what haunted him more; the carnage or the destruction ? the bodies buried in blood stained rubble or the limbs poking through stone, pointing toward the sky like they were crying out to be saved ? the sense that things wouldn't feel safe for days after the dust had settled ? he'd seen it all before + he'd gotten so good at pretending that it all came crashing to the floor when he hung his jacket up, just another part of the job that he didn't have to cross the threshold with. + he almost believed himself, really, but it never quite made it that far. he'd come home wearing the weight like a cloak, using it to hide how disconnected he felt from reality until he'd shaken enough of it off to feel human again. to be someone again.
HE struggled FAILED TO DO THAT BEFORE JAY GOT HOME.
the aftermath of a 7.5 magnitude earthquake laid all over their house. happy pictures missing their frames were haphazardly strewn along the floor, shattered glass collected dust in piles under the couch + in the corners of rooms, cabinet doors swung open to reveal the nothing that now lived within them, furniture toppled over itself as if someone was looking for something + had run out of places to search ── it was unsettling. almost like they'd been robbed yet nothing + everything had been taken at once. he'd normally have half the house picked up by the time he heard his husband's truck pull into the driveway, start yelling for him to go take a shower while they still had hot water before he even had a chance to offer to help, but the door opened + ... nothing.
everything stood where it had when he got home two hours prior. concrete dust stained hands pulled at the hem of his navy blue LAFD quarter zip in a way that said he was stuck, unable to break free from the hell inside his mind. jay knew. he watched it all unfold on scene + did his best to comfort within the bounds of professionalism, but it didn't even make a dent in buck's state of mind. it was like an annoyingly dull background noise that hummed in his ears when the ringing quieted for a few seconds. there but not something he could hold on to or even reach for because he'd forgotten how.
all that kept replaying in his head were the final moments of a dying father. how desperate he was to get the last i love you to his family before the blood loss took him ── the confessional like video that was burning a hole through his phone. the one he hadn't had the heart to delete, not yet. even though the family had both seen + been sent it ... he still felt like he had an obligation to keep it alive. keep him alive. it was his last minutes. they were on his phone. that meant something. he'd convinced himself of it long before he got settled + had further grounded himself in that idea by the time he felt the fabric of the couch shift under jay's weight.
@halztead said ❛ tell me what you see when you look at yourself. ❜
a hero. a husband. a friend. a firefighter. NOTHING. the quiet truth settled into his stomach until it was in knots + he was silently begging to throw up the emptiness inside. ❛ noth ── ❜ he couldn't say that, though. he wasn't ready to have that conversation so he figured it was best for everyone if he tried again. ❛ i don't ... ❜ but he couldn't bring himself to say that either. if he were being honest with himself, + he'd done his best to do so all day, he wasn't ready to answer jay's question at all. not because he didn't have an answer, but because the answer he had made him uncomfortable. he knew that was the point ── jay wouldn't ask him anything that wasn't meant to get him out of his head. reassure him even when he didn't think he needed it. somewhere he knew he should answer, but he fought it down with a hard swallow. another time then. ❛ if he would've just reached for my hand ... ❜
