Buck lay under the covers with them pulled the way up over his head. He would take as much time as he needed to wallow; it was why he hadn't gone to Tommy's the night before, even though Tommy kept on pushing him to do so. The first follow-up after the ER visit and then the first surgery to repair his shoulder had been good. However, he was still going to be out for a long time. Then, he was still unsure if he was going to be able to be a firefighter again, not the same way he was. He was older and wiser now, so he knew that there were a lot of things he could do that would keep him in the business over helping and saving people.

No one was going to check on him because they assumed he was with Tommy as he had been since he had been released after the surgery a week and a half ago. He had his arm immobile and wasn't going to do a damned thing to set back his recovery.

Even if this were what retired him from active firefighter life, he would never regret it.

He played it all through his head a million times, but there was nothing else that he could have done. His ropes were undone from getting back up on the bridge, the kid he had just come up with was still affixed to his harness, and the car carrier that held the baby brother was still on the ground beside him. The ambulances weren't close enough to move the kids anywhere else yet, and the girl clinging to him was still so scared that she was shaking. Buck wouldn't let her go until he could put her down on the gurney to make sure that she was good.

The screech of tires and then the sight of the car coming at them. The baby had just stopped crying, and it started again when he picked up the carrier and slung it towards his elbow, and then he went down; the sudden drop and the tearing made him cry out, but the car that was headed at them had gone over his head as he hung off the side of the bridge, his arm getting more and more sore as hung there and wasn't able to get the carrier to where he could hold on with his other arm.

Everyone on the scene had scrambled to get Eddie down to him to get the kids off him and into something that would hold him when he finally gave up the ghost with his arm. The kid hadn't let go, and Eddie had just, in the end, hooked up Buck and made sure he let go. He just hung there with the kid on him, and Eddie took the carrier.

It had been a drunk driver who had blown past the police barricade that had been set up and then lost control when they clipped the barrier and then went right for them.

All three of them would be dead if he hadn't acted like he had. He couldn't regret that.

There was nothing to do but wait and see what happened. He was allowed to wallow, and he was going to do it. He would allow the low, and then he would put it away.

Buck started to drift off to sleep again, and he dreamed of the smell of bacon and something else that he couldn't place. Cooking sucked right now as he wasn't able to do a lot of things.

When Buck woke up again, he was wrapped in warmth more than the sheet he had been sleeping under would give him. The smell of coffee hit his nose next, and he cracked open his eyes to see the cup on the stand beside the bed. He groaned and tried to roll to get up, but his hips were pinned by Tommy['s arm thrown across them. He wanted to wallow and not have to make Tommy feel better about this.

"Make me a promise," Tommy said.

Buck wanted to tell him to go away.

"Promise me that you won't push me away when you are hurting, and I'll promise to let you act however you want. If you want to doom and gloom over possibly losing the job you love because of this, I'll support that. I'll bring you everything in bed, and you don't have to get up at all. Just don't push me away, Evan."

Buck had no idea what to say to that. It sounded like a good compromise, but he wasn't sure that it was going to hold out like that. No one else had allowed him to feel what he felt when it came to anything. He was told that things that happened to him and others didn't mean he could feel what he felt. Like when Eddie had been shot, he hadn't been allowed to do much more than be freaked out at first. Then, after that, he had to act like his best friend hadn't been shot in front of him.

"I can call Miriam, and she can tell you how epically I pouted the last time I was hurt and that she allowed me to feel what I felt for as long as I needed to process what happened to me. She and I made that promise to each other because she knew what it was like. When she started out, she wasn't allowed to react to anything, or she was labeled an emotional mess and kept back from rescues. It became toxic until a new captain came in and allowed her to feel what she felt."

Tommy rolled Buck to his back, careful of the arm that was immobile against his chest. Buck kept his eyes closed but wanted to look at Tommy when he cupped his cheek.

"Evan," Tommy cajoled.

Buck opened his eyes and looked at his boyfriend.

"There you are. Eddie called me this morning to check on you and didn't want to call you on the phone and wake you up if you were asleep. It seemed that your sister pushed him to do that through Howie, and then Eddie realized that you let everyone think you would stay with me, and then you came here. Eddie knew what happened and gave me a little of what everyone was pushing you into after the embolism."

Buck closed his eyes again and inhaled deeply before letting it out slowly. Tommy's thumb took up a sweep across his cheek, calming him down.

"Hungry," Buck said, not able to make the promise to Tommy yet. He wasn't sure what he wanted.

"I made food that you can eat one-handed, and I've got it in the oven on warm to make sure it's still pretty good. Not gonna be as good as fresh, but then I thought the smell would draw you out of here, but that didn't happen. So I came up to cuddle you."

"I'm not getting out of bed," Buck said.

"Okay, then I'll bring breakfast to you. Do you need any help before I go and get the food?"

"No, thanks." Buck sat up carefully; he pushed with his good arm and groaned as the blood flow from that made his shoulder ache. He needed to take pills, and that meant getting good in him because that shit made him so damned sick to his stomach if he didn't have a full meal on him. So he got up before Tommy could hold a hand and went to the bathroom. His stuff was laid out on his good side on the counter, which was something that he had meant to do the night before but hadn't. It made tears well up in his eyes, and he tried to hold them back but decided to let them fall a little while he got himself taken care of. It took a lot longer than he thought it would be then he was so sore from sleeping for shit without Tommy there with him. He needed to change out of the shirt at some point, but he would allow Tommy to help him with that. He needed a shower first, which Tommy was also going to help with.

The food was all setup, and Buck's pills were there in the little case that Maddie had bought so that Buck would lay out his pills for the week to help any confusion if he was too sore to think if he had taken something or not.

Tommy came back up the stairs with a second plate that didn't have as much food on it, but he hoped that Tommy would eat more than that.

"I snacked while cooking."

Buck's plate was covered with a dish lid, and he was careful as he sat down. Thankfully, Tommy had moved all the drinks off the tray. Buck hissed in pain as he got settled against the headboard. He really needed to get a good bit of food in him before he took those pills, but he wanted to start to feel better as fast as possible.

Tommy settled the tray over his lap and made sure it was stable before he picked up the coffee and juice to put them on Buck's tray.

"Thanks," Buck said.

"Of course, I meant it when I said I wanted you at my place to take care of. Even if that means letting you spend all day in bed, Evan."

"People say that, but when they think I should just be over it, they act like I'm a child to not be over it as fast as they think I should be."

"Hmm, I can see that being an issue. I can't say that I might not push you sometimes, but I'll always talk about what you are feeling. Depression can set in, but there is also a need to go through the stages of grief at the pace that allows each stage to be done. On the other hand, someone keeps defaulting to that stage."

"Sounds like something my therapist told me once a few years ago."

"I'm sure that it's where I got it and I realized that while there are times that someone just refuses to move on from stage because they haven't really started to heal, there are no set dates for any stage of it. You cannot be pushed to do something and work through it at the same time."

Buck leaned into Tommy a little and took the lid off his food. He laughed as he saw the dollar coin-size pancakes on the plate. They were covered in strawberry jam and a little bit of cream on each one, and then there was a pile of cream on the side for the ones that were on the bottom layers. There was bacon on the side of everything and potato wedges that looked like they were homemade and not just gotten from his freezer.

"I love you," Buck said. He pressed his lips together as if it wasn't what he meant to say, but he meant it. When he could breathe, he spoke again. "I mean that."

"Good because I love you too, Evan. Bad days and all."

Buck picked up his fork and started to eat, not paying attention to Tommy beside him and eating the food on his plate without speaking. It felt like a good silence as Buck tried to process what he felt. He wanted what Tommy was offering him, but he wasn't sure that he trusted it, and that made him feel like shit. Tommy had never done anything that hurt him, even Tommy leaving on the first date hadn't really hurt him. He knew why it happened and trusted that Tommy didn't do it because Buck acted like a fool. Tommy had just pointed out that he had come out of the closet and been out for years, and Buck had tried to have him back into the closest with him.

Coming out had been as easy as breathing, even if he had planned to dance with Tommy at the wedding when it wasn't taking place in a hospital room. There was nothing to do but accept that Tommy didn't accept him for how he was, and all he asked in return was the same kind of treatment.

"I promise," Buck said when he paused while eating to take his pills. He didn't look at Tommy as he said it, either; he just focused on the juice he was drinking.

"I promise," Tommy said.

For the first time in a long time, it felt like someone was making a promise to put him first, just like he tried to do with the people he was with, and he could say that no one had ever made him feel like that. Abby tried, but she had so much else going on. Ali had been too short even to think she would do it. Taylor would never put anything but the truth and her job at the front. Natalia had been doomed from the start, but he really liked her.

"Can we go back to yours?"

"Sure. After we get you in the shower here, then I can help you pack up more stuff to make sure that you are good for the next while."

"Or I can just never leave."

"Or that. Let's see how this goes over the next two weeks, and we can talk about it more then."

Buck nodded, and he felt like his heart was going to burst. He should make sure to tell Eddie thank you for pushing Tommy to come over. He was happy, and it felt like his heart might just burst through the fog of what he would end up doing for the rest of his life if he didn't get back to what he was before.

Maybe life was looking up.

The End