if you don't love me now you'll never love me again
eddie says “chain of command” like it’s a real, usable concept in a room that contains evan buckley, which is already his first mistake, and buck doesn’t even hesitate—just tips his chair back, all loose-limbed and insufferably pleased with himself, and goes, “that’s crazy, man" and that—that’s the problem, right there, because eddie could ignore it. he knows how this works. he has, at this point, a fully developed internal framework for Handling Buck When He’s Like This, which mostly consists of strategic non-engagement and not rewarding bad behavior. except buck is watching him now, not in the broad, performative way he does when he’s playing to an audience, but in that sharper, quieter way, like he’s waiting to see what eddie does with it, like the outcome actually matters. so, against his better judgment, eddie says, flat, “not that kind.”
and immediately regrets it. because buck goes still for half a second—just enough to clock the phrasing, turn it over, light up—and then he’s leaning forward, interest narrowing in. “oh, so there is a kind.”
eddie closes his eyes for a second, like he’s trying to reset the timeline. “it’s a figure of speech.”
“yeah,” buck says. “a weirdly specific one. like you didn’t have to pick chain. you could’ve said order. structure. hierarchy. but you went with chain. bold choice.”
“i didn’t—”
“no, no, it’s fine,” buck cuts in, already leaning into it. “i’m just trying to understand the parameters here. like is this a metaphorical chain of command or are we talking—”
“buck.”
“—because there are different systems, eddie, and i think clarity is important—”
there’s a pause, which is new. usually buck would keep going, immediately pile on, escalate until eddie either shuts it down or walks out. but instead he studies him for a second, like he’s recalibrating, like he’s deciding what version of this he wants to play.
“okay,” buck says finally, slower now. “so walk me through it. if there was a chain of command—purely theoretical—where would i fall.”
eddie stares at him. “there is no chain.”
“right, but if there was.”
“there isn’t.”
“eddie.”
it’s the tone that does it, not the words. that slight shift—less joke, more intent, like buck is asking something under the surface of what he’s actually saying, and eddie can feel it, annoyingly, like a hook under his ribs.
“you don’t fall anywhere,” eddie says. “we’re equals.”
“hm,” buck says, like he’s filing that away, like it’s data. “so no hierarchy.”
“no.”
“no one in charge.”
“no.”
“no one giving orders.”
eddie narrows his eyes. “correct.”
buck nods, thoughtful, and for a second eddie thinks—hopes—that’s the end of it.
it is not.
“so if i just decided to start, i don’t know, taking direction from you—”
“don’t.”
“—hypothetically—”
“buck.”
“—you’re saying that would be, what, inappropriate? unfounded? not supported by existing structure—”
“you’re not funny.”
buck’s mouth quirks. he leans in, elbow on the back of eddie’s chair, invading space in a way that is both deliberate and, somehow, completely unselfconscious. “that’s not what you said last time.”
eddie closes his eyes for a second, recalibrates. when he opens them again, buck is still there, still too close, still looking at him like this is a game he intends to win.
“you don’t take direction from me,” eddie says, steady.
buck tilts his head. “i don’t?”
“no.”
“huh.” a beat. “could’ve fooled me.”
and there’s something in the way he says it—not loud, not joking, not quite—that throws eddie off just enough to be dangerous, because it drags up a hundred small, inconvenient memories all at once: buck watching him on calls, adjusting without being asked; buck bristling when someone else tries to step in; buck, over and over again, choosing him, not because he has to but because—
“that’s different,” eddie says, sharper than he means to. it should be easy. that should be a throwaway line, something eddie can bat right back. you keep showing up, or someone has to keep you from doing something stupid, or anything, anything that puts it back where it belongs.
“so if i did start following your command—”
“buck.”
“—hypothetically—”
“buck.”
“—you think there’d be, like, a training period, or—”
“so no chain,” buck says again, quieter now.
“no chain.”
“no command.”
“no.”
“just—what. mutual agreement.”
eddie exhales. “something like that.”
buck considers him for a long second, something bright and complicated flickering across his face, like he’s trying to decide whether to leave it there or ruin it.
he ruins it.
“cool,” he says, easy again, grin snapping back into place like armor. “just wanted to make sure we weren’t accidentally getting into anything weird with chains.”
eddie stares at him. “you made it weird.”
“did i, or—”
“buck.”
“—did you start it—”
eddie grabs a nearby pen and throws it at him. buck catches it midair, still grinning, like this is exactly where he wanted them to end up.
and that’s the other problem, the one eddie doesn’t say out loud, the one he’s not going to touch—there's not a chain, but they're still bound into place.
