Chapter Text
buck messed up. at some point they started to bleed because they are messily scabbed over.
silently and gently eddie starts to clean up the crescent shaped bloody indents well working around the skin buck scratched completely raw.
silently eddie cleaned up his mess. silently and slowly eddie picks bucks legs up one by one taking them off his pants that eddie puts in the hamper with plans to wash tomorrow.
silently eddie leads buck back to his room and picks out soft baggie clothes for buck to wear to bed
as he hands them to buck the first word in spoken in what feels like hours
“what are you doing”
“giving you pajamas to change into” eddie response with so much gentle force it’s almost fact
“eddie i can’t stay here tonight. your coach is awful and you and chris had plans for tomorrow”
“your right my coach is awful, that’s why you will be sleeping in here. and also you know damn well chris will be ecstatic that your still here”
“but where will you sleep, i can’t just kick you out if your bed.”
“if you’ll have me i thought i would stay in here. with you.”
buck makes eye contact with eddie for the first time tonight willingly and nods his head afraid if he try’s to speak nothing will come out.
silently they get changed. silently they crawl into bed with each other with buck trying to be as close to the edge of the bed as he can as to not take up eddie’s space.
almost as if eddie read his mind he pulls buck to the center with him wrapping buck in his arms and pulls him as close as he physically can.
“love,” there is that word again that makes bucks heart flutter with hope “you mean the world to me and i don’t know what i would do without you. those months with bosco as my partner were the worst. i kept leaning in to talk to you but it was her. and that made me angry. buck you are not nor where you ever exhausting. i should have never said that and i don’t think i ever apologized so i’m doing that now. I am so sorry. i’m not sure what’s been running through your head lately but i need you to know you are not exhausting. you are not a burden or a bother. you are not weak. you are not annoying. buck the whole team missed you. we may have had a really shitty way of showing it but we did. sweetheart we love you.”
why does he know me so well (and why does he keep calling me theses names). every single thing buck has been thinking the past couple months shut down by eddie in seconds. buck finally turns to eddie not caring if he sees his tear stained face.
“my beautiful boy” eddie mumbles as he coerces bucks face
”i wasn’t planning on telling you this right now because it is not what you need but i do think you need to know it and if you can’t say it back that’s okay there will be no hard feelings but love do please stay here” eddie pauses to take a breath almost to brace himself. buck feels like he hasn’t breathed since they laid down
“buck i love you. i love you with my entire being. i love everything about you. i love how you go on research bings when your bored. i love how you light up when you can share about it, which you can always do by the way. i love how you treat chris, how you treat him as a kid not as a kid with a disability. i love how you love that kid as your own, how you would do anything for him. i love how when you make food you do every measurement to exactly what’s in the recipe. i love how you dance around the kitchen when you cook which out noticing it. Evan i love every goddamn thing about you. flaws and all. i need you to know you are loved exactly how you are and that will never stop no matter what you do or think.”
buck is sobbing at this point
“buck, love, tell me what your thinking”
“i don’t deserve this. no one has ever treated me like this” buck says between sobs
“ i am so sorry no one has ever seen you the way i do but treated you the way you deserve because you do deserve this. you deserve the whole world. buck your a hero. you saved who knows how many people during a tsunami on blood thinners after getting crushed by a latter truck. buck you spent the whole day looking for chris even though you were exhausted and bleeding. you never gave up on him. you may have faults but so does everyone it’s human nature but your a good man who deserve to be told every single day”
buck tilts his head up and kisses eddie,because that’s how close they were all it took was a tilt.
“i love you too” buck said still sobbing
“get some sleep love, you me and chris have a big day planned tomorrow”
buck is growing. he is seeing a therapist now and actually talking to eddie about his issues. he still has nightmares he still has bad days he still defaults to scratching but eddie noticed it and gently pulls his hand away and holds it, running circles in his palm till he’s calm.
maybe he can’t do this on his own