Chapter Text
When Buck awoke, he knew he fucked up.
For starters, he was much too comfortable to be in the Minnesota wilderness in the dead middle of winter. Far too warm.
And secondly, he could hear Bobby’s voice.
He was talking to someone else, which meant they weren’t alone, but he was still there. And that was enough to have Buck know that his plans were ruined.
When he opened his eyes, he was met with the familiar sight of a hospital. How ironic was it that this was where he was supposed to wake up weeks ago, in a Los Angeles hospital rather than Bobby’s Minnesota house?
He was underneath layers of blankets with an IV in his arm. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that he was probably here for hypothermia, and that was probably for the best.
Being in the hospital rather than the house was better though, as Buck still had a chance to escape from Bobby. All he had to do was pull a nurse aside and tell them what happened to him, and then the police could come and this would all be over.
Bobby noticed he was awake from the doorway of the hospital room, hurrying to his side in an instant.
“Evan!” he exclaimed, stroking Buck’s hair the second he was by his bed. “You scared me, sweetheart.”
Buck looked past Bobby at the nurse he had been talking with before, opening his mouth to say something.
Only all that came out was a loud, drawn out noise, his tongue not cooperating to make the shapes he needed it to in order to form words.
“I know, honey. You don’t like hospitals. This is why you don’t run away from home.”
“You’re such a good dad,” the nurse told Bobby. “I’m not sure I could do what you do.”
“Well, I couldn’t do what you do,” Bobby said with a chuckle. “How about you make sure my boy is nice and warmed up to go home and I’ll get him out of your hair so you can carry on doing your job?”
“Of course, Mr. Nash,” the nurse said, checking Buck’s vitals. It was something he had been through many times before, only every other time he had been able to make small talk, maybe even flatter the nurse if she was cute. Every time Buck tried to speak though, all that came out were unattractive noises that made him sound like he never learned how to speak a single word.
No matter how many times he tried to tell her he was there against his will, that he didn’t consent to any of this, that Bobby was a dangerous man, nothing worked. Even the word ‘help’ was too much for Buck’s stiff, useless tongue.
“He looks much better now. His core temp is back up to an almost perfect 98.4 and his extremities have warmed up nicely. All you’re going to need to do is watch for blistering, which happens sometimes after frostbite sets in. Evan’s was mild, but it was still there. If that happens, just bandage them up so that he doesn’t pick at them and change them daily. With that, we can discharge you guys right after I take his IV out!” she said in a cheery voice. Buck didn’t think there was anything to be so cheery about, but he supposed she had no idea of the situation happening inches from her face.
The pinch of the IV being removed from Buck’s wrist was nothing compared to the pain he felt when he realized that he really wasn’t going to be able to leave. The second the nurse left to get Buck’s discharge papers, Bobby leaned down close, looking every bit the concerned guy who brought his friend into the hospital, but Buck knew better.
“If you even think about running again, you will regret it, do you understand me, Evan?” Bobby said in a voice so sinister and gruff it sent a shiver down Buck’s spine. He nodded involuntarily, either because he was too tired to do anything else or he was terrified to disobey Bobby again.
The nurse came back with his discharge papers and completely bypassed Buck’s outstretched hands to hand them to Bobby. He signed them with ease, handing them back to her.
“Oh! It might be a bit hard for him to walk on his feet, let me go get you a wheelchair,” she said before disappearing around the corner again.
While she was gone, Bobby helped Buck pull the blankets off of him, sliding his feet out of the bed one by one and lifting his torso up to a sitting position. The world outside of the blankets felt so cold, and all Buck wanted to do was curl up in them again. Maybe if he asked nicely, they would let him bring one back to Bobby’s house so he could keep one in the crib, since he was going to be there for a while. Oh wait, he couldn’t ask them anything because he couldn’t speak.
The nurse returned with a wheelchair and watched as Bobby lifted Buck with ease and placed him down in the chair. He picked up a coat off of the chair and draped it over Buck’s frame, a poor excuse of protection from the weather outside. He explained that he had more blankets in the car, apparently from when he made a trip home while Buck was passed out.
The nurse walked with them as Bobby wheeled Buck to his truck outside, waiting until Buck was situated in the front seat and buckled to bid them goodbye and take the wheelchair back inside the hospital. Buck watched with teary eyes as he watched his only connection with the outside world disappear back through those doors, back to her normal life, while he would be going back to what he could only describe as his own personal hell.
“I’m very disappointed in you, Buck,” Bobby finally said after a long stretch of silence.
The sun was rising over the horizon, and the clock on the dashboard said it was a little before eight in the morning. Buck had no idea how long it would be until they got home, but he tried his hardest to memorize the roads they were going down. It wasn’t easy, there wasn’t anything that really stood out as a landmark. The hospital was surrounded by a few buildings encased in trees, and now that they had left, all Buck had seen were more trees. Minnesota was all trees and nothing else, it seemed.
“I did nothing but give you my all. The very best, Evan. I worked hard and saved up for years to be able to do this for you. I gave you everything I had, and this is how you repay me?” Bobby went on. “I thought you were going to die, Evan. I heard that alarm go off and I thought you were going to wander into the woods and I wouldn’t be able to find you. Do you know how scary that was for me?”
Bobby was serious, he wasn’t even referring to himself as Daddy. It almost invoked something akin to regret in Buck, but then he remembered what exactly Bobby had done to him. Sure he may have sacrificed everything, but those sacrifices were to take Buck away from everyone he loved and put him in a house in the woods and treat him like a toddler. That was nothing Buck ever expressed interest in, nor did he want.
He still couldn’t speak, but that didn’t stop Bobby from going on.
“We’re going to discuss punishments when we get back home. But first, Daddy is going to order a new lock for the door. Clearly someone can’t be trusted not to elope.”
Buck’s head snapped towards Bobby, a questioning noise in his throat.
“Silly boy. You don’t think I took you without coming up with a backstory, did you? For all that nurse is concerned, you’re my son with mental delays and a tendency to run away. Your dad here forgot to lock the door before we went to bed and you got out into the cold. Of course you and I both know that’s not true, but I couldn’t tell her what actually happened without her being very disappointed in my little boy trying to escape from his loving home, could I?”
Buck was seeing red, unable to continue looking at Bobby. He returned to looking out the window, trying to steady his rage before he reached over and yanked the steering wheel, driving them into one of the millions of trees on this road alone.
“Of course they asked for your medical history, and I got to tell them where we were from. The lovely state of California, well known for wildfires. Our poor little doctor's office – which was still doing things the old school way with paper records – got caught up in one of the big fires, as well as our home. Your old man here was originally from Minnesota, so we moved back here to start over, far away from the fires. Now all I have to worry about is my boy running off on me in the middle of the night when I forget to lock the door. Of course, that won’t be much of an issue soon.”
Buck let out a noise again, his mouth still completely numb, but wanting to let Bobby know he was not happy.
“Don’t worry, the lidocaine will wear off soon. We couldn’t have someone spilling some secrets about him and his daddy’s relationship, could we?” Bobby chuckled deeply. “You might have to have a bottle for breakfast. Unless you want some more baby food?”
Buck’s silence was enough of an answer for Bobby.
The rest of the ride back to the house was pretty quiet, aside from the radio, gently humming country music with the occasional static interruption. And long. At least an hour. Buck knew it wasn’t good that what was probably the closest hospital was an hour away. They really were in the middle of nowhere.