juice - 27 - they/he/whatever - main @jostxn - 911 sideblog so i dont annoy ppl i know irl - also i write stuff on AO3 so i guess if you like that its @slowmohomos
hello 911 tumblr <3 ive been slightly hesitant to join any of the fandom here bc of bad behavior on both sides of bucktommy v. buddie but im pulling the trigger and getting my ass on here if only so i can have a place to reblog shit without worrying about annoying my irl friends on my main.
this is link to my profile on AO3 - i currently have eight 911 fics posted and like 10 wips percolating for constant thinking about while im at work. this is listed in chrono order of posting, and is all bucktommy for now (mostly oneshots bc i can't write more than one chapter to save my own goddamn life). i will do my best to update as i post!
lay me out across the grey - 3,839 words, 1/1 chapters, post-lightning nightmares + bucktommy and bathena
Buck's not the only one that struggles after his own near-death experiences.
i will not doubt you - 2,685 words, 1/1 chapters, breakfast date chatting + bucktommy
Tommy picks Evan up for their fourth official date at 10am sharp.
He's not nervous, obviously.
just walk, don't run - 3,201 words, 1/1 chapters, minor injury and comfort, Tommy POV + bucktommy, pt 1 of take a walk around the block again
"-live from the scene of this four-alarm fire in South Glendale, where first responders have evacuated the building and fighting to keep the blaze under control. Sources say that arson may be suspected-"
"Whoa, Tommy, look, it's your boy!"
just me and the moon and the long night - 3,814 words, 1/1 chapters, break-up/make-up, Buck POV + bucktommy, pt 1 of you look like you love me
A few hours after Eddie pulls away in the U-Haul, Texas bound, Buck does something stupid.
and baby, i don't blame you - 4,926 words, 1/1 chapters, break-up/make-up, Tommy POV + bucktommy, pt 2 of you look like you love me
It's been three goddamn months. It was supposed to hurt less this way. It doesn't make sense that he could've fallen so hard for Evan in the span of six months.
are you with me? - 6,456 words, 1/1 chapters, minor injury and comfort, Buck POV + bucktommy, pt 2 of take a walk around the block again
The next thing he remembers, Buck is on the ground. His head throbs, the morning sun terrible and blinding, and his face feels wetter, something hotter than sweat smearing over his cheek and chin.
half a mile and we'll see the shore - 6,993 words, 1/1 chapters, minor injury, getting back together, bucktommy
Dr. Copeland is gonna be pissed. Actually, she'll just be sorely disappointed, but she'll take every pain to reassure him that 'healing isn't linear' and 'sometimes, we fall into old coping mechanisms even when we know better' and 'you're going through a hard time right now, Buck, it makes sense.'
this is good land, or at least it was - 6,861 words, 1/1 chapters, post-lawsuit resolution/alternate meeting, bobby+buck and minor bucktommy
Buck waits until end of shift. The faster he can get out of the building after this conversation, the faster he can get back to the loft and cry himself to sleep in his pillow. Not that he's thinking it'll be a conversation, mind you - Bobby's said less than five words to him in the last week, and he doesn't think it passed twenty in the last three he's been stuck man behind. And anyway, as much as he likes to babble, he's gonna do his damnedest to keep it short and sweet. Hand over the paperwork, apologize, and escape.
a couple weeks after the funeral, buck writes tommy a letter. well. he writes a few. the first draft is stiff. the second isn’t much better. the third is basically his heart bleeding out on paper. the fourth also is not much better. the fifth is angry. the sixth is a blank page that he crumples before even trying to write anything. a few days later, after a long hike and a drive along the coast and a shift that’s just really fucking wrong, he gets it right in draft seven.
or so he thinks.
tommy’s house is dark and his truck isn’t in the driveway when buck stops by and drops the envelope in tommy’s flip-top mailbox beside his front door. just as well, buck thinks. if he had to go off-script because tommy suddenly appeared and said hello, there’s no telling how bad he’d mess things up. this way, he’s said what he means and means what he said, and he can live with that.
except: there’s no word from tommy the next day, or the next, or by the end of the week.
or by the end of the month.
or by buck’s birthday.
or by tommy’s.
or by buck’s birthday again.
a lot can change in a year, he reasons as he tries to smile when maddie and theo carefully carry in a cake with 35 lit candles on it and place it in front of him.
19 days later, he’s in the middle of making apple-cinnamon pancakes for breakfast for theo and himself when there’s an insistent knock at the front door.
his heart catches in his throat when he’s trying to wash off batter he’d sloshed on his hands and the knocking stops and he hears theo yell, “who are you?”
“theo!” buck calls, wiping his trembling hands on his apron. “what did i say about opening the—”
there, in the doorway, staring bewildered at theo in dinosaur pajamas, is the familiar figure of tommy kinard.
in the year and change since they’ve seen each other, tommy’s gone a little sharp around the edges, as far as buck can tell. his eyes are a little more worn; there’s more silver at his temples. his tan jacket hangs a little more loosely. he looks uncertainly between theo and buck, nervously crumpling the paper in his hands before jamming it and his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
buck feels like this moment is superimposed over the tommy he remembers from the time he toured harbor, or maybe the other way around. similar outfits, similar gestures, but a chasm of everything between them.
tommy clears his throat. “i can—i’d better go,” he says nervously.
“theo, my dude,” buck says calmly, “how about you go get dressed, then we’ll have some breakfast?”
theo fixes him with a mulish expression.
“it’s apple cinnamon pancakes,” buck negotiates. theo stares. buck sighs. “you can have whipped cream from the can.”
theo grins impishly. “deal.” he sticks a—aw, gross—sticky hand out for buck to shake, then runs off to change.
“and please wash your hands,” buck calls after him, cringing when he registers the wheedling note in his voice and remembers his visitor.
he’s angry, he wants, he wants to cry, he wants to slam the door in tommy’s face ‘cause where does he get off showing up here after a year of radio silence, he wants to smooth tommy’s creases and anxious edges under his hands and lean in and see if he still smells the same.
“i’ll, uh, i’m sorry for disrupting your morning routine,” tommy says as he shifts from one foot to the other. “i didn’t—i didn’t know. you didn’t mention it.” he pulls the paper he’d been fretting with back out of his pocket. “i got your letter, but i don’t know…”
“my letter?” buck breathes through a wave of nausea. “tommy, that—that was a year ago, i don’t—”
“MISTER POOP, THE PANCAKES ARE SMOKY!”
“shit!” buck exclaims. “can you—will you come in?”
“MISTER POOP SAID A BAD WORD!”
“how—never mind,” buck groans. “will you get in here?”
tommy hesitates. “evan, i don’t want to get in the way, if you—if you have people over.”
if you’ve moved on, says the tilt of his head and the emotion in his eyes.
“MISTER POOP!”
“i thought he’d gotten over that,” buck mutters. “tommy, it’s good to see you, but are you in or out? i have to—just—”
tommy gulps. “i’m in.”
“BUCK!”
“got it, thee-bee, hold your horses,” buck says as he strides toward the kitchen. to his relief, he hears the front door close, then careful footsteps follow the sound of chaos into the kitchen.
over breakfast, theo makes a fast friend in tommy, who, to buck’s chagrin and delight, is still so cool. he learns that in the past year, tommy has traded his coffee habit for a tea habit, grown a bumper crop of potatoes, and, oh, by the way, been working some out-of-town desk job for the state forestry service, of all things.
“you’re not—you’re not flying?” buck gasps after he manages to reroute a mouthful of pancakes down the correct pipe.
“flying?” theo shrieks, waving his fork in the air. “you can fly? oh! you’re tommy?”
tommy chuckles, keeping it light, but a shadow crosses his still-, always-beautiful face. “yeah, kiddo, that’s me. though i don’t do much flying these days.”
buck’s blood runs cold; he’s lost his appetite.
theo doesn’t drop it. “why not?”
tommy smiles sadly. “it’s complicated.”
theo scowls. “comple-cated.” he pushes a pancake around. “grown-ups is always comple-cated. is there anything not comple-cated when you’re a grown-up?”
tommy hums. “a few things.” he looks at buck then, eyes bright and jaws clenched. “but probably not as much as we’d want.”
“that’s dumb,” theo grumbles.
“theo,” buck warns without any heat.
theo burps. “can, i mean, may i be excused to go make my bed now?”
buck signs fondly. this kid. “wash your hands and face first?”
theo nods soundly. “you got it, dude!” he clambers out of his chair and hops over to tommy. “nice to meet you, poop king!”
“sorry about him,” buck says reflexively. he stands to clear the table. theo usually helps by carrying his own plate to the sink, but—today’s a special occasion, buck reasons.
“no, he’s—” tommy laughs softly. “he’s something else.” a beat passes, then suddenly, he’s beside buck, standing by the kitchen sink. “is he—”
buck ensures the stopper’s in place, then squirts soap into the sink and turns on the faucet. “it’s been a helluva year, tommy.”
tommy lets out a tiny pained noise and slumps against the counter. “a year? i thought—evan, why didn’t you—i don’t know, call, or text?”
buck throws a scrubby wash cloth into the soapy slosh in the sink. “because every time i talked to you, tommy, i hurt you. i couldn’t—i couldn’t trust myself to say the right thing at the right time. so i wrote you a letter. i wrote you a letter a year ago, a few weeks after the—after i saw you last. i wrote you seven letters, and only took the last one to your house because the first six were crap. i don’t—i don’t know why you’re here now, tommy, but i don’t think this is going to work if you’re blaming me for not reaching out the way you wanted me to.”
“i rented out my place,” tommy blurts. he slaps the letter, wrinkled and sweaty, on the counter. “i got in late last night. my mail was forwarded, but…”
“that wasn’t mail,” buck realizes.
tommy smiles ruefully. “after i put clean sheets on my bed last night, i noticed my copy of long dark tea-time of the soul on the nightstand with this marking my tenant’s spot, about 1/3 of the way through.” he shudders through a breath. “i can’t believe—evan, it’s been a year.”
buck’s hands still in the soapy dishwater as he blinks away his own emotions about the past year. his voice is small when he asks, “why didn’t you tell me you were leaving? i would have—i would have wanted to know, tommy. i g-get why you wouldn’t, after e-everything. but i wanted to know.”
“i sent you a text, evan,” tommy says gently, maybe more gently than either of them deserve, or maybe just-right. “but i see now, maybe it was just another thing. too much.”
“not—not too much,” buck contests, shaking his head. his shoulders slump. “just—”
tommy digs the palms and heels of his hands into his eye sockets. buck wonders if his calluses are the same, or if they’ve changed in the past year, like buck has, like they both have.
“yeah,” tommy agrees, muffled behind his wrists.
what a mess, buck laments. what a mess of crossed wires and missed chances and stupid. anger burns behind his breastbone, but it dawns on him that as angry as he is with tommy, and himself, he’s angry most of all about lost time.
the few dishes and utensils he’d dirtied for breakfast rest in the drainer now, and he wipes his hands on his apron. “feel free to say no,” he hedges, “but—would you like to stick around for a while? i’m sure you, uh, you’ve got a lot to do today, now that you’re back in town, but—”
“yeah?” tommy breathes. “yeah, i’d—i’d love that. you’re sure it’s ok, with your, uh, theo?”
buck sighs. in for a penny; in for a pound. “yeah, he, uh, we’re kind of a package deal, now. it’s kind of—”
tommy smiles. “comple-cated?”
buck wonders if tommy’s ever been more attractive. “yeah. comple-cated.”
“i can—well, i want comple-cated,” tommy says earnestly. “with you.”
buck remembers. he remembers it all. but despite everything, he wants tommy more. he always has.
a few hours later, theo’s tired himself out after a rigorous game of—well, buck’s not really sure what, something that was part basketball and part tennis and part being a pirate, and 100% something tommy came up with—and is resting in his room. buck and tommy took the offering of a q-word morning to lay their cards on the table, if not in total, then enough to inform their next steps.
tommy, knowing what it would mean, stayed.
now, buck’s laying out their lunch on the patio table; tommy brings out their drinks.
“it’s funny,” he remarks, wringing his hands once they’re free of cups. “i didn’t think this sort of thing happened in real life.”
he’s nervous. buck wants to hold him. tommy allows it.
“what sort of thing?”
tommy’s laundry detergent is different, but everything else seems to be the same. buck can’t help but sigh deeply, content.
“heh,” tommy squirms. “the letter thing. it sort of reminds me of this one episode of frasier.” before buck can ask, tommy continues, “that’s the one with the pretentious brothers and curmudgeon dad in seattle.”
buck smiles. “and not the show about nothing with the new yorkers.”
“got it in one.”
buck lets the quiet settle for a few moments. “so what happened on frasier?”
tommy sighs. “well, before he moved to seattle, frasier left a letter for his ex-wife, lilith, saying he still loved her. except, the letter fell behind a piece of furniture, and lilith didn’t find it for a year. and in that year, frasier changed. they tried to give it another go—”
buck, recalling the time he and tommy tried to give it another go, says, “they hooked up, didn’t they.”
tommy snorts. “yeah, they hooked up, and lilith says, ‘oh, this is a mistake,’ and frasier runs his mouth about oh, thank goodness, they’re in agreement, it was absolutely a mistake, they’re different people now, they got it out of their system, now they know, that sort of thing. except lilith was talking about the, the eggs or the toast or some mistake with the room service order.”
oh. that’s bad. buck says as much. tommy hums in agreement.
“so? did they ever figure it out? were they endgame?” buck asks, the are we doomed thinly-veiled underneath.
tommy hums non-committally, obviously evading the question. buck huffs with fond annoyance.
“i think we’re more niles and daphne,” tommy murmurs. “i don’t know if you know how much chill i don’t have about you.”
buck does not, in fact, know. “you’ll have to tell me sometime.”
to his surprise, tommy replies, “you might regret that, evan.”
“never,” buck says fiercely, tightening his grip around tommy’s back. “i only regret not having you.”
tommy sags against him in relief.
inside the house, the tell-tale clatter of an awake theo resumes, lively and bright.
it’s not new, what they have, but it’s not what they had before, either.
for the first time in over a year and a half, buck feels like he can really breathe.
hiiiii screamlet your fic title is: “midnight calls and sunset views”
[another for the made-up fic title ask game]
got away from meeeee. set a few interminate-but-not-too-many months after bobby's funeral, total au of everything. dialogue only, 1.8k, maybe a little too dark thanks to this post. tommy in da torment nexus.
---
"um. hey."
"hey. hey! hey tommy. um. hi. hey. uh. what's. what's going- how are you? what's up? hey, i'm sorry i-"
"it's fine. um. listen. could you. do me a favor."
".............................................. yeah, yeah anything. what's- what can i do for you? i mean finally, i can return the favor, so. what. what is it."
"....... could you, um. could you just talk to me. for a little bit."
".................. okay............ are you............ are you okay?"
"yeah i'm fine, i just need- i just- if you could just talk to me? about anything. doesn't have to be anything, just. anything."
"okay...... um. well. can i ask you questions or-"
"just talk to me."
"okay, okay, i can do that. wow, way to put me on the spot, haha. yeah i can talk. um. so right now, i'm at home- i moved, by the way, over the summer, i've got my own house now! i'm still renting but it's mine, like a lot more mine than- honestly? probably more mine than anywhere i've lived as like, an adult. or ever. like i didn't- you remember i kinda didn't decorate the loft much until- well until you were like, what's a guy gotta do to a get a decorative throw around here, it's COLD, and i run hot, we were also on the fourth floor so heat RISES, but you were cold? and then i got that throw, and i got pillows, and- right, and then i moved into eddie's place and i wasn't there long enough to decorate much. i did unpack, though! i- yeah. you weren't- yeah, i should tell you i did end up unpacking. and then i repacked like, two months later when he and chris moved back to town. they weren't just visiting for the funeral, they moved back. so i packed up, eddie let me stay in the guest bedroom with my stuff in one of those pods outside until i found a new place, and now i'm in a new place and it's great! it's got a big yard and- tommy? you're still there, right? did i actually talk your ear off?"
"i'm listening. you found a new place with a big yard. have you had anyone over?"
"okay. um, yeah, a couple of times! ravi and harry come over, and i babysit jee and the baby- jeez, tommy, do not ask about the baby's name, it's. like i shouldn't because he's my nephew but just- just don't ask."
"i heard. uh. it got posted on one of the LAFD facebook groups. i saw it over someone's shoulder. that's- that's a real fuckin' name."
"yeah. yeah, it's a real fuckin' name. hey, where are you? can i ask about you? what's been up with you?"
"me? what's up with me? um. that's a good question. a great question. such a good question. i... don't know how to answer that."
"okay. did you have a shift today?"
"i did. yeah, i did."
".... did it go okay?"
"it, um. it didn't. it really didn't."
"what happened?"
"well. um. you know how. they're always saying there's like. one more straw? before everything breaks? and today was kinda my- well, it was like. i kept thinking, this is fine, i'm resilient, i'm good, 10 more hours, 5 more hours, 3 more hours, i'm gonna make it- and things kept happening? things- evan, i could not get a fucking win today. and the body count isn't even that high! you'd think i had crashed my helicopter into a stadium full of people or something, but no, it's just........... i couldn't get a win today. not fucking one."
"i'm sorry. i'm so sorry. those days are the worst. the really fucking worst. ...... where are you? can we talk? in person?"
"oh, no, i don't- that's the last thing i want."
"okay. okay maybe, but is it something you need?"
"ha ha. cute. …… i don't know what i need."
"...... where are you, tommy?"
"oh. you can't hear it. yeah, i'm at the beach. fucking hate sand but that's the cost of the ocean, i guess. gotta get through all of this sand just to touch the ocean."
"yeah. yeah, sand sucks. did you go to the beach much as a kid?"
"evan, i didn't do a single fun thing when i was a kid. not one. every day of my kid-life sucked, really fucking sucked."
"hey, mine too!"
"no it didn't."
"no it really did! like the maddie parts were good but they were the only good thing, like the only good thing. my parents were so- like they couldn't decide whether they were terrified of me or hated me, so it was for the best if i wasn't at home a lot. it's why i've never seen any movies or tv! they're teachers, right, so they didn't want me rotting my brain anyway, and if i was inside they'd- i don't know."
"god. what the fuck. why?"
"um. long story. that's an in-person story. a not-today story, for sure, but also an in-person story. what's a thing people eat in soap operas?"
"..... in soap operas?"
"yeah. it's the kind of story you tell with a big glass of wine in your hand and then you're eating something with a fork you can drop dramatically. it's a fork-dropping kind of story. i know exactly the face you'd make. it can't be pizza. a little classier than nachos. something with fries, i think. what were we talking about?"
".... the beach?"
"yeah. you're at the beach? does... does the beach help you feel better? maybe you didn't go as a kid, but maybe you're good with it now? you like it?"
"i don't. not really. but i- sometimes you just want to sit somewhere and feel really small, you know? and then everything feels less big."
"that's. yeah, i get that. i do. ….. can i come see you? hang out at the beach with you?"
"i don't know. um. why- talk to me some more. distract me."
"okay. aren't there a lot of distractions on the beach? well, i guess it's late. it's not super late but i guess people are packing up, going home?"
"yeah, but it wasn't very crowded anyway. i found a quiet spot."
"oh."
"so talk to me."
"yeah. yeah, let me-"
"not a lot going on with you?"
"with me? no, uh. not really. it's been pretty quiet with me. i keep- i think i should get a hobby. or hobbies. you have hobbies. what's something i would like?"
"i don't know. cooking? you liked cooking."
"oh. yeah, i did."
"could try baking."
"… did someone tell you?"
"tell me what? hah. evan. no one from the 118 has talked to me since we broke up. like. no one. like i said, i only knew about howie's kid- your nephew, i guess- from someone else's facebook app. no, no one's told me anything. thanks for saying hi at the funeral, by the way. you were the only one. once i saw no one was going to talk to me i just- bolted. no reason to stay."
"god. tommy, i'm sorry. i- fuck, we should have done things differently. me, everyone. we should have done everything differently."
"yeah. then we wouldn't be here, would we?"
"yeah. but- but listen, maybe we can meet up? you and me? now? it doesn't- it doesn't have to be this way. like we can- we can change anytime we want. that's what i realized, tommy. like. fuck everything. we can do anything we want, anytime we want. who or what is anyone ever waiting for, you know? …………. tommy?"
"… that's. um. that's a really good… good thing to hear. i knew calling you was a good idea. please don't tell me i should have called more."
"i won't. look at me not-saying it. i'm not saying it. i'm not even thinking it."
"alright, don't push it. ……. was the offer serious? about, um. meeting up. you're not… busy?"
"i'm not busy. i'd throw out my calendar for you if it wasn't empty tonight."
"could you pick me up? i took a car here. i didn't come with much."
"yeah. yeah, i'll come get you. stay on the phone, okay?"
"you shouldn't talk and drive, you've seen the PSAs."
"this one time, okay? just this one time. and i'll be careful. talk to me about something boring so i don't get too distracted."
"is that even possible with you?"
"probably not, but. whatever. okay, i'm going. you're not far from my new place, actually."
"oh. that's nice."
"you go to this beach a lot? this quiet beach with no people?"
"not really. i just needed to be outside. and like i said, it's nice to- to sit here and feel like everything can go away. like anything can happen."
"yeah."
"related to your whole we can do anything we want thing."
"yeah. we're not as stuck as we think we are."
"evan, i'm… i'm really glad i finally called you. i knew you were the right person to call."
"yeah?"
"yeah. you've- you've got this thing where- you want so much. but in a good way. do you know how good that is? to want things?"
"is it? i always felt like… like i want too much."
"yeah, people probably say that because they don't remember what it felt like. and who do you think you are, you know? wanting things when you should be happy with what you have. it's- it's so fucking good of you. please don't change that. please."
"… but it feels like… like i don't have enough. like i don't…"
"yeah… yeah i guess."
"but thanks for saying that. i'll remember that. it's- it feels true. ………… do you… want things?"
"… hah. evan. i wanted one very, very specific thing when i called you and now: not so much. it's gone away. now i- i'm really glad i get to see you."
"like 10 more minutes. i told you, super close. for LA, i'm pretty much teleporting."
"twenty minutes. everywhere in LA takes twenty minutes."
"i've seen that movie!!!!!! tommy!!!!! one of my exes LOVED that movie and it's SO GOOD!!!! what's that thing he said, about the rat pack?"
"what's with you, kid? you think the death of sammy davis left an opening in the rat pack?"
"YES!!! who's sammy davis?"
"god, don't even worry about it."
"it's still funny. okay i'm getting there, are you coming to me or am i getting sand in my sneakers?"
"i'll come to you, but. shit, i didn't think about that. i've been sitting in the sand for a while."
"that's fine. i've got a vacuum, car washes exist, whatever. i just didn't want sand on me. okay, i see you. do you see me?"
"yeah. yeah i do. hey heads up i'm going to need…….……… a really big hug. like. biggest you've got. please."
"okay, i'm out of the car, putting my phone down- i'm stretching, see? i got you. i'm ready."
"okay. thank you. um. talk to you- now. yeah. now."
*producer about to make one of the worst seasons of television ever put to screen* surely writing purely in reaction to what the fans are saying on twitter will work out great for us this time
The bar was close enough to walk to. Buck had never been this aware of his body before. They were about the same height and width, so he didn't know why Tommy felt so massive next to him. Their shoulders brushed a few times. Buck's neck was burning at the contact.
Tommy held the door for him and Buck could barely look at him.
”Bar or table?”
”Oh, uh. Do you have a preference?” Buck asked.
”Bar is usually better when you're alone,” Tommy smiled.
”Bar it is!”
At least he wasn't completely clueless when it came to alcohol. When he stopped bartending, he stopped keeping up with the trends, but the classics never really changed. Tommy was a beer guy, which Buck very much was not. He swirled the ice cubes in his drink until they melted, while listening to Tommy talk about beer. Buck was great at taking in information, so he felt like he was back on even keel.
Then Tommy decided to touch Buck's knee, and Buck stopped listening. It was hardly a come on, Tommy was just an enthusiastic storyteller, but Buck looked down and discovered just how close their legs were. He moved his foot a little bit and suddenly his knee was touching Tommy's thigh.
”Am I boring you?”
Buck's head snapped up. ”Not at all!”
Tommy laughed – and touched his knee again. ”Sorry, when I get going, it's–”
”I like it. You're–” Buck gulped his drink. And coughed. ”You're passionate! It's great.”
”Thank you,” Tommy said, more than a little amused. ”What about you? What're you passionate about?”
”Learning,” he grinned. ”I love learning. I had no idea you could age beer like that. With the barrels. Very cool.”
”I feel like you're making fun of me, but I'll take it,” Tommy winked. ”You're not a big drinker?”
”Used to be. Drank a lot in my twenties – too much. I was a bartender for a while and it all just,” he made a pointless gesture, ”lost its appeal. These days, I just want it to taste good.”
”Wise decision.” Tommy emptied his beer and looked at Buck for a second. Before he got the chance to squirm, Tommy asked, ”Your twenties. How long ago was that?”
”Oh, my god,” Buck sputtered. ”How young do I look? I thought the lighting in here was atrocious.”
Tommy giggled and grabbed Buck's thigh for stabilisation. ”Oh, trust me, it's bad, but your face,” he smiled, ”I can't tell.”
”I'm thirty-two,” he almost felt shy saying it.
”Oh,” Tommy's eyebrows went up. ”Straight out of high school, then?”
Buck dissolved into giggles. It wasn't even that funny, but Tommy looked very proud of himself. Buck wiped his eyes. ”Does that ever work?”
”You tell me.”
”Oh, you're horrible.”
Tommy slapped the bartop. ”Alright, Mr Thirty-Two, do you have a better one?”
”No, but that doesn't make yours good!”
”Made you laugh, didn't it?”
”Alright, alright, fair point.” Christ, what did he usually do? He didn't have a go to anymore. He couldn't exactly flex, when Tommy was bigger than him. That wouldn't impress him. Looking at Tommy's shoulders, he might not even be impressed by Buck being a firefighter. ”Hey, what do you do for a living?”
”I'm a pilot.”
Buck threw up his hands. How was he supposed to impress a pilot? That was so hot, what the hell. ”You don't even need lines! Not with all that.”
Tommy smirked. ”All what?”
”You don't get to fish for compliments, looking like that.” Buck downed the last of his drink. ”Pilot? Really?”
”Air Ops with the LAFD. I don't have a cap, if that's what your imagining.”
”Wait, firefighter pilot? That makes us colleagues. I'm with the 118.”
Tommy's face went slack and oddly blank. ”Oh.”
”That's the most ominous sounding oh I've ever heard.”
”Sorry.” Tommy shook his head. ”I've worked at the 118.”
”You have? When?”
”Got out about … eight? Years ago.”
That was an odd way to put it. ”You got out?”
”That house is cursed.”
”Oh, definitely.”
Tommy gave him an up and down look. ”Should've known you were a firefighter with those arms.”
Part of Buck was always going to be sixteen, so he put his glass down and flexed. ”Heavy rescue.”
Tommy was torn between looking and laughing. ”Does that ever work?”
”Every time,” Buck grinned. It did not. ”If you were there before me, do you remember Hen?”
”Henrietta? Yeah, I was there when she was a probie.”
Hen never let Buck full name her. Although, Tommy could call him whatever he wanted and Buck would say thank you.
Buck took a breath.
Did he want to fuck a man?
He looked at Tommy.
He did. Buck very much would like to fuck a man. No, he wanted to fuck Tommy. It had to be Tommy. He glanced at the bartender. Definitely Tommy. Although those slacks looked great on the bartender. Really highlighted how narrow his hips were.
”Evan?”
”Sorry, I was– Sorry. Hi,” he smiled.
”Hi,” Tommy smiled back.
Buck blurted, ”How old are you?”
”Forty-five.”
”Oh, fuck.” Buck covered his mouth, said a muffled, ”Sorry. I don't know why I said that.”
”Sure, kid,” Tommy said and patted him on the leg.
Buck let out a sound halfway between a whimper and a moan. If he wasn't already covering his mouth, it would have been really embarrassing.
”You good?”
I can be so good, Tommy, please, please, please. Buck cleared his throat. ”I'm great.”
Tommy looked between him and the glasses on the bartop. ”Maybe we should find an activity that doesn't involve alcohol.”
It had less to do with the alcohol, and more to do with the fact that Tommy (presumably) had a dick between his legs and Buck didn't know what it looked like. ”A third location? Sounds exciting.”
Tommy shifted on his stool, pulling his wallet from his back pocket. ”You'd be really easy to kidnap,” he said offhanded, as he waved down the bartender.
inspired by your salbucktommy tag in the 'sleeping with da fishes' post: pastry chef buck is facing a lot of evidence that his new job is mayyybe a front for the mob, but on the other hand, it means there's no oversight/restrictions from management on his elaborate and experimental confections - so he's keeping his head down and living his dream. but when sal and tommy start checking in on the place more and more often, he gets a little nervous (turns out they don't care about the margins of the business as much as they both have a sweet tooth, for more than just dessert)
OKAY sorry I took a break from these because I was writing SalPhillip and then this AU about Buck and Tommy meeting in Hershey right before Buck leaves home and them kind of road tripping and falling in love. And then an Eddie/Esteban one that has stalled all the way out. But I'm back!
1. Buck goes through culinary school and resigns himself to rolling out croissants every day in some bakery until he hears from a guy that there's a sudden new opening at this restaurant he can't afford to go to but passes by on his way to his bartending job. He figures it'll be a better start than a fast casual bakery or something, so he shows up and interviews with the bar manager. "Yeah, the owners have some business to take care of," the guy, Chimney, says, snapping his gum. "Show us what you got, kid." And Buck realizes this is a practical interview, and he suddenly forgets every quick but good recipe he's ever learned. Chimney lets him loose in the kitchen, and Buck makes three souffles, because he's not sure what they'll be looking for. He does cheese and leek, chocolate, and lemon. "These are French," Chimney observes, peering at them. "We're an Italian restaurant." "Yeah, well, I'd need more prep time for something more, uh, appropriate," Buck says, scratching his neck. "Also, I'm pretty sure Italian people like souffles, right?" Chimney grins at him and picks up a spoon.
2. So Buck doesn't want to stereotype, but he's pretty sure something weird is going on at his new job. He's met the owners exactly once, they're two guys who wear suits and talk quietly to each other and look around suspiciously before having "business meetings" at the more private corner booth. Chimney and Hen, the head chef, make vague references to the previous pastry chef having been "taken care of" when he left. Buck makes a joke about a customer coming back and killing him because he accidentally put raspberry coulis on their chocolate cake when they'd said on the ticket to not put it anywhere near the dish, and the server comes back and says, "The huge, scary guy at six doesn't like raspberries, dude." When Buck gets a new slice and pointedly skips the coulis the way he should've, he says, "Here, now I won't get shanked in the parking lot." And the server snorts and says, "Yeah, like anyone would fuck with any of the staff here, especially you. Our bosses would have them taken out fast." Everyone laughs at that, and Buck laughs nervously with them.
3. The thing is, the owners seem to be happy with Buck's work. They come in, they ask for whatever his special is. He'd asked Mr. Deluca once if they had a specials menu from Eli, the previous pastry chef, and Mr. Deluca laughs and says, "Probably, but do whatever you want, kid. I trust you. You trust me?" And he winks at Buck, which makes his face get warm. "Sal, stop scaring him," Mr. Kinard says, a hand coming down on Buck's shoulder. "We don't need you chasing off another chef." When Buck looks at him, he's grinning broadly, his eyes crinkling. His face gets even hotter. The two bicker all the way into the office. He gets to make whatever the hell he wants, and he does. The special is different every night, it's always based on what he wants to experiment with or what's in season. He makes baked Alaska once, and his new assistant, Ravi, looks like he wants to cry whenever it comes up on a ticket. When the owners come in after hours and split a slice, Buck thanks them for letting him even try. "You can do whatever you want, kid," Mr. Deluca says, waving his spoon. "You sure about that, Mr. Deluca?" Buck asks with a smile. "We trust you, also stop with that shit. Sal," he says before nodding to Mr. Kinard. "And Tommy."
4. The last piece of the puzzle is when there's a big deal about "the family" coming to visit. The restaurant is being shut down for it, and Buck watches as people file in. Older men in crisp suits wearing pinky rings, imposing younger men wearing the same, women in smart clothes with nice jewelry. It's a fucking mob meeting. When he finds out it's happening a few days before, he quietly asks Sal what the head of the family likes for dessert, and Sal looks pleasantly surprised and says, "Cassata." Buck gets to work, doing it himself while Ravi works on assembling everything else that was already planned. Buck is sweating when the cake gets brought out. Twenty minutes later, a tiny woman who looks like she's old enough to remember the day the first flight was taken comes into the kitchen with an empty plate. She zeroes in on Buck and walks up to him, setting the plate down and taking his hand in one of hers. "La cassata è squisita," she says, and he glances up and sees Sal and Tommy hovering near the doors to the kitchen. "G-grazie mille," Buck stammers. When she responds in Italian, he has to explain he doesn't speak it. "We'll change that," she says, patting his cheek with her other hand. "You cook like that, you will learn. Salvatore will help." She says it with a familiar wink, and Sal pinches the bridge of his nose. When she leaves, Sal and Tommy approach. "Thank you," Tommy says, squeezing his bicep. "Nonna's very important, and she gets homesick. That meant a lot to her." Sal nods. "She had tears in her eyes, I don't know what you did but--" Sal cuts himself off and cups Buck's jaw and neck and kisses his cheeks. "You are getting a fucking raise, kid," he says, drawing back with a grin.
5. There's a guy who hangs around sometimes, and Buck is told under no circumstances to talk to or trust him. He's an affable man named Bobby. He looks like a Fed. When he tries to talk to Buck during his break when he's getting a mocktail from the bar, Buck shuts down. He knows. He knows that he's working for some possibly bad people, but they take care of the employees and the community and their customers. He's lost count how many times he's been quietly asked for something sweet for someone who's having a hard time, how many sheet cakes and pies he's made for shelters and centers and fire stations. They're probably fucking murderers (at least by proxy), but they're good people. "Sorry, I can't help you," Buck says, grabbing his drink and going back into the kitchen. It keeps happening, though. He'll be out back tossing trash, Bobby's there. He'll be out in the dining room, Bobby's there. Finally, he has enough and screws up the courage to say something to his bosses.
6. Buck slips into their office one night after closing, and Sal is sitting behind his desk with Tommy perched on the edge. They look happy, relaxed. There's wine that Buck had watched Tommy walk by with earlier when he'd stopped to snag a couple of slices of torte. There's two empty dessert plates that look like they've been licked clean. "Everything okay, Evan?" Tommy asks, standing. Buck looks between the two of them and says, "O-okay. I know what's going on here, and I know I'm not supposed to know about it--" And Sal and Tommy exchange uneasy looks. "--but I'm okay with it. It's fine, I'm just happy to be here. A-and I won't tell anyone, I swear. But there's this guy that keeps hanging around here, a-and I think he's trying to get me to flip on you guys. I won't. I would never, okay?" He's out of breath and red faced and kind of sweating and nervous, because he's trying to project loyalty and please don't have me killed and dumped in the harbor. "I just want to keep making you guys happy," he adds, in case that wasn't clear. And then Tommy kisses him.
7. Bobby's not a Fed, he's the manager of a restaurant that Sal and Tommy used to work for as front of house and kitchen managers. He'd fired Sal, Sal had decided to start his own place, and Tommy followed. They'd poached their old coworkers from other places after they'd been run off by the guy who'd managed the place before Bobby, and Bobby's been trying to poach Buck. The business meetings? They're looking for a third partner to help with some of the day-to-day stuff so Tommy can focus on the helicopter tour business he's been trying to start up. Sal's family just happens to be a bunch of Sicilians, and they'd picked the restaurant for the grown ups only dinner during their family reunion. They ran off old chefs for being more arrogance than talent and for mistreating the staff, and, yeah, a couple were intimidated by Sal. "What about the old pastry chef? Y-you 'took care of him,'" Buck says from where he's sitting on the small couch in their office. He's been kissed by both of them, then kissed again, then he'd burst out something embarrassing about being a mob wife. "Eli? We gave him some money to start his own bakery in Boston," Tommy says, wiping tears from his eyes. He'd been laughing so hard at one point that he'd started crying. "You thought we were in the mob? Even Gambino's out making wine or some shit these days," Sal says, and Buck buries his face in his hands. "You guys were acting weird," he complains. "Yeah, we had a thing for the new pastry chef, that's kind of a no-no," Sal says. "Also, I'm not telling Nonna you thought she was the head of a crime family, it'll go to her head. And she loves you, by the way." Buck peeks between his fingers at them. "She was really nice," he says. "For a cold-blooded murderer," Tommy says dryly, and Sal smacks his arm.
8. Buck officially turns down Bobby's offer but tells him to talk to Sal and Tommy about coming in as a third partner in the restaurant. "They want more time outside of here," Buck says, pushing a bowl of gelato he'd made across the table. "And it sounds like you've got experience. More than just management experience." "Yeah, well, my last restaurant burned down because I cut corners on important things," Bobby says, accepting the bowl and picking up a spoon. "And I lost my family in it." "I'm sorry," Buck says, his heart clenching in his chest. "Won't happen again," Bobby says, taking a bite and smiling. "This is good, kid." Buck smiles and shrugs. "Thanks. It's an easy one," he says. "I gotta go check my cakes. Stick around, Sal and Tommy will be here soon." And Bobby does, and they have a business meeting. Buck sends out matcha tiramisus. After, when handshakes have been exchanged and lawyers are to be contacted, Sal tells Buck to take a break, and he gets pulled into the office and kissed and thanked. "We're closed tomorrow," Tommy says, nuzzling his neck. "Can we take you out? On a date. Not--" Buck groans. "You're never letting that go, are you?" he asks. "Nah," Sal confirms, unbuttoning Buck's coat. "We ain't letting anything go when it comes to you."
9. As a joke, Sal and Tommy use mobster phrases around Buck way too often. He's at the mall with his sister and has an idea when he passes one of those shirt printing shops. Later, he shows up at Sal and Tommy's and presents them with their shirts. "What the--'I'm sleeping with da fishes'?" Sal reads. "What's yours say?" Tommy silently turns his around with a sigh, and Buck unzips his hoodie. "'We're da fishes,'" Sal reads off their shirts, rolling his eyes. "You're such a fucking nerd, come here." He pulls Buck and Tommy to the couch, and Buck gets shoved down on it. "What about dinner?" he asks, grinning. "Fuck dinner," Tommy says, whipping his shirt off. "Yeah, we want dessert, baby," Sal teases, bending to kiss Buck's neck. "Know a good pastry chef?" Buck wriggles happily and spreads his legs for Tommy. "Y-yeah, but I'm pretty sure he works for the mob," he says with a breathless laugh.
10. Sal may or may not have been lightly involved with a certain family when he first moved to LA, but he got out of that fast and doesn't like talking about it. And he was never officially brought in, he just looked the other way on some stuff when he was working at his first restaurant. So he was never actually in the mob, okay?
sometimes you see Takes™ that make you go "mmmhmmm okay yeah i see we both interpreted that differently based on what the show gave us, but i see how you arrived at your ideas even if they're different from mine," and then sometimes you see Takes™ that make you go "brother what show did you even fucking watch"
If you're still taking AU prompts, how about an AU where Bobby survives but can't stay Captain of the 118, and Tommy gets arrested for stealing the helicopter? (How would Buck deal with that much change and worrying about people he loves?)
This one gave me a lot of trouble and then I wrote nearly 6k for some reason. This might not be exactly what you were looking for but I hope it's close enough.
1. The lights were on when Maddie made it home from the hospital, which meant Buck was in there, probably cleaning and cooking and making himself useful. After the breakup, when Buck would commandeer their kitchen when he got sick of being in his own, Howie would joke about taking back their spare key.
“The key is a privilege and not a right,” he’d whispered one night, mindful of Buck asleep on the couch. “And he has lost his privileges.”
“He’s just having a hard time,” Maddie had said, although she privately had her own doubts about how important a six month long relationship could be.
“He can have a hard time on someone else’s couch,” Howie complained. She raised her eyebrows. “Wait, not like that.”
The front door opened. “Maddie,” Buck called, “are you okay?”
Her head dropped to the steering wheel. She was so tired.
She took a deep breath and opened the door. “I’m fine. Stay there.”
She winced as her feet hit the pavement; her ankles were swollen. Everything about the pregnancy seemed harder this time around. Maybe it was just being five years older, maybe it was already having one kid while gestating another, maybe it was listening to her husband die, maybe it was the entire fucking world.
Buck didn’t stay there, coming down the walk in his sock feet and wincing with every step. “I can grab Jee.” He peered into the back seat. “Uh, Maddie, I don’t want to alarm you, but where is your daughter?”
“The Lees took her.” She kept moving past him. Momentum was key. “They wanted to give Howie and I some time to visit. They’ll drop her off later.” They originally offered to keep Jee overnight, but with Howie in the hospital, Jee was scared and a night away from home would just result in a meltdown.
“Oh, th-that’s good she’s getting some grandparent time,” Buck said, visibly drooping before rallying. He followed her inside, shutting and locking the door and neatly putting away the shoes she kicked off. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired,” she said, heading for the kitchen. “Thirsty. Vaguely nauseous.”
No sooner was the word out of her mouth than Buck was bustling around the kitchen. She had just gingerly lowered herself into her chair than Buck sat a cup of ginger ale in front of her. “Thank you,” she said, taking a careful sip. Her teeth were sensitive to the cold and at some point when everything had settled down, she needed to make a dentist appointment.
“No problem,” Buck said, and returned to bustling. Buck and their parents had been locked in trench warfare for all of Buck’s teenage years over him doing chores, and they’d probably have twin heart attacks at seeing Buck willingly and enthusiastically loading the dishwasher without a forty-five minute screaming match. “So I did a couple loads of laundry and did a quick wipe down of the bathroom and kitchen, and if you give me like five minutes I’ll grab the vacuum. There’s a bunch of casseroles from the meal train, but I went shopping. You got bread, milk, butter, and plenty of dino nuggets for Jee.”
The urge to put her head on the table was overwhelming. Buck was just trying to be helpful, she reminded herself as the waves of words threatened to drag her under. This was how he loved.
“Thank you,” she said again. “I’ve got an update.”
Buck went very still and very focused, like a pointer dog who spotted a duck. “Is Chim getting discharged?”
“They want to keep him for a few more days, but then he can home.”
Buck nodded, absently patting at his pocket for his phone. He’d been taking notes on everyone’s recovery: Howie, Hen, Bobby. His poor notes app must be on the verge of committing suicide. “I thought they were talking about sending him to a-a skilled nursing facility?”
“He’s doing better so they said he can come straight home.” His half of the antiviral had eradicated the virus, but the damage had already been done. Howie would live, but no one knew what recovery looked like. No one knew if he would return to duty. No one knew if he would need to be on oxygen for the rest of his life.
“Okay, that’s good.” Buck’s head was down as he typed a new note into his phone. “I’ve been thinking about that. Chim coming home, I mean.”
“The Lees are going to stay with us,” Maddie said, ripping that band-aid off. “They’ll be able to take Jee to preschool and Howie to all his appointments. They’ll be here to help when the baby comes.”
“Oh,” Buck said, looking like his heart was breaking. “Right. They’re great. The Lees, I mean.
A scream rose, and Maddie clenched her teeth against it. Her husband almost died, the doctors couldn’t tell her what his health outcome would be, her daughter almost lost both her parents within months of each other, and she still had to worry about hurting her brother’s feelings. And the worst part was that the only reason Howie was alive was because of her brother and her brother’s ex. It was so fucking unfair.
“Hey,” she said, forcing herself to be gentle as she caught Buck’s wrist and urged him to sit. “You need to take care of yourself, too. Are you taking the leave they offered?”
“What? Oh, yeah. I’m on it now.” Buck mustered up a brave smile. “You know I’m here for you, whatever you need.”
“I know,” she said, and buried the unkind thought of throwing him at the Wilsons for awhile. “I love you.”
“I love you, too,” he said, and squeezed her fingers.
She took her hand back and drank the ginger ale. Buck turned his phone over in his hands, the corners of his mouth tight and miserable.
“Have you talked to Tommy?” she asked at the risk of ending up with another dozen loafs in her freezer.
Buck’s head jerked up. “You want me to call him now?”
A flash of irritation that she ruthlessly smothered. “I never not wanted you to call him.” A half-lie at most. “Can you let him know I’m grateful for what he did to help us? I’d do it myself, but I don’t have his number.”
“Y-yeah, of course. I’ll do it now.” He gave his phone a sad waggle.
“Maybe not right now.” She levered herself up. “I’m going to sneak in a nap before the Lees get here.”
It took a moment, but then Buck was popping up. “I’ll let you do that. There’s so many options for dinner.” He waved his hand at the fridge. Just the thought of opening it and sorting through the casseroles made her want to lay down and die. Anne and John could handle that. “Call me if you need anything.”
“I will,” she said, and shuffled towards the bedroom.
She waited until she head the door close and lock before she laid down and gave herself permission to rest, just for a little bit, until whatever came next arrived.
2. Hen was, depressingly enough, familiar enough with recovering from a severe injury to know that the irritation and frustration from being forced to rest were signs that her body was healing and that she was on the mend. But if she had to spend one more day in bed or on the couch, she was going to set something on fire just to have the excuse to get out of the house.
“At least wait until the kids are out of house before beginning your budding arson career,” Karen said without pity. “How do you feel about setting up camp in the backyard?”
Hen felt better about it than the couch, and so she settled on the lounge chair Denny had spent the last ten minutes making sure it got the perfect sun to shade ratio and drank the lemonade Karen brought her and listened to the kids mostly friendly bickering as they constructed cardboard cars from a kit that were supposedly powered by the Nintendo Switch remotes. It was a good day, and she had long ago learned not to take them for granted.
It was such a good day that she had nearly dozed off when the chime of Karen’s phone dragged her back to consciousness. Karen held it at arm’s length to read the text because she refused to admit she needed reading glasses. “How do you feel about having a visitor?”
“Depends on the visitor,” Hen said. Eddie was in Texas, and Chim and Bobby were still in the hospital. “Depends on if it’s Buck.”
Karen gave her a pointed and disappointed look. “Do you want to try that again, Henrietta?”
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Hen said, two inches tall and annoyed about it. Karen was her wife, not her mother. “You know how he can be.”
The disappointed increased, but even Maddie had admitted that Buck could be exhausting. “I know he wants to help,” Maddie had confessed when she had stopped by with Jee for a playdate, “but I’m so tired.”
“He saved your life,” Karen said quietly, like Hen could ever forget. A small, shameful part of her said, We got lucky. How much worse would he be if Bobby had died?
“A short visit,” she said.
Twenty minutes later the doorbell rang. Karen went to let him in and then ten minutes after that—long enough for them to catch up and for Karen to give him the time limit—Buck was bounding into the backyard, waving at the kids and making the appropriate noises over their little cardboard cars. His hair was brushed and his shirt tucked in, and yet Buck looked like a man in the moment right before realizing his legs had been cut out from under him.
“I’m not staying long,” he said with a bright, false cheerfulness. “I’m just dropping off your portion of the meal train. You and Karen won’t have to cook for weeks. And this is for you.” With an exhausted flourish, he produced a tupperware container.
Hen swallowed her reflexive, unhelpful impulse—aren’t you over Tommy yet?—and warily cracked the lid. “Oh,” she said, pleasantly surprised at the blondies. “My favorite.”
“You know I can make actual brownies that taste good, right?” he said, dancing away from the swat she aimed his way. “There’s also a bunch of muffin tops for the kids and I made a batch of those peanut butter cookies with the chocolate stars in them for Karen.”
In those first six months post breakup, Buck baked indiscriminately—loaves and cookies, brownies and tarts, pies with intricate lattice work and delicate puffs of meringue, rolls with molten cheese centers and cakes with frosting so precise and exact it was like something out of a TikTok—and they didn’t have a choice on what he pushed on them until Chim declared an embargo that even Bobby had endorsed. But this wasn’t Buck baking to avoid his feelings. Buck had spent time and money making her family’s favorite pastries because Hen had almost died and he loved her. Maybe Karen had a point.
“Sit down,” she said, overwhelmed with fondness for the probie she watched grow up. “It’s been a minute since we talked.”
“Well, it’s not like I get invited to brunch,” Buck said, shockingly snide as he folded down into Karen’t abandoned chair. “Sorry,” he added to her raised eyebrows.
“Are you okay?” She went to lay a hand on his arm.
He shifted away. “I’m good. Hey, did you hear we’re getting an interim captain? Not Gerrard, thank god. I think they finally took the hint there.”
That explained the snideness. Buck loved the 118 too much to just let anyone into the captain’s chair, although he might not have a choice, given the long, slow recovery before Bobby.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“Samuels. He used to captain the 93 back in the day,” Buck the infant said.
“I thought he retired.”
Buck shrugged. “Apparently not.”
“He’s a good captain, from what I hear. You’ll like him.” She broke a blondie in two and offered Buck half.
“I made those for you.” He waited until she took a bite before saying, “Are you going to take it when they offer it to you?”
The little shit timed it specifically so she couldn’t brush the question off. She had to sit with it as she chewed and swallowed and washed it all down with a sip of lemonade. He really wasn’t a probie anymore.
“If they offer it,” she said.
“Hen. Come on.”
She sighed and watched as Denny and Mara lined up their little cars for the race. This was the most time she spent with them in months. How much more of their lives would she miss if she was captain? How much more neglect could her marriage take before it collapsed, hollowed out? How much more could she bear?
“I don’t know,” she said.
“Bobby wants it for you. He’s been mentoring you.” Where she expected frustration or anger, there was only a quiet disappointment, like Buck has already worked out the answer before even asking the question.
“The last time I was acting captain,” she said with a forced calm, “I lost my daughter.”
“Yeah, I know,” he said, even though he didn’t, he couldn’t.
What did Buck know about watching your child being taken away and knowing it was your fault because you let another mother’s son die? What the fuck did he know about her life?
“I’m getting tired,” she said, and perhaps for the first time in his life Buck took the hint.
“I gotta get going,” he said, standing with a wince, which meant he wasn’t stretching out his bad leg. “You’d be a good captain, Hen.”
“Thank you,” she said, and then, “Have you talked to Tommy?”
Buck startled. Yeah, turnabout was a bitch, wasn’t it?
“I texted him,” he said, not looking at her. “I haven’t heard back. Have, uh, have you talked to him?”
“I also texted and I also haven’t heard back,” she said. The disappointed droop of Buck’s shoulders made her stomach curdle with guilt. “He’s never been great about replying.”
“He was always good about getting back to me.” Buck shook himself and summoned up another terrible, cheerful smile. He waved to the kids and then slipped away.
In the yard, Denny let Mara win, and he smiled as she jumped and whooped. She loved her job but she loved her kids more.
“Everything okay?” Karen asked, slipping into the seat next to her.
“Yeah,” Hen said, snagging her hand and pressing a kiss to the back of it, “everything is great.”
3. When he wasn’t sleeping, Bobby was working his way through the puzzle books Athena and the kids had dropped off. He missed doing the daily Connections—he couldn’t look at a screen without his brain trying to crawl out his nose—but he was becoming an expert at Sudoko. He only bothered with the very hard puzzles now.
The door opened. It wasn’t time for his medications or for the nurses routine check in, less frequent now that the doctors assured him his internal organs weren’t in danger of liquefying, Athena was out at lunch with the kids, Hen was home recovering, and Chimney had only just been discharged. That left only one person.
“Buck,” he said, filling in a seven with a great sense of accomplishment. “I just saw you yesterday. What brings you by?”
Buck sheepishly held up a couple of cooler bags. “More of the meal train. I thought Athena and the kids might like it. Well, mostly Harry.”
“His does eat like he’s got hollow legs.” Bobby set the puzzle book aside. Buck looked the same as he had for the past week: exhausted but forcing himself to be cheerful. “When is the last time you slept?”
“Where’s Athena?” Buck avoided the question by setting the bags out of the way and folding himself into the uncomfortable chair with a wince.
And Bobby was hit with a sense memory of the doing the same when it was Buck in the hospital, his back stiff and aching from being curled over for hours as he prayed the rosary. Even no he could still feel the bump of them over his knuckles.
“Bobby?” Buck said.
“Sorry, I was wool gathering.” He gave Buck a reassuring smile that didn’t reassure enough as he hoped. “Athena is out with the kids right now, but she’ll be back.” The only person more difficult than Buck to chase home to sleep was Athena. He despaired of both their backs. “How’s it going, kid?”
“It’s good,” Buck said, summoning a smile that doesn’t do much beyond twisting his mouth up. Brooke had been the same way, smiling when she felt the worst so she wouldn’t worry them. “Eddie got offered a paramedic job. He’s going to take it. Chris really likes being back in Texas.”
“That’s good for both of them,” Bobby said, watching Buck closely. “Chim is back home.”
“The Lees are helping out. Jee is getting excited about having a baby brother again.” Buck wouldn’t look at him. “I saw Hen the other day. She’s doing well. I told her about Samuels.”
Ah, there it was, the true reason for Buck’s visit, the very thing he had and Athena had talked to death. Well, no time like the present. Time to rip off the band-aid and break Buck’s heart.
“Chief Simpson asked me for some recommendations,” Bobby said, shifting with a wince. Immediately Buck was there to rearrange the pillows. “Samuels is only temporary, but he’s a good man and will take care of you all until the position can be filled permanently.”
“So you’re not coming back,” Buck said dully.
“Too much damage this time,” he said gently. “I might stay on in a more administrative role, but I can’t be in the field again. It won’t be safe, not for me or for team.”
“I don’t know if Hen still wants to be captain,” Buck said, gaze fixed on some far away point. “Not after what happened with Mara.” He paused. “I don’t want Gerrard coming back.”
“He’s not. I won’t let that happen.” Bobby hesitated. “Tommy worked with Gerrard for years.”
That got Buck looking at him, if only to frown in confusion. “Uh, yeah, I know.”
“I never asked if that caused problems between you two,” he said, choosing his words with delicate care. “You never said why you broke up.”
“It wasn’t that.” Buck frowned harder. “Or not just that. We didn’t really talk about important stuff. Or any stuff.”
Looked like he got it wrong; this kid was breaking Bobby’s heart. “You can change that. Give him a call.”
Buck’s mouth twisted into a miserable knot. “I have been calling him and texting him but he won’t—” he broke off with an even more miserable sniff. “He hasn’t even left me on read. I think I used up my last chance with this one, Bobby.”
When they wheeled him out of the lab, oxygen mask over his face and fluids and plasma on standby, Tommy had been at Buck’s side, feet planted deep and immovable. If Tommy wasn’t picking up the phone, it was because he physically wasn’t able to.
“You should go check on him,” Bobby said. “He loves you, kid.”
Buck couldn’t even manage a smile for that. “Not anymore, if he ever did.”
Bobby reached out and gripped Buck’s arm. “You’re going to be okay, Buck. We both are. Captain’s orders.”
“Copy that, Cap,” Buck said, and sat with him until Athena returned.
4. Buck didn’t know Sal well enough to guess who he expected at his door on a Tuesday afternoon, but it probably wasn’t him having a nervous breakdown.
“Have you talked to Tommy?” Buck demanded, feeling crazy around the eyes.
“Have I,” Sal said slowly, “spoken with Tommy?”
Buck dug his phone out of his pocket and waved it in Sal’s face. “He hasn’t picked up when I call or answered my texts. He hasn’t even left me on read. Something is wrong.”
“Or, and stay with me on this,” Sal said, unimpressed and obviously losing patience, “he finally smartened up and stopped letting you ruin his life.”
“But when has he ever done the smart thing?” Buck shot back, mouth firmed to keep from miserably wobbling. “And it’s just not me he’s ignoring. He hasn’t texted Chim or Bobby back. He hasn’t responded to Hen. Does that sound like Tommy to you?”
Sal stared him down for a long moment before digging out his phone and scrolling through it. “I talked to him two weeks ago. Fuck.”
“Fuck,” Buck echoed through a mouth gone sour with fear.
“Fuck!” a naked toddler exclaimed with delight right before ramming into Buck’s legs.
“She’s going through a naked phase,” Sal said, expertly scooping up the kid before she could worm past Buck and complete her jailbreak. “You better come in.”
The naked toddler was called Maria, and she wailed dramatically as Sal wrestled her into a shirt with a t-rex on it. “When did you see him last?” Sal asked, ignoring as his daughter went completely limp in a last ditch effort to avoid wearing pants.
“At the lab. He, uh, he texted me and called me after that, but then he just stopped.” The fear curdled into shame. “I, uh, didn’t notice at first. I’ve been busy looking after everyone else.” A terrible smile stretched across his face, and he turned away so he wouldn’t frighten Maria. “Turns out they didn’t need me. Joke’s on me, I guess.”
Sal sighed very quietly. “All right, gremlin, you don’t have to wear socks but the pants and shirt stay on and you have to color quietly while I talk with Buck here. Deal?”
Maria frowned as she seriously considered it, looking so much like a miniature Tommy that Buck had to lock his jaw against an animal scream. “Deal,” she finally said, holding out a tiny hand for Sal to shake.
“Gina is a lawyer,” Sal said, setting Maria up in the living room with a coloring book, an army of plastic dinosaurs, and a literal bucket of crayons. “She loves making deals.”
“Gotta do deal,” Maria agreed, and upended the crayon bucket over her head. “Rain!”
“That’s right, honey, make it rain.” Sal dropped a kiss on the top of her head and then led Buck to the kitchen.
On the fridge, tacked up with a magnet in the shape of a watermelon, was a picture of Maria and Tommy, her tiny face pressed against his, their mouths open in a fearsome growl, hands hooked into tiny claws. Buck collapsed onto a chair. There was one like that of him and Jee on Maddie’s fridge, the two of them pretending to be tigers when Jee was in her big cat phase. Tommy was so loved, even if it wasn’t by him
“Are they t-rexes?” Buck asked.
“She’s obsessed with dinosaurs. If I have to watch one ore documentary about them I am taking a sledgehammer to the fossils at the natural history museum.” Sal leaned against the counter and crossed his arms. “Tell me what happened at the lab. Leave nothing out.”
Buck did. Sal’s eyebrows were the bitchy twin to Tommy’s, and by the time he got to the end, they were nearly in his hairline.
“Let me get this straight,” Sal said, stare gone hard and unforgiving, “Tommy pulls a stunt that could have gotten him black bagged and sent to Guantanamo, and you didn’t think to reach out to him until your little friends were too busy to play with you anymore?”
Buck winced. “They didn’t need me. I thought Tommy might.”
“Jesus Christ.” Sal scrubbed a hand over his face. “He’s a person, Buckley. You know that, right? Tommy is a person and not a doll you can take down from the shelf whenever you’re lonely.”
The shame sat like a stone in his stomach. “That’s fair,” he said quietly.
“You’re right that’s goddamn fair,” Sal snapped. “Do you have any idea what he lets you get away with? You are so careless with him.”
Buck flinched. It’d been almost ten year since he joined the LAFD, and he thought he’d grown up since then. Joke was on him again. He was still the careless twenty-six year old who couldn’t be trusted with anything important. All he did was break things.
“I know,” Buck said, forcing himself to meet Sal’s gaze. “But that doesn’t mean something isn’t wrong. I, uh, I went to bring him some of the meal train. He wasn’t home. His truck was in the driveway.”
Tommy’s truck was his baby, in that he doted on it more than some people did with their actual babies. If he absolutely had to let it sit out on his driveway, he always threw the custom made tarp over it. When the Jeep was up on the lift, Buck had watch Tommy spend ten minutes fussing with the drape over the tarp, worried about the weather, like SoCal was in danger of getting a freak hailstorm. Buck had found the whole thing charming and endearing.
“Oh hell,” Sal said and dug out his phone.
The first call rang through to Tommy’s voicemail, as did the second and then the third. Sal texted something quickly. The phone chimed. Sal’s frown changed from furious to worried.
“He’s not picking up for Gina either,” Sal said. “And he’s ignoring our 911 texts.”
The shame stone crumbled back into fear. “He’s in trouble, isn’t he?” Buck said.
“Yeah, kid, I think he is.” Sal blew out a long breath. “I gotta make some calls. Go make sure my kid has her clothes on and isn’t making another run for it.”
Buck stood but paused at the kitchen door. “Do you really think I ruined his life?”
Sal didn’t glance up for his phone. “Tommy is fully capable of ruining his own life, but you certainly helped.”
In the living room, Maria glanced up and said, “Wanna color?”
“I’d love to,” Buck said, and took a careful seat next to her.
Over the next hour, Sal made his calls. There were many of them, his voice rising and falling, although he only got loud exactly once.
“You left them in there to fucking die,” Sal snapped to what Buck futilely hoped wasn’t Chief Simpson. “You think the last contract negotiations were bad, wait until we put this to a fucking vote.”
It was quiet after that, and when Sal finally left the kitchen, it was with a solemnity that nearly made Buck snap a crayon in half.
“Hey, gremlin,” Sal said with a gentleness that every parent but his own had. “Can you go play in your room? I gotta talk to Buck.”
“Is Tommy okay?” she asked, shoulders hunching around her ears as she picked up on her dad’s mood.
“Tommy will be,” Sal said. “I’ll come play dinosaur graveyard with you after this. Deal?”
She stuck our her tiny hand for a shake. “Deal.” And then with a wild cackle, she sprinted towards her room. “Deal not with clothes!” Her shirt was the first to go.
“That’s on me,” Sal said. “I didn’t include clothes.”
Buck began cleaning up on reflex: coloring books neatly stacked on the coffee table, crayons back in the bucket, army of dinosaurs back into their own plastic container. It was the same thing he did after Jee was done playing. It was one less thing for Maddie to have to clean. He could do the same for Sal.
“Is Tommy okay?” he asked, digging a stray ankylosaur from under the couch.
Sal waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, he’s fine. He’s just been arrested.”
Black bagged, Buck thought, Guantanamo. His chest went tight. His lungs couldn’t expand. He stopped breathing.
“None of that shit, Buckley.” A hand on the back of his neck forced him head between his knees. “Tommy is fine. And if my wife gets her way, which she always does, he’ll be out before end of business today. So stop hyperventilating. You’re not helping.”
The edges of his vision cleared. He sucked in a lungful of air and then another. Tommy was under arrest but he was going to be okay. Buck would make sure he was. “I’m good,” he croaked, and Sal gentled his grip to help him to sit up. “Why did they only arrest him?”
“Probably because the army doesn’t want it to get out that they left some of LAFD’s bravest to die of super Ebola. Tommy is the easier target, and he embarrassed them by needing three choppers to take him down.”
It took six months, but he gotten pretty good at reading Tommy, but Sal was an unknown. They had only met once and only for about an hour over drinks. Buck had liked Gina more than her husband, and he spent most of that hour talking about the struggle of rolling back old, outdated laws. He didn’t know what it meant when Sal looked at him like that.
“I don’t know what goes in your fucked up little codependent polycule,” Sal said slowly, unblinking, “but Tommy needs you for this. And he won’t ever admit it because his parents fucked up him up good, but he needs you for the rest of it, too. Are you going to be there for him?”
“Yes,” Buck said.
Sal was unimpressed. “There are no half measures here. If you’re in it then you have to be all in and not just there when the rest of your family is too busy for a play date. If you can’t do that then you walk away right now and you stay gone. Tommy doesn’t need more help in ruining his life.”
Everyone he loved had someone—Maddie and Chim, Hen and Karen, even Eddie had his son—and Buck had been scrapping by for years now., useful but not permanent. Careless. But he wasn’t twenty-six anymore; he was capable of care.
“I’m here, for however long he wants me,” Buck said firmly.
Sal nodded, once. “Be at the courthouse in forty-five minutes. You need to give testimony.”
Buck scrambled up. He was unshaven and his shirt was at least one day past needing to be washed. His work duffel was still in the Jeep. There was a clean shirt in there and spare deodorant and even some pomade. It wasn’t great, but it was all he got.
“Go get our boy,” Sal said, clapping him on the shoulder.
Buck went.
5. Tommy had been in worse places than spending a week in county lockup. There was those long weeks he spent in a medical tent in the middle of the Afghan desert, waiting to be med evaced to Germany, infection creeping into the staples holding his guts in. There were the long nights at the 118, all of them exhausted from a five alarm fire where an entire family had died, and Gerrard had called them all weeping pussies for the crime of having a single feeling about it. There had been the morning in Eddie’s kitchen where Evan had confirmed his greatest fear, that he was only good for a fuck and nothing more. So yeah, on the whole, it could have been worse. It could always be worse.
Tommy signed the forms and was given back his personal belongings: wallet, aviator sunglasses, shitty movie receipt because movie theaters no longer gave out tickets, his phone with approximately three hundred missed calls and unanswered texts. Evan’s name was at the top.
He shoved everything into his pockets and stepped out a free man to where Evan Buckley was waiting for him. His eyebrows jumped up.
“Hi,” Evan said, hand raised in an abortive waive. His hair was slicked back like it was when the first started dating, before Tommy had unashamedly begged Evan to free his curls, and he was sporting at least three days worth of stubble. His face was gaunt. He hadn’t been sleeping. He was beautiful. “Sal and Gina are here if you want to—oh!”
Tommy crossed in three strides and grabbed Evan, holding on tight. “You’re here.”
“I’m here,” Evan said, long arms wrapped around him, hands fisted in the back of Tommy’s shirt. “I’m sorry it took me so long.”
“Doesn’t matter.” He tucked his face into Evan’s neck. He shook. “Is everyone okay? Bobby isn’t—”
Evan made a low noise. “They’re fine. Are you okay? You were in jail!”
He laughed to hide the shakes. “County jail. Doesn’t count.” Evan made that noise again. Tommy cupped the back of his head. “I’m okay. I promise. You sprung me.”
“Okay,” Evan said, sniffling even as he drew back. His eyes were wet and red rimmed. “So full disclosure, Sal and Gina did the springing. I just gave some testimony.” He touched Tommy’s cheek, his jaw, his mouth. “They’re giving us a day and then we have to over for dinner.”
“Not until tomorrow, right? We have the rest of the day?” he asked hopefully. His old sergeant said that it was the hope that killed you, but Tommy hoped anyway.
“Yeah, the whole day,” Evan said on a happy sigh. “I’m going to be so careful with you. I’m not going to let us ruin it this time. I promise.”
Tommy kissed the corner of his mouth. “Well, in that case, honey, you should take me home.”
Evan smiled like the sun coming up and took him home.
we need to talk more about the fandom experience of "I actually do like the idea of these two characters together and think it would have been an interesting direction for the show to have gone in, but unfortunately everyone who openly ships them is so exhaustingly unpleasant about it that it's barely even enjoyable to engage with the fandom at large anymore so the ship itself is now ruined for me"
So all the way back in 2024 after I binged all of 911, I started writing a time traveler's wife au because I love weird magical bullshit and tbh I hated that book but liked the general idea. I wrote 11k, got stuck, wrote a bunch of other stuff, and then s8 and s9 happened and now the way I characterized this version of Tommy and the 118 is so outdated that there is no way it is ever getting finished. That's not to say I won't ever write this au--I actually think there's even more narrative and thematic meat to it now then back when we just had s7--but it will never be this version of it. So I am releasing it into the wild as an interesting artifact of another time.
i. Evan, 33
When they met for technically the second time, Tommy was in the middle of stealing a helicopter based solely on Howie’s hunch.
“Not my hunch,” Howie said. “Hen’s hunch. You doubting her hunches now, Kinard?”
“I doubt you need to say the word hunch this much,” Tommy said, tucked into a corner of the hangar, running mental inventory of which aircraft was fueled and ready to go. “You know I’m always going to back Hen’s play.”
“Oh good, because full disclosure, if you tried to weasel out of this I was going to remind you that you owe me a life debt.”
“You’ve already called in that debt like eight times now,” Tommy pointed out.
“You saved his life?” someone shouted loud enough that Tommy had to pull the phone away from his ear.
“I’ve told you this story,” Howie said.
“Uh, you definitely have not.”
“Eyes on the road, Buck!” the third person in Howie’s conspiracy snapped.
“We’ll be there in twenty if Buck doesn’t get us killed,” Howie said, and the call cut out on presumably Buck’s offended hey!
A guy saved your life once and you paid and paid and paid.
By the time Howie and his fellow miscreants skulked through the hangar in full turnouts—Jesus Christ, they were definitely getting arrested—he had everything ready to go. All they were missing was Hen and her good as confirmed hunch.
“Tommy!” Howie said, hand held out, which Tommy used to pull him into a hug, folding over to compensate for the difference in height.
“Did you somehow get shorter?” he asked with one last solid pat to Howie’s back.
“That any way to talk to the man who granted you the sweet gift of life?” Howie retorted.
“Don’t say it like that. It makes you sound like you’re my father.”
Howie grinned. “You wish.”
Two weeks after Howie dragged his unconscious ass out of a methane filled mall, they went out and got heroically and unwisely drunk, and the list was amended to Love, Actually, monster trucks, craft beer, and shitty fathers.
Tommy offered his hand to Howie’s tagalongs. “Tommy Kinard.”
“Eddie Diaz.” Diaz’s grip was strong and firm, and he gave the traditional two pumps. “Thanks for helping us out, man.”
“I’m still making interest payments on that life debt,” he said dryly, attention turning to the last co-conspirator. The kid was tall, easily his height and comprised of about eighty percent leg, eyes wide and blue. A punctuation of a birthmark was stamped along his left brow like god’s most perfectly placed semi-colon.
“Hey,” the kid said, beaming so hard that Tommy ran the risk of sun blindness if he stared at that grin head on, “it’s you.”
Tommy raised his eyebrows, which only made the kid grin wider.
“Wait,” Howie said, glancing between them, “Tommy is—”
“Evan Buckley,” the kid said quickly and loudly. “Everyone calls me Buck, but it-it’s Evan.”
“Evan,” Tommy said, his offered hand shaken enthusiastically for a beat too long before he could gracefully extricate himself.
“It’s so good to finally meet you,” Evan added, the shape of the words sharp with relief, as if Evan had been counting down the minutes.
“I wasn’t aware I was keeping you waiting,” he said.
In his peripherals, Diaz’s eyes went wide and a bit crazy. “Chim is always talking about you, so it feels like we know you already.”
“Really,” he said flatly with a matching flat stare for Howie. “And here I thought you only remembered I existed when you needed a favor.”
“You think I keep that Maurice story to myself?” Chim said, breezy tone undercut by how squirrely he looked.
Across from him, Evan’s brow furrowed as he mouthed Maurice to himself.
“You’re clearly lying.” Tommy jabbed an accusatory finger at Howie, who flinched. Despite being able to talk down panicked civilians, Howie had a terrible poker face. “But since we’re about to do something monumentally stupid that will only get us fired if we’re lucky, I’m choosing to ignore whatever this is.”
Howie rolled his eyes. “Gee, you’re a real swell guy.”
“Just remember that when I’m calling in this favor. Let’s go.”
He herded everyone into the helicopter—a tight fit for three men in turnouts and Evan’s giraffe legs certainly didn’t help—and outfitted them with headsets pilfered from a grounded Bell 260, feeling like an overgrown nanny. A feeling that was not helped by the way Howie and Diaz were jostling for the seat next to Evan. Howie won through the expedient method of kicking Diaz’s shin and climbing in while Diaz swore.
“You’re popular, kid,” he said to Evan, who ducked his head with a pleased grin.
Howie snorted. “I’m here to stop their one shared brain cell from bouncing between them like the world’s dumbest screensaver. You have no idea how much these idiots enable each other.”
“Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea of what two idiots can get up to,” Tommy said, grinning at the disgruntled look Chim shot him.
“What does he mean?” Evan asked, glancing at Howie before his attention snapped back to Tommy. Christ, that stare was intense. “What do you mean?”
“Ask me about Howie and Hen’s probie years some time. Speaking of, you sure this is her plan?”
“It’s Hen,” Howie said irritably even as he elbowed Evan repeatedly in the ribs until Evan finally broke that stare. “What do you think she’s planning?”
“I wouldn’t put it past her to commandeer the entire Coast Guard.” Tommy straightened, and sure enough there was Hen, striding into the hangar with a lot less confidence than she needed to make this work. “Excuse me, gentleman. I have a felony to be complicit in.”
He thumped a fist against the helicopter and crossed the hangar, moving quick with purpose. That was the only useful thing his old man taught him: act confident and like you belonged and people would let you get away with murder. It was how he kept Gerrard from clocking him and how he ended up hating himself for a solid two decades.
It was easy enough to steamroll Melton, who had a preexisting paranoid suspicion everyone was secretly laughing at him that Tommy was not above abusing when needed, and he needed to if only because Hen, despite coming into the 118 and upending his life, was really bad at lying. Which was probably, he reflected as he led her away, why she was so good at upending his life.
“What are you doing?” Hen asked quietly.
“Helping out an old friend. Thought you’d be a little more grateful.” He cut her a look, but Hen remained unimpressed as ever. “I’m disappointed that you went for Donato over me. She’s not certified for solo flights yet. That’s sloppy work, Wilson.”
“I’ve had a lot on my mind.” There was a defensive note to her voice.
“Karen okay”
“What? No, she’s fine.” Hen softened, just a touch. “We’re fine.”
“Glad to hear it.” He hadn’t spent much time with Karen, who hadn’t been welcome at the firehouse for obvious reasons, but he’d been at their wedding and danced with the brides.
Hen sighed. “Tommy, why are you doing this?”
He spent literal years wanting to be honest with Hen, and so he said, “You asked.”
She softened further before her eyes narrowed with suspicion. “But I didn’t ask.”
“Yeah, about that,” he said, and gestured to the helicopter and the three grown men inside.
“You weren’t answering your phone,” Diaz said, as if that was a valid reason for them stealing a helicopter for an unauthorized rescue mission.
Hen was unimpressed, judging by the flex of her jaw, but before she could even draw breath for a sharp retort, Howie obnoxiously snapped his gum and said, “Hey, Hen, it’s Tommy.”
“Yes, I’m aware,” she said.
“No,” Howie continued, heavy with meaning, “it’s Tommy.”
Hen’s head whipped towards him and then, bafflingly, to Evan, who shrugged, bashful and apologetic.
“Tommy,” she repeated.
“Apparently,” Howie said darkly, and snapped his gum again.
Tommy didn’t bother waiting for them to start making sense; they had maybe ten minutes before Melton started to pull paperwork that didn’t exist. “You’ve gotten weirder since I’ve been gone,” he said, handing Hen the last headset and bullying her into the copter before climbing in himself.
“You have no idea,” Howie said.
“I’m about to fly us into a hurricane based solely on Hen’s hunch,” Tommy said dryly. “I’ve got some idea.”
“Hey, you said hunch,” Evan said with genuine delight.
“Yes, I did,” Tommy said, and took them up and out.
--
They were an hour into the flight, the rain and wind kicking up, and the tension was loud enough to sing.
“So,” Tommy said in the aftermath of Hen and Howie angrily agreeing with each other, “I see you two still fight by pretending you’re not fighting. That’s a healthy way to approach conflict.”
Behind him, Evan swallowed a laugh. He couldn’t see the kid but he sure as hell felt the stare that been directed his way ever since they took off. It was enough to give him a complex about his piloting.
“We’re not fighting,” Hen insisted.
“Nope,” Howie agreed. “We’re good.”
Another gust hit, and Tommy breathed slow and even to keep from clenching up on the throttle as the old girl rode it out. He ignored the concerned look Hen threw his way. Flying into a hurricane wasn’t the best life decision he’d ever made, but at least this one didn’t come with being actively shot at.
“Just like how you were good back in—what was it? The Great Snit of ’13?” he asked, grinning at the twin offended noises Hen and Howie made.
“The Great Snit?” Diaz asked.
“First of all, no one called it that,” Howie said.
“Everyone called it that,” Tommy said.
“And second of all,” Howie continued at a much louder volume, “it was a minor disagreement, and we were perfectly professional. Weren’t we, Hen?”
Hen, as honest as she was, made a face.
“Is that what we’re calling being passive-aggressive about where you store the pressure bandages?” he asked. “Because that’s—hold on.”
The wind slammed into them, and Tommy gritted his teeth and clenched his jaw and did not think about turning them back towards land before he got them all killed. Hen asked him to go find Bobby and Athena, and that was what he was going to do.
“We good?” Hen asked quietly once they whole bird stopped shuddering.
“For now,” he said because he didn’t believe in false assurances when everyone was knee deep in the shit.
The tension ratcheted back up, although at least this time it wasn’t helped along by Hen and Howie pretending they weren’t pissed with another.
“Hey,” Evan said, “when exactly in ’13 were they fighting?”
“Why would you need to know that, Buck?” Diaz asked, so pointed Evan was in real danger of being stabbed.
“Just curious,” Evan answered.
“Curious,” Howie repeated.
“Yeah, about your and Hen’s probie years.”
Tommy could hear the kid’s shit eating grin.
“Don’t you dare,” Howie said. “That’s not even how it works.”
“Like you know how it works,” Evan shot back, a surprising edge to his voice.
“I’m pretty sure Hen knows how it works,” Diaz said before Howie could transition from arguing because he was tense and bored to arguing because he was genuinely irritated.
“Do not drag me into this,” Hen said, and then, because she just couldn’t help herself: “I’ve got some theories.”
“What theories?” Evan said, flat and—not offended, not exactly. Tommy recognized that tone, had used it for a good chunk of his life whenever someone came prodding at all his tender, hateful parts. It was the tone he’d used for Howie and for Hen and for himself in those lean, starving years following his discharge. It was the tone of someone who didn’t want to be looked at. It made him ache, even now.
“While I’m enjoying this little radio drama,” Tommy said, ignoring Evan’s baffled radio drama, “you wanna let the pilot see the script?” He could only see Hen and the way her expression set, still and carefully neutral. This was a shared secret and he was on the outside. “Or maybe not.”
“Hey, wait, it’s not like that,” Evan said so earnestly, like he was actually worried they’d inadvertently hurt this feelings, that Tommy seriously considered taking the risk of them crashing into the ocean just to turn around and meet Evan’s stare head on.
So it was, all things considered, a welcome distraction when dispatch came on the radio and said, “LAFD Copter 1701, do you read? Firefighter Kinard, come in please.”
He barely kept from wincing. “Go for Kinard.”
“Call from Chief Simpson.”
Fuck.
“Firefighter Kinard,” Chief Simpson said, and even through the wind and the storm fucking with the connection, Simpson’s heavy disappointment seeped through. Tommy’s stomach clenched, an old, tired reaction to his name being said that way. “I know you’re not doing what I think you’re doing, and Captain Wilson and the 118 better not be with you.”
There was no answer that would not incriminate them. Might as well take the tried and true route of outright insubordination and make his old sergeant proud.
“Chief Simpson,” he said, hissing air through his teeth, “trouble reading—sshh—can’t hear—sh-sh-shk—” and he threw in one more guttural stop for good measure before flicking off the radio.
In the ensuing and, frankly, insulting silence that followed, Evan cleared his throat. “Did-did you just make fake mouth static at the fire chief?” There was that delight again, like Evan was charmed by the shit he just pulled.
“Think he bought it?” Tommy asked.
“God, no,” Howie said immediately. “That was awful.”
“Hey!”
“Sorry, man,” Diaz said. “It was not good.”
“Mm,” Hen agreed. “If we weren’t getting fired before we definitely are now.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that,” he said as they rode out another gust. “We’re flying into a hurricane. We’re probably gonna die anyway.”
“We’re not going to die,” Evan said, and Tommy felt his eyebrows jump to his hairline. Evan didn’t say it like a first responder with practiced assurance or with a soldier’s black irony. Evan said it with the casual certainty of someone who had skipped to the end of the book to find the happily-ever-after waiting for him.
“How do you know?” Tommy asked, and if he sounded curious it was better than pleading.
“Yeah, Buck,” Howie said, his usual sarcasm drowned by that strange loaded meaning everyone kept aiming at Evan, “how do you know that?”
“Uh, statistics?” Evan said.
“Buckaroo,” Hen said, eyes closed as if begging some higher power for patience, “what does math have to do with this?”
Buckaroo Tommy mouthed to himself, unfairly charmed.
“Statistically speaking, none of us should be alive,” Evan said. “I mean, how many close calls have we had? A ladder truck crushed my leg and I got struck by lightening.”
“Don’t forget the tsunami,” Diaz added.
“Right, the tsunami,” Evan continued blithely, as if the words coming out of his mouth weren’t objectively insane. “Chim, you had rebar go through your brain, you’ve been stabbed, and Jonah the serial killer stopped your heart twice.”
“What the fuck,” Tommy said with feeling, and was promptly ignored.
Evan didn’t even pause. “Eddie, you had a forty foot well collapse on you and you were shot. Twice.”
Diaz made a noise. “Are we counting that time when I was in the Army? It was before I knew you.
“We’re counting that,” Evan said firmly. “And Hen, you’ve…”
“I’ve what?” Hen asked.
“Wait, have you almost died?” Evan asked.
“No, because unlike the rest of you,” Hen said, much too smug for a woman Tommy had personally witnessed get tangled in the hose line she was supposed to be winding, “I have good sense.”
He and Howie barked out a laugh at the same time.
“I see we’re conveniently forgetting that factory fire,” Howie said.
“The worst I got was a scar,” Hen said flatly.
“Mm, so Sal didn’t have to lead you out when you got turned around by the smoke?” Tommy said, grinning at the disgruntled look Hen shot him.
“Who’s Sal?” Evan asked.
“Tommy’s Eddie,” Howie answered. “Don’t make that face. Bobby fired him when Sal shot his mouth off.” He sighed. “Don’t make that face.”
Tommy really wished he could see what faces Evan was making, especially since Hen was now directing an apologetic look his way. There was a rhythm to their banter, a familiar dance they had long since memorized the steps too. Tommy may have been invited to cut in, but he was just off the beat enough that it made his gums itch.
He cleared his throat. “What about me?”
There it was again, Evan’s attention snagged and caught on him, and Tommy was self-aware enough to admit he liked it. “Chim saved your life,” Evan said.
“Carried him like a princess out of an exploding mall,” Howie added.
Tommy rolled his eyes.
“So like I said,” Evan continued, “we should all be dead by now. The odds are on our side that we’ll make it through this. It’s just statistics.”
“That’s not how math works,” Diaz said.
Evan made an offended noise in the back of his throat. “Which of us had math superpowers from being struck by lightening?”
Tommy had no choice but to laugh at the sweet absurdity of it. If he knew what the 118 had turned into he might have made an effort to call Howie up more often. “That is some baseline you’ve got there, kid.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” Howie muttered.
“You don’t believe me?” Evan asked with that same astounding earnestness, as if Tommy’s answer actually mattered to him.
“Your insane math is very persuasive,” he said dryly, and insanely felt Evan’s beaming grin warm the back of his neck.
--
Back when Tommy had been a gangly limbed, wet behind the ears kid with unearned confidence, his flight instructor had taken him aside after a particularly hard landing and said, “You’re a cocky shit, Kinard, and might have some talent buried under your bullshit, but the only way you’re ever going to be a decent pilot is if you learn you’re going to die one day.”
“You think I got talent?” Tommy had said, snapping a cocky grin that got his weekend pass revoked.
But that advice hadn’t been wrong. It was a hard lesson to learn, and it took a rescue op going to hell with a gut shot man dying in the back of his bird to drive the point home. The soldier, barely older than him, had bled out before they reached the base.
If Tommy brought the copter down onto The Uno’s hull in a landing that would have made his old instructor suck air through her teeth, he at least brought them down.
We are not going to die, Tommy thought, and the words were in Evan’s voice.
“I think that knocked my teeth loose,” Howie complained.
“If you think you can do better than you can fly us into the next hurricane,” Tommy said. Behind him Evan snorted a laugh, and Tommy felt that old cockiness stir; the kid thought he was funny. “We’re on a tight schedule. One good wave is going to wash us and our ride out to sea.”
“Right,” said Hen. “Chim, you’re with me. Buck and Eddie, let’s get a line started so we can get down there. Coast Guard is on their way but I don’t want to wait, especially since we probably have injuries.”
He’d always seen something in Hen ever since as a probie she declared she was bringing in the tide. Howie would say it was righteousness, and that wasn’t wrong, but Tommy always thought of it as solidity, like Hen was a fixed point they could anchor themselves to.
“Look at you now,” he said quietly.
“Look at you,” Hen shot back, that same jut to her chin, a challenge to meet her where she stood.
“You know, I’ve actually missed you,” he said, and met her grin with one of his own.
There was a rhythm to working rescues, ingrained muscle memory that kept him upright when he was so exhausted that the edges of his world went sharp and brittle. It kept him moving now, helping to anchor the line and follow them down into the ship where they began triage.
Howie and Hen moved together, never missing a beat. It was a shame that Eli left before Hen arrived, ostensibly because his wife wanted to be closer to family but mostly because Eli’s patience had finally been wrung dry and he was about a week away from punching Gerrard in his hateful face. Eli would have liked Hen, and he would have liked Hen even more with Howie.
“Athena,” Evan said, folding her into what objectively looked like a really good hug. Comforting. “Where’s Bobby?”
“There was a lost kid,” Athena answered, looking back to the capsized corridors. “He went to get him.”
Evan and Diaz shared a single and look, and then Diaz shouted, “Hen, we’re going after Bobby!”
“Copy,” Hen said, her attention trained on the gunshot victim. Howie lifted one hand in acknowledgment.
“Wait,” Tommy said, and Evan came up so short and abrupt that Tommy nearly winced in sympathy for the kid’s leg muscles. Diaz went ahead. “Do you know where they are?”
“Don’t worry,” Evan said with the same easy confidence of we’re not going to die, “we’ll find them.”
“Buck,” Diaz said, and then Evan was loping after him on his ridiculous giraffe legs.
There was a pricking helplessness to watching Evan and Diaz disappear down the gaping dark corridor while he tried to do the math of how quickly water was flooding in, how long before the entire ship would be dragged down.
“Buck’s gonna Buck,” Athena said, hand wrapped around his forearm. “Good to see you again, Kinard.”
Tommy matched her ironic tone. “And you, Sergeant Grant. You should let Hen check you out.”
Tommy had enough run-ins with Athena during his tenure at the 118 to know she could out stubborn even Gerrard, and so the fact she barely protested betrayed how exhausted she was. She didn’t sit so much as fold, Hen guiding her down.
“How did you know to come find us?” Athena asked.
“Hen had a hunch,” Tommy offered.
Athena laughed, thin and high, so close to the edge of exhausted hysteria that the only keeping her from tipping over was probably Hen’s fingers on her pulse. “Thank god for your hunches,” she said.
“And thank god for pilots who still owe Chimney a life debt,” Hen returned, her gaze cutting to him, an invitation to join in.
“A guy saves your life and you pay and pay,” Tommy said, and went to radio the Coast Guard for an ETA.
--
Evan and Diaz still hadn’t returned when the rescue evac arrived and took over. Tommy knew better than to insert himself into a situation that didn’t need him, and took up a post by his bird, which hadn’t been swept into the Pacific. The hurricane had blown past, and clear skies were creeping back in. With any luck there might even be some sun later to dry out his flight suit that was bunching in tender places.
Howie was shepherding their patients onto the medevacs. A Coast Guard ship was designated for triage and transport, and the sooner they got there, the better. Their gunshot victim and the injured mother would need blood transfusions, and everyone else was exhausted and dehydrated and on the verge of hypothermia. They needed to get moving, which would have been made easier if Athena Grant hadn’t planted herself on the hull and said, “I am not leaving without my husband.”
“Athena,” Hen said, her hands cupped under Athena’s elbows, “Buck and Eddie will get them, but the best thing we can do right now is to get to safety.”
Athena set her jaw. “And who’s going to get them to safety?”
That was his cue, and Tommy didn’t need Hen’s pointed look to carefully cross the slick hull to towards them. “That would be me. I’m their ride.” He hooked a thumb towards his helicopter.
Athena’s eyebrows rose in a lean, unimpressed arch. “And you’ll wait?”
In any other situation, Tommy would be inclined to offense, but Athena was clinging to sanity by sheer will. Tommy truly couldn’t say he’d be this calm in her place if his husband was in the belly of a ship subsumed under an entire ocean.
“As long as it takes.”
Athena’s eyebrows didn’t drop.
Hen leaned in and whispered, just on the edge of hearing, “It’s Tommy.”
Athena’s eyebrows lowered and her jaw softened. “You’ll wait.”
“I’ll wait,” he promised, though god only knew what he was promising.
Athena nodded once, and when Hen tugged her to the medevac she didn’t resist. “Bobby’s gonna love this.”
Sure would be nice if any of the 118 clique could be bothered to loop him in on where he fit in their strange dance, but he’d settled for getting everyone off this doomed cruise ship. The Coast Guard copters took off, and Tommy was left to wait.
It didn’t take long; LA hadn’t managed to beat the Midwestern politeness out of Bobby Nash, who abhorred tardiness. No sooner had the sun risen then the stragglers climbed out of the ship. Evan carried the lost kid on his back, skinny arms wrapped around his neck and Evan’s big, gentle hands looped under the kid’s knobby knees. Bobby was leaning on Diaz, and Tommy couldn’t tell if he was injured or if it was sheer exhaustion pulling Bobby down.
“Need a lift?” Tommy shouted.
Evan’s head jerked up, smile breaking like the day, and in his head Tommy heard, on repeat, Hey, it’s you.
--
Setting down on the Coast Guard ship’s helipad was a hell of a lot easier than a cruise ship’s hull, but he was pretty sure there was at least one sigh of relief from the back. Evan, who had taken the seat upfront like it was reserved just for him, said, “Not to backseat pilot, but this was a much smoother landing.”
“I can always leave you on the next sinking ship,” he said, cutting the engine and the rotors.
Evan snorted as they didn’t climb out of the copter so much as fall onto their feet in their haste to get free. Tommy didn’t take offense; he loved flying but even he was happy to get his feet on the ground. For the first time since Howie called, he felt his shoulders unknot and his back muscles unlock. God, he was going to sleep for the next fourteen hours.
They barely cleared the pad before Bobby, exhaustion melting from him like Minnesotan snow, ran down the stairs and onto the deck, his entire focus on Athena, who was running just as fast towards him. They collided, Bobby lifting Athena off her feet. They were smiling so hard that it took two tries for them to kiss properly.
Tommy had a reputation for being a cynical bastard, but he was also a sucker for romance, and he didn’t even try to stop his grin, basking in the relief and joy radiating from Bobby and Athena. It was a sweet reminder than happy endings still happened, even for men like him and Bobby Nash.
Evan’s hand on his shoulder nearly startled him. Gone was Evan’s bright smile, replaced with a quiet solemnity that sent a shiver down his spine.
“I told you that we weren’t going to die,” Evan said, a twitch at the corner of his mouth ruining the gravity of the statement.
Tommy laughed so hard he snorted, and Evan’s surprised delight just made him lean into Evan’s grip.
“I,” he said, once he caught his breath, “will never doubt your crazy lightening math again.”
“It’s just statistics,” Evan said, and squeezed his shoulder under the bright, hot sun of a new day.
ii. Evan, 6 maybe 7
The first time Tommy met Evan went like this: he was six months at Harbor and the constant knot at the base of his skull was slowly unraveling, bit by bit.
“Hey, Kinard,” York called, head hanging over the back of the couch and his feet up on the coffee table. “How’d the date go?”
“Who said I had a date?” Tommy said, downing the last of his coffee before it grew colder. “Put your feet down. Who raised you?”
“Wolves,” Shore said, grinning at the finger York gave her. “And we know you had a date because you wore a shirt that wasn’t black.”
“Or gray,” York helpfully added.
“You must have liked them.” Shore collapsed on the couch, kicking her feet up next to York’s. “The blue brought out your eyes.”
Tommy bit down on the reflexive denial. This wasn’t the 118 and Captain Santiago wasn’t Gerrard; she regularly talked about how her son was dating his way through his entire college campus. His latest boyfriend was from his statistics class but before that he briefly dated a girl from his Gothic Lit seminar.
“He was fine,” Tommy said. The knot unwound a little more. “Not really my type. Too brooding.”
“Add it to the list,” York said. “Kinard likes ’em cheerful.”
Tommy eyed their boots and considered knocking their feet to the floor. Better to let Santiago catch them and assign cleaning duty. “You got a list going?”
“We’ve all worked together long enough that I unfortunately know everyone’s tastes.” York gestured out beyond the lounge towards the hangar and the crew within. “Mitchell likes ’em tall, Wu likes ’em short, and Nancy here likes ’em stacked.”
“I am a connoisseur of men’s tits,” Shore said. “I will not apologize for that.”
Tommy snorted; of the very few things Shore felt compelled to apologize for, sex didn’t make the list.. “And what do you like?” he asked York.
“Me?” York’s grin was lazy. “I’m easy. I like everything.”
“Christ,” Tommy said, on a laugh. “I should introduce you to Howie.”
York eyed him curiously, the same he did every time Tommy doled out another crumb about the 118—Hen’s insane organizational method or Howie’s constant gum snapping or Sal’s habit of keeping all his tools on his left—like York couldn’t figure him out.
“You’re hard to read,” Shore said, slouching down further. “Hence the list.”
“I don’t know if I should be touched or file a HR complaint,” Tommy said.
“Personally, I’d go with the complaint,” Santiago said. York and Shore swung their feet to the floor with guilty speed. “I’m positive there’s something you should be doing.”
“We’re going, Cap,” Shore said, heaving herself upright and then tugging York after her.
Santiago waited until they had gone before saying, “Are they bothering you?”
Tommy again caught his reflexive denial—he’d dealt with far worse hazing—and instead considered the question carefully and seriously. If he wanted his life to be different than he had to be different.
“They’re only giving me a little shit, Cap, and it’s coming from a good place,” he finally said, satisfied with his answer.
“Glad to hear it, although you let me know if that changes.” She bumped her knuckles to his shoulder. “Those radios aren’t going to test themselves.”
Tommy took the hint and headed to the hangar. He wasn’t a probie, not with the all the years under his belt, but he was still new to Harbor and got assigned some of the scut work, albeit not the worst of it.
He finished running through Copter 1701’s frequencies when static scratched across the line, quick and loud enough that he almost missed the pop of displaced air. Tommy shook his head and wriggled his little finger in his left ear. Please let that not be a sign of an ear infection. He got them all the time as a kid, but he’d thought he outgrew them once he hit puberty and shot up two feet in eleven months.
He hopped out, and said, “Hey, Mitchell, are we expecting any incoming—”
There was a kid staring up at the copter used for medevacs, head tipped back and mouth open. He was six, maybe seven. Tommy was shit at estimating small children’s ages; all he could say for certain was that the kid was somewhere in that nebulous zone between toddlerhood and puberty.
A quick glance around didn’t reveal anyone resembling a parent or a guardian. Hell, none of the other crew in the hangar had noticed the kid at all. The kid darted forward to touch the copter’s strut.
“Hey,” Tommy said, and the kid snatched his hand back, expression equal parts guilty and mulish. He adjusted his tone as he closed the distance. “You like helicopters?”
The kid nodded, sending his mop of blond hair bobbing. There was a birthmark stamped along the edge of his left brow, and his chin bore the telltale scrap of asphalt rash and his eyes the telltale redness of a recent crying jag. “They’re cool.”
“They are very cool,” Tommy agreed, hesitating a moment before crouching to put himself closer to the kid’s level. His left knee, which never worked right after Afghanistan, cracked. “This is the one we use when we need to take someone to the hospital if they’re hurt. And that one”—he pointed towards another medium duty copter—“we use for rescues when trucks can’t reach them.”
The kid’s eyes widened further. “Do you know how to fly?”
“I do. Do you want to know which one is my favorite?” At the kid’s furious nod, he pointed to the Bell 206. “It’s small but fast.”
“Cool,” the kid said, and took off towards it, moving far faster than anyone with those short legs should be able to.
Tommy stood with a wince, absently rubbing his knee before catching up in a dozen steps. “Easy there. We don’t want you getting hurt.”
The kid’s shoulders inched up and his lower lip wobbled. “Sorry,” he said in a small voice.
Oh no. No parental figure appeared to save him; Tommy was on his own with a child on the verge of tears.
“Hey, you’re not in trouble.” He crouched again and caught the kid’s gaze. “I’m Tommy. What’s your name?”
“Evan.” The kid blinked his tears away in a practiced move.
“It’s nice to meet you, Evan.” He offered his hand, and Evan took it with narrow eyed suspicion, like he thought Tommy was making fun of him. Tommy solemnly shook his hand, so small in his own. “Did you come here with anyone?”
There wasn’t a school tour scheduled because he hadn’t been drafted to lead it; it was a station wide joke that he talked to kids like they were all retirees, but he remembered being that young and hating how adults spoke over and around him. He wasn’t going to make another kid feel forgotten.
So if it wasn’t a school trip then Evan was probably a firefighter’s son. Shore and York didn’t have kids, Mitchell only had nieces, and they threw Singh a baby shower last month. He was still slowly and carefully learning everyone’s lives, but Evan had to belong to someone.
“What does she look like?” The question earned him a blank stare. “What’s her name?”
“Maddie.”
There was no Maddie among the pilots, but there was a Matilda on ground crew for B shift. Maddie could be a nickname. She seemed too old to have a brother this young, but Evan could be a half-brother. Their father wouldn’t be the first to suffer a midlife crisis and get his new girlfriend pregnant.
“We’ll find her,” Tommy said firmly, and pushed himself to his feet—he was going to have to ice his knee when he got off shift—and held out his hand to Evan, who took it after another suspicious stare, leading him from the hangar to the station house.
They barely made it through the door when Wu stuck her head out of the kitchen, and said, eyebrows practically in her hairline, “What do you got there, Kinard?”
“This is Evan,” Tommy said. Evan peeked out from behind him. “Evan, this is Emily. We work together.”
“I think that’s the first time you ever used my first name.” Her wary stare was perfectly matched by Evan. “What’s up with the kid?”
“Evan,” he corrected. “We’re looking for his sister.”
“Maddie,” Evan said helpfully.
Wu’s eyebrows which had inched down, furrowed. “Do we have a Maddie?”
“You would know better than me.”
Evan’s eyes went large and tragic.
“Oh no,” Wu said, physically recoiling, and Tommy made a mental note that she was not the go-to for any calls with children. “Cap has the roster. She’ll know Maddie.”
“Thank you for your help,” he said dryly, and Wu stopped panicking long enough to glare.
“Cap’s in her office,” Wu said, and then made herself scarce, probably worried that Tommy might take leave of his senses and leave Evan in her care.
“C’mon, kid,” he said, turning towards he admin wing. “We got a new lead to follow.”
Evan made a confused face, and Tommy had to accept that a six year old was not the audience for his jokes.
“Are you a fireman?” Evan asked, short legs working overtime to keep up; Tommy guiltily shortened his steps and slowed down.
“I am,” he said.
Evan furrowed his brow, birthmark adorably scrunching up. “But you fly helicopters.”
“You can be a firefighter and still fly helicopters.”
“Huh,” Evan said, like this never occurred to him. He idly scratched his chin, and a scab peeled away. Blood seeped out.
“New plan.” Tommy veered towards the locker room. “Let’s get that taken care of before it turns gangrenous.”
“You’re weird,” Evan said with all the world-weariness of a fifty year old noir detective.
Tommy cracked up, laughing so hard he snorted, and Evan gave a little pleased smiled.
The locker room was empty this far into the shift, and he swung Evan up to sit on the counter.
Evan gave an indignant squawk and kicked his feet, barely missing Tommy’s hip. “Sorry,” Tommy said, leaning out of range. “I’ll ask next time.”
There was that stare again, more confused than wary, like Evan didn’t understand why an adult was apologizing to him. It was terrifyingly familiar, and Tommy ignored the sour clench of his stomach. He was an adult now, not that small, scared kid, and he got to choose who he wanted in his life.
He cleared his throat and dug out the first aid kit from the cabinet. “All right, Evan, let’s get you cleaned up. Don’t want your sister thinking we’re not taking care of you.”
“Okay,” Evan said in that small voice, and offered his small palms.
Christ, the kid was breaking his heart.
Tommy took out the alcohol pads, ripping open a packet with his teeth. “This is going to sting.”
Evan tipped up his chin and firmed his jaw. “I’m ready,” he said, and then winced when Tommy, cradling Evan’s hand in his own, gently drew the pad along the scrape.
“Sorry,” he said quietly, trying to be as quick as possible. “How’d you get these?”
“Fell,” Evan said.
That would explain the cuts on his palms from where he tried to catch himself. Kids got banged up all the time. Tommy had spent damn near his entire adolescent perpetually bruised and bloody, but there was something about the way Evan said it, so matter-of-fact for someone so young, that drove him to ask, “Where are your parents?”
“Work.”
Finished with his left hand, Evan obligingly offered his right palm as Tommy tore open a new packet. “Do you know where they work?”
Evan shrugged. “Maddie takes care of me.”
Palms done, Tommy turned his attention to Evan’s chin. “You know,” he said, as Evan made a small noise and jerked away, “if you’re ever in trouble, you can go to any fireman for help. That’s what we’re here for.”
“Okay,” Evan said with a look that clearly said Tommy was being weird again but Evan was willing to look past that.
Tommy sighed, knowing better than to push, especially when he didn’t have anything to go on but old, tired fears from his own childhood. This was a conversation to have with Maddie and not Evan.
“Done,” he said, resisting the urge to tell Evan he’d been brave only because he didn’t think he could stop from laughing at the sheer offense Evan was sure to take. He rifled through the kit until he unearthed the box of, huh, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles bandaids. Mitchell must have stocked it last; his nieces were going through a phase. “Pick your poison, kid.”
“Donatello,” Evan said promptly. Tommy would have guessed Raphael or Michelangelo, but maybe Evan just liked the color purple. “These look weird.”
Tommy squinted at the bandaids. “I think it’s one of the new shows.” It was a safe guess. It felt like every other year there was a new version of the turtles out. Tommy had been obsessed with the live action movies from the 90s. Had watched the first one so many times he wore out their VHS copy, and his dad refused to buy another one.
Evan made a face but he sat still as Tommy carefully placed a bandaid on each palm and then over his chin. “All patched up,” he said, and gave in to the urge to ruffle the kid’s mop. “Can I lift you down?”
Evan gave the question serious consideration before nodding, arms held up so that Tommy could swing him back to the ground.
“Can we find Maddie now?” Evan asked, a droop to the words. Tommy gave it ten minutes before Evan had an exhausted meltdown.
“We’re back on the case,” he said, and earned himself another look that clearly said Evan thought he was the weirdest person on the planet.
They left the locker room but only made it one hall over when Mitchell popped in from the back and said, “And here I thought Wu was pulling my leg, but you have a kid. Who gave you a kid?” He leaned just enough on you to have Evan glaring up at him. Mitchell was a tall bastard, taller than even him, and so thin that it was a real concern that’d blow away when the Santa Ana winds came through.
“This is Evan,” Tommy said, surprised when Evan reached for his hand. “We’re looking for Maddie.”
“So I heard.” Mitchell hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Matilda is covering for Singh. She’s out checking the tanks.”
Evan’s head swung around, a bloodhound catching the scent, and then he was ripping his small hand free and racing back towards the locker room and the side exit.
“Thanks for that,” Tommy said, and Mitchell held up his hands in apology.
He lightly jogged after Evan, picking up pace as Evan careened around the corner, nearly bouncing off the walls as his sneakers skidded along the freshly mopped floor. The new probie was putting in the extra effort.
“Maddie!” Evan shouted, out of sight.
Tommy rounded the corner, ears popping. No Evan. He ducked into the locker room, but it was empty. The exit door was closed. The hallway was empty.
“Kid?” Tommy called, backtracking the way they came in. “Evan?”
Shore met him at the kitchen, scrapping her hair up and away from her face. “You missing something?”
“You see a kid go through here?” He held out a hand at hip height. “This tall. Blond hair. Birthmark on his left eye.”
“Sorry, no.” She finished tying her hair back. “I was not aware you have a highly specific kid.”
“Not mine.”
“See, now that just raises more questions,” she said just as the bell went off.
It was a medevac, a spinal by the sound of it, and he was the pilot on call. “Can you look for him? I gotta—”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it. What’s his name?”
“Evan,” he said already turned towards the hangar. “His sister is Matilda. Maddie. We think.”
“You think? Did you just pick this kid up off the street?”
“Hangar, not street.” Santaigo called for him. “Fuck, I gotta—you got him?”
“I’ll find him,” Shore said, flapping a hand dismissively at him. “Go before Cap writes you up.”
He hauled ass and only received Santiago’s mildly disapproving eyebrow. It was a smooth flight and a smoother rescue—couple overestimated their hiking abilities and had a nasty fall down a steep slope—which was good because the worry dogged him, teeth gnawing at his stomach.
“You find him?” he asked Shore when they finally made it back to Harbor.
“Not me,” she said, glaring at errant hair that was whipped up by the wind. “Mitchell said he thinks he saw the kid get picked up by his sister. Not Matilda, by the way.”
“Thinks he saw or actually saw?” Tommy said.
Shore was unimpressed. “It was on the far side of the lot, but he saw.”
Relief pried the teeth loose. “Okay, that’s good. Evan was getting scared.”
Her head cocked to the side. “So you like kids.”
He jabbed a finger at her chest. “Do not put that on the list.”
“Too late. It’s already on there. You like cheerful men and want kids. You’re secretly a big softie, Kinard.”
It was just Shore giving him affectionate shit, but she wasn’t wrong. He spent too long trying to be the kind of man his father and, later, Gerrard would like and hating himself for it. Maybe he liked that he had a soft spot for lonely kids.
“Like a marshmallow,” he said.
Shore grinned. “Yeah, you can stick around.”
“As long as I have your permission,” he said dryly.
She punched him in the arm, the edge of her knuckles digging in enough to bruise. “Probie just made some coffee. I saved you a cup.”
He followed her inside, and the knot unwound just a little more.
--
iii. Evan, 33
His fourteen hours of sleep was going to have to wait until after Santiago pulled him into her office to rip him a new one.
“Care to explain why I had to learn from Chief Simpson about your little stunt, Kinard?” Santiago asked, mouth a hard line.
Tommy folded his hands behind his back and settled into parade rest, his gaze directed to the left of her ear. Gerrard had loved it when he did that. Got a real power trip out of it.
“Cut that out. I’m not your drill sergeant.”
“Sorry, Cap.” It took conscious effort to relax his muscles and soften the line of his spine. “Old habits.”
“They do die hard.” She leaned back against her desk, careful not to dislodge the multiple, haphazard stacks. She claimed to have an organizational system, but Tommy only saw the mess and it made his palms sweat. “I’m still waiting on that explanation.”
He felt his face settle into careful neutral blankness, another old habit he couldn’t shake. Gerrard had only ingrained it further; Tommy couldn’t afford to show weakness with him, and to Gerrard emotions were the biggest weakness.
“I should have informed you, sir, but we had no proof at the time that The Uno was in distress.” Despite his best effort, his gaze slipped to left of Santiago’s ear. “And even if we did have confirmation, it was outside of LAFD jurisdiction.”
“Well outside,” Santiago agreed, and when he chanced a glance, the corner of her mouth was hooked up, a line of load bearing amusement girding the reprimand. “Unauthorized doesn’t even begin to cover your joyride. If The Uno had not been in distress you would be looking at suspension right now if not outright termination or worse.”
“We got lucky,” he said, that old cockiness bleeding back in.
Santiago’s gaze went sharp, and he forced his expression back to placid stillness.
“You’re such a shit, Kinard.” She pursed her lips, tongue tucked up against her teeth the way it did when she was considering someone. “Explain your thought process to me.”
He hesitated, and hated that he did so. Santiago didn’t set traps for him to fall into. She meant what she said or she wouldn’t have said it.
He exhaled. “I worked with firefighters Han and Wilson for years, and I trust their instincts, especially Wilson. She’s one of our finest.”
“She’s been noticed,” Santiago said, and Tommy felt the faintest prick of pride. There was going to come a day where he got say he knew Hen when.
“Wilson said that something had gone wrong, and I believed her.”
“You should have come to me,” Santiago said.
“I didn’t want to put you in an awkward position.”
She snorted. “Much better for Simpson to think I have no idea what’s happening in my own house.”
He flinched.
Santiago sighed and pushed off the desk. “Damnit, kid, I can’t have your back if you don’t let me in. I’m not Gerrard. I will never toss you to the wolves.”
Tommy swallowed; she never said what she didn’t mean. “I know.”
“Do you?” Santiago didn’t soften—she was not the kind of woman whose kindness came as comfort—but she caught his eye and said, “There are people I would fly into a hurricane for without hesitation.”
“I owe them,” he said, the words small in his mouth.
“We’ve all heard the shit the 118 gets into. I like Nash. He doesn’t have the usual ego.” That meant that Bobby hadn’t been an asshole to her, still a rarity with the upper brass, who remained skeptical of anyone neither white nor a man. “It anyone deserves the benefit of incredible stupidity and doubt, it’s them.”
Tommy considered that, and Santiago patiently waited for him to finish turning it over. That was one of the things he appreciated most about her, her willingness to give him space to carefully think things through.
“You wouldn’t have officially signed off on it,” he finally said.
“Christ, no. You didn’t have a single shred of actionable intel.” She smiled at his unimpressed look. “But given this was a Cat-5 and we’re still cleaning up after the tsunami, I might have assigned some pilots to patrol along the coast so we could act quickly in the event of any flooding.”
“Oh,” he said.
There was that amusement again, and Santiago reached up and gripped his shoulder. “I told you, I got your back, kid.”
“I know, Cap, but old habits—”
“Die hard.” She gave him a shake. “I don’t want to see you for the next three days. Don’t argue with me. You’re out of flight hours and the coming adrenaline crash is going to lay you out. You good to drive?”
“I live close. I’ll be fine.”
“Good. Get out of here.” She lightly shoved him, waiting until he was at the door before adding, “That was a hell of a flight you pulled off. You’re a good pilot.”
“Thank you, sir.” He let slip nineteen year old Tommy’s grin. “The trick is knowing you’re gonna die.”
Santiago barked out a sharp laugh. “Get the fuck out of my station, Kinard.”
Tommy lifted two fingers in a salute because he was still a cocky shit at heart and got the fuck out of her station.
--
Tommy didn’t even bother pulling his truck into the garage, just parked in the driveway and stumbled to the door, avoiding the one rickety porch step he meant to fix but still hadn’t gotten around to yet. He let himself inside, reflexively sticking his left leg out to prevent Whitlam from making a jailbreak. Whitlam yowled his disapproval and immediately tried to scale his shin. Tommy scooped him up before the claws could come out. Whitlam squirmed and wriggled until Tommy gave in and draped him over his shoulders like a furry, drooling shawl.
“I’m not going to feed you,” he warned Whitlam, who only upped his diesel purr until he was half-deaf in his right ear.
He detoured to the kitchen long enough to drink some water and eat a handful of olives straight from the jar because he was too tired to even pour a bowl of cereal, all with Whitlam studiously grooming his ear and the hair at his temple.
“Time for bed, bud,” Tommy muttered, staggering towards the bedroom where he shed his pants and socks, Whitlam amiably rocking with the motion like an old sailor at sea. There was no getting around the shirt, and so he gently removed Whitlam, who registered his complaint by going boneless and pooling from Tommy’s hands onto his pillow.
“I’m not going to fight you on this one,” he said, falling face first onto the bed. He was out before he even pulled up the covers.
His slept the sleep of the exhausted—dark, dreamless, unmoving—and was shocked awake thirteen hours later by Whitlam lodging his complaint about his late breakfast by lying directly on his face.
“I think you might be kind of dumb,” Tommy said once he lifted Whitlam free. “There is no way you’re getting fed faster if you smother me to death.”
Whitlam, resting place reassigned from Tommy’s face to his chest, settled in for a session of purring and drooling as Tommy gently rubbed fingers along the hollows of his skull, paying particular attention to the spots behind his ears and along his jaw.
By the time Whitlam had decided they procrastinated enough, his phone had just about vibrated itself off his bedside table. He fished it free of the usual detritus of life—the odd gas receipt, lip balm, small bottle of sunscreen—and took one look at the notifications piled up on the lockscreen before tossing it onto the bed.
“We need food and coffee before we tackle that.” He scooped Whitlam into the crook of his arm like a particularly hairy and dumb baby. “What do you say to some breakfast?”
Whitlam scrambled free, leaping to the floor and sprinting so fast towards the kitchen than that he drifted around the corners, claws scrabbling along the hardwood floors Tommy had discovered after a truly terrible weekend pulling up the old carpet.
He followed at a more sedate pace, shoving a hand through his hair and idly scratching his stomach. He really should just give in and get an automatic feeder, but he liked the chore of portioning out Whitlam’s food while Whitlam wove between his feet and did his best to trip him. And it was good for Whitlam to get the social interaction when the girl across the street came to feed and play with him during his longer shifts.
“All right, all right,” he muttered, dancing around where Whitlam went up on his back legs to try to claw the bowl out of his hands. “You act like you’ve never been fed once in your entire life.”
Whitlam was too busy shoving his entire face into the bowl to dignify that with a response. Tommy ran a hand along Whitlam’s spine, clicked on the coffee maker, and went to take a shower.
It wasn’t until he was showered, dressed, fed, and on his second cup of coffee that he braved his phone. Every group text he was in had blown up—no one gossiped like a bored firefighter during a q-word shift—including the one with his old army buddies, who had heard it from a friend of a friend in the Coast Guard. Those were easily dealt with by sending a pic of Whitlam, draped over his shoulders in his post-breakfast daze and grooming his ear, as proof of life.
There were several texts from Donato complaining about how she missed all the fun even though she was the one who insisted on visiting her family. Despite years of therapy, he was constantly baffled by people who actually liked and voluntarily spent time with their family outside of nagging obligation.
More surprising than Donato was a text from Lena Bosco, who had a kick like a mule and blushed every time a woman expressed admiration for her arms. Be careful with the 118. They get attached.
Even through text, her withering tone was clear.
118 was my old house before I transferred, he sent.
During the six minutes it took for Bosco to reply, Tommy finished his coffee and successfully diverted Whitlam’s attention from his ear with a few well placed chin scritches.
That explains a lot about you.
“Ouch,” he said, and then, with more feeling, “Ouch.” Whitlam, displeased his chin scritches had stopped, dug his claws in a little more. “You’re about to lose privileges if you keep that up.”
Whitlam purred and kneaded his shoulder.
“I see you’ve called my bluff. Touché.”
Whitlam purred louder. Shore was right; he was a soft touch.
Well, he put it off long enough. Taking a fortifying breath, he opened the thread he had with York and Shore. He didn’t bother scrolling back, not when the latest was from Shore, in all caps with an inadvisable amount of skull emojis: KINARD YOU ASSHOLE.
Hello to you, too, he sent back. I'm fine, if you were wondering.
We weren’t, York replied.
Tommy barely had enough time to read it before his phone rang. He sighed, and said, “I’m not going to apologize.”
“You absolute asshole,” Shore said, an echo to her words. She was in the hangar.
“So Nancy’s upset,” York said, and then made a pained noise when Shore punched him the shoulder.
“Am I on speaker?” Tommy asked.
“It’s just us,” York said, answering the question he hadn’t asked. “We know you’re a wallflower.”
That made him smile for no good reason, even as Shore said, “I cannot believe you didn’t give us a call.”
“It was my old house,” Tommy said instead of it didn’t involve you because that would have ensured Shore physically crawling through the phone to punch his face in. Whitlam grumbled a protest as his resting perch tensed, and Tommy made the conscious effort to relax his shoulders.
“And we’re your current house,” she snapped.
York sighed. “What Nancy means—”
“Oh, I know you’re not about to go putting words in my mouth, Wesley.”
“—is that you don’t have to fly into hurricanes alone.” York paused. “That’s not even a metaphor. Jesus.”
Yeah, that was the effect the 118 had on everyone, even him when he’d been there. Jesus.
“I didn’t want put you in a position where your careers were at risk,” he finally said, careful.
Shore made a deeply offended noise.
“Nancy is taking a lap,” York said after an awkward pause. “While she’s doing that you want to replay that sentence and pinpoint the exact moment you come across as an—hey, Nancy, what is he?”
“An asshole!” Shore shouted in the background; Tommy could perfectly picture the angry cadence of her pacing. She did that a lot in the aftermath of the tsunami, when they were out of flight hours and grounded until they got their federally mandated four hours of rest, too exhausted to fly but too wrung out to sleep.
“Is it the part where I made a decision for you?” he said.
“Ding, ding, ding! Jim, tell him what he’s won!” York’s voice dropped back to his usual register. “We’re big boys and girls. We can decide what to risk our careers for.”
Tommy scrubbed a hand over his face. He’d been out from under Gerrard’s thumb for longer than he’d been under it, but old survival instincts died even harder than old habits. “You’re right. I should have trusted you. I just—” He blew out a breath, frustrated in how to explain it. “I owe them.” It was what he tried to explain to Santiago, what Howie and Hen were to him. What he had been to them: a beaten dog snapping and biting, and then, perhaps, a friend.
“Your survivors club,” Shore said, voice closer, like she snatched the phone out of York’s hand.
“My survivors club,” he agreed.
Five months in, York and Shore had taken him to the nearest ladder bar and asked him if he liked Harbor and poured tequila into him until he had said, drunk but sincere, I love it here. You never had Gerrard.
“Next time,” Shore said firmly, “you call us. We’re your house.”
Tommy’s first instinct was to joke and deflect—Of course I’ll call you next time there’s a hurricane we need to almost kill ourselves flying into—but that was the reflex of a scared kid who had made himself small so his sorry excuse of a father could feel big. Tommy had learned to love that kid no one else had ever bothered to, but he’d grown and he changed and those survival tricks now hurt rather than helped.
He breathed in, and on the exhale said, “You’re my house. Next time, Nancy, I call you.”
“Oh, first name,” York half sang, like they were kids on a playground. “That’s how you know he’s serious.”
“Don’t you have a job you should be doing?” he said, which was when the bell went off, loud even through the shitty phone speaker.
“I swear to god if you jinxed us,” Shore said.
“Send Whitlam pics. We got rights,” said York, and hung up.
Tommy sent over a picture of Whitlam with eyes rolled back in sleep, tongue hanging out and drooling on his shoulder. Two hours later Shore texted, all lower case and lacking any punctuation, asshole i mean u not whitlam he’s perfect, and knew he was forgiven.
--
The thing everyone forgot about big, dramatic rescues was that they always came to an end and you were forced back to regular life and all the chores that waited: laundry and dishes and cleaning Whitlam’s litterbox. He was taking the latter out to the garbage bin when his phone once gain buzzed.
Package successfully delivered, he fished his phone from his pocket. For the first time in over a year, Howie had resurrected their survivors club chat. Hey tommy what are u doing tonight? We owe you a beer.
You owe me more than a beer, he replied, avoiding the bad porch step out of habit.
2 beers?
He snorted, ducking down and scooping up Whitlam when he tried to make a run for it. “You’re very predictable. Ever considered switching up your tactics by trying literally anything else?”
Whitlam bit his chin.
“You’re lucky you’re cute.” He released Whitlam to do his customary post-shit laps.
To Howie he texted, You owe me a steak dinner for flying into the hurricane and a weekend in Vegas for landing on a capsized ship.
Why, Mr. Kinard, how forward, Howie responded. But u should know my hand is spoken for.
Before he could respond with an appropriate quote from Pride and Prejudice—the Colin Firth version, of course—Hen texted, Unlike you, we have kids. A beer is all we can afford.
His eyebrows jumped up. Howie, you have a kid?
Her name is Jee-Yun, and she is the light of my life that once didn’t let me sleep for 49 hours.
Who would give you a kid? he sent.
Wouldn’t u like to know, Howie responded with—was that a winky face emoji? Are u in? I’ll even bring Eddie so there’s someone worse at pool than u.
Tommy rolled his eyes. I play a good game.
Howie’s response was a succinct, if insulting, row of laughing-crying emojis, which only served to make him nostalgic for the days before texting when you had to actually call someone to make fun of them. Christ, he was old.
How are you so bad at figuring out angles? Hen said. You have to know math to be a pilot.
I don’t know why you think this is convincing me to go drinking with you, he replied.
U love us, Howie said.
Whatever you need to tell yourself. He hesitated, stomach knotting like he was fourteen again and Michael Giri had just smiled at him in English class. Jesus, Kinard, get it together. So I should expect the entire 118 squad?
It was, he reflected as the chat went silent, more embarrassingly obvious than if he had just outright asked if Evan was going to be there.
It was Hen who broke the silence. Shaw’s. 7p. First round is on Chim.
Only the first round, Howie responded. I’ve got a kid to send to college some day.
We all got kids to send to college, Hen replied.
See you there, he responded.
He got two thumbs up back.
“Well,” he said to Whitlam who had completed his laps and was now snoring in a sunbeam, “I guess I’m going out.”
--
Shaw’s was a popular ladder bar where the staff didn’t blink at two men half undressing to show off their scars. It was far enough from Harbor and his house that it rarely made the drive worth it, and it meant less of a chance to run into Howie and Hen. Not that was particularly likely given they both had kids. He still couldn’t believe Howie had a daughter. Howie had always been good with kids on a call, coaxing out smiles under the most nightmarish of circumstances, but that skillset didn’t always transfer over to children of your own. He should know.
“Yo, Tommy!” Howie called, waving from a corner table.
He crossed to them, avoiding the clumped crowd around the pool tables, catching the chair Hen kicked towards him and eyeing the bottles on the table. “You started without me?”
“You don’t have kids, but trust me when I say you do not take a night out for granted,” Howie said.
“Who said I don’t have a kid?” Tommy said, keeping his expression placid.
“You do not. Wait.” Howie leaned forward, stabbing an accusatory finger at his face. “Please tell me there isn’t a tiny Kinard running around.”
Even Hen, who was always good at clocking his bullshit, furrowed her brow like she couldn’t quite suss him out.
Tommy finally cracked a smile. “I’m the only Kinard around.”
“Thank god,” Howie said, and slid a bottle towards him. “Got you one of your terrible beers.”
“I see you still have the palette of a nineteen year old,” he said dryly, taking a drink. It wasn’t a bad choice. Maybe Howie’s palette was improving.
“I ordered,” Hen said.
Maybe not.
“Where’s Diaz?” Tommy asked.
“Got stuck in traffic after dropping Chris off,” Howie said. “His son.”
Tommy intellectually knew that he was at the age where the majority of his peers were settling down and going about the business of raising the next generation, but it was still shock to look around and seeing most everyone he knew doing exactly that. The Howie he’d known back in their shared 118 days hadn’t been able to keep a girlfriend longer than three months. But then Howie had known a Tommy playing straight from so deep in the closet he had weekly tea date with Mr. Tumnus. But now Howie had a daughter and Tommy had brought his last boyfriend to Harbor’s holiday party. They were so far from who they used to be they might as well be different people on a different planet.
“All right,” he said. “Let’s see ’em.”
Hen and Howie don’t need to be told twice. Hen was faster on the draw, and Tommy’s leaned forward, elbows braced on the table to better see the pictures.
“Jesus, he’s a full on teenager now,” Tommy said. Denny still had at least one more growth spurts before he was done, but already his face was losing its baby softness. Kid was going to have a hell of a jawline when puberty was finished with him.
“I know.” Hen’s express was fond and wistful. “No idea when that happened.”
“I remember when he was small enough to fit in my hand.” It was one of few times Karen had come to the station, Denny in a sling across her chest. Tommy didn’t have strong feelings about babies—unlike Shore, who had responded with a blunt oh, no thank you when offered baby Singh to hold—but he’d been game to take the kid to give Karen and Hen a break; Hen had confessed that she got more sleep during twenty-four hour shifts than she did at home. He’d been surprised at Denny’s tender, dense weight in his arms.
“And I remember how he spit up on Chim,” Hen said with a grin.
“He was a champion spitter upper,” Chim agreed. “Got me right in the face once.”
Tommy swiped to the next photo. Denny grinning with a small girl half hidden behind him.
“Mara.” Hen’s voice dropped, not quite hushed, but gentler.
“Your daughter?” he asked, although it was obvious.
“Our foster daughter, but yes, we want to adopt. Here.” Hen flipped through until she got to one where Mara was smiling, gaze directed somewhere beyond the camera.
“She’s cute.” What Mara was was happy, and Tommy dropped his voice to match Hen’s. “You and Karen are good parents.”
Hen’s gaze was heavy but not unkind, and for a moment the years slipped away and Tommy was back on the 118’s floor and Hen was demanding their respect. She always saw more than any of them.
“Thank you,” she said, answering all the things he hadn’t said.
He bumped his shoulder into hers.
“Okay, we’ve all seen Denny,” Howie said, earning himself a kick to the ankle judging by his wince. “This is Jee-Yun.”
Jee-Yun was soft cheeked and adorable with bright eyes and a wide grin, and Howie adored her. Howie was the kind of father to carefully cut Jee’s food into small pieces and walked stooped over so he could hold her hand and listen to her babble and peer curiously at whatever caught her attention. He was the kind of dad Tommy never got.
“She takes after you,” Tommy said as Howie flipped through the album.
“She gets the smile from her mother,” Howie said. “This is Maddie.”
Maddie was dark haired and dark eyed, and her cheek was pressed to Jee’s little fat one, the two grinning and squinting against the sun, Jee with her mother’s smile.
“Maddie is Buck’s sister,” Hen said, so casual it had to be deliberate. She tipped the bottle back and drank.
Tommy glanced back at the photo. He would never have guessed Evan and Maddie were related if he hadn’t been told. There weren’t many similarities—hair was different, bone structure, too, even the shape of their noses—but the smile, the shape and the brightness, that was the same in all three: Evan and Maddie and Jee.
“Huh,” he said, and relinquished Howie’s phone back to him.
“You started without me?” Diaz asked, pulling out the last chair and snagging a beer for himself.
“I am not wasting my one night out,” Howie said.
Diaz made a face and then said, “Oh, are we doing pictures? This is Chris.”
Tommy bit back a sigh as another phone was shoved in his face. He liked kids, especially his friends’ kids, but there were only so many pictures he could make the appropriate noises over and comment on how cute the kid was before he lost his mind. Last baby shower—that time for Wendell and their partner—he, Wu, and Shore had ended up in the kitchen for a breather before venturing back out for more baby talk.
But he wasn’t a complete asshole, not anymore at least, and so politely made the right noises as Diaz proudly showed off his kid. It wasn’t like he had to fake enthusiasm; Chris was a cute kid; it was easy to see Diaz in the line of Chris’ jaw and the shape of his eyes.
“Oh, I forgot about this one,” Diaz said.
Tommy blinked back in to a photo of Evan and Chris grinning with a boa snake draped over their shoulders.
“They go to the zoo a lot,” Diaz said in answer to Tommy’s raised eyebrows. “Buck’s got an in with the zookeepers.”
He filed that away. “So do you all use Evan for free babysitting?”
Evan, Howie obnoxiously mouthed to Hen.
“It’s not using if he offers,” Diaz said.
Hen shrugged when he looked to her for confirmation.
“Huh,” Tommy said, and finished his beer. “Where is Evan?”
“It’s a Buckley night,” Howie said, that same breezy tone as he when he made the Maurice crack and still just as fake. “Just Buck, Maddie, and Jee. I’d say they’re watching movies, but given Buck and Maddie’s truly tragic lack of film knowledge, they’re probably playing a game.”
“More likely they’re drinking when Jee’s in bed,” Hen said, adding for his benefit, “You sneak in time around the kids when you can.”
“I cannot wait until Jee starts kindergarthen,” Howie said. “Maybe that will finally tire her out to sleep for a full night.”
“You’re gonna cry like a baby when she does go,” Diaz said in the tone of a man speaking from experience. “You’ll miss the days when she was always underfoot.”
Howie made a face. “She pops up like a monster in a horror movie. A cute monster,” he hastened to add.
“Enough kid talk,” Hen declared. “We’re boring our guest of honor.”
Tommy shrugged and took another swing of beer. “I don’t mind.”
“Everyone minds after awhile,” Diaz said, companionably nudging Tommy’s arm.
“Not everyone.” Howie had that grin that meant he thought he was being clever. Tommy braced himself. “Buck loves kids.”
Diaz tipped his bottle towards Howie. “He really does.”
Tommy squinted suspiciously at them and their suspiciously innocent expressions. The whole thing had the vibe of meeting the boyfriend’s family only without the boyfriend.
“Okay,” he said, shifting his feet apart in case he needed to push up and out for a quick exit. Old habits. He forced himself to lean back. “What is this about?”
“Just buying an old friend a beer,” Hen said in a passable imitation of his voice. “Thought you would be a little more grateful.”
He grinned and, following Diaz’s example, tipped his bottle at her.
“That was impressive flying,” Diaz said, tone generous with the compliment. “Where did you learn?”
“Army, actually,” he said, keeping his expression bland in the face of Hen and Howie’s interest. He’d been so careful and militant in never letting anything personal slip in fear of drawing Gerrard’s attention that he never said anything true at all. Even when Gerrard was gone, the habit was too ingrained for him to do more than dole out the occasional crumb. The closest he came to opening up was with Sal, but even then he was still lying, if only by omission. “Did a couple of tours in Afghanistan.”
“No shit,” said Diaz. “Me too. Did two tours over there.”
“Everyone did a tour there, even the kids who hadn’t been born when this started.” He gave Diaz a speculative look.
“How young do you think I am?” Diaz demanded, laughing a little at Tommy’s raised eyebrows. “I have a kid.”
“You were a child bride,” Howie said.
“I was eighteen.” Diaz’s tone was a touch defensive, and Howie held up his hands, palms turned out. Diaz’s attention turned back to him, and Tommy could see him doing the math in his head: the standard contract for an Army pilot, how long he’d known Hen and Howie, his tenure with the LAFD. “When did you get out?”
Now it was Tommy’s turn to do the math. “Close to fifteen years ago. Medical discharge.”
Diaz whistled. “That during the Taliban resurgence?”
Tommy snorted. “When wasn’t there a resurgence? Caught some flak over Kandahar during an evac. Got us out of there, but I caught a round in the side. Hit my spleen and I needed surgery to remove it and stop the internal bleeding, and then the whole thing got infected.” The resulting scar wasn’t pretty, but it appealed to a certain type of guy. Evan was a firefighter; he probably appreciated a good scar.
“Jesus,” Howie said quietly, and Tommy found himself sharing a look with Diaz, grateful to have someone who understood. “So that got you kicked out?”
“Discharged,” he and Diaz corrected at the same time. He hesitated a moment; old habits died hard but they did die. “I probably could have stayed on, but my captain heard a rumor that command was going to open up a Don’t Ask Don’t Tell investigation. I decided to take the discharge and keep my benefits.”
He watched as Hen and Howie did the calculus—his father, DADT, Gerrard—and solved for x. He was an asshole who snapped at every offered hand, and the fact he bit out of fear didn’t make it better.
“I didn’t know it was that bad,” Diaz said. “It was repealed right before I enlisted.”
Tommy finished off his beer; his throat was dry. “Christ, you’re making me feel old.”
“Imagine how we feel,” Howie said lightly. “Hey, child bride, go get the next round.”
Diaz rolled his eyes but made his way to the bar without further complaint.
“You know what’s funny?” he said before Hen could say his name in that fucking awful gentle way of hers. “I did my probie year at the Nine-Nine.”
“I didn’t know that,” Hen said.
“The 118 was down a couple of guys, and I got seconded to fill in. It was supposed to be temporary, but Gerrard liked me.” He kept his tone ironic rather than bitter. “Posting became permanent.”
“And you got stuck there,” Howie said.
“We all got stuck there.” Hen held out her drink. “To us survivors.”
“I’d drink to that,” he said, gamefully tapping his empty bottle to Hen’s and then Howie’s, “but I'm dry.”
Howie tipped his head back. “Hey, child bride, where’s our drinks?”
“This better not be a thing,” Diaz called back, heading their way with a pitcher.
Tommy took in Howie’s smirk. “Sorry, man, but it’s definitely a thing.”
Diaz rolled his eyes, and once he poured them fresh glasses, they toasted properly: to the survivors of the old 118.
Your responses for magical prompt type things are always fun soooo...
5 (or more) facts about an AU where Buck's math powers stick around after the lightning strike...and maybe he develops other abilities?
(BuckTommy for a pairing if you want)
FInally, after more than a month, we arrive at the very last prompt of the 5 au facts. It ends, like it was always going to, with some weird magical bullshit.
--
1. The conversation slipped out of his grasp. Tommy looked like he was thirty seconds away from clawing off his own skin to escape. He ran the numbers (he never stopped running the numbers); the probability of Tommy leaving crept from five percent to fifteen to fifty to fifty-two to fifty-three to—oh no.
“Why be apart when we can be together?” Buck asked, reaching for Tommy, who always reached back (except for when he didn’t).
“You’re so sweet,” Tommy said (forty-four percent), “but I’m your first, not your last. You won’t mean to, but you’re going to break my heart.”
Fifty-eight percent. Sixty-three.
“No,” Buck said. He was missing a variable (he never missed a variable). “I won’t. I can’t.”
Tommy eased out of the chair, slow and careful, like one wrong move would send his guts spilling over his fists and onto the floor. “Take care of yourself, Evan.”
(Eighty-two, eighty-three, oh god, eight-eighty.)
“Are you breaking up with me?” Buck asked, and ran the numbers one last desperate time.
“Yeah,” Tommy said, like he was helpless, “I guess I am.”
The equation balanced. There was an eight percent probability. Buck took it and made it real.
“I guess I’m not,” Tommy said with a sharp, confused shake of his head. “No, I don’t think so.”
“Can you sit down? Can we talk?” He reached out and Tommy reached back. “Please.”
Tommy sat. The talked. After all, numbers didn’t lie.
2. The math didn’t fade. He didn’t use it to cheat at cards again and he definitely didn’t take his trick to Vegas. He didn’t care that the mob no longer ran it because he liked keeping his kneecaps and also being alive, Eddie. It did come in handy on the job. Instead of taking precious time they usually didn’t have to figure out dosage or how much weight a compromised floor could hold or the force needed to take down a wall, they just asked Buck, who did the math and came up with an answer.
And then a bridge fell out from under them. The ambulance went over the edge. Hen knocked her head so hard she lost consciousness. Chimney was impaled. Eddie was slowly being crushed in the camper. Bobby was lost to them entirely.
Buck did the math and he didn’t like the answer. So he changed it. They all went home.
And now Eddie was asking him to change it again.
“He wants to go to Texas,” Eddie said. “Buck, he wants to leave.”
Buck did the math (it was impossible not to do the math). There was, of course, a probable future where Eddie didn’t have a son—he had seen it, after all, in his coma—but it was unthinkable. Buck wouldn’t think it.
“I’m leaving,” Chris said when Buck quietly let himself into the bedroom. “You can’t make me stay.”
“Hey, I’m not here to make you do anything,” Buck said, not a lie. “Your dad loves you.”
Chris rounded on him furious, and Buck remembered being seven and twelve and fifteen and twenty-one, on fire with anger and unable to breathe. So angry that he took Maddie’s money and her Jeep and ran away from home. He never went back.
“I thought my mom was alive,” Chris spat. And then, quieter: “He made me think she was alive.”
“Come here,” Buck said, and a single gentle tug had Chris folding into him, shoulders shaking as the kid tried not to cry his heart out.
Buck had never tried to change the past. It was hard enough running the numbers to get the outcome he wanted in living moment. The math needed to change an event that happened years ago probably didn’t even exist. And there was no telling what would happen if Shannon lived (if Daniel lived). Would he and Chris still ended up at the pier? If they weren’t there, what would happen to the people Buck pulled out of the water? Would Eddie have still gotten shot if he hadn’t felt the need to befriend that mother and her son? If Shannon lived and he was unhappily divorced, would he have told Buck to call Tommy? Would Eddie need him at all?
“It’s okay if you have to leave,” Buck said, one heartbroken kid to another. “But you can always come back.”
“What if I never come back?” Chris asked.
“Then you never come back,” he said, and helped him finish packing.
When he stepped out of Chris’s bedroom, backpack in his hand, Eddie said, furious, “What is the point of you?”
That was a good question that couldn’t be solved with math.
3. The intermittent showers were getting worse. The wind kicked up enough that he could feel the helicopter shudder around them. Tommy Kinard’s hands upon the controls didn’t waver.
“Hey, Tommy, on a scale of one to ten, how good of a pilot are you?” Chimney asked, snapping his gum.
“The scale goes to eleven,” Tommy said.
Chimney snorted. “Does that mean the odds of you crashing us into the ocean are low?”
Buck automatically calculated the wind speed and the intensity of the rain and visibility (let The Uno be x) and gave an answer.
“That was a rhetorical question,” Chimney said, giving him a look that Buck chose to ignore.
“Hey, kid,” Tommy said, and even though Buck only had a view of the back of his head, he knew Tommy was smiling, “never tell me the odds.”
“That’s from Star Wars,” Chimney helpfully pointed out even though Buck knew that. Everyone knew that (let Tommy be y).
A flare lit up the sky. The Uno was capsized. Tommy brought the helicopter lower and then lower still, hands steady. Buck didn’t need to do the math. The helicopter set neatly down on The Uno’s belly.
4. By the time he crawled out of the tunnel and to Tommy, Buck had screamed his throat bloody.
“Evan, you have to stop,” Tommy said, down on his knees better to gather Buck close. “Please, sweetheart, stop trying.”
He was still screaming, Buck realized, even as he ran the numbers, again. The probability was stacked against them; there was no equation where they all lived. Bobby got the antiviral and Chim died. They split it between them only to die, in agony, hours later. There was no time to synthesize a second dose. He couldn’t undo the explosion or Moira Blake’s firing or even the fire that had brought Bobby to Los Angeles. Someone was always going to die.
The only two certainties in the universe was death and numbers.
5. After the funeral, Tommy took him home. Their dress uniforms were returned to the back of the closet and one of the endless grief casseroles went into the oven. They ate one handed, their free hands locked together, and then Tommy did the dishes and Buck shoved the leftovers back into the fridge. Tommy put on an old black and white movie they pretended to watch. Buck liked the accents if not the words.
“Eddie blames me,” he said.
“Come here.” Tommy tangled them together, his head on Tommy’s chest, his ribcage slotted against Tommy’s ribcage, and his long legs threaded through Tommy’s legs. They wee touching everywhere two bodies could touch. “Eddie blames himself.”
“When Chris left for last year,” Buck said, even though he knew where this would ultimately lead, but it wasn't like his world could end twice, “Eddie asked me to make him stay.”
Tommy’s hand, sweeping along his spine, stuttered to a stop. “You didn’t do it.”
“I couldn’t,” Buck said. “Not to Chris.”
“Can you do that?” Tommy’s hand stuttered back to start. “Make a person do what you want.”
“It’s probability.” The numbers were still fucking running. Buck closed his eyes. “It’s just math.”
Tommy tenderly combed his hair back from his face. “Did you ever do math on me?”
The calculations were laid out in a neat row. All he had to do was pick the right one.
“Yes No,” he said. Probability became fact. “I would wouldn’t do that to you.”
Tommy kissed his brow. “Sorry. I know that. I know you.”
“You do,” Buck said, and turned his face into Tommy’s neck and wept.
It was a coffee shop they both liked. Really, it was only a matter of time before they ran into each other. They were standing infront of the accoutrements.
”Hi, daddy,” Buck said, sad little smile on his face, and popped the lid off his drink.
Tommy gave him a sad little smile in return. ”Hi, baby.”
”How're you?”
”Pretty shit. You?”
”Pretty shit,” Buck echoed. He found himself thumbing a tear out of his eye, and sniffing to clear his nose. He tried to get the lid to snap into place, but it wouldn't. Now he was frustrated, too.
Tommy bumped his shoulder, took the cup and lid from him, snapping it on easily. ”You OK?”
”No.” Buck took the cup back. ”I called you daddy and made myself sad.” Tommy already knew he was weepy about it, so he wasn't subtle the next time he wiped his eyes. ”Why'd you call me baby? That's just mean.”
”Right,” Tommy said, with that dumb expression Buck could tell was on his face, just by the sound of his voice. ”Because you're the only one with feelings.”
”Hey, fuck you.”
There it was, the dumb expression – and the eyebrows. ”Sorry, I forgot. Daddy doesn't have feelings.”
Buck exhaled, as the fight went out of him. Yeah, that was fair. ”Do you need to be anywhere?”
Tommy took a moment to respond.
”No.”
Silently, Buck led them outside. All the tables were occupied, so he took them around the corner, to a patch of grass that was technically considered a park. They sat on a bench, respectable distance apart.
Buck turned the cup in his hand and carelly pushed the sleeve down enough to move. The coffee was still too hot to go without, but it was something to focus on. He spun the sleeve around the cup a couple of times, before saying, ”Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you appreciate flowery language.”
”Depends on the context.”
Buck inhaled, exhaled. Anger would get them nowhere. ”I need to be frank with you, to avoid misunderstandings, yes?”
Tommy hadn't touched his coffee either. ”I have a vivid imagination,” he said, noncommittal.
”Right. This is me doing that.” He took a second to look in the general direction of Tommy's face, instead of his knee. ”I have feelings for you. I fell hard and I fell fast. I need you to know that.”
A muscle ticked in Tommy's jaw. ”OK.”
”You said a lot of hurtful things, but that didn't change how I feel. And I know I hurt you, too.” Tommy looked up. ”I flirted with someone else on our anniversary. I told you a lot of things, without giving you the context. I didn't tell you how I feel, when I should have.”
”OK,” Tommy said.
It took everything in him, to not move closer. ”I didn't give you space to be scared. I put you in a position where you felt like you couldn't be, and I'm sorry I did that.”
”Evan–”
”No, I want you to hear this,” Buck held up his hand. ”I think I scared you. I'm not sure when or why, but looking back, I think I did things that rattled you, and I didn't give you space to talk about those things. Because we were focused on me.”
”That's– That's not entirely true.”
”Correct me, then,” Buck said. ”Because every person I've spoken to about you, focused on me, too. About it being my first time. I've been in more relationships than you, haven't I?”
”I don't see the relevance, but yes, you have.”
Tommy's hand was resting on his thigh and the temptation was too great. Buck reached out and curled his fingers around it. ”I should've treated you like a partner and not like you were this unflappable guy, who's got it all worked out.”
”Maybe I wanted you to think that I was.”
”At first, sure,” Buck said. ”But then you get the flu, or you're hungover, and you puke infront of each other, and you treat each other as human.”
”I don't really get sick.”
”I hang out with a lot of toddlers.”
Tommy snorted and squeezed his hand. ”Alright, what's your point?”
”I want my daddy back, and I want him to tell me when he gets scared.”
”What if I'm seeing someone?”
He knew Tommy was probably making a terrible joke, but jealousy burned in his gut. ”I will fight him. Physically. But I don't think you would've called me baby, if you did. Or I hope you wouldn't.”
”I only have one baby at a time.” It was such a non answer, and the tone of his voice was joking, but Tommy's face looked grave. He looked at Buck for a beat, then lowered his eyes. ”What if I'm scared all the time?”
”Then I want to know that.” Buck moved closer to him on the bench. ”I want to know you. That's all I want.”
”And if it doesn't go away? The fear.”
”Then it doesn't.”
Tommy rotated the cup in his hands. ”You'd be OK with that? Long term?”
”I would.” Buck put his hand on top of Tommy's, to make the fidgeting stop. Tommy switched his cup to the other hand, so he could curl his fingers around Buck's. ”I like it messy,” Buck said. It was a joke, but he didn't get the tone quite right.
”You don't know the kind of mess I leave behind.”
”That's what makes it exciting.”
Tommy smiled a little. ”You think so?”
”You've seen the kind of stuff I get up to. You should return the favour.”
”It won't be as exciting as yours.” He tried to bite back a grin, but it didn't go very well, ”I don't get cursed.”
Buck had no qualms about grinning. He leaned into him, ”There's a first time for everything.”
”Don't put that out there.”
Buck muffled his laughter into Tommy's shoulder. ”Hey, daddy?”
