it's raining cats and dogs where I live so what better thing to do than finally share another snippet of my reflection is an empty canvas. we're officially 3k words in! and it's still not being edited sooo that's fun.
np 🏷️: @corporatebanana @beefcakekinard @sad-girl-hours23 @angels-all-sin & YOU reading this 🫵🏻
“W-when? How?”
“In the air, he… he was also tired and we thought it was the sedative too but, he threw up blood and then, his heart stopped and Miller she, she did all she could with the compressions but it was too late.” Tommy’s hands curled up in fists, it was his turn to not look at Evan in the eyes. “I think it was internal bleeding, which we should have seen coming too but, the spine was all we were focusing on besides—” His eyes went back to Evan’s. “—besides the phone call.”
“The phone call.” Evan’s chin wobbled, his voice a mere whisper, “I-I shouldn’t have—”
“Don’t. Evan, what you did was…”
So sweet, Tommy thought. He was surprised to say the least, and he knew he shouldn’t have let Evan make the call but, getting to hear Nate and Andy making up made it all worth it. In a way, he should’ve guessed he was going to do something like that.
It was Evan after all.
“You did good, okay? And you know it. They needed that.”
“Yeah, and look where that got them.”
Sometimes Evan said things that left Tommy speechless. From pronouncing his allyinship at his first date with a man, to going off about a century old outlaw cursing him to… to that morning. He always found a way, and from that he had to recover enough to say or do anything, whatever it was.
“Evan, why did you come here?” Though sometimes it went far smoother than this, if Evan’s surprised expression was anything to go by. “I mean, I just didn’t expect it.”
Evan looked down, a nervous smile tugging at his lips, “It’s… I guess I wanted to be the one to tell you about Andy.”
“Oh.”
He kept explaining to Tommy, how he didn’t want for him to find out from anyone else first and how he’d never forgive himself if he let that happen. All Tommy could do was stare at him, dumbfounded.
Neither of them could stand the idea of not telling the other about this.
it's still monday where I live and so, what if I say it's 2.7k words so far and yet we're still missing the first half AND we've just gotten to buck and tommy seeing each other again after the worst has happened BUT you guys get a big snippet. also title reveal, I decided to call this fic "my reflection is an empty canvas".
Tommy let them go back and excused himself by saying he needed a minute, Miller and O’Neil nodded without a word. Not like they even needed one.
Elbows on his knees, head in his hands, Tommy took a deep breath.
This wasn’t fair, none of it. Nate should’ve gotten a fucking chance to be cared for, to be back with he man who had made him so happy all those years ago. This shouldn’t have happened to him, he shouldn’t have died, not after everything he told them. Not after they got another chance and actually used it.
And now they were going to have to tell Andy what happened.
Fuck.
Tommy wondered whether Andy told Evan anything about their story, and how much of himself he revealed. If he was anything like Nate had told them, then Andy wasn’t the type of person to just share his entire backstory to a complete stranger unless said stranger was either blackmailing him or very persuasive.
Evan was very persuasive.
Shit, Evan.
Tommy pulled out his phone, going straight to his text thread with Evan. Staring at his phone for a minute, he tried to bring himself to think of just one thing to send. Just one opening, one message to let Evan know, that was it.
He groaned. Nothing, he had nothing.
More like, nothing seemed right. “Hi” or “Hello” felt too informal for what he wanted to tell him, “We need to talk” was too fucking ominous and would worry Evan more, “Something happened. Please call me” was better but not quite right, “Hey, I know we haven’t talked in a while, but are—” nope, backtracking that one. Fuck, why was it always so hard to try and just talk to him?
“Hey Evan, you okay? Not sure if you shift’s ended but give me a call when you’re free. Need to tell you something, work related.” Okay, that wasn’t bad, he could send that.
Minutes went by and he still wasn’t letting himself send the stupid message. At this point Tommy thought it was better to just drive to the 118 and tell Evan right there.
Okay, that wasn’t such a bad idea. A little crazy but, not bad. He sighed, realizing it was time for him to finally leave the chopper.
Whatever, it wasn’t like he was going to be hanging there for much longer.
okay so, if anyone else remembers this post I made about a bucktommy reconciliation idea? I outlined it and am turning it into a fic. It gets very sad at some point (the comments from this post reveal the final twist) so yeah, hurt and comfort it is this time
np tag: @evanquackley @beefcakekinard @corporatebanana @sad-girl-hours23 @aringofsalt and YOU 🫵🏻
there are references to bobby's death in this snippet + big spoiler for the fic so, beware of that.
Tommy knew there wasn't anything they could've done.
Sometimes, no matter how much you retraced your steps and thought of the different ways you could've saved the day, there was no real answer. There couldn't be an answer.
The night that Bobby died was one of his best examples.
There were so many ideas he had come up with, so many choices he thought could have saved him or given him more time, but there was no point. In every universe, Bobby hid his symptoms and those slowly took away everything from him, killing him without anyone noticing until it was too late.
The moment Nate had started coughing was the trigger of a similar chain reaction.
They had just finished talking, Tommy letting the silence fill the air as he piloted towards the hospital. He’s passed enough hours in the chopper to get acquainted with it, to make every one of his movements predictable, and to let his body do everything it had learned. Very little things caught him off guard, or forced him to focus on how even the most basic step was done— actually, he was used to being two steps ahead while in the air— so, there wasn’t much that could disrupt him.
Hearing Nate throw up and the monitors scream at him was surprising enough to make everything stop for a second.
rules: post the last lines you wrote, then tag as many people as there are words (we're not doing that though lmao). I was tagged by so many lovely people @michaelormewood @angels-all-sin @beefcakekinard mwah to you.
I had to add the paragraph before because otherwise it would NOT have made any sense whatsoever BUT this is from my bucktommy reconciliation fic, so enjoy... this.
It was interesting, how long it could take for one’s brain to process information. How sometimes we could find out about something and either accept it immediately, or it could take us way too long to even grasp what was said. Sometimes we even denied it until there was nothing more left. This felt like the latter for Tommy.
“But how?”
I think everyone has been tagged so far, but @sad-girl-hours23 and @corporatebanana and YOU get a tag
