Work Text:
“Oh shit!” Linda’s outburst startles Josh, almost making him spill his coffee.
They were both in the break room. Linda at the small table, Josh just having refilled his mug, sat at the island. “What, everything okay?”
She looked up, as if noticing him for the first time. “Oh, hey. Yeah, kinda. Eddie just told me about how the new captain of the 118, Gerrard, used to be the old captain and why he got removed the first time. I don't know why the department put him back there. That man should have been fired a long time ago.”
“Wait, Eddie? Like Eddie Diaz?” Josh hadn’t spoken to the man but a few brief words in passing since he had gone back to being a firefighter full time. He had assumed Eddie had dropped contact with everyone at dispatch, but clearly he had been wrong. Sure they had had a few tiffs, but they had so many mutual friends Josh had assumed everything had been fine between them.
Linda smiled at her phone again, typing a response as she spoke to her boss. “Yeah, I heard Chris took off to Texas so I texted to check on him and now he’s venting about the new boss. I don’t mind though. He clearly needed an outside perspective.”
Why did that make him want to scream? So what Eddie still talks to Linda and not him? It’s not like they were really that close before, not like Eddie and Linda were. They were always huddled together at lunch sharing stories, or recipes, or TV show recommendations. Josh and Eddie only really interacted when necessary, or when Josh was having to reprimand the other man. So why does it bother him so much that he never sees Eddie’s name on his phone screen. It’s ridiculous.
________________
Eddie laughed at the meme Linda sent him. Their text thread was more active now, just like it had been when he worked dispatch. He shouldn’t have slacked off on his friendship with her, she really is amazing. She just gets him.
“What are you laughing at?” Buck leaned over to look at his phone screen.
The brunette turned the screen to show his friend. “Linda sent me this when I told her about all the shit with Gerrard.”
Buck squinted at the phone, “Dispatcher Linda?”
Eddie nodded and typed his response.
“I didn’t know you still kept in touch with anyone from your dispatch days.”
“Just her, she really got into telenovelas so I gave her recommendations of the ones with the best translated English subtitles.”
The blonde sat back against the arm of the couch, eyeing his friend skeptically, “Uh huh. Do you still talk to anyone else? Josh, or May?”
Eddie froze at the mention of Josh’s name. Ever since Buck and Tommy had started dating, ever since Eddie had witnessed them interacting and being a couple, he had started wondering certain things about himself. And then one night he had had a very spicy dream involving a certain dispatcher bossing him around, he woke up so hard he jerked off twice in the shower before work. Then it kept happening, he kept having dreams that involved the other man, not all of them dirty. Once they were just sitting on the couch watching TV. It was so domestic it made his heart ache, and his head spin. Since then, he has avoided all mentions of Josh. At Maddie and Chimney’s wedding it was thankfully easy to avoid the man despite the cramped quarters.
He hadn’t told anyone about the dreams either. Not even Frank, who he’d started seeing 3 times a week since the whole Kim thing.
Shaking his head to clear the gay thoughts he cleared his throat before answering. “Uh, no. Just Linda. May is at school anyway. She doesn’t need some old guy texting her while she’s doing homework.”
Buck scoffed, “I text May all the time! She even sent me a text this morning asking about Bobby and Athena’s househunt.”
Humming, Eddie pocketed his phone. “And you don’t think that’s weird?”
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Linda and Eddie were getting drinks. She had had a bad shift and he had agreed as soon as she suggested it.
And now two drinks in, Eddie was loose and their mutual venting sessions were done. “So how’s dispatch been without me? Boring I assume.”
Linda laughed, as the bartender set her 3rd martini and his 3rd beer down. “Same old, same old. Josh can’t keep a boyfriend. Cindy is pregnant again. Lowell still needs to see a damn dentist. The new facility is awesome though. You should stop by sometime.”
Eddie hummed. His brain had stopped working at the mention of Josh’s dating life. And of course he was just drunk enough to not have a brain to mouth filter anymore, so he couldn’t stop himself from saying, “Boyfriend? Josh uh, has one? Like right now, does he have one?”
LInda tilted her head at him, her eyes scanning his face quizzically. She must find what she’s looking for because a small smile plays across her lips. “I’m not sure actually. Last I heard, no.”
“Good, that’s good.” He took a sip of his beer. After he swallowed he corrected, “Well, not for him I guess. Unless he doesn’t want one, then it is. I don’t know what I’m saying. Why am I still talking?”
His companion just chuckled, “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you had a thing for our very own Mr. Russo.”
The firefighter choked on his beer, spluttering he wiped his hand across his mouth to clear the liquid. “What? No, no I don’t. I’m not into guys, or maybe I am, I don't know anymore. But Josh? That’s crazy.”
A comforting hand is placed on his arm, “Whoa. Eddie, I was joking. I wasn’t trying to – I– wait. Did you say…? Oh Eddie.”
Linda manhandled him off of the stool he is perched on and into a hug. “I’m so sorry I teased you. I didn’t realize.”
He hugged her back. “No, no. It’s fine. I just,” with a sigh, he released his friend and sat back on the stool. “I’ve just clearly had too much to drink. And no one to talk to about this. I mean, I could talk to Buck. He literally just went through his own sexuality crisis. Or Hen, or Karen, or literally anyone. But it feels to big to just go to a friend I see every day and say ‘So i’ve been having gay thoughts recently and now all my dreams include a mutual friend of ours who used to be my boss.’”
“All of them?” Her tilted head and furrowed brow indicate how intently she’s listened to his entire spiel.
Groaning, he dropped his head onto the table. “Can we change the subject now? I think I need to go home.”
—--------------------
Linda spent her next shift with Josh gathering intel. Whenever she saw Josh go to the break room she followed and made sure to bring up Eddie somehow to gauge the other man’s reaction.
She even managed to rope Maddie into a conversation about her brother’s best friend while they were all taking a much needed lunch break.
“I had drinks with Eddie the other night.” She kept one eye on their boss as she talked. “He told me he’s ready to get back out there and try dating again.”
Maddie hummed, “Good for him. I just hope he’s worked through whatever it was that pushed Christopher away. Buck won’t say and Chimney doesn’t know, so I guess it was bad.”
“He’s seeing someone, a therapist I mean. He said Christopher was supposed to be coming home soon, at least before school starts again. And his therapist suggested trying dating, so he asked me to set him up with someone.”
She saw Josh freeze and a blush creep up his neck.
“Oh yeah? Who do you have in mind?” Maddie, none the wiser, was pulling her phone out to scroll through her contacts. “I think Helen is still single, and her daughter and Christopher are the same age.”
Josh stormed out the room before Linda could respond. Suspicions confirmed, she smiled to herself.
—------------------------------
Linda said there was supposed to be a dispatch reunion of sorts, but when he arrived Eddie only saw Josh sitting at the bar, alone.
He pulled his phone to shoot her a quick text: Where is everyone?
“Eddie?” Josh’s voice made him look up. The other man was wearing a dark sweater and jeans that looked like they hugged every inch of him perfectly. Even though he was sitting and Eddie couldn’t actually see, he would bet money his ass looked phenomenal.
“Uh, hey.”
They smiled awkwardly at each other.
Eddie’s phone vibrated with a response from Linda: Sorry for the lie. But you two need to talk. Thank me later
He felt his ears getting hot as a blush crept up his face. Clearing his throat, he put his phone away and gestured to the empty bar stool beside Josh. “Mind if I…”
Taken aback, the other man shook his head, “No, no go right ahead.”
Eddie ordered a beer and sat down. The tension between them thick with awkwardness as both men racked their brains for something to talk about.
When his beer was brought, Eddie took a huge gulp before he could get the courage to speak.
“So, how have you been? We haven’t talked in a while.”
Josh snorted, “Only because you run the other way when you see me.”
Screwing his face up, the firefighter rubbed his neck. “You noticed that, huh?”
“Hard not to. I swear you used your grandmother as a human shield at the wedding. Did I do something?”
After another gulp of beer, Eddie shook his head. “No, of course not. I’ve just - nevermind. No you didn’t do anything.”
The dispatcher turned on his stool so that he was fully facing the other man, his knees brushing Eddie’s thigh in his new position. “So then why avoid me?”
He couldn’t look over, he knew he would chicken out if he looked into those deep brown eyes. “I just -- you –you make me crazy. A few months ago Buck realized he was Bi, and then he started talking to me about things in his past that he realized weren’t strictly ‘hetero behavior’ as he called it, and I started thinking. And then I started remembering. Then dreaming. And I may or may not have a huge crush on you. So yeah, I ran cause I didn’t know how to deal with it, still don’t actually, but Linda is desperate for drama so she tricked me into coming here and told me to tell you.”
A soft “oh” was all he heard before the knees on his thigh shifted again and Josh was facing the bar again.
“Yep. So now you know, and I’m gonna go.” He downed the rest of his beer, then stood to leave.
“Wait!”
Eddie sighed but didn’t turn around, “I don’t need you to let me down gently. I’ll just tell Linda her plan failed and we don’t ever have to talk about this again.”
A hand grabbed his, gently uncurled his fist and then fingers were lacing with his. “Please don’t. I wasn’t going to let you down gently, I was going to tell you that you have driven me crazy since the first day you walked into my dispatch in those stupid uniform pants. And maybe see if I could buy you another beer?”
Finally turning to meet Josh’s eyes, Eddie smiled. “My uniform pants? Really?”
Josh tugged on his hand, dragging him back onto the bar stool. “You have to know how good they make your ass look. It’s sinful Mr. Diaz.”