Work Text:
Day 14: ‘cause I want you to know what it feels like to be haunted
To be clear, Eddie Diaz doesn’t believe in things like magic or jinxes or fate. The universe does not scream, a simple word can’t conjure a day of hell on shift, and he’s pretty on the fence about God.
Ghosts, on the other hand, are real. That, or Eddie’s been insane for most of his life. He’s choosing to believe it’s the former, though. Not much he can do about it if he is crazy, and at least this way he feels like he’s helping.
Helping ghosts move on to whatever’s next, that is. Because Eddie can see and hear ghosts.
A psychic medium, his Abuela had called him. It was when Eddie was six, and she saw him talking to Abuelo in the living room. Abuelo had died the week before, after a stroke, but he still sat in his old chair for a month before moving on. He’d been almost done with the book he was reading, and Abuela and Tia Pepa had taken turns reading out loud to him so he could hear the ending.
They’d explained it all to Eddie later, once he watched Abuelo fade out with a peaceful smile on his face. The people in Abuela’s family had been blessed with the ability to see spirits, some could even commune with them.
It had skipped Eddie’s father, and they believed that it wouldn’t get passed along to any of his children. They’d been wrong.
(Years later, when Eddie was fourteen and Adriana was three, she’d crawled into his bed and asked him about the woman who sat in her room. Odine had died in a car crash in the early 80’s, and she liked to be around children, taking a liking to the Diaz kids in particular. Eddie hadn’t been able to figure out how to help her, but she was happy enough to stick around. Eddie had called Abuela the next morning to let her know that little Addie was apparently a psychic prodigy.)
The whole ghost thing hadn’t bothered Eddie much until he was deployed to Afghanistan.
Shooting at people, not knowing if you had been the one to hit them or if they’d died was one thing. Having dozens of ghosts surrounding you with their screams and pleas for help was another. Eddie hated every second of being there, but he was scared enough of failing Christopher and Shannon that he went for a second tour anyways.
When the chopper went down, Eddie lost consciousness for a few minutes. When he came to, he didn’t realize Greggs had died until he saw the man’s body next to his feet.
“We can freak out about it later, Diaz, you have to get everyone outta here first.” The dead always seemed to understand on an instinctual level that Eddie could hear them. Greggs wasn’t even surprised, like it was just another fact of life. “Come on, man, you have to do it. My hands don’t work anymore.”
So, Eddie got everyone living out of the chopper, Greggs coaching him through it. They worked smoothly together until Eddie started heading back towards the downed helicopter. “What are you doing, Diaz? Everyone’s out, you should hold your position until help gets here.”
Eddie was far enough away, and the sound of gunfire was loud enough that he felt confident to speak to Greggs in a whisper. “I’m taking you home. Your family deserves to have someone to bury. Your daughters deserve to say goodbye to their dad.”
The look Greggs gave him made Eddie’s insides hurt. Grief looks different on the dead, worse in a way the living can’t quite comprehend. “And your son deserves to have his father come home. Diaz, enough kids have lost parents tonight, don’t you go putting Christopher through that.”
Eddie ignored him, and got three bullets for his trouble.
“You’re an idiot for that,” Greggs said, swinging his feet where he perched on the exam table next to Eddie. “But I do appreciate it. I’m glad I get to go home. Do me a favour, though? Anonymously send some violets to my wife. They’re her favourite flower, and I want her to have one last thing from me.”
There’s not much arguing with ghosts, and Eddie watched as the Greggs looked over his shoulder while he confirmed the flower delivery, then faded out out existence.
Moving to Los Angeles was a fresh start in a lot of ways.
Eddie hadn’t been around other psychics in years, not since Abuela and Pepa moved. It was nice to be back around people who understood, who got it.
Addie had been the one to give Eddie the last push towards the decision. “This town ain’t big enough for two psychics, Eddie. Go be something good.”
He was trying his ass off, but it was hard.
The biggest issue? Eddie had somehow joined the most haunted firehouse in the United States of America.
He’d been poached from station six by Captain Nash, who painted such a beautiful picture of family and community over the phone that Eddie agreed to join without having met anyone from the team. That proved to be a mistake when he showed up for his first day and met Captain Nash, as well as his poltergeist.
Poltergeists are rare, rare enough that Eddie’s only ever dealt with one back home. They’re the result of tragedies so awful the spirit can’t move on, they become trapped in layers of grief and warped by time. They become awful, painful beings who torment the living.
The thing that’s attached to Nash, with one smoking hand on the back of his neck and it’s lips brushing against his ear as it whispers incessantly to him… that thing is terrifying.
You wouldn’t know Bobby was being haunted, not by looking at him. He’s a kind man, warm and smiling and welcoming to Eddie. He’s become used to the thing sapping out his energy, and that scares the shit out of Eddie. The one other person he’s seen be haunted by a poltergeist?
She didn’t survive it.
“The changing room is just over there, yes the walls are glass, yes I’ve asked to have it changed, no the department hasn’t allocated funds for that.” Bobby sighs, pressing a knuckle to one of his eyelids. “I’ll have the team come say hi to you when they get here, I think you’ll really like them. Buck especially, he’s about your age.”
When Eddie looks up a few minutes later, he realizes just what a mistake joining the 118 was.
Three living people stand next to Bobby watching Eddie get into uniform (the glass walls will certainly take getting used to, shit). Two out of three also have ghosts attached to them.
The shorter man at least has a ghost that seems to make some sense, given their occupation. It’s a man in full turnouts, who’s casually leaning on the living man.
The taller man is the one who trips Eddie up. He doesn’t even realize he’s got a ghost attached to him at first, he’s too busy trying not to swallow his tongue when he sees blue eyes and pink lips and the kind of pout that makes Eddie want to commit crimes. It’s only when he (very subtly) checks out the rest of his body, that Eddie notices the little boy standing at the man’s side.
Most ghosts look similar to how they did at their death. Those with particularly gruesome deaths can usually hide some of the gore. This little boy though… he’s emaciated with a smooth bald head. Eddie can tell on sight that the poor kid died of cancer.
He learns, over the course of the day, a few things. He learns that his co-worker is Buck, and when Eddie has a moment alone in the washroom he learns that Buck’s ghost is named Daniel. “Do you mind if I ask how you know Buck? Is he your dad?”
The kid looks a little older than Chris, and Eddie’s chest aches thinking about Buck having lost a son. It would somewhat explain why his girlfriend fled the country and his intense hatred for Eddie on sight.
From his perch on the bathroom counter, Daniel makes a face. “Ew, no! Evan is my little brother, I’m way older than him! But, uh, you can’t tell him about me.”
It’s Eddie’s turn to make a face. “I usually don’t tell anyone that I can see ghosts, people tend not to like that.”
“No, you can’t talk to Evan about the fact that he has a brother at all.” Daniel sighs and looks down at his hands. If Eddie looks hard enough, he can see a bruise on his hand from where his I.V. would’ve been. “I died when he was a baby, he doesn’t know about me. My parents didn’t talk about me, and they made Maddie keep me a secret. Maddie’s a secret too, sorta. Evan hasn’t told anyone here about her.”
The idea that this little boy has stuck around for decades, knowing that he’s been pushed aside by his parents and forgotten by his sibling, breaks Eddie’s heart. “Why didn’t you move on, Daniel? This can’t have been easy for you.”
Daniel puffs out his little chest, trying to make himself look bigger. If he’d lived, he would probably be older than Eddie, but in death he’ll never grow into the double digits. “I’m his big brother, I can’t go until I know Evan knows about me, and until he has someone who’ll take good care of him. Like a husband or a wife, someone to protect him.”
There really isn’t any arguing with the dead, so Eddie nods and carries on with his day.
When the ambulance explodes, Eddie feels a little like his heart explodes too. Buck is beautiful when he smiles, and Daniel whoops with excitement at the explosion and the newfound friendship between Eddie and Buck.
“You’re my brother’s first ever best friend!” Daniel is bouncing a little in the front seat of Eddie’s truck, as Eddie drives home the next morning. He isn’t buckled in, and Eddie has to keep reminding himself that the kid can’t die twice. “I know you’re still new friends, but I have a good feeling about you, you’re going to be his best friend. Oh, and Maddie is back, so Buck isn’t going to be alone anymore! I’m calling him Buck now, by the way, so you don’t get confused and call him the wrong thing. Even Maddie is calling him Buck, and she got to hold him when he was a baby. I didn’t get to hold him because I was too sick.”
Daniel keeps up that level of chatter as Eddie gets out of the truck and into the house. Chris is sitting at the table, eating eggs while Abuela greets Eddie. She smiles a little quizzically at Daniel, but before she can say anything, Chris pipes up. “Did you bring a kid home from a fire?”
Both Abuela and Eddie look at Chris, then look to Daniel, who’s bouncing on his toes. “There are kids who can see ghosts? I haven’t been able to play with a kid since I was alive!”
Eddie watches, helpless, as his son leads the ghost boy into his room. Abuela smiles, hitting him on the arm. “Mijo, our little Christopher is a prodigy just like his Tia! Now, tell me all about your day, I see you made friends.”
~
Shannon coming back into Eddie’s life comes as a shock, even if maybe it shouldn’t be.
It’s just that Eddie’s been more than a little preoccupied. There was an earthquake and a lot of ghosts following him around after, and then there was Abuela’s broken hip, and Buck…
Well, there was Buck giving Eddie the tools to fix his life. He gave Eddie Carla, who in turn found Eddie the school that called Shannon.
Normally, Eddie would keep something like his estranged wife showing up and kissing him a secret. Unfortunately, he currently has a gaggle of ghosts following him around and making observations about his life. “I don’t like her.”
Daniel throws himself onto the couch next to Kevin, every ounce as dramatic as Buck. It’s honestly a wonder that Maddie is as lovely as she is, when both of her brothers are the world’s biggest drama queens.
Next to him, Kevin laughs, loud and joyful. He’s just as sunny as Chim, although a lot less intense. He has the kind of quiet confidence that makes Eddie feel at ease. “I think she’s a catch, Eddie. If I was alive I’d be fighting you for her.”
They’re sitting in the lofted area of the firehouse, and when Bobby walks by to get to his office, his poltergeist detaches from him to drift towards them.
Eddie’s noticed her doing that occasionally, leaving Bobby to join the other ghosts. Daniel, specifically. She goes over to him now, flashes of a woman popping through the kind of choking black smoke Eddie’s only seen at bad fires.
Her voice only comes out in a wheezing whisper, most of her sentences getting lost to the noise of the world around them. She caresses Daniel’s head while she talks, and the little boy smiles up at her. “…talking…wife…son?”
It takes Eddie a second, and he readjusts his grip on the phone he’s holding to his ear. His favourite trick to being a psychic without people thinking you’re psychotic? Pretending you talk on the phone when you’re really talking to the dead. “Uh, yeah, I talked to my wife. We have a son, Christopher.”
The smoke clears the longest it has since Eddie’s joined the 118, and he sees a kind looking woman with chin length blonde hair. “I…two kids, Bobby Jr…. Brooke.”
It’s the clearest sentence Eddie’s heard from her, and things start clicking in his head. “So you’re stuck here because…”
The smoke reappears again, dark in the way it does when the poltergeist, Bobby’s late wife, is having a particularly volatile day. She drifts back over to Bobby, and Eddie can see him wince the second she touches him. “God, I don’t know how he can live with her stuck to him like that.”
Kevin grimaces. “He wasn’t planning on being around much longer. He had… well, he had a whole plan.”
It’s not the kind of information Eddie shouldn’t know, but he has it now, and he can’t help his curiosity. “What made him change his mind? Or should I be keeping a closer eye on him?”
Once again, Daniel puffs out his chest, this time with pride. “Buck did! I mean, a little bit it’s that Bobby has a special blood type that helps save babies, but also he’s been a lot happier since meeting Buck! I can’t blame him, my baby brother is the coolest.”
Eddie can’t help but agree. He also has much less wholesome thoughts about Daniel’s brother, but he’s never going to tell the ghost child that. “Yeah, he’s the best.”
It’s funny, sometimes, how perceptive ghosts can be. Kevin, for example, takes one good look at Eddie when he’s talking about Buck and gets the kind of smile that spells trouble. “Oh, so Buck’s the thing keeping you from going for Shannon.”
He’d respond to that (a denial, obviously, because Eddie has much more valid reasons to not date his wife) but he feels a gentle hand on his shoulder, and lips brushing close to his ear that make him shiver. “Who’s the best?”
Unthinking, Eddie leans a bit more into the space Buck has taken up next to him. “You.”
There’s this blush Buck gets, when Eddie says just the right thing. It’s there plain as day on his face now. “Yeah? Who’re you talking me up to?”
And it’s not like Eddie can tell the truth, so he lies, and hates how easily it comes to him. “Just an old army buddy, we’re catching each other up on our lives.”
Buck doesn’t need to know that Eddie hasn’t talked to anyone he served with since he went home to El Paso.
As he always does, Daniel drifts over to Buck’s side and begins gently touching the lines of his tattoos. “You’re a good friend, Eddie. I think Buck needs to hear that sometimes, that he’s the best guy ever.”
Daniel doesn’t share much about Buck’s life after Daniel’s death, but between the three Buckley siblings, Eddie’s figured out enough to know it wasn’t great. “Hey, man, I’ve gotta go but it was nice catching up.”
Hanging up the phone, Eddie turns his full attention to Buck. He’s smiling, the Sunday Morning Soft smile that Eddie’s been familiarizing himself with. “Do you want to come with me and Chris to go see Santa?”
The smile on Buck’s face makes Eddie forget his worries completely.
~
For a long time, Hen was the only member of the 118 who wasn’t haunted and Eddie loved her for it. He loved not having to keep something that big from her, he loved not having to try to subtly put things to rights for the ghost attached to her.
So, when she comes in one day with the ghost of her Dad, Eddie feels a little defeated.
“I just want her to know I looked for her. I want her to know that I kept tabs and collected newspaper clippings.” Byron is sitting in the backseat of Eddie’s truck, wedged between Daniel and Kevin. It’s been a long shift and going home sounds just as exhausting knowing that he can’t complain to Shannon about any of it. She doesn’t like hearing about his work, it reminds her too much of his days in the army. “I don’t want her to think she wasn’t enough. It was only my own fault that I left.”
Eddie hits his head off of his steering wheel twice. “Okay, how do you suppose I do that? I can’t tell her the ghost of her dead dad is telling me all about how proud he is of her!”
Daniel passes through the backrest of the front seat, so that he’s sitting next to Eddie. “You could be like The Ghost Whisperer! Maddie got really into that show when she married Doug.”
They all make a face at the mention of Maddie’s late husband, and Eddie thanks whatever is out there that Doug hasn’t made a reappearance yet. It’s still not totally out of the question, he knows of more than a few ghosts who appeared decades or centuries after their deaths, but Eddie is enjoying the peace for now.
“There’s a safety deposit box, my friend Sam has the key.” Byron recites a phone number, and Eddie hopes the guy doesn’t go into the great beyond before Eddie has the chance to write it down somewhere, he’s already forgetting the damn thing. “Just tell him I’m dead and then give him Henrietta’s mailing address. Please.”
Eddie sighs, but he’s long since accepted his fate when it comes to carrying out errands for the dearly departed. It’s not even the weirdest thing he’s had to do for a ghost.
(He still can’t smell certain orange scented cleaners without gagging. He smelled like the stuff for months.)
Carrying out Byron’s wishes leads to Hen, a few days later, looking a little teary eyed. “A friend of my dad’s sent me this key to an old safety deposit box, and when I opened it he had this little journal full of letters he wrote to me but never sent. I’d done the same thing, as a kid. It doesn’t make up for anything but… it’s more than I ever got when he was alive. He was a bad person, but he loved me.”
Byron smiles, presses her lips to the top of Hen’s head, and fades away. Daniel watches with sad eyes.
Later, sitting on the couch with Chris and Daniel, Eddie brings it up. “You know, you could move on if you want. If there’s anything I can do to help you be ready for the change, you just need to tell me and I’ll do it.”
But Daniel shakes his head. “I can’t, not until my brother and sister are taken care of and not until everybody knows I existed.”
Chris brushes a hand through Daniel’s knee, which makes them both giggle. “I hope your brother knows soon.”
The agreement that Chris shouldn’t know who Daniel’s family really is was a difficult one to come to, but necessary all the same. It’s one thing for Eddie to lie to Buck about everything, it’s something entirely different for Chris to be forced into that.
~
At first, Eddie thinks Shannon, her ghost, is just taking her time. He believes, with everything he has, that Shannon will come back. That she’ll need a little damn peace. There’s no way she doesn’t feel her business was unfinished.
There’s no way she won’t say goodbye to Chris, have a longer goodbye with Eddie.
He’s half right.
He sees the tail end of the conversation a few hours after Shannon’s funeral, after Eddie convinced his parents to go back to their hotel room for the night. Shannon is sitting on Chris’ bed, talking to him in a quiet voice.
“You are my favourite person, Chris. I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you. I just couldn’t be good enough for you, no matter how hard I tried.” Shannon’s still wearing her yellow top and blue jeans. Her hair is still wavy, and it looks better when it isn’t soaked in blood and sweat. “I just need you to know how much I love you, baby.”
Chris’ lip wobbles, but he nods. “I’m glad you came back to say goodbye, mom. I’m going to really miss you.”
Shannon nods, reaching out to touch him, only for it to pass through Christopher’s shoulder. “I’m going to miss you, too, but I have to go find my own mom. I’ve missed her a lot.”
Trying to prolong the goodbye, Chris’ eyes look up and catch on Eddie. “Dad! Mom came to say goodbye.”
Shannon looks over her shoulder, but she doesn’t look pleased or relieved to see Eddie, just a little resigned. “Hi, Eddie.”
“Hi, Shan.” The reality of her visit hits Eddie square in the chest. “You were okay with the goodbye we had in the ambulance, weren’t you?”
She nods, then kisses Chris’ forehead, even if neither of them feel a thing. “Okay, I have to go now, boys. Promise me you’ll take care of each other?”
They do, and Eddie watches as the back of Shannon’s head fades into thin air, and he’s left alone with his crying son.
It’s another few hours before Chris is asleep, eyes swollen from his tears, and Eddie hears the door open and shut. He doesn’t even worry about it, relief filling him up when he goes into the living room to find Buck wandering in, looking around. “Hey.”
“Hi, Eds.” Buck’s voice is quiet, and he’s wearing a blue sweater that looks soft, and Eddie realizes he’s never needed a soft place to land more than right this second. Luckily, Buck knows him better than anyone else ever will, and opens his arms. “Come here.”
They don’t talk about the tears Eddie sheds on Buck’s sweater, and Eddie is forever grateful.
~
Something no one told Eddie about explosions, is that the smell of being so close to one will stick to you for days afterwards. Eddie learned that first in Afghanistan, when no amount of rationed-water showers would get that damn smell off of him.
When the ambulance blew up, Eddie didn’t even mind the smell that much, not when it reminded him of Buck’s pretty blush and the sound of Daniel’s hiccuping giggles.
Standing here listening to the sound of Buck’s pained screams amidst the chaos of the boy with the bomb, Eddie knows that the smell clinging to him will make him sick until he manages to scrub it off.
For once, Eddie feels just as fucking useless as the ghosts he’s surrounded by. Daniel, at least, can sit next to his brother. He flickers out occasionally, to check on Maddie, Eddie thinks. Kevin looks lost though.
“Howie, don’t do this.” They both watch as Chim serves himself up to the kid on a silver platter. He walks over, ready to trade his life for Buck’s without a moment’s hesitation. “Howard Han, you come back here right now, come on, you can’t die before you talk to Eomma and Appa! They can’t lose both of their sons!”
The kid refuses Chimney though, and like magic Bobby is there, walking up to the kid with his hands raised.
Bobby’s poltergeist isn’t surrounded by smoke for once. She appears next to Eddie, watching as Bobby talks to the kid. “Who is that? The boy under the ambulance, the one Daniel is talking to?”
“Buck.” Eddie says, and his voice sounds raw and so wrong. He sounds wrecked, the way he did when Shannon was dying. Hen looks at him with tears in her eyes, before setting her gaze back on the awful scene in front of them.
The poltergeist nods. “And Bobby loves him? Like a son, I mean. He’s laying down his life to save this boy he sees as his son.”
Eddie nods, and thanks god that no one is looking at him right now. No one other than Buck, who’s too far away and too close to death to catch the fact that Eddie is having a conversation with mid-air.
The poltergeist smiles a little, then floats over to Bobby and kisses him once on the cheek before… moving on. She leaves, like she hadn’t been a malevolent spirit wreaking havoc on Bobby’s life for who knows how long. No even a moment later Bobby is tackling the bomber to the ground and Eddie is sprinting over to Buck.
“You have to hold his hand!” Daniel is sobbing, trying to hold onto Buck’s hand with no luck, little hands passing through big ones. “Please! He’s scared and he needs someone to hold him.”
Eddie complies, knowing full well that he’d hold Buck’s hand no matter what. “Buck? Buck, look at me. I’ve got you now, just look at me.”
Hen begins setting up a line for Buck, so that they can push fluids the second they get into the ambulance. The two of them are the only ones not working to pick the fire truck off of Buck, and the ones who get to watch in real time as Buck screams and sobs and begs.
Kevin is trying, his form flickering as he tries to channel his energy into moving the truck. He’s unsuccessful, of course, it takes so much for a spirit to move something as light as a pencil that he’s kidding himself trying.
Then, after another unsuccessful try, they find themselves surrounded by ghosts and civilians alike. Together, the crowd tries to get the ladder truck off of Buck. It’s louder than anything Eddie’s ever heard, the amount of chatter almost deafening, but Eddie still hears Buck’s wailing loud and clear.
They get Buck out, and Eddie could throw up he's so relieved.
That night, Eddie sits next to Buck’s still form and holds his hand. Against all odds, Buck still has two legs and he’s breathing. Maddie is asleep in the chair opposite Buck’s bed, and Eddie takes the opportunity to turn to Daniel, who’s trying in vain to stroke her hair. “Life is short, Daniel, you know that more than anyone. Let me help you move on, let me help your story get told.”
Daniel frowns, and goes to say something, when Maddie’s eyes snap open. “What did you just say?”
Eddie feels ice in his veins, and his hands shake in his lap. “I was just—”
“You said his name. You know his name.” Maddie looks wildly around the room, looking through Daniel at least twice. “You know about Daniel, except you couldn’t unless you can see ghosts, which is insane. That’s an insane thing to claim.”
It would be an insane thing to claim, which is why Eddie stays silent, looking helplessly between Maddie and Daniel.
Finally, Daniel snaps. “Tell her that she used to sneak me peanut M&Ms from the vending machine because it was the only thing I craved during chemo, but Mom didn’t approve. She’s the only person alive that knows that.”
“Your brother,” Eddie says, wincing when he sees the hurt on Maddie’s face. “Daniel says that you used to bring him peanut M&Ms while he did his chemotherapy, but it was a secret because your mom didn’t approve.”
Maddie’s face goes pale, and she looks at Eddie for a long moment before letting out an aggrieved fuck.
Eddie looks at the three Buckley siblings, closes his eyes, and can’t help but return the sentiment.
He doesn’t open his eyes again, not until he feels the hand under his squeeze, the proof of Buck’s life the only thing that can bring Eddie back from the brink of insanity he’s on.
He’ll figure out everything else out later, for now, Eddie’s partner needs him.