It's still there, the same half-smile he's worn all night.
Eddie's stuck in traffic on Sunset, trying to find the detour that will get him home to Christopher and Buck, and when he glances in the rear-view mirror, his half-smile is reflected back at him. Even as he's careful to dodge the zigzag of hurried drivers, it catches his eye, reminds him of something. But it's a good thing, right? This version of happiness is steady and safe when too many things are anything but, and certainly better than a frown. A memory tugs at him for attention, but he brushes it aside.
He'd put this smile on a few hours ago, sometime after his shower – probably somewhere between pulling on his jeans and buttoning up his shirt, if he really had to guess. And it fits comfortably enough. After all, until just now, he'd forgotten it was even there. Through dinner, dessert, and an impromptu math lesson, this perfect half-smile, in place for the entirety of his date with Ana.
Again, he's sure it's a good thing.
Right?
When he makes it home, Eddie studiously ignores the way the half-smile gets tossed onto a chair with his jacket, how rolling up his sleeves as he talks to Buck coincides with new smiles that vary naturally –still mostly neutral, with a touch of amusement that seems to accompany so many of his conversations with Buck – but whatever he'd carefully positioned across his mouth before he'd left for dinner is gone, replaced with something he doesn't have to think about at all.
The half-smile only reappears when Buck asks about his evening.
Eddie tells him it was nice and hopes the ease with which his expression crawled to him from the chair and slid back into place means he's not lying to either of them.
Before he turns away, he almost asks Buck to stay longer, whether to give Eddie a chance to defend his reaction to the date or forget it entirely, he's not really sure. But Christopher is waiting for a goodnight story and Buck slips out the front door just as Eddie steps into his son's room, facing an amateur interrogation while he sets aside a million questions of his own.
Everything is a little too quiet when he finally returns to the living room, and the memory he'd ignored on the drive home becomes easier to hold onto in the silence. He falls onto the couch and drops his head into his hands, trying to piece together thoughts of Shannon and Ana and screaming and smiling, a more complicated equation than anything he'd attempted after dinner. Part of him wants to call Buck for help, but another argues that might be cheating. Like Buck could be the answer himself.
He hasn't made a decision either way when his phone chirps from where it lies on the coffee table, and while Eddie still doesn't believe the universe screams, he wonders if maybe it whispers via text.
Hey so I came home to find albert with veronica so that was fun
In your apartment?
Yep
Yikes. You know you can come back here if you want.
You sure
You've had a standing invitation for a while now.
Buck takes longer to respond than Eddie expects, but the reply finally appears.
Be right there
The promise of Buck's arrival gives Eddie permission to stop thinking so hard, and when he heads to the bathroom to splash water on his face, he searches for the half-smile, curious as to where it's fallen and whether it has any plans to return.
But Eddie's pretty sure it's gone for the night, and he's back on the couch by the time he hears a light knock, followed by Buck's key in the door.
"Welcome back. I already grabbed a beer for you, if you want it."
Buck kicks off his shoes and joins him, taking a long drink from the bottle before he sits back, their legs touching, a mostly unintentional kind of contact that always manages to ground them both, even as neither of them acknowledge it.
"Thanks," Buck says, nodding at the beer. "That was just wild. Getting back to my own apartment and practically tripping over a bra on my way to a front row seat for a show I never wanted to see. Not that I'm a stranger to the Netflix and chill thing, but I didn't really need to be on the flip side of it tonight, you know? And like, walking in on a roommate with anyone is bad enough, but the fact that it was Veronica just made it super weird, and then they tried to offer me dinner, but that was just—hey, are you okay?"
"Yes?"
"Not the most convincing response, and your face is doing that thing."
"What thing?" Eddie asks, his brow furrowed. He feels like he's spent half the night staring at his own damn face, and he doesn't think it's fair for it to betray him now.
"That thing you do when you want to talk but are also talking yourself out of talking about whatever you want to talk about."
"Wow, thanks for clearing that up."
Buck puts his bottle down, then turns just enough to study Eddie. "Did something happen with Christopher after I left? He's okay, right?"
"Yeah, yeah. He's fine. He asked more about who I was with tonight."
"And you're still not ready to tell him."
It's not a question, and Eddie doesn't bother to respond to it, setting his beer next to Buck's instead. "Ana is an amazing woman. She's smart and funny and kind and beautiful and a hell of a cook and—well, all of that is pretty great for me. And being with her is nice."
"Yeah, you mentioned that."
Eddie watches Buck, waiting to see if he'll say more; there was an edge to his comment, something not quite bitter on his tongue, but not altogether pleasant either. And Eddie knows Buck doesn't want to listen to a dissertation about Ana's best qualities any more than he wanted to be in the audience for Albert and Veronica's escapade, but Eddie needs to work his way through this.
He needs to understand what's happening in his head. He thinks he needs Buck to understand it, too.
"How do you know when the long list of things that make someone pretty great, isn't enough?"
"You know I'm not exactly a relationship expert, right? I mean, I was chased out of my apartment by a bra on the floor, so I may not be the best person to give you advice. Especially when—" Buck cuts himself off and shakes his head. "I just don't know if I should be the one to help here."
"I think you might be the perfect one to help here."
Buck exhales slowly, sidestepping the potential danger of Eddie's response. "Long lists are all head, no heart."
"Sounds like someone ate their fortune cookie after dinner."
"It's not a well-balanced meal without it."
"So, I shouldn't be making a list?" Eddie asks.
"Lists are for things like grocery shopping or what to pack for vacation. A reminder of stuff you don't want to forget. If you're making a list about a person, if you're trying that hard to remember why you like them, maybe it's already too late."
"It would be easy to make a list of things I like about you. Is that bad?"
"When you're talking to other people about me, do you recite that list for them? Do you tell them about how nice I am or how nice it is to be around me?" Buck pauses and takes a deep breath. "Do you ask whether those things are enough?"
"It's so simple being with Ana. It's something that doesn't require much of me. Just showing up makes her happy and it's sweet," Eddie explains, finding it his turn to sidestep. "And if anyone asked me to find something wrong with her—with dating her—it would be hard."
"Sounds perfect."
"It really does. But that's the problem, isn't it? It sounds perfect. It looks perfect. And there's really nothing wrong with any of it, except that—"
"Except that—what?" Buck asks, daring him to finish. But Eddie can't yet, pivoting instead for the third – fourth? – time, with the hope that Buck will come along for the ride.
"When I was with Shannon, so much of our relationship was about what we were supposed to do – what I was supposed to do. Honestly, we probably would've had our own problems – I don't know – but I think should kept getting in the way of want to."
"Before she left or after she came back?"
"Both," Eddie admits. "And then tonight, as nice as everything was, it started to feel a lot like should again. Being with Ana is just a much easier version of it – no resistance at all instead of resistance from every direction."
There's something flickering in Buck's eyes. Hope or something like it.
"Sooooooo—you already know you don't want her."
Eddie shrugs. "I think all the easy and nice made it more difficult to grasp that, but then I saw my smile tonight and something about it bothered me."
Buck blinks hard in surprise. "Your smile?"
"In the rear-view mirror on the way home. A perfectly acceptable, inoffensive and totally fake half-smile that gives nothing away. A way to pretend everything is fine, for myself as much as anyone else. It wasn't until you left earlier that I realized I recognized it, familiar from years in a marriage that was wrong at least as often as it was right."
"So, a half-smile comes from an empty heart?"
"Jesus. I really can't order any more Chinese takeout for you," Eddie groans. "But yeah, maybe. Or at least an uninvested heart."
"Do you think you're just—is this a sign that you're not ready to move on from Shannon yet?"
"Actually, I think I'm—" Eddie sighs, because the same question already crossed his mind, and he wants to be careful about how he answers it now. "Buck, how did you feel about me going to Ana's tonight?"
Buck's eyes go wide. "This isn't—this isn't really about me."
"No?"
"Eddie—" Buck huffs.
"I want to know."
"I'm your best friend and I want you to be happy."
It's a well-rehearsed answer, and Eddie wonders just how long Buck's relied upon it. Probably as long as Eddie's relied upon the same.
"Not the most convincing response, and your face is doing that thing."
He thinks Buck's going to ignore him completely after being echoed like that – and maybe Eddie deserves it – but instead Buck looks off to the side and Eddie follows the lump in his throat as he swallows. He just hopes something honest remains on Buck's tongue. "If you're ready to move on—do you think someday, maybe—do you think you'll find someone you want?"
"Someday, maybe. Yeah," Eddie murmurs. "Soon, probably."
Buck glances back at him for moment. "But for now—"
"I'm gonna have to call Ana tomorrow and find a time to talk. She deserves that."
"Because she's nice."
"And because I'm grateful that she gave me the chance to try doing this when I wasn't sure I could," he says. "Bobby has been helpful, talking to me about grief and the fact that it never goes away completely. Letting me know it's all okay, and that I don't have to be stuck anymore. But I don't know if you and I would be having this conversation if Ana hadn't given me the opportunity to act on that advice."
He gives Buck time to process everything he's saying and knows it won't be easy for either of them. But he doesn't want easy anymore, not when he can have messy and sincere and beautiful. And not when he can have a relationship he doesn't want to hide from his son.
"To answer your earlier question, I hated it," Buck whispers. "That you were there when I was here, waiting for you."
Eddie's fingertips find Buck's, tangling them together atop Buck's knee. "Someday, maybe, after I talk to Ana, we can ask someone else to stay here with Christopher while we go out to dinner."
"That would be nice," Buck agrees, ducking his head playfully.
Eddie laughs, a quiet, gentle thing that lands between them and becomes a smile.
It's a real one this time.