#week nine

[thisapplepielife]

Written for a @astrangersummer.

Save it For a Rainy Day

Week #9 Prompt: Where It All Started | Word Count: 1950 | Rating: T | POV: Wayne | Characters: Wayne, Eddie, Steve | Pairings: Wayne & Eddie, Steddie | CW: Eddie's Rough Start in Life, Parental Neglect, Language, S4 Canon | Tags: Good Uncle Wayne Munson, Taking in Eddie, Eddie and Steve Meet as Kids, Haircuts and Swimming Playdates, Fix-It, Happy Ending

He's so little. 

That's the only thought Wayne has, over and over again. He's so goddamn little. With lank, limp hair, all snarled and knotted, matted. Unkempt. Dirty. Dark circles under his sullen eyes. He's small, but at the same time he looks every bit of a hardened fifty-five, at all of seven-years-old.

He didn't look like that the last time Wayne had seen him. 

And Wayne is sick that he's deteriorated to this point, in just two years time. At five, he had been a happy, wild boy. All snips, snails and puppy dog tails. 

With a loud mouth and big, round cheeks.

Al swore he was fine, that they both were, on the rare occasions when he'd call after losing Betts and Wayne had believed him. Until the social worker was on his front steps, Eddie standing there, head bowed, so utterly serious.

"Do you want me to find someone to try and comb it out, or would you like to shave it and start over?" Wayne asks, and Eddie just shrugs. Still not talking, still buried deep within his shell.

Wayne's not going to decide for him. Thinks it should be his decision, but knows it can't stay like this either, even if he doesn't have it in him to start dragging a comb through it. He knows that'll hurt, and he can't do it to Eddie. Won't. 

"When you decide, you let me know," Wayne says, hoping he'll decide sooner rather than later.

It takes three days, but Eddie finally comes up behind Wayne on the couch, and taps him on the shoulder, and makes the motion for shaving his head.

"Okay, I'll get you an appointment," Wayne tells him, because he wants to do this right, and not leave Eddie with the memory of Wayne shaving his head in the kitchen of the trailer. Maybe that's cowardly, but he'd rather push that off on a professional. 

Eddie is sitting on the little wooden board the hairdresser placed over the arms of her chair to make him taller, the hydraulic lift hadn't even been enough to get him where she needed him, and he somehow still looks little.

She gently, oh so gently, takes the clippers to Eddie's hair, shaving off strips, as she talks him through each pass. Eddie seems fine with it, there are no tears, but no smiles either.

This was the right call. A beauty shop, not a barber. Wayne's own barber does just fine on his own hair, but wouldn't have been so delicate with Eddie, and right now, Wayne's pretty sure his boy needs a soft touch.

There's another boy in the chair next to Eddie, probably the same age, but he's so much larger, and more animated. Studying every move of her hand as she barely trims anything off his thick head of hair. He doesn't need the booster board, even if Wayne suspects he's younger than Eddie.

"Nanny Louisa, can I get my haircut like that?"

She laughs, "Steve. Your mother would have both of our hides. We all have very strict orders for your haircut and you know it." 

"Aw, man, it looks so cool," Steve whines, and if Wayne isn't mistaken, that's Richard Harrington's boy. And if that's true, there's no way he's leaving here with his head shaved, that's for damn sure.

And then, as if it were a miracle, Eddie smiles. It's small, faint, barely there. But it's a goddamn smile, aimed at the other little boy that is watching as Eddie's hair falls down all around his chair and onto the floor.

The Harrington boy doesn't win, and only gets a trim, but Eddie has straightened up on the board. Not nearly as withdrawn as he was when they entered the shop.

Maybe shedding all that damaged hair feels like a new start. Wayne sure hopes so, because they're gonna need all the help they can get.

When he's all brushed off, and the plastic cape removed, the hairdressers each hand Eddie and the Harrington boy a coupon for a free ice cream cone at the shop down on the corner. It's a perk for being good in the chair, and they both earned it today.

Eddie clutches his coupon in his little hands.

"Do you want to save that, or get it now?" Wayne asks, and Eddie looks torn. That isn't the look Wayne wants on his face, so he quickly amends his question, "Or both? You can save your coupon for a rainy day, and we can still get ice cream now," Wayne offers.

"Really?" Eddie says, looking so hopeful, and it's the most beautiful word Wayne's ever heard in his whole life.

"Really," he reassures, "you save it until you want to use it. And I'll buy, today."

"Can we go get ice cream, too, Nanny Louisa?" the Harrington boy asks, and she looks reluctant, but finally nods. She couldn't let him get his head shaved, but ice cream, that's probably a much more doable request.

Wayne sits at the table with Louisa and makes the world's most uncomfortable small talk, as the boys sit at another table together, and jabber back and forth. Well, Steve is doing most of the talking, but Eddie, his sweet Eddie, has said more in the past thirty minutes than he has in the past week, and Wayne doesn't care who has gotten those words out of him, he'll be grateful. 

When the cones are gone, both boys appear at the side of the table, "Eddie's coming over tomorrow to swim," Steve announces. 

"Oh, is he?" his nanny asks, teasing Steve, and Wayne smiles. 

"He is. His uncle will bring him," Steve says with a confidence that things will always go his way in life, and Wayne hopes that rubs off on Eddie, just a little bit.

"I will?" Wayne teases, and Eddie meets his eyes, and Wayne nods. "If it's okay with Miss Louisa, I think that could be arranged."

"I don't know how to swim," Eddie admits on the way home, and Wayne laughs.

"Maybe you shouldn't have made a swimming playdate then, kid," Wayne teases, and Eddie laughs, a small quiet laugh. But it was a laugh. Wayne heard it.

"Yeah," Eddie says, and then he's quiet for a stretch, "could you teach me?"

Wayne isn't so sure that's his area of expertise, but he supposes he could try, "Yeah, I can try."

Knowing Eddie would be far too embarrassed to go to the public pool, Wayne takes Eddie out to the swimming side of Lover's Lake.

Wayne, not sure the last time he's even been in shorts, wades out in the water in his cut-off jeans, surely blinding the boaters a mile out with his white legs, as Eddie walks in beside him.

And Wayne teaches him, always staying within an arm's reach. And Eddie swims. It might not be the fancy strokes that the Harrington boy can surely swim, in his private pool with his private swimming lessons. 

But Eddie's doing it, and Wayne feels like maybe, just maybe, he's finally done something right for the kid today.

Eddie's laughing, and splashing, a quick study, and Wayne lets him paddle around for as long as he wants, until the sun threatens to sink beyond the horizon. 

Once back on shore, Wayne wraps him up in a towel, just one from the house, and gets him back into the truck.

"I'm starving," Eddie says.

"The downside to going swimming, I'm afraid," Wayne answers, but swings by Benny's Burgers on the way home, getting them both a burger, fries and a milkshake. Ice cream twice in one day is fine, Wayne's pretty sure, since Wayne's celebrating the first good day they've had since Eddie got here.

Anything the kid wants, forever, Wayne will do his best to make happen.

In the morning, Wayne brings Eddie by Melvald's General Store, to let Eddie pick out a beach towel from the rack. Eddie combs through them, so serious as he checks out the options: Star Wars and Barbie and Huckleberry Hound.

"Garfield!" Eddie finally declares, and Wayne supposes that's the one. 

"Garfield, great choice," Wayne says, taking the towel to the counter so they can pay for it. So Eddie won't be embarrassed bringing a fraying old towel from home. So he'll have something new, and fun, that he picked out all for himself. 

Wayne probably should have washed it first, but he's not that organized, and Eddie'll live. Wayne pulls off the tag and hands it over, and Eddie hugs it to his chest.

Pulling into the circle drive at the Harrington's is weird, to say the least. He's never set foot on the property, and never imagined he ever would. But, Eddie's brought a lot of changes, and if Eddie likes this other little boy, and he's kind, Wayne will be polite and make his boy happy in any way he knows how.

That evening, when he picks Eddie up, he's tired, and a little sunburnt, but rattling off information about his new friend and all their grand plans for the summer vacation.

And as time always goes, that summer flew by too fast, and before Wayne knew it, years had passed. The boys drifted apart as fast as they became friends. As kids do. By high school, Wayne hasn't heard the name Steve Harrington from Eddie's mouth in years. 

But that summer, that first summer, Wayne will forever be grateful for him. For Steve Harrington, Garfield beach towels, and more ice cream cones than he could ever begin to count. To swimming, and fishing, and playing in the backyard. 

To the little kid that made his boy smile again.

And when Steve Harrington, now grown into a man, shows up on Wayne's doorstep, Eddie's denim vest clutched in his hands, filthy and blood-stained, Wayne lets him inside without a word. 

Wayne takes one look at him, and tells him to wait there. 

He has to dig, but he finally finds Eddie's piggy bank in a cardboard box that he'd packed from the remnants of the trailer, and pulls out the bottom plug. Change falls out, clattering onto the desk. 

But inside, there's a slip of paper. Folded to fit, and dirty from spending so much time hanging out amongst the coins.

Wayne clutches it in his hand, and when he presses it into Steve's palm, trading him for the vest, Steve looks down at it, his eyes wet and red-rimmed.

Wayne starts, "I don't know if you remember-"

"Of course I remember," Steve cuts him off. 

"Well, I thought today might be that rainy day."

Steve laughs, and sniffles a little, both at the same time.

"This ice cream shop has been closed for years," Steve says, but he's finally smiling, just a little. 

Eddie's not here to do it himself, not here to coax out that smile, so Wayne's repaid the debt for Eddie himself. 

"Yeah, well…" Wayne trails off.

"But it is, you know," Steve says, "that rainy day. So, thank you."

And months later, Eddie shows up on Wayne's doorstep again. Dirty, his hair matted, and eyes downcast. Thin, worn to the bone, and as silent and stoic as he had been at seven. Wayne asks no questions. The answers don't matter right now. Instead, he pulls on him, hugging him tight, welcoming him home.

They've done this before, and they can do it again. And Wayne's grateful to have the opportunity. He was so sure he'd never see him again.

Then, after Wayne's gotten Eddie settled, and Eddie is standing in front of the bathroom mirror, combing out his own hair, Wayne excuses himself, heading for the kitchen to call Steve Harrington.

Wayne tells him to bring ice cream.

If you want to write your own, or see more entries for this challenge, pop on over to @astrangersummer and follow along with the fun!

[every-character-ever-poll]

SUCTION CUP MAN - Piemations

PROPAGANDA:

HE'S SMUDGING UP YOUR DASHBOARD, FOOLS! LOOK AT HIM GO! also ace rep I love this partially unkillable guy

[the-babygirl-polls]

Jak - Jak and Daxter

[sarahsmi13s]

CSI: Bobby

forensic scientist!robert 'bob' floyd

i can kill you in 70 different ways and not leave a single trace of evidence behind

bob floyd had always been fascinated by science. it was the art of discovery and learning. he loved all branches of the subject, but chemistry and physics were his favorites one was based in learning how things worked in the world. how things reacted to each other, with each other. and what they were composed of and how to break them down. the other was based on learning how the world worked on things. how those things reacted to the circumstances and conditions around them. biology snuck in at third place later when he got to ninth grade. and the human body was such a complex yet simple thing. a near perfect combination of his two loves. and then later his sophomore year of high school he went on a field trip to the local crime lab when his science class was doing a unit on DNA. and that is when he found his true love. forensics

======

and thank you to @desert-fern for giving me this idea! 💜

[ineffablyruined]

Thank you so much to everyone who continues to participate! The amount of joy I get every time I get a tag in something you created is next level.

Prompt for Week Nine:

Renewed.

Are two people back in contact, renewing their connection? Is the bookshop getting a new coat of paint? Are we looking at a library AU and someone has to renew their book loan? I don't know, but I'm hoping you do!

@interesting-egg and I are so excited to see what this week's creations bring.

The Rules Are Simple:

Every Friday until the Season 3 premiere, I'll post a prompt.

You will have a week to write, draw, paper craft, record, completely scrap and start from the beginning after a crisis of confidence (oh, is that just me?), and post your interpretation of the prompt.

Tag your post #IneffablePromptAThon, #IneffablePAT #Ineffable Prompt-A-Thon, and/or #IPAT. Make sure to use them on Tumblr, X, IG, and AO3 so everyone can easily find your works!

Also tag your posts and AO3 with the Week Number and the Prompt, so we can all tell which prompt your creation accompanies.

Tag me @ineffablyruined in all of your posts, too, so I can reblog!

Add your contribution to the Ineffable Prompt-A-Thon collection on AO3 for this week. Link is below!

Look for the next prompt. Rinse. Repeat.

HAVE FUN!

This is meant to be zero stress. If you can't do a week, that's completely fine! Prompt not working for you? Skip it. Going to be late? No worries at all!

It is just meant to be a fun outlet to get your creative juices flowing and keep the fandom well-fed with copious amounts of fic and fun until our Ineffable Duo makes their return to our screens (whenever that may be).

There is no length requirement, no rating requirement, no timeline requirement. It can be canon-compliant, AU, crossover, whatever tickles your fancy, as long as it's Good Omens related and incorporates the prompt. It's all Tickety-Boo!

If you want to be tagged in the posts, let me know!

Link to this week's collection:

Tags under the cut:

@naturallyteal @bumblee27 @czitara @martinsharmony @ineffable-xenanigans @dierama-mojo @lickthecowhappy @ineffably-queer-book-lover @eybefioro @crowleys-hips @goodoldfashionednightingale @depraveddame

[mysmoshsideblog]

Serving Cunt: Tumblr Edition

Week Nine, Cuntegory One: Smosh Channels

Serving Cunt is currently dedicated to @rocketrocky. she's not dead but tumblr nerfed her blog for no reason so these polls are in her name until they give it back.

entry one: Main Channel

entry two: Smosh Games

entry three: SmoshCast

entry four: Smosh Pit

entry five: SmoshAlike

NOTE: although the poll timer lasts a week, poll results will be recorded july 2nd at 11:59PST. any votes cast after that are just for funsies

[astrangersummer]

Thank you to everyone who participated!

save it for a rainy day by @thisapplepielife

tumblr |  wayne, eddie, steve | T | 1950 words

i just wanna get to know you by @ataliagold

tumblr | ao3 |  steddie | T | 1281 words

trailer sweet trailer by @arelliann

tumblr | steddie | G | art

[sapphic-summer-riordanverse]

Week Nine (14/7/25)

Undead

Sports

Laundry

Free Choice

[miacontextualreview]

08/05 | Essay Structure

Analysing this contextual review was useful for understanding the basic structure of the paragraphs and writing. Each context had a similar structure, defining the context, the characteristics of the context, discussions that scholars have been having on the context, and a small sentence that relates the context to practice. All of the information is backed up by references and the writer doesn't add any of their own opinions. The only time we hear the writers voice is when they are linking the context back to their practice, but even this is very small. They will only mention something like, This is the definition I am using throughout my project etc.

From analysing the writing and structure, I started planning my own contextual review structure. This was slightly difficult because I haven't been able to research all my contexts yet since some of them I have been struggling to find research on and others I have only recently introduced as key contexts. In my research design feedback, Andrew suggested that I look into ideal beauty now and throughout history, the meaning of beauty etymologically, culturally and socially. Andrew advised that researching into this would help me gain inspiration on different ways of presenting beauty, which I agree with. Originally I spoke to Welby and he suggested just defining this as a key term at the beginning of my exegesis and moving on, but I think that having an understanding of ideal beauty and what that means historically will help set up other contexts in my work. I might only put a small section on this in my essay and then build on it later throughout my exegesis.

[hollis-art]

i see them everywhere...

[aryll]

ooh you wanna play nine sols. you wanna play nine sols so bad

[every-character-ever-poll]

HATSUNE MIKU - Vocaloid

PROPAGANDA:

I'm pretty sure (almost) every single person in the world knows who Miku is but not what her source material is normally people would say NO Miku is NOT an anime character, but she has now made appearances in a few animes! I'm so proud of Miku for becoming as iconic as she is and appearing in multiple animes now. stan Miku. we all love Miku

[the-babygirl-polls]

Hajime Hinata - Dangonronpa

Other Additions:

sorry

[sarahsmi13s]

|| week 9 poll ||

okay it's that time again! time to vote for the next moodboard!

and this friday (april 5) we'll be seeing cowboy!buck

also i know the week numbers are kinda off, that's on me. but this is week 8 so this is for next week (week 9) LOL sorry about that

[mysmoshsideblog]

results are in! week nine's top cunt is:

crater lake!! cuntgratz <3

thanks for playing folks, week ten begins tomorrow!

[xnyu09]

edit: i removed the caption ^^ i dont want to cause any more discourse over the topic.

i want to be clear on my stance that i do not excuse the abuse that david cain did to cass, nor do i want to downplay cass’s experience as a victim. i drew this from a personal space so apologies if anyone was offended ^^