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fan_flashworks2024-12-13 01:49 pm
darkjediqueen) wrote in fan_flashworks2024-12-13 01:49 pm
Entry tags:
9-1-1: Fan Fiction: Finding Joy
Title: Finding Joy
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: No Warnings Apply
Fandom: 9-1-1
Relationships: Evan Buckley/Tommy Kinard
Tags: Angst, Happy Ending, Getting Back Together
Summary: Tommy had to find his joy.
Word Count: 9,228
Tommy settled into the table with his cup of coffee. He looked around the seating area and stopped. He took in the little girl who was on her knees in the chair. She was careful as she reached out and picked up the spoon before taking a lick of the top of the ice cream. She was pretty calm for her age and, so far, well-behaved. Tommy had been seeing a lot more kids who were hellions. He liked it when they were calm. If kids were not, he just usually left. He wasn't one to make a scene about it.
The parent with the little girl was not in Tommy's line of sight with the people at the table between them. Tommy kind of wanted to see who the parent was to tell them they were doing a good job with the girl. Tommy looked down at his coffee gain, and he smiled to himself. The last two years of dating hadn't given him anything. He hadn't really been putting his heart into it, and he knew it. There was no one he had found who had matched Evan.
Evan, who Tommy had ended things with in the best way possible to make sure that Evan still didn't want him. Tommy had gone for the kill shot, and it was why, after a month, when Tommy had known that he had made the worst mistake of his life, he hadn't gone back. He wanted to. Still, to this day, he wants to go back. Evan had never reached out, and he had never reached out, either.
Tommy asked how he was doing to Eddie on occasion but Evan was the thing that was never really brought up. Eddie hadn't dropped him even though Tommy had broken Evan's heart. Tommy figured that Evan himself told Eddie not to drop him, so Tommy just didn't ask about him. He never asked if Evan asked about him. After a year, Eddie told him that he didn't talk about either of them to each other. That it wasn't fair to either of them to haunt the friendships he had, so he just made sure that he said nothing. Overall, general things were fine. He didn't mean that, but he wasn't going to bring in the other things.
"How are you doing with that coffee?" the waitress asked as she came over.
"Oh, um, fine. I'll take the pancake special, no syrup, and instead the strawberry preserves."
"You got it." The waitress picked up the menu and stopped.
Tommy looked at her to see that the table next to him was getting up. He looked over to see that he could see the table and almost wished he hadn't been sitting with the girl, Evan.
That made Tommy's stomach drop out. He had no idea what he was going to do now, and there was no way to hide. Hopefully, Evan wasn't going to look over at him.
The little girl was invested in her ice cream. A moment after swallowing it, she made a noise.
"Hurts?" Evan asked.
The girl nodded her head. Evan got into a bag at his feet and pulled out a pill bottle. He saw two different pills from it. One looked like an antibiotic. That explained the ice cream—any food that one could get in a kid. He had seen them there for a while before he had settled down, so the ice cream was probably more like dessert.
"Here you go, the rest of her breakfast to go," the waitress said as she laid down a box.
"Thanks."
Tommy turned back to his coffee and tried not to look again. He didn't need Evan catching him looking at them. The age of the girl meant that Evan had moved on to someone who had already had the kid, which Tommy knew Evan would be good at—being a parent. It wasn't a shock that someone had snatched him up and made an honest man out of him.
"I'm done," the girl said a few moments later.
Tommy glanced at the ice cream, which was gone outside of the soup at the bottom. She then picked up the bowl and slurped it up.
"You are. I'm nearly done. So you want your coloring tablet?"
The girl nodded her head. Evan dug around in the bag at his feet and came up with the tablet. The girl took it and turned it on, pulling the stylus from a spot on the side of it, and then started to mess around on it. Evan started to look around, so Tommy looked to the side, hoping that Evan had forgotten about him and wouldn't recognize him.
A few minutes later, his breakfast was out, and Tommy turned himself in the chair, his back mostly to Evan and his daughter. He started to eat even though it tasted like cardboard in his mouth. The girl never would have been his because she came with whoever Evan was with now, but the idea of him and Evan having a kid made Tommy regret what he had done even more.
His goal was to eat as fast as he could and finish his coffee before he got up and left, leaving a big tip for just leaving without saying goodbye. He was good at eating fast; the job demanded it.
When everything was nearly done, Tommy felt a tug on his shirt sleeve and turned to look. It was the little girl. Tommy looked up to see that Evan was on his phone talking to someone softly enough that Tommy couldn't hear it.
"Tommy, is it pretty?"
The name from the girl's lips had Tommy freezing. How in the hell did she know his name? Tommy looked at Evan again and found him glancing at the table where his daughter had been, then he was gasping before starting to look around, looking the wrong way first but then coming around and seeing her there with him. He ended the call and hung up the phone.
The look of relief but no shock told Tommy that Evan had known he was there. He wasn't sure what he felt about that. Evan had known but hadn't said anything. Tommy knew and hadn't said anything as well, so he got it. He just didn't like it.
"Tommy, pretty?" the girl asked again.
Tommy looked at the tablet to see the color-by-numbers drawing on the tablet. It was mostly filled with correct colors, but there were a few things that he knew were impossible that the girl had done, despite what it was supposed to look like.
"Very pretty," Tommy finally choked out.
"Thanks." The girl turned and headed back to the table.
Tommy looked at Evan again but Evan just nodded at him. That hurt more than anything in the world. Tommy smiled at him, even though Evan couldn't see because the girl was looking.
"You ready to go, Joy?" Evan asked.
"Yes." Joy put the stylus back where it belonged and then handed the tablet over before she picked up her drink and finished it off.
"Drinks to go," the waitress said as she came over and dropped off a small carrier with two drinks in it. Have fun, Buck, Joy."
"Bye," Joy said. She hugged the waitress before she came over to give Tommy a hug.
The look of shock on the waitress's face was enough that Tommy spurred into action and gave her a little hug.
It left Tommy with so many questions that he had no answers to. He would have to ask someone, and there were three options that didn't involve going to Evan. Eddie, Hen, and Howie. Eddie was out because he wasn't sure what Eddie would even tell him. Howie meant Maddie and that was out because he wasn't going near her to ask about this, which left Hen. She might turn him out. They had still texted a few times, and nothing had fizzled out between them. He and Howie were closer, and it was something that Tommy had clung to even if he had only been meeting up for basketball with Howie and Eddie more than anything else.
"How do you know them?" the waitress asked when Evan and Joy were gone.
"I used to date her father before she entered the picture. I didn't realize that he would know me at all. That was a shock."
"Yeah, Buck looked shocked about it all. You hurt him?"
"I hurt us both with a stupid decision that I burned the bridge on."
"That sucks. He was sad for a long time, and then he started to come around with Joy. He adopted her, and that was the best moment of his life, I think."
Adoption. The things were serious, and it seemed that Evan was married to Joy's other parent. Tommy wasn't going to assume it was a woman because it could have just as easily been a single mother.
"I'll take the check," Tommy said.
The waitress laid it down, and she slipped away from the table. Tommy left more than enough for a good tip, and then he was gone as well.
---
Tommy hesitated as he opened the door of his truck. He nearly shut it again, but the door opened up, and Denny came out. He stopped on the porch and then went back to the door and yelled inside. Tommy couldn't hear what he yelled, but it brought Karen to the door as Denny took off down the street. Tommy slipped out of the truck and then he closed the door, steeling himself for the conversation that was about to happen. He had taken the chance that Hen wasn't covering another shift or something, and she would be home.
"Eddie wondered who you would come to," Karen said as Tommy stepped up onto the porch.
"Evan told Eddie that I saw him with Joy?" Tommy asked.
"Yes, so we had a small little private bet on who you would pick. Eddie didn't think you would come to him because of the natural divide in the relationship that he had set up. I thought you would go to Chim."
"Chim's attached to Maddie, and I could ask him to meet me someplace alone, but I felt like this needed something a little more private. This is not something that really should be talked about in public, I think."
"It's not as complex as you think it is." Karen waved for him to go inside. Hen was sitting on the couch with a cup of something in her hand. There were two other cups on a tray on the coffee table.
Tommy picked up one, added a little bit of sugar to the tea, and then sat down. He looked at Hen and could see the upset there—not exactly upset at him.
"We didn't know that something was going on until a year and a half ago. By then, he had Joy for a few months."
"Had her? No..." Tommy closed his mouth not to finish that thought.
"No, Joy's an orphan. Buck had moved not long after you broke up with him. There was a little bit of an issue, and then there was this whole thing going on. Anyway, we were called to a fire. We had two confirmed adults on the site, and no one knew anything about the eight-month-old little girl who had been walking and got hidden in a closet. Buck is the one who found her and shared oxygen with her until they were both rescued since the path that he had used to get there had collapsed behind him. They both went for smoke treatment, and he fell in love."
Orphan. Evan was raising her alone.
"He's thrown himself into being a father. He's gone on a few dates, but most of them seem to end when he brings up being a single father," Karen said.
"And he's happy?"
"Yes," Hen said.
Tommy nodded. He wondered how Eddie had never slipped on talking about Joy. Or Chris. There was a lot there that made sense when it came to not talking about each other, but did Eddie keep that up on that side?
"She knew me."
"What?" Karen asked.
"I guess she's been sick? Evan gave her pills and then let her color on a tablet. She approached me, asked if it was pretty, and said my name."
"There is a picture of us from the medal ceremony on his mantle of the new house he's in. Well, it's not new, but he moved out of the loft. He's got a few rooms covered in pictures. I'm sure that your picture is in more than that one. She's inquisitive." Hen shrugged like that explained that.
"She is inquisitive," Karen said. She picked up her tea and took a sip of it before he curled her feet up onto the couch. "She couldn't be a chip off the block more if he actually gave over his DNA for her. He indulges all of her questions, and the babysitter he has for her is just as inquisitive. She's thirty and doesn't want kids of her own but loves watching them. She lives in the house next door to his, and after the childcare place that Buck had been using was closed again on a day when he had a shift, and he didn't want to call out, she started to watch Joy. It's been really good. She watches two other children a few days a week as well so Joy gets some fun with other kids. When it's just Joy, she watches her at Buck's place, but when the other kids are around, she watches them at her place and then brings Joy over to Buck's to sleep at night."
Tommy wasn't sure what to think of that. There was a swell of jealousy because if he hadn't ended things with Evan, he would have been part of that. Evan would have been with him when he fell in love with Joy. That place would be theirs, or they would be living at Tommy's house. There was so much he was missing because he had been scared of Evan leaving him behind. Fear had done a lot to hurt him.
And Tommy had let that fear shape his life.
---
Tommy looked at the church, and he debated what he was going to do. The church had never been a safe place for him, but even as a child, he had found the act of confession something that was good. He would do it alone in his bedroom when he said his prayers at night. His parents had never listened to him, so it was the time when he could be free to confess everything.
The Pride flag in the corner of one of the windows in the church told him that he was safe there, but he still felt like maybe he needed to do something else. He wanted to go to Eddie and confess a lot of things. He wanted to have someone who could understand him, but Eddie's relationship with God was just as fractured as Tommy's. The whole of the Kinard Family had been devout Catholics, and while Tommy considered himself lapsed, he still had that need for confession.
The door to the church opened, and a couple came out, a smile on their face. The priest who had clocked him the last time that he had walked someone out looked at him with a smile on his face before he left the door open. Tommy opened the truck door and slipped out, shutting it and locking it but not setting the alarm. He didn't need that going off because someone got too close to the car. He inhaled and exhaled a few times as he walked, making himself calm down as he stepped over the threshold.
The priest was standing at the back row, leaning there and looking like peace as he stared at Tommy.
"Welcome," the man said.
"Thank you, Father..."
"Brian. You can just call me Brian if that is your choice.'
"Father Brian is fine. We can head to the booth, or you can sit wherever you like."
"The booth is a little small for me."
Father Brian waved to the pews behind him. Tommy looked around before he headed to the front. Up where no one could hear him unless they got really close. Tommy sat down and silenced his phone, looking for a message from Evan. There had been nothing even though Tommy would have thought that Evan would have said something by now.
"It's been years since my confession inside of a church."
"You confess otherwise?"
"I do. I used to do it as a child at my bedside when I was made to say my nightly prayers. Then I just started to do it whenever I was home if it was after a shift or when I went to bed before a shift.'
"And when you say shift you mean?"
"I'm a firefighter."
"You know, I have a high number of firefighters who come here when I don't see them at the stations closest to here."
Tommy laughed. He looked at his hands. "It's the flag in the window for me."
"Ah. That's why you don't go to church anymore."
"No, I consider myself lapsed, but I like the aspect of confession. I get things off my chest. I am freed by the act of it. Sometimes, just speaking about the issues helps me to figure out what to do, but this one. I'm not sure what I need to do because I tried it, and it didn't help."
"Sounds like this is less a normal confession and more that you need help figuring out what to do. I'm pleased you came here to get help with it. Do you want to tell me?"
"How much time do you have, Father?"
"As long as you need. I have no scheduled meetings the rest of the day, and we can head anywhere that you want; I get my other help to come and sit confession if need be. We have a lovely garden in the back."
Tommy looked up at Jesus, and he inhaled before nodding.
"You can head through that door and I'll get Father Avery to head out here to make sure that anyone else who needs help will have someone."
Tommy didn't get it, but Father Brian did. Tommy stared at the cross, and he breathed.
By the time Tommy had finally made it outside, the sun was setting, and Father Brian looked like he had all the time in the world to deal with Tommy's issues. They took a turn around the outer edge of the garden while Tommy figured out where to start, and then when they turned inside the garden, Tommy started to speak. He spoke about his years in the LAFD, hiding who he was and how he had hidden it for a long time. The woman that he had been engaged to for two years before he had finally broken it off with her. Leaving the 118 and the people who he missed when he left. He talked about meeting Evan and Eddie and how he had clicked with both of them in different ways.
He spoke of his six months with Evan and how afraid he had been of losing everything. How he had ended it with him but hadn't been able to let go of him. How seeing Evan with Joy had filled him with so much jealousy that he had left and had taken a run around his neighborhood for so long that he had passed out as soon as he got home. How he hadn't been able to get the idea of slipping back into Evan's life to have that life for himself.
"You are scared. You have gotten nothing you wanted in life outside of becoming an LAFD pilot, and even that was kept from you for a long time. You are afraid of losing everything."
Tommy knew that because it was what had been said to him by his last therapist after he had been ordered to go after a loss on a call. It hadn't affected his ability to fly, but he had been pulled in to make sure that something small didn't become something big.
"Do you think that he would take you back?" Father Brian asked.
"I don't know."
"Do you want him because he's got a kid, and you can't see yourself getting a kid in any other way?"
Tommy stopped at that. He knew that he could probably qualify for being a foster parent. He knew that things were better with being placed with a married couple but there were single parents out there who made sure to prove that they had someone who was able to help or to be able to afford childcare while they worked. Evan had been given a child.
"No, I want a family. I started to see myself with a family with Evan. Adopting a kid or three, maybe having one by surrogate since he had proven that he didn't mind being a donor to a friend of his. I want him because I never stopped. I never stopped loving him, and I've been lying to myself for two years about not loving him. I broke my heart, and it's never healed up. I've never been able to move on from him."
"Then you know what you need to do because you can't move on until he breaks it the rest of the way or fixes it."
Tommy swallowed.
"And maybe start with Eddie."
"Why?"
"Because he's going to be your biggest hurdle." Father Brian laughed. Then he laid his hand on Tommy's shoulder and pointed to the side of the garden.
Tommy looked that way to see Eddie leaning against his truck, Eddie's truck parked on the other side of it.
"I guess it kind of shoots a little bit of anonymity when you know at least two parties, right?"
"I would never tell either of you anything that you tell me, but yes, I know enough from that to figure out that you and Eddie were talking about some of the same things. It's just horrible timing that he's here right now."
Tommy nodded and looked at where Eddie was still waiting for him.
"Come back any time that you want. Or you can see sanctuary inside, and I'll tell him to leave."
"No, I can handle Eddie."
Tommy could handle him. There was every single chance that Evan would never take him back, especially after so long. Yet the fact that Joy knew who he was from what had to be pictures said something about what Evan's thoughts were on him.
---
Tommy opened the door to his house to find a stuffed rabbit being shoved into his face and then the screech of a kid at his feet before there was the sound of tears. The thudding of feet was next. The screaming kept going down the hall.
"So, I need you," Eddie said.
Tommy took the rabbit, looked at Eddie, and then back into the house, where he could still hear the screaming.
"I have an order that is being sent here of ice cream from that place that Joy loves and hell, Buck loves as well. Pepa was in a car accident, and it was supposed to be an Uncle Eddie and Joy night, but well, I need to go there to help her because none of her children are in town right now. Her normal babysitter is on vacation, and I told Buck I would watch her tonight since he's out with Maddie doing some sibling stuff. I didn't ask because Buck was cagey."
"And I'm your first option, not Howie?"
"Howie's dealing with two kids already who are missing Maddie. He would say nothing, but I hoped you would be okay with this."
Tommy was going to say yes because he had hung out with Joy twice now at Eddie's place when he had dropped by for an afternoon of hanging out to find Eddie getting his nails done by Joy.
"I packed up all of her stuff. Like I said, I have ice cream and pizza on the way. The ice cream cannot be seen by her at all, or she will not eat dinner. You'll be fine. The list of stuff and when to cut off the TV and everything is in this backpack." Eddie handed over the black backpack, and then there was a smaller purple one.
"Does Evan know that you are leaving his child with me?" Tommy asked because that was not a game he wanted to play.
"Yes, he's well aware. I would not do this without his okay. He'll be by around noon tomorrow to get her. A list of approved places to take her for breakfast or foods she likes to help make are in the backpack as well."
Tommy was about to ask how Eddie had time for that when he realized that this was Evan they were talking about. Of course, Eddie got that kind of thing in the bag, even for Eddie when he watched her. Everyone probably got it.
"Where did she go?"
"Toss up between on your bed or in your shower."
Tommy tried to figure out all of that because that made no sense, but at least the bedroom was clean. He didn't remember if he had the lube sitting out still or not but he would take care of that if it was still out.
"Look, text me with anything you need to know because I get it. I'm dropping a lot on you. Buck's not going to be pissed, I promise."
Tommy wasn't sure about that, but he took Eddie at his word right now. He nodded his head, and he turned to look back, where he couldn't hear Joy anymore. "How scary is silence?"
"Right now, not at all. When she's throwing a bit of a fit, she's calmed down when she's silent."
"Why is she upset?"
"Cause Uncle Eddie time is the best, and she's pissed that she's not going to get to spend the night at my place. She'll calm down and settle, I promise. I tossed two DVDs in there that I have on hand for her because I doubt you have anything close to a kid's movie here."
Tommy just stared at him because Eddie knew full well that Tommy had the whole Disney movie collection that he grew up on. Eddie was freaking out and, despite the bluster, was probably worried about leaving Joy with him.
"Go, we will be fine. I'll text if I need anything."
Eddie turned and left, jumping in the truck that Tommy only just realized was still running.
Tommy shut and locked the door, throwing the deadbolt as well as the chain because he wasn't sure that she could reach the deadbolt, but the chain would need a chair for her to reach, and he hoped he could hear that. He laid the two backpacks down on the couch before heading back to his bedroom. He found Joy on the bed with a book open on the bed. The book had been one that Evan had been reading back when he stayed the night. It was full of colorful landscapes and short stories that were written about each of the images.
"hi," Tommy said.
"Hi, Tommy," Joy said without even looking up from where she was looking at the book.
"Hungry?" Tommy looked at the time. It was four in the afternoon. He had no clue when she would eat dinner, but it sounded like Eddie had the ice cream and pizza on the way or at least set for them to arrive.
"No, not yet," Joy said.
Tommy walked further into the room, happy when the lube wasn't out on the nightstand. He sat down at the end of the bed and watched her look at the pictures. She looked pretty happy just sitting and doing that, so Tommy left her to do it.
He spent the next twenty minutes getting things put up that he didn't think a kid should have access to. If she was half as inquisitive as Evan, he knew she was going to get into things. Once that was done, he checked on her again, and she had moved on to a book about fish, looking at the pictures even slower than the other book.
Tommy shook his head before he debated what to do. He took a picture and found Evan's text thread. The last message had been where Evan had said he was going to come down to him on the night of their anniversary. Tommy sent that picture to Evan hoping that seeing her at ease at his place would help calm Evan down. Tommy watched as the little dots appeared and then disappeared before appearing again and then disappearing again. Then, the dots appeared again, and a message came through.
Evan: She loves looking at pictures of anything, really. Even your books about planes and helicopters through the years would be fun for her, just FYI.
That wasn't something that needed to be retyped, so Tommy wondered what Evan had started to type the first two times. He would probably never know. Tommy slipped his phone into his pocket and looked at Joy.
"I'll be in the living room if you get bored."
Joy said nothing; just flipped the page in the book again. He headed back to the living room, opened up the bigger backpack, and found more than enough stuff thrown in there to last her for a few more days. It looked like Eddie had thrown it all in pretty quickly. Tommy found the dirty laundry bag inside of there and he shook his head. The little notebook about the care and feeding of Joy was next. Tommy set everything aside and started to flip through it. There were pages dedicated to Joy from the moment that Evan had gotten her—each one with a time period written at the top.
This was the kind of thing that needed to be brought out much later when Joy was bringing her first serious boyfriend home. He found the pages for now and the list of activities that were on there; some were crossed out, and others were added in with a different colored ink. She would want to eat in an hour based on the time listed, and her bedtime was a little earlier than Tommy expected, but then her wake-up time was about when Evan liked to wake up for the day. It was the kind of thing that made him smile. This whole book was Evan down to a T.
Tommy felt eyes on him, so he looked up and saw that Joy had a picture frame in her hand. He knew which one. The one that had been out here, but he had taken to his bedroom after the breakup. Then it had come back out to his nightstand after a while because every night he told Evan to sleep peacefully.
Laying the book aside, Tommy waited to see what Joy wanted to do. She handed the picture to him before crawling up and tucking into his side, taking the picture back. She looked between the picture and then Tommy a few times before she yawned and tucked the picture close.
Tommy picked up the book and looked at the thing about naps.
Joy liked twenty-minute power naps in the afternoons instead of longer nap times. And they were still in the timezone of being allowed one without it disrupting her sleeping time. Tommy turned the TV on and found one of the stations that played safe music for Joy's ears. Then he got his phone out and let Joy sleep like that if she wanted. He leaned forward only long enough to move the backpack on the coffee table to let him see the TV.
Not long after the nap, the pizza arrived, and the ice cream was just after that, and Tommy got that hidden without her seeing it. He looked at the six ice creams that Eddie had bought him. One of them was Evan's favorite; another was one they liked to share; then there were two that Tommy figured were for Joy, and then two other flavors. Hot Toddy sounded like a really good flavor. It was the kind of good stuff that he would really like.
Tommy looked back at where Joy was sitting in the breakfast nook, on her knees, chomping down on pizza and taking sips of her milk. The cup was one of the few smaller plastic ones he had, and he had gotten a straw for it. He had nothing on hand that would be good for Joy to use without fear of her dropping it, so the straw was needed. He wondered what kind of cups she liked, whether she liked handles or to hold them with both hands. He would have to ask Eddie about that next time.
Next time. He had no idea if there was going to be a next time. Yet he was hoping.
---
Tommy knew something was wrong but wasn't sure what it was. He tried to roll over and found a weight on the bed beside him. He picked up his phone and turned on the flashlight before looking over to see that Joy was in the bed beside him. He swallowed at the way she was curled on the pillow with her own blanket on top of her and the stuffed bear that Tommy remembered winning for Evan in her arms. It had somehow ended up in Tommy's guest room, and he hadn't ever taken it out of there. Joy had fallen in love with it when Tommy had put her to bed, so he had gotten the little bit of dust build up off of it and then let her cuddle it.
Carefully, Tommy rolled over and turned off the flashlight, turning on the light beside him. He checked the time to find it was just past midnight. He hadn't been asleep for long. He debated it, but he would rather make sure with Evan that this was okay.
Tommy: Awake?
Tommy watched the screen, and it took a few seconds for the dots to appear.
Evan: Is Joy okay?
Tommy: Not sure. She crept into my bedroom and is asleep on my bed on top of my blankets.
Evan: Oh, Eddie forgot to warn you about that. It's what she does at new places and has for a while. She doesn't sleep over at many new places, but she had a sleepover with John, Annie, and Jee and ended up in John and Annie's bed. Then, it was Bobby and Athena's place. Hen and Karen's. If she doesn't remember being there, she will end up in bed with an adult. I didn't think about it, as I assumed Eddie would tell you. Sorry.
Tommy: It's fine. Should I move her under the blankets?
Evan: That's up to you. She'll sleep through it, but her blanket should be warm enough if your place is still kept the same as it was before.
Tommy: It is. I'm not sure how she got into the bed without me knowing. I only realized that when I tried to roll over, there was a weight on the bed.
Evan: She's good at that.
Tommy laughed, and he could see Evan's face.
A new message came through, but it wasn't from Evan. Tommy swapped to his thread with Eddie.
Eddie: You might end up with Joy in your bed. She does that when she stays over at places she has never been to or doesn't remember sleeping in before.
Tommy: About ten minutes too late, Diaz.
All Eddie sent back was a laughing emoji. Tommy moved back to Evan's thread, and he told Evan what Eddie had just sent him.
Evan: Eddie's worried about his aunt, but she's doing better. He just got home a few minutes ago, based on the texts he sent me a little while. Try and get some sleep, Tommy—Joy is very much like me first thing in the morning.
Tommy: Goodnight, Evan.
Evan: Goodnight.
Tommy laid his phone over after checking the battery. He got out of bed to be able to move Joy with ease. He got her under the blanket so that moving didn't roll her off the bed. He didn't need to take Joy to the ER to get her checked out the first time he was left alone with her. He smiled at her after he got back into bed and got ready to turn the light off.
This was something he could get used to, and it was scary.
---
Tommy lay down in the grass and looked up into the sky. Joy was having fun in the backyard, and Tommy kind of wanted a nap. She was a ball of energy, and it was worse than Evan. Still, Tommy didn't want to leave her out there with him asleep. There was nothing much she could get into in the backyard, but again, this was Evan's kid.
Joy ran at his side so he turned his head to watch her. She was flying a stick with a ribbon tied to it that Tommy had made for her, hoping that it would run some of her energy out, but so far, there was nothing out of it. He had no idea what he was going to make her for lunch. He would figure out what he had and then go from there. There was a sheet of paper in the notebook about things she currently liked. That one was something that Tommy thought Evan was making into a scrapbook. The whole thing ribbon on a stick thing wasn't in there but Tommy vowed to add.
"PAPA!" Joy yelled.
Tommy turned his head and started to get up, but Joy dropped onto him and stayed there.
"Papa, come cuddle."
Evan laughed and he laid the bag he had on his shoulder down as he shut the gate.
Tommy looked at the time. It was a few hours before Evan should be there.
"Maddie was missing her kids, so we decided to get up early and head out early," Evan said as he came over. He sat down on the grass, and Joy climbed over Tommy and onto his lap, hugging him tightly. "Did you have fun with Tommy?"
"Yes, we watch Ariel and Mulan."
"Oh, you did, huh? That's great."
"He also said we were going to watch Aurora at lunch, but you got here."
"We can stay for lunch so you can see your Aurora." Evan looked at Tommy. There was worry there.
"You know you are more than welcome here, Evan."
Evan's eyes started to water a little, and Tommy remembered that the last time he had seen Evan and really talked to him, he had called him Buck. When they saw each other on calls, he always just went out of his way to not call him anything because he wanted to call him Evan so much but he felt like that wasn't allowed.
"What is that?" Evan asked as he picked up the stick with the ribbon on it.
"Tommy made it for me. It's fun. Watch." Joy took it from Evan, scrambled out of his lap, and took off. The ribbon fluttered as she ran.
"Well, that's something new," Evan said.
"She was running around with the ribbon, but it wasn't high enough, so I got a stick. I know they make toys like that; it'll be easy to make up something else better and not on a stick if she wants to have something for the long term."
"There are few toys that she doesn't love." Evan smiled at Tommy, and it was a fond smile. Something that Tommy thought that anyone could have for him after what he had done.
"Well, as long as she likes what she has," Tommy said.
"Papa, lunch?" Joy asked.
"How about a snack first?" Evan asked as he scooped her into his arms as she ran by him. "We can see what Tommy has in his cupboards to make for a snack."
Tommy remembered the popcorn from the night before. The kernels had been in the backpack, and a little book of recipes was attached. There were a few in that book that were tried and true. Tommy recognized Hen's writing, Howie's, and even Bobby's in the book for new recipes. The little book fell open to kettle corn, though, and that meant it was the tried and true one. Tommy had made it to the exact measurements and found it was some of the better popcorn he had ever had.
"Popcorn," Joy said.
"Really? Popcorn?"
Joy turned her gaze on Tommy, and she started to pout at him.
"Fine, popcorn," Evan said when Tommy looked at him.
Tommy grinned and got up, brushing the grass off his back as much as he could. Evan headed inside and went for the cupboard, which he had declared two years ago was the home for the microwave popcorn popper. It was the same one Evan had bought him, still in the same spot.
Joy tugged on Tommy's pants, and he picked her up. She was the most easy going child, outside of the tantrum at having to leave Eddie the day before. Tommy wasn't sure if this was just something that Evan did or if it was the way she was.
"Papa make," Joy said.
"Yeah, he is. From memory,y too. I guess you like it a lot, huh?"
"Six months of going strong on her liking popcorn as her snack two to three times a day. Between breakfast and lunch is the one that she gets the least. I have debated buying stock in this corn—the hull-less kind. I have bought it by the case at the store I got it from. It's great, but my place smells like popcorn all the time now."
"Nothing wrong with that," Tommy said.
Evan turned and glared at him for a second before he put the popper into the microwave and hit an exact time on it. He turned and looked at Tommy and Joy. It took a few seconds for Tommy to realize that Evan was trying to keep that image in his mind.
"Why don't you go and pick out a movie?" Tommy asked as he set Joy down.
"Okay." Joy took off, running to the living room. She stopped at the doorway and looked both ways before heading to the hall.
"What is that?" Tommy asked.
"She has been run into too much when she just runs through doorways, so now we treat doorways like crossing the street. It's helped her not be run over. Usually by me because I don't hear her steps, and then there is a body on the floor, and she's crying."
Evan was looking at the microwave when Tommy looked at him.
"Evan," Tommy said.
Evan turned to look at him but then glanced back at the microwave and pulled the door open just as it was going off. He took off the lid and shook the popcorn to get it all spread around, then popped a piece into his mouth.
Joy came running back into the room with three DVDs in her hand. SleepingBeauty was in there, as well as Lilo & Stitch, and strangely enough, a Muppet movie. Tommy just couldn't tell which one it was.
"Wow, you get options," Evan said with a smile on his face. He opened a cabinet, pulled out a trio of bowls, and spread the popcorn between them, giving them all pretty much even portions.
"How about we go ahead and watch Aurora?" Tommy asked.
Joy nodded her head, and she took off back to the living room. She stopped again to make sure that no one was coming at her before she took off again.
Tommy laughed, and he shook his head. He looked at Evan and saw that Evan was looking anywhere but at him.
"Are you mad that Eddie dropped her off here?"
"No. Look, she's going to go down for a nap just before lunch; she might not make it through the movie. Let's save that kind of talk for then, please."
"Okay." Tommy stepped up and took two of the bowls, then waited for Evan to put the third on top of the two, perfectly balanced. "Go ahead and get us drinks, please."
Evan nodded.
Tommy wasn't sure where he wanted to sit down, but when he got into the living room, Joy was in the middle of the couch. So Tommy set the popcorn down and handed her the bowl that had a little less before he started to get the DVD going. He didn't have a lot of streaming services, and while he did have Disney+, he was one who liked the whole act of putting in a DVD. Evan had laughed at him the first few times, but then he had settled into it and started to pick the movies they watched based on what Tommy had. It was a nice way to cuddle and still have to get up and do something.
When Tommy settled on the couch, Joy scooted closer to him, and when Evan came in and set the drinks down before he sat down, she huffed at the cup with the straw.
"I'll get better cups for you, I promise."
Evan sat down on the couch, and when he was down and settled, Joy threw her legs over his lap and laid her head on Tommy's thigh. It seemed she was going to go to sleep a lot sooner than Tommy and even Evan thought.
This was so surreal that when the movie started, Tommy didn't look away from it. He laid his arm over the back of the couch and relaxed, but he never looked at Joy or Evan, especially Evan. There was no reason to do so. And there was nothing that he could do right now to fix this. To fix the mistake that he had made two years ago that had fucked them over. That had broken Tommy's heart and hadn't allowed him to move on.
"She's asleep," Evan said.
Tommy stopped the movie, and he looked down at Joy for the first time to see that she was asleep. He smiled at her because she was so trusting but Tommy hoped it was only with people that she knew or knew of.
"How did she know my face?"
"Pictures in the house. I have scrapbooks of a few periods in my life. I went from baking to not calling you to making a whole thing of my life. It helped me grieve. There were pictures of Daniel in there, too, ones that my father saved from my mother's purge of everything to do with him. The book with Joy and her coming into my life has our stuff in them. Eddie said the first time he was a friend that we weren't as close to anymore, but then Chris talked about you, and I think she realized that you weren't as close to me. She asked about you a lot over the last month before that day. She knew who you were from the moment you sat down."
"I didn't even notice you two. I mean I saw her, but I hadn't known about her before that. Eddie never said anything."
"I'm sorry for Eddie just dropping her off. I was about to come home, but that still didn't help him get to Pepa quickly."
"And no one else was actually available?"
"I am not sure about that. Look, there is one thing you need to know. Outside of Eddie, no one agreed with my decision to foster and then adopt Joy. She was distraught with everything, and she was throwing fits, only calming down when I was with her. That's why my foster stuff was fast-tracked. They hoped that with time, she would calm down, but she never did, and then there was no other family. So she was mine to adopt. Her normal sitter dropped in my lap in a spectacular way. But no one agreed to it."
"Not even Bobby?"
"Okay, well, Athena agreed. She couldn't make BObby come around, though. So I don't ask them to watch her that much. Maddie loves her, but she's distant like she's afraid I'm going to regret it and try to give her back."
"They don't know you. You weren't going to give her yo from the moment you fell in love. Eddie said it was while you two were getting checked out for smoke inhalation."
"Yeah, it was like being smacked in the face, and I realized that in some ways I could understand my parents at that moment, but then I thought about if Joy had died that day and treating the kids after like they were second class to the boy who died. I..." Evan sighed, and he dropped his head back on the couch. "She'll wake up if we keep on talking. Let's go to the kitchen."
Tommy waited for Evan to get up first before he got his leg free of Joy's head and then got up off the couch. The kitchen held nothing new, but Tommy felt like it was maybe a good thing to talk in there and not on the couch. It seemed their big moments were all in kitchens.
"I've not gone back to Miceli's," Tommy said when Evan said nothing for a few moments.
"I think that place is cursed, or we were. I waffle back and forth on that one. I am not sure which I want it to be."
"I regretted it as soon as I walked away, but I had hurt you, so I just stayed away."
"I think that I gave up," Evan said. He walked over to the sink and pulled himself up to sit on the counter. Looking like he was afraid of something. "I tried dating but there was no one who was even close to you. Then I realized that there was never going to be anyone who replaced you. So, I just talked about random dates. I haven't been on one since just before I adopted Joy. I talked about going on them because it was something that people wanted to hear. It also stopped Maddie and Hen from trying to set me up on blind dates. I think Eddie figured out that I'm lying about it, but I just..."
Tommy stepped over to him, and he braced his hands on either side of Evan's hips, making Evan look at him. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for the hurt that I caused you. I'm sorry for the pain that I caused us. There is no way to fix what I did."
"I could have fought for you. I could have made you talk to me. I could have done a lot, but I just...I was messed up after that. I wasn't sure how to fight for us. I think that I needed this."
Tommy leaned in, and he made sure that Evan wasn't going to shove him away before he brushed their lips together. Evan grabbed his shirt to keep him close. The kiss stayed simple with a little pressure on the lips, and then Evan pulled back.
"We have to go slow. I cannot take the pace I set before,e and I think you didn't realize how much my pace freaked you out."
"I didn't. How about I take you on a date, Evan? You and Joy. I'll pick a nice place and we can go there for lunch and then pick up a few things for Joy for here. I would love to be in the group of people who are allowed to watch her."
"Hmm, you have the good movies right there where she can pick them easily. Well, besides me. I have the whole Blu-Ray collection, well, at least the ones that she likes."
"Because of me?"
"Yes. I have the room, too. Well, now I do. There was an extra room in my place that I turned into a little den. We watch our movies in there. The living room also has a TV, but I just have the streaming stuff hooked up there. The house is nice, but it's not..." Evan looked around the kitchen and sighed. "It's not here. I love here better."
"Okay, that's good."
"I meant to say that we should move in together instead of move in with me, but that still would have freaked you out, wouldn't it?"
"Yes, it would have. I'm not sure that it would have gone well at all. It might have been a little better, but I would have still left like that. You butted up against something I thought I had worked on long before, but then it was there in my face, and I was freaked out."
Evan let go of Tommy's shirt and he slipped his arms around his neck and held onto him. Tommy stepped closer to wrap his arms around Evan and hold him tightly. It felt good. Holding Evan in his arms.
"How will everyone react to you and me dating again?"
"Just about as well as they did about Joy. I'm not going to tell them for a while. Well, besides Eddie. Eddie will never be lied to. I don't hang out with the others as much. I mean, I watch Jee-Yun and Charlie a good bit, and they love playing with Joy, but I can make sure that it's nights where you aren't coming by for now. I want to be sure of us before I tell them because I don't need them telling me that I am stupid for trying again with you. I never wanted someone like I wanted you, Tommy. I never pined for someone like that. With Abby, it was refusing to admit that it was over. I didn't even think much about what else that could mean. I wanted to be happy. I thought that happiness was only with you, and I had to learn that it didn't mean that."
"I had found my happiness and my joy, and I was happy with my life before you, and then you invaded, and it was like you shaped me differently," Tommy said.
"I had to find that happiness without someone else, beyond Joy. I had to find me and I did. Now, I want you and me to find our happiness."
Tommy turned his head, pressing his lips to Evan's neck, and sighed. He held on tighter when he thought Evan was going to back away, but he didn't. He just held on.
"I won't run again, not without talking about things. I've changed, and I'll show you."
"Good. because if you break my daughter's heart, there is nowhere that Eddie and I won't find you."
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: No Warnings Apply
Fandom: 9-1-1
Relationships: Evan Buckley/Tommy Kinard
Tags: Angst, Happy Ending, Getting Back Together
Summary: Tommy had to find his joy.
Word Count: 9,228
Tommy settled into the table with his cup of coffee. He looked around the seating area and stopped. He took in the little girl who was on her knees in the chair. She was careful as she reached out and picked up the spoon before taking a lick of the top of the ice cream. She was pretty calm for her age and, so far, well-behaved. Tommy had been seeing a lot more kids who were hellions. He liked it when they were calm. If kids were not, he just usually left. He wasn't one to make a scene about it.
The parent with the little girl was not in Tommy's line of sight with the people at the table between them. Tommy kind of wanted to see who the parent was to tell them they were doing a good job with the girl. Tommy looked down at his coffee gain, and he smiled to himself. The last two years of dating hadn't given him anything. He hadn't really been putting his heart into it, and he knew it. There was no one he had found who had matched Evan.
Evan, who Tommy had ended things with in the best way possible to make sure that Evan still didn't want him. Tommy had gone for the kill shot, and it was why, after a month, when Tommy had known that he had made the worst mistake of his life, he hadn't gone back. He wanted to. Still, to this day, he wants to go back. Evan had never reached out, and he had never reached out, either.
Tommy asked how he was doing to Eddie on occasion but Evan was the thing that was never really brought up. Eddie hadn't dropped him even though Tommy had broken Evan's heart. Tommy figured that Evan himself told Eddie not to drop him, so Tommy just didn't ask about him. He never asked if Evan asked about him. After a year, Eddie told him that he didn't talk about either of them to each other. That it wasn't fair to either of them to haunt the friendships he had, so he just made sure that he said nothing. Overall, general things were fine. He didn't mean that, but he wasn't going to bring in the other things.
"How are you doing with that coffee?" the waitress asked as she came over.
"Oh, um, fine. I'll take the pancake special, no syrup, and instead the strawberry preserves."
"You got it." The waitress picked up the menu and stopped.
Tommy looked at her to see that the table next to him was getting up. He looked over to see that he could see the table and almost wished he hadn't been sitting with the girl, Evan.
That made Tommy's stomach drop out. He had no idea what he was going to do now, and there was no way to hide. Hopefully, Evan wasn't going to look over at him.
The little girl was invested in her ice cream. A moment after swallowing it, she made a noise.
"Hurts?" Evan asked.
The girl nodded her head. Evan got into a bag at his feet and pulled out a pill bottle. He saw two different pills from it. One looked like an antibiotic. That explained the ice cream—any food that one could get in a kid. He had seen them there for a while before he had settled down, so the ice cream was probably more like dessert.
"Here you go, the rest of her breakfast to go," the waitress said as she laid down a box.
"Thanks."
Tommy turned back to his coffee and tried not to look again. He didn't need Evan catching him looking at them. The age of the girl meant that Evan had moved on to someone who had already had the kid, which Tommy knew Evan would be good at—being a parent. It wasn't a shock that someone had snatched him up and made an honest man out of him.
"I'm done," the girl said a few moments later.
Tommy glanced at the ice cream, which was gone outside of the soup at the bottom. She then picked up the bowl and slurped it up.
"You are. I'm nearly done. So you want your coloring tablet?"
The girl nodded her head. Evan dug around in the bag at his feet and came up with the tablet. The girl took it and turned it on, pulling the stylus from a spot on the side of it, and then started to mess around on it. Evan started to look around, so Tommy looked to the side, hoping that Evan had forgotten about him and wouldn't recognize him.
A few minutes later, his breakfast was out, and Tommy turned himself in the chair, his back mostly to Evan and his daughter. He started to eat even though it tasted like cardboard in his mouth. The girl never would have been his because she came with whoever Evan was with now, but the idea of him and Evan having a kid made Tommy regret what he had done even more.
His goal was to eat as fast as he could and finish his coffee before he got up and left, leaving a big tip for just leaving without saying goodbye. He was good at eating fast; the job demanded it.
When everything was nearly done, Tommy felt a tug on his shirt sleeve and turned to look. It was the little girl. Tommy looked up to see that Evan was on his phone talking to someone softly enough that Tommy couldn't hear it.
"Tommy, is it pretty?"
The name from the girl's lips had Tommy freezing. How in the hell did she know his name? Tommy looked at Evan again and found him glancing at the table where his daughter had been, then he was gasping before starting to look around, looking the wrong way first but then coming around and seeing her there with him. He ended the call and hung up the phone.
The look of relief but no shock told Tommy that Evan had known he was there. He wasn't sure what he felt about that. Evan had known but hadn't said anything. Tommy knew and hadn't said anything as well, so he got it. He just didn't like it.
"Tommy, pretty?" the girl asked again.
Tommy looked at the tablet to see the color-by-numbers drawing on the tablet. It was mostly filled with correct colors, but there were a few things that he knew were impossible that the girl had done, despite what it was supposed to look like.
"Very pretty," Tommy finally choked out.
"Thanks." The girl turned and headed back to the table.
Tommy looked at Evan again but Evan just nodded at him. That hurt more than anything in the world. Tommy smiled at him, even though Evan couldn't see because the girl was looking.
"You ready to go, Joy?" Evan asked.
"Yes." Joy put the stylus back where it belonged and then handed the tablet over before she picked up her drink and finished it off.
"Drinks to go," the waitress said as she came over and dropped off a small carrier with two drinks in it. Have fun, Buck, Joy."
"Bye," Joy said. She hugged the waitress before she came over to give Tommy a hug.
The look of shock on the waitress's face was enough that Tommy spurred into action and gave her a little hug.
It left Tommy with so many questions that he had no answers to. He would have to ask someone, and there were three options that didn't involve going to Evan. Eddie, Hen, and Howie. Eddie was out because he wasn't sure what Eddie would even tell him. Howie meant Maddie and that was out because he wasn't going near her to ask about this, which left Hen. She might turn him out. They had still texted a few times, and nothing had fizzled out between them. He and Howie were closer, and it was something that Tommy had clung to even if he had only been meeting up for basketball with Howie and Eddie more than anything else.
"How do you know them?" the waitress asked when Evan and Joy were gone.
"I used to date her father before she entered the picture. I didn't realize that he would know me at all. That was a shock."
"Yeah, Buck looked shocked about it all. You hurt him?"
"I hurt us both with a stupid decision that I burned the bridge on."
"That sucks. He was sad for a long time, and then he started to come around with Joy. He adopted her, and that was the best moment of his life, I think."
Adoption. The things were serious, and it seemed that Evan was married to Joy's other parent. Tommy wasn't going to assume it was a woman because it could have just as easily been a single mother.
"I'll take the check," Tommy said.
The waitress laid it down, and she slipped away from the table. Tommy left more than enough for a good tip, and then he was gone as well.
---
Tommy hesitated as he opened the door of his truck. He nearly shut it again, but the door opened up, and Denny came out. He stopped on the porch and then went back to the door and yelled inside. Tommy couldn't hear what he yelled, but it brought Karen to the door as Denny took off down the street. Tommy slipped out of the truck and then he closed the door, steeling himself for the conversation that was about to happen. He had taken the chance that Hen wasn't covering another shift or something, and she would be home.
"Eddie wondered who you would come to," Karen said as Tommy stepped up onto the porch.
"Evan told Eddie that I saw him with Joy?" Tommy asked.
"Yes, so we had a small little private bet on who you would pick. Eddie didn't think you would come to him because of the natural divide in the relationship that he had set up. I thought you would go to Chim."
"Chim's attached to Maddie, and I could ask him to meet me someplace alone, but I felt like this needed something a little more private. This is not something that really should be talked about in public, I think."
"It's not as complex as you think it is." Karen waved for him to go inside. Hen was sitting on the couch with a cup of something in her hand. There were two other cups on a tray on the coffee table.
Tommy picked up one, added a little bit of sugar to the tea, and then sat down. He looked at Hen and could see the upset there—not exactly upset at him.
"We didn't know that something was going on until a year and a half ago. By then, he had Joy for a few months."
"Had her? No..." Tommy closed his mouth not to finish that thought.
"No, Joy's an orphan. Buck had moved not long after you broke up with him. There was a little bit of an issue, and then there was this whole thing going on. Anyway, we were called to a fire. We had two confirmed adults on the site, and no one knew anything about the eight-month-old little girl who had been walking and got hidden in a closet. Buck is the one who found her and shared oxygen with her until they were both rescued since the path that he had used to get there had collapsed behind him. They both went for smoke treatment, and he fell in love."
Orphan. Evan was raising her alone.
"He's thrown himself into being a father. He's gone on a few dates, but most of them seem to end when he brings up being a single father," Karen said.
"And he's happy?"
"Yes," Hen said.
Tommy nodded. He wondered how Eddie had never slipped on talking about Joy. Or Chris. There was a lot there that made sense when it came to not talking about each other, but did Eddie keep that up on that side?
"She knew me."
"What?" Karen asked.
"I guess she's been sick? Evan gave her pills and then let her color on a tablet. She approached me, asked if it was pretty, and said my name."
"There is a picture of us from the medal ceremony on his mantle of the new house he's in. Well, it's not new, but he moved out of the loft. He's got a few rooms covered in pictures. I'm sure that your picture is in more than that one. She's inquisitive." Hen shrugged like that explained that.
"She is inquisitive," Karen said. She picked up her tea and took a sip of it before he curled her feet up onto the couch. "She couldn't be a chip off the block more if he actually gave over his DNA for her. He indulges all of her questions, and the babysitter he has for her is just as inquisitive. She's thirty and doesn't want kids of her own but loves watching them. She lives in the house next door to his, and after the childcare place that Buck had been using was closed again on a day when he had a shift, and he didn't want to call out, she started to watch Joy. It's been really good. She watches two other children a few days a week as well so Joy gets some fun with other kids. When it's just Joy, she watches her at Buck's place, but when the other kids are around, she watches them at her place and then brings Joy over to Buck's to sleep at night."
Tommy wasn't sure what to think of that. There was a swell of jealousy because if he hadn't ended things with Evan, he would have been part of that. Evan would have been with him when he fell in love with Joy. That place would be theirs, or they would be living at Tommy's house. There was so much he was missing because he had been scared of Evan leaving him behind. Fear had done a lot to hurt him.
And Tommy had let that fear shape his life.
---
Tommy looked at the church, and he debated what he was going to do. The church had never been a safe place for him, but even as a child, he had found the act of confession something that was good. He would do it alone in his bedroom when he said his prayers at night. His parents had never listened to him, so it was the time when he could be free to confess everything.
The Pride flag in the corner of one of the windows in the church told him that he was safe there, but he still felt like maybe he needed to do something else. He wanted to go to Eddie and confess a lot of things. He wanted to have someone who could understand him, but Eddie's relationship with God was just as fractured as Tommy's. The whole of the Kinard Family had been devout Catholics, and while Tommy considered himself lapsed, he still had that need for confession.
The door to the church opened, and a couple came out, a smile on their face. The priest who had clocked him the last time that he had walked someone out looked at him with a smile on his face before he left the door open. Tommy opened the truck door and slipped out, shutting it and locking it but not setting the alarm. He didn't need that going off because someone got too close to the car. He inhaled and exhaled a few times as he walked, making himself calm down as he stepped over the threshold.
The priest was standing at the back row, leaning there and looking like peace as he stared at Tommy.
"Welcome," the man said.
"Thank you, Father..."
"Brian. You can just call me Brian if that is your choice.'
"Father Brian is fine. We can head to the booth, or you can sit wherever you like."
"The booth is a little small for me."
Father Brian waved to the pews behind him. Tommy looked around before he headed to the front. Up where no one could hear him unless they got really close. Tommy sat down and silenced his phone, looking for a message from Evan. There had been nothing even though Tommy would have thought that Evan would have said something by now.
"It's been years since my confession inside of a church."
"You confess otherwise?"
"I do. I used to do it as a child at my bedside when I was made to say my nightly prayers. Then I just started to do it whenever I was home if it was after a shift or when I went to bed before a shift.'
"And when you say shift you mean?"
"I'm a firefighter."
"You know, I have a high number of firefighters who come here when I don't see them at the stations closest to here."
Tommy laughed. He looked at his hands. "It's the flag in the window for me."
"Ah. That's why you don't go to church anymore."
"No, I consider myself lapsed, but I like the aspect of confession. I get things off my chest. I am freed by the act of it. Sometimes, just speaking about the issues helps me to figure out what to do, but this one. I'm not sure what I need to do because I tried it, and it didn't help."
"Sounds like this is less a normal confession and more that you need help figuring out what to do. I'm pleased you came here to get help with it. Do you want to tell me?"
"How much time do you have, Father?"
"As long as you need. I have no scheduled meetings the rest of the day, and we can head anywhere that you want; I get my other help to come and sit confession if need be. We have a lovely garden in the back."
Tommy looked up at Jesus, and he inhaled before nodding.
"You can head through that door and I'll get Father Avery to head out here to make sure that anyone else who needs help will have someone."
Tommy didn't get it, but Father Brian did. Tommy stared at the cross, and he breathed.
By the time Tommy had finally made it outside, the sun was setting, and Father Brian looked like he had all the time in the world to deal with Tommy's issues. They took a turn around the outer edge of the garden while Tommy figured out where to start, and then when they turned inside the garden, Tommy started to speak. He spoke about his years in the LAFD, hiding who he was and how he had hidden it for a long time. The woman that he had been engaged to for two years before he had finally broken it off with her. Leaving the 118 and the people who he missed when he left. He talked about meeting Evan and Eddie and how he had clicked with both of them in different ways.
He spoke of his six months with Evan and how afraid he had been of losing everything. How he had ended it with him but hadn't been able to let go of him. How seeing Evan with Joy had filled him with so much jealousy that he had left and had taken a run around his neighborhood for so long that he had passed out as soon as he got home. How he hadn't been able to get the idea of slipping back into Evan's life to have that life for himself.
"You are scared. You have gotten nothing you wanted in life outside of becoming an LAFD pilot, and even that was kept from you for a long time. You are afraid of losing everything."
Tommy knew that because it was what had been said to him by his last therapist after he had been ordered to go after a loss on a call. It hadn't affected his ability to fly, but he had been pulled in to make sure that something small didn't become something big.
"Do you think that he would take you back?" Father Brian asked.
"I don't know."
"Do you want him because he's got a kid, and you can't see yourself getting a kid in any other way?"
Tommy stopped at that. He knew that he could probably qualify for being a foster parent. He knew that things were better with being placed with a married couple but there were single parents out there who made sure to prove that they had someone who was able to help or to be able to afford childcare while they worked. Evan had been given a child.
"No, I want a family. I started to see myself with a family with Evan. Adopting a kid or three, maybe having one by surrogate since he had proven that he didn't mind being a donor to a friend of his. I want him because I never stopped. I never stopped loving him, and I've been lying to myself for two years about not loving him. I broke my heart, and it's never healed up. I've never been able to move on from him."
"Then you know what you need to do because you can't move on until he breaks it the rest of the way or fixes it."
Tommy swallowed.
"And maybe start with Eddie."
"Why?"
"Because he's going to be your biggest hurdle." Father Brian laughed. Then he laid his hand on Tommy's shoulder and pointed to the side of the garden.
Tommy looked that way to see Eddie leaning against his truck, Eddie's truck parked on the other side of it.
"I guess it kind of shoots a little bit of anonymity when you know at least two parties, right?"
"I would never tell either of you anything that you tell me, but yes, I know enough from that to figure out that you and Eddie were talking about some of the same things. It's just horrible timing that he's here right now."
Tommy nodded and looked at where Eddie was still waiting for him.
"Come back any time that you want. Or you can see sanctuary inside, and I'll tell him to leave."
"No, I can handle Eddie."
Tommy could handle him. There was every single chance that Evan would never take him back, especially after so long. Yet the fact that Joy knew who he was from what had to be pictures said something about what Evan's thoughts were on him.
---
Tommy opened the door to his house to find a stuffed rabbit being shoved into his face and then the screech of a kid at his feet before there was the sound of tears. The thudding of feet was next. The screaming kept going down the hall.
"So, I need you," Eddie said.
Tommy took the rabbit, looked at Eddie, and then back into the house, where he could still hear the screaming.
"I have an order that is being sent here of ice cream from that place that Joy loves and hell, Buck loves as well. Pepa was in a car accident, and it was supposed to be an Uncle Eddie and Joy night, but well, I need to go there to help her because none of her children are in town right now. Her normal babysitter is on vacation, and I told Buck I would watch her tonight since he's out with Maddie doing some sibling stuff. I didn't ask because Buck was cagey."
"And I'm your first option, not Howie?"
"Howie's dealing with two kids already who are missing Maddie. He would say nothing, but I hoped you would be okay with this."
Tommy was going to say yes because he had hung out with Joy twice now at Eddie's place when he had dropped by for an afternoon of hanging out to find Eddie getting his nails done by Joy.
"I packed up all of her stuff. Like I said, I have ice cream and pizza on the way. The ice cream cannot be seen by her at all, or she will not eat dinner. You'll be fine. The list of stuff and when to cut off the TV and everything is in this backpack." Eddie handed over the black backpack, and then there was a smaller purple one.
"Does Evan know that you are leaving his child with me?" Tommy asked because that was not a game he wanted to play.
"Yes, he's well aware. I would not do this without his okay. He'll be by around noon tomorrow to get her. A list of approved places to take her for breakfast or foods she likes to help make are in the backpack as well."
Tommy was about to ask how Eddie had time for that when he realized that this was Evan they were talking about. Of course, Eddie got that kind of thing in the bag, even for Eddie when he watched her. Everyone probably got it.
"Where did she go?"
"Toss up between on your bed or in your shower."
Tommy tried to figure out all of that because that made no sense, but at least the bedroom was clean. He didn't remember if he had the lube sitting out still or not but he would take care of that if it was still out.
"Look, text me with anything you need to know because I get it. I'm dropping a lot on you. Buck's not going to be pissed, I promise."
Tommy wasn't sure about that, but he took Eddie at his word right now. He nodded his head, and he turned to look back, where he couldn't hear Joy anymore. "How scary is silence?"
"Right now, not at all. When she's throwing a bit of a fit, she's calmed down when she's silent."
"Why is she upset?"
"Cause Uncle Eddie time is the best, and she's pissed that she's not going to get to spend the night at my place. She'll calm down and settle, I promise. I tossed two DVDs in there that I have on hand for her because I doubt you have anything close to a kid's movie here."
Tommy just stared at him because Eddie knew full well that Tommy had the whole Disney movie collection that he grew up on. Eddie was freaking out and, despite the bluster, was probably worried about leaving Joy with him.
"Go, we will be fine. I'll text if I need anything."
Eddie turned and left, jumping in the truck that Tommy only just realized was still running.
Tommy shut and locked the door, throwing the deadbolt as well as the chain because he wasn't sure that she could reach the deadbolt, but the chain would need a chair for her to reach, and he hoped he could hear that. He laid the two backpacks down on the couch before heading back to his bedroom. He found Joy on the bed with a book open on the bed. The book had been one that Evan had been reading back when he stayed the night. It was full of colorful landscapes and short stories that were written about each of the images.
"hi," Tommy said.
"Hi, Tommy," Joy said without even looking up from where she was looking at the book.
"Hungry?" Tommy looked at the time. It was four in the afternoon. He had no clue when she would eat dinner, but it sounded like Eddie had the ice cream and pizza on the way or at least set for them to arrive.
"No, not yet," Joy said.
Tommy walked further into the room, happy when the lube wasn't out on the nightstand. He sat down at the end of the bed and watched her look at the pictures. She looked pretty happy just sitting and doing that, so Tommy left her to do it.
He spent the next twenty minutes getting things put up that he didn't think a kid should have access to. If she was half as inquisitive as Evan, he knew she was going to get into things. Once that was done, he checked on her again, and she had moved on to a book about fish, looking at the pictures even slower than the other book.
Tommy shook his head before he debated what to do. He took a picture and found Evan's text thread. The last message had been where Evan had said he was going to come down to him on the night of their anniversary. Tommy sent that picture to Evan hoping that seeing her at ease at his place would help calm Evan down. Tommy watched as the little dots appeared and then disappeared before appearing again and then disappearing again. Then, the dots appeared again, and a message came through.
Evan: She loves looking at pictures of anything, really. Even your books about planes and helicopters through the years would be fun for her, just FYI.
That wasn't something that needed to be retyped, so Tommy wondered what Evan had started to type the first two times. He would probably never know. Tommy slipped his phone into his pocket and looked at Joy.
"I'll be in the living room if you get bored."
Joy said nothing; just flipped the page in the book again. He headed back to the living room, opened up the bigger backpack, and found more than enough stuff thrown in there to last her for a few more days. It looked like Eddie had thrown it all in pretty quickly. Tommy found the dirty laundry bag inside of there and he shook his head. The little notebook about the care and feeding of Joy was next. Tommy set everything aside and started to flip through it. There were pages dedicated to Joy from the moment that Evan had gotten her—each one with a time period written at the top.
This was the kind of thing that needed to be brought out much later when Joy was bringing her first serious boyfriend home. He found the pages for now and the list of activities that were on there; some were crossed out, and others were added in with a different colored ink. She would want to eat in an hour based on the time listed, and her bedtime was a little earlier than Tommy expected, but then her wake-up time was about when Evan liked to wake up for the day. It was the kind of thing that made him smile. This whole book was Evan down to a T.
Tommy felt eyes on him, so he looked up and saw that Joy had a picture frame in her hand. He knew which one. The one that had been out here, but he had taken to his bedroom after the breakup. Then it had come back out to his nightstand after a while because every night he told Evan to sleep peacefully.
Laying the book aside, Tommy waited to see what Joy wanted to do. She handed the picture to him before crawling up and tucking into his side, taking the picture back. She looked between the picture and then Tommy a few times before she yawned and tucked the picture close.
Tommy picked up the book and looked at the thing about naps.
Joy liked twenty-minute power naps in the afternoons instead of longer nap times. And they were still in the timezone of being allowed one without it disrupting her sleeping time. Tommy turned the TV on and found one of the stations that played safe music for Joy's ears. Then he got his phone out and let Joy sleep like that if she wanted. He leaned forward only long enough to move the backpack on the coffee table to let him see the TV.
Not long after the nap, the pizza arrived, and the ice cream was just after that, and Tommy got that hidden without her seeing it. He looked at the six ice creams that Eddie had bought him. One of them was Evan's favorite; another was one they liked to share; then there were two that Tommy figured were for Joy, and then two other flavors. Hot Toddy sounded like a really good flavor. It was the kind of good stuff that he would really like.
Tommy looked back at where Joy was sitting in the breakfast nook, on her knees, chomping down on pizza and taking sips of her milk. The cup was one of the few smaller plastic ones he had, and he had gotten a straw for it. He had nothing on hand that would be good for Joy to use without fear of her dropping it, so the straw was needed. He wondered what kind of cups she liked, whether she liked handles or to hold them with both hands. He would have to ask Eddie about that next time.
Next time. He had no idea if there was going to be a next time. Yet he was hoping.
---
Tommy knew something was wrong but wasn't sure what it was. He tried to roll over and found a weight on the bed beside him. He picked up his phone and turned on the flashlight before looking over to see that Joy was in the bed beside him. He swallowed at the way she was curled on the pillow with her own blanket on top of her and the stuffed bear that Tommy remembered winning for Evan in her arms. It had somehow ended up in Tommy's guest room, and he hadn't ever taken it out of there. Joy had fallen in love with it when Tommy had put her to bed, so he had gotten the little bit of dust build up off of it and then let her cuddle it.
Carefully, Tommy rolled over and turned off the flashlight, turning on the light beside him. He checked the time to find it was just past midnight. He hadn't been asleep for long. He debated it, but he would rather make sure with Evan that this was okay.
Tommy: Awake?
Tommy watched the screen, and it took a few seconds for the dots to appear.
Evan: Is Joy okay?
Tommy: Not sure. She crept into my bedroom and is asleep on my bed on top of my blankets.
Evan: Oh, Eddie forgot to warn you about that. It's what she does at new places and has for a while. She doesn't sleep over at many new places, but she had a sleepover with John, Annie, and Jee and ended up in John and Annie's bed. Then, it was Bobby and Athena's place. Hen and Karen's. If she doesn't remember being there, she will end up in bed with an adult. I didn't think about it, as I assumed Eddie would tell you. Sorry.
Tommy: It's fine. Should I move her under the blankets?
Evan: That's up to you. She'll sleep through it, but her blanket should be warm enough if your place is still kept the same as it was before.
Tommy: It is. I'm not sure how she got into the bed without me knowing. I only realized that when I tried to roll over, there was a weight on the bed.
Evan: She's good at that.
Tommy laughed, and he could see Evan's face.
A new message came through, but it wasn't from Evan. Tommy swapped to his thread with Eddie.
Eddie: You might end up with Joy in your bed. She does that when she stays over at places she has never been to or doesn't remember sleeping in before.
Tommy: About ten minutes too late, Diaz.
All Eddie sent back was a laughing emoji. Tommy moved back to Evan's thread, and he told Evan what Eddie had just sent him.
Evan: Eddie's worried about his aunt, but she's doing better. He just got home a few minutes ago, based on the texts he sent me a little while. Try and get some sleep, Tommy—Joy is very much like me first thing in the morning.
Tommy: Goodnight, Evan.
Evan: Goodnight.
Tommy laid his phone over after checking the battery. He got out of bed to be able to move Joy with ease. He got her under the blanket so that moving didn't roll her off the bed. He didn't need to take Joy to the ER to get her checked out the first time he was left alone with her. He smiled at her after he got back into bed and got ready to turn the light off.
This was something he could get used to, and it was scary.
---
Tommy lay down in the grass and looked up into the sky. Joy was having fun in the backyard, and Tommy kind of wanted a nap. She was a ball of energy, and it was worse than Evan. Still, Tommy didn't want to leave her out there with him asleep. There was nothing much she could get into in the backyard, but again, this was Evan's kid.
Joy ran at his side so he turned his head to watch her. She was flying a stick with a ribbon tied to it that Tommy had made for her, hoping that it would run some of her energy out, but so far, there was nothing out of it. He had no idea what he was going to make her for lunch. He would figure out what he had and then go from there. There was a sheet of paper in the notebook about things she currently liked. That one was something that Tommy thought Evan was making into a scrapbook. The whole thing ribbon on a stick thing wasn't in there but Tommy vowed to add.
"PAPA!" Joy yelled.
Tommy turned his head and started to get up, but Joy dropped onto him and stayed there.
"Papa, come cuddle."
Evan laughed and he laid the bag he had on his shoulder down as he shut the gate.
Tommy looked at the time. It was a few hours before Evan should be there.
"Maddie was missing her kids, so we decided to get up early and head out early," Evan said as he came over. He sat down on the grass, and Joy climbed over Tommy and onto his lap, hugging him tightly. "Did you have fun with Tommy?"
"Yes, we watch Ariel and Mulan."
"Oh, you did, huh? That's great."
"He also said we were going to watch Aurora at lunch, but you got here."
"We can stay for lunch so you can see your Aurora." Evan looked at Tommy. There was worry there.
"You know you are more than welcome here, Evan."
Evan's eyes started to water a little, and Tommy remembered that the last time he had seen Evan and really talked to him, he had called him Buck. When they saw each other on calls, he always just went out of his way to not call him anything because he wanted to call him Evan so much but he felt like that wasn't allowed.
"What is that?" Evan asked as he picked up the stick with the ribbon on it.
"Tommy made it for me. It's fun. Watch." Joy took it from Evan, scrambled out of his lap, and took off. The ribbon fluttered as she ran.
"Well, that's something new," Evan said.
"She was running around with the ribbon, but it wasn't high enough, so I got a stick. I know they make toys like that; it'll be easy to make up something else better and not on a stick if she wants to have something for the long term."
"There are few toys that she doesn't love." Evan smiled at Tommy, and it was a fond smile. Something that Tommy thought that anyone could have for him after what he had done.
"Well, as long as she likes what she has," Tommy said.
"Papa, lunch?" Joy asked.
"How about a snack first?" Evan asked as he scooped her into his arms as she ran by him. "We can see what Tommy has in his cupboards to make for a snack."
Tommy remembered the popcorn from the night before. The kernels had been in the backpack, and a little book of recipes was attached. There were a few in that book that were tried and true. Tommy recognized Hen's writing, Howie's, and even Bobby's in the book for new recipes. The little book fell open to kettle corn, though, and that meant it was the tried and true one. Tommy had made it to the exact measurements and found it was some of the better popcorn he had ever had.
"Popcorn," Joy said.
"Really? Popcorn?"
Joy turned her gaze on Tommy, and she started to pout at him.
"Fine, popcorn," Evan said when Tommy looked at him.
Tommy grinned and got up, brushing the grass off his back as much as he could. Evan headed inside and went for the cupboard, which he had declared two years ago was the home for the microwave popcorn popper. It was the same one Evan had bought him, still in the same spot.
Joy tugged on Tommy's pants, and he picked her up. She was the most easy going child, outside of the tantrum at having to leave Eddie the day before. Tommy wasn't sure if this was just something that Evan did or if it was the way she was.
"Papa make," Joy said.
"Yeah, he is. From memory,y too. I guess you like it a lot, huh?"
"Six months of going strong on her liking popcorn as her snack two to three times a day. Between breakfast and lunch is the one that she gets the least. I have debated buying stock in this corn—the hull-less kind. I have bought it by the case at the store I got it from. It's great, but my place smells like popcorn all the time now."
"Nothing wrong with that," Tommy said.
Evan turned and glared at him for a second before he put the popper into the microwave and hit an exact time on it. He turned and looked at Tommy and Joy. It took a few seconds for Tommy to realize that Evan was trying to keep that image in his mind.
"Why don't you go and pick out a movie?" Tommy asked as he set Joy down.
"Okay." Joy took off, running to the living room. She stopped at the doorway and looked both ways before heading to the hall.
"What is that?" Tommy asked.
"She has been run into too much when she just runs through doorways, so now we treat doorways like crossing the street. It's helped her not be run over. Usually by me because I don't hear her steps, and then there is a body on the floor, and she's crying."
Evan was looking at the microwave when Tommy looked at him.
"Evan," Tommy said.
Evan turned to look at him but then glanced back at the microwave and pulled the door open just as it was going off. He took off the lid and shook the popcorn to get it all spread around, then popped a piece into his mouth.
Joy came running back into the room with three DVDs in her hand. SleepingBeauty was in there, as well as Lilo & Stitch, and strangely enough, a Muppet movie. Tommy just couldn't tell which one it was.
"Wow, you get options," Evan said with a smile on his face. He opened a cabinet, pulled out a trio of bowls, and spread the popcorn between them, giving them all pretty much even portions.
"How about we go ahead and watch Aurora?" Tommy asked.
Joy nodded her head, and she took off back to the living room. She stopped again to make sure that no one was coming at her before she took off again.
Tommy laughed, and he shook his head. He looked at Evan and saw that Evan was looking anywhere but at him.
"Are you mad that Eddie dropped her off here?"
"No. Look, she's going to go down for a nap just before lunch; she might not make it through the movie. Let's save that kind of talk for then, please."
"Okay." Tommy stepped up and took two of the bowls, then waited for Evan to put the third on top of the two, perfectly balanced. "Go ahead and get us drinks, please."
Evan nodded.
Tommy wasn't sure where he wanted to sit down, but when he got into the living room, Joy was in the middle of the couch. So Tommy set the popcorn down and handed her the bowl that had a little less before he started to get the DVD going. He didn't have a lot of streaming services, and while he did have Disney+, he was one who liked the whole act of putting in a DVD. Evan had laughed at him the first few times, but then he had settled into it and started to pick the movies they watched based on what Tommy had. It was a nice way to cuddle and still have to get up and do something.
When Tommy settled on the couch, Joy scooted closer to him, and when Evan came in and set the drinks down before he sat down, she huffed at the cup with the straw.
"I'll get better cups for you, I promise."
Evan sat down on the couch, and when he was down and settled, Joy threw her legs over his lap and laid her head on Tommy's thigh. It seemed she was going to go to sleep a lot sooner than Tommy and even Evan thought.
This was so surreal that when the movie started, Tommy didn't look away from it. He laid his arm over the back of the couch and relaxed, but he never looked at Joy or Evan, especially Evan. There was no reason to do so. And there was nothing that he could do right now to fix this. To fix the mistake that he had made two years ago that had fucked them over. That had broken Tommy's heart and hadn't allowed him to move on.
"She's asleep," Evan said.
Tommy stopped the movie, and he looked down at Joy for the first time to see that she was asleep. He smiled at her because she was so trusting but Tommy hoped it was only with people that she knew or knew of.
"How did she know my face?"
"Pictures in the house. I have scrapbooks of a few periods in my life. I went from baking to not calling you to making a whole thing of my life. It helped me grieve. There were pictures of Daniel in there, too, ones that my father saved from my mother's purge of everything to do with him. The book with Joy and her coming into my life has our stuff in them. Eddie said the first time he was a friend that we weren't as close to anymore, but then Chris talked about you, and I think she realized that you weren't as close to me. She asked about you a lot over the last month before that day. She knew who you were from the moment you sat down."
"I didn't even notice you two. I mean I saw her, but I hadn't known about her before that. Eddie never said anything."
"I'm sorry for Eddie just dropping her off. I was about to come home, but that still didn't help him get to Pepa quickly."
"And no one else was actually available?"
"I am not sure about that. Look, there is one thing you need to know. Outside of Eddie, no one agreed with my decision to foster and then adopt Joy. She was distraught with everything, and she was throwing fits, only calming down when I was with her. That's why my foster stuff was fast-tracked. They hoped that with time, she would calm down, but she never did, and then there was no other family. So she was mine to adopt. Her normal sitter dropped in my lap in a spectacular way. But no one agreed to it."
"Not even Bobby?"
"Okay, well, Athena agreed. She couldn't make BObby come around, though. So I don't ask them to watch her that much. Maddie loves her, but she's distant like she's afraid I'm going to regret it and try to give her back."
"They don't know you. You weren't going to give her yo from the moment you fell in love. Eddie said it was while you two were getting checked out for smoke inhalation."
"Yeah, it was like being smacked in the face, and I realized that in some ways I could understand my parents at that moment, but then I thought about if Joy had died that day and treating the kids after like they were second class to the boy who died. I..." Evan sighed, and he dropped his head back on the couch. "She'll wake up if we keep on talking. Let's go to the kitchen."
Tommy waited for Evan to get up first before he got his leg free of Joy's head and then got up off the couch. The kitchen held nothing new, but Tommy felt like it was maybe a good thing to talk in there and not on the couch. It seemed their big moments were all in kitchens.
"I've not gone back to Miceli's," Tommy said when Evan said nothing for a few moments.
"I think that place is cursed, or we were. I waffle back and forth on that one. I am not sure which I want it to be."
"I regretted it as soon as I walked away, but I had hurt you, so I just stayed away."
"I think that I gave up," Evan said. He walked over to the sink and pulled himself up to sit on the counter. Looking like he was afraid of something. "I tried dating but there was no one who was even close to you. Then I realized that there was never going to be anyone who replaced you. So, I just talked about random dates. I haven't been on one since just before I adopted Joy. I talked about going on them because it was something that people wanted to hear. It also stopped Maddie and Hen from trying to set me up on blind dates. I think Eddie figured out that I'm lying about it, but I just..."
Tommy stepped over to him, and he braced his hands on either side of Evan's hips, making Evan look at him. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry for the hurt that I caused you. I'm sorry for the pain that I caused us. There is no way to fix what I did."
"I could have fought for you. I could have made you talk to me. I could have done a lot, but I just...I was messed up after that. I wasn't sure how to fight for us. I think that I needed this."
Tommy leaned in, and he made sure that Evan wasn't going to shove him away before he brushed their lips together. Evan grabbed his shirt to keep him close. The kiss stayed simple with a little pressure on the lips, and then Evan pulled back.
"We have to go slow. I cannot take the pace I set before,e and I think you didn't realize how much my pace freaked you out."
"I didn't. How about I take you on a date, Evan? You and Joy. I'll pick a nice place and we can go there for lunch and then pick up a few things for Joy for here. I would love to be in the group of people who are allowed to watch her."
"Hmm, you have the good movies right there where she can pick them easily. Well, besides me. I have the whole Blu-Ray collection, well, at least the ones that she likes."
"Because of me?"
"Yes. I have the room, too. Well, now I do. There was an extra room in my place that I turned into a little den. We watch our movies in there. The living room also has a TV, but I just have the streaming stuff hooked up there. The house is nice, but it's not..." Evan looked around the kitchen and sighed. "It's not here. I love here better."
"Okay, that's good."
"I meant to say that we should move in together instead of move in with me, but that still would have freaked you out, wouldn't it?"
"Yes, it would have. I'm not sure that it would have gone well at all. It might have been a little better, but I would have still left like that. You butted up against something I thought I had worked on long before, but then it was there in my face, and I was freaked out."
Evan let go of Tommy's shirt and he slipped his arms around his neck and held onto him. Tommy stepped closer to wrap his arms around Evan and hold him tightly. It felt good. Holding Evan in his arms.
"How will everyone react to you and me dating again?"
"Just about as well as they did about Joy. I'm not going to tell them for a while. Well, besides Eddie. Eddie will never be lied to. I don't hang out with the others as much. I mean, I watch Jee-Yun and Charlie a good bit, and they love playing with Joy, but I can make sure that it's nights where you aren't coming by for now. I want to be sure of us before I tell them because I don't need them telling me that I am stupid for trying again with you. I never wanted someone like I wanted you, Tommy. I never pined for someone like that. With Abby, it was refusing to admit that it was over. I didn't even think much about what else that could mean. I wanted to be happy. I thought that happiness was only with you, and I had to learn that it didn't mean that."
"I had found my happiness and my joy, and I was happy with my life before you, and then you invaded, and it was like you shaped me differently," Tommy said.
"I had to find that happiness without someone else, beyond Joy. I had to find me and I did. Now, I want you and me to find our happiness."
Tommy turned his head, pressing his lips to Evan's neck, and sighed. He held on tighter when he thought Evan was going to back away, but he didn't. He just held on.
"I won't run again, not without talking about things. I've changed, and I'll show you."
"Good. because if you break my daughter's heart, there is nowhere that Eddie and I won't find you."