#If I didn't see the pop-up I'd jsut been fucked

[grabyourpillow]

Wrong number

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Steddie - Written for the Discord Server "Fanfic Lounge"'s Weekly Prompt". This is pt.1

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[Unknown number]

Hi 

Wanna get a coffee?

Or ice cream

Or talk

Idk. 

Whatever u like.

Ik this is stupid. I jsut wanted to try at least

U know I see u every day. U don't look at me though. 

I admire u n it hurts because u're urself and so bright and I'm just

A dumbass.

it feels like if I try and reach out it will burn yk? 

And I wish I could just forget about u but u're sitting right in front of me, n all I can do is look at that beautiful brown hair of urs

Sometimes i. An when I see ur face n just. U have the prettiest eyes.

But just sometimes, u look tired. i don't think. I don't think you're happy. Ppl can be jerks. 

I mean I would know. Hope I'm not as much one now. 

Anyway ppl are jerks and so they make u believe u don't deserve to be but 

And Ik it hurts but u seem so wild n strong and but I wish u didn't have to all the time and also 

u deserve to.

be happy I mean.

I'd like it if u talked to me. 

Just once

Eddie blinks at his phone screen for 2 seconds. 

The fuck.

He had just pulled his phone out from under his pillow to see who the fuck was awake at 3:54 in the morning — well, he was, but that was normal — and kept texting him. 

Cause no one fucking texted Eddie.

The number of his buddies amounted to a grand total of two, and Gareth and Jeff preferred WhatsApp, and the only other person whom it could have been, namely his uncle, was loudly snoring in the bedroom next to him.

His original thought had been that it might be one of the DnD kids but then it had better be a fucking emergency.

He hadn't been expecting... whatever this is.

Eddie taps in the space to reply and waits as his keyboard takes bloody ages to open.

At least he can look at his Metallica lockscreen, while in his messaging app, the only problem his phone had that was actually useful. 

This phone had been past its prime for a while now, but it's not like he could afford to change it.

When the keyboard finally pops up, he types in

Wrong number dude

and goes the fuck to sleep. 

__

The messages pop back into his head 3 days later. 

He's playing his guitar harder than he has ever done before, the vibrancy of the saturated sound drowning out the noise of his mind in which his thoughts, as always, were racing carts on seventy-two roller-coasters, going in different directions. And the carts were on fire. 

Black Sabbath lyrics always managed to convey things he didn't know how to express. 

As he sets the guitar down, the sentence "You deserve to be happy." rings in his mind.

Maybe he did, but he sure as hell didn't see how.

__

His DnD campaign-preparing and Song- listening evening gets interrupted, as Spotify cuts — how dares it — the song he is listening to because technology has decided there is nothing more important than for him to be aware he has an incoming message.

[Unknown number]

Omg

The notification reads.

The music resumes and Eddie doesn't pay it any more attention. 

Then his phone starts to vibrate, the red "INCOMING CALL button" smeared across the screen.

Eddie groans.

God knows what possesses him to pick up. He stays silent at first.

"Hello?" Comes from the other end of the phone.

A guy. Roughly his age, Eddie would think. 

"Hi." 

"I'm. I didn't think you'd pick up."

I didn't think so either.

"Oh god I'm so sorry. You must think I'm such a creep."

The voice, oddly enough, seems distantly familiar. 

"Hey don't sweat it man," Eddie lightly drums on the heater next to him with his free hand. "We've all had our silly I-wish-you-would-talk-to-me crushes," he says, remembering the messages.

"Right, yeah." The guy chuckles. "Honestly, I'm not planning to... I don't know. Murder them? or something." He pauses. "That... sounded creepier, didn't it?"

Involuntarily, the corners of Eddie's mouth pull upwards. "Yup." Eddie already likes the guy. 

They both fall into a short silence.

"If I may, uh–"

"Steve."

Huh. 

"–Right, Steve." Eddie likes most people who bother to talk to him. It's just, those people did not usually include guys named Steve. "Just talk to them. Life is too fucking short."

Steve seems to consider it.

"I'll... I guess I'll try. Thanks."

"You're welcome." 

Eddie hangs up.

___

Eddie scrolls through the messages. He's bored.

"I wish I could forget about you."

"You deserve to be happy." 

Something about the lines hits him in a way that tugs right on a taught string in his heart. 

Didn't help that he himself had brown hair. A wavy/curly brown mess of a hair, that was now past his shoulders – still the best decision of his life – but brown hair nonetheless. 

Steve seemed like a good dude. Eddie wishes him luck.

___

"Do you ever feel like you're losing your mind?" Chrissy asks him, as they walk home from uni together. 

Eddie chuckles. Humorlessly. "Like, every day."

___

[Unknown number]

https://open.spotify.com/track/0GjEhVFGZW8afUYGChu3Rr?si=VlTksqrCTRaLT3uGRIxuGg&utm_source=copy-link

.... Thanks?

ABBA is great

They sure are.

ur turn.

? 

Helloo

Hang on

___

Eddie sticks his hands into the deep pockets of his jeans jacket, only half listening to what Dustin is saying as they're walking to the DnD club room. 

"I wish Max would come. You know Max? Red hair? Wheelchair? She is the absolute coolest."

The kid is jumping up and down excitedly, as always. "Oop—" he trips, and Eddie narrowly manages to haul him back from the road so that he doesn't die.

"Jesus Christ kid, eyes in front of you alright?"

Dustin nods but mutters something under his breath. "Sometimes you sound just like Steve."

___

Eddie's eyes pop open in the middle of the night.

Wait a minute. 

He grabs his phone, scrolls past the few messages —and occasional cat photos— Steve has been texting him.

Eddie answers sometimes. 

More often than not it does bring a smile on Eddie's face. More often than not, Eddie tries not to think about how it's one of the highlights of his day.

But today it's Eddie who messages Steve before  he can think twice about it.

[Steve guy]

Do you know a kid named Dustin? Brown curly hair?

The reply is immediate. 

 nosey, baseball cap n thinks he's sooo clever? 

That's the one

haha yes I know him

What a coincidence. Did that mean that Steve, a guy his age, not an asshole, might actually live nearby? That they might even have crossed paths?

His phone rings.

"Hi Steve," Eddie answers.

"Hi. I uh."

Steve clears his throat. "Offer for a coffee still stands."

You deserve to be happy. 

Anyone writing stuff like that deserved to be known a little more. And really, it had been a long ass fucking time since Eddie had met anyone interesting. Maybe Steve needed someone to talk to about his crush.

Why the heck not. 

"Sure."

"I'll text you the address?"

"If it's a remote location in the woods," Eddie pauses,"for murder, I ain't coming."

"I would neeeever." Steve retorts, mock wounded.

They both pause. 

"See you there then."

"See ya."

___

>Pt.2

[jaythelay]

Google automatically without my input stealing my texting data is expected, just not moral or legal.

Given how they work with law enforcement without delay, be ready for Google to be brought up a lot more for data they shouldn't have being given to Legal Gang members. Either because you're pregnant, or trans, or simply their target.