? Why you’d never let me come visit, even when you first moved out here?”

“I’m just—busy.” Maddie says, her voice small. “And Doug is particular about his space. That’s all. I didn’t want—I just didn’t want to cause you any trouble.”

It’s hard not to notice Maddie’s very particular choice of words. Didn’t want to cause you any trouble. 

“Is Doug not a fan or something?” Buck says it sarcastically, but he’s at least a little serious. Doug didn’t come around to the house much when he and Maddie first started dating because of their parents, but even later he never showed any interest in spending any time with Buck despite how close he was to his sister. He acted put out whenever Buck was in the kitchen the one time he visited their tiny apartment in Philadelphia, and was sullen and uncommunicative during the few car rides they took together. When they moved to Boston, naturally, Buck never heard from Doug again.

“No, it’s not that,” replies Maddie. “He never asks. He doesn’t even know you play football, or where you go to school. I’d like to keep it that way.”

“Why?” Buck asks, feeling like there’s a conclusion he’s missing here.

“It’s just… easier.” She smiles a little shakily, clearly aiming for lightness when she speaks again. “Besides, it’s kinda nice keeping my football star baby brother all to myself. Congratulations on Texas, by the way. You’ve been incredible.”

Buck will allow the topic change for the moment, but he hasn’t forgotten about Doug. “You’ve been following?”

“Of course,” she says. “I go over to Ezra’s house—that’s the nurse who gave you the clothes—and we watch together. You’ve improved so much.”

Buck knows what he wants to say. He wants to say that he was playing and behaving so badly that he essentially got kicked out of school, and that the only reason he’s at UT Austin is because Bobby took pity on him and is enough of a big-shot that he could bypass the usual procedures. He wants to say that Bobby and Eddie are the only reasons he’s still standing, because Bobby got him in the door and Eddie kept him honest once he was there. He wants to say that Maddie’s absence set him down a dark spiral, and that those two men were the ones that dug him out. 

He wants to say that she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. 

What he knows, though, is that none of those things were her fault. Not really. She would’ve been the first person to smack him over the head if she knew how he was behaving, especially last year, and it’s not fair to blame her for something that she couldn’t control anyway.

Still. 

He knows being mad at her for this stuff won’t do anything, is the point. It won’t erase all the mistakes Buck made, and it won’t get her to come home, either. 

And that’s the next thousand miles. It may have been a few years, but he can still read his sister like the back of his hand—she’s holding herself taut like a bow, all the way down to her clenched jaw, and her eyes keep flicking to the door like she expects someone to burst in at any second. Even without this and just relying on common sense, Buck knows that there’s more to the story than she’s saying. He doesn’t know how bad, but he knows he can’t stomach any of the guesses he’s making in his head. 

“Come back with me,” he says suddenly, all the pieces slotting into place. The solution seems so simple.

“What?” Maddie is laughing at first, but it quickly dies down when she meets Buck’s gaze and realises he is very much not kidding. Her face falls. “You’re serious.”

“Yeah, I am,” Buck confirms. “Think about it. We have a day of sightseeing in Boston tomorrow, then we’re leaving the day after that. Chartered plane and everything. You could stay in my dorm, or—oh, duh. You could stay with Bobby and Athena. You’d love Austin, Maddie—the music is great, the food is even better, and if you wanted you could work at one of the hospitals near—”

“Buck, no.”

She says it so firmly that Buck actually stops in his tracks, looking over incredulously. There’s a moment where her eyebrows turn up on the insides and she looks like she does when she’s about to cry, but it’s gone in the span of a breath and then her eyes are hardening into sharp glass.

“I can’t,” she says, her voice small despite her prickly demeanour.

“But you can—”

“I can’t,” she pleads. “Please. It’s not—you don’t understand. It’s complicated.”

“It doesn’t seem very complicated to me,” Buck shoots back, folding his arms. “Your husband is a dick. I have somewhere for you to stay.”

“My whole life is here, Buck,” Maddie replies. “I have a job I love, friends, a beautiful house.”

“Are you happy?” Buck is just as surprised as Maddie seems to be at the question, but he stands his ground. “Be honest. If the answer is yes, then I’ll go, and… you never have to hear from me again.”

Maddie’s eyebrows knit once more. “That’s not what I want. I really am glad you came, Buck. I forgot how much I missed you.”

Buck didn’t forget. He never forgot. 

“You didn’t answer my question.”

There’s a pause, and it goes on for so long that Buck is wondering if Maddie simply didn’t hear him—until he studies her properly and sees she’s truly considering it. Any answer to this question that requires this much thought, Buck thinks, is the wrong answer. 

“I am happy, yes,” Maddie replies finally, her mouth turning upward in what’s clearly supposed to resemble a smile. Something in her eyes—or rather, what’s not in her eyes—makes Buck’s stomach sink. 

“I don’t believe you,” Buck says, and something flashes across her face too quickly for Buck to identify. He thinks it might have been fear. 

And the thing is… Buck is beginning to think he understands. He knows now, in his bones, that Maddie didn’t cut off contact with him by choice. It was preservation, both for herself and for Buck. 

He understands. 

“Okay,” he says when it’s clear that Maddie is about to try and convince Buck she’s telling the truth. He doesn’t know if he can listen to it. “Okay. You’re not coming back with me, that’s—okay. But I’m not letting us go another three years without talking, alright?”

Maddie’s eyes are wet when she nods, smiling for real this time. “Sounds good to me,” she replies, then her face falls. “But—I don’t want Doug to know.”

Buck, again, doesn’t wait for an excuse or explanation. He just nods, prepared for that response. “I know. I have an idea for that. Meet me back here in ten minutes.”

Ten minutes later, Buck is striding back into the ER and back to the break room, where he finds Maddie waiting for him. The look of relief on her face when he comes back almost breaks his heart, because it’s obvious that she was beginning to think he wasn’t coming back. 

Handing her the package he went out for, he waits for her reaction. “So?” he prompts after several long beats go by where she just stares at it. “What do you think?”

“I…”

“I can return it if you don’t think it’s a good idea,” he says, suddenly self-conscious. He goes to take the prepaid phone back from her, but her grip tightens on the bag. 

“No, it’s—” She looks up at him, close to tears once again. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

“Maybe you should keep it here,” he advises, and Maddie nods. 

“I’ll keep it in Ezra’s locker.” She glances at the wall. “Now, I have ten more minutes before my break ends. If—if you’re okay with it, I’d love to hear more about your life.”

And God, the hesitancy in Maddie’s voice damn near splits Buck in half. All the anger about her thinking she gets a right to ask dissipates at once, and what’s left is one simple fact: Buck missed his sister. 

(There are so few people, Buck thinks suddenly, that he could go from angry to sad to normal in the span of minutes with. That’s what siblings are, he supposes.)

“Bobby came to SMU at the beginning of the season,” he begins. He glosses over the fact that he hadn’t been playing well at his alma mater for a while, but judging from Maddie’s deadpan expression, she saw him play. The point is, he tells her, he wasn’t himself—and Bobby gave him a second chance.

“And then I met Eddie. Bobby made us room together, actually.”

Maddie snorts. “He loves to do that, huh?”

Buck laughs with her, easy and free. “He does. Anyway, having Eddie around—and Ravi, too, and Lena and Albert and the rest of the team—really helped me get my shit together. I just couldn’t—I couldn’t make myself…”

“Obey?” Maddie guesses, and nods when she sees Buck’s reaction. “I saw a clip of you from training camp at SMU at the beginning of the season. Every route they’d give you, you’d run the opposite. It was... it almost seemed like you weren’t in control of it, and your body just jerked you away at the last second.”

Stunned, Buck sits back against the worn cushions of the sofa, “Yeah. That’s… exactly it. Eddie helped me tune back into the rhythm, y’know? To learn to work with my team, rather than against them.”

“See?” Maddie replies, pleased. “It may have been a while, but I do know you, Evan. Just like I know how you feel about Eddie. I would’ve caught on even if you didn’t mention him every other sentence.”

Buck blinks. Maddie just smiles knowingly. 

“I don’t—” Buck starts, then stops. He actually wasn’t going to deny it. “I don’t think we have enough time to get into that, Mads.”

“Okay,” she replies slowly. “If you’re on good terms with him now, then okay. The last thing I remember about Eddie, though, is him breaking your heart at camp.” At Buck’s look, she shrugs. “I know we weren’t talking as much by then, but I read between the lines. He really did a number on you.”

“He did,” Buck acknowledges, “but it was a misunderstanding. Besides, he’s a completely different person to who he was at camp. I mean—the same, but. Not.”

“War would do that to a person. Can I ask how he does with all that? His injury, the memories?”

Buck considers the question, weighing whether or not to answer. “He’s pretty stoic, most of the time,” he says finally. “Especially about his shoulder. It took me a while to realise how bad it was. The damage done by not rehabbing it properly means he’s taking a risk every time he goes on the field, but he can’t not. I know the feeling.”

Maddie nods. “It’s what he does. I’m sure he finds comfort in the team, too.”

Buck scoffs. “The team finds comfort in him. He’s Captain for a reason.”

“And does your Captain know how you feel about him?”

That’s actually a more complicated question to answer than Buck expected. He is sure Eddie knows, at least to some extent, that Buck has feelings for him—and he’s never done a thing about it because of one simple fact. 

“He’s straight,” Buck replies.

Arching a brow, Maddie folds her arms. “So, what? Camp was just experimenting?”

“I guess. I don’t know.” Buck thinks of the conversation that he and Eddie had when he found out that camp had been a misunderstanding—of what Eddie said about the expectations put on him by himself and his family. That part feels too private to speak aloud, but he knows it at least complicates Eddie’s feelings. “It’s complicated.”

And Maddie can’t really argue with him using her argument against her, can she? “Okay,” she concedes after a moment. “But all I’ll say is this: I see a lot of patients come into the ER that are scared shitless—especially in situations like Eddie’s where they’re not sure if their lives will be the same after they come out. Eddie was scared. Until he saw you.”

Buck is speechless for a moment, but as soon as he regains the ability to move he’s shaking his head. “No—I mean, I’m sure—”

“I’m just saying what I saw,” Maddie interrupts, holding up her hands. “It’s clear he cares about you a lot, and vice versa.”

Buck doesn’t really know what to say to that, either. “We’re good for each other, I think,” he says finally. Absently, his mind tugs at the invisible tether connecting him to Eddie, searching for him in the hospital. He comes up empty. “Is Eddie going to be okay?”

Buck knows he’s asked the question before. Maddie knows he needs to hear the answer again. “He’s strong, and he got here fast. His kind of injury is very complex, but he has the best team possible working on him.” Buck arches a brow, and Maddie sighs. “Yes. Eddie will be okay.”

Buck blows out a long breath, storing the words for the hours ahead when he’s doubting if Eddie can make it through this. They said they wouldn’t know the extent of the damage until they opened his shoulder up, but Buck just hopes that when he returns Tommy will have received an update. 

As if on cue, Maddie stands. “We should go. My break’s almost over. I’ll, uh—try to drop by again, okay?”

Buck stands, too. He hadn’t noticed it before—how much he towers over her now. He’d forgotten. He looks down at her and wonders for a brief moment if she’ll come back, but knows instantly she will. She won’t let go of him that easily this time. 

He can’t help it. Buck embraces Maddie, his arms enveloping her smaller body in a bear hug until she’s almost being lifted off the ground. She laughs and wraps her arms around his waist, squeezing him back just as tight. 

“I love you, Evan,” she murmurs into his shoulder, and Buck pulls back. 

“I love you too, Maddie,” he says, making sure she’s looking right at him to see how much she means it. “God, I missed you.”

Her eyebrows turn upwards again, eyes watering, but then she sniffs and composes herself before reaching for the doorknob. “Missed you too, kid. Okay—let’s go.”

Maddie returns Buck to his chair beside Tommy in the waiting room, which is now a little quieter as the evening dies down. Tommy smiles in greeting, clearly noting that Buck appears tired and worn out but alive. 

A few people have noted their all-hospital uniform, Buck realises, and are casting curious looks in their direction. Maddie seems to notice it too, because she bites her lip. “We should get you somewhere more private,” she mutters. 

Tommy checks his watch. “That might be a good idea, because the game ended a few minutes ago—a lot more of us will be coming.”

Maddie nods. “Okay. I’ll sort it out, alright?” she says to Buck, and then she’s giving him a quick side hug and dashing back down the hall towards the nurse’s station.

Buck and Tommy both watch her go once again. “How was that?” Tommy asks Buck after a few beats.

“It was… eye-opening,” Buck replies finally. “Have the doctors said anything?”

Tommy nods. “She just came by before you got here. She said they’ve been able to restore blood flow to his arm, and now they’re working on the nerves. This part is complicated, so… it might be a while before we hear anything again.”

All at once, the colours and sounds and smells of the waiting room become too much. Buck heaves back into his chair alongside Tommy and nods, numb because the sound of a baby crying down the hall is perfectly tuned to pierce his eardrums, sending sharp waves drilling into his skull. He wonders for a moment if he’s hallucinating, but no—there’s a large clown lumbering down the hallway towards them, his white makeup highlighting the red gash on his forehead and making him look even scarier. Even the smell of bleach and linoleum is singing the hairs of his nostrils, all of it entirely too abrasive. 

Buck is wondering whether he’s having a panic attack—and then is wondering if he can remember any of the techniques he’s learned for Eddie, just in case—when he hears a familiar voice around the corner. 

“I’m looking for Edmundo Diaz?” The voice receives a muffled reply. “No, I understand that’s private information, but I’m his Coach. This is his doctor. We have the necessary paperwork for you to tell us what’s going on—can you have someone from his surgical team come and speak to us as soon as possible, please?”

“Bobby?”

Buck’s Coach turns, his expression calm but eyes a little wild, and breathes a sigh of relief when he sees him. Behind him are Hen, Ravi, Lena and Albert, and Buck can see another gaggle of players starting down the hallway towards them in the distance. Their own cavalry has arrived, but this presents a new problem: this waiting room is about to be inundated with the Longhorns team.

“How is he?” Bobby asks when he reaches them.

“He’s in surgery now,” Buck says, and Tommy repeats the details of the update he just gave Buck.

“They’re trying to find us somewhere more private to wait," he finishes.

It occurs to Buck then that Bobby probably doesn’t know Maddie is here. It’s been such a whirlwind that he feels like he’s lived an entire lifetime since leaving the field in the ambulance—here, in the stark fluorescent light of the hospital, his day comes into sharp relief. 

As if on cue, Maddie appears around a corner and walks towards the desk. She's entirely focused on reading something on the clipboard in her hands. “Looks like we can get you up to the VIP wing, Evan,” she says, still distracted, and when she looks up she starts at how Buck and Tommy have multiplied since she was last here.

She blinks. If Buck and Tommy were conspicuous in their gift-shop outfit, then they’re screwed with all the Longhorns tracksuits and game day suits around them right now. Buck knows Maddie is thinking the exact same thing. 

 “Is this—?” Bobby starts, then stops and narrows his eyes. Buck can literally see Bobby making the calculations in his head, then his eyes flicker to the name tag clipped to her scrubs. 

“Coach Nash, it’s good to see you again,” she says quietly, holding out her hand. She seems unsure—it’s been years since Maddie surprised him at the end of camp game one year and the two met, but Bobby obviously still knows who she is.
It only takes him a second to place her. “Maddie, likewise,” Bobby replies. “Please, call me Bobby.”

He looks to Buck, his eyes conveying a silent message: did you know she was here? What is happening?

Buck looks back, hoping his eyes say I’ll explain later, and turns back to Maddie. “So, the VIP wing?”

After a beat, Maddie is back in nurse mode. “Yes. We should get you all up there as soon as possible.”

Bobby and Athena launch into action, both of them clearly relieved at being given a task. Between the two of them—and Hen’s extraordinary spatial management skills—they’re eventually able to corral everyone towards the elevators and stairs towards the VIP wing. 

At the other end of the long hallway, the elevator dings. Buck dimly notices the shapes of people getting out in the distance, too focused on making sure Albert stops flirting with the nurse and follows them, but then the glint of a camera lens catches under the fluorescent light and Buck freezes. 

The paparazzi seem to notice them at the same time, because between one heartbeat and the next the beady black eyes of their camera lenses are pointing in the team’s direction and advancing, fast. 

“Coach, can you tell us anything about Diaz’s status?”

“How will this affect his playing moving forward?”

“How will this affect the playoffs moving forward?”

Only a few manage to shout their questions out before Athena is squeezing Bobby’s arm and stepping in front of him, all cop. “You can direct all your questions to Sue, our Director of Communications. Interrupting a team on their way to support their teammate is more than a little disrespectful towards Eddie Diaz and the entire Longhorn community, don’t you think?”

That does it. Athena’s pointed way of speaking—a style no one on the team or from camp has ever been able to replicate, despite trying—has a way of clearing paths, and Buck watches with glee as the order washes over the paparazzi. Some of the men physically take a step back, and several more drop their cameras, bow their heads and apologise. 

“We’re actually hiring new security, if you’re interested—” Bobby jokes as they start down the hall, to which Athena whacks him on the arm goodnaturedly. 

“I deal with bozos and imbeciles plenty on my own time, thank you,” she replies with a sniff. “I don’t want to add your team to the list.”

Buck, meanwhile, is now focused on solving a different issue. He falls into step beside Maddie, deep in conversation about recovery methods with Tommy, and leans down to her. 

“Are there snacks in the VIP wing?” Buck whispers surreptitiously. “Eddie will probably want Limón Sabritas when he wakes up.”

Maddie frowns. “Why are you whispering?” she hisses back. 

“So the team doesn’t hear if you have food.”

She still looks confused, and on her other side Tommy just shakes his head sagely. “Trust us,” he says. “Keep all food hidden. They’ll steal from half-eaten trays if given the chance.”

“Noted.” Maddie turns to Buck. “Lemon… what was it?”

“Limón. Sabritas. They’re a Mexican chip, but we get them all the time in Texas. It’s all he’ll want when he wakes up.”

“Right,” Maddie says slowly, not commenting on Buck’s confidence in Eddie’s snack choices. “I’m not sure we have those, but I’ll see what we can do.”

A few minutes later, they arrive at the VIP wing—manned by hospital security, who are then joined with Longhorns security when they finish securing the building a moment later. Through the double doors, the silence compared to the hustle and bustle of the rest of the hospital is serene. The fluorescent lights have been switched out for something much warmer, and instead of linoleum the floors are now carpeted. Wood panels and a sleek white nurse’s station in the centre of the wing finish out the look, altogether making Buck and the rest of the Longhorns feel like they’ve stepped into another dimension. 

At least waiting here will be much nicer. Buck can still smell the bleach, but only faintly—and no screaming kids. Bliss. 

The Longhorns settle into the spacious waiting room, all of them clearly relieved—they all have gone from the screaming stadium of Fenway Park to no doubt being harassed on their way to the bus, then to being approached by paparazzi yet again in the hospital. And now this: only two nurses not including Maddie at the desk, and the rest of the wing completely empty. 

Buck looks around at his teammates all sagging into their chairs, getting comfortable for the long wait. He isn’t the only one who was overwhelmed, it seems. 

The next two hours pass in relative quiet. Maddie has to go back to work, of course, but promises to stop by again once Eddie’s out of surgery; someone else comes down to apologize to Bobby for initially being denied access to Eddie when they arrived, and they get another update that Eddie’s stable, but not out of the woods yet. 

All they can do is wait. Buck is restless at the best of times, and though the quiet calms him down it also makes his skin crawl. If Eddie was here, he keeps thinking, there would be more talking and laughter. Instead, it doesn’t feel right to talk about much while they’re waiting for news. 

Athena leaves with Judd and comes back twenty minutes later with armfuls of food from what looks to be several different restaurants. They were right to bring options, though, because the team is ravenous—they practically tear the bags apart in their efforts to get to it, and not even ten minutes after Athena and Judd arrive the food is gone. 

Tommy is a quiet source of comfort the whole time, gamely quizzing Buck on PT concepts in a low voice when it’s clear he wants a distraction and just sitting with him in comfortable silence when he doesn’t. He gets the feeling he’s going to be grilled for more information on Maddie later, but right now he’s just glad for the company. 

Dr Singh finally emerges more than five hours after Eddie went in for surgery, looking tired and stony-faced as he walks through the double doors and removes his scrub cap. Buck’s heart lurches into his throat and he sways unsteadily to his feet, sure the surgeon’s expression means bad news. 

Along with Buck, there’s a rustling as everyone else in the room stands in sync to await the news. It takes a moment of Bobby glancing back at him meaningfully for him to realise that his coach wants him to join the small group talking to the doctor, and so he circles with Bobby, Hen and Tommy to hear the news. 

Dr Singh takes a long breath, and Buck steels himself. 

“The surgery went well,” Dr Singh begins. “There were some complications while trying to repair the nerves, however—the extensive scar tissue and prior damage made an already difficult surgery even more precarious—and our sensors were unable to detect a response in one of the nerves for a period of time.”

“But you were able to detect a response in that nerve eventually?” Hen presses. 

Dr Singh nods. “Yes, and his motor reflexes appear to be intact. It’s really the best outcome we could have hoped for, given the injury. He'll have a nerve block in his arm to minimize post-op pain, but it should wear off in a few hours.”

You can’t say that until we’re sure he can throw a ball, Buck thinks fiercely, but doesn’t say anything.

“Can we see him?” Bobby asks. 

Dr Singh glances at the massive group of people standing behind them warily. “Immediate family only in Recovery, I’m afraid,” he says.

Bobby puts a hand on Buck’s shoulder, his grip full of certainty. “That’s us.”

“We can take you to him in a moment,” Dr Singh replies. “He should be awake soon.”

“And what does recovery look like?” Tommy asks. “Is there a pre-set physical therapy regimen the hospital recommends for this type of procedure, or is it situational?”

“That all depends on Eddie,” Dr Singh says carefully, and then looks at Bobby and Buck. “Do you have any more questions before you go see him?”

The small group shares a look, then shakes their heads. Hen turns, relaying the bulk of the information—that there were complications, but Eddie is okay and should be awake soon—to the anxious team, who all instantly relax upon hearing the news. Ravi, Lena and Albert, huddled together in the back, sag with relief and almost collapse on top of each other.

Buck is too focused to think about them, or anything else. He only has one thing on repeat in his head: Eddie, Eddie, Eddie.

Eddie.

Underneath the tangle of tubes and wires, the beeping of monitors and slow drip, drip, drip of several I.V. bags, is Eddie Diaz—though it’s hard to make him out at first. Buck actually has to take several more steps into the room before his brain identifies the outline of Eddie beneath the sheets.

It’s only when he does that he feels like he can breathe again. There are circles under Eddie’s eyes, and he’s pale, but his chest is rising and falling and his eyelids flutter open and focus on Buck. 

He’s alive, and he’s okay. 

Seeing the deep amber of his irises almost splits Buck in half. Seeing his mouth curl into a dopey smile as he registers Buck’s presence makes him burst into flame. 

“Hey, Eds,” Buck says softly, fighting the urge to grab his hand or, God forbid, throw himself over Eddie’s prone body and weep. He manages to walk across the room without doing any of those things and takes a seat beside him. He waits anxiously for Eddie to respond.

When he finally does, it’s in typical Eddie fashion. “What the hell are you wearing?”

Buck glances down at his gift shop outfit, only now remembering that he’s still wearing it, and laughs. “This was as undercover as I could get.”

Eddie hums his approval, his eyes drifting shut for a moment as the ghost of a smile flits across his lips. “Stealthy.”

“How are you feeling?”

“Thirsty,” Eddie rasps, but when he reaches for the pitcher of water on the cart beside him, he freezes. His eyes go wide with fear. “Evan, I—I still can’t feel my arm—”

“The surgeon said that’s from the nerve block,” Bobby jumps in calmly, standing so he’s in Eddie’s eye line. Buck had completely forgotten he was here. “The numbness should wear off in a few hours.”

“So it’s not… it worked?”

“The surgery was a success,” Bobby replies with a nod. “There was a little trouble with one of the nerves, but they were able to fix it, so we’ll just have to wait and see how it’s doing once the numbness is gone.”

Smoothing over the complication is the right choice, Buck knows. Right now, they can only wait before they come to any conclusions. Buck focuses on the task in front of him, pouring Eddie a cup of water and grabbing a straw. 

Eddie holds the cup with his good hand and takes a few long gulps, wiping his mouth before handing it back. “Damn, I’m hungry,” he mumbles, absently running his fingers over the bandage on his shoulder. He looks up at Buck, his eyes clearing as he begins to look hopeful. “D’you think they have Flamin’ Hot Limón Sabritas?”

Buck grins, and behind them Bobby snorts out a laugh too. Eddie’s brows furrow. “What?” he asks, suspicious, and his tone only makes Buck and Bobby laugh again. 

“You two are a perfect pair,” is all Bobby says in reply. 

“I asked Maddie if they had any Sabritas here already,” Buck explains, which makes Eddie smile again. 

“Maddie?” Eddie questions, and then he has the decency to look sheepish. “Is she—I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, but—”

“It’s okay,” Buck cuts him off. “We can talk about it later. You don’t have to worry about that right now.”

Eddie shakes his head. “No, I do.”

“I’ll give you two a minute,” Bobby says smoothly, drifting towards the door without a second glance. Buck doesn’t fight him on it, too busy staring at Eddie and trying to drink him in, making sure he’s truly here.

“I should’ve told you earlier,” Eddie says as soon as the door clicks shut. “I just saw the opportunity and took it. I know some warning would have been nice, so… I’m sorry.”

Buck shakes his head. “I probably would’ve thrown up in the ambulance if I knew she’d be there, so I’m kind of glad I didn’t know,” he replies. “Besides, your ‘surprise!’ before you passed out is gonna make me piss myself as soon as I’m able to laugh about today.”

“I said that?” Eddie rubs his forehead. “I don’t even remember.”

“You were pretty out of your mind by that point,” Buck reminds him. “How are you feeling?”

“Okay,” Eddie says, taking another gulp of water. “Kinda groggy, and I feel like my head is filled with floss. But I’m okay.”

Neither of them have to mention the shoulder: it’s an unspoken fact between them that they won’t worry about it until they have to. Instead, Buck dutifully relays what little information he has about the surgery once again and scrounges up a tiny bag barbecue chips, which Eddie munches on happily a few minutes later as he’s wheeled back to the VIP wing.

He whistles when they walk through the double doors, gaping at the fancy light fixtures on the walls. “Did we just go through a portal to Beverly Hills or something?” Eddie mutters to Buck, the other man leaning down to hear him. 

Buck snorts. “No, man. Just one of the many perks of being a Texas Longhorn,” he responds. “Are you sure you’re up for visitors?”

Eddie takes a breath. It’s clear he’s exhausted, but he prepares himself anyway. “Yeah, I’m good. You said it was gonna be a fly by, right?”

Keep it brief. Buck logs the note in his mind and focuses on his task, holding the door open for Eddie to be wheeled into his hospital room. The private room is spacious but not overly decorated, sparse cedar panelling and a white leather chair beside the bed giving the space a much more relaxed vibe despite all the monitors and medical equipment scattered around the room. 

Once Eddie is settled, Bobby looks to him. “Ready?”

Eddie nods. “Ready.”

The first to come in are, predictably, Ravi, Lena and Albert. Ravi grins as soon as he comes in and sees Eddie, his face the picture of calm. Lena has a brief moment of relief washing over her before her expression becomes one of annoyance. Albert mostly just seems happy to be there and be seeing Eddie, alive. 

“You scared us, dude,” Lena says, punching him playfully on his good arm. 

“Eddie Diaz, always a flair for the dramatic,” Ravi adds with a smirk. 

Eddie scowls back at him, though Buck sees a smile twitching at the corner of his lips. “Me? Dramatic?”

Ravi looks dumbfounded. “You went down in Fenway Park, falling like a graceful princess—”

“I was not a graceful princess!”

“You kinda were, Eddie. You sorta floated to the ground.”

“As I was saying,” Ravi continues pointedly, narrowing his eyes at Eddie and Albert, “then you construct this elaborate plan to get Buck to see his sister again. It’s a little dramatic, if you ask me.”

“Does everyone know about that?” Buck questions, and Ravi doesn’t even try to deny it. 

“We got kinda bored in the waiting room,” Lena explains. “So… yeah. Basically the whole team knows Eddie found your sister, and she’s the hot nu—she’s, um, the nurse that triaged Eddie when he came in.”

Lena is beet red. Buck ignores it. “Ravi—seriously, man?” He addresses the question to who he knows already was the original culprit, and sure enough the man in question deflates. 

“I know, I know. I just couldn’t help it!” he tries, and when both Eddie and Buck wrinkle their noses he sighs. “Sorry, guys. I got swept up in the excitement.”

Buck looks at Eddie. He actually likes that the whole team knows about Maddie now, if he’s being honest, so the rest of it is up to Eddie. 

“At least let me wake up from surgery before you talk about me next time, yeah?” Eddie requests, and this is met with a laugh and a nod from Albert. Buck knows from the look in Eddie’s eyes that he truly isn’t mad, and he’s glad for it—he hates the idea of ending this trip like that. 

“So, do you know when you’re being discharged?” Lena asks, reading Buck’s mind, and. 

The thing she’s forgetting is that they’re still in limbo, stuck waiting for Eddie to regain feeling—or not. Until then, there are no answers. She seems to realise this after a beat, because she shakes her head. 

“I’m not leaving until I get some jello,” Eddie replies, and everyone laughs. The mood brightens after that, and the trio are more than happy to fill Buck and Eddie in on the rest of the game. They won, thankfully, though all three of them admit it would’ve been much easier if Buck and Eddie had been there—Albert scored his first touchdown, though, so much of the excitement is dedicated to that.

It’s nice to hear about how everyone’s doing, but eventually Eddie begins yawning and Buck makes the executive decision that it’s time to go. Ravi, Lena and Albert say their goodbyes—Ravi leaves behind a bag of snacks including Limón Sabritas, because he’s a God amongst men—and then a few more groups come by. They mostly just poke their heads in the door or come in to dap Eddie up, wish him well, and then leave him to rest. Buck is thankful that his teammates know when not to overstay their welcome, because by the time the last of them leaves Eddie looks like he’s about to fall asleep sitting up. 

With Bobby off to ask someone whether Eddie can have his central line taken out because it’s been bothering him, Eddie and Buck are finally alone once more. 

“You okay?” Buck asks, and Eddie nods. 

“Yeah. Thanks for being my manager there. You know I’m not very good at saying no to people.”

“Neither am I,” Buck says flippantly, shrugging as he situates himself on Eddie’s bed like he’s been wanting to do all night. “As it turns out, though, that rule doesn’t apply when it’s for someone else.”

It doesn’t apply when it’s for you.

Eddie just smiles. “Can you pass me those Sabritas? I’m starving.”

Buck gets up again to grab the bag and toss it back to Eddie. Eddie catches it with his good hand, but as the bag sails through the air Buck could swear he sees the fingers on Eddie’s injured arm twitch as if moving to catch it.

Buck freezes, as does Eddie. “Was that—?”

“Yeah,” Eddie breathes, staring at his arm. “I think so.”

“Do it again, do it again,” Buck chants, rushing over to sit back on the bed and join Eddie in staring at his arm.

After a minute of nothing but Eddie looking a little constipated, he gives up and throws up his hand. “Fuck,” he mutters, more dejected than Buck has ever seen him. 

“No,” Buck responds fiercely. “You’re not giving up. Take a breath, get a hold of yourself, and try again.”

“I’m trying.”

Buck tries to think of an analogy that could help him. “You use your hands all the time,” he suggests. “Just rely on the muscle memory of those magic fingers.”

Eddie stills, looking up at him dubiously through his eyelashes, and Buck sort of wants to die a little bit. 

“I didn’t mean—God, just ignore me, I’m—I don’t even know what I was trying—”

“Buck.”

Buck is halted by the gentle graze of Eddie's fingers on his forearm, stopping him in his tracks. It takes a moment for him to gather the courage to look back up at him, having turned away while he stuttered out his apology. He’s both embarrassed of his blood red face and afraid that Eddie will take one look in his eyes and know exactly what he’s thinking. 

Two more beats go by, and then Buck steels himself and glances up. He finds Eddie’s expression is nothing but warm openness—he even seems a little amused, which only makes Buck more red. 

It’s only then that Buck realises the hand that brushed him is Eddie’s bad one. 

He gasps. “You can—?”

Eddie grins. “Yeah. I was wondering how long it would take you to notice.”

“How does it feel?”

Eddie has to think about it for a moment. “Stiff,” he says finally, looking down at it like he’s seeing it for the first time. “It feels kind of foreign, like I’ve just had a new limb attached to me.” He prods up his forearm, touching points on his bicep and frowning. “I… think the numbness is going away, but… I’m not sure. I feel like I can’t tell anymore.”

“Give it a minute,” Buck advises. “Your shoulder just got rewired and your arm lost blood flow for a while. It might take a second for your body to remember how to work it again.”

Eddie sighs. “Guess I’m in for even more PT,” he mutters, which Buck doesn’t try to deny because he knows it’s true. “How long d’you think I’ll be out for?”

“Someone with this kind of injury?” Buck thinks about it for a moment. “Months.” 

Eddie looks away, but Buck doesn’t miss his eyes immediately becoming puppy dog eyes as his mouth turns down at the edges. He looks dejected, and Buck rushes to finish what he was saying. 

“Lucky for us, you’re not ‘someone’,” Buck finishes, smirking. “You’ll be back for the rest of the season in no time.”

Eddie sighs in relief, shaking his head. “Don’t fuck with me like that,” he warns, and Buck just smiles more in response. “I keep thinking that the season’s almost done, but really it just started.”

“We have a lot of time left,” Buck agrees. “So right now we’ll just focus on getting you healed up. I know one thing for sure, and it’s that I’m not doing the Longhorns without you.”

It’s hard to even imagine a world where Buck is on the team and Eddie isn’t. The line between where Eddie ends and the Longhorns begin has become impossibly blurred in Buck’s mind, until now they’re practically one and the same—his lifeline. 

“Good thing you’ll never have to,” Eddie replies, and it’s so… soft. There’s something in his eyes then, something that flickers like a candle in the corner of a dimly lit room, and Buck seizes it with all the desperation of a starving man in the desert.

There are times where he’ll look at Eddie and see his friend, his best bro. He’s a teammate, he’s a video game opponent, he’s a roommate. Simple. And then other times…

He’ll look at Eddie and know, somehow, that he’s thinking of them. Of camp, of the massage table, the woods, the lake, the cabin. Of all the moments crackling between them in the time since. It’s a certain twinkle, Buck thinks, that gives it away—something that says, wouldn’t you like to know what I’m thinking right now?

It’s that twinkle that Buck finds when he looks in Eddie’s eyes now. In times when Eddie looks at him like this he thinks it’s the one time he truly feels seen, like there is someone that can look at him and know everything just from a glance. He usually doesn’t like being so easy to read. He doesn’t feel like that when it comes to Eddie. 

“I’m really fucking glad you’re alive,” Buck blurts out, and he doesn’t just mean after the game today. He means in general. 

“I’m really fucking glad you’re alive, too,” Eddie whispers back, and Buck knows he means it the same way. 

And then there’s a split second where Buck thinks Eddie is leaning in. Between one heartbeat and the next, his chin is tilted upwards and his eyes are flickering with an invitation, daring Buck to reciprocate.

That’s not even a question.

He would have if Bobby didn’t return in the next second. He knocks and opens the door at the same time, giving Buck only a minute to shuffle back awkwardly on the mattress because he and Eddie were sitting very close, and he hadn’t even noticed. 

Bobby walks in breezily, but a half-hitch in his step as he rounds the corner and takes in the pair gives him away. Buck doesn’t think he’s going to get a stern talking-to later, but he anticipates a handful of cryptic analogies and soul-searching gazes coming his way soon.

“Eddie can feel his arm,” Buck announces when he sees Bobby and the jovial nurse trailing behind him. He’s only barely resisting the urge to yell for them both to leave to see if Eddie really would kiss him. When he glances back at Eddie, he sees that he looks totally normal except for the pink tinging his cheeks.

Bobby’s smile is full of relief. “That’s fantastic news,” he replies, stepping further into the room and up to Eddie’s bedside. “Nurse Dinah is going to check you out, okay?”

Nurse Dinah gets to work, checking Eddie’s vitals and confirming blood flow to his arm with a frown of concentration that almost makes Buck want to laugh. After what feels like an eternity, she looks up at Bobby and nods. “I was given the go-ahead by Dr Singh to remove the central line if you’re stable, and you are,” she tells Eddie. “Does that sound good?”

“Thank God,” Eddie mutters with relief, his head hitting the pillow. “This thing is so clunky.”

Dinah sets up the cart and puts on a fresh pair of gloves. “Since I’m regaining feeling, do you think I’d be able to see the doctor soon?” Eddie asks while she preps, shifting in his bed. He glances around the room. “Not a big fan of hospitals, even if you do have chandeliers.”

Dinah chuckles. “You should see the piano in the lobby, then—maybe it’ll change your mind,” she jokes. “I’ll call the doctor down when we’re done here, how’s that?”

Eddie nods, turning his head when instructed so she can get to work removing the line. He keeps his eyes fixed on Buck’s the whole time, not looking away even as he follows Dinah’s directions to let out a long breath as she begins pulling. He doesn’t even flinch, his gaze locked with Buck until the end of the wire finally emerges from his skin, but Buck hears his pulse tick upwards on the monitor and the hand gripping his—when had they started holding hands?—tightens.

“Definitely one of the most well-behaved patients I’ve had during that procedure,” she comments approvingly as she begins packing her things away. Buck almost laughs when he sees Eddie clearly trying very hard not to growl at her cheerful demeanour. “Let me go give Dr Singh a call now.”

True to her word, within half an hour she returns with Dr Singh in tow. He first directs Bobby and Buck to stand aside, and they stand awkwardly as he performs another series of tests, poking and prodding Eddie’s arm and inspecting the surgical site while muttering to himself the whole time. 

Finally he straightens, his face impassive until he takes off his glasses and smiles. “The repair has taken well already. Perfusion is good, and your nerves seem to be intact. I have to say, I’m very impressed,” he says, and Buck isn’t sure if he’s impressed with Eddie or impressed with himself. 

He doesn’t care—all he feels is floods of relief. 

“Of course, you’re not out of the woods yet,” he continues, and Eddie’s face—which had a matching relieved expression—darkens. “We will need to monitor you for clots and check blood flow regularly. Rehab will be extensive, both to improve your range of motion and to regain function given the nerve damage, and—”

“How long before I can play again?” Eddie interrupts. He’s staring down the doctor, waiting for his answer. 

And Dr Singh doesn’t look like he’s about to say Eddie will be back to throwing touchdowns in days. He puts his glasses back on again and takes a deep breath. “This injury, Mr. Diaz… you’re out for this season at a minimum, and depending on nerve recovery—possibly forever.”

Eddie is still staring, unblinking. Meanwhile, Buck’s world is tilting on its axis; in an instant everything he’s imagined for his future, for Eddie’s future, is gone. He has the impossible urge to say, desperately, but he regained feeling quickly, so he’ll be fine, but he knows all he’ll get in response is a pitying look from the doctor. 

Bobby nods once, his jaw ticking, and then he turns away for a moment. Buck looks from his taut shoulders back to Eddie’s stony face, and finds the other man already waiting for him. 

“I’ve come back from worse,” Eddie says, jutting his chin. All Buck can see in his face now is pure determination. “The season’s not over yet.”

“It’s—it’s been an emotional day for you,” Dr Singh replies, looking to Bobby for help. “Even in the most optimistic of circumstances, and without your previous injury, recovery would take months. Not to mention the likelihood of doing so much worse to yourself if you keep—”

“Thank you for your time and expertise, Doctor,” Bobby says swiftly. “We’ll give Eddie some time to process and talk again in the morning, shall we?”

It wasn’t the rescue Dr Singh was looking for, and Buck fights the urge to laugh as he is essentially ushered out. Nurse Dinah follows behind him, clearly pleased. 

Once they’re gone, Bobby turns back to Eddie. “I meant what I said,” he begins. “You can have some time to process all of this. You don’t need to think of football right now.”

And Buck knows what response that’s going to get.

“It’s all I can think of,” Eddie shoots back. “Coach—Bobby. I can’t stop now. The team needs me, and I need them.”

“You would still be Captain.” Bobby takes several steps forward, quick to reassure Eddie. “I would never dismiss you from the team for—for this.”

“I need to be on the field,” Eddie argues. “And I’m going to, okay?”

“Did you miss the part where Dr Singh said you could hurt yourself even worse next time?” Bobby shakes his head. “No. You’re my responsibility, and I can’t risk your life like that.”

“That’s not your choice to make.”

Buck doesn’t realise he’s spoken aloud until he sees both men staring at him. He swallows. “It’s Eddie’s body, his life. If this is what he wants, then why can’t you let him try?”

“Because I can’t watch you get hurt again!”

Bobby’s words are sharp, and he lets out a frustrated breath and glances away before looking back at Eddie. “You didn’t see yourself get tackled, go down so hard. Eddie, hearing that noise and then seeing you out there, not moving—” he breaks off. His eyes are misty. “If I let you go out there again and you got hurt, it’ll be something you can’t come back from. And it’ll be all my fault.”

Buck doesn’t dare fight Bobby on the concept of autonomy again. He knows it doesn’t matter to him—not in the face of this. Eddie doesn’t speak for a long time either, studying Bobby intensely, until finally he sighs. 

“Okay, Bobby. Okay.”

Bobby narrows his eyes, clearly unsure if Eddie means his concession. “So…?”

“I won’t push you,” Eddie promises. “I’ll focus on healing.”

Bobby leaves a minute later to retrieve the other coaches, and as soon as they’re alone the pair turn to each other. 

“You’re not gonna stop, are you?” Buck phrases it like one, but he knows it’s not really a question.

Eddie studies him. “Would you give me shit if I said I wasn’t?” he asks carefully. 

Buck takes a moment to consider the question. He wants Eddie safe—the idea of seeing him like this again, or worse, scares him more than he knows how to put into words—but he also knows that for Eddie, life and a life playing football are one and the same. Football always has risks, and Eddie’s worked too hard for this to turn back now. 

“No,” Buck replies. “I’m going to help you.”

Tommy, Hen, Chimney and Judd come in to extend their well wishes. Buck doesn’t know why Tommy waited for so long to come visit, given that he was fighting for Eddie’s medical care and that he and Eddie are close outside of that. The physical therapist remains quiet while the assistant coaches grill Eddie on his status and how he’s feeling, all of them buzzing around him in their own ways. 

“I know you don’t believe in it, but I brought you a good luck charm anyway—it’s a maedeup bracelet. I’m hanging it on your bed here, see?”

“Do you feel any nausea from the pain medication? I saw from your chart that you’re off the fentanyl, but I know morphine can cause some bowel irritation—”

“You hungry? I got some deer sausage in my jacket, I think.”

Eddie smiles at them all, gracefully fielding all of their fretting even as his eyes drift past them to Tommy. He’s still hanging back, leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded as he watches the scene in front of him. 

When Eddie looks at him, he moves further into the room. “‘Sup, slugger?”

Eddie snorts. “I wasn’t in a fist fight.”

Tommy pretends to inspect him dubiously. “You look like you’ve been in the ring, man,” he replies with a shake of his head. 

“Better get some makeup on me before my closeup, then,” Eddie replies with a grin. “I bet the paparazzi are still banging down the door.”

According to the last message he’d received from Maddie, that assumption was right. 

Tommy nods sagely, his eyes sparkling. “Can’t have you losing ‘pretty boy’ status,” he continues, and jerks a thumb in Buck’s direction. “Otherwise it all falls to that one.”

“We’re doomed,” Hen agrees, her voice dripping with sarcasm, and everyone laughs. 

“Seriously, though,” Tommy says, uncharacteristically somber as he looks back at Eddie. “I’m really happy you’re okay.”

“Thanks, man,” Eddie replies, appearing genuinely touched as they clasp hands and bro hug. While he’s leant down, Tommy whispers something into Eddie’s ear that makes him snort, and when he straightens again his expression tells Buck nothing about what he said.

Instead, he looks amused as he looks straight over at Buck like he’d known he’d be watching. Buck, beet red now, turns away. 

The coaches are thankfully ushered out soon after that, and even Bobby and Athena leave—but only after they switch hotels to one right next door to Mass Gen, promising to be over in a flash if anything happens.

The door finally clicks shut, and Buck heaves a sigh as he sags against it. “I never thought they’d leave,” Buck mutters.

“They left because they knew you’d stay,” Eddie points out around a yawn, seemingly totally normal about that point. “Three people in one cot is kind of crowded, after all.”

Buck rolls his eyes, glancing at the leather recliner he has to finagle into a bed in a few minutes. It had been a struggle to convince Bobby and Athena to let him stay, actually; they said he looked dead on his feet, and Athena seemed genuinely surprised that he had no interest in going back to the hotel to shower and get a good night’s sleep. He had to stay, he explained, not only for Eddie but also because Maddie had said she’d stop by when her shift ended and would be coming soon. Bobby just nodded in response to this, making him promise to call if anything happened. 

“So, what’s the plan? TV? Food? I could see if I could sweet talk someone from food services into getting some of that Mamajuana you like.”

“They’re not gonna let me have alcohol, Buck,” Eddie points out.

“It wasn’t for you—I was gonna make you watch me drink it,” Buck fires back, laughing when Eddie pretends to hurl the cup of water on the table at him in response. 

In the silence that follows, the energy seems to seep out of Eddie slowly and then all at once. The tiredness is back, sloping his shoulders and drooping his eyelids, and he yawns twice before he speaks again. 

“Wanna watch a movie?” he suggests, but his words are soft and slurred with exhaustion. 

Buck chuckles, shaking his head. “Get some rest, Eds. I’ll be here.”

“I know,” Eddie responds with a smile as his eyes slip shut. 

Buck doesn’t sleep. He can’t. 

He goes to the nurse’s station and is pleased to find Ezra there, who he easily sweet-talks into lending him his laptop in return for end zone tickets at the next game. He makes a camp back in the waiting room, using spare blankets to make a nest in an armchair that he curls up in as he dives online. 

His brain is whirring. Sleep is a forgotten possibility at this point, because he has a plan. 

Eddie’s been a lifeline for him for so long. A lighthouse in the darkness. A rock. He fits every analogy Buck can think of—and so it’s his turn to do the same. He can fix this.

Buck can fix this.

Chapter Text

Eddie

Soft sunshine. Monitors beeping. Snoring. 

These are the first things that Eddie’s senses take in when he wakes up, bleary-eyed and achey. The next thing he sees is Buck slumped in the recliner—only half-transformed into a cot—with someone’s laptop open on his chest and several pieces of paper strewn around him, the early morning light streaming in through the cracked curtain and onto his face. Someone clearly stopped by the hotel overnight, because he's back in his own clothes, and his sweatpants and hoodie combo makes him look so soft.

He’s fast asleep, which at least gives Eddie a moment to take everything in. His own sleep had been fitful, plagued by bouts of dull shooting pain as the nerve block wore off and recurring nightmares of his shoulder exploding, so he’s glad for a moment of peace before everyone descends on him once again. 

He appreciates the company and concern, he really does, but… this is a lot. The doctor had told him in no uncertain terms yesterday exactly what he’d been afraid of—even if he somehow manages to claw his way back to football, things are even more precarious for him now. Any number of things could happen if he got hit that badly again, and none of them are good.

So just don’t get hit, Eddie thinks to himself, and while the sentiment is ironic given the sport he plays it’s not without its merits. 

What he remembers the most about yesterday besides time slowing to a stop when Dr Singh gave him that update was Buck. Buck kneeling over him on the field. Buck convincing the paramedics to go to Mass Gen even when he wasn’t sure why. Buck in the ambulance. Buck in the triage room, appearing out of nowhere to grab his hand when Eddie was scared out of his mind but didn’t know how to say it. 

I’m really fucking glad you’re alive. 

You always find me.

Eddie pushes out a slow breath, letting his head fall back against the pillow and shutting his eyes. He feels like his mind is even more scrambled than it was when he first woke up, and not just because of his injury—it’s clear given Buck’s current position that he stayed up for a while, and Eddie has no doubt that he was researching how best to help him. 

Eddie might find Buck, but Buck saves Eddie. Every time.

And… that’s a lot. 

As in, he blinks and realises he’s been watching Buck sleep like a stalker for several minutes now, a stupid fond smile on his face, and he knows if he looked in a mirror right now he’d be blushing. Jesus Christ. 

This is bad. 

All of his worrying must be loud, because Buck stirs a minute later without any prompting. He blinks, scrunching his nose up adorably as he turns his face away from the light, and looks up at Eddie. He looks dismayed to see him awake.

“How long have you been awake for?” he says with a frown. “You should’ve woken me up.”

Eddie smiles despite himself. “I just woke up myself,” he lies smoothly, moving to shrug and wincing when his bad shoulder twinges. He remembers this from when he got shot: retraining himself to stop subconsciously moving it and aggravating the injury. It made him feel robotic. 

“How are you doing?” Buck asks.

With a sigh, Eddie shifts in the bed. “Okay. I feel less loopy than I did when I got out of surgery, even if I’m more tired now.”

“You were tossing and turning a lot,” Buck comments. 

“Sorry if I kept you up—”

“No, no,” Buck replies quickly. “You didn’t. It just sucked, knowing you were uncomfortable but not being able to help.”

“You helped.” It comes out way softer and more sincere than Eddie intended, and he curses himself. “I just mean, uh—thank you for being here.”

“You’re welcome, but I’m not done yet,” Buck replies, lifting the computer off his chest and rubbing his eyes with his other hand. 

(It always takes him a second to get up in the morning. Eddie finds a lot of joy in those first few seconds, where Buck’s hair is sticking up in every direction as he lifts his head from the pillow and blinks at him, mumbling to ask what time it is before inevitably drifting off for another few minutes. Eddie always lets him.)

Today, though, Buck is wide awake in a flash when the computer turns on. He squints at it, scrolling, then nods to himself and leans over to grab the scraps of paper abandoned on the floor. 

“I have a plan,” he announces, then stops. “No. Wait.”

With that, he stands and stumbles out of the room on wobbly legs. Eddie blinks, unsure if he just hallucinated, but before he has time to press the call button Buck appears again, this time with Bobby, Hen, Tommy and Maddie in tow. 

They all smile at him in greeting when they enter. “It’s good to see you again,” Maddie says to Eddie. “Awake, I mean.”

Eddie flushes. He has no idea how much Maddie knows about him, but he gets the feeling it’s at least a little given the look she’s currently giving him. All he knows is that he feels far too exposed right now. 

Judging by Buck’s wary expression, he knows it. He keeps glancing between the two of them like he’s expecting Maddie to point fingers and start spilling every secret she knows, but the nurse just smiles to herself and puts her hands in her pockets. 

“Buckaroo’s been busy,” Hen comments, looking approvingly at Buck. “Tell him what you found.”

Buck takes a breath, settling on the edge of Eddie’s bed with the laptop in his hands. “Well, it wasn’t just me,” Buck protests. “Maddie’s been with me since she got off work at 5, and Tommy and Hen arrived not long after that, and—” 

“Just tell him, Buck,” Bobby reminds him gently, and he nods.

“I found a trial in Austin,” he begins, and when Eddie immediately starts shaking his head—he doesn’t even know why—he holds up a hand. “Stem cells combined with this new grafting technique. They’re already in the third phase of research, and have had incredible results with nerve damage—Hen says they wouldn’t be able to take you until the dislocation has healed more, but Tommy and I put together a physio plan that we’ll start on ASAP.”

It takes Eddie several seconds to process all of what he’s being told, the drugs still swimming through his body making his brain feel syrupy whenever he has to think hard. “So, what’s the prognosis with the stem cells?” he says, defaulting to pessimism. He can’t dare hope for much else. “60% function?”

Buck looks affronted. “100, Eddie. Of course. Several patients have regained full mobility after complete paralysis, man. You’re small potatoes compared to them—no offence.”

Eddie can’t help but laugh at this. “Okay,” he says slowly, mulling it over in his head. Judging by the peanut gallery behind them, Buck had consulted with them and they’d all agreed it was the best course of action. More than anything, he trusts Buck. He knows that his friend has scoured the internet to find the best solution for him, and so if this is what Buck says works?

“Okay, let’s do it,” he finishes, and the relieved look on everyone’s faces tells him they hadn’t expected him to say yes. “What’s next?”

“Well, the first step is getting you out of here,” Bobby begins.

Eddie’s heart sinks. Dr Singh’s estimation for release hadn’t been optimistic in the least—in fact, it was so pessimistic that there wasn’t even a date set—so he knows there’ll be a battle to be fought. 

“You’re being transferred to Outpatient at Gaffney in Austin this afternoon,” Bobby replies, and holds up a hand when Eddie gasps. “On the strict condition that you take things very easy for the rest of the time here in Boston—if you even lift a finger on your bad arm I’ll strap you to a chair, I promise—you can stay and fly home with the rest of the team tomorrow, then start rehab the day after.”

“You have to be careful, Eddie,” Hen reminds him. “It’s one thing to re-injure yourself on the football field if that’s the cross you want to bear, but it’s another thing entirely to hurt yourself because you bump into someone too hard on the street.”

“Embarrassing,” Eddie agrees solemnly. 

“Stupid,” Hen corrects. 

“And that’s Buck’s job,” Chimney adds, standing in the doorway. “Morning, Eddie. Good to see you up.”

“Morning, Chim,” Eddie replies with a smile. “So, Gaffney?”

“They have an excellent rehab program,” Tommy says. “I have several friends there, though none are as talented as me.”

“Whatever will I do without you?” Eddie laments jokingly, though secretly he’s not kidding. He’s grown comfortable with Tommy as his physical therapist—he’s no nonsense but easy to joke around with, incredibly good at his job, and most importantly: he already knows everything. He’s already seen all the scar tissue, the x-rays, read all the reports promising Eddie would never have normal function of his arm again. He’s the first professional that absolutely refused to believe Eddie wouldn’t get better, starting off with the belief of success rather than the promise of failure. It was that belief that kept Eddie going through his own moments of self-doubt, and it’s a feeling he doesn’t want to miss.

“You’ll never find out,” Tommy replies, grinning. “They gave me privileges there, so I’ll be able to treat you.”

The sigh of relief Eddie lets out is audible to everyone in the room, but he can’t bring himself to be embarrassed about it. All he feels is thankful that Tommy somehow knew he would need him at the next hospital, too. Home, a voice in his brain chants, like a reminder. You’re going home.

He was in the hospital for almost a month when he got shot. Never again. 

“And you’re… okay with this?” Eddie says to Bobby. He feels like the words I can’t watch you get hurt again are still ringing in his ears from the conversation the night before.

Bobby looks much calmer this morning, at least. He settles in a chair beside Eddie’s bed and nods. “I want you to take care of yourself, Eddie. That includes physical therapy. And then…” he trails off, and Eddie can see that he wants to say he won’t let him back on the field, but he restrains himself. “We’ll see. Buck certainly did his research, and you have a whole team behind you cheering for your recovery.”

Eddie grins. “It’ll be a piece of cake.”

It is not, in fact, a piece of cake. 

His first hurdle comes earlier than he expected. Eddie would be lying if he said he doesn’t reconsider checking out multiple times that afternoon, when the poking and prodding of final examinations and I.V.s being removed makes every inch of his skin feel raw and exposed by the time they finish. 

Still, he has a clear objective. He focuses on getting the go ahead from the doctor and accepts the nurse’s well wishes as he dresses, using it as a distraction to fight the nausea when he stands. It’s so bad for a moment that he’s almost glad for the catheter he’s had for the last eighteen hours, even though the reminder makes him shiver, but a few breaths in through his nose and out of his mouth steadies him and he’s able to make it to the bathroom. 

Going to the bathroom completely one handed is also easier said than done. He’s just glad for the sling binding his shoulder to his chest—even if it makes him feel like he’s in half a strait-jacket—because he keeps instinctively moving to use his arm and knows he’ll only hurt himself more. It’s a frustrating reminder, but he’s eventually able to finish up without incident and keeps the chant of home up in his head as he exits and packs up his meagre belongings. 

He asked Maddie earlier if she could find the jersey they cut him out of in the ER. He wasn’t even sure why when he asked, but now when he packs the headphones, toothbrush and replaces his cross necklace around his neck, he thinks he understands.

It’s not even that the jersey is different, because they didn’t get special ones for this game—it’s really just that he keeps getting stuck on the worry that that was the last game he will ever play. If that’s true… he wants that jersey. He needs something tangible to hold onto from the game. 

Buck is knocking on the door a minute later. “Hey, it’s me,” he calls out.

“You’re good, come in,” Eddie replies, and Buck pushes the door open.

“So, I have good news and bad news,” he begins as he walks into the room, surveying the space. “God, this place is nicer than the hotel they put us in.”

“Is that the good news or the bad news?”

“Neither. Well, actually—my first question is, how are you feeling?” he asks, and then tilts his head. “You don’t look so good, man.”

Eddie pretends to scowl. “I’m fine.”

Buck gives him The Look. The Look says, I know you’re not telling me the truth right now. It’s the look he always gives when Eddie’s shoulder pings during practice or locks up during an ice bath and he tries to say I’m fine. 

“I’m just… a little tired, still. Achey. But I’m okay.”

Buck nods, accepting this as an answer for now. “So, energy wise… up for an afternoon in the city, or do you want to go back to the hotel and crash? Because I’m good with either, really.”

Eddie knows that if he chose the hotel, Buck would insist on staying with him—he’d pretend he was bored of the city anyway, like he was tired and needed to rest as well. Eddie would be glad for the hypothetical company, but that’s just because he’s always glad for Buck. 

No. He’s not denying Buck—and himself—the opportunity to explore a new city, especially after the past twenty four hours. 

“I’ve been stuck in bed for too long already,” Eddie replies with a shake of his head. “City. Definitely.”

Buck claps his hands together. “Perfect. So, the good news is that Ezra wrangled us tickets to a Celtics game, and because it’s a free day we don’t even have to tell the Longhorns staff,” he begins, and Eddie gasps. Getting to meet the players or go out on the court as a Texas promotional move is cool, but he’ll always jump at the chance to be just another face in the crowd. Not having to have an hour-long meeting with the publicist just for her to remind him to smile is worth it. 

(Seriously, he glared in a picture with a kid one time. He’ll never hear the end of it.)

Wait.

“Who’s Ezra?”

Is that the bad news? Eddie thinks to himself. We’re going to a Celtics game with tickets he got from his boyfriend? The medications he’s on might be making him half hysterical. 

“He’s a nurse, he was here when we came in. He’s Maddie’s friend,” Buck explains. That doesn’t tell Eddie what he needs to know. He must narrow his eyes or something because Buck laughs and continues.

“He’s a good guy. He actually met Maddie because she went to high school with his wife. Doug had an offer from Beth Israel when he finished his residency, but Maddie didn’t like it there—said she decided she wanted to work here, and then she met Ezra a week later. Destiny, if you ask me.”

“So Doug’s…” He can’t say that he hates the idea of Maddie’s husband being far, far away, knowing what little he knows about him.

Buck’s expression grows stony. “He transferred here a few years ago, apparently. Decided it was a better hospital for cardiothoracics, so… yeah. He’s here.”

“Jesus.” Eddie can’t help it. 

Buck just nods, and they sit in silence for a second. Eddie feels guilty—since they arrived, he hasn’t given much thought to Maddie outside of what seeing her would mean for Buck. He knows he was dealing with other stuff, but Maddie was too. Buck hasn’t said a lot, but Eddie knows him well enough to read between the lines and he can guess at the rest. This whole time, Maddie’s been enduring… Doug.

Eddie takes a moment to feel the rage and frustration that he’s sure is less than a fraction of what Buck feels, and then he collects himself. 

“What an asshole.” He knows that’s the understatement of the century, but Buck nods. 

“Yeah. Ezra says all the doctors love him, but the nurses despise him,” Buck continues. “We talked for a while last night when he came in to check on you.”

“In here?” Eddie asks, and Buck shakes his head.

“We set up camp outside. You should’ve seen it—we had, like, a massive round table of people working on our plan.”

“You did?” Eddie echoes, dumbfounded and touched in equal measure by the image of people coming together for him. 

“Of course we did,” Buck replies, like it’s obvious. He smiles. “Me, Tommy, Bobby, Athena, Hen, Karen, Chimney, Judd, Ezra, Maddie. We consulted other hospitals, too, and Dr Singh weighed in. We weren’t gonna stop until we found a solution.”

“I know,” Eddie whispers, suddenly overcome with emotion all over again. He clears his throat, struggling to gather his thoughts, and then remembers what Buck said when he entered. “So… what’s the bad news?” 

“There are four tickets, not two—you, me, Maddie, and Ezra.”

“How is that bad news?”

Buck blinks. “I don’t know, I thought… it might be a lot, is all. You just had major surgery, and—anyway, I thought if you were going to go in a group of 4 you’d want to bring Ravi and Lena.”

Eddie shrugs with his good shoulder. “I mean, having them there would be fun, obviously,” he replies. “But it’s not, like, a dealbreaker. Besides, I’d love to spend more time with the people that helped save my life—especially Maddie.”

It occurs to Eddie then that Buck might want him to say no specifically to avoid more of this interaction. Maybe he’s uncomfortable with it, for whatever reason, and that would explain why he’s trying to make the game sound undesirable. To his surprise, though, Buck has a different motivation. 

“Unless you didn’t want us to…” Eddie says, trailing off. 

“No, it’s not that,” Buck rushes to explain with a shake of his head. “I just—I don’t want you to push yourself for my sake and get hurt. Plus, I thought you might want to take it easy today. After… all of that. ”

“We’re not wasting any more time in this room,” Eddie announces firmly. “Or in a hotel room. We’re going to enjoy Boston.”

Enjoying Boston, apparently, begins with pretzels. 

“Are you sure this is okay?” Buck whispers for the second time as he eyes the pretzel cart warily. 

Beside him, Ezra can’t help but laugh. “Have you never eaten from a food cart before?” he asks. 

Buck folds his arms, defensive. “Of course I have,” he replies.

Maddie snorts. “Unless SMU is rife with hot dog stands, you’ve eaten from one,” she corrects with a grin. 

“I’ve eaten from more than that—”

“No, it was when we went to New York with Mom and Dad. You said the gyros smelled like ass.”

“I ate at another stand at a football tournament in Chicago, thank you very much!” Buck responds, triumphant. 

Maddie narrows her eyes. “You told me you took one look at the kebabs and yakked,” she says, and she seizes on Buck’s sheepish look and whacks him on the arm. “You’re such a dirty liar!”

Ezra and Eddie share a look. They’ve been walking around Boston for thirty minutes—a quick detour to drop Eddie and Buck’s things back at the hotel, and then they were back on their way—and in that time Maddie and Buck have gotten into no less than ten of these tiny arguments. 

Despite his splitting headache that only gets worse when Buck puts on his whiny voice, Eddie can’t find it in himself to be mad. First of all, watching anyone go toe-to-toe with Buck and dish it back as much as he gives it will always be a front-row activity that Eddie can get behind. But really, it’s the second reason that makes all of Eddie’s irritation dissipate into the air like smoke: Buck.

He’s been grinning since they left the hospital with Maddie by his side, Doug’s attendance of a conference in San Diego leaving the nurse available to join them without worrying about him finding out. The freedom has gotten to them both, as the siblings have matching manic energy as they rapid-fire catch up on everything they hadn’t covered since seeing each other again.

Buck is bright-eyed and practically vibrating with joy the whole time, listening intently to Maddie’s stories and looking like the cat that got the cream every time she chastises him for doing something brotherly like poking her in the arm incessantly to annoy her. The familiarity of the sibling behaviour is thawing Eddie from the inside out, so he has no idea how Buck isn’t a puddle already. 

He seems to genuinely want Eddie to get to know her, too—once they get past his initial worries (and Eddie promises him for the third time that he’ll tell him as soon as he gets tired and wants to go back), he’s explaining inside jokes and telling stories and generally looking like he’s having the time of his life. 

He keeps glancing between Eddie and Maddie like he’s expecting one of them to disappear, and multiple times Eddie catches him taking a steadying breath and nodding to himself as he looks at them before continuing down the street.

One realisation Eddie has over the course of the afternoon is just how much siblings have their own language, even if they don’t realise it—even if it has been years since they’ve been in the same room. 

They fire jokes back and forth at rapid speed, referencing old high school buddies and aunts and family friends with all the practiced nonchalance of someone who knows the other person will get it—it’s all, ‘she looks just like Shauna, right?—’ and ‘OHMYGOD totally!’ or ‘do you remember when Uncle Pete brought the thing with the—’ and ‘YES, the firecrackers!’. 

It occurs to Eddie then that this is probably what hanging out with him and Buck is like for other people. Inside jokes they don’t get, silent communication, and a whole host of shared secrets that everyone else around them isn’t privy to—not to mention the shared history. He feels like he knows Buck like the back of his hand, but Maddie is on a whole other level. 

This could make Eddie jealous, but it doesn’t. Instead, all he can think is that he’s glad Buck’s had someone in his corner his whole life, even if it wasn’t him. 

They visit the Museum of Fine Art, which Eddie finds beautiful even though he’d be the first to admit he doesn’t know the first thing about art. He’s glad for the painkiller Buck insists on giving him afterwards even though he rejects it at first, the coffee and warm croissant soothing his stomach which has been constantly uneasy since he woke up from surgery. 

The rest of the afternoon glides on in a similar fashion, as they next visit the Museum of Ice Cream (at Buck’s insistence, obviously) and walk around Boston Common. Eddie is quick to realise that Maddie has found her own version of him in Ezra, exchanging inside jokes much like she does with Buck and like Buck does with Eddie. They have a quick rapport, and seeing how much he makes Maddie laugh distracts him from the little pang he gets every time Ezra looks in Buck’s direction. 

He can’t pinpoint the exact moment that the constant low-grade buzzing of his feelings for Buck turned into a deafening roar. It happened recently, he knows. Maybe it was in the ambulance, or when he saw the look on Buck’s face when he visited him in his recovery room. Or maybe it was before that, all the times Buck stayed late after practice to run a drill Eddie still wasn’t happy with, or all the times he’d woken up from a nightmare to find Buck leaning over him with gentle words and never looking away.

The when doesn’t really matter now, anyway. All that matters is he’s here, exploring Boston with Buck by his side, and he’s kind of losing his mind. 

It’s the little things. The glances that linger, all the little acts of care like holding the door so Eddie can duck under to get inside or stopping Ezra when he interrupts Eddie (Eddie particularly enjoyed that one), the occasional split second when Buck’s eyes drop to his lips before he looks away.

It all drives him insane. He feels like he’s getting a contact high off Buck’s joy, and every brush of his arm or whiff of his scent is reinforcing Eddie’s addiction. He’d happily be drunk off Buck any day, and right now he thinks he is. 

Despite the fact that fall’s peak has already passed, Ezra and Maddie both insists that they get ice cream from a retro shop before they head to the stadium for the game. Eddie begrudgingly admits that it was a good idea after taking the first lick of his dulce de leche ice cream (heavenly), and his friends all cheer, making him grin.

“Wanna try mine?” Buck offers, holding out his rocky road. 

Eddie nods, taking the cone, and tries some. As soon as the taste explodes on his tongue, he shuts his eyes and groans. It’s even better than his, which he didn’t know was possible.

“You’ve got a little—” Buck mumbles when he takes the cone back, gesturing to the corner of his mouth. Eddie hadn’t noticed his cheeks being so red before. 

“Oh, uh, thanks,” Eddie says, wiping at the corner with the back of his hand. 

Buck laughs, sounding strained, and shakes his head. “You missed.” And then he reaches out—seemingly without thinking—to wipe it away with his thumb, bringing his finger to his own mouth before he stills. 

There’s a moment where they’re both frozen, staring at each other as Buck hesitates with his hand paused right in front of his face. Eddie can almost see the internal conflict warring in Buck’s head, until finally one side wins and he moves. Without breaking eye contact, he licks the ice cream slowly off his thumb.

“Delicious,” he says when he’s done, because he’s trying to kill Eddie, and then he’s calling out to Maddie and Ezra and moving to catch up before Eddie has time to process anything. 

Iso Left, Power Right 24, Zone Read, Sweep 28… Buck. 

His attempt at distraction by listing all of the Longhorns’ run plays does nothing to take his mind off Buck, and he’s only glad that his body isn’t responding in kind. That’s the last thing he needs right now. 

Thankfully, he’s able to catch up and they head for the TD Garden, the home of the Boston Celtics. The energy is electric for two straight blocks leading to the stadium, fans crowding the streets and leading various chants as they march. Buck points out a few people attempting to climb the lampposts to pull down street signs as they pass, and they can’t help but laugh when they realise—alongside the climbers—that the city has greased the poles. 

The atmosphere inside the stadium is even more electric. All Buck and Eddie have to do to disappear is put their hoodies and baseball caps on, and then they blend in with the rest of the Celtics fans streaming into the stands and finding their seats. No one ever spares them a second glance except the few that notice Eddie’s sling and do their best not to ram him. 

Eddie has found himself thankful that Buck is bigger than him a few times over the last few months, but he’s never been more glad for it than when they’re moving through the crowd. His broad chest shields him from sharp elbows apparently trying to knock his shoulder out of his socket (again), and when they’re standing on the escalator he stands with one hand on the rail, angled so Eddie is tucked in the gap between his body and the glass, and Eddie almost gets hard all over again. 

He resolutely avoids eye contact during both of these incidents, certain that Buck would take one look at him and know exactly what he’s thinking. Buck’s always been good at reading him but in recent weeks it’s reached new heights, and this is one thing Eddie doesn’t want Buck to see. Instead, he focuses on getting to his seat in one piece, and manages to make it relatively unscathed—Ezra’s tickets are high in the stands of the lower section, putting them level with the jumbotron, and the massive screen showing the players warming up is a good distraction. 

The game itself is electric. The Celtics play considerably better than the city’s college football team, and Eddie revels in the energy of the game. It’s fun to watch a sport that he himself has no stake in—he’d play FIFA sometimes, sure, but besides that everything is football, football, football. Here, he isn’t thinking about strategy and how he can use what he sees to make himself better as a player. Instead, he’s eating popcorn from a bucket he and Buck are sharing and screaming for defense to get open without a care in the world. 

The fact that he was in the hospital less than eight hours earlier feels like a distant truth. It doesn’t matter that Eddie broke and was stitched back together yesterday, it doesn’t matter that he might not play football at the same level ever again—the same way that he knows it doesn’t matter to Buck that he and Maddie will go their separate ways once more at the end of the night. None of this matters, because here and now, they’re cheering and singing along to every song blaring over the loudspeaker and laughing at the kiss cam. 

And then the screen changes, and Eddie’s heart stops. And then he begins to laugh. 

On the massive screen in front of them is a pixellated version of Buck and Maddie, blinking up at themselves in confusion. It takes them a second, but Eddie and Ezra both die laughing at the way they realise at the same time. Frantically, they both begin shaking their heads, Buck turning bright, bright red.

“SHE’S MY SISTER!” Buck yells, and the cameraman is able to read his lips because the camera shifts and Eddie breathes a sigh of relief. 

The camera is now angled to Buck and Eddie. 

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

It’s a risky move, aiming the kiss cam at two guys, but to Eddie’s surprise most of the crowd cheers them on. Several people in the rows in front of them turn around in their seats to look when they realise where Buck and Eddie are sitting, their faces mixtures of excitement and confusion as they look between the two. 

It’s clear that they’re half-expecting Buck to say that (somehow) Eddie is his brother, too, because no way will they be kissing on screen, and when he doesn’t move they start glancing back to the jumbotron, where eventually the camera moves away to show a couple excitedly kissing and cheering as they stare at themselves on the screen. Eddie doesn’t know if he feels relieved or disappointed that their chance has passed. He can't bring himself to look over at Buck. 

The screen changes again, and Eddie is shocked to see himself once more. Even on the screen he can spot his flushed cheeks under the shadow of his hood, but his focus is immediately drawn to his left. On the screen, a giant Buck is looking right at Eddie. 

The crowd cheers when they see Eddie and Buck on the screen again, and Eddie flushes, steels himself and looks over. Buck’s eyes are sparkling, and he swallows hard when their gazes meet—but he doesn’t look away from Eddie. He’s waiting for something. 

Oh. Duh. He’s waiting for Eddie. Unconsciously, Eddie’s eyes flicker down to Buck’s lips, and Buck seizes on the movement with all the desperation of a starving man.

Eddie can actually see the internal calculations going on in Buck’s head as he considers whether or not Eddie is being serious. He’s always known, to some degree, that Buck needed him to give the go-ahead—particularly since he’s been publicly identifying himself as straight, and said as much to Buck, too. 

But Buck must have known that was bullshit the whole time, right? Or—if it wasn’t bullshit, he must have known that it didn’t apply to Buck the same way, right? That Buck is his own category, that he blows the categories into tiny little pieces and makes Eddie reconsider every part of his life he thought he had figured out?

Eddie’s eyes flicker down to his lops one more time, and he knows that now Buck understands.

“Do you—” Buck begins to ask, and he actually seems to be considering it.

Oh God. Ohhhhh God. 

The thing is that anyone could be watching right now, including a whole host of people that Eddie really doesn’t want to watch him kissing Buck on live television—the team, for one, but mostly his parents. His dad isn’t a basketball fan, but there’s always a chance that he’s tuned in just for tonight. The thought of his dad seeing him on the big screen like that is mortifying. Even if they didn’t see it, someone from church could recognise him and then… Eddie doesn’t know. He really isn’t certain what would happen next.

He sort of never got that far in his sexuality crisis last time. 

He hasn’t done anything real with guys since Buck, and now that he’s had his recent revelation it’s hard not to see why. It was always Buck. It all seems so obvious now, his feelings for Buck—how could any other guy compare, when Eddie’s tasted him?

And that’s what jolts him into movement: he wants to know if Buck still tastes the same way he’s dreamed of for five years. 

He’s done wasting time. God, he hopes their hoods are providing enough cover right now.

“Don’t think,” Eddie whispers, and Buck grins.

And then Buck is moving and then Eddie is tilting his head and then they are closing their eyes and then—

After over five years, Eddie is kissing Buck. 

It’s a chaste kiss, because they’re on a big screen and they’re not heathens, but it warms Eddie up from the inside out all the same when their lips meet and Buck’s hand rests gently on his bicep. 

He feels like his blood is fizzing. 

And fuck, Buck tastes even better than he remembered. Like soda and popcorn and something sweet and undeniably Buck that makes him want to chase the taste down his throat. He’s intoxicated by it, wanting nothing more than to keep kissing him forever.

Just as quickly as it begins, it’s over. Eddie is just thinking about darting his tongue out to lick along the seam of Buck’s lips, seeking entry like he did so many years ago, when a loud noise jerks him out of his daydream. 

It’s one of the stupid airhorns they give out to the crowd, abrasive and blaring, but he’s almost thankful for it because when he looks he sees that the screen has already switched to another couple, and both Maddie and Ezra are staring at the pair with wide eyes. 

Eddie glances back at Buck and sees the same surprise, but the undercurrent beneath it is apprehension. Just like before when the kiss cam turned back to them, he’s waiting for Eddie’s cue.

And it’s only then that Eddie realises just how heightened their emotions have been for the past twenty four hours. There’s no denying that whatever happens from here in terms of football, Eddie’s injury has shifted things considerably—not to mention Buck reuniting with Maddie. Combined with seeing Eddie get injured, Eddie has no doubt that Buck is feeling a whole host of emotions right now. 

Even though his own emotions has brought his feelings into stark relief, he has no idea what effect Buck’s has had on him. And all of a sudden, he feels like he’s taking advantage—he’s known, whether consciously or unconsciously, how he felt about Buck for weeks, and now he’s kissed him without knowing if his feelings are for Eddie or more just heightened feelings in general. 

He tunes back in to see that a shutter is going down behind Buck’s eyes. It’s an act he’s seen many times before, when he stops paying attention at practice while Bobby explains a play or Ravi tries to explain a chemistry concept to him—he doesn’t want to participate in reality right now, so he’s shutting down. 

He must think—and that means that he—

Oh.

Oh.

Before either of them can overthink too much, he grabs Buck’s hand and squeezes. It’s a silent message, a we’re good, let’s talk later, and Buck squeezes back once before letting go. 

Okay. That’s—Eddie can do this.

Maddie and Ezra are still shooting them both glances when the game ends an hour later. 

They’re all exhausted from the day’s events combined with cheering at the tops of their lungs for several hours, and are quieter when they exit. This turns out to be a good thing, because Eddie can focus on getting out alive. The further up in the stands you get, the drunker the fans are—and it shows when the game finally ends with a sweeping win for the Celtics and everyone begins to leave. So many people can’t walk straight that Buck and Eddie start to laugh because it looks like The Walking Dead, everyone stumbling around without a care in the world. 

Eddie almost gets knocked into twice before Buck slips back into bodyguard mode, deftly using his body as a shield as they move through the crowd. Every time Buck looks at him, Eddie feels a stab of heat ripple through his body, and he’s wondering if Buck’s thinking the same thing he is: massage table. cabin. hands, mouths, tongues.

Eddie shivers despite himself, and Maddie cuts him a sidelong glance. 

“Are you okay?” she asks, briefly slipping into nurse mode as they finally duck out onto the main street which is quickly filling up with fans already. 

“I’m good, thanks,” Eddie replies with his cheeks flushed red, resolutely not looking at Buck. He needs to be more present—he’s here, in Boston, with new friends. These are all good things. Besides, he can tell it’s taking Maddie everything in her not to interrogate Eddie or her brother, and because he appreciates the effort he decides to help her out. “So, had you been to a Celtics game before tonight?”

Maddie shakes her head, watching Ezra emphatically tell Buck a story just ahead of them. “I haven’t really done a lot of the more touristy stuff. I kinda hit the ground running at work pretty soon after we moved here, and it’s just… fallen by the wayside, I guess,” she replies. 

Neither of them have to say why it fell by the wayside. Eddie hasn’t mentioned Doug this whole time, but he knows that she knows Buck told him, and seems not to have an issue with it. Eddie’s thankful to be another person there for her, even if it’s in a less overt way than Buck or Ezra. 

“Yeah, we don’t get to do much of that stuff in Austin, either,” he replies.

“What stuff do you do with my little brother, then?” 

Eddie takes back everything nice he’s ever said about Maddie. God, he was dumb to think he was safe because the game was over—it’s clear from glancing at Maddie’s amused expression that her game is just starting. 

“Um—no, that wasn’t—I—”

Maddie holds up a hand, putting Eddie out of his misery with a smile and a shake of her head. “It’s okay, Eddie,” she placates him, glancing ahead once again at Ezra and Buck to make sure they’re out of earshot. “I might not have been around recently, but…”

“He’s still your brother,” Eddie supplies.

“Exactly, and I know him. That’s how I know how good you are for him.”

“Oh—we’re not—”

Somehow, Maddie is able to silence Eddie with just an arched brow. “Aren’t you?” At his expression, she just laughs. “God, you two are just as bad as each other. Have an actual conversation, okay? Talk it out. I think you’ll be surprised by what happens next.”

Eddie frowns, but he knows better to fight her on it—even if he’s not sure she’s right. There’s just still a part of him (and not a small part) that is convinced Buck would laugh in his face if he was honest about his feelings.

Maddie scowls back at him, and then sighs and stops in the street. In front of them, Buck and Ezra keep walking. “Eddie, I don’t know you that well,” she begins, her voice and expression deadly serious, “and I mean no disrespect, but I need to tell you something.”

Heartbeat in his throat, Eddie swallows. “What is it?”

“Get your head out of your ass. It’s not a hat.”

Buck

Buck’s head feels like it’s going to explode when they head back up to their hotel room that night. He and Eddie are both quiet, lost in their own thoughts, and he’s glad for a few seconds to breathe and figure out what the hell he’s doing.

The kiss? What the fuck was that?

When Eddie said don’t think, Buck reacted on autopilot. He’s dreamed of those words more times than he can count in the years since camp, but he never thought he’d hear them coming out of Eddie’s mouth again—his head has been swirling ever since the kiss, and he’s pretty sure he hasn’t caught his breath since. 

He can confidently say that he never thought he’d be kissing Eddie again, but… here he is. And he’s damn sure going to figure out what the hell that was, because he and Eddie haven’t gotten the chance to talk since the game ended and he refuses to go to bed without interrogating him. He needs answers, needs to understand what that look was that Eddie gave him at the game. More than once. 

They’d said goodbye to Maddie and Ezra at the end of the night with the promise that Maddie would come and see them off at the airport tomorrow. Buck hates the idea of saying goodbye to her on a more permanent basis in twelve hours more than he can put into words, but he also knows that whatever they have now will be better than before—they can actually talk with the phone Buck got her, and they’re already planning to figure out a way to get Maddie out to Texas. It’s better than he’s had in years, so he’ll take it.

Buck’s just glad that the team is out celebrating tonight—when they visited in the hospital, he’d waved off Ravi’s invitation to join him, Lena and Albert for a lowkey movie night. Eddie had predicted that they’d offer to stay with him, but because he remembered they’d talked about going to some obscure club on their night off, he insisted that they don’t wait up for Eddie and Buck and promised that they’d be getting an early night anyway.

(The fact that both he and their friends think of Buck and Eddie as a package deal isn’t lost on him.)

The floor of their hotel is made up entirely of Longhorns players and staff members, so it’s eerily quiet when they step out of the elevator and make their way towards their room in silence. 

Buck can feel Eddie casting him sidelong glances as they walk, but he doesn’t look up. He’s afraid that all the turmoil is showing on his face, clear as day, and he just needs—he just needs another minute with his feelings before he puts them to words. 

“Do you want to order any room service?” Eddie asks as he opens the door, toeing off his shoes and glancing at the bed that he dumped his stuff on earlier. Buck’s bed on the other side is perfectly made and untouched since he didn’t sleep on it the night before, and Eddie walks over to run his fingers over the crisp white sheets. 

He glances over his shoulder when he gets no reply from Buck and finds him still standing in the entryway, staring at Eddie. Buck is frozen watching Eddie’s fingertips brush over the soft linen, unable to move.

“So… room service?” Eddie prompts, and Buck shakes his head without looking away.

“Not hungry.”

“We could watch a movie?”

“Seen it.”

“Seen what?”

“Movies.” Buck steps further inside the room, taking a moment to place his shoes neatly beside Eddie’s, then crosses to stand in front of Eddie’s bed. He shrugs, still not looking away. “Seen ‘em all.”

“You’ve seen every movie?” Eddie repeats dumbly, blinking in confusion.

Buck nods slowly, taking another step forward. “Yup.” He’s categorizing every twitch of a reaction, searching for that Look that Eddie gave him before. There has to be something that tells him how he’s feeling.

“Uh, we could… we could…” Eddie trails off.

“We should talk about the kiss,” Buck blurts out. He’s unable to play it cool anymore, not when he’s here. Not when every cell in his body has been vibrating since their lips touched again. 

He feels like he blinked and he was suddenly on top of a rollercoaster, being catapulted down into the depths below before he even had a chance to see where he was going. He knows exactly when it happened, though—it was when Eddie found him at the fountain, languishing like an idiot and embarrassing himself. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, but it was the first time Buck realised that Eddie was always, always there.

Eddie straightens upon hearing the ‘K’ word, looking away for a moment as a muscle in his jaw twitches. Buck waits. When he looks up, his eyes full of regret, Buck is sure he’s going to ask him to pretend it never happened. 

(Buck’s not sure he knows how to do that. He’s not sure he could do that.)

“This trip has been a lot,” Eddie starts, and this is not where Buck thought he was going with this.

You’re telling me, Buck says in his head. You were unconscious or asleep for a good chunk of that. 

“The injury,” he begins to list things but seems to get stuck on this one, the words lodging in his tongue. He takes a beat and starts again. “My shoulder, Maddie, et cetera. I think—emotions are heightened right now. The kiss cam, it was…”

Buck feels himself deflate like a balloon. Eddie thinks the kiss was a mistake. The product of some kind of heightened adrenaline attack, or something.

“Oh,” Buck says, unable to hide the way his voice breaks over the vowel. He looks away. God. Pull it together. “So… we should just forget about it, then.”

Eddie blinks. “No, that’s not—”

“It’s okay, really. Honestly, the adrenaline in the stadium, the badgering—I get it. It’s okay.”

If he says it’s okay enough times it’ll become true, right?

Somehow, Buck doesn’t realise how close they’re standing until his eyes lift to meet Eddie’s and he finds that they’re close enough that he can see the flecks of amber in Eddie’s eyes. He lets out a tiny, shaky exhale, and notes how Eddie’s gaze drops to his lips for half a second. 

There it is. The look.

But Eddie wants to forget about it, so… “listen, it’s already forgotten, alright? We can just—be best friends, and train, and—”

“Is that what we are?” Eddie hums, taking a step forward. “Best friends?”

Buck swallows, shifting his weight uneasily. “Um. Yes?” He takes a second to collect himself, then nods with more confidence. “Yeah, of course, man. Always.”

He wonders if now is an appropriate time to dap him up, but decides it would be cringe and keeps his hands at his sides. He juts his chin up as he meets Eddie’s gaze, and wow.

Ha hadn’t noticed that he’d taken a step back until he looks up and realises that his back is almost against the wall, and Eddie is quite confidently following into his space—not enough to really be close, but just the suggestion of it. He’s looking at Buck like he can read him like a fucking book.

“God,” Eddie mutters, and then he laughs, low and melodic like brass wind chimes, and Buck sort of wants to die a little. And then Eddie takes one more step, confidently moving into his space. “She was right. She was so right.”

“Who was… right about what?” Buck tries, but his voice is in a whisper. It’s been a while, but backed up against a wall like this? He’s right back at camp, and somehow despite the few inches he has on Eddie he feels smaller. 

And Eddie’s looking at him like he knows it, too. He’s searching Buck’s eyes like Buck was searching his for The Look only moments ago, only this time Buck knows that he sees everything.

Buck braces himself. Still, somehow, he half-expects Eddie to back away. To pretend it never happened.

“You have no idea, do you?” Eddie murmurs. He seems to still be talking to himself.

“Is that a. Um. A rhetorical question?” Buck manages, swallowing hard. Eddie follows the movement with his eyes, and when Buck’s tongue darts out to lick his lips, he follows that too.

His gaze snaps up to meet Buck’s, and the tension is crackling in the air. “Yeah, it is. And now it’s your turn to ask me one.”

All of a sudden Buck knows exactly what he’s asking. He’s sure of it, all moments of doubt dissipated and long forgotten. He’s sure. All of a sudden, he’s not afraid anymore.

“Kiss me.”

And Eddie does.

Chapter Text

Buck

Every cell in Buck’s body is vibrating. He can feel every individual atom wherever Eddie touches. 

And he’s touching everywhere. 

As soon as he’s given permission, Eddie is surging forward and claiming Buck’s lips like they’ve always been his. It’s a bruising, possessive kiss, nothing like the one they shared only an hour earlier on the jumbotron, and it takes everything in him not to melt right there—the only thing keeping him going is the possibility of getting more kisses like this.

And he does. Eddie presses him against the wall and nips at his bottom lip, grinning when Buck gasps and following the sound with his tongue. His hand cups Buck’s face, his thumb sweeping over his cheeks once, twice before sliding down over his chest and around his waist to pull him closer. 

The noise that Buck makes when their hips press together should be embarrassing, but it’s not because Eddie just groans in response and presses closer. Buck’s hands have been stationary on Eddie’s chest this whole time as if he was unsure he had permission to touch, but now he throws caution to the wind and moves around to his back, feeling the muscle there ripple as Eddie ducks his head to kiss Buck’s neck.

The movement pushes Buck further against the wall, and Eddie uses his hips to pin him as he lays claim to the column of his throat, licking and biting anywhere he can reach. He finds the spot just under Buck’s jaw that always makes his knees weak, catching onto his reaction before he moves away. A well-timed scrape of his teeth followed by a soothing tongue and a twist of his hips has Buck seeing stars.

“Fuck, Eddie.” It’s half-hiss, half-whimper, but he has no thoughts to spare for embarrassment now. Not when they’re like this. Not when Eddie pulls back and looks at him through half-lidded eyes, his lips bitten red and glistening.

“What do you want, Evan?” Eddie breathes, his hand lifting to cup Buck’s jaw.

“You,” he whispers in response, and when Eddie’s thumb brushes over his mouth he opens a little. Before he can overthink it, he darts out his tongue to taste him.

Eddie curses under his breath. Buck knows, he knows they should probably slow down. It’s been a lot, but at the same time… it’s been five years. Buck had a spell cast on him at football camp and ever since, Eddie’s taken up permanent residence in a corner of his brain. 

He means no disrespect to any of his drunken, fumbled hookups in the years between, of course—most of them were great. It’s just that they weren’t him.

All thoughts of going slow go out the window when Buck sees the look in Eddie’s eyes. His pupils are blown so wide that his mahogany irises are tiny rings around the edges, and he’s staring back at Buck like he wants to eat him whole.

Buck lets him. 

With a grin, he tugs Eddie back to his waiting mouth and licks in with no preamble, wanting to show him just how much he’s missed him. Judging by the groan Eddie lets out, he gets the message. His tongue sweeps inside Eddie’s mouth with the same motion he uses to skate his hands over the top of his ass before pulling him impossibly closer.

The noise Eddie makes when Buck lowers his hands and squeezes is heavenly. It’s somewhere between a moan and a whimper, and Buck can’t hide his high and needy whine in response to it. He tries desperately to get control of himself. This is a marathon, not a sprint, Buck, he chants, but it does little to slow his racing heart. 

His race comes to an abrupt end less than ten seconds later. 

It’s the ass squeeze that does them in in the end, Buck thinks, but he’ll never be sure—all he knows is that Eddie tries to do the same while he ducks to kiss Buck’s neck, and in the moment forgets not to use his bad arm.

It’s a sharp movement but he lifts it only an inch or two from his side before he makes a sound that is much less pleasing than the one before—somewhere between a yell and a sob—and in an instant all the colour drains from his face. He pulls away, hissing as he doubles over. 

“God, are you okay?” Buck asks, then curses himself as he looks at Eddie’s position. “I mean—of course you’re not. What can I do?”

Eddie’s other hand flails, reaching out, and Buck grabs it gladly. After a few more seconds of his head between his knees and squeezing the life out of Buck’s hand, he’s able to straighten up a little. His face is still contorted into a grimace and his eyes are screwed shut, but his cheeks are tinged pink at the top and he’s able to push out a long exhale of breath that seems to steady him. 

Another moment goes by, and Eddie cracks one eye open. “I totally ruined the moment, didn’t I?” he says with a tiny grin, though it doesn’t reach his eyes.

“No, no,” Buck reassures him, and then considers it. “I mean… yeah. But it’s not your fault.”

“Yeah, it is. It can literally only be my fault.”

“That’s not true! I’m the one who got you all—” Buck cuts himself off to make a vague gesture, which ends up just looking like a reference to Eddie’s obvious hard on. Buck tries very hard not to make direct eye contact with it. “We just got kinda… carried away.”

Eddie is staring at Buck’s lips, he realises, and making no move to hide it. Buck could swear he hears Eddie curse under his breath when his tongue darts out to wet his bottom lip. “Yeah. We did.”

Buck swallows, studying the life still only just returning to Eddie’s face. He can’t be the one to hurt Eddie, or the reason he gets hurt. He won’t.

“I don’t think we should do this,” Buck begins, and he sees Eddie’s expression contort into five different things before settling on practiced neutrality. “No, I mean—fuck, sorry. I don’t mean this, just… kissing.”

Eddie arches a brow, confused. “And what is ‘this’?”

And there it is. The question Buck was praying Eddie wouldn’t ask. But it’s okay—Buck can hear the implied air quotes around this. He knows it’s not… whatever. 

The point is that Buck knows how to handle situations like these. In fact, he’s a pro. 

“It can be whatever we want it to be,” he says carefully, “but right now, I think—we’ve been through a lot. Maybe we just don’t put too much pressure on it.”

His eyes flick up to Eddie’s, where he finds him already staring back. He seems to be considering something. “So… what now?” he asks, taking a step closer. It reminds Buck of the position they were in just thirty seconds ago, and from the darkening of Eddie’s eyes he’s thinking the same.

“We clearly can’t be doing that again,” Buck says, gesturing. “Not right now, while you’re healing. But… I want to.”

Eddie grins, and this time it does reach his eyes. “Obviously.”

Buck mock scowls in return, which makes Eddie grin wider. It’s this easy gesture that allows Buck to step in closer and brush a curl back from Eddie’s forehead. “We should just… take things slow.”

“So you’re saying—” Eddie blinks, gathering himself. “You want to be more than friends, but… what, no makeouts?”

“Definitely not,” Buck replies, shaking his head. “I don’t know about you, but—once I start I don’t want to stop.”

“Me neither,” Eddie breathes. His eyes flicker down to Buck’s lips, and Buck feels his blood heat in response. 

“You’ll just end up hurting yourself, and we need you to focus on healing right now. Remember, the sooner your shoulder is stable, the sooner you can get the surgery.”

Eddie nods, letting out a slow breath. But then he arches a brow. “So no kissing until…”

Buck really didn’t think this through. He considers it for a moment, weighing his options. “At least until after the surgery. But if you piss me off, I’m waiting until we’re sure the graft took.”

“You really think you can wait that long?” Eddie replies.

Buck frowns. “What do you mean?”

“Are you saying that after five years, after that kiss, you… what? Got it out of your system?” Eddie’s eyes are glued to Buck’s mouth now, and he smirks when Buck swallows. “I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think I can restrain myself for a few weeks?” Buck challenges, folding his arms, and Eddie confidently shakes his head. “Oh, come on. You’re good, but you’re not that good. I can keep it in my pants when I want to.”

Eddie scoffs. “Please. Campbell told me all about your legendary escapades at Kappa last year.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t want to keep it in my pants then,” Buck points out. “I didn’t have you as the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.”

“Are you calling yourself a leprechaun?”

“Metaphorically, yes.”

“I’m glad that you’re not a literal leprechaun,” Eddie says conversationally, like this is an entirely normal thing to compliment someone on. “I mean, no hate to them or whatever, but I like that you’re taller than me.”

Buck steps into his space, grinning when it forces Eddie to tilt his head up a little to look at him. “I know you do. You get this look in your eyes every time I do that.”