Archive of Our Own

A whole month.

That’s how long Tommy could push his luck.

All in all, that was surprisingly long. He had expected the ceiling to fall down above his head much, much sooner. He was managing. Mostly.

As soon as he closed the door to Buck’s apartment, he’d wanted to turn around immediately. But he stomped down the guilt, the regret, the heartbreak, and left.

He knew he’d regret it. He’d been lying through his teeth, after all. But he’d been spooked, no other way to say it. Suddenly bringing up the future, and Tommy was reminded of all the times he had planned for a future only to be left high and dry. That happened too much, surprisingly often in those seven, eight years he had been out.

And he couldn’t do it again, not with Evan. When he started dating him, he’d thought he’d hit the jackpot. What a guy. And that was the whole problem.

He knew, he knew that he could fall in love with him. Would fall in love with him. But with his experiences, he was sort of expecting Evan to, at some point, realize that he wanted different things.

It wasn’t like it was a big problem, Tommy had made a joke about it at the time, but the six-month anniversary dinner – well, it had stung a bit when Evan had admitted he hadn’t gotten Tommy anything. He wasn’t materialistic, not at all, would have been over the moon about a single flower or a box of chocolates, but in past relationships, this had tended to be the first sign – a sign that his partner wasn’t as involved as him. And then, the woman … normally, Tommy didn’t really care. People looked at them, people approached them, it had happened to both of them. But it just added to the tumultuous emotions roiling in his stomach.

And he’d already been nervous about the anniversary that night, because he knew Evan didn’t like playing basketball, but he always watched it with Tommy, and he went on deep-dives about the history of the sport, and it was the catalyst that got them together. Without that basketball game, Tommy would have pined for the man silently and never made a move. But Evan had smiled, and looked like he’d understood Tommy’s reasoning, and Tommy felt like Evan could see him. But then, the rest happened.

He’d tried to brush it off. Couldn’t. Kept coming back to that, kept thinking about it. He knew he’d been a bit cold to Evan in the aftermath, couldn’t hide his hurt as well as he’d wanted to.

Kept thinking that he was in love with Evan, and suddenly, he wasn’t sure what Evan felt for him in return. Whether he was actually as serious about this.

Because that was when he started thinking about how Evan never really clarified anything about his sexuality. Which in and of itself wasn’t a problem, there were plenty people who never put a label on it. The problem was that Tommy was starting to think that Evan had at no point ever taken the time to really think about it. He knew he was attracted to Tommy, but Tommy was starting to doubt he’d ever really thought about what that meant. What that would mean for the future.

And then came the nail in the coffin. It shouldn’t have been, talking about moving in after six months wasn’t that unusual. But that was the first time either of them had ever mentioned that, and Tommy thought about his earlier concerns, about how Evan hadn’t really put thought into what he wanted. The word “love” didn’t even really seem to be entertained. And Evan talked about how he admired Tommy, and Tommy felt pressure in his chest. He would never live up to whatever image of him that Evan had built up in his mind.

And when Evan had asked Tommy to move in with him, Tommy had chosen to flee. It felt like he had been right, when he questioned what Evan wanted from him. It felt as if Evan didn’t know him at all. It felt … careless, thoughtless, of him to ask Tommy to move out of his house. So, he’d broken it off, said words he didn’t mean just to hurt, just to make sure he had a clean break and Evan wouldn’t try to convince him otherwise – because he could, he definitely could.

Tommy was a coward, he could admit that. He could have stayed and talked. He could have asked Evan what he had actually meant, he could have made sense of it all. He didn’t. He was too afraid of the answers. Too afraid Evan would start thinking more about it, realize something, and end it himself.

He admitted that he’d run away because he was scared, not because he wanted to leave Evan, not because he couldn’t see a future with him. Not because he thought that this wasn’t salvageable.

Tommy also admitted that calling him “Buck” in the end had been a dick move.

He’d wallowed for the evening, cuddled with his cat – a one-eyed, fluffy black beast named Odin – and cried. He didn’t watch a movie, something he usually did when he was feeling down, because all he could think about was that he and Buck were supposed to go see one.

By the time he had worked through his denial, and had mustered up the courage to admit that he would have to grovel, he felt like it had been too late. Maybe, if he’d turned back immediately. Or shown up the next day.

Tommy would simply have to start seeing Buck as another notch in his ribcage, another scar on his heart, and move on. Like he always had.

Only he knew, deep down, that Evan Buck was different. The others, he could recover from. He could trudge on, heal, and keep carving at his life until he was happy enough. This time, he couldn’t. He would never be the same again.

Served him right.

It landed him here – a month after the fact, his heart raw and throbbing with dull pain in his chest. They were on a call, and Tommy had theoretically known that there was a possibility they would run into each other on the job. Only it hadn’t ever really happened before, so why would it now?

On the other hand, back before he and Buck got together and he had shared calls with the 118, he didn’t specifically try to look for them, didn’t try to look for one specific last name stamped over the back of a turnout coat. You only really noticed something once it was gone.

It was an all hands on deck situation, a large apartment building that caught flame, and they were all busy evacuating people, trying to get the fire under control, trying to understand what the best strategy would be. Tommy had done this sort of thing a thousand times.

He wasn’t in a helicopter today, had opted to help out on the ground. For the most part, he didn’t even have time to think about the fact that Buck was around here somewhere, too busy with helping, and saving lives, and trying not to let his coworker’s chatter about whatever drive him insane.

He had trouble concentrating at the moment. It could have been the heartbreak.

He didn’t think about Buck being here, he really didn’t, until he was in the apartment building with a couple of other firefighters and scanning around for people that were still missing. He didn’t notice at first, until he and another man entered a room, and he first saw the 118 emblem on the helmet, and then the BUCKLEY on the back of the coat.

Just his luck.

Tommy didn’t say anything, and neither did Buck. They just shared a nod, and continued on together through the rooms. Air was getting thick. Tommy could barely see two feet in front of him. That did not stop him from seeing the woman and what he assumed was her child, crumpled to the floor in one of the last apartments they checked.

They worked seamlessly without words to each other, the only thing spoken being information about the victims that Buck quickly relayed through the radio.

Tommy did hear Bobby on the other end, however, instructing them to leave the building immediately – it was getting unstable. The damn thing really wasn’t up to code, was it?

So, Tommy threw the woman over his shoulder, and Buck picked up the kid, and they made their way out of there as quickly and safely as possible. No use running when you could barely see, there was always a risk they would stumble over something, and they really didn’t have the time for that.

They almost made it, too.

They were in the entrance area when things went wrong. There were a couple of their colleagues, Tommy recognized Eddie, and a few others from some other houses, all of them bringing the last of the people still stuck in the building out.

They’d been so close. Then, the floor underneath their feet cracked. Tommy heard, and felt that crack all the way into the marrow of his bones. His heart jumped. Another crack.

Eddie shouted something at them, probably to hurry up, but Tommy knew.

He looked over at Buck, found him looking back at him. Even through the screen of his helmet, he could see it on his face. They both knew.

They made the decision at the same time, their voices mingling as one of them shouted, “Quick!” and the other one, “Catch!”

They threw the woman and child at the others. Tommy only had enough time to see the two of them caught safely by them. Eddie stood frozen. The realization blooming across his face was the last thing Tommy saw. It all happened in split seconds.

Then, there was nothing under their feet.

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Fire Captain Nash stood outside of the building, talking with the paramedics taking care of the injured.

A call rang out.

“Buck and Tommy!” Firefighter Diaz shouted into his radio. “The floor, Bobby! They fell through the fucking floor!”

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It wasn’t a long way down. Still, it felt like hours. Like seconds. Forever and nothing at all.

Tommy hit the ground, got the breath knocked out of him. Something heavy landed on his leg, there was a crack somewhere, and he could feel the awful stab of something piercing his abdomen. The debris from the floorboards fell around him, some of them hitting him. He held his arms over his head to protect his face.

They had fallen into the basement, the concrete floor shockingly cold. There was no fire down here, but the heat and smoke from above would fill this place in no time.

Tommy had lost his helmet on impact, it had rolled off to the side, and he couldn’t be bothered to try and tilt his head to look for it. The thing had protected him from smacking his head on the ground, but he could still feel the pounding, guessed that he probably still had a concussion.

He didn’t want to look down at his body. He looked at his body.

A metal rod, probably a pipe that had broken off of the ceiling, speared through the left side of his abdomen, embedded in the ground. Tommy groaned. No way he was moving with that. His right leg was buried under a heavy concrete beam, probably from the ceiling. When he tried to shift, just a little bit, pain shot up his femur like an electric current.

He had trouble taking deep breaths, and he supposed that meant his ribs were definitely broken. At least a couple of them. He felt cold all over, and assumed that was the shock. The pain of the rod in his midriff only slowly started flowing in, first as something dull and far away, but it became sharper, and hotter, and stronger by the second. Every time Tommy moved, every time he breathed, it got worse.

His pant leg was torn on the left side, too, ripped from the bottom almost all the way up to his hip, and there was a long cut from his knee to the inside of his thigh. He could feel his legs, and when he tried, he could wriggle his toes, so that was a relief. Not that it would help him much.

A groan from a little ways over pulled him out of his thoughts, and with piercing despair, Tommy realized that Buck was here. Buck was also alive, at least alive enough to make sounds.

“Hey,” Tommy started, but his voice was so raspy and hoarse that he barely made a sound. He cleared his throat, tried again, “Hey, you awake there?”

Another groan. The sound of rubble moving. Slowly, Tommy turned his head so he could look at Buck. He was in the middle of pushing himself out from under broken floorboards and part of the ceiling. He didn’t seem to be using his left arm – the arm he’d dislocated a couple weeks back, the arm Tommy had taken care of – and even in the dimness of the basement, Tommy could see the shine of dark blood on the ground.

“You’re bleeding,” he pointed out.

“Doing a lotta things,” Buck returned, voice breaking.

He crawled out of the pile of rubble. Dust dyed his hair and the back of his turnouts white, and his face was covered in blood. It was dripping from his mouth, his nose, and a long cut narrowly missing his right eye, spanning from the corner of it up to his hairline.

Tommy watched with bated breath as Buck pushed himself forward, and then stopped, collapsing to the ground. He was flat on his stomach, panting. Tommy could see his shoulders rise and fall quickly. His foot seemed to still be stuck in the pile.

“Come on, you gotta move,” Tommy tried to encourage him, but he had a hard time keeping the panic out of his voice. If Buck stopped moving …

Buck groaned. Pushed himself up for a moment, but his arms gave out and he dropped back down. He shifted, as if to pull his leg out, but he stopped, whimpered. Tommy couldn’t see much of him, there, but he knew he was bleeding more from his torso.

“Buck, work with me here!” Tommy snapped. “Get the fuck up!”

“Stop yelling at me,” Buck moaned.

Tommy took a deep breath, and reined in his terror and the pain fogging up his head. He had to keep cool. Buck was confused, it seemed, and if Tommy had to guess, he’d probably hit his head harder – his helmet was gone and he’d been buried under wood and concrete. Anything but a concussion would be a miracle.

Buck was still lying on his stomach, shaking, and trying to take slower breaths. Failing at it, too. Tommy had to keep him calm, and keep himself calm. He was scared out of his mind, but he couldn’t let that affect him right now. Buck needed him, and he needed Buck’s help.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “But I need you to listen to me. You’re the only one who can move. I know it’s going to hurt, but I need you to try and get your foot out of there. I can’t move, I can’t come get you. You have to do that yourself.”

Buck, turning his head against the ground to look over at Tommy, swallowed. His eyes flickered over Tommy’s form, clearly taking in the pipe, and the rubble on his leg, and whatever other injuries Tommy had that he hadn’t noticed yet. He licked his lips, and Tommy saw a flash of his blood-stained teeth. Buck swallowed again, then nodded.

“Okay,” he rasped. “I’ll try.”

Tommy forced himself to keep his eyes on Buck and not look away. He was asking so much of him, and he was not going to try and ignore what was happening. Buck looked back, eyes locked with Tommy’s, as if that alone was giving him the strength he needed.

I’m here, Tommy wanted to say, tried to say with his eyes. I’m sorry I wasn’t. I’m here, now, I’m right here.

And Buck pushed himself forward, fingers scraping over the rough floor. He groaned through clenched teeth, and the rubble shifted behind him. He army-crawled forwards on his elbows, and he whimpered, and then he howled. Panting, sweat shining on his forehead, but his eyes were open, he was staring right at Tommy.

“Almost got it, you can do it, come on,” Tommy said, hoped he’d be encouraging.

Buck nodded, nodded again, and moved. He planted his leg – the bad one, the one that got crushed before, the one that wasn’t crushed now. With something more akin to a roar, Buck pushed, and pulled, and finally, there was the clatter of the debris falling to the ground, and Buck’s leg was free.

Tommy could have cried and laughed with the relief coursing through him. “Good, Buck, that’s good, you did so good,” he said instead, breathless.

Buck had collapsed back the ground, taking shuddering breaths. A soft whimper left his mouth on every exhale. Tommy watched him swallow a few times, wondered how close Buck had been to throwing up.

He gave him a couple of seconds to catch his breath, but they were on a timer, here. Buck was still bleeding, Tommy was sure, and Tommy himself was starting to feel a bit woozy.

“Buck,” he said, and when he didn’t seem to react immediately, he continued, “Buck, I need you to move.”

Buck stirred. “Please,” he groaned, pushing himself up on his hands and knees, “stop calling me that. If I’m gonna die, I don’t want the last time I hear you say my name to be Buck.”

Tommy wanted to say something reassuring, like, we’re not gonna die, but he wasn’t so sure about that, himself.

“Okay,” he said instead. “Alright, Evan.”

Evan’s eyes met Tommy’s. He nodded, as if to tell him that he was there, that he was waiting for Tommy to tell him what to do.

“Can you come closer?” Tommy asked, pushing himself up on his elbows with a groan. The pipe shifted a little.

Evan nodded and crawled over to him. He was using his arm again, and he was putting his weight on both of his legs despite the fact it should probably be on neither. But they had no other choice right now.

“You got your radio? Mine’s shot.” Tommy showed him the torn-off cable still connected to him. The radio itself was somewhere, probably disappeared in the same corner as Tommy’s helmet.

With a grimace, Evan brought himself up to his knees and patted for his radio. It was covered in dust like the rest of him, but it was still connected, it seemed. Tommy breathed a sigh of relief.

“This is Firefighter Buckley with the 118, does anyone copy?” Evan spoke into the radio. No reply. “Firefighter Buckley and Firefighter Kinard, we’re in severe distress, does anyone copy!?”

“Fuck,” Tommy breathed.

The radio crackled, and they both perked up, but there was nothing but static. Tommy’s stomach dropped out, and his hope with it. Evan looked at him, eyes big and wet, and Tommy knew there was nothing he could say to take that desperation, that fear away from him.

They were alone down here. Tommy was pinned to the ground. Evan was bleeding, and in no shape to get Tommy off the floor and carry him out. Tommy swallowed down the tightness rising in his own throat, blinked away the blur of frustration in his eyes.

He reached out a hand to Evan, winced a bit when he balanced his weight on only one arm. His ribs hurt. “It’s okay, you did everything you could. Maybe they heard us, but they’re looking for us. We just have to make sure there’s anything left to save.”

Evan looked at him, wide-eyed, still with blood all over his face, and with his hair stuck up in all directions and the shine of tears overlaying his blue eyes, he looked painfully young. Tommy couldn’t do anything to make it better – he was scared, too.

But Evan’s face hardened. He nodded, determined. “Tell me what to do.”

Tommy had him shrug out of his coat and take off his ruined shirt and the suspenders. Told him to put the coat back on and close it tight. Smoke was slowly trickling down from upstairs, and the ceiling creaked. At one point, the whole place was gonna come down, and the fire with it. Tommy debated for a moment whether he should make Evan look for their helmets, but that was when something shifted, and he felt a gush of wetness at the back of his shirt.

“Oh fuck,” he breathed.

“What?” Evan asked, his shirt and suspenders in one hand, but then his eyes flicked down and he saw what Tommy assumed was the spread of blood.

Great, so they were both bleeding now. Evan’s wounds on his face had stopped, but the one on his torso – running from his belly up to the side of his ribcage – was still open, and now, something in Tommy had dislodged and the pipe was not plugging the wound up properly anymore.

Evan moved without needing further instructions. He took his already torn shirt and ripped it until he had a couple of rags, and then came the shitty part. He wadded one of the shirt parts up and pressed it to Tommy’s stomach where the rod was sticking out, and Tommy clenched his teeth on a groan. Still, he took over, pressing the cloth tight against the wound.

Then he pressed against Tommy’s shoulder, and Tommy leaned harder on his other arm, twisted on his side as far as he could. Evan could probably not see much, as the rod was still embedded in the ground, and had stabbed clean through all layers of Tommy’s clothing, but he definitely found the right spot to push another cloth against. This time, Tommy couldn’t keep the noise of pain down.

Evan used his suspenders to tie the makeshift bandages, putting so much pressure on them that Tommy momentarily forgot how to breathe. He gasped for breath, and against the pain, but this would buy him some time. He swallowed down the taste of bile in his mouth.

A hand wiped his hair from his forehead, and Tommy hissed. He hadn’t even noticed the cut in his eyebrow. Evan searched his eyes. “Okay?” he asked.

No, not at all. But as okay as Tommy could be. “Now you,” he panted.

“But your leg-”

Tommy shook his head. “Take care of your wound first, then we can deal with that. Okay?”

Evan nodded. He and Tommy both made quick work of Tommy’s own suspenders. They couldn’t use his shirt, because he was still stuck to the ground, but it should be enough. Tommy had to help Evan a little, which was easier said than done with the angle.

Upon closer inspection, he realized that the cut on Evan’s ribs was mostly shallow, and the wound only really got deep enough to be a problem on his abdomen, right next to his naval. They pressed another torn piece of Evan’s shirt against it and tied one of the suspenders tight around Evan’s middle like a belt.

Tommy’s leg was a bit trickier because the cut was so long, so they simply pushed the last of Evan’s shirt against the worst of it, pulled the two ends of the torn pant leg tight and tied it off. This cut was the least of Tommy’s worries.

Once their wounds were as taken care of as possible, Evan, with great difficulty, pushed himself up to his feet. He wobbled in place, and Tommy made as if to grab him, but there was really nothing he could do, stuck to the ground as he was.

Evan stumbled over to Tommy’s right side, and his leg, and put his hands on the slab of concrete on his leg.

“How- can you feel your leg?”

“Yeah. Hurts like a bitch.” Tommy flexed his quad against the pressure.

Evan bit his split lip, hissed when his teeth hit the wound. “I’m gonna try to lift it.”

“What?” Tommy asked. “Wait, that doesn’t sound like a good idea. What about your arm? There was something wrong with it. And you really shouldn’t be putting weight on your foot.”

With a slight grimace, Evan moved said arm. “Popped it back in,” he said, trying for nonchalance and failing. “It’s not really a high priority.”

You’re a high priority, Tommy wanted to say, but kept his mouth shut. Place and time.

So, Tommy laid back and tried to relax as Evan squeezed his fingers underneath the rubble and tried to lift it. He did it, a couple of inches, but a quick look in his face told Tommy that there was no way he was moving it further. And Tommy could not roll out from under it.

“This is gonna suck,” Tommy breathed. “Put it down, Evan.”

But, with a clenched jaw and almost fever-bright eyes, Evan refused. “Absolutely not, it’s gonna make it worse.” His voice was strained.

“I’m not getting outta here, and you’ll just make your injuries worse, put it down!”

“No,” Evan muttered. “No, no, no, I won’t!”

Tommy didn’t know from where he took the strength. He didn’t even know what happened, watched Evan’s shaking muscles bunch, watched him, somehow, take the thing and twist on the spot. Tommy moved to the side as far as he could, just as the slab slammed into the ground inches from him.

With an open mouth and wide eyes, Tommy looked at Evan who was taking quick, irregular breaths, and if this wasn’t the most terrifying moment of his life, it would have been the hottest thing Tommy had ever seen.

Evan shuddered. He looked like he wanted to say something.

Then, he threw up. Stumbled, his bad foot catching against the ground, and dropped to a knee, bracing himself on the piece of rubble he had heaved from Tommy’s leg.

“I told you it was too much!” Tommy reprimanded him.

With a groan, Evan raised his head, but looked back down to puke his guts out once more. He spat on the ground and tried heaving himself up, but he staggered, and stumbled over Tommy’s legs to collapse on his other side which wasn’t beneficial to either of their circumstances.

Tommy breathed through the pain, through the throbbing of his pulse in his right leg. His shirt was sticking to his skin in the back. He turned to look at Evan. He was lying half on his stomach, his eyes closed.

“Evan,” he croaked. “Evan, open your eyes.” No reaction. “Come on.” Panic was rising in Tommy’s throat. He leaned over as far as he could and shook Evan’s shoulder. “Evan!”

Evan whimpered. He finally got his eyes open, staring at Tommy like an animal, like roadkill not quite dead yet. God, Tommy couldn’t bear to see him die.

“You gotta stay awake for a bit longer,” he said, he begged.

“I-” Evan started, trailed off, stuttered, “I’m sca-I’m scared.”

“Me, too.” Tommy swallowed. “Save your strength. You could still get out of here.”

When Tommy looked up at the ceiling, he could see the orange glow far above them through the jagged hole. Smoke was spreading further into the room.

“I’m not getting out of here,” Evan retorted with a scoff. “Not without you.”

Tommy shook his head. “Evan …”

“No,” he interrupted. “I let you walk away before, but I’m not turning my back on you.”

Silence. They dropped back the floor, next to each other, and stayed silent.

Tommy stared up, watched the gray and black smoke grow thicker. Ash fell from the ceiling, and made his eyes hurt, so he turned his head to the side. Evan was looking at him.

“Why did you?” he asked, his voice soft and quiet.

“What?”

“Why did you walk away?” Evan clarified. “You didn’t have to. We could have talked it out, maybe later. You didn’t have to go.”

No, he didn’t.

Tommy took a breath as deep as he could with how thick the air was getting. They were doing this, it seemed. Figures they only finally found themselves ready to talk when there was a good chance neither of them was walking out of here.

“Felt like I didn’t have a choice,” Tommy said.

Evan’s eyebrows pulled together in something akin to anger. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Means that-” Tommy stopped, considered for a moment, tried to put everything he was feeling into his next words. “Means that I needed to pull the plug while there was still time.”

“Time for what? And pull the plug? We- we were fine! And okay, I jumped the gun with asking you to move in, but you could’ve just talked to me!” Evan was getting agitated. It couldn’t be good for his state.

“Evan. It wasn’t just about moving in. But it was part of it.”

“Why?” Evan pressed. “Help me understand where I went wrong! I wanted a future with you, so bad, and you- you didn’t believe me. You talked like you knew better what I wanted than I did. If you didn’t believe we could make it, why did you ever agree to meet for coffee?”

“That’s not-” Tommy stopped. Thought about it. “I said yes because I wanted closure. Move on. I already knew you could fuck me up for good, I thought if I heard you out, I’d be better. When you asked me for a second chance … I don’t think I’ve ever been that happy. I thought- I hoped that we’d have a chance.”

Evan stared at him, seemed to take his words in. He blinked. Tommy wondered how his probable concussion was doing. “So, you thought we could make it. Then why say that first and last bullshit?”

Tommy grimaced. Evan really wasn’t pulling his punches. Asked the hard questions, the ones Tommy didn’t want to answer. But he had to answer. If they weren’t making it out of here, the least Buck deserved was some sort of closure.

So, Tommy scrapped together his courage and spoke with honesty. “Because it hurt. And I thought, maybe if you hated me, you’d be fine.”

A deep exhale next to him. Tommy wondered whether he could actually feel Evan’s breath, or if he just imagined he did.

“That’s not fair. You don’t get to- you can’t just-” A pause. “It didn’t work, anyway. I don’t hate you. I couldn’t.”

And that, somehow, was even worse than Evan telling him he did, in fact, hate him. Because then, it had been all for nothing, Tommy had hurt Evan for nothing. Tommy couldn’t keep the wounded noise down, not for the life of him, made a sound like an animal, like something small and weak and afraid – because that was what he was.

Evan was watching him. His eyes seemed a bit unfocused, but Tommy couldn’t let that fool him. He was alert, and his gaze was piercing Tommy. He watched Evan’s face relax into something like realization. It was terrifying, to have someone who knew him. It was a foreign experience.

With his next words, Evan swung the axe. Landed it in the heavy trunks Tommy had built his fortress out of. “Why do you think you don’t deserve to be loved?”

His weak spot had been hit, one that Tommy hadn’t even known he had, hadn’t known to patch up before someone could exploit it. Only Evan was the one who found it, and he didn’t exploit it, would never. Just asked, just saw the things as they were. Looked at Tommy with wide, sincere eyes. And so, Tommy’s walls came down like the burnt-out fundament of a shoddy apartment building.

He started at the beginning. Of the only happy memory he had about his father – in the snow, when he was a kid, trying to walk in Thomas Kinard Sr.’s huge footsteps. How his father had laughed and picked him up, put him on his shoulders, and walked. How after, he only remembered his father as cold, and then as rage-hot and loud, and how his mother let her child stay in the firing line to keep herself out of it. How he’d wished, day and night, they would divorce, but when they did, she left him behind, and Tommy learned as a child that love could never be enough.

He ran away, at seventeen, faking his father’s signature, and enlisted. Kept to himself, too afraid of DADT and getting a dishonorable discharge. Only to get an honorable one after being the sole survivor of a helicopter going down, and how his fear and trauma kept him from the sky for years to come – a pattern, always running from the things he loved the most.

He spoke of failed relationship after failed relationship, of being the entry, of being the first, of being the in-between, but never enough to actually be the end. Never considered to ever be the last. How he’d heard it so many times that he started believing it. But not only in romantic relationships.

“Everyone I love the most loves me less,” he finally spoke out his greatest shame, his greatest pain.

“What’s that mean?” Evan had stayed quiet through Tommy recounting the greatest hits of his life. It couldn’t have been that long, but Tommy felt like someone had scraped his skin off. What’s one more layer?

“Howie,” he started, because he’d loved him once, was maybe the first one Tommy had let himself love after fighting tooth and nail, “only ever calls when he needs something. And I help him, he saved my life-” when he had no reason to, “but we never just check in with each other. Hen, obviously, doesn’t, and that’s okay, she’s got a lot going on. Sal – you never met him, he was my work buddy – got transferred and cut ties with all of us. Didn’t even tell me he got transferred, I thought he’d gotten fired. And Eddie was your friend first. We hung out a couple of times after, but he wasn’t in it.” He took a shuddering breath. “No-one ever is.”

“They love you.”

“They don’t give a shit,” Tommy fired back. “Not even enough to tell me to get out of their lives.”

Evan swallowed down whatever he was probably about to say. “But that isn’t why you broke up with me. What changed? Did you also think I loved you less?”

Tommy didn’t want to answer that. But he had to. He nodded. “The anniversary.”

“I knew it.” Evan glared at him. “It did hurt you, didn’t it?”

“Of course it hurt me. But what was I gonna do, start a tantrum in the middle of a restaurant because my boyfriend didn’t get me anything? Because he was being nice to a stranger?”

Evan tried to push himself up, but he winced in pain and stayed down. Tommy also didn’t want to have this conversation pinned down to the ground and slowly losing his breath to the smoke in the house, but here they were.

“You should have talked to me!” Evan pointed out, angry. His eyes were hard, and his lip had cracked open again, and Tommy was so sick of seeing him bleed.

“It would have ended the same.” And wasn’t that just the truth. Tommy got in his own head, he ran when he got scared, he always had. He’d have run from Evan that night, too.

“Do you have that little faith in me?” Evan’s voice was biting, but mostly hurt, and that bit more.

“It’s more that I don’t have faith in myself,” Tommy said. Faith to end it and set Evan free, because Evan was a people-pleaser, and Tommy had thought there was a chance Evan would settle for him if only not to hurt him. Faith to do right by Evan. Faith to not be the broken, fucked up thing left of the man he could never be.

“You know, I thought something was off, and I talked to Josh and Maddie about it. And they … they got that idea into my head. I- I got scared again, and I was worried I hurt you. And I did, but they said it was probably nothing, and you’d tell me. That we’d have a future. I’m sorry, I overcorrected. I do that.”

“I wanted a future with you,” Tommy said. “So badly. But Evan, that night … the way you spoke. Like you didn’t see any of my flaws, because there’s so many. I’m not brave. I’m not confident, and I’m not comfortable. I lash out, and I hurt people to protect myself – you saw it firsthand. I burned more bridges than I can count. I’m selfish, but mostly I’m afraid.” Tommy swallowed heavily against the tightness in his throat. “I was gearing up to showing you all of this. Slowly. But then- then you spoke of some- some idealized version of me. And I wondered whether you even wanted to know the real me.”

“I see him,” Evan rasped. “I see him every time you roll your eyes, and when you get snobby about something, or when you get pissed, or you’re really tired.” His eyes were bright with tears, and Tommy was certain it wasn’t just the fear and pain. “I see you, Tommy. I didn’t mean to put you on a pedestal. I don’t think you’re- you’re perfect or flawless. I see it. I just love you.”

Tommy’s tears spilled over. He hadn’t expected how much hearing those words would hurt. He’d thought that finally learning someone loved him would be warm and gentle, a soft caress. Instead, it was a thing with claws and teeth that hooked behind his sternum and tore it out to get to what it protected.

How could Evan ever think he was brave? When he himself was here, and after getting his heart broken in a cruel and selfish need to get away, and he still looked at Tommy like that, and told him he loved him with the sincerest expression on his face.

Tommy didn’t deserve him. Never had.

But then … Tommy had never tried. He had never thought that Evan actually saw him and loved him anyway. He didn’t take Evan’s words at face value. Was it really that farfetched that Tommy could see him and love him, and Evan could do the same thing right back?

Tommy had never thought he was brave. So maybe it was about time.

“I love you, Evan,” he said, and despite the tears running down his cheeks, despite the tightness in his jaw, despite the terror making his hands tremble, his words were steady and strong, as if nothing could shake them. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier.”

Evan was crying, too. His tears dripping over the bridge of his nose and to the ground. Took with them some of the blood dried on Evan’s face. He was still covered in dust and dirt and blood, and his eyes were big and wet, and he’d never looked more beautiful than then and there, with a breathless smile slowly lighting him up.

“So, tell me now.”

And so, Tommy cracked open his own ribcage and showed Evan what was inside. And instead of sticking his hands in, tearing at his bones and flesh and blood, Evan only held his hands out, waited for Tommy to place his own heart there, and watch him cradle it. Whisper affirmations to it like a scared animal, because that was what Tommy’s heart was. Scared and wounded, and so, so desperate for someone to see him. Evan did.

It was terrifying. It was exhilarating. Like the first time he went up into the sky. Like the first time he actually held the controls in his own hands without any help. Like the first time he saw a storm up close, like the first time he flew into a wildfire so vicious the air up in the sky was thick and black. Like the first time he’d had to dive out of an aircraft with a parachute strapped to his back. Like the first fucking time he kissed Evan.

To love. To be loved.

If only they’d had more time. Because the smoke was getting thicker, and it was getting harder to see, and to breathe, and Evan and Tommy were still down here.

Evan’s eyes were starting to slide shut. Tommy reached for one of his hands and squeezed his hand as tightly as he could, and Evan made a noise of complaint when the bones in his palm ground together. Still, he opened his eyes again, and found Tommy’s. There was resignation on his face. Acceptance.

Evan opened his mouth. Closed it, seemed to reconsider what he was going to say.

“Why didn’t you come back?” he asked, a whisper.

“I wanted to,” Tommy confessed, a breath. “But I thought it’d been too long.”

“How long?”

“Four days.” Four days of lying to himself and denying his most obvious feelings, and pretending like he wasn’t bleeding open-chested onto his hardwood floor.

“You could have come back,” Evan told him, gently and cruelly, went right for Tommy’s jugular. “You could have come back yesterday. Or this morning.”

“I’m sorry I wasted all this time,” Tommy said, a little choked up now. “And that I hurt you. You never deserve to be treated like that, especially not because I’m scared.”

“Well,” Evan said with a weak smile. “I’m sorry I swung too hard in the other direction.” His face changed, into pain and sorrow. “I miss you so much.”

“I miss you, too.” With the way they were lying, Tommy couldn’t bring Evan’s hand any closer, so he brought his free hand to his mouth, kissed his own fingertips, and put them on Evan’s fingers. Evan’s chest shook with his shuddering breaths slowly turning into sobs.

Tommy had missed Evan, and missed him still, because even though they were talking, and found common ground, there was nothing to be done with it. Tommy stared into Evan’s eyes, and saw his own thoughts reflected there. Saw the grief for what they had missed, and the resignation for what was to come.

“We’re gonna die down here, aren’t we?” Evan asked with a sniffle.

“I think so.” Tommy swallowed. His mouth felt so dry. The tears finding their grave in the corner of his lips didn’t help.

If only he’d turned back. At least then, once they’d ended up here, they would have had another month of being together, of sharing their moments. Of love.

Tommy, who’d had himself propped up on his elbow still, slowly let himself drop flat to the ground. He knew that his gut wound was still bleeding. It was probably part of why he was feeling so woozy, now. That, and the smoke. It was thickening rapidly now. Blurred the shape of Evan next to him, stole the direct sight to his eyes.

Evan tightened his fingers around Tommy, and Tommy squeezed back. A reassurance for both of them – they weren’t letting go.

Breathing was getting harder by the second. The sharp, familiar scent of smoke overtook everything. Ever since Tommy had crashed his helicopter for the first time, he dreamed of dying in fire and smoke. He guessed it was finally time.

He only wished Evan wasn’t here with him. But he’d told Evan to leave, and he hadn’t, stubborn and loyal, and Tommy would have done the same had their roles been reversed. Would have never left Evan to die alone, no matter what had happened before.

There was an almost rhythmic knock above them. Tommy didn’t really pay attention to it, was more willing to let it lull him further to the sleep that was clinging to his eyelids.

The sound was right on top of him. He opened his eyes. It didn’t sound structural. Was there someone there? He tried to call out, yell, “Hey!” at the ceiling, but his voice croaked and broke out on him, and Evan wasn’t much better on that front.

The sounds stopped. Didn’t pick up again. Their window of opportunity, if it had actually happened and hadn’t just been a trick of the mind, was gone.

“No-one’s coming,” Tommy whispered roughly.

“At least not in time.” Once he finished talking, Evan coughed, and groaned, and the cough sounded hard and heavy, and must have been hell on his chest and throat.

Tommy looked over at him. Found him staring back. He started counting the seconds between the flutters of Evan’s eyelashes whenever his eyelids closed. The amount of time grew longer and longer. The darkness keeping Tommy from seeing Evan did the same.

He was still holding Evan’s hand. Their grip on each other was turning weaker, but neither of them was letting go. Tommy wasn’t letting go, not now. Not when he did before.

Never again. Even if he only had what was probably a couple of minutes left to prove it.

They were probably going to fall unconscious before the rest of the building came down on them, and fire and brimstone and shitty architecture would bury them. Small blessings, Tommy supposed.

Dragging his eyes open got harder, but he forced himself to do it anyway. Evan was so still next to him, and for a moment, Tommy was filled with the terror of being alone. But then, Evan shifted, and his eyes met Tommy’s. He could barely see the shine of tears.

“Will you be there?” Evan’s voice was barely anything anymore, far from the boisterous tone Tommy loved so dearly.

“Hm?” Tommy’s head rolled a bit. His eyes were fighting hard to fall shut, but for now, Tommy fought harder.

“When we’re dead,” Evan clarified. “Will you be there?”

With as much conviction as Tommy could muster in this state, he promised, “I will find you wherever you go.”

“I love you.” A whimper, regret given voice.

“I love you, too.” A sigh, not quite acceptance.

He held Evan’s eyes. There was nothing else to do. Tommy’s eyelids drooped. Evan was clearly struggling harder and harder to stay awake. It was a losing battle for both of them.

Tommy knew that not too far from now, his eyes wouldn’t open again and he wouldn’t even be able to tell. He wouldn’t be able to tell if Evan was already gone or was still there with him. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t even lean in or raise his head enough to kiss Evan one last time. His grip on reality was loosening. He couldn’t even really feel the pain anymore, and he knew that was a bad thing.

Evan’s fingers in his twitched. Tommy didn’t have the strength to squeeze them anymore, but he weakly tapped the pad of his fingers against Evan’s skin. He was there. He would be with him.

Tommy wondered whether there would be peace when he went. He hoped he’d still be holding Evan’s hand.

People said that their life flashed before their eyes when they died, but Tommy didn’t see the life he had lived. He saw the one he didn’t get to, the one he wanted to live.

He saw himself with Evan, tired but alive, settling on the couch in his house, Odin on Tommy’s lap, purring up a storm.

He saw them in his kitchen, putting up new cabinets so Evan could have the kitchen of his dreams.

He saw himself at his table, surrounded by their friends, as Evan made him blow out 41 candles.

He saw boxes, so many of them, and him and Evan sitting on the ground with plans and clipboards to optimize where to put what.

He saw dark brown eyes staring down at him. Someone was yelling.

He saw them at fancy dinners.

He saw them admiring their new rings.

He saw them dressed in white, holding hands in front of their families, all of them gathered there to celebrate them.

He saw their first dance.

He saw someone’s hand slip out of his fingers.

He saw them cut the cake.

He saw them exhausted and so, so happy after the fact.

He saw them in a hospital room, a tiny little infant sleeping in his arms.

He saw the sky above him. It was the same color as Evan’s eyes.

-----------------------------------------

When he regained awareness, he frowned. He didn’t think being dead would hurt so much. And damn, did it hurt. A steady throb in his skull, a stinging pain behind his eyes. His back hurt, and so did his chest, and his abdomen and leg – and basically everything.

There was an annoying beep. It took Tommy a bit to realize that it was a heart monitor, and that the annoying beep was probably his own heart. He twitched his fingers.

With tremendous effort, Tommy opened his eyes. Closed them against the light, and slowly blinked them open again and again until he got used to it. He took in his surroundings – he was laid up in a hospital bed, with the thin blanket pulled up to his armpits and folded under his feet with care.

His arms were bruised all over, and the hair was singed in places. The room was mostly empty safe for one of the chairs, occupied by none other than Eddie Diaz. Who was staring right at Tommy.

“I’m supposed to be dead,” was the first thing that Tommy got out.

Eddie froze for a moment. Made a sound like a half-buried snort. “Well, you gave it your best shot. Almost succeeded, too. I have a hell of a bone to pick with your heart.”

Whatever that meant. Tommy watched Eddie call for the nurse, and then stayed quiet while he fussed over the wires connected to Tommy. He was connected to a drip. Tommy wished he could actually feel the liquid in his throat, because that was dry as hell.

“You found us?” he croaked.

Eddie winced at the sound of his voice, but he nodded. “Just in time, too.” He shook his head. “Three times, man.”

Tommy looked at him uncomprehendingly. He really needed Eddie to start making sense. Also, it was cruel to expect him to be able to grasp a single thought. That he was able to string more than three words together was a miracle already.

After a couple of moments of confused silence, Eddie clarified, “You flatlined three times. We lost your heartbeat when we got you out of there. Second time was when we reached the doors. Did you really have to be that dramatic?”

Tommy shrugged. He couldn’t remember any of that. One second he was lying on the concrete floor thinking he was about to die, and the next, he was alive and patched up.

“And a third time in surgery. They told me you came back before they could even start CPR on you.”

Three times. Which was probably why Tommy felt like someone had pureed him in a blender. He wanted to ask questions, but the nurse came in and checked him over, promised that the doctor would be there soon, and left as quickly as she had breezed in. Had told Tommy that he was allowed some water.

Thank fucking God.

Eddie typed away on his phone, and almost immediately, Hen entered the room, carrying a cup of water. Room temperature, he found out, because Eddie and Hen helped prop him up, and then Hen steadied his hand so he could drink.

“What’s the verdict?” Tommy asked once the cup was empty.

“Grade 2 concussion,” Eddie started. “Pretty nasty cut on your leg, but they stitched that up and it shouldn’t get infected.”

“Broken femur,” Hen continued. “You got some extra metal there. Puncture wound of your abdomen. Your spleen got ruptured, but they didn’t have to remove it. Several broken ribs.”

“They’re looking good, their alignment is fine. And finally, smoke inhalation. Some cuts, bruises, and burns. Do you know how lucky you got?”

Tommy gave up looking between the two of them as they relayed his medical situation. It was making his head spin too much. He leaned his forearm over his eyes.

“How the fuck am I alive?” he breathed.

When neither of the others answered, Tommy shifted his arm and raised his head, looked at them. Their faces looked hollow – haunted.

“We almost didn’t make it in time,” Hen said. “It was touch-and-go for a moment. Even after surgery, they weren’t sure what would happen. They kept you in a coma for a week.”

“A week.” Tommy had never really been in a coma. He’d had several concussions, but the closest he’d ever come to dying was that gas leak, when Howie had carried him out. He’d never gone into cardiac arrest before, much less three times.

“They had to give your body time to heal. The surgeon wasn’t sure whether one surgery would be enough,” Hen explained. “But since then, your heart’s been steady and strong. But it will take a while until you’re back to full strength.”

“We were all so worried,” Eddie said now. “The first few days were hell, especially once Buck was doing well enough to come. We had to force him to go home when he got discharged. He’s been here all along. Did you know he woke up when we got you and tried to hold onto you?”

Tommy hadn’t known, because he couldn’t remember being found. What he did remember was lying next to Evan and hoping he’d see him once it was over. He’d been so convinced it’d been over, resigned that he never got to have that life he was tentatively willing to reach for.

God, Evan.

“Evan is okay?” Tommy asked, relief flooding through him. He thought he’d die with him down there.

“Doing better than you,” Hen said. “He didn’t even tear his rotator cuff when he dislocated his shoulder again. Blood loss, smoke inhalation, concussion, and a broken foot.”

“Cracked ribs, too,” Eddie added. “But he woke up pretty quickly. First word out of his mouth was your name, by the way.”

“He said you talked?” Hen raised an eyebrow at him. Tommy had always felt like she could see through him, could see all the parts he hated in himself. But this time, he didn’t feel judged. Hen had been through all of this. He should have guessed she’d understand him.

“Not much else to do when you’re pinned to the ground and about to die.” Tommy tried to shrug, but that hurt, so he aborted the movement half-way through. “Where’s Evan? He’s at home?”

Eddie shook his head. “He’ll be here soon. It’s all he does. He’s on medical leave, so he’s not at work, and he spends all the time he can here.”

From there, a doctor came by and talked to Tommy about the same things Eddie and Hen had told him. A nurse brought him another cup of water, and Tommy finally realized all the cards and flowers and stuffed animals someone had neatly stacked up on the side table. He couldn’t read them, because his eyes were still having trouble focusing on one spot for too long, but their existence alone brought a tightness to his throat.

Hen and Eddie helped Tommy sit up and while Hen fussed a little with his lines, made sure they were neat, Eddie tried fixing Tommy’s hair for him. When he was about to spit into his hand, Tommy laughed and pushed him off. He didn’t mention the pride in Eddie’s grin.

“Just trying to make you look your best for when your boy arrives,” he teased.

As if right on cue, Howie appeared in the doorway, pushing Evan in a wheelchair into the room. He looked – well, alright. He was showered, and the cuts on his face were closed. He was in sweatpants and a t-shirt with a zip-up hoodie that looked suspiciously like Tommy’s favorite blue one. His arm wasn’t in a sling, and his foot wasn’t in a cast, so Tommy assumed he was mostly alright. Only that he couldn’t use crutches with that arm.

“Hey, man,” Howie greeted him with a soft smile, relief on his tired face, and Tommy threw him a quick smile before his eyes fell back to Evan.

Evan looked even more relieved. There was a shiny film of tears over his eyes, making them so bright, and Hen moved out of the way so Howie could bring the wheelchair closer. Only Evan immediately heaved himself out of it when he stopped, hopped over to Tommy’s bedside on one foot, and planted himself on the mattress next to him.

“Tommy,” he breathed. “Oh God, baby.”

His hands moved over Tommy without touching him, as if unsure where to put them first. They finally ended up on Tommy’s face, against his cheeks, and Evan leaned his forehead against his, eyes closed. Tommy’s own fluttered shut as well, and he breathed.

There was that smell of antiseptic and something Tommy had come to call hospital-despair, but this close, there was only Evan. He’d showered, seemingly right before he came here, but he smelled of Tommy’s shower gel and shampoo. Tommy raised his own hands, put them on Evan’s waist, could feel the warmth of him through the fabric of the hoodie.

Evan brought him in still with his hands on his cheeks, and kissed him. Embarrassingly, Tommy could feel his bottom lip tremble for a moment. He hadn’t thought- he really didn’t think he’d ever have the chance to kiss Evan again.

He loosened one of his hands from Evan’s waist, brought it up to his face, and sunk into the kiss, sunk into the pillow behind him, pulled Evan with him so he’d be close, always close.

Tommy’s heart was beating out of his chest, and he could hear the beep of his heart monitor speed up a little. He would be a bit embarrassed if he wasn’t so, so fucking happy. His heart was beating, and he was alive, and Evan was warm, a solid thing leaning against him, just as alive. Breathing.

Someone whistled from beside them, and if Tommy had to guess, it was Eddie. They pulled away from each other, the sound of their lips separating soft but so loud between them, and Tommy wanted Evan back immediately. He looked so pretty, with a flush on his cheeks, a smile he couldn’t seem to stop, his eyes still that lovely, beautiful sky-blue. Tommy could feel his own cheeks heat up, and risked a glance at the others.

The three of them were grinning, teasing, but there was something else there, like an honest joy at seeing the two of them.

Hen was the one who broke the silence by holding out her hand to Eddie and Howie and saying, “Pay up.”

Tommy couldn’t keep down his delight, his smile growing brighter, and finally into a soft laugh that pulled a little at his ribs. Of course Hen had taken bets.

Evan turned to look at her, a put-upon betrayed frown on his face. “You bet on us?” he asked, as if that wasn’t exactly Hen’s brand.

“We bet on what you were gonna do when you saw Tommy. I said you’d kiss him immediately.” Hen shrugged, and accepted the money Howie and Eddie handed her.

“What’d you say?” Tommy asked, nodding at them.

“I said he’s start crying,” Eddie shrugged, and at Evan’s following outrage, he raised his hands in defense. “Hey, it’s what you did the first time you saw him after you woke up!”

“Maddie and I said he’d start berating your for almost dying,” Howie said. “He did that a couple days ago.”

“Shh,” Evan hissed, then turned back to Tommy. “Don’t listen to him. As if I could let you sit there unkissed.” His voice turned into a soft mumble, just between them.

And Tommy was so fucking charmed. It might have been the drugs still being pumped into his system. It might have been the joy and relief at being alive, and seeing Evan alive. It might have just been the love.

They let themselves be heckled and teased by their friends, and Tommy’s heart had never been fuller. At one point, Eddie pushed Evan out of the room – in the wheelchair again – because they wanted to get some snacks, and Tommy would have rolled his eyes at their shared unsubtlety if his head wouldn’t spin if he did it.

That left Tommy alone with Howie and Hen, who looked at him with something like remorse, something like grief. It used to be them, and Sal for a while, but in the last couple of months before Tommy transferred, they had become a unit.

After a moment of silence, Howie started talking. Said that Evan had told them what Tommy said – that his closest friends didn’t care for him much. And suddenly, Tommy had to deal with apologies from them that he had never wanted, because he didn’t blame them for it, no matter how much it hurt. Tommy had been surprised they even wanted to be his friends after he made their lives hard when they first got to the 118.

Tommy had apologized for his behavior a long time ago, and had put in all the work he could to make it up to them. He’d loved Howie, and he’d been terrified of Hen, and when they offered their friendship, he hadn’t been sure if he was even worthy of that. Still, he’d clung to it. And yet, he had never truly opened up to them. He got over Howie, but he never told him about his past feelings. Hen, he was sure, had clocked him years ago, and he never had the courage to tell her. After he left the 118, he lost whatever connection he had to them.

In the end, yes, they didn’t really reach out to him, but he’d been too scared to reach out to them. He didn’t put it all on them, not when he was too ready to tuck his tail between his legs and run. He said as much.

One of them made a joke that broke the tension. Tommy’s ribs punished him for laughing, and he full-heartedly blamed Howie, who only laughed harder.

When Hen apologized again for not reaching out after he and Evan had broken up, Tommy waved it away with, “You’re his family, it’s okay.”

“Technically, you were our friend first,” Howie pointed out. “Just let us apologize to you. We accepted yours.”

Tommy opened his mouth. Closed it. Crossed his arms over his chest and tried hard not to pout, but Evan had rubbed off on him a little.

Conveniently, Eddie and Evan chose that moment to come back into the room, and Tommy sighed in amusement. As if they hadn’t waited outside of the room for them to finish talking.

They spent a bit longer there, shooting the shit, and Tommy was content in a way he had never really felt. There was still a long way to go, and he would have to wait and see how he felt when he wasn’t hopped up on pain meds, but perhaps, there was light in his future.

At one point, however, Tommy’s social battery was empty, and he was also getting tired. Struggling to keep his eyes open, struggling to follow the conversation.

So, Howie, Hen, and Eddie bid their goodbyes, gave Tommy hugs as much as they could with him lying down in a hospital bed, and promised to rotate and come visit him soon.

Evan stayed, in his wheelchair, and said he’d text someone when he needed a lift home. Before Eddie left, Evan made him push the chair closer to the bed, and then took Tommy’s hand into both of his.

Left alone, Tommy slowly turned his head to the side to look at Evan. He was smiling, softly, and playing around with Tommy’s fingers.

“I’m so glad you’re awake,” he said in a hushed tone. “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t made it out of there with me.”

Tommy squeezed his hand. “We really made it out,” he said in wonderment, and it only hit him now. He was alive, Evan was alive, and he hadn’t thought he would be. He didn’t think he’d be able to look at Evan safe and alive and breathing ever again. “God, Evan, I didn’t think-”

Evan shushed him. “I know. Me neither.” There were tears in his eyes. Tommy wished he could stop making him cry. He raised a hand, his thumb catching the first tear that made it out. “I didn’t really-” Evan’s breath hitched. “I didn’t let myself think about what would happen if you didn’t wake up. I just told myself you would.”

“I’m sorry.” There was not much else Tommy could say.

One of Evan’s hand took Tommy’s on his face, and he leaned his cheek into his palm. His breath shook. “It’s not like you asked for that. But I-uh, I, I kept thinking that the last time we talked, we were both in pain and afraid. And we could have died without ever- ever really getting past it. I could have lost you for good, and I couldn’t live like that.” With big, watery eyes, Evan implored, “Please don’t take yourself away from me again.”

Tears stung Tommy’s nose, spilled over his cheeks. With his fingers, he traced the still pink line of the scar running from Evan’s eye across his forehead. It would scar.

“Don’t let me go,” he whispered.

Evan nodded. Turned his head a bit to kiss the heel of Tommy’s palm. He let Tommy’s hand drop to the mattress and leaned over him, kissed him gently. Tommy raised his head to meet him, and let himself get kissed back into the pillows.

Tommy sighed, felt his own breath fan out over Evan’s cheek. When Evan pulled away, he gently strokes his fingers through Tommy’s hair, despite the fact that his fingers got stuck on the tangled curls. He was smiling, so softly, and Tommy’s chest felt too full with emotion.

The smile turned into a bit of a smirk. “Do you know how big your pupils are?” Evan asked him with a laugh.

Tommy scrunched up his nose. “’s not my fault I’m high.” He blinked a couple of times. His vision was starting to get blurry.

Evan gently stroked the back of his fingers across Tommy’s cheek. “You can sleep. I’ll be here for as long as I can.”

“I love you,” Tommy said, because the last time he’d said it, it was with an undertone of sorrow and mourning, and that’s not how Evan should remember it.

“I love you, too. Sleep now.” A gentle suggestion, an enticing call.

Tommy sunk back into the pillows. Evan was still holding his hand, and when Tommy squeezed, Evan squeezed back.

-----------------------------------------

They had Tommy stay in the hospital for a while. And just as they had promised, Hen, Eddie, and Howie came by to visit him. So did Maddie, and Bobby dropped by, and so did Karen with the kids. Lucy came by, and Tommy’s usual co-pilot Tracy. They brought cards from the people at Harbor, and someone had actually baked Tommy cookies. He was sort of overwhelmed, and his side table was starting to overflow with the little gifts and trinkets his friends had gotten him.

Evan was a permanent presence in the room whenever he was allowed in. He brought Tommy one of his fidget toys, one of the little cubes with buttons on it, because Tommy was bored, needed to fidget, and he was not allowed to read thanks to the stupid concussion.

How the hell Evan had gotten out of there with a less severe one, Tommy would never understand. But it meant that Evan could read him all the cards and well-wishes.

As he was sifting through the gifts, Evan recounted the situation. “I’m crashing at Maddie and Chim’s place right now. Maddie didn’t want to leave me alone after everything, and it’s not like I’m there a lot. I just go there to sleep, shower, and change clothes.” Evan shrugged. “Karen and Bobby are also fighting over who gets to cook for you. They both have different ideas of what is the perfect recovery food.”

“Neither of them has to cook for me,” Tommy tried to wave off, but Evan snorted.

“They’re gonna, better get ready. You’ll probably have enough for weeks once you’re back home.”

Tommy shook his head, but he was smiling. “Howie and Hen said you talked to them. Did you talk to my coworkers, too?" Because they had never shown up at the hospital for him before. Sent him texts, yes, but had definitely never sent him a tin of cookies.

Evan blushed. “I may have used some words to insinuate that they could use to be a bit more mindful. Considering you almost died and everything.”

“You didn’t have to do that. But,” he continued when Evan opened his mouth in protest, “I appreciate it. Really, thank you.”

That brought a smile to Evan’s face, but it turned tentative soon after. “That’s not the only thing I did,” he admitted. “I, uh, I contacted Sal.”

Tommy was surprised his heart monitor didn’t stop in that moment. “What?”

Evan used the edge of Tommy’s bed to pull himself closer to him with his good arm. He looked nervous, started fiddling with the corner of Tommy’s blanket. “I asked Bobby about him. He’s still with the 122, he’s Captain now. He-uh, I gave him your number. He wanted to reach out.”

“Do you have my phone?” Tommy asked.

“You’re not supposed to look at screens!” Evan protested.

“Evan.” That, and a pointed look was enough for him to pull out Tommy’s phone from the pocket of his – Tommy’s – hoodie that he was still wearing. He handed it over.

Tommy unlocked it, and saw he had several text messages from different people. Most of them had already been at the hospital, but there were some from people who said they would come down to visit him soon, and wished him better in the meantime.

And yes, there was a new message from Sal. The last text conversation between them was more than eight years old, and it consisted of a couple of one-sided texts from Tommy asking Sal what was going on, what he was doing. Tommy had never deleted the thread, because for a while, he’d seen Sal as his closest friend.

It was a simple message. Just a hey buddy, I heard the news. Glad you’re okay. Give me a call soon. But it was more than Tommy had had in years.

“That fucking asshole,” he breathed with a smile, and put his phone away. He looked over at Evan, still fidgeting nervously with the blankets. Tommy held his arms out. “Come here.”

Evan pushed himself even closer, put the wheelchair right next to Tommy’s bedside, and leaned in to him. Tommy braced himself with one of his lower arms on the bed, used the other one to reach for Evan’s jaw. He kissed him, and kissed him, and held him in place. Evan leaned further into the kiss, pushed Tommy back down, and Tommy pulled him along, as far as he could go.

There was a tongue in his mouth, in that familiar way that Evan let it flick behind Tommy’s teeth at first, and Tommy let it in with a little sound, because he couldn’t help that sometimes.

Evan breathed out, and Tommy breathed him in. Refused to let him go, leaned further into the kiss when Evan put one of his hands on his face, the other one on his chest, gently and carefully. Tommy wondered if he could feel the pounding of his heart.

He could hear it, far away, because that was not what he was focusing on. He was focusing on the soft, full lips pressed against him, the taste of Evan’s tongue, the slickness of saliva against his mouth, the way his nose dug into Evan’s cheek and brushed his as they moved their head for new angles.

Tommy would have happily spent the rest of his day here, being kissed, relearning the corners of Evan’s mouth, if someone didn’t pointedly clear their throat.

They almost jumped apart, but Evan stayed close, looked over his shoulder at the nurse who was standing in the room and barely hiding her amusement. Her eyes sparked as her mouth twitched up in a smile, then she schooled her expression and nodded at the heart monitor.

Oh. Yeah. That thing was still connected to Tommy’s finger, because the doctors wanted to keep an eye on his heart for a while longer. And his pulse was definitely faster than it had been a couple of minutes ago.

Tommy’s face was already flushed, but he felt even hotter now. He looked away from the nurse.

“Mr. Kinard, it would be best for you to not strain your heart for a while longer,” she said, a smile in her voice. “You’ll have to take it easy for a while.”

She waited for them to confirm they would, and left the room again. They stared after her. Their eyes met.

“So, that was mortifying,” Tommy stated.

Evan started laughing. Loud and heavy, gasping for breath, leaning on the bed and bracing himself with a forearm on the mattress, but it trailed off into a groan when the pressure got to be too much for his hurt ribs.

“Serves you right.” Tommy grinned at him, chuckled when Evan half-heartedly punched him against the arm.

Tommy caught his hand before he could fully pull it away, and brought it to his mouth to press a kiss against the knuckles. His heart was starting to slow down again, and Evan sat himself straight in his wheelchair. Tommy settled down into his pillows.

“Read me something?” he asked.

Evan dug out one of the books that Tommy was currently reading – because most of the time, he was reading three books at once at least. Tommy wasn’t allowed to strain his heart or his eyes, so he simply laid there, and watched Evan’s focused expression as he read from where Tommy remembered leaving off.

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Tommy got to go home.

The cut on his leg was mostly fine, the stitches were out – so were the ones on his abdomen – and Evan was very meticulous taking care of the scar, rubbing lotion into it and moving it gently so the tissue wouldn’t tighten up too much. He was allowed to walk on that leg, and was to slowly start adding more and more weight to his broken leg over the next couple of weeks. He got crutches for home, and while his ribs and gut wound still pinched him sometimes, he was mostly fine.

Evan was doing better, too. He’d upgraded from the wheelchair to crutches, as well, and was allowed half of his bodyweight on his foot. Tommy had watched him try to learn how much that was with a scale one of the nurses had given him.

Eddie picked them up. Brought them to Tommy’s house which was what they’d agreed on. There was more space, and after a moment of talking, they had agreed that neither of them was ready to let the other out of their sight for longer than necessary.

Whenever Evan had to go home for the night and Tommy was still awake at that point, he had trouble falling asleep. He always had the sting of smoke in his nose. And more often than not, he would wake up from nightmares filled with pain and fire and blood, some of them mixed with older nightmares he used to have, and he would panic when he couldn’t find Evan anywhere. One night, he’d been in such hysterics that he’d called Evan right then and there, and woken him up at almost 3 a.m.

No, they weren’t going to be apart for now. Besides, they had about two functioning legs and three and a half arms between them, they would make it work somehow.

Both of them needed help in the shower, and they made it work with a lot of maneuvering and thanks to the fact that Tommy’s shower was enormous.

Once they were done, Evan wandered off to find them clothes, because they had only taken fresh underwear with them. Tommy was left to hold himself up on the sink, his broken leg bent a little so he wouldn’t stand on it.

He turned a bit to the floor length mirror that stood next to the toilet. Evan had teased him about the thing, asked him why he needed another mirror in the bathroom, if the one above the sink wasn’t enough.

Tommy stood himself in front of it, carefully put his foot on the ground without putting too much weight on it. He’d left the hospital with less weight and muscle mass than he’d had in a long time. He tried not to dwell on that. Stared at the scars. The one on his left leg was still pink, and dotted with the small holes left behind from the stitches left and right. He pulled up the pant leg of his boxers a bit, looked at where it ended just before hitting the crease of his thigh. A couple of inches more and he might have had bigger issues. He shuddered at the thought.

The surgery scar on his right leg was nothing compared to the jagged line. It was short, straight, clinical, also with the mark left behind by the stitches. It was a precise cut a couple of inches above his knee.

His fingers brushed the thin line that the hole left by the rod in his belly had been turned into. It was pink, still, like all fresh scars, but it would pale and fade out, small enough to not be noticeable. If Tommy turned, he would probably find an identical scar on the other side.

“We match now,” Evan’s voice said from behind him.

Tommy turned to look over his shoulder. Evan had a pile of clothes under one arm and was using one crutch on the other side. Tommy frowned at him and only got an eyeroll as an answer.

“I’m being careful,” he said, put the clothes on the closed toilet lid and leaned his crutch against it. Then hopped over to stand half behind Tommy.

He nodded down at his leg, the scars from his old surgery having turned silvery with age. There were more than on Tommy’s legs, because he’d had several surgeries there. There was also a new one on the back of his other foot now.

Evan pushed himself next to him. Gestured to the healing wound on his torso. It was way more obvious and bigger than the small cut left of what Tommy had. The half running up the side of his ribcage could very well heal without leaving a mark, but the part curving to his naval was probably here stay.

They both had facial scars, too. The cut in Evan’s lip was long gone and almost forgotten, but the one running from his eye between his eyebrows and up to where his drying curls were falling over his forehead would never fully fade. Tommy, on the other hand, had one that parted one of his eyebrows down the middle, stopped just before hitting the lid of his eye.

Evan followed his eyes in the mirror, and turned to look at him. He raised his fingers and brushed against Tommy’s eyebrow, the pad of his index finger covering the healing tissue.

“Looks badass,” he said with an almost-smile.

Tommy huffed out a laugh. Evan, his sweet, wonderful Evan – seeing the bright side of things. Here they were, forever marked by that moment of terror unlike anything Tommy had ever felt before, and Evan thought Tommy looked badass.

“Gonna have to start lying about how I got it,” Tommy said, leaning closer to examine it. “Don’t think I fell into the basement is cool enough.”

Evan’s smile grew wider. “Got it in a knife fight protecting 20 orphans,” he suggested.

“Had to jump out of my helicopter that was about to explode and a piece of shrapnel hit me in the air,” Tommy fired back.

“Single-handedly wrestled a bald eagle and won.”

Tommy laughed, and Evan’s eyes sparked with mirth and pride. Tommy nudged him with his shoulder.

“How’d you get yours?” he asked, still grinning brightly.

“I’m gonna tell people I’ve always had it. Or that it came with the lightning strike.” Evan ran a finger down its length.

Tommy took Evan’s chin between his fingers and kissed him. He couldn’t believe how full his heart felt, how the only ache left in his chest was from his cracked ribs. Evan had that pretty smile on his face, and he looked soft and light. Tommy loved him so much.

“I’m starting therapy on Thursday,” he blurted out, and that had actually not been what Tommy’d wanted to say.

Evan’s eyebrows shot up as he took that in. “Yeah?”

Tommy nodded. “I went way back when I got discharged. Haven’t been since, and I really need it. Not just because I almost died and my nightmares have been getting worse.”

For most of his life, Tommy had nightmares every now and again. Of his father, his mother. Of time in the army. Of emergencies that hit him a little too hard. Of that helicopter crash that kept his feet tied to the ground for years to come. Now, there were nightmares of the basement, of dying alone, of Evan dying, of Evan being in that helicopter with him years ago.

There were more things he still had to work through. Fathers, and armies, and fear, and how his first instincts were to lash out and run.

“I’m proud of you,” Evan said, pulling Tommy out of his musings.

With a sigh, Tommy raised his hands and cupped Evan’s face. He stared right into his beautiful eyes when he said, “You terrify the shit out of me, Evan Buckley. But I’ve never been this happy before.”

And Evan smiled, leaned closer to kiss him, and Tommy let out a deep breath that found a new home in Evan’s open mouth.

He pulled away a bit, but stayed close enough that their lips were brushing, still, close enough that he had to tilt his face a bit. His eyes were only half-open.

“Please, be patient with me,” he pleaded. “I’m still getting there.”

A hand brushed against his face. The next words were so full of conviction and sincerity that Tommy couldn’t do anything else but believe them, “I’m here with you.” And Evan would be. Every step of the way, a shadow holding onto Tommy’s heels, following him but always there. Never far.

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Tommy went to therapy. Evan went back to his own home at one point. While they were both on medical leave, they met up almost every day. Sometimes, they met up with other people. Sometimes they did group hangouts. Sometimes, Tommy, raw and exhausted from therapy, could only lie on his couch and pet his cat. On those days, Evan would come over with some baked good. Bored as he was, he’d taken up baking and was rapidly perfecting the craft. Which could become a problem, because Tommy had a hell of a sweet tooth and wasn’t allowed to do heavy workouts yet.

Tommy took painting back up. He used to do it just after the army, and stopped while he was stationed at the 118. He’d taken to drawing sometimes once he transferred, mostly when he was bored at work, but he went all out – revived the small room he used to use as his art studio, bought new canvases and fancy sketch books, bought new pencils and brushes and colors, and started painting. He barely spent a day without his fingers stained.

The first days he wouldn’t let Odin inside, but the poor thing cried pitifully outside the closed door until Tommy let him in. He then proceeded to carefully walk around the room to knock anything over or step on some of the paintings Tommy had laid on the floor to dry, and plopped himself down next to whatever project Tommy was currently working on.

Tommy sent pictures of Odin to Evan every day. When Odin took up the habit to take a ride on Tommy’s shoulders around the house, Tommy started sending Evan selfies. He got some in return, mostly of Evan with flour in his hair.

They navigated their relationship. If they didn’t see each other, they called in the evening. There was a lot of talking, in general. Sometimes just about their days, sometimes about whatever they had discussed in their respective therapy appointments, sometimes about their past. Slowly but surely, Evan helped Tommy take down the walls he had built, and he didn’t run once he looked behind the façade.

They had to wait a while for their thank-god-we’re-alive-thank-god-we’re-dating-again-sex. After all, they had to recover from quite heavy injuries, and Tommy still had to go through testing to see whether his heart was really okay. Besides, the meds Tommy was on killed whatever sex drive he had.

Things were moving, slowly. Tommy painted. Evan baked. They met up and cooked together, exchanged what they’d done at PT, did their exercises together. Tommy watched Evan in his house, watched Odin warm up to him more and more, and thought that this was it. Everything he wanted.

When they finally got the go from the doctor, they didn’t fall into bed immediately. They both had talks with their Captains about returning to active duty, and would start light work soon. Tommy was over the moon. He didn’t care what bullshit he’d have to deal with, he couldn’t wait to finally get back. Soon enough, he’d be back in the sky.

He and Evan met up later at the gym that day, did their first actual full workout in a while, and left the place sore and exhausted. They went back to Tommy’s place together, took a quick and efficient shower, and tumbled into bed barely dressed. Slept like the dead.

They cooked breakfast the next morning, and talked about their plans for the day. When they realized they had nothing going on, they decided to go for a run together. Tommy’s muscles still ached from the day before, but he liked pushing himself – reasonably – and he was itching to start building up his strength and endurance again, and he knew Evan was in the same boat.

Just like before they broke up, they spent most of their time together whenever they could. Still, they found the time to hang out with their friends, and Tommy was slowly reconnecting with Sal.

The things Evan had done for him. The joy he had brought to his life.

When it did finally happen, it was different.

Sex with Evan had already been the best sex of Tommy’s life. Evan was just so good, he was fun and hot, and so curious. He approached everything with that single-minded focus, and sometimes, Tommy thought he’d burn out until there was nothing left.

When they found their way back into bed, they did just that – crawl into bed. They’d had sex in places Tommy really shouldn’t try to have sex in, but even though they started on the couch, making out while some movie played in the background, they moved to the bedroom as one.

They took their time. Rediscovered the lines and edges, new and old, of each other’s bodies. Tried out whether they still reacted the same way to the same things, or if something had changed. Spent time touching and mouthing at new scars, and old ones.

Tommy refamiliarized himself with Evan’s body with his mouth and hands, placed kisses and gentle bites wherever he could, squeezed the muscle Evan was rebuilding. He took him into his mouth, went down as far as he could which was all the way, and stayed there, enjoyed the way Evan’s hips twitched off the mattress a bit, pushed his cock just a little bit further down Tommy’s throat.

Evan’s hand was in Tommy’s hair, petting him, and he whispered his praises into the air, eyes locked with Tommy’s, a string of, “You’re so good at that, I love your mouth, you take me so well, look at you,” between them. And Tommy soaked it all up, never thought he’d be discovering a praise kink at this point.

He let Evan’s cock go, at one point, and moved his legs up, brought himself down to lie flat on his stomach so he could start mouthing at Evan’s hole. And that’s when the fun really started, when Evan’s moans became louder and more unabashed, when his fingers tightened in Tommy’s hair and he pulled him closer, when Tommy closed his eyes and just ate Evan out like it was the only thing he wanted to do.

With his hands on the backs of Evan’s thighs, he could feel their tremble, and he could hear the most beautiful sounds leaving Evan’s mouth, how he asked for, “More, please, more.”

And Tommy gave him more, would always give him more. Put his fingers in him when he asked, kissed him when he asked, and pushed his cock inside when he asked.

And when they were pressed flush together, no space left between them, Evan wrapped him in his arms and urged him to move. Tommy’s lips found Evan’s, and he moved, rocking into his body and his mouth. Evan held him while he did his best to crawl into his skin, whispered to him, and kissed him over and over again.

It was intense. Tommy cried. So did Evan. Tommy’s chest shuddered with soft sobs and stuttering breaths, and Evan’s body mirrored him because they were one and the same now, and if anyone tried to pry them apart again, they wouldn’t survive without their other half.

Tommy could see on Evan’s face that he felt the same when he came, that wonder and ecstasy on his face unlike anything Tommy had ever seen before, and Evan truly was the most beautiful sight in his life.

After they’d long since caught their breath, and lain next to each other on the bed, sharing kisses and touches and words, Evan returned the favor, fucked Tommy so good he thought he saw the galaxy when he came. They held onto each other, and cried, and buried parts of themselves in each other that no-one could ever get out.

Tommy felt like cracked glass put back into the furnace. You could still see the cracks, they would always be visible, but they were sealed now, airtight and softened.

Evan was cuddly these days, after they got back together. Touchy. When they were walking, there would be a hand in Tommy’s, or an arm around his waist. When they were cooking together, Evan would put a hand on his hip to move past him. When Tommy woke up before Evan and went to the kitchen to make coffee, Evan would wander out after him soon enough, slide his arms around his waist and plaster himself to his back. When Tommy was on the couch, Evan would squeeze himself next to him – mindful not to faceplant on him when Odin was near, because the old cat defended his place on Tommy’s lap with his life. When they were going to sleep, Evan would nuzzle into his side, and always had a hand on Tommy.

Tommy loved it. Basked in it, grew in it. Tommy took every opportunity to kiss Evan. A little one to his cheek or temple or birthmark when they were out and about. So many kisses against the corner of his eye where his scar started. And so many more against that sweet, beloved mouth.

They hadn’t been this clingy before. Sure, they had spent most of their time together, and they had been comfortable with each other, but almost dying next to each other changed things. Tommy truly believed there would never be a person who knew and saw him the same way Evan did.

There was no-one else. Nor should there be.

Things changed, and at times, they stayed the same. They evolved. Moved along.

When Evan brought up the future again, months down the line, Tommy wasn’t afraid anymore. He suggested they should start by moving in together.

They moved Evan’s things into Tommy’s house, and unpacked together, found their way through merging their lives permanently.

Tommy watched Evan reorganize his kitchen, find places for all his pots and pans and fancy knives, and watched him baby-proof the cupboards and drawers so Odin wouldn’t try and play with the shiny new things Evan had brought into the house.

And Tommy started thinking about his wedding vows right then and there.