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mourntheantagonist · 3 months ago

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This Can’t Be Fucking Happening

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

warnings: graphic depictions of violence (gun violence), homophobic language, child abuse

read on ao3

Steve watched with clenched teeth as they secured the handcuffs around Neil’s wrists. Tighter. He found himself thinking. Don’t be so fucking gentle.

Neil was wheezing just slightly, his color was slowly coming back to him, but the effects still lingered. Steve found some sick satisfaction in it.

He was being pulled in opposite directions. Powell had him held back, arm wrapped securely around his torso. Then there was a magnetic pull driving him towards Neil. His hand was preparing itself already, forming itself into the perfect crescent shape he could use to wrap right around his throat.

“Arrest that faggot! He nearly fucking killed me!” Neil spat.

He wished he’d had Eleven’s powers. He knew exactly what he’d do with them right about now. He’d snap his fucking neck.

Steve was still in the process of cooling off, which was not helped by the sight in front of him. Neil Hargrove, still alive and breathing, still talking.

“How about you stay quiet,” Callahan said, tugging the chain on his cuffs, earning him a solid wince, “let’s not dig the hole any deeper than you already have.” Or in other words. Shut the fuck up.

Thank you.

Callahan guided Neil out of the room, finally out of sight, finally out of Steve’s face. He knew they were obligated to give him medical attention, at least he could find some solace with the fact that he’d be cuffed to the bed. Might even teach him a lesson, like the one he tried to teach Billy by putting that lock on the outside of his door.

He watched as they left the room, through his bedroom door. Steve noted the way the wood trim had splintered, almost completely detached from the wall on some parts. He could hear the sounds, they replayed on a loop like a locked groove.

He stared at the door. Unable to think about anything else. Just the sounds. The kicking. The banging. The impending doom of it all.

Then a figure emerged in the opening. Not Neil. Not Callahan.

Hopper.

He waved his hand in a certain way that had Powell following orders before Hope even finished his sentence. “Let the kid go, he’s alright.” He said, although, Steve wasn’t too sure.

Hopper came closer, leaning over, getting his face up close and personal to his. “Let’s take a look at you kid,” he said, “you took quite a beating there.”

However, Steve wasn’t looking back at him. He wasn’t listening. Now that the source of his rage was out of the room, Steve was left with only one thing to focus on.

He stared at it blankly.

The still closed door.

Nothing emerging from the other side.

…

“Fucking faggot!”

His cheek felt like it was on fire, which was ironic, because his dad hadn’t hit him there. But that was the sensation at the forefront of his mind for some reason—the feeling of the skin on his face rubbing against the carpet.

Neil was on top of him, his knee firmly pressed into the center of his back, a hand wrapped around the back of his neck, pinning him there to the floor of the living room.

It was his own fault. He was the idiot for trying to get away.

All he could see from his place on the floor was the underside of the couch, and he couldn’t help but focus on how filthy it was under there. He had hoped it would serve as some kind of distraction, maybe make the time move just a little faster.

But, nothing could lessen the blow of each and every word as it passed through his father’s lips. Every sentence was absorbed directly into Billy’s being.

“Next time, I’ll kill you,” he said, directly into his ear. He could feel the hot mist as he spat. “I mean it.”

…

Billy’s fist collided with the door, the sound was loud and hollow.

“Steve! Please! You have to let me go! You have to let me go! You have to—” a sob tore through his words, cutting him off.

He was hyperventilating, his chest rising and falling in frantic, shallow bursts. Every scenario slammed into him at once, running through his mind at warp speed. He saw it—again and again—Neil storming in, face twisted with rage, the glint of the gun as he raised it. Aimed it. Directly at Steve…

No.

He couldn’t let that happen. He couldn’t let Steve get hurt because of him.

He just had to get past the fucking door.

Tears streamed down his face—unrelenting, flowing freely like a dam had burst behind his eyes. He kicked the door. Again. And again. Harder. Stronger. And it wouldn’t fucking budge.

“Steve! Please don’t do this! Please!” he was begging—pleading. Please. Don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. Let me take care of it.

Nothing he said was met with a response. His words fell into the void, unanswered. On the other side of the door, he could hear Steve, his voice rising in a frantic murmur, though it was unclear who he was speaking to. Billy couldn't stop pounding on the door long enough to decipher the words. The sound of his fists hammering against wood drowned out everything else, leaving only a dull thud of frustration.

He could hear his father, too, a floor below. The sound of his voice was muffled but distinct, a reminder of the way things always were. Like father, like son. Both of them, lost in the same reckless drive, trying to break down a damn door. Billy couldn’t let his dad be the first to break it down.

He kicked again. His bare foot connected with the door’s solid surface—centered, hard, with everything he had, sending a surge of pain up the entirety of his leg. For a brief, exhilarating moment, he thought he felt a shift, a crack, a splinter of movement in the wood. It was a sign. Just a few more hits. Get the door open. Get out there. Then—

Then…

Fuck.

Surrender. The word slipped into his mind, unbidden. It tasted foreign, but somehow, it felt more honest than anything else. He imagined it like a white flag, waving above his head—a surrender not for himself, but for whatever this was. The fight. The hopelessness. The rage. It was easier to accept the idea of surrender than to face the consequences of doing nothing.

But it wasn’t the word Steve would use.

Stupid. Idiotic. A death wish.

And maybe Steve was right. Maybe that was a more home portrait.

Still.

Billy winds up dead in either scenario. So he chose the one where Steve survives.

He kicked it again. Tears sliding down his cheeks.

And again. Desperate.

Again.

With the third kick, the door shuddered beneath him—but it was the distant sound that froze him. Glass shattered below, its jagged fragments breaking apart with a horrifying clarity. The sound lingered, stretched out in slow motion. Everything else went silent. Billy’s breath caught in his throat. Steve stopped pacing the room outside. The world around him held its breath.

The only sound that remained was the soft, steady rhythm of footsteps drawing nearer from downstairs. Slow. Relentless.

And all that talk—the pounding, the urgency, the desperate need to break through this door, to shield Steve from his father, to put himself in the line of fire, to face whatever came next—suddenly felt irrelevant. It faded, slipping away like a half-remembered dream, its weight diminishing with every step closer to the inevitable.

Billy’s body collapsed, almost involuntarily, as his instincts took over. His sobs came, but they were muted, swallowed by his own chest. He crawled, weak and trembling, to the farthest corner of the bathroom, his limbs heavy and uncooperative. With trembling hands, he pulled his knees to his chest, folding in on himself like a child. His head bowed, the tears falling silently, rocking back and forth, a fragile attempt to find some kind of solace, some kind of control in a situation that had long since spiraled out of his hands.

Every drop of strength he had was drained from him, leaving him trapped under the suffocating weight of helplessness.

Steve was going to die.

He was going to die.

They both were.

It was how the story always ended in his head, but for some reason, sitting on the floor of that bathroom, he could believe it was actually coming to fruition. So quick. Barely any warning. Only enough warning to suffer the remainder of his life in this agonizing, debilitating fear.

That was always his dad’s favorite part. He thrived on it. Scaring him into submission.

And there Billy was, giving the man exactly what he wanted, and he couldn’t do shit about it.

His hearing vanished, plunging him into debilitating silence. The world around him fell away, reduced to nothing but the loud pounding of blood in his ears. He couldn’t hear Steve. Couldn't even tell if he was still there, still alive. Was he out there? Had he left him, abandoned and trapped, to die alone?

Steve wouldn’t do that. He knew that much. But then again, there were a lot of things he thought he knew. Things that had crumbled to dust. Like the belief that he’d always protect Steve from Neil. That he'd never let Neil hurt anyone else. He'd do anything to keep that promise.

And yet here he was, curled in a broken ball on the cold bathroom floor—sobbing, gasping for air, stuck under the weight of something so heavy it threatened to crush him into nothing. He felt small. Weak.

Like a fucking coward.

His heart rate picked up. His chest tightened. He didn’t know why. He couldn’t hear anything. Couldn’t see anything. Maybe it was subconscious. Like whatever sounds happening outside that door were so horrible that his mind wouldn’t let him pay witness, leaving his body to simply react on its own.

The blood drained from his face so fast it left him dizzy. If he were to stand up and look at himself in the mirror, he was sure he’d find something stark white staring back at him. His limbs felt detached, weightless, like he was floating just outside himself. The air was thick and unbreathable. His vision wavered, darkening at the edges, dipping in and out of focus like a light bulb, flickering, about to die out.

He still couldn’t hear anything. Just the pounding of his heart, speed ever progressing, like a train building momentum. The hair on his arms bristled, every nerve in his body going rigid in warning. Not good. His heartbeat climbed, speeding up, ticking away like a clock running out of time. The space between seconds becoming shorter and shorter. The world was spinning too fast.

The room lurched around him.

Then—something loud. A sharp, earsplitting noise tore through the silence. Loud enough to break through the walls his mind had thrown up to protect him. Loud enough to drag him back into reality.

His body locked up, frozen between breaths. His mind scrambled to keep up, to make sense of what had just happened. Slowly, stiffly, he turned his head to the left. The shower wall—fractured. Shattered ceramic littered the tub, tiny jagged pieces reflecting the harsh sunlight filtering in through the window above him. And in the center of it all, embedded deep in the tile, was something round, metallic.

Another shot.

Billy saw it coming this time. Watched it rip through the door like it was made of paper, a flash of movement slicing through the air, inches from his eyes, striking the shower caddy with a metallic ping before ricocheting away. Backwards.

The first thing he felt was a crushing pressure, like someone had planted a knee on his bicep and pressed down hard. Then the heat came, burning deep beneath the skin, searing hot, like he was being branded from the inside out. And then—the sting. Sharp. Blinding. His breath stuttered as he yanked his right hand up to his arm, fingers searching blindly. Wet. Warm. Sticky.

Blood.

A tremor started deep in his core, radiating outward until his whole body was shaking. His knees threatened to give. He tried to move, to get up, to do something, anything, but his muscles had nothing in them, useless, paralyzed. His chest shuddered—he’d stopped breathing again.

And Neil wasn’t finished.

The next shot was the loudest, now that Billy was fully alert, every sense cranked to its highest setting.

His body caved in on itself. His legs sliding away from him, body going slack against the bathroom cabinets. The pressure in his chest cracked open, and suddenly he was gasping, his breath catching on a sob. His vision dropped, his gaze landing between his sprawled knees just in time to see the slow spread of yellow pooling beneath him.

He tried to stop it. He couldn't stop it. His body wasn’t his own anymore.

A broken sounding noise clawed its way out of his throat. He squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for the next one, breath hitching as his mind latched onto a single, numbing thought—

How many more before he gets it right?

He waited. He listened closely, waiting for the tell tale double click sound. The warning.

He waited.

And waited.

But the next sound he heard wasn’t the sound of the pump. It was different.

There was a commotion on the other side of the door. He felt something heavy hit the floor, shaking the entire house.

He could hear two voices. His dads, muffled behind the door.

“Get the fuck off of me you fucking faggot!”

And Steve.

No words. No blatant evidence of his presence like his father had provided. But Billy could hear the sound of his breath, rapid, heavy, alive.

Billy’s body seized, his throat tightening in response, and then it happened. The dam inside him broke. His chest heaved as sobs tore through him, raw and frantic. Every emotion swirled in him, crashing into one another, each one more violent than the last—relief, fear, pain, anxiety, shame, humiliation—all of it boiling over, drowning him.

He wanted to get up. Wanted to find the strength to break down the fucking door and fight, to do something other than just sit there. But he was immobilized, crushed beneath the weight of his own mind, paralyzed by the pain in his left arm. He was stuck, soaked, sitting in a puddle of his own piss. The humiliation of it was another wound in itself, a sharp, biting sting that only added to the suffocating weight of everything.

So he was left to listen, panic, and pray that Steve would be alright. Pray that Neil wouldn’t be alright. Hope against hope that he’d wake up from this fucking nightmare. He just had to wake up.

There was more tousling happening on the other side of the door, and Billy couldn’t tell if Steve was winning or losing. There was another thud, then the sound Billy recognized clearly as a fist connecting with a cheek, followed by coughing. Steve’s coughing.

Fuck.

No.

Time moved so quickly, like a blur of fleeting seconds that threatened to suffocate him. Billy's heart was racing, thumping violently in his chest, a frantic rhythm that pulsed in his ears—too loud, almost deafening, but still not enough to drown out the sounds of his surroundings. His head spun, a wave of dizziness crashing over him, sharp and disorienting. The taste of bile rose in his throat, a sour knot of panic settling deep in his stomach, twisting and churning with every breath he took.

The footsteps grew louder, each step deliberate, heavy, as if the weight of them pressed down on his chest, making it harder to breathe. The door creaked softly as if in warning, the slow, agonizing turn of the doorknob like the slow tick of a clock counting down to something inevitable. His palms were slick with cold sweat, the clammy feeling clinging to his skin as he tried to steady his shaking hands.

Billy closed his eyes, desperate to block it all out. He tried to slow his breathing, but each inhale was shallow, jagged. His chest rose and fell in a frantic, erratic rhythm. He couldn't control it, couldn't calm the storm of fear that raged inside him. His mind screamed at him to fight, to move, but his body was frozen—paralyzed with terror.

He squeezed his eyes shut harder, his body trembling as he tried to force himself to accept it, to make the terror more bearable. Make peace with it. But each second that passed felt like an eternity, every nerve raw and exposed, every inch of him screaming for relief. He told himself it would be over soon—the only solace he could find in the situation.

Just as the door was about to open, just as he was about to come face to face with reality. There was another crash. Something loud. Something deafening. Another loud thud. Another body hitting the floor.

He could hear Steve’s screams.

Not screams of fear. Not the desperate, pleading cries of someone on the verge of losing.

These were the screams of pure, unbridled rage. The kind of rage that burned so hot it consumed everything in its path. The screams of someone who was winning, like a bear who had been poked one too many times. The sound of it echoed through the walls, wild, vibrating with a raw, primal intensity that sent a chill straight through Billy’s spine.

Then there was his father.

He couldn’t hear him properly. His father’s voice had been stolen, strangled. Billy could only make out the wet, ragged sounds of him choking, his lungs gasping for air that wouldn’t come—each breath a desperate, gurgling struggle that pierced the silence like a knife. The sound of his father’s life slipping away, his body wracked with spasms of helplessness, made Billy’s chest tighten, each moment stretching longer, colder.

Billy soaked it all in—every jagged breath, every gasp, the desperation that clung to the air, heavy and suffocating. Billy took in a long, deep breath. Something his father couldn’t do. There was a sick satisfaction in it.

He squeezed his eyes shut, his body trembling, heart pounding in his ears.

Please. Just let it be over.

The words were a prayer, whispered over and over in his mind, desperate, pleading, but there was no answer. Only the choking, the screaming, the unbearable weight of it all pressing down on him.

Steve. Please. Kill him.

And then. Footsteps. Multiple bodies entering the room. Voices. Other voices.

And Steve’s.

“No! Get off me! GET OFF OF ME!” It was desperate, guttural.

And Billy just sunk into the floor.

- : -

“God kid, you look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Officer Powell said, nudging Steve’s shoulder, careful, like trying to wake up a sleepwalker.

Steve didn’t move. Didn’t respond. Just stared straight ahead, breath caught in his throat, holding back a myriad of things he was terrified of letting out—terrified of bringing to reality.

“Steve,” It was Hopper’s voice this time, “kid, what’s going on?” There was a hint of worry in his voice. It still wasn’t enough to pull Steve from his trance. Staring blankly ahead, hoping Billy would just get up, walk out, give some kind of sign that there was still life behind that threshold, eliminate the sinking feeling that just kept sinking deeper and deeper.

Hopper waved a hand in front of his face, like hello, is anybody in there? Steve wasn’t totally gone. He could still hear and see everything that was happening. He could see the quizzical look on Hopper’s face. He just couldn’t speak. He couldn’t move.

“What’s he looking at?” It was Powell this time, talking about him like he wasn’t even there. Couldn’t blame him. Steve wasn’t really there. He couldn’t be. Not in that moment. Not until he knew.

Hopper followed his gaze, tracking his line of sight like a laser, pointed directly at the door with the three bullet holes marking its surface, no discernible pattern to their presence. He looked back at Steve, like he had been hiding some crucial piece of information.

“Is there somebody in there?” Hopper asked. For the first time, Steve found himself able to react, able to offer something tangible—though not as definitive as words, it was enough to confirm the fear lingering in the air. His breath hitched at the question, a sharp inhale that Hopper caught.

There was a look shared between Hopper and Powell, a look that carried dread. Nothing like what Steve was feeling, but it was there. It didn’t make Steve feel any better.

Hopper moved slowly, giving Powell a nod that communicated something Steve wasn’t privy to. Something he wasn’t sure he wanted to be privy to. He walked towards the door. Steve couldn’t stand to look, but he also couldn’t stand to turn away. He was trapped there, sick, waiting for an answer he wasn’t ready to have.

Seconds felt like hours. It all moved in slow motion, and maybe that was the universe’s way of giving him just a few more moments of denial. A few more seconds in a world that hadn’t taken Billy from him.

But, as the rules of the universe would have it, time continued to move forward. Reality inching forward with every passing moment. Steve stared intently at the slice of light emerging from the slightly ajar bathroom door. Hopper was on the inside, and suddenly time was moving too slow for his liking.

He needed to know. He needed to know now.

As the thought creeped up on him, he saw something emerge, however, to his disappointment. It was Hopper, no Billy in tow.

Hopper’s next words were careful. Calculated. Quiet.

“Powell, can you toss me that blanket over there?”

And suddenly, the weight of the world slammed into Steve’s chest, as if an invisible force had yanked the very breath from his lungs. The pain tore through him like a jagged knife. The floodgates opened, and he couldn’t hold it back anymore��the sob broke free, loud and uncontrollable.

“No!” he cried, his voice thick with agony, his body shaking with the force of the grief he could no longer contain.

The world seemed to stop for a moment, the air heavy with his sorrow. But no one answered his anguish. Powell, standing to his left, didn't flinch. He just did his job—moved without hesitation, grabbing the blanket from the chair. The one his grandmother had given him for Christmas, the soft fabric that was once used to provide warmth now cold and distant, about to be used to shield Billy's corpse from onlookers.

He couldn’t take it. No!

This can't be fucking happening!

Steve sobbed harder, his chest heaving. His throat burned as his cries turned hoarse, the pain breaking him in ways he couldn't explain. It was as if he were screaming to some indifferent figure in the sky, pleading for an answer, for some way to make it stop. But there was nothing—just the emptiness of his cries echoing into the void, unanswered.

“Please, No!” Steve cried, raw and guttural, “please!”

Steve could no longer hear anything but himself. His whole body went numb. His vision started to blur and he was sure he was about ready to pass out. And some part of him, something deep inside of him that still had a mind to cling to hope took that as something, maybe evidence that this was all a nightmare, and the haze in his vision was just his body trying to wake him up.

Steve squeezed his eyes shut, tighter than he thought physically possible. He felt the tears still trapped in his ducts as they were forced out and left to roll down his cheeks. He blinked rapidly. Waiting. Begging.

Just wake up! Just fucking wake up!

But each time he opened his eyes, it was the same god-awful sight, unchanging. He felt like he was about to throw up.

Hope was slipping through his fingers, like sand. That small, fragile part of him that still believed in something good, swallowed by the darkness that consumed the rest of him. Giving in.

And then, out of nowhere, there was someone standing in the doorway.

It took a second for Steve to process what he was looking at, his mind fighting to decide if what he was seeing was real or imaginary. But slowly, his mind settled on a decision he was comfortable with: I don’t fucking care.

Because it was Billy. Standing. Breathing. Blanket wrapped tightly around him. His chest rising and falling with the unmistakable rhythm of life.

And Steve. He collapsed to his knees. His body was too weak to hold him up any longer. A tidal wave of relief crashed over him, lifting him from the depths of despair, and sweeping him to shore. In that instant, he wasn’t drowning anymore.

And for the first time that day, with the weight of the world once crushing his chest now lifted, Steve finally took a deep breath.

#morning self rebloop

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mourntheantagonist · 3 months ago

Text

This Can’t Be Fucking Happening

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

warnings: graphic depictions of violence (gun violence), homophobic language, child abuse

read on ao3

Steve watched with clenched teeth as they secured the handcuffs around Neil’s wrists. Tighter. He found himself thinking. Don’t be so fucking gentle.

Neil was wheezing just slightly, his color was slowly coming back to him, but the effects still lingered. Steve found some sick satisfaction in it.

“Arrest that faggot! He nearly fucking killed me!” Neil spat.

He wished he’d had Eleven’s powers. He knew exactly what he’d do with them right about now. He’d snap his fucking neck.

Steve was still in the process of cooling off, which was not helped by the sight in front of him. Neil Hargrove, still alive and breathing, still talking.

Thank you.

He stared at the door. Unable to think about anything else. Just the sounds. The kicking. The banging. The impending doom of it all.

Then a figure emerged in the opening. Not Neil. Not Callahan.

Hopper.

He waved his hand in a certain way that had Powell following orders before Hope even finished his sentence. “Let the kid go, he’s alright.” He said, although, Steve wasn’t too sure.

Hopper came closer, leaning over, getting his face up close and personal to his. “Let’s take a look at you kid,” he said, “you took quite a beating there.”

However, Steve wasn’t looking back at him. He wasn’t listening. Now that the source of his rage was out of the room, Steve was left with only one thing to focus on.

He stared at it blankly.

The still closed door.

Nothing emerging from the other side.

…

“Fucking faggot!”

Neil was on top of him, his knee firmly pressed into the center of his back, a hand wrapped around the back of his neck, pinning him there to the floor of the living room.

It was his own fault. He was the idiot for trying to get away.

But, nothing could lessen the blow of each and every word as it passed through his father’s lips. Every sentence was absorbed directly into Billy’s being.

“Next time, I’ll kill you,” he said, directly into his ear. He could feel the hot mist as he spat. “I mean it.”

…

Billy’s fist collided with the door, the sound was loud and hollow.

“Steve! Please! You have to let me go! You have to let me go! You have to—” a sob tore through his words, cutting him off.

No.

He couldn’t let that happen. He couldn’t let Steve get hurt because of him.

He just had to get past the fucking door.

Tears streamed down his face—unrelenting, flowing freely like a dam had burst behind his eyes. He kicked the door. Again. And again. Harder. Stronger. And it wouldn’t fucking budge.

“Steve! Please don’t do this! Please!” he was begging—pleading. Please. Don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. Let me take care of it.

Then…

Fuck.

But it wasn’t the word Steve would use.

Stupid. Idiotic. A death wish.

And maybe Steve was right. Maybe that was a more honest portrait.

Still.

Billy winds up dead in either scenario. So he chose the one where Steve survives.

He kicked it again. Tears sliding down his cheeks.

And again. Desperate.

Again.

The only sound that remained was the soft, steady rhythm of footsteps drawing nearer from downstairs. Slow. Relentless.

Every drop of strength he had was drained from him, leaving him trapped under the suffocating weight of helplessness.

Steve was going to die.

He was going to die.

They both were.

That was always his dad’s favorite part. He thrived on it. Scaring him into submission.

And there Billy was, giving the man exactly what he wanted, and he couldn’t do shit about it.

Like a fucking coward.

The room lurched around him.

Then—something loud. A sharp, earsplitting noise tore through the silence. Loud enough to break through the walls his mind had thrown up to protect him. Loud enough to drag him back into reality.

Another shot.

Blood.

And Neil wasn’t finished.

The next shot was the loudest, now that Billy was fully alert, every sense cranked to its highest setting.

He tried to stop it. He couldn't stop it. His body wasn’t his own anymore.

A broken sounding noise clawed its way out of his throat. He squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for the next one, breath hitching as his mind latched onto a single, numbing thought—

How many more before he gets it right?

He waited. He listened closely, waiting for the tell tale double click sound. The warning.

He waited.

And waited.

But the next sound he heard wasn’t the sound of the pump. It was different.

There was a commotion on the other side of the door. He felt something heavy hit the floor, shaking the entire house.

He could hear two voices. His dads, muffled behind the door.

“Get the fuck off of me you fucking faggot!”

And Steve.

No words. No blatant evidence of his presence like his father had provided. But Billy could hear the sound of his breath, rapid, heavy, alive.

So he was left to listen, panic, and pray that Steve would be alright. Pray that Neil wouldn’t be alright. Hope against hope that he’d wake up from this fucking nightmare. He just had to wake up.

Fuck.

No.

He could hear Steve’s screams.

Not screams of fear. Not the desperate, pleading cries of someone on the verge of losing.

Then there was his father.

He squeezed his eyes shut, his body trembling, heart pounding in his ears.

Please. Just let it be over.

The words were a prayer, whispered over and over in his mind, desperate, pleading, but there was no answer. Only the choking, the screaming, the unbearable weight of it all pressing down on him.

Steve. Please. Kill him.

And then. Footsteps. Multiple bodies entering the room. Voices. Other voices.

And Steve’s.

“No! Get off me! GET OFF OF ME!” It was desperate, guttural.

And Billy just sunk into the floor.

- : -

“God kid, you look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Officer Powell said, nudging Steve’s shoulder, careful, like trying to wake up a sleepwalker.

Steve didn’t move. Didn’t respond. Just stared straight ahead, breath caught in his throat, holding back a myriad of things he was terrified of letting out—terrified of bringing to reality.

There was a look shared between Hopper and Powell, a look that carried dread. Nothing like what Steve was feeling, but it was there. It didn’t make Steve feel any better.

He needed to know. He needed to know now.

As the thought creeped up on him, he saw something emerge, however, to his disappointment. It was Hopper, no Billy in tow.

Hopper’s next words were careful. Calculated. Quiet.

“Powell, can you toss me that blanket over there?”

“No!” he cried, his voice thick with agony, his body shaking with the force of the grief he could no longer contain.

He couldn’t take it. No!

This can't be fucking happening!

“Please, No!” Steve cried, raw and guttural, “please!”

Just wake up! Just fucking wake up!

But each time he opened his eyes, it was the same god-awful sight, unchanging. He felt like he was about to throw up.

Hope was slipping through his fingers, like sand. That small, fragile part of him that still believed in something good, swallowed by the darkness that consumed the rest of him. Giving in.

And then, out of nowhere, there was someone standing in the doorway.

Because it was Billy. Standing. Breathing. Blanket wrapped tightly around him. His chest rising and falling with the unmistakable rhythm of life.

And for the first time that day, with the weight of the world once crushing his chest now lifted, Steve finally took a deep breath.

#harringrove #billy hargrove #steve harrington #stranger things #mandi writes tresh #tcbfh

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