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Eddie wakes up to someone squishing his face between their hands.
Christopher, he thinks, probably. Buck’s sleeping on the couch, but, of the two of them, Christopher is much more likely to be squishing his face between his hands.
He’s thinking all of this, somewhere between half-awake and a sleep-blurred daze, when he registers that the person is talking. Chanting, really.
“ Gay Eddie ,” the voice whispers, weirdly close to his face. “ Gay Eddie. Gay Eddie .”
Huh.
That’s not Christopher. That actually kind of sounds like - -
Eddie sits up with a gasp, eyes flying open to find a mirror staring back at him. Or, not a mirror-mirror, but a mirror. An Eddie. Another Eddie, or a doppelganger, or a demon, or definitely something bad. Something he should - -
He shifts his weight, preparing to down the Other Eddie with one practiced, efficient sweep, when the Other Eddie reads his mind and meets his movement.
Fuck.
He sucks in a breath, the “Bu” of Buck’s name right on his lips when Other Eddie slaps a hand over his mouth.
“Shut up. Shut up. Shhhhh. No,” Other Eddie whisper-yells. “Shut up.”
“Mmph!” Eddie protests, trying and failing again to free himself from Other Eddie’s hold. It’s as if every move he makes, Other Eddie knows he’s going to make it.
“I need you to be chill,” Other Eddie says, brows raised in what appears to be judgement, as if he’s reacting strangely to his demon doppelganger waking him up with a chant in the middle of the night.
“HmhmHM?” Eddie complains through the hand pressed against his mouth.
Other Eddie seems to understand that what he meant by that is what the FUCK? and pointedly rolls his eyes in response.
“No, I'll talk. You listen,” Other Eddie instructs. “I’m about to zip into thin air again so I need you to lock the fuck in and pay attention. Eyes on me. Focus.”
Eddie blinks.
“Great,” Other Eddie nods. “Okay.” He takes the hand that isn’t currently rendering him speechless and presses a finger against Eddie’s chest. “Gay Eddie. Got it? Eddie, gay. You, Eddie,” he reiterates, tapping the finger sharply against his chest, “gay.”
Eddie blinks at him like he’s lost his mind.
“Now I really need you to lock in for this next part,” Other Eddie begs, leaning in closer. He brings his other hand up to slap the side of his face in time with his words. “Kiss Buck. Gay Eddie, kiss Buck.”
Eddie blinks.
This isn’t happening. This can’t be real.
Other Eddie raises his brows expectantly, as if awaiting an answer.
Eddie’s brain is about three minutes behind, which is to say it’s still fully and peacefully sleeping, unaware that it’s about to be thrust into…whatever this is.
A midnight demon ambush?
A glitch in the fabric of the universe?
A time travel intervention?
He’s blue-screening, wide-eyed and fucking confused, when Other Eddie slaps him back into the room.
Ow. There’s a fucking ring on his finger.
“You can gay panic later, I need to know if you’re with me,” he demands. “Gay Eddie, yes?”
Somehow, Eddie knows that Other Eddie is really him. He’s different, but he’s him.
Which is why he knows it’s pointless to try and lie to him about a very truth of who he is, but he’s been doing it for so long and he’s so good at it, he can’t stop himself.
Eddie shakes his head.
“Wrong,” Other Eddie sighs. “You’re wrong. I’m right. You’re gay. Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck. You copy?”
Eddie blinks.
“Repeat it,” Other Eddie instructs, peeling his hand away from his mouth, squishing his cheeks between his hands again.
Eddie opens his mouth, considers yelling for Buck, but nothing comes out. He shakes his head.
Other Eddie sighs dramatically. “You gotta lock the fuck in for me, man. Do not fuck this up for us.” He tightens his hold on Eddie’s face, pressing his forehead against Eddie’s.
Eddie’s eyes widen at the proximity.
“Gay Eddie,” Other Eddie whispers. It feels like a threat. “Kiss Buck.”
“I’m…dreaming,” Eddie concludes. Eddie doesn’t believe in demons, or time travel, he remembers. Those things don’t exist. He just needs to wake up, and this will stop happening.
“Sure,” Other Eddie agrees. “Whatever. None of this is real, just repeat it back to me anyway.”
He can’t do that. He can’t look it in the eye, or it’ll be real. And if it’s real, then Eddie will have to face it.
Eddie clears his throat. “I don’t want to.”
Other Eddie shakes him by the shoulders. “We don’t have time! This is it. I’m telling you, this is it,” he promises. He’s never been on this side of it, but he knows the look on his face anyway. It’s the one he uses when he’s sure. When he’s completely certain. When he’s holding out a hand for a patient and asking them to trust him. To jump. “Gay Eddie…” Other Eddie prompts.
Eddie swallows.
He feels the cool metal of the ring against his face.
Hope pools in his chest.
He jumps.
“Kiss Buck,” Eddie whispers.
Other Eddie leans up and kisses his forehead with a gleeful smack. “Yes!” He grins. “You sweet, stupid, deeply repressed idiot. That’s it. Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck. Lock. In. Yeah? Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck. It’s getting embarrassing, so sooner the better. And throw the fucking hair gel away,” he says, ruffling Eddie’s hair. “I’m out of time. Gay Eddie, kiss buck, okay? Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck. Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck.”
Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck.
Gay Eddie.
Kiss Buck.
Gay Eddie.
Kiss Buck.
“Hey, Eddie?”
“Kiss Buck!” Eddie shouts, scrambling awake with a gasp and falling directly off the bed and onto the floor.
Buck gapes at him from where he’s standing at the end of his bed.
“What?” Eddie blinks.
“What?” Buck chokes.
“Wait,” Eddie asks, shaking his head. “What did you say?”
“Uh. ‘ Hey, Eddie?’ ” Buck repeats. “Your alarm has been going off for ages. Are you okay?”
Eddie blinks. “Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck,” he mumbles under his breath.
Gay Eddie.
Kiss Buck.
Gay Eddie
Kiss Buck.
“Um. Are you good?” Buck frowns.
That’s a great question. That’s a really very good question. He doesn’t know how to explain that he just experienced a dream so vivid and so life-altering that his face is still stinging from the slap of his doppelgänger’s hand.
“I think…I need to kiss you?” Eddie admits.
Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck.
Gay Eddie. Kiss Buck.
All the working out seems irrelevant, really, when this is the result. He doesn’t really understand how he got here, either, but he did, and he’s here, and he needs to kiss Buck more than he needs to breathe.
Buck blinks. “Um. Okay. Sure.”
“ Sure ,” Eddie repeats, blinking up at him. “You’d just - - let me kiss you?”
“Uh. I mean - - yeah.”
Eddie stares at Buck. Buck stares at Eddie.
Eddie, realizing he’s still sitting on his ass on the floor, reaches out a hand — Buck meets it. He pulls him up.
Eddie lands standing right in front of Buck. There’s maybe an inch between them.
“I - - gay Eddie,” Eddie says, tapping a finger against his own chest.
“Oh,” Buck smiles. “Uh. Bi Buck,” he returns, pointing at himself in a mirror of Eddie. Like the other half of him. Like this is it.
Of course this is it.
He looks at Buck and Buck looks back at him. Amused. Confused. Hopeful.
“What was the, uh, other part?” Buck asks.
“Hmm?” Eddie hums.
“You woke up saying it,” Buck reminds him. “Gay Eddie…”
“Kiss Buck,” he breathes.
Buck nods. “Yeah. That,” he whispers. “We should do that.”
Eddie looks at him — at the rest of his life — nods, and kisses him.
Fucking fuck. Eddie is gay. Eddie is so, so gay. Eddie couldn’t be more gay.
Gay Eddie!! Gay Eddie is kissing Buck! Gay Eddie is going to kiss Buck for the rest of his life.
“I think I need to throw out my hair gel,” he mumbles vacantly against Buck’s lips.
Buck moans against his mouth. “ Yes . You should burn it ,” he groans, melting further against him. “This is the best day of my fucking life.”
When Eddie is rudely pulled from his husband’s warm and sleeping arms a year later, he doesn’t really have time to process that it apparently wasn’t a dream at all. He has 30 seconds to metaphorically, and literally, if need be, slap Idiot Eddie across the face so hard he stumbles right out of that closet. The rest of their life is on the line. Everything is on the line.
He squishes Idiot Eddie’s face between his palms and locks the fuck in.