lest I go unsheltered

buck & maddie siblingism, post 7.04 | read on ao3

The last time Buck felt this nervous about talking to Maddie, he was fifteen and had scratched the Jeep. It was a real good one too, paint and metal flaked off the driver’s side door, the panelling beneath dented enough to catch when you tried to close it. Maddie and his parents were out for the night, and it hadn’t taken much convincing from his friend Andrew for Buck to lift the keys from the bowl on Maddie’s dresser and take it for a spin. When he’d scraped the door while parking Andrew had climbed out, taken one look at the car and fled. It wasn’t the kind of scratch you could buff out and besides, he and Maddie had promised a long time ago to be honest with each other. They were on the same team, always.

But Maddie had loved that Jeep. Buck remembers feeling sick to his stomach, practicing what he would say to her. He’s pretty sure he threw up over it.

He hopes he’s not gonna throw up now. Maddie’s in the kitchen, pouring enough red into their wine glasses Buck probably shouldn’t drive after drinking his. Chim’s doing something with Albert tonight and Jee is asleep, had been already when Buck got over here. He’d poked his head in to check on her and brushed an air kiss over her soft curls, so as not to wake her, in case she felt a real one. He’d stood from his crouch to find Maddie watching them in the doorway, her head leaned up against the jamb. She was smiling softly. When she saw him looking she lifted her hand, tilted it toward her mouth. Wine?

Jesus, he’d need it. Buck had nodded and followed Maddie from Jee’s room.

She brings the promised glass out, unnervingly full, and sits across from him on the couch with one leg on the floor, the other tucked up beneath her. Buck flicks his fingernail over the thin rim of the glass, listening to the sharp ring of it, until Maddie sighs and reaches over and puts her hand over his to stop it.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, not exactly kindly. Not accusatory either, just—exasperated. Her eyebrows have climbed halfway up her forehead but when Buck doesn’t answer straight away they draw back down, then further still, until she’s frowning. “Evan?”

I scratched the Jeep, Buck had blurted, almost twenty years ago now from the top of the stairs before Maddie had even taken her key out the door. She’d looked at him that same way, eyebrows drawing together, face scrunching into a scowl as the words registered. She’d said, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me, and stomped back outside to take a look at the damage. She’d left her keys in the door.

Buck’s pretty sure she’ll have a different answer this time, but the words still stick in his throat. It feels like it did when she told him about Daniel, when everything in his life could be divided neatly down the line of before-I-knew, and after. He’s drawn a second line in his head without even realising it, but which side of it things are sitting on, he’s still figuring out. He’d taken Maddie’s Jeep to impress Andrew, was the thing, who had blue eyes and shaggy blonde hair and was always quick to smile, quicker, even, than Buck, though of course he’d only been Evan back then. C’mon, Ev, he’d pleaded, wide-eyed, glinting with mischief. He’d wound the windows all the way down as they drove, laughing, the sound carrying from the car and turning Hershey into something else entirely, something that clung at Buck’s heart and made him want to stay. At least, until two years later, when Andrew had gotten into Cornell and left Buck there, in Hershey, taking all the good things about it with him.

Should Buck have known, even then?

Maddie’s still looking at him. Buck wriggles his hand out from under hers and sets his wine on the coffee table. After a moment, she puts hers down too.

“I’m,” Buck says, and the word that should come after sticks in his throat. “Something—happened. I, um, I did something.”

“Oh-kay,” Maddie says slowly, drawing the word out like it’s two: Oh… kay. She brings her other leg up so she’s cross-legged on the couch. “Is it something bad? I don’t need to hide a body for you, do I?”

“What?” Buck laughs, a quick exhale through his nose. It’s enough to ease some of the tension in his shoulders and break Maddie’s face into a small smile. “No, nothing like that. Though I—I’m concerned that’s where your mind went first.”

She shrugs. “Chim and I’ve been marathoning Criminal Minds.”

“Ah.” He rubs at his mouth. “No, um. It’s not, like, a big deal, I guess. I mean—it is, but not—like that.”

“Okay.” She looks at him.

Buck had stayed at the top of the stairs until Maddie had come back inside. She’d taken a deep breath, slid her keys from the door, shut it behind herself and locked it. I’m really mad at you, she’d said, her voice level. And then she’d looked up at him, and sighed—maybe at the way he was clutching his hands round his shoulders. Maybe at the fact he hadn’t moved an inch since she got home. Maddie sighed a lot when she was here. At their parents, when they couldn’t go a single Sunday dinner without arguing. At Buck, when he spilled bright blue nail polish all over the carpet in her room. At Doug, over the phone, when she didn’t know Buck was listening.

She’d walked up the stairs and sat next to him on the landing. Their shoulders bumped together. But I’m really glad you told me, she’d said, then grabbed his head and scuffed her knuckles through his hair. You’re paying for the repairs, stupid. Which had been a lie, anyway.

Buck takes a breath. He lets it out all at once. Maddie’s looking at him steadily. “Tommy kissed me,” he says. “I kissed him back. We’re going on a date on Saturday and I. I think I like guys.” He swallows. “That’s, um, it.”

“Evan,” Maddie says, and then nothing else because she’s in his arms, hugging him. His hands come up to her shoulder blades, the wings of them beneath her sweatshirt, and he’s been bigger and taller than his older sister since his growth spurt when he was fourteen but right now it’s like that doesn’t even matter. She holds him like she won’t let go and that tiny knot of tension, that ugly scrunching of doubt that had been nestled in his chest—it releases. Of course, it seems to say. Of course it’s okay. Like Buck had been an idiot to ever think otherwise. Which—he’s often an idiot. Maddie loves him anyway.

“I’m sorry,” she says thickly, sounding suspiciously snotty where her face is pressed against Buck’s neck. “I don’t really know the right thing to say. I love you, Evan, I’m—so proud of you.”

Buck gives his own sniffle. “That works,” he manages to say, and then Maddie is pulling back, wiping at her eyes and under her nose. There’s a damp patch on the shoulder of Buck’s shirt, that she seems to use as a target when she socks him. “Ow. What was that for?”

“You’re an idiot!” She throws her hands into the air. “You were pulling—fucking—pigtails!” Each word is punctuated by another punch. There’s no weight behind them, and after the third Maddie sits back, takes a deep breath.

“Is this where you tell me that being mean to a boy isn’t the way to tell him I like him?”

“Seems like I don’t have to.” She presses her lips together, like she’s trying to still be mad, but it hardly lasts a second until her face splits into a smile. “Evan,” she says. “Oh my God. Okay.”

She leans over to scoop up their glasses of wine and presses Buck’s into his waiting hand, and they could be fifteen and twenty-three again, shoulder-to-shoulder on the landing of their house in Hershey. Twenty-seven and thirty-five, drinking wine on Abby’s couch. Twenty-nine and thirty-seven, sifting through a baby box of memories, stood just over the line between before and after. Although maybe Buck was wrong. Maybe there is no line—no clean way to divide a life that will always be messy, because that’s what life is, isn’t it?

Windows rolled down—nail polish on the carpet—a kiss you didn’t even know you wanted, until you did.

Maddie takes a big gulp of wine, and her eyes are sparkling, matching a smile that’s almost as wide as her face. “Tell me everything,” she says, and Buck laughs, and does.

to the substitute art teacher

buck/eddie, future fic, 2.3k, T | read on ao3 (locked to registered users only)

Midnight ticks over while they’re on a call. A girl at a house party in West Hollywood stuck her head through the bars of the third floor balcony railing and couldn’t get back through. She’s calmed down from the hysterics dispatch reported by the time the engine rolls up; when Buck meets her on the balcony, saw in hand, she’s mostly just embarrassed.

“Hey,” he smiles, trying to sound as non-judgemental as possible. “Julia, right? I’m Buck. We’re gonna get you out of there in just a second.”

Steph crouches down on Julia’s other side, setting her med bag and blanket on the tiled floor. “How you doing there? Anything hurt?”

“Just my pride,” Julia sighs. “Do you think you could—drop me home, after? My lift’s being a total douchebag.” Buck looks over his shoulder at the party still going on inside; a couple of guys are laughing, leaning into one another, their bodies angled toward the small balcony.

“We don’t really—” Steph starts to say, thumbing the radio with her free hand and meeting Buck’s eyes over Julia’s head. He lifts his shoulder in a half-shrug. “But, uh, sure? We don’t have another call to get to.”

“Guys.” Hen’s voice crackles, exasperated over the radio. Buck starts up the saw instead of answering.

Steph covers Julia’s head with the blanket while the saw makes short work of the balcony. “Dude.” One of the guys who’d been laughing inside is staring at the scene, dumbfounded. The beer in is hand is tipped enough it’s dripping onto the tile. “You’re gonna, like, pay for that, right?”

“Fuck off, Dustin,” Julia mutters, as Steph ushers her out the door.

“Uh, yeah.” Buck hands the guy the piece of railing in his hand. “What she said.”

Hen is waiting for them out on the street, arms crossed over her chest and eyebrows raised so high Buck’s surprised she’s not giving herself a headache. Or maybe she is, and she just likes telling Buck off too much to care.

 “Sorry, Cap,” he says. “It was my call. I can take her in the ambulance, meet you guys back at the station?”

“Oh.” Julia sniffs. “It’s, um, no trouble. I can call an Uber…”

“Don’t be silly.” Hen unfolds her arms. “Surge pricing is crazy right now. Where’s home?” Julia mumbles out an address. “It’s on our way. Come on.”

Steph breaks off with t9he probie for the ambulance; Buck helps Julia up into the engine and climbs in after her. They’re halfway to her house when Ravi makes a surprised little sound. “What’s the time?”

“Twelve twenty-eight,” Hen answers from the front. There’s a smile in her voice when she says, “oh. Happy birthday, Buck.”

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28K | COMPLETE | READ ON AO3

The world doesn’t fall away, exactly. Mike is acutely aware of the scratchy seat fabric beneath his hands. It’s also way, way too hot in this auditorium, and Mike isn’t even the one under the stage lights. He’s thirsty. He wants ice-cream. But, mostly, the world narrows down to Will. Mike can’t look away. He can’t look away from the bob of Will’s throat when he swallows, the way he’s frowning, just slightly, just enough to carve a line between his eyebrows. He can’t look away from the curve of Will’s ear, the tuck of his elbow. He can’t hear anything but Will, Will reading, Will speaking, Will as Romeo. OR, Hawkins High puts on Romeo and Juliet. Mike has feelings about it.

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never did run smooth

byler au | chapter 4/5 | 6/24k

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Mike has a lot of regrets in his life. His freshman talent quest entry, for one. Attempting to stage a heist DnD campaign in the middle of Dustin’s Agatha Christie phase. Cutting his hair like that from ages eight to thirteen. Not telling his mom how much he didn’t blame her for his parents’ divorce.  That night, in the summer storm. Will’s face, wet with tears and the rain. What Mike should be doing, in this tent, Will’s eyes like rockpools and his hands cool to the touch on either side of Mike’s face, is kissing Will back. He should take his hands and put them over Will’s. Feel the ways Mike’s are bigger, but Will’s stronger, callused and for once not covered in paint. Or put them against the soft dip of Will’s waist he knows is hiding there, beneath the puffer jacket and green sweater he’s sure used to be Jonathan’s. Mike should close his eyes, part his lips, make a noise in the back of his throat—something. Something other than just kneeling here, his hands firmly on his knees, frozen in place as Will kisses him for the first time in the tent that used to be Castle Byers. Kisses him, and then—stops kissing him, rocking back on his heels in something like horror, his face panicked, moon-pale, even under the warm yellow glow of the hanging battery lantern.  “I’m—” Will says, followed by something that might be sorry, though it’s lost in the way he’s scrambling to his feet, jamming them into his boots at the same time as he’s shrugging on his raincoat. By the time Mike’s brain catches up to his racing heart and his mouth finally gets the memo and opens—to say something, anything, come back, I wish I’d known, I wish I’d kissed you first—Will is gone. Worst. Thanksgiving. Ever. (Apart from, you know. The first one. Yikes.) 

never did run smooth

byler au | chapter 5/5 | 4/28k

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“The princess bars your way into the tower. Lucas, what’s your move?” The six of them are huddled around the table in the Wheeler basement. Will is leaned back in his chair, eyes slightly unfocused and on the ceiling—he rolled embarrassingly dead last for initiative earlier, and just used his last turn to cure El’s wounds from their skirmish on the spiral stairs. El looks intent, her elbows planted on the table—when they finally convinced her to play DnD with them, they’d all thought she’d pick mage. She’d chosen fighter instead, because she’d wanted, quote, “a giant sword.” Max is playing a soulknife rogue she’s dubbed “Egg.” Right now she’s fiddling with her braille dice, hot pink, that the rest of them had pooled their money to order for her.  Dustin looks so stressed he’s sweating, and Lucas is little better—Mike coughs pointedly to prompt him, and Lucas panics, says, “I seduce the princess?” It comes out a question. “Roll for charisma,” Mike answers. Lucas rolls. The table groans. It’s a nat one. “The princess scoffs at your clumsy attempt at seduction,” Mike narrates. Will brings the front two legs of his chair back down and looks over, amused. “She says she’d kick you in the balls if she thought you had any.” Dustin whistles low through his teeth. “Ouch, dude.” “Max?” Mike reminds her. This is only her and El’s second campaign with them, and they’re not fully over all the mechanics. “What’s your action?” Max chews her lip a moment; then grins, wicked sharp. “I seduce the princess,” she says. “Roll for charisma?” It’s a nat fucking twenty. Over the top of the party whooping, Mike yells, “the princess is so taken by, uh—Egg, she forgets about her duties beyond the tower door.” “But soft!” Max recites, her arms outstretched. “What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Princess Madalena is the sun. How ‘bout we go canoodle in that dark, convenient corner over there, my lady?” “Max, you have the lockpicks,” Dustin hisses.  El puts a reassuring hand on his arm. “I will break down the door with my sword,” she tells him. Max, still gloating, pats Lucas commiseratingly on the head.

never did run smooth

byler au | chapter 3/5 | 6/18k

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“So.” Max corners him. Mike’s been doing just fine, avoiding her this past week—they only have a couple classes together, and he begged off movie night with the party a) because he just knows she would’ve backed him up against the kitchen counter while the rest of them were debating pizza toppings, and b) because movie nights always end up with him and Will sitting shoulder to shoulder, hip to hip, never mind the fact they have four other friends who could act as a buffer, but who never seem to fucking ever sit between him and Will. Mike doesn’t know why. Well, actually, Mike does know why, and it’s because Will has the tendency to doze off in the boring parts and when he dozes he kind of drools, and Mike is the only one of them who’s never given Will shit for it. Like, privately, yeah, it’s fucking gross, but also it’s not, because it’s Will, and he looks adorable whenever he falls asleep, drool or no drool, and— Yeah. This is why Mike skipped movie night.  But it’s Tuesday again which means it’s rehearsal again, the last before they break for Thanksgiving, which means Mike can’t feasibly come up with an excuse to avoid Max when they’re literally doing the exact same job, which is how she corners him here, in the wings, while Will and Jennifer Hayes are on stage and Mike would rather be anywhere but back here listening to them make Shakespearean fucking cow eyes at each other. “Yes?” Mike answers, after a long and deliberate pause in which he hoped Max would simply give it up as a bad job and storm away. She doesn’t.