#Chrissy Lives AU

[86baybee]

I was supposed to go to sleep but I drew this instead 🙃

(click for better resolution!)

[artrmeblog]

STRANGER THINGS 4: CHRISSY LIVES FAN COMIC : CHRISSY, YOU WOKE UP!!!

I read somewhere that “Uptown girl” by Billy Joel was officially Chrissy’s Vecna song, so I figured that it was the right choice for the scene. Just like the song “Every breath you take” by Police, was appropriate to end the comic. ;)

Happy to report I managed to finish it before the weekend. I checked and the total work time for this comic totalled up to 50+ of work. I do hope that it lived up to the hype. Thank you so much for all the love. I am not kidding. My notification box exploded with so much love. I went from 280+ to 800+ followers in record speed.  Thank you so much for all the love and patience for this comic. 

Much love to the actors as well for giving such an amazing performance and being to active with the fandom.❤️❤️❤️

[thecabinsixwitch]

BREAKING: honorary freak chrissy cunningham stopped by corroded coffin practice to see her fellow freak eddie munson absolutely shred!!

[a-strange-inkling]

The Vanishing of Chrissy Cunningham

Preview:

March 22, 1986,

Hawkins, Indiana

When he reaches the drive to the lake house he finally stops running. His chest burns, skin red and pulsing, eyes wet and blurry.

The night creatures all keen a quiet, melodic lament into the darkness. Like they know, like they saw. It all catches up with him, sucking out any air that’s left in his lungs. He can’t breathe. His knees hit the ground heavily, breaking skin as he doubles over. Hands digging into the gravel, he squeezes until his palms bleed.

And then, Eddie Munson screams like he’s never screamed before. A raw volatile sound that tears the air apart violently.

Hot, burning tears stream down his face as he screams himself hoarse. Sobbing until he gags, vomiting up what feels to be the whole of his insides. His body convulses as every moment, every memory of her flashes before his eyes. Oh those beautiful eyes. That sweet smile. Gone. Cold. Ripped away from him.

“Hey, um can you give me a hand with this?” he asks shyly.

She glances up from where she sits on the table, tying her sneakers, eyes really, really blue and deep, almost like they're not real.

“Sure!” she lights up.

Falling limply to his side, he heaves, trembling on the cold hard ground.

He’s never going to see her again.

The thought guts him, leaves him carved out, empty and hollow as he just stares into the darkness surrounding him. She was just there and now… now she’s gone.

He never got to say anything… he never got to say…

She’s gone.

Chrissy is gone.

[goggles-mcgee]

Stranger Things AU where Chrissy doesn't die (why? Because I love her and she deserved better okay)

How does Chrissy not die? Stick with me on this one folks as I'm sure this will have plot holes but I'm sleep deprived and don't care! So when Chrissy goes to Eddie's trailer, Eddie puts on one of his records to give him some confidence, Chrissy is cool but he still feels pretty on edge dealing his product to "The Queen of Hawkins High." He puts on the newest record he got: Metallica Master of Puppets.

Chrissy is waiting for him to find what she asked for but can't help but listen to the music and honestly she didn't think she would like it but she did. She really did. But Eddie comes in and sees her staring at his record player and thinks she is annoyed by his music and stutters out apologies as he turns it off and continues in his search. She of course gets pulled into her hallucination and Eddie is freaking out but when she starts to levitate he bumps into his record player and it starts playing his album again.

Chrissy hears the song and it saves her, she didn't know it had become her favorite song that fast or in that moment, all she knew is that she heard it and she ran.

The song was Welcome Home (Sanitarium)

Her and Eddie are freaking out when she snaps out of it and they don't know what to do but Eddie knows a group of little geniuses and tells Chrissy and look she's desperate. She told Eddie what she saw and that she heard the music and look Eddie may have been held back but he is smart and hey if the music helped then he's all too happy to lend Chrissy his Walkman with the cassette of Master of Puppets.

The other victims happen and some other third person idk who, maybe one of Jason's friends.

Anyways Chrissy gets close with the whole Party and though she's scared she wants to help with the plan. Max offered to be bait but Chrissy firmly shut that down and offered to be the bait, her and Max got pretty close. She doesn't admit that she sees Max as a little sister.

Eddie and Chrissy are the next Platonic Soulmates with a capital P. "Eddie, my Dear Edward, I love you. You know I love you, but for the love of all that's Holy go shower. You think Steve's attracted to the stench of weed, the leftover smell of room of nerds and whatever you stepped in during today's lunch speech?"

Steve and Chrissy are bffs, former mean girls who love to gossip. "Steve you will never guess who is dating who now after just breaking, hint it's teachers not students."

Chrissy and Robin have a tentative friendship where Robin may or may not have developed a crush on Chrissy and Chrissy appreciates how real Robin is and is always ready to compliment the girl. "Oh I remember you worked at Scoops! You really pulled that uniform off, not many can do that believe me."

Chrissy lives! And gets adopted by the group and yeah her parents are assholes but that's just another thing for her and Steve to bond over. Sometimes she stays over at Steve's just to spite them.

Chrissy lives and learns to be comfortable with who she is while also learning who she wants to be with this ragtag group of amazing people who fought for her, with her, and would do so again without hesitation.

[schrijverr]

I Found Myself a Cheerleader 28

Chapter 28 out of 28

Bumped to the lowest step on the social ladder after his fight with Billy, Steve gets roped in with the cheer team. What starts as a favor to help them out when one member breaks her leg in turn for protection from the brunt of the bullying, sets the universe on a different path.

In this chapter, With everyone healed, they slowly move back into their lives. As the dust settles, Steve and Eddie go on their first date together.

On AO3.

Ships: steddie & buckingham

Warnings: hate-crime mention, brief child abuse mention, period typical homophobia (I promise it’s the happy chapter, nothing happens)

~~~~

Chapter 28: The First Date

Time has passed since Eddie first woke up again. Despite his coma, he’s been recovering pretty well all things considered and is released pretty soon alongside Max and Chrissy.

Steve has stayed in the hospital with him for most of it, growing closer to both Eddie and his uncle, while they kept an eye on everyone else too. Despite Robin’s earlier judgments of Eddie, the two have hit it off and Chrissy has also easily come into the fold, turning their trio into a quartet of queer dumbasses.

Chrissy has been officially disowned and is going to stay with the Buckleys until she’s fully healed up. They would keep her longer, but they don’t have the means with only a nurse and a low on the ladder office grunt salary. Just like Steve couldn’t stay forever, even when they wanted him too.

However, Steve will take her in after. Hopper has legally come back from the dead and they have worked out a deal that Steve can buy his cabin from him slowly over the years.

The room that used to be a haunting shrine to his memory is now packed up with joy as Hopper moves out of Steve’s cabin. The Byers are moving back to Hawkins, Hopper is moving in with them, not wanting to rip another family from his daughter and the relationship he now has with Joyce.

The Byers and Hoppers had cleaned the spray paint off and fixed up the door. Steve nearly cried in thanks when he got home to find it welcoming and lively, instead of that violated mockery of his safe space.

At first, Will and El shared Steve’s bed as Steve slept on the couch, while Hopper and Joyce took Hopper’s bed. Jonathan and Argyle had found some mattresses to put on the floor. It were way too many people for the small cabin, but it was filled with joy and people. Steve needed people whenever he wasn’t sleeping at the hospital, unable to be alone.

Of course, he slept over at Robin’s place too, the three of them gossiping and joking around, laughing as they forgot how the world can be cruel to people like them.

It wasn’t without ups and downs of course. Steve had his first bad nightmare soon after going home to sleep, instead of staying at the hospital. It was mortifying, but while tea with Joyce wasn’t the same as tea with Robin, card games with Chrissy or hot chocolate with Eddie, it was still pretty good. It felt a lot like understanding. Like acceptance.

He also finally talks with Nancy. After they’ve waved goodbye to the Byers, who are off to Cali to finish the year there, she pulls him aside and asks: “Uhm, what you said, you know, in the Upside Down, that you, uhm, that you-”

“That I’m in love with Eddie,” Steve fills in for her, putting her out of her misery.

“Yeah, that. Is that…?” Nancy struggles a little more.

“That is still a thing yeah, I’m gay,” Steve tells her and it feels good to tell her that. “I didn’t figure it out until after fighting that demogorgon and even then I denied it for a long time. Sorry for leading you on when it wasn’t going to work out between us.”

“It’s okay, I- I wasn’t in a good place either then,” Nancy gives him a smile and it finally feels like they’re friends again. “I felt safe with you, still do, but- It’s not the same. I- I am also sorry, for being weird during everything.”

“Oh,” Steve says, not able to give another reaction, because he was pretty sure she was never going to mention that ever again.

“Me and Jonathan talked,” she says. “We were in a rough spot before, I guess. Still are. Uhm, he- he’s going to take a gap year, stay with his family, but I can’t stay here. I’m leaving in the fall for college. But with Hopper here, Jonathan is planning on coming with me next year, maybe in the spring already. So, we’re just taking it slow. Seeing where it’s going.”

“That’s good, Nance. I’m happy for you,” Steve tells her genuinely. Because he is. They have had their worst moments together, been their worst selves around the other, have seen their lows, but he would never wish her ill will. She’s been through a lot and she deserves to get better.

“Thank you,” she says. “I’m also happy for you and Eddie. You seem happier with him. You deserve that.”

Steve feels himself blush. It’s still new, but so wonderful and he can’t help but be happy whenever his relationship is mentioned. “Thank you, I am happy.”

And that’s the end of that conversation. They’re not best friends, Steve doesn’t think they’re ever going to be after all that has happened between them, but they are friends. The air is cleared and they’re both finally on the same page.

It feels good to close that chapter behind him on good terms.

Meanwhile, he’s starting a new chapter. With Eddie. Their date has taken a back burner, since Eddie couldn’t leave the house much at first. But Steve has gotten to sit in on his games with the kids, which has been great. Steve is never going to get into DnD, it isn’t for him, but it’s cute how excited they all get and he can listen to Eddie talk for hours and not get bored.

However, enough time has passed and tonight, he and Eddie are going on a date.

A date!

Steve’s first date with a boy.

Eddie’s first date ever.

It feels big.

Huge.

Too big.

But also, so so good.

However, it being good, doesn’t mean Steve is not nearly shaking apart with nerves. Which is how he finds himself on Robin’s bed, groaning into his hands as he complains: “I don’t know what to wear. Robbie, save me!”

“Well, you brought about your entire fucking wardrobe, there must be something,” she rolls her eyes, justified in her annoyance, since she’s been forced to listen to Steve whine about his date for days now.

“But none of it is cute,” Steve pouts.

“You’ve been on dates before. Many!” Robin exclaims. “Why are you being so difficult now? It’s just Eddie. He’s not even that hot. He’s a weirdo who walks on tables, which is highly unsanitary, by the way.”

“But I actually like Eddie,” Steve whines. “And he is cute. He’s passionate.”

Robin doesn’t look like she fully gets that he can actually find Eddie attractive, but she softens up a little when reminded of the fact that those dates he’d gone on were to hide. So, she says: “I can ask Chrissy to tell you what looks hot. She’s still into men.”

Steve considers it for a moment, then shakes his head. “I want you to tell me,” he says petulantly.

“Chrissy’s your friend too. She actually knows what she’s talking about,” Robin huffs.

Chrissy is currently trying to catch up on all the work she missed while being in the hospital and unable to attend school just yet. They could go bother her, but with the two of them dating and Steve spending a lot of time with Eddie, he wants to hang out with Robin. She’ll always be his number one.

“No,” he shakes his head again. “Chrissy will tell me what cheerleaders will like, you can tell me what weirdos like.”

“You’re also a weirdo, dingus,” Robin informs him, but she looks pleased with his insistence.

She gets up and starts going through the pile of clothes Steve brought with a little more interest than before. He’s sure that once he leaves for his date, she’ll squirrel away some of his clothes, but he doesn’t care. He has a few of her shirts hidden at his cabin too.

Robin contemplates for a second, then pulls out a pale yellow polo and holds it up. “This,” she says. “And jeans. Because Eddie is a weirdo like me, who actually likes a preppy cheerleader. I promise, he’ll like this.”

Steve laughs, but not at her, just delighted at the fact they get to do this. That they get to talk about their partners and pick out clothes for their dates. It makes him feel light.

“Go on. Change!” Robin demands, holding out the outfit to him in excitement.

“Okay, okay,” Steve smiles, taking the clothes as he starts undressing. Neither of them have made an effort with modesty, so Robin just waits as Steve changes into the outfit.

“Spin,” she demands.

Steve spins.

“Yes,” Robin nods. “It’s perfect. You look like a preppy little puppy.”

“And that is good?” Steve asks, amused and a little tentative.

“That’s good,” Robin assures him.

“Thank you,” he grins happily, flopping back down on the bed next to her. He’s still nervous, but having Robin help with his outfit calmed him a little.

“Of course, Stevie,” Robin smiles at him. “You’re gonna call me when you get back, right?”

“If I get back,” Steve winks.

“Dingussss,” Robin whines. “Then you call me from Eddie’s place.”

It should be overbearing. It should feel like it crosses a line to be so wrapped up in each other’s lives. But it never has with Robin. She has called him so many times after dates with Chrissy or other big moments. Sometimes she’s alone, sometimes Chrissy will be giggling through the line as well. They click together.

“I’ll call you form Eddie’s place,” Steve promises.

“Good,” Robin nods decisively. “And have fun and all that of course.”

“Wow, thank you for your gracious wishes,” Steve snorts.

“Oh shut up,” Robin giggles, pushing him softly, though he pretends it’s much harder as he groans dramatically and rolls off the bed. Of course, Robin doesn’t believe him for a second, rolling her eyes as she calls him a drama queen.

The two fuck around a bit more as Steve pushes his clothes in the corner, before Robin follows him to the bathroom where he fixes his hair. A part of his products permanently lives at the Buckley house with how often he’s there.

Despite the fact that they have only one daughter, the shelve in their shower is bursting with both Chrissy’s and Steve’s stuff as well. The two of them taken into the fold of Daisy’s and Thomas’ kindness and acceptance.

All of them came out to them after their stint in the hospital. They’ve always kind of known with Robin with how she started acting when she hit puberty, never fully hiding, but not admitting it either. With the rumors that floated around about Steve last summer and Chrissy’s attachment to Robin, it wasn’t difficult to make assumptions, though they patiently waited for them to be ready to say something.

Once Steve deems himself done, they stumble down the stairs. Chrissy throws down her pencil enthusiastically when she seems them, happy to be done. She smiles: “You look great, Stevie!”

Steve twirls a little, blushing as he grins: “Thank you, Chris.”

Thomas pops his head out of the kitchen. Daisy is working late today, so he’s cooking. He knows what’s been happening, also having opened the door for Steve holding all his clothes, after which Robin pushed him aside, exclaiming how it was an emergency. Then they had to calm him down that no, it wasn’t a bad emergency, just a teen emergency. Robin gets her anxiety from her father.

Now, he just smiles at Steve and says: “Have fun. And be safe. Don’t do anything you don’t want to do.”

Robin groans in embarrassment at her dad and Steve feels himself flush. Still, he’s more touched than embarrassed at the concern for him, finally having adults in his life that actually care, so he smiles at Thomas and promises: “I will.”

“You’ll call us when you get back, right?” Chrissy asks, before Robin can accompany Steve to the door. She would join too, but still being in casts makes being stationary easier.

Steve smiles at the fact that Chrissy has also picked up on their closeness habit. He ruffles her hair in a way that has her squawking and ducking away, as he says: “I will.”

Then Robin walks him to the door, the two dragging out their goodbyes as they always do, trying to cling to the other for as long as they can, before they truly part ways. With that done, Steve gets into his car and drives to the trailer park.

Eddie is sitting on the steps of his trailer when Steve pulls into the trailer park. He’s smoking a cigarette in a way that shouldn’t be as hot as it is, long fingers deftly holding the cig, bracelets moving whenever his arm moves.

Steve swallows heavily, before he parks the car, now getting spotted by Eddie. He lights up, those beautiful eyes sparkling as he waves, shaking his head to unsuccessfully get his hair in check and out of his face.

“Stevie,” Eddie greets, stepping closer, realizing their outside and awkwardly leaning back out of Steve’s space.

“Hey, Eds,” Steve replies, smiling, though that twinge still goes through him. He might finally be at a place where he is comfortable with his sexuality, but that doesn’t mean the rest of the world is. So, bro high five it is for now. “Come on, let’s go,” he nods to the car to distract from the reality and get the date back on track.

Eddie grins happily at that and does a dorky little cheer that Steve finds way more attractive than he should.

When he looks away he meets Max’s eyes. Being in the hospital has really scared her mom and the two have been closer than ever. Steve helped Wayne built a ramp to the trailer so Max can get in with her wheelchair. Right now she is at the top of that ramp, giving Steve an amused look.

He flips her off with a grin, then gets back in the car. His sides twinge a little, but his stitches have been taken out finally. Eddie’s are also still there right under his shirt and pants, but right now neither of them care. The wounds are healing, aches are fading and all of them are looking towards the future.

Steve starts to drive and Eddie smiles at him when he glances over. “Hey, Stevie,” he greets, a shy smile on his lips.

“Hi, baby,” Steve says back, letting his voice go soft and warm. He has done this song and dance many times before, but this time it feels good to see the person he’s with blush and giggle, leaning in slightly.

They’re on the bigger road now, which leads out of town, so Steve feels a bit more confident to put his hand on Eddie’s thigh.

Next to him, Eddie takes a sharp breath and Steve listens to see if it was surprise of discomfort, making himself at home when it turns out to be surprise.

It’s quiet for a few seconds, but Eddie has never done well with silence, so he breaks it when he asks: “So, how is this gonna go?”

Steve knows Eddie must be even more nervous than he is. The second he saw Eddie grin, most of his nerves faded. He has done this before, he knows this. It feels right with Eddie. However, Eddie is in the deep end without swimming lessons.

So, he projects as much confidence and comfort in his voice as he answers: “Well, I’m gonna drive to a town where no one knows us. We’re gonna get fries and milkshakes that we’re gonna eat on the hood of the car in a parking lot somewhere. Then we’re going to the drive in theater and watch a movie. And then we’ll drive home. How does that sound?”

“That sounds good,” Eddie answers, boisterous personality creeping back into his voice again. It is not as if Eddie hadn’t known what they were gonna do, Steve told him before, but he obviously had to hear it again.

“Good,” Steve grins, glancing over to meet Eddie’s own. “Now, pick a tape and put it on.”

Eddie dives into his glove box with glee, judging Steve with fondness as he goes. Steve can defend himself about some of his music tapes, since Robin, Chrissy and all the kids have left tapes to play throughout the years. Others… not so much.

Then Eddie stills and his voice is suddenly quieter as he asks: “Why- You have the Master of Puppets album.”

“Oh, yeah, I, uhm, I might have bought it,” Steve flushes, a bit embarrassed. “So you would have something to listen to that you liked when we drove.”

He doesn’t dare to look at Eddie, instead focusing on the road. But he shouldn’t have worried, Eddie lets out a loud noise, somewhere between a squeal and a scream, before he exclaims: “That is so sweet,” and rushes to put in the tape.

At the positive reaction, the smile returns to Steve’s lips, widening even more.

In the passenger seat, Eddie starts to head bang wildly, singing along to the songs in that deep, nice voice of his that Steve has come to love so much. Corroded Coffin hasn’t performed yet since spring break, but this private concert of pure joy is the best Steve has ever seen.

The drive is filled with karaoke, laughter and jokes. It’s perfect, just driving them could have been the date and Steve would have been happy.

Still, he’s excited for the rest of their date as they pull up to a diner. Inside they keep their distance, Steve talking to Eddie about the latest baseball game, he watched with Lucas and Hopper. Eddie nods along, listening. It’s sweet that he’s trying, because Steve knows that it isn’t really Eddie’s cup of tea.

They both order fries and a milkshake, like Steve had suggested, but they also order a burger. Then wait until they can take it with them.

Steve drives them to an empty field, parking alongside the road and they spill out of the car, both giggling like they’ve done something they shouldn’t.

They sit shoulder to shoulder on the hood of the car. Eddie leans his head on Steve’s shoulder and Steve feels like his heart explodes as he buries his nose in Eddie’s curls for a second, breathing in the smell of smoke that clings to Eddie and his three-in-one shampoo, conditioner, body wash that Steve despises yet loves.

Despite having their own, they steal fries from the other and share their milkshakes as they point out shapes in the clouds to each other. They laugh like little kids when one looks like a dick, before Eddie gets distracted by a cloud he swears looks like a d20, but Steve can only see a blob.

When their food is gone, they get back in the car again, this time they hold hands over the console as Steve navigates to the drive in theater and Eddie insists on buying their tickets, since Steve paid for dinner.

Steve argues: “I asked you out, I pay. You can pay next time.”

Eddie blushes happily at the next time, but shakes his head stubbornly anyway. “I feel like it was a mutual asking out, despite all the end of the world things. Besides, I finally have money – government hush money, but still – if I want to help my boyfriend pay for our date, I should be allowed to.”

If he’s honest, Steve was sold the second Eddie said boyfriend. He still can’t quite wrap his head around the fact that he has a boyfriend now and it’s enough to make him smile widely like a giddy loon.

Of course, Eddie clocks that immediately and soon Steve is standing next to Eddie as he defiantly pays for their tickets. Though Steve doesn’t mind, Eddie looks cute when he’s smug.

Afterwards, Steve couldn’t tell you what the movie was actually about (luckily he doesn’t work at Family Video anymore, having been fired for obvious reasons). Instead, he spends the whole movie staring at Eddie, holding his hand.

They’re parked in the back, out of sight as best as they can. It gives them the confidence to sneak a few kisses here and there, though nothing more than that.

They’ve kissed before, but Steve never tires of it. Eddie is just so eager and enthusiastic. It’s endearing and hot. He’ll make soft noises against Steve’s mouth and grip him as closely as Steve grips him. Despite the amounts of girls he kissed, he never knew how much fun just making out could be. He could kiss Eddie for hours.

The movies ends and they drive back home, this time the music playing quietly in the background as they talk.

“I wanna go to college, is that weird?” Eddie softly says.

“Why would that be weird?” Steve asks.

“I don’t know,” Eddie shrugs. “I’ve failed senior year two times, only reason I’m even graduating this year is because you threatened the government into feeling bad about me being hunted by the town and nearly dying for their mistakes.”

“You’re smart. If you want to I think you can do it,” Steve tells him. “What would you wanna do?”

“Creative writing,” Eddie smiles, it’s small and a little shy. He explains: “I love music and if the band takes off, I’m 100% doing it, because that would be the dream. But I love stories more. Like, I can work on my DnD campaigns for hours and I love thinking about the stories. Reading. I want to create worlds.”

“That sounds amazing,” Steve tells him honestly. He has always loved listening to Eddie talk, following along as he spins a tale out of thin air. “You can definitely do it.”

“You think so?” Eddie asks.

“Yeah, I do,” Steve replies. “Ask any of the kids and they tell you your campaigns are insane. I think so too from all I’ve heard second hand and what I witnessed. You’re a natural storyteller. You can totally do it.”

“So, you don’t think it’s silly?” Eddie inquires, sounding like he believes Steve, but needs to hear it again.

“I don’t,” Steve tells him. “Where do you wanna go?”

“Not far and nowhere special,” Eddie says, excitement bleeding in again. It’s clear he’s thought about it a lot. “I wanna start following courses at the community college, part time at first so I can work and help uncle Wayne pay the bills. Hush money is good, but doesn’t solve everything.”

That Steve knows. The hush money allows him to have a few nice things and bridge the gap when he looked for new employment, but he’s not set for life or anything close to it. So, he hums his understanding.

“I might follow Robin and Chrissy,” Eddie goes on, catching Steve’s interest more. “I mean, Robin is waiting for her right?”

“Yeah, saving up for college,” Steve says.

“And you’re probably following those two to where ever they decide to go to college?” Eddie continues.

Steve flushes slightly. It’s not that he wants to do long distance with Eddie, but the thought of not living near Robin kills him. He can’t survive if he can’t easily check up on her in the middle of the night. “Yeah, sorry,” he whispers.

“No need for sorry, sweetheart,” Eddie says in that soothing deep rumble, obviously having caught onto Steve’s thoughts. “I knew you two weren’t going anywhere without the other when I agreed to date you. I want to stick close to them too.”

The confession eases something in Steve’s chest and happily he says: “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” Eddie nods. “Robs is pretty cool, Chrissy too. I like them. I wouldn’t mind transferring whatever college credits I build up here to a local college elsewhere. We can all rent an apartment together, two couples, but they don’t have to know how. It’ll be fun.”

Steve can picture it in his mind’s eye. When Eddie suggested running away to the city together, bats circling above their heads, he didn’t have the mind to think about the details. But he can’t say he doesn’t like the image Eddie’s painting.

“I’d love that,” he admits softly.

“That’s good,” Eddie smiles. Then asks: “What do you wanna do?”

Steve thinks, rubbing his thumb over Eddie’s hand mindlessly as he does. The two haven’t let go since they got back in the car after paying for tickets.

“I don’t wanna go to college,” Steve tells him after a moment. “Everyone always thought I would, but I don’t want to. I wanna work with Robin in that stupid fruit shop until you all go to college and then I wanna do something with my hands.”

“That sounds like a good goal to work towards,” Eddie says. “Know what you wanna do with your hands yet?”

“No, not yet,” Steve answers. “I might go to trade’s school or find someone who wants to take me in and teach me. I liked patching up the cabin or working on my car. So something like that, probably.”

“You’d look hot in overalls,” Eddie teases and Steve blushes, giggling like the girls he used to take on dates.

They continue to build possible futures they could have together as they drive. Most of them probably won’t exist, but some of them might and it’s good to dream. To believe you can have a future like that.

Steve’s heart feels full with affection to the boy next to him. Neither of them has had it easy, but it feels like the hard part is behind them. That they made it and only need to see where it goes from here, but they can only go up anyway, so it’s okay.

It’s already dark when they get to the trailer park. Most people are already inside, so no one sees the two boys in the front of the car.

“Do you, uhm- do you want to come inside?” Eddie offers tentatively.

They’ve hung out quite a lot already with some heavy making out involved too. However, something in Eddie’s voice sounds too hesitant and Steve finds he doesn’t want to. Not yet.

He shakes his head and softly confesses: “It’s probably silly, but no, I- I wanna do this right, if that makes sense? I finally get to do this with someone I actually like and I want to build it up first, take my time, because I don’t have to rush. It’s stupid, sorry.”

“No, no, it’s not stupid at all,” Eddie quickly says. “I- I quite like that idea.”

“Yeah?” Steve looks up, meeting those eyes.

“Yeah,” Eddie nods, a bit breathless as he stares at Steve with those big beautiful brown eyes of his.

Cutting the tension, Steve smirks and affectionately teases: “Want to get fully romanced, huh, Eds?”

“Well, I wouldn’t mind the full wooing experience,” Eddie grins back, but he betrays his sincerity by curling his hair around his finger.

Steve finds his own features softening and he says: “Let me walk you to the door then. Promise to kiss you goodnight.”

Now Eddie takes the hair he’s been curling around his finger and pulls it in front of his face. In juxtaposition to his actions, he says: “Oh fuck off, Steve.”

“I like sweetheart better,” Steve tells him in a moment of confidence, kissing the hand he’s still holding, before dropping it and getting out of the car.

Eddie scrambles out after him, a little less graceful that Steve had been. Steve doesn’t care, though, he loves how Eddie flip flops between dramatics, grace and clumsiness. It’s part of his charm and Steve is properly charmed.

The two walk to the door. The porch light is left on by Wayne, before he left to work, but Eddie flicks it off, so nosy neighbors won’t be able to see.

He leans in close to Steve, but doesn’t press their lips together, instead smirking as he says: “So, sweetheart, huh?”

Steve feels himself blush, both at the tease and due to the heat that settles in his veins when the petname rolls of Eddie’s lips. “Yeah,” is all he says, a bit dumbly.

Eddie looks pleased with himself, his fingers skittering along Steve’s body until they fall to his waist, curling around his belt loops. Eddie tugs a little as he says: “I was promised a kiss goodnight, remember, sweetheart?”

And it is absolutely unfair how Eddie is using it against Steve, but Steve doesn’t mind it in the slightest, if it means Eddie will call him sweetheart for the rest of their lives.

So, like the whipped boyfriend he is, he obligingly leans down and presses his lips against Eddie’s, enjoying how they’re a little chapped, yet so soft. Softer than Steve had imagined them to be, before they first kissed.

They continue kissing for a little bit longer, neither of them wanting it to end. However, Steve is aware of how vulnerable they are like this, so after a bit, he pulls away and smiles at Eddie: “Is this a yes for a second date?”

“Of course it is,” Eddie smiles. “It was even before you asked me on the first.”

It’s so sincere how he says it and Steve is swept off his feet, unable to help how his heart swells at the words. “Oh,” he replies, giddy. “That’s good.”

“I’m glad,” Eddie tells him, dimples in place like they had been throughout the whole date.

Without making a conscious decision, Steve reaches up to cup Eddie’s face, thumb caressing the right dimple. “I love your smile,” he says, voice filled with awe and affection.

Eddie blushes brightly, Steve can see, even in the dark of the night. He tries to hide, but his fingers are still tangled in Steve’s belt loops and the hand holds him in sight.

“Pretty,” Steve breathes.

“You’re the pretty one, sweetheart,” Eddie replies, getting his blush under control.

“Beautiful then,” Steve corrects, smirking as Eddie blushes once more, this time nuzzling his hand to hide his face. Steve takes pity on him and pulls him into a hug, letting Eddie hide his blush against the crook of his neck.

God, he never wants to leave this moment.

However, the moment cannot last forever, so they each bid the other goodnight, before Eddie opens the door and flicks on the lights, while Steve goes back to his car.

Eddie remains in the doorway as Steve starts the car and begins to drive, waving until he disappears out of sight in the rear view mirror.

All the way home, Steve feels like he’s floating on a cloud and he practically bounces up the stairs to the cabin, keys jingling happily as he unlocks the door.

Inside, the cabin is quiet. The Byers are starting to pack their stuff back in Cali as the kids try to finish up the school year like the rest of the party is trying here. Steve misses the liveliness, but he’s grateful for the privacy.

He kicks off his shoes and falls on the couch, grabbing the phone as he dials a familiar number, not having to wait long, before Robin exclaims: “Steve?”

“Yeah, yeah, Robbie, it’s me,” he tells her, grinning from ear to ear.

“Oh my god, how did it go?” she demands to know.

In the background he hears Chrissy say: “It’s pretty late. Ask if he’s at Eddie. Did they do it?”

“Are you at Eddie’s?” Robin asks, relaying the message, before Steve can hear her move around so Chrissy can listen in as well.

“I’m at home,” Steve answers. “We wanted to do it right. Do the whole romance thing. I kissed him goodnight at the door.”

Chrissy squeals and says: “That’s so cute. Was it a good date?”

“It was,” Steve answers happily, sagging back into the couch as he tells the two of them all about it, not sparing a single detail.

When he sat on the bleachers, dejectedly watching the basketball before the cheer team distracted him, he couldn’t have imagines where his life would be one and a half years later. A lot has happened, not all of it good, but the friends he made because of it are worth it all.

This is the life he wants to live. The future he wants to work towards. And now he can.

~~

A/N:

Eddie deserves to be a little flustered and to be treated right. We love a confident Eddie, but he is also a massive dork at heart <3

I know this is a little shorter than the others, but it felt silly just to drag it out for the sake of it all, but hopefully you enjoyed it all. Thank you so much for reading it in it’s entirely (know that you’ve just read 251 pages), it was a thrill to write :D (and totally didn’t take me from Feb to July to complete before I started posting, what? xp)

[c-is-for-circinate]

Kind of want to toss more snippets of things that probably won't become long extended fics up onto tumblr. So: Eddie/Chrissy, with deeply bisexual ADHD disaster child Eddie, because we deserve it. (Also background hints of Steve/Nancy, but rest assured Eddie is 100% projecting and highly incorrect about that dynamic.)

Chrissy lives, through sheer dumb luck -- a tape shoved into a player out of some vague idea in the back of Eddie's mind that he could be smooth, could maybe help a pretty girl who for some godforsaken reason seemed to like him have a good time -- and it's great, it's incredible, it's more luck than any of them should've ever dared hope for--

And Eddie is thrilled, obviously. Terrified out of his mind, pretty sure he should be running for the hills, but. Chrissy Cunningham is alive, and for some bizarre, unfathomable reason, she seems to like him.

It's just...jesus christ, what is he supposed to do with that?

It's not that Eddie doesn't like girls. Girls are pretty, and smell good, and have curves in places he's maybe imagined putting his hands a time or two (thousand), and have generally starred in at least thirty to forty percent of his favorite jerk-off fantasies for the past several years. But the general class of females of approximately his own age in Hawkins, Indiana have heretofore been somewhat disinclined to follow up on Eddie's occasional flirtations, and somehow he doesn't think the other skill set is going to be much help here.

It's just...look. Eddie knows, he knows goddamn well that for ninety-nine point nine percent of guys like him, whose eyes skate over the slope of a gentleman's broad shoulders as readily as the swell of a lady's hips, that the easy road would mean playing straight for sixty-some-odd years, marrying a nice girl who doesn't ask too many questions, and maybe getting the occasional blowjob in a truck stop bathroom from a pretty boy you pretend you don't want half as much as you actually do. Of course he knows that. He's given those blowjobs, a lot more often than he's ever had a nice girl like Chrissy Cunningham look at him twice. Because that's the thing, isn't it, once again the Munson luck striking right at the heart of things. Once again, Eddie isn't like every other guy in Hawkins or Indiana or, fuck, the whole damn world probably. Can't just do things the normal way. Has to do everything opposite, and look where that's gotten him lately.

Truck-stop bathrooms are easy. The grit of them, the feel of cold tile through thin denim, the taste of latex and the smell of musk and sweat and come, a thick-fingered hand in his hair and the press of tight muscle under his fingertips, the rush of knowing that even on his knees, he's the one with the power here -- it's good. It's so good, the back rooms of that bar in Indy where one flash of his fake ID gets him an all-access pass to all the sex a boy could want, no strings attached. Slipping into that space is almost as easy, as natural, as slipping into the DM's seat at Hellfire. He doesn't even have to change his look, just makes sure the bandana is tucked into the correct pocket and they come to him, ready to let Eddie take the reins and drag them into something just painful enough to be really satisfying when they make it through to the end.

That's the thing about being a freak. That's the thing, that's always the thing, the backwards mixed-up thing in Eddie's brain that had him reading Tolkien before he turned nine but can't get through one Charles Dickens novel without wanting to scrape himself out of his own skin. He can calculate probabilities and percentage tables for a D&D game in his sleep but can't sit still through a single math class. It took less than a week to get note-perfect on the entire Master of Puppets guitar solo and six years might not be enough to graduate high school.

So yeah, Eddie knows how to be a freak and a faggot, can take a grown man to pieces with his hands and his voice and his dick if he just clicks into that zone where he has all the power to shape the world the way he wants it. That doesn't mean he has any goddamn idea what to do when Chrissy Cunningham smiles at him like that and he trips over his own feet.

He should be looking at Harrington. Steve goddamn Harrington is striding around like that, absolutely shirtless, streaked in dirt and his own blood like some goddamn primal warrior come to life. That would be safe. Safer. Something. Pretty boy in just the right amount of pain, Eddie should be enjoying the eye candy, but he can't because: 1) they're literally in hell and monsters could come after them at any time, 2) Nancy Wheeler apparently has a bedroom full of actual guns and is still in love with her ex-boyfriend, so Eddie's pretty sure he'd better keep his eyes to himself if he wants to keep them at all, and 3) far more importantly than all of that, Chrissy is scared enough to be holding his hand and he's terrified that his palms might be sweating. She's so pretty. He wants her to actually like him so, so badly. This is an absolute nightmare.

"You doing okay?" he asks Chrissy quietly, letting her lean on his arm to help her over some rough terrain when they have to take a detour around a knot of vines. She clutches at his sleeve and smiles timidly, putting on a brave face that makes Eddie want to do something insane like find a suit of shining armor just so he can bow to her in it.

"We're going to be fine," she says. "We just have to get to Nancy's house and it'll all be okay. Right?"

"Gonna let Wheeler make you a a total badass with a gun?" Eddie asks, and then mentally kicks himself. Who flirts with a girl by calling her a total badass? How do smooth guys flirt with girls if they stick around past the initial five minutes of inviting them to come see your band, which literally no girl has ever actually said yes to before? Eddie isn't even sure he has a band any more, if Chrissy's ex-boyfriend has anything to say about it, which means he's kind of out of ideas.

Eddie has one blinding, insane moment of wondering what would Jason Carver do here? before he almost chokes on his own tongue. Fuck. He really can't do this.

"Maybe," Chrissy says, a little shy, and slides her hand down his arm to slip her palm into his again. "Do you think I could?"

There's a smudge of dirt on her perfect nose. Eddie wants to lick it off. Oh god he's a freak. You can't lick cheerleaders. Fuck, Eddie doesn't even know how to go down on a girl. Fuck, why did he think about that. It doesn't matter! He's never going to get the chance! Chrissy is never going to want him to touch her like that anyway!

"I think if the last few days have proven anything, it's that literally anything is possible," Eddie says, and then realizes he just implied that Chrissy being a badass is even more unlikely than alternate dimensions, which is probably even worse than calling her one in the first place, and holy shit, how is it even possible to be this awful at this? Why is she still standing here with him? "I mean, I could even stop being a coward who apparently runs away from absolutely everything, which I've discovered I am now, that's how weird things are, so yeah, compared to that, Chrissy, I think you could absolutely be a badass if you wanted to be."

"I don't think you're a coward," Chrissy says, and she's stepping closer, why is she stepping closer, tucking their arms together. "I mean, I couldn't even run away. He would've gotten me right there, if you hadn't..."

"Luckily I think Harrington and Wheeler are big enough heroes for all of us." Eddie catches sight of them up ahead, Wheeler on point like a hunting hound leading the way, Harrington keeping watch on all sides with that flashlight ready to spring into action at any minute. It should probably be Harrington back here with Chrissy, if he and Wheeler weren't so obviously the perfect battle couple together. Hell, even Buckley, who's up front with Nancy right now and who Eddie knows he clocked checking out Chrissy's legs earlier. She's awkward, yeah, but on her it'd be endearing, and maybe Chrissy deserves better than cowardly asshole boys for a while anyway.

She definitely deserves better than Eddie. She tugs him out of the way of a vine half a second before he trips over it in the dark, like a klutz and a dumbass, and Eddie curses himself for a failure.

[clairelilcorner-a]

"Schools here! I can't wait to fail." - From Eddie to Chrissy lmao

“oh come on! who ever said you’re going to fail?!” chrissy said but she wanted to giggle. he’d failed before. not only once... three times? she’d lost count of it. truly, school made her nervous with jason around, especially after she’d broken up with him, but she had gotten closer to eddie during summer and she wouldn’t leave his side no matter what anyone else in this place spoke about him. “it will be different this time... trust me! wanna know why? you never had a study partner before but guess what... now you do!”

[rogue-durin-16]

BRAINS OVER BRAWN

Summary: using herself as bait in order to protect Max, Chrissy is dropped at the Creel's residence with Dustin and Eddie as her guardians. Unfortunately, someone tips off Jason after spotting Dustin outside the murder house.

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Chrissy Cunningham

Genre: angst w/ happy ending

Tags:

Eddissy: @chaoticlovingdreamer @acvross-the-universe @queenofstarsanddarkness

Permanent taglist: @elia-the-bibliophile @randomparanoid @karlthecat15722 @thebutchersdaughtersblog @amourtentiaa @just-here-to-escape-from-reality @comfort-reads

Warnings: language, violence, guns, blood

A/N: props to my best friend for giving me ideas to write a believable fight scene between Eddie and Jason, because this one was complicated af. Also say thanks to Grace Van Dien for putting out there which songs would have saved Chrissy from Vecna, we love you queen. Enjoy babes <3

Rogue-durin-16 masterlist

I gulped, my legs wobbling once my white Reebok sneakers landed on the sidewalk by the Creel's house. This was crazy. Was I really doing it?

With each step I took towards the entrance, I became more and more dazed; the Brigitte Bardot's cassette that Steve Harrington had struggled so much to find faintly played through Eddie's headphones, though it was currently being muffled by the stammering of my heart.

What was I thinking? I wasn't brave —not braver than Max Mayfield, at least. But Max was a kid.

I felt a finger gently tap on my shoulder, snapping me out of my negative train of thought that threatened to go downhill.

I spun my head to my right, switching the attention from the ominous stained glass to a concerned Eddie, pointing at his ear as to tell me to remove the portable music player.

With a sigh, I did what Eddie requested and took off the headphones, letting them hang from my neck.

"You okay?" Eddie questioned in a whisper.

He wasn't a fan of the plan. Specially, not of the part in which I ventured into the lion's den to act as bait. He didn't particularly like the idea of Dustin being there either, but groups of three were made, and at the end of the day, the Creel's house was the safest.

If you didn't have me on account, of course.

"As okay as I can be right now." I limited myself to reply, tugging on the sleeves of my newly acquired leather bomber in order to stop my fingers from fidgeting.

"Hey," the tall boy reached for my hand to give it a reassuring squeeze. "We're not letting him get to you again, right Henderson?"

We both turned to the freshman, who enthusiastically nodded. "The moment it gets remotely bad," he raised his right hand, showing me the big radio cassette player we had grabbed from Eddie's trailer. "We're calling in Brigitte... Bardot, or whatever her name is."

Dustin's words made the corner of my lip twist up in an endeared smile, which Eddie turned into a relieved breathy laugh the moment he spoke again.

"You can bet they'll hear her all the way from Indianapolis." He joked, bumping my shoulder with his. "We're not taking any chances here."

"Promise?" It was almost inaudible, but Eddie caught it.

"Promise." He assured me, intertwining his fingers with mine, automatically diminishing my anxiety.

Something about Eddie's presence made me feel unbelievably safe —which was actually hilarious if we considered that, just a week earlier, the idea of meeting him alone in the woods made me uneasy at the very least.

My two assigned protectors awaited in silence for me to be ready and give them the cue to enter the abandoned house.

"Screw it," I let go of Eddie's hand and, after doing a couple of little jumps on the spot, I put back on the headphones and grabbed the door knob. "Let's do this."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

EDDIE'S P. O. V.

I was trying not to pace, to sit still by Chrissy's side as she stayed crosslegged in that dusty attic, holding her hand like she had asked me to. My knuckles had turned white and my palms sweaty from complying.

Her eyes were rolled back while her petite frame slightly convulsed on the spot, making her ponytail and bangs wave as if there was a breeze of fresh air coming from somewhere. The little notepad rested open over the wooden box before us, her last scribble on display for me.

'Thank you ♡'

Thank you. I still couldn't understand why she had trusted me to keep her body safe in the abandoned house while her mind battled with Vecna, trying to slip away from his grasp.

And even though I didn't understand, I would carry out every wish and need she had, because, fuck, she deserved every good thing in our fucked up world.

Every. Good. Thing.

There was a rage, a frustration, tightening like barbed wire around heart after listening in silence to all the bad thoughts she spilled to trick Vecna into taking her; all those horrible things about herself that she, to some extent, believed to be true.

I was ready to tell her the truth once she woke up; how she was beautiful —inside and out—; how she was the farthest thing from a horrible daughter for not listening to her mother; how she was capable and brave, so brave, and a good person.

I was ready to tell her that she didn't have to fulfill anyone's expectations but hers, that she didn't have to change her body to fit into anything, that Jason was the problem for not listening to her and not the other way around.

But to tell her all those things, first she had to fucking wake up, and she had to fucking wake up soon or else...

"C'mon..." I muttered through gritted teeth in the lowest tone possible, unable to refrain myself from emitting any kind of sound.

Stay with her.

Stay with her.

"Fuck." I halfheartedly let go of Chrissy's hand to peek through the boarded up broken window. "C'mon, Dustin." I pulled the flashlight from my back pocket and pointed it to the playground's direction.

On-off. On-off. On-off.

Nothing.

I looked over my shoulder to check Chrissy's state; it hadn't changed, but something inside of me was telling me we needed to rush.

"C'mon, Henderson." I turned back to the window, sharpening my eyes in order to try and see in the dark.

On-off. On-off. On-off.

"What the fuck." I took a step back from the window. Dustin wasn't there, he wasn't in the playground. God, we didn't need more problems.

Staring at Chrissy's vulnerable, entranced state, I debated between trying the communication through light again or going out to check why wasn't Dustin responding.

It was just as I turned to turn on the flashlight again that the front door, three stories down, was slammed open, loud enough for me to hear the hit.

"EDDIE!!!"

My heart missed a beat at the freshman's distressed scream, following by fast, loud steps up the stairs that quickly came to a halt.

Forgetting about my task of remaining silent, my immediate response was to yell back, "DUSTIN?!"

Nothing.

Something was wrong. Something was so wrong.

"Motherfucking..." I muttered, as scared and stressed as I would ever be, running to grab the Brigitte Bardot cassette from my walkman. "Son of a bitch. Fucking... Christ." With shaky hands, I sprinted back to the window, under which the radio cassette player had been set, and threw it in before attempting to make my way downstairs.

I could barely get past Chrissy before my pace died down.

"Holy shit..."

Just when I thought I couldn't be more distraught, I was met with Jason fucking Carver climbing the attic stairs, left arm holding Dustin against his chest while his right hand held a gun up to the kid's head.

Great, just fucking great.

"Fuck me." I instinctively raised my hands in surrender, eyes ping-ponging between Dustin and Jason, whose deranged glare wasted no time in scan the place and therefore finding Chrissy in a matter of seconds.

"You fucking freak!" Jason shouted, taking slow steps forward and therefore making me step back at the same speed. "I knew you had her." I saw his bloodshot eyes stare at what I figured was Chrissy's back, but didn't dare to look at her.

"Dustin, you okay, man?" I chose to ask, as laid-back and possible, my attention focused on the scared freshman forced to walk in front of the jock.

Dustin's quick nod made Jason's focus snap back to us, pressing the barrel against the kid's temple, which made my whole body stop functioning and Dustin's lids be screwed shut.

"He won't be okay if you don't back off."

"Listen—"

"Back off!"

I had no option but comply, trying not to stumble while I mantained the six feet distance between us, only stopping after Jason reached Chrissy.

"Chris?" He crouched, manhandling Dustin with an iron grip to check the cheerleader's state. "What did you do to her?!" He yelled, standing up and turning his head to me so fast that it might as well have given him whiplash.

"Listen, let the kid go, alright?" I nearly begged, seeing Dustin's eyes welling up with tears he refused to spill.

"I'll let him go when you let her go!" The loading of the gun dramatically echoing in the eerily silent attic nearly put me under cardiac arrest.

When my body unknowingly tried to move forward to reach the curly haired boy, Jason yanked him back, a string of curses falling from my lips as he did so.

"Eddie—"

"Henderson, shut up." I ordered with widened eyes. Thank God the blond boy wasn't trigger-happy. "Jason, you don't understand—'

"I do." He growled. "The only reason why I didn't shoot you on sight is because I understand, you satanic freak."

"Dude, I'm catholic." I replied with unnerving levity.

"Eddie! remember your first campaign with us?" Dustin's words were a quick, nervous gibberish. "The Gnolls that attacked the party." Luckily, Jason had decided to try to decipher whatever the kid was saying instead of shutting him up for good. "Gareth's idea. Brains over brawn."

Oh boy, this was gonna suck for me.

"What's he talking about?!" Jason urged me to explain, the loose strand of hair hanging over his forehead trembling. "What does that mean?!"

I shrugged, giving my head a slow shake. "I have no idea, man."

"Cut the bullshit. Here's what's gonna happen." He drew a loud breath, jaw clenching as he tried to put himself together. "You're gonna wake her up." Without blinking, he tilted his head to Dustin. "Or I'm gonna kill him."

God, my heart was jackhammering to the point it made me dizzy. Why did it have to be me handling this situation? Killing off a couple of nightmarish bats would have been much easier than dealing with a delusional, unhinged jock with a gun who also happened to hate my guts.

This was on me for volunteering to be Chrissy's protector. What was I thinking? I wasn't brave.

Fuck it. Bravery or not, I wasn't going to let Jason hurt Dustin or get to Chrissy.

Brains over brawn, Eddie. Time to roll the dice and hope for it to score a high number.

"I'm sure Chrissy would looove to know you murdered a fourteen year old in her name." I commented, risking adding a sarcastic undertone to my words.

"Wake her up, you fucking psycho!"

"Psycho?" I scoffed, looking down at the basketball player. "That's rich from the guy pointing a gun at a kid." I tried to bring in a watered down version of my usual histrionic demeanor, hoping to bewilder Jason enough for him to forget about Dustin. "Maybe I should wake her up. Let her see you like this. She would hate you." I dragged the last two words in a slow tone, trying not to startle the blond senior while simultaneously riling him up.

"You don't know what you're talking about!" He seethed, though there was a tinge of fear showing in his irises. "You don't know Chris!"

"And you do?" I huffed, eyes squinted at him. "You don't even know what she was going through." My reproach was genuine, flashes of Chrissy's tortured, miserable state coming to my mind accompanied by the echoing of her dark confession to Vecna.

"If she was going through anything, she'd tell me!" His grip on Dustin loosened, and so did the need to press the pistol against his head, since he was now motioning at the girl with it. "She trusts me more than anything!"

"That so?" I dared to take a step forward. "Then why was she in my trailer and not in your house?" The guy was now vibrating with rage, and God would I be enjoying it if it was not for the imminent danger threatening all of our lives. "You know what I think?" I taunted in a low voice. "I think you've never listened to her."

"Shut up, Munson."

"You never even cared about what she had to say, did you? And why would you, Jason?" My voice, which was previously a mocking whisper, began to gradually raise. "She was there to sit still and look pretty, wasn't she?"

"SHUT UP!" He finally tossed Dustin to the ground, nearly making him bump into Chrissy, and menacingly cocked the gun at me.

"She's a trophy for you, right? Something to show around." I egged on, trying to convince myself that he would not shoot, when we all knew quite well what he was capable of. "The Head Cheerleader and the Basketball Captain. What a fucking cliche."

"I love her more than anything."

"Really? Because it looks like you just wanted an excuse to come after me with a loaded gun, pretty boy."

"I'm going to kill you, Munson." He declared, knuckles white from the tight grip on the butt of the gun. Fuck, if the bullet didn't stop my heart, the fear would.

"All talk no action. I guess that's why Chris swapped you for the freak, huh."

I knew the nickname would strike that final nerve, so I braced myself and tried not to falter when I heard the bullet being shot.

Though it never came; Dustin had pushed the gun away, forcing Jason to shoot the roof and earning the kid a well packed punch.

Letting out a warcry to hype myself up, I leaped forward, tackling the shorter senior and sending us both to fall on the creaky planks on the attic's floor.

Using the initial shock and the fact the the gun had slipped from Jason's grasp as my only advantages, I propped myself upright on my knees and threw a blow down full force, making it crash into the blond's cheekbone with a strength I didn't know I had, leaving a cut on it from my chunky ring and the jock momentarily stunned.

I clutched my fist with a hiss, feeling my own stinging pain from the hit on my knuckles.

"EDDIE!!"

My head instinctively snapped at Dustin, and I was first met with the cause of the terrified scream; Chrissy beginning to raise from the floor.

"THE CASSETTE!" I yelled at the top of my lungs.. "DUSTIN, THE C—"

Pow!

Jason's knuckles hastily colliding with my jaw marked the end of what I knew to be my strike of luck.

My reflexes were clearly not as good as an athlete's, so in my dazed state, I could do close nothing to dodge a second blow, way more calculated than the previous one.

After trying to shake Jason off me and attempting to unsuccessfully land a couple of hits of my own, I opted to shield myself.

I barely registered the melodic, ironically lighthearted voice of Brigitte Bardot being blasted through my radio cassette player; thankfully, it took Jason so aback that he halted his vicious attack on me.

"STOP THIS!" His hysterical threat came out muffled by the blood thumping in my ears. Through swollen, blurry eyes, I saw how Jason scurried away in Dustin's direction.

No way.

Drawing strength from the adrenaline, I managed to kick the jock in the guts before he could get up. I pushed myself off the wooden floor, making it squeak under my weight before charging at Jason once more with a loud cry.

I knew it was a losing game, and Jason confirmed it the moment he not only deviated my fist to crash on the planks, but also switched our positions; with a crazed glare, he held me in place by taking a fistful of my blood stained shirt to push me against one of the posts supporting the damned attic's structure.

I didn't hear the thump behind Jason.

CHRISSY'S P. O. V.

"Stop running, Chrissy." The devil-like voice was calm; he was taking his time to chase me through the beautiful playground he had recently turned into a goreish nightmare. "It's time."

I stopped running by the swings; my chest heaved and tears blurred my eyes once more. He was right, it was time.

That was my last genuinely happy memory. There was no point in trying to get away anymore, and that broke me.

"Chrissy." I let out a shriek at the closeness of his voice. Frozen in place by the horror I felt, I could only widen my eyes, my legs dangerously shaking while he circled me until we stood face to face. "Stay very still." He ordered, raising his clawed hand until it hovered over my head. "It'll be alright."

It'll be alright.

The words Eddie had scribbled on his notepad moments ago while we waited alone for Phase Two came to my mind, accompanied by his soft half smile as a saving grace.

I didn't know if that would count as a happy memory, but I had to try. Pushing out of my thoughts the fact that Vecna was inches away from me, I shut my eyes and visualized that instant as vividly as I could, tears spilling from my closed lids.

Moi je joue à joue contre joue

Je veux jouer à joue contre vous

Mais vous, le voulez-vous?

"You think a song will save you, Chrissy?" He mocked me, tilting his head to the side. "Nothing will s..."

I had no time to think before the ground split beneath me while everything dissolved into dusty smoke, including Vecna.

I caught a mere glimpse of it before falling into a seemingly never ending darkness that made my stomach sink and knocked the air straight out of my lungs.

And then... Thud!

My feet hit the ground without a warning, cheerleader instincts kicking in and making me react on time so I wouldn't break my ankles.

It took a while for my senses to register anything aside from my hyperventilation, the undusted old wood beneath me and the deafening singing of Brigitte Bardot.

"Chrissy!" Two trembling hands grabbed my forearms and forced me to meet a curl framed face.

"Dustin?" The kid was on the verge of tears, visibly torn between leaving my side or making sure I was alright.

And then every violent sound silenced by the cassette started to come to me; the tussling, the grunts, the hits, Jason's raging screams.

The gun lying at arm's reach on my left.

EDDIE'S P. O. V.

"You think I don't know why you chose Chrissy?!" He yelled, fisting my shirt; had I not being so battered, I would have worried about him tearing the cheap fabric. "You think I don't see how you look at her?! YOU FUCKING FREAK?!" His voice cracked while he shoved my head against the post, triggering a worn out wince from me. Shit, I was so gonna have a serious concussion after this. "YOU'VE" Punch. "ALWAYS." Punch. "WANTED HER!"

Bang!

I didn't even flinch at the shot, but Jason did. His hands instinctively went up to somehow cover his head, but someone else was faster on the attack, shattering a vase against my attacker's temple and successfully freeing me from his iron grip.

Dustin's shoe flashed in front my eyes to kick Jason's semiconscious body off of me before hooking his arms around mines, dragging me away from the jock.

It was only after my perspective of the room had changed that I saw Chrissy struggling to stand up, the gun held firmly by both of her hands.

Like a rabid animal, Jason was soon clambering scarily fast towards me and Dustin, making us both scream as if that would somehow stop him.

"Get off them." Chrissy's stern, tired voice was barely audible over the song, but it was enough to make Jason change his mind about resuming the fight.

"Chris— Chris, it's me, babe." It was scary, how gentle he turned once he realized Chrissy was out of the trance. He wasn't in much of a hurry to rescue her from us now that she was aiming the pistol at him.

"What did you do?" She questioned in a grieving mumble, glassy blue eyes stealing a worried glance at my form.

"Baby, put down the gun." He ordered, getting up from the floor in an attempt to make his way to Chrissy. "I don't know what this freak did to you but we'll make it right."

"Don't get any closer." She warned the basketball team captain, taking a step back in order to rest against one of the wooden posts.

"Babe, I know you're scared—"

Determination and anger twisted Chrissy's face before she tilted the barrel down ever so slightly, shooting right in front of Jason's feet.

"I SAID DON'T GET ANY CLOSER!" Dustin's hold of me loosened, most likely due to feeling more protected now that Jason seemed to be listening to Chrissy. "Dustin? Can you get Eddie to the stairs?"

"I— I can try." The kid was able to sit me up but, despite putting in his best effort, I couldn't even stand up before we stumbled back to the floor. "Fuck."

Chrissy seemed to ponder her options, brows furrowed in concentration.

"Turn around and walk to that corner." She ordered Jason, momentarily cocking the gun at the farthest place from the attic's entrance.

The boy's bewildered eyes landed on us, then the corner, then Chrissy again, switching back and forth between the end of the gun and her cold gaze. "Chris, c'mon." He chuckled, trying not to let the nerves slip. "You're not gonna shoot me."

"I don't want to shoot you." She corrected him, jaw clenched and eyes squinted as if she was battling with her soft self and her own fears to make the following statement. "But I will if you touch Eddie again. So," Jason gulped, now more convinced by his girlfriend's words. "You're going to turn around, and walk to that corner."

Unable to react different due to the shock of the situation, Jason did nothing but obey, walking past us livid with widened eyes and hands up.

"Stay there." Chrissy's stern voice faltered while she put the gun down and rushed to us, her strong demeanor crumbling into pieces once she kneeled in front of me. "God..."

"Bad, huh?" I questioned, trying to lighting the mood but obtaining the opposite.

"It's going to be okay, Eddie." she didn't sound very convincing, but what was remaining intact of my body melted when she took off her scrunchie and carefully put my hair back in a bun. "It's... God, okay. That's a lot of blood."

"Great." I hissed, clenching my fists when Chrissy used her fingertips to move my bangs out of the way.

"Dustin, you have water?" By the way Chrissy's were automatically casted down, I figured the freshman, who kept me sat upright, had responded negatively. "We're... We're gonna get you to a hospital, okay? C'mon."

She moved to my side, draping my left arm over her shoulders and linking her fingers with mines before prompting Dustin to do the same.

With extra support, a little pride and a lot of pain, I was able to start walking.

"Waitwaitwait," I stopped them at the stairs, earning a worried look from both. "Can't go to a hospital, they'll call the police."

"Eddie, I don't know if you noticed but" Dustin motioned dramatically at my upper body with his free hand. "This is bad. Dying beats jail."

"Do I... look like I'm dying?" Chrissy's overenthusiastic 'no!' overlapped with Dustin's deadpanning 'yeah'. "I mean, it does hurt like a bitch."

"Listen, we'll get you to a hospital." Chrissy began, taking a step forward for us to follow her lead. "I'll— I'll stay with you, okay?"

I vehemently denied, feeling instant regret when that simple movement made me prone to lose balance and fall down the old stairs. "What about Vecna?"

"I think the plan worked." Chrissy shrugged, locking her eyes with mine. Now up close, I could appreciate how bloodshot they were. "The song... It wouldn't have worked."

My breath hitched, my left hand tightening around hers as if that would stop her from disappearing again.

It wouldn't have worked.

"It's okay, Eddie. He's gone." I hope. She didn't say it, but both Dustin and I could hear that thought. "Wait here, guys." She asked in a soft whisper once we reached the bottom of the stairs. So different from the harsh tone she had used with Jason minutes ago.

Speaking of which— Chrissy run upstairs, her ruined, soiled skirt shimming gracefully as she did so.

She was down in no time, wiggling Jason's car keys in one hand while the other held the gun limply against her thigh.

"I got ourselves a ride." She stated, sporting a smile way too warm bright for the situation. God, I loved her smile. "I gotta warn you, I'm not the best driver." She commented, throwing my arm over her shoulders once more.

"Well, look at it this way, we're driving to a hospital anyway." Dustin pointed out, making Chrissy laugh, her eyes squinting as she shook her head and casted it down.

Following her movements, my eyes inevitably fell on the stuffed pocket of the jacket Nancy bought her at War Zone, which until that moment had been empty. The two notepads we had used to communicate before baiting Vecna peeked from it.

When she looked back up at me and noticed what had caught my attention, she gifted me a small, timid smile.

"Happy memories." She simply said, only loud enough for me to hear. "I need those."

Happy memories.

My heart made a flip, and I felt like a middle school kid all over again.

[i-used-to-wear-the-fedora]

Can I request a fluffy Eddie X Chrissy fic where Chrissy wakes up and hears laughter and finds Eddie in the living room playing with their toddler daughter and Chrissy melts at the sight of her little family and how great of a father Eddie is and Chrissy thinks about how lucky she is and how she never would have thought she would ever end up falling in love, being married and having a child with Eddie Munson? Also, their daughter looks just like Eddie?

"-higher, higher!"

"Hey, easy there Arwen. Daddy's not an actual horse." Chrissy woke to the familiar sound of giggling. The redhead sitting up in her bed and glancing over at the bedside table's alarm clock to see it was nine in the morning. Her husband's side of the bed was empty when she got up and wondered down the hall towards the source of the noise in the living room.

"Oh my." The woman giggled at the sight. Her husband was bent over with his arms behind him supporting their their three year old as she excitedly waved her arms around.

"Onwards Brego!" The child demanded, her plastic sword hitting Eddie on the side of the head. The brunette turning to his wife with a pleading look.

"Little help here?"

"Oh no, I wouldn't want to interrupt your fun." Arwen looked over when Chrissy spoke and quickly jumped off Eddie's back to rush over to her.

"Morning mommy!" The little girl clung to her leg, showing off her large gap toothed grin.

"Morning sweetheart." Chrissy picked her up and noticed that in Arwen's dark mess of girl curls, twigs and other small debris were stuck in her hair.

"Me and daddy played Hide and Seek and I won!" The girl proudly boasted. "Now daddy has to play horsey cause he lost!"

"Well you can play horsey later. We need to get you ready for daycare."

"Awww..." The toddler huffed but allowed the woman to pick her up.

"I'll get breakfast started." Eddie placed a quick kiss on his wife's cheek. "Chocolate chip pancakes sound good?"

"That sounds great Eddie." The woman smiled as she watched her husband disappear into the kitchen of their small trailer. They'd bought it when they found out that they were expecting with the help is Eddie's uncle. Her parents had been...less than excited when they found out about her relationship with Eddie. Then they got married. She hadn't seen her mother or father since but she didn't care. Chrissy was happy. She had a living daughter and a beautiful child. Arwen was almost four now and she looked almost exactly like Eddie. Save the smattering of freckles that covered her face, Arwen was very obviously her father's child.

People in town gave them looks and whispered behind their backs.

'Isn't that the Munson boy?'

'I thought he went to prison just like his daddy.'

'She only married him after she got knocked up.'

'That poor child.'

But Chrissy didn't pay them any mind. The woman stopped caring what anyone else thought a long time ago, and she couldn't possibly love her family anymore than she did at that moment.

[86baybee]

Post-Corroded Coffin show 🎸💖💕💗

[artrmeblog]

Happy to report that the Chrissy lives fancomic AU is almost done. Currently drawing the last pannels. All thats left now is rendering and adding text. SEE YA SOON!!!!

[probablyscreamingintothevoid]

I'm not saying I would pay to see Chrissy take Steve's nail bat to Jason's knees... But I'm not not saying it, ya know?

[a-strange-inkling]

The Vanishing of Chrissy Cunningham (Van Scene)

(God help me, these two got me writing again... I have three AUs in the works, here is a preview of the first chapter of my *Chrissy Lives AU*)

...

Triumph is in the air tonight.

They must have won the basketball game, the whole town is spilling out of the gym, chanting and celebrating like it’s the fucking Olympics.

“Yikes.” Eddie says to himself, looking around. And they think he runs a cult.

He lets the masses filter out before pulling up to the back entrance, which is ghostly quiet in comparison.

And there’s Chrissy.

He spots her standing in the shadow of the overhang, her shoulders hunched up, fiddling her fingers nervously, waiting. She immediately lights up when she sees him approaching, and he feels his pulse revving up right along with the engine.

He pulls up to the curb, grinning crookedly as he rolls down the window. He looks her up and down.

“Rah, rah, rah.” he teases.

She smiles as she crosses the cement sidewalk between them, tucking her cardigan a little tighter around herself.

Leaning across, he opens the passenger door for her. She climbs in beside him, the smell of something sweet and floral wafting around her, filling up the space.

“Hi.” he greets, like this is something out of the ordinary, unable to stop smiling.

But then, she’s smiling too, so maybe it’s alright.

“Hi.” she returns shyly, settling in the seat.

It’s a weird sight, he can't deny that. Chrissy Cunningham in his dingy van, all neat and pristine, sitting in the midst of his mess.

If she’s put off, she doesn’t show it. She buckles herself in, smoothing out her little pleated skirt.

“All set?” he asks, giving her another once over. It seems like this is, in fact, actually happening. He’s taking Chrissy Cunningham back to his trailer to get high.

“Yeah.” she replies assuredly.

“Okay, then,” he nods in return, shifting into gear, looking around to make sure they're alone before pulling out. “Cleared for takeoff.”

She looks a little nervous, like back in the woods. If they hadn’t met up that afternoon, he would think that it had something to do with him.

“Uh so…” he fills the silence. “Sounds like it was a good night for the jocks.” he notes, as they turn out of the school parking lot.

“Hm? Oh yeah.” she replies. “Yeah, it was pretty incredible, one of the freshmen scored a winning shot in the last second of the game.”

“Oh, nice.”

Carver must hate that.

“And your club?” she asks in return. “That went well?”

“Oh, uh, yeah, great actually.” he nods, surprised she’d even ask. “After we drank the blood of the sacrificial virgin, we uh all danced around the corpse, and…”

She bursts out laughing, covering her mouth as if she’s afraid she's being too loud. He chuckles, warmed by her response. It prompts him further. “And you know Satan hasn’t answered our calls yet, but you know we’re, we’re hopeful.”

She tries to get a hold of herself, and it’s like there is a hanger in his mouth, he can’t stop smiling.

“It really is just a game.” he tells her, after she catches her breath. “It’s all bullshit what they say about it.”

“Yeah, yeah I know,” she replies, unconcerned. “My little brother used to play it all the time.”

Eddie’s surprised by that. “He doesn’t anymore?”

“Not after the Newsweek article.” she replies. “My mom threw out all his books. She was really freaked out.”

“Ah.” he’s not surprised. “You weren’t?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t think the devil is in some game.”

“No?” he asks, a little prompt in his tone.

She remembers what happened earlier that day. What has been happening in her dreams when she sleeps.

“No.” she answers firmly.

Open the door, Chrissy! Open this door!

The only place the devil seems to be is in her head.

Eddie shoots her a quick glance. “Speaking of Satan, what did you um, tell Carver?”

She looks over at him, but he keeps his eyes on the road, not seeing what kind of reaction that got out of her.

“I mean, I’m guessing he probably wants to celebrate with you tonight.”

“I just… told him I had to go home and change.” she supplies with a shrug, still feeling guilty about it. “I’ll tell him tomorrow that I got a headache and that I decided to stay home.”

What would women do without that headache excuse?

“Seems solid.” he replies, popping his lips.

“Thanks,” she says, scoffing a little under her breath, like she is just realizing now just how ridiculous this all is.

“The Satan comment was a little uncalled for.” he admits.

“A little.” She agrees, pursing her lips, trying to subdue the laughter he keeps pulling out of her.

“I’m sorry.” he says, turning to face her so that she knows he means it.

His eyes linger a little too long and he hits a pothole, sending them both up in the air and down hard.

His cassettes piled on the dashboard go flying all over, three or four landing on her lap.

“Shit, sorry!” he exclaims, steadying the wheel. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” she says, reaching for the scattered tapes.

“Just leave ‘em.” he tells her. “I shouldn’t have this many floating around in here.”

“I don’t want you to lose any of them.” she replies, gathering what she can reach. They must mean the world to him.

He spares a quick glance to see her bent over in her seat trying to reach the ones at her feet. He smiles to himself, shaking his head slowly in disbelief, tongue tucking between his teeth.

He doesn’t know how someone can be so fucking sweet, he really doesn’t.

“Okay, just uh, I guess put them in this like middle compartment…thing.” he takes a hand from the steering wheel, keeping his eyes on the road this time, as he pops the lid open.

“Wow!” she gasps, eyes widening, feigning amazement as she looks up at him. “It’s like it was designed to hold stuff like this!”

He snickers at her teasing, rubbing a bashful hand slowly over his face. “Okay, alright, easy. Jesus.”

You’re screwed, Munson. he tells himself. You’re so fucking screwed.

She doesn’t just toss them in, no, she stacks them neatly, like little books on a shelf, title side up.

She looks each one over curiously before she puts them in.

“Which one’s your favorite?” she asks.

“Oh no, no!” he nearly shouts. “Don’t do that to me.”

“What?” she asks, startled.

“I have been on my best behavior, Chrissy Cunningham, and you ask me something like that!?”

“It’s a normal question!” she exclaims, her voice the highest volume he’s ever heard it.

“Chrissy, it’s like asking me to choose a favorite child!” he admonishes.

“It should just be the first song that pops into your head when someone asks you.” she tells him factually, like she’s done some sort of study on it.

“Are you kidding me!?” he asks, voice cracking in mirthful disbelief. “I have like fourteen songs in my head right now.”

“Eddie…”

“Okay, if it’s so easy, prove it, what’s your favorite song, Chrissy?”

She lets out a breathy, incredulous laugh, her mouth hanging open without an answer.

“See!? See!?” he tells her. “Not so easy, is it?”

“That’s not fair!” she exclaims.

“Oh, it’s so fair!” he replies, making a face.

“No, no, because I do have a favorite song, but I can’t tell you what it is.”

“What!? Why not?”

“Because you’re going to make fun of me if I tell you.”

He gasps dramatically, placing a hand over his heart. “I would never…”

“I don’t know, I just sorted your collection…”

“Okay, c’mon, just tell me what it is, it can’t be that bad.”

“I’m not telling you.” she shakes her head laughing.

“C’mon, Chrissy! Now I have to know!”

She shakes her head all the faster, pursing her lips as if to lock it inside.

“Chrissy.”

“You have to promise me you won’t judge!”

“Sure, fine, I promise I won’t judge.”

“Swear it.”

He puts three fingers up in the air with a roll of his eyes. “Scouts honor.”

She mumbles something under her breath and he cranes his ears, but she couldn’t have said what he thought she said.

“I’m sorry?”

She says it again through her teeth, but it’s unmistakable this time.

“Cyndi Lauper!?” he says in disbelief.

“You said you wouldn’t…!”

“Cyndi Lauper!?” he shouts louder, reaching into his newly organized row of tapes. Did she alphabetize them? “Jesus Christ, Chrissy,” he pops a case open with his teeth and shoves the plastic into the rectangular cavity right above the radio.

“It’s a beautiful song!” She defends herself. “The lyrics…”

“The lyrics?” he squeals in horror. “I’m sorry, I can’t just stand idly by and let this happen, I have to do something!” he says, turning up the volume, before reaching up to take her by the shoulder. “Listen to me, just breathe, everything’s going to be okay, Chrissy, I’m going to save you, okay?”

She shakes her head trying not to look as amused as she is as the surprisingly mellow tune of a guitar plays through the speakers. It picks up a little with a set of drums.

“We’re going to ease into it, okay,” he pulls his hand back, taking hold of the wheel. “Try to suck the poison out.”

Take me down to the paradise city

Where the grass is green and the girls are pretty.

She smiles, leaning back into her seat, resting her head. “I shouldn’t have told you.” she mumbles more to herself than him, warm and breathless from all the laughing.

“Shhh.” He hushes jokingly. “The lyrics.”

Take me home.

Oh, won't you please take me home

So far away

So far away

She gets a little lost in it, turning to look out the window, watching the fuzzy lights from the streetlights go by.

“Good, right?” Eddie asks.

She nods, contemplatively.

It’s different from anything else she is allowed to listen to, but there’s something about it, like a storm pounding against a glass window.

Calming chaos.

The music starts to skip and jumble suddenly, an unpleasant quiet squeal scratches her ears, making her wince.

Chrisssssssyyyyy.

No. No. No.

Chrisssssyyyy

Not now.

She grips her skirt tightly, trying to focus on something, anything to help her stay on solid ground.

Oh, she suddenly feels like she is going to be sick, a wave of nausea washing over her.

Dear God, please not here. She prays softly, focusing back on the lights outside. Almost there, just give me a few more minutes. Please.

“Damn piece of junk.” she hears Eddie say, bashing the dashboard.

She keeps her eyes on the window, she doesn’t want him to see her looking ill, he might not sell to her if he does.

To her horror, the streetlights flair up brightly. She feels an electric hum shaking right through her core.

Eddie continues fighting with the cassette player, but it only whistles and cries all the more, the words distorted like some deep slow chant. Her ears start to ring.

Chrissy.

It’s not a whine this time. It’s a deep guttural beckoning, echoing in the pit of her stomach.

And there under one of the lights in the street she sees the voice made flesh. A dark twisted figure staring right at her, watching her as she goes by.

She holds back a scream.

It’s not real. It’s not real.

The music kicks back in and Eddie is saying something. The ringing slowly clears as she watches the figure disappear into the darkness.

“Chrissy?”

“Are we almost there?” she asks him suddenly, looking back through the front window.

“Oh, uh, yeah it’s just up this road here.” he tells her, a little taken aback, nodding his chin toward the right.

“Sorry.” she blinks a few times.

The world seems a little more solid, real, but she knows she doesn’t have long.

“It’s okay,” he replies, noting the change in her. “You’re fine.”

And she wants to cry because he sounds so certain.

[schrijverr]

I Found Myself a Cheerleader 20

Chapter 20 out of 28

Bumped to the lowest step on the social ladder after his fight with Billy, Steve gets roped in with the cheer team. What starts as a favor to help them out when one member breaks her leg in turn for protection from the brunt of the bullying, sets the universe on a different path.

In this chapter, seeing Chrissy attacked has them all on edge, which isn’t helped when they return to the cabin and find it completely ransacked. Eddie missing from the scene. The search for him only sets them on the path to more danger.

On AO3.

Ships: steddie & buckingham

Warnings: general season 4 shenanigans, child abuse mention, hate-crime, homophobia, f-slur, bullying mention

~~~~

Chapter 20: The Escape

Steve screams Chrissy’s name loudly and shakes her, despite the fact he knows it won’t do anything to save her.

Behind him, the others get there and see what has happened. Max is rushing forward, already pulling off her own headphones to give to Chrissy, but she is stopped by Lucas, who yells: “Are you insane? Vecna is looking for a target right now.”

“Do you expect me to let her die for me?” Max screams back, an again going unspoken. “She needs music.”

A part of Steve wishes Lucas hadn’t stopped Max, but he knows that wouldn’t have solved anything. Right now Chrissy needs music and Steve knows how to get it. He quickly scoops Chrissy up, hating how light she feels as he yells: “Get out of the fucking way!”

The party scrambles to let him pass as he carries Chrissy down the stairs, relieved she isn’t floating yet. Robin is at his side, Nancy at his back. Nancy asks: “Where are you going?”

“She needs music, I’m bringing her to music,” Steve replies.

“You’ll never make it to the car,” Nancy argues. “It’s too far.”

“We don’t have to make it to the car,” Steve tells her.

“The piano,” Robin exclaims, picking up on what Steve is saying as they hustle down the stairs to the now abandoned piano where once a happy family sang.

Right as he crosses the threshold, Chrissy floats out of his arms, hanging there in that horrid, ominous way. She always loved flying, but not like this. Steve wants to pull her back to earth, but knows music is more important to get right now.

So he lets Robin tug helplessly on Chrissy’s shoe as he takes place at the piano. Steve is the only one who gets to make Chrissy fly, not this Venca creep, and he is the one that knows how to get her down safely. Always there to catch her.

It’s been almost half a year since Hopper’s funeral, when they broke into his house to steal a suit to wear. However, the song still comes to him, having been burned into his memory. He thanks god for the strict French nurse, who had taught him.

Everything around him disappears as he starts to play. Hands gliding over the keys as the notes of We’ll Meet Again float through the air. The piano is a little out of tune, but it adds to the charm, well, Steve hopes so at least.

He doesn’t know all the words, but he knows the chorus, so he sings: “We’ll meet again. Don’t know where. Don’t know when. But I know we’ll meet again some sunny day.”

After that Robin takes over. She’s a decent singer and Steve wonders when she learned this song or if she has always known it. However, as long as she keeps singing Steve doesn’t care. The two of them keep on creating the music, hoping that Chrissy will come back to them, instead of leaving them behind.

The room is filled with the haunting piano and Robin’s surprisingly nice voice.

It seems to take a life time.

It only takes a minute.

Steve thinks it will never end.

The moment never really begins.

Then Chrissy is collapsing down to the ground, limp for a second, but seemingly still breathing. Of course Steve gets up immediately to check on her, right behind Robin. However, he is pushed back to the piano by Max, who demands: “Keep playing! He’s still here.”

Naturally, Steve plops back down on the bench without question as he starts up the notes again. It is harder this time, because he keeps trying to look back to where Chrissy is gasping, trying to come down from her encounter with Vecna.

He hears Robin ramble in that concerned comforting way of her and when he glances back Max is next to Chrissy too. The only one, who can know what she might have gone through.

Dustin, however, has disappeared outside with Lucas, but soon returns with a recording device, so they can tape Steve’s playing. It has proven effective, so it’s their best shot for Chrissy. Especially since the other tape is broken. Robin singing again just in case that’s important.

Once they get the tape, they put it in the backup walkman Steve brought and by god is he relieved as they hand it to Chrissy, meaning Steve can leave his bench.

Steve doesn’t waste a second, sliding out of the piano bench and running to where Chrissy is clinging to Robin. Though she lets go in favor of falling into Steve’s arms when he drops to the floor next to her.

“Oh god, Stevie, she- she was there,” Chrissy sobs and Steve holds her closer, knowing she is talking about her mother.

“You’re okay, you’re okay,” he assures her, as he strokes her hair, not wanting to give too much of her private details away to the party around them. “She’s not there. You’re not with her. You here with me and Robs and the others. You’re safe. You’re alive. I got you. I always got you.” He kisses the top of her head.

Chrissy cries a little more, hiding into Steve’s chest as Robin rubs her back, obviously unsure about what else to do.

When they have all come down from the crazy experience, they go to the Wheeler house. All of them collapse on the couches, not having been spotted by Karen or Ted. The exhaustion after the adrenaline drops makes that all of them forget about anything but sleep.

The next morning, they go by the grocery store. They’re all stuffed into Nancy’s car, probably looking a little insane as they pick a six-pack and some snacks and stuff to make dinner. If they need to hide Eddie for a little longer, Steve can cook for him. A good home cooked meal can do wonders for the soul.

But as they get to the cabin, Nancy gasps and hits the break in a way that tosses them all around in the car.

Steve is about to make a comment to her about safe driving, when he notices what made her react like that. The door to the cabin is open, the glass broken and on the walls is smeared in red spray paint the word FAG next to it is MURDERER.

His blood runs cold as he stumbles out of the car, aware of the kids behind him, who now see what has been done to his cabin. There has always been the sense that the cabin still belongs to Hopper in a way, his presence felt in location, security measures and room. However, looking at it now, Steve has never felt more like he owns it.

His cabin is his home. His safe space. He loves living there, finally having a place of his own that he can exist in without judgment or prying eyes, only letting in those that he wants there. And now that has been violated.

In his horror, he hasn’t even realized what that could mean for Eddie, who had been hidden there, until Dustin is running past him, calling out: “Eddie? Eddie!”

Without thinking, he snaps his arm up and grabs the back of Dustin’s sweater. Dustin looks back, frowning and looking offended as he exclaims: “What the hell, dude! Eddie might be in there. We need to find him.”

“I know,” Steve replies. “But maybe there is someone else in there too.”

That gets everyone’s attention as they look from Steve to the cabin, its open door now looking like a gaping maw instead of a welcoming entrance beckoning.

So far no one has commented on what is painted on the cabin, but Steve feels the words’ judgment as he takes the lead. When there is danger, Steve knows what to do. When they might get hurt, Steve is in the front.

Inside, the whole cabin is overturned. His couches are shoved to the side and blankets are strewn around. In the kitchen all the cabinets are open. Looking into the bathroom, he sees the shower curtains have been pulled down.

The doors to his own room and Hopper’s room are cracked open. His own room is better for hiding, so he pushes the one open first. His heart beats in his chest and he hates that he does not have a weapon as he waits for someone to jump him. The door creaking slightly.

Empty.

His closet is open, clothes tossed around. His bed is a mess and the window is open. But the room is abandoned, no one is there.

Hopper’s room has met the same fate and Steve curses whoever has done this. How dare they invade Hopper’s place. El’s last memory of her dad. Her one wish for this cabin in which she found kindness and love. He vows to clean up everything to how it had been when all this is behind them, so El can still come home properly.

“It’s abandoned,” he calls out. The words a relief as well as a mystery, a terrible mystery. The cabin might not have a threat, but Eddie has disappeared to and none of them know where he might be and what might have happened to him.

“Where is Eddie?” Dustin asks, sounding scared. Steve immediately hates how he sounds. Hates how he doesn’t have an answer. Hates how he is focusing on keeping himself from panicking so he can’t focus on finding an answer.

“I can’t see his clothes anywhere,” Nancy says. “Maybe he took them and ran.”

“Why would they even come here?” Robin asks.

“Who came here?”

“The basketball team,” Lucas speak up and they all look at him. He explains: “It must have been them. They’re on a war path. They think Eddie killed one of their own. They want his blood.”

“But Eddie didn’t do it,” Dustin points out.

“Well they don’t know that, do they?” Lucas snaps. “All they know Patrick died in his trailer with only him there. They hate his guts, Dustin. Just like they hate yours and now mine and Steve’s and everyone who has ever dared to not be cool and popular.”

It’s quiet, Dustin looks as if he’s been slapped in the face, staring at Lucas as they both breathe heavily.

Lucas then looks away and says: “And I wanted to be part of them, just so I wouldn’t be hated by them. They’re hunting us right now. I’m- I’m sorry, I should have listen to you and Mike. I was just so tired of the bullying.”

Steve readies himself to step in if Dustin makes a wrong move. He knows how Lucas has been struggling and he doesn’t want Dustin to ruin this. But he is pleasantly surprised when Dustin replies: “Hey, I get it. If I had more hand eye coordination I might try your method too.”

That gets a huffed laugh out of Lucas and he holds out his hand that Dustin shakes, before pulling Lucas into a hug.

Right when they let go, the radio that has been left by the party so Eddie could contact them, which has now been abandoned on the table, crackles to life. Eddie’s voice says: “Dustin, can you hear me? Stevie? Wheeler?”

Dustin fumbles for the radio, clicking it on with a breathless: “Eddie! Holy shit. Are you okay? Over.”

“Nah, man. Pretty- Pretty goddamn far from okay,” Eddie replies. He sounds rough, shaken up, but not hurt. Steve hates that he is relieved by the emotional devoid tone, because it at least means that Eddie is safe.

“Where is he?” Nancy asks.

“Where are you? Over,” Dustin repeats.

“Skull Rock,” Eddie answers. “Do you know it?”

They do know where that is, so they tell Eddie they’re coming. Steve slips on a comforting sweater, needing something soothing right now. He also grabs his nail bat from under his bed. Something made Eddie flee, it cannot be good and he wants his bat with him.

The walk is silent at the start. Steve keeps thinking back of his cabin, on how they knew to look there, knew to target him. That the kids saw what had been spray painted on the front.

Robin must feel his gloomy mood, because she slides up next to him and takes his hand. She squeezes it and he squeezes back. A gesture of silent support. She knows what is going through his head, she gets his fear and she is here for him every step of the way.

Chrissy also catches up with them, bumping her shoulder against his as she takes off one of the headphones. She quietly asks: “Are you okay?”

He looks at her, concerned eyes looking back. Chrissy has always been too kind for her own good honestly. So caring. He smiles at her and says: “I will be. This isn’t the worst that happened this week.”

“I know, but you can still be upset,” Chrissy tells him.

Steve hadn’t fully considered that. Sure, he is upset, but they have to move on. The town is getting worse and Vecna is still on the loose. They have to stop him and clear Eddie’s name without anyone getting hurt, so they don’t have time for Steve to mope. Chrissy makes it sound easy though, like of course he is allowed to be upset.

“Thanks,” he nods. Then is quiet for a beat, before he says: “I just don’t get why they always have to come back when I think I’ve gotten rid of them. I haven’t even done anything.”

“Well, you did house Eddie, you know. I think they don’t care about anything else you might have done,” Robin pipes up, then winces. “Bad comment.”

“It’s okay, Robs,” Steve laughs. He doesn’t mind her off the cuff comments. They can be quite funny and are a quirk of her. He doesn’t get annoyed, he only snaps if he feels under stress or hurt and she often knows when not to push.

“I also don’t think it would have mattered,” Chrissy adds. “I know those guys, if they’re convinced of something, they won’t stop chasing it. You’re just collateral.”

And Steve has been part of that crowd for years, witnessed them from Chrissy’s perspective for half a year and has been their target for a while now. He knows how they can be. How they don’t need evidence that it’s true, just the knowledge that it hurts. He sighs: “I know.”

“It’s gonna be okay, dingus,” Robin assures him with a soft grin.

“Yeah, I’m sure they won’t do anything with that weapon on you,” Chrissy says, nodding the nail bat he has been swinging absentmindedly.

He looks down at it and laughs, a bit surprised, he had forgotten he is carrying it and that is registers as scary. The nail bat for him is protection, not something to be afraid of. He smiles: “Yeah, I can take them.”

“Like that Russian guard,” Robin pipes up and Chrissy raises her brow at them when Steve nods in agreement.

“But I don’t want to kill anyone,” Steve amends. The bat is for non-human monsters, the kind that don’t stay down after a hit. Steve doesn’t think if he can stomach it if he’s responsible for someone seriously getting hurt, or worse.

“Yeah, yeah,” Robin waves him away. “At some point you gotta stop pulling punches, dingus. I am not capable of saving you if you throw yourself in danger like a dumbass. Look at these arms,” she shakes her arm in his face, “noodles! Incapable of fighting a grown man.”

Steve starts to laugh at Robin. Then Chrissy comments: “I think you could fight someone. You’re pretty strong, Robs.”

The look on Robin’s face is incredible. She turns entirely red and splutters a bit. Steve is now fully laughing at her and she shoves him away with a loud: “Shut up, dingus.”

“Okay, okay,” Steve laughs, putting his hands up as backs away. He wants to laugh a little bit at Robin’s expense, not out her.

He realizes that with them there, he has forgotten a little about why he was in a mood and now he can pay more attention to where they are. He calls out to Dustin: “Hey, we’re going in the wrong way.”

“No we’re not,” Dustin stubbornly replied.

“Dude, I’m telling you, you’re taking us the wrong way,” Steve says, walking a bit faster to catch up with Dustin.

“It’s North. I’m positive. I checked the map,” Dustin tells him in that way that tells Steve Dustin thinks he knows best.

A little annoyed, Steve points out: “You do realize Skull Rock is a super popular make out spot?”

“Yeah, so?”

“Yeah, well, it wasn’t popular, until I made it popular, alright? I practically invented it,” Steve informs him. “We’re heading in the wrong direction.”

He starts walking in the right direction, Dustin might be smart, but Steve knows he’s right here, so he doesn’t listen as Dustin complains: “Steve. Where are you going? Steve!”

“Stop whining,” he just tells Dustin as he waves everyone to come with him. “Let’s go. Trust me.”

Reluctantly Dustin follows as do the others as Steve leads them through a familiar forest. He turned Skull Rock into a make out spot when he was still King Steve, before Nancy he kissed many girls there, wondering why it never really felt like the movies.

Dustin is now walking next to him, looking a little sulkily down at his compass. Steve knows he’ll get over it if he gives him a moment, so he lets him stew as they walk side by side.

Sporadically he turns back to check on everyone. Lucas and Max are seemingly having a good conversation, Chrissy and Robin are joking around as well and Nancy is diligently watching the rear. He makes eye contact with her and she sends him a smile, he smiles back before looking ahead again, wondering why that made him uneasy.

Before he can think too much about it, Dustin suddenly says: “Was Lucas right? You know, when he said the basketball team hates you for not being cool and popular? That doesn’t make sense. You are cool.”

Steve’s heart constricts at that. He knows that Dustin has always looked up to him and he loves the blind faith the boy puts in him. It’s one of the few things he has never wanted to take from any of the kids; their trust in him.

“I’m glad you think so, dude,” Steve says as he scrambles for what else to say.

Dustin shoots him an annoyed look and complains: “Steveee,” obviously realizing how Steve is deflecting.

“Henderson,” Steve counters snappily, before taking a breath. He doesn’t want to fight with Dustin right now, he is too worried about Eddie and being a target himself, so he amends: “It wasn’t the worst, I just lost a fight against Billy and the results were very publicly visible. There isn’t really a social recovery from that.”

“But you’re Steve,” Dustin says, like that means anything. And to Dustin, it probably does.

“I am,” Steve smiles, unable to help the sadness that clings to his voice.

“You are like the coolest guy, I remember Mike yammering on about it when you and Nancy got together,” Dustin replies. “And Billy should have left you alone after Max’s threat.”

“He did, he did,” Steve lies. “Rumors just fly and I was loosing popularity long before that. It just happens sometimes, no big deal. Didn’t you say yourself that popularity is just a construct for high schoolers.”

“I mean, yeah,” Dustin agrees and Steve is glad he is seemingly letting it go, though never entirely of course. “But the basketball team are high schoolers. We need to get into their heads.”

“Dustin, you’re also a high schooler,” Steve points out, faintly amused by the turn this conversation has taken, but feeling the fear creep into his chest as well. He doesn’t want Dustin to press about the basketball team, doesn’t want to lie to him, doesn’t want to think about telling him the truth either.

“It’s different,” Dustin protests.

“Sure it is, buddy,” Steve tells him, going for condescending in the hope Dustin will get offended and defend himself instead of asking further.

“It is,” Dustin insists, taking the bait. “Because I am a mature person, who is above popularity contests, while basketball players by the virtue of being a basketball player, obviously do care, therefore are susceptible to those sort of things. In order to get into their minds, we have to understand that.”

“Lucas plays basketball,” Steve points out the flaws in Dustin’s logic. It’s hilarious that the kid is calling himself mature when he is so clearly kid-like on some fronts.

“He doesn’t count.”

“How so?”

“Well, he came to his senses and saw he was wrong.”

“And what about me?”

“You are on thin ice, but you also distanced yourself – I’m proud of you for that by the way.”

“Oi, don’t get cocky with me now, you little shit!”

“I’m not!” Dustin squawks, then immediately amends: “Well, maybe a little bit. But I’m almost always right.”

“Really?” Steve raises a brow.

“Yeah, like right now,” Dustin replies. “I checked the map and compass a thousand times, Steve. We need to head North and right now we’re not going North. We’re never going to find Eddie like this, I mean it.”

In a twist of beautiful irony, they come up on Skull Rock. Steve doesn’t answer Dustin directly, just exclaims: “Oh boom. Bada bing, bada boom. There she is, Henderson. Skull Rock. In your face, man, in your stupid, cocky little face.”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Dustin frowns, because he is a know it all, who can never be wrong.

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve waves him away as he scans the place for Eddie. “Even with it staring you right in the face, you can’t admit it. Can’t admit you’re wrong, you butthead.”

“I concur,” a voice says behind them and they whip around, only to be filled with relief when it is Eddie, unharmed and well. He grins: “You, Dustin Henderson, are a total butthead.”

Steve shouldn’t find his little breath and the way he hoist up his jeans hot, but he does, so he just stares dumbly at Eddie for a second, as Dustin says: “Jesus, we thought you were a goner.” He pulls Eddie into a hug while Steve pulls himself together.

He watches as Eddie hugs back and hears the exhausted tone in Eddie’s voice as he replies: “Yeah, me too, man. Me too.”

His heart aches for Eddie, who is obviously going through hell. He just had to flee from Steve’s cabin, a place they thought he would be safe. A place Steve thought, he would be safe. And now that is gone.

It is gone and all the emotions that he had managed to forget while bickering with Dustin come bubbling right back up. He doesn’t know what has happened, but he will never forget arriving at the cabin and seeing it like that, just like his car at graduation. The image is something that will stick with him forever and he can’t imagine what it was like for Eddie to be present as they did it.

Needing to remind himself that Eddie made it out okay, that Steve isn’t alone in what happened and that they’re both shaken up, but have each other, he lets his bat fall and reaches out and pulls Eddie into a hug.

The action is a little clumsy with Eddie stumbling as Steve pulls him in, needing to steady himself before he is able to hug back. But when he does, it’s soothing. Steve can feel parts of his shoulders unclench as he feels Eddie’s warmth under his hands, his breaths against his skin, the way Eddie holds on to his sweater.

“I am so glad you’re okay,” he whispers fiercely. “I- I got so scared when I saw the cabin. They- they graffiti-ed it, broke my front door. Fuck- Eds, they got in.”

Eddie rubs a soothing hand down Steve’s spine. Steve feels kind of guilty, because he should be comforting Eddie right now and instead Eddie is comforting him, but it’s too nice to step away from. Especially when Eddie whispers back: “I’m okay now, sweetheart. We’re okay. I’m sorry about your cabin.”

Steve lets out a laugh, it’s a little hysteric and a little too close to a sob, but it’s a laugh. He steps back before he can get emotional in front of everyone and tries to play it off. “I do not care about my cabin right now, dude.”

He catches Eddie’s eye, heart fluttering when Eddie grins at him the moment their eyes meet. Eddie pats his pockets with a twinkle in his eyes as he says: “I’m glad about that, don’t think I can pay you back right now.”

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Steve informs him.

Before Eddie can reply to that or defend himself, they are interrupted by an indignant Dustin, who demands to know: “How long has this been going on?”

“What?” Eddie asks, like he honestly has no fucking clue what Dustin is talking about, something Steve knows is a lie, because the edge of a dimple is showing.

“This- this canoodling!” Dustin exclaims and Steve has to bite the inside in his cheek to not laugh at the kid.

“Don’t be dramatic, Henderson,” he tells him, aloofness always coming easy to him. “My house has just been broken into, I’m allowed to be worried about the fugitive I was housing there. Maybe instead of being weird catch Eddie up on that Vector creep.”

“You-” Dustin starts, pointing at Steve in an accusing manner, before dropping it in favor of recounting all their discoveries and the absolute mess that has been the last 24 hours.

As Dustin talks the others chime in with additions to what they experienced to create a full picture for Eddie, who isn’t looking like he has much faith in the operation. Steve can understand that, especially when they move onto how to kill Vecna, for which they would have to go into the Upside Down. Something that isn’t really possible right now.

Their options look pretty bleak.

However, something in the conversation must have triggered Dustin, because he starts to pace up and down as he mutters to himself. Both Steve and Eddie track his movement with curiosity until Eddie leans in and asks: “Hey, uh, Henderson’s not, uh, cursed, is he?”

“Cursed?” Steve repeats. “No, no, he’s fine. Mental? Absolutely.”

That gets a smile out of Eddie again, though Steve can’t feel satisfaction at that, because they both startle when Dustin suddenly yells: “Boom! Bada. Bada. Boom. I was right! Skull Rock was North.”

“Seriously? You’re serious?” Steve asks. He knows Dustin is a cocky little bastard, but this is a little extreme. But Dustin hums as he nods. Steve gestures around them: “This is Skull Rock, okay?” Again that stupid little hum and nod. “You’re totally, absolutely, 100% wrong! Right now.”

“Yes,” Dustin agrees. “And no.”

“Oh my god,” Steve mutters to the sky. He can’t with this kid sometimes. Next to him Eddie snorts at his misery, the traitor.

“This worked correctly when we left the Wheeler’s house. Correct when we got in the car on Curly, but it started to slip the further East we went. Now it’s way off,” Dustin explains. “When I was leading us here, I wasn’t wrong. The compass was.”

“So you’re using faulty equipment. You’re still wrong,” Steve argues, feeling a little silly, but also annoyed. He is right, goddammit. He found Skull Rock. He won’t let Dustin take that from him. He needs the win.

But then the conversation quickly devolves into something Steve can’t follow and he is reminded of just how smart Lucas is as well when the kid easily catches Dustin’s drift. Steve can barely follow the first part, but he does get that there might be another gate.

“Snack sized gate,” Robin nods, also understanding and Steve loves her and her wonderful, dorky mind. Chrissy obviously does too with the way she snorts at that.

“How? Why?” he asks instead, because those are valid questions. Portals are never good news. The only times Steve has seen portals is when monsters crawl out them.

“No idea,” Dustin answers honestly. “All I know is that something is causing this disturbance and the last time we’ve seen anything like it, it was a gate. And I hope it is, because then we’d have a way to Vecna. And a shot at freeing Chrissy and Max from this curse.”

With those words, he starts to walk away and fear grips Steve immediately. He calls out: Where are you going? Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey.” Dustin stops and looks back at him. “Eddie’s still a wanted man, who got attacked, I might add. We can’t just go hike in the woods.”

“This little steel capsule,” Dustin holds up the compass like the dramatic nerd that he is, “might be the key to saving Chrissy, Max and Eddie.” He focuses his attention to Eddie, who has been disappearing a little into the background, which is unlike him. “What say you, Eddie the Banished?” Dustin asks him.

“I say, you’re asking me to follow you into Mordor, which – if I’m totally straight with you – I think is a really bad idea,” Eddie tells Dustin and Steve nods, glad the other isn’t letting the kid run towards danger. “But, uh, the Shire- the Shire is burning.”

Steve feels his insides plummet at that, he vaguely recalls this from one of Eddie’s rambles and it sounds like he is going to agree with Dustin. Something that is confirmed to Steve when Dustin starts to jump excitedly like an idiot. Eddie gets up and it feels like the beginning of the end as he says: “So Mordor it is.”

Everyone takes that as a sign to start moving and Steve picks up his bat as he mutters: “What’s Mordor?” to himself, watching Eddie forget his stuff and run back. A little bitchily he says: “Get your stuff, dude. Let’s go.”

He feels like he’s allowed to be annoyed with Eddie for agreeing to Dustin’s bullshit.

During their walk through the forest, Dustin drags Eddie along with him, excited about the prospect of adventure. Eddie doesn’t look wholly convinced, but Steve isn’t saving him either. Eddie dug his own grave, let him lie in it.

Steve, meanwhile, is watching the rear of the group. The bat swings casually, the weight comforting in his hand. If anyone tries anything, he at least won’t be unarmed.

Eddie never really said what happened at the cabin, but that only makes Steve worry more. Eddie is never quiet. Whatever happened, Steve won’t mind making Jason loose a few teeth.

It’s dark by the time Dustin has lead them to the edge of the lake, right to where Fred must have died. Nancy looks a little green and clings to Steve’s arm, who supports her. After Barb this can’t be easy on her.

“There’s a gate in Lover’s Lake?” Max asks, voicing their confusion out loud.

“Whenever the demogorgon attacked, it always left an opening,” Nancy says, having pulled herself together into her mask of professionalism. “Maybe Vecna’s the same way.”

“Yeah, only one way to find out,” Steve says, not liking where his night is going, because if there is a gate on the bottom of that Lake, Steve knows who is going to check it out. And that is him. He’s not letting anyone else do it, even if he hates the idea of doing it himself.

They go look for a boat unearthing one near the docks. Eddie and Steve carry it to the water, it’s not a big boat, can fit maybe five people, max. Not all of them can go.

It’s clear the others have noticed too, but no one comments on it as Robin steps in, before helping Chrissy aboard as well, then Nancy. Steve wants to protest that, but is distracted by Eddie climbing past him, who is followed by Dustin.

Well, Dustin attempts to follow him. Eddie, however, stops him in his tracks with: “Hey, hey, hey, are you trying to sink us? This thing holds four people, tops. Okay?”

“It’s better this way. You guys stay here with Max. Keep an eye out for trouble,” Nancy explains and Steve realizes they mean to leave him behind there. Just the babysitter again.

“You keep an eye out,” Dustin snarks back, not wanting to be left behind. “It’s my theory.”

“They’re right, Dustin. Leave it,” he speaks up, already thinking about he is going to get aboard as he stealthily puts his nail bat in the boat.

“Since when are you on their side,” Dustin exclaims.

“Since they’re talking sense,” Steve rolls his eyes at Dustin.

“Yeah, listen to Nance,” Robin tells Dustin from where she is making Chrissy more comfortable on the boat.

“Who put her in charge?” Dustin asks, indignantly.

“I did,” Robin replies cheerily and Steve has to work not to laugh at that bitchy comment.

With that Dustin gives in and hands over the compass to Nancy, though he obviously does not want to and will make that clear to everyone. Steve doesn’t care if he complains about it for the rest of his life, as long as he stays away from the danger.

Steve pushes off the boat and quick steps aboard. Eddie has left a space open for him, obviously anticipating this while Nancy frowns, which Steve ignores in favor of apologizing to Dustin, whom he is leaving behind, much to Dustin’s dismay.

Nancy is less annoyed with his presence on the boat when he and Eddie start paddling so the three girls can investigate the waters to look if they see anything.

After a little bit, the compass starts going wild. They have found the gate. Well, probably. They still don’t know for sure. Robin is checking in with Dustin in the most Robin-like manner, informing Dustin that: “Your compass has gone from wonky to wonky with a capital ‘ahh!’”

She hasn’t realized what that means yet, but Steve has, so he is already taking off his shoes and socks, wanting to get ahead of protests before anyone can notice. Nancy, of course, notices: “Steve, what are you doing?”

“Somebody’s gotta go down there and check this out,” he informs them, hoping he sounds authoritative enough for them to let him go. “Unless one of you four can top being a Hawkins High swim co-captain and certified lifeguard for three years, then it’s gotta be me. No complaints, alright?”

“Hey, I’m not complaining,” Eddie backs him up, though Steve thinks that is more out of fear, which he can’t blame the guy for, especially as he watches him fumble with his pocket, probably looking for a smoke.

“I do not want to go down there,” Chrissy agrees, looking anxiously at the blackness pooling all around them.

Steve takes of his sweater, hearing crinkles behind him. When he turns around, Eddie is the source of the noise. He is holding some cigarettes like Steve suspected, but he has also tied a plastic bag around a flashlight so Steve will be able to see down there. Eddie offers it to him with a soft: “Hey. Good luck.”

And it hits Steve that what he is about to do is dangerous. He might not come back, he might not see any of them again.

With lead in his heart, he takes the flashlight from Eddie, letting their fingers touch. Then he looks at Robin, imprinting what she looks like in his mind, before doing the same to Chrissy. He turns back to Eddie then, decides to be a little bold, since it might be the last time.

So, he gives Eddie a one over, getting stuck on his lips between which now is a cigarette, before looking in those deep, dark, beautiful eyes. He winks and says: “Thanks,” before diving into the cold water.

Steve swims down, muscle memory taking over as he searches for the gate. He finds it looking gross and glowing. Sickly in the lake bed. He reaches out to touch it, feeling oddly compelled to do so, startling back when it seems something is trying to reach back.

He needs to get away from it, he thinks wildly, as he kicks off from the bottom and breaks back out on top. He holds on to the side of the boat and reports: “I found it.”

The four, who he must have startled by his sudden appearance, lean back towards him and ask: “You found it?”

“I found it. Yeah, I found it,” Steve confirms, still panting slightly from his time without air, his heart beating fast after the scare. He wants to get out of this water. And soon.

He is about to ask for a hand back onto the boat, needing to tell them to get out of there, because the gate looks out of place. Dangerous. When he feels something wrap around his leg. His eyes grow wide and he catches Robin looking back.

Her excited exclamation to Dustin dies on her lips and she reaches back out to him, the question about whether he is okay never reaching his ears as the something yanks him down.

Steve struggles and fights, but it’s no use. The water around him turns into a slimy feeling as Steve is dragged through the gate. Into the Upside Down.

~~

A/N:

I love conversations between people too much, which gets in the way of plot, but we are getting there, no matter how slow!!!

[lion-hearted-wolf]

“She was the smell after the rain; a promise of a new life.” (d.j.) →  AU in which Chrissy lives the beautiful, peaceful life she deserves, in a lovely new home full of books and flowers, and with her loved one(s) beside her.  ♥