Word Count: 5,051
Warnings/Spoilers: No specific warnings for this chapter.

Eddie returned to the shift rotation with something more guarded around the edges of his eyes and Buck became increasingly aware of how much he reached out to Eddie in an attempt to bridge it, with soft nudges under the table and brushes of their shoulders to try to stop Eddie caving in on himself with guilt and self-loathing. With Christmas around the corner, he hoped it would bring some much-needed cheer to everyone's eyes.

Which was maybe why he felt so furious when the shift schedule had been finalised and they discovered they were working Christmas Day. Buck was pretty sure he would rather have been anywhere else than the station, but the gloom that pervaded everyone seemed to be exacerbated by the news and Buck was determined to try to change that, if only for a little while.

He'd called Athena about his idea and she'd agreed, getting in touch with Karen to coordinate food. While Eddie was helping Bobby with lunch, Buck had broken into Eddie's phone to steal Isabel's number from his contacts and then negotiated with her about how to get Christopher to the 118 for the surprise. He'd told Maddie and she'd squealed about the plan but promised to keep it secret from Chim, and then he just had to trust that everyone outside of the station would show up at the right time.

If nothing else, working Christmas Day at least meant he wasn't sitting at home. Alone. Or enduring it with Maddie and Chimney.

It was the least he could do to ensure it was a good Christmas party.

He tried to commit the way Eddie and Christopher's faces lit up when they saw each other to memory, the bright grin on Eddie's face that Buck hadn't seen for weeks when he twirled Chris around. He tried to hold onto the way Chris pressed his cheek into Buck's shoulder after the kid had demanded a cuddle, small fingers bunching into his shirt.

"Thank you for making my Christmas magical, Buck," Chris murmured and Buck had pretended it didn't make his eyes burn as he kissed Christopher's forehead, squeezed him extra tight, and then let him wander away to hang out with Denny and a bunch of other kids that Karen had brought with her.

He tried to cling to the way Bobby hugged him before they'd eaten, listening to Bobby's gruff voice with the emotions he couldn't quite hide. "This is really great, kid. Thank you."

And Buck had smiled, soaking in Bobby's warmth and love and stowing it in a jar for later when something might make him think of his father's frustration that he hadn't done well enough on his report card, or hadn't done well enough in a sport team. He tried to etch the press of Bobby's hands into his back for the nights when he woke up in terror, afraid and alone again, the paternal affection that he'd never really known or understood until he'd arrived at the firehouse and come to see Bobby as someone he could think of as family, even though he didn't know what the term really meant.

When the shift was over and everyone paired off with their significant others to return home, Buck watched them all depart with a glowing sense of pride that the Christmas party had been a success and he'd brought some joy to the 118 after a year of so much heartache and misery and pain.

His pride had lasted until he entered the cold, empty apartment. The fuzziness in his belly faded, the warmth in his smile disappeared, the happiness traced into his eyes vanished. He surveyed the space and debated whether it could still be called a home when it felt so dead inside.

For a while, at least, Christopher was right: Christmas had been magical.

He tried to remember that later when he was curled up in his bed without anyone to wish him a Merry Christmas, without anyone to hold him, and tried to ignore the few tears that escaped into the fabric of the pillow.

The day after Christmas, Eddie texted him a series of photos of the Diaz family party with Christopher tangled in the embraces of various extended family members and either smiling the biggest grin or pulling the silliest faces.

At the bottom of all the photos were four simple words:

wish u were here

Buck stared at the fragment of a sentence almost the entire day. Even when he put his phone down to try to stop staring at it, he still found himself picking up the phone to look again in case he'd misread it or he'd missed part of the text. He couldn't help wondering what the hell the words were meant to mean, or what the hell he was meant to do with them, or if Eddie had any sort of awareness of how it made Buck feel.

Problem was, he wasn't even sure he could name how it made him feel.

"Hey, you coming over tonight?" Eddie asked as he slung his bag over his shoulder, the muscles in his arms straining against the weight and momentarily distracting Buck from sliding the two parts of his zip together so he could get his hoodie closed.

"Uh…" His fingers slipped again and he cursed, fixing his attention on the zipper until he managed to achieve success. Eddie was watching him with an amused grin that did nothing to alleviate the nervous flutter in his stomach that Eddie in his general vicinity, looking at him like that, with muscles swelling all over the place did to him. He'd stared at the four words of Eddie's texts for so long the last couple of days that he thought it might be the only thing he'd see for the rest of his life. "I…didn't really have plans?"

"So is that a yes?" Eddie said, eyebrows raised in either expectation or anticipation.

"If you're su-"

"We'll see you about seven then," Eddie said with a nod, pivoting and disappearing from the locker room before Buck could coordinate anything more coherent.

"Buck!" Christopher cried as he click-clacked down the hallway to be swept into a hug by Buck.

Buck propped the boy on his hip, bumping his fist against Christopher's. "How's my favourite man?" He tickled Christopher's chest, making the kid giggle and swat at his hand, while carrying him through the hallway and towards the sounds in the kitchen.

"I thought I was your favourite man?" Eddie teased, glancing over his shoulder and pointing at an unopened beer on the counter that was evidently meant for Buck. He felt like a shy smile flickered across his face at the gesture.

Christopher laughed. "Don't be silly, Dad. Buck loves me way more than you."

"Ouch, mijo," Eddie said, holding a hand to his heart and clutching at the counter which only made Christopher's laugh louder.

"I thought that was meant to be our little secret," Buck stage-whispered to Christopher, tickling his tummy and making Chris squirm against him. "We have to pretend we like your dad because he cooks better than me."

"You don't mess up that often anymore, Buck," Christopher said with a cheeky glint in his eyes that made Buck pout at him in mock horror.

"I knew it! My son only likes me for my food, and you-" Eddie pointed an accusatory spatula at Buck. "You just come here so you don't have to order take-out every night."

"Guilty," he shrugged, flashing a grin at Eddie as he pressed a kiss to Chris' cheek and lowered him to the floor. He swiped the bottle of beer from the counter and popped the cap, rolling it between his fingers as Chris leaned his head against Buck's hip. Buck couldn't resist running fingers through the soft blond curls while he stared at Eddie. "I guess I should see myself out then, if you're so hell-bent on making sure I don't get to eat here tonight."

"Aww, but you only just got here," Christopher whined. Buck and Eddie shared an amused look that they were also desperately trying to hide.

"Maybe Buck can stay for dinner this time and next time? Next time, I hit him over the head with the spatula to cook something for us."

"That sounds good, Dad," Christopher said with a satisfied nod, tapping his way out of the kitchen and into the living room where Buck saw him fall to sit among a pile of Legos.

"Hitting me with a spatula, huh?" he mused, losing the battle against letting his smile show. "You sure know how to make a guy feel welcome, man. Thanks."

Eddie snorted, poking at whatever rice dish he was making on the stove. "That's what you get for calling Christopher your favourite."

Buck felt his heart skip, eyebrows rising almost to his hairline. "Oh? Would you prefer I called you my favourite?"

"Nah," Eddie said, shaking his head and waving the spatula towards him, "because you aren't my favourite either. Christopher is, every day of the week."

Buck couldn't decide if he was meant to laugh or cry so he settled for sipping from the beer and leaning against one of the counters while he looked at the kitchen table which was already set for three. It struck him how utterly domestic it was to hang out with Eddie and Christopher like this. He could almost imagine sharing a life with someone again. Abby had helped him understand how to have a relationship with someone, how to develop meaningful connections, not just one-night stands. And he'd had Ali, and it had been brief but better than nothing.

And now… Now he missed having someone to talk to about anything and everything. It was true, Eddie would almost always answer his calls at any time of the day or night, but their dynamic was different to what he'd had with Abby. She had an older, gentler wisdom that had bordered on maternal at times, maybe because she'd become the parent to her mother, but with Eddie… With Eddie, it was something else he hadn't pinpointed yet. They joked and grinned so much and every time it made his heart jump.

"Hey." Eddie touched his cheek with the back of his knuckles, startling Buck out of his memories of Abby and Ali as he caught Eddie's drawn brows above his concerned eyes. "You okay?"

And, of course, Buck could never tell Eddie anything about all the weird feelings because it seemed likely to create a mess that would destroy their friendship once and for all, and Buck really wasn't sure how he'd cope if he lost Eddie's friendship. The strain during and after the lawsuit had been bad enough, but if Eddie ever realised he had some sort of feelings that weren't purely friendship…

He shuddered at the thought of it, how quickly they'd fight over each other to put in transfer papers so one of them could get the hell out of the 118 and away from the other. If Eddie left, it would almost certainly cause friction because the others would want to know what had happened. If Buck left, he'd struggle to sever ties with them because of Maddie and Chim's relationship. Either way, the 118 family he had been so desperate to hold onto, the one he'd been so grateful for at Thanksgiving, would disintegrate and it would be all his fault, again, because he sometimes imagined wanting something more with Eddie. So he couldn't let Eddie realise he felt anything out of the ordinary. He couldn't afford to have incredibly awkward conversations with Bobby about it.

"Just a long day," he lied, and Eddie's eyes flickered between his again before he let his hand fall and turned back to the stove.

"I keep thinking there'll be a shift where things don't go totally to hell, but I'm starting to believe that's never going to happen," Eddie mused. Buck couldn't tell if Eddie was playing along with the lie or had believed it, but he appreciated the out to conceal how much he wanted to vomit his feelings all over Eddie's kitchen floor.

"We work in Los Angeles. People are crazy here."

Eddie looked unconvinced. "Yeah, but the stuff we see? You could write about it and put it on a TV show and no one would believe it happened in real life."

Buck nearly inhaled beer up his nose because he snorted, but the slight burn was a good distraction from noticing the slope of Eddie's shoulders beneath his shirt and the way his torso tapered towards his waist and how much Buck sort of really wanted to ask for a hug because the two victims they'd lost today had been rough on all of them when it was the middle shift between Christmas and New Year. It didn't help that he knew exactly how comfortable it was to curl into Eddie's arms and talk.

Eddie shifted the conversation to plans for the New Year party that was being held at Maddie's place and whether it was wise to take Chris when it would be a late night or if he should drop Chris off with his Abuela.

"You don't have to stay for midnight, you know," Buck said as Eddie moved around the kitchen, gathering a serving plate for the rice dish.

"But that's the whole point of it, isn't it? Stay for midnight, clink drinks, sing awful songs, kiss someone."

Buck could've dropped his bottle of beer at that last one but he was saved, perhaps, by Christopher's arms wrapping around his waist.

"What's up, champ?" he said, ruffling the boy's hair and using him as the perfect distraction from what Eddie had just said.

"I just missed you, Buck," Christopher admitted and Buck knew his heart probably expanded in his chest with warmth at the sweetness of the kid that had completely captured him a while ago.

"I saw you at Christmas," he teased, lifting Chris onto his seat as Eddie set the serving plate in the middle of the table. "Lucky for you, then, that you're my favourite dude because I missed you too." He sat beside Chris, brushing a light hand through the errant curls and couldn't help smiling at Christopher's beaming grin.

He was distracted briefly by Eddie's knees brushing against his beneath the table, catching the small smile tugging at one edge of Eddie's lips as he watched them. It was a challenge for Buck to keep his expression neutral but he wasn't convinced he was entirely successful at keeping the emotions off his face.

Christopher launched into summarising what he'd learned at school in the past month because he hadn't had a chance to tell Buck much at the firehouse Christmas party, and he talked about a new ice cream flavour he wanted to try but "Dad keeps saying no because it's winter and it's cold, like that somehow makes a difference" (Eddie had looked equal parts scandalised and sheepish), and he mentioned a park he wanted to go to because some kids at school had mentioned it had really awesome play equipment. Buck listened, as did Eddie, and they both added their own comments to the conversation when it seemed necessary to prompt Christopher to continue. And it was all so very normal, so very familial, that at times Buck almost forgot he was an invited guest. It was times like this, hanging out and eating and talking, that he realised just how easy it was to fit in with both Diaz boys and how welcoming they were with warmth and acceptance.

"Can you clean the dishes while I get him ready for bed?" Eddie asked when it was clear they were done eating and Chris was attempting to conceal yawns behind his hands. Buck felt like his stomach was almost certainly overloaded with the delicious chicken and rice dish that Eddie had made and was more than willing to call it a night and head home.

"Sure," he agreed and, despite Christopher protesting that it was early – when it definitely wasn't anymore after talking for so long – Eddie scooped him up and carried him towards the bathroom.

Buck hardly had an issue with clearing dishes and packaging the leftovers, but he started calculating how long he should stay before returning to his apartment. He hadn't slept since he got off shift and he knew he was emotionally and physically exhausted from the calls. He thought he was doing a good job keeping his 'I'm okay' face on because he was around Christopher. He knew Eddie had been very resolute in keeping his emotions together after he'd given up the fight club thing, but they hadn't talked about it in the past couple of weeks so Buck wasn't entirely sure how Eddie was doing. Sometimes, Buck wanted to insist that Eddie remove his shirt to ensure the bruises were fading– and, maybe, to check that there weren't any new bruises. Yet he usually felt that wasn't his place, because their friendship still had bumps and kinks which hadn't been totally straightened out yet.

He'd finished cleaning up before Eddie reappeared so he grabbed another beer from the fridge and settled on the couch, bouncing his good knee in an attempt to release some of the nervous tension from the day. He could still see the glassy green eyes of one of the victims and some fragment of her face reminded him of the outlines of a face of a woman in the tsunami and he shuddered, forcing his focus on the bottle of beer in his hand and pushing Lego pieces around with his toes.

"Can Buck read me a story?" he heard Christopher say as the bathroom door opened and light spilled into the hallway.

"You'll have to ask him that."

"Buck!"

"Christopher, I've taught you better than to yell."

Christopher giggled, his crutches clicking as he moved through the corridor. His eyes lit up when he saw Buck on the couch, expertly dodging Lego pieces by sweeping them aside with his crutches as he crossed the carpet and climbed into Buck's lap with absolutely no preamble or request if it was okay to invade Buck's space. When Buck nudged a kiss to his damp hair, he inhaled the scent of lavender and oranges. The pyjamas littered with dinosaurs were soft as he cradled Christopher against his chest.

"Hi," Christopher said, fixing Buck with a grin and bright eyes behind his glasses. "Dad said I had to ask you if you'd read me a story."

"Did he?"

He glanced from Chris to Eddie leaning against the wall of the entry, arms crossed over his chest and something that looked almost fond sparkling in his eyes. He looked so relaxed, and so utterly distracting in a damp tank-top, that Buck would almost venture as far to say Eddie Diaz looked happy. He doubted he'd deny either of the Diaz boys anything in the world if they asked him for it. Maybe he needed to rethink the idea that Chris was the only Diaz who had stolen his heart.

"I guess that's the least I can do after your Dad cooked dinner."

"Yay!" Chris cheered, wrapping his arms around Buck's neck. Buck carefully got to his feet, adjusting Chris' weight and shaking his head at Eddie's silent offer of assistance. He'd carried this kid as he ran to escape a tsunami. He'd carried him through flood waters to get on top of a fire truck. He could carry him the short distance to bed. He could carry him to or through anything. He was incredibly mindful of the danger of Legos underfoot, though.

"So what story are we reading, little man?" he said as he settled the kid on the bed, tugging blankets over Christopher's legs and propping his crutches against the bedside table within easy reach.

"Narnia!" Chris pointed at the fat tome of a book on his bedside table and Buck flipped to where the bookmark was, scanning the pages to familiarise himself with a story he probably hadn't read since he was a kid.

Chris wriggled under his arm so that his cheek was pressed to Buck's chest, mumbling along occasionally with the words Buck spoke aloud. From time to time, Buck attempted a pretty terrible English accent for some of the dialogue and when he realised Chris was no longer making breathy giggles but instead breathy snores, he tucked the bookmark inside the pages and gently set the book on the table. He combed his fingers through the damp curls, soothed by Chris' warmth and soft weight and life. He wondered whether Chris still had awful nightmares or if he'd developed a dislike of water like Buck. The thought of the beach still chilled him to the bone.

After ten minutes of letting Chris sleep against him, Buck carefully manoeuvred the boy so his head was against the pillows and then he slid from the bed. He shut off the light and eased the door to be slightly ajar, quietly padding down the hallway to where Eddie was sitting on the couch and fiddling with something on his phone.

"He's asleep," he whispered, gazing at the scattered Legos and thinking he didn't stand a chance of not stepping on them this time and shrieking with pain that woke Christopher up. It was a wonder he'd blindly navigated them before when he had Chris in his arms. "I… Uh… I should probably take off too. Get some sleep. Long day."

"You aren't staying?" Eddie said, extinguishing the light on his phone as he looked up with an unreadable expression on his face.

"I…hadn't been planning on it?" he said with a small frown, because Eddie had invited him over tonight but he hadn't expected it to be for the night. He probably would have brought a change of clothes if he had.

Eddie pressed his lips together, eyes darting away, and Buck struggled not to bite his own lip because everything about the change in his face and posture screamed that he wasn't okay. Once again, Buck had gotten caught in some wonderful fantasy of having a family and enjoying the warm press of Christopher sleeping against him in favour of ignoring the cold apartment and empty bed that he was meant to be returning to. And he hadn't paid enough attention to assessing how Eddie was after a pretty rough shift.

"Will you?" Eddie eventually said, barely more than a nervous whisper as his glimmering gaze drifted back to Buck.

Buck hesitated, wondering if it was the smartest idea when he knew he had a whole lot more mess going on in his head, but he couldn't leave Eddie when he was practically pleading with him to stay. Something was going on and it felt important to be there.

So he nodded and Eddie's whole face cleared of the tension he'd apparently been feeling and Buck finally felt like he'd done something right for a change.

"I'll find you some clothes," Eddie said, tracking a slow but pain-free path through the Legos and moving past Buck towards his bedroom.

Buck turned to follow, accepting the sweatpants and t-shirt that Eddie rummaged out of a drawer and then heading for the bathroom. He'd never admit to holding the clothes to his nose and inhaling deeply, soaking in the scent that he was beginning to know well, before realising that probably sounded far creepier than he'd intended. He changed quickly before returning to Eddie's room, placing his folded clothes by the door and sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Are you okay?" he asked as Eddie gathered his own sweatpants and shirt, something distant in his eyes as he drifted around the room setting off an alarm in Buck's internal warning system.

"Yeah." Eddie didn't meet Buck's look as he left the room and that was enough to confirm Buck's suspicions that he was barely holding it together, which was at least somewhat comforting when Buck also felt like he was fraying at the seams.

It was a restless few minutes as he waited for Eddie to change, brush his teeth, douse the remaining lights in the house. His leg bounced with anxiety as he heard Eddie's shuffling footsteps move through the corridor before he entered the room and closed the door behind him with the softest of clicks.

Eddie avoided his eyes as he turned off the light. The silence between them quickly turned uncomfortable after Eddie settled on the mattress and released a heavy sigh into the darkness. For an awkward and uncertain moment, Buck stayed still and wondered why the hell Eddie had wanted him to stay if he was going to be silent. But if he'd learned anything about the increasingly weird dynamic between them, Eddie always had a reason and he very rarely reached out for help so coming out and talking about anything was probably something he struggled with as much as Buck.

Buck eventually shifted so he was lying on his side facing Eddie, wriggling his legs beneath the blankets and staring into the darkness. He could tell Eddie was as stiff as a board beside him and he waited, unsure what it was that Eddie wanted or needed but figuring that giving Eddie the time to process was worthwhile. He'd already asked if Eddie was okay, and Eddie had already lied. And Eddie would know that Buck knew he'd lied.

"It was Shannon's birthday yesterday," Eddie murmured after a very long time of looking at the ceiling, his voice quaking over only five words.

Buck closed his eyes when he realised just how much Eddie fought to keep control of his emotions and thoughts around everyone at the house, the way he continued to fight for control over every part of his life even when things were probably spiralling. They'd had numerous calls that shift. They'd had the two fatalities. And Eddie hadn't given the slightest indication of the burden he was carrying throughout the shift.

Jesus.

Buck reached his hand through the darkness until he found Eddie's hand, grasping his palm and anchoring him to a point in the present because it was about the only thing Buck thought he could do.

"I'm sorry, Buck. I- I didn't mean to load this on you, I j-just-"

"Shhh." Buck rubbed his thumb against the knuckles of Eddie's hand. "You've been there for me so often. It's okay."

"I- I couldn't s-stand the thought of being a-alone tonight, you know?" Eddie's voice trembled and it was clear from the way the bed was also quivering that he was desperately trying to hold back sobs but that the tears had probably well and truly started in the long span of silence.

"C'mere," he whispered, tugging Eddie's hand until the other man rolled towards him, sinking into his chest as Buck folded his arm around shaking shoulders to hold him close. "I'm here, Eddie. I'm here. You aren't alone, okay? Let it out."

Eddie made a small sobbing noise, fingers curling into the shirt against Buck's chest. His whole body vibrated with the force of his sadness and Buck lowered his head to rest against the top of the brunette hair of the other man.

"I've got you, Eddie," he breathed, sliding his spare hand around the back of Eddie's neck to cradle his head, using his thumb to rub circles into the skin which Eddie so often did which helped soothe Buck's fears and pain. He could feel the way Eddie's tension gradually unravelled, the way he hid his hushed cries and whimpers and sniffles in Buck's chest. He focused on holding Eddie against him, rubbing his back or stroking his hair, until the shaking lessened and the pitiful noises of pain grew quieter. When Eddie's tension abated, when he was a heavy, boneless weight against Buck's torso, Buck felt like maybe he'd done okay at comforting Eddie.

He knew Eddie wasn't asleep, though. He knew how deep and slow and even Eddie's breathing was when he drifted to sleep, knew the way that his weight would settle more loosely against Buck if his muscles stopped being so coiled for an attack or a rejection.

"I'm s-sorry," Eddie said hoarsely, and Buck lessened his hold on Eddie's head so that his fingers could flit over his face, gathering the slick of tears against his thumb and adding gentle pressure to the curve of his jaw and behind his ear to raise his head from Buck's chest.

"It's okay," he insisted, even though his heart still ached because he wished he could take away Eddie's pain. He almost wished he could erase Shannon from Eddie's life completely, but that would mean vanishing Christopher and the boy was filled with too many bright smiles and giggles to take that away from the world. He wasn't sure Eddie would be who he was if he didn't have Christopher in his life. Buck knew he wouldn't be anyone resembling who he was if not for Christopher. "It's okay to hurt over this. I'm not going anywhere, man."

"I… Th-Thanks," Eddie mumbled, his grip turning slightly more clingy but Buck didn't mind. He tiptoed his fingers up and down the ladder of Eddie's spine and kept his breathing deliberately steady, and gradually, gradually, gradually, he felt Eddie's weight increase as he found a path to sleep.

Buck stayed awake for a while longer because even though he was strung out from the day, even though he was emotionally exhausted himself from the shift and then Eddie's breakdown, there was some sort peace he'd never really felt before except when he was holding Eddie in his arms. He tried to place if he'd ever felt it anywhere else. The best he could come up with was maybe after Maddie had had an awful breakup when she was in high school but even that wasn't really the same.

Whatever this feeling was that kept sticking in his chest and making him want to shield Eddie, he didn't want to think about what it meant too hard.

He was afraid of what the answer might be.

~TBC~