Word Count: 7,104
Disclaimer: I am in no way associated with 911, Fox, or anything else related to that particular universe.
Gus collects him from the house in the middle of the day to return him to the hospital, where he undergoes more scans on his head and x-rays on his leg. The results and reports from the scan will take time to compile, but the x-ray satisfies someone from orthopaedics that the cast can be removed.
He wrinkles his nose at the pale skin beneath it, the wastage of muscle clear, and there's a scar snaking up the length of his leg and a pink blob of scar tissue around his knee.
"It will fade," Gus says as Eddie touches fingertips to the scars. His mind flashes toward Buck, wondering whether he has something similar.
The orthopaedic doctor is swapped for a physiotherapist, who spends an hour showing him different exercises he needs to do at home to improve his range of movement, to encourage his knee to bend. She straps his knee into a brace to reduce some of the weight he puts on his leg and then encourages him to stand properly for the first time in two months.
His back feels hunched and his spine aches and there's a dull throbbing in his leg, but she claps when he can hold his stance for nearly thirty seconds before he has to sit again on the bed.
"It will take time," Gus says and Eddie's about ready to whack him with a crutch.
He can't deny that his leg feels fifty pounds lighter though, and there's a sense of freedom that brings something that's almost a smile to his face as he limps out of the hospital and back to Gus' car. As Gus drives him home, he texts Bobby and Hen and Karen and Chim and Maddie the news and gets varying degrees of emojis, exclamation marks, and congratulations in response.
"You'll have home visits twice a week to ensure you're moving and that the recovery of your leg is on track. You should be able to drive short distances in about two weeks once you can prove you've got better control over your ability to put pressure on your foot."
He nods as Gus reels through information, his thumb still hovering over the screen as he debates texting Buck. Would Buck be pleased? Would Buck be overjoyed? Or would Buck not care?
He ends up shutting off his phone and staring out the window as he catches bits and pieces of Gus' talk, accepting that whatever door to rebuilding a friendship with Buck has been slammed shut in the fortnight since they kissed.
Buck's right, Eddie thinks as he grits his teeth and tries not to scream at the latest physical therapist forcing his knee to bend further than he's independently managed so far.
Rehab does suck. Rehab is agony. Rehab leaves him breathless and in tears and utterly exhausted.
And Eddie can't even text him to ask him how to cope with it.
The removal of the cast, the slow progress in rehab exercises, does at least have one key benefit – he earns driving privileges.
Driving offers the independence he'd lacked, even if he relies on the GPS to direct him everywhere and even if he has to use it to get home again because he can't remember any addresses or locations or directions. He drives to the beach on his own and stares at the ocean, and he drives to the cemetery where Shannon is buried when he begs Bobby for the information. He has to ask for directions for her burial plot and once he finds it, he manages to lower himself to the ground by the headstone. He traces fingers into the carved grooves of her name, of the date of her death, and lets the tears slide down his face. He's determined to bring flowers next time to replace the spindly bits of nothingness that would probably crumble into dust if he touched them.
When he leaves the cemetery, he decides to get his own groceries for the first time in more than two months. His eyes are still red-rimmed and he's still sniffling occasionally as he moves through the grocery store, pausing at random items that flicker impressions without words. It's as he approaches the checkout that something more real flares to life, and he turns his head to the right to try to focus on the ghosts of a memory flickering on the edge of his awareness. He can remember yelling, the anger that flared hot beneath his sternum, but he doesn't remember why. He doesn't remember who the person was. He doesn't remember what had made him so mad.
"Sir?"
He reels at the boy scanning his groceries, eyes flashing over his shoulders again like he can see the phantoms standing there. He's sure they're mocking him. He's sure they're hurling abuse behind the silent wall that traps them from being recalled.
"Sorry," he mutters, pulling his wallet out of his pocket to hand over some cash.
He uses the cart as a walking frame, limping slowly to his car and loading groceries into the backseat. Maybe if he moved back to El Paso, he'll stop feeling like his connection to LA was fraught with ticking time bombs. Maybe if he moved somewhere else completely, he'd be able to let go of all the places that hint at a life he can't recall living.
Bobby informs him in the middle of doing more knee curls that have his hands bunched into cushions so that he doesn't pierce the skin of his palms with his nails that the shift rotation means the team is working Thanksgiving. He offers Eddie a place at the table but Eddie's not sure where the table is, and he's not sure if he's ready to visit his place of former work. He scratches at the denim covering his leg, wondering if his skin has always been so sensitive to fabric, and says Abuela will have something prepared anyway.
"You're always welcome if you change your mind," Bobby insists but he shakes his head because he can't stand the thought of feeling like a stranger in his own place of work. He's not sure if that feeling will ever fade, if he'll ever get enough pieces back to feel like he belongs, and so the ending to the call feels laced with more awkwardness than usual. There's nothing he can really do about it though, and he hardly blames Bobby for how he feels or what happened that means he can't be working with Bobby on Thanksgiving.
He calls her later that evening once Chris is asleep, gritting his teeth around more careful stretches of his knee.
"It is late, Edmundo," she admonishes, like he doesn't know she stays up late watching stupid telenovelas and gossiping with Pepa.
"I had a- a question." He hesitates, waits for her encouraging hum, and forces a breath past his lungs when he extends his knee again. "Bobby called. He- He's working on Thanksgiving."
"You know you're always welcome here, nieto." Her tone implies that it's obvious he can come, and her words aren't even a question or an invitation. There's the weight of expectation, an understanding that he's not able to actually ask and she doesn't have to actually offer. "You can say hello to uncles and aunties and cousins."
Eddie knows it's important for Chris to be surrounded by family even if he's not actually thrilled by the prospect of all the noise and the teasing about events and issues and gossip from recent years that he won't remember and younger cousins he may not recognise. He forces a smile to his lips, thanks her for allowing him to come, and listens to her gush about all the plans she's been making with Pepa.
It doesn't make him feel any more comfortable but he doesn't let her know that.
Chris had been pinging around the walls all morning with excitement at seeing his aunts, uncles, and cousins. Eddie had been trying to keep him contained but eventually he gives up encouraging Chris to sit still, or draw, or make another Lego tower, and decides to go to Abuela's early. He can always help set up tables, or cut vegetables, or contribute something and his son can find new people to entertain him.
"Alright, let's go," he announces and Chris cheers, his crutches clicking across the floor as Eddie limps after him. He buckles Chris into the truck and then has a crushing realisation – he doesn't actually know where Abuela lives and he doesn't know how to get there.
He considers banging his head against the steering wheel but that would freak Chris out too much.
"Hey, buddy?" His hand thumbs over the screen as he texts Abuela and Pepa, hoping they're not so busy or noisy while preparing food that they don't hear their phones. He really doesn't want to have to call them within earshot of Chris. "Let's, uh… How about we go to the store? See if we can get something to take with us to Abuela's?"
Chris doesn't realise that Eddie's playing for time when he agrees to the plan, so Eddie tries his best to remain upbeat when inside he's scrambling. He doesn't know which other family members might be going, isn't even sure which contacts he has in his phone might be living in Los Angeles. Sophia was in Chicago, Adriana was in Texas. A lot could have changed in five years which made it impossible to know who to text for help. Would Bobby know where Abuela lived? Would Buck? Would Buck even respond if Eddie texted him?
He encourages Chris to take his time wandering the store, checking his phone every five steps for a message and seriously starting to consider a call when Chris' voice pulls him away.
"Is something wrong with your phone, Dad?"
He shoves his phone in his pocket and tries to smile at Chris, eyes scanning over the packet mixes of cake and muffins like that's what he'd come to buy at the store all along. "Just checking the time, mijo."
Chris stares at him, a tiny frown between his brows like he knows something's amiss.
"Did you find something you want to get?" he says in his latest attempt at a deflection.
"We should take something already made." Chris points at several of the mixes. "The kitchen will be too busy for us to make anything like this."
"Alright, good idea." Excellent, excellent. More time to waste. "How about we look at those, then?"
Chris' gaze is still narrowed but he starts moving towards a different part of the store and Eddie lags behind, checking his phone again. Increasingly frustrated, and absolutely certain he wasn't going to get the answers he wanted any time soon via text, he tries calling Abuela and when it goes through to voicemail, attempts Pepa. Both ring out and he can feel the anxiety building that he's going to ruin this for Chris, and he's so infuriated with himself that he can't remember where his own grandmother fucking lives that he just wants to take some of the cakes that Chris is eyeing off and start hurling them around the store. It might get him arrested, it would certainly be more problematic than slamming his head against the steering wheel, but he hates how something so ridiculously mundane has now become a major ordeal because he never stopped to consider he doesn't have her address.
"I don't know which one to choose," Chris says, tugging at Eddie's shirt and saving him from breaking down in the middle of the store. "Pepa likes chocolate better but Abuela likes vanilla."
"There's nothing that says we can't get both, bud," he says, running his fingers through Chris' curls before he notes the next predicament, and another way to lose some time and get some distance from his kid to make a call. "I- Uh- Neither of us have our hands particularly free for two cakes. Can you, um… Can you do me a favour and grab a basket from the entrance?"
Chris doesn't question the request so Eddie seizes on the opportunity to call Bobby. He knows he's working, and he might not even have his phone handy, but he has to try. He keeps Chris in his sights as the call rings, and then there's a click.
"Eddie? You change your mind?"
"No, I'm going to Abuela's." He shifts a little on the crutches when Chris disappears around the corner of an aisle. "Listen, I need your help."
"Sure, Eddie. Anything."
He hesitates, knowing exactly how stupid this is probably going to sound. "I need Abuela's address."
"You need-" He hears the start of the disbelieving question and scrunches his eyes shut and then Bobby's voice trails away, the realisation obviously washing over him. "Sorry, that- I didn't even think of that."
Eddie grimaces, noting Chris has gathered a basket. "Me either."
"Alright, hold on." There's a crackle in his ear and a muffled, "Do either of you know Isabel Diaz's address?"
"Why do we need her address?" Chim's faint voice reaches the phone at the same time as Hen's confused, "No?"
Eddie feels his heart sink, starting to feel the desperation seep into his fingers because he doesn't know what to do. If Abuela and Pepa aren't answering his calls, if his colleagues don't know, if he can't reach out to Buck-
"Maddie probably knows though," Chim adds and Eddie frowns. Why would Maddie know? "I'll text her. She can call Eddie directly."
"Thanks, Chim," Bobby says, another fumbling sound where Eddie guesses the phone must have been lowered, or partially covered. "So Chim-"
"Is going to text Maddie and she'll call me," he finishes, waving at Chris when his son sees him at the end of the aisle and starts walking towards him. "Thanks, Bobby."
"Of course. Have a good day, Eddie."
"Yeah, you too." The call disconnects and he keeps his phone in his hand, reaching for Chris when he gets close enough to run a hand over his head. "Thanks, bud. You're a champion. So much faster on the crutches than me."
"It's because my arms are stronger than yours," Chris points out with a cheeky grin and Eddie chuckles.
"Are you saying my arms are noodles?" he teases and Chris giggles, extending the basket towards him.
"You don't work out like you used to."
Eddie blinks, grasping the basket and trying to sort through Chris' words until he can find a joke to make rather than asking for more information or exposing how confused he feels. "Well, I don't know if you'd noticed, but I sort of broke my leg."
"Oh?" Chris' eyebrows rise and okay, when had his son gotten so sassy and how could he stop his kid from growing up so fast?
"Yeah. Big cast. Pins. Kind of a big deal," he says, easing one of the cake containers Chris had pointed at earlier into the basket and then reaching for the other to settle on top. "Anything else you think we should take?"
"Nah, we always leave Grandma's complaining about eating too much anyway," Chris says and Eddie snorts.
"Alright, Smarty-pants. Off we go."
He's in the middle of paying for the cakes when his phone chimes with another call and he spies Maddie's name across the screen. He thanks the cashier for helping put the cakes into a cart for him, finding it easier to lean against the frame like a walker than the damn crutches and a basket, and thumbs at the phone.
"Hey." He gives a little wave to Chris who leads the way out of the store and towards his truck.
"Hey, Chim texted you need Abuela's address?"
"Yeah, I- I didn't even think about it until earlier."
"Understandable. I've got it so I'll text it to you?"
As much as he's relieved, he's also bewildered that of all the people that might have known where his grandmother lives, it's Maddie. She wouldn't have even been on his radar of people to contact.
"That- That'd be great. Thanks, Maddie."
"Of course. Have fun!"
The call ends and a moment later, the address comes through. He sends her a series of heart emojis in thanks and starts to feel like he can breathe again, like it won't be a disaster that he doesn't know where the hell he's meant to go.
Of course, the panic about obtaining the address had distracted him from the actual reality of where he was going: a giant noisy family gathering.
He doesn't mention to Abuela or Pepa that he texted and called earlier because his intention of arriving early seems to have been matched by everyone else. The house is swarming with relatives and he can't get a word in as his grandmother and aunt draw him in for kisses to his cheeks and hugs before passing him off to other aunts and uncles who he knows and cousins he has varying success remembering depending on their age and how much they might've changed from his last flickers of memory of them. It's incredibly overwhelming to feel so much touching, to be swept into so much noise, but somewhere amidst it all he can hear Chris laughing and chattering away and it reminds him why he'd decided to come here instead of accepting Bobby's offer.
One of his Tias sweeps away the offered cakes to the kitchen. Pepa directs him outside where apparently there's a backyard fire burning for warmth. He casts his eyes around for Chris but his kid has already disappeared with a pack of younger cousins who Eddie isn't going to pretend he recalls, an explosion of chatter between them in English and Spanish making him smile as he heads outside.
He freezes, eyes widening when his gaze sweeps over the assorted group gathered just outside the door.
"Sophia?"
His eldest sister turns toward him, face splitting in a grin as she shrieks and rushes at him. "Surprise!" she squeals, arms tight around his shoulders.
He struggles to maintain a hold on the crutches when he wants to grip her so tightly, and someone must realise because then one of the crutches is withdrawn from under his arms and he can wrap it around her.
"It's been so long," she breathes against his ear and he can't even deny it or correct her, because to him… To him, it feels like seven or eight years, since before his last deployment.
He tucks his face into the crook of her neck and shoulder, tears he hadn't expected to shed today spilling down his cheeks. Her perfume isn't familiar but the soft press of her body is, the way she holds onto him reminding him of a childhood trailing after her shadow. "I love you, Soph," he whispers and she hugs him tighter.
"Love you too, chiquito." She relaxes her grip slightly so that she can cradle his jaw, thumbs brushing over the damp stains and gazing into his eyes. He wants to sob, his hand grasping at her arm and fingers grazing the inside of her wrist, because this… He didn't expect this. He didn't expect to feel breathless with affection and shock at seeing his sister. "I'm so sorry I haven't called. It's- When we heard you were injured, I wanted to be on the first flight out here."
He wants to ask her why she wasn't, but he's not mad. He'd been so overwhelmed in the hospital that he wasn't sure how he would've handled any more than his parents and Abuela, and then eventually Bobby. "It's okay."
"It's not," she insists, almost certainly where he got some of his stubbornness from. "We knew it was bad and then Mama told us you couldn't remember anything from the last few years and I- I thought-" She rises on her tip-toes to kiss his forehead. "I thought maybe you had enough to cope with but I wanted to be here, okay? I wanted you to pick up the phone and call. We both did. We just didn't know when or what would be too much."
Something tugs at his heart when he thinks about how he hasn't called Ana either. Maybe later. Maybe he could call with Sophia, though he could completely imagine all of them ending up in tears.
"Never be afraid to call me." He tugs at her wrist, intending to kiss her palm or her knuckles before he notes the ring on her finger. He remembers what Abuela had said in the hospital which feels like a distant dream sometimes, and he pauses as he gazes at it and then meets her eyes. "Is… Is he here?"
Her smile is radiant. "Probably bullied into the kitchen." Maybe she sees something in his face because the smile slips, her fingers curling to hold onto his hand. "You…don't remember."
He swallows, another wave of sadness and fury swirling through him as he tries to find something, anything, some semblance of a memory of a wedding that wasn't his own to Shannon.
"I'll show you photos later," she says, squeezing his hand and lifting his eyes back to hers. "I have so many on my phone, Ed."
He kisses her knuckles as he'd originally intended and she pats his cheek. "Now, where is your adorable little rascal? Auntie Soph needs some cuddles from her favourite nephew."
"He's your only nephew," an uncle calls from the barbecue and various family members chuckle.
He glances around for his second crutch and she gathers it from leaning against the table, following him back into the house where Chris is in Abuela's little family room talking in a pile of young cousins. He positively squeals when he sees her, holding up his arms as she steps around various small arms and legs.
"Auntie Fia!" Chris chirps, arms locking around her neck and legs anchoring around her waist as she lifts him with a mocking groan at how heavy he's gotten. "I didn't know you were coming! Dad didn't tell me."
There's a sparkle in her eyes when they meet his, a smile at the edge of her lips. "Dad didn't know."
He wonders when she decided to come, if it was the plan all along or if she got a very late call from Abuela when he decided to attend Thanksgiving here. He wouldn't put it past Abuela. He also wouldn't be surprised if someone had surreptitiously filmed the whole thing and already sent the footage back to relatives in Texas.
She presses noisy kisses to Chris' hair and he squeals and Eddie gets his turn to snap a few photos of Chris grinning, of Sophia's head tipped back with a laugh, of the way Chris nuzzles into her shoulder and holds onto her like he's a koala that will never let go.
"You know, it's almost enough for me to agree to have my own," Sophia teases after she relocates Chris to the floor and picks her way through the limbs again to pat Eddie's cheek. "Almost."
Eddie had wondered – how could he not wonder, when so much had been forgotten? – but he'd been afraid to ask. "What's stopping you?" he asks instead as he follows her.
She snorts. "Aside from the crying and the poop and the whole growing-an-alien-inside-me thing?" She shakes her head and peers into the kitchen. "Babe? Come say hi to Eddie."
"Eddie's here? Why didn't anyone tell me?"
And Eddie blinks, because he recognises the voice, and it's the second time in less than half an hour where he's struck dumb, frozen to the spot, as he takes in the brown-haired, brown-eyed, six-and-a-half foot Marcus.
"Sarge," Marcus salutes, a lopsided grin on his face, as Eddie looks between his former soldier and his sister.
"Knight?" he says, trying to keep a smile from breaking out. "Really? You chose him?"
Sophia rolls her eyes, arm sliding around Marcus' waist. "Yeah, you said that last time too."
He knows she means it as a joke but it still stings, and there's a flash in her eyes when she realises, but Marcus clears his throat.
"So do I hug you or?"
"Come here, you ass," he mutters, holding out an arm and Marcus folds him into an embrace almost tight enough to crack some more ribs if Eddie hadn't squeaked out, "Didn't you hear? I'm breakable now."
Marcus laughs, patting his back before pulling away and waving a hand at the crutches and the brace. "Gotta say, brother. You look like you've been in a war."
Eddie flips him off. "You, and only you, can make that joke."
Marcus looks inordinately pleased as he slings his arm around Sophia's shoulders and his sister shakes her head, but there's a smile playing on her lips that shows she's happy and that's worth it. "Beers?"
Eddie nods. "Please."
He returns outside simply because the backyard is bigger than the rest of the house and one of the younger cousins scurries to get him a chair and it's not until he's actually sitting that he realises how much he's grateful to sit. His arms ache, and his knee hurts, and he very carefully bends it. He's in the middle of straightening it when two more chairs scrape beside him and Marcus passes him a beer.
"Soph?"
"Got caught with an auntie." Marcus rolls his eyes and clinks the neck of his beer with Eddie's. "Gives us some time for you to tell me how you've really been. The unsanitised version."
Eddie wrinkles his nose and lightly kneads at his thigh around the straps of the brace, trying to loosen some of the knots of pain that linger beneath his skin. "Which part? Because I can deal with the physical aspect."
Marcus leans forward, hands clasped around his bottle of beer. "So it's the memory part?"
"You'd struggle too," Eddie points out but Marcus simply shrugs and sips a mouthful.
"Forgetting some of the shit we saw doesn't seem so bad, Sarge."
And…well. There was that to consider, he supposes.
"I remember most of that. It's the after that that's missing."
"Ah." Marcus shrugs again and leans back in his chair. "And you think that's worth remembering?"
Eddie stares at him. "You don't?"
Marcus fixes him with a look, one that has seen too much, one that conveys he knows Eddie far too well. Years in the corps did that, he supposes. Shared stories, shared campfires, shared meals. "You got discharged to spend time with your family and, like all of us who have that fantasy when we're being shot at and think of home, didn't realise just how tough it was going to be."
Eddie forces himself to focus, absorbing every word Marcus said because maybe it would help fill in gaps, or provide explanations.
Marcus shakes his head, perhaps knowing what he was trying to do. "You lost Shan, Sarge," he says and Eddie wonders if that is ever going to get any easier to hear. "I know you're probably missing the good parts but you've lost a lot of the bad parts with reintegration into civilian life. I wouldn't mind forgetting that sometimes."
Eddie wonders what Marcus did after being discharged, and he wonders what he did. Marcus said he hadn't realised it was going to be tough – but how? What had he done? Maybe Marcus is right. Maybe those are parts he doesn't want to know. Maybe those are parts he's better off having lost.
"Anyway, how are your friends taking it? How's Buck?" Marcus says, breaking into Eddie's musings in the most startling of ways. "I'm guessing he must be pretty handy to have around, huh? Helping you and Chris out, providing tips on strengthening your leg?"
Eddie's tongue is stuck to the roof of his mouth as he tries to sift through all the possible answers, all the possible explanations for how Marcus knows about Buck. His sister, certainly, but he's so confused that he's almost grateful when Sophia reappears and sits in Marcus' lap. It makes his fingers twitch, brotherly urges of old never far from reach, but she runs some fingers through Marcus' hair and Eddie watches as Marcus leans into her affection, the lines around his face appearing to soften when he smiles up at her. It's clear they love each other, and it's another thing Eddie adds to his list of what he wishes he could remember.
"Did I interrupt boy talk?" she teases when the silence stretches between them all. Eddie's still pinging around responses and reasons.
"I asked about Buck," Marcus explains and Sophia's face lights up.
"Oh yes, how is Buck? Did he declare his undying love for you over your bedside?"
He stares at her in surprise, then to Marcus who is grinning like they know something he doesn't know. He hates it. Hates it.
"I… Uh… Buck- Buck's in a relationship with someone else," he says, watching as Sophia's face falls into a puzzled frown and Marcus' smile fades.
"For how long?" Sophia demands, something else sparking in her eyes that promises retribution.
He fidgets with his bottle. "Most of the year, I think," he mutters, lifting the bottle and swallowing several mouthfuls while Sophia splutters.
"Most of the year?" Her fingers toy with the shirt covering Marcus' shoulder.
"Damn, bro. What did you do?" Marcus adds.
It's his turn to splutter at the presumption in their words. "Me?"
Sophia's spare hand pinches the bridge of her nose. "Ay, Dios."
"You two were like…" Marcus folds his middle finger over his index, crudely twining them in a way that makes Eddie's cheeks feel warm which might be why he finds the cold beer in his hands super interesting to look at and drink. "I didn't even know you two broke up."
Eddie's mouth is undoubtedly agape when his eyes flick up to look at his sister and brother-in-law. Just who had Buck been to him? What had they known? How had they known it?
"We- I don't think we were ever together?" he says instead.
Sophia's still pinching the bridge of her nose when she replies, "You're telling me you weren't with someone you and Chris and Abuela never stopped talking about?"
Well… That answers at least some of the questions he had.
He shakes his head and she mutters a curse in Swedish, probably because anyone around would reprimand her if it had been in Spanish, and she extricates herself from Marcus' lap to stalk back into the house. Eddie's not sure if it's something he said, or didn't say, but it adds to the confusion he's felt in the month since he kissed Buck. Buck had already expressed his love, and then he'd followed it up with Eddie walking away. Why had he walked away? Why would he walk away from someone that loved him? From someone his family thought he was dating?
"Don't hurt yourself over there, Sarge," Marcus murmurs, patting his uninjured knee but also giving him the time and space to ruminate over the mysteries that had invaded his life.
He inevitably gets drawn into other conversations during the course of the afternoon but none stick with him the same as hearing Buck's name fall from Sophia and Marcus' mouths. There's one that feels like he's been torn open in front of them, when the discussion turns to who is the best cook in the family and who is the worst.
"Eddie," reply several aunts and at least two uncles when the latter question is posed.
"Hey."
"Remember when he used baking soda and the wrong flour and then wondered why the cake didn't rise?" an aunt giggles and the others erupt into laughter but Eddie struggles to muster a grimace.
"Don't forget when he dumped sugar in the casserole rather than salt," an uncle says to more howls.
The icy sensation stabs him in the guts and tears through his belly, and usually his balm is to find Chris but when his sister and Marcus are around, maybe he can find shelter with them. He lifts his crutches beneath his arms, intending to enter the house and be anywhere but listening to this.
"Or there was that time he- Hey, where are you going?" another uncle says when he spots Eddie on his feet.
He forces the tears away, casting a look over the aunts, uncles and cousins who are gathered and willing to poke fun at him. He knows teasing is their way of showing affection but this… This is different. It always will be.
"Oh." Tia Laura covers her mouth and then swats at her husband, and her sister. "Edmundo. We didn't think."
Her words seem to make the others realise the implications of their words and it only hastens his urge to leave. "It's okay," he says, feeling brittle as he smiles at them. "I needed a fresh drink anyway."
It's quiet behind him when he leaves but he hears a fresh eruption of laughter by the time he's limping through the house and figures they'll either poke fun at him behind his back or find a new topic. Nothing lingers for long. He decides to divert to the bathroom because at least that will give him a few minutes respite, where he can lean his head against cool tiles and gather his thoughts.
"Uncle Eddie?"
He pauses, casts his eyes over his shoulders at a little girl that's probably six and whose name he has no chance of knowing. He's not even sure who she's related to.
"Yeah, honey?" he murmurs, shuffling on the spot until he can face her. Her long brown hair is tied into a braid over one shoulder and she fidgets with the hem of her green dress.
"Are you gonna go back to saving people when your leg's better?" She turns big hazel on him, reminding him too much of Chris, and all he can do is gaze at her. Saving people? He tries to slot that piece alongside all the other pieces he's learned or remembered.
"I don't know, sweetheart." Whoever she is, he's not going to scare her with the fact his head is a mess. "We'll see how I feel when my leg's better, right?"
She nods, smiles shyly at him, and then darts away like she hadn't just asked a reasonably simple question that left Eddie reeling. Maybe he should have attended a family thing earlier. Maybe he wouldn't remember anything, but he'd certainly learn a whole lot.
He returns to the party eventually, hovering close to his big sister because she offers him a feeling of security and stability that he hasn't felt in months. Sophia doesn't seem to mind, leaning against his chair and running her fingers through his hair while they listen to whatever is going on around them. It helps keep his discomfort at bay and having Marcus around is also helpful, because they can swap stories of an older time that excludes others rather than so many of the recent stories that exclude Eddie.
There are too many of them to fit around a single table so several plastic tables are arranged and it's a long process while they eat to go around the group and say what they're thankful for this year. When it circles around to them, Sophia fixes her eyes on him across the table.
"I'm thankful for my little brother," she says and he reaches across the table for her hand and squeezes it tightly.
Chris mumbles something so quietly that Marcus nudges him. "Speak up, kid. Some of us have got hearing damage." Eddie rolls his eyes at his friend when Marcus winks at him.
"I'm thankful for Buck," Chris says, only a little louder and stabbing his fork onto the plate.
Eddie stares at him, because of all the things… "Why are you thankful for Buck, mijo?"
Chris' eyes move towards him slowly before they return to the plate in front of him. "He saved you."
Eddie's still staring when Sophia squeezes his hand and helps shake him out of it. It reminds him of what Cameron had said, that Buck had been the one to dig him out, and along with the little girl earlier asking him if he'd return to saving people… He pieces together the information about shifts and a family and calling Bobby Cap and how Athena is a cop but he's not scared of her. His eyes move from Chris, to Sophia, to Marcus, and back to his sister again.
"I was a- Was I a first responder?" he says and he can tell by the way her hand tenses and her mouth parts that he's right.
"You asking or telling?" Marcus says as he spoons more potato salad onto his plate but it doesn't matter. Sophia had never had a good poker face.
The realisation surprises him. Shannon had always hated the risks and dangers when he was deployed, and he senses from the conversations he has with everyone that he'd moved to LA without her. If he'd been a single parent with Chris, why would he sign up to a job that entailed hazards? At the same time, it occurs to him that the 'accident' that everyone has talked around might not have been an accident at all but a major injury while he was on the job. Maybe that's why he hasn't been hassled about showing up to work. Maybe that's why he's not had to deal with any bills. If he was injured in the line of duty, everything's being taken care of out of his hands.
He's so distracted that when going around the table reaches him, he fumbles through what he's thankful for – family, his friends, his life – and he keeps checking Chris has enough food, that it's sliced into small enough pieces, but he's still mulling over what he's learned and what he knows. Had he used his military medic training to become a paramedic? Or maybe he'd swapped a rifle on his hip for a Glock and he worked within Athena's world? But then what sort of TBI could he have gotten as a police officer that would leave him like this? He doesn't want to ask for more information but it sits there, that awareness that he'd been responsible for saving lives and had nearly lost his own in the process.
After eating, Sophia curls up next to him and draws Christopher into her lap.
"You ready for this?"
He wrinkles his nose, knowing there's no way in hell he's ready for this, but he relents anyway. She taps at her phone and then he holds it in front of them.
"Soph- OH MY GOD!" Ana screams when her video connection must pick up who else is in the frame with her sister. Chris giggles while Eddie grins, leaning his head on Sophia's shoulder as he watches Ana's phone bounce all over the place as she screams and flails her arms.
"What? Adriana, what is-"
"Sophia is with Eddie and Chris! Look!"
The picture changes angle and flips a couple of times and then Eddie sees his mother for the first time since he was in the hospital. She covers her mouth with a gasp, eyes clearly filling with tears.
"My babies," she whispers and Sophia chuckles and wraps an arm around Eddie's shoulders.
"Hey Mama. We thought we'd surprise you."
"I am surprised. And Christopher too! How are you, nieto?"
Chris scrunches his fingers in a shy wave at the screen before pressing them back to his face. "I'm okay, Grammy. I miss you."
"I miss you too. C'mon, let's go find Gramps. Ramon! Come see!"
The phone continues to move as his mother searches for his father and Eddie starts to notice parts of the house. He frowns, adjusting the angle of his chin to examine the images closer.
"Did they move?" he murmurs in Sophia's ear and she inhales in surprise before nodding.
"Once we'd both gone to different states and a spare room for Chris wasn't needed, they downsized," she whispers back before brightening when Ramon Diaz fills the screen. "Hey Papa. How are you?"
"I'm good, mija. Are you with Marcus in LA?"
"Yeah, we came to surprise this gordito," she teases and Eddie elbows her in the side. She laughs and pinches his shoulder. "Have you eaten?"
"We have finished cleaning up, yes." Ramon's eyes look over the screen. "I must hand back the phone to your sister. Apparently she needs to see more of Chris."
Chris tilts his head against Sophia's chest, one set of fingers bunching against Eddie's arm. He loosely tangles their hands together and rubs his thumb over Chris' knuckles as Ramon's image vanishes and Ana's replaces it.
"Okay, I'm stealing all three of you. Marcus can survive without you, right?" Ana practically spins through the house.
"Why are we leaving Marcus out of this? He can come too," Sophia points out but Ana shakes her head.
"Siblings and favourite nephews only." She reaches some sort of family room area and flops onto the couch. "That's the rules."
"If you're trying to guilt me into having a baby-"
"I would do no such thing, hermana," Ana insists. "We know you and Marcus could never produce someone as adorable as Christopher so-"
Sophia squeaks with indignation while Eddie laughs and squeezes Chris' hand.
"I miss you, Auntie Ana," Chris says and Ana's bottom lip juts out in adoration. "You should come visit."
"I would if I could, baby. You know that. Work is tough to get time off, though."
"But we're family," Chris protests, like it's that easy.
"I'll see what I can do, okay?"
It sounds like something she says a lot and Eddie gets the impression she doesn't usually follow through. Not that Ana was never a girl of her word when they grew up but…Sophia always wanted to get out of El Paso, to live somewhere bigger and more exciting. He's not surprised she ended up in Chicago just like he's not surprised he moved away from the prospect of working with his father to come out to LA.
"Now, talk to me. Tell me how much Eddie cried when he saw you and how shocked he was when he saw Marcus."
He casts a withering glare at the phone and both his sisters and Chris laugh. He wonders if his older sisters will ever stop teasing him just because he's the baby of the family.
~TBC~