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El Paso is good, honestly. It has its moments, at least. It’s different, and that’s what Chris wanted when he called his grandparents, and it’s what he’s gotten, so he can’t exactly complain. It’s not. He didn’t. Whatever.
It’s Chris’ birthday, and he’s still in fucking Texas, and that’s fine, that’s good, actually. His dad video calls him, and he’s clearly been celebrating with his friends without Chris, and there’s something about his big stupid grin, and Buck’s bright smile that just pisses him off. He vaguely remembers being in his mother’s arms as they video called his dad for his birthday years ago, except this time he doesn’t even have his mom. It’s his first ever birthday without either of his parents, and he chose that, but it just sucks. Someone calls his name, and he takes the excuse to walk away as quickly as possible from the stinging in his eyes and the pain in his chest, looking at his dad and Buck and their friend Tommy celebrating without him.
He’s not being fair, probably, but he’s just so angry. He could see a plate of Buck’s special birthday cupcakes in the corner of the screen, and he doesn’t think about it much in the moment, but that night, trying so hard to think about anything but the stupid video call, or the complete lack of any text or call since, he keeps thinking about the cupcakes. It’s his first birthday without either of his parents, sure, but it’s also his first birthday in years without Buck’s special birthday cupcakes. It’s a silly thing to care about, probably. Childish. He misses the cupcakes though.
That’s going to keep happening, is the thing. Little traditions they’d had in L.A. won’t happen any more, he has to learn to live with cupcake-less birthdays, and cookie-less Christmases.
———
The week before Thanksgiving, he’s sitting in front of a chessboard, letting his grandparents think he’s practising strategies or something. He’s actually thinking about the miso banana loaf cake that Buck made for Thanksgiving last year. It wasn’t a tradition, not yet, but it could have been, he thinks. If he’d asked Buck, he would have made one, Chris is sure. There’s the weirdly familiar rumble of a car engine, and he looks up to see his dad in the front yard, here in El Paso, and all thought of it flies from his head.
Things move quickly, it feels like. His dad has a place in El Paso, apparently, fucking left L.A., and it’s awful and overbearing and kind of amazing. Chris is furious and relieved and upset and pleased all at once, and he yells and he swears, and nothing he does makes his dad look any less glad to see him. He spends that weekend at his dad’s new condo in El Paso, which is truly two streets away from his grandparents, and it’s a little awkward, and he can feel himself being more difficult than he wants to be, but he can’t seem to stop himself. He goes back to his grandparents for all of one night, and then tells his dad that he wants to stay at his place more regularly, and pretends he can’t see the tears shining in his dad’s eyes, can’t hear the crack in his voice when he replies “Whatever you want, mijo”. Pretends he doesn’t hear his grandma’s voice, somewhere between stern and shrill, laying into his dad in the kitchen while he packs up his room. Wishes he knew what he was feeling.
It’s only on the morning of Thanksgiving itself that he thinks about Buck’s weird loaf cake again. They’d been having breakfast, which is always uncomfortably silent. He’s not sure, but there's a little part of Chris that thinks maybe his dad is scared of him, these days. Scared of saying or doing the wrong thing. He seemed so sure and confident when he arrived in Texas, but it’s barely been a week and he just seems…dimmer. Like he’s folding in on himself. It’s honestly kind of terrifying. He was never like this in L.A., not even when things were bad, not even when he got shot. Any time he did start to shut down, Chris knew how to perk him up, or Buck did, but Buck’s not here, and Chris is maybe the problem.
He suddenly remembers the loaf cake. He can’t just call Buck, sure, but. Maybe that’s still a way to get them doing better.
“Can we bake something today, dad?” he asks into the silence of the room, and watches his dad unfurl just a little, the way he always seems to whenever Chris engages him in conversation of his own free will. “Maybe a pumpkin pie?”
“Yeah, mijo, sounds good,” he agrees, “Pick a recipe and we’ll go pick up ingredients, we don’t have to be at your bisabuela’s until four.”
They finish breakfast, and it’s still quiet, but it’s a more comfortable silence now. Better, somehow.
His dad takes their plates away, and before Chris can unlock his phone he drops his tablet on the table next to him. Chris suppresses a smile. He doesn’t super want his phone to be what they keep referring to, especially once they’re cooking and their hands get inevitably gross. It’s nice that he doesn't have to say that. Maybe his dad is kind of overbearing about some stuff, but it’s the big picture stuff. He’ll make a giant fucking decision with no warning, like cheating, or moving to El Paso, but he doesn’t micromanage Chris on the small stuff. He just offers options. It’s nice.
Chris unlocks the tablet, it’s embarrassingly easy, because his dad uses Chris’ birthday as all of his pins and codes, no matter how many times Chris points out that’s like famously insecure. He opens up the browser, and it’s a faux pas to look at someone else’s browser history, it’s not like Chris doesn’t know that, but there’s only one way that Chris is ever going to know what his dad is thinking and doing, and that’s by snooping, because god forbid his dad actually communicate. The last thing on there is a soup recipe that they actually had for dinner a few days ago. It was good, even if it took forever. What catches Chris’ eye, though, is the website name. Eating with Eddie. How embarrassing to choose a recipe just because you have the same name as the blog owner. What a dad move.
“Anything good, mijo?” asks Eddie, making himself another cup of coffee.
It startles Chris just enough that he clicks on the soup recipe by accident, and when it loads? Well. It’s not exactly the snooping that Chris thought he might do, but it’s not exactly nothing, either. He airdrops the link to himself, and searches for a pumpkin pie recipe. It takes a while, but that, too, yields more significant results than he thought a cooking blog ever could.