#Eddie can talk loud sing loud and listen to loud music

[missjashin]

Wayne finding Eddie and Steve sleeping together and he is taken aback but not because Eddie sleeping with a boy or not even because he is sleeping with Harrington. No, he is taken aback because the boy is sleeping soundly with Eddie. His Eddie. Who happens to be snoring like a jackhammer.

And yet there Steve is. His head resting on the juncture of Eddie’s neck and shoulder, basically having his ear right on the level of Eddie’s mouth, but face relaxed like nothing has ever bothered him in his life.

[dynamic-power]

Steve is mostly deaf by the time he is 20. One more concussion during the last stand against the upside down stole his sense from him.

It's a struggle. But his friends are amazing. Robin and Dustin and Eddie learn sign language with him, and eventually, all of the party knows enough that he never feels left out of conversations.

He can still hear some low sounds. Robin's voice is lost to him, but Eddie's is low enough that he can still hear the timbre of it. He can still hear music with low pitches, too; he develops a new appreciation for rock and metal music.

It gives Eddie an idea. One afternoon, he drags Steve to Gareth's garage, where he sets up Jeff's bass guitar and an amp. He shows Steve how to hold it, how to pluck at the strings, and how to play a basic scale. Half an hour later, Steve is laser focused, sitting on the amp and listening and feeling the low thrum of the guitar.

A week after that, Steve drags Eddie to Indy to buy one of his own.

He sets it up in his garage, and he and Eddie spend hours playing together. Eddie teaches him as much as he can, but there is a lot that Steve has to figure out for himself. He's never had a challenge quite like this one, and he finds himself loving it.

He finds himself loving his time with Eddie, too. Eddie is funny and awkward and talkative, even with his hands. He's passionate about music and is an eager and enthusiastic teacher. They add dinner nights to their routine afternoon jam sessions, and Steve discovers Eddie is also very physically affectionate when he doesn't have a guitar in his hands.

One evening, as they are reclining on Steve's couch with the radio turned up way too loud, Eddie starts to sing along with the song. Steve doesn't really think about it. He just leans over and presses his ear to Eddie's chest, listening to the low pitch of his voice. If Eddie thinks it's weird, he doesn't say anything. After a while, his arm wraps around Steve's shoulders and holds him close. The song changes, but Steve doesn't move, and Eddie doesn't stop humming along.

It's easy after that. Easy to exist in Eddie's personal space, easy to fall for his goofy smile, easy to realize his new favorite spot is sitting in his garage beside Eddie.

And when Eddie's hands are flying as he tells Steve about this new song he's writing, it's easy to lean over and kiss him.

[blushweddinggowns]

I'm all for the angsty overhearing a conversation trope where it's all sad because of a misunderstanding. But I also love the opposite. Overhearing a conversation where the other person is just singing their praises. Especially with Steve and Eddie.

Like Steve being very aware that he likes Eddie, but way too afraid of rejection to actually do anything about it. So he just pines away, and gets closer and closer to him with the full expectation of it never going anywhere. Until one day, he comes to pick Dustin up from Hellfire too early, and he can hear everyone talking through the door. About him. But mostly it's Eddie, his loud voice carrying across the room. And he's just raving about him, and somehow managing to bring him up in conversations that have nothing to do with him.

Do you remember that time Steve saved my life by shoving my guts back into my body? Yeah, that's the level of skill and luck you're going to need to survive this.

Did you guys know that Steve actually gave me this background music? He's weirdly knowledgeable about classical stuff. Isn't that cool? He's so smart and-oh, yeah, the merchant agrees to the deal.

So uh, is Steve maybe seeing anyone? He isn't right? Like he would tell me if he was, wouldn't he?

And he doesn't give a single fuck at the collective groaning of the group whenever he gets going, never failing to pull out the I almost Died saving the world with you card to get them to shut up. And by the time it actually ends, Steve is a glowing, blushing mess who can't stop smiling.

Or the other way around. With Eddie full on assuming he has 0 shot because Steve's, Steve.

The golden boy who could obviously never be into him like that, or any other guy for that matter. So he doesn't do anything about his feelings, he just hangs out with him more and more and falls for him more and more, waiting for the inevitable day when he gets a girlfriend and his fantasies could finally die. Except one day, he spends the night at Steve's, but he isn't in bed when he wakes up. He goes to find him, just to hear him downstairs loudly talking to Robin. Because neither of them know the concept of inside voices when they're together. And he waits at the top, listening in just for the fuck of it, but mostly because he doesn't want to interrupt.

"I just feel like bed sharing the way you guys do is gay as hell," Robin sighed, "Especially at your age. Also, should we even be talking about this with him in the house?"

And before Eddie has time to freak out over that and the possibility he's gotten caught with his feelings, Steve is already answering, "I know right? And don't worry about it, he sleeps like the dead. But I don't know what to do about it. He still hasn't done anything. Am I just reading this whole thing wrong?"

"Well you could try making the first move instead of trying to trick him into doing it," Robin tried.

"And ruin our friendship incase I'm wrong? Yeah, no. Besides, I go like, full dumbass around him when I'm nervous. He's too hot. I'd probably walk into a wall in the middle of professing my undying love."

"Yeah," Robin sighed, "You probably would."

And Eddie is just having a moment upstairs. A full on I think I may have to jump for joy moment. Or even, I think I'm five seconds away from squealing like a teenage girl moment.

Yeah, I like that shit.

[sp0o0kylights]

Wayne takes in a Beat to Shit Steve Harrington after Starcourt as n Owed Favor to Hopper Part 4

Part Three: link

First Chapter (parts 1-3 on tumblr) on A03: Link

The kid was madder than a wet hen.

Just as slippery as one too, when he got like this--music pulsing like a living thing to signal all his rage and upset. 

Not like Wayne hadn’t expected it. 

He just wished it wasn’t quite so damn loud. 

The music had started up almost immediately after Eddie had stormed to his room, startling Steve awake and nearly making Wayne curse for it.

Normally it was a good thing--music meant Eds was willing to listen instead of heading for the hills.  

Normally, they didn't have a house guest who looked like he'd gone ten rounds with a bear.

They had a routine for this, was the thing and the music was a key part of it. It worked all the edges off for Wayne, and he'd long figured out that about thirty minutes was a the perfect length of time for Eddie to stew before he could actually talk things through.

Given the hand Harrington put to his forehead, Wayne wasn't eager to give him that thirty minutes.

Not when Steve deserved little peace he could have.

Unfortunately, so did Eds. 

Still.

 Strutting through the door and demanding to talk right now was a bad move and so, with a sympathetic look given to Steve, Wayne did what he did best

Gave space.

Let Eddie rage, as Wayne got up and shuffled about the kitchen.

Pulled out the soft earplugs he pretended weren’t there for Eds to steal (playing that damn loud guitar all the time could not be good for his ears) and offered them to Steve, before making two cups of what Wayne privately thought was the Munson “chitchat” drink. 

One cup of hot water, one packet swiss miss, a small amount of maple syrup drizzled in, topped with little marshmallows they reserved for these types of situations. 

Wayne took his time with it, thinking through what he wanted to say. 

‘I understand that this is a screen door on a submarine kind of situation...’ 

Nope. 

‘Son I know you hate listening to anyone for anything but this is serious...’ 

Absolutely not--that would end up with the boy bolting for sure. 

‘Ed’s, I love you but could we please turn Ozzy off while we talk? That man wails louder than any damn cat I have ever met.’

That one was purely self indulgent, mostly because the wall was starting to shake. 

Wayne put the finishing touches on the cocoa before staring at both of them. 

Perhaps if he stared the Garfield mug in its eyes hard enough, the right words would come through. 

They did not.

He kept trying, standing there long enough for the cocoa to reasonably have cooled and for Eddie’s song to flip over to something with more screaming in it than singing. 

Wayne supposed that this was the hardest part of being a parent. You just didn’t get to have the magical one liner. The right thing to say at just the right time.  

The joke that would ease all the tension and let things progress forward nice and easy.

Instead, you got to fumble your way through the dark with a flashlight up your ass and hope you were going in the right-ish direction. Ideally without making things worse. 

Wayne was here though, and that had to count for something. 

(Knew it counted for something--because Eddie was still here. 

They had cleared hurdles far higher than this when it came to trust. They’d get through this too, come what may. 

Steve too.)

“Can I just ask,” Eddie started, aggressive as always when Wayne finally gave in and entered his room, feeling all sorts of awful for the migraine Steve had to have, “what the absolute fuck is happening?” 

Sure as fire he was sitting on his bed, leg bouncing a mile a minute.

An unlit cigarette hung between two fingers, looking a little chewed on, but otherwise undisturbed--as it should be, because one of Wayne’s few rules was that smoke stayed outside the house. 

“You could.” Wayne said loudly but agreeably, as he turned himself around and dropped down next to his kid.  

Held out the Garfield mug, and was happy when it was taken from him. 

“Figured you might have other things to say, though.” 

Likely a lot of things. 

It was as good an opening as any, and his kid didn’t disappoint, launching right to it. 

“Why is he here and not at a hospital?”

 ‘Here’ was punctuated by Ed’s hand winging towards the door, and while it wasn’t the righteous fury Wayne expected, it was at least, an easy answer to give. 

“Steve has some people looking for him. Bad people. Hospital makes him an easy target.” 

Wayne was still talking loud. Could only hear Eddie himself because he was looking at the kid’s lips more than he was actually hearing his voice. 

Eddie took that in, swallowing it about as well as he’d swallowed anything he hadn’t liked. 

And thank the stars above, he finally reached a hand out and turned the music down. Not a lot--Steve wouldn’t be able to hear them over all this--but enough that Wayne didn’t have to struggle. 

“We’re hiding him from the cops now?!” Ed’s spat. 

“Cops know he’s here. Hopper’s the one who asked me to take him.” Wayne reminded him, because it was the truth. 

Not the full truth, but given how Ed’s pissed off half the local PD on a good day, Wayne absolutely did not want to see his nephew take on Federal Agents.

(Particularly not the kind who were going ‘round killing kids.) 

“So--what?” Eddie yanked hard on his hair, a gesture that looked less intentional and more like he was trying to fight his own anger down. “Hopper just called you up and said ‘Hey, we had a whoopsie with the rich kid, the hospital’s not safe anymore. Can we stash him with you for a few days?” 

Wayne nodded once, slow-like. 

Always remembered how too fast movements had made Eddie flinch and jerk back when was littler, and given the way Steve was looking, figured it was a good time to be cautious again. 

“He did.”

“And you just--agreed? Just like that!?” 

“I did.” 

He pretended not to see Eddie boggle at him at the simple admission, so furious that he seemed to struggle for words when he normally had too many to say. 

Wayne took advantage. 

“We did talk a bit more than that, I’ll admit.”

Ed’s scoffed. “About the weather I’m sure.” 

“‘Bout trust.” 

Eddie blinked at that. 

“Trust.” He echoed flatly. 

“What have I always told you? People like to ask you to trust them, but you they don’t get to have it until--” 

“They provide proof or a reason.” Eddie finished with an eyeroll. “So which did Hopper provide then?”

Wayne took a noisy sip of his coca. Smacked his lips a little before saying: “Both.” 

Didn’t bother to say anything else, because he knew Eddie would finish the thought for him. 

“One of them was me, wasn’t it.” 

Eds didn’t say it like a question, but Wayne hummed in agreement anyway. 

He wasn’t gonna shame his boy, but he wasn’t gonna sugar coat Eddie’s involvement in this either. Not when he’d already admitted that was half the reason Hopper had gone to Wayne to begin with. 

“No one is expecting Steve to be here.” He said, seeing the chance to hammer home the most important part of this entire shitshow. “So long as no one finds out he’s here, he’ll be safe. Everyone will be safe.” 

Steve from the Feds who were hunting him for while he was busy being involved in shit he couldn’t control and Eddie because he had a mouth that most people didn’t like. 

Not small town people anyway, and absolutely not authority figures with guns. 

“Who’s even after him?” Eddie was theatrical as always, hands waving away as he talked. “Did he make a deal with the mob? Piss off some other rich guy? I know it’s not anything drug related, I’d have heard about it by now.” 

After years of experience, Wayne knew exactly how far to lean away to stay out of range, too used to his nephew talking with his entire body.

“That’s his story to tell ya, Ed’s. It ain’t mine. Same way it ain’t my place to tell him your story.” 

That at least got the boy to think for a minute. Put down that frustration he carried with him all the time, and use the brain they both knew he had. 

“How long is he staying here?”

Wayne shrugged. “Don’t know.” 

Eddie sighed and mockingly mimicked Wayne, taking an obnoxious slurp of his cocoa. “The neighbors are going to notice if he’s here more than a few days. The trailer park isn’t exactly big.” 

“They didn’t notice that time you decided to make fireballs with the cooking spray and about blew up half the driveway. Don’t think they’re gonna notice someone being quiet in the house.” 

Eddie snorted, and probably rolled his eyes again, not that Wayne could see it given the kid was looking into his own mug as he thought it all through. 

Wayne sat with him as he processed. 

Eds worked at his own pace with things, and while life at large might be against that, Wayne was happy to let him do it. Found it easier that way, then trying to poke and prod and force him like so many father figures did. 

Wayne’s patience was rewarded not even a full minute later, when Eddie turned to him and asked; 

“What if he finds out?”  

This in a quieter voice. An unsure one--words and body hunching in a way unlike the Eddie the world outside knew, but very much like the little boy Wayne had brought inside his home. 

It took Wayne  a moment to connect the dots--he’d been speaking out of the place parents and authority figures often do, and in doing so hadn’t thought much of the fact his nephew had a real secret. 

The kind small town minds didn’t like--and would kill him over. 

This all wasn’t about Wayne taking in Steve, he realized abruptly.  It was that Steve being here meant Eddie couldn’t be himself. 

Could not relax in a place he was accepted for who he was, because Wayne knew and made sure Eddie understood he was wanted here, had a place here, regardless of who he loved. 

Now, Wayne had gone and removed it.

‘Shit.’ 

“He won’t.” Wayne said. 

Knew that wasn’t enough, and so, promised: “But if he does, I’ll make sure he understands his safety here relies on your own.” 

Ed’s chin jerked in a nod, the two of them sitting in silence for a moment before the boy did as he often did when he wanted a hug but felt too awkward to ask for one, and tipped himself into Wayne’s side. 

“Thanks old man.” Eddie whispered into his shoulder and not for the first time, Wayne wished things were easier for the poor kid as he put his mug in one hand and hugged his kid with the other. 

Hoped that in the future, it would be.

Even if he had to force everyone and everything coming after him--and now Steve--to do it.

(Wondered vaguely, how bad it was that he was already getting as protective as Steve as he was of his own kid.

Probably very, given his kid clearly hated Harrington.)

xXx

Wayne took the first night of Steve’s stay off.

He wasn’t the type to use his PTO lightly. Was used to rationing it for any possible thing Eddie might need him for.

A night up sick when he was younger, to a night spent chasing him down during some of their bad spots--but the last year or so Wayne had slowly realized he hadn’t had to use it much.

He was still careful with it though, precious as it was, and was thankful for it now as it ensured his nephew didn’t murder their house guest. 

Or at the very least, didn't sit there pecking at him.

The kid might've failed English a few times, but he had a real gift with words and an even better one with insults.

(Wayne wasn't quite clear on what all the "King" jabs were about, and absolutely did not get why Steve looked far more hurt at the comment about his "sad ass floppy hair" but given the increasingly flat look Steve was throwing Eddie's way, Wayne figured it couldn't be anything good.)

Thankfully a pointed reminder about Steve's injuries had finally gotten them all some peace, enough for Harrington to drop back to sleep--and for Wayne to realize he looked a little too dead while he did it to be comfortable getting any sleep himself.

The kids chest barely moved, and that it ate at Wayne’s until he got up and shoved a hand under his nose. 

Felt his breath, and told himself the poor sod was fine. 

Hurt, absolutely, but alive. 

Over and over again, until the sun had made its rotation in the sky, bringing the morning with it.

‘Better than nightmares, I suppose.’ Wayne figured, as exhaustion scraped at his eyelids.

Those Wayne knew, would come later. When Steve’s brain caught up to the rest of him, and stopping dumping survival chemicals through his battered body. 

He'd given up on sleep entirely sometime around 1 am, and now he sat at his small kitchen table, writing out a medication schedule for Harrington so he and the kid both knew when he could have his next Tylenol. 

Wasn’t even halfway through it before Eddie made his typically late appearance and blew through his door. 

Had his back up from the moment he’d stepped a foot in the kitchen and it didn’t take a genius to see he’d worked himself into a snit again.

Unfortunately for him, whatever scenario that imaginative brain of his had cooked up fell flat to the reality that was the poor kid on the couch. 

Steve Harrington was one a hell of a sight.

Didn’t help that he was doing his level best to make himself as small as possible, curled deep into Wayne's ancient couch.

The blankets covered the ribs and hid away most of the damage, but there wasn’t much Steve could do to hide the shiners on his face--or the marks around his neck.  

Not when they’d grown worse overnight, practically inviting questions.

It was almost laughable how quickly Eddie ate whatever words he’d prepared, mouth awkwardly chewing around them as if they were tangible. 

The less-than-sneaky looks he threw at the younger teen were equally amusing, and if Wayne wasn’t trying to peace keep, he’d have given in and chuckled when Eds split attention caused him to pour half his coffee into the sink rather than a cup. 

Looked utterly lost when, after finishing putting his coffee together and grabbing some junk food thing that absolutely was not a breakfast item, he came to stand awkwardly at Wayne's shoulder, openly staring as Steve blatantly ignored him.

Eds didn’t know what to do, and Wayne couldn't blame him. 

Seemed to keep thinking he was going to encounter a boy that likely no longer existed, and whose blood tinged specter just made things sad.

Shit like this, Wayne knew, took a man’s ego and warped it, shaping it to something else entirely. 

At least for Steve, it seemed that getting wrapped up in whatever mess he had had shaped him for the better, instead of pretzeling him into something worse. That, Wayne thought, spoke to the boy's character more than anything he’d done prior. 

(It helped to know what Hopper tolerated and what he didn’t. That he’d vouched for Steve in the same way Wayne knew he’d vouched for Eddie, even if Eddie didn’t yet realize the cop he antagonized so much would do that for him.) 

That didn't erase the history his kid had with Harrington, though.

Wouldn't stop him from seeing the old Steve, first.

‘Don’t you got school?” Wayne asked when he decided Ed had stared enough. 

“Yeah, yeah.” Eddie waved him off, trotting out the door. “Bye old man, house parasite!” 

It was clearly a jab, meant to nettle, but Steve barely acted like he heard it. 

Wayne rolled his eyes. 

“Goodbye, Eds.” He said firmly, much of a warning as he ever gave, and fondly watched his nephew scuttle out the door. 

Turned to see how Steve was taking things, and was once again given a reminder that Steve wasn’t doing a hell of a lot other than feeling his injuries. 

“I think I promised you a game, son.”  Wayne said gently, startling Steve out of the distant, dim look he had trained on the wall. 

It wasn’t a lot to offer in terms of a distraction, but it would have to do.

[sparkle-fiend]

Eddie is six years old, the first time he hears the voice. 

It wakes him with a jolt – sends him tearing through the house, searching under every bed and behind every door for the boy he hears calling his name.

Mama finally stops him. “Sweetheart, what did you lose this time?” (Eddie is always losing things.) She looks impatient, standing with a laundry basket balanced on one cocked hip, curly hair spilling out of the messy bun on top of her head.

“I heard somebody saying my name! I gotta find him, I think he’s hiding.”

Mama’s whole attitude changes, all at once. She sets the laundry aside and drops to her knees in front of him, squeezing his little hands between her own. “Oh baby. That voice means you’ve got a soulmate!”

She smiles bright as the suncatcher hanging in the window, and presses sloppy kisses all over his face until he screams with laughter, squirming to get away. 

“My lucky, special boy!”

Eddie’s never been lucky before. It’s exciting.

———

In school, they learn all about soulmates. About how rare they are. Uncle Wayne is the only other person Eddie knows that has one. 

When he found out about Uncle Wayne’s soulmate, Eddie was so excited – bubbling full of questions, like a bottle of fizzy pop. But whenever he tried to talk about it, his dad got real mad.

“You keep your mouth shut about soulmates,” he said. “Don’t talk about that shit in front of your uncle.”

It’s hard. Eddie starts staying over at Uncle Wayne’s trailer more and more when Mama gets sick. And Eddie’s never been good at following rules; especially when he’s curious about something.

“Uncle Wayne?” Eddie finally asks one day. “Where’s your soulmate? How come I’ve never seen her?” You have met her right? is what Eddie’s really asking. He can’t imagine waiting until he’s as old as Uncle Wayne to find his soulmate.

His uncle goes sort of brittle, tensing up like every joint is made of glass. His lips press together behind his beard, and his denim blue eyes go shiny and wet – like he’s trying not to cry.

If Eddie could take the question back, he would. Suck it right back into his mouth, like the smoke from his uncle’s cigarettes. This is why you gotta listen better baby – that’s what his Mama would probably say.

“My Lorretta died a few years ago. Before you were born.”

Eddie never considered that. In all the movies, soulmates die together. The thought of it leaves a queasy feeling squirming through his stomach.

“I still hear her though,” Uncle Wayne says, with a terribly soft look in his eyes. “Still hear her singing our song.”

“Like a memory?” Eddie whispers.

His uncle shakes his head. “Time don’t matter for soulmates – no more than distance. I can hear her still, across the years.”

Like a ghost, his uncle doesn’t say. A ghost that will haunt him forever. None of the dry textbooks in school ever mentioned that part.

It starts to worry Eddie. As he gets older, his soulmate’s voice starts to get clearer. He always hears the same thing – a desperate, grown-up voice screaming at him to “Run Eddie! RUN!!!” 

It must be from the future. But his soulmate sounds so scared. What could possibly happen, to make his soulmate sound like that?

Eddie starts to listen to music more. Loud, heavy stuff to drown out the frightened voice. 

Late at night, he curls up under the covers and softly sings his Mama’s favorite song – hoping that somewhere, somewhen, his soulmate will hear him.

That it might help, the way it helps Eddie when Mama sings him to sleep.

———

Eddie is twelve years old, the first time he really listens to the voice.

Mama's been dead two years, and his dad keeps pulling riskier and riskier jobs. Tonight, he's decided to try and break into the pawn shop on Fifth street. 

Eddie is the lookout, stationed on the opposite corner with a pistol weighing heavy in the pocket of his coat (just in case, Ed). 

He doesn't want to be here. He tried to argue with his dad. Said, "I've got a test tomorrow. I've got homework and..." and I hate this life. (He doesn't say that part.) I don't want to steal cars or break into buildings or mug people. I don't want to be like you.

His dad just gripped him by the arm hard enough to bruise, and said, "You like to eat, dont'cha? Well, lookouts get to eat. Lazy little shits don't." 

So Eddie is standing on a street corner in the middle of the night, watching his dad furtively attempt to pick the lock on the front door of the pawn shop, when a cop car slows down at the end of the street.

Fear floods his bloodstream so fast it leaves him dizzy. The cop has clearly noticed something. Eddie can see the shadowed figure inside the car reach for his radio. 

Eddie has two choices.

He could pull the pistol out of his pocket and fire a few shots down the street, forcing the cop to take cover long enough for his dad to get away (which is what his dad would expect him to do). Or he could... 

"Run!"

The sudden loud voice, echoing between his ears and behind his eyes and inside his heart, startles him into flinching. 

"Run Eddie, RUN!!!" His body obeys before his brain has a chance to process the words. He's halfway down the street when the siren shrieks to life. 

Later, as he sits in the backseat of the social worker's car on the way to his Uncle Wayne, he can't quite believe he did it. He bailed on his dad - left him to get arrested and go to prison. This is Frank Munson's third strike; he'll go away for life this time. 

I'm such a coward, Eddie thinks numbly. Such a chicken piece of shit. He digs his ragged nails into the soft flesh of his palms, squeezing hard enough to draw blood. 

As if he'd spoken aloud, a soft voice responds, "You're not a coward. You're one of the bravest people I've ever known. Running isn't always a bad thing, okay? Sometimes it's just the smart thing to do."

His soulmate sounds so fierce, so certain. Eddie blinks hard against the hot burn of tears. The smart thing to do.

———

Eddie holds onto those words, like magic talismans. They provide comfort, not just in the immediate days after his dad's arrest, but other times too. Every time he runs away from a bully or a cop or a deal gone bad, Eddie thinks to himself - I'm not a coward. I'm just smart.

It works... until the night he stumbles out of his uncle's trailer, leaving Chrissy Cunningham's broken body on the living room floor. He's so terrified he doesn't have time to think, not until after he's ditched his van and taken shelter in Rick's boathouse. As he leans against the splintered wall and catches his breath, it hits him.

I left her there. What if she was still alive? (She wasn't. She couldn't have been. Not after... not after that.) He grabs fistfuls of hair and tugs until his scalp aches. Wracks his brain trying to figure out what happened, what he could have done to stop it.

He's never felt so ashamed before, not even when his dad was cursing and screaming and calling him a coward through the thick glass of the visitation window. 

His soulmate's words whisper in his ears, "...sometimes it's just the smart thing to do," and Eddie pounds on his skull with his fists to drown the voice out. "Not this time," he snarls. I should have done something. I should have tried to save her. 

He doesn’t feel smart this time. He feels like a cowardly piece of shit.

His soulmate’s voice falls silent. 

Through all the craziness to follow – finding out that monsters are real, running for his life from an angry mob, fighting alongside Steve Harrington in an evil Upside Down version of Hawkins – Eddie doesn’t hear his soulmate again.

Not until he’s staring up at Dustin Henderson, realizing that he can’t run away again. As he hesitates at the bottom of the rope, Dustin calls out nervously, “Eddie, what are you doing?”  

“I’m buying more time,” he says. He ignores Dustin’s screams as he cuts the rope and slides the mattress out of the way – making sure the kid can’t follow him. 

And then he hears his soulmate say, “Wait, wait a second. Eddie?! Is that you?” 

Eddie is twenty years old, the first time he recognizes his soulmates voice.

He pauses at the door of the trailer and squeezes his eyes shut tight. “Hey Stevie.”

“Holy shit, it’s you,” Steve whispers in awe.

It’s the first time they’ve been able to speak to each other like this, responding in real-time. Eddie wishes it could have happened in different circumstances.

“I’m so sorry Steve.” 

“Eddie? What are you doing?” Steve sounds alarmed.

Eddie doesn’t answer. He slams his way out of the barricaded trailer and grabs one of the discarded bikes, hoping to lead the swarm of bats away as far as possible. 

He makes it halfway across the trailer park before one of the bats knocks him off the bike. He grunts and rolls, gaining his feet quickly. Chest heaving, charged with adrenalin – Eddie hesitates. He could keep running… or he could stand his ground and fight. 

Maybe Steve can hear the hitch in his breath in that moment, because the other boy seems to have worked out what’s going on, even from miles away. Steve screams, “No!!! Run Eddie, RUN!!!!”

It’s like the night his dad got arrested. Eddie doesn’t even have time to think - his body reacts to that voice and he runs, worn Reeboks slapping the pavement.

(In another world, Eddie would have turned to face the swarm. In another world, Eddie would have died.)

He’s fast. He’s always been fast. He buys himself a few precious moments, before the bats drag him to the ground. They start to rip through his clothes, through his flesh, and he tries to hold back his screams – he doesn’t want Steve to hear this…

Those extra seconds save his life. It’s bad - but not as bad as it could have been. The bats start to drop from the sky, writhing and shrieking; they’re dying, although Eddie has no idea why. Hopefully, it means Steve and the girls were successful. 

He struggles to sit up just as Dustin reaches him, crying and frantic. “Eddie!! Oh my god, are you okay? Jesus, there’s so much blood…” the kid moans. 

“Yeah, yep. I’m good,” Eddie pants through gritted teeth. “Help me up okay?”

Dustin insists on binding the worst of his wounds first, using strips of fabric torn from the ghillie suit. The pain makes Eddie want to scream all over again, but he allows it. It is an awful lot of blood.

They lean against each other and limp back to the trailer, where Dustin knots t-shirts and jeans and flannel shirts into the remnants of their rope until it’s long enough to reach the other side again. 

Eddie manages to haul himself up the rope and through the gate – and that’s where his strength runs out. The pain of landing on the thin mattress knocks him right out.

———

When Eddie wakes up, he’s in a hospital bed. 

Holy shit I’m alive, he thinks. He honestly wasn’t sure he would make it.

He moves gingerly, testing each limb, turning his head against the stinging pull of a bandage along the edge of his jaw.

The room isn’t empty; Eddie apparently has a roommate. He clears his throat and the person in the other bed stirs, turning to look at him. 

It’s Steve.

His soulmate.

Eddie feels a funny little swoop of exhilaration in his stomach. “Hey Stevie.”

Steve’s face goes soft at first, like he’s experiencing the same fizzy warmth that Eddie is feeling. Then he blinks, and his brows draw down into a scowl. “What the hell was that, huh? What happened to ‘I’m no hero’?”

Oops. 

Eddie tries to make light of the situation. “Maybe I wanted to try it out,” he says flippantly. “Not too sure it suits me though. Think I might stick to being a coward from now on – it’s a lot less painful.” 

Steve doesn’t smile. He fixes Eddie with a serious look, hazel eyes blazing in the sallow light of the hospital room. “You listen to me Eddie Munson. You're not a coward. You're one of the bravest people I've ever known. Running isn't always a bad thing, okay? Sometimes it's just the smart thing to do."

Eddie’s breath catches in his throat. Those words – once a gift from the future, now an echo of the past. He never should have ignored them. “Maybe you’re right.”

Steve’s mouth is already open to continue the argument. “I…” he stops, clearly caught off-guard, face scrunched in adorable confusion. “Yeah. Yeah, I am right.”

Steve runs a faintly trembling hand through his hair. The angry expression melts into something gentler, almost unbearably soft. “I’m glad you listened to me in the end, at least.”

Eddie shifts his weight, pressing his cheek into the scratchy hospital pillow so he can keep his eyes on Steve. 

He’s so beautiful. Even bloody and bruised, with dirt still smudged along his hairline and dark circles under his eyes – he’s the most beautiful boy Eddie has ever seen. And Eddie almost gave this up – if he’d died in the Upside Down, he would have left Steve alone, with only the echo of Eddie’s voice left to haunt him.

“Yeah,” Eddie says hoarsely, “me too.”

He still feels guilty over Chrissy’s death - he probably always will. But he’s coming to realize that proving himself a hero wouldn’t have been worth the pain his death would have caused.

Eddie’s got a second chance… and he plans to make the most of it.

[cowboysandpilots]

Sing Me To Sleep

It's no secret that Steve gets nightmares, not that he doesn't try to hide them; it's just gotten so much harder now that he's been sleeping with Eddie.

Eddie is a heavy sleeper. He sleeps through all his alarms and usually doesn't get up until his uncle literally yanks him out of the bed. It's a different story with Steve. Ever since the younger man had been sleeping over, Eddie was up at every little shift or whimper. He hadn't known that the nightmares were that bad, but most nights, Steve wakes up screaming, and Eddie almost has a heart attack while he wraps his arms around the man.

It doesn't take much to reassure Steve that he's safe; Eddie's gotten pretty good at reminding Steve where he is and making him name the things he can see around their room. The thing that takes the longest is Steve's brain allowing him to go back to sleep. It takes weeks, and they're both exhausted, but Eddie finally finds something that works completely by accident.

Eddie had been hanging out with Jonathan and selflessly let him pick the music. He'd seemed to have moved on from The Clash to The Smiths, and Eddie had been mostly tuning it out until some lyrics caught his ear. "Hey man, what song is this?"

"Oh, It's called 'Asleep,' you like it?"

"Yeah." Eddie smiles, "Can I borrow this tape for a while? I promise I'll give it back."

Jonathan hands the tape over without complaint, and Eddie listens to the song on repeat until he can get it right. Until he goes back to Steve's house, and the inevitable nightmares strike again.

Eddie gathers him up like normal and waits until Steve is calmed down enough that his breathing and heart rate go back to normal. Only then, does Eddie start singing softly.

"Sing me to sleep Sing me to sleep I'm tired, and I I want to go to bed

Sing me to sleep Sing me to sleep And then leave me alone Don't try to wake me in the morning 'Cause I will be gone"

It only occurs to Eddie as he sings the lyrics out loud that they're talking about dying, but he feels the need to commit, and if Steve notices, he doesn't comment. In fact, by the second verse, Steve's eyes are already fluttering, and Eddie's voice trails off, kissing his forehead.

"Sweet dreams Stevie. I'm sorry about the song; please don't die in your sleep."

——

(This is the first thing I've written on here in ages. Please reblog if you can. ❤️)

Come find me - All My Links

[steveshairychest]

Eddie has been gone for a month.

His touch lingers on Steve’s skin, it burns him, the feel of invisible fingers ghosting over his body keeping him awake at night. Some nights he traces over all the places he can still feel the echoes of those cold fingers; his arms, hands, the small of his back. Eddie's fingers were always gentle, if Steve hadn't been so hyperaware of Eddie he probably wouldn’t have even noticed the feather light graze of Eddie's fingers against his back when he passed Steve by.

Now, it feels as though every single one of those touches are seared onto his skin.

He hates that he let Eddie get under his skin.

He’d tried to keep him at arms length; ignored the obvious flirting, the small secret smiles they shared, the brush of Eddie’s fingers over his own so clearly asking if he could hold his hand. Steve had pulled his hand away and tried to ignore the disappointed frown on Eddie’s face.

He hadn’t been ready to bare his heart again, to be vulnerable, especially not while he needed to keep everyone safe.

Maybe afterwards, he’d told himself. Maybe they could see where things go after they’ve had time to recuperate and Steve has had time to actually process what he felt.

With that thought in mind, he’d bumped Eddie’s shoulder with his own and smiled, wishing he could tell Eddie to just wait for him, to give him time, to not be sad because Steve really did want to hold hands but he wanted to do it when they weren’t fighting for their lives. He wanted to pick Eddie up in his car and hold his hand on the way to their first date, he wanted to hold his hand and never let go.

Now, laying in his bed for the fourth day in a row, he wishes he’d tried harder to push Eddie away because the ache in his heart is unbearable. He wishes he’d shoved Eddie’s gentle touches away to protect his fragile heart but he also wishes he’d just gone for it, wishes he hadn’t been so scared and just held his god damn hand.

His fingers flex around nothing, aching to know how Eddie’s hand would have felt in his own.

He questions why he feels so strongly for someone he barely knew, he doesn’t even know Eddie’s favourite colour or if he liked coffee or what he wanted to do when he finally graduated. All Steve knows is that Eddie had sunk his chipped black nails into him and made a home in his heart, he’d flicked on all the lights inside him, drawn on the walls of his heart and left his mark everywhere, something Steve failed to notice until it was too late.

He sits on the floor in his room, a box of tapes spilled out in front of him as he tries to figure out which ones Eddie clearly loved the most. He’s desperately trying to fill the gaping hole in his chest with the things Eddie loved. Which is hard because Dustin isn’t ready to talk about Eddie yet. The second Steve tries to bring him up, Dustin shakes his head and changes the conversation. Eddie’s friends weren’t of much help either, they don’t know or trust Steve, well, they did know Steve but that version of him isn’t who he is anymore.

This version of himself just wants to know Eddie, wants to feel close to him.

So, he’s left to figure out Eddie on his own. He’s piecing all the small puzzle pieces of Eddie he has together, hoping to eventually see a clear picture of the man that has left him sobbing into his pillow for a month straight.

He listens to all the tapes that have scuff marks and obvious signs of wear and tear on the cases, cataloguing them as ones Eddie must have played the most.

He tries to guess which songs might have been Eddie’s favourite. He pretends that Eddie is actually sitting right beside him, showing Steve which tapes he liked, which ones he hated. He tries to imagine how he would have sounded singing along to the loud music, he imagines him head banging and doing air guitar solos next to him.

Steve pushes stop on his player, his face is stained with new tears and his heart squeezes painfully in his chest.

He wishes he didn’t have to play pretend.

[poorlittlegreenie13]

Scenes From an Italian Restaurant:

WC: 2,000

Syd/Carmy falling in love to the soundtrack of Billy Joel, idk

It's past midnight, but Carmy & Syd still haven't finished closing. It might have something to do with the fact that neither of them can sleep without nightmares at home, and that there's something uniquely comforting about having another person with an equally fucked up sleep schedule to silently work with well into the early hours of the morning. They rarely talk while they're working like this; a blurry, unfocused period somewhere between opening and closing, things that do not strictly need to be done, but that they both take pride in doing anyway. It's their fucking restaurant, they both seem to enjoy treating it like a child they're co-helicopter-parenting.

This particular night, Carmy is in the kitchen doing food prep & Syd is sweeping up the dining area. It's quiet enough to hear herself breathe in, and the silence is getting annoying, so she finds herself sweeping toward the kitchen, peeking through to look at Carmy. As she gets closer to him, she hears him... muttering to himself, maybe? No, that's not it. She walks closer, slipping into the kitchen as quietly as she can, and realizes he's... singing. Carmy Berzatto. Singing. In the kitchen.

Her first impulse is to laugh but she stops herself.

He's kind of... good.

She listens for a little while, mesmerized, trying to make out the lyrics.

A bottle of red, a bottle of white. It all depends on your appetite. I’ll meet you anytime you want, in our Italian restaurant.

She moves slightly and Carmy freezes like a scared deer in the fucking forest, of course. His eyes are so wide and scared, Syd almost feels bad, so she tries to break the tension.

“Didn’t realize you moonlighted as a singer,” she says with an awkward smirk, leaning on her broom. “Did you write that?”

Carmy’s eyes narrow. “Did I— did you just ask me if I wrote that?”

Syd shrugs slightly, sensing she’s made an error.

“It’s Billy Joel,” Carmy says, looking genuinely concerned that she’s lacking this crucial piece of information.

“Okay, sorry, I’m not, like, Italian… and into 70’s music,” Syd says, with a dry, sarcastic smile.

“No, no, but this is a classic song,” Carmy says, “I mean, this is just a good song.”

Sydney just stares at him blankly. “I wouldn’t know,” she says.

“Alright, something’s gotta be done about this,” Carmy says with a disapproving shake of his head, tone as serious as it might be if he was noticing a typo on a menu or a smudge on a plate. He unplugs his headphones from his phone, walking to the restaurant’s sound system and connecting his phone.

A jazzy piano song overtakes the speakers, Carmy pausing to crank up the volume to far above their normal level before turning back to Syd with a smile on his face.

“Cold beer, hot lights, my sweet romantic teenage nights,” the voice of Billy Joel (apparently) sings out over the speakers of their restaurant. Carmy looks at her expectantly. Syd raises an eyebrow.

“It’s… loud,” she says.

“No, no, no,” Carmy says, rolling his eyes, infuriatingly smooth Italian-American vowels softening out as he speaks, an unquantifiable accent that Sydney is pretty sure is going to actually kill her one day. “It tells a story,” Carmy insists, turning back to his prep, chopping vegetables to the beat of the song, talk-singing along with the song, back turned to Sydney. “Brenda and Eddie were still going steady in the summer of ‘75, when they decided the marriage would be at the end of July.”

Sydney can’t help the laugh she lets out. Carmy spins around, an indignant smile on his face.

“Stop looking at me like I’m crazy,” he says, “you’re the one who doesn’t know Billy Joel.”

“I do know some Billy Joel,” Syd says. “Just not this Billy Joel.”

“Well I'm showing you this Billy Joel,” Carmy says. “Listen. Come on, you’re not listening to it. This is good music.”

He sets down his knife, walking over to her, holding out a hand.

Something in the pit of Sydney’s stomach fires off like an over-excited fire-cracker.

“Are you seriously trying to dance with me right now,” she asks flatly, glancing between his face and his extended hand, trying her very best to hold her sarcasm out in front of her like a shield against whatever fuckary this is.

Carmy’s smile fades, just for an instant. Sydney can’t stand it. She rolls her eyes, and takes his hand. Immediately, he grins, spinning her around him. She can’t help but smile. Carmy reaches out for her other hand, pulling her in on one side and pushing her away on the other, awkward high-school-dance moves that a grown man should probably not be pulling on her right now, and should certainly not be working as well as they are.

She meets his eyes, wide grin, slight flush, hair even more disheveled than usual. For a second, she just stares at him, forgetting to dance, forgetting to smile. Carmy, oblivious, is still singing.

“They parted the closest of friends, then the king and the queen went back to the green, but you can never go back there again, no no.”

Fuck.

She shakes her head ruefully, spinning him around to break their eye contact. And okay, maybe she spun him away from her slightly too hard because his hand slips out of hers and he stumbles a few steps away from her, laughing, and then, in a flash of movement, moving back to her, one hand coming to her lower back, the other settling around her shoulders pulling her into his chest, still laughing, still red in the face, breathing slightly heavier than usual, vocalizing Billy fucking Joel right into her ear.

What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck?

Is she slow dancing with Carmen fucking Berzatto in their kitchen right now?

He’s ridiculously warm in a white tee shirt and jeans, solid and impossibly, weirdly soft, leaning heavily against her, breathing against her neck, smelling like kitchen spices and sweat. This is simply not fair. This is… seriously outside anything normal or manageable. Carmy’s hand on her lower back is keeping her in place against him, stomach to stomach, fingertips splayed out across her back.

She’s stopped moving, she realizes. Carmy stops too after a moment, but he’s still pressed against her, still smiling slightly. Syd lets out a short, nervous laugh.

“Is this weird?” Carmy asks, voice low, unsure, still holding her close—maybe so he doesn’t have to look her in the eye, maybe so he can just rest his chin against her shoulder for a little longer.

Very slowly, Sydney brings a hand to the space between Carmy’s shoulder blades, just resting it there. “Kind of, yeah,” she says. “But not bad weird.”

“Fuck, sometimes… it’s like I forget to be nervous in front of you,” Carmy says—quick, breathless words, slowly pulling back from her, an embarrassed little smile on his face. “And I make a fuckin’ fool of myself before I realize I’m doing it.”

Sydney smirks back at him. “Well it’s kind of too late to fool me into thinking you’re cool,” she says. “Might as well stop being nervous about it. I mean, that ship has sailed.”

Carmy laughs, shaking his head, going a bit redder in the face. “I just really want you to like Billy Joel,” he says.

Syd smiles. “No, I do,” she says. “I totally do like him. I really like him.”

“He has other good songs,” Carmy says. “I always liked this one though. I was like fourteen, thinkin’ I was gonna meet a girl and take her to an Italian restaurant and get… fucking married at twenty. Talk about a ship that’s sailed.”

He goes quiet.

Over the speaker, Billy Joel is still singing.

“A bottle of red, oh a bottle of white, whatever kind of mood you’re in tonight. I’ll meet you anytime you want, in our Italian restaurant.”

“It kind of did work out though,” Sydney says, over the last few chords of the song, “I mean, you do in fact own an Italian restaurant.”

“Yeah,” Carmy says, a boyish smile crossing his face. His expression lingers on her for a long moment.

The song ends, and abruptly, loud guitar chords blare through the kitchen.

“Oh my God,” Carmy says, grinning, the tension of the moment entirely shattered. “Fuckin’ love this one.”

He crosses back to his prep station, picking his knife and returning to his work like nothing happened, bobbing his head and singing, “You had to be a big shot, didn’t you?”

Syd watches him for a little while longer before going back to her sweeping, making a mental note to never think of this night ever again. She’s not sure she could withstand the sheer force of her own stupid fucking yearning. Minutes pass. Half an hour. Carmy cycles through ten odd Billy Joel songs, and then—

“Hey, Syd!” Carmy calls from the kitchen.

Sydney turns, white-knuckling her broom handle, collecting herself for a moment before walking toward the sound of his voice.

When she reaches him, he gives her a crooked, slightly unsure smile.

“If it’s not bad weird," he says, "can we keep doing it?”

Her face burns. She stares at him for a long moment, trying to gauge whether he’s joking or not.

“I mean, can you come here again?” Carmy says, quieter, sounding slightly desperate, while she’s still trying to gauge his sincerity.

Wordlessly she steps toward him, heart pounding. He wraps his arms around her waist, exhaling heavily, chin returning to its place on her shoulder, An Innocent Man playing through the empty restaurant.

“Some people live with the fear of the touch, and the anger of having been a fool.”

Sydney’s not entirely sure how the night ends. It sort of blurs together; Carmy holding her against him, clasped hands, kitchen knives, food prep, sweeping, laughing, blushing, Billy Joel and Carmy’s singing voice. Eventually, Sydney in the doorway, bag slung over one shoulder, Carmy flushed and breathless from laughter, Sydney mentally filing away exactly how it sounds when Carmy says her name, out of breath and slightly desperate.

“I feel like I should apologize to you,” he says, but he's still smiling.

"Yeah you should apologize for not finishing your prep," she says, clinging to the remaining shreds of her self-respect as she stares at him. "Get that done. I need some fucking sleep."

"Yes, chef," Carmy promises softly, with a rueful look on his face. She turns to leave, but he speaks again. "Hey. "Thanks, Syd."

She turns back.

"For what?"

He shrugs, looking down at his feet.

"I just had a nice night."

"Yeah, me too, Bear," Sydney says, and then forces herself to walk away from him, out the door and into the Chicago cold.

Maybe the sleeplessness is making them both crazier than she realized.

Or maybe it's not just the sleeplessness.

Because she's pretty sure she's going to be thinking about exactly how Carmy's arms felt wrapped around her for the rest of her fucking life. And if that's not insanity, she doesn't know what is.

[stardust-walker]

For Cryin Out Loud

Eddie is having a bad day so Steve comes home and takes care of him. They take a bath together and end up fooling around because they're 2 idiots in love. Part of my little Hard of Hearing/Deaf Steve little one-shot I wrote that is apparently growing a mind of it's own and turning into a little series of one shots!

There may be minor typos but I haven't posted this on AO3 yet but it's been sitting in my word docs for a solid month so enjoy!

rated: E

cw: smut!! my first time really writing anything bc these boys changed my whole brain chemistry i swear 2 u

border by cafekitsune!

Steve has a feeling that it hasn’t been a good day when he walks in and he doesn’t see Eddie, but he can hear the music playing from the bathroom. The music gets louder as Steve walks through the door and calls out a greeting, almost like Eddie is cranking the music for him too. Steve can recite the opening lines to You Took The Words Right Out of My Mouth from memory at this point and he thinks Eddie must be doing the same thing in the bathtub upstairs. 

Eddie had bitched up a storm at first but Steve reminded him more than enough times that it was a gift and he couldn’t be an asshole about it. He tries to listen a little closer as he mills around the kitchen cutting up fruit and gathering snacks to bring up with him. The song comes to a close as he starts back towards the hallway with his hands full of a peace offering. And yep there it is. The mixtape starts over after a few minutes of silence in which Eddie must have been rewinding the tape. He wonders how long Eddie’s been up there. Probably since Robin left for work a little over an hour ago if he had to venture a guess. Steve moves a little faster as he hums along to For Cryin Out Loud. 

~

“You know, Meat Loaf really knew what he was talking about with this one,” Eddie had said one of the first times they listened to it together. The song had hit the 5-minute mark and Eddie was bobbing his head to the music. Steve just watched him, the corners of his mouth twitching up into a smile. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, totally,” Eddie’s smile was infectious and Steve felt like he was going to orbit another planet. He practically melted when Eddie leaned in to kiss him just as Meat Loaf continued to sing about how of course he loved whoever he was singing to. It was like Eddie himself was screaming it from the rooftops. So when Steve decided to make Eddie a mixtape, it was no surprise that was the first song he put on there.

~

Gareth had caught Eddie listening to the mixtape once. More like he’d gotten into the car with him and stared in horror at the radio before declaring that Eddie was some sort of saint for listening to Guns n’ Roses. At least according to Eddie, but Steve had just smiled and pointed out that he’d caught him strumming the opening notes to Patience more than a few times. 

Steve couldn’t help but think the song was a little close to home for him. He climbed the last few stairs and he could hear Eddie singing the chorus quietly to himself. When Eddie started whistling along, Steve let out a laugh.

“Steve?” The water splashes slightly. Eddie must have sat up in the bath.

“Yeah,” he calls out before he enters the bathroom and leans against the doorway. Eddie reaches out to turn down the stereo with wrinkled fingers and Steve couldn’t stop the fond smile from creeping onto his face. 

 Eddie eyes the plate of fruit with hungry eyes before his gaze shifts back to Steve. “Is that for me?”

“I was thinking we could share actually unless you’re feeling greedy.” He crosses the room and sets the plate down on the closed toilet lid. Steve wrinkles his nose in concentration as he slowly kneels down next to the tub. In the background, Tom Petty is starting to sing about some girl who loves Elvis. “Hey,” he whispers as he brushes the hair out of Eddie’s eyes. They’re a little swollen and Steve frowns. “Bad day?” 

Eddie shrugs and lets out a shaky breath. “Kind of.” He runs a hand over the surface of the water as he looks away. Steve doesn’t push it. He could easily say that the incident during spring break was 3 years ago. Vecna’s been dead for 2. But he gets it; none of them will probably really be over it. A lot of them bear the scars and the damage from it still, Eddie included. Steve notices how some days it’s harder than others for Eddie to get out of bed in the morning. Instead of saying anything, he leans in and brushes his lips over Eddie’s cheek. Eddie sighs and when Steve pulls back, the other man’s eyes have fluttered shut.

“Do you want me to get in?”

“Yeah,” Eddie’s voice cracks. He opens his eyes and they stare at each other for a second. Eddie’s big brown eyes make him look even more open and vulnerable as he scoots back against the wall. “Sit in front of me though. I want us to look at each other.” 

Steve nods because who is he to not give Eddie what he wants? Eddie drums on the side of the tub as Steve rises to his feet and starts to shed his clothes. He can see Eddie in the mirror as he rests his cheek on his arm to get more comfortable looking at him. His heart swells. Eddie is mouthing the words to the next song as it starts and Steve thinks about how Eddie bitched when Steve begged him to buy the newest album from The Cure. Steve had tried not to cry the first time he heard Lovesong. Seeing Eddie mouthing the words at him makes him feel totally different. But still, he tries to control himself because Eddie is having a bad day. As much as they both might want it, he’s pretty sure that fucking in the bath isn’t going to work out anyway.

Steve takes his hearing aid out and takes a moment to adjust to the slightly more muffled sounds around him. Steve’s half-hard just from the weight of Eddie’s staring at him. He pulls his underwear off and places them with the rest of his clothes before he turns to face the tub. 

Eddie’s face lights up in a way that makes Steve laugh. “Hey, gorgeous.” He leans back and wrinkles his nose as he moves his leg to make room. Steve lowers himself into the tub which is pretty warm still. Eddie probably filled it up again while he was downstairs.

“I bet you say that to all the boys,” he winks. Eddie laughs. Steve is so fucking in love with him that it hurts. “Did you actually wash your hair or were you just half underwater?”

“Hm,” Eddie hums as he slides lower into the water. “I plead the fifth.” He sighs as the water reaches the middle of his chest. 

“You’re so gross,” he rolls his eyes and dodges the small splash of water sent his way. “I was going to offer to wash it for you but now I don’t want to.”

Eddie pouts. “Only if you want to.” The unspoken fear of being a burden is still there and Steve gets it. He really does. So he motions for Eddie to sit up and move closer before he reaches behind him for the shampoo. Eddie winces as he bends his knee a little too fast. “You’re too good to me.” 

Steve is faintly aware of the fact that Dio starts playing and it’s one of Eddie’s favorites. Naturally.

“No, I’m not. Now shut up and close your eyes.”

“Yes, sir,” Eddie smirks as he closes his eyes and tilts his head back slightly, baring his neck to Steve. He ghosts his fingers over the scar on his neck. They match and he doesn’t think he’ll ever be over it. Eddie shivers slightly as he leans in and presses a kiss right to the center of his throat before he starts on washing his hair. It’s hard to gauge how gentle is the right amount when it’s not your hair but he tries his best. Skillful fingers comb the knots from Eddie’s hair as he relaxes, eyes only squeezing shut tighter when it’s time to rinse the suds out. 

Steve cups the other man’s scarred cheek in his hand when he’s done and Eddie’s eyes flutter open. “There he is,” he whispers.

Eddie smiles as he leans in, his hands settling on his boyfriend’s biceps and there’s something heavier about his gaze now. “You’re really something else, you know.” 

Part of Steve feels bad for the fact that he kind of likes the days that are like this. It’s a bad day but he can still bring Eddie back from it. They can take their time and take care of each other in whatever way they need to. Sometimes it’s just cuddling and talking about it. Sometimes Eddie doesn’t want to talk at all or Steve can’t bring himself to put in his hearing aids and connect with the world. They just deal with whatever they need.

Eddie licks his lips. Steve watches as the water drips down from his bangs and slides down the side of his face before it stops right on his cupid’s bow. He’s pretty sure it’s shit like this that Warrant is singing about in Heaven because Jesus fuck it’s insane.

Steve ducks in, nose bumping against Eddie’s as he does, and when he kisses him, their teeth click. Eddie’s smiling and it’s like a switch flips in his head. Eddie sighs against Steve’s lips as his wet hands slide up his arms to grip his shoulders. He knows they shouldn’t do anything, at least not here. He just can’t bring himself to do anything to stop it when Eddie slides forward almost into his lap. Steve groans as Eddie nibbles at his bottom lip. His hips buck up slightly and Eddie yelps as Steve slides backward an inch. 

They pull apart and Steve stares at Eddie: his pupils are blown wide and his freshly washed hair starting to curl already and he can’t take it anymore. “Let’s go to bed” Eddie leans in and whispers. Christine McVie is singing through the speakers about how she’d be with someone anywhere and everywhere. He fucking gets it and he’ll scream it from the rooftops one day.

He’s gentle when he helps Eddie out of the tub and towel dries his hair. Their hands wander and the only other sound in the room aside from the music is Eddie’s quiet singing and the occasional gasp or laugh. They leave the music blaring as they hurry down the hall. When Eddie lays on the bed and motions for him to follow, Steve thinks that one day he’ll kiss every fucking scar that the Upside Down left on him if he hasn’t already. 

He doesn’t need to be told twice and they’re both laughing as Steve kisses his way up Eddie’s left side. He takes special care to kiss as much of his scarred-up chest as he can. Eddie sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “Steve,” he whispers in a way that makes all the pistons in his brain fire. “Stevie, come on.” 

Right now is about Eddie, so he starts moving again. Licking and kissing and biting his way up his lover’s neck and he’s already starting to fall apart just a little. Steve curses himself for not putting his hearing aid back in. Now he’s missing out on every little sound Eddie makes even though he has them committed to memory by now. Steve plants a hand on the bed on either side of the man as he pulls away. Eddie’s hair is splayed out on the pillow like a halo and Steve swallows hard as he tries to burn the sight into his brain. There’s a part of him that wants to see it every time he closes his eyes because there can’t be anything better than that.

“What do you want,” he whispers as he eyes the man beneath him with hungry eyes. 

“You.” Eddie grins up at him. Steve grins right back as he presses himself down onto him. Eddie groans and Steve crashes their lips together and swallows the sound right up. Eddie slips his tongue into his mouth. Steve trembles a little as a hand slides down his back, fingers tracing down his spine in a feather-light touch. The fingers on Eddie’s other hand wind into his hair and Steve lets out a groan that mirrors Eddie’s own. It’s like a feedback loop.

They’re barely touching each other. Just grinding against each other and only breaking away to breathe until Steve sits up enough to feel around on the bedside table until he snatches up the lube. Eddie’s dick twitches in interest and yeah. He’ll give him whatever the fuck he wants whenever he asks. Within reason. So sue him. The way that Eddie’s big brown eyes stay focused on him as he flips the cap and pours lube onto his fingers is enough to make him crazy.

“This okay?”

His bangs flop in front of his eyes with how fast he nods his head. He parts his legs almost like it’s an instinct by now as Steve moves to kneel between his knees. Steve watches just as closely and he feels his breath catch when Eddie starts to melt under his touch. It’s just one finger circling his rim at first and Eddie pulls his legs in tighter as he sighs. By the time Steve has two fingers inside of him, Eddie is panting quietly. Steve curls his fingers and he hits that spot that he knows has Eddie seeing fireworks. He can’t stop himself from kissing his way up his chest again, fingers still moving inside of him.

When he’s close enough, Eddie grips him by the hair and tugs him up gently. He crashes their lips together with an intensity that leaves Steve gasping. Eddie’s all over him. All-encompassing as their mouths move together and they breathe each other in. Eddie’s thighs are trembling as they wrap around Steve’s waist. Steve pulls his fingers out of him slowly.

 Then there’s so little space between them that neither of them can reach down and wrap a hand around both of them to jerk off. That might be what Eddie wants, but Steve thinks it’s close enough as he breaks the kiss only to latch onto the soft skin of his neck. Eddie’s voice is muffled and Steve lets out a confused sound as he gets shoved back by a palm to the forehead. “Wrong side,” Eddie sighs before he guides Steve to the other side of his neck and Jesus Christ he likes this angle a lot better. It’s like Eddie realizes what he needs. The hand that guided him moves to the back of his hair and the other cradles the side of his face like he’s something precious. 

Steve’s hips jerk and Eddie hisses almost right in his ear. “Fuck yeah just like that. Come on.” The gasps and whispers guide him better than anything else as they grind against each other. They’re so close that he can feel the muscles in Eddie’s stomach start to tense up. He can hear his breathing pick up and the soft moans that start to spill out even when he’s trying to hold them back. Eddie’s close and so is he. It’s almost painful when he manages to sit up to slip a hand between them and it only takes two hard jerks for Eddie to finally break. 

He takes in everything. He always does. The way Eddie throws his head back against the pillows and his eyes roll back just a little bit before he squeezes them closed. The way he blushes red right down to the scars on his chest. It’s the way that Eddie groans out his name that sends Steve right over the edge with him. He slumps forward, trembles, and curses through his own orgasm as he buries his face in Eddie’s shoulder. “Fuck,” he pants out as he wipes his hand on the sheets. They have to do laundry anyway.

His arms feel a little like jello as he pushes himself up off of his boyfriend. Eddie smiles up fondly at him as Steve leans in to kiss him. He stops halfway there as Eddie lets out a short laugh.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” Eddie shrugs as he reaches up and brushes a stray piece of hair from Steve’s forehead. “Hi.”

The gentleness of it throws him off and he sputters. “Hi?”

Eddie laughs as he pulls him down again. “You know, I think I’m having a better day now.”

Steve rolls his eyes as he twirls a strand of Eddie’s hair between his fingers. “Oh, you don’t say?”

“Yeah, well you know. When the prettiest guy in Hawkins tries to woo you, it’s kind of hard to stay suffering.”

“Oh poor baby.”

“I think pizza would really secure the wooing,” Eddie sighs dramatically as he turns his head to pout at his boyfriend.

“You’re a pain in the ass.” Steve snorts as he pulls himself into a sitting position. 

Eddie gasps and mockingly grabs his chest. “But you love me!”

“For cryin out loud?” Steve quirks an eyebrow before he leans over to kiss Eddie on the forehead.

“And all that other shit the guy sings about.”

“You’re a sap.”

“Takes one to know one, Stevie!” 

[bidisasterevankinard]

Fuck it Friday 🎸🎤

Tagged by @wikiangela @eddiediaztho thank you💙💙💙

Enemies to lovers, Eddie watches Buck's show

The song which inspired all scene (idk why but i really needed Buck sing it)

“Are you ready for the last song LA?” Buck shouts it into the microphone with enthusiasm like he wasn’t just performing for almost three hours. Eddie would even think he’s not tired even a little bit, but Buck’s red face and wet with sweat tight white T-shirt which now almost transparent, show how tired he would feel soon.

People shouting in approval and Eddie knows they're impatient to find out which song Buck chose to close today.

The blue eyed smiles brighter on the reaction and then starts talking looking like he’s thinking about something that happened long ago, and when Buck for a second turns his head to backstage Eddie sess the glimpse of pride.

“You know, I try to use different songs in different cities to close the show, but today, here in LA, closing not just the show but this tour, the biggest show and biggest tour in my career where more than million of people came to listen to me, I want to sing the song which I think is the most important in my career,” Buck stops and takes a full chest of air and then exhales.

“It was my first song I wrote completely by myself and it was the song which brought me to the label and made me famous on the Internet. This song made everything that happens with me right now real, it made my life the way I love it,” dramatic pause, but some people already scream so excitedly like they know what Buck is talking about. Eddie thinks there might be Buck’s fans when he was just a guy making covers on the internet in his free time.

“I will perform Speakerphone after a year I wasn’t doing it,” all the crowd cheers loud now and Eddie is one of them.

This song is one of his favorites, and he still remembers how he heard it for the first time through the radio in Texas and how he even stopped the car in the nearest park zone to find this song on the Spotify.

He had listened to this song on repeat for weeks, and he knows all the lyrics by heart. This song and the thing that Buck Buckley, the guy with the really incredible voice and really cool song he wrote himself, was from “118 - music”, was one of the reasons Eddie decided to join this label when Bobby reached him.

But then he and Buck didn’t click, which Eddie still thinks was a stupid from both of them.

He can’t believe he will hear this song live right now.

But Buck starts the first part of the song, which is just his acapella part, and Eddie holds his breath when the lyrics touch his ears and all the energy from the audience and Buck reaches him.

Then music starts and Buck starts to move and go all “Buck” on the stage with dance moves and jumps and runs to the crowd to sing it as close to them as he can.

And Eddie really hears how people sing the song like it’s their performance and not Buck’s. Only on the chorus Eddie understands he hums it too.

“Now I need you, what?” Buck points to the crowd with his micro and the crowd doesn't let him down screaming “pick up, pick up”.

“And sing all the chorus with me loud.”

Tagging if they want to share : @honestlydarkprincess @911onabc @alyxmastershipper @transbuck @cowboy-buddie @lover-of-mine @heartshapedvows @bekkachaos @giddyupbuck @buddierights @housewifebuck @thewolvesof1998 @wildlife4life @hippolotamus @transboybuckley @devirnis @loserdiaz @spotsandsocks @monsterrae1 @spaceprincessem @userdisaster @caroandcats @mandzuking17 @translasso @jesuisici33 @bigfootsmom @jeeyuns @forthewolves @paranoidbean @diazblunt @shortsighted-owl @the-likesofus @pirrusstuff and anyone who wants to share

[bug-fics]

Trailer park kids Eddie x reader headcanons

Major implications for southern-esque Eddie. Just growing old together as poor kids

Pairing: Eddie Munson x reader

This is way longer than I was planning lmao. Literally like 2k words of headcanons but it’s cute so it’s fine

(No descriptions of reader, gender neutral)

At least where I’m from trailer parks are a major sense of community. Eddie growing up surrounded by people who would always have his back fueled him as a kid. I know we often make Eddie a sad kid who was hated by everyone but I like to think the trailer park helped Wayne raise Eddie a lot while he was growing up.

When Wayne was working long shifts at the plant Eddie would go over to his neighbor's house for dinner and homework help. The nice lesbian ladies taught Eddie all about Dolly Parton. 9 to 5 became his anthem as a 13-year-old kid who has watched everyone around him get screwed over by “the man”

As his best friend for life, you grew up in the same trailer park, but instead of an angsty teen who is all for bringing down the patriarchy, you grew up to be a spunky happy go lucky person who loves running around barefoot, dancing to country music and singing off pitch as loudly as you can while Eddie just stares with a smitten look. (Obviously, you also hate the patriarchy but Eddie wears his love of anarchy loud and proud)

It’s always been you and Eddie growing up but there were a few trailer park kids who you would play pretended with. None of you had toys growing up, money typically went towards food and bills so it was rare for a toy to be seen in the park. When someone did get lucky to get something new it was a big hit. None of the kids were stingy with their toys because growing up poor you learn to care for those who don’t have what you do.

Having a secret spot for just you and Eddie in the woods behind your trailer. It wasn’t anything special, just a dried-out River that had a lot of stray cats nearby.

You broke your arm falling out of a tree in the woods so in order to make you feel better Eddie threw himself out of the same tree on purpose hoping to break his arm as well.

It worked

Having matching casts. Eddie got pink because you got pink and when it was time to switch colors Eddie chose the camo green plaster so you did what any best friend would do and got pink again

Eddie crying because you didn’t copy him

“It’s ugly teddy, I don’t know what you wanted me to do”

This makes him sob even more. (Ofc the broken arm isn’t what made him cry)

By the third plaster switch you learned your lesson and let Eddie choose for the both of you which made everything better

Wayne saved every cast. Each one is full of signatures from the problem of forest hills. Many of them are relics with names of elders who have passed or families who got lucky enough to move away. It was a weird momento but they were put in a box in storage

I like to think Wayne is a very sentimental guy, saving everything he can of Eddie’s (and yours by association) as a way to try and make Eddie’s childhood better. It’s dumb but something Wayne thinks helps.

Sharing your Walkman together listening to tapes handed down from neighbors. Good music was expensive so most of the recordings consisted of ’50s and 60’s classics but sometimes someone would give you something newer like an Abba or Led Zeppelin cassette.

One day one of the burly biker guys who lived in a trailer on the other side of the park gave Eddie a few of his Dio tapes and that was the start of his metal addiction. (I like to believe Eddie isn’t really a music elitist, he just doesn’t like when people disregard his interests, and metal music is typically talked down upon so he’s gotten used to defending it)

Like I said, he grew up on country and Dolly Parton. He has no right to be rude about other people's musical interests.

It’s just a part of the defense mechanism he built up when he realized that the trailer park and the way people treated each other was just a little bubble and most people aren't that nice. Especially the upper-class folks who look down on you in school for not using “proper English.”

(You and Eddie as well as most of the trailer park kids failed English at least once because of all the southern slang and phrases you used in your essays that were  supposed to be professional)

I like to think Eddie has had a screaming match with one of his English teachers about certain words not being real.

“Mr. Munson how many times do I have to tell you ‘fixen to’ isn’t a real phrase” “well I’m FIXEN TO tell you that y’er wrong”

“Mr. Munson, you can’t do that in my classroom.” “Can’t n’ver coulda done nothin, Mrs. T”

I don’t know just young Eddie arguing with southern phrases as his comebacks, his trailer park accent still making an appearance. It’s cute.

You and Eddie were a force to be wreckin with. Your mom and his uncle couldn’t handle your shenanigans

I like to think that all the years of growing up together you and Eddie had sleepovers every night. Even on school nights. Like switching between his trailer and yours. It wasn’t a big deal because you lived next door to each other but it was still a hassle.

“Where are your pj's?” “Left 'em at Eddie’s.”

“Eds have you seen your backpack? We gotta get your homework done” “yeah.” “Where is it?” “Ts at Bugs.”

(Eddie calls you Bug because as a kid he’d chase you around with them. You don’t have a fear of them but playing tag with worms is much more fun especially when Eddie thinks you’re scared)

Eddie had freckles and a gap tooth growing up. The freckles faded because he never went outside in his teen years and his gap went away when his grown-up teeth grew in.

The younger teenage years between you two were filled with tension. Puberty wasn’t fun especially when you both grew out of the baby faces and couldn’t bathe together anymore.

Lots of stolen glances and yearning except neither of you knew what the feelings were so they were labeled as platonic. Even when thing’s definitely crossed the boundaries of friendship it was “just how we act” which definitely made realizing you were in love a lot harder as adults

Standing up for each other in high school. (Having the other kids from forest hills also stand up for you guys. It was a found family of hoodlums of course you were gonna stick together)

You actually weren’t a part of hellfire. You didn’t sit with them you didn’t talk to them you didn’t share any interests with them. The only reason why you knew about any of that stuff was because of Eddie. So you had your own group of school friends that you sat with at lunch

The only time you talked to anyone in that club was for corroded coffin. Jeff, Gareth, and Charlie got used to you being around for practice and gigs even if you had no clue about anything they were doing.

You and Eddie were definitely the type of friends to kiss and say it was just platonic

You’re the only person who has seen Eddie cry other than Wayne and your mom when he was a kid.

Getting detention on purpose if the other got in trouble. School was unfair to kids like you, so might as well get some quality bestie time out of it.

As you got older and Eddie finally graduated he managed to leave and move to the “city” with Robin and Steve leaving too behind. It wasn’t far, the city being only about 2 hours away but daily hangouts turned to weekly if you were lucky.

One summer Eddie brings the gang (Steve Robin and Dustin technically max is there but like that doesn’t count she lives there) to the trailer park for a tailgate/block party where they meet you. Dancing barefoot with Marlene and Darcy, a few girls who you grew up with who weren’t lucky enough to get out of the park. Well, you and Marlene were dancing, Darcy was a few months pregnant with her first kid, but you were sure to include her in the fun. (You three were the resident line dancers at these parties, dancing like no one’s watching.)

You don’t notice Eddie and his new friends right away. In fact, Eddie found your shoes before he found you, thrown towards the side, your socks not far behind. The only reason why you noticed Eddie is because Wayne called your name once the song ended and he was standing next to his uncle.

Running as fast as possible toward the boy. You can hear the pads of your feet on the gravel street the party was being held on. I mean full-on throwing yourself in his arms screaming the nickname you had for him (tater, short for tater tot because as a kid he’d carry them around in his pocket for snacks when he got hungry.)

He wasn’t gone for long. You both had seen each other a few weeks ago but when you spend nineteen years together every day of your life, three weeks seem like a lifetime.

It’s always been an unspoken assumption in the trailer park that you and Eddie would get married at some point. The gossip stopped when he moved to the city, especially because the new gossip was that Marcus (another boy from the park) was wantin to ask your mom for permission to marry you since Eddie was “out of the picture”

Of course, you were none the wiser. You’ve had plenty of suitors but why take any of their offers when you had your best friend Eddie? It’s totally platonic to want to move into a house, share a bed and cuddle up in the mornings, raise a kid, adopt a cat, grow old, and be buried together.

Mhm best friend Eddie

Being in the park, Eddie’s new friends get to see a new side of him.

You convince him to dance with you. Lots of twirling and laughing together. (City Eddie wouldn’t be caught dead dancing to country music)

Screaming the lyrics to red solo cup with each other while pouring drinks (quoting the song you told Steve that he didn’t have a pair of testicles since he preferred to drink from a glass (fuck king Steve who threw parties Idk who that is, I just know sad Steve who was forced to be a rich businessman growing up)

rushing around like headless chickens looking for the props you needed to perform a true southern draw (growing up the two of you lived to play cowboys.) yelling at some of the younger kids in the park for their plastic guns and stealing cowboy hats from some of the elder guys who were sitting in the plastic white chairs strewn around.

Fake draws were serious in this household.

Of course, you both cheat turning and shooting before someone told you to draw your guns. This definitely turns into a huge screaming match.

Letting Dustin have his first sip of beer

“How old is the boy? Fifteen?! And you’ve never even had a sip of beer? Tater you’ve changed, he’s well past his prime your supposed to introduce him to it as his elder.”

Fighting with Steve because he’s trying to stop you from giving Dustin beer but Dustin is all for it. He thinks it’s gonna officially make him a man.

Of course, he spits it out right away. Cheap beer is disgusting, but it’s a delicacy in the trailer park.

When Eddie goes back to the city, he makes a joke about stealing you to come live with him. And of course, you agree. The joke turns into a real conversation about getting you out of Hawkins and it doesn’t take much convincing on his end.

Of course, the apartment he shared doesn’t have an extra room but you can just share his room. You know? Take half of his closet, you can have your own key and share his bed as you’ve always done. And of course, you get whatever side you want and sometimes Eddie would bring you breakfast in bed, and hold your hand, and give you little kisses, but it’s totally platonic with a capital P, and definitely not just dating without dating (mhm yep sure)

The city is much different from forest hills. Eddie has to basically build a contraption that resembles those leash kid backpacks so you don’t run off.

Definitely a golden retriever x golden retriever dressed as a black cat dynamic

[bleedingoptimism]

 AU that lives in my head

It’s ‘92, there’s no upside down and Steve is going to college to be a physical therapist.

He works nights at a bar with Robin, they live together and are very broke but very happy, he is set on not failing school and proving his parents wrong but he's a slow learner, the good grades don’t come easily and he is constantly distracted by pretty faces so he's adamant on not dating until he's done with school.

So he works nights, goes to school in the afternoons and hangs out with his kids in his free time.

Eddie owns a music shop in town that has a special room all decorated for D&D nights and that's how he meets the kids.

But the way that he meets Steve is because one night the bar is hosting a bachelorette party (Chrissy's) and the guy who was supposed to put on a show (nothing too scandalous because all of Chrissy's friends are prudes) cancels last minute and the bar owner tells Steve,

“I will pay you double if you go out there and sing”

And Steve says “No, no way” but the owner insists, 

"Triple if you grab that guitar, take off your clothes and sing two songs!" 

And Steve does obviously, because its easy money and they need it so he's thrown on the stage with only an acoustic guitar that (barely) covers his junk, ("Wait you didn't tell what song!?")

Eddie is sitting close to the bar because he can't stand Chrissy's other friends, making small talk with the barwoman and his mouth hits the ground when Steve appears on stage (Robin's mouth does too but Eddie doesn't see that) 

The guy looks shocked for a millisecond before smiling and saying “Ahoy ladies” and then immediately cringes (the barwoman behind him starts cackling) but the guy on stage takes a deep breath and then starts talking to the audience flirting up a storm and the audience is eating it up, he asks for songs requests and sits on a stool carefully, all the time making sure everything is covered.

He actually uses one hand to adjust himself behind the guitar before crossing his legs (making his audience shuffle trying to get a look) and Eddie thinks ‘big boy’.

When the man asks for requests Eddie yells Metallica just to be an asshole but he perks up and says "Oh, one of my kids has been listening to this song nonstop" before he starts tuning the guitar, Eddie thinks 'He has kids?? He looks so young.' 

So this guy, this David by Michellangelo starts playing ‘Nothing else matters’ and he's not really good with the guitar, mostly playing something resembling the right tune but these people would not know the difference, only Eddie does and he doesn't give a shit because his voice!

His voice is amazing, he’s doing an acoustic, soft version that sounds incredible and he has range, he sounds so good, and he sings looking at his audience with soft eyes that close on the chorus like he’s feeling every word and Eddie is kind of in love.

 When the song is done everyone claps, the audience is enraptured and Eddie claps really loud but not as loud as the barwoman behind him who keeps yelling "Yeah! go Steve!! that's my babyman!!!"

Steve, his name is Steve.

So Steve asks for one last song and Chrissy asks for Don Mclean and he lights up and says American Pie is one of his favorites and he sings with passion and makes everyone join him for the last part with encouraging smiles and winks and its great and Eddie write odes about the naked man with the guitar in his head all the while.

 Then he's off the stage and Eddie wants to ask the barwoman if he's a regular but before he can Steve shows up with the same black shirt she’s wearing and she screams, runs towards him and jumps, he catches her easily as she says, “That was fuckign amazing dude”

 “I’m never doing that again” 

“I saw your ass, it's great!” she says laughing excitedly and Eddie snorts, making them both look at him, Steve smiles bashfully and says to both of them, “Yeah, sorry about that” 

And Eddie, can't help himself says, “Don't be”

Steve turns red and Eddie suddenly feels hungry but he takes a step back, doesn't want to come on too strong and says “You were great, the singing I mean”

“Thanks?, thank you.”

“I’m serious, you have an amazing voice, and the guitar wasn't half bad”

And Steve laughs prettily and says, “My guitar was shit man” and Eddie is freaking out because this guy is fucking gorgeous.

They talk some more, he learns both Robin and Steve have been working at the bar for almost a year now and that that little stunt with the guitar was the first and last time is ever going to happen and Eddie thinks he’s really lucky if that's the case, he says that much just to watch Steve blush again and Robin laugh, he flirts just a little more and then goes back to Chrissy when he gets the hint that, although Steve looks interested he’s not getting his number tonight.

Robbin slaps Steve when Eddie leaves, “Why didn't you get his number?” and Steve reminds her about his rule of no pretty faces while he’s studying.

Next time Eddie sees Steve is when he’s hosting D&D at his shop. They are wrapping up and the kids are leaving but Mike’s car won’t start and he’s cursing and hitting his wheel. It’s raining heavily so Dustin, Lucas and Will are waiting inside and Dustin says, “I think we should call mom”

“No way he said we shouldn't bother him unless it's an emergency, he’s got a big test on monday!” Lucas says and Eddie thinks ‘mom?? He??? Test? What??’

But Mike comes back inside furious “Lets fucking call mom!” he says as if he knew exactly what they were talking about.

So Dustin asks Eddie to use his phone and while he’s calling, Eddie asks Will “Who’s mom?”

“Oh he’s just a friend of ours, but he’s older and really overprotective so we call him mom, it's an inside joke” he shrugs, and Lucas looks at Eddie very seriously and says,

“Not in front of him so please, if he shows up” and mimics closing his mouth with a zip.

Mike look super pissed about having to call this guy so Eddie asks him if he doesnt like him, and Mike, exasperated says “No, I fucking love him and if any of you say that to him I will kill you” and Eddie is really confused. 

Especially when, who actually shows up is Steve but like a completely different Steve from the guy he saw at the bar, that one had dark fitting jeans and an obscenely tight shirt and carefully styled hair and this one? This one is wearing a comfy yellow sweater and gray sweatpants and his hair is a mess and he’s wearing glasses and Eddie is having a breakdown because he doesnt know which one is hotter.

Steve runs to the shop because it's still pouring outside and once he’s in he doesn't even get to talk because Mike is on him instantly, “Steve! This fuckign car man! It keeps breaking and I did everything you told me, I take care of it! I’m so sick-!”

Steve calms him down first, talks him out of destroying the poor thing and says “We’ll look into it,ok?”

Then he finally greets the others, hugs them all and Dustin says “Sorry for bothering you when you were studding man” and Steve messes up with hair,

“Its ok I need it a break anyways” 

He’s so nice with the kids. It's so cute and Eddie thinks ‘oh, his kids, now I get it’ with a smile and that’s when Steve sees Eddie and goes red all over but Eddie saves face and introduces himself as if they don't know each other.

Steve is still blushing but he smiles and makes small talk for a while, then says “Well, let's look at the car”

Mike complains about the rain but Steve says “Sorry kid but I need to get back to studying, I'll check it out, you can stay inside” 

Mike sighs “No, no I told you, I want to learn lets go”

Steve hesitates before going out, whispers ‘I can't get sick tho’ and takes off his sweater and throws it to Will “Here, hold this for me BB?”

Will catches it ungracefully and blushes.

Eddie thinks it's a small miracle he’s wearing a white tank top underneath but as soon as they step outside they are both drenched and the top becomes a curse.

To distract himself he asks Will about the nickname and Will says it mean Baby Byers, “Steve is friends with my older brother so growing up Jonathan was Byers and I was Baby Byers”

Lucas whispers to Eddie that Will might like that nickname a little too much and Eddie chuckles and thinks he can't really blame him, they are all staring at them trying to find out what wrong with the car, well the kids are, Eddie is staring at Steve’s shoulders, his arms, his chest, for some reason even tho he’s already seen him practically naked, the tank top and the rain and the fact that he’s fixing a car is making it much worse.

He hears Lucas tell Dustin “He’s going to cause another accident man” and Dustin laughs so Eddie asks them,

“Another?” and Lucas tells him they once saw a girl run head first into an open car door on her bike for staring at Steve and they all start laughing.

Steve helps Mike fix the car and they high five and go back inside looking triumphant, the kids say it's getting late and while Steve dries with a towel Eddie just handed him and puts his sweater back on (small mercies) they say their goodbyes, after they leave Steve hangs around looking awkward, Eddie thinks he gets why so he tells him, “Listen man, I won't say anything about that show at the bar if that's what you are worried about”, and Steve laughs and says,

“What? No, they already know I work at a bar and Robin already told them about the impromptu concert, they laughed their asses off. I was actually going to ask you not to tell Mike I butchered his favorite song” 

Eddie laughs and tells him once again he didn’t, he was amazing. And if he sounds way too enamored when he says it, they both pretend not to notice.

[stevesbipanic]

A starter I think?

Steve doesn't use his voice as much as he wants to. He can sing, and it sounds lovely, but he never mentions it. He could talk so much about so many things, but he doesn't.

You see, it started with his parents. When they were around they were always too busy or too irritable. Then they started leaving and he was alone... there was nobody there to listen, so he just stayed quiet. At school, nobody truly cared about what he thought, what he wanted to talk about. If he wasn't saying something important, there was no reason for anyone to listen. Singing would just make them turn on him. Who knows what they'd think of a boy who likes to sing? He couldn't risk it.

Now, he's finally ready to open up again, to sing, to speak freely, to make noise just because he wants to. And Eddie is there for it all, listening like Steve is a Siren.

Steve had loved singing since he was very little. It had started when his mother wanted him to be in the church choir, it would give him something to do and get out of the house and it added to the Harringtons perfect family image around town.

He would practice all the time at home, his mother would watch him sometimes, telling him if he was off key or should be louder, his father was always "too busy" to listen. But once Steve outgrew the cuteness of being in the choir his dad made him quit, telling him it was time to have real man hobbies like basketball.

His mother no longer found it cute either, now she was either busy away with his dad or they both found his singing too loud, too noticeable. Steve was told to be quiet and so he was. Even when his parents were basically never home he didn't sing anymore, he didn't know if he even could anymore.

Sometimes at school he'd see auditions for the choir, or the play and musical or a band, but he knew his father would never approve.

None of his friends knew he could sing, the most they'd heard him was hum occasionally, they'd probably think he's weird if he liked to sing.

He slipped up one day, sorting tapes in the backroom of Family Video, listening to the radio, he couldn't help but sing along. He didn't notice Robin come in to check on him.

"You can sing!"

Steve had dropped all the tapes in his surprise.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"I heard you, dingus. You can sing and you sounded so good! Why don't you ever sing?"

"Cause my dad says only sissy's sing."

"You're dad's an asshole."

Ok, so one friend knew, and he'd sing occasionally in the backroom, only when he knew it was safe.

Then he met Eddie. Eddie who was loud and fun and didn't care if he looked like a "real man". Eddie who sang and played guitar and was amazing. Steve had asked him to teach him how to play guitar, he'd had one stashed in his cupboard for years thinking girls would find it cool. Now he hoped Eddie found him cool.

Steve had been planning it for ages, a bar downtown had an open mic night and he had told the other young adults they should go sometime, be like other people their age.

Only Robin knew that Steve planned on playing that night. When Steve stepped up to the microphone and started playing the guitar that Eddie had taught him to play, he was beautiful. Eddie had never heard a voice as beautiful as Steve and he made sure he'd hear his voice for the rest of his life.

[unclewaynemunson]

( 🥐 anon )

hiii !! i have two ideas! you can choose whichever!

fairy and eddie making flower crowns

mermen steve and eddie making shell bracelets

Aaand another one, yaaay! okay so idk if you know the song mermaid bar by maya hawke but that heavily inspired this thing. Go listen to it if you don't bc her music is *chef's kiss*

TW for mention of death / suicide (if you're reading this and have issues in that area, please talk about it with a safe person in your environment or call your country's suicide prevention line if necessary)

---

It had been days since Eddie had last eaten. He was preparing himself to never eat again because that beast-like feeling had terrified him right to his bones. It had been more instinct than anything else, something primal and desperate trying to keep his weakened, hungry body alive. His sharp teeth cutting into the diamondback terrapin, its raw flesh dropping into his stomach and awakening something awful deep inside of him.

Eddie used to love turtles, before he fell into the Hudson river and his ribs separated to make space for gills; before his legs turned into black and silver scales shimmering in the light that filtered through the waves; before webs sprouted between his fingers.

He had left the Long Island winter beaches behind him now, coursing to the open seas and wondering how long he would last on his empty stomach, half hoping he would get caught in a fishnet or encounter a ship. But no such thing happened. He was all alone with the fishes down here.

Until he saw something that weirdly looked like... a building. Like a house, a human house, or maybe a shed. His curiosity suddenly kicked in again – a familiar feeling, finally, thank whoever caused this whole predicament – and he purposefully started swimming closer.

It didn't take long before he could distinguish that it was a wooden building, decorated with all kinds of shells and half overgrown with corals. Sardine Dream Mermaid Bar was written right above the front door, in uneven and slightly wobbly letters. The door was open and since Eddie's curiosity was growing by the second, he swam inside without even thinking about it.

'Ahoy!'

And holy shit. Behind the counter of what was unmistakably a very real, actual bar, was possibly the most beautiful creature Eddie had ever encountered. His brown hair was dancing around his face in graceful waves, his toned arms were covered in all kinds of shell bracelets, and his bare chest... Well. Eddie was pretty sure he'd lose his consciousness again if he were to keep looking at that chest.

'You can talk!' Eddie thought out loud, and hey, apparently, he could talk too. 'I can talk!'

The creature – mermaid – boy – person – smiled a smile that was ridiculously beautiful despite his scary sharp teeth.

'Yeah, we can talk.'

'There's more like you?'

He kept smiling. 'Way more. You can hear them singing, if you listen closely.'

Eddie froze in his place as he listened intently; and sure enough, very faintly, he could hear some kind of ethereal song carrying through the water.

'I'm Steve.'

The stranger held out his webbed hand and Eddie hesitantly shook it while telling him his own name.

'So I take it you're new?'

Eddie nodded dumbly.

'Alright, I bet you're hungry, then. I'll get you something to eat. What do you want? Oysters, caviar, scallops?'

'Um, scallops is fine, I guess.' Eddie's empty belly started twisting nauseatingly at the promise of something to eat – something he wouldn't have to kill between his own teeth. Or at least, he hoped that was what Steve was going to serve him. He didn't exactly know the rules of whatever this was.

'What is this place?' Eddie asked while Steve turned around to prepare a plate for him. He caught a glimpse of the golden fishtail that had been hiding behind the counter and – wow. He had never seen colors like that before in his life.

'It's um... A refuge, I guess,' Steve told him. 'I opened it when I ended up here. It's a place where people can come if they're in trouble, or if they feel like they don't belong anywhere, you know.'

And oh, Eddie could relate to that. He took the plate that Steve held out to him and gratefully dug in.

'Jesus Christ this is good,' he murmured around his full mouth, gaining himself another smile from Steve before he closed his eyes to properly revel in the rich taste on his tongue.

'So how did you get here?' Steve asked.

'Fell in the goddamn river,' Eddie managed to say between two bites. 'Fuckin' stupid really. Partying in New York. Drunk, high, you know how it goes. Slipped, hit my head, and that was it. Or, well, that was supposed to be it.' He dropped the mussel he had been holding to make jazz-hands. 'Yet here we are.' He swallowed another bite. 'What about you, how did you get here?'

'I jumped.'

'You jumped in the –' But before Eddie could finish his question, understanding dawned over him. 'Oh.'

'Yeah.'

'I'm sorry.'

'It's okay,' Steve said. 'I'm happy to be here, actually. Things are much better now. Not everyone is lucky enough to land in bubbles when they fall.'

'Yeah, I guess,' Eddie mumbled quietly, thinking about his mother and how she had fallen, back when he was little. There certainly had been no bubbles to catch her.

'Hey.' It sounded soft and Steve tilted his head a little bit, staring at Eddie as if he was trying to figure him out. 'You can stay here for as long as you need to,' he continued. 'I'll teach you everything you should know. We have this – this ritual.' He gestured to a tall jar that was standing on the counter between them, filled with all kinds of shells in various shades of white. 'This is our tip jar. Everyone leaves some shells when they come here, and we use them to bind ourselves to each other. I'll make you a bracelet right now, to make you part of the community. And when you feel that the time has come – when you feel at home here, when you're ready to navigate this world without me – you can return the favor.'

Eddie let his gaze wander to Steve's forearms, both covered in bracelets.

'So these are all from people you helped?'

The sudden bashful look on Steve's face didn't escape Eddie's notice.

'Yeah, I guess I did,' he said, almost like it surprised himself.

With his belly filled and his human instincts finally returning to him, Eddie felt brave enough to stretch out his hand and gently trace the bracelets on Steve's left arm with his index finger.

'It'd be an honor to give you a bracelet of my own someday, Steve,' he said softly.

And when he saw the look in Steve's soft brown eyes, it suddenly didn't seem so bad to Eddie anymore that he had fallen into the river.

[cicimunson]

His Bard and Her Rogue

Request: For the request I was maybe thinking something like Eddie x plus size reader, and the reader would be one of the theatre/choir kids? and she goes and auditions for the lead in the school musical/play and the student who is directing it is a dick and says she couldn’t be the lead cuz she is plus size and so Eddie finds out and and gives the director what for?  ^-^

This was so much fun to write and thank you for all your advice while it was getting done!

Characters: Eddie Munson, Female Reader, random OC

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Reader

Word Count: 1k

Warnings: Violence, Reader is upset

“Whoa, whoa, what’s going on?”

You step back, wiping tears from your face. “Sorry, Eddie. Didn’t mean to run into you.”

“It’s cool, but are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” You lower your head and don’t meet his eyes.

Eddie cups your chin gently and tilts your face up. “Hey. You’re clearly upset. Talk to me.”

“It’s so embarrassing.” You sniffle.

“You know every embarrassing story of mine. One of the perks of being friends since kindergarten.” He winks down at you.

“I can’t help it if you do a lot of dumb stuff.” You reply.

He laughs, still gently cupping your chin.

“I’m just saying, surely you can spare one embarrassing story.”

Maybe I’ll feel better if I just talk to someone about it.

He stares down at you, waiting.

“I confronted Peter and asked why I wasn’t given a role in the school play. I know I wasn’t the best singer but I thought I would at least get ensemble or something.”

Eddie looks surprised. “He didn’t cast you?”

“No.”

“That makes no sense. I’ve heard you practicing nonstop the past two weeks. You’re good. Annoying when you’re singing over my music, but good. I can’t believe he didn’t cast you.”

“Well, he didn’t.”

“What did he say when you confronted him?”

You lower your head again and mumble a response.

“Y/N, speak up.”

Damn it. He’s going to be mad.

“He said I’m too fat to be in the play.”

Eddie’s eyes narrow. “What?”

You sigh. “He said he has a vision for the play and wants everyone to be thin and athletic. I don’t fit into either of those boxes.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“No. And he said it in front of everyone. I’m so embarrassed, Eddie. I have to quit theater now. I can’t face everyone after that.”

“Come with me.” He takes your hand and tugs you toward the auditorium.

“No, Eddie, please, I can’t go back in there.”

“Fine. Wait here.”

“What are you gonna do?”

He doesn’t reply as he yanks the door open and stomps inside.

You stand outside the door, listening for any noise. You hear Eddie shouting something you can’t quite make out, and other people yelling.

Oh God, what is he doing?

There’s a loud bang and you gasp.

Shit, I gotta get in there.

You fling open the door and hurry down the aisle to the stage.

Eddie has Peter, the director, by the shirt up against the wall, pointing a finger in his face.

“And if you can’t see how talented she is, you’re an idiot! You’re lucky she even auditioned for your stupid play!”

“Oh my God, Eddie, let him go!” You rush up on stage. Everyone is standing around looking shocked, but no one is helping. They’re all scared of Eddie.

Eddie whirls around and shoves Peter toward you.

“Apologize to her. Now.”

“I’m sorry.” Peter replies instantly, looking horrified. “I should have cast you. You have a great voice.”

“Tell her she’s stunning and you’d be grateful to have her in your play.”

“You are! You’re stunning. I’d love for you to be in my play.” Peter stammers.

Eddie yanks him back and gets in his face once more. “Good boy. Now if you ever, ever, upset her or talk about her weight again, I’m going to come back here and beat you into the wall. Your legacy at Hawkins will be to be a giant greasy smear on the brick, you hear me?”

“Yes. Yes.” Peter squeaks.

Eddie shoves him away. “Y/N, we’re leaving.”

He throws an arm over your shoulders as he leads you from the stage. Everyone is watching the two of you.

“Eddie, have you lost your mind?”

He doesn’t reply as leads you outside to his van.

“Eddie, what were you thinking? You’re lucky there were no teachers in there, you could have gotten into so much trouble.”

“I don’t care. Nobody talks to my girl like that, ever. He’s lucky I didn’t throw him off that stage and stomp on him.”

“Your…your girl?”

“Hmm?” He stares down at you, looking confused.

“You called me your girl.”

He goes red. “Oh, well, I meant like, my friend. You know, my friend, who’s a girl. My girl.”

“You could have gotten expelled, Eddie.”

“I told you, I don’t care. Nobody is going to make you feel bad and get away with it.”

“It was sweet of you. It really was. But doesn’t make what he said any less true.”

“What do you mean?”

You sigh. “Come on, Eddie. He was right. I don’t fit in with the other theater girls. They’re skinny and pretty and I'm…I mean, look at me. I’m huge.”

He shakes his head. “Stop that. You’re perfect.”

“I’m not. I’m nowhere near perfect.”

“Well, you are to me. I meant what I told Peter. You’re stunning.”

You blush. “You meant that?”

He nods and smiles. “Of course. I’ve always thought so.”

“You’ve never said that before.”

“I know.”

“Why haven’t you mentioned it?”

He sighs. “Because we’re such good friends. I didn’t want to mess it up by telling you that I’m crushing on you.”

Eddie Munson is crushing on me. Did I just hear him right?

You reach up and tuck his hair behind his ear. He tugs your hand away. “Hey, no touching the ‘do.” But he smiles and pecks your fingers.

“I like you too, Eddie. I have for a while now.”

His eyes widen. “You do?”

“Of course. You’ve always been so good to me. You’re sweet. You’re handsome. You have such a good heart.”

He wiggles his eyebrows and you giggle. “You think I’m handsome, hmm?”

“Of course that’s the only part you heard.”

He leans down and kisses you. You hesitate for a second, then grips his shoulders gently, kissing him back.

He moans low in his throat and his arms wrap around you.

“We should have done this years ago.” He mumbles as he breaks the kiss. “I’m stupid for waiting this long.”

“I suppose you’ll just have to make it up to me.” You tease and he grins.

“Looking forward to it.’

[sparkle-fiend]

An exploration of Steve’s home life, and relationship with his parents.

*****

People always feel sorry for Steve, when they hear how often his parents are away. "They leave you all alone in that big house? How long has it been since you saw them?" They always say the same things - express the same concerns, the way they have ever since he was in middle school.

Steve never knows how to respond. The truth is - he's happier when his parents are gone.

When the house is empty, he can breathe. He can move through the space and fill it with his own presence; he can talk as loud as he wants, listen to music - even sing if he wants to. He doesn't have to make himself small or quiet.

When his parents are home, Steve feels tense all the time, on edge, like walking over eggshells. Carefully watching every word, minding every detail of his appearance and behavior. It's never enough, of course. His father always finds some fault.

They’re going into the fourth week in a row that his parents have been home (a record this year) when he sees his mother rubbing her temple, wincing with a headache as she observes the contents of the pantry.

Steve says, "Hey, why don't I make dinner tonight?"

He's been learning how to cook, making dinner for Eddie and the kids on D&D nights, and he thinks he's actually gotten to be pretty good at it. His mother is delighted at the offer, and Steve feels a warm little thrill of pride – until his father walks into the kitchen. It’s all downhill from there.

"That's not how you dice tomatoes Steven; the pieces are all completely uneven."

"Did you even add any salt to this?"

"The pasta is overcooked. I can't eat this - it's practically mush."

"How did you manage to screw up such a simple dish? It's basically spaghetti; a child could make it."

Each word is a chisel, chipping away at him. By the end of dinner Steve is trembling, trying to keep any emotion off his face.

The real kicker is when they start clearing the table, and his father spills a glass of wine all over his white button-down shirt.

"Goddamnit!" he roars, jumping back with enough force to send his chair clattering to the ground.

"Shit!" He slams a fist down onto the table in frustration, with enough force to rattle all the remaining dishes. Steve can't help it - he flinches hard, feels his heart begin to race.

His father has always had a temper, always been prone to flying off the handle at the smallest things. He's never violent toward Steve or his mother, but sometimes the rage feels like a physical force all the same.

It's been so much worse since Starcourt. His father's tantrums send Steve back to that cold metal room, head aching as an angry Russian shouts in his face, demanding Steve tell them what he knows.

Steve retreats to the kitchen, chest heaving as he gulps for air. He starts cleaning up with numb focus, waiting for his father to leave the dining room before returning to help his mother pick up the glass.

After that, he waits in his room. When the house goes silent, he slips out the window and sneaks to his car, keeping the headlights off until he reaches the main road.

When he was younger, he would drive all night just to stay out of the house. He'd been up and down every back road in Hawkins until he could probably navigate them blind; sometimes he would even hit the highway out of town, racing for hours across empty corn fields, swallowed by the sweep of the night sky.

He has somewhere he can go now. He cuts the headlights again as he pulls up to the little brick house on the edge of town - purchased with a hefty government payout to keep the Munson's quiet about the real fate of the old trailer.

Steve slips around back and pulls himself up onto the roof of the porch, crab walking carefully until he reaches Eddie's window. There's a sliver of light visible under the lowered shade - if there hadn't been, he would have returned to his car.

Instead, he taps lightly at the glass until the shade flies up and Eddie yanks the window open. "Jesus Christ, what are you doing? You know you can come in the front door like a normal person, right?"

"I saw Wayne's truck in the driveway. I didn't want to wake him up."

"He wouldn't care - I try to tell you that every time. Get in here."

He pulls Steve through the window, gripping him by the elbow so he doesn't fall when his feet get tangled in a pile of clothes on the floor.

They sit together on the edge of Eddie's bed, and despite the warmth of another person pressed against his shoulder; Steve can't seem to stop shaking.

"Steve," Eddie whispers, brows furrowed in growing concern, "what's wrong?"

Steve shrugs. At this angle, he can see the two of them in the mirror over Eddie's dresser. There's Eddie, looking comfortable and soft in sweatpants and a tank top, rings all discarded in the dish by his bed. And there's Steve, looking worn thin, hair limp and eyes bruised from exhaustion.

"My parents are still home. Sometimes it's hard to sleep - I don't want to scare them if I have any nightmares."

That was true enough, even if it wasn't the whole story. He can tell by the way Eddie's reflection scowls that the other boy isn't buying it.

They've danced around it before. He knows that Eddie and Wayne are both suspicious of his relationship with his parents; hell, he's pretty sure Joyce and Hopper are too. It makes him feel stupid.

His father has never touched him, not once. Steve is just overdramatic, making a big deal out of nothing when others have had it so much worse. Eddie certainly did, before he started living with Wayne. Steve's not going to whine to him about how his dad says stuff that hurts his feelings sometimes.

"Well you know you're always welcome to stay here. Wayne could sleep through an air raid siren - you won't bother us."

Steve nods, and accepts the sweatpants and t-shirt Eddie digs out of the drawer for him. When he comes back from the little bathroom down the hall, Eddie has the blankets folded down and the overhead light turned off.

Steve climbs into bed silently, and Eddie follows. Neither one of them acknowledges the fact that there's a pullout sofa in the living room downstairs - a much nicer one than Wayne used to sleep on at the old trailer.

Eddie rolls onto his side, facing Steve, and lifts an arm in invitation.

They've been dancing around this too - the unspoken thing between them.

Steve shuffles forward until he's close enough for Eddie to drape the offered arm over his shoulders, and then he allows himself to be pulled closer still. He presses his face into Eddie's chest and just breathes.

This is home. The scent of cigarette smoke and weed mixed with Old Spice, the tickle of Eddie's curls over his forehead. Here, he doesn't have to be alone to be himself.

As the tension in his muscles starts to ease, unwinding like a spring, the tears take him by surprise. Eddie must feel them wetting the fabric of his tank top, because he holds on tighter. "I've got you, okay?" he mutters into Steve's hair. "I'm not letting go."

In the morning, Steve will try to sneak out before Wayne gets up. Wayne will meet him at the door with a cup of coffee, and drag him into the kitchen for breakfast, and when Eddie gets up, they'll share weighted looks over Steve's head while he eats his eggs and pretends not to notice.

Wayne will mention, not for the first time, that it's actually a three-bedroom house - "Just furniture, is all it needs. We'd be more than happy to have you stay."

Eddie will chime in, "Wayne's been wanting you to move in since he tried those leftovers you brought over."

They'll laugh, like that's all there is to it.

Maybe this time, Steve will finally say yes.