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“It’s just so heartbreaking – they curl up, weeping, inside their mother’s bones,” Buck drawled on and suddenly the coffee maker Eddie had been hell bent on fixing wasn’t quite so interesting anymore. It’s not that he hadn’t been listening – he had and always would listen to Buck – it’s just somewhere between Buck mentioning the new Minecraft movie and whatever he’d pivoted to now, Eddie had lost track.
“Sorry, what?” Eddie stopped prodding at the coffee maker and was sure he heard a defiant screw fall. He’d donated his previous coffee maker, deeming it too heavy to shift amidst everything else, and had been given this one by his mother. She’d claimed it worked perfectly, yet Eddie knew now it was just another thing she’d stretched the truth on.
“The ghasts Eddie, their babies. It’s so sad, how they just-” Buck gestured out across the countertop his phone was propped upon, spreading specks of flour. “They just stay there, doomed to live in a world they weren’t built for.”
Eddie’s forehead scrunched up. It had been doing that an awful lot lately, the lines the motion made almost permanent. Ghasts? He’d never heard of the animal, though the name felt like something he’d said before, the memory on the tip of his tongue.
“What are ghasts?” Eddie tried to picture them in his mind’s eye. Were they mammal? Fish? Bird? Eddie thought of an odd, lumpy thing not dissimilar to the blobfish and then laughed to himself. Buck clicked his tongue 800 miles away and, even if they had not been facetiming, Eddie was sure to have heard it.
“It’s not funny, Eddie. The ghasts are from Minecraft,” Buck explained and suddenly the image was clearer now. Eddie was quite familiar with them, in fact. He’d often been chased by them while Chris, half the size but with just as much sass, had sat beside him giggling. Eddie smiled at the memory. “Quit grinning – they’re all dried out and sad, it’s upsetting.”
Buck had abandoned whatever dough he had been kneading to press his knuckles firmly into the countertop, scowling at Eddie through the camera. Eddie schooled his face and cleared his throat. He nodded in agreement.
“Yes, it is,” he said, still not quite understanding the full picture. The ghasts he remembered were loud, obnoxious and deadly. “Is it new? I don’t remember the babies when Chris and I used to play Minecraft.”
Though, really, that had probably been 10,000 updates ago. Even the shooters Eddie found himself playing in the hours that stretched in his free-for-all schedule seemed to update more than Eddie changed over the milk. Every time he returned there was some new weapon, or map, or glitch the teenagers bunking from school exploited to kill him and goad him into quitting.
“It’s a new update, apparently.” Buck’s fingers began to work the dough again. “You never invited me to play Minecraft.”
By the time Buck had come into the picture, Minecraft was but a fleeting thought in Chris’ mind. He and Eddie had still played, occasionally, but what was Minecraft to the R-rated games Buck had introduced him to? Why spend hours crafting block mansions when he could build Lego cities with his favourite firefighter? Eddie’s ego was still scarred from that particular confession nearly seven years later.
“Guess Chris just got bored of it by then,” Eddie shrugged to appease the slight pout across Buck’s face. As if he had supersonic hearing – which he did not, or, if he did, he turned it off on a whim to wilfully ignore Eddie constantly – Chris rounded the corner into the kitchen and cocked his head at his father. The slight frown that seemed ever-permanent these days eased, somewhat, when he spied Buck and gave a shy wave on his journey to clear out the remains of the groceries Eddie had only bought yesterday. Damn teenage boys and their bottomless pits for stomachs. “Hey, I’m making dinner in a bit,” Eddie warned as Chris deposited squirty cream straight into his mouth. That supersonic hearing had gone offline again, clearly.
Making dinner was a generous statement, in all honesty. While Buck kneaded dough to perfection, Eddie was due to microwave their latest ready meal to… well, warm at least. The stove had gone kaput on him a mere day or two after Chris moved in and Eddie had prioritised coffee over dinner. Chris seemed to be enjoying the mix of TV dinners and takeout though.
“What did I get bored of?” Chris asked, mouth still full of squirty cream. He sounded bored of this conversation already.
“Minecraft,” Eddie and Buck said as one. Chris finally swallowed his refrigerated treat.
“Oh, right. You know I still play that,” he murmured, immediately regretting the confession when Buck pressed his face up to his camera in gleeful hope. “Sometimes,” he added at Eddie’s accusatory face.
“Did you hear about the dried ghasts, Chris? It’s so sad,” Buck repeated, his lower lip wobbling at the thought. Eddie tried to hide his smile. Maybe he should ask Hen to add to Buck’s guilt-ridden chores list to keep him away from TikTok, or maybe he could just send Buck more reels to try and shake up his algorithm a bit. Although Eddie’s Instagram had taken an odd turn, lately, with a bit more half naked men than Eddie had ever wanted to see. Not that he ever wanted to see a half-naked man. Especially not the one who was caught up in conversation with Eddie’s son now, the dough forgotten while he and Chris lamented the ghasts’ fate. If Eddie had notifications for when Buck posted and therefore was often the first to like his frequent half-naked selfies, then, well, that was between him and the numerous FBI spies monitoring his internet activity.
“Dad?” Chris’ voice brought Eddie back to the present where Buck was, sadly, quite covered up. Flour covered his large arms, the sleeves of his hoodie straining around his muscles, while his apron struggled to contain his broad chest. “Dad,” Chris repeated, more insistently. Eddie blinked and came back online. “You up for it?”
“Up for what?” Eddie refocused his attention on the coffee maker that was more spare parts than anything else by now.
“Minecraft,” came both his son and his best friend’s exasperated replies, the pair of them sharing a look through the phone screen that Eddie could not decipher.
“Oh. You want to play with me?” Eddie could feel his eyes well up, just a little. Bar their sad little meals and the occasional basketball game on TV, Chris had holed himself up in his room and been more content with the company of internet strangers than his own father.
“Duh,” Chris said, all nonchalant, but Eddie was sure he heard a twinge of hope there too. There was definitely hope in Buck’s voice as his flour-doused hands filled the screen.
“Please, Eddie. Please play Minecraft with us,” Buck begged and, well. How could Eddie resist?
“Dinner first,” he insisted regardless, coffee maker abandoned on the very table he and Chris would need to eat. “Then we’ll play.”
Eddie’s tongue scraped against the roof of his mouth sometime later, his tastebuds singed into obscurity, the trays of his and Chris’ meal abandoned in the trash can as they settled into the living room. Eddie had helped Chris to move his PC, and the now coffee maker-less table into the room, for he was not going to play a game with his son under the same roof yet separated by walls. That was ridiculous. Eddie commandeered the Xbox he’d brought with him, his battered headset sat over one ear just like Chris’ brand new, state-of-the-art gaming headset rested upon his. There was a strange sound and then Buck’s tinny voice blared through Eddie’s left ear, eager and excited.
“Let’s go,” Buck insisted. Eddie could hear the flick of his joystick and realised with a smile that Buck was scrolling through the menu options, impatiently waiting for Chris to invite him into a game.
“Alright,” Chris huffed. Eddie’s invite came in first and, thanks to their proximity and the internet package he’d upgraded to sweeten Chris’ move, he had fully loaded a good chunk of the map before Buck’s character popped in beside him. Compared to Chris and Eddie – the former dressed in a skin that had probably cost more than the dinner they’d just eaten, and the latter at the very least accessorised with whatever free stuff had been available when he’d last played – Buck looked every much the noob he was. Wearing the basic Steve skin, with his gamertag F1R3H035 overhead, forever a sore subject for his misspelling, Buck’s character span in circles as he took in his blocky surroundings.
“Where’s Chris?” Buck asked once he’d resettled his view on Eddie. Eddie turned in-game to find they’d been abandoned.
“Adventuring,” Chris replied before Eddie could answer.
So much for playing together, then. At least Buck was there. Buck asked a thousand questions as Eddie began punching a tree to gather them some wood, stifling his chuckle when Buck eagerly went to do the same. Eddie lost himself in the calmness that was crafting: first some sticks, then a wooden axe, a pickaxe, a sword. He crafted two of everything, of course.
“Buck,” Eddie called once he was done, spinning to find what was once a forest had been turned into a plain. Saplings bobbed in masses around him and the culprit, having just learnt to jump thanks to Chris, hopped into Eddie’s view with a block of wood in hand. “I made you this.”
Eddie threw his goods at Buck’s avatar, surprised he still had room in his inventory to receive them. Another half-assed explanation from Chris and Buck was as well-equipped as he could have been.
“Hey,” Chris said after he’d finished teaching Buck the benefits of the tools. “I’ve found a village. You might want to come find me before it gets dark.”
“Good idea,” Eddie agreed. He hated the nighttime in-game when he had a partner at his side who knew how to fight, he couldn’t imagine having to face it with the guy who’d only just learnt how to sprint. Chris gave out his coordinates and Eddie dutifully followed them on the map he insisted was included when they had set up the world. Somewhere between trees seven and eight, Buck had dropped his and so he was at Eddie’s mercy.
“There’s so many flowers,” Buck cooed as he and Eddie ran away from the rapidly sinking sun. Eddie hummed his acknowledgement. The first peaks of wooden staircase roofs had just appeared on the horizon when suddenly Buck gasped. “Eddie, where’d you go?”
Eddie turned, ready to laugh, only to find that Buck had indeed disappeared.
“Dad, how’d you lose him? It was basically a straight line,” Chris snorted from across the room. Eddie threw his hand up indignantly. How hard was it to just follow him? He asked Buck as much and knew, as he knew almost everything about Buck, that his reply had come with a shrug.
“There were flowers, Eddie.”
Flowers were about as useful as dirt to Eddie, who cared more for his and Buck’s safety than of their décor. The safety that was soon to be threatened by the sinking sun. Eddie and Chris worked together to guide Buck to the village that, predictably, Chris had abandoned the second Eddie had arrived at. What was that internet thing Buck was always saying? The children yearned for the mines, or something. Eddie yearned for Buck to hurry the hell up. If a skeleton or spider got to him, they’d have to make the whole journey again.
There was probably something to be said about the way Eddie’s whole body lightened when he spied Minecraft Steve come frolicking across the plains, log block still in hand, mere moments before the world went dark. Though Eddie wasn’t about to think too hard about why, exactly, he felt like a weight had been lifted at the sight of Buck coming home. Eddie watched from within the safety of one of the villagers’ houses, its occupants making displeased murmurs and hums at his presence.
“In here,” Eddie called while he moved to the door to open it. Buck’s avatar lagged forward, likely having expended its food bar and therefore his ability to sprint, and Eddie grimaced when a skeleton’s arrow sailed past his blocky head.
Buck had amassed quite a following: skeletons, spiders, creepers, zombies and spider jockeys alike. He was screaming into both Chris and Eddie’s ears as he raced to the relative safety of the villager’s house. Eddie shifted in his chair and, as though to spite the flip of his stomach when Buck finally reached him, he closed the door in his face.
“Eddie,” Buck hissed, quickly figuring out how to let himself inside only for Eddie to close the door again. Eddie watched through the small pixellated gaps in the wood as Buck’s character flashed red when the mob reached him. “Eddie, please, let me in.” The door opened. Eddie closed it again. Another hit, another screech. Open. Closed. “Eddie!”
Buck’s character careened into the wall when Eddie finally relented, slamming the door on the eager mob. Through the headset, Buck panted as if he’d been the one to run a mile.
“You made it,” Eddie praised.
“Yeah, no thanks to you.” Buck’s scared puffs of breath broke out into low laughter. “Now what?”
Smiling, Eddie glanced around the villager’s hut. There were two beds, both occupied by their unwilling roommates, and a chest. Eddie had placed the sole crafting table himself. The hostile creatures banged relentlessly at their door. They wouldn’t break through, not on normal at least.
“Now we sleep,” Eddie decided for them. He booted a villager from its bed and got comfortable as his screen darkened. He knew Buck had followed him when a villager grumbled and past like a shadow across Eddie’s screen. Eddie tried not to think too hard that he and Buck were currently sharing a bed, albeit a digital one. Chris sighed from across the room.
“You know I don’t have a bed, right? You’re just going to be laying there for ages.” Chris didn’t avert his eyes from his screen. Eddie frowned.
“No, we won’t – you can come up here and sleep. There’s plenty of beds up here,” Eddie tried to sound firm like a father should. Instead, he sounded just shy of desperate. Chris groaned. “Christopher, you can’t expect Buck to just hole up inside and wait for the sun to come up.”
Nighttime in Minecraft was, in theory, two minutes shorter than the day and yet it had always felt ten times longer for Eddie. It felt longer now as he stared at his near-dark screen and listened to Buck whistle through his headset. Eddie called Chris’ name again and his son finally tore his gaze from his own screen to glare at him.
“Are you being serious right now? You’ve got swords, you’ll be fine.”
Eddie glowered at him, his mouth opening to retaliate but not before Buck could chime in.
“I think I dropped my sword, actually,” he murmured in soft shame. “Also, I think I’m starving.” True to his word, Eddie could hear the wounded noises come from Buck’s character as his lack of food took its toll. Eddie’s own hunger bar was near depleted, but he had also not spent half the day picking flowers. Chris groaned.
“Give me a second.”
Chris arrived like a true knight in shining armour – quite literally decked in iron from head to toe – and showered gifts upon Buck and Eddie in the form of food and, in Buck’s case, a spare helmet.
“Hey, where’s mine?” Eddie grumbled while he refilled his hunger bar.
“You can mine your own,” Chris retorted. Eddie huffed. He could, but he’d have liked a special hat too. It took Buck 30 seconds to put it on, even with Chris’ coaching. Chris had stolen a bed from another villager’s home and placed it across from the beds Buck and Eddie had deemed theirs. Eddie could not have hidden his pleased grin if he tried, the satisfaction building as he took his place next to Buck and the game fast-forwarded to morning.
The first question Buck asked once the sun had risen and Chris had left them, again, leaving he and Eddie to wander around the village, surprised Eddie by how long it had taken him to ask:
“So, where are the ghasts?”
“The nether. Well, the normal ghasts are – the dried ones aren’t out yet,” Chris explained.
“Oh,” Buck sighed. Eddie bit his lip. Would this mean Buck no longer wanted to play? It had been the ghasts that had drawn him to the game, after all. Not Chris. Definitely not Eddie. But Eddie needn’t have worried, for the ghasts were quickly forgotten with a cry of: “Oh my god, a duck!”
“Chicken,” Eddie corrected a little too quickly. “It’s a chicken.”
“Whatever. I want it.”
Eddie watched Buck chase after it, rolling his eyes fondly at the pleased gasp Buck let out when it laid an egg.
And so began Buck’s foray back into ranching. Eddie helped him to build fences with the ample wood that clogged up his inventory and taught him how to lure his precious chickens with seeds. Then came the cows and the sheep, followed by the pigs, which required carrots and thus a lesson in farming. Farming was quite the difficult task, at first, for Buck kept excitedly jumping on the farmland Eddie had just tilled for him. He was sure that the farmer villager was judging them. Hard.
“Why do they keep staring?” Buck asked while he and Eddie extended his pen to accommodate even more animals.
“Because you keep messing up their farm,” Eddie joked.
“Oh, sorry,” Buck apologised aloud to the villager that watched him now. Then suddenly he was screaming.
Eddie turned, expecting a creeper, only to find Buck running into the hills with the village’s iron golem hot on his tail. Eddie’s name became a mantra while he ran, before he exploded into a mess of logs, sticks, wooden tools and an iron hat. Eddie stole the hat before Buck could respawn. He made it midway across his beloved farm before the golem got him again.
“Eddie, help,” Buck wailed. If Buck’s avatar could, Eddie was sure it would be shaking behind the wooden door that kept the iron golem from ending his life yet again.
“I don’t know how, dude – you’re the one that hit a villager.”
“I was giving him a high five, Eddie. I was trying to make friends.”
Chris had to come to their rescue yet again. Only Eddie could see the roll of his eyes as he guided Buck through the trading process, upping his reputation amongst the village and soothing the iron golem’s ire. Chris also replaced Buck’s hat, along with some pants, a chest plate and boots. When Eddie asked if he had anything for him, he was showered in cobblestone.
“Gee, thanks.”
But Chris was gone, again, and Buck had discovered a horse so naturally Eddie helped to corral it. It was quite the scene to watch Buck as he jumped upon its back over and over only to be kicked off before the horse finally gave in and was tamed. Yet it was funnier still to see Buck be guided by the horse’s whim instead of his own, the explanation from Chris that he’d need a saddle to guide it responded to with a simple: “Get me one then.”
The answer that it was not that easy elicited a whine until Eddie distracted him with a sign for his animal pen. Buck reacted to it as if it was as precious as diamonds.
Not quite as precious as the village’s cat, which Buck thundered after like a toddler as soon as he spotted it.
“Eddie, why doesn’t it like me?” Buck exhausted his sprint bar to keep up.
“You’re scaring it, you need to crouch.” Eddie did as he’d instructed and inched toward the cat. “And to tame it, you need fish.”
He produced some raw salmon he meant to cook now that Chris had left them to their own devices. Buck’s character was as much of a bottomless pit as the real Chris was, forever exhausting his hunger by sprinting and jumping everywhere. While Buck was the provider in real life, Eddie gladly took on the role in-game. Buck gasped when hearts poured from the cat’s head as Eddie tamed it.
“Aw, I want one.”
One turned into as many as Eddie had fish to give, for the second they spawned Buck was demanding that it became his. The soothing music of Minecraft was soon drowned out by a melody of meows wherever Eddie went. The chorus was almost deafening within the home he and Buck had since expanded to accommodate chests, a wolf and cats. Lots and lots of cats.
“Don’t you think that’s enough now?” Eddie asked while he waited for the mutton he definitely had not acquired from within Buck’s animal pens to cook. Not that Buck was likely to notice, not since he’d discovered the joys of breeding.
“You can never have enough cats, Eddie,” Buck insisted as he led yet another kitten into their home. Eddie could only roll his eyes when Buck harnessed the power of romance and bred another. At least they’d solved their creeper problem. There were only so many times he could repair the house and Buck’s pen before he lost his mind.
Eventually, Buck grew brave enough to go out at night. More often than not, however, there would be a shriek and then Buck would appear back in the house empty-handed. By the sixth time Chris had replenished Buck’s armour and tools, he had turned on keep inventory. Eddie appreciated it as much as Buck did, often losing his own life while fishing to the new, at least to him, enemy ‘the drowned’. It was by the river that Eddie found himself when Buck made a discovery.
“What’s the blue stuff in the stone?” Buck asked. “I used my pickaxe on it, and it disappeared.”
Eddie arched a brow and turned to find the village void of Buck.
“Did you go to the mines?”
“I went to find Chris,” Buck said. “Why does it keep disappearing?”
“Buck, where are you?” Chris chimed in for the first time in what had felt like an age.
“Trying to find you, why?”
It turned out Buck was a stone’s throw from Chris and, much to Chris’ chagrin, the blue stuff had been the diamonds he feared they were. Chris’ own mining had pivoted away from them when he’d rushed into a bit of lava but Buck, either by sheer luck or lack of self-preservation, had barrelled his way through and trashed nearly half of what could have been a decent diamond haul. Had it have been Eddie, Chris would have rage quit. But it was Buck and Buck was treated to some diamond boots. Eddie had hardly got a word into asking after his own before the long-expected answer of mine your own left Chris’ lips. Eddie clicked his tongue. Fine. He would. He began a mine around the back of his and Buck’s house, his own stubbornness keeping him from joining the mine Buck and Chris had disappeared into. From the sounds of Chris’ exasperated sigh, Buck had already gotten lost again. At least when the message F1R3H035 burnt to death appeared, Chris could take comfort in that he hadn’t lost more diamonds.
The three of them fell into comfortable silence after Buck returned to Chris’ mine. Eddie made progress in his own mine, proudly declaring his own diamond haul. So, it was just enough to make a diamond hoe, but it was diamond nonetheless. Chris had yet to find some of his own, though Eddie’s small win felt like a grand loss when Buck cried out in glee at his and Chris’ matching footwear. Buck’s newly minted feet took him far away from Chris, again, although Eddie realised that was more Chris’ fault than Buck’s when his best friend cried out his son’s name having turned a corner to find him gone. Chris’ increasingly short and curt directions did nothing to help and, as usual, Buck found himself drawn to danger.
“Ooh, what’s this, Chris?” That was all the warning they got before Buck stepped through the nether portal Chris had built using the bucket method in the depths of his mine. “Hey, wait a minute, I thought you said there were no gh-” Buck’s words cut off with a yell. Buck frantically panted as he ran away from the hostile mob. Eddie heard the clicking of his triggers as he buried himself behind some netherrack.
“Buck, why?” Chris pressed his hand into his forehead in a motion eerily similar to Eddie.
“What do you mean why? I had to go in, duh,” Buck said. More clicking as he dug his way back out. A very telling pause. “Uh. What do I do if the door is empty now?”
“Die,” Chris said plainly. Eddie jerked his head in his direction in tandem with Buck’s shocked gasp. “What? We’ve got save inventory on. You won’t lose anything.”
“Chris, go and help him,” Eddie chided. Chris waved him off.
“You go and help him.”
So Eddie did. He abandoned his mine and, armed with the diamond hoe he accidentally made while listening to Buck and Chris having fun without him, followed his map to Chris and to the portal Buck had stumbled through. Only the second he brought the portal back to life, the bottom left of his screen declared that F1R3H035 tried to swim in lava.
“Buck.” Eddie threw his hands up in the air. So much for a grand rescue.
“Sorry, I didn’t see the drop. Wait there, I’m coming – we can go on an adventure!”
Eddie huffed but found his way to Buck’s hidey hole and waited for the other man to appear. His stomach did a somersault when Buck arrived, his voice high pitched as he called Eddie’s name in greeting… before he promptly turned and fell. Again. Eddie barked out a laugh.
“It’s not funny,” Buck chuckled. “Give me a second.”
Buck was back a few minutes later and this time he survived long enough to give Eddie a loving tap with his sword. It was a shame a ghast had set aim for Eddie in that moment, and that he’d been so caught up in mining and finding Buck he’d forgotten to eat, for suddenly Eddie was gone.
“Oh no,” Buck whispered, just before his character was bombarded with fireballs. He and Eddie laughed when they reunited in the house they called home. “Let’s try again.”
If Minecraft left bodies, Buck and Eddie could have built a tower from the nether floor to its building limit for the number of times they died. If one of them did not fall, they died by ghast. If it was not the ghast, it was the pigmen Buck pissed off by accidentally punching them. If not a pigmen, then a blaze. If not a blaze, then likely each other as they spammed the melee button.
“Guys,” Chris whined when yet another death message filled the corner of his screen, but he was laughing just as much as Buck and Eddie were.
It was only when Chris’ words gave way to a yawn and he rubbed at his eyes that Eddie thought to check the time, almost falling from the couch when he looked to his phone.
“Crap, we’ve got to quit playing,” he said. Chris scoffed.
“You can’t rage quit just because you’re bad at it,” Chris teased. Eddie glared at him.
“No, but we have to stop because it’s one am.”
“Shit,” Buck hissed through their headsets.
“It’s not that late.” Chris waved away his father’s concerns. He felt the heat of Eddie’s stare upon him. “N-not that I’d ever stay up this late on a school night usually.” He nervously chuckled. “You’re right, time to go. Night Buck!”
Eddie’s view of the nether turned into the idyllic loading screen of Minecraft as the game informed him his session had been ended by the host.
Chri turned off his computer in record time. For a moment it looked to Eddie like he might try and drag it back to his room, the device likely imperative for his ‘sleep’, but then he clearly thought better of it. Instead, Eddie was graced with a rare hug.
“Can we play again tomorrow?” Chris murmured into Eddie’s shoulder.
“Definitely,” Eddie agreed. His thoughts wandered to when he could pull Chris into his arms with ease for goodnight hugs such as these, and to times when he and Chris used to play split screen, and it was for him who Eddie used to chase away the mobs for. It was hard to picture that little boy in the man that pulled away from Eddie now, but Eddie knew, deep down, that that Chris was still in there. He’d seen it tonight in between the teenage eyerolls and petulant cries of his and Buck’s name, hidden in the sweet gifts he’d given Buck and the endless patience to which he’d explained things, in the way he’d helped Eddie, too, with things that were new and confusing and unfamiliar. Just before he disappeared to get ready for bed, Chris leaned in and wished Buck goodnight one more time through Eddie’s headset.
Eddie watched him go; his lips quirked upward in a fond smile. He jumped when Buck came alive in his ear again, having lost himself in the love he had for his son.
“Man, I wish we didn’t have to stop playing.” Buck sounded as young as Chris. Eddie laughed.
“Tomorrow, Buck – I promise.” Whatever Eddie had wanted to say next was cut off in a yawn and suddenly the walk to his bedroom felt like a trek. “Text in the morning?”
“Sure, Eddie. Goodnight.”
“Night, Buck.”
Eddie pulled his headset off and shut down the TV with his eyes half-closed. He clambered to his feet and jolted away when his foot caught on the many wires tied to Chris’ computer that had almost led to a grave, expensive mistake. He stilled the machine with his hands and breathed a sigh of relief when it stayed put. Sleep took hold of his eyelids once more as he shuffled down toward his room, only for the buzz in his back pocket to jerk him awake next. Eddie squinted with one eye to read the text Buck had sent to their group chat with Chris, smiling at the picture that was captioned started my own world. There was something about it that looked a little… familiar. Eddie looked up as Chris exited the bathroom, toothpaste still smeared around his lips.
“Isn’t that the…” Eddie began, his thoughts confirmed with Chris’ knowing smirk.
“The tutorial world, yeah.”
Eddie hearted the message and replied have fun, night Buck before he went to brush his own teeth. Chris also hearted the message, but the slightly too-loud shutting of his door signalled he was due to crash out soon.
The next evening, after yet another lukewarm TV dinner, Eddie and Chris settled in for a new session of holding Buck’s pixellated hand through the simplest of tasks. Except within minutes, it became quite clear that Buck had used his day off to improve his skills.
“Did you even sleep today?” Eddie asked while he watched Buck adjust the village farm into more of a production line. Buck’s noncommittal hum was not too convincing. His pens were the next to be upgraded. Eddie felt a sense of loss when Buck demolished the sign he’d made to replace it with one that glowed, thanks to some fancy squid ink that hadn’t been there when Eddie and Chris used to play.
“Jesus, Buck,” Chris said in awe when he finally resurfaced. “What did you do, download all the crafting recipes straight into your brain?”
“No, I just read the wiki,” Buck confessed. Eddie smiled to himself as he imagined it: Buck, hunched over his laptop while he lapped up every fact, every craft, every possibility. “Oh, Eddie – I got something for you.”
Eddie let out a little noise of surprise. Buck made something for him? Eddie happily followed Buck’s speck on the map to a spot behind the house that had grown in size since he had last been to the surface – it appeared that he, too, yearned for the mines – near to Buck’s new and improved pen. Eddie frowned when he found Buck stood in front of some odd art piece. It stood four blocks high, three of which were solid gold and the fourth a piece made from obsidian Buck must have mined with the diamond pickaxe Chris had gifted him. Despite Buck having shown his knowledge had surpassed even Chris, Chris still showered him with gifts. Eddie, predictably, had received none. No, whatever Buck was choosing to give to him would be the first he’d received since they’d started playing. Eddie tried to hide his disappointment that it had turned out to be a useless tower.
“It’s nice, thanks, Buck,” Eddie praised anyway. Buck scoffed.
“Not that, Eddie – this.”
In Buck’s blocky hand appeared a flower. A poppy, not a rose like they used to be, but red all the same. Poppy upon poppy poured from Buck’s character to Eddie’s and soon Eddie had a bouquet full. Eddie was sure it must be hay fever that made his eyes blur and not some pixellated flowers. Chris snorted as he approached.
“Some flowers, really, Buck?” Perhaps he too had been hoping for something that showcased Buck’s new knowledge, and not some measly flower he’d likely had in his inventory since the start. Eddie remembered his manners.
“I love them, thanks Buck.”
And Eddie did, truly, love the flowers as much as he loved the teenager that gagged and wandered off. He loved them as much as the man that asked in a timid voice are you sure and then breathed a sigh of relief when Eddie reaffirmed that yes, he was. They weren’t a diamond pickaxe, or some enchanted armour, or even one of the hundreds of cats whose meows still made Eddie’s ears bleed, but they were his.
It was a shame those hundreds of cats had been moved to the cattery, as Buck had dubbed it, for they would have come in handy to stop the creeper that blew up Buck, Eddie and Buck’s stupid statue to smithereens. Thank Chris for kept inventory. Regardless, Eddie accepted Buck’s second gift of a frame and immortalised his poppies above their beds – still side by side despite the ample room they had now – and found himself smiling whenever he and Buck took their avatars to bed.
When a mysterious parcel arrived at his and Chris’ house days later, Eddie almost threw it in the trash for fear of it being a bomb or, worse, a Hildy product. Even when Buck text him to ask if he’d got it, Eddie opened the package at arms-length only to bring the gift inside right to his nose once it was revealed. Pressed into a clear, perfectly square frame was a dried poppy. Eddie did not hesitate to than Buck and hang it where it belonged: high above the bed that was actually meant for two.