emchant3d - Tumblr blog

emchant3d · 11 days ago

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care + keeping

or: what's a world tour even matter when the man you love gets injured on the ice? ⛸️

rating: E🌶️ tags: hockey🏒 + rockstar🎸 AU, injuries ❤️‍🩹, care-taking, ice baths🧊, massage therapy 🥵, going above and beyond for the person you love, fluff, happy endings💕 (interpret that in any and every way you want, it'll be relevant)

very belatedly for @steddieas-shegoes, who asked for hockey + rockstar steddie AND slightly-less-but-still-very-belatedly for @steddielovemonth Day Twenty-Eight—“It is a curious thought, but it is only when you see people looking ridiculous that you realize just how much you love them.” ―Agatha Christie

Steve thinks they’re all overreacting, here.

Like, he understands why—if he gets another concussion graded higher than 0 he’s fucked, even Hop will think twice about even just letting him live out his contract as a duster, fuck, and there he was, having spent his whole life trying his damnedest to get as high above a zero wherever grades were involved; life was so fucking weird—but he didn’t even blink longer than normal this time, Jesus H. Christ.

So carting him off the ice with the scoop stretcher and the neck collar when he was the one who started to get up first to go after the asshat who fucking head butted him like a goddamn barbarian—that’s the right…class, not race, right?—or, y’know, sort of like he remembers Henderson deciding was the ‘most logical’ way of handing those anti-Yankovic bullies’ asses to them, before Steve had asked if that was really such a good course of action to commit to without a full-set of collarbones.

Which was a conversation that’d happened when the shithead was in the eighth grade.

(And it’d been a terrible course of action; he’d called the school as a Mr. Henderson that obviously wasn’t even a real person in the picture, and then made sure to pop his trunk with the bat visible when the little shitheads who were trying to bully his little shitheads walked by, said hello sweet as pie to the dipshits and pretended he was just adjusting it while making sure the sun caught the nails just right—that had been a viable and effective plan of action.)

Point is, though, now: on the ice, as fucking professionals? Maybe Steve’d roll with it on provocation, but he had legitimately just been coming back on, he hadn’t even had the chance to piss off Hargrove yet.

Which, between him and himself and possibly his fiancé: is kinda the part Steve’s pissiest about in the whole goddamn affair. Baiting and then decimating that little cuntnugget is absolutely the highlight of every game Steve has to suffer through the fucker’s presence.

But, now that he’s finally been released by medical—Steve knows this isn’t their home turf but when did any team have a portable CT scan on-hand, and outside of their training facility at that; and then add in why was it Steve’s own team‘s medical staff was operating it like they had been the ones to cart it along in tow?—but, whatever. Now he’s got his clean bill of ‘brain’s only as fucked up as when you brought it in’ and now he has to deal with the physical ramifications of what was, for the rest of his body, a targeted and unprompted blow that Steve knows Hopper’s gonna push beyond just match penalty any way he can, he hates Hargrove and his lackey goons almost as much as Steve does—but then on top of the universal ache in him?

Steve’s gotta fucking figure out how to argue his way out of being kept off the ice ‘for your own goddamn good, Harrington’ until the end of the fucking month—he can’t cut it that close to the playoffs, he’s gotta heal whatever’s not-brain-related as smart and as fast as he can, preferably while still seeing some semblance of actual play.

He strips halfway at his locker to assess the damage and—yeah, swelling’s bad enough he’ll need the ice bath first. Their whole squad of trainers had followed him to check his noggin, and he’d slipped out of their grasps in a very intentionally collective way, but he…he thinks he still knows enough about how to prep it to figure out the fancy new Canadian plunge bucket that he knows they’ve got in here, all on his own.

Except: the ice bath makes a particular sound when it’s being prepped. And Steve can hear that particular sound, just now, muffled for distance but unmistakeable.

And Steve was definitely alone in here, because he’d bolted without a chaperone once they’d made the mistake of announcing him free and clear of a concussion. Like: the alone-for-a-couple-goddamn-seconds thing? Was intentional.

But he follows it anyway, because…he doesn’t exactly want some rando who waltzed in somehow catching a glimpse of him stark fucking naked for their TikTok or their…whatever-gram-is-popular-this-hour Live.

The source of the sound, though, once Steve rounds the last corner toward it, isn’t a rando at all. Not even close.

“Ice first, babe,” Steve’s fucking fiancé says as he smiles that way he has that’s not megawatt for the cameras, but more like suns he’s harnessed from other galaxies just to make his joy at seeing Steve, of all people, bright enough to know without any words at all.

But yeah: Eddie’s making a figure-8 in the water like it doesn’t have its own circulation system, or like Eddie doesn’t trust it to operate sufficiently for his Stevie, and if Steve ever needs a reminder of how lucky, or how loved he is, this is the kind of shit that keeps it top of mind, every goddamn moment.

(So yeah: he never strictly needs a reminder, ever, but strike him dead if he fails to melt into it every time he’s reminded, anyway.)

“You remember what happened when you tried to sneak a hot shower in to rinse off last time,” Eddie quirks a brow at him as he reaches out for Steve, ushers him toward the bath and patiently guides him slow beneath the frigid waterline. Steve takes the minutes he needs to adjust—to the cold, he’s never gotten flat-out used to it enough to switch on a dime once he’s in, but then also to the almost categorically impossible presence of his fiancé, here, not just at his side tending his very-minor-not-concerning injuries but like…in this space, at all. Which is why the first words out of his mouth when his teeth aren’t in danger of cracking for the shivering anymore are:

“What the hell are you doing here?”

Because the match is away tonight, sure, and Eddie being there to see him play isn’t out of place, Eddie is weirdly and adorably proud of being his own brand of WAG, here, but it’s been less frequent of late because: Eddie?

Eddie’s in the same city tonight to play on their fucking world tour.

Which would have wrapped sound check by now and had at least the first openers on stage, what the fuck—

“You know I keep an eye on you until we go on, when I can’t be here,” Eddie says simply, and Steve tries to turn to where he hears Eddie’s voice come from—tries not to pout at the contradiction in his partner who should not be here at all, should be a few blocks down where Steve had fully intended to wait backstage for him after the game ended, but since he seems to in fact not be a figment of Steve’s imagination and is actually here, then why the fuck is he currently so far away—so Steve tries to turn toward the sound but…

Okay fine, yes. He regrets that attempt at asking movement from his obliques kinda fucking instantaneously.

But Eddie’s half-tutting, half-shushing gentle at the hiss Steve tries to stifle for the hurt as he rushes back, more towels in hand—small ones.

“In lieu of the shower I know you’re crawling out of your skin for.”

The moment Eddie reaches one toward his cheek Steve fucking moans: oh, his Eddie knows him so well. He can’t start with a shower to get clean and not pay some sort of price for it later.

So Eddie brought the heat to him; starts tenderly wiping down the skin left not wholly submerged, so careful of the already mottled bruising, and Steve’s eyes slip closed—fucking orgasmic like this.

Never gets any less earth shattering, to be loved like this.

But the point stands: the arena Corroded Coffin was playing tonight’s arguably in walking distance—Steve had been absolutely serious that he wasn’t even going to shower before unsuiting and bolting over to at least catch the encore, and that in itself speaks to his commitment, here; y’know, before he had to butt heads quite literally with fucking goddamn Hargrove—but they’d be on-stage at least, a couple songs in at most, and yet: here’s their lead guitarist.

Offering Steve a half-peeled perfectly ripe banana—like, Steve’s picky as fuck about what counts as a ripe banana and this one is perfect, he knows before he even bites in—with a blueberry Oikos in the other hand, tiny disposable spoon balanced on top and—

Oh, god.

Crook of the elbow? Eddie’s holding his own personal mid-show glass bottle of Yoo-hoo. Chocolate milk had sneaked into Steve’s recovery snack pack, but…the glass bottle of Yoo-hoo.

That’s Eddie’s, for after the sixth song of the set like clockwork—and Steve only drinks the goddamn chocolate milk because it makes him think of the love of his life in the first place, but while maybe Steve’s chest gets a little fluttery at the gesture and its layers of hard-earned, long-built knowing of people you care for that deep, it’s more a gesture-within-the-much-bigger-gesture, that one being Eddie’s presence here and not actively working toward his own Yoo-boo break—

“Plus Rob messaged me,” Eddie says out of the quiet and fuck; not that he blames Robin but fuck, mountains out of molehills here, of course that’d set Eddie running—

“So what am I doing here? No brainer babe,” Eddie rubs the cloth up Steve’s pec:

“Tending my beloved in his time of trial,” Eddie answers, smooth as anything as he continues to needlessly swirl the tub around Steve’s lower half until his already pale hand is bone-white for the cold, but then he’s just casually drying off his hand and standing, bending to press lips to Steve’s brow with the casual affection that keeps Steve weak in the knees still after all this time, and then Steve hears the flowing of water elsewhere, followed by some random shuffling around, before Eddie reappears at his side.

“Eddie,” Steve tries to sound reasonable around the unquenchable sheen of fucking-besotted he’s currently coated in—not least because what Eddie’s brought with him looks to be a basin of hot water given the steam rising from it, and a stack of face cloths—but he can’t let that distract him just now because:

“You have a show tonight.”

Which is why Eddie’s presence is an impossibility of scheduling at the very least—he may be playing in the same city Steve’s is for once on the same night, but it’s a decent half-hour walk from the arena they’re in now, which would have probably been quicker than trying to get through traffic this time of night with so many things going on; but this far into the match on top of it? Eddie should be waiting in the fucking wings by now, ready to take center stage for his show—

“That’s been regrettably cancelled.,” Eddie says but like…without any actual tone of the regret he claims. “Or maybe they went on without me. I’m lead guitar, I’m not the lead singer,” Eddie shrugs, wholly unbothered; “entirely replaceable, we’ve got Roddy in the wings specifically for this sort of reason, plus we’re in the city!” Eddie takes a second to gesture broad with both hands, stretching his arms wide. “So many local friends the boys could have called up to see if they could step in? Especially for just a night.”

And the…the simplicity in it. The nonchalance. The lack of care—or else, the only care in Eddie’s body being directed to Steve alone, and nothing else. Least of all, y’know. Eddie’s whole-ass career.

Steve wants to push, wants to protest and point that shit out, but Eddie’s lifting the banana back to his lips—which, he raises a brow at because…it’s such a terrible juxtaposition of contexts but the idea of being fed a banana, nearly naked…

Not that he can really hope to get hard for the frigid temps, but: doesn’t stop the stirring in his belly.

“You’re the fucking frontman if any of you are,” Steve volleys back on delay, mouth still half-full.

“Says you,” Eddie grabs for another, still-warm cloth and resumes his tending—Jeff’s lead vocals but hates the attention, so while Eddie stands by Jeff as frontman, no question, Steve goes with the actual person who’s always center in the photoshoots—his own biases aside.

“But we have plenty of people who can step in for the night,” Eddie shrugs it off; “and contacts in the area to call up, make a once-in-a-lifetime one-off event out of it,” and yeah, even Steve can think up at least ten guitarists based here just now, but still—

“I told the guys to make the call however they saw fit,” Eddie rubs against Steve’s nipple as he says it, and goddamnit: Steve would swear that’s intentional as distraction. Because Eddie…Eddie really doesn’t care if they went on without him or refunded the whole goddamn show.

He doesn’t fucking care. And he goes after what he does care about, and of course that still raps heady in Steve’s blood—how could it not?—but fucking hell—

“Eddie,” Steve tries not to sound ungrateful, because he’s anything but—Steve’s chest feels less bruised and more warm for the swell from the inside, for the sole reason of Eddie, being here—except:

“You can’t just—”

“Can,” Eddie leans, pecks one cheek; “did,” and Steve scoffs as if he can even pretend to be surprised by his fiancé anymore for these sorts of….shenanigans, let alone be convincing in acting like he disapproves in anything but theory—he’s only human, and what’s more: he’s so deeply in love it’d fucking kill him if he wasn’t convinced it was the very thing written in blood, keeping him alive.

Then Eddie pulls back, traces Steve’s lips with a callused fingertip before flicking his gaze up; before leaning in to say in a definitive kind of defiance, laced in undeniable devotion:

“Am,” and he captures Steve’s lips slow, thoroughly and deep and Steve…it’s enough for Steve to forget for a second that he’s banged up at all, the way that mouth, that tongue draw sensation like ascension to a higher fucking plane.

And then Eddie’s scooping up a spoonful of the yogurt and makes to try and lift it toward Steve and— Steve’s reflexes outstrip Eddie’s by a mile, even when injured, and he grabs it the spoon in his own hand, because he’ll be damned if he’s fed Greek fucking yogurt by his fiancé in possibly the least sexy of circumstances.

With possibly the least sexy of foods, at that. Doesn’t mean Steve won’t eat it, but. Now he can glare and pout around the spoon on his terms.

“People cancel because they lose their voice and shit all the time,” Eddie balances the container between them for Steve to spoon his own portions from; “this was way more important.”

Steve only narrowly avoids snorting the yogurt up his nose at that.

“How?”

Eddie—who may have shitty reflexes but sure as shit isn’t weak, and can in fact yank the spoon back when Steve’s not expecting the assault on it—but he takes the spoon away and puts it down somewhere out of Steve line of sight alongside the yogurt so that Eddie’s big wounded eyes can look their absolute scandalized best, good god.

“The love of my life, the heart in my chest, injured gravely?” Eddie’s holding the uncapped Yoo-hoo out for Steve to make good fucking use of, like the immense gift it is revered as in the view of this specific man deserves. He eyes Steve expectantly before Steve sighs and takes a long swig, much to Eddie’s approval—or at least enough approval for him to finish his answer:

“Self-explanatory, sweetheart,” Eddie shakes his head, incredulous that Steve would even ask. “Where you need me’s where I’m always gonna be.”

It’s a very good thing Steve’s injuries are largely on the lower half of his body, so there’s no confusing the heavy thump of his heart for those—because Eddie does that, causes that in Steve even now, and at this point Steve’s gonna put money on it never stopping—but he can’t accidentally attribute the heady-giddy trip of his pulse for some other-lesser muscle spasm.

“You’re absurd,” Steve says in the way he knows lands like other words, every time.

Other words closer to I love you bigger than breathing you absolutely insane motherfucker, given the way Eddie grins, flushing a little and popping both dimples for it.

Steve wraps his lips around the fucking Yoo-hoo bottle because if he doesn’t he’ll have nothing stopping him from kissing the hell out of that stupid gorgeous face, and while Steve doesn’t want to be stopped from that, like, ever?

He knows his abs will have another, very fucking loud opinion on the matter just now.

“You seriously canceled?” is what Steve seems to automatically funnel all his feeling into asking, the question a little wobbly, his eyes stinging just a touch.

“Second I heard, I was on my way.” Eddie leans against the rim of the tub, reaches in to swirl the water as if the thing was not actually pretty loudly circulating itself. “The guys expected it, didn’t even try to stop me,” Eddie tacks on, glancing at the clock on the wall behind Steve’s head, pursuing his lips before turning the bath off; “wanted me to send their love, too.”

Steve makes to try to stand but it’s like Eddie knows his plan before he gets to even struggle after it, soft but firm hands on his shoulders.

So Steve returns the pouting, with a much less…considering vibe.

“How did you—” Steve starts to ask but Eddie just tuts a little as he pecks Steve’s lips, shutting him up effectively, the beautiful bastard.

“When you’re playing, and I’m just waiting for our set time,” Eddie’s making the rounds of the space, collecting fuck knows what from cabinets and shelves, since the towels are literally next to Steve where he remains seated in the tub; “again, what do you think I watch?”

Steve rolls his eyes, because yeah, okay. But still—

“They’d have just said I got sidelined if you’d waited half-a-damn-second, it’s not even—”

“If I watch you get bodied to fuck, two-on-one by that fuckass Hargrove, and then crumble to the ice?” Eddie pauses, waits for Steve to meet his eyes as he asks almost indignantly:

“You think I’m waiting for those idiot fucking commentators?”

Okay. Okay fine.

Point.

“Robin said that they carried you off,” also: point. Steve hadn’t asked what Robin had shared specifically but the way Eddie’s voice drops to a whisper, breathy with leftover feeling that’s nothing less than real fear; goes solemn-like for it, Steve…he fucking concedes; “so I knew it had to be bad.”

Like there was anything to really concede. He’s in a fucking ice bath and he feels warm all over just knowing Eddie’s…Eddie’s here.

“It’s not that bad,” Steve says, and it’s not even an act, or posturing or some shit, not that he’d bother trying that around Eddie anymore, like he’d ever be able to fool him, and wouldn’t ever want to anyway; it’s just that Steve’s genuinely and frequently had so much worse that this—

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

And then Eddie’s there, arms outstretched with a towel over his shoulder, one of the oversized full-body ones flopping a little as he’s reaching and pulling Steve up mostly on his own steam, bracing Steve’s arms further back to both ease him up slow but also to bear more of Steve’s weight—which, again, Steve’s not an invalid but yes, also again, being treated like even a little discomfort is a cause for concern like this is…

It’s heady, is all. Always has been; another thing that looks like it always will be.

Steve feels pretty steady on his feet when he gets to them in the slowly warming water near his knees, but Eddie’s busy guiding him anyway to step out onto, yep, waiting towels, apparently he’s not going to trust the specially designed mat these tubs are installed on to safeguard Steve from slipping, Steve’s mother-henning really has rubbed off on his fiancé through the years.

And then Eddie’s flipping the towel over both arms so that he’s reaching toward Steve as a waiting, fluffed-up embrace and Steve…fuck.

Steve steps forward, or tries to: barely makes a single move before Eddie’s wrapping Steve up in his arms and the towel all at once and holding him so gentle, so attentive to where he guesses Steve’s ache are and Steve would have to know his fiancé less than better than the back of Steve’s own hand, than the beat of Steve’s own heart, to miss how Eddie still manages to be careful while he clutches Steve…just-this-side of desperate.

He moves to drying Steve off quick and then shifts back to the embracing of him, hugging him close under the towel, and Steve braces in advance against how hugging Eddie as tight as he gets in return will strain on his muscles—doesn’t matter.

Always fucking worth it.

Eddie squeezes him at the shoulders—so careful, the safest place to not cause hurt—and pulls back, wraps Steve up and gives him another quick scrub before leading him to the massage table and handing him a fresh set of longer, not-soaked boxer briefs, which: Kim, their head team PT and magical sports masseuse, will probably kill him for using it as a simple chair, but—they apparently let Eddie in, the logistics of which Steve’s not actively questioning just yet because he’s got this gift horse here, taking the best care of him whether he needs it or not, and the only way Steve’s looking him in the mouth is to kiss the hell out it.

Point being: Kim and the rest had to assume some degree of chaos would be left in the aftermath with Steve’s beloved partner involved.

“Water,” Eddie sticks a bottle in Steve’s hand once he’s sitting on the table, still-slightly-sad dick dutifully tucked away warm to recover. “Hydration is critical.”

And Eddie says it so clinically, like an expert, but also so damn earnestly, like a lover, and…fuck but Steve’s the luckiest sonofabitch in the world.

“Lay down.”

Steve quirks a brow.

“You had your hand in that water, you’d have to give me a little more recovery time before you want to try to defile Kim’s sacred table.”

“Dirty mind, my liege,” Eddie gasps, hand-to-chest theatrics firmly in place. “You cannot scandalize the peasantry when you yourself is perched rightly atop the only fainting couch in sight!”

Steve rolls his eyes, bites his lower lip against just how wide he wants to grin—encouraging Eddie’s dramatics might give Steve enough time to get a stiffy again but.

Even though they’re not in public per se, they’re not not in public. And Steve will have to face his coaches, fuck, then his whole team, both in the foreseeable future.

“Seriously though,” Eddie’s voice pokes through, a gentle hand on Steve’s bicep accompanying a much more even tone. “On your stomach first.”

Steve feels his brows raise again, higher this time.

“What for?”

Eddie looks at him, way too concerned for Steve’s question.

“You fell back and cracked your head, that was when they finally got those fuckers off you,” Eddie says, just a touch judgemental, like Steve is the confusing one, but then Eddie—whose hands have moved to maneuver Steve where he wants him—stills, eyes big as he pulls back to look Steve straight on:

“Right?” he asks it, almost…hesitant. Anxious. “Or was it something else, did they get you bad in the front, I know they got you all over but I thought the worst was—”

And his hands had started to go flappy like they do when he’s stressed, especially by surprise, like if he’d been wearing his rings they’d be throwing the fluorescents around like a light show—so Steve has to catch them. Has to lean and stop them and bring both hands together, draw them to his lips.

“Babe,” Steve whispers to Eddie’s fingertips before kissing at his palm: “I really am fine.” Eddie looks up through his lashes, fierce as he shoots back simply:

“The bruising says otherwise.”

And fuck all: those lashes make the whole thing unfair, the concept of trying to fight back with the truth is just…pointless. Moot by default. Dead on arrival.

Those lashes are fucking…they should be illegal. Steve adores them so goddamn much.

Eddie’s leaned down to kiss at Steve’s hands in return, to nuzzle them a little so Steve notices when he goes still again, just breathing with his hand caught between Steve’s; with his cheek on Steve’s skin there. Breathing deep; heavy but not unsteady.

It’s hard to read when he can’t see anything more.

“Babe?” he asks, because he needs to be sure Eddie’s okay—he wasn’t lying when he said his current predicament may have been the mother hen tendencies transferring via proximity.

“Where is it the worst?”

And Steve…of course Steve melts at those eyes glowing with only one thing brighter than concern:

Pure fucking devotion. Heart-pumping, soul-deep care.

“Back,” Steve reaches to stroke reassuringly from Eddie’s jawline down to the pulse point in his neck, soft against the pad of his thumb; “you were right.”

Eddie grabs Steve’s hand at the wrist and kisses the center of his palm before turning him the way he wants and…

Oh.

Oh, fuck, but he’s quick to get started at the last thing Steve expects. Despite…the obvious tells of the context, of what precisely he is lying down on.

Because the motions are familiar, the feel of them on his skin, down through his muscles with the targeted way they ache before they unlock, unwind, release with the rolling, crisscrossing pressure and holy fuck, it’s like Eddie’s got a direct line to Steve’s nerves—he does, kinda, and they know each other now better than either of them knows themselves, but not like this—because yeah, there’s bruising, but Eddie’s avoiding places Steve knows would be less obvious on the surface than they feel, Steve’s well aware which kinds of injuries show quick versus which ones simmer, but then Eddie also somehow knows where he needs working the most, and hell if he isn’t hitting every spot just right—

“Where’d you learn this?” Steve asks incredulous, because like, Eddie may be just about every possible flavor of melodramatic but, given his concern for Steve in his profession and his still-mind-boggling but absolutely genuine relishing of giving Steve all good things: for all the times Steve’s ended up banged to fuck way worse than this?

Eddie would never have held out on him.

“Natural talent,” Eddie says, and Steve can hear the way it curls coming out of his mouth, can picture in his head the way Eddie’s nose’ll have tipped a little haughtily up in the air. Fucking absurd man—and so Steve snorts accordingly.

Love of Steve’s whole goddamn life, though.

“I have my methods,” Eddie says, playfully cagey until he yelps when Steve stretches his hand just a little to catch Eddie’s thigh when he passes close enough to pinch.

It does the job though.

“We hired a sports masseuse to come with us on this leg,” Eddie admits, a little quieter but not like he’s one bit sorry about it; “she’s been showing me things, just basics,” and there, it’s like he almost tries to downplay it, what the fuck—

“But she’s been showing me how to do the best things for you.”

And Steve…Steve‘a a little fucking floored when that sinks in as a…real thing. That Eddie did.

For him. On top of all he’s done and is doing for him.

“You’ve been flying,” Steve puts together, the words syrup slow because Eddie isn’t a fan of flying, hates it even more without Steve next to him—if I’m going down, I want you next to me, he’d admittedly once, and Steve had dutifully told him he was morbid as shit but had maybe kissed him senseless for it anyway—but then what’s more:

“You’ve been flying private.”

It’d been weird when Steve found out they’d chartered one of the label’s jets on top of just abandoning the bus—Eddie always thought private travel was peak arrogance, very un-metal.

But such an aircraft would be necessary to carry a fucking massage table and an instructor to match, wouldn’t it?

“Kim vetted her,” Eddie adds, still a little hesitant with his words while never once letting up with his hands; “she doesn’t tolerate wasting time, so,” and Steve groans because fuck yeah, right there, and he hears Eddie’s grin when he adds on:

“I kinda had to learn fast.”

Steve wants to flip over and kiss this man until he’s at least half as bruised as Steve, in the best way, in the good places.

But Eddie’s really fucking talented with his hands, so Steve just moans appreciatively until Eddie slowly rotates him and eases him up slow.

“More water,” he wraps Steve’s noodle-languid hands around a water bottle, makes sure he’s got a grip and takes the cap off for him even before letting go and turning, something crinkling while his back is turned before Eddie’s hands are back and stretched out to Steve instructively; indulgently:

“And snack.”

He hands Steve a mostly unwrapped protein bar: Peanut Honeycomb, his favorite.

Somehow, in the face of everything Eddie’s done so far tonight, that punches Steve in the center of his chest with pure, unfettered feeling.

Like, just that little thing. To get Steve his favorite flavor protein bar, which is like a fucking store brand so Eddie either ordered that shit in advance, or just…carries them, maybe.

It’s not just a little thing, is all.

It’s closer to being kinda…everything.

“Now, they say low intensity activity is recommended, to keep up the blood flow so you can…stitch together and stuff,” Eddie’s preoccupied enough to miss Steve biting his tongue to get his emotions under control for at least just now, holding out his hand for the now-empty wrapper and getting that out of the way as he talks in perpetual motion. “Probably not immediately, but,” Eddie dances his lithe fingers over Steve’s thighs, baffling as to the intent until he pushes near the backs of his knees and Steve…doesn’t flinch.

And Eddie grins wolfish as fuck.

“All the things I’ve read agree,” he carries on and it takes Steve a second to get back to what Eddie had been saying before grasping firm but so, so attentive around his knees as he—

Slides to his own knees and eases Steve’s blessedly-recovered-to-room-temperature cock out of the sport-cut shorts, then a little further: and Steve gets with the program—fucking low intensity activity, goddamn—just as Eddie skips deftly over his quickly hardening length and delicately licks at the curves of his balls, reaching back to cradle them to his lips almost tenderly, kind of…massaging them with his mouth.

Low intensity, yeah, sure.

Tell that shit to the building tension in Steve’s groin, and the similarly-building momentum of his pulse, goddamn.

Hell of a way to keep up the blood flow.

“Muscular relaxation is definitely optimal, so,” Eddie nuzzles the now-damp skin and hums into the space between where his dick strains up and his sac hangs waiting, and Steve doesn’t mean it as discouragement when he hisses:

“Someone could come in!”

More like…commentary. A heads-up. A reminder.

Eddie kisses that intimate little gap where he’s breathing in deliberately, the fucker, and driving Steve a little fucking crazy for it.

“They’re not going to,” he assures, unbothered before he adds:

“I brought Hopper.”

Steve probably would comment quickly and meaningfully on the point of Eddie bringing his head of security, if his head were in the game just now, but Eddie’s gone back to rolling Steve’s balls over his tongue, and has added a hand teasing at the slick slit of him and just, just…

Goddamn.

Steve’s usually got pretty reliable stamina, sometimes too much depending on the goal or the timeframe, but that also means Eddie’s long become an expert at circumventing it when it proves a detriment. And even if he’s nowhere near rushed, no touch on Steve’s body anything but gentle and careful and something like cherishing: even then?

Of course Eddie’s able to get him to the edge quick, especially with those lips on his balls—Steve’s weak as shit for that.

Add in the way Eddie presses in just the slightest bit more, the wetter the head of Steve’s cock gets? Fuck: he was never gonna last.

When Eddie’s mouth and hand swap seconds before Steve’s coming to make sure he shoots straight down Eddie’s throat, palm cupped light around his balls like precious things as they release, all in perfect time just for the way Eddie can read his body?

Yeah, okay: low intensity activity, right, check that off. Steve didn’t lift a finger.

And muscle relaxation? Double check. Holy fuck.

Now Eddie’s hands are gentling up Steve’s chest as he catches his breath a little, he’s not gasping but he’s definitely not not a smidge overwhelmed, and not even just for the physicality of it all. Maybe not even mostly for that.

So he grabs Eddie’s hands against his chest for a second, then pulls, his point unmistakable: get the fuck up here next to me, you perfect fucking insane man.

Eddie, of course, does not disappoint—still careful though. It’s…it never fails to strike Steve, not as a surprise anymore—that ship’s long since set sail—but it strikes him how a man who’s never not been the most cup-runneth-over for attention can be so single-minded when it comes to the care and keeping of Steve, of all people.

But Steve’s arms are mostly fine so he scoots to make room for Eddie, cares all of jack shit about how the motion stings because that’s so fucking distant from mattering just now, Steve needs Eddie next to him, and Eddie eyes him a second, to make sure he can fit where Steve’s inviting him to lay down on his arm so he can be wrapped in it appropriately—make sure he can fit to his own estimation of Steve’s wellness for the task—but eventually Steve must pass the test before Eddie’s lowering himself slow, gentle: and the second he’s low enough Steve rolls him against his side, fuck the bruises, and tucks this impossible man under his chin.

“Did you really bring Hopper to keep my own team out of their locker room?” Steve asks his curls, mostly a whisper which gives everything that lives under it away.

Not that Steve needs, or wants, to ever hide it.

“I brought Hopper so he’d be roped into sports-ball talk so no one would notice they were being kept from their locker room,” Eddie drags his lips against Steve’s shoulders, warm and wet and Steve tries not to sink too deep into thoughts of where that mouth had just been, and what it’s been doing.

“I called Elle, and talked to Kim,” Eddie helpfully distracts him; “asked if I could come take care of you first, if you were okay enough that you didn’t need the whole medical entourage.”

“Asked,” Steve’s skepticism is blatant and…fuck if it isn’t endeared as shit, all the same.

“Mmhmm. Politely, too,” Eddie nods so that his hair tickles under Steve’s chin.

“Oh, I’m sure,” Steve half-snorts, though: if Eddie did go through their very sweet but notoriously unswayable PR lead, who deigned to pass him over to Kim, single-minded in game-mode as she is, who in turn agreed to take the call?

Okay, so. Maybe.

Steve honestly doesn’t know which possibility makes him feel more bubbling-over adoration for Eddie more.

“That’s why they’ve let us be?” Steve lets the simple question land steeped in all that feeling, and the rise of color on Eddie’s cheeks just where Steve can make out where he’s still tucked close, makes it clear that it lands just like Steve hoped.

“Mmm,” and the rumble from Eddie’s lips is so fucking sweet against the line of Steve’s throat; “not that I don’t trust them, they’re fucking rockstars,” and that’s some high fucking praise from the literal rockstar, Steve will have to remember to share it; “I just…”

And Eddie huffs out all the breath in his lungs on a whine Steve doesn’t think means to be broken, but ends up that way nonetheless. It twinges something so much worse and deeper in Steve’s chest than any bruising, any superficial wound as he wraps Eddie just a little bit closer; a little bit tighter.

“I’m okay, babe,” he whispers after a long stretch of moments just existing in proximity, pressed up against proof-of-life, alongside living-breathing warmth.

“Thank fuck,” Eddie finally sighs out all the built up tension left in him, warm against Steve’s bare skin as he whispers, confesses:

“I was scared, Stevie,” and the words are small, but they are…they’re like their own form of catharsis. They’re carrying the fear they speak out of Eddie’s system by the syllable:

“Getting over here, I was,” and his voice does crack there, and Steve buries his face harder in Eddie’s curls, kisses him there and lets him just breathe until he gathers the rest of that fear to purge one last time:

“I was so scared.”

Steve brings a hand up to stroke through Eddie’s hair, massage at his scalp with blunted nails the way he likes best until his breaths come easy, until the weight of him’s a loose and languid thing.

“How much longer you think we got?” Steve eventually murmurs into those messy curls, punctuates it with a kiss, unhurried, at the beginning and end of the question.

“Hop’s the only contact I approved to bypass the ‘Do Not Disturb’ on my phone,” Eddie answers, wholly unbothered; “he is contractually obligated to give us a five-minute warning.”

So Steve just settles back into stroking Eddie’s hair and relishing the way his husband-to-be leans into it, preens wordlessly for the touch, and it’s a little bit wild because yeah, truthfully: Steve did think everyone had been overreacting. He’s been bruised worse falling off a fucking roof (one time, Henderson—one fucking time).

But even if it was minor by comparison to a whole hell of a lot worse encounters he’s had on the ice?

Steve can’t really feel anything but Eddie warmth, and the way it seeps into his own veins like it’s shared by rote.

Because, well: it kinda is.

♥️

✨also on ao3

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#steddie #this is so so wonderfully written #just gorgeous

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