Chapter Text
Buck was zoning out on his couch when someone started knocking on his door. Everyone who cared about him — and some who didn't, apparently — had keys, so he decided to ignore it. Unfortunately, the person in the hallway didn't get the memo that he was ignoring them, and continued to knock. For a moment, Buck thought it might be Chris, coming ahead of Eddie without his keys for some reason, but the knock would be lower. This was definitely an adult sized knock.
He was debating whether or not yelling at them to go away would be the kind of response that encouraged or discouraged them from continuing, when a female voice called out. "I know you're there, Buckley! I saw your jeep! Open up!"
What finally prompted Buck to get up was the soft cry that followed her shout.
Yanking the door open, but blocking entrance with his body, Buck finally saw his visitors. The woman looked familiar the same way most of his past hookups did. But the toddler on her hip who was quietly crying was a different story entirely. A toddler with curly blonde hair and blue eyes.
"You gonna let me in?" asked the woman — Janice? Janine? Jane? Definitely a J, because he'd banged her in the back of the Jeep outside a bar called Jumpers, and he'd noted the initials then.
"How'd you find me?" Buck asked cautiously.
She snorted. "Your face was plastered all over the news after the truck thing. And the big numbers on the truck itself were pretty hard to forget." Right, of course. "I went by your station a few times, but you weren't there and they wouldn't even confirm you still worked there. So I did some research, and it took me a while to wear them down, but I finally got someone at the firefighter union to give me your address."
Which was a completely different violation that Buck was going to have to process later, because he just could not handle that right now. The little girl began to fuss again, and Buck sighed. "Come on in," he decided. She already had his address, so there was little point in keeping her out now.
"You want some water or something?" Buck offered.
"No, thanks," Ja—
"Sorry, but it's been a while… Jane?" Buck guessed. He couldn't keep calling her 'the woman' in his own mind.
"Jeanie," she offered easily. "And this is Avalyn."
"Right." He'd been close, at least. "Well, you can have a seat," Buck gestured at his kitchen table. He didn't want Jeanie over on his couch — it felt far too invasive — so the more formal area was better.
Jeanie accepted and put Avalyn down at her feet. She pulled a stuffed animal out of the bag Buck was only now noticing and handed it to the little girl, making her face light up. When she smiled, Buck could easily see the resemblance to himself. "So…"
"She's yours," Jeanie said. "I only hooked up with like 4 guys in the right time window, and you're the only white one."
"Okay," Buck accepted that for now. He'd want to check, but he couldn't deny the similarities. "I know we used a condom."
"Yeah, apparently there was some leakage," Jeanie acknowledged. "I went back to the bar pretty regularly, gave my number and your description—" she swiped her thumb over her eye in a clear reference to his birthmark "—to all the bartenders but no one saw you there again."
Because their night together had been right before he got together with Abby, Buck realized. And Jumpers had been near his old roomshare, on the other side of town from Abby's and then the loft. He'd just never gone back. "Yeah, I— uh, I moved," Buck waved his hand to encompass the loft. No point in getting into details about Abby, or Ali. "So, uh…"
"I already had to defer a year of school because of Avalyn, and now I'm only able to go part time," Jeanie said quickly. "I don't— I didn't want this. But my parents said they'd stop paying my tuition and disown me if I got rid of her. Bad enough I'd had sex outside of marriage, no need to add any other sins."
"Sorry," Buck said, because he wasn't sure what else to say.
"Yeah, well, I can't do this anymore. I want to finish my degree and finally start my life. So, I don't care what you do with her. If you want to keep her, or not, whatever. But I'm done." Jeanie jumped to her feet.
"Wait," Buck struggled to do the same — he hadn't bothered with his nightly stretches in the midst of his pity party — "You can't just leave—"
"All her information is in the bag," Jeanie said quickly, moving towards the door. "Including the custody stuff. I've shown her your picture, from the TV, so she knows who you are."
"Jeanie, you can't just leave!" Buck protested. The baby — Avalyn — started crying, and Buck looked back at her, panicked for a different reason. By the time he saw that she wasn't hurt, just upset, and looked back, Jeanie was already out the door. Buck followed, but she was already slamming through the door to the stairwell when he reached the hallway. He wanted to follow, but he couldn't leave Avalyn alone in his apartment, either.
Finally, Buck closed the door and walked back to the table, finding a hiccupping toddler staring back at him solemnly. "Papa," she said, holding her hands up to him.
Fuck.
Buck picked her up and made soothing noises, then dug into the diaper bag until he found a pouch of cheerios. It was probably too late for a snack — hell, it was too late for her to be up, since it was well past Chris's bedtime and he was considerably older than her — but Buck figured she could use a little comfort food right then.
Pulling out the rest of the contents of the bag, Buck eyed the folder full of papers while Avalyn sat on his knee and happily dug into her snack. Part of him wanted to call Athena, and have her look into Jeanie, but he wasn't sure he really had that option anymore.
There were a lot of things he didn't have anymore.
"Looks like it's just you and me kid," Buck said quietly, running his fingers through Avalyn's curls. He'd always found it soothing when Maddie did it to him as a kid. "Just you and me."