Yuna and David having watched their autistic son be so isolated all of his adult life and never having a happy relationship or close friends who understand his anxiety and then finding out that the man they’ve spent a decade hating on his behalf can casually talk him down from a panic attack in less than a minute
The phone vibrates for some time now. Hen, Chim, and Ravi watch it slowly vibrate off the edge and hit the floor with a good smack.
Ravi winced as his eyes flickered to Eddie, who sat there rubbing his forehead and sighing.
"You, uh, gonna get that?" Ravi asks.
"Nope," Eddie says, relaxing further in the chair and kicking his feet up. "Where the hell is Buck? Thought he'd be here by now," the man says. They were at a small get-together at Maddie's and Chim's.
"So, who are you exactly ignoring?" Hen asks.
"Nobody," Eddie says.
Hen huffs. "Right, and I'm a straight woman."
The phone then starts a series of singular brr-brr.
"That, my friend, is a group chat," Chim says, waltzing in the living area with drinks. "What other group chat are you also in, Diaz? Are you cheating on us?"
Eddie laughs. "No, no it's just-" another single vibration. "My cousins, and sisters. They're trying to get me to come over."
"Oh?" Hen asks, raising an eyebrow.
"Are you not on good terms with them?" Ravi asks, curious about the man's family.
"I am," Eddie sighs. "They all caught wind of me coming out, you know? And by wind, I mean my mom calling every single family member and telling them what I told them,"
"Ooo, damn," Hen winces. "Do you think they wouldn't...?"
"No, no, they wouldn't care. My cousin Alysia has a wife. Still, I'm a little nervous. I didn't get the chance to tell them, and so I'm avoiding them. And I don't want the date set-ups to start again," Eddie groans.
"Well, it doesn't seem to be working," Maddie says with a sigh. "Baby Nash is down for a nap. "Thanks again for the white noise machine, Hen. I was freaking out when our old one stopped working so suddenly."
"Hey, not a problem. We have a few in the closet, so it's no bother."
Another vibration, but this time it was a different pattern. Eddie perks up, reaching over for his phone. "That's Buck."
"I'm not going to even comment on the fact that he set a different pattern just for Buck," Chim says, amused.
Eddie quickly sits up, alert. "What the fuck--" he says, panicking. Everyone whips their heads over to Eddie, all concerned.
"What?"
"Did something happen to Buck?" Maddie says, worried. She pulls her phone out."
"He just messaged me help sos, but left a crying emoji," Eddie says, confused. "Jesus Christ my cousins and sister left so many messages," the man mutters. Eddie notices a voicemail left by his cousin.
He sighs, ignoring it and clicking on the voicemail Buck left.
"I have been taken against my WILL," the voicemail Buck left says.
Maddie tilts her head at her brother's tone of voice. Not panicking enough.
A woman laughs, "You came willingly!"
"I-I did not--" the voicemail ends.
Eddie glares at the screen.
That laugh.
"That was my fucking sister," Eddie hisses. He scrolls back to his voicemail logs, clicking on the previous one he had ignored from his cousin.
"Ahhhh!!!!! Baby Primo!!! Come on, don't ignore us!! We just wanna hang out. It's been forever, and I feel like we haven't done that in a while--hang you know? We got a party going on, ama making some food, managed to get your sister here too, but she said you wouldn't come unless we had something to get you to come over. Usually, abuela works, pero you know she's in Texas right now for a small trip," his cousin, Fernando, says.
Oh. Oh no.
"I don't like where this is going~" Chim says, looking at Eddie amused.
"Oh no," Eddie mutters in horror.
"So we got your gringo here!" Fernando cheers. "It was easy, man."
Another voice chimes in. "Yeah, all Sophia had to do was show up at his place and wave baby pictures of you, you know, the one where you were all cute and chunky--" Alysia, his cousin, says.
Eddie's face turns red. He glares at Hen and the others, who were all too amused by the events unfolding. Hen looks like she really wants to see those photos.
She was going to probably get those photos one way or another.
Alysia continues. "He was confused about who we were until he spotted Adriana and Sophia, probably from family photos you have in your house. Soon as he saw your baby photo, he was all happy, smiling away. Swear his eyes lit up and everything."
"They manhandled me into the car!" Buck's voice says in the background.
"He's kinda right. Sophia actually manhandled him into the car. Said something about it being chilly and that we should all sit in the car." That. That was his sister, Adriana. "He was like, 'okay.'"
"They're lying!" Buck cries out.
"You keep that up, and I'm not showing the videos," Adriana threatens.
Silence.
"Thought so," She huffs,
Jesus Christ.
"Anyways, you know where mi mama is, we're all at her place. We'll wait for you. Don't worry, I think ama is going to keep him busy in the kitchen. We'll feed him, too. He looks like he needs a few tacos," Fernando mutters.
The voicemail ends.
And a headache starts forming for Eddie.
"Did-Did your family just kidnap my brother?" Maddie asks.
"Is it kidnapping if he went willingly?" Chim says. "I mean, leave a trail of Eddie's baby photos, and Buck will go anywhere."
"I don't blame him. I kinda want to see those photos too," Hen says.
the writers REALLY liked my artist resource post, so I thought i'd give y'all my dragon hoard of things i use for writing
Reverse Dictionary, you type in the meaning of a word, and it gives you a bunch of words that mean that. (MY MOST IMPORTANT OFFERING IN THIS LIST)
Slang Dictionary, what it says on the tin.
Anglish Translator, Anglish is if English evolved without borrowing from other languages and it really itches my brain (Anglish is if english grown without borrowing from other languages and it truly itches my brain)
Incorrect Quotes Generator, Put character names in, and incorrect quotes come out. Really fun way to goof around with your characters' dynamics.
Handspeak, an ASL dictionary
Library of Babel, Odds are, the finished version of your wip is in here somewhere
The best fantasy map maker i have ever used
Glitch Text Generator is one I use A Lot, does ť̷̨̢͓̤͔̤̤̝̺̯̄̔̄̌̄͗͒͋͂͋͝ḩ̵̼̜͍͚͕̏̓͊̈̉̆̄͐́͗͒̈̃̊̚͜i̵̻̐̇̎̏̀̋̌̃̇̿͘̚s̴̮̔̂̇͒͑͝͝ͅ to your text
Totally not bootleg microsoft office
Emotions Thesaurus a guide for writing emotions and their associated body language
Mythcreants, has a whole bunch of stuff you can read to learn more about the technical aspects of writing
A decent article talking about what to think about when creating a language
Trope Talks, particularly good for beginner and younger writers or people who have a hard time reading. Honestly this whole channel is a fantastic format to get information into my adhd rattled brain.
FOR MY AO3 BESTIES! Postimages will host your image forever so you can embed it into your work
Ambient Chaos, sometimes the only thing in the world that can kick your brain into writing mode is nuclear sirens and lofi beats
Radioooooo, play a station from any place and year. Particularly helpful for period pieces.
holy shit i’ve never seen it explained this way but this, this is it. i’ve never understood why family/friends tell me they’re proud of me for doing something because i don’t feel accomplished; i just feel relieved
I can't stop thinking about Buck barely showing any signs of grief, so I wrote this. Buddie, 1.2k, T, sad sad sad.
---
Something’s wrong with Buck.
Of course something’s wrong with Buck. Something’s wrong with all of them. Something’s wrong with Eddie, his thoughts a tornado of sorrow and regret, his heart a throbbing bruise in his chest.
But something’s really wrong with Buck. Something that went from confusing to concerning to terrifying in the time it took to drive from the airport back to South Bedford Street and throw his bag down on the couch and follow Buck into the kitchen, watch him make tea for both of them. Something Eddie forgot about during the funeral, too busy choking on his own grief. Something that bubbles back to the surface now that they’re home and alone, the quiet of the house settling around them.
“You want anything to eat?” Buck asks as he hangs his hat by the door, starts pulling off his jacket. “I made a lasagna last night, but I could cook something else.”
“Buck,” Eddie says. He reaches for him, but Buck’s already heading for the kitchen, tossing his jacket over a chair on the way.
Eddie never understood how people could eat after funerals. He doesn’t get the constant parade of casseroles, the packed fridge, the countertops full of paper plates covered with plastic wrap, holding cookies and coffee cake and cinnamon rolls, icing smushed and runny. After Shannon died, he felt sick about the amount of food he was throwing away, swallowing down bile as he scraped platter after platter of cold potatoes and congealed mac and cheese into the trash.
But it doesn’t surprise him that Buck has returned to stress baking. He’s already choked down two dry crumpets, forcing them past the lump in his throat in hope he could bring Buck some comfort by eating them. But he couldn’t tell if Buck was comforted or not. He can’t tell, now, if Buck even needs comforting.
“Buck,” he says again from the doorway of the kitchen. Buck has the fridge open and is staring into it like he’s looking for what’s missing. “Are you really hungry right now?”
Buck shrugs with one shoulder. “I could eat,” he says. He sounds so fucking casual. The uncanniness settles like ice in Eddie’s stomach.
“Okay, well. I’m not hungry, but I can—sit in here while you cook?” He sweeps the hat off his own head, sets it on the island. What he really wants is a hot shower, to scrub the film of sadness off his skin, and then a long, long nap, to wake up when it’s dark enough for him to look at Buck without feeling sick.
“Only if you want to,” Buck says, then turns to him with a smile. A smile, soft and fond. The kind of smile Eddie has missed so much it hurts, but now he doesn’t want it, because it’s so—so strange.
“Buck,” he sighs, taking a half-step forward, twisting his own shaky hands together. “Are you okay?”
“Of course,” Buck says, smile widening. Then, he seems to realize that was the wrong thing to say, and he tilts his head to the side, gaze tracking upward like he’s searching for different words somewhere in the room. “I mean, not okay, no. But. I will be, you know?”
No, Eddie doesn’t know. He doesn’t know how anything is going to be okay ever again. Bobby is gone. His body is on a plane headed north, where none of them can ever see him again. Chimney had the acrid sting of booze on his breath at the funeral, and he wouldn’t even look at Maddie, who trailed after him all morning like she wasn’t sure she was allowed to get close. Hen told Eddie that Gerrard gave a fucking speech at the firehouse. And even now—why are he and Buck here alone? The 118 and the Grants should all be together as a family, sharing stories about Bobby, huddled together to keep out the cold despair.
And maybe Eddie doesn’t deserve that anyway, because he wasn’t there. He wasn’t there when they needed him. But Buck, at least, should be with his family. He should want to be.
“I think I’ll make pancakes,” Buck says, turning back to the fridge. Eddie watches him rummage around until he comes out with eggs and milk and butter. And he’s—he’s humming now, under his breath. It sounds like Amazing Grace.
“Oh, Buck,” Eddie says under his breath, and then he’s moving without thinking, swimming upstream against the wrongness coursing through him. Buck sets the ingredients down on the counter and turns to him with a questioning look just before Eddie takes his face in his hands and presses their mouths together.
It’s barely a kiss, more of a grind of teeth against flesh, the taste of copper spilling onto Eddie’s tongue as Buck’s lip splits under his canines. This will shock Buck out of it, Eddie thinks. It might break them, but at least he’ll recognize the version of Buck that pushes him away. At least his best friend will be here again, however briefly.
“Eddie,” Buck murmurs against his mouth. His voice is gentle, fragile, and for a moment, Eddie thinks he’s done it. He smears his mouth up over Buck’s cheek, hoping, praying to taste salt.
But Buck’s skin is dry. His hands find Eddie’s biceps and ease him backward. He’s smiling again, sadder this time, but not sad enough. Not like a grieving son, but like a man about to let Eddie down easy.
“I love you,” Buck says. Eddie’s stomach swoops, but not with hope. With fear. Buck’s voice is too flat, and there’s nothing behind his eyes. Nothing at all. “Maddie said we should say that more.”
“I love you too, Buck,” Eddie says, ragged and desperate. But Buck is already pushing him farther away, extending his arms to their full length, then releasing Eddie and stepping backward. He takes a breath, and Eddie thinks he sees it shake out of him, a flutter in his throat, but he turns away, offering only the impenetrable straightness of his back.
“I think I’ll put chocolate chips. In the pancakes.” Eddie watches as he picks up the butter, puts it down again, opens a cabinet, shuts it. “You sure you don’t want one?”
“No.” Eddie steps backward, then again, collapses when the back of his knees hit one of the chairs. “No, I’m good.”
What should he do? He doesn’t know what to do.
Bobby would know what to do. Eddie should call him. He shuts his eyes, imagines dialing, imagines the familiar voice on the other end. He can conjure it so well in his head, so clearly it feels real, brief and sun-warm.
Then Buck starts humming again. Eddie drops his face into his hands, breathes quick against the surge of nausea.
Bobby would know what to do. Buck needs him. Eddie needs him. But he’s gone.
i hate to admit this but i think if i were in a bad mood and spongebob were around i wouldnt be able to navigate that situation with the patience or grace it demands. and i worry he would blame himself
and that’s a wrap on all the kiss prompts in my inbox <3 thank you so much for indulging my silly little domestic fantasies for these silly little boys!
as requested by an anon after i posted that very first prompt... i give you firehouse proposal :’)
35. a kiss that leaves you breathless
ao3
“Should I just bring the list with me?” Buck asks with his head poked inside the fridge. “We can swing by the store on our way home—we finished the eggs last night and I think I’ve run out of oat milk too?”
He closes the fridge, takes a step towards the pantry to check.
Eddie swallows his mouthful of dry cereal. “You have. It’s already on the list.”
Buck detours to press a kiss to the top of Eddie’s head instead. “Thanks, babe. I was thinking spaghetti and quesadillas and this sriracha cauliflower that looks real easy—oh, and we need to make something for Christopher’s bake sale, too.”
“Oh, we need to, do we?”
“Eddie.” Buck looks at him, imploringly. “You know what those PTA moms are like. I couldn’t say no!”
“You literally run into burning buildings for a living.”
“Yeah, and I’d rather do that.”
Eddie rolls his eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Uh huh, and what does that say about you, then?” Buck’s gone to the pantry after all, and is rummaging through their supply of canned veg. “You’re the one who puts up with me.”
“It’s not.” Eddie’s throat sticks. It’s this fucking cereal. “It’s not some—hardship, Buck, you—you’re not something I put up with.”
“Sure.”
“Buck.” His boyfriend looks up from the spice rack, a certain softness to the furrow in his brow. Eddie wants to smooth it away and kiss the faintly sun-spotted skin in its wake.
“Hey, no, I know,” Buck says, hooking his ankle around the chair beside Eddie’s and tugging it out from the table to sit, a tangle of limbs and long lines. He takes Eddie’s hand, the one not holding his spoon, and laces their fingers together, criss-cross. “Sorry. Bad joke.”
“Yeah, well,” Eddie manages to say, and thunks their foreheads together, just this side of too rough, and folded into a pair of Captain America socks in the corner of Eddie’s dresser is a velvet box he hasn’t opened since the day he bought it, three weeks ago, and every time he’s looked at Buck since those words have sat, tingling, jostling like horses out from the starting gate, on his tongue. Every touch, every glance, feels like he’s giving it away but Buck carries on, oblivious, or otherwise a very good liar, and the racing in his coltish heart dies down, just a little, enough to tilt his head and press the corners of their mouths together like the dog-eared page of a book Eddie already knows the ending to. “What’s new?” he asks against Buck’s lips and feels, more than sees, Buck’s grin.
“Oh, I see how it is. Just for that,” and Buck pokes him in the arm, “you can take the next PTA meeting.”
“Ouch.”
“You have no idea.”
I do have some idea, Eddie wants to say, but the words get stuck somewhere in his throat. I do have some idea because for years I went to those meetings alone, and I sent Chris to school with store-bought sugar cookies I read the allergen notice on ten times before buying, and I didn’t think about all the pieces in my life that were missing until you filled them without question. Until you brought home baking powder and almond meal and cooking chocolate and desiccated coconut and showed me how to fold in the flour, your hand over mine on the wooden spoon. Until you kissed me in our kitchen, choc chip batter in your hair, and clutched at my elbows so tight you creased my shirt.
“Hey,” Buck says, in that same kitchen, pressing his knee into Eddie’s like it belongs there, “where’d you go?”
Home, Eddie wants to say. “Nowhere. Just thinking.” Buck hmms. His hair looks blonde and so fine, like Christopher’s, in the stuttering filtered sunlight. “You want the rest of my cereal?”
They do bring the grocery list with them to work, tucked securely inside the leaves of Buck’s wallet. Eddie drives, for a change, tapping out Kendrick on the steering wheel. Buck sneaks in a nap, head pillowed against a folded sweatshirt he’d dug up from the backseat, and Eddie spins the volume dial down low. Buck’s hand is splayed on his thigh, knuckles dry and on their way to cracking. Eddie imagines the ring, silver and simple, picked out by Christopher, against Buck’s pale skin.
The shift goes easily enough. A couple house fires, a dog stuck beneath a porch. Lucky, three-legged, one-eared: Buck cradles her to his chest as she’s pulled gently from the crawlspace, scratching her under the chin and making soft cooing noises that do really weird fucking things to Eddie’s chest. Chim nudges him, none too gently, in the side. “You’re making googly eyes,” he notes, disgusted, but Eddie can’t bring himself to care.
The ring, the ring, he thinks, as Buck kisses Lucky’s brown-spotted snout.
Bobby starts on a stir fry for lunch once they get back from the call and sets Buck on the carrots. Eddie should probably go take a nap, or work out, or call Carla, or work on the half-written proposal speech in the notes app on his phone, the sixth version of it since he bought the ring.
But Buck is talking to Bobby about mushroom spores, and pressing the gills flat onto paper to make a print to tell if it’s poisonous or not, and Eddie finds himself on one of the stools at the kitchen counter instead, resting his chin on his hand and his elbow on the countertop and he probably couldn’t look more lovesick if he tried.
“Hey, Eds, we should get some broccolini later,” Buck says over his shoulder as he peels. “There’s this butter and white wine sauce I wanna try.”
“Sounds good.” Bobby gives Eddie a look over the rice cooker. “Hey, you need me to do anything, Cap?”
“Nice of you to ask,” Bobby replies dryly. “There’s some bok choy that needs rinsing.”
“I can do that.” Buck makes room for Eddie by the sink. He flicks on the faucet and runs the leaves under, pulling each stem apart piece by piece. They knock elbows and Buck grins at him.
Bobby flicks on the radio. A strong synthesiser beat begins to play, nigglingly familiar. Buck begins to hum along, endearingly tone-deaf, and it hits Eddie: Sweet Dreams by the Eurythmics. Adriana would blast it from her room while studying until their mom almost had to knock down the door.
“I travel the world and the seven seas,” Buck croons, terribly, switching the peeler for a knife and beginning to julienne the carrots.
“I’d stick to the humming.”
“Yeah?” And the look Buck gives him is not much different to any other look Buck’s given him but it cuts Eddie at the kneecaps all the same. It’s mid-afternoon. Bobby is two feet away slicing the beef to stir fry and Hen is over on the couch reading her textbook. Buck is in his LAFD tee and there’s a tiny nick in the divot of his chin from shaving in their bathroom this morning, because Eddie had bumped his elbow while brushing his teeth and kissed his apologies into his skin, profusely. They’re going grocery shopping after their 24-hour because Buck is the type of person to make grocery lists and Eddie will sneak in the sugary cereal he pretends Chris likes but they both know Eddie’s the one who eats it and Buck will roll his eyes but he’ll let him, and they’ll spend five minutes in the long-life milk section while Buck debates over the sale prices of different brands of oat milk before getting the same one he always gets and Eddie won’t say a word about it, and they’ll drive home with their groceries packed neatly into their green reusable bags and at every red light Buck will lean over the gearshift to kiss Eddie on the cheek because it’s been 24 hours and they’re still so in love they’re stupid with it. And they’ll go to sleep on the bed Buck lugged over from the loft when he first moved in, made up with the forest-green sheets Eddie picked out from Bed Bath & Beyond, and in the afternoon they’ll pick up Christopher and take him out for a late lunch and Eddie will order Buck’s caramel oat latte and they’ll talk about Percy Jackson over their tuna melts. And in the evening Buck will lean into Eddie on the couch and drool a little on his sleep-shirt in front of a movie neither of them end up watching, and Buck will slip in his mouthguard before they fall asleep and in the morning they’ll wake up tangled together and do it all over again.
And there’s a velvet box in the corner of Eddie’s dresser and Buck is looking at him like he has no idea about the words pushing against the roof of Eddie’s mouth and it’s been three weeks and he had vague plans for a beachside picnic or a candlelight dinner or a sunrise hike and his speech is barely half-written, half a million drafted ways to say I love you.
And Buck is looking at him, knife in hand, poised over the sliced carrot, and he has their grocery list tucked inside his wallet beside Christopher’s last school photo and his licence with a change of address sticker plastered on the back.
“I love you,” Eddie says, and out of the corner of his eye sees Bobby pause, mid-slice, over the beef.
Buck squints at him. “…I love you too?”
There’s a lone bread tie on the counter. Eddie picks it up, twists the plastic-coated wire into a loop, and Buck’s eyes go wide like Bambi.
“This is, um, temporary,” Eddie says, and hopes to God nothing unsanitary is spilled on the tiled floor as he gets down on one knee, “I swear I have the real thing at home and I was waiting for the right time but—every time’s the right time with you, Evan, because it’s you, and you’re right for me.”
Buck has, thankfully, put down the knife.
“I don’t really—know what else to say, except that I love you, I’ve been loving you, and I kind of want to keep doing it forever. If you’ll have me.”
“Eddie.” Buck’s eyes are shiny, and Bobby is definitely filming this behind them, and Eddie’s knee is getting sore. “You actually have to ask.”
“I know that,” Eddie, who had, in fact, forgotten, says. “Evan—Buck. Will you marry me?”
Buck’s yes is almost drowned out by Chimney’s hollering from the loft staircase, by Hen’s cheers at the dining table, by Bobby’s quiet, shaking sobbing right behind them, but Eddie hears it clear as a bell. He lets Buck pull him to his feet: those hands, so big, so steady, those hands which have built their life together brick by brick. The bread tie fits when he slides it on and then Buck’s kissing him, urgent and fierce and blinding, and Eddie’s chest is heaving, the kiss leaving him breathless, and he thinks, bizarrely—although maybe not, maybe not at all—that they’ll need to add champagne to the grocery list.
blakekathryn
dededos
germansingergirl
origamiaround
stormborns
turnnoffyourmind
