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Buck doesn't know why, but he keeps moving frames across the shelf in the living room.
He needs to do something with his hands, he just can't think of anything actually productive to do because Eddie is here.
He’s actually back.
He’s just a few feet away, getting Chris settled in his room.
Everything he wants is in this house again, and he doesn't know what to do besides helplessly moving frames around, fluffing pillows, and fixing the carpet to make sure it's not a tripping hazard for Chris. All while he panics about how there is no way he can make it through a conversation with Eddie without Eddie figuring it out. Or without him blurting it out.
And while he tries to distract himself from the urge to grab both of them and not let go.
Buck's a clinger, what else can he do?
“Chris and I could get a hotel,” Eddie's voice startles him for the nth time that day, and he doesn't miss the way Eddie flinches, rubbing his hands together as Buck blinks at him.
“What?”
“You're being—” Eddie stars, before shaking his head, “if it's not okay for us to be here, we did just show up and it's a bit—if you want your space, Chris fell asleep already but, I can still just get us a hotel,” he offers, voice clear but a bit trembly, like he's forcing himself to stay calm.
It just makes Buck more confused.
“What? You're—this is your house, Eddie,” he frowns, and Eddie shrugs, looking around like he's unsure of his place.
But it doesn't feel like it's only about the house.
“Not anymore, not really,” he says, with a humorless chuckle, “I'm just saying if—”
“You're not getting a hotel,” Buck interrupts him, maybe a bit too forcefully, before taking a deep breath. “I don't,” he trails off, and Eddie tilts his head, watching his face.
“Then why are you so jumpy?”
“What do you mean?”
“Buck, you've been in edge since you saw me, I know I've been gone a while, it would be presumptuous of me to expect things to just be like they were, but it's kinda making it seem like you don't want me to be here, and you can tell me if this is too much, I—”
“Stop trying to leave me,” Buck snaps before he can stop himself.
Too honest.
It makes Eddie's eyes widen.
But it doesn't last long before his face softens.
“I'm not, that's literally the exact opposite of what I want, but you look uncomfortable and I don't know what else it could be besides the fact that I'm suddenly invading your space, I get it, it's bad timing, I just—”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Buck cuts him, turning back around to continue hopelessly moving decorations around, and Eddie sighs.
“Buck.”
“Yeah,” he nods, but doesn't turn around.
“Please, just tell me what's wrong.”
“Well, it’s—”
“Don't say nothing, I know you,” Eddie fights, and he drops his arms to his sides, moving to face him.
“Can we drop this?”
“Not when you look upset that I'm here after biting my head off for leaving in the first place,” Eddie says, crossing his arms over his chest.
He can't tell Eddie.
He can't let Eddie shut down either.
“I'm not upset.”
“Well, you're not happy about it, either.”
“I—”
“I came back because, you know, you,” Eddie says, then blinks a couple of times, waving a hand around, before adding, “home, and, if you need time to adjust, it's fine, I can find somewhere else for the—”
“You're not getting a hotel, Eddie.”
“Then talk to me,” he says, his expression more vulnerable than Buck has seen in a while, and he freezes.
There are a lot of issues with being forced to confront the idea that you might be in love with your best friend.
Eddie is Buck's favorite person, and he never wanted to look at what that meant all too closely because, well, he can't hate the fact that he can't have something if he convinces himself he doesn't want it.
So he talked himself out of it.
Twisted himself into knots to stop the thought from taking root.
But it's not like he could stop himself from letting the feeling register with Eddie standing in front of him.
When Eddie is in his reach, and somehow even more beautiful than in his memories.
FaceTime doesn't do justice to the effect Eddie has on him.
So Buck is forced to accept the fact that he is in love with him.
Probably has been for most of the time they've known each other.
So he's probably fucked.
“God, this is all Tommy's fault,” he groans and Eddie makes a confused noise, blinking at him.
“What?”
“I didn't know, but once he said it, I couldn't stop thinking about it, and once I knew, I couldn't not know, and how do I even deny it or move on from this when you're literally here and I was trying to make peace with the fact that I was never gonna get you back, and—”
He's rambling. He knows he is. Can't help it, even when Eddie gets that amused look on his face he always gets when Buck loses himself while talking about something.
“Buck, you're not making sense,” Eddie says, taking a few careful steps closer to him.
“I—”
“It's okay.”
“No, it's not because you're here and you said you came back for me but it doesn't matter,” he says, and Eddie's face drops.
“It doesn't—” Eddie repeats, taking a few steps back.
Okay, now he's definitely fucked.
“No, not like that,” Buck interrupts, moving closer to him, not letting Eddie add that space between back in, “I'm so happy you're back, Eds, I'm so—relieved. I can't fill the space that exists in my life without you and Chris, it's like I can finally breathe right, but now everything I want is in this house and I can't get it because you're straight and it's fine, nothing has to—”
“But I'm not,” Eddie says, then frowns to himself.
“—change between us, I just need to—what?”
“I'm not straight,” Eddie says, locking eyes with Buck, and turns his world upside down.
“You like men?”
“No,” he shakes his head, and Buck frowns.
“But—”
“I don't like men, I love you,” he says, just to turn Buck's world right side up again.
“You—you do?”
“I just told you I came back for you,” Eddie says it like it's obvious, like Buck should've known this already.
As if he didn't just fundamentally alter the reality Buck exists in.
“You love me?” He repeats, more trying to figure out the way the words taste in his tongue than asking for confirmation.
“I do.”
Eddie gives it to him anyway.
“Oh.”
“Is that a problem?” He asks after a beat of silence, starting to look tense as he watches Buck.
“A problem?”
“You kinda look like I punched you. When I imagined telling you this, you looked a bit happier about it.”
Imagined it?
How long has Eddie known?
“You said me being bi wouldn't change anything between us,” he says, not even sure why, and Eddie's expression flashes with something close to devastation before he catches himself.
“Clearly, I'm an idiot,” he says, shaking his head, turning back to Chris' door.
Buck realizes a second too late that Eddie thinks he's rejecting him.
“Eddie, stop,” Buck moves closer to him, grabbing Eddie's arm, forcing him to turn back to him, “Hey,” he waits until Eddie's eyes meet his, “I love you too.”
“Yeah?” Eddie breathes, whole body relaxing with the action in a way that makes Buck giddy.
“So much I don't even know what to do with it, you just—I didn't know I could want this, want—”
“Us?” He finishes for him, and Buck nods.
“Yeah.”
“Well, you can,” Eddie says, taking the final step between them so they’re basically chest to chest, “so what do you want to do about it?” He says, eyes flickering down to his lips before meeting Buck’s again.
“Eddie,” he breathes, or tries, suddenly lightheaded as the proximity register.
“Yeah?”
“If we do this, I don't think I can let you go if—”
“Good thing I don't ever want to leave you then,” Eddie shrugs, still looking at him as if he can’t understand how this isn’t obvious.
“Eddie.”
“For the love of God, Buck,” he says with a frustrated huff, “I just dropped everything to come back to you, what do I have to do to convince—”
Buck doesn't let him finish.
Doesn't know what possesses him, really.
Seven years of waiting, maybe.
Of wanting.
He just moves his hands to Eddie's face and drags him into a kiss.
Maybe Eddie was waiting for it, too.
There's no hesitation in kissing Buck back.
In fact, Eddie melts into his touch, fingers gripping at his shirt, deepening the kiss, and trying to pull him closer.
There is no closer.
There's no reducing the space between them without fusing them together.
But by God, Buck wants to try.
Bury himself into Eddie's chest so that he will never have to be away from him ever again.
Crack his own chest open and tuck Eddie safely between his ribs next to his heart.
Seems fitting with the way it feels like it's beating for him either way.
Probably always had, it almost feels like he spent his whole life searching for this feeling.
So he never wants to let it end, as Eddie’s hands sneak under his shirt, the warmth from his fingers sending a shiver up his spine.
But he can’t fight the urge to smile.
To laugh as if there’s something in the air.
Eddie is back. And he loves him.
Eddie loves him.
Eddie’s fingers are digging into his back as he kisses Buck like he needs it more than oxygen.
Eddie is smiling into his lips, reacting to the way that he started smiling.
So Buck pulls back, leaning his forehead on Eddie’s, laughing—giggling—when Eddie kisses him again, short and sweet, once, twice, three times, before pulling back enough to look at him.
“Hi.”
“Hey.”
“I don’t need a hotel then? Or to sleep on your couch? Because no offense, that couch sucks,” Eddie teases, startling a laugh out of him, and Buck leans his head on his shoulder, melting against his chest when Eddie’s arms wrap around him.
“I’m not letting you out of my sight anytime soon,” Buck mumbles into Eddie’s neck, and his arms tighten around him.
“Good,” he says, pressing a kiss to the side of his head.
“We can figure the rest out as we go, right?”
“We always do, don’t we?” Eddie says, hands moving to Buck’s face to get him to look at him.
“I guess we do.”
“We’ve always been a good team,” he says, grinning at him, thumbs gently stroking Buck’s cheek.
Yeah, Buck loves him so much.
“I love you,” he breathes, because he can now.
He could get used to the way Eddie is looking at him like he’s the best thing he’s ever seen.
“I love you too, baby, so much.”
Buck can’t stop himself from leaning in to kiss him again.
From losing himself in the feeling.
Eddie came back for him.
And for the first time, it feels like he doesn’t have to worry about where they’re going.
Eddie’s home.
Eddie’s got him.
Always had.