#been feelin particularly mushy lately...... what's in the air

[shitouttabuck]

playing with the hair and "you sure this is ok" sounds so soft aaaah I hope you'll find inspiration, I love your writing

got a little sappy with this <3

bed-sharing prompts: person A idly playing with person B’s hair while they’re asleep + “you sure this is okay?”

the sound of love astounds me

Eddie’s man-behind today. Bobby tries to be fair with it, not constantly relegating the probies to the job no one really wants, and today it’s Eddie’s turn again.

He’s grateful for it—he slept badly last night, and that’s probably why Bobby made him stay behind in the first place, taking pity on his dragging feet and muffled yawns not one hour into their shift.

They’re past the 18-hour mark now, late night blanketing the firehouse in a thick, heavy quiet. The rest of them have been out on a call for a while, a three-alarm factory fire at the edge of their jurisdiction. Eddie’s itchy about it, always is when it’s a more serious call and he’s not there alongside his team. Not there alongside his partner.

Buck’s a big boy, and Eddie knows, he knows him not being there isn’t going to unbalance the dynamic of their team so dramatically something goes wrong, but. He’s supposed to have Buck’s back, and as much as he trusts the rest of the 118—with his life—no one else is Buck’s partner. Not the way Eddie is.

The sound of the engine backing into the station catches his attention and he gets up from the couch, leaning over the loft railing as everyone stumbles out the rig, sooty and sleepy. Hen looks up and gives him a tired smile, Chim bumping into her shoulder as he blows Eddie a kiss before heading to the showers.

Buck’s last out the engine, exhaustion written into the slump of his body. He doesn’t look up at Eddie, seemingly lost in his own thoughts as he shuffles slowly after everyone else.

Eddie reheats dinner, serving it all up just as the rest of his team flops into chairs around the dining table. Still no Buck.

“Did you cook this?” Ravi asks, poking suspiciously at the casserole with a fork.

“I’ve made my peace with food poisoning, I’m so fucking hungry,” Chim says, mouth already full.

“Hey,” Eddie protests mildly. “I followed Bobby’s recipe exactly.”

“Really?” Bobby asks, examining his own plate in surprise. “Oh, uh, no, of course. Looks good, Eddie, thank you.” He takes a very deliberate bite, making a big show of chewing amidst noises of approval.

Eddie sighs and turns to Hen. “Where’s Buck?”

“Still showering,” she tells him. “Rough one today.”

Eddie’s heart sinks. “Did you lose someone?”

Hen shakes her head, setting down her fork. “No, no—sorry, didn’t mean it like that. He got stuck carrying two guys out on his own, though. And one of them was in pretty bad shape. Think his whole body is feeling kinda tender.”

“Oh,” Eddie blows out a relieved breath. “Okay.” He smacks Chim’s hand away from the last corner of the casserole. “That’s for Buck. You can have some more garlic bread.”

Chimney pouts at him, and Eddie ignores it in favour of covering the casserole dish and sticking it back in the oven to keep warm.

One by one, everyone wanders to the bunks, drained from the day. Eddie hangs behind, clearing up the kitchen and waiting for Buck to show up. There’s no sign of him by the time the counters are sparkling, so he flops back down on the couch with his book. If it’d been a bad call… Eddie’d like to think he knows what Buck needs, usually. And sometimes that’s just a minute to decompress by himself, washing off a weight of weariness rather than an intangible hurt.

Sure enough, he hears the quiet padding of Buck’s footsteps come up the stairs not much later. Eddie cranes his head over the back of the couch, smiling upside-down and wonky when Buck comes over.

“Hey,” he says. “You okay?”

“Mm,” Buck hums. His eyes are droopy with exhaustion, cheeks ruddy from being under the hot spray of the shower for so long.

“Dinner’s in the oven,” Eddie tells him.

Buck exhales heavily, giving him a small smile. “Not so hungry.”

“Sleep, then,” Eddie says, nodding in the direction of the bunks.

Buck grimaces. “Everything aches.”

“All the more reason to sleep,” Eddie presses.

Buck looks at him, blinking tiredly. “Okay,” he says, suddenly amenable, rounding the couch and climbing onto it. He drapes himself across it, settling on his back and shoving his head into Eddie’s lap with a contented sigh. Eddie sits frozen, book in one hand and the other hovering over Buck’s chest.

Buck cracks open one eye to look up at him consideringly. Eddie smiles down at him automatically, can’t really help himself, and gently lowers his forearm to rest across Buck’s broad chest.

“This okay?” Buck asks, slightest note of hesitancy in his voice.

“Better if you were asleep,” Eddie says, flipping the page of his book. He lets the hand curled around Buck’s torso squeeze gently, reassuringly, even as he goes back to reading.

Buck huffs an amused breath, wriggling a little as he settles more firmly in Eddie’s lap, turning his head to get comfortable. This angles his face so that it’s basically pressed into Eddie’s crotch, tip of his nose brushing the fly seam of Eddie’s pants.

Eddie swallows, positioning his book a little higher to cover any change in expression his face might betray, because—it’s Buck, and this isn’t sexual, but God, Eddie hasn’t had this kind of intimacy in his life in a while. He’s less worried about popping a boner from his best friend’s face so close to his dick and more concerned Buck’ll take one look at him and know just how badly Eddie wants him this close, all of the time.

Whatever. If everyone had a friend like Buck, everyone would be a little insane about loving him this much, too. It’s not an Eddie thing, it’s a Buck thing.

Buck’s breathing evens out, deep and steady, and Eddie reads until the words start swimming on the page. He yawns, putting the book down and wondering if he can catch some sleep like this, because he’d rather be trapped on a desert island with his parents than wake Buck up right now.

Buck’s snoring lightly, warm puffs of breath Eddie can feel even through the fabric of his pants. His hair is curling messily from his shower and—there are bits of… something in it? Eddie sighs, knowing Buck probably just zoned out under the spray for half an hour without actually scrubbing his hair at all.

He runs his fingers through Buck’s hair, dislodging flecks of indiscernible airborne debris from the fire. He cards through more purposefully, combing it out as best he can and scratching his nails gently against Buck’s scalp.

Buck murmurs, nuzzling into Eddie. The hand closest to the back of the couch scuffles along the cushion till it finds Eddie’s, wrapping around it and tugging it to his chest with such strength Eddie blinks in surprise, astonished that he’s still asleep.

Eddie goes back to sorting through Buck’s hair one-handed, discarding tiny pieces of detritus lodged in his curls. He gets a little lost in it, something calm and hypnotic about the repetitive motions: stroking, cleaning, brushing through, over and over and over.

He’s startled from it when someone clears their throat softly. He just about manages not to jerk in his surprise, and Buck remains slumbering peacefully. Hen’s standing a few feet from the couch, eyebrow cocked and mouth quirked with amusement.

“There a reason you’re grooming Buck like a monkey picking nits off her baby?” she whispers.

Eddie flushes, removing his hand from Buck’s curls. “He has a bunch of shit in his hair from the fire,” he says defensively.

Hen bites down on her smile. “Okay, okay,” she says soothingly, like she’s talking to a spooked horse. “He forget to actually wash it during the longest shower known to man?”

Eddie sighs, fingers resuming running through Buck’s hair almost unconsciously. “You know how he gets when he’s this tired.”

Hen hums, and Eddie looks up at her again. “Why’re you up? Can’t sleep?”

She shakes her head, inclining it towards the bathrooms. “Just needed the toilet.” She makes as if to head back down, then pauses, looking at him assessingly.

“What?” Eddie asks.

“Nothing,” she shakes her head again, smiling softly. “Just—I don’t think there’s anyone other than Karen and Denny whose hair I’d pick through voluntarily. And any other kids of mine, I guess. Family.” With that, she turns and disappears down the stairs.

Eddie swallows. He looks down: Buck, face pressed into Eddie’s stomach; Buck, hand clutching Eddie’s arm to his chest; Buck, curls wild and springy from where Eddie’s been running his fingers through them, cleaning him, grooming him, taking care of him. Hen’s not dropped a bomb of any sort on Eddie; Buck’s his family, he knows that, Buck knows that, he’s fairly sure anyone who’s ever met them knows that.

But he thinks yeah, there isn’t anyone other than Chris and Buck whose hair he’d pick through like this. And maybe that’s a different, more specific kind of family than he or anyone else realised. Maybe that’s a different, more specific kind of love.

Buck snuffles discontentedly in his lap and Eddie scratches his scalp soothingly, heart settling as Buck settles.

So maybe the reason Eddie wants him close all the time is slightly different to what he thought. This remains true: if everyone had a friend like Buck, everyone would be a little insane about loving him this much. That’s a Buck thing. But maybe, if he’s open to it, Eddie can make loving him this much, every day and in every way, an Eddie thing and exclusively an Eddie thing.

Buck shifts on the couch, tugging Eddie’s arm a little higher up on his chest, and Eddie splays his palm over Buck’s heart, feeling the steady thump.

When Bobby wakes them both for breakfast hours later, Eddie leans against the table to stretch the crick in his neck from sleeping sitting up. Behind him, Buck reaches a large hand out to massage the junction of his shoulder gently, and Eddie melts into his touch.

“Would you pick nits out of my hair?” he asks before his brain comes fully online.

“Sure,” Buck says, not missing a beat. “D’you have lice?” He leans forward to inspect Eddie’s hair and Eddie swats him away.

“No,” he says, slightly offended. “I do not have lice. Just—hypothetically.”

Buck yawns. “’Course, Eds,” he says. “Your lice are my lice, and all that.” He serves himself a heaping of scrambled eggs and ambles off to the kitchen to grab orange juice from the fridge.

And maybe Buck is just the kind of person who, unlike Eddie and Hen, would comb through anyone’s nasty hair. But your lice are my lice is more romantic than anything Eddie’s ever heard, even in his own wedding vows, and when Buck knocks his knee against Eddie’s under the table before stealing a bite of hash brown, Eddie thinks maybe this love between them is equally cared for, a two-way street in every sense of it, a Buck-and-Eddie thing.

(more bed-sharing prompts)

#911 fic #buddie fic #911 #buddie #been feelin particularly mushy lately...... what's in the air #writing tag #bed sharing prompts #whoops this one is couch not bed i guess #mine