"Wait, what's — " Buck tries to ask, but for a short guy, Chim still has all the strength of a firefighter, and he drags Buck along with him as he walks away from the bar.

Buck manages a glance back and a helpless shrug at the amused look on Tommy's face.

3) It turns out Buck took Tommy's place at the 118 and on the trivia team. Hen and Chim seem more mad that they lost their MVP ("I hate to admit it," Hen says, "But that man knows sports and movies and 20th century history to a really impressive degree." "Henrietta!" Chim snaps. "Do not speak fondly of the betrayer.") than that they lost their colleague and…maybe friend? Buck's not sure how much of the shit-talking is just for show. He's not going to be a lot of help to them for sports or movies or history, and when Hen asks what his specialty is and Buck says, "I dunno…trivia?" Chim lets his head drop to the table with a groan.

"Okay, listen to me," Chim says firmly, pointing two fingers at his own eyes and then at Buck's. "He wasn't here for the last one and we weren't here for the one before that. This is our first opportunity to show him we don't need his freakish knowledge of basketball stats. Do not fuck this up for us, Buckley."

Buck's starting to think that maybe this isn't going to be quite the chilled bonding experience he was expecting.

4) There's a round on aquatic creatures that Buck absolutely knocks out of the park. Then there's a round on 90s rom-coms, followed by one on sports that has Chim howling with rage and glaring daggers over at Tommy's table where he's squished between two other burly firefighters and scribbling industriously. There's a break after that, and Buck offers to go to the bar when he sees that Tommy's heading up there too. He can feel Chim glaring at him the whole time, so he doesn't do more than offer Tommy a smile. Tommy has no such qualms, beelining over to him once he has his drinks — Buck tries not to look at the way he's holding three bottles of beer in one hand, the necks slotted in between his thick fingers.

"Hey," he says, sounding bright and breathless. "How's it going?"

"You know Chim's going to give me hell for talking to you, right?"

Tommy winks. "Why'd you think I'm here?"

"Oh," Buck says, and tries not to let himself droop, because Tommy's really cool, and Buck doesn't want him to only be talking to Buck to get a rise out of someone else.

"Well," Tommy says, and his free hand rubs at the back of his neck. "I mean. Not just that."

"Buckley!" Chim yells. "Stop fraternizing!"

Tommy laughs. "When he gets really mad, he gets his little vein, right here," he says, tapping his own temple. "See how it goes."

"Yeah," Buck says, feeling giddy.

5) The 118 don't win. Harbor — because Tommy is a pilot, Buck realizes with an inexplicable swooping in his stomach. So. Cool — don't win either. In fact, they come joint third, tied exactly. He thinks Chim's madder about that than if the Harbor team had won outright. So he's a little confused when, once the winners have taken their prize and the quizmaster has wrapped up, Chim and Hen head directly for Tommy's table for an exchange of back slaps and greetings.

"I thought we weren't allowed to fraternize," he says, because he's trailed after them.

"During quiz time," Chim says.

"Quiz time is sacred," Tommy admits.

"You can talk to each other as much as you want outside of quiz time," Hen tells them.

Buck's not sure why, but he looks at Tommy right as she says that, and feels like he's been frozen solid by the color of Tommy's eyes, the laughter lines around them as he smiles.

"Is that a promise?" he asks, his voice low, and Buck feels like they're the only two people left in the bar.

"Yeah," he says, pretending he can't feel himself blushing, can't feel the weight of the stares Hen and Chim are switching back and forth between him and Tommy like spectators at a Tennis match. "Yeah, I'd like that."

They swap phones to trade numbers and Buck feels a zap of electricity when their fingers graze as they pass them back. Tommy's put his details in as 'Tommy (quiz night)'. Buck doesn't think too much as he changes it to 'Tommy (hot pilot)'.

tommy is man enough to admit he has a WILD crush on this guy, but he's professional enough not to let it get in the way of doing his job. anyway, he really likes taylor too — she's funny and ambitious and a little mean which are all characteristics tommy really likes in a friend. while evan is sweet and enthusiastic and full of sunshine, which are all things tommy likes in a guy. not that it matters, he reminds himself, because taylor's not going to be his friend, and evan's absolutely not going to be his man. normally, he can guess within a few minutes of meeting a couple whether they're going to stay together, but he really can't tell with these two. the vibe he gets is good friends with a lot ot sexual chemistry.

the show goes on — tasks, activities, honesty challenges, whatever they do on this show, again, i apologise, i have not watched it oops — and tommy continues to spend a lot of time with both of them. he and evan hit it off immediately, even beyond the things they have in common. a couple times tommy thinks there's something more to it — evan's almost too interested in what he has to say, finds too many excuses to hang out with him and talk to him about things other than his relationship with taylor.

the day before the show do their "new relationship" twist, where each half of a couple gets assigned a new person to live with for three weeks, to see whether the grass is really greener, evan and taylor have a huge fight, and neither of them will tell tommy what it was about. oh, they give him reasons ("he doesn't respect my work and his 'family' hates me" vs. "sometimes i don't think she even wants to be with me at all, she doesn't take me seriously"), but he can tell they're both holding out on him.

evan gets matched with a vet tech named elena who is sweet and funny and has none of taylor's sharp edges. taylor gets matched with an entrepreneur named alan who is hot as breakfast, but takes himself extremely seriously and has none of evan's sweetness or enthusiasm (unless you count his enthusiasm for perfectly calibrating his pre-workout stacks).

tommy thinks it's going to make them both realise how much they like each other, maybe they'll make it after all. and then he gets a text from a runner who works on the show saying buck needs to talk to him urgently. once the moment of "who the hell is buck?" has passed, tommy hurries over to the apartment evan is currently sharing with elena and finds him pacing up and down the corridor. the first thing out of his mouth is "i think i have to quit the show".

tommy's not as cutthroat as some of the producers who will do anything it takes to keep a contestant on the show, but he does need to know more, and he doesn't want evan to sacrifice his fee if he walks. "okay," he says. "why don't we go get a drink and we can talk it through?" evan nods, looking pitifully grateful. tommy takes him to a nearby coffee shop, because he doesn't drink with contestants on the show. evan looks around with big, wide, worried eyes like he's expecting the place to be full of other producers who are there specifically to listen in on their conversation. tommy fights against a deeply unhelpful wave of affection and buys their coffees.

it's worse than he imagined. "taylor's writing an article," evan says in a hushed voice. "about the ethics of reality tv." tommy thinks, shiiiiiiiit, and starts flicking through a mental rolodex of every interaction he's had with either of them. crush aside, he doesn't think he's crossed any lines. but there's a really messy couple that one of the other producers has been handling, and there are always, always people on these shows that need therapy more than they need to air out their relationship woes on national tv for entertainment. and then evan says, "but we signed stuff. i don't want her to get in trouble." and if tommy wasn't already falling for him, he thinks that would have done it. "if i quit," he goes on, "if i say they can't use my footage, will that help?"

they go back and forth on it for the length of time it takes them to drink two coffees each. at one point tommy says, "it's sweet, that you're concerned for her. you're a good boyfriend." evan's mouth twists unhappily and he says, "don't give me too much credit. i'm so…i'm so embarrassed, tommy. we came on this stupid show — sorry, i know it's your job, but if i have to do one more ridiculous fake date or honesty exercise i'm going to lose my mind — and i don't think she ever even wanted to figure out if we should stay together or not. i think it was just a way in for her." ambitious, that was the first thing tommy noticed about taylor, the first thing he liked about taylor. now, looking at the way evan's drooping like a sad puppy sitting outside in the rain, it doesn't seem so endearing. "i'll talk to her," tommy offers. "don't do anything yet, okay?" evan nods, sniffs, thanks tommy for the coffees.

on their way back to the apartment complex where the contestants are staying, evan stops on the sidewalk and says, "um. thank you. i'm—i'm really glad it's you." tommy doesn't know what to do with that, so he reaches out, intending to put his arm over evan's shoulders and give him a jostling, bro-y half hug. instead, evan reaches out in return and the gentle way he puts his arms around tommy, the careful way his hands spread wide on tommy's shoulder blades like he wants to feel as much as possible has his heart racing with stupid, stupid feelings. he closes his eyes and lets evan hug him for way longer than he should.

tommy doesn't get to speak to taylor until the next day — she's filming a yoga date with alan, which tommy's fellow producer describes as 'a total shit show'. when they sit down together the next morning, he doesn't waste any time, just tells her he knows about the article, and waits to see what she says. what she says, with a smile is, "i'm a reporter, tommy. i'm always working on articles. you'll have to be more specific." tommy frowns and tells her that evan is worried about her from a legal perspective. she scoffs and says, "he always does this. i'm a professional. i spoke with my editor, we spoke with our legal department. i'm not stupid. i thought about it before i did this." tommy can't help himself, bursts out, "did you think about him? he's heartbroken, taylor." "oh, he is not," she shoots back. "believe it or not, in spite of all your little late night chats, i know buck better than you do. he's embarrassed and he doesn't want to hear his family say 'i told you so' for the fifth time." tommy can tell that taylor's used to that tone taking her a long way, so he pushes down the spike of anxiety about late night chats and just raises his eyebrows. "god," she mutters. "fine. give me your phone, i'll talk to him." tommy's busting through a bunch of rules here in the interests of damage control, telling himself it's damage control for the show rather than for evan's heart. he puts his phone into taylor's outstretched hand and she dials, holding it up to her ear as she says, "a little privacy?"

tommy doesn't know what they talk about, but taylor looks a little subdued when she brings his phone out to him, and they make it through the rest of the show without incident. tommy tries to ask evan about it, but all he'll say is "we talked. we made some decisions. thank you for helping." tommy feels like he's going to vibrate out of his skin for the rest of the recording, and his heart is in his mouth when he watches their final filming. "we've decided to separate," taylor says. "we have different priorities," evan says. "we love each other, but we're not a good match anymore," taylor says. "there are other things we want to explore," evan says, and they have to reset and reshoot because taylor lets out an incredibly unladylike snort of laughter and evan gets the giggles. tommy doesn't think he understands these two at all.

two weeks after filming wraps, taylor's article drops. it actually could have been a lot worse, and tommy's never been so grateful that he's in a position to pick his jobs and to no longer have to work on things that make him feel as uncomfortable as some of the early roles he took on.

a day after that, he gets a message on his work phone from evan. can we meet? it says. i'd love to buy you a coffee. it's such a terrible idea, tommy knows that. he says yes anyway.

when they film the reunion episode a couple months later, taylor doesn't attend. (tommy knows for a fact that she was very deliberately not invited, because the higher ups are mad as hell about the article because even if it doesn't make allegations of misconduct, it does absolutely skewer the show as a whole, and what it says about the reality tv industry.) evan does attend, and tommy has to look away and bite his lip hard so he doesn't give the game away when evan says, "i'm good. i'm really good. i'm actually seeing someone new. i know it's fast, but i really like them. like, a lot. i can see it going the distance."