Timeless

Chapter 7: Eddie

Eddie was making it by. He got used to being on the base after about a month. He thought that he never would at the beginning. He had bonded with his crew. There was something special about the bond that formed between people in the middle of a war zone. A lot of the time, they talked about their lives back home, families, hobbies, partners. The problem was that Eddie wasn't really able to talk about Evan and Chris. Every time he tried, he started crying. He did let his team know that he had people waiting for him back home, people who were his motivation out here. He missed them both so much and he hated that he could only video call them once a week.

The way that he dealt with that was by writing letters to his boyfriend. He tried to write every day that he could. Even if it was just a short letter about how much Eddie missed him. He knew that Evan was scared back home. He had so much on his plate and he was so worried about messing up. Eddie wanted to be there for him, even if it wasn't in person.

Evan and Chris were always with him. He never took off the necklace Evan gave to him at the airport. He would fidget with it often as a grounding technique. He also kept a picture of Chris and Evan in his uniform. It was a picture that Eddie had taken one day when they had spent the day at the apartment in Texas before they had gotten together. Evan was sitting on the floor with Chris in his lap, holding a book in front of them. Chris isn't even paying attention to Eddie, more focused on the book, but Evan is smiling with the blush on his cheeks that drove Eddie crazy. It was his favorite picture of his boys.

"Mail," a fellow soldier called, walking into their tent. He handed out letters and boxes to everyone in the bunks before finally making it to Eddie. There were two envelopes. One from Evan, a response to Eddie's last letter. The other one was from a name that he recognized. Robert Nash, Evan's captain. To say he was nervous was an understatement. Eddie had never talked to Captain Nash before. Evan had told him about his captain on their calls and in his letters but the two had never actually shared a conversation.

Eddie opened the letter, hoping that it wasn't anything negative. Evan had taken risks before in the academy. He just hoped that he wasn't hurt. He couldn't take that with him being so far away.

Eddie,

I wish I could meet you in person, but I guess for now this will have to do. I wanted to get in contact with you after Buck told me about you guys and your story. He didn't tell the rest of the team, it's a little too hard for him right now. But it's in his file so he really had no choice but to tell me. I do want to say that I would love to meet you once you are finally home. Buck has become very special to me over these last few months and I would love to meet the man that he talks so highly about. I think that it's good that we have a form of communication just in case anything is to happen. I am starting to notice Buck taking a few more risks on calls than normal. He insists that he's just doing his job, but I think that he's doing this because of the fact that he's missing you. He is letting his feelings show in his risks which, as you know, can be very dangerous. I was hoping you could talk to him about that, and maybe get it through his head what exactly he's doing. I feel he'll listen better to you than anyone else. You stay safe and I look forward to hearing from you.

Bobby Nash

Eddie sighed as he finished the letter. It was both a sigh of relief and a sigh of frustration. Evan was safe, but he was taking these risks when he had so much to lose. He had a son to come home to and he had Eddie waiting to hear from him and wanting him safe when he was finally able to come home. Eddie had to talk to him about this before Evan got himself seriously hurt.

He wrote back to Captain Nash, telling him thank you for reaching out and for taking care of Evan when he wasn't there. He told him that he would talk to his boyfriend about his stunts and try to get it through his head that he wasn't expendable. He told Bobby that he was more than welcome to name drop him if Evan was planning on doing something that he knew was a risk. He gave him the contact of his superiors. If anything were to happen to Evan, they would be able to get the news to Eddie the fastest and be able to get him home on early leave if necessary. He also told him that he would love to meet him at some point if Evan ever lets him go when he's finally home.