Work Text:
"Maddie."
"Buck."
He felt insane. He felt like he was losing his mind. Maybe he was, actually. Maybe that call yesterday had siphoned his brain out through his ears the same way that woman had leaked all the water from the fish tanks. He probably should have checked the water-soaked carpet for gray matter. It might still be there.
Maddie sipped the coffee she was holding and made a sound of approval. "This is really good. You picked a good café. I'll have to come back sometime without my deranged brother."
"Maddie."
"Evan Buckley, I cannot help you if you don't tell me what you're freaking out about." She raised a brow and swirled her drink. "I'm good, but I'm not that good. So, spill."
Buck groaned and dropped his head against the table. That was where he lived now. It wasn't the comfiest of pillows, but he would make do. "He was picking up fish, Mads."
"Huh?"
He raised his head up just enough to make eye contact with her. "You heard me. He was picking them up. From the ground. He saved the fish, Maddie."
"What on Earth was this call?" Maddie sounded bewildered. Buck didn't understand what was so confusing about it. He thought he had been pretty clear. "You know I don't take every single call in the Los Angeles area, right? I'm gonna need more to work with."
Buck sat up fully, a serious look settled on his features. "There was a woman who went nuts in the fish store, right?" Buck started. "I think her boyfriend spent her paycheck on tropical fish. I don't really know the details."
"Sure," Maddie hummed. "What a normal and average sentence. Continue."
"So, she was mad, and she drove up there and started smashing tanks." Buck bit his lip in thought. "I think she had grabbed his tire iron and just went to town. Those fish didn't deserve it. She really shouldn't have taken her anger out on them."
"Innocent bystanders," Maddie sighed. "Just happened to be in the wrong tank at the wrong time."
"Truly," Buck agreed. "And she managed to smash, like, ten tanks before we got there. We got called because the water got to the electric, but that's besides the point. What's important is that there were fish on the ground."
"Famously where fish shouldn't be."
"And it was like—" Buck zoned out at the memory, only coming back to himself when Maddie snapped her fingers in his face. "Maddie. He was picking up fish from the ground. And he knew what types of fish they were and what fish they could safely be put with. He saved them."
"So, you're all—" she gestured vaguely at his face, “—because Eddie picked up fish off the ground and put them in tanks."
"Well, when you say it like that, it doesn't sound so impressive," Buck said stubbornly.
"It sounds so impressive, honey," Maddie said patiently. "Not just anyone can pick up fish."
"Maddie," Buck whispered conspiratorially, "I think I might want Eddie to pick me up, too."
Maddie laid a hand over Buck's. "I think you want him to pick you up, too.”
__________
Buck was fine, thank you. It wasn't a problem at all that he and Eddie still lived together, or that Buck was subject to seeing his hands throughout every day and night.
Had Eddie always been so capable? Buck knew those fish were slippery—he himself refused to admit how many fish he dropped while trying to save them—and Eddie had just scooped them up like it was no big deal.
And now that it was on Buck's mind, it wasn't leaving. It wouldn't have been such an issue if it weren't for the fact that Eddie kept being so competent with his hands.
Like now. Buck watched from the table as Eddie chopped an onion to sauté, and holy shit, how did Eddie make cutting an onion so sensual?
Not that he was trying to, obviously. Eddie was just cutting an onion. It wasn't his fault that Buck couldn't tear his eyes away, or the fact that Buck was feeling some genuine arousal at the way Eddie made a perfect horizontal slice in the middle of his onion quarter before doing the vertical slices for the dice. Clearly, Eddie was just trying to prep dinner for them, but thinking about that only made Buck's situation worse, because oh my god, Eddie was cooking him dinner.
Buck heard himself make some sort of noise, somewhere between what he imagined a dying squirrel might sound like and the sound of a boiling kettle. Probably incredibly attractive and seductive.
Eddie put the knife down and turned to look at him, concern on his face. "You okay, Buck?"
"Yes. No. Shut up," Buck told him, quite rationally. "Don't look at me. Are you okay?"
Eddie looked bemused, which was exactly how he shouldn't have looked while Buck was being so normal. "I'm good, bud. Any way I can help you?"
"Maybe by cutting that onion better," Buck retorted. "Your angles are crooked."
Unfortunately, Eddie didn't rise to the bait. He simply smiled and shook his head before going back to his stupidly-perfect dices. "If you say so."
It was bad enough that Eddie was good with his hands, but now he had the audacity to be kind and level-headed? When would the injustices end?
Buck huffed and dropped his head against the table. Comfier than the table at the café, he noted disdainfully. Even Eddie's table was better than other tables. Ugh.
And then, Buck noted later, Eddie had the absolute gall to make a delicious and flavorful dinner. When they were sat at the table—as a family, because everyone insisted that they had family dinners every night—Buck stabbed his fork into a perfectly diced onion piece and a golden brown strip of chicken, and when he brought it to his mouth, it practically melted on his tongue in a delicious symphony of flavor.
Buck was certain he was hiding his emotions very well. He was a master of his facial expressions. Not even the most talented of psychologists could deduce his thoughts—
"Onions diced to your standards, Buck?" Eddie asked casually through his own mouthful.
Buck took an angry bite. "Evidently," he said stiffly, then, upon second thought: "They're slightly rectangular. Could have been more square."
Christopher, who had been otherwise completely disinterested in the dinner conversation, looked between them in intrigue. "Do they taste better to you when they're squares?"
"Duh," Buck said quickly.
Eddie hummed, amused. "Do elaborate. How do square ones taste to you?"
"Uh... equilateral."
Chris's eyebrows rose. "They taste equilateral to you?"
Eddie nodded seriously at Chris. "Not just any parallelogram will do," he told him. "Equilateral or nothing."
Christopher just looked at Eddie, then at Buck, then shook his head and sighed. "You guys are so weird."
Buck opened his mouth to argue, then remembered that he had almost flung himself over the rail of the firehouse loft because Eddie had turned the page of his book in an incredibly attractive way, and well. He did not have much of a leg to stand on.
It somehow kept getting worse as time went on. Everything Eddie did, he did well. The corners of the comforter were perfectly tucked under the mattress before they left for work. The sandwich he gave Buck for lunch was cut into identical halves. Hell, he even managed to clean the firetruck with a type of precision and care Buck had never seen before.
It was infuriating. Buck spent all of his time split between trying to avoid Eddie and being mildly turned on by everything he did. It wouldn't have been such a problem if it weren't for the fact that work exposed all of Eddie's capabilities simultaneously, and Buck was in no position to run away.
That was, of course, until it was time to leave. Buck saw Eddie getting ready to go, getting changed into his wrinkle-free clothes and scooping up his keys to drive them both home, and he just couldn't do it. He couldn't get into the car and deal with Eddie perfectly adhering to the speed limit, coming to a full and complete stop at every stop sign, and always remembering to use his turn signal.
So, he gathered up his duffle and walked out the door and then kept walking. He was a few blocks down when Eddie's truck pulled up next to him, the window rolled down and an exasperated Eddie stuck his head out. "Buck. You know this is a three hour walk home, right?"
"I'm campaigning for walkable cities," Buck said defiantly. "There's no reason why a fifteen minute drive home should be a three hour walk. Pedestrians first!"
"I don't want you getting hurt," Eddie said gently, like an asshole. "We just had a long shift. I'm sure you're tired. If you really want to walk in protest, then I'll drive next to you the whole time to make sure you're okay."
Buck stopped in his tracks and pointed accusingly at him. "See! That! Stop being so fucking perfect."
Eddie looked bewildered. "What did I do?"
"Everything!" Buck shouted. "You're so good at everything, and maybe I want to be a fish. Have you ever considered that, huh?"
"I can tell you with one hundred percent honesty that I've never considered that."
"Ugh!" Buck dropped dramatically to sit on the sidewalk, and, much to his chagrin, Eddie put his truck in park and came out to sit down next to him. Buck looked at him before flinging a hand over his eyes theatrically. "Do you have to be so considerate?"
Eddie tapped a finger against his arm twice. "Hard for me not to consider you."
Buck humphed and glared at him. "Because you're perfect."
Eddie just laughed. "Far from it, Buck."
Buck made a sound of disagreement, as it was true. Eddie was entirely perfect at everything he did. It was just a fact of life, one that was driving him insane.
Buck flopped back onto the sidewalk. "Everything is awful."
Eddie tugged at his arm to pull him up, and when Buck refused to get up, he simply shrugged and laid down next to him. "I'm so sorry that you think I'm perfect."
Buck groaned and rolled over to face him, and Eddie followed. "You're not sorry even a little."
"I'm really not," Eddie agreed easily. "It's been really entertaining to see you get all bratty about it."
Buck would've gotten upset about it, but he looked at Eddie's eyes, and oh, there was something in them that Buck really liked. Something soft and fond that made him want to give in, but also made him want to keep going just to see how his expression would morph with it. "Oh, really?"
Eddie's eyes flickered down to Buck's lips, then back up. "Really entertaining."
Buck closed the gap first, mouth crashing to Eddie's, and when Eddie responded just as eagerly, it was like all the pent-up frustration left Buck's body at once. He rolled on top of Eddie, legs bracketing his hips, and sunk into the kiss, his hands going to Eddie's perfectly styled hair and tugging.
Eddie's arms went around Buck's waist, pulling him closer and closer until there was no space left to fill. Buck whined and trailed his lips to Eddie's throat, where he bit at the perfect skin.
"Buck," Eddie gasped, a hand flying to the back of Buck's head, "we gotta—shit, we gotta stop and get home before we get arrested for public indecency."
"You care about the law," Buck whined into the crook of his neck, "that's so hot."
"Shit," Eddie swore, hips bucking. "Come on, baby, let's get home. Please let me drive. I can't wait three hours for this."
Buck acquiesced for entirely selfish reasons, chest heaving and head blissfully blank at the sight of Eddie's perfect driving, even as he looked debauched, somehow managing to stay level-headed throughout the whole drive—despite Buck's best efforts and wandering hands.
And when they got back home, let's just say Buck was elated to find that Eddie's perfection continued to the bedroom.