#max and eleven

[i-wheeley-like-you]

my personal least favourite thing is that the wheeler siblings are the epitome of evil to the lgbt community. look at this shit.

[threewaywithdelusion]

When the Villains Fall (The Kingdoms Never Weep) -- Max & El Fic

Read it on AO3 here:

Max was jealous of El’s tears. 

Maybe that was a horrible thing to say. Maybe that made her a terrible person. But Max couldn’t help it. 

El cried all the time these days. Heaving, gulping tears that screamed her heartbreak to the world. Silent, streaming tears that showed that her grief never left her alone, not even for a moment. Morning tears and evening tears and couch tears and shower tears. 

Max couldn’t bring herself to cry. 

She lay in El’s bed with her, chatting about idle distractions some of the time and holding El while she cried the rest of the time. 

It made sense for El to cry over Hopper. He had died a hero. 

“Billy died a hero too,” El had said when Max had voiced the thought out loud. “He saved me.”

“He did,” Max said. She would forever be grateful to Billy for saving El. She’d never even gotten to thank him and she hated that he would have that over her forever. If he’d still been alive, he would have been insufferable about it. Every time her mom asked Billy to do the dishes or clean his room or whatever, he would have foisted the chore off on Max, saying “I saved your friend, so you have to do whatever I want.”

She would have hated it. And now she hated that he would never act like a dick to her again. That he died while she was in his debt.

So yes, she missed Billy. 

But she was also so, so grateful he was dead. 

Billy would never shove her around again. Never grab her arm so hard she had bruises in the shape of his fingers. Never drive recklessly just to scare her, threatening her with death in a fiery car crash to get her to agree to whatever he wanted.

For the first time in years, Max felt like she could breathe. She wasn’t tiptoeing in her own home. 

Neil was drunk and enraged of course, but he had never laid a hand on Max in all the years he’d been married to her mother. There was something darker and colder in his eyes these days, and Max thought he might lose that self-control some time soon. But Neil had never been the man in Max’s nightmares He might scare her on occasion, but the very sight of him didn’t make her blood run cold. 

Max’s monster was dead. 

“You do not cry,” El said, silent tears rolling down her cheeks. She was half-propped against the headboard, wearing one of Hopper’s old flannels and curled in on herself like she could protect her heart. “Joyce says tears are good. They are ca-thar-tic. Feel better after crying.”

Max fought not to roll her eyes. El didn’t have a good bullshit detector and she took everything people told her as a statement of fact. And sure, Joyce’s advice was good for El. But that didn’t mean it was good for Max. And if Max rolled her eyes, El might think the advice was untrue, instead of just that it didn’t apply to people who shouldn’t be mourning. 

“Billy doesn’t deserve my tears,” Max said. 

“Why?” El asked. “He was good. At the end.”

“That doesn’t make up for all the time he was bad,” Max said. She wished he’d just died bad. She wished she could still hate him unadulteratedly, without needing to factor in the heroism of his death. 

She’d cried at Starcourt. She’d lost it, sobbing and screaming, trying to hold onto Billy’s body. She didn’t remember moving from inside the mall, didn’t remember being pulled away from the corpse. 

All she’d known was grief and pain and horror. He’d died such a bloody death. 

When she’d come back to herself, she’d been in the parking lot outside Starcourt, held in Lucas’s arms. She’d still been sobbing, clutching onto Lucas’s shoulders with blood-stained hands. His arms had been around her, his voice in her ear going, “it’s okay, Max. It’s over. You’re going to be okay.”

“Billy,” she’d keened. 

There had been a beat, and then Lucas had said, “I’m sorry he’s dead, Max. I’m so sorry.”

Max couldn’t think of that night without being ashamed. It would have been bad enough to let Lucas see her cry over Billy when Billy was a racist asshole who had tried to kill him. But she hadn’t just cried. She’d made him hold her. Made him comfort her. 

Lucas had told her he was sorry for Billy’s death when he would have had every right to dance on or piss over his grave. 

“I’m mad at him,” Max said. “I’m so mad at him and he’s gone so I can’t do anything about it.”

El stared at Max for a moment then said in a small voice, “I am mad too.”

Max blinked. “At Hopper?”

For a moment hope rose in her. El wasn’t a bad person. If El was mad at Hopper for something he’d done and she still grieved him, maybe it was okay for Max to do the same. Maybe Max wasn’t horrible. 

El nodded carefully. “He said he would be okay. He was not okay. He lied.”

Max’s stomach sank. “That’s normal, El. A lot of people feel angry at someone for dying. It’s not the same.”

El stared at Max for a long time and Max wondered what she saw? A grieving sister? Or a monster of a girl?

“It is okay to miss a bad person,” El said seriously, her dark eyes wet with tears. “Hop said.”

“Hop wasn’t a bad person.”

El shook her head. “Not Hop. Papa.”

Max hardly dared to breathe. El had never mentioned her Papa before. 

“Did he hurt you?” Max asked. 

El nodded slowly. 

A flash of rage broke through Max’s griefguilt. El was kind and good, nothing like Max. She didn’t deserve to be hurt. “Where is he now?”

“Gone,” El said. “Two years ago.”

Two years ago. That would have been the year of the first fight against the Upside Down. The year El had escaped from the lab.

“And you miss him?” 

El shook her head vehemently. Then she stopped, looked at Max with big, ashamed eyes, and nodded. Then, looking frustrated, shook her head again. “Two years ago,” she said. “I cried.”

Max understood what El was trying to say. Did Max miss Billy? No. She probably never would. Did Max wish Billy was alive to torment her? No. But she also desperately, more than anything, wished he wasn’t dead. 

“Billy doesn’t deserve my tears,” Max repeated. 

“I know,” El said. She leaned over Max so she was staring straight down into her eyes. “You do.”

Max let out a choked little sob. One of El’s tears splashed onto her cheek, rolling down towards her ear, and for a moment, between the tightness in her throat and the wetness on her cheeks, it almost felt like she was crying. 

But Max didn’t deserve to cry. Not even for herself. 

She was a terrible person. The type of person who got jealous of El’s simple grief, who made Lucas comfort her about his would-be murderer’s death, who prayed for Billy to die and then had the audacity to play the victim when he actually did. 

Max was grieving, yes, but not for Billy. She was grieving for the girl she’d been before Billy’s death, before she’d learned the depths of cruelty inside her. Maybe even for the girl she’d been before Billy had taught her how to be afraid. Before he’d made her into the kind of person who saw a man die, bloody and heroic, held his body in her arms, and thought thank God. He can’t hurt me anymore. 

Max didn’t deserve to cry. She didn’t deserve catharsis. 

Monsters didn’t deserve comfort. 

Max almost missed the days when Billy had been her monster. At least she could run or hide from Billy. 

She didn’t know what to do when these days, she saw her monster every time she looked in the mirror. 

El was still crying and she curled in closer against Max’s side, soaking her shirt with her tears. Max wrapped an arm around her, holding her while she shook. 

This, she could do. At least this one tiny part of her — the part that El saw, the part that gave El comfort — was still good. 

But El was leaving with the rest of the Byers for California and Max was afraid of who she would become once she was alone. 

Everyone always left. 

But maybe this was what Max deserved. 

[queerxqueen]

I think about that night all the time. The night it came for you.

STRANGER THINGS 5 DATE ANNOUNCEMENT

[hot-patootiee]

Steve’s parents running into Steve and Eddie with a gaggle of children.

They’re hanging off of both adults, calling them mom and dad.

“Steve, what’s going on here?” Richard Harrington asks.

“Co-parenting.” Steve replies in a deadpan tone. Max is actively pickpocketing him and Dustin is tugging on his jacket trying to get Steve’s attention, a never ending chorus of ‘Mom, come look’ leaving his mouth.

“Nah, at this point we’re just parenting.” Eddie corrects, fending off a grabby El trying to play with his wallet chain.

Eddie scoops up Steve’s wallet when Max tries to make her escape. She groans out a frustrated ‘Dad’ before retreating back to Lucas and Mike, who are hiding around the corner, poorly.

“Richard, I think this is the reason we only had one.” Martha Harrington stated blankly, wide eyed taking in the scene in front of her.

Robin nods from where she sits at an adjacent table, trying and mildly failing to braid Will’s short hair. Will sits perfectly still and disciplined as Robin works. A complete contrast to the wild children that Steve and Eddie are actively managing.

“I picked the best one.” Robin smiles condescendingly at Steve and Eddie, patting Will’s head.

[byersandhighers]

I was thinking it would be funny if during one of those hear me out cake videos a group of dudes pranked their homie and every single person put for every single hear me out, the dudes dad and now I can’t stop thinking about it as the party

All: this is our hear me out cake

Lucas: hear me out *puts a picture of Sheila the Thief from the dungeons and dragons 80s cartoon*

Will: hear me out *puts a picture of Lucas’s dad*

Lucas: is that my dad??

Will: *shrugs*

Mike: Hear me out *puts a different picture of Lucas’s dad*

Lucas: what the hell guys

El: hear me out *puts a third picture of Lucas’s dad*

Lucas: what is wrong with you! Did you take that picture from my house?

Dustin: hear me out *places a fourth picture of Lucas’s dad*

Lucas: everyone stop putting my dad! *Sees it’s Max’s turn next* max, max I swear to god if you put my father, we are breaking up, I will never forgive you

Max: Lucas don’t be weird, I’m not going to put your dad

Max: *sticks a picture of Lucas’s mom on the cake*

[kdkdnfuiahuag]

i can’t believe they kept them apart when they needed each other the most

[stevemania]

season 3 remains my literal fav

[bananananurr]

I forgot this existed, so here um yeah…

[benetton-schumi]

'you can't handle max being cunty' that wasn't cunty that was dangerous. and stupid. and something you shouldn't be allowed to do.

2017 seb got a stop-go penalty for deliberately driving into lewis. 1997 michael got dsqed from the whole championship for intentionally crashing out jacques. suzuka 1989 senna was disqualified for crashing out prost. there are standards in the sport that are supposed to be upheld.

allowing drivers to get away with these things for several years (max's whole career effectively) allows these things to happen repetitively. max is all for snitching when other drivers don't follow the regulations perfectly (lando not lifting for double yellows last year, lando jump start in bahrain) but when he does it nothing happens.

there's no justification for driving into your competitor? if you can't control your emotions or regulate yourself in a high stress high pressure situation then maybe you shouldn't be in the sport. it's not like it's unprecedented from max.

[dailystrangerthings]

EL HOPPER & MAX MAYFIELD Stranger Things — Season 4 Chapter Nine: The Piggyback

[kidovna]

medusa and her blind lover but make it elmax

[starsnoscars]

everyone: i hope will kisses mike in s5 !!!!

are you sure it's going to be will?

[inconspicuousdreamgirl]

I'm so ready for joyce and robin to team up and solve the most insane stuff

I guess I have a type

[bylertruthr]

how st characters would go viral on tiktok

el: duets a cooking video and asks out of nowhere “what is salt?”

will: “a day in my life as the most emotionally repressed boy in indiana”

mike: someone comments “are you gay” on one of his videos, he responds to it in a video saying defensively “i’m not gay! i just really love my best friend!” it becomes a meme

max: goes viral for skateboarding past a group of people fighting while sipping a slurpee and headphones on

dustin: unironically doing a cosplay in the street and filming himself

lucas: reacts to videos with the most over dramatic expressions ever

steve: posts a thirst trap with the caption “hot single mom energy” with erica and dustin gagging and making disgusted faces in the background

nancy: “grwm” except it turns into a 10 minute feminist rant

robin: duetting ‘alpha male’ videos and roasting them

[chillikm]

Commemorative doodle of everyone’s favourite mother for Mother’s Day…Steve “The Hair” Harrington!

[cuepickle]

If stranger things was a comic (and I was the artist)