Blue Jean Serenade

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/56496109.

Rating: General Audiences

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Category: M/M
Fandom: 9-1-1 (TV)
Relationship: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Characters: Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Evan "Buck" Buckley, Christopher Diaz (9-1-1
TV)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Teacher Evan "Buck" Buckley, Cowboy Eddie Diaz
(9-1-1 TV)
Language: English
Collections: 911 & 911 Lone Star Action for Gaza
Stats: Published: 2024-06-08 Words: 5,017 Chapters: 1/1
 Blue Jean Serenade
by Chash

Summary

Chris's class is coming to the teaching farm where Eddie works for a field trip, which means
Eddie might finally get the chance to meet the teacher he's been admiring from a distance
since school started.

Notes

This is a fill for @anglverses on twitter for 911 Gotcha for Gaza. As always, if you're
interested in participating, check out the tumblr!
"Why do I even have to go to school?" Chris asks, pushing his spoon around his cereal bowl
with an epic pout.

"I feel like we've had this conversation. For one thing, it's the law. For another…"

Chris rolls his eyes, as Eddie was expecting. "I meant today. I have to take the bus all the way
to school, and then take the bus all the way back here? And then I have to do it again?"

"Oh, do you have a field trip today?" Eddie teases. "You hadn't mentioned it in, like, fifteen
minutes, I almost forgot."

"Daaaaad."

Eddie flashes him a grin. "I might be able to swing you not having to go back to school after
the field trip is over. If Mr. Buckley says it's okay. But I'm pretty sure you have some classes
to go to before your field trip, so that's why you have to go in. Even if it feels like a total
waste of time. Besides, don't you want to come in with your class?"

"No," says Chris.

"Okay, wow. Why not?"

"Because I want to be here when the bus gets here! So I can surprise them."

"Wait," says Eddie, holding up one hand. "What do you mean, surprise them? What's the
surprise here, exactly?"

"No one knows we live here."

"Why not?"

Chris gives him one of those unimpressed looks that cut right through him. The kid has a real
talent for them. "So it'll be a surprise, duh."

Eddie's not sure what the surprise is, exactly, but kids are weird like that. Chris is clearly
excited about the trip and looking forward to showing off the farm, even if he doesn't want to
reveal he lives here prematurely. His son is a born showman, after all; it shouldn't be
surprising that he has big plans for how he wants the reveal to go.

But it does nag at Eddie. He'd just sort of assumed that Chris was talking about his
excitement for the field trip as much at school as he was at home. He'd thought everyone in
the class would know that this was Chris's farm, where he lives, and that they'd probably be
seeing Chris's dad at some point, and that part of why Chris's dad isn't chaperoning is that
Chris insisted he needed to be working so everyone will be able to see how cool he is.

And by "everyone in the class," he mostly means Mr. Buckley.

Eddie knows how ridiculous he is about his son's teacher, especially given that he's never
even formally met the man and he's pretty sure Mr. Buckley has no idea who he is. After all,
their only real point of contact is the afternoons when Eddie doesn't have work and gets to
pick Chris up from school instead of having him take the bus home. Mr. Buckley is usually
waiting with his class until they're all collected, and Eddie gets to see him smiling and
laughing and high-fiving kids as they leave and generally just being really stupidly attractive.

Queerness is still a little new for Eddie, an identity he's getting used to. But every time he
sees Evan Buckley, he has absolutely no doubt that he really likes guys.

He'd also been kind of hoping, just a little, that Mr. Buckley would maybe get in touch with
him about this field trip, ask him some questions or bring some special requests, so at least
Chris's whole surprise thing makes him feel better about that. But now he feels like he was
conspiring with his kid against his teacher, when really Chris was just conspiring against
everyone on his own.

Whatever. It's fine. Mr. Buckley and his class are going to come through, Bobby will show
them around, and Eddie will give them some fun facts about horses if any of them run into
him. He'll probably get to introduce himself to Mr. Buckley, thank him for being such a great
teacher to Chris, and then they won't see each other again until parent/teacher conferences.
Totally normal.

"It's Chris's field trip today, right?" Bobby asks him as they work on the morning chores
together.

"Yup. He's mad I made him go in first, he wanted to just be waiting here to welcome them.
He said he hasn't told anyone he lives here, he wants it to be a surprise. So don't blow his
cover."

Bobby smiles. "I will do my best. How much do you want to be involved? I'm sure everyone
would survive if you took the afternoon off and helped me handle introductions and
questions."

It's tempting, but he shakes his head. "No, Chris says he wants everyone to see me in action.
If there were a way to make sure I'd be on a horse and throwing a lasso at something when
his classmates saw me, he'd be all over that."

"Fair enough. I'll try to give you a warning when I let them go for free exploration so you can
be looking your most manly and heroic."

Eddie laughs. "That's all I ask."

Buck likes to think of himself as a cool teacher. A nice, chill teacher, the kind his students
can trust and confide in, the kind who's capable of discipline but tries to resolve things
without harsh punishments when possible. And, for the most part, he thinks he's right about
himself.
His first field trip, though, brings out all of his control freak tendencies.

"Okay, chaperones!" he calls, cutting through the excited chatter. Nash's Teaching Farm is
pretty cool, Buck won't deny, but there are logistics to deal with before they can get started.
"Do you have five students with you? Except for Ms. Thomas, you only have four."

The yesses come back immediately, and he tries not to scowl. They clearly did not have time
to count.

"Okay, take attendance, make sure you have the right five." He looks down at his own group.
They're his students so of course he knows he's all set, but as the teacher, he needs to lead by
example. "Baker, Hallie."

"Here," says Hallie, raising her hand.

"Diaz, Christopher."

"Here!"

"Ericson, Julie."

"Hi, Mr. Buckley!"

"Kanazawa, Akito."

"Here."

"And Owens, Cass."

Cass rolls her eyes. "You know we're all here, Mr. Buckley."

"If I don't do it right, who will?" he asks her, and she smiles a little, so at least he's still good
with the kids. That's something.

He waits for the chatter to die down, then asks, "Chaperones, are we good?"

Everyone responds in the affirmative, and Buck nods. "Perfect, follow me."

As first field trips go for his teaching career, Buck thinks a working farm/ranch is a pretty
good one. He did a brief stint at a farm in Montana in his post-college figuring-out-his-life
phase, so he's familiar with the basics and feels more prepared to answer questions than he
would in some other places, and it's pretty low pressure. They're going to look at some
animals and then go back to school. It's fine! It's going to be a great field trip. He's not going
to lose any students, everyone is going to have fun, and maybe he'll be less nervous on the
next one. He has absolutely nothing to be worried about.

Denny's mom, who asked him to call her Karen, falls into step with him as a ranch hand leads
them in for the introduction and tour. "I know we don't know each other very well, but this
already feels like a new side to you."
He has to smile. "Yeah, something about having a checklist rewires my brain. But hey, if it
keeps everyone safe and with the group…"

"Oh, it won't," says Karen, immediate and devastating.

"What?"

She pats his arm. "I know this is your first field trip, but I've chaperoned a few of these.
There is no way we aren't going to have at least one kid wander off. Which is fine!" she adds
quickly, probably because all the blood has left his face. "I know it sounds bad, but we
always lose track of someone, and we always find them. I just want you to be prepared."

"Wow," says Buck. "I hate it, thanks."

"You'll be fine. I promise."

Bobby Nash, the owner of the farm, introduces himself and runs through the basics of what a
teaching farm does generally and what this teaching farm does specifically, which actually is
pretty cool. They have some therapy horses, a bunch of sustainable agriculture programs, a
food share program for local beef, eggs, and limited produce, and even a summer camp kids
can enroll in. If Buck hadn't figured out he wanted to be a teacher, this is definitely the kind
of thing he'd want to do.

Once Bobby has finished going over the farm's background and their safety rules, they're
supposed to break into their groups for some free exploration, which is when Buck realizes
that not only have they already lost a kid, but they've lost one of his kids.

Christopher is gone.

"You are so jumpy," says Bosko, watching Eddie with a smirk.

"What?" he demands. "No, I'm not." His tone is not helping his case, but it is what it is.

"Oh yeah, you're really normal. Why is Chris's field trip even a big deal? He lives here. That's
got to be the most boring field trip ever."

"He hasn't really made many friends yet. I think he's hoping they're all going to be really
impressed with the place and want to hang out all the time."

"Okay, that explains him. So why are you like this?"

"I want my son to have friends."

"And?"

He caves. "And his teacher is really hot and I want him to think I'm cool."

"Have you ever spoken to him?"

"No. I just see him from the car when I pick Chris up. You don't have to tell me it's pathetic, I
already know."

Bosko considers him. "Honestly, I think this might be too advanced for you at this stage of
your queer journey. Maybe try going to a bar and flirting with someone first. Your kid's
teacher is so high stakes."

"I'm not flirting with him," Eddie protests. "I just like looking at him."

"Still. Maybe work your way up to looking at guys you might actually have to have a
conversation with. Don't want to embarrass your kid in front of his new friends."

"I'm not embarrassing. I'm--"

"Dad!"

Eddie and Bosko both turn as Chris hurries towards them. For a second, Eddie's sure that
more kids are behind him, that he's the leader of a group, but it becomes increasingly clear
that Chris is alone.

That seems bad.

Eddie scoops his son up in his arms. "Hey, buddy. Where's everyone else?"

"They're listening to Mr. Nash do his introduction."

"And why aren't you listening to that, huh?"

"Because I already know everything! I know what we do here and I know how to be safe. I
don't need to listen."

"He's got you there, Diaz," Bosko murmurs, thankfully too quiet for Chris to hear, and Eddie
glares at her.

"And did you tell anyone that you already knew this and you didn't need to stay?" he asks,
already knowing the answer. Any adult would veto Chris going off on his own, if they knew.
It doesn't matter that he lives here, it's still a liability issue.

"I thought we could ride back," says Chris. "You and me on Moonlight."

"Buddy."

"It would be so cool!"

"Everyone's probably looking for you. They're going to be worried."

"That would make the horse cooler," Chris insists, and Eddie glares at Bosko before she can
say something, presumably about how correct Chris is.
"We're not riding a horse back to your classmates. You're not getting rewarded for running
away from your field trip."

"But--"

"Come on, kid," Eddie says. "You know this wasn't okay."

"Okay, but can't carry me back," he says firmly. "Coming back on a horse is cool. But coming
back on my dad…"

On the one hand, Eddie probably does need to punish him in some way for this. On the other,
carrying Chris back to his classmates is less a punishment than a humiliation. Especially if
the other kids think Chris couldn't walk back on his own.

Eddie puts him down and resists the urge to hold his hand while he's at it. Chris isn't grown
up, but he's old enough to want independence and to look cool. He went about this in
absolutely the worst way possible, but at least he actually was safe because he does live here.
It doesn't seem like a sign that he's going to be wandering away from field trips because he
wants to impress the other kids.

Shit, Eddie really hopes this isn't going to become a regular thing. Maybe he should start
volunteering as a chaperone, just to make sure it won't. He can be a special chaperone whose
whole job is just to monitor Chris. That wouldn't be weird at all.

"I was safe," Chris grumbles as they head back towards his classmates. "I don't see the big
deal."

"For one thing, no one else knows you're safe, and they're having to take time out of their trip
to look for you."

"I guess," he admits.

"And what if another kid saw you leaving?" Eddie goes on. "You know your way around, but
what if someone came looking for you and got lost, or--"

Or maybe just Mr. Buckley came looking for him, because there he is as they round the barn,
closer than Eddie has ever seen him, close enough to get the details of how his shirt is a little
too tight and his lips are way too pink and his eyes are way too blue and he has a birthmark
by his eye that's very distracting.

"Or Mr. Buckley," Eddie says stupidly.

Mr. Buckley gives him a tight smile. "You must be Chris's dad."

Mr. Nash clears things up for Buck in seconds once he's reported that a student is missing.
All he asks is, "Is it Christopher Diaz?" and as soon as Buck picks his jaw up off the ground
and confirms, Mr. Nash is nodding. "His father is the supervisor here. I know he's been
excited about coming on a field trip to his home."
"His home?"

"Ranch work doesn't pay much, so housing is generally offered as a perk."

"I know," Buck says absently. "But I didn't know Chris got that perk."

"Eddie said he wanted it to be a surprise."

Buck feels a headache coming on. "Do you know where he would have gone? Chris, I mean."

Nash's expression softens, apparently realizing that Buck is worried even if he isn't. "Yeah, of
course. Eddie should be with the horses right now, and Chris knows that. I assume you're
watching one of these groups?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, well, you can leave them here with me, I'll show them the chickens, they're always a
big hit. Then the rest of the groups can start exploring as planned and you can come back
here once you've got Christopher and collect your group. Trust me, this happens a lot, and it's
usually a lot worse because we have no idea where the kid has gone. And every single
employee here knows what Chris looks like and loves him. If he's not with Eddie, we'll find
him in no time."

Buck tries not to flush. "Yeah, uh, that would be great. Sorry, this is my first year teaching
and my first field trip, so…"

"No need to apologize." He gives Buck the directions and Buck lets his kids know that
Chris's dad works here, so he went to find him, and Mr. Nash is going to show them the
chickens while Buck gets Chris.

One nice thing about second graders is that they're still just young enough to accept that with
no questions asked. Somehow, they don't find it suspicious at all.

Buck studied the map of the farm on his way over, so he already had a vague idea of where to
find the horses even without Nash's detailed directions. It is a pretty cool place, he notes
absently, and he wonders why Chris's dad didn't want anyone to know he worked here.
Maybe he's embarrassed about working on a farm for some reason? But it's a teaching farm.
It seems like a bad place to work for someone who's not proud of what they do.

He's still pondering it when he hears a man's voice saying, "What if someone came looking
for you and got lost, or--"

Chris comes around the corner of a barn followed by a guy who must be his dad, and Buck
has to take a second.

Currently, Buck considers himself bisexual in theory. In his own mind, he's pretty firm and
sure about it, but when it comes to telling other people, his insecurities creep in. He knows he
likes women; he has plenty of experience to back that up. But with guys, there's nothing so
concrete. He has celebrities he thinks are hot and a few male coworkers he's checked out in
passing, but he's never so much as kissed a man, and that feels like a prerequisite.
But Chris's maybe dad is the kind of guy Buck would love to kiss. Even with the deer-in-
headlights look he has at the first sight of Buck, he's stupid hot, big brown eyes, broad
shoulders, huge arms, firm chest, and he's even wearing chaps. If he had a cowboy hat on,
Buck might do something embarrassing, like propose marriage.

"Or Mr. Buckley," says Chris's dad, coming to an abrupt stop.

Buck is torn between relief, annoyance, and attraction, which is a terrible place to be. "You
must be Chris's dad," he says, trying for mature and responsible and probably hitting closer to
constipation.

"Yeah, uh, hi." He offers his hand, which is warm and rough and feels very nice in Buck's.

Seriously, this must be one of the worst times to develop a spontaneous crush. It's so
inconvenient.

"I'm Eddie," he goes on. "Sorry about all of this, Chris shouldn't have--"

"I already knew all the safety stuff, Mr. Buckley," Chris says, somehow both apologetic and
petulant. "I just wanted to see my dad."

"But you were with us," Buck tells him. "If Mr. Nash hadn't told me where your dad was, I
don't know how long it would have taken to find you. And that wouldn't have been fair to
anyone, right? If we had to spend the whole field trip looking for you instead of seeing the
farm?"

"No," Chris admits. He glances up at his dad. "Did you two rehearse this?"

Chris's dad--Eddie--rolls his eyes. "No, bud, we didn't. There were just a few very obvious
holes in your plan."

"I can take him back on my own if you need to get back to work," Buck offers, as Eddie
keeps walking with them. "Mr. Nash said you're the supervisor here?"

"Yeah, but I don't have much to do right now. What do you think, Chris? Can I tag along with
you guys?"

Chris makes a big show of thinking it over. "I don't know. You wouldn't bring me back on
Moonlight…"

Buck tilts his head at Eddie, curious, and Eddie just shakes his head before turning his
attention back to Chris.. "Good thing I didn't. If we'd ridden back, we probably wouldn't have
run into Mr. Buckley. Then we would have had to go looking for him."

"Yeah, but on a horse! You could have picked him up and put him in front of you like in a
movie."

Buck makes a valiant but obviously futile effort to not think about the very dreamy cowboy
galloping past him and hauling him up into the saddle with his very strong arms. He'll have to
save that one for later.
"Last chance, am I going back to work or not?" Eddie tells Chris. "You know Bosko needs
my help if you don't want me to stick around."

"You can come with us," says Chris, like he's granting his dad a huge favor. "If you want."

Eddie ruffles his son's hair and then turns his attention to Buck. "Is that okay, Mr. Buckley? I
wouldn't want to get in the way."

For a second, Buck thinks about saying no, but realistically, there's no way he's not going to
take the excuse to hang out with the hot dad for the afternoon. "Yeah, of course," he says,
giving Eddie a smile. "The more the merrier."

"So, why didn't you want Chris to tell anyone he lived here?" Buck asks. They've reclaimed
the rest of the kids from Bobby and Chris is eagerly leading the way, a tour guide in his
element. He'll occasionally ask Eddie for more information about something or pass along a
question he can't answer, but for the most part, Eddie is free to bring up the rear with Evan
"Call me Buck" Buckley, who is kind of destroying his ability to think.

Which is probably why Eddie completely fails to work his way through Buck's question."

"Uh, what?"

"Mr. Nash said you didn't want Chris to tell us he lived here. Or maybe that you wanted it to
be a surprise?"

Eddie frowns. "Bobby must have misunderstood. I had no idea Chris hadn't mentioned it.
He's been excited that his classmates were coming out here for weeks, I assumed that the
entire school knew by now. I found out this morning that he wanted it to be a surprise."

"Hence the whole making a grand entrance on horseback thing," says Buck, snapping his
fingers.

"Yeah, he didn't warn me about that one either. I really am sorry."

"It's fine. My heartrate is almost back to normal. But this is my first field trip ever, so the
stakes were pretty high for me."

"And right away, you lost a kid."

"First thing!" Buck agrees, laughing. "I think it might be a record."

"Nothing wrong with making a record. And you're setting the bar really low. The next one
has to go better, right?"

"No, don't say that!" he protests, with an overdramatic groan. "You're going to jinx me. Now
just watch, I'm going to lose one on the bus somehow."
"And if that happens, I will take one-hundred percent of the blame. Luckily, jinxes aren't real,
so…"

Buck is clearly about to protest, and Eddie is locked and loaded to tease him for being
superstitious, but their group has run into another group and Chris has been excitedly
discussing something with another kid. Apparently negotiations have ended, because Chris
calls, "Dad! Can they see the house?"

"Why do they want to see the house?" Eddie asks.

"Because they want to know where we live, duh," says Chris.

"We're not going inside," Eddie says firmly. It's not a big house, he hasn't cleaned, and there
are a lot of kids. He is not giving tours of his messy living room. "But if you just want to
show them what it looks like, sure, knock yourself out."

The other chaperone joins them, and Buck makes a quick introduction: Karen, Denny's mom,
which is kind of helpful because Chris has mentioned Denny a couple of times and seems to
like him, so maybe they could, someday, set up a playdate. That's a good goal to have, right?
Realistic and achievable.

"Is it just you and Chris?" Karen asks, once they've gotten through the pleasantries.

Eddie hopes he's not blushing. He's also definitely not looking at Buck, but this is his
opportunity, right? He might never get a better chance to let Buck know that he's both single
and at least a five on the kinsey scale. And the more he talks to Buck, the more he really,
really wants him to know both those things.

"His mom's in LA, but yeah, I have full custody. I figured we could stay close enough that he
could still see her, but far enough away that we wouldn't be running into her in the grocery
store."

"Yeah, he's mentioned her a couple times," says Buck. So apparently he already knows the
single part. "It sounded like she was still a part of his life, even if he doesn't live with her."

"Yeah, it was a big relief. I thought we were going to have a really rough divorce. We were
already separated and I knew she wasn't homophobic, but I was still worried she wouldn't
take me telling her I prefer guys very well."

"But she did?" Karen asks.

"Turns out, she'd been trying to figure out how to tell me that she liked girls. So, yeah, give it
a year or two for both of us to get settled and I think we'll probably be friends again."

"Oh yeah, that is the ideal outcome there," says Karen. "Is there a boyfriend in the picture for
you? Is that why you told her?"

"Uh, no, nothing yet. Bosko, one of the ranch hands, keeps trying to convince me to go to this
gay bar she likes in LA, but I'm not actually sure I trust her taste in bars."
Karen tells him about a few local queer events she and her wife are involved in, which is
really great to know and Eddie appreciates it, but he can't stop watching Buck out of the
corner of his eye, trying not to read into every twitch of his mouth. It's not like it really
matters. Even if Buck is single and some flavor of queer, which is already pretty unlikely, he
doesn't have to be interested in Eddie. But Eddie would really love to know.

Karen is kind enough to ask, "What about you, Mr. Buckley?"

Buck startles. "Uh, what about me?"

"You're new in town too, aren't you? How's your social life?"

"Oh, uh, some of the other teachers are nice. And my sister and her husband and my niece are
pretty close! That's actually why I took this job, I wanted to be closer to them. Her name's
Jee-Yun, she's the cutest," he adds, pulling out his phone and pulling up a picture of a very
adorable infant in a woman's arms. "But I guess that's not really a social life."

"Not in the traditional sense, no," says Karen. "Well, if you like trivia, you're welcome to join
us for that. I don't think that's an inappropriate level of friendship with your second-grader's
teacher."

Buck ducks his head on a laugh. "Yeah, I feel like there aren't a ton of conflicts of interest at
this stage. Either your kid is doing basic addition and learning to spell or he's not. No amount
of personal affection or bribery will make me tell them two plus two equals five."

They've made it to the house, and Eddie tries to see it through Buck and Karen's eyes. After
five months, Eddie pretty much loves it, but objectively he knows it's small and a little weird
and he wouldn't have ever given it a second glance if the rent hadn't been free. But it's his and
Chris's place, just theirs, and that's kind of everything. And Buck apparently used to be a
ranch hand somewhere in Montana, so he not only likes the place, but says it's way nicer than
what he had for his own lodgings.

Again, it doesn't have to mean anything. But Eddie really wants it to.

Once they've seen the house, Chris insists that Eddie show them the horses, and he puts up
token amounts of resistance, but, really, he wants to show off his horses, and maybe his
riding skills. Just a little.

Obviously, he can't tell if Buck actually appreciates any of said skills, but once they're done
and heading back to the buses, Buck does say, "I think I might want to go to some of the
other stuff you were talking about too, too. Not just trivia."

It takes Eddie and Karen a second to catch up to his train of thought; Karen's the one to ask,
"You mean the queer events?"

Buck clears his throat. "Yeah, uh. I think I'm probably bi? I've been thinking about it for a
while, but--" His eyes cut to Eddie, and Eddie's heart skips a beat. The riding thing totally
worked. "Anyway, yeah. Those sounded cool."
"Well, we'd love to have you any time. Why don't you both give me your numbers and I can
let you know next time we have an event."

"I might as well get your number too," Eddie says, trying to sound as casual as possible.
Judging from the look Karen shoots him, it is an utter failure. But he and Buck exchange
numbers, so, whatever, it was totally worth it. He'd rather get the hot teacher's number than
be subtle.

As the bus is leaving (without Chris; apparently there really is no point in his going back to
school just to take the bus home again), Eddie's phone buzzes in his pocket. Buck has texted
Thanks again for the exclusive tour :) and just seeing his name makes Eddie's stupid heart
flip over.

It's definitely a good start.

By the time Buck's second field trip to Nash's Teaching Farm rolls around, he's feeling a lot
better about the whole thing. Is he still a slightly terrifying head chaperone who puts fear into
the hearts of kids and parents alike with his rigid rules? Yes. Does he still kind of worry about
somehow losing more kids than he actually brought with him? Obviously. But he has a lot
more successful field trips under his belt now, and they've mostly gone off without a hitch.

And, of course, when the bus rolls up, his boyfriend is waiting by the gate, in a cowboy hat,
on a horse, ready to help corral kids and make sure that none of them escape or get hurt. And,
really, it's impossible to feel anything but awesome about that.

Best field trip ever.

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