#a tiny hint of pre steddie

[loveinhawkins]

Once they’re far enough away from Angry Hicks Land, Erica rifles through the supplies before finding the bag she’s looking for. She throws it at Eddie, only for him to immediately fumble the catch.

“Wow,” she says. “You’d be immediately kicked off the basketball team.”

“Uh, my talents don’t exactly lie on the basketball court,” Eddie says—his tone is dry but his face is slightly flushed in embarrassment.

“Huh,” Erica says. “Guess Lucas is multi-talented.”

Steve chuckles in approval from the driver’s seat—hopefully not too loudly; yeah, she’d defend her brother to the hilt, but she doesn’t want to get too ridiculous and actually have him overhear her.

Thankfully he seems in a world of his own, sat with Max and Dustin at the back of the RV. His eyes keep flickering over Max and her Walkman headphones.

He’s frowning. He’s been doing that a lot—Erica’s sure he’s had a permanent crease in the middle of his forehead since the year began, probably before then, too.

She wants to iron it out. Doesn’t quite know how to.

The bag rustles as Eddie opens it up. “Um. What’s in—?”

“Essentials,” Erica says.

Eddie blinks. “Sinclair, this is a belt.”

“Your jeans are very sad,” Erica tells him pityingly.

Steve cackles. Eddie’s blush deepens, and he jabs the back of the driver’s seat with his elbow.

“You having fun over there, Harrington?”

“Oh, tons,” Steve says.

Erica laughs. Eddie sticks his tongue out at her.

Once they’re parked outside, she half-loses track of him while correcting Lucas’s abysmal attempt at spear-making. He’s there in the corner of her eye, rough-housing with Dustin, but her thoughts turn vague and distant as she double knots the rope.

A little while later, she’s lying on her back, stretched out in the grass. She can faintly hear Lucas and Max having an arm wrestling match, Dustin providing old-timey sports commentary.

A shadow falls over her.

Erica sits up.

Eddie’s standing there with his hands on his hips. He’s wearing the bullet belt, the metal glinting in the sun.

“Whaddya think?” he says.

Before she can reply, he actually does a full-blown twirl, and it’s maybe one of the most embarrassing things she’s ever seen—which is definitely saying something.

She can’t help the fond smile from breaking out as she rolls her eyes. “Well, at least you’re dressed for the part.”

“Coming from you, Lady Applejack, that’s the highest of compliments.”

Eddie flops down next to her. He leans across and picks up something: her spear. She’d actually forgotten about it, just for a moment.

“Not quite a kukri, huh?”

It’s meant to be a joke, Erica can tell—but she can still hear the tension in his voice. He tosses the spear aside.

A sinking feeling she’s been pushing back makes itself known again; she wishes this was all just a game.

Eddie’s eyes are unfocused, like he’s thinking something similar.

Erica nudges him. “What’s up?”

He shrugs. “Just thinkin’, Sinclair.”

“Hmm. Seems rare for you.”

Eddie snorts. “Shut up. S’just…” He sobers. “Had this whole… plan. I forgot.”

“About?”

A smile. “You. You were gonna, uh. Be it. If you wanted.”

Erica raises an eyebrow.

“Um. The, uh… the leader of Hellfire.”

Eddie’s fingers drum nervously on his knees. Erica takes pity on him.

“You do know I’m eleven, right?”

“Trust me, I’m painfully aware,” Eddie says with a fleeting grin. “Your introduction is seared into my memory goddamn permanently. No, I was gonna… there’d be stand-ins till you got to high school, like whoever wanted to try out… And you’d be the official, uh—”

“Next in line for the throne?” Erica says wryly.

Eddie laughs, but it’s short-lived—he soon turns thoughtful again.

“Sure. Now I’m thinking, what, eleven, twelve…” He counts on his fingers. “Yeah. By the time you start high school, maybe that’s just enough time for people to not lose their minds about…” He smiles weakly. “Hey, maybe don’t call it Hellfire under your reign.”

“Oh, so you think I’m chickenshit,” Erica says.

“No,” Eddie says softly, and suddenly he’s not half-joking; he sounds deadly serious. “Just don’t want you to—y’know, be mixed up with…” He trails off.

Erica’s not told him about what happened at the town hall, but from the way he’s talking she suspects he knows at least a little.

She wants to be able to snark back at him, you really think Hawkins will still be talking about you years later? Please, you’re not that important.

But the thing is, she can’t know that for sure. She doesn’t know what’s going to happen next.

And that scares her.

Something else mixes with the sinking feeling in her stomach. It’s cold and unstoppable: the righteous fury she felt in the hall, as grown adults condemned a boy they did not know, when she’d figured out within barely five minutes of meeting him that he was all bark and no bite.

“Was gonna give you an open invite to Hellfire, anyway,” Eddie’s saying—almost under his breath, as he twists blades of grass around his fingers. “Like, just whenever you could make a session. I was gonna ask you, obviously, but… Was gonna write up, like, solo adventures your character could be part of whenever you couldn’t come. Same for Lucas, if he—”

“Okay, did you actually tell Lucas that?” Erica asks knowingly. “Or did you just think it?”

Eddie shifts guiltily.

“You need to tell him,” Erica says—remembering the week before Christmas that she’d accidentally broken his mug; they’d fought, and Lucas had eventually slunk into her room, somehow convinced that he’d been completely at fault. “Otherwise he just gets all quiet and thinks he’s done something wrong.”

“Noted,” Eddie says quietly. Contrite.

He looks off into the distance at the ongoing arm wrestling match and sighs; falling onto his back, an arm flung over his eyes, he says, “Thought I had all of Spring Break to figure shit out.”

“And what’re you doing right now?” Erica says pointedly. “Get planning, Eddie The Banished.”

Eddie huffs. Smiles. “Okay, okay.”

He lapses into silence. It makes Erica think that he isn’t just dwelling on ideas for a campaign. There’s a crease between his eyes—and maybe it’s a different kind of frown than the one Lucas wears, but it’s a frown all the same.

She gives him a moment, then pulls out a blade of grass and pokes him in the cheek with it.

He lifts his arm off his face. “Hmm?”

Erica holds out her hand. “I’m making the arrangement official.”

“The arrange—oh.”

Eddie sits up, blinks, blinks, blinks.

Oh, honestly, Erica thinks. He’s one of the most soft-hearted people she’s ever met.

She waits until he takes her hand before saying firmly, “To the future of Hellfire.”

Eddie smiles again, and his lips shake just a little at the edges. “The future of Hellfire,” he murmurs.

They shake on it.

“Seems like a fair trade,” Erica adds. “You get a belt, I get your club.”

Eddie laughs, puts an arm around her shoulders and squeezes.

“Erica Sinclair,” he says, eyes bright with affection. “I’d give you the whole goddamn world, if I could.”

[infinitenatones]

Thought I'd share the latest paragraph I wrote for my current Steddie smut fic. Just a little teaser for you.

It's Rockstar Eddie and Teacher Steve although this paragraph doesn't mention that. They've been together for years now. It's shameless smut with a tiny hint of plot.

18+ only, MINORS DNI!!

Steve’s jeans now feature a very obvious wet spot from his pre cum. Palming himself just isn’t doing it anymore, he wants to feel Eddie, needs to feel him. To have Ed’s hands roam his body, his lips leaving marks claiming him, the dark chocolate curls wrapping around his fingers as he pressed Eddie face closer to him. A sinful moan fell from his lips mixing with the music of the mixtape. He was so lost in the moment and his desire for more that he almost missed the noise of keys being fumbled with by the door. Eddie’s gravelly voice muttering a string of curses pulled him back into the room, his man is finally home and he seems pissed. Steve doesn’t mind though, having sex with Eddie when he’s annoyed is a delicious thing. Letting him use Steve to fuck out his frustrations, it was always intense and animalistic, he loved it. Plus the after cuddles were always so sweet and cozy, even when he was being used like a slutty little fuck toy Eddie made sure to remind Steve after of just how much he adored him.