#62k

“Oh, okay. I’m sorry about assuming. Now if you’d like to see—”

“It’s fine. He just – he meant that we’re…friends?” Eddie said with a frown because he honestly didn’t want to get into the specifics. The salesperson was already looking like they regretted coming over. They didn’t need to hear about how Buck was worried about Eddie leaving him or—

“Friends?” Buck choked out turning to look at him in aghast. “That’s all I am to you?”

“Buck – you know I didn’t mean it like that,” Eddie turned slightly so he could give them some semblance of privacy. “The point is…you mean a lot to me, and I don’t know how to describe it to people. You’re more than my best friend. Obviously more than a partner. You’re my – my—”

“Trial run boyfriend?” Buck sneered.

“I wasn’t going to explain this whole trial run thing.”

“Um, you know how about I show you the terry cloth couches, and you can—” the salesperson rambled.

Buck made a face. “It doesn’t feel real when you say it like that.”

“What are you talking about?”

“When you say trial run boyfriend, it feels like this is all temporary. Like you’ll – you’ll end it.”

“We’re trying this out. You wanted to try this out. I’m doing this for you!”

“I know that!”

“And now you’re angry at me?”

Buck rolled his eyes and sat down heavily on the third couch. It was a dark grey mini-sectional. It was springy too. When Eddie sat beside him, he shifted even closer to Buck and maybe this wasn’t a bad option.

“I’m not angry,” Buck snapped.

“But you wanted—”

“A trial run, I know.”

“You know we have some lovely options also over – over here, if you’d like to take a look…”

“What’s going on?” Eddie itched to put his hand on Buck’s knee, wanting to offer some semblance of comfort.

“I hate when you call me your trial run boyfriend! I hate that term,” Buck bemoaned. “I even hate the word run and trial like separated too! Who hates the word run? It’s run!

“ We’re more than that! We’re best friends, obviously. But we’re not – I mean, it sounds so…temporary. Trial run boyfriends! I mean it’s – we’re figuring some stuff out and I know I was the one who – who came up with the term but I – I hate it. I hate thinking of you as temporary. We’re not temporary. You’re permanent to me.”

The salesperson looked like they want to be consumed by the floor. “You’re know, people get really passionate about furniture, so I understand the, uh…passion. And you know, that’s the phone. You might not hear it, but let me go answer it and I’ll just leave you two to…yeah,” the salesperson hurried away. (Eddie would say he ran away, but he didn’t blame him.)

Eddie gave in to temptation and put his hand on Buck’s knee. Gently, he said, “Buck, you’re permanent to me too. I want to be your real boyfriend. Your forever boyfriend. Your husband. I told you that.”

“You never actually said husband.”

“Okay, I said I want to be more. What else did you think I meant?”

“I don’t know!”

“Talk to me, please?”

There was a long silence as Buck chewed his bottom lip. His eyes were downcast and in the quietest voice, he finally said, “It’s me. How could you be happy with just me?”

Eddie softened. “Buck, I’m always happy with you. Being your boyfriend is this really cool bonus. But at the end of the day, you being my best friend is what I love most about us.”

Buck slowly turned to look at him.

“Which is why I know you. I know you inside and out and your idiosyncrasies are these really neat things about you. So yeah, I can be happy with you because that’s just the way it’s always been. And when you said you wanted to try this out, I mean, of course I’ll try it out with you. That’s what we do.”

Buck’s eyes were so shiny and blue. Eddie scooted a little closer and moved his hand further up his knee.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3