Archive of Our Own

Christopher wasn’t really sure when Buck’s status in his mind went from being Dad and Christopher’s friend to kind of being another dad. It was before Buck and Dad started dating, he knows that, which is probably kind of weird, but ever since Christopher met Buck for the first time, Buck has always been someone that he knew he could rely on. Someone who would protect him and care for him and someone he could run to when he was scared or mad at Dad.

Point is, Buck has had parent status or close to it for a really long time, so when Dad had brought up the idea of making it more official, Chris didn’t have a problem with it in the slightest.

“I’ve been thinking of asking Buck to marry me,” Dad says as they’re driving home from school one day. Christopher’s actually pretty surprised at how normal he sounds about it, even though he’s willing to bet Dad had done a lot of stressing out about it before he was comfortable bringing it up. As expected, he doesn’t let Christopher say anything before he’s nervously adding, “But I only want to if it’s okay with you, buddy. You know that your opinion matters to me above anything.”

And— “Yeah, I know, dad. I think you should.”

“You— really?” Dad looks over at Chris in shock, like he thinks he would’ve said no.

“Do you think you’ll have a big fancy wedding? Like Maddie and Chim?” he asks, thinking of the wedding they had had last Spring, or the wedding that Hen and Karen had had a few years ago, which wasn’t technically a wedding, but close enough. Yeah, Dad and Buck should do something like that, outside with all their friends and family, that’d be cool.

Dad laughs. “Um, yeah, maybe. I have to ask him first, though.”

“He’s gonna say yes,” Christopher assures, because, well, duh.

“I appreciate the vote of confidence, bud.”

Christopher doesn’t say that he’s just stating facts because they’re pulling into the driveway and he just opts to get out and go in. He and Dad can talk more later.

“Hey Buck,” Christopher greets as he spots Buck on the couch. As Chris tosses his backpack on the ground by the door, Buck gets up and meets them by the door, ruffling Christopher’s hair and kissing Dad on the cheek. Blegh.

“Did you give it any more thought?” Buck asks Dad as Chris starts down the hallway to his room.

“Buck,” Dad says, in the same tone he uses when Christopher hasn’t eaten all of his green beans. Yikes. “Christopher!” he calls, and Christopher stops in the hallway. “Where does your backpack go?”

Christopher huffs. “Sorry, dad,” he grumbles, retreating to grab his bag so he can bring it to his room.

“You said we could talk about it later,” Buck says, leaning against the back of the couch. “It’s later.”

“Talk about what?” Christopher asks curiously.

“Nothing,” Dad tells him, giving a look to Buck. Yeesh, Christopher wouldn’t want to be on the other end of that expression. Christopher shrugs and starts heading to his room again, wincing when Dad asks, “Why are you in such a hurry to get to your room? Do you have homework?”

Christopher groans. “Can I do it later? Please? Me and Logan were gonna play Roblox.”

Dad frowns. Shoot. “Christopher, you know the rules. Homework, first, video games, later.”

“Fine,” Chris grumbles, turning to head to the table. He wonders if he can get by with just doing his science. Buck will probably help, he’s been really interested in this unit on evolution. Chris can probably lie and say he doesn’t have any other homework and then do his math later, it’s not like Dad or Buck are super helpful in that department anyway.

“I’m just saying, Eddie, it’s a good opportunity, and you shouldn’t pass it up,” Buck says, following Dad into the kitchen.

“What is?” Christopher tries again.

Dad peeks his head out at Chris, pointing at the sheet Christopher has just set on the table. “Homework,” he commands.

Buck leaves the kitchen and comes to sit next to Christopher, looking over the worksheet and his eyebrows perk up in interest. As expected.

“What’s a good opportunity?” Christopher asks, hoping to stall having to do his homework for even a little longer.

“Your dad got asked to go to this conference for firefighters,” Buck explains.

“Oh, that’s cool. When are you guys going? Can I stay with Hen and Karen?” Chris does like staying with Tía Pepa, but he prefers staying with Hen and Karen because he and Denny usually play a lot of video games. And Hen and Karen are both super smart and good at helping with homework. Better than Dad and Buck, at least. Not that he would ever tell them.

Buck laughs, but his face twists up a bit. “Uh, the chief actually only asked your dad so you could probably just stay with me… if you’d be okay with that.”

Buck doesn’t look that upset over it, but Christopher remembers when his friend Jeremy did laser tag for his 13th birthday, but he couldn’t invite Christopher because his mom said he could only bring three friends. He was happy for his friends that did get to go, but a little sad that Jeremy didn’t ask him, but then they all went to an arcade for his 14th birthday, and he did ask Christopher that time. Plus, the arcade was cooler anyway.

He reaches over and pats Buck’s arm. “Maybe you’ll get to go next year. But this year you and I can just hang out.”

Buck smiles in that way that he does sometimes like he’s in disbelief at whatever was just said to him. But then his expression turns mischievous, and he says, “Yeah, we can hang out and do all sorts of stuff without having to worry about the fun police.”

“Yeah!” Christopher cheers, meeting Buck’s hand in the air for a high five.

Dad walks up behind them in that moment and looks at Christopher’s still empty homework assignment and says, “Doesn’t look like a lot of homework is being done right now, guys.”

Buck meets Christopher’s eyes and mouths, “Fun police.” Chris giggles but turns his attention to the sheet. The sooner this gets done, the sooner he can play Roblox.

Christopher forgets all about the firefighter convention thing until he’s getting ready for bed. He passes Dad and Buck’s room on the way to the bathroom to brush his teeth, and, well, is it technically eavesdropping if the door is wide open and the people having the conversation know that you’re within earshot?

“—don’t understand why you won’t drop this, Buck,” Dad says with a huff. “I said I don’t want to go, so that’s it. I’m not going.”

“See if I believed that, I’d drop it,” Buck replies in a hostile tone that Christopher basically never hears. Dad and Buck don’t argue, not the way that Dad and Mom did, and it’s rare if anything, but it still makes Christopher nervous. Buck has promised over and over that he’d never leave, even if things don’t work out with Dad, but Chris still gets scared sometimes. “But I think we both know that you’re not gonna turn down the chief because you don’t want to go, but because of some fucked-up belief—” okay, so they definitely don’t know Chris is listening, “—that you don’t deserve to go if I’m not going.”

There’s the faint sound of footsteps, but Christopher can’t see what’s happening and doesn’t want to peek his head out for fear of actually getting caught now. He’s not sure if they’ll care that he’s listening, but it’ll definitely interrupt the conversation, and Christopher’s curious where it’s headed.

Buck’s voice is softer now, in volume and tone. “And I appreciate the sentiment, baby, you know I do, but I don’t want you to miss out on this phenomenal opportunity just because of me.”

There’s a pause and then Dad says, “It’s a good opportunity for career advancement, Buck, and I was never about climbing the ladder, you know? That’s your thing.”

“Pun intended?” Buck teases.

“Shut up.”

“Okay, but it’s also just a fun chance to get to see new techniques, new equipment, to learn all sorts of new things, and meet other professionals from all over,” Buck explains. “Doesn’t that sound cool?”

Christopher definitely thinks it does, but sometimes Dad’s too boring to enjoy the cool learning experiences that Buck and Chris adore.

“All stuff that you’d have a much more fun time doing,” Dad states. Which, yeah, Chris would agree.

“Eddie. All cool stuff that you can take pictures of to send me, or facetime me during, or just tell me all about after. And I get to live vicariously through you and we’re all happy.”

“Look— if I say no, then maybe the chief asks you, you know? And then you get to do all that stuff in person instead,” Dad offers.

“Or you say no and the chief asks someone else and then I don’t get to know about it at all.”

Hm, Buck makes a good point.

“Just— I’ll think about it, okay?” Dad says, and there are footsteps getting louder so Christopher goes back to brushing his teeth.

The next day after school, Dad sits down with Chris and tells him he’s going. Chris isn’t very surprised, Buck can be quite convincing sometimes, especially to Dad.

“That means it’s just gonna be you and Buck all week,” Dad states, which, like, duh.

“I’ve stayed with Buck alone before, Dad.”

“I know,” Dad replies, “but this isn’t just because I picked up an extra shift or I’m in—” He doesn’t finish the sentence, but Christopher can fill in the blanks. Because I’m in the hospital. Times like that aren’t something either of them likes to think of. “This would be for nearly a whole week. And in that time, you gotta do what Buck says, y’know? You gotta be good. I don’t want you acting up just because I’m not around.”

“You think he’s not gonna wanna marry you if I misbehave?” Christopher teases, then rolls his eyes. “Come on, Dad. I know.”

It’s not for several more weeks though, and in that time, Christopher nearly forgets all about the conference.

Christopher keeps bugging Dad about when he’s gonna propose to Buck. He gets scolded on more than one occasion for texting details about it directly to Dad because “you know Buck uses my phone for things sometimes. How am I gonna explain this in my texts?” They do keep discussing in person, though. Rings, locations, et cetera, et cetera.

“Dad, can Logan come over next Monday?” Chris asks as he comes out of his room for dinner. “His mom’s got some… thing. I don’t know. Logan said that she said to text her and figure out logistics.”

Dad looks up from where he’s setting the table. “Uh, I’m not here next Monday, bud, remember?”

It takes a second, because Christopher knows that according to the normal schedule, Dad and Buck should be off work next Monday. But then he remembers. If he looked at the calendar on the fridge, he’d see it marked on all five weekdays next week along with the times and flight numbers of Dad’s flight there on Sunday and home on Friday.

“Oh, right.” When Buck comes out of the kitchen, Christopher turns to him and says, “Buck, can Logan come over next Monday?”

Buck gives Dad an amused look. Chris rolls his eyes. That’s not an answer. Buck and Dad seem to be having one of those conversations that they do sometimes, with just their eyes. It’s annoying. Chris can tell that Buck wants to defer to Dad for an answer, but Dad is trying to challenge him. He’s been doing that lately, making Buck make decisions. And Chris gets it. Next week, Dad won’t be there, and Dad doesn’t want Buck to call or text him every time he has to make a decision relating to Christopher.

Dad had explained it a bit, wanting Buck to feel more confident about this stuff, not just because of next week, but “if Buck is gonna be your stepdad, legally, not just in our minds, he should have more confidence about being a parent-like figure.” He also wanted to make sure that Chris respects Buck. Which he does. But whatever.

Just when Chris is about to huff and protest about the fact that neither of them has given him an answer yet, Buck speaks. “Uh, yeah, that’ll be fine.”

“I’ll text Amanda,” Dad says. “You have her number?”

Christopher knows the answer is yes even before Buck nods. Buck probably has better contacts and relationships with most of Christopher’s friends’ parents than Dad does. Long before they were dating. Buck’s just better at that stuff.

The night that they get home after dropping Dad off at the airport, Chris can tell Buck is nervous.

When they get home, Buck asks, “Christopher, can we— can we talk for a second?”

“Sure,” Chris replies easily, sitting on the couch.

Buck sits next to him. He opens and shuts his mouth a few times before taking a moment to think through what he wants to say. “How would you feel if your dad and I got married?”

Christopher smiles brightly. Dad wouldn’t propose without telling Chris, so that must mean— “You wanna ask him?”

Buck bites his lip and nods. “You know I love you and your dad so much, Christopher. And I’m ready to make that permanent. Official. But only if you’re okay with it.”

Christopher has to resist the urge to say ‘you’ll have to beat him to it’ or anything similar. Instead, he just crosses the distance and hugs Buck. “I think you should.”

Buck hugs him tightly and his voice comes out a bit teary when he responds. “You really think so? I mean, you’d be okay with that?”

Christopher gives him a very serious look. “You’re basically my dad already, Buck, you might as well make it official,” he expresses honestly.

Buck gives him a soft smile. “I love you so much, Chris.”

“Love you, too, Buck,” Chris responds. “So, do you have a ring yet?”

Buck smiles excitedly and pulls out his phone, typing a few things in before turning it to Chris. “Not yet, but I’ve been looking at some options.”

When Buck picks Chris and Logan up from school on Monday, Christopher realizes he’s not nervous that Buck is gonna embarrass him, not the way he might be if it was Dad. Buck is just… cooler than Dad, to be honest, not that he’d ever tell either of them that.

They have a few hours before Logan’s mom will be by to pick him up. She’d be done pretty soon after Logan’s little sister’s doctor’s appointment, but they agreed that Logan could stay through dinner.

“You guys got homework?” Buck asks as they walk through the front door.

Chris shoots a look at Logan, who’s already looking at him. “Not really,” Chris lies. He considers saying no, but he knows Buck would call him out on that. It’s rare that he has no homework these days.

“Well, if it’s not much, then you can get it out of the way before doing anything else, right?” Buck suggests.

“Buck,” Christopher groans. “We can do it after dinner.”

“Remember, Amanda’s coming to pick Logan up after dinner, so wouldn’t it be better to do it while you’re still together?”

“Eh, we’re in different math classes, Mr. Diaz,” Logan answers, “different homework anyway.” And it is true. They’re in a lot of the same classes, but they got split up for math. Chris isn’t sure if their homework is actually different, but Buck seems to buy it, and that’s all that really matters.

Christopher notices that Buck doesn’t correct Logan about his name. He supposes it makes sense, seeing as how Buck wants to marry Dad. Maybe he wants to be a Diaz. Chris thinks it’d be kinda cool if they all had the same last name. Come to think of it, people that don’t know them super well, like from school and stuff, have been calling Buck ‘Mr. Diaz’ for years now and Buck’s never really corrected them. Maybe he’s wanted to marry Dad for a long time now. Chris knows that he’s considered Buck a part of their family for years now anyway.

“Can we go play video games now?” Christopher asks.

“Alright, fine. Just this once, though,” Buck replies.

“Awesome!” Logan cheers as they begin towards Christopher’s bedroom. Logan turns back, though, to ask, “Hey, Mr. Diaz, can we order pizza for dinner?”

Buck chuckles. “Yeah, I— I think I can make that work.”

“Cool,” Logan says, then, to Christopher, “your dad is the best, dude.”

Christopher turns to Buck and agrees, “I know, right?”

Christopher watches Buck blush and smile just before he follows Logan into his room.

“Bye Christopher! Bye Buck! Thanks again!” Logan’s mom calls as she retreats to her car.

As soon as Buck shuts the door, he turns to Christopher and says, “Alright, homework time.”

Christopher groans. “But Buck, Denny just asked if I could play games with him.”

Buck crosses his arms. “You can,” he states simply, “after you finish your homework.”

“Buck, please,” Christopher begs, even pulling out the puppy dog eyes that Buck says are lethal, but don’t work on Dad anymore.

“Chris, if you don’t do your homework now, when are you gonna do it?” Buck asks.

Christopher shrugs. “Later.”

“There’s only a few more hours until bedtime,” Buck points out.

Chris is about to argue that he’s a teenager, he doesn’t need a bedtime, but he thinks better of it, it was hard enough to get them to agree to push it later, so he chooses to pick his battles for now.

“I’ll have time later,” Chris insists, “but Denny might log off if I don’t play now.”

“Come on, Chris, you said it wasn’t that much, so just get it out of the way. Text Denny and let him know you’re doing homework, but you’ll be on soon, yeah? He’ll understand, he probably has tons of homework these days.”

Yeah, yeah, cause Denny’s in high school now. Whatever. And not that he regrets lying to Buck about how much homework he has, but… when Christopher thinks back over what he has to do? Ugh. Worksheet for math. A little reading for English. Shoot, that history project he keeps putting off. Yikes. That stuff will take, like, all night.

“Fine,” Christopher grumbles, grabbing his backpack from his room and sitting at the dining table. He shoots a quick text to Denny first, letting him know he has homework to do, but if Denny’s still on when Chris is done, he’ll join.

Buck goes into the kitchen to do the dishes and for once his quiet humming doesn’t soothe Chris, but annoys him. He’s frustrated that he can’t play video games. Annoyed that Buck won’t let him. Angry that he has to work on his stupid homework. Don’t get him wrong, he likes school, but he thinks that school should stay within the bounds of the school building and the school day. And the fact that he has to take time out of his personal life to do homework is just plain stupid. It’s not like his dads ever have to do work at home. Any lifesaving they do outside of work is because they’re good people and not because Bobby told them they have to put out a certain number of fires at home, too.

Buck’s still humming. Chris is still frustrated. There’s a part of him that just wants to yell at Buck to just shut up already, that Christopher is trying to concentrate on his homework, and the humming is distracting, but he also knows Buck would be hurt by that, and Buck isn’t really the reason why he’s having a hard time working. He pulls out his headphones instead, putting on a playlist for studying that had, ironically, been made for him by Buck.

It helps, and he’s able to focus for a while, only taking them off after Buck leaves the kitchen and gets settled on the couch.

“Hey, baby,” Buck greets into the phone that’s now pressed to his ear. Talking to Dad, Christopher supposes. “Yeah, we’re good. Yeah, I saw the pictures! It looks really cool.”

They continue talking for a bit and Christopher tunes it out. Just as he’s about to put his headphones back on, Buck calls, “Hey, Chris, you wanna come say hi to your dad?”

Christopher looks over at him and shrugs. “I don’t know, can I pause my homework long enough to say hi or is that not allowed?” he snarks.

There’s a bark of laughter from the phone that Buck is now holding up, clearly on speaker now. “Sounds like you two are getting along swimmingly.”

Buck gestures Chris over to the couch and Chris goes. By the time he gets there, Buck has switched the phone call to a facetime, and Chris sees his dad on the little screen, propped up against the headboard of his hotel bed.

Despite the fact that Christopher is still kind of mad at Buck, he sits right next to him on the couch, more out of habit than anything, and presses up against his side so they can both fit in the camera. He chats with his dad and Buck for a few minutes, then begrudgingly returns to his homework.

As soon as Buck hangs up the call, though, he sits next to Christopher at the table. “Alright, what can I do to help so you can be done with this sooner?”

Christopher’s already done with his English and his math, so it means sheepishly admitting to Buck that he has a history project due that he totally forgot about. Buck doesn’t even seem that mad, just comments that he used to forget about school projects all the time. They’re able to get it done (and it’s even good quality if Christopher says so himself) in record time. He has nearly a whole hour before he has to get ready for bed, and he almost forgets that he’s supposed to be mad at Buck. Almost. Because Denny is offline by the time Chris is done, citing an early next morning and maybe they can play tomorrow! Damn.

During lunch the next day, Christopher’s friends start making plans to go see some horror movie after school. It doesn’t sound too interesting to Christopher, but he likes hanging with his friends and his friend Kyle’s dad has already volunteered to take them all to see it, so he sends a quick text to Buck asking if he can. He’s not sure how quick Buck will respond since he’s at work, but he texts back within minutes.

what? no that movies rated R chris

Christopher huffs.

come on please??

kyles dad is taking us itll be fine

everybody elses parents said yes

as luck would have it, im not everybody elses parent

and i say no

Christopher groans.

“Did your stepdad say no?” Kyle asks.

“Yeah,” Chris admits. “Just give me a bit though, I bet I can get him to change his mind.”

yeah youre not cause youre cooler

ah flattery

a really good tactic i must say

The bell rings for the end of lunch so Christopher sends one final text.

so thats a yes then???

not a chance bud

Christopher rolls his eyes as he tosses his phone into his locker and heads to class.

 When the end of the school day rolls around, Christopher knows he has a few minutes before Carla will be here to pick him up and his friends are still grouped around waiting for Kyle’s dad and excitedly (and loudly) chatting about their plans. Christopher takes the chance and calls Buck, praying that he picks up and isn’t out on a call.

It rings once, twice—

“Hey, Chris, everything good?”

“Odds you’ve changed your mind about the movie?” Christopher tries in his most pleading tone.

“Slim to none. I watched the trailer and looked at some reviews online and I’d say my opinion is lower now than it was before. That movie is so gory, Chris. That’s absolutely a hard no.”

“Buck,” Christopher whines. He lowers his voice, he’s far enough from his friends, but he really doesn’t need them to hear this. “Please. All my friends are going.” It’s not actually true, only two of his friends besides Kyle could get their parents to agree, but Buck doesn’t need to know that.

“I’m sorry, bud, but that’s the rule and you know that. I don’t think you’d be pushing this hard if it was your dad.”

“Yeah, cause he’s lame,” Christopher grumbles, “so of course he’d say no, besides it’s dad’s stupid rule, not yours.”

“Christopher!” Buck scolds, but Chris can hear the grin in his voice. “That’s— not nice. Plus, it’s not your dad’s rule. It’s our rule, for the household, and it still applies even when your dad’s not here.”

“But you’re cooler than dad, so can’t you let this one thing go? Please?” Christopher says in a final attempt.

Buck pauses and takes a breath, and Christopher thinks, yes, this is it. But what Buck replies instead is, “Christopher, I don’t appreciate you continually trying to push this. I said no, and I meant it. It’s not up for discussion.”

It sounds so rehearsed, and Christopher isn’t sure if it’s because Buck actually has practiced this or that it just sounds so much like the kind of thing Dad would say, but it does make him lose any remnants of hope he had left.

“Fine,” he grunts out in response. “Bye.”

“Bye, Christopher,” Buck says softly, “Love y—”

The rest of his sentence is cut off by Christopher angrily smashing the end call button. It’s not fair, is all he can think. As he says bye to his friends when Kyle’s dad arrives. It’s not fair. As he gets home and does his homework. It’s not fair. As he receives all the texts about how good the movie was and how he missed out. It’s. Not. Fair.

Christopher is still mad at Buck when he wakes up in the morning, so even though he’s awake when Buck gets home from work, he doesn’t come out to greet him, just listens to his conversation with Carla as she greets, “Buckaroo! How are you doing without your boo?”

“Missing him lots,” Buck responds quietly. He sounds tired, like he probably didn’t get much sleep at the station.

“Oh, I’m sure he misses you, too, honey.”

“How’s—?” Buck asks, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out he’s inquiring about Christopher.

“Haven’t seen him this morning,” Carla informs, “but he was fine by bedtime last night, back to his cheery self.”

Of course Christopher had been fine last night. Even though he was still a bit disappointed about the movie thing, it wasn’t Carla he was mad at.

“Okay, good. I can handle drop off.”

“You sure? You look ready to pass out any second.”

“Nah, I still got an hour or so left in me. I’m good.”

“Alright.”

Carla knocks gently on Christopher’s door and peeks her head in. “You are awake! Good. Buck’s home now, so I’m gonna head out, okay? I’ll see you tomorrow, sweetie.”

“M’kay,” Chris replies. “See you tomorrow, Carla.”

When he does eventually leave his room and make his way to the bathroom, though, he doesn’t reply to Buck’s cheery “Good morning! I missed you.”

Just before he closes the bathroom door, Buck asks, “What do you want for breakfast?” Christopher doesn’t respond to that either, just lets the door slam behind him.

By the time he’s done getting ready and goes to the dining room, Buck is setting down a bowl of cereal and a plate of eggs. “Wasn’t sure what you wanted, so I hope cereal and some eggs works. I’d have whipped up some pancakes but we’re short on time. You know how it is. School mornings, right? Maybe we can have some Saturday morning with your dad, yeah?” He’s doing that thing where he’s talking really fast, barely taking a break because he wants to fill the silence. He’s nervous.

Christopher grunts in response.

Buck sits down next to him. “Are you… still mad about the movie?”

Christopher keeps his gaze carefully trained away from Buck, but shrugs petulantly.

“Well, I’m sorry that you’re upset,” Buck says, “but I don’t regret what I said. Celia said Jeremy was up all last night with nightmares.”

“I wouldn’t have had nightmares,” Christopher snaps, finally looking at Buck. “I’m not a baby.”

Buck takes a careful breath and pats Christopher’s shoulder gently. “I— I know that. I’m just saying I’m glad, because in the super tiny chance that you did, I would’ve hated for that to happen on a night where neither me nor your dad was home to comfort you.”

“Hmph.”

“What do you say you and I watch a scary movie tonight when you’re off school, yeah? We can pick something that’s not too scary, but still something. And just in case either of us feels a little too freaked out afterward, you can sleep in me and Dad’s room.”

It doesn’t sound like too bad of an option all in all, but Christopher doesn’t want to let up just yet, so he says, “No, thanks, I’m busy.”

He watches Buck’s face fall, but Buck recovers quickly. “Oh, yeah, that’s okay. Some other time?”

Christopher basically forgets to be mad at Buck by the time he gets out of school, is nearly vibrating out of his seat as he informs Buck about a fight that happened at school.

“—and the teachers had to break them up! And someone said that one of the girls got hurt so bad she had to go to the hospital.”

“Wow, well I hope they’re both okay,” Buck comments.

“Yeah, but they’re both gonna be suspended for a super long time.”

Buck laughs. “I bet.”

Buck informs him that he baked some cookies during the day because he was having a hard time sleeping and he’ll allow Christopher to have one for an after-school snack. So, the second they get home, Christopher tosses his bag down in favor of getting to the kitchen for a cookie. He loves Buck’s chocolate chip cookies.

But before he can even get to the kitchen, Buck is calling his name, “Christopher! We both know this isn’t where your bag goes.”

“So move it!” Christopher teases as he grabs a cookie. Turns out, Buck hadn’t just made some cookies. There are at least five containers scattered across the counters of various types of cookies that most certainly had not been there this morning. Christopher, of course, picks the chocolate chip ones.

Buck follows him into the kitchen and crosses his arms, giving him an unenthused expression. Ugh, really? It’s gonna be like that?

“Come on, Chris, we gotta break this habit of tossing your bag down right by the door like that. It’s a tripping hazard.”

Christopher rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll move it.”

Buck stares at him expectantly.

What, now?

“Let me finish my cookie,” Christopher says.

“Chris, now,” Buck says, in a tone so much like Dad it’s scary.

Christopher sets the cookie down on a napkin and goes to move his backpack.

The rest of the afternoon is generally without issue. Buck is so much like Dad though and it’s, like, slightly annoying, because he won’t let Christopher get away with anything. It’s Chris, do your homework, and Chris, we’re not eating dessert before dinner, and Chris, we’re not eating dinner on the couch, blah, blah, blah.

They do get to do some fun stuff though. They watch a movie together after Christopher’s done with his homework. They talk about watching a scary one, but as they’re scrolling through Netflix, they stumble upon an action movie they’ve been meaning to watch together, so they watch that instead. And then they spend a while on facetime with Dad and it’s great. Buck does cut him off in time to send him off to bed, even though they’re having a great conversation about one of the lectures Dad saw that day, but whatever. The second he walks away, Dad and Buck start getting all mushy with their ‘I love you’s and ‘I miss you’s and Christopher would really rather not be present for that anyway.

The next day passes with ease, though Christopher is a bit on edge by the time he gets out of school. He’s super nervous about how he did on his math test, and two of his friends had an argument early in the day which left their whole group feeling off and tense, especially during lunch, which is usually one of Christopher’s favorites times of the school day. And then science club was boring, and he was anxious to go home the whole time. He’s also just so ready for Dad to be home. Not that he doesn’t appreciate being with Buck, but he misses Dad, if he’s honest. Buck also seems really tired by the time he gets home around dinner time, like he didn’t have the greatest day either.

They eat their dinner in relative silence, and as they’re finishing up, Christopher informs, “I’m gonna go play video games with Denny.”

“Is your homework done?” Buck asks.

Christopher hesitates, probably for just a second too long, before saying, “Uh, yep, all good.”

Buck raises an eyebrow tiredly. “Are you lying to me?”

“Look, I’ll get it done later, I swear.”

Buck sighs. “You’ll get it done now, Christopher. You know the rules.”

“Buck, please, just this once,” Christopher pleads.

“No,” Buck replies in a firm tone. “I’m not gonna keep having this conversation with you.”

“Last time, Denny was offline by the time I finished my homework,” Christopher complains.

“Too bad, Chris.”

Later, Christopher will blame it on the bad day, but as he gets up from the table, he says, “You’re such an asshole!”

“Christopher! Language!”

“You never let me do anything,” Christopher shouts.

Buck doesn’t give in and shout back, just keeps his calm, firm voice. “We have rules for a reason, Christopher, and you’re going to follow them. Homework first before any video games. I’ll go through your backpack if I have to. And if you keep this up, there will be no video games at all for the rest of the week.”

Christopher goes to his room, but not before shouting, “I hate you!” as he slams his bedroom door shut.

Buck doesn’t say anything in response. In fact, he doesn’t bother Christopher for the rest of the night, not even to go through his backpack like he had threatened to do. Christopher does the rest of his homework first, just in case, before getting on to play games with Denny, who is thankfully still free.

Christopher nearly forgets all about the argument as he exits his room to go brush his teeth and get ready for bed. All the lights in the house are off, but the light in Dad and Buck’s room is on and the door is cracked. As Christopher gets closer, he hears the soft sniffles. Well, shoot. He feels bad, he had been a lot meaner than needed earlier, he was just so angry. He’s about to knock gently, maybe even give Buck a soft apology, when Buck speaks.

“I—I can’t do this without you,” Buck says through his sobs. He must be on the phone with Dad. Shit. “I can’t parent him. I’m not his dad and he knows that. And— and he hates me.”

“You know that’s not true, sweetheart,” Dad assures. Christopher can barely make out the words through the phone speakers, but he can hear it if he strains his ears. “He loves you so much. He’s just a teenager. You think he hasn’t said that kind of stuff to me before? Called me a jerk for putting my foot down? Of course he has.”

“I want to be fun all the time, of course I do, but I also know that I can’t.”

“I know. I think you’ve just been our friend for so long that it’s hard to adjust to the idea that you’re his stepdad now, too, and sometimes that means enforcing the rules, too.”

“‘M not his stepdad,” Buck mumbles. Christopher rolls his eyes, and thinks yet in his head.

“Yet,” Dad replies smoothly.

Buck sniffles again, but still manages a flirty response. Barf. “Why, Edmundo Diaz, do you have something you want to say to me?”

“Mmm, definitely not over the phone.”

Christopher walks away before he can hear anything else. He feels bad about the way he treated Buck, especially knowing it caused Buck to be so torn up over it, but he’s too stubborn to give in to apologizing right now, plus saying anything now feels like it would be confessing to having overheard.

He gets a text from his dad just before he goes to bed.

You better resolve this with Buck before I get home.

He deserves an apology.

i know

i will

in the morning

Chris doesn’t see Buck in the morning, and he’s more than a little disappointed. He knows Buck had worked something out to work a relatively short shift today that would allow him to get off in time to pick up Christopher from school, even though it also meant going in super early. Normally, if Dad and Buck go into work before Christopher goes to school, they’ll wake him up anyway, just long enough to squeeze in some ‘I love you’s. Christopher likes to pretend it’s just because they all love each other that much and not because they’ve had one too many close calls not to remind him of their love every chance they get.

Buck doesn’t wake him this morning. He’s woken by Carla telling him it’s time to get ready for school. The whole way to school, he thinks about texting Buck, because Buck should know he’s sorry, but he feels like he owes him an apology in person, and he knows he’ll get the chance to see him at the end of the school day. And they’ll have the whole car ride to the airport to talk about it and make up, and he’ll still fulfill his promise to Dad. Technically, Dad’s work thing goes until the end of the day, but he said all the good stuff ended yesterday or this morning, and he’d rather spend time with Buck and Chris, so he decided to leave early instead of this evening or tomorrow when everyone else will be. Christopher’s really grateful because Dad’s flight is supposed to be getting in just before he gets out of school, so he and Buck can meet Dad at the airport.

Due to some combination of the anticipation of Dad getting home and the anxiety from Buck leaving without saying goodbye this morning, Christopher is on edge and the whole day just seems to drag. Teachers have to say his name multiple times to get his attention, and he gets questions wrong that he might not otherwise. One of his teachers even questions him about it after class, but he assures them it’s just for today and he’ll be back on top of things on Monday.

He’s incredibly relieved to exit the school building and see Buck waiting for him. He’s more than ready to get Dad from the airport and head home. He’s unsettled immediately upon getting in, though. It takes him saying Buck’s name three times to draw Buck out of whatever weird trance has him staring out the windshield.

As soon as whatever spell is on Buck breaks, he turns to Christopher with what is probably an attempt at a smile. “Chris! H-hey, uh, how was school?”

Christopher raises an eyebrow at him. “Fine. Are you okay?”

“O-oh, me? Yeah, uh, yeah, I’m fine.” It’s clearly a lie and Chris isn’t really sure what to do. He’s rarely ever seen Buck act this… weird.

Buck starts driving, and Christopher takes a moment to observe him and the unsettling feeling grows. One of the first things he notices is that Buck is still in his LAFD uniform. While it’s not completely unheard of for Buck or Dad to not change at work, it’s so rare that it catches Christopher off guard. He supposes maybe Buck was just too excited to get out of there so they could go pick up Dad or maybe a call ran super late, and he just didn’t have time to, but… it’s weird. And then there’s the fact that Buck’s sitting up super straight, both hands gripping the wheel super tight. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that he’s super nervous and Christopher starts to wonder if it’s because of him, because of their fight. He’d hate to think that he’s the reason Buck is so off. There’s also the music. It’s all really sad stuff. Chris knows that Buck has all of his music sorted into carefully curated playlists and this has got to be one of the most depressing ones, which can only really mean one thing about Buck’s mood.

“I’m sorry,” Christopher blurts.

Buck looks over at him, confused. “You’re… sorry?”

“For what I said yesterday. Buck, you know I didn’t mean it. You know that, right?”

Buck turns back to the road ahead of them, but Christopher watches his face twist as he thinks really hard. He mouths ‘yesterday’ to himself. So whatever’s got Buck acting weird is probably not Christopher then. And whatever it is is distracting him so hard that he completely forgot about their fight, despite the fact that Chris could hardly think about anything else all day.

His eyebrows shoot up as realization, and he looks back over at Christopher. “Oh! Oh, Chris, it’s fine. I get it. I’ve been a teenager. Sometimes we say things we don’t mean. And I just… I don’t want to dwell on it right now.”

Huh. Okay. Well, Christopher will take it. He looks out the front window. It strikes him just now that it doesn’t really look like they’re driving to the airport, but he’s also not entirely sure how to get there so he figures that he’s probably just a little mistaken about where they are.

“I’m just really sorry I said those things,” Christopher repeats, just for emphasis, because even if Buck is apparently over it now, he wants to assure Buck that he really didn’t mean it. He looks over at Buck and watches his face soften as he says, “I could never hate you, Buck.”

He’s not entirely sure what he expected, but it wasn’t for Buck to tear up. “I love you so much, Christopher,” Buck replies, and even his voice is watery. Buck reaches over and pulls Christoper towards him to kiss the top of his head. It’s awkward over the center console, but he makes it work.

“Love you.”

Christopher isn’t really sure what to do from here, not when Buck focuses his gaze straight ahead of him and no matter how fast he swipes them away, he can’t quite hide the giant teardrops falling down his face. Christopher just hopes that they get to the airport sooner rather than later, because he really isn’t sure what’s wrong with Buck and is even less certain about what to do to fix it, but he knows Dad will be able to. When in doubt, any time there’s something wrong with Dad or Buck, the other one always knows how to fix it. That’s just how it’s been, for as long as Christopher has known.

Seeing as he’s not really sure where to go with Buck, he figures he’ll just leave it alone. He pulls out his phone to pass time, to which Buck’s head snaps over in his direction.

“W-whatcha doing?” he inquires quickly.

Christopher frowns, but turns his phone screen towards Buck just a little as he says, “Looking at the TikToks my friends sent me.”

Buck immediately backs down and looks relieved. “Oh, okay. Cool, yep, yeah, you… do that.”

Christopher wants to ask what that’s supposed to mean, but he’s pretty sure he’s not going to get any clarity on Buck’s behavior any time soon, so he just drops it. As he makes his way through his DMs, Buck keeps shooting glances over at Christopher’s phone, like he’s looking for something maybe? Christopher just tries to ignore it.

Even scrolling TikTok, Christopher isn’t able to ignore Buck’s jittery energy, so he puts his phone down in favor of trying to start up a conversation with Buck. He remembers something interesting he learned in science since they’ve been learning about geology lately.

“How’s the ring hunting going?” Christopher tries.

Buck glances over at him, like he’s not sure Christopher is actually talking to him. You know, as opposed to all the hundreds of other people in the car. “U-um, it’s— it’s fine.”

“Well, I know you were really liking the idea of using our birthstones, but we were talking about diamonds in class today,” Christopher explains, “and how a lot of people like using diamonds because of the symbolism since diamonds are like really tough and stuff.” Truthfully, diamonds had been only a small part of the lesson today, but Mr. Garcia gets on tangents really easily, so it only took a few well-directed questions from Christopher’s classmates before the whole class period was squandered away and they had only gotten through a small portion of Mr. Garcia’s powerpoint.

“Yeah, I read up a lot on that, too,” Buck says, but he doesn’t say any more. Any other day, he would elaborate on his research and how it shaped his decision. He’s not usually this quiet, or this difficult to start up a conversation with.

“I’m just saying, you should consider it, even if you think Dad’s gonna fuss.”

Buck smiles a little sadly. “Yeah.”

The song switches and though it’s not a bad song, Christopher thinks the sad music isn’t helping him draw Buck out of this funk that he’s in, so he asks, “Do you mind if I switch up the music?”

Buck shakes his head quickly. “No, go ahead. Sorry, I— I meant to change playlists before I picked you up, I’m not sure how it… slipped my mind.”

Christopher’s pretty sure he knows exactly how something could’ve slipped Buck’s mind, judging from how distracted Buck has seemed this whole time. Regardless, he grabs Buck’s phone and quickly types in the pin code, a combination of his own and Jee-yun’s birthdays. He just picks one of the top playlists that he knows is something a lot lighter.

“I mean, Dad’s gonna fuss no matter what the ring looks like or how expensive it was or wasn’t, so you might as well go all out, right?” Christopher tries again.

Buck gives a soft little chuckle. “Yeah, I… I should, huh?”

Christopher nods. He knows his dad has joked at least once about getting Buck something big and “noticeable from space,” per his own words.

Since he’s still holding Buck’s phone, he decides to see if he can find the rings Buck was looking at again. “Did you bookmark those pages?”

Buck’s eyes goes wide as he looks over at Christopher, who’s opening up Buck’s browser, and says, “Oh, Chris, don’t—”

The first thing he sees upon opening it, though, is a headline… about a plane going down. Immediately, Christopher’s heart drops. He can’t breathe. It— It can’t be.

“What was Dad’s flight number again?” he asked in a voice so small he’s not sure Buck even hears him.

Buck’s gaze nervously flicks between Christopher and the road in front of them. The road that Chris is sure is getting closer and closer to their house. Truthfully, he doesn’t need the confirmation. Buck— his behavior, his uniform, the way that he’s looking at Christopher now? The fact that they’re clearly driving home and not to the airport at all? That’s all the confirmation he needs.

Still, he closes the browser in favor of opening Buck’s calendar, the one they all share despite the fact that Buck and Chris are the only ones who use the digital one, with Dad preferring the physical one hanging in the kitchen. The one that Buck checks all the time, adds anything Dad writes there to the digital calendar and updates the physical one for Dad with anything Christopher adds via his phone. There’s a part of Christopher’s brain that thinks that if something happened, if— well, they wouldn’t need that old physical calendar. He and Buck don’t really use it anyway.

The flight number’s right there, the same one as had been in the headline, and— no, no, no, this can’t be happening. Work was the scary thing. Work was what Christopher had been afraid of for a while. And yeah, technically, this had been work related but— but it wasn’t running into burning buildings or scaling the side of a cliff, this was fine, this was safe, or— it was supposed to be. And yet.

Christopher opens the article again and his eyes scan as much of the page as they can before his vision is so blurred by tears that he can’t make out the words. The article’s short, not many details yet. Just the fact that the flight had gone down a couple hours ago, somewhere east. They don’t know causes or many details on the passengers and—

Buck has a hand on his shoulder and says, “Shit, Chris, this isn’t how I wanted you to find out, and— look, we’re almost home, so we can talk about it once we get there.”

Buck says more, Christopher’s pretty sure, but he can’t hear it over the ringing in his ears. All he can think is Dad is dead. Dad is dead. Buck knows Dad is dead and is going to break the news to Christopher as soon as they get home. Christopher doesn’t even know what’s happening, just knows that his chest hurts, and he can’t breathe, and he can’t stop crying, and he feels like he’s gonna be sick, and, and, and—

He’s not even sure what happens, but Buck is kneeling in front of him, passenger door open, and Buck is instructing Christopher to breathe, and Christopher is trying his best to obey. By the time his vision clears, he sees that they’ve made it home.

Once Christopher’s breathing is back to being somewhere close to normal, Buck says, “Let’s go in and we can talk, yeah?”

Chris shakes his head. “Tell me now, Buck.” He’d rather have the band aid ripped off.

Buck looks between Christopher and the house reluctantly.

“Buck, please,” Christopher pleads. It comes out barely more than a whisper.

“We don’t know anything right now. There’s— there’s a death count, but— no names. I haven’t heard anything from him, and my calls aren’t going through, but that doesn’t necessarily mean—”

Christopher doesn’t even wait to hear the rest of it, and he’ll probably feel bad about it later, but he pushes Buck hard in order to get out of the car. And he knows that he’s slower than Buck, especially since he didn’t grab his crutches when getting out of the car, but Buck doesn’t immediately chase after him. He hears Buck opening and shutting car doors. Christopher pulls out the house key that he always keeps on him, just in case, and unlocks the door. Christopher is well on his way to his bedroom when Buck walks through the front door with his work bag and Christopher’s backpack. He unceremoniously drops them on the floor by the door.

Chris can’t help but snark, “That’s not where those go. It’s a tripping hazard.”

Buck doesn’t even react, nor does he move them, just pursues Christopher. “Christopher, look—” He reaches out and the second his hand touches Christopher’s arm, Chris slaps it away.

“No!” Christopher doesn’t even know what he wants to say, he just knows that he’s so angry. And sad. And he just— he wants his dad. The tears are starting up again.

“We can’t jump to the worst-case scenario, okay?” Buck insists. “We just need to wait for information.”

But Christopher doesn’t want to wait for more information, not when that could take forever. He knows his dad and Buck have already had too many close calls, and he’s learned it’s better to prepare for the worst than hope for the best and get your heart broken.

“No!” Christopher yells again. “No, no, no, this— this is your fault!”

In all of this, Buck hasn’t seemed surprised by Christopher’s behavior, but now he stops, stills, and his eyes widen. “M-my fault?”

And it’s probably the wrong thing to say, but Christopher is just— he’s so angry, he’s so angry and he wants to lash out at someone and all he can think of is the conversation he overheard all those weeks ago. Dad, saying he didn’t want to go and Buck pushing until he agreed.

“He didn’t even want to go!” Christopher cries. “But you told him to. You pressured him to go and now— Now, he could be dead!” Buck looks like he’s about to say something, but Christopher isn’t done. “I wish you and Dad had never even met!” With that, Christopher actually goes into his room, and Buck doesn’t stop him, or say anything. By the time Christopher slams the door in his face, Buck is still just standing there, frozen.

Christopher can’t bring it in himself to care right now, not so soon after finding out that his dad is— He lays down on his bed, burying his face in his pillow, and finally lets out the rest of the tears he’d been holding back.

When Christopher wakes up, he’s immediately hit with a wave of regret. Why did he say those things? Those awful, horrible, cruel things. To Buck of all people. Buck, who is the nicest person on the planet. Buck, who has a horrible tendency of blaming himself for things he can’t control anyway, even though there’s no way that he could’ve stopped this and yet Christopher went along and blamed him for it anyway.

He opens his eyes with the intent of going to find Buck and apologize, but— his room— well, it’s not his room. It— well, his bedsheets, his desk, his posters, sure, but— but it’s not his room. Not the way he ever had it set up, it’s not even the same shape. He peeks out the window and— it’s not the view from his window, it doesn’t even look like their neighborhood in L.A. Strangely, it actually kind of reminds him of the neighborhood his grandparents live near, back in El Paso.

He pulls out his phone and he knows it’s gotta be some kind of weird dream because when he opens his own location on Maps, he’s in Texas. El Paso, Texas. The exact neighborhood he was thinking of, too, he’s less than half a mile from his grandparents’ house. He gets up from bed and leaves his room, attempting to navigate this unfamiliar house. He follows the sounds of noise coming from what is probably a kitchen.

When he gets to what is, indeed, the kitchen, he sees none other than his father. His father who’s pouring a cup of coffee from an old, normal, non-electronic coffee maker, rather than the stupid Hildy one that he swears up and down that he absolutely despises but has still never gotten rid of.

After he gets over his shock of seeing his dad there, in front of him, alive and well, he rushes towards him and hugs him tightly. Dad lets out a little grunt and seems to be surprised but sets down his coffee mug after a moment to hug Chris back. Christopher still isn’t sure if this is a dream or not, but the hug feels… well, it feels real, not the way that it usually feels when you interact with someone in a dream.

Christopher doesn’t let go of him for a good long while, but that doesn’t stop Dad from commenting, “Well, you’re up early. I mean, I guess so am I considering both of us have the day off.”

Christopher finally pulls back from the hug, and the first thing he decides to ask is, “Dad, why are we in Texas?”

Dad stares at him for a minute, as if he’s the crazy one. “We… live here?”

Christopher frowns.

“I’m sorry, is there a punchline coming?” Dad asks after another moment.

Christopher shakes his head. “We don’t— We don’t live in Texas, Dad. We— we live in L.A.”

At this, Dad begins to look concerned and presses the back of his hand to Christopher’s forehead. “Bud, are you feeling alright? We haven’t lived in L.A. in years.”

Years? Christopher didn’t exactly look in the mirror in this weird dream thing, but he’s fairly certain he’s still 14.

“Where’s Buck?” he tries instead.

Dad pauses to think, and Christopher can see him scrolling through a list of people in his head. “Who’s Buck? Is that one of your friends from school or something?”

What the actual heck? Because there’s no way Dad could ever forget Buck. Not when he’s— well, he’s Buck.

“He’s— He’s Buck. He’s your best friend, Dad, your boyfriend. You guys are gonna get married.”

Dad frowns and pulls Christopher into a very unfamiliar dining room and sits him down at the table. “Chris, are you sure you’re okay? Did you have a really strange dream? Because we don’t live in L.A., we don’t know anyone named Buck, and I—” Dad looks a little uncomfortable as he speaks the next part, “I definitely do not have a boyfriend.”

“No, Dad, we do live in L.A., we’ve lived in L.A. since 2018. And we’ve known Buck for that long. You both work at the 118. You guys have been best friends forever and then you started dating a couple years ago. Dad, you— you really love him, and you told me you were gonna ask him to marry you. You can’t have forgotten Buck.”

Dad’s eyes go wider and wider as he speaks and after Christopher finishes, Dad just waits and stares at him. After he seems to gather his thoughts, he says, “Um, look, we— we did move to L.A. in 2018. But— I worked at Station 6, Chris. We do not currently, nor have ever, known anyone named Buck. I’m definitely not dating a man.” When he says it, it comes out quickly and Dad avoids Christopher’s gaze. It reminds Christopher of the way Dad acted a lot long before he and Buck started dating. “And— we moved back here in 2019,” he finishes quickly.

Christopher’s chest starts feeling a little constricted, but he doesn’t want to feel like he did earlier, so he does his best to steady his breathing, just like Buck showed him. He tries to focus on his dad in front of him. Chris is fairly certain he hasn’t dreamed up the last seven years of his life, but he’s so confused, and Dad is telling him that he’s wrong about everything he’s ever known.

“I don’t know where any of this is coming from,” Dad says softly. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

Christopher shakes his head. “Something’s wrong.” He stands from the table and Dad tries to stop him, but he shakes him off. “Just— just give me a minute, okay?”

Dad looks worried but lets him return to his room. He pulls out his phone and types in a number that he memorized years ago.

It rings once, twice, and then— “Go for Buck.”

“Buck! I’m so glad you answered. Something’s wrong with Dad.”

There’s a pause on the other side and then Buck replies, “Okay, okay. Look, um, I’m really glad you called me…? But if something’s wrong with your dad, you— you really should just, um, you need to hang up and call 911.”

Chris huffs. “No, not like that. He’s just, like, he’s— confused about, I don’t know, life and reality and how the world’s supposed to be, except it’s more than just him because we’re in Texas right now and I don’t remember going to Texas.” He’s met with silence on the other side, so he checks, “Buck, are you still there?”

The answer comes out a little rushed. “Yeah, I’m just— I’m very confused and I— are you sure you’ve reached the right Buck?” Christopher’s heart sinks.

“You’re Evan Buckley, but your friends call you Buck. You work at Firehouse 118 in L.A.,” Christopher tries.

“Uh, yeah— yeah, that’s me,” Buck answers.

“Then I’ve reached the right Buck,” Christopher says.

“Okay, and you are?”

Christopher frowns. “Christopher.”

Buck doesn’t respond.

“Your favorite animal at the zoo is an okapi because you think it looks like someone broke a few animal figurines and hot glued them back together but did it all wrong,” Christopher tries, “You love telling people the story of the first time we went to the zoo together and you always make sure to mention it’s the first time you ever saw an okapi and you didn’t even know they existed before that.” There’s silence on the other end. “You roll your eyes at rom-coms and romance movies because you associate them with being a kid and your big sister making you watch them but you actually love them because of those memories with your sister and the fact that you want to have a love like in all those movies. And you secretly watch them when you’re alone and you always cry when the characters confess their love. Your niece, Jee-yun, is your favorite person in the whole wide world, but you’re too nice to admit it so you just say you love all of your family the same, including all of us kids, but if you did admit it, we’d agree because she really is—”

“How do you know all that?” Buck asks, sounding kind of scared, but curious all the same.

“It’s me. It’s Christopher, Buck.”

More silence.

“You don’t know me?” Chris knows his voice comes out more as a squeak.

“Uh, I’m— I’m not sure?” And Christopher is right back to wanting to cry. His Buck would know him, would recognize him from his voice. Which means—

“You know me, you have to know me,” Christopher says, though he hopes it comes out right with how choked up he’s sounding.

“I don’t— I don’t know—”

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. Something’s wrong. I thought it was just dad, but apparently it’s you too, and I’m really scared, and I don’t know what to do.”

There’s more silence. Buck doesn’t speak, and neither does Chris.

But then, finally, Buck says, “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how to help you.”

Chris hangs up out of frustration, throwing the phone down on his bed as he pushes his glasses up his face and presses his palms into his eyelids to try to stop the tears. His phone starts buzzing and when he looks at it, it’s Buck, calling him back. He declines it. Less than a minute later, it starts buzzing again. He declines it again. Buck doesn’t try a third time.

A text message comes through. I’m sorry, Christopher. I wish there was something I could do.

Christopher doesn’t respond. Once he has sufficiently dried his tears, he leaves his bedroom. Upon entering the living room, he finds his grandparents, sitting on the couch with Dad, having a seemingly serious conversation. It’s weird, seeing them in person. He hasn’t seen them in years, not since they got mad at Dad for dating Buck. They still send Christopher Christmas and birthday gifts, and he gets the occasional facetime to catch up, but he and Dad don’t go to El Paso anymore, and his grandparents definitely don’t visit L.A.

But now, they’re here, in the living room with Dad, no animosity or awkwardness to be seen from either side. But he supposes that makes sense, remembers the way Dad had flinched earlier at the mere implication of him dating a man. Yikes.

They all stop talking the second they notice Christopher.

His grandmother turns to him instantly and says, “Hey, sweetheart, we heard you were a little confused.”

He’s about to insist that he’s not confused, that they’re the ones who are confused, when his grandfather joins in. “You know, mijo, I bet you just had a really intense dream. That happens sometimes. And then afterwards we get a little confused about what’s real and what’s not.”

Chris frowns and crosses his arms. “I’m not confused,” he insists. “I didn’t dream up seven years of my life. You guys are the confused ones and I— I don’t know what’s happening, but something weird is going on.”

They both give him pitying looks, and he knows he’s not going to be able to get through to them. He’s just hoping he can get through to his dad. His dad, who isn’t giving him that same pitying look. No, Dad’s brow is furrowed, and he’s looking at Christopher with worry in his gaze, along with a good amount of confusion. But in his eyes, Christopher can see it, he can see the determination, to help, to fix this, and Chris knows that with that look on his side, it’s only a matter of time until he can get Dad to believe him.

His grandmother leans forward in her seat. “Well, now, of course you didn’t dream it all up, your dad says it sounds like some things were the same in your dream, it was just more… exaggerated.”

“But it wasn’t a dream!” Christopher replies stubbornly, just barely keeping his voice below shouting level, he’s not trying to get in trouble here. “If anything, this is the dream.”

His grandfather frowns and looks around. “Look around you, Christopher. Does it seem like this is a dream?”

Christopher looks around, and… no, it really doesn’t. He’s already tested the theory a little and it’s much too vivid to be a dream.

“Have you tried pinching yourself? Seeing if you wake up?” His grandfather tries again with a chuckle. Christopher’s not in the mood, this isn’t a laughing matter to him.

Christopher huffs. “Just because it’s not a dream doesn’t mean it’s real. Maybe it’s… maybe it’s an alternative reality. A parallel universe or something.” He looks over at his dad, really hoping he can get something out of him this time. Surely, Dad knows what he means. Buck had been the one who had been into Marvel a lot more and convinced them to watch everything in the MCU, but he and Dad had seen some of them before, so surely in a Buck-less universe they would still be aware to a certain extent?

Dad does look at him, seemingly considering the idea.

Before he can say anything though, Christopher’s grandmother is speaking up, “See, Eddie, and this is why you shouldn’t let him watch all those movies. I told you they’re bad for him and they rot kids up brains right up.”

Christopher’s not really in the mood to listen to his dad get lectured over stuff that isn’t even a problem, and he’s already over the pitying looks and the patronizing comments from his grandparents, so he just sighs and says, “Look, I dunno. Maybe it really was a weird dream. Can I go to my room and play video games now?”

Dad’s frown deepens, like Christopher’s easy submission worries him even more, but his grandparents seem pleased. His grandfather gives him a pat on the back as he shuffles back to his bedroom, while his grandmother starts on her long rant about the effects of video games and the violence in them, too. The second he’s back in his room, he pulls out his laptop, which, thankfully, he still has. He also digs through his desk to find one of his dad’s credit cards. Ha! He snatches it and hides it in his desk sometimes, but his dad doesn’t use it often enough to ever notice it’s missing. And thus far, he’s never said anything about the few extra charges on Roblox. Christopher’s just glad that whatever weird alternate universe things are happening, some things never change.

It only takes him half an hour to find an airline that will allow someone his age to fly alone that also has flights soon. And within that half an hour, his plane ticket is booked. He shoves what he feels like is absolutely necessary into his backpack and sneaks out the back door, with Dad still distracted by his grandparents that he doesn’t even hear him leave.

The Uber driver gives him a few questioning looks on the ride to the airport but doesn’t say anything. It’s a bit of a mess getting through the airport on his own as he’s never really paid that much attention before because he always had his dad there with him, but there’s a first time for everything. Plus, many of the staff and surrounding travelers seem to think he’s simply adorable, which, ugh, he’s not a kid, but they’re all willing enough to point him in the right direction.

It’s not until the flight is boarding that his phone starts getting flooded with text messages and calls from his dad. And he keeps sending his dad to voicemail, because what would he even say? But the texts and voicemails he gets are all along the lines of Christopher you better not get on any planes. Oops. Well, seems like Dad found out. Christopher expected him to, obviously, there’s only so much he can get away with when every account and card he used was his father’s, but honestly, Dad isn’t at the airport right now, so Chris would really like to see him try to stop him.

Within a few hours, he’s landing in L.A. and ubering to the firehouse. He spends the whole ride jittery, not even sure what he’s going to say once he gets there, not after his disastrous phone call with Buck earlier. Heck, he’s not even really sure if the people he wants to be there will be there. Buck answered his call super easily earlier, which could mean he’s on shift, but not on a call, or… well, or it could mean he’s not working right now.

Whatever, first stop the firehouse, and if they’re not there, he’ll try Buck’s old apartment. He’s not really expecting Buck to just suddenly recognize him in person even though he didn’t over the phone, but… well, he really doesn’t know what to do, and even though he had been making slow, minimal progress with Dad, he’s sure that Buck will be a lot more willing and eager to help, especially if Christopher travels all this way to get here.

The firefighter cleaning the engine when Christopher walks in— something Paulson? He thinks??— regards him with a strange look. Which, well, Christopher doesn’t know the guy very well in his normal life, let alone in this strange reality where Buck doesn’t even know him, so he’ll give him a pass today.

“Is Buck here?” he asks timidly.

“Upstairs.”

Christopher nods and marches along to the staircase. He gets more weird looks from the firefighters in the station, clearly wondering who Christopher is to walk around like he owns the place. Whatever, he’s got more important business at the moment.

“Hello?” Bobby greets, coming down the stairs to meet him.

“Hi, Bobby,” Christopher acknowledges politely. As expected, Bobby is a little taken aback that Christopher knows his name.

“I’m sorry, have we met?”

“Not in this lifetime, apparently,” he answers bluntly. Which, admittedly, is pretty confusing, and not the way he’d ever talk to Bobby in his real life. But he’s getting sick of being the only person who seems to be confused around here.

“O…kay. Do you need any help?” Bobby asks. And Christopher isn’t sure if he’s offering to help him up the stairs or inquiring because of the fact that he’s just waltzed into a fire station.

“No, thank you,” Christopher returns. Bobby just walks up the stairs beside him.

Bobby huffs out a laugh. “Alright, well may I ask what you’re doing here?”

“I’m looking for Buck,” Christopher replies simply.

“Buck!” Bobby calls out, and Buck jogs over just in time to meet them at the top of the staircase. “You’ve got a visitor.”

Buck smiles. It reminds Christopher of the smile he had so many of the first times they met. Non-threatening, just a general ‘pleased to meet you’ smile with a hint of Buck’s love for kids peeking through. “Well, hello there. You’re here for me?”

The smile, though… it’s not Buck’s ‘Christopher’ smile. Not that plain adoration and contentedness. Buck doesn’t recognize him. Still. And Chris expected this, he did, but it doesn’t make the heart break any better.

“I’m Christopher,” he introduces.

Buck’s eyes go wide. “Uh—” he stammers, “oh, uh, I, uh— I thought you were in Texas?”

Christopher shrugs. “I came to L.A.”

Buck’s eyes go even wider. “Buddy, where are your parents?”

He’s not entirely sure how to say ‘well, one half of them is in front of me,’ so he settles on shrugging and saying, “Probably in Texas.” He’s not actually sure if that’s true, hence the shrug. He’s not sure what happened to Mom in this universe, but she hadn’t been there, no signs of her anywhere in the house, and it makes him wonder if her fate in this universe was similar to his regular one. As far as Dad, well, he might be on a plane to L.A. for all Christopher knows. He’s been a bit too afraid to check his messages since he landed, just focused on getting to the station.

Buck gives him an incredulous look. He opens his mouth and closes it a few times. Bobby looks at Buck like he’s waiting for him to explain, but Buck just shrugs and shakes his head at Bobby.

Christopher huffs. “Look, it doesn’t really matter where they are, though, cause you’re my dad.”

Buck looks like he’s gonna pass out as he looks at Christopher, which, yeah, okay, maybe he could’ve worded that a little better, but quite frankly it’s Buck’s fault for not knowing and understanding so then Chris wouldn’t have to explain what he means by that. Bobby’s eyes go wide in Buck’s direction, and he looks a little like he’s gonna pass out, too. Or like he’s gonna ground Buck for life. Christopher doesn’t really think Bobby has the power to ground Buck, not the way that Dad surely will Chris after fleeing to L.A., but he’s sure that Bobby could find a comparable punishment. Hen, Chimney, and Ravi completely whip their heads around and towards the stairs from where they were pretending not to eavesdrop on the couch.

Bobby’s the one who breaks the stunned silence. He slowly and carefully says, “Buck, do you have something you want to tell us? I mean, you’re more than welcome to talk privately in my office if you need to—”

Buck shakes his head and says, “No, no, I—” He turns back to Christopher. “Look, buddy, I think you might be confused because I— I would know if I had a kid.”

Christopher tries to say something, to clear up his initial statement, but Chimney’s already speaking, “Buck, how long had your 1.0 days been going on before you started here?”

Christopher isn’t quite sure what that means, but Buck and Bobby both make faces at Chimney’s words.

“How old are you anyway, kiddo?” Hen asks gently.

“Fourteen,” Chirstopher informs.

They all appear to do a little mental math before Buck mumbles, “It’s… possible.”

“Buck,” Bobby says softly.

Since the room’s finally a little quieter, Christopher is finally able to jump in. “He’s not my biological dad, but… but he’s my dad.” Most of them just stare at Christopher and Buck, seemingly considering this fact and how it fits in with the things that they know about Buck. Chimney’s the first one who seems ready to say anything but as soon as he’s opening his mouth, Hen puts a hand on his shoulder and shakes her head.

“I’m not your biological dad, but I’m… your dad?” Buck repeats. There’s a minute where it looks like he’s trying to piece it together in his mind. His eyes flick to Bobby for a second and understanding seems to take over his face. “Okay.”

“Well, you’re gonna be my stepdad soon,” Christopher elaborates.

This seems to draw more loud comments and gasps from their spectators. Most along the lines of “She has a kid?!” and “Buck, did you know?” Christopher is thoroughly confused, but that’s proving not to be a new feeling today.

“No,” Buck clarifies to the rest of them, “No, she doesn’t. This is… something else.” He turns back to Christopher and asks, “Look, how about we go sit down and you can explain it all to us?” Christopher nods and follows Buck and Bobby to take seats over by the others.

As they walk over, Bobby mutters to Buck, “If the bell rings, you’re man behind, yeah?”

Buck starts, “Cap—” but then glances at Chris and says, “Yeah, that’s— that’s probably for the best actually, thanks.”

When they get settled, Buck doesn’t ask any of the others to leave, and Christopher doesn’t really care if they’re around. They’ve all always been family, so it shouldn’t matter what’s said now. However, it does mean that there’s five sets of eyes all watching him carefully and he finds himself squirming in his seat, uncomfortable with all the attention.

Christopher carefully recounts the situation to fill them in all in, how he woke up in Texas, but he’s not supposed to be living in Texas, and how everyone is super confused about what’s real and what isn’t.

“And Buck’s been in my life since I was really little. I mean, he basically raised me, or helped a lot at least,” Christoher finishes.

Buck regards the rest of the room carefully before trying his question. “So, I’m, like, getting married to your mom?”

Christopher frowns at him, then realizes he hasn’t filled in that specific piece of the puzzle in all his explanations. “No, my dad.”

Hen, Chimney, Bobby, and Ravi’s heads all turn to Buck. Buck’s eyes go wide, and he shakes his head. “No, I’m— you’re— you’ve got to be mistaken. I’m straight.”

Hen is the first one to jump in by saying, “Buck, you don’t have to—”

“No,” Buck cuts her off calmly, “no, I’m not gay.” He looks over at Hen and Ravi and adds quickly, “Not that there’s anything wrong with that! I just— y’know, not me.”

Christopher frowns. It’s not quite the same resistance as Dad, but it’s confusing enough. He remembers when Buck and Dad sat him down and Buck explained that he was bisexual and so even though he dated girls, he might date guys, too. It was shortly after he and Taylor broke up, but still many months before Dad and Buck started dating. Christopher isn’t sure what may have changed in this universe that the same wouldn’t be true.

Hen says, “It’s okay, Buck.” Then she turns to Christopher, “Look, are you sure it’s not you who’s confused? Do you remember hitting your head or anything lately?” She gets up and slowly moves toward him, like she’s going to check him for a head injury.

Christopher moves back in his seat and shakes his head. Buck puts a gentle hand on Hen’s arm to stop her. “No, I’m not confused,” Christoper insists. “I didn’t hit my head, I didn’t have a bad dream, okay? I didn’t make up seven years of my life.” He looks around the room. “None of you know me, right?”

Ravi gives him a pained expression. “I mean, should we?”

“Yes!” Chris all but shouts. “Yes, you should because we’re all family. And something’s wrong, because you guys don’t remember me, but you should.”

“I’m sorry, kid,” Bobby says.

Christopher lets out a frustrated groan because they still don’t get it, they don’t believe him. “Look, even if you don’t know me, I know you, I know you all.” He looks at Bobby. “Bobby, you’re— you’re like the grandpa I always wanted but never had. You’ve always been so kind and supportive of me and my dad and Buck. I love eating everything you make, and I love the fact that you teach Buck how to cook because it means I get to eat your great recipes at home, and I don’t have to deal with Dad’s cooking.” They all chuckle a little, and he turns to Hen. “Hen, Denny’s one of my best friends. Even though we don’t go to the same school, I love getting to play video games with him. I love going over to your house and getting to ask Karen all sorts of super interesting questions because she just knows everything. Chimney, I still don’t know why they call you Chimney because everyone says it’s not a kid appropriate story, but you always say you’ll tell me the whole thing when I’m grown up. You and Aunt Maddie are some of my favorite people and I love having a baby cousin even if she is a little annoying sometimes and doesn’t know how to play games right.” By this point, they’re all just staring at him in disbelief, unsure but curious as to how he knows all these things about their lives. “Ravi,” he says finally, “I’m really glad you joined the team. You never make me feel like I’m being annoying when I want to hang out with you at the firehouse instead of anybody else, and you still get a lot of my references even if you are kinda old because you’re not as old as everybody else and that’s really cool.” They all laugh at that, too.

“I don’t know what’s happening,” Chimney says once Christopher’s done. “I don’t know where this kid came from, but I don’t think you can deny that, I mean he’s clearly not making this up, and I don’t think he just somehow magically knew all these things about us.”

“So you’ll help me?” Christopher asks, trying not to get his hopes up too high. And he doesn’t mean to, but he turns his gaze to Buck and then just watches as Buck’s face melts.

“Of course,” Buck answers.

“Where do we even sta—” Ravi begins, but is cut off.

“Christopher!” a voice calls. And there’s the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. Dad. Well. “Christopher!”

Chris turns from his position to look over at his dad. “Hi Dad.”

He figured this would happen. He thought he at least had a little more time. He gets up and makes his way over to his dad. Dad strides over and rather than ripping him a new one, he grabs Christopher and pulls him into a tight hug.

“God, you scared me so bad, Chris.”

Christopher hugs him back. “I know, and I’m really sorry.”

Dad pulls back and looks at Christopher sternly. “I don’t think you do know. You cannot ever do that again.”

“I won’t!” Chris insists. Because, truly, he really hopes he never is in extenuating enough circumstances where he wants or feels like he has to do this again.

There’s an awkward noise behind Christopher, somewhere between a cough and someone clearing their throat, and he already knows it’s Buck. When Dad pulls away from the hug and stands back up fully again, he and Buck regard each other carefully.

“You guys really don’t know each other?” Christopher asks.

“No,” they say at the same time, then both give an awkward chuckle.

Christopher huffs. “Dad, this is Buck. Buck, this is my dad.”

“Eddie Diaz,” Dad says, holding out his hand for a handshake.

“Buck— uh, Evan Buckley,” Buck says, taking Dad’s hand with an awkward little grin. They both stare at each other some more and the handshake lasts just long enough to start to get weird before they both clearly realize it and pull away. Yep, same old Dad and Buck alright. Buck is the first to speak again. “Uh, look, so I’m still really confused about what’s going on here, and, like, if this is some super elaborate pickup line—” Dad’s eyes go wide, “—I should just— I mean, you should know I’m flattered, really, but I’m not into guys.”

“No, no, me— me either,” Dad replies. “Very straight. All straight here.” His eyes do one more full body glance at Buck, then he adds, “Not attracted to men in the slightest.”

Buck doesn’t seem to notice Dad’s weird behavior, which makes sense, Chris supposes, if he doesn’t know Dad enough to know what might be considered weird. Or maybe it’s that Buck is being weird, too, a little redder in the face and seemingly more jittery than he was before Dad arrived. “Good, cause I really didn’t want to have to have a conversation about the moral or ethical implications of using your child for a super elaborate pickup line like this. Or how much weird personal stuff he knew about me and my friends.”

Dad raises an eyebrow at this. “He— He knew stuff about you guys?”

Buck bits his lip, but nods. “Yeah, a— a lot actually.”

Dad looks at Christopher again, finally taking his eyes off of Buck. And Christopher sees it in his eyes. Dad… believes him.

“Well,” Chimney interrupts as he appears beside them with a pat on Buck’s shoulder, “it’s a good thing it wasn’t a pickup line because our Buck here is very very happily taken. Engaged, in fact.”

Christopher frowns. “You’re engaged?”

Buck shoots a glare at Chimney, who backs off a bit. He looks a bit embarrassed for it to be mentioned, suddenly avoiding Christopher or Dad’s gazes. “Uh, yeah, her, uh, her name is Taylor.”

“Taylor?” Christopher screeches. “Like— like Taylor Kelly Taylor?”

Buck looks back up at him, shocked that he seems to know who Buck is talking about but nods anyway. And how could Chris not know Taylor. She was the only girlfriend Buck had who was around long enough to ever really be in Christopher’s presence, but he’s sure that even if there were others, she would’ve been the only one who was ever truly that… memorable.

“See the kid who doesn’t even know us doesn’t like her,” Chimney snarks.

“I do know you,” Christopher corrects. “And unfortunately, I also know Taylor.”

“Well,” Buck defends, “I’m sure she’s… different, in your version of events.”

Chimney hums to himself. “Once a— witch, always a—”

Buck whirls on him and smacks his arm. “Can you not right now?”

“Okay,” Dad interrupts, “well, I don’t know what’s happening, but Chris, we’re going home. Come on. And you will be promptly grounded once we get there.” He turns back towards the stairs.

“Can we please stay for a little longer, Dad?” Christopher begs, moving just next to Dad to be in his line of sight. “We came all the way out here we shouldn’t waste it. Maybe we could go see Tía Pepa or something?”

Dad sighs. “I mean… yeah, yeah I suppose I need a moment to figure out the plane tickets anyway, so we might as well.” Dad starts to move.

“Wait,” Buck says, “so you’re just leaving?”

Dad glances back in Buck’s direction, but turns away as if the simple look is enough to burn him. “We have to get home.”

“You don’t believe him?” Chimney asks.

Dad sighs, but he doesn’t turn around. “I’m not really sure what to believe at the current moment.”

“What if he’s right?” Chimney questions. “What if he’s telling the truth? And there’s some sort of weird magic or, like, parallel universe thing going on here? We can help him.” Dad turns finally to look at Chimney.

“We can?” Buck asks.

Chimney shrugs. “I don’t actually know, but— we can try, you know?” He turns to the rest of them. “Right?”

Bobby’s eyebrows shoot up. “Look, I love helping people as much as any of us, but I wouldn’t even know where to start with this. Good luck, though.” And with that, he retires to the couch.

Chimney looks at Hen and Ravi desperately. Hen just shrugs a little sheepishly, “Magic and parallel universes and stuff were always your thing, Chim.”

Ravi raises his hands in surrender. “This one feels a bit above my pay grade.”

Chimney groans. “You people are useless!” He turns back to Buck.

“See?” Dad says, gesturing to the team. “It’s better if we just leave.”

“No,” Buck says firmly. Dad looks at him, eyebrow raised. “It’s not better if you leave. You can— you should stay. Just for a little longer.”

Dad holds Buck’s gaze for a long, silent moment. “Okay, just for a little longer.”

The four of them move to one of the tables in the loft.

“I don’t mean to— to interrupt your shift,” Dad adds as they’re walking.

Buck shrugs. “It’s fine. I’m man behind, so don’t worry about it.”

Dad huffs. “God, I hate being man behind.”

Buck chuckles. “No, I get it. Me, too. You’re a firefighter?”

“Yeah,” Dad replies as they sit down at the table. “Back home in El Paso.”

Chimney claps his hands and says, “Cool, let’s—”

But Buck talks over him. “El Paso, huh? You know I’ve traveled a lot of the country, but I only started firefighting when I settled in L.A. I’ve always wondered if it looks different other places.”

“Eh, some parts are different, others are exactly the same,” Dad informs.

Buck lights up at this insight. “Really?”

“Okay, gentlemen—” Chimney tries again.

“Yeah,” Dad agrees, “I mean, I can’t speak for everything cause I wasn’t really in L.A. long enough to even finish my probie year, but I got the gist.”

Chimney raises an eyebrow at Christopher as Dad speaks. Chris just mouths back, “All the time.” Chimney makes a pained expression.

When Dad and Buck’s conversation has mostly cleared up and they finally seem to remember that there are other people in the room, Chimney says, “Okay, now where to start? Christopher, can you recount your steps this morning?”

“Okay,” Christopher agrees. “Let’s see, well, when I woke up, everything was the same, but then also not. Like, a lot of the stuff I had in my room was the exact same, but it was set up differently, and I didn’t have any of the birthday gifts or Christmas gifts that Buck’s ever given me in my room. And I checked my location and I was in Texas, but we live in L.A.”

“You said you used to live in L.A., though, right?” Buck inquires.

“Yeah, we moved here for a little bit when Chris was young, but… it was too hard, some stuff happened and we moved back.”

“Eddie, Eddie Diaz,” Bobby’s mumbling on the couch. “Eddie, is your name short for anything?” he calls.

“Uh,” Dad stumbles.

“Edmundo,” Christopher answers.

Buck’s eyes light up with glee and he mouths “Edmundo” with a playful raise of his eyebrows.

“Shut up,” Dad grumbles and Buck makes a yelp and jolts like Dad kicked him under the table or something.

“Yes!” Bobby claps. “Edmundo Diaz, one of the best names to ever cross my desk, that’s why I know you. Didn’t we speak on the phone? I remember thinking you would get along well with… with Buck, in fact.”

“Guess you were right about that,” Buck mumbles softly with a shy smile, eyes glancing at Dad and then over at Chris, then back to Dad.

Bobby continues, “You were between picking here and…”

“Station 6,” Dad fills in. “Which is where I ended up.”

“Right,” Bobby replies. “Well, no hard feelings, kid.”

Dad sighs. “Yeah, except apparently that was the wrong decision because I have my son here telling me that in some maybe sort of alternate universe picking the 118 makes my life turn out fantastic.” He looks over at Buck as he says the final word, but Buck is no longer looking in his direction. Christopher groans because he feels like he’s back to watching Dad and Buck awkwardly dance around each other and he was finally done with that, he doesn’t want to start over again.

“Okay, so what else was different about your life here versus in Christopher’s timeline?” Chimney questions. “Let’s start with back when you lived in L.A. and then make our way from there.”

“And that’ll… help us figure this thing out?” Dad asks what they’re all thinking.

“Not necessarily,” Chimney answers, “but we need more information before we can figure out where to go from here.”

“Okay, let’s see,” Dad hums, “We moved to L.A. when Christoper was seven. I started working at Station 6—”

“Instead of the 118,” Buck adds.

“Right,” Dad agrees.

“Why did we move back?” Christopher asks.

“Uh,” Dad frowns, his gaze nervously flicks around to the three of them as they regard him curiously, all wondering the same thing. “Christopher,” Dad says softly, “in your version of events… your mom and I, did we… divorce… or…?”

Christopher shakes his head. “No, no, she— Mom died.”

Dad nods, and he doesn’t look surprised. “Right, okay. Same here. And after… that, it was just— it was too difficult to be here. I was already struggling with childcare, but then your mom was back in our lives and we were doing fine, but after she— it was just— the straw that broke the camel’s back, I guess. My parents had been pressuring me to move back and they just made a good point that back in El Paso, I’d have more help, so… we moved back.”

Christopher frowns. He doesn’t remember a ton from when they first moved to L.A., but knows there were a few hushed arguments between Dad and Tía Pepa, and he supposes that was probably why. “What about Carla?” he asks.

“Who’s Carla?”

Christopher sighs when he realizes. “Buck introduced you to this lady. She helps us a lot. She’s the reason I started going to this school that I really really like. And she watches me sometimes and, like, gives me rides to and from school when needed. She’s really great and she’s like the nicest person ever. Her name is Carla.”

Something seems to click in Buck’s brain. “Carla… Carla Price?”

“Yeah,” Christopher confirms.

A small smile appears on Buck’s face. “God, I haven’t spoken to Carla in… ages. But I can see how she definitely could’ve helped you. She is red tape’s worst nightmare.”

Chimney raises an eyebrow at him, clearing curious about who Carla is to him. Buck ducks his head, before picking it back up and mumbling, “She was the home health care aid of Patricia.” When this doesn’t ring any bells for Chimney, he adds, in a voice so quiet that he might as well just be mouthing the words, “Abby’s mom.”

Chimney catches the words, though, and loudly exclaims, “Abby?!”

Which then gets an “Abby?” from Bobby and a “Why are we talking about Abby?” from Hen, and a significantly quieter, “Who’s Abby?” from Ravi.

“Who’s Abby?” Dad asks Buck directly.

“Just… an ex,” Buck replies with a shrug.

“Oh, not just any ex,” Chimney adds. “The ex.”

Dad raises his eyebrows teasingly at Buck, and repeats Chimney’s words in a slightly mocking tone. Buck laughs and blushes a little at Dad’s teasing. Barf.

“It was… a long time ago,” he says finally. “And that’s not the point right now.” Buck focuses on Chris. “Okay, so I introduce your dad to Carla, and she helps you guys, so then you don’t move back to El Paso.”

Christopher shrugs. “I guess. And we have everyone else, too. Chim, Maddie, Hen, Karen, Bobby, Athena. They all made it a lot easier and helped us a lot when Mom died. And you, too, Buck, of course.”

Dad frowns. “Sorry, who are all of these?”

Buck’s eyes go wide. “Shi— Uh shoot, sorry, you don’t know everyone. Uh, okay, so Chimney,” he points at Chimney, sitting at the table with them. “He’s married to my sister, Maddie. Uh, that’s Hen,” he points her out, “Karen’s her wife. And then Bobby, who’s married to Athena. Oh, and, uh, that’s Ravi.” Ravi waves a hand at his name being said without even looking up from his phone. “But, honestly, beyond being a team, we’re… we’re family, you know? We— we look out for each other.”

“Station 6 wasn’t really like that,” Dad comments. “My current house… well, I’m close with some of them, but you guys seem… This seems like a really good team to be a part of.”

“It’s the best,” Buck agrees with a giddy smile.

“I mean,” Chimney starts again, “all I can see is that we have some strange butterfly effect after Eddie went to Station 6, which leads to him never meeting Buck, and then all these other things not happening.”

The words never meeting Buck immediately stand out in Christopher’s head. They ring in his ears and his face falls. “Shit,” he curses.

Dad doesn’t even scold him for his language, just immediately says, “Chris? What’s wrong?”

“This is all my fault,” Christopher admits.

Buck shakes his head and reaches out to set a hand on Christopher’s shoulder. “No. No, bud, I’m sure it’s not. Why would you think that?”

“I wished for this,” Christopher says through the sobs that are quickly bubbling up his throat. He puts his head in his hands. “I wished for that you two had never met.” He barely gets the words out before the tears start falling. “I didn’t mean it, I didn’t, I swear, I—”

Dad’s right there by his side, rubbing his back and saying, “It’s okay, Christopher.”

To his surprise, Buck is also out of his chair and crouched on the ground beside him, hand gently resting on his leg and eyes trying to meet Christopher’s through the gaps between Christopher’s fingers.

“Okay,” Chimney says, not acknowledging the scene in front of him. Christopher’s a little grateful, even though he knows Chimney, this Chimney doesn’t know him and he’s still feeling a little awkward about the fact that he’s now bawling in front of someone who might as well be a stranger. Despite the fact that this Buck doesn’t know him either, he doesn’t feel that same discomfort from Buck’s presence. “Okay,” Chimney repeats, “so we’ve definitely got some sort of magic or something going on here. You wished for that and the universe granted it by giving you this timeline of events in which they never met.”

Christopher picks his head up out of his hands, tears still streaming down his face, to ask, “B-But, how do I f-fix it? I don’t want to stay here. I— I can’t stay here.”

Dad and Buck both look a little upset at his words, but they’ve got to understand what he means, right? That he needs to get back home to his life and his family and his version of events, even if it’s screwed up because he’s fighting with Buck and Dad might be… not well.

“Right,” Dad agrees. “And then we can all get back to… the way our lives are supposed to be.” He looks… disappointed when he says it, eyes glancing over at Buck in a way that Christopher might be tempted to describe as longing.

Dad looks away right as Buck looks over at him. Buck finally leaves the ground beside Christopher to sit back in his seat, putting on a clearly fake smile as he says, “Yep, you can get back to your life in Texas, and pretend this crazy day never happened.”

Dad meets Buck’s eyes now. “And we can go back to… not interacting.”

“Right.”

“Right.”

“Right!” Chimney interrupts, breaking whatever weird tension is going on, for which Christopher is eternally grateful. “Well, in media, there’s always something you gotta do, right? An end goal. Some lesson the universe wants you to get out of this before it’ll let you back to your life. So, I guess you gotta… figure out what that is?”

Dad huffs. “That would work phenomenally if this was a work of fiction, but I’m not if you’ve noticed,” he gestures around them, “this is real life.”

“Well, I don’t exactly see you offering up solutions,” Chimney quips.

“You’re not exactly providing anything concrete either, Chim,” Buck shoots back.

“At least it’s a start, Buckley.”

Buck turns back to Dad and Chris, looking a little helpless, and completely distraught about this fact. “Look, um, my shift’s ending soon, so how about we just take a minute. You can go see your aunt and then we can reconvene later? See if any of us comes up with anything?”

Before Christopher can reply, Dad shakes his head. “No, we really couldn’t take up any more of your time. We’ll— I’m sure we can figure it out on our own.”

Buck frowns, looking a little like a kicked puppy at having his offer of assistance rejected. “You’re not taking up my time, I’m— I’m offering it. Really, I don’t mind.”

“Buck, you don’t have to—”

Buck’s already up and out of his seat, pulling Dad away. Dad regards Buck carefully, with a skeptical expression and his arms crossed. Christopher isn’t sure if they meant to get far enough that Christopher and Chimney couldn’t hear them, but Chris still can.

“Look, I know this is weird,” Buck is saying in a hushed voice, “and you don’t believe in this or whatever—”

“I didn’t say that,” Dad snaps.

“Okay. Okay, well, you know, you already spent the time and money to come all the way out here, so… I mean three brains is better than two, right? And trust me, I have nothing better to do once I’m off shift. I mean, this is probably the most interesting thing that’s happened to me in, like, years, man. So I don’t want you to deny my help because you think it’s some inconvenience to me.”

Dad just grunts in response.

“And, I mean, think about it the other way around, right? If your son somehow got sent to some weird alternate universe, wouldn’t you hope that that alternate universe version of yourself was doing everything in his power, and using all the resources at his disposal to get Chris back to you?” Buck suggests.

Dad rolls his eyes and says, “I mean, yeah, I guess.”

Buck reaches out, putting a hand on Dad’s elbow, and says more, but Christopher can’t focus it because Chimney is talking to him now.

“Look, kid,” Chimney says, also speaking quietly. “I’m not exactly sure what your key to getting out of this is. I’ll keep brainstorming for sure, but… I know I’m not imagining whatever’s happening with… that.” He gestures vaguely in the direction of Dad and Buck.

“They’re just like they were before they got together in my universe,” Chirstopher explains.

“Well,” Chimney says, “I’m not saying this is the solution to all your troubles, but I don’t think it could hurt to… nudge them together, if you know what I’m saying.”

“What, you want me to, like, parent trap them or something?” Christopher questions.

“Shhh,” Chimney hushes. “But, I mean, it couldn’t hurt, right? If they ended up together in your universe, and they’re acting like that despite the fact that they barely know each other in this one? Who’s to say they’re not supposed to end up together every time? And I’m not making any promises about this solving your issue, but there’s always true love’s kiss, right?”

Christopher thinks that Chimney most certainly has a point, and he’s glad to be validated on it, knowing that it’s not just his brain seeing what it wants to see because he thinks Dad and Buck should just always be together. But— “Doesn’t Buck have a girlfriend or whatever?”

Chimney huffs, rolling his eyes. “Ah, yes, Taylor, of course. Look, I’m not suggesting your Dad be a homewrecker or something, but I don’t think that home is very stable in the first place, so… I think Buck is too nice to ever break it off with Taylor, but I think even a nudge in the right direction, to make him realize that there could be something better out there for him? Really, your dad would be doing us all a favor, helping to put an end to that.”

Christopher doesn’t get to respond to Chimney’s words, because Buck and Dad are coming back over. “Alright, Chris,” Dad says, “let’s get going so they can get back to work.” He turns to Buck, pulling his phone out and tapping the screen a few times before handing it over. “Here, let me get your number and we can figure out when and where we’ll be meeting when you’re off work.”

Bobby’s walking over now, glancing over at the clock. “Buck, why don’t you head out now?”

Buck frowns. “Cap, there’s still—”

“We’ll be fine,” Bobby interrupts.

Dad guides Christopher back towards the stairs so they can start making their way down while Buck wraps up his conversation with Bobby.

“Think about what I said,” Chimney calls after them.

Christopher looks over his shoulder as he walks and answers, “I’ll do my best.”

Chimney gives him a little salute, and Chris giggles.

“What did he say?” Dad asks.

Christopher shrugs. “Just some thoughts about what to do.” Christopher’s not even sure how to go about doing Chimney’s suggestion, or if it’d help him, but at least it’s one idea. And he knows he just needs a little more time to figure out a plan and set it in motion.

As they’re getting to the bottom of the stairs, Christopher hears Buck bounding down the stairs behind them. “Just give me a moment to change, okay?”

Buck rushes into the locker room.

“We’re gonna figure this out,” Dad tells Christopher softly.

“Thanks, dad,” Christopher replies.

“I know I’m not, like— your version of me,” Dad says nervously, “but— I’m still me. And I still love you.”

“I know.”

They’re silent for a moment, Dad’s gaze clearly wandering around the firehouse because he’s not as used to it as Christopher is. Chris immediately spots the moment Dad sees Buck through the glass locker room walls, right as he’s taking his shirt off.

Dad immediately turns his back to the locker room, completely facing Christopher now, and the color of his face rivals the color of the engine. He clears his throat and jumps into scolding Christopher instead. “I understand these were extenuating circumstances but know there will still be consequences for just fleeing the state like that. And taking my credit card.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Christopher replies, despite the fact that they both know that it won’t be him exactly who receives those consequences should they succeed. But he’s also not sure how all of this alternate universe stuff actually works. Whatever. Dad’s clearly just clinging to something to talk about that allows him to keep his mind focused on Christopher and his back facing the locker room.

Buck approaches them and says, “Alright, all set to go?”

Dad nods. “Where are we going?”

Buck hums. “How would you feel about just coming back to my apartment? I know it’s not ideal but…”

“Wouldn’t that bother your fiancée?” Dad asks, a hint of snark in his tone on the final word. Christopher almost giggles at how Dad seems to have adopted Chimney’s attitude towards Taylor, even though he doesn’t even know her.

Buck seems a little surprised at Taylor being brought up. His expression gets a lot more nervous when he speaks, like he’s searching for an excuse. “Oh, she… she, uh, she won’t be home.”

Dad raises an eyebrow, definitely judging this response. “I’m just saying, we can go somewhere else if that’s better.”

Buck nods in agreement. “But we also don’t know how long this is going to take. And a public place means worrying about when they close or feeling bad for taking up a table for too long.” Buck’s eyes go wide. “I mean, I’d totally understand if you’re not comfortable with that, though. I am a stranger, and I’d understand if you didn’t want to come over, let alone bring your son there. I mean, I promise I’m not a serial killer… Even if that’s exactly the kind of thing a serial killer would say. I just—”

Dad holds up a hand and Buck stops. Dad’s expression melts a little at how much Buck seems to care. “I… I guess you have a point. And I trust that you’re not a serial killer, even if I probably shouldn’t.”

“So, my place then?” Buck asks sheepishly.

“Sounds good,” Dad agrees.

As they walk out to the parking lot, Dad and Buck are both looking around a little awkwardly. “Uh,” Buck starts, “gonna take a wild guess here and say you don’t have a vehicle in L.A.”

“Oh, really? How’d you figure that out?” Dad teases.

Buck laughs. And, ugh. There it is. That stupid laugh. It’s not Buck’s normal laugh, not like when he actually finds something funny. No, this is more like a little giggle that Christopher’s only ever heard pointed at Dad. Especially when Dad’s just said something that’s so incredibly unfunny, but Buck always thinks Dad’s the funniest person in the world. He thought maybe he’d get a reprieve in this weird timeline, but of course he wouldn’t. Of course, even here, Buck is going to giggle like everything Dad says is the funniest thing he’s heard in his life. Disgusting.

“Uh, you know,” Buck starts after he finishes laughing, “you can get an Uber if that’d make you more comfortable… but, if you want you can always ride me— I mean, ride with me, oh my god.” Buck’s eyes go wide and his face goes bright red. Dad just smirks at him and Christopher isn’t really sure what’s happening, but he’s tempted to just run back into the firehouse and demand someone in there adopt him because it’d be better than dealing with whatever this is. “You can ride with me, in my, uh, in my jeep.” Buck points his vehicle out as he speaks again.

“Sounds good,” Dad agrees, and they follow Buck to the jeep. Dad takes his usual place in the passenger seat with such an ease that you’d think he’d done it a million times before. But he hasn’t. This is the first time this version of Dad has been in Buck’s jeep but immediately looks at home there. Relaxed. Comfortable. Like Christopher is. Christopher thinks of Chimney’s words, about how maybe Buck and Dad are really meant to end up together every time.

Christopher watches as Buck hooks his phone up to the car instinctually but then disconnects it in favor of putting on the radio. His eyes regard Dad carefully as he does so, and Christopher considers providing the context that Dad basically has the same (albeit not always great) taste in music that Buck does so there’s no reason for Buck to be nervous, but he decides to keep his mouth shut.

It doesn’t take long after they pull out of the station, though, before Buck starts humming along to whatever’s playing on the radio. Just humming, not being loud about it like he normally would. Christopher’s sure he’s heard the song before but also knows it’s one of those songs that definitely hit its peak of popularity before he was born. Once it gets to the chorus, Dad starts singing along quietly. Buck immediately notices and looks over at Dad. They share a smile, and both start singing a bit louder and by the next chorus, they’re both belting out the lyrics. Christopher considers if covering his ears is gonna get him scolded for being rude.

The singing isn’t even the main thing that’s bothering him. No, that would be the looks and smiles that Dad and Buck keep throwing each other as they sing. He keeps his mouth shut and his ears unfortunately uncovered because watching Dad give Buck goofy laughs and giggles in between lines is the happiest Chris has seen his dad all day. It almost lets Christopher feel normal again. Like nothing’s wrong and this is his everyday life. He feels like he finally has his parents back.

As the song comes to a close and he has the chance to speak again, he tries, “Hey, can we get ice cream?”

Dad frowns and turns to him. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten that you’re still in trouble.”

Buck doesn’t even seem to notice Dad’s words, though, but instead says, “Oh my gosh! Wait, this is basically you guys’ first time in L.A., and I’ve got the best ice cream place to show you.”

Christopher raises an eyebrow at Dad and mouths, “Please.”

Dad just turns to Buck, who is looking at him and saying, “Do you wanna go?”

Christopher catches the exact moment Dad cracks: the moment he looks at Buck’s eager expression. He keeps his face serious, though, but Chris knows it’s only a matter of time. 3…2…1… His expression softens. “We’d love to.”

And so they pull up to an ice cream place. Christopher expects it to be somewhere they’ve been before. They don’t exactly have one particularly place they go to, opting to try new ones every time they go out, but they have a few they like and have visited multiple times. This one’s probably on the list of ones they have yet to try, but Christopher isn’t really sure. Buck’s the one who handles all of that.

As they get out of the car, Buck strolls up to the counter with ease. “Hey, Melinda!” he greets.

The cashier smiles brightly. “Buck! You’re back! And you’ve brought friends! Finally. Y’know, I was really beginning to wonder if you had those.”

Buck snorts. “Yeah, yeah.” He gestures towards them, “This is my— This is Eddie. And Chris!”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Eddie and Chris, what can I get for you?”

Dad looks at the large menu board clearly a little overwhelmed. Christopher doesn’t have nearly the same apprehension. This place is awesome! He’s going to have to make sure they get a chance to go when he’s back to his real life.

“I’ll have the—” Christopher’s eyes scan over the ice cream flavors “—ooh! Cotton Candy ice cream with… Skittles… oh and Nerds! And Pop Rocks? Oh and—”

“Chris,” Dad warns.

Christopher looks at him a little sheepishly and notices Buck holding back a laugh. Chris turns back to Melinda. “That’s all.”

“Good choices,” she affirms.

Dad’s still looking over the menu, so it’s Buck’s turn to order. His eyes light up when he spots the seasonal special, and so, of course, he gets the pumpkin spice flavor, like the millennial he is. All the attention turns to Dad now. He glances at Buck, his eyes pleading for help.

Buck notices instantly and nods, turning back to Melinda. “He’ll have the Hot Cookie.”

“Alright!” She spouts off their total, and Dad and Buck both take out their wallets.

“I got it.” Buck waves Dad away.

“Buck, no, I can—” Dad shoves his hand forward but Buck bats it away.

“It’s fine,” Buck insists, turning his body a bit more to block Dad from the counter. He continues shoving away Dad’s every attempt at handing his card to Melinda. She shoots Christopher an amused look.

“It was Christopher’s idea, and his ice cream is definitely, like, half the total. I should pay,” Dad explains. Buck’s hand finally catches Dad’s, and he covers Dad’s hand with his own.

“And I was the one who chose this place,” Buck counters. “I got it.”

Dad isn’t able to insist any further because Melinda is grabbing Buck’s card. “Don’t worry,” she tells Dad with a wink, “You can always strong arm him into letting you pay for the next date.”

Buck and Dad both freeze, faces going red. “Melinda, this isn’t—” Buck tries, but she’s already walking away. Buck shrugs it off to Dad. “Sorry, you can ignore her, she’s just…” he trails off.

“Yeah,” Dad replies with a nod. “Right, of course it isn’t. Cause you’re engaged.”

Buck’s eyes go wide. “Right! Right, Taylor. And, uh, and you’re straight, so.”

“Right,” Dad agrees. “Yes, yes, I am… that.”

They continue to stare at each other, so Christopher just clears his throat and says, “I’m gonna go sit down.”

Dad’s gaze snaps to him, as if he’s finally remembering there are other people in the room. “Uh, yeah! Yeah, let’s… let’s go find a table.”

Buck gestures back to the counter. “I’ll— I’ll wait here for the ice cream.”

Christopher hears Chimney’s words in his head. I’m not saying this is the solution to your troubles, but I don’t think it could hurt to… nudge them together.

“Dad,” he suggests, “Why don’t you help Buck? He won’t be able to carry them all himself. I’ll be okay.”

“I wouldn’t blame him if he doesn’t want to let you out of his sight again,” Buck jokes. Dad laughs a little softly. Ha. As if Dad hasn’t spent half of the time since he’d been introduced to Buck unable to take his eyes off the man and seemingly forgetting that anyone else even exists.

Dad ruffles Christopher’s hair. “Just… don’t go too far, yeah?”

So Christopher shuffles away, finding a table for the three of them. He takes out his phone, not really sure how much this whole alternate universe thing will have affected his social media algorithms, but he’s sure he can find something to interest him for a few minutes. He glances up a few times only to see Buck and Dad chatting away.

He’s glad they’re getting along, but he’s not exactly surprised on that front. He wonders if there are a dozen or more parallel universes where they ended up together, even if the circumstances were slightly different. He’d like to believe it’s true, knowing how happy they make each other in his everyday life. Even though he rolls his eyes at them because sometimes they’re gross and embarrassing, he’s still happy they found each other. He doesn’t know enough about this universe’s version of them to really deem that they’re miserable without knowing each other but… well, they might be.

He doesn’t get to think about it for too much longer because Melinda’s handing them their ice cream, saying something else that makes Buck go bright red and Dad bite his lip and look elsewhere, probably pretending to have not heard the comment.

“Here’s your sundae, Chris,” Buck says as he sets it down and sits across from him.

“His abomination, more like,” Dad teases, taking a seat as well. He looks down at his own ice cream. “I still can’t believe you ordered me something called the ‘Hot Cookie.’”

Buck shrugs. “Well, you know, you are what you eat and all that.” He freezes the second the words leave his lips. Dad’s face goes red and he is suddenly very interested in staring at his ice cream. “I just mean— like, um…” Buck eyes trace the table for a few moments, seemingly having a silent conversation with himself before he sits up straighter and looks back up at Dad with a smirk. “I mean, I guess it’s more you eat what you are.”

Dad glances up at him, just barely, and asks, “And what I am is…?”

“Hot,” Buck answers confidently, sending Dad’s gaze straight back down.

Christopher’s really not sure what’s happening, but he’s already over spending time with them. It’s been a few years since Dad and Buck started dating, but honestly, he’d say pretty confidently that this is somehow worse than the before times.

“Why did Melinda say she wasn’t sure you had friends?” Christopher asks. It’s been something that he’s been wondering since they walked up and he’s just trying to find any way to change the subject from whatever weird tension Dad and Buck have found themselves in again.

“Chris,” Dad warns.

“It’s okay,” Buck says with a chuckle. “She’s just— I just… usually come here alone. That’s all.”

“You don’t come here with your friends?” Christopher asks.

Buck shrugs. “I mean, the first day I tried this place, I was with Chim— Melinda wasn’t here that day, of course, just my luck. But then… I don’t know, I liked it enough and it sort of became my special place. I honestly really hoped I’d get to like, bring a date here someday, or, y’know… bring my own kids here one day.” He gestures around to the couples and families around them.

“Do you bring your fiancée here then?” Dad asks, a little snarkier than probably necessary.

Buck frowns, looking down and stabbing his sundae a few times with his spoon. “No… No, she, uh,” he looks back up with a smile that is so clearly fake that Christopher’s sure even Dad notices, “she thought ice cream dates were juvenile.”

Dad’s face does something. It’s like he’s trying to seem genuinely sad for Buck’s sake, but he’s having a hard time hiding his own annoyance. Christopher doesn’t blame him. Of course, Taylor wouldn’t want to go on fun ice cream dates with Buck. She’s not fun and interesting like Dad or even Buck. Christopher doesn’t get why Buck dated her in the first place, and he definitely doesn’t understand why this universe’s Buck wants to marry her, of all people. He’s sure that even if this version of Dad doesn’t know Taylor, he’s probably starting to see that she and Buck just don’t match.

“Well,” Dad suggests, “once you guys have kids, you’d be able to still fulfill that part of your dream, right?”

Buck looks off to his side with a little sad, forlorn look on his face. “Uh, yeah, maybe, some day.” After a moment, he adds so quietly Christopher almost can’t hear him, “I hope.”

Dad clearly sees the need for a change of subject, so he decides to pick on Christopher and his sundae, which is very delicious, thank you.

“Hey, Christopher,” Buck starts, after drawing himself out of whatever trance he had been in. “When did your dad and I…” His eyes flick over to Dad. “I just mean, well, I’m curious, that’s all. Was it soon after we met?”

This question also seems to pique Dad’s curiosity. His eyebrows raise as he looks between Buck and Chris. But then he frowns. “Well, when I moved to L.A., I was still married to Sha— to Christopher’s mom.”

“Yeah,” Christopher agrees. “You guys were friends for a really long time first. From basically the first day.” He thinks about adding the detail that they didn’t exactly get off on the right foot immediately, and it’s something that Dad likes to pick on Buck for, but he decides to leave that part of the story out. “And you would come home talking about him sometimes. But I met Buck for the first time when he drove us home after the earthquake.” The mention of the earthquake doesn’t seem to surprise either of them initially, and Christopher didn’t really think it would, but it’s good to know that the weird changes of this universe seem to just affect Christopher’s life directly and not, like, everything.

Dad seems to do some mental math. “The earthquake? That was… soon.” Chris shrugs. And Dad looks over at Buck with a thoughtful expression. “I must’ve really trusted you,” he comments softly.

Buck smiles a little shyly. “I mean I can definitely see how we could’ve gotten really close. I definitely would’ve wanted to… be your friend.”

“Yeah,” Dad nods, “Me too.”

“So we’re friends,” Buck clarifies. “And then your wife passes in 2019?”

“In May,” Christopher adds. Buck makes a face.

“What’s up?” Dad asks.

Buck shakes his head. “Nothing, just a… tough time for me, too.”

Christopher frowns, immediately piecing together what Buck must mean. “Because of the ladder truck?” Buck seems surprised that Christopher knows about this, but nods.

Dad’s gaze flicks back and forth between the two of them. “What am I missing here?”

Buck shakes his head again. “It’s— it’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

Dad doesn’t seem to believe this but replies. “O…kay.”

Buck refocuses on the topic at hand. “So we were friends for a while, but then we started dating at some point.”

“Yeah, you guys didn’t start didn’t dating until 2023,” Christopher informs. They both look a little surprised at this, like they expected Christopher to say they started dating a lot sooner. “I think it was like… March? Or something like that.” Buck makes a face again, worse than when he had been thinking about the ladder truck bombing.

“M-March 2023?” Buck asks. The question confirms any doubt Christopher had about whether or not the events of this universe were pretty similar. He supposes they must’ve looked slightly different, obviously, but it makes him a little sad to think that they still happened.

“After the lightning strike,” Christopher confirms quietly.

“The lightning strike?” Dad interrupts. “What does that mean? And please don’t say nothing again.” A small part of Christopher feels a little happy that he’s finally not the only person who’s confused by all of this.

Buck takes a deep breath. “In March 2023… I was struck by lightning on the job. My heart stopped for a bit, and— I was in a coma for a few days.”

Dad’s expression softens from the building frustration to just… sadness. “God, Buck, I’m— I don’t know what to say. Jesus.”

Christopher decides to take the moment to speak up and see if he can lighten the moment. “I think— I think you guys were… well, something was happening and you both finally realized it after so many years.” He turns to his dad. “A few months before, you— well, you didn’t really come out to me,” he giggles, thinking of that day so many years prior, “but you just kind of asked me how I would feel about you and Buck dating, which led into you explaining that you wanted to date him and stuff. And then— well, I think you were both scared. But after Buck woke up, you guys talked in the hospital and then—” Christopher shrugs. “And then Buck just stayed with us while he was recovering. And eventually you two told me that you were dating.”

The whole time Christopher is talking, Dad is just watching him intently, but Buck… Buck is watching Dad. Dad finally turns and when his eyes meet Buck’s, both of their gazes snap in different directions.

Dad clears his throat. “So you… you didn’t mind me and Buck dating? It wasn’t weird that I was… dating a guy?”

It feels exactly like the kinds of things Dad said in Christopher’s universe back when Dad came out to him. He rolls his eyes a little playfully. “No, I didn’t mind. Buck had basically been my other dad for so long, it wasn’t weird.” The words come out so naturally because it’s just a piece of information that’s been true for so long that it’s not weird to Chris, but Dad and Buck both give him these soft expressions, he thinks there may even be tears starting to appear in Buck’s eyes.

“But if we were so… close,” Dad questions, “Why did it take so long, for us to… to get together?”

Christopher shrugs, because it’s a question he had asked himself many times in the years before they got together. “I think… I mean, everyone else knew that you guys were… that there was something there, but I don’t think either of you did for a really long time. I don’t even think either of you knew you weren’t straight until each other,” he admits. Dad and Buck aren’t looking at each other, but their faces mirror each other, both making some sort of expression, as if they definitely agree with this piece of information. “And so you dated other people.”

Buck looks back at Chris now. “Like… Taylor?” Christopher nods. “When did we—? Never mind, sorry, I’m— sorry.”

Christopher thinks of Chimney’s dislike of Taylor and how Buck seemed embarrassed for her to be mentioned around anyone else. And he really wants to know more about this Buck’s relationship with Taylor, but, truly, he didn’t know a lot about their relationship in his own version of events. “Something having to do with some news story, I guess? I don’t know really.” He doesn’t really know a lot of the details since Dad was working at dispatch for a while and they didn’t see Buck nearly as often. Just knows that one day Dad came home saying Chimney was in the hospital because a bad guy had hurt him and there were some hushed conversations between Buck and some of the others about Taylor, and then she was a thing of the past.

“Jonah,” Buck says softly in understanding. He sighs, expression full of regret.

Dad gives him a look, hand reaching out across the table, but stops short of touching Buck. He raises his eyebrows at Buck, a silent question of if he wants to talk about it. This moment doesn’t seem to be for Christopher’s eyes, but he watches them carefully anyway, thinking more about what Chimney had said. They somehow seem to get each other this well after only knowing each other for a couple of short hours. Like some kind of soulmates or something else that Buck’s romcoms would say.

Buck shakes his head, though, and instead completely shifts his demeanor. He sits up straighter, gathering their now empty dishes. “What do you say we get out of here?”

Dad agrees quickly and the three of them get up and get back to Buck’s jeep. Somehow in the walk back to the jeep, Dad and Buck seem to forget Christopher even exists, caught up in their own conversation. Christopher finds himself once again forgetting that this isn’t his normal reality because of how well the two are getting along.

While they are driving, though, he’s able to ask to borrow Buck’s phone to ‘change the music’ and takes note of Chimney’s phone number while he has it. He sends Chim a text.

hey its christopher

any other ideas for my… situation???

He’s not sure if he’ll actually hear back. He doesn’t think this version of Chimney would have any reason to be less genuine and he knows his own Chim would still be just as enthusiastic to assist. Luckily, he hears back within minutes.

Well my working theory is that it’s got to do with the reason behind your wish

I’ll let you know if I come up with anything else

Good luck kid!

Hm. See, that’s kind of what Christopher was expecting, but it doesn’t make him feel great. Just thinking about the kinds of things he said to Buck, not just in those last moments in his universe, but honestly everything over the last few days? Well, he’s… he’s ashamed, okay? He was mean, and he wouldn’t feel so guilty saying that kind of stuff to Dad, because, well, that’s Dad. But Buck? Yeah, Buck didn’t deserve that.

Buck and Dad seem to be very off track about the point of all of this and are really just a lot more focused (and interested) in how their current lives differ from their lives in Christopher’s universe. And Chris… well, he’s more than willing to stall. Especially while he tries to think of what the universe or whatever expects him to do. Like, okay, cool, maybe it’s because he was kind of an asshole to Buck, but what is he supposed to do to fix it?

Buck takes them to his loft, and it’s really weird to be back after a year or so since Buck moved in with them pretty quickly after he and Dad started dating. Christopher pays careful attention to the place, expecting it to look quite different. Not that this universe’s Buck is turning out to be all that different, but his life is pretty different, with him having been dating Taylor for a few years. Yet… the loft looks pretty similar to how it had the last time Christopher had seen it in his own life. Pretty similar to how it had looked… after Buck and Taylor broke up, if he’s honest, including the absence of Taylor’s ugly couch. Dad makes a joke about the lack of a couch and Buck just looks a bit nervous about it before they all settle at the table.

“So you really moved away from L.A. after your wife died? Wasn’t Station 6 there for you?” Buck is asking Dad.

Dad shrugs. “I mean, of course they gave me that time and space to grieve. But… I don’t know. It was just— it was really hard. You know, her and I— she wanted to get a—” he stops, looking over at Christopher, who frowns. Dad just looks back to Buck and says sadly, “I never even got the chance to say goodbye. Just got the call from the hospital after she was— she was already gone.”

“I’m sorry,” Buck replies.

Dad waves him off. “It was a long time ago.” He sighs. His gaze finds a spot on the wall as he continues. “But— my parents, they… I don’t love being under their thumb, you know? It’s a decent part of the reason I moved to L.A. in the first place. But they made a good point about us needing that support, and I just— I felt like Christopher needed more support from— from family. So we moved back, and we had my parents, and my sisters, and… it was the right decision for us.” His eyes find Buck once again. “I think.”

Christopher reaches over to his dad, and Dad reaches an arm over the top of Christopher’s chair, pulling him just a little closer, and Christopher doesn’t even mind that much today. As much as he doesn’t want his dad to think he made the wrong decision to move to Texas, it’s important to him that Dad understands the events of his universe as well.

“I think… it was bad, after Mom died, but… I was okay, because I had Buck.” Christopher looks over at Buck now, who gives him a soft smile. “We spent a lot of time together during those times. And we hung out here a lot, or you’d come over to our house and we gave you rides to physical therapy. And,” Christopher can’t help but grin as he continues, “we’d compare PT exercises and our crutches and even though we were all sad a lot, being together made us all feel a lot better.”

When Christopher looks back at Dad, he’s frowning, clearly trying to piece this information together. “You said,” he addresses Buck, “that that was a hard time for you…?”

Buck cringes. “Yeah, I… I got hurt on the job. It was… I was really… I wasn’t doing great mentally for a while there because so much of my identity is tied to being a firefighter and I was really scared I wasn’t going to be able to anymore.”

“Can I ask what happened?” Dad inquires gently.

Buck bites his lip, looking down. “There was this kid going around with package bombs—”

“Right,” Dad agrees. “I remember that.”

“And one of them… well, he put one of them on one of our trucks and…” Buck trails off, taking a moment. He seems to have intention to continue, but a look of understanding seems to take over Dad.

“God, I saw that on the news, that was… that was you?” Buck nods. “Shit, Buck,” Dad breathes, then points at Chris. “You didn’t hear that.” Christopher can’t help but roll his eyes as if he isn’t a literal teenager. His friends say way worse, but he’s not about to tell Dad that.

Buck gives a sheepish little shrug. “It was a long time ago.”

Dad chuckles. “First the lightning thing and now this… You really are one unlucky son of a—” he looks back over at Christopher, “person.”

Buck shrugs. “I’d say so. Since apparently, they happened to me in at least two different universes. It was… a tough time. I mean, the 118 was there for me, obviously, but… I wasn’t doing well. But at least I had Christopher in one of those.” He manages to turn the sentiment around right at the end with a grin in Christopher’s direction, which Chris can’t help but return.

“I wish I was there for you this time around, too,” Christopher admits, reaching out to pat Buck’s arm where it’s resting on the table. “Those were some of the best weeks of my life, even with the tsunami.”

Dad and Buck both go pale at this. “The tsunami?” Dad exclaims. “W-what do you mean?”

Oh. Right. Well.

“Um,” Christophers starts, then stops. “Well, uh, see when Buck was doing better but not back at work yet, we— we went to the pier.”

“No,” Buck breathes, almost as an involuntary reaction.

Christopher nods. “It— It was a really fun morning, and we had a bunch of good food and played a lot of games and we won a bunch. Um, and— and then…”

“The tsunami,” Dad finishes.

“I was at home that day,” Buck says, “Only heard about how horrific it was from my sister and— and the guys at the 118, so— being there, god I couldn’t imagine.” Dad regards Buck carefully.

Christopher shrugs. “You kept me safe,” he explains gently. “And you saved a whole bunch of other people. And it was still scary, but… but it could’ve been worse. And it wasn’t. Thanks to you.” Buck makes an awkward expression at this, like he isn’t sure what to do with Christopher’s words.

Dad is still just staring at Buck, in awe. But eventually, he speaks. “Thank you.”

Buck frowns. “What are you thanking me for?”

“You saved my son.”

Buck shakes his head. “It— it wasn’t this—” he gestures a little vaguely in the air in front of him— “universe. It wasn’t this—” he gestures at himself now— “version of me. There’s no reason you should thank me.”

Christopher is about to disagree, but Dad beats him to it. “I think one thing we’re noticing here is that just because this version of events may be different to what Christopher went through, we all seem to be pretty damn similar. You committed to helping Christopher nearly immediately today, didn’t you?” Buck nods. “You so readily believed him about all of this and were willing to help him and try to figure this out. So I don’t think it’s that far of a stretch to believe that you, just as you are now, are the type of person who would’ve saved him if, god forbid, he had been in a situation like that.”

While Dad is talking, Christopher eyes flick back and forth between Dad’s confident expression and Buck’s face as it gets increasingly redder with every word Dad says.

Christopher knows that he should really work on trying to get home, but he’s still not sure what to do with any of it and really doesn’t want to bring up any of his fights with Buck to them right now. Luckily, he doesn’t have to figure any of it out because his stomach rumbles. Loudly.

Dad’s gaze snaps to Christopher, then back to Buck. “Shoot, I— we really didn’t mean to stay this long. I didn’t even realize it was getting late. I’m so sorry we’ve imposed.”

Buck frowns. “You’re— no, Eddie, it’s— it’s perfectly fine. Trust me. I don’t mind having a little company and I definitely don’t mind trying to help out with this whole weird situation. We’re going to find a solution. I just know it,” Buck assures Christopher, ignoring the fact that they haven’t made any progress in the last who even knows how long.

Dad just nods. “And I appreciate that, but really, we should— we can head out.” He stands.

Buck shakes his head, gesturing Dad to sit back down. “No, no, you can— just stay for dinner and we can continue to figure this out. Because I still don’t have many ideas. But I’m confident I’ll get some. Just— we need a little more time, yeah?”

Dad’s posture relaxes a little, but he doesn’t sit quite yet. “You’re sure it’s okay?”

Buck nods. “Absolutely.”

Dad finally sits back down. “If we’re staying, I can at least buy us food. Anywhere good you like to order from?”

Christopher wants to insist that Buck cook because he loves Buck’s food, but he realizes that might be considered rude since this isn’t technically his Buck, and he’s not really in the mood to hear Dad’s lecturing right now, so he keeps his mouth shut.

Fortunately, he doesn’t have to ask because Buck volunteers. “We don’t have to worry about ordering something, I can make something for us!”

Dad’s eyes go wide. “Oh, I could never ask you to do that.”

Buck grins. “Well, good thing you’re not asking. I’m offering.”

Dad clearly isn’t catching on to how much cooking for them would mean to Buck, so Christopher whispers, “He loves cooking, Dad.”

And it’s clearly not as quiet as he was intending because Buck replies, “Exactly! And it would be an honor really. I never get to cook for people.”

Dad raises an eyebrow. “What about your fiancée?”

Buck’s smile falls. “Oh, she, uh, well…” The next part comes out mumbled, “Was never really around for me to cook for anyway.” He brightens up again in favor of changing the subject. “You know, I was thinking about making mac and cheese for dinner.”

Christopher can’t help but light up at this. “Please, please, please!” He turns to Dad, providing the extra context, “Buck’s mac and cheese is the best.” He’s almost jealous of Dad, he’d give anything to be able to try it for the first time again. Buck starts to speak, and Christopher can’t help but parrot him, having heard him say it a thousand times, “Well, it’s technically Bobby’s recipe, I just change up the seasonings a little.”

Buck blushes at the way Christopher knew his excuse word for word. For someone who loves compliments, Buck has a really hard time receiving them and always tries to brush them off with some reason or another. Christopher knows that most of Buck’s recipes come from Bobby, but every time he’s had one of these dishes cooked by Bobby, he still finds Buck’s better, and he likes to remind Buck of that every time he makes the “it’s Bobby’s recipe” excuse.

Dad gets that scolding face again. “Christopher, we can’t just ask Buck to cook whatever you want.”

Buck stands now, getting ready to start in the kitchen. “Well, once again, you’re not asking. I’m offering. In fact, I’m insisting because that’s what I want for dinner. So I’m going to make it for myself anyway, and whether or not you eat some is not my problem.”

Dad sighs. “Alright. Fine. But at least let me help?”

Christopher gives him a skeptical expression. “Are you actually good in the kitchen?”

Buck stifles a laugh as Dad looks a little offended. “Am I not supposed to be?”

Christopher shrugs. “I mean, Buck cooks everything for us. And… I guess you help sometimes?”

“Well, unfortunately,” Dad says, glancing over at Buck, then back to Chris, “I don’t have a Buck, so I cook for us pretty often. And practice makes perfect. Probably. Practice makes… better.”

Buck does laugh at this, making his way over to the kitchen to start gathering ingredients and utensils.

Christopher shrugs. “There was a while you were… not working normal firefighter hours,” he doesn’t want to elaborate too much on Dad’s time at dispatch, not right in this moment they’re having, “and you were home for dinner every night. And, well, you definitely were practicing then, but… it wasn’t amazing.”

Dad looks mock-offended again. “Well, I can most certainly handle being a sous-chef.” He joins Buck in the kitchen. “Go ahead, give me a task. Tell me what to do.”

Buck raises an eyebrow. “Alright, here, you get started grating the cheese.” He gestures to where he’s already laid out a few blocks of cheese with the cheese grater.

“Yes, chef,” Dad replies. Christopher giggles. Buck blushes.

“Hey, Buck, do you have a PlayStation?” Christopher asks.

Buck grimaces. “Uh, I have an Xbox? Will that do?”

Christopher frowns. “I mean, I guess. Can I play it?”

“Chris—”

“Of course, buddy!” Buck agrees easily.

Dad gives Christopher a look. Chris chooses to ignore it. “Thanks!” He makes his way to the living room, checking out what games this universe’s Buck has. He seems to have worse taste. Which, seeing as he’s with Taylor, makes sense, Chris supposes.

He mostly tunes out Dad and Buck’s light banter over their cooking, but every time he glances over, they seem to be getting along well. One time he looks over, Dad is struggling with the cheese, and Buck easily steps up behind him, resting his hands over Dad’s and maneuvering him to grate the cheese better. Dad is bright red, even after Buck steps away.

On one hand, he feels like they’ve fallen into a sort of normal. If he forgets for a moment, this could feel like any ordinary night for them. Dad and Buck flirting while making dinner, Christopher playing games in the living room. But then he remembers that this isn’t normal. Yet, Dad and Buck awkwardly flirting without really realizing one or both of them was doing so had been normal for so many years anyway, so it’s still not too far removed from his reality.

While all this is happening, he receives a new message from Chimney.

Any progress?

Christopher manages to snap a picture just as Buck is holding a spoon up to Dad’s lips to get his opinion on the taste.

Well!

Oh Maddie’s gonna love this

Christopher just replies with the laughing crying emoji. It isn’t too long before his phone pings with another text.

What about progress on the other front? Figuring anything out?

nope

Christopher knows it’s a lie. He would have to be actually trying in order to say whether or not he’s making progress. He will. He’s going to. Soon. He just… needs to figure out what to do with it.

He only gets a few more minutes before Dad is calling him over as Buck is plating up some of the mac and cheese. As Christopher gets closer to the table, Buck nods over towards the bathroom. “Go wash up first, bud.” Buck’s eyes go wide as soon as the words leave his mouth, and he looks at Dad, then Christopher.

Right as Buck is opening his mouth, to apologize probably, Dad nods and says, “Yup, go wash your hands, Chris.”

Christopher rolls his eyes but pivots towards the bathroom, gladly directing his attention away from where Dad and Buck are giving each other soft, cheesy smiles. When he leaves the bathroom, both of them are getting settled at the table, next to each other this time rather than across from each other like they had been sitting earlier. They’re also sitting a lot closer than the chairs were previously set. Their arms are brushing against each other, which Christopher thinks seems incredibly inconvenient for dinner, but is quite similar to what Christopher recalls from the days when Buck still had the loft.

From the moment Dad takes his first bite, he makes a surprised expression. “Damn, Buck. Add this to the list of reasons why I’m not surprised the alternative version of me married you.”

Buck blushes for a moment, but then questions, “Are we married? I thought we were just engaged.”

They both look at Christopher for an answer. “You’re not engaged yet,” he reminds them, barely holding back an eyeroll at their behavior. “You just both want to get engaged.”

Dad nods. “That’s right.” He turns back to Buck. “Well, I’m honestly just surprised that I never asked you sooner. We barely know each other and I’m ready to get down on one knee.”

Buck rolls his eyes, but he’s still quite red. “I haven’t always been good at cooking,” he mumbles. “It’s taken practice.”

“Yes, you have!” Christopher insists.

Buck shrugs. “Okay, well, maybe in the time I’ve known you two, I’ve been… good, but I’m not perfect.”

“Nobody’s perfect,” Dad scoffs. “But you might be the closest thing to it.”

Buck’s face becomes an even deeper shade of red, which Christopher honestly didn’t think was possible, and Buck seems to shrink in on himself, but he also looks secretly delighted after hearing Dad’s words. Christopher can’t stand it. They’re so gross.

There’s silence for a bit longer before Buck finally takes his attention off of Dad and regards Christopher with an odd expression. “So, when you first came here, you said I was basically your dad, but I’m not even your stepdad.”

“Yet,” Dad reminds and he seems a little proud to make the correction. “But I think if there’s anything we’ve learned from all of what Christopher has told us, you’re a really big part of our lives, and it won’t be long before you’ll actually have legal ties to Chris, and to me. I wouldn’t even be surprised if we were talking about adoption.”

It’s a good point, and Christopher makes a mental note to talk to Dad and Buck as soon as he’s back because he thinks it’d make all of them feel better if Buck adopted him. A bit quietly, he mentions, “Well, technically, legally, Buck’s still basically been my dad for—” He cuts himself off, not sure if he should bring it up at all.

Of course, they both turn their attention to him anyway, so Christopher continues, “Well, a long time ago, something happened to Dad, and he— he had a talk with his lawyer. And he told me that if something bad ever happened to him, Buck would be the one to take care of me. So Buck’s basically been my dad in legal terms for a while, y’know?”

Buck and Dad don’t respond for a minute, choosing instead to just stare at each other. Eventually, Buck says, “You put me in your will?”

Dad nods. “Apparently.” Dad turns to Chris. “When was this?”

Christopher considers for a moment. “I don’t know, like around when the pandemic started, so like 2020?”

Dad and Buck do the thing where they just stare at each other again. Buck breaks the silence. “That was… soon.”

Dad nods in agreement. “Yeah, but… I really trusted you.”

“Still several years before we started dating,” Buck comments.

“Which just makes it all the more significant,” Dad replies with a shrug.

The moment lingers for probably too long as they all continue to eat their dinner, and Christopher takes the opportunity to switch topics by getting Buck on a tangent about one of the games he had been playing. The conversation devolves into video games for the entire time they’re eating dinner, and then Dad and Buck go off to do the dishes, while Christopher is left to do whatever. He chooses to play the Xbox some more, and surprisingly, neither Dad nor Buck argues with him on it. Instead, they seem to be in their own little world and into some conversation while they’re doing the dishes. Christopher can’t help but once again mistake this for his everyday life, with the easy conversation between Dad and Buck being comparable to how they are anyway. The only differences being that they’re at the loft instead of their house, and that Buck and Dad are being slightly less mushy. Slightly less mushy in that they’re not outright flirting and kissing each other every now and again, but they are still passing little offhand flirty comments and then looking away each time it happens.

As soon as Dad and Buck are done with the dishes, Buck offers, “What would you guys say to going out for a walk?” Dad seems to ready to agree, even before Buck adds, “I just don’t want to feel like we’ve been trapped in my apartment for ages. And— well, there’s this little park nearby that I take jogs through on my mornings off. It has a great view of the sunrise, or the sunset.” He gestures out the windows where the sun is inching lower in the sky.

“Sure,” Dad agrees easily. “What do you say, Chris?”

Christopher can’t help but let out a little bit of a dissatisfied sigh. “I mean, yeah, I guess.”

“Great!” Buck claps his hands. As they all get ready and head out, he starts spewing information on how good walks are for digestion after eating. Dad’s doing the thing that Christopher recalls several members of the 118 have referring to as ‘heart eyes,’ and Christopher really can’t disagree. Chris is pretty sure Buck could be talking about the most disgusting thing in the world and Dad would still be giving him his full attention and the fondest look on his face.

The park that Buck takes them to is really nice, and Christopher distantly remembers maybe coming here with Buck a few times back when he lived in the loft. For now, though, Dad and Buck walk ahead and Christopher trails behind them. Their discussion continues even beyond the digestion and walks thing because of course Buck ends up on a million and one tangents that Dad is absolutely willing to listen and inquire further about. If they didn’t glance back occasionally at him, he’d think that they completely forgot about him. He does notice, though, how their hands continually brush as they’re walking side by side. This observation means he also notices how Dad seems to be intentionally putting his hand, and himself, in Buck’s space. Hm. He also notices how close they’re walking in general, especially for how little they know each other. They never do end up holding hands, though, and Christopher isn’t sure if he’s surprised or not.

As they’re on their way home, Buck starts inquiring about Christopher’s situation. “I just feel bad because I feel like we’ve gotten pretty distracted and haven’t been trying as hard as we could to sort this out,” Buck explains sheepishly. “Did you ever get anything else from Chimney? I mean, I can try and contact him—”

And Christopher isn’t sure what possesses him to do so, maybe a desire to stall from talking about the things he had said to Buck, but what comes out of his mouth is, “He thinks you guys should kiss.”

Buck and Dad both freeze and then let out awkward chuckles before continuing to walk. “Okay, haha, Chris,” Dad replies. “Buck really has a good point, though, we should figure something out.”

Christopher shrugs. “I’m serious. Chim thinks that since I wished you guys had never met, and, like, threw your lives off track to where you’re not together, getting you guys back together could solve it. You know, true love’s kiss and all.”

“Well, it’s not like your dad and I are actually into each other,” Buck says, at the same time as Dad says, “Why did you wish that anyway?”

Christopher’s sure he isn’t imagining the way Dad looks disappointed when he processes Buck’s words. Buck is too distracted letting them back into the apartment to notice how it seems to affect Dad.

As they get back inside, Dad excuses himself to use the bathroom, and Chris and Buck are left on their own for a minute. Christopher takes a seat in Buck’s armchair, and Buck sprawls out on the floor in the living room. Christopher would feel bad about it, but he knows that sometimes Buck likes sitting on the floor, prefers it even, and that’s why he bought a really nice rug ages ago, the same one that is currently on the floor of the loft even in this universe.

“I’m really sorry, Buck,” Christopher says quietly.

Buck frowns and sits up. “For what?”

Christopher squirms in his seat a little, feeling embarrassed even thinking about his actions. “Last time we spoke, in my universe… I was really mean to you.”

“I’m sure it’s fine, buddy,” Buck assures.

“No, Buck, I was… I was so mean. You don’t even know. I said things… I didn’t mean them, I was just upset.”

Buck gives him a kind smile. “Look, Chris, when we get you back home, if you just say that to… well, to me. I’ll forgive you. I know it. And if you were really upset about it, I’m sure I already knew that you were upset and I wouldn’t hold it against you.”

Chris doesn’t even notice as Dad leaves the bathroom and joins them in the living room. He squeezes Christopher’s shoulder as he passes him and then sits on the floor next to Buck. He sits a decent distance away this time, rather than how weirdly close they’ve been the entire day, and for so many years of Christopher’s childhood.

“Is that why you wished we hadn’t met?” Dad asks. “You were upset?”

Christopher shrinks a bit in his seat. “Yeah. There was… a lot going on. And me and Buck hadn’t been getting along great.” Dad and Buck both frown at this, so Chris adds, “Not that it was Buck’s fault, I was just… pushing my luck, I don’t know. I thought I could get him to let me break rules, and I knew he wouldn’t let me, but I got mad at him for it anyway. And then… something bad happened, and I was— I was upset, and I just wanted Buck to leave me alone, so I said the worst things I could think of to get him to go away. And… it was really mean.” He can’t help the tears coming to his eyes. “I was so mean, Buck, I’m so sorry.”

Dad has a complicated look on his face, like he pities Christopher, but there’s also a part of him that wants to scold him. Buck, on the other hand, Buck scooches closer, puts a hand on Christopher’s knee.

“Chris, it’s okay. I promise. I think you could say anything and so long as you apologize just like that, with that adorable face of yours,” he reaches up to pinch Christopher’s cheek, which Christopher quickly slaps away with a choked-out laugh, “I don’t think I could hold anything against you,” Buck finishes.

“I don’t think that’s the correct way to respond to this,” Dad grumbles, but he scoots closer to take one of Christopher’s hands. “Just maybe don’t do that ever again, bud.”

“I won’t,” Chris insists, because really, he would never. Of course, it’s at this moment that Christopher can’t hold back a giant yawn. And it’s literally not even that late, he really shouldn’t be getting tired, even if did get up really early and has had a long day.

Dad, of course, immediately starts to get up and say, “Shoot, sorry, it’s getting late, isn’t it? We should— we really need to get going.”

Buck shakes his head and grabs Dad’s arm. “Eddie, it’s fine. I mean, I wouldn’t even care if you guys spent the night here— only if you wanted to, though. Of course.”

Dad doesn’t seem as opposed to this idea as he tries to pretend he is. “I don’t expect you to— Buck, we couldn’t.”

Buck manages to drag Dad away so they can argue over it a little further from where Christopher’s settling a little further into the chair. He’s not really sure why he’s so tired all of a sudden. He hears Buck arguing that Dad not get a hotel, and Dad bringing up Tía Pepa’s. He doesn’t catch all of it, but eventually Buck brings Christopher a blanket, and tells him he’s welcome to nap in the chair, but if he’s too uncomfortable, Buck has an air mattress he can inflate. He informs Christopher that if he does fall asleep, they’ll wake him up when it’s time to go. Once Buck walks away, Christopher glances back over the top of the chair to see Dad sulking at the dining table, and then Buck joining him.

They have some more hushed conversation, but eventually it gets a little louder and Christopher wonders if they think he’s asleep. He’s not. Though he is desperately fighting off this sudden wave of tiredness.

“I just don’t understand why you care so much,” is the first thing Dad says that’s loud enough for Christopher to hear. “I mean, I’m glad. I appreciate it, I do,” Dad goes on, “but why is it so important to you to help us? Why do all of this?”

There’s silence and Christopher wonders if they’re talking so quietly he can’t hear them again, but when he peeks over the back of the chair, he sees them both just regarding each other carefully. Buck gets up and grabs two beers from the fridge, holding one out to Dad in a silent offer. Dad takes it.

Buck sits down and eventually, he speaks, “Look, I don’t know how much I believe in… any of this. But when I spoke to Christopher for the first time today, when I saw him. I felt… something. Like some part of me knew that this kid was important to me, that we were… connected somehow.” He pauses, then lets out a sigh. “No, that’s not totally it. You deserve honesty, and the truth is that it’s also because I’m selfish. I guess I just… I like knowing that there’s a version of me out there who’s actually happy. And I want to do whatever I can to help him.”

It doesn’t surprise Christopher, this (probably) unintentional admission that Buck isn’t really happy where he is now, but it apparently does surprise Dad.

“Aren’t you happy here?” he asks. “You have this great life, beautiful apartment, this— amazing team that you work with, oh, and, of course, your lovely fiancée.”

Christopher watches as Buck makes a face at this, then shrinks into himself. “Yeah, well, there’s a version of me out there who’s doing a lot better, with a family— a partner who loves me and— a son.” The last part comes out a little like a sob. Christopher has to fight off another yawn, desperate to see where this conversation is going.

Dad pats Buck’s shoulder. “You have a partner who loves you, right? Someone you’re getting married to. And… you’ll get married and then you’ll have your family, eventually.”

Buck groans. “Taylor doesn’t want kids. Or— well, I don’t know. She doesn’t want kids right now. She said we can revisit the conversation when she’s at a good point in her career, but I feel like she’s been at a good point in her career, for— for years now, but nothing’s ever good enough for her and—” He cuts himself off.

Chrisopher thinks the Taylor and kids thing makes a lot of sense. He had always noticed that Taylor was fine around him, albeit a little awkward, like she didn’t know how to interact with children in general, but especially kids around his age. She never seemed to mind his presence and even sometimes contributed to interesting discussions about his schooling or his life, so long as it was a topic that she was interested in. She also seemed to really enjoy Jee-yun’s existence— buying her little outfits and toys. But then anytime they were at any sort of gathering with a majority of the 118 and their families, and Maddie, though a little hesitantly, or Buck, offered for Taylor to hold or interact with Jee, she politely declined every time.

Dad frowns. “That sucks. I mean, you seem really good with kids, and I can tell that you’d really want some of your own.”

Buck nods a little sadly. “We make sacrifices for the people we love, though, right?”

Dad shrugs, and looks back out towards the living room, so Christopher ducks his head back down. “It seems like you’ve made a lot of sacrifices for her,” he mutters, so low Christopher almost doesn’t catch it.

When Christopher sinks back down into the armchair, he finds his eyes drooping closed, and it takes a lot of work to keep them open. He’s not sure he’s ever been this tired in his life, and he’s not sure why he is today of all days, especially when he so badly wants to hear the rest of this conversation.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I got the vibe your friends and family don’t seem to like her,” Dad tells him. “And Christopher hasn’t even technically met her in this universe, but even he doesn’t like her.”

When Chris peeks back out, Buck is staring down at the table, a little ashamed. He’s fiddling with the bottle in his hands in a gesture that Christopher knows is nervousness. “She… hasn’t always made the greatest decisions towards me or… or my family. But she was with me during some really rough times and… I’ll never be able to repay her for that.”

Dad reaches out to rest a hand on top of both of Buck’s, stilling them and the beer bottle. “I just… I hope whatever she’s done doesn’t outweigh the good. And… well, honestly, I don’t think you should stay with her just because you’re… repaying her for whatever she’s done for you. That’s not good for a relationship either.”

Buck downs the rest of his beer and gets up to grab a new one. He doesn’t come back to the table immediately, just stands at the counter, staring down at it, considering.

“Several years ago, I… well, I got injured. And when I did, my girlfriend at the time, she… she broke up with me. Because she didn’t want to deal with that. She decided my profession was too dangerous.” He lets out a bitter laugh. “Even though she knew what I did when we started dating.” Christopher knows what Buck is talking about. He can’t remember many of the details, they hadn’t dated long enough for Christopher to meet her, and a lot of that stuff got swept away in all the grief of losing his mom. But he knew Buck had a girlfriend before the ladder truck bombing, and then all of a sudden, he didn’t anymore. “And I just— when I got hurt again, and Taylor stayed? It felt like the best thing. And it’s so fucking stupid because my parents used to only care about me when I got hurt and I thought I had finally gotten over that, but then I get shot and all of a sudden— not dumping me while I’m in a hospital bed is suddenly the best thing she could do.”

Dad is just staring at Buck, and Christopher knows exactly why. He’s shocked by the same piece of information, probably not in the exact way that Dad is, but he’s still surprised and it’s finally enough to break him out of his tiredness.

“Sorry,” Buck says, finally returning to the table. “Didn’t mean to like— trauma dump here.”

Dad just keeps staring at him. Then he quietly says, “You got shot?”

Buck shrugs. “Yeah, there was this guy going around— I wasn’t the only firefighter who got hurt… I don’t know. It doesn’t matter, it was a long time ago.”

“I remember hearing about that. I didn’t realize you were one of the firefighters… affected.”

Buck nods. “Yeah… it was… it was a tough time. And it was a really rough recovery. Taylor and I had barely started dating by then. We had been friends for a while, but honestly, she would’ve been well within her right to back off or at least not help at much, but she… she stuck it out with me. And she was really good, even on my really bad days when I just refused to get out or bed or— was an asshole about going to PT, or anything, you know? She was there, and she was— I mean, she was kind of an asshole right back, and I definitely deserved it, but she never left my side. She wanted to see me get better and it just— it meant a lot to me.”

Buck doesn’t seem as happy and in love as he could be— as he probably should be, while he’s telling the tale. Dad goes back and forth between looking happy for Buck and looking slightly annoyed, never at Buck, just kind of in general.

But he does manage to put on a seemingly genuine smile as he says, “Well, I’m— happy for you, I guess. And I hope you guys are really happy together.” He looks around the apartment, probably making some of the same observations Christopher had made only hours prior, even if he didn’t have the same context to compare it to. “She really lives with you here? I mean, this place kind of screams bachelor pad.”

Christopher isn’t sure what it is about this that makes Buck finally break, but Christopher catches the moment it happens. The moment he switches from the fake façade he had been putting on to… well, a more normal, if not a little sadder, Buck. “It’s because she doesn’t,” he explains. “Look, I don’t know how long you’re still going to be around, and I don’t know how much more you’re going to be interacting with my team, but I can’t— I don’t want to keep lying. Not to you.” Dad frowns. Buck takes a deep breath. “Taylor and I broke up several weeks ago.”

“The team doesn’t know?” Dad asks, and Buck nods. “But they’re… like family to you. I don’t understand why you wouldn’t…”

Buck shrugs. “I… I’m embarrassed, okay? I defended her to them through so much. I’m ashamed to have to go to them and admit that we broke up. And… well, a part of me is scared that they’ll— I know they would never be unkind, okay? But I also know that the second they find out, they’re gonna— hell, celebrate it, I don’t know. And I just couldn’t stomach telling them back when the heartbreak was so fresh. And now I just… I don’t know how to.”

“Look,” Dad consoles, “I may not know the team very well, but— I mean, they seem like good people. Even if you weren’t upset over it, I don’t think they’d ever make you feel like you weren’t allowed to feel your feelings, despite how they may have felt about her.”

“Yeah, I just— I’m still scared.”

“Can I ask why you broke up?” Dad inquires. “You don’t have to— I’m just… curious. Nosy, I guess.”

Buck laughs, but it comes out more like a sob. “Judgement free zone?”

Dad considers this. “I mean, I can’t guarantee I won’t judge her, but I would never judge you.”

Despite the fact that it went away for a moment, the tiredness seeps back in and Christopher finds himself slipping lower into the chair and having to work harder to listen in. He almost wonders if it’s the universe’s way of telling him that this conversation isn’t his business, but he really wants to hear the next part, so he strains, and he pushes himself, and he forces his eyes open, afraid that once they’re shut, he won’t be able to help but drift off.

Buck laughs softly again, and it’s a little less sad this time. “When I asked Taylor to marry me, she made one simple request. She didn’t want to have to plan the wedding. She knew that I cared a lot more about what the wedding looked like than she did. And all she wanted to have to do was find a nice dress and show up. She didn’t want any of that extra effort of actually going through and planning the wedding. And I agreed but— it’s our special day and I wanted it to be perfect for both of us. And— god, I just wanted her to care.”

“That’s… reasonable,” Dad assures.

“There were a lot of things that I didn’t have to ask her about. I knew what kind of cake she would prefer. I knew— what color scheme she’d like, the flowers, the venue, amount of guests, okay? But— there were little things that I would still ask her, especially for certain decisions that I was having trouble picking. Like little questions and she would— get annoyed that I was bothering her.”

Christopher sees the restless energy in Buck even before Buck jumps up from his seat to pace by the table.

“Well, one night she snapped at me because she was trying to do work or whatever. Because she’s always fucking working. We could never have a single nice night alone together without her fucking work being a part of it. And I was asking her to pick between a couple different kinds of decorations, because I’m a little indecisive sometimes, okay? And she snaps at me to just make the decisions because she specifically requested not to be a part of the wedding planning process. And I was honest. I told her that I wanted her to care about the wedding. And she— she said she didn’t even know if she wanted to have the wedding.”

“Shit, Buck.”

Buck laughs bitterly again. “And I— stupid little me, you know, I thought maybe she meant she wanted to elope. And when I asked her if she meant that or if she didn’t want to get married to me, she just— she just stared at me. She just stared at me and I— well, I had my answer. So I just walked out. And the next day when I came home, half of her shit was packed and she wasn’t there. And her ring was on the counter next to a note.”

“Buck,” Dad says softly. Buck stops pacing, looking over to Dad and collapsing back into a chair at the table. He puts his head down on his arms. Dad reaches over, brushing a soothing hand down Buck’s back. “You know, the first time my wife— Chris’ mom— the first time she left, it was just with a note.” Buck looks up at him, listening intently. “I mean, I definitely deserved it, don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t a great husband to her, but… it still hurt. And then the second time… well, I was ready to give my all, to throw myself into that relationship, even though I’m not even sure it was right or better that time around and she— she asked for a divorce. And then she died, so we didn’t even really get closure on that.”

Christopher’s thoughts are swirling now because he doesn’t know much of this is similar to his universe, but he didn’t know any of it anyway. He distantly remembers earlier when Dad asked him if they got a divorce in his universe, and he supposes this is why he asked. He’s not sure if he wants to ask Dad when he gets back, sure that there’s a reason Dad didn’t tell him… if that’s the truth anyway. But… he wonders, that’s all.

“I’m sorry, Eddie,” Buck replies quietly.

Dad shrugs. “I’m not… trying to get pity here. I mean— I deserved it really, both times, but I guess… I just want you to know that it sucks, and I’ve been there. I’ve been— I’ve been in it for someone— with someone— who just… who wasn’t there with me. Even if I was doing it for the wrong reasons— which I’m not saying you were—”

Buck laughs a little sadly. “I might’ve been.”

Dad pats his back again. “I just— I need you to know that you’re allowed to feel. Okay? I may never have met this woman, but… I still think you deserve better, and even though it hurts, I’m glad you’re not going to be tied to her forever. You still have a chance to go out and find someone else who will love you better. You deserve someone who will care about you and your taste, and god— your wedding. And if you want a family, you should be with someone who also wants that, for 100% certainty, not someone you might have to sacrifice for in the future. And— you should be with someone who you don’t have to constantly be worried about whether or not your family approves of. And I know you… you valued that relationship a lot because she stayed with you during tough times, but… I promise you will find someone else who will do that for you.”

Buck sits back up during the course of Dad’s speech. He doesn’t reply for a while, just stares at Dad, lets himself inch closer. Eventually he says, “Eddie, tell me if I’m reading this all wrong—”

“You’re not,” Dad replies, letting his hand gently hold the side of Buck’s face. Christopher ducks his head back down, because he’s seen enough of that in day-to-day life. He doesn’t need to see it here.

But instead of whatever he may expect, they just keep talking. “This isn’t just because of what Christopher said earlier, right?” Buck asks.

“What?”

“Well, I mean, any of it, really, but… about Chimney and—”

“No, no. It’s not— I’m not—Buck, I didn’t even think I was interested in kissing guys—”

“Me either.”

“But,” Dad pauses, “I can’t confidently say I’ve ever wanted to kiss someone as much as I want to kiss you right now.”

“Me too. Eddie—”

And then Christopher knows they’ve got to have kissed, so there we go Chim, there’s the true love’s kiss or whatever. Without their conversation to distract him anymore, Christopher has a hard time pushing away the sleep still trying to take him down. He lets his eyes droop closed and he’s out within seconds.

When Christopher wakes up, he’s back. He’s back! In his own room. He recognizes it, even in the darkness. Everything as it should be. He checks his phone, sees how late at night it is, but when he checks his location, he is, in fact, right where he’s supposed to be. Unfortunately, it seems like everything with Dad and the plane crash wasn’t just a bad dream, though, and Buck—

Shit, Buck. He gets up out of bed and gets to Buck’s room as soon he can. He hears the sobs coming from Buck, but he pauses when he hears Dad’s voice, Dad! He can’t make out the words exactly, but that’s definitely Dad and then— and then the voicemail operator is asking Buck if he wants to delete the message.

Christopher pushes the door open just as Buck hits a button on his phone and the message starts at the top.

“Hey, baby,” Dad’s message starts, “I just wanted to call to say that I love you so much, and— look, I don’t know what’s about to happen and I’m really scared but— I just need you to know how much I love you and how you’re going to do a great job with Chris— you already do, okay?” Christopher doesn’t even say anything or ask before he’s climbing into the bed next to Buck. Buck immediately turns to him and pulls Christopher into his arms. As Buck keeps sobbing, Christopher lets his own tears fall as well. “So stop second guessing yourself,” Dad in the voicemail continues, “Also, I didn’t say this over the phone last night because I really thought I’d have the chance to in person, but, well, just know that if I make it out of this— god, I am going to marry the shit out of you.” There’s a pause in the message where Dad’s own sobs join the sounds of theirs. “You hear me? I wanna marry you, Evan Buckley. But— fuck, shit, please just know I love you and you hug Chris so tight for me, okay? You hold on to each other and love each other and—” The message cuts off, and there’s the stupid voicemail thing again. Buck saves the message and puts his phone down.

Buck uses his now free hand to comb his fingers through Christopher’s hair. Christopher snuggles closer into Buck’s chest, knowing Buck won’t care if Christopher’s tears soak the front of his shirt.

It’s only with his face buried that Christopher finds the courage to say, “I’m sorry, Buck.”

This only prompts Buck to cry harder. “Chris, you don’t have to—”

“I do,” Christopher insists. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean any of it. This— none of this is your fault. I was just— upset—”

“I know, bud—”

“But still, it… it wasn’t fair to you to say any of that. And I’m so sorry, Buck. I love you so much and—” The rest of his sentence turns muffled and uncomprehensible, but Buck just hugs him tighter.

“I love you, Christopher. And I get it, okay? We’re both feeling a lot right now, so—”

Buck’s cut off when his phone starts ringing. Christopher doesn’t catch what the person on the other side says, but Buck’s letting go of Chris and excusing himself out of the room. Christopher isn’t sure what to expect, so he tries not to think about what may be happening and just… waits. It’s more difficult than he would’ve expected.

When Buck comes back into the room, he flicks the lights on and Christopher groans and covers his eyes. “Sorry, bud,” Buck apologizes, but… he’s smiling. Tears are still falling down his face, but he looks nowhere near as upset as he had before. “We gotta go get your dad.”

Something in all the rushing emotion and thoughts running through Christopher, the first thing that comes out of his mouth is, “He’s alive?”

Buck pulls him up and out of bed. “He is. And they got him to a hospital here. He’s… he’s a little scraped up, still won’t be able to work for a few weeks, but… we might be able to take him home tonight.”

“Really?” Christopher exclaims.

“Yeah, now let’s get going.”

Somehow, despite being one of the scariest times Dad’s been injured, the hospital visit is the least scary. Christopher rushes in the second they’re allowed in, careful when he hugs Dad because Buck had said something about broken or bruised ribs. But Dad hugs him back fiercely, pressing a million kisses to his head and then pulling Buck in, too. Christopher doesn’t even make fun of them for kissing a million times. He loses track at how many ‘I love you’s are passed between the three of them.

He's not sure how long it is, but Buck is right and they’re told Dad can go home. While they’re driving home, Dad tells them some of the details of the crash that he remembers. How he had been one of the ones who was mostly uninjured and had medical training, so he had spent most of the time helping other people until first responders arrived. He has to assure them every few seconds that he’s fine, and he got off better than a lot of the others, and he switches to talking about the conference, but they’re all still pretty tense.

It isn’t until they’re getting home that Buck and Christopher both are finally warming up to the idea that Dad is home, and he’s safe. Christopher decides to acknowledge the elephant in the room that the two of them seem to be dancing around.

“So are you guys gonna get married now?”

Buck looks over to Dad. Their hands have been connected for basically the whole drive, but now Buck pulls Dad’s hand up to his mouth and presses a kiss to his knuckles. “You know, I do believe you said some things in your voicemail, Eddie,” Buck teases.

Dad groans. “God, I was gonna— I had plans, you know? I had a real, actual, good proposal planned out.”

“Are you taking it back then?” Buck asks, mock offended.

“Never,” Dad whispers. “I love you. And I wanna marry you, if you’ll have me?”

Buck gently pulls Dad into a kiss over the center console, and Christopher takes that as his cue to get out of the car. Dad and Buck follow him into the house after a while. It goes without saying that the three of them want to go straight to bed after the long day they’ve had, and neither Dad nor Buck seems to mind that Christopher crawls into their bed, not ready to walk away from his dad just yet.

Just as Buck turns the lights off, Christopher decides to ask, “Is Buck gonna adopt me when you guys get married?”

In the darkness of the night, Christopher can’t see either of their faces, so he’s not sure what kinds of thoughts are going through either of their minds. It doesn’t take long before Dad says, “I think that’s a good idea. If you’d want that.”

Buck’s words come out a little choked up, and Christopher wouldn’t be surprised if he’s crying again. “You guys really want that?”

“Yes,” Dad and Chris say in unison.

“You’re a part of our family,” Dad continues, “Of course we’d want that in every way possible.”

Christopher reaches out until he finds Buck’s arm and pats it gently. “You’ve basically been my other dad for so long, so we might as well make it extra super duper official. And I promise I’ll actually listen to you from now on anyway.” There’s soft chuckles from both of them.

“Okay,” Buck agrees. “I love you both.”

“Love you,” Dad repeats. “Now let’s get some sleep.”

“I love you, too,” Christopher tells them. “I have to tell you guys a crazy story tomorrow, though.”