You can still smell the smoke. Buck’s turnout gear is draped over the back of a chair, singed and half soaked. There’s a gash on his cheek that he hasn’t even noticed yet, blood curling down his jaw. You’re standing in the kitchen with a towel in hand, white knuckling the edge of the counter like it personally insulted you.

Nobody talks about what happened on the call. Not yet. Because Buck didn’t think. He never thinks. He just runs in, guns blazing, heart first. That’s what makes him him. But today? That choice nearly got him killed. Again.

And this time, Eddie can’t let it go. “You were supposed to wait for backup,” You say, voice low and trembling with anger he hasn’t figured out how to hide. Buck shrugs, tired.

“The kid didn’t have backup.”

That’s Buck for you. Always someone else’s life before his own. Always willing to burn himself up just to light the way for someone else. And you? You feel like you are watching the man you loves slowly destroy himself in the name of being enough. “You think we’re all gonna be fine if you die a hero?”

Buck finally looks up. There’s that flicker in his eyes. That sadness he hides with a crooked grin and bad jokes. The kind of grief that goes too deep for words.

“I didn’t think you’d care that much,”

Buck says, quietly. And your chest caves around the words he doesn’t say. Of course I care. Of course I care too much. Don’t you see? It’s always been you.

But you doesn’t say it.

You just presses the towel into Buck’s hand and say, “Clean yourself up. You’re bleeding.” Because it’s easier to treat a wound than to admit the real one’s under his ribs.