Word Count: 2,245
Warnings/Spoilers: None in particular for this chapter.

If Buck had expected that Christopher knowing about – and accepting – that he and Eddie were now kissing, and that that would cause some sort of seismic change in Eddie's disposition in his attitude or behaviour around the station, then he really needed to recalibrate his expectations and understanding of how Eddie operated.

Outside of the firehouse, Eddie stopped by when they weren't on-shift or frequently invited him over. When Christopher was there, they spent plenty of time together talking about activities for the weekend that the three of them could do or watching movies or TV shows that were age-appropriate for the kid. When Chris wasn't around, they'd sometimes shared memories that didn't sting – Buck quickly learned that Shannon was still a sensitive topic, while Eddie generally avoided mentioning the tsunami, the bombing, or Buck's parents.

And sometimes, but only when Chris wasn't around, they didn't talk much at all. There'd been two occasions that Eddie hadn't even waited to check if Buck was alone in his apartment before kissing him and Buck's back collided with his closed door, hands fumbling for skin or fabric as he sank into Eddie's touches. Those were the times that, afterwards, he'd felt more like Buck 1.0 than Buck 2.0, forgetting to articulate what he wanted or needed and just giving himself over to the feelings that Eddie's hand and mouth evoked in him. He was hardly an idiot. He wasn't going to complain about that to Eddie.

But the other times, the times where Eddie used his superior control and patience – because Buck had yet to learn any of it – and they were a tangle of limbs while Buck stared into warm brown eyes and basked in the comfort of Eddie's fingertips on his cheek, or the back of his neck, or trailing down his side… Those times, Buck almost forgot about all the turmoil that Eddie could cause within him.

Explaining the turmoil was simple: at the firehouse, it was like Eddie was a different person. Buck would almost go as far to say Eddie had an identical twin brother that showed up for shifts like some sort of Jekyll and Hyde situation where he had no recollection of who Buck was or what they'd done in the time since their last shift. Sometimes he observed Eddie from across the room, the guy utterly oblivious to his watchful gaze, and he wondered if he should suggest Eddie get checked out for some sort of amnesia because of…what, his time in Afghanistan causing some sort of brain damage? It sounded absurd.

At the firehouse, Eddie kept some sort of distance from Buck. They still sat together at meals, still worked alongside one another on a call when Bobby paired them up, and still changed in the same space, but Eddie… The warmth in Eddie's expression that Buck saw when they were hanging out at Eddie's house or Buck's apartment was gone. It wasn't even like Eddie looked at him with the barely constrained rage of the lawsuit, because this was… It was a sort of indifference, with his lips pressed together in a thin line and his arms crossed so that he seemed aloof and closed off.

And Buck… All it did was leave him more and more confused. Was it his fault for suggesting they take it slow? It wasn't as though he could blame Eddie for giving him mixed signals because he'd made it clear when they weren't at the station how he felt, and Chris knew and still adored Buck, but at the station… At the station, Eddie's behaviour was turning his head inside out.

"You're awfully quiet today," Hen said as she settled on the couch beside him, draping her arm over the back of the couch and ruffling his hair like Eddie had done almost a month ago. A fucking month of Christopher being okay with them as a them and still no sign of telling anyone anything at the station. Should he suggest changing the 'slow' tune to something a little faster? "Did you sleep okay?"

Truth be told, he'd been barely sleeping the past fortnight but that was more because his thoughts were keeping him awake rather than a return of the nightmares. There had been some awful dreams that included him in some sort of dark, perilous situation like a house fire with too much toxic smoke. He always felt like someone was there, someone who could save him, but that someone remained just out of reach and never gave him a hand or any sort of acknowledgement. Instinctively or otherwise, he always knew that person was Eddie when he was asleep. Every time he woke up alone, he was yelling Eddie or Chris' names and then his blood iced in his veins and he was left with the hammering heart and clutched sheets that had become so familiar to him for almost a year.

"Just a lot on my mind," he said, shooting her what he hoped was a satisfactory smile.

"We missed you at Bobby's Easter dinner," she said, failing to buy into his deflection because her eyebrows rose behind her glasses, her shoulder brushing against his. "Trouble in paradise?"

He sighed, eyes flicking around to check if anyone else was in the vicinity but it seemed like Eddie was downstairs like always and maybe Chim was with him. He thought Bobby had gone to his office to jot notes about the last call because you never knew when the alarms would call you to the next one. "You ever feel like someone matters a lot to you but you're not sure how much you matter to them?"

Hen's lips pursed as she surveyed him, her fingers scraping through the hair at the back of his head. "I used to feel that way with Eva sometimes," she admitted after a very long pause. "I wanted her to be healthy and involved in Denny's life but she always struggled to stay clean for me, or for him, or for herself."

It…wasn't really the comparison Buck was trying to make – he didn't think Eddie was an addict – but he could make the connection between how Hen had interpreted his question and what he'd actually asked. On the one hand, it wasn't an answer. On the other hand, it was Hen's acknowledgement that she understood an imbalance of care for someone.

"Is this about Abby?"

He looked at her in surprise before realising what she meant and shaking his head. Abby… Yeah. She'd done this to him too, sort of. Giving him hope and warmth and making him a better person and then just…vanishing on her overseas trip, posting Instagram updates about her travels but never responding to his many messages. He'd been so confused about Abby for so long too, crashing at her apartment because he thought she'd wanted him to look after it rather than realising he was basically just a BnB user. He'd never really understand what their relationship was either. She'd provided comfort, and a maternal sort of affection and love that he'd never really had before, and she'd asked him on dates and they'd shared laughs. In some ways, probably because of Christopher, Eddie showed a lot of paternal affection and love that was equally foreign to Buck. Both times, he'd basked in it like a dying flower soaking in the sun and the water until he was blossoming again under the care and ministrations.

But…this wasn't about Abby, right? Eddie was nothing like Abby, and certainly how he felt for Eddie was nothing like Abby.

He put his head in his hands because he really didn't understand himself anymore, shaking his head even as his frustration spiked. He'd never been good at working out how he felt about other people, especially when he was in some sort of romantic relationship, and this thing with Eddie felt like it was a complete mess. Chris had known for a whole freaking month and he still felt like he was sneaking around behind the backs of all their co-workers.

"No, it… It's not about Abby," he muttered between his fingers, rubbing at his eyes and exhaling while Hen rubbed a hand up and down his back. At the end of the day, he felt certain of at least that. "It's more than that and it's- I'm tired of feeling like I only matter some of the time."

Hen hummed beside him, her hand moving across his shoulder blades and down again. "You know the only way you'll ever really know what you mean to someone is to ask, right?"

"But that might blow everything up." He propped his head on his hand, elbow digging into his knee, so he could look at her. "It might all go to hell."

He doubted it even as he said the words. Surely he mattered enough to Eddie that what was between them wouldn't explode? But… But what if it did? All his old fears that had led to him suppressing his feelings for so long burst into life behind his eyes again. What if he lost Eddie and what their relationship had been developing into, and then he simultaneously lost his best friend too? And then if he lost Eddie – in any form – he'd lose Christopher too? And then-

"Hey." Hen squeezed his shoulder, pulling him away from the abyss. "Even if it blows everything up, you have your answer. Isn't that better than not knowing?"

Buck knew the logical answer was yes but the emotional answer was a whole lot of no.

"You deserve to feel like you matter all the time, Buckaroo," she murmured, and it sounded so very motherly that he almost smiled. "If you're feeling like someone's dirty little secret sidepiece, then that's a really shitty way to feel when you're investing your heart in a relationship."

He blinked, realising that she had come close to hitting the nail on the head even though he'd never use those sorts of words if he talked to Eddie about it. He could imagine Eddie failing to understand how he felt when outside of the house, he was so affectionate. He could imagine how hurt Eddie would be when he realised all the toxic negativity and doubt that he allowed to wrap around him.

He opened his mouth to respond when the alarms went off. She shot him a commiserating smile, squeezing his shoulder again, before they moved towards the staircase.

Buck couldn't meet Eddie's eyes in the back of the truck and he didn't think Eddie even tried to look at him.

And even though he knew they hadn't had a fight which explained all the distance in Eddie's expression, he felt sick with the realisation that he couldn't see any other way to discuss how he felt without it leading to an argument.

They were both too irrational with their emotional fuses for it to end any other way.

Maybe one day, Buck wouldn't be so surprised by how quickly his anxiety could darken his emotions and how thoroughly he dwelled on those darkened thoughts until he withdrew under the guise of protecting those around him from how he felt.

The more aware he became of Eddie's distance at the station, the higher Buck built the wall around his heart. He knew Hen was right, in her own sort of way, that he had invested his heart but he didn't really believe Eddie had when he could be so ambivalent at the station. He also knew Hen was right that he should just ask but he was increasingly terrified of ruining everything by asking a stupid question that led to him losing Christopher as well. And then one night it had occurred to him again how he risked more than just the two Diaz's, because a division between Eddie and Buck would fracture the family at the 118 that still felt tenuously held together sometimes after the lawsuit. If things went badly, he decided he'd be the one that left the station. He couldn't continue working alongside Eddie but he knew Eddie needed the others to help support him and Chris. Not to mention Buck wasn't sure he'd ever be able to look Bobby, Hen or Chim in the eyes again.

He'd deal with Maddie's relationship with Chim, and the difficulty of completely extricating himself from all the ties of the house, at some other distant point.

Once he withdrew though, once the wall was high enough to hide behind, it became easier to function at work. He could listen to Bobby's commands and follow Eddie's lead without question, and he stopped letting himself think so he could just…do. It surprised him how easily he could turn off his feelings now that he needed to avoid being hurt, now that he was trying to steel his resolve and shield his heart from breaking. He wondered if that was why Eddie was so closed off at work – he needed to avoid being hurt. Because if Buck had become certain of anything lately, it was the knowledge that Eddie would break his heart.

"Hey."

Eddie's hand caught his arm as he went to leave the locker room after a shift, already dressed in his civvies even though Eddie was still very much in all his gear after unloading the truck. It had been more than a fortnight since his conversation with Hen and he'd been making terrible excuses and dodging Eddie's attempts to hang out ever since. He remembered how badly he'd let Chris down because of the lawsuit and he felt like he was doing it again but it was impossible to be around Eddie when they didn't have a station of people around or calls to distract him. He knew Eddie would see straight through him, call him out, and everything would disintegrate.

Eddie's fingers flexed against his skin. "Are you coming over later?"

Buck's eyes focused on a point somewhere above Eddie's head. "Maddie wanted to hang out," he lied, trying for some sort of apologetic smile as his gaze slid towards Eddie's wary expression. "Maybe some other time?"

"Yeah…" Eddie's fingers slipped from his arm, flooding his stomach with ice even though his flesh felt branded with the imprint. "I, uh… I'll text you?"

"Sure," he said with a vague sort of nod, exiting the changeroom and fleeing towards his truck without a backwards glance. If he had, maybe he would have seen the creased brow and lost look of Eddie's confusion staring after him.

~TBC~