Buck bobs his knee up and down as he sits nervously in a chair. He lays lazily back into his seat with his arms crossed over his chest. Across from him Matt and Kelly are sitting with coffee cups in their hands. Matt waits patiently for someone to cut through the silence. Kelly avoids eye contact tapping his thumbs against the mug.

"It's good to see you, Evan."

He shrugs tiredly at Matt. "It's Buck now."

Matt nods looking down at his coffee. "I know. Um, it's been four years, what have you been up to?"

Buck gestures around the firehouse. "Came to L.A. Well, went to Hawaii than here."

He doesn't like the idea of them being there, especially Kelly. He wants nothing more than to reach for the ring, but that would raise questions he doesn't want to answer. That or reach over the table and bitch slap him. Both thoughts sound good to him.

Matt looks over to Kelly seeing him look anywhere but Buck. He shakes his head with a roll of his eyes. "I know you guys had shit happen in the past but I wasn't expecting this four years later."

"I have no idea what you mean," Buck plays dumb.

Kelly licks his bottom lip. "He knows, Evan."

"Don't call me that," he hisses. Even though it has been four years, Evan's face still burns when he thinks of Kelly's betrayal. He could forgive a lot of things but not that. He can't accept him calling him by his birth name.

"We didn't come here to fight, Ev-Buck." Matt's correction changes his line of sight. He glances over at him seeing the sincerity on his face. The sympathy there. Why he doesn't know.

"Then why are you here? Jay makes one call then suddenly you're here? Like you said it's been four years."

"You dropped us, Buck! You got a new number, you went off the radar. Jay didn't even know where you went. You didn't tell anybody you were leaving. We had to find out through Boden!" Matt exclaims.

There have been a few times over the time Buck has known Matthew Casey. On rare occasions, you'd see him blow up like he just did. On those occasions, it normally involved a call they were on.

He doesn't like seeing this side of Matt. Buck knows they aren't in the wrong, the blame is on him. At least it partially is.

Buck looks over to Kelly. "What about you? Anything to say?" He chokes out, tears brimming the corner of his eyes.

Kelly doesn't say anything. Matt groans, frustrated with the man. "Look, I came here to make you were alright. I'll leave you two to talk. You both are my brothers but I swear to god if you don't talk I will get Herrmann on the phone to talk some sense into the both of you."

"Matt—"

"It's been four years, Buckley. Either make up or get closure but I didn't come here with him to see you glare daggers into his soul or Sev looking like someone just kicked a puppy. Talk."

Never in his years has he also seen Casey be so blunt and intervene on other people's issues. He was always one to say to let the person come to you. Never has he pushed two people suffering through personal problems together.

Matt exits the kitchen walking down towards the others. From a distance he watches him go up to his sister. Offering a hand he assumes he introduces himself to her.

He scowls looking back over to Kelly. Jelly gulps nervously periodically looking up to meet Buck's gaze. "Why are you here, Kelly?"

Kelly visibly tenses in his chair. He lets out a shaky breath. "You disappeared."

"You did the one thing you promised you wouldn't do."

It's no surprise Buck's past relationships never panned out. He doesn't know if it's his constant addition of trauma breaking them apart or not, but he visibly remembers the relationships he thought could have a chance. It started before Chicago, before the SEALs. It can be a shock hearing Buck has been cheated on before.

Kelly made the promise to never do what those men and women did to him. Unintentionally he became the person he never wanted to be. Buck 1.0 isn't who he ever saw himself becoming until coming to L.A. he's starting to believe the transfer out wasn't such a good idea. Somewhere else could have been more suitable.

He shakes the thought from his head focusing on the green-eyed man in front of him. He takes a minute to see the change in his appearance. The fourth one-year-old has aged phenomenally. He looks to have more muscle, his hair slightly longer, gray hair peeking out. The look only made him ten times hotter since the last time he saw him, and he hates it. He hates how good he looks.

"I know," Kelly whispers holding the back of his neck with one hand. "Shay—"

"No," he shuts him down. Kelly snaps his eyes to Buck. "Don't use her as an excuse. She wasn't a part of the fight we had and you know it. I don't know how something as stupid as me being a SEAL ticked you off so much but I know Shay wasn't a part of it."

"She wouldn't want this..." he trails off quietly.

"A little too late, don't you think?" Buck's eyes darken.

Ever since they ended things with Mashahdi he still has t had the courage to turn his emotions on. He only had a moment when he was hugging his girls. Turning on his emotions would mean feeling the endless pain in his body. It would mean taking the blame. It would mean admitting to any wrongdoings that weren't completely his fault. It would mean showing his flaws. Buck doesn't want that. He doesn't want to feel.

His cold stare burns into Kelly making him shrink into the chair. "What happened, Buck?"

He shakes his head again. "This isn't about me. This is about what happened. Why did you do it, Kelly? Huh?"

"I-I wasn't thinking. I was reckless and stupid."

"It doesn't fix anything."

"Shay—"

"Shay is dead!" He stands up furiously slamming his fist into a wall. Despite his strength, it doesn't do anything to the wall. He ignores the throbbing pain in his knuckles as they start to bleed.

Kelly stands up walking around the table. His anger flared up. "You think I don't know that! She was my best friend!"

"She was mine too! Shay isn't a part of this!"

"She is!"

"How! How the hell does she play into this? Please tell me!"

Kelly backs him up into a wall. Buck's anger doesn't subside. He can feel his heart beating a hundred miles an hour at the close contact but he doesn't back down.

"You said that you could be called back at any time. You said it didn't matter."

"It's part of the job!"

"Yeah well, I don't accept it. I didn't then and I don't now. Not when you said you didn't care if you would die over there."

He narrows his eyes biting his tongue. He looks over at Kelly seeing his chest heave up and down. The warmth in his eyes was gone.

He leans his head back against the wall. "This is about Shay, isn't it?"

"She wouldn't have wanted you to go back just to commit suicide. I didn't want you to go back. I wasn't about to lose another person I love."

Kelly backed away from him letting out a sigh as if the weight has been lifted off his shoulders. He punched his lips together looking sadly back at Buck.

Buck doesn't know what to say. How could you be in a situation as big as this?

• • •

Matt is moaning to Jay about Buck and Kelly's inability to act like adults and talk things through. Maddie and Hen are standing outside the ambulance listening to everything. Hen's jaw dropped at the bomb dropped.

She whispers over to Maddie, "I didn't know he was into men. There are more of us! Thank god."

Maddie chuckles, "I've known since we were kids. He had certain tells. His coming out was always up to him. I'm not sure who all knows."

"None of us did, I can tell you that."

She hums going back to listening to Matt annoy Jay. Each of their hearts stops when they hear a loud shout coming from the kitchen, "Shay is dead!"

"Halstead—"

"Right behind you."

Matt and Jay race up the stairs coming to a stop and listening from a far wall. The only thing separating them is a glass wall.

"She wouldn't have wanted you to go back just to commit suicide. I didn't want you to go back. I wasn't about to lose another person I love." It is Kelly they hear speak harshly.

Matt looks to Jay, "did you know about that?" Jay shakes his head as they lean in still eavesdropping like little kids.

"I'm not suicidal. I never was," they identify the next voice as Buck.

"Could have fooled me. You were so quick to say you would go then. Then you said you wouldn't care if you died out there."

"It's a—"

"It's a part of the job. I know, you've said it before. Something I don't accept when it comes to you. We had already lost Shay, I wasn't about to lose you too."

Buck scoffs, "you left."

"I was upset!" Kelly exclaims. "The night didn't go as planned..."

Buck laughs humorlessly. "No shit, you didn't come home. Instead the next morning during our shift you tell me you slept with someone else. You went back on your promise."

"I know that and it eats me alive every day knowing what I did. I've tried apologizing for days after that, I tried making it up to you the best way I can."

In a quiet voice, Buck replies, "nothing will fix knowing you put your dick in someone else."

Jay and Matt can't listen anymore about the scandal that went on. Seeing as they haven't killed each other yet they back away heading down the stairs.

Maddie strides up to them, "what's going on? What happened?"

"Mom and dad are fighting," Jay says smugly.

She sighs grabbing at her heart. "Wait, mom and dad?"

"Hey, Halstead." Jay looks behind Maddie seeing T.K. walk up with his father. "The road has been cleared. I know the captain doesn't want us here. We're going to start our trip back to Texas."

"Alright, don't try to get yourself killed on the way back."

They hug each other briefly to which T.K. laughs. "If dad lets Jugg drive I make no promises. Hey, hug Buck for me. And keep an eye on my big brother."

Jay smirks, "I'm telling him you said that."

"Please don't."

Jay shakes Owen's hand. "Thank you for keeping my son alive."

"Always. Be safe out there."

"You too."

As the 126 heads out Jay and Matt look up to the kitchen. Maddie clears her throat gathering their attention.

Right, they almost forgot about her.