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[eddie]

PLOTTED STARTER for : @kinghaargrove

⛧˖ ─── AS AN UNWRITTEN RULE, EDDIE always did what he could to avoid passing concrete judgements upon strangers that he knew little about. Having grown up in a shithole town like Hawkins, which had never done him the service of offering the same courtesy, he knew all too well how misconceptions could completely dismantle a person's reputation and self-worth. As a species, humans seemed easily inclined to see the bad in others and RELUCTANT to see the good, with only a small, select few ever caring enough to ask questions before they'd deemed someone a hopeless delinquent. A bad apple. A devil-worshipper.

            A FREAK.

            Even for someone like him though, someone who suffered the STRIDENT hand of scrutiny and misplaced judgement on a daily basis, Eddie found it difficult to place much faith in the plausibility of Billy Hargrove being an okay guy. Normally, paying heed to rumors and gossip went against his personal doctrines, but with the considerable assemblage of transgressions that were stacked against him from such reputable sources, it was hard not to at least take them into consideration—be it with a grain of salt or not. Indeed, his lack of brownie points had left him standing on ground that was LESS than neutral, but it wasn't as though he needed to like the guy or agree with his life choices to sell him drugs.

            With the reputation that Billy had, it was easy for Eddie to assume that the BRUISES that would occasionally mark his complexion were the result of some tussle that he'd gotten into at whatever party he'd been at over the weekend. Or maybe he just liked it rough with all of the women that he supposedly slept around with. He wasn't exactly discreet with his sexual escapades, after all.

            The dots were quickly connected and any loose theories that Eddie once had abruptly lost their credibility, however, when he'd found himself TRAPPED inside of his bedroom, the sound of a raised voice and incoherent beratement reverberating from the next room. It was hard to hear what was being said, but there was one word that stood out clearly amongst all of the shouting ...

            F*GGOT.

            It was an uncomfortable word to hear, considering his own sexual preferences were far from what society considered appropriate or acceptable. The reaction it drew was almost VISCERAL, his body flinching at the sound. His own father hadn't exactly been a saint and he was no stranger to a raised hand himself, but the violence that echoed from the other room took him aback.

            In silent surrender, Eddie had taken a seat on the end of the bed, not a word falling from his mouth after Billy had returned … not unscathed. His dark eyes took note of the marks, but he didn’t allow his gaze to linger for long, hushing his compassion in an effort to keep the boat from rocking any further. Whether the derogatory slurs of Billy Hargrove’s father had any CREDIBILITY, he didn’t know, but he was clever enough to know that leaving the room when the metaphorical gun was still smoking would result in grim consequences for both of them. And so, without speaking a word, Eddie had settled into the space, doing his best to deal with the tension through tight lips and an averted gaze.

            Eddie imagined that the situation was just as uncomfortable for Billy, if not more so, but it was hard to know which WIRE to pull when dealing with such a tangled and unstable mess. The wrong selection could result in an explosion.

            The silence was eventually broken when Eddie had fished a cigarette from the pack in his pocket, only to suddenly be limited by his lack of a lighter. ❝ Hey, Hargrove? You, uh, got a lighter? ❞ He asked, glancing over towards him while he wiggled the unlit cigarette between two of his fingers. A smoke might calm his NERVES, he thought, or at the very least it would give him something to keep his hands occupied so that he wasn’t incessantly fidgeting with his rings or picking at the rips in his jeans. Of course, there was also the hope that it might serve to break the ice.

[eddie]

PLOTTED STARTER for : @kegk1ng​

⛧˖ ‒‒‒‒‒ EVERYTHING HAD HAPPENED SO QUICKLY after that harrowing night in the living room of his trailer house, where Eddie had borne witness to the gruesome death of the Hawkins High cheer captain. The vision of her small frame pressed against his ceiling still haunted the corridors of his mind and ghosted through his dreams at night, the nauseating sounds of snapping bones remaining cemented in the forefront of his memory as though it had been playing on a continuous loop the entire time. It was the guilt that he felt over her death, however, that was threatening to drag him under and swallow him whole. If it wasn’t the fact that he’d fled her mangled corpse, then it was the fact that he hadn’t come back into the room sooner, or the fact that he’d let go of her in the first place. The remorse of each of his decisions sat heavier on his shoulders than he’d ever truly professed, the burden gnawing on his conscience and adding to the amalgamation of reasons that had inevitably prompted, what he could only assume, would be his final stand: a self-sacrificing battle amidst a swarm of otherworldly bats.

           Despite the decision being one that he’d made in a split-second and while under an immense amount of pressure, Eddie was confident that it was the best choice he’d made in a long time. Maybe ever. The odds of his survival were an obvious slim to none, and sure, he would be throwing himself over a blade for a town that despised him and wanted him dead to begin with (and all to the fault of their own ignorance), but it wasn’t for them that he’d offered up his life. In fact, there wasn’t even the smallest shadow of their presence in his mind as he found himself swallowed up in a cloud of flapping wings and gnashing fangs. It was the friends that he’d made, the friends that had become his family, that occupied all of his thoughts and filled his heart with genuine bravery for the first time in his life. It was for them that he would lay his life on the line and cast himself willingly into perpetual darkness.

           With every fibre of his being, Eddie had been prepared to close the curtains on his short life of nineteen years, but the sudden appearance of an opening in the swarm of frenzied creatures allowed for a moment of reconsideration. Through the crack, there came a voice. Amidst the beating of wings and the ear-splitting screeching of a frantic horde, he couldn’t decipher exactly what was being said, but he’d followed in the direction anyways, breaking out through the veil of leathery appendages and sprinting away towards the treeline while the fangs that followed him tore more flesh from his bones.

            The adrenaline that was now pumping through his system pushed the pain away enough to allow him the opportunity to glance over his shoulder once or twice, ensuring that the creatures were still in pursuit. The further he could get them from the gateway, Dustin, and the rest of the gang, the better.

            It wasn’t until he’d stumbled through thick patches of bramble and bushes that he finally ceased his escape, falling to his knees and inevitably surrendering to the effects of blood loss and exhaustion as the dark world around him began to blur. When he felt himself being hoisted back up onto his feet, he wasn’t sure how long he’d been down for, but the clamor and commotion of the swarm made it clear that it hadn’t been for too long. A groan escaped his lips through a winced facial expression before he’d looked next to him to see the face of his rescuer, and the sight left him momentarily with a loss for words. ❝ Hargrove? ❞ He finally blurted. His dark eyes narrowed in disbelief, what remained of his vision straining to pull him into focus. He looked tired and disheveled compared to the old picture that his memory painted for him, but he was unmistakable in his perception. But ... wasn’t he DEAD?

            ❝ Shit ... You’ve gotta be fuckin’ kiddin’ me. ❞