Summary: You and Tucker break up when the burnout of senior year leaves you both running on empty. But a coordinated trap set by his starving roommates forces you two to finally admit how much you need each other.
Angst to fluff
Warnings: Not proofread yet, a little spoiler if you didn't read the books, cursing, breakup, emotional exhaustion, New Adult audience
A/N: I said I would lock in and study but I just can't help myself 😭 I can't wait for Tucker's season!!! I love all of the characters but now that I think abt it, Dean and Tucker are my favourites. As always, this fic is based more on the books than the show. I hope you like it!! Feedback is much appreciated. Take care of yourselves xx Lots of love 🫶🏻
Words:
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When you first started dating John Tucker, it felt like finding a quiet, solid harbor in the middle of a Category 5 hurricane. You hadn't just fallen for the sweet, fiercely patient guy with the auburn hair and the slow, intoxicating southern drawl—you had essentially inherited his entire chaotic world.
Tucker was the undisputed anchor of the Briar hockey house. He firmly believed that being a team player was just as critical off the ice as it was on it. By default, he was the resident cook, the guy who cleaned up the post-party messes, and the one who quietly kept his three massive, hyperactive roommates from burning their townhouse to the ground.
You fell into step beside him so naturally it felt predestined. When he was fixing a broken railing on the porch, you were sitting on the steps handing him the screws. When he was cooking his legendary, carb-heavy meals for the guys, you were perched on the kitchen island, chopping vegetables.
You became the "Mom" to his "Dad." At first, playing house was a massive turn-on. There was something undeniably hot about domesticity when it was mixed with the raw, adrenaline-fueled energy of a D1 athlete. You’d help him organize the pantry, and he’d reward you by backing you against the wall, his callused hands gripping your thighs to lift you against his chest the second Garrett, Logan, and Dean left for gym. You loved him, and because you loved him, you took on his burdens.
But as the brutal New England winter thawed into spring, that shared weight stopped feeling like a partnership. It started feeling like a noose.
Senior year was a meat grinder. Tucker was quietly suffocating under the anxiety of his future, agonizing over whether to move back to Texas to take care of his mother, or risk his dad's insurance money to start a business in Boston. You were buried under the crushing, soul-sucking pressure of your final exams and post-grad panic.
You were both running on fumes, completely depleted. Instead of leaning on each other for comfort, you started treating each other like just another exhausting obligation on a never-ending to-do list.
The casual touches stopped. The sex evaporated, replaced by the sheer necessity of sleep. You were two ghosts haunting the same kitchen.
Tucker was standing at the stove, aggressively stirring a pot of marinara sauce. The muscles in his broad back were visibly knotted beneath his gray t-shirt. You were sitting at the kitchen table, staring blankly at your laptop screen, a dull, throbbing headache pounding behind your eyes from too much caffeine and not enough sleep. The silence between you was so thick it felt toxic.
"Can you hand me the garlic powder?" Tucker asked. His signature southern drawl, usually so warm and rich, was clipped and hollowed out.
You blinked, dragging your burning eyes away from your thesis paper, and blindly reached across the counter for the spice rack. Your sleeve caught the edge of a glass olive oil bottle. It tipped, fell, and shattered against the tile floor, sending a slick puddle of oil and jagged shards of glass across the grout.
You squeezed your eyes shut, letting out a ragged, trembling breath. "Shit. I'm sorry."
"Jesus Christ, Y/N," Tucker groaned. He dropped his wooden spoon against the stove with a loud clatter and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Just... leave it. I'll clean it up. Like I clean up everything else."
The profound unfairness of the comment felt like a physical slap to the face. Your eyes snapped open, a hot, defensive spark of rage overriding your exhaustion.
"Excuse me?" you snapped, pushing your chair back so hard it screeched against the floor. "I spent three hours this morning doing the laundry you and Logan left piled in the hallway. I scrubbed the bathrooms yesterday so you wouldn't have to. Don't stand there and act like you're the only one keeping this place afloat."
Tucker whipped around, his brown eyes suddenly flashing with a raw, desperate anger. "I'm the only one holding us afloat! I am fucking exhausted, Y/N. I'm trying to figure out my entire goddamn future, I'm trying to keep this house from falling apart, and every time I look at you lately, you're a million miles away. It's like you don't even want to be here anymore!"
"Because I'm fucking tired, Tuck!" you yelled, your voice breaking as hot tears of sheer frustration flooded your vision. "I am so damn tired of being the caretaker! I'm tired of pouring everything I have into you and your friends and getting absolutely nothing back! If looking at me is so exhausting for you, then why am I even here?"
Tucker stared at you. His broad chest heaved with heavy, labored breaths. And then, the most terrifying thing happened.
The anger completely drained out of his face.
It was replaced by a hollow, devastating emptiness. The fight just left his body. He leaned back against the counter, looking at you like he was staring at a stranger.
"I don't know anymore," he whispered. His voice was completely broken. "I don't have anything left to give you. I'm empty. Maybe you shouldn't be here."
The words paralyzed you. He wasn't yelling. He wasn't fighting for you. He was just... letting you go. He was too tired to hold on.
A cold, protective numbness washed over your shattering heart. You closed your laptop, shoved it into your tote bag, and grabbed your coat off the back of the chair.
You walked down the hallway, your vision swimming.
Just as you reached the entryway, the front door swung open. Dean and Logan ambled inside, laughing loudly about something Coach had said at practice. Dean kicked off his sneakers, taking a deep, appreciative breath of the air.
"Oh, thank God. Smells like chicken parm," Dean said, his signature cocky grin spreading across his face as he dropped his heavy hockey bag to the floor. "Hey, Y/N/N. What time is dinner?"
You pulled your coat on, refusing to wipe your eyes. You looked dead at him, your voice dripping with cold, bitter heartbreak.
"Ask Tucker," you rasped. "I quit."
You walked out into the freezing night air, letting the heavy front door slam shut behind you.
Dean blinked, his grin slowly fading as he turned his head to look at Logan.
"Did she just..." Dean trailed off, the reality of your shattered voice finally cutting through his oblivion.
Logan winced, staring at the closed door. "Yeah, dude. I think Mom and Dad just called it."
For five days, the fallout of the breakup played out in two different apartments, mirroring each other in a devastating, silent tragedy. You and Tucker hadn't just broken up—you had both completely flatlined.
At Hannah and Allie’s dorm room, you had become a ghost haunting their hand-me-down couch. You hadn't showered in three days. You wore an oversized Briar Hockey hoodie that still faintly smelled of sandalwood and citrus, pulling it up over your nose every time your chest seized with another panic attack. You dragged your heavy textbooks onto the cushions with you, but you hadn't turned a single page.
Hannah tried everything. She brewed endless cups of tea and gently rubbed your back while you stared blankly at the wall. Allie took a fiercer approach, bringing over tequila and loudly threatening to march over to the guys' house and slash Tucker's truck tires.
But neither tactic worked. If you spoke the words out loud—if you admitted that the safest, most solid guy you had ever known had looked at you with utter defeat and let you walk away—it would make it real. And you weren't ready to live in a reality where John Tucker didn't want to be with you anymore.
Across campus, the house was suffering an identical, agonizing death.
Without Tucker functioning as the beating heart of the house, the ecosystem had violently collapsed. But it wasn't the towering stack of pizza boxes on the coffee table or the unwashed laundry spilling into the hallway that had Garrett, Logan, and Dean on edge. It was the absolute, hollowed-out shell of their best friend.
Tucker was drowning, and he was taking himself down quietly. He hadn't turned on the stove since the night you walked out. His bed felt massive and freezing without you curled against his chest. To escape the suffocating silence of his room, he punished himself at the rink. He woke up before dawn to run brutal suicide sprints, hit the boards with an aggression that had Coach Jensen screaming at him, and then came home just to stare at the spot on the kitchen tile where the olive oil bottle had shattered.
He had failed you. That thought looped in his head like a sick, twisted mantra. He was supposed to ease your load, and instead, he had been the one to finally break you.
By day five, your friends decided they had seen enough collateral damage. A secret meeting was called to order in a back booth at Malone's.
Garrett, Logan, and Dean were crammed into one side of the sticky vinyl booth. Hannah and Allie sat opposite them.
Dean was aggressively eating a stack of pancakes, inhaling them like a man who had been wandering the desert for forty days.
"Slow down, Dean, you're going to choke," Allie muttered, sliding her coffee cup out of the splash zone.
"I can't," Dean mumbled around a massive mouthful of syrup and carbs. "Tuck hasn't cooked a single meal since Thursday. We've been living on dry Cheerios and protein powder. My body is cannibalizing its own muscles, Allie-Cat. I'm wasting away."
"You're fine," Garrett sighed, unapologetically stealing a piece of bacon right off Dean's plate. Garrett looked across the table at Hannah, his dark eyes dead serious. "What's the status on Y/N? Because if I have to watch Tucker stare blankly at the wall for one more day, I'm going to lose my fucking mind. He's a ghost, Wellsy."
"Y/N isn't any better," Hannah reported quietly, wrapping her hands around her warm mug. "She's practically fused to our couch. She won't talk about what happened. If Allie or I even say his name, she just pulls the blanket over her head and pretends to sleep."
"We tried to get Tuck to talk, too," Logan chimed in, leaning forward. "He just told us to drop it. They're both completely shut down."
"Because they're both too damn stubborn," Allie said, crossing her arms over her chest as she looked between the three massive hockey players. "If we confront them, they'll just get defensive and dig their heels in. We have to be sneaky about this."
Garrett leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "Allie's right. An intervention won't work. We can't force them to talk to us. We have to force them to talk to each other."
"How?" Logan asked, raising an eyebrow. "They're actively avoiding each other. Y/N even changed her route to class so she wouldn't have to walk past the ice arena."
"Think about it," Hannah said, a slow, wicked smile spreading across her face as she looked at Garrett. "What is the core issue here? They're both caretakers. They spent the entire year playing Mom and Dad to you guys. When things got hard, they stopped taking care of each other."
Dean swallowed his pancakes, his green eyes lighting up with realization. "So... we give them something to take care of."
Garrett grinned, tapping his knuckles against the diner table. "Exactly. We manufacture a crisis. Something so chaotic that their instincts override their stubbornness, and they have to team up to fix it."
The plan was executed with military precision.
Tucker was at the gym, violently punishing a heavy bag until his knuckles were bruised and aching beneath his wraps. He was trying to outrun the suffocating emptiness that had swallowed him whole, but it wasn't working. Without you to take care of, he had no idea what to do with his hands.
His phone vibrated furiously in his gym bag. He ignored it. Ten seconds later, it aggressively buzzed again. Then again. Cursing under his breath, he finally tore his gloves off and swiped the screen open to see three frantic texts from Logan.
Logan: WE HAVE A SITUATION.
Logan: DEAN TRIED TO USE THE STOVE. THE KITCHEN IS LITERALLY SMOKING.
Logan: GET HOME NOW.
Tucker’s heart plummeted straight into his stomach. Dean was a disaster in the kitchen on a good day. Tucker grabbed his keys and sprinted out to his truck, breaking at least three speed limits on the drive back to the house.
Meanwhile, across campus, you were buried under your fleece blanket on Allie’s couch, staring blankly at the wall, when your phone started ringing.
"Hello?" you answered, your voice thick and raspy from disuse.
"Y/N, thank God!" Allie yelled through the speaker. She sounded completely out of breath and bordering on hysterical. "You have to get to the house right now!"
You sat up so fast your head spun, the protective numbness instantly vaporizing. "Allie, what's wrong? Is someone hurt?"
"Dean decided he was tired of starving and tried to cook dinner!" Allie shouted, the shrill, piercing sound of a beeping smoke detector echoing faintly in the background. "There is smoke everywhere! Logan is panicking, Garrett can't find the fire extinguisher, and Tucker isn't answering his phone! You have to come help us!"
"I'm on my way!" you yelled, throwing the blanket off and shoving your bare feet into your boots. Your "Mom" instincts completely overrode your heartbreak. You didn't even bother grabbing a real coat, sprinting out the door in your oversized Briar Hockey sweatshirt.
Ten minutes later you slammed your car into park, ran up the front steps, and shoved the heavy wooden door open.
"Allie?!" you yelled, coughing as a faint, bitter haze of smoke drifted down the hallway.
You rounded the corner into the kitchen and stopped dead in your tracks.
The room was an absolute biohazard. A thick layer of white flour was dusted over every visible surface like snow. A pot was boiling over on the stove, hissing aggressively as starchy water hit the hot coils. The smoke detector had been ripped off the ceiling and was sitting on the island, its battery completely removed.
But there was no Allie. No Dean. No Garrett or Logan.
The only person in the kitchen was John Tucker.
He was standing in the center of the chaos, still wearing his sweaty gym clothes, staring at the boiling pot with utter, unfiltered confusion. He whipped his head around when he heard you gasp.
"Y/N?" Tucker breathed, his bloodshot brown eyes going wide.
"Where are they?" you demanded, your heart hammering violently against your ribs as you scanned the empty room. "Allie called me, she said there was a fire—"
"Logan texted me," Tucker interrupted, taking a cautious step toward you. His deep southern drawl was rough and entirely bewildered. "He said Dean was burning the house down."
You both froze.
You looked at the empty kitchen. You looked at the perfectly dismantled smoke detector. You listened to the absolute, unnatural silence radiating from the rest of the house.
"Those motherfuckers," Tucker breathed, dragging a heavy hand down his face as the realization hit him.
You let out a shaky, jagged exhale, leaning back against the doorframe as the adrenaline violently crashed out of your system. You had been set up. The boys weren't starving, the house wasn't burning down, and there was no emergency. Your friends had orchestrated a highly coordinated, incredibly cruel trap.
Tucker walked over to the stove, his broad back stiff as he clicked the burner off and dragged the hissing pot to a cool coil. The kitchen fell into a heavy, suffocating silence.
For the first time in six agonizing days, you were really looking at him.
He looked terrible. The shadows under his eyes were bruised and purple, his auburn hair was a sweaty mess, and he carried a rigid, defensive posture that absolutely shattered your heart. He looked like a man who had lost everything.
He grabbed a dish towel, keeping his eyes glued to the flour-covered counter. "I'll clean this up," he muttered, his voice sounding hollow and completely defeated. "You can go back to Allie's."
"Tuck..." you whispered.
"I mean it, Y/N," he rasped, aggressively wiping at the flour. His knuckles were turning stark white. He wouldn't look at you. "I know you don't want to be here. You don't have to stay just because they tricked you."
You watched him frantically scrub the counter, your chest physically aching. The anger and resentment that had fueled you for the past week completely evaporated, leaving only a profound, desperate sadness. You realized then what Hannah and Garrett had figured out days ago. You both had hard exteriors, but inside you were soft. You were both so damn busy trying to hold the house together for everyone else that you let yourselves fall apart.
You walked forward, your boots stepping over a stray piece of burnt pasta on the floor, reaching for the roll of paper towels sitting on the kitchen island. You tore off a handful, wet them under the faucet, and stepped right up beside him.
In absolute, suffocating silence, you started wiping the flour off the counter next to where he was frantically scrubbing.
Tucker went completely rigid. The aggressive motion of his hands stopped instantly. He stared at your smaller hand moving in sync with his, his broad chest rising and falling with ragged, uneven breaths.
The silence stretched, heavy and agonizing, broken only by the hiss of the cooling stove.
"I love you."
The words were so quiet, so raw, they almost didn't register. Your hand froze on the counter. You slowly turned your head to look at him, your heart completely dropping into your stomach.
He had never said those words to you before.
Tucker finally looked up.
"I love you," he repeated, his signature southern drawl thick and trembling. "I realized it a couple of weeks ago. And it terrified the absolute shit out of me."
"Tuck..." you whispered, your throat painfully tight.
"I'm supposed to have a plan, Y/N," he choked out, swiping a shaky hand across his jaw. "I've been saving my dad's insurance money for years. But graduation is right there, and I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. If I move back to Patterson to take care of my mom, I lose you. If I stay in Boston and try to start a business, I have no idea if it's going to fail. I felt like I was drowning in all this uncertainty, and I..."
He swallowed hard, looking at you with complete, heartbreaking defeat.
"I didn't know how to integrate you into a future I hadn't even figured out yet. You work so hard, and you have all these goals, and I was so scared of dragging you down into my mess that I panicked. I pushed you away."
"You idiot," you cried softly, the hot tears you had been holding back for six days finally spilling over your lashes. You dropped the paper towels and turned fully toward him. "You don't have to have it all figured out. Nobody has it figured out."
"I'm supposed to be the one who fixes things," he rasped, his voice breaking. "And I was so terrified I was failing you."
"You never failed me," you whispered, stepping into his space and resting your trembling hands flat against his broad, tense chest. "And you aren't dragging me down. I don't care if we're in Boston or Texas. I don't care if your business plan takes years to figure out. I don't need a perfect plan, Tuck. I just need you."
A jagged, shuddering breath tore out of Tucker's chest.
He closed the distance between you in a heartbeat, wrapping his massive arms around your waist and burying his face deep into the crook of your neck. He held you so tight it bruised, lifting you slightly off your feet as his large frame collapsed against you.
"I can't breathe without you," he confessed, the words vibrating fiercely against your skin. "Don't leave me again. Please, darlin', don't walk out that door again."
"I'm right here," you promised, wrapping your arms around his neck and pressing your tear-stained cheek against his temple. You buried your fingers in his auburn hair, holding him just as desperately. "I'm not going anywhere."
The Mom and Dad of the house were finally going to be okay.
Princess Haalah al-Noor bint Hashim and Princess Rayet al-Noor bint Hashim arriving at the Zahran Palace in Amman with their cousins for the wedding of their cousin Crown Prince Hussein of Jordan to Rajwa Al Saif on 1 June 2023 ✨
29 March 2026: King Abdullah II received Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and discussed the current developments in the region.
His Majesty reiterated his condemnation of Iran’s ongoing attacks on Jordan and a number of Arab countries, emphasising the need to respect the sovereignty of states and to step up international efforts to achieve comprehensive and sustainable de-escalation through diplomatic channels.
The King warned of the dangers of prolonging the conflict and exacerbating the economic burden on the region and the world.
The meeting also touched on Jordanian-Ukrainian ties, as well as ways to strengthen them.
For his part, the Ukrainian president condemned the attacks on Jordan and other countries in the region, stressing the need to restore stability in the Middle East.
Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Maj. Gen. Yousef Huneiti, Director of the Office of His Majesty Alaa Batayneh, and the accompanying Ukrainian delegation attended the meeting.
13 April 2026: King Abdullah II, during a meeting attended by Crown Prince Hussein, reviewed the government’s progress in implementing the roadmap for public sector modernisation.
During the meeting with Prime Minister Jafar Hassan and a number of government officials, His Majesty urged utilising technology to modernise public sector institutions and improve their performance in serving citizens and investors.
The King was briefed on key achievements of the first phase of the executive programme (2022-2025), including expansion of digital government services and the opening of 13 comprehensive government service centres in several governorates.
His Majesty was also updated on the government’s plan to launch the National Academy for Public Administration, which will serve as the leading body for developing public sector capabilities, replacing the Institute of Public Administration.
In this context, the King called for the continued development of civil service appointment mechanisms, underscoring the importance of creating an environment that attracts skilled and talented individuals, within a framework based on transparency, fairness, and performance-based career progression.
His Majesty listened to a briefing by Minister of State for Public Sector Development Badriya Al Balbisi, during which she noted that the executive programme’s second phase (2026-2029) focuses on expanding the scope of implementation to include municipalities, increasing reliance on modern technologies to enhance the efficiency of public sector performance and expenditure, and improving the quality of services provided to citizens.
Director of the Office of His Majesty Alaa Batayneh, and Minister of Digital Economy and Entrepreneurship Sami Smeirat attended the meeting.
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