For a sentence starter: “I guess we’d end up here way more earlier if I flashed my fangs at you”
hello again vampire!buck my most beloved 💕
“i guess we’d have ended up here earlier if i’d flashed my fangs at you,” buck murmurs.
eddie huffs. “what makes you think that?”
buck rolls his eyes, brushing his lips against the back of eddie’s neck. his fangs slip out, scraping across eddie’s skin, and eddie gasps before buck can even puncture his skin.
“that makes me think that,” buck says, tightening the arm around eddie’s waist. eddie leans back against him, turning his head to bare more of his throat.
“just because i don’t mind your fangs—” he starts, cut off when buck starts laughing.
“i think we’re a little beyond don’t mind,” he says. he nips at the side of eddie’s throat, quick and barely there, and eddie’s breath catches.
“it’s not like i jumped you the first time i saw your fangs,” eddie grumbles.
“i was dying,” buck says. “might have been a little tacky.”
“also the whole unrequited love thing,” eddie says, finding buck’s hand around his waist and threading their fingers together.
“not unrequited,” buck murmurs, pressing his lips to eddie’s throat again. no fangs this time, just soft reassurance.
“yeah, but i didn’t know that at the time,” eddie says. he squeezes buck’s hand. “you haven’t fed in a bit,” he says. “do you need to—”
“you’re just strengthening my original argument,” buck says. “should have shown you my fangs a long time ago.”
“so i like the fangs,” eddie says, and he’s facing away but buck can hear him rolling his eyes. “but i loved you before i ever saw them. you know that.”
“i know,” buck says, his thumb stroking along the back of eddie’s hand. “i know.” his fangs slide out again, scraping against eddie’s throat. “but now that you mention it, i am kind of hungry…”
eddie laughs, turning to kiss buck and then back again, baring his throat. “you know i’m all yours,” he says. “whenever you want.”
eddie in the vampire!buck au posting this and then simply refusing to elaborate when hen and chimney are like bitch i didn’t think you believed in vampires
OMG A HORNY SENTENCE you know what I'm going to ask
"I have it on good authority that you happen to like pointy things" for the vampire!buck au
also for @alex1424 and @arrenemris, fellow vampire enthusiasts 💕
“i have it on good authority that you happen to like pointy things,” buck murmurs behind him, and eddie jumps.
“where’d you come from?” he asks. he’d been alone in the firehouse loft just a moment ago, trying to sew buttons back onto his uniform shirt and cursing the needle that kept dropping the thread.
“i was downstairs,” buck says, resting his chin on eddie’s shoulder and wrapping an arm around his waist. “i heard you slandering the good name of pointy things, i couldn’t let that stand.”
“not every insult to pointy things is an insult to you,” eddie says. “this stupid fucking needle—”
“what are you doing, anyway?” buck asks. “i didn’t think uniform repair was our responsibility.”
“it’s not,” eddie says. “but you keep ripping my shirts off me, so—”
“hasn’t seemed to bother you so far,” buck says, pressing his lips to the side of eddie’s throat, trailing down, tugging the collar of his uniform shirt out of the way so he can scrape the tips of his fangs across the skin over eddie’s collarbone.
eddie bats his hand away. “we’re going through too many shirts,” he says. “people are going to start asking questions.”
“we could just tell them,” buck says. “then you wouldn’t have to hide away up here in the dark stabbing yourself with a needle. could be stabbing you with something much more fun instead.” he punctuates his words with a nip to the flesh above eddie’s jugular vein, and eddie shivers.
eddie hums, turning his head to brush his lips against buck’s cheek. “isn’t there some sort of super secret vampire code?”
“it’s more like guidelines,” buck says. “but i meant—i was actually talking about you and me.”
“oh, i see,” eddie says. “you just want to brag about ripping my shirt off.”
buck laughs. “absolutely,” he says. “have you seen yourself?”
“you’re one to talk,” eddie says.
“and yet you’ve never once ripped my clothes off me,” buck laments.
eddie turns in his seat, reaching for buck so he can kiss him properly. his tongue flicks across buck’s fangs, and it’s familiar by now but the thrill is the same, still, the memory of the fangs sinking into his skin and the lingering knowledge that his life is in buck’s hands. there’s something intoxicating about it, about giving himself over so completely to someone who could tear him apart in seconds and finding only tenderness in return.
“that can definitely be arranged,” eddie murmurs against buck’s mouth. “but you have to sew your own buttons back on.”
send me a sentence and maybe i’ll write more sentences
You do such lovely and satisfying prompt fills and I would love to see any and all of the Halloween ones but I’m gonna piiicccckkk: This one!
“the power just went out, and it's a full moon outside.”
okay so first of all sorry for sitting on this for so long!! i was saving it for the full moon for aesthetic purposes™
also, this fic is pulling double duty bc in addition to being a prompt fill it is also an atrociously belated birthday present for @kitkatpancakestack!
final order of administrative business: this fic is part of the vampire!buck verse, the rest of which can be found here (but it might be fine as a standalone? who knows!)
[ao3 link]
Eddie’s getting pretty good at the whole unrequited thing.
Well, good is probably overstating it—he doesn’t know if he can call it good when it’s actively tearing him apart. When it’s ground glass shredding his lungs with every breath, jagged shards of calcified hope digging into his skin with every touch. So maybe good isn’t the right word. But he’s… used to it.
How could he not be, after all this time? It’s all he’s known for—god, years now. He doesn’t have an exact timeline of when he fell in love with Buck—he was in far over his head by the time he’d realised. Zero to sixty in the blink of an eye, like someone flipped a switch and one Tuesday morning he’d just known.
It had been an entirely unremarkable Tuesday morning, just a handful of firefighters gathered around the coffeemaker in the firehouse loft. The shift had been going into hour two with no calls and coffee was a hot commodity, and Eddie had been sure he’d come up too late and was about to lose out to the feeding frenzy unfolding in front of him.
Buck had appeared at his side, a mug in each hand, holding out the one with just the amount of milk Eddie likes.
“I wouldn’t try getting in the middle of that,” he’d said, gesturing at the firefighters still circling the kitchen island. “Here, I’ve got you covered.” He’d grinned, far too bright for the hour of the morning—and without the fangs, no matter how much his memory now tried to superimpose them on his every mental image of Buck—and something in Eddie had shifted. It’d swelled in his chest, carbonated his blood until it fizzed and bubbled under his skin.
Oh, he’d thought. I love this man. And he’d tried to search his memory for something that had changed between them, but he’d kept coming up empty. Everything was the same as it had always been.
So maybe he’d always been in love with Buck. Maybe he’d always felt this way, and it had just taken him some time to catch up.
Buck’s hand had grazed Eddie’s as he’d wrapped his fingers around the coffee mug and Eddie had felt his breath catch, felt a shiver race from his fingertips down his spine until it burrowed into his marrow and his brain was fuzzy with it.
Oh, he’d thought again. He’d probably need to get a handle on that.
And he had. He could write the book on the singular agony that is unrequited love for your best friend. He could probably even scrape together a respectable pamphlet on unrequited love for your best friend who is also a vampire regularly drinking your blood, even if the readership for that might be a little limited.
But he’s floundering a little with this newest development. With—whatever this is.
There’d been a moment, that day he’d stormed into Buck’s loft, when he’d thought maybe—that whole night had been one big moment, really, and he’d been giddy with the relief of finally telling Buck. With the fact that after years he no longer had to imagine the feel of Buck’s hair fisted in his grip or the muscled planes of his chest, because those feelings were now seared into his skin.
He’d been giddy on the potential of it all, and it wasn’t until the euphoria had begun to fade that he’d realised Buck hadn’t actually said anything, aside from implying there’d be a next time.
That Eddie himself hadn’t actually said anything, except that he’d wanted Buck. And what a word that was, wanting—it could cover so much, or hardly anything at all.
That night had changed everything, and it had changed nothing, and now they’re in this excruciating limbo where they’re fucking every time they have a house to themselves, and he’s taking iron supplements to keep his red blood cell count up—
(“But I thought iron was bad?” he’d asked when Buck had brought it up, a near-visceral reaction prompted by the memory of Buck splayed out in his bed, pale and clammy and freshly impaled on rebar.
“It is, when it’s not in blood—look, I don’t know how it works, I’m not a vampirologist—”
“—There’s no way that’s a thing.”
“—Only because scientists don’t know I exist—anyway, look, we can’t have you passing out on shift, because neither of us would ever live that down, so will you just—”)
—and it’s just sex, because they’re not saying anything, but there are moments in between that make him question everything he thinks he knows. He might be losing his mind a little.
Sometimes Christopher has a sleepover so Eddie’s not in a rush to get home to his kid, and instead of climbing out of bed after a hasty comedown he stays, and Buck curls his limbs around him as they drift off.
Sometimes when they’re at the station he sits next to Buck on the couch, just a fraction of an inch closer than he should, and instead of moving away to get some space Buck leans closer into him.
Sometimes Buck comes over and they keep their clothes on, and it’s like it used to be when all they were to each other was best friends. They cook dinner together and Christopher grades their performance like a judge on a cooking show—Buck comes out on top, of course, because Eddie’s always been a functional cook at best but Buck enjoys every second of it—and the house is full of laughter and off-key singing along to his kitchen playlist and the feeling that these are the people that he’s meant to spend his life with.
It’s like it used to be, except that when Buck chops vegetables for dinner and Eddie watches him grip the knife, he doesn’t have to imagine what those fingers would look like wrapped around his dick.
He doesn’t know what to do with that.
It was easier to keep it all back when he couldn’t do anything about any of it. Easier to bundle all of his want and his love and his desire into a tight little knot and hide it behind his sternum, push it down until he could feel it sitting on his diaphragm, feel it with every breath he took.
But it’s not all off-limits anymore. There are parts of that knot he can untangle now. He’s allowed to want, to kiss, to reach out and touch. He’s allowed to know the feel of Buck’s fangs scraping across his skin, and the look on Buck’s face when Eddie pushes into him.
He’s allowed so much, but he’s not allowed to love, not out loud, and it’s a confusing line to walk. He’s constantly afraid he’s going to lose his balance and step out of bounds, that he’ll say something that reveals far too much.
The problem isn’t that he’s in love with Buck, because that’s been the case for years. Loving Buck is as familiar to him as his own name. It’s made a home for itself between his ribs and under his skin; it’s present in every breath he draws, and will be as long as he keeps breathing.
The problem is that sometimes Buck looks at him and he thinks maybe—
Maybe.
But maybe not. Wouldn’t Buck have said something? Anything, instead of returning to business as usual the next morning, except now with extra nudity. Just like when Eddie had offered his blood up to Buck, changing everything and somehow changing nothing.
By the time Eddie had understood that Buck thought he only wanted him this one way, in body but not in spirit, it was far too late to bring it up. Because Buck seems happy with the arrangement, and it’s a house of cards Eddie doesn’t dare touch. He’s long since resigned himself to having Buck in his life any way he can get, and this definitely qualifies.
But sometimes he still can’t help but think maybe, no matter how much it tugs at the edges of his being and threatens to unravel him.
Tonight is definitely one of those times. Because Eddie is trying very hard not to be fifteen years old imagining secret meanings in everything Buck does, but—it’s Halloween, and Buck’s dressed as a cowboy. And not in a cheap mass-produced costume, either, but in Eddie’s clothes, the sturdy jeans and soft flannels he keeps at the back of his wardrobe and breaks out when he misses Texas, once in a blue moon.
(The clothes are just a little too tight on him, but Eddie’s trying not to think about that. Abuela is going to drop Christopher off any minute. He can’t think about that.)
Buck looks like he belongs, in Eddie’s house and in his life and in his heart. He always does, in sooty turnouts at a house fire or stretched out in his bed all sweaty and fucked-out, but there’s something about the outfit and the way his cautious expression explodes into a blinding smile when he sees Eddie struck dumb by the way his jeans hang on Buck’s hips. Something that hollows out his bones and fills him with affection, effervescent like champagne—the good kind that Buck insists on getting whenever they celebrate, for birthdays or healed injuries or victories at the monthly firehouse pool tournament.
Buck stands in Eddie’s living room wearing Eddie’s clothes, and Eddie can’t quite put a finger on why but he thinks—maybe.
Then Buck’s eyes slide down to take in what Eddie’s wearing, and his face twists into a delighted grin. “I see we match.”
Eddie glances down at himself. His costume is the opposite of Buck’s, mass-market and a little itchy, one seam already unravelling, but the white polyester shirt with the high collar and the waistcoat and the swishy black cloak with an even higher collar—was it extraordinarily cold in Transylvania, or was that just a fashion choice?—add up to an adequately recognisable Dracula.
It’s one step removed—just enough for plausible deniability, probably, in some sense of the term—but they’ve dressed up as each other for Halloween.
Buck blinks, and Eddie realises he’s been staring. They’ve both been staring. “Uh, hold on,” he says, digging in his pocket. “There’s still—” he pulls out the plastic fangs that had come with the costume and holds them up, and Buck grabs them from his hand before he can try and fit them on.
“Yeah, no, these aren’t going in your mouth,” Buck says, crushing them in his fist so hard Eddie hears the plastic cracking. “These are insulting. It’s like they’ve never seen real fangs before.”
“To be fair,” Eddie says. “That might be a bit of an unreasonable expectation.”
“The customer is always right, right?” Buck says, letting his fangs slide out.
And Eddie knows he has a thing about the fangs. He’s accepted it as part of his life. But it still catches him by surprise, the urge to say something outrageous, something he wouldn’t normally be caught dead saying. Something like well, if you’re going to take my fangs, maybe you should give me yours in return. And against his better judgement he’s already opening his mouth, already forming the words when the lights flash, once, and the power goes out.
Buck’s fangs glint in the sudden darkness.
“Shit,” Eddie says instead, crossing over to the nearest light switch and flipping it a couple of times. He’s not expecting anything to happen, but he still groans in frustration when nothing does.
“Eh, it’s just a power outage,” Buck says, and starts to unplug things around the room.
“Yeah,” Eddie says. “The power went out, and it’s a full moon outside.”
Buck stares at him, uncomprehending. “And?”
“And!” Eddie says, gesturing at Buck.
“Eddie,” Buck says slowly. “The full moon isn’t really a thing for me. I feel like you should know this by now.”
“No, I know, it’s werewolves, but—if you exist, do they?” And Buck frowns, like he’s never considered it before.
“I mean, I’ve never seen one.”
“But you haven’t really been around for all that long, have you?”
“Just because you’re two years older than me—” Buck starts, and Eddie cuts him off.
“No, listen, all I’m saying is I was older than you are now the first time I heard vampires exist. Just because you haven’t heard about it…”
“Okay, but what does the power have to do with it?”
“It just seems like a bad combination,” Eddie says. “What if, I don’t know, there's a werewolf down the street with a panic room with an electric lock, and now they’re free to roam?”
“I think you’ve seen too many movies,” Buck says. “It’s just a power outage.”
And Eddie’s about to argue, because maybe he’s seen too many movies, but he doesn’t think Buck—fang-bearing, blood-drinking, actual vampire Buck—should be quite so quick to dismiss the possibility of other supernatural beings. Except his phone rings, and it’s Abuela, and Christopher takes priority over Buck’s confounding skepticism.
“Do you have power?” Abuela asks as soon as he picks up, before he can say so much as hello.
“No, it just went out.”
“Okay,” she says. “Okay, I’ll keep Christopher with me, then. It’s a full moon, you know people get strange on full moons. And with the power out, and it’s Halloween? I think we should all stay inside tonight.”
Eddie doesn’t know if Buck can hear her through the phone, but he points at it and mouths see? anyway. Buck huffs and rolls his eyes.
Right. Vampire hearing.
“That sounds good,” he tells Abuela, even through the pang of sadness at the thought of missing a Halloween with Christopher. His kid is getting older, and he doesn’t know how many Halloweens he has left before Christopher no longer wants to hang out with his dad. “Better safe than sorry.”
“I’ll take him around the neighbourhood if the power comes back,” Abuela says. “See if we can salvage any of this Halloween.”
“Thanks,” Eddie says. “Hey, tell Christopher we love him, will you?”
He realises what he’s said approximately two-tenths of a second later, when Buck’s eyebrows shoot up into his hairline and Abuela’s voice in his ear asks “We?”
Eddie swallows. And maybe there are implications that aren’t exactly accurate, but he doesn’t think anything he said was technically incorrect. So he just smiles at Buck as he tells Abuela “Yeah, Buck’s here.”
“I see,” Abuela says, sounding like she’s seeing something far beyond what Eddie is saying.
Eddie doesn’t know if contesting the point in front of Buck would make the situation better or worse.
He’s still trying to decide when Abuela speaks again. “Well, I need to get going,” she says, in the same tone she uses when she’s trying to hustle guests who’ve overstayed their welcome out of the door. “I’ve got dinner on the stove. Happy Halloween, love you, bye!”
She hangs up before Eddie can say goodbye.
“See, she’s on my side,” Eddie says, because it seems like the easiest option. “Full moons are bad news.”
“Hey now,” Buck says. “I never tried to argue the full moon part, just that I don’t think the power outage means we’re suddenly going to be inundated with werewolves.”
“I never said inundated,” Eddie says. “But one or two could do plenty of damage.”
“I’ll protect you if the werewolves come,” Buck promises, with a half-smile that flashes his fangs. Like Eddie needs a reminder.
“Isn't there meant to be some kind of age-old rivalry between you guys and werewolves anyway?” Eddie asks in an effort to distract himself, because it’s too early in the evening for the kinds of things he wants to do to Buck.
“Again, I’ve never actually seen a werewolf,” Buck says. “But hey, I guess we’ll find out when the panic room escapees come calling.” There’s a distinctly mocking lilt to his tone, and Eddie groans.
“Shut up.”
Buck just grins.
They drift into the kitchen soon enough, because if they’re going to be stuck inside all night hiding from Schrödinger’s werewolf, they’re going to need dinner. Eddie hadn’t planned for anything, because they were supposed to be trick-or-treating with Christopher and grocery day isn’t until tomorrow, but Buck guarantees him he can throw together a meal from things he finds in the cupboards. He gets to work, and Eddie realises Buck knows his kitchen far better than he does. Eddie doesn’t even recognise half the things Buck pulls out.
And for the second time tonight, he thinks—maybe.
Maybe. But the house of cards teeters in his mind’s eye, and he still can’t tell whether adding this final card would shore it up or bring it tumbling down.
But it’s getting harder and harder to hold it in, and in the end, the words fall from his lips without much conscious input.
Buck is doing something at the stove, stirring something in a pot, and he turns to show Eddie. “Look, I think we might be able to trick Chris into eating spinach with this.”
It’s nothing out of the ordinary. It’s nothing flashy or particularly sexy, but Eddie says it anyway, reflexive like it’s something he says every day: “God, I love you.” Easy, because loving Buck is as easy as breathing.
Then he remembers what he’s currently wearing. “Wait, I forget, can I say god? I want to be as authentic as poss—” he trails off as he looks up and sees Buck standing at the stove, half-turned to face him, silent and frozen. He’s holding the wooden spoon he’d been using to stir, and there’s sauce dripping onto the floor.
“What—”
God, I love you.
The words echo around his mind as the blood drains from his face, and he stands up from the kitchen table so abruptly that the chair scrapes against the floor. “I—” but his mouth, so quick to betray him just moments ago, can’t seem to form words.
“I—” he tries again, and when nothing comes out he backs out of the kitchen, keeps moving until he can duck into the bathroom and close the door behind him. Maybe he can’t swallow the words, can’t unring that bell, but he can escape the bell tower.
Eddie checks the bathroom lock and slides down to sit against the door, head in his hands. So much for not toppling the house of cards. So much for living with what he has.
There’s a noise, footsteps, and then something that sounds like Buck is sitting down, too, his back against the other side of the door.
For a moment Buck says nothing, and then, so soft Eddie barely hears it: “Why didn’t you say anything?”
Eddie sits there on the tiled floor of his bathroom, staring at the abandoned rubber duck on the bottom shelf of the cabinet that no one’s used in years but that he hasn’t had the heart to throw away, and tries to find a way to tell Buck that he’d thought he had. That when he’d stormed into Buck’s loft and made big proclamations about wanting, he’d been talking about more than Buck’s fangs and his body.
But he can’t find the words, not in any order that makes any kind of sense.
There’s silence behind the door, then Buck takes a breath, so deep Eddie hears it even without supernaturally enhanced senses.
“For the record,” Buck says, “I love you, too.”
Eddie scrambles to his feet and yanks the door open, so quickly Buck loses his balance and sprawls out on the floor, half in and half out of the bathroom. “Why didn’t you say anything?” Eddie asks, staring down at Buck.
“I—” Buck starts and then swallows, and Eddie watches his throat work. “Usually if people say they want me, they only mean it one way.”
“Oh,” Eddie says. Knowing what he knows about Buck’s romantic history… it makes sense.
“But not you,” Buck says, wonder blooming in his voice like the sun rising over the horizon.
“Not me,” Eddie agrees.
Buck grins, and quick as a flash he hooks an ankle around Eddie’s leg, knocking him off balance. Eddie falls forward, but Buck’s there to catch him.
Like he always has been.
“Hi,” Buck whispers when Eddie’s face is inches from his.
“I love you,” Eddie says, just for the novelty of saying it. He’s spent so many years keeping it in, it’s a wonder it’s not spilling from his every pore. “I want all of you.”
“That can be arranged,” Buck says, raising his eyebrows suggestively, and Eddie doesn’t stop laughing until Buck reaches up to kiss him.
(1.8k, rated T, complete. vampire!buck au.)
read it on ao3
@911week day 3: "whatever you do, please don't look." + hurt
Eddie sits in the parking lot outside Buck’s apartment for a long time, trying to decide whether or not to go in.
He wouldn’t even have to think about it, most of the time, would just walk right in. He has a key, after all. But their last call had been rough, and Buck had been quiet and withdrawn for the rest of the shift. Eddie had asked if he wanted to come over, but Buck had said he’d needed time alone.
That had set off the first alarm bells.
The next ones had come moments later, when he’d overheard Chimney and Hen talking about the fall Buck had taken, how they could have sworn he’d been impaled on the rebar sticking out of the floor of the abandoned apartment building.
“Trust me, I know my rebar injuries,” Chimney had said, and Hen had elbowed him, the way parents do when their kids say something inappropriate.
But Buck had gotten up and walked out of the building, which isn’t something people tend to do after being impaled by rebar, so Chim and Hen had let it go.
Eddie, however, knows better. At least he thinks he does. He doesn’t know how all of it works, exactly, but there is a very real chance Buck could, actually, be impaled by rebar and walk away. He’s just a little worried about the aftermath.
So now he’s in his truck wrestling with the fact that Buck had wanted to be alone, but every instinct Eddie’s ever had is telling him that he should probably check up on Buck anyway.
He gets out of the car.
Buck’s door is locked, but Eddie lets himself in with his key. None of the lights are on, and he doesn’t see Buck, which must mean he’s upstairs.
Eddie stands in the entryway and listens for a second, but the only sounds are his own breathing and the keys in his hand. He starts up the stairs, calling out for Buck as he goes.
“What—Eddie?” he hears, Buck’s voice somewhere between a mumble and a groan.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“Don’t—” Buck says, and groans again, swallowing the rest of whatever that sentence was going to be.
Eddie reaches the top of the stairs and sees Buck in his bed, mostly hidden under a blanket. The sheets look bloody, and there are torn pieces of plastic littering the ground. They’re bloody too.
“Eddie, don’t—” Buck says again, and pulls the blanket further over his head. “Just—whatever you do, please don’t look.”
But Eddie doesn’t turn away. He doesn’t know how to not look at Buck.
Instead, he crosses the room and sits on the bed, somewhere in the vicinity of where Buck’s waist is under the blanket. He reaches for the top of the blanket and tries to pull it down, but Buck’s grip is surprisingly firm for someone who got impaled by rebar less than two hours ago.
Eddie isn’t surprised.
“Buck,” he says, channeling the gentle but firm tone he uses on Christopher when he’s being difficult. “I know you’re hurt. Let me look at you.”
“I’m not—”
“Don’t even try it, Buck,” Eddie says, and pulls the blanket back.
Buck doesn’t look good. He’s paler than usual, almost chalky, and his hair is sticking in every direction. There’s blood smeared around his mouth.
“You can’t be here,” Buck mumbles. “I’m—”
“Hurt,” Eddie supplies. “You need help.”
“No, I mean…” Buck trails off and takes a deep breath, then shudders, like it’s hurting him. “I’m—” Either he can’t say it, or he doesn’t want to, because all Buck does is open his mouth and let his fangs slide out.
“A vampire,” Eddie says. “I know. Now will you let me take a look at you?”
But Buck is frozen in place, staring wide-eyed at Eddie. “You—you know?”
“Christopher has been really into the supernatural,” Eddie says, matter-of-fact, as he pulls down the blanket. “I put it together.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“You weren’t harming anyone,” Eddie says, and gestures to the torn-up blood bags littering the floor. “I figured you’d tell me in your own time.” He moves Buck’s shirt aside and runs his hands over his torso, searching for the wound. In any other situation he’d be taking his time, cataloguing every inch of skin stretching across Buck’s stomach, but he isn’t clear on exactly how Buck’s healing situation works. He doesn’t know how much time he has.
He finds the wound on Buck’s left side. It looks like the rebar went clean through him, and from the placement, Eddie estimates it might have hit his spleen, maybe the large intestine.
“You’re telling me you got up and walked away after this?” Eddie asks, and he can’t tell if he’s annoyed or impressed.
“I thought it would heal,” Buck says, gasping a little when Eddie probes the exit wound at his back. “And I—ah—I couldn’t risk them taking me to the hospital again. I think they’re starting to get suspicious.”
“Why isn’t it healing?” Eddie asks, running through options in his head. He knows what he’d do if Buck was human, but he’s pretty sure none of that applies here.
“Rebar is steel,” Buck says. “Steel is mostly iron, and iron is a big no-no.”
“Why is that?” Eddie asks, momentarily distracted by the realisation of how much he doesn’t know about Buck and his… condition? Species?
“Can we do the whole walking vampire encyclopaedia bit later?” Buck groans.
“Right, sorry. So… the iron is blocking your natural healing?”
“I think so, yeah.” Buck gestures weakly at the blood bags. “I haven’t fed in a while, so I thought it would help, but…”
“Does the bagged blood usually work?”
“For feeding, yeah, but it’s not as—I don’t know the technical terms, but it’s not as—potent, I guess? They freeze it for storage, I guess that does something.”
“Okay,” Eddie says, and starts unbuttoning his shirt.
“What—what are you doing?” Buck asks.
“Is my neck okay? I don’t—I’m not too familiar with vampire lore, but a vein’s a vein, right?” And part of Eddie thinks it should feel weirder, negotiating where to let his vampire best friend drink from him, but—it’s Buck. If there’s something he wouldn’t do for Buck, he hasn’t encountered it yet.
“Eddie, you can’t—I can’t—”
“Yes, you can,” Eddie says, and he reaches for Buck, helps him sit up and scoots closer so Buck can reach his neck. “You need help, so shut up and let me help you.”
Eddie doesn’t know how to say take me, take all of me, there’s no part of me that isn’t already yours. But this part he can do: he can offer up this part of himself, let his blood heal Buck.
“But—” Buck tries to argue, even as his fangs slide out again, and he leans closer, like he’s drawn in by the beat of Eddie’s pulse beneath his skin.
“But nothing,” Eddie says, and cups the back of Buck’s neck, pulling him closer until Buck is cradled against his chest, his face buried in Eddie’s neck.
There’s a moment where nothing happens, then Eddie feels twin pricks on the skin of his neck, and a strange kind of pressure as the blood starts flowing. Buck’s cool lips against his skin send shivers down his spine, and if he closes his eyes he can imagine Buck’s lips on him in a different situation, one where they’re doing this because they both want to and not because Buck might die otherwise and Eddie is pathetic enough to take advantage of it.
He still has a hand on the back of Buck’s neck and he slides it into Buck’s hair, holding him close. After a moment, Buck starts moving, like life is slowly flowing back into him. He lifts one hand to the other side of Eddie’s neck, and Eddie knows Buck is probably just trying to keep him steady, but there’s something infinitely tender about the way Buck’s fingertips tickle the back of his neck.
Buck’s other hand goes to his waist, his fist clenching in the fabric of his shirt.
It’s more intimate than it has any right to be, for a random Wednesday afternoon in July. It’s not even dark out, and lazy rays of sunlight filter in through the crack in Buck’s curtains.
Eddie wants to live in this moment forever.
Finally, Buck pulls away. There’s fresh blood around his mouth, stark against the dried rust-coloured stains from earlier. He ducks his head, looking away like he’s embarrassed, and before Eddie knows what he’s doing he reaches out and grabs Buck’s chin.
“Don’t go weird on me now,” he murmurs, swiping at some of the blood with his thumb.
“Is this really your threshold for weird?” Buck asks.
“All of this is weird,” Eddie admits. “But—Buck, I came here knowing exactly what you are, and I came to help you anyway. You don’t need to hide it from me, any of it.”
“What am I?” Buck asks, like this is the part of Eddie’s sentence that he’s stuck on.
“You’re Buck,” Eddie says, because in the end, that’s all that matters. “And, okay, I have some questions, but they can wait. It’s okay. I’m not going anywhere.”
Eddie’s pretty sure that every word he’s saying is telegraphing every single thing he feels, but if Buck picks up on it, he doesn’t say anything. Which is fair, Eddie thinks—Buck’s been through a lot today.
Besides, to the extent that he’s ever planned on telling Buck how he feels, it’s never taken place minutes after he saved Buck’s life. If they ever do have that conversation, Eddie wants to be sure that Buck isn’t being influenced by anything else, like the fact that Eddie knows he’s a vampire, or that Eddie just saved his life.
It’s not that he thinks that conversation is going to happen. Nothing Buck has done has ever suggested it would. But a guy can dream.
Buck is silent, and the longer he doesn’t speak, the heavier the moment grows. Eddie knows what it looks like when Buck is about to spiral over something that isn’t worth spiralling over, so he says the first thing he can think of.
“Okay, I do have one urgent question.”
“Yeah?” Buck asks, and when he looks up he’s a little wary, like he’s worried about what Eddie’s going to ask.
“I saw you take down, like, an entire loaf of garlic bread at the station last week. Shouldn’t that have killed you?”
“God,” Buck grumbles. “Don’t believe everything you read.”
“Wait, you can say god?”
“It’s—” Buck starts, then cuts himself off. “No, you know what, if we’re gonna do Vampire 101, I’m gonna take a shower first.” And Buck’s grumbling, but Eddie sees him smiling as he heads into the bathroom, and he thinks they’re going to be okay.
