Buck was a babble-mouth when he was tired. Want him to tell you something? Wait until he's just, "resting his eyes".
With that being said, he's stated and asked some weird shit. Ask Eddie, he would know. He's usually the one who has to answer.
It was a quiet night, the rain just outside the window was calming. The TV in Eddie's room played Friends, the Barbados episodes at a quiet volume as neither of the men in bed had been paying attention. Eddie was catching up on a book he promised himself he would finish, and Buck was laying down, half asleep, with his arm across Eddie's waist. Every so often, Eddie would get distracted and look up to the TV, but he'd remind himself to continue. He'd wondered what Buck was thinking about, because he wasn't asleep, and he knew that. Buck seems to roll over every time he falls asleep. He's a barnacle until he's not.
Eddie was either going to reach down and massage the man's head for a second or two, or straight up ask if he'd been awake.
He didn't have to when Buck began to softly speak, "do you still think I'm exhausting?" Buck's voice was genuine curiosity, mixed with some guilt, and topped off with a whole bunch of sleepiness. Eddie paused everything. Reading, blinking, moving, breathing, all of it. Eddie recalled ever calling Buck exhausting one time. That one time was probably one of Buck's hardest. It took Eddie a few therapy sessions to express how much guilt he had for being so rude to his best friend in a time of crisis. Eddie could almost hear his own voice, calling Evan Buckley, the most caring man on the planet, exhausting.
It felt like time was moving through molasses, but he still quickly marketed his page with a folding of the corner. He gently place the book on the nightstand, and turned. Buck hadn't opened his eyes, and Eddie didn't even know if he was just sleep talking. "Why would you ask me that," Eddie asked, keeping his eyes on Buck. "Do you think I think you are?"
Buck slowly nodded in response to the question. Eddie felt all of his therapy reversing in just a few seconds, and it was his own fault. "Do you," Buck chimed in. "No. Of course not," Eddie stated firmly. By this time, Eddie was scooting, sitting up right, to laying down with Buck. "Do you think you are?" The dreaded nod in answering came just a few seconds later. Eddie didn't know if Buck would remember this conversation in the morning, or even in a few minutes, but if he did, Eddie didn't want to make him feel so misheard ever again.
"You aren't. And..., I love you."
Buck opened his eyes this time immediately. Saying "I love you" wasn't never said, it was just somewhat rare. Rare enough for Buck to wake himself up to look at Eddie. "You are not exhausting."
