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munsonsreputation · 7 months

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I SHOULD HATE YOU

steve harrington x fem!reader

word count: [22.3k]

warnings: warnings: no use of y/n, enemies to lovers, reader and steve use foul language towards each other (bitch, asshole, ect). blood (one of them gets hurt...but not bcs of each other), eventual smut (oral: both m and f receiving, fingering, piv, multiple o's,) minors gtfo before i superkick you!!!

summary: You and Steve Harrington hate each other’s guts…or at least you should, that is until a camp outing reveals everything that you both have been trying to hide.

You desperately wanted to see what everyone else saw in Steve Harrington that you didn’t. All those words of how he changed so much and had this entire redemption arc when he decided to finally stop giving shit about stupid high school social orders and commit his life to be the esteemed and reliable babysitter.

Hell, even Robin Buckley, the one girl who really couldn’t stand him a few years ago, was now his best friend, and Nancy Wheeler, his ex-girlfriend, could actually stand to be in his presence without wanting to cringe and vomit because she actually dated him.

You just couldn’t see it in him no matter how hard you tried, not even the kids could convince you that Steve wasn’t all that bad anymore. If anything they gushed about how much they admired him. How he was the cool older brother figure that they all wanted and had wrapped around their fingers ready at their beck and call.

Everyone loved Steve, but to you it was just bullshit.

“Why the sad face, doll?”

Steve pouted feignedly, causing you to roll your eyes, slapping the flies away from your skin as you watched him pitch his stupid tent.

“I’m not sad. I’m more so annoyed.” You grunted out with a glare.

“I told you to bring bug spray.” He reminded shaking his head, clearly amused seeing you get angry at the innocent flies.

“I did, but it doesn’t fucking work and for your information, I’m annoyed because you’re here.” You said through gritted teeth, slapping your neck as another one landed but flew away before you could kill it.

Steve snapped the poles into place, engrossed with his task.

“Well if it makes you feel any better,” he chimed in, standing with a straight smirk across his face, “I’m not particularly happy with your presence either seeing as though you’re not doing shit besides standing there being a bitch.”

Your eyes widened, arms crossing over your chest as you stared at him in disbelief. But by this point it shouldn’t have been so surprising granted that you and Steve never stopped bickering, even when you both should have known to ignore each other.

“Oh, go fuck yourself, Harrington!” You shouted, turning on your heel and flipping him the bird as you walked away.

“Tell that to my right hand, sweet cheeks!” He called out with a whistle, reveling in the art of getting under your skin.

Nance and Jonathan exchanged amused glances, painfully familiar with how much you and Steve despised each other yet somehow got here alive without slitting each other's throats. But that didn’t seem like it was going to be lasting long seeing as though this was now the beginning to a very long night.

You plopped down onto the foldable chair, still wearing a scowl that didn’t seem to want to cease even with the distance you created between you and him.

“We barely got here and you’re already at each other's throats.”

Nancy shook her head not understanding why you both couldn’t be adults about this whole thing.

“He started it!” You insisted, pointing your finger in his direction.

Jonathan couldn’t help but jump in with a chuckle, feeling as if this was payback for all those times he and his brother Will gave his mom a hard time. Seriously, dealing with you both was identical to watching two toddlers tattle tale on each other for every little thing before toys and fists were thrown.

“So now you’re playing the blame game?” He suspected.

You clicked your tongue, sitting up straighter, shoulders pulled back as you crossed your legs and placed your hands on top of your knees, ready to mock Steve and his privileged life that he just had to leave behind for the day.

“Why couldn’t he just have stayed home in his stupid mansion, driving around in his stupid Beemer, where he could be stupid all by himself and leave us out of his stupid stupidity.”

You seriously looked like you could end him with your bare hands — and if they didn’t know better they’d let you have a go at it just to see how far you would get. Surely Steve would put up a good fight too, probably make it quick and easy so he didn’t have to hear your voice anymore, but you would definitely be taking your time with him.

“He’s the only one who’s ever been camping and if something happens then he’ll know what to do.”

Nancy attempted to reason with you, hoping you could see it through just this once, for just a couple hours.

You shrugged your shoulders, watching him in your peripheral vision.

“Whatever, as long as he stays away from me then I can make it through the next 24 hours.” You waved off.

But Jonathan lugged up a box, plopping it before your feet with a loud clatter coming from inside of it, staring at you with a smile.

“If you want to make it to at least tonight, I’d suggest you start getting to work.”

Cursing under your breath, you were beginning to rethink your choices of saying ‘yes’ to trip when you had not one outdoorsy bone in your body and surely no bone, not even a cell that could stand Steve Harrington.

But getting it pitched up yourself wasn’t all that bad considering the fact that the instructions were self explanatory and had images to make it easy to follow. It was that nagging, infuriating voice that belonged to Steve that was getting on your last nerve. Like a mosquito in your ear, he kept buzzing and buzzing and—

“Try again, you’re holding the pole backwards, smarty pants!” He called out, smirking to himself when you tried to ignore him by shutting him out and doing it at your own pace.

But ignoring him only fueled his determination to keep going, poking and prodding at your patience that was withering away by the second. Every snarky smartass remark was like nails on a chalkboard, causing your eye to twitch, teeth to grind, and self-restraint to grow weaker.

“Your tent is gonna fly away in the middle of the night if you don’t make use of those stakes!”

“You shoulda listened to me, I told you that pole was in the wrong slot!”

“How about you put a little elbow grease into it and stop trying to put it together like you’re the goddamn princess of the camp ground!”

Your blood was damn nearly boiling, knuckles going white as you shoved the stupid pole into the other side, trying to get the frame to stay together. But your anger and rushing only made it worse, the wobbling frame threatening to give out on itself if you tried to force it in anymore than you already had. His whiny voice and every taunt that came with it just made you want to take the pole and use it for something else — silencing him.

Nancy and Robin had scolded Steve multiple times, knowing that your fuse with him was ridiculously short. Eddie and Jonathan, well-acquainted with your dynamic, kept their distance, observing from the sidelines not wanting to be caught in the impending storm between you two.

Eddie watched you carefully, your jaw clenching, air pushing out of your nostrils and he was sure that if it was humanly possible there would be a hot steam coming from the top of your head.

“Knock it off, man, she’s getting pissed.” He warned his friend, taking a swig of his beer, while he darted between you both.

Steve however, wasn’t threatened in the slightest, continuing to provoke you with another snide comment.

“She won’t be pissed for long if a bear comes and mauls her in the middle of the night because she doesn’t know how to pitch a damn—”

That was the last straw.

“I’m gonna fucking kill you!” You screamed, ripping off the pole and storming towards Steve not caring how insane you looked.

Eddie quickly got on his feet, dropping his beverage and intervening just in time.

“Not so fast!” He lifted you off the ground holding you back as Jonathan managed to wrangle the pole out of your hands.

Steve was having a fit of laughter, hunching over himself and grabbing at his midsection.

“You’re so easy to piss off.” He cackled, shaking his head at you and giving himself an imaginary point for already getting under your skin in the first hour of being there.

“You’re such an asshole!” You fumed, continuing to struggle in Eddie's grasp.

He kept his hold tight knowing if there was any room left for you to get away, it would most likely end with warfare. And while he and your friends never liked to come in between your tumultuous relationship, they knew letting you both rip each other apart wouldn't do anyone good – even if it gave them some peace.

Nancy had had enough — the trip was supposed to be peaceful, getting to be one with nature and finally getting away from the kids for once, but of course, that wouldn’t happen seeing as though you and Steve acted like children possessed.

“Enough!” She shouted, bringing temporary silence as you both could feel the seriousness in her voice.

“You’re right, Steve is an asshole and because he feels so sorry, what he’s gonna do is finish pitching up your tent while we go to the lake to cool off. Got it?”

She turned towards him, her eyes widening, signaling Steve to comply for the sake of peace just this once.

But instead, he protested, standing up defiantly, “Hell no! I wouldn’t even pitch her tent if—”

“I’m not asking you, I’m telling you.” Nancy interrupted, not leaving any room for negotiation because at this point it was futile.

Robin gestured to the partially completed frame with a small shrug.

“It’s the least you can do, half of it is already done.” She said, hoping to lighten his mood about it.

Reluctantly Steve huffed, glaring as he made his way over to you, faces only inches apart as everyone began to sigh, seeing as though you’d both be starting again. Eddie gripped you tight, not even giving you any wiggle room to try anything.

“You’re lucky Robin’s staying in your tent because if she wasn’t, I wouldn’t even think about finishing it.” Steve rasped begrudgingly smirking because you were a prisoner in shackles.

But you jutted your neck forward as if you were about to headbutt him which caused him to flinch back, holding his arm out front of his body. That alone made you cackle, just a taste of what you could have done to get him to shut up.

“Get to work, boy scout.” You sneered.

Throwing Eddie’s arms off your midsection, you brushed right past him going towards your bag to get out a bikini to change into while the rest of them whispered their scoldings, particularly punctuating the importance of Steve not messing with you anymore because they couldn’t stand it.

Jonathan nudged Steve’s shoulder, a pleading expression on his face.

“Would it kill you to not be such a dickhead to her for one whole day?”

Steve dramatically gasped, wrapping his arms around his own neck pretending to suffocate, “Y-yes… I-I can’t breathe, no oxygen!”

His best friend rolled her eyes, unimpressed with his childish behavior “You’re such a dweeb, I swear.” she said, smacking the top of his head as she walked past him and followed you to the bathrooms.

“You heard her, get to work.”

Nance snapped her fingers, pointing sharply at the tent hoping that for once he’d listen.

Jonathan and Eddie decided to serve as watch guards knowing that if no one was here to watch him and make sure he did what he was told, he would probably let you sleep with a half assed tent while Robin stayed with him and Eddie.

Maybe all you needed was to get as far away as possible from him… for as long as you could.

Stepping into the lake, the water felt nice against your skin, cooling down the sizzling blood still rushing in your veins and easing your body to a state of relaxation. If you closed your eyes hard enough and let the sun bask down on your face, you could pretend as if he wasn’t just a few feet away from you, grumbling like a whiny child forced into time out to write a hundred sentences.

You honestly should’ve known better than to agree to come along the trip knowing Steve was going to infect it with his existence, but your friends had convinced you otherwise, selling it as an opportunity to get out of Hawkins for a weekend and just enjoy each other’s company.

If you had known that Steve was going to be even more of a pain in the ass than usual, you would have never even thought about getting into Eddie van and driving all the way here with no other means to leave.

“I just don’t understand how he’s nice to everyone but you.” Robin pondered aloud, trying to understand the mystery between your relationship.

“It’s because he wants me dead, Robin, simple as that.” You deadpanned, seeing no other explanation to it other than pure hatred.

“Don’t be ridiculous, he doesn’t want you dead.” Nancy laughed, brushing off your comment knowing that Steve didn’t hate you that much.

“Oh my bad, I meant that he wants me to suffer a long excruciating death by letting his ego take up all the space in the room.”

Your voice leaked of sarcasm, eliciting laughs from the girls who found humor in what you saw as the truth.

Robin and Nancy knew there was no way the both of you could really hate each other as much as you both liked to think you did. If you really did hate each other for real, then you wouldn’t even dare to tolerate each other's presence but you both did — and while sure most times it was for the sake of your friends, by now one of you should’ve been fed up enough to leave.

Their laughter faded, Robin staring at you with a mischievous smirk as you waded in the water, enjoying the temporary peace. Perhaps she could be out of line with the thoughts brewing up in her head, but it was just a theory — a possible reasoning for you and Steve’s differences.

“Did you ever stop and think that maybe you two might get along better if you liked each other in a different way?” She wiggled her brows before biting her lip.

And like that, the peace was gone.

“Absolutely fucking not!” You shouted, rejecting it with clear disgust as you began splashing her in retaliation.

She giggled some more, trying to shield herself from the large splashes as Nancy swam off to the side, happy that at least you were having some fun now, even if the conversation still revolved around Steve. Robin swam through the splashes, wrapping her hands around yours to make them stop before you both began laughing, letting her hug you as an apology for her words.

“You’re so lucky I love you.” You grumbled, leaning closer to her to rest your cheek against her shoulder.

“Opposites attract, you know.” She continued to tease and you poked at her side, glaring half jokingly.

“Not him and I.” You declared sternly, gaze moving back up to the shore where the men still gathered near your tent.

It was nice not having to watch you stick your nose up and complain about the flies as if it was the end of the world. Without you in his ear and sights, he could finally enjoy just a smidge of the day, even if it was pitching his mortal enemy’s tent. If he didn’t think about it too much, he’d forget that it would be keeping you safe and you’d wake up the next morning, living another day to make his life miserable.

Tugging the tarp into place, he zipped it up and down making sure it slid smoothly before dusting off his hands and taking a step back to examine your his work. He tilted his head, shrugging his shoulders not in the mood to fix the lousy frame.

“Besides the crooked roof, it’s not that bad.” He announced, more so glad that his punishment was over.

Jonathan grinned, patting him on the back with a hopeful look as if this was the turning point.

“Well you should tell her she didn’t do a bad job then! Say something nice to her for once.”

Steive chortled looking over to him in disbelief before wagging his finger mockingly.

“Over my dead body.”

Jonathan sighed, sliding away from him and going to grab another beer for himself. Slowly but surely he was giving up on the idea of trying to get you and Steve to get along for the weekend. At this point, he and Nance’s plan was failing terribly, seeing as though neither of you said one good thing to each other all day and it probably would never happen.

Eddie rolled his eyes, resting his back against the tree as he watched you and the girls spinning in the water enjoying yourselves.

“Why can’t you both just put your differences aside and get along?” He wondered, seeing as though you were both capable of being happy, just why not with each other.

Steve darted his eyes up to his obviously, “She’s had it out for me since day one. Never liked me and never even tried to.”

Walking over to your bags, he picked them up along with Robin’s placing them in the tent, but he more so threw yours in, not giving a damn if the tent shook with it.

Eddie sighed, going over to fix it nicely into a corner when Steve turned away.

“To be fair, you haven’t tried to like her either so the odds were never going to be in your favor to begin with.” Jonathan pointed out truthfully.

How were the both of you ever going to get along if you held so much against each other without trying to see it through?

“You sure you don’t have a thing for her deep down? They always say that people who hate each other really just have to settle their differences in bed so they can see eye to eye.” Eddie snickered, patting his back stiffly.

The thought alone made Steve sick. Kissing you? Hugging you? Actually enjoying your existence? That sounded like a nightmare from hell if he’d ever dreamt one. Eddie and Jonathan found it a bit comical, even taking notice of their friends silence, his mind thinking up all the dirty and—

A hard smack landed on Eddie’s arm.

“I don’t know where the hell you heard that from, but I wouldn’t even sleep with her if we were the last two people on Earth.” Steve sneered, nose sticking up with disgust.

Edide rubbed at the skin, he and Jonathan watched as Steve walked away, tugging his shirt off and beginning to make his way into the lake without another word. They knew it was inevitable, the hatred that was brewing in his bones for you, was just a ploy for something else — something you and him didn’t see quite but everyone else did.

“Twenty they finally kiss?” Jonathan challenged, turning to him with an open hand.

Eddie cackled, smirking smugly.

“Twenty-five they end up hooking up tonight,” he added to the wager and to the lines that you and him would cross.

“Deal.”

You rolled your eyes, detaching yourself from Robin catching the sight of Steve inching his way into the lake. Soon after Jonathan and Eddie followed suit, running in like chickens with their heads cut off and splashing all of you with their boy-ness.

It frustrated you more than the way it should have made you angry — the way all your friends could seamlessly get along with him as if he wasn't the worst person you ever met. He even embraced Jonathan in a bromance hug as if at one point in their lives they didn’t despise each other for the girl they both liked.

It was so… confusing?

You let them bask in the presence of Steve, knowing that while you didn’t enjoy time with him, you would never try to rob the rest of your friends from it. Instead you went off on your own, going in just a bit deeper for some privacy as they lingered a few feet behind you.

“Don’t go too far out!” Nancy called out to you knowing you weren’t the best swimmer.

“I know, mom!” You singsonged, looking up at the sky and taking it all in — random cloud shapes and the birds that flocked above.

The camp ground was two hours out from Hawkins, tucked away in a nicer part of town, of course, Steve was the one who suggested the place. Nevertheless it was actually breathtaking, a nice contrast to the small town that you all came from which didn’t have a lake that compared to this, just good ole’ Lover’s Lake and Sattler Quarry.

This would probably be your first and last time camping, so you were trying to make the most of it, not letting the little scuffle totally ruin your experience. You had wished you brought your polaroid along, wanting to snap photos of the view to remember it by but in hindsight it was better to live in the moment.

“Let’s play sharks and minnows!” Robin announced cheerfully, wanting to seize the moment and do something fun she remembered from childhood.

You didn’t pay them any mind, your silence serving as an answer that you’d be sitting that game out and enjoying watching them instead.

Steve cupped his hands around his mouth, shouting loudly, “I call shark!”

They erupted in shrieks, splashing their way farthest from Steve, getting a head start since he was a skilled swimmer.

Eddie, who was a distance away yelled out, “Ready, set, go!”

Steve didn’t even bother mapping out everyone else, they weren’t his prey, you were.

“Better get moving, princess!”

Steve wore an irritatingly smug look, catching your eyes before he dove under the water and made his way towards you.

Your eyes widened, flaring your arms back as you attempted to doggy paddle away from him but it was obvious that he had the upper hand with his skill set. The tips of your toes started to slip from the ground, water pushed up to your collarbones as you still tried to get away from him without drowning.

It was futile trying to lose him, you didn’t even dare to inch further back knowing by then the water would submerge you fully. Instead you opted to sweep the water against him the closer he got to you, though he was unaffected by it still swimming with ease.

“Steve, stop! Go away!” You shouted, kicking your legs trying to get him back.

“Gotcha!” He grinned, popping his head out of the water to stand up straight and wrap his arms around your midsection

You pushed at his chest, trying to get away. “You dickwad! I wasn’t even playing!”

“Too bad!” He stuck his tongue out at you, gripping your skin just a tad tighter and hoisting your legs around his hips.

“Steve put me down, I swear to fucking…oh my god!” You exclaimed, quickly moving your arms around his neck when you felt the woosh of water against your back when he moved you both deeper into the water.

You watched your friends over his shoulder become smaller and smaller, until they were little specks on the shore waving with shit eating grins on their faces knowing that Steve wouldn’t actually do anything to hurt you.

Despite how disgusted you were being so close to him, you had no choice but to hang on for dear life. Steve gave you a bit of height with you over his hips, and had it not been for that, you’d be drowning by now.

“S-Steve, please I can’t swim!” You begged, eyes finally daring to meet him and for once you weren’t looking at him with such disgust but with desperation.

His face contorted with surprise, eyebrows raised and mouth held wide open before tugging up into a lopsided smirk.

“Never thought I’d ever hear that word come out of your mouth… let me hear it one more time?”

His grip barely went slack as you whimpered, using your legs to jerk him back to you before you slapped his chest, fingers gripping his biceps under the water and letting your nails dig painfully into his skin.

“Get me back to the shallow! Right now!” You growled, watching as he winced a bit hissing in a sharp breath feeling the sting.

Seriously, if you were a better swimmer, you’d be out of his grasp by now and holding his head underwater until he floated like dead weight. He had the advantage over you, but you’d be damned if you didn’t at least put up a fight.

“What’s the magic word?” He teased, exhaling as your nails eased out of his skin yet somehow you still held on to him not wanting to take a risk no matter how revolting he was.

“I. hate. you!” You screamed, starting to thrash around in his arms hoping that your struggle would annoy him so much that he’d bring you back to the shallow just so he wouldn’t have to deal with you.

But instead, he loosened his grip again, using it against you because just as he suspected, you seized your movements immediately, looped your hands around his neck, clinging to him like a koala.

“Still waiting on that magic word.” He singsoned, not being too cruel this time around, wrapping his arms securely around your frame, not actually thinking he’d ever let you go.

You hoped your friends couldn’t read your lips from there or else you wouldn’t hear the end of it.

“Please.” You gave in, whispering it against his neck.

The hair on the back of his neck stood tall, shivers creeping up his spine feeling a twinge of sympathy for you, but not too much to spare, when you cursed his name right after the fact. Satisfied, he spun around, guiding the two of you back to the bank where you were more comfortable.

Letting out a breath of relief, you relaxed your arms and slightly loosened your legs from around his waist, a little surprised at yourself for being able to stand his skin sticking to yours for so long. This was the most contact you and Steve had ever endured with each other. All of the previous encounters consisted of you smacking him and him chasing you with something gross like a dead roach.

“You didn’t think I’d actually let you drown, did you?” Steve asked, looking down at you.

You rolled your eyes, staring up at him past your lashes. “I don’t know, you’re quite the asshole so I thought so.”

He ran his tongue over the inside of his cheek, tsking disapprovingly.

“Such a shame you think so lowly of me,” he said acting hurt as rolled your eyes yet again, “here’s payback for earlier.”

His arms abruptly left your body, letting you actually slip out of his hold watching as you went down with a screech that quickly died. You shut your eyes tightly, arms pushing yourself up to the surface where you coughed roughly, his stupid laughter filling your ears when you came to.

“I still hate you!”

You huffed, splashing him once more before trudging towards your friends who watched with glee, thankful for the five minutes of free entertainment that didn’t involve them.

Steve stood where he was, arms crossed, face dripping with lake water, but still wearing a wide smile, more than happy with his little stunt and the fact that he got your blood pressure rising. Something about riling you up, filled him up with a sort of satisfaction, yet he wouldn’t ever admit that you were the only person who could get under his skin the same way he did you.

Surprisingly enough, he stayed away from you during the rest of the time in the lake. Instead, he bothered Eddie and Robin with his stupid ideas to race across the lake and find the biggest pebble to see who could skip it the farthest.

Thankfully for you, you got the bathe in the sunlight, enjoying conversation with Jonathan and Nancy who at first bothered you about the whole you in his arms thing, but eventually gave up when you gave them the death stare. You obviously were holding back something considering you never missed a beat to berate Steve, but this time around, you didn’t even want to get into it — they wondered why?

As the sun slowly began to tumble, casting oranges and pinks in the sky, you felt your fingertips becoming overly pruney, cueing your desire to get out and get freshened up for the evening.

“I’m gonna go wash up.” You announced raising a hand over your forehead to block the light as you stared out at them in the water.

“We’ll be out in a bit!” Robin called through her laughter, continuing her fun in chasing Eddie and Jonathan around in the water with a stick she had found.

You carefully tiptoed through the rocks, making your way up to the camp ground. The tent wasn’t half bad, and to your surprise Steve had actually followed through on his task of finishing it. You’d guess that if he wasn’t so intimidated by Nancy and her threats, he wouldn’t even think about doing it, nevertheless at least now you could say Steve did something useful for you for once, even if it was against his will.

Your bag was already conveniently placed in your tent, so you grabbed your toiletries, a clean towel, and your change of clothes before you walked over to the communal bathrooms where the showers were also located. Thankfully it was just you and your friends on the grounds, so it was fairly clean and had more privacy than usual which was always nice.

You pulled the curtains to one of the stalls back, assessing the area before putting your things down on the shelf and hanging your towel on the railing, stepping in and pulling the curtains closed. Stripping off your swimwear, you wringed out the excess water and hung them on the adjacent wall letting them air dry for the time being.

Cranking the lever, the shower head spritzed alive, letting semi-warm water sprinkle across your skin, rinsing you free of the lake water. You hummed to yourself, raking your fingers through the knots and tangles of your hair, doing your best to get them out before rubbing the skin over your neck and chest.

“You really should have picked the stall away from the sunlight.”

Steve’s voice echoed, halting his footsteps in the doorway as he stared at the figure behind the curtain, the only other person in here was you and he could definitely tell by your pedicured toes peeking under the gap of the shower.

Clenching your jaw, your hands stopped its movements over your body, turning your head over your shoulder as you were met with Steve’s shadow staring right on the other side. If you squinted hard enough you could make out the smirking features on his face, but to your obvious surprise all you could do was shriek.

“Oh my god!” You shielded yourself with your arms as if that would help, seeing as though the curtain alone wasn’t doing its job of saving you your dignity.

He held his hands up, gesturing his arm up and down at the curtain.

“Relax, I can only see your shadow because of the sun.” He explained nonchalantly, walking into the stall beside yours and switching the water on.

You swallowed, still not trusting him completely as you stepped forward, peeling back the curtain a bit to see if anyone else was coming that way.

“Are the rest of them coming? I need to save myself the embarrassment and move to another stall if they are.” You asked rapidly, really hoping that neither of your friends or any visitors would be greeted with your naked silhouette the second they stepped in there.

“They’re playing chicken in the lake so no, they won’t be coming any time soon.” He responded, sounding actually sincere for once, because while he enjoyed messing with you, he still respected your privacy enough to know setting you up like that wasn’t cool.

See… there were boundaries between your hatred, probably ones so low the bar was on the floor...but they were boundaries.

“Thank god.” You sighed, tugging the portion of the curtain closed and walking back into the stream of the water, squeezing some shampoo into your hands as you began lathering it through your scalp.

“By the way, are your tits pierced or were you just excited to see me?”

Your eyes widened, a gasp leaving your mouth while your fingers stopped. His incessant laughter bounced off the walls and rang in your ears like the worst kind of pain, wishing you had taken your chances earlier and at least tried to drown him.

“You’re such a pig!” You said, banging your hands on his side of the wall until his laughter died down scoffing.

He grunted, tapping your wall back harder. “Learn how to take a joke and stop getting your panties in a twist.”

“What’s a joke is that rumor about you being so largely endowed.” You began pretending to gag.

“I heard Stacy Burnham asked you if it was even in and when you said yes she was so disappointed.” You sassed sharply, hoping it would embarrass him enough to shut up.

“I didn’t even hook up with Stacy Burnham!” He retorted ridiculously, knowing that rumor was so absurd and untrue.

You rolled your eyes and wished he could see you, “Not surprised, it probably didn’t feel like much for you either when you’re packing less than three inches.”

Steve scoffed loudly, knowing that was definitely not true and it wasn’t just his ego talking.

“Oh trust me, you wouldn’t even be able to take half of what I’m packing.”

“A half inch? Yeah, cause I’d be too busy crying with disappointment.” You faked sobbed, flipping him off though he couldn’t even see you.

He didn’t have a comeback, clearly not in the mood to argue about what he was packing because truly you’d only believe him if you saw it for yourself. And trust him, he’d burn himself alive before ever thinking about seeing you naked or letting you see him naked.

That was just totally out of the question… and like he told Eddie, it would never happen even if you both were the last people on Earth.

“Let me borrow some soap.” Steve muttered knocking on your wall, hand dangling above your stall waiting for you to pass it over.

“No.” You chuckled, smacking his hand before you grabbed your body wash and rubbed it against your palms to create bubbles.

“Why not?” He coaxed, not putting his hand back down into his stall as you sighed and went on about washing your body.

“You tried to kill me earlier and let me drown.” You reminded him.

“And what would you call that little stunt back there when you tried to stab me to death?” He retorted.

You were quiet, rolling your eyes knowing that he wouldn’t let this go any time soon, so in order to save both of your energies, you simply picked up the bottle of shampoo, thrusting it up into his hand as he chuckled to himself and grabbed it.

“See! Sharing is caring, now, if you need to borrow some brains you know where to find me.”

“Shut the fuck up.” You snapped, trying to enjoy the rest of your shower despite knowing that the only thing that separated you both was a wall.

You showered in complete silence, only Steve knocking on your wall to give you back the products, fingers tapping against his palm to silently ask you for the next. After a few minutes you had finished, finally shutting the water off as you dried down.

You slipped your legs through a fresh pair of underwear, letting it snap against your skin as you worked the fitted cami over your torso and then slipped on the shorts that you rolled over your hips to stop them from falling.

Whipping the curtain back, you didn’t wait for Steve to finish, simply leaving him as you went back towards the tents to hang your still wet swimsuit over a tree branch and stuffing your things back into your bag.

After a few minutes he came out, walking over with his towel around his neck, sporting a loose t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants.

“Well you’re definitely getting eaten alive by mosquitoes tonight.” He shook his head at your rookie mistake, laughing along with it.

You looked down at yourself, much of your skin left exposed for the same flies that badgered you earlier to feast upon.

“Give me a break, I didn’t know there would be so many flies.”

He walked over to his stuff, plucking out the aerosol can and tossing it over to you, “Here.”

You caught it, looking over the bottle label as he spoke, “It’s the only brand of bug spray that actually works.”

“Thanks.” You mumbled, twisting the bottle open and misting it over your arms and legs, letting the product coat every inch with a light sheen.

You tossed it back, working it into your skin as Steve took his turn to spray it on his exposed arms and neck knowing from experience that waking up to a hundred fly bites was the most uncomfortable itchy pain to be in.

“How were the showers?” Eddie huffed, water dripped off his body as he made his way up to you both, the rest of them following behind.

“Fine, just don’t pick the stall directly at the entrance. Wouldn’t want anyone getting an eye full.”

Steve smirked as you turned beet red, tucking your face into your chest and walking to your bag to pretend to search for something.

Nancy wrapped her arms around herself, biting back the cool air that was coming in from the day winding down.

“Why don’t you guys get started on the fire so that way we can have dinner soon.”

Sunset was just nearly finishing up, only about a half hour of sunlight left before darkness would set in. Steve knew from experience that keeping the fire overnight would be the best bet at having means to some light and warmth.

He nodded, looking around for the items to get it going, “Yeah, sure, where’s the charcoal?”

“Charcoal?” Jonthan asked, confused, scratching the temple of his head, not remembering seeing it when you were all loading Eddie’s van that morning.

Steve nodded his head obviously, looking around at the group. “For the fire? I told you guys to pick it up.”

You sighed, standing up to face them with your hands on your hips. “Don’t tell me you guys forgot it.”

“Are we doomed if we say we did?” Eddie spoke, a guilty inflection in his voice, because he was totally in charge of that but it had slipped his mind.

Steve shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “Just means that now we have to find some sticks and leaves. Do it the old fashioned way.”

Robin the ever so considerate one, starting snapping her fingers, pointing between you and Steve biting back her sneaky smile.

“So stop standing around and start searching! We don’t want to lose daylight before then.”

Taking a deep breath in you held back your comments of how you didn’t want to go anywhere alone with Steve since he obviously had a death wish for you. However it was obvious that this was going to be a group effort, and if you wanted to make it out of here alive, you would just have to suck it up and follow Steve’s lead.

He stared down at your bare feet, pointing at your tent.

“Put some shoes on and let’s go.” He said, before the others smiled contently, running off to the showers and leaving you both alone again.

“This is the last time I’m ever camping.” You grumbled sliding on a fresh pair of socks and slipping your shoes on, bending to tie them up.

Steve tapped his foot against the grass, shaking his head at you and your ability to nit-pick every little thing.

“You know, it would be more enjoyable if you’d stop making every minor inconvenience a big deal.”

You finished off the ties with a tug, walking over to him and glaring at his hypocrisy with an instance you were all too familiar with.

“Are you really one to be talking Mr. I got mad at Dustin Henderson for using up all my hairspray even when my date flaked on me?”

He hated that you remembered that even when it had been months ago since it happened. Neither you nor Dustin let him live it down because it was the first time he let a girl get in between his extraordinary ability to be the charming babysitter he made himself out to be. Dustin, so annoyed with his attitude, didn’t ask Steve for any rides to the arcade nor did he visit him at Scoops for a whole two weeks.

Instead, you took on the babysitting role, driving him to the arcade, dropping him off to school, and even picking the kid up at Star Court when all his friends caught a ride with Steve to be dropped off back at their place. Steve thought Dustin was being ridiculous about the whole thing until you pulled up in your car, wearing the biggest smile as you rolled down your window and sent him a cold smirk.

“Not such a great babysitter anymore, huh?” You laughed, watching as his face fell and Dustin got into the passenger of your car, waving goodbye to his friends while you sped off.

Safe to say, Steve apologized to the kid, terribly sorry and embarrassed by his behavior and even throwing in a bottle of hairspray and a free banana split every time he came into Scoops as an apology gift.

The two of you followed the trail a few feet out from the campground, trucking through an uneven rocky path and outgrown bushes. He was clearly more familiar with the area given his experience, knowing exactly where to go, taking a shortcut that passed cut through the bumpy trail and led you to a small area of dirt and trees.

“We’re looking for sticks about this size, but really any twig or stick will do.” He spoke, reaching down to pick up a large stick and show it to you.

You looked around, eyes peeled out for the sticks that were scattered in the area.

“And what about leaves?” you asked.

“Those too, but they’ve gotta be dry, almost crumbly.” He specified, walking off to start the collection process.

“Got it.”

You and Steve worked the best when there was no talking involved, perhaps that's why your friends always suggested going out to see a movie at the theaters instead of at each other's homes where you both would clearly not give a damn about causing a disturbance. But despite that, right then you both were going a whole ten minutes without insulting one another or making threats to see the other dead.

When you picked up the wrong stick of a leaf that wasn’t crumbly enough, he just grunted, shaking his head until you dropped it and found another that would suffice. That system was working well so far, so maybe that was the key: limited talking.

“Go drop that pile off and come back for more, we’re gonna need a whole bunch to last until morning.” Steve instructed, noticing that you had already gathered quite a bit in your arms.

You peered into his arms, his pile about the same size as yours, maybe a little smaller.

“Want me to take some of yours?” You suggested, wanting to save you both a few more trips up there.

He nodded, carefully stacking them on top of what you already had, steadying the pile and removing the bigger ones to ensure it didn’t tumble over while you were walking down. When you got all that you could carry, Steve gave you a cautious look.

“Be careful and walk slowly, the path gets rocky when you get closer to the camp. If you fall, just scream and I’ll hear you.” He was so serious about it, like a true camp counselor, or as you liked to call him...

“Heard you loud and clear, boy scout.” You hummed, turning around and making your way carefully down the trail.

For once you actually listened to what he said, taking your time and not rushing your way down knowing it wouldn’t do you or him any good if you ended up taking a spill and losing all the fire starter then scratching yourself up in the process. You remembered the shortcut he took, a right turn that he conveniently marked with a X in the dirt. Just a little more walking before the campsite came back into view and still no signs of your friends being done yet.

You dumped the sticks and leaves near the outside of the fire pit that was in the center of the camp. Dusting your hands off and taking a deep breath, you looked back up the hilly trail where Steve was somewhere up there waiting for you to come back.

“C’mon, princess.” You muttered to yourself, feet taking you back there with fast steps trying to beat the sunlight.

Clearly the outdoors just wasn’t your thing, easily becoming winded despite the fact that the trail wasn’t that steep. But you were trying to cut yourself some slack because for a rookie, you kinda got the hang of keeping your balance and not getting lost through the unknown woods.

“H-how many more piles do we need? I can’t do this five more times.” You huffed, hands on your hips as you caught your breath watching Steve dump a few more sticks in a pile on the ground.

He peered over at you, wiping the sweat that beaded on his forehead with the back of his hand.

“Probably one more, will do.” He answered, strolling further up, just to grab a bit more in case.

You honestly didn’t know how a small town city boy like him was so good at things like this — usually he was only good at picking up girls and making a doofus out of himself when he didn’t know how to talk about anything else beside him.

Maybe it was those annual Harrington trips he took when he was a little boy or maybe he really was secretly a boy scout and been hiding it all along, either way, thank god it was him doing most of the dirty work and not you.

“Should I bring these down or do you want me to wait?” You shouted loud enough for him to hear glancing over at the piles he made while you picked a few more sticks up.

“You can— fuck!” He winced, clutching his palm in his other hand, starting to feel a sharp pain shoot in around the area.

Hastily you dropped the sticks, abandoning the pile and racing to where he was while trying not to fall so that you could see what exactly was going on. There was a pained look on his face, teeth biting into his bottom lip as he turned away and tried to shake it off. But alas you reached for his wrist, bringing his hand towards you to access.

“Shit, you’re bleeding.” You whispered, bringing the injured hand closer to see if the gash was deep or not, but you couldn’t quite tell with the small pooling of blood in the way.

Steve jutted his chin downwards, showing you the jagged stone responsible.

“I didn’t see it when I went for the stick.” He explained.

You nodded, releasing his wrist gently. “C’mon, we need to get it cleaned and bandaged before it gets infected.”

“I gotta grab the—”

“No!” You yelped, pulling him up by the collar of his shirt when he attempted to bend down for more sticks despite his injury.

He stopped, visibly stunned at your sudden attentiveness that was usually never present when it came to him.

“I’ll carry those, but you don’t pick up or hold anything else. If a splinter gets in there I’ll be the one needing to dig it out and it'll only hurt more.” You said sternly, shaking your head at him like he should have known better.

“I thought you liked seeing me in pain.” Steve smirked somehow still able to be a little shit even with a fucked up hand.

“I do,” You tilted your head, but sighed, “But I really don’t need the one person who actually knows what they’re doing to be the first one dead.”

“Fine by me.” Steve shrugged, forced to watch you pick up all the sticks and leaves by yourself, he followed behind you as you occasionally looked behind your shoulder to see if he was okay.

When you both finally made it back to the tents, you dropped the pile, pointing at the foldable chairs a few feet from the pit.

“Go over there.” You instructed, brushing past him with vigor as you went to your tent to retrieve the first aid kit you packed for emergencies like this, though you were really hoping you didn’t have to use it.

You flipped the case open, taking a look at all the materials it contained while you walked over to him, kneeling in front of him and deciding what you were going to do. Grabbing an alcohol wipe, you disinfected your hands before you tapped his knee.

“Show me.” You demanded, holding your hand out, until he reluctantly placed it in yours giving you a closer look at the gash.

The blood had stopped so you knew it wasn’t that deep of a cut that would require stitches or staples, but it most definitely needed to be wrapped up to prevent an infection and trip to the emergency room.

You reached into the kit for a fresh alcohol pad, ripping it open with your teeth as you steadied his hand in yours.

“Just get it over with already.” He muttered, head turning away anticipating the sting that was going to be worse than your nails digging into him.

“Don’t be a wimp.” You joked, swiping it gently over the area to get it clear from the drying blood and any outside contaminants. He didn’t pull back, only sucking in a deep breath from the mild burn but after a few seconds the worst part was done.

“See, not so bad, right, big boy?” You laughed, patting his knee again before throwing aside the bloodied napkin as he swallowed thickly, waiting for your next steps.

He watched you carefully, grabbing some sort of ointment, squeezing a small dollop onto your finger before you dabbed it over the cut making sure to coat it evenly. Then you placed two pieces of gauze over the top to keep it extra clean and enclosed.

You repositioned his arm, letting his elbow rest upright on his knee.

“I’m gonna tape you up now, so try not to get it wet, but if you do I can always rewrap it.” You told him, getting the tape ready.

Steve was surprised by your skill, expertly maneuvering the tape through his fingers, across his palm and over his wrist, repeating it a few times to ensure that the gauze wouldn’t budge and would keep the cut sealed tight.

“Where’d you learn how to do this?” He asked curiously, watching as you smoothed out the creases as you went.

You shrugged, doing one last wrap around for good measure, “I had a phase where I thought I wanted to be a nurse.” You grinned, teeth wrapping around the excess tape to rip it off before you flattened the remainder over his wrist.

He nodded slowly, stammering out,“T-thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” You brushed it off, cleaning up the bloody wipes and putting the first aid kit back in your bag after disinfecting your hands once more.

The sun was nearly covered by the clouds, painting the sky a darker orange shade as nightfall threatened to spill over soon. At this point, the fire needed to be started, now — no more distractions and no more arguing.

“So?” You shot Steve a look, then back down at the fire pit, “Wanna tell me what I need to do to get this thing started or what?”

Steve was more than capable of getting it done himself with one good hand, but seeing as though you were pretty stern in his efforts to not carry a single stick, not even a paper light leaf, he knew this would be no different. Instead he moved to stay beside you, acting as supervisor just so he could make sure you were doing the right thing.

“You’re gonna wanna start by making a bed with the leaves.” He instructed, watching as you dropped down on your hands and knees to get low enough into the pit as you threw them in, trying your best to make it as leveled as possible.

“It looks good,” He praised, giving you a tight smile when you looked up at him waiting for the next steps.

“You want to do it the old fashioned way or do you want to use Eddie’s lighter?” He chuckled, knowing he’d pick the easy way just like you were going to.

“Fuck that, I’m not a cave woman, where the hell is the lighter?” You strided towards his and Eddie’s tent, rummaging through the metal heads duffle bag until you felt the familiar body of the lighter.

You went back into place, flicked it on and looked at Steve cautiously until he nodded, granting you permission to set the bed of leaves on fire. Blindlessly you passed the lighter up to him, watching as the flames slowly engulfed the leaves and began to crackle.

“Now start adding a few sticks. We’re gonna need to add more throughout the night to feed the fire.” He said watching as you carefully threw some in, doing your best to cover the bed beneath it until only a little of the fire was exposed.

“Alright, that’s good enough.” He bent down patting your shoulder and feeling the warmth of the fire starting to get hotter.

“Well that wasn’t so hard.” You grinned to yourself dusting off your hands and knees, happy with your outdoor accomplishments thus far.

“Technically the lighter made the fire.” He shot back, flicking it between you both as you rolled your eyes and blew the flame out.

“Oh shut it.” You muttered, going to busy yourself with something else while Steve put the lighter back where it came from.

You propped open the rest of the chairs, randomly placing them around everyones tents and two extra ones right in front of the fire pit. Steve was watching the fire, making sure it didn’t get too big or burned too slowly — so far the bed of leaves you built were holding up and it didn’t seem like it’d be going out until morning tomorrow.

After a few minutes the voices of your friends came tumbling out of the bathrooms, seeing them all dressed in their PJ’s that somehow showed they were more prepared than you. All of them decked out in long sleeves, hoodies, and sweatpants — god, you wished you got the memo.

“Damn this is cool! I’ve only ever seen a campfire in movies!” Eddie enthusiastically ran closer, peering into the bright orange pit.

You looked over at all of them, dramatically holding your arms wide open.

“Were you guys having a foursome or something?! Steve and I did all the work and he even got banged up in the process.” You said, walking over to him to lift and show them his injured hand.

Robin gasped, running up to his side to check up on him, obviously worried for her best friend, “What the heck happened.”

Steve shrugged looking over at you with a somewhat grateful look, “Grazed a sharp rock, but it’s fine. She wrapped it up and we’re all good to go now.”

“Well shit, sorry we took so long,” Jonathan apologized half-heartedly, while his mind was celebrating that you both actually seemed to work well together when it was needed.

“Eddie and Robin thought they saw a spider in the showers so we all had to take turns using one stall.” Nancy rolled her eyes, giving you an apologetic look, the both of you knowing Robin and Eddie were a tad bit dramatic at times.

“It’s fine, but you can make it up to us by cooking.” You grinned, you and Steve giving each other a sly look before you pointed at the icebox of food waiting to be cooked.

So you and Steve finally got to kick back… in silence of course.

You both sat in the foldable chairs, watching as the four worked diligently over the fire — Nancy holding skewers of hot dogs over the flame, Robin prodding at the potatoes wrapped in foil with a pair of tongs, Jonathan toasting the hot dog buns one by one, and Eddie feeding the fire with a few more smaller sticks.

He peered over at your silent figure, watching the way you zoned off into your own world, somehow right beside him yet a world away. You were probably thinking about something else, either all the remarks you wanted to snap his way yet were held back or maybe you were making a list of new ones to call him tomorrow.

But he cleared his throat, attempting to get you back here with him, “Do you uhh, want a drink?” Steve asked, breaking the silence.

You blinked, turning to watch him flip open the cooler to grab himself a beer while he looked back at you waiting for your request.

“Water, please.” You said, watching as he dug his non injured hand into the ice box to pull you out an ice cold water bottle, shutting the box closed.

“Thank you.” You said softly twisting it open to take a sip.

While doing so, you furrowed your brows, noticing the way that Steve struggled with the twist off since he was using his non-dominant hand. He almost went to put the bottle in his mouth to use his pearly whites as an opener before you quickly capped off your drink and stepped in.

“Give it here.” You said, taking the glass from his hand, and tucking the lid under your shirt to stop it from pinching your skin as you effortlessly twisted it open.

“Thank you.” Steve nodded with a small smile, taking it from you as you shook your head with a grin and went back to watching your friends.

Steve couldn’t wrap his head around how you could be so selfless but at the same time so selfish. You’d do anything your friends asked of you at the drop of a hat, maybe even without them asking to begin with — you’d just jump in and do it. But when it came to him, half the time you didn’t give a damn, ignoring every warning or piece of unwarranted advice he’d thrown your way.

It was utterly confusing, considering that you were the most selfless person to him today than you’d ever been before. You could’ve left him to deal with the cut by himself seeing as though he still had one good hand left, and honestly you could’ve left him to do the stick and leaf collecting all by himself… but you didn’t.

On a regular day if he even dared to ask for your help, the answer would be “no,” with no explanation other than the fact that you just didn’t want to have anything to do with him. So it struck a chord in his mind, wondering why now? It couldn’t just be because you both were in the middle of nowhere, he knew that much.

Why all of a sudden was there this shift, the one where you helped him without receiving anything back?

“How is the food coming along?” You whistled towards your friends.

Nancy smiled widely, holding one of the skewers up, “It’s almost done! Maybe two more minutes!”

Robin pouted, snapping the metal tongs to get your attention, “The potatoes need a bit more time, they’re still hard as rocks.” she huffed, resting her chin on her knees.

“Did you poke them with holes?” You wondered as she frowned and shook her head.

“Was I supposed to? I didn’t know, I’m sorry.” She apologized ridiculously for something that wasn’t a big deal.

You shook your head shooting her a reassuring smile.

“S’okay! They’re gonna cook through, but sometimes poking holes just speeds it up a bit… It's okay! If anything, we can have them for breakfast.”

“Okie dokie!” She smiled, happy that she didn’t entirely sit there for nothing.

He hated himself for watching you so carefully, taking notice of the bright smile you flashed against the moonlight and how your voice was so syrupy sweet. He never took notice of it before, but you had a radiance about you, something that everyone seemed to catch except him.

Maybe it was because half the time you were shooting daggers through him and screaming your lungs off, but now, for the first time, he felt like he was seeing a different side of you — the one he tried to fight off knowing for so long.

“Are you okay?” You furrowed your brows, waving your hand in front of Steve’s face.

He shook his head, snapping out of it and nodding awkwardly, “Y-yeah, I’m fine… you?”

“I’m okay.” You told him, turning your attention back to your friends.

Maybe it was your tiredness that was preventing you from being the bitch that you usually were to him or maybe you felt a little bad for him because of his injuries, but whatever it was filled the air with some sort of calmness that usually wasn’t around when he was in your vicinity.

Really, on most days, if you’d caught Steve staring at you, which most times he wasn’t unless it was full of revulsion, you would have snapped and told him to take a lap, but it was almost as if you could feel what his eyes were doing.

His gaze drinking you in slowly like the beer in his hands and trying to understand your craft. He didn’t stare through you, nor at you, but to you… trying to get under your skin in a way he hadn’t done before.

It felt…weird, so awkwardly weird. On a regular day the both of you could barely go two minutes without cursing each other out the second either of you spoke a word to each other. Now all of a sudden you both had your P’s and Q’s ready for each other along with genuine concerns about the other’s wellbeing?

God, you both couldn’t wait for it to go back to normal.

“Food’s ready!” Eddie called out, slicing through the unspoken tension.

You and Steve stood up, heading towards the food knowing you were both dying to have something in your systems after a long day. Beating him to it, you plated him a hot dog swiftly moving on as if the little gesture meant nothing.

“Condiments?” You asked, picking up the ketchup bottle, giving it a good shake before squeezing a dollop on your plate.

“Huh?” He asked confused, too wound up about your niceness.

“Do you want any condiments on your hot dog?” You clarified once more, raising your brow up at him.

He needed to stop reading into things so much.

“Oh, y-yeah” He nodded, watching as you squeezed some for him, “and mustard please,” he said, and you nodded, reaching for the yellow bottle and doing the same before you capped it off and left him in the dust when you went to sit with the girls.

Eddie snuck up from behind him, just nearly whispering into his ear lowly, “Aren’t you two being friendly for once?”

He smirked, wiggling his eyebrows when Steve looked back at him a bit startled. He rolled his eyes, walking over to the chairs near their tent and plopping down.

“She’s pitying me because of my hand.”

“Or she just genuinely wants to help you out?” Jonathan chimed in taking a seat beside him.

Steve shook his head, picking up his food, “I doubt that. She’s probably gonna use this against me for the rest of eternity.” He replied before taking a bite.

“I don’t think so man, I think she actually cares, and I think you like that she cares.” Eddie waved his finger in the air before poking at his cheek.

Steve snapped his teeth, pretending to bite the finger that Eddie quickly pulled away. Jonathan laughed at the banter because of course Eddie had to be the one to stir the pot when things were staring to cool and settle.

“She doesn’t give a damn about me….”

Steve started, trailing his eyes to where you were, watching you share whispers to the girls before you met his eyes for a split second.

“She still hates my guts.” He said as you snapped your eyes back to Nancy and Robin.

“Did we miss something while you guys were gone?” Nancy raised her brows, glancing back at Steve and the boys who were engrossed in their own conversations whilst they ate.

You shook your head towards her, swallowing your food before speaking.

“Nope, why do you say that?” You buzzed, wondering why all of a sudden she thought something had happened.

Robin chimed in swiftly, nudging your arm with a weak punch, shooting you a more than obvious look.

“Cause you guys haven’t tried to kill each other for the past hour and a half and you actually could stand to sit beside him without arguing.”

You tilted your head at her incredulously.

“I thought you guys wanted us to get along?”

“Oh, we do…” Nancy nodded enthusiastically, “we’re just wondering what made it happen considering you both tried to kill each other a few hours ago.”

Letting out a deep breath, you tried to give your best irritated look under your tiredness.

“We’re just tired that’s all. We’ve run out of insults and to be quite honest, I need to recharge my battery with some sleep before attempting to murder him tomorrow. Before you know it we’ll be at each other’s throats again.” You explained hoping they would drop it.

But of course they didn’t.

“Would it kill you to, I don’t know, be a little more positive on the outlook of you and Steve’s relationship.” Robin beamed hopefully.

You rolled your eyes, shaking your head as you glanced over at Steve’s figure.

“He still hates me,” you said, meeting his orbs split, “I know it,” you muttered, tearing your eyes away.

Neither Nancy, nor Eddie, or Jonathan, and Robin didn’t believe a goddamn word that came out of your mouths when it came to each other. Clearly things were starting to unfold and whatever it was that happened when they weren’t around to see it was obviously just the catalyst.

So many things that went unspoken for way too long were lingering in the air and they all knew you needed the space to confront it.After a while of eating, Nancy dramatically yawned, gesturing her boyfriend over to her with wide eyes silently telling him to go along with what she was doing, without you or Steve taking notice.

“We’re gonna head to bed now.” She announced, tiredly clinging to her boyfriend's side.

Jonathan nodded, wrapping his arms over her shoulders.

“Yeah, we’ll see you guys in the morning.” He said, the two of them beginning to get into their tents while calling out their goodnights to you all.

“Wake us up if you need anything.” You called out as they both hummed and zipped up their tarp for the night.

You were going to turn in too, really you were more than tired, just needing a good night's rest so that you’d be ready to go in the morning. Throwing out your plate, you walked over to your tent to grab your toothbrush and other nighttime necessities.

“I’m gonna go brush my teeth.” You said, walking towards the bathrooms.

“Wait up,” Steve called out, grabbing his own brush and jogging towards where you waited so you guys could go together.

Robin tilted her head towards your tent, as Eddie nodded, swiftly grabbing his lighter and pre rolls from his duffle bag and joining Robin inside the structure. That honestly wasn’t a part of the plan, seeing as though he was going to keep the blunt to himself, but now it was just convenient and would make the perfect excuse.

Steve didn’t bother to settle to the empty sink beside yours, instead he switched the water on letting you run your brush under the faucet first before he did his. You squeezed a strip of toothpaste over your bristles before doing the same to his guessing he forgot to pack his own which he totally did.

The both of you stood in front of the mirror, brushing in silence with the water trickling weakly. Your eyes drifted from his face to his hand that rested at his side stiffly. You knew it was probably still a little sore, but by tomorrow morning the pain should subside enough for him to move it a little more freely.

“Do you want me to rewrap your hand?” You offered, mouth still full of toothpaste as you spoke mumbly.

He met your eyes in the mirror, lifting his hand towards you, trusting your opinion rather than his own.

“What do you think?”

You stopped your brushing for just a second, leaving the brush between your cheek and teeth as you picked up his hand and gave it a good look to see if there was any oozing blood or loose tape — which there was neither.

Putting his arm down gently, you shook your head. “Looks fine, I’ll just clean it and change the gauze in the morning.”

“Okay.” He mumbled, smiling softly.

Steve let you rinse first, leaning up against the wall as he watched you spit out the residue and wipe your mouth clean. You stepped away, letting him have his go while you reached into your small toiletry bag, placing your brush back inside and twisting open your lip balm to smooth over your lips.

“Want some?” You raised your brow, seeing him watch you while he swigged some water in his mouth.

He spat, turning off the water and looking at the tube, “Birthday cake?” He questioned the flavor on the label.

“Tastes like vanilla and strawberries.” You said as he shrugged, puckering his lips towards you as you applied a thin layer before capping it off and throwing it back into your bag.

He smacked his lips together, a bit of his tongue coming out to lick at it, “I can’t taste it?”

“You’re not actually supposed to eat it, Steve.” You chided, shaking your head as you both walked to the tents.

“Then why would they advertise it as birthday cake if I can’t taste the cake?” He retorted, still trying to lick at his slimy lips to taste it.

You didn’t want to get into with him over some stupid lip balm flavor so instead you held back, listening to his lips smacking, persistent on getting to try the artificial taste while you tried not to laugh. As you got closer to the tents, a different smell lingered in the air along with the smokey aroma of the fire.

“Do you smell that?” You sniffed the air, turning to Steve seeing him do the same.

He sniffled in a few times, deciphering the smell and after a few seconds, he knew exactly what it was, an unmistakable likeness to the back of Eddie’s van.

“It’s weed.”

You looked around, realizing the absence of Eddie and Robin who were just sitting near the campfire before you went to the bathroom. Now, you noticed your tent that was half unzipped was completely sealed and if you listened close enough you could hear the whispers being spoken from inside.

You stomped over to them, unzipping the tarp, pulling it roughly.

“Are you guys insane?” You hissed, tossing in your toiletry bag while staring at them in annoyance.

“Insanely hiiiigh.” Robin hiccuped with a giggle joined by Eddie’s snorts while he took another hit.

Steve peered in from behind you, his expression stern.

“You’re not even supposed to bring that stuff onto the camp ground, you’re gonna get us kicked out, dumbass.” Steve scolded, ripping the joint from Eddie and putting it out against the ground.

“Hey! That was a special strain!” Eddie argued, attempting to reach for it but Steve pulled it behind his back, not letting up.

“I don’t care.” You said dryly, “you need to get out and go to your tent so I can sleep.”

You attempted to pull him out by the arm but he didn’t budge as easily as you thought he would.

“No, wait! Ten more minutes!” Robin whined, smacking your arm away from her friend, “You guys are letting all the good stuff out!”

Zipping up the tent, you and Steve backed away defeatedly. You ran your hands through your hair, closing your eyes briefly trying not to let their little antics tick you off despite your exhaustion.

“Ten minutes and I’m counting!” You warned, thumping the top of the tent before you flopped down onto the chairs hoping time would fly faster.

Steve looked at you apologetically, holding back his joking comment about how it didn’t matter that he built your tent, seeing as though you were locked out, but he didn’t want to make you more irritated than you already were… surprising right?

“Night?” He said, shooting you a remorseful smile when he stopped in front of your chair.

“Goodnight, Steve.” You yawned, waving him off as you hugged yourself to bear the cold clad in nothing but your tank and shorts.

He nodded walking to his tent a few feet away, toeing off his shoes before giving you one last look until he zipped his tent closed. He reached for the small flashlight he packed, putting it on its lowest setting so that Eddie could see when he came in. Giving his pillow a pat, he laid back pulling his blanket over himself and attempting to close his eyes and rest.

Sleep should have come easy seeing as though he had been up since seven in the morning, yet he still couldn’t fall into slumber no matter how hard he tried. He knew it wasn’t the fact that he wasn’t in his bedroom because he’d been camping times before and sleep naturally came easy but tonight it just wasn’t budging.

He shifted uncomfortably, aware of the passing minutes that stretched beyond ten, and Eddie still hadn't joined him. He was totally sure he didn’t even hear you give them another warning from the outside, meaning that you were definitely asleep on that chair.

Sitting up to peek through the small gap he left open, there you were — head tilted back, eyes closed, arms hugging your body, seemingly oblivious to the bitter cold that was going to leave you with hypothermia. If he was really feeling like being an asshole to you, he would’ve left you out there to suffer the consequences of your actions, but he couldn’t.

Quietly stepping outside, Steve approached, bending down to gently nudge you awake.

“Psttt, wake up," he whispered, cautious not to disturb Nancy and Jonathan nearby who were dead asleep by now.

You responded with a sleepy mumble, lips curling up as you somehow shifted deeper into the chair that was not designed to sleep in like that no matter how tired someone could be.

He tried again, this time more rigid in his efforts by grabbing your hand and squeezing it, “Wake up.”

Feeling his toasty hand in yours, you groggily opened your eyes, dazed orbs looking into his.

“What?” You grumbled, eyes opening to be met with Steve’s filled with confusion.

Without much explaining, he squeezed your hand again, pulling you up, “You’re crashing in my tent tonight.”

You had no choice but to let him pull you along, stumbling behind him as sleep still clouded your senses.

“Why?” You groaned, rubbing at your eyes while he guided you to his tent where he widened the tarp, gesturing for you to enter.

“Because that special strain Eddie was talking about was for sleep. Neither of them are gonna budge till morning.” He informed you, resting a gentle hand on the small of your back to keep you up right as you lazily toed your shoes off.

“Well fuck me.” You muttered under your breath crouching when you stepped into the small space.

He snorted behind you, “In your dreams.” He said before zipping it up.

“Shut up,” you groaned, crawling towards the empty space beside him.

Now it was starting to feel like things were going back to normal.

You settled into what would have been Eddie’s side, a half fluffed pillow under your head and nothing else. Though their overall set up was way more comfortable than what you and Robin had going on in yours. Steve had layered a sleeping mat beneath the comforter, making the surface a little more plush that way no rocks or gravel could be felt under the tarp — plus it added an extra layer of warmth, something you desperately needed right now.

Laying on your back, you left a good distance between you both, wrapping your arms around yourself once again hoping that now you’d be able to sleep comfortably even if it was beside Steve. Closing your eyes, you focused on breathing trying to not think so hard about the shivers in your bones knowing you wouldn’t be able to feel them once you fell asleep.

“I can hear your teeth clattering.” Steve sighed, casting a glance towards you where you laid beside him, starting to rub your hands up and down your arms in an attempt to generate warmth.

“I obviously wasn’t prepared for this, and my blanket is in my tent.” You muttered, eyes still closed and tucking your knees into yourself to find some semblance of comfort.

He made a thoughtful noise, lifting up his blanket and turning his body towards you. You could feel the space tighten, the fuzzy material of his blanket skimming your bare skin.

“Get under here.” He whispered, nodding his head when you finally opened your eyes looking at him with uncertainty and confusion.

You didn’t know what to make of it, if this was some kind of cruel joke he was playing on you, where he was actually going to hog it for himself and let you spend the rest of the night with your teeth clattering.

But deep down he wasn’t all that bad, sure he poked fun at you and made your blood boil like no other, but when it came down to morals, he had some saved for you… at least for now it seemed like.

Steve raised his brow at your hesitance, lifting the blanket up higher.

“What’re you waiting for? Do you want to freeze to death because by all means let me know.” He challenged pretending as if he wouldn’t care.

You swallowed thickly, turning your back towards him as you cautiously scooted under the blanket, feeling its comforting weight draped over your body. His fingers funneled you over more of the material, letting you have most of it as you quietly thanked him, tucking the throw under your neck where your fingers held it tight.

This was totally out of character coming from Steve knowing it would’ve hurt his ego a lot less if he’d just given you the blanket for yourself and spent the night with no covering. But for some reason you couldn’t place the gesture, not knowing why he would go out of his way for you or if this was some ulterior motive to hold against you in the future.

“I thought you wouldn’t mind me dead.” You said, trying to find a way to ease the awkwardness that you felt in your mind when he was just inches behind you.

“I don’t,” he laughed, his breath grazing the back of your neck. “But I don’t want to haul your frozen body in the back of Eddie’s van.” He added with a playful glint.

There was your old Steve, back.

“C-can we just go to bed?” You stuttered, clearing your throat as you rested your head deeper into the pillow just wanting to dream off somewhere, anywhere but right there in reality.

“Sure.” He agreed, shifting slightly before settling down and closing his eyes.

Silence enveloped you both, just the sounds of crickets from the outside and gentle crackling of the fire that burned slow in the air.

Part of you wished he maybe would have left you out there to fend for yourself or maybe just threw his blanket over you for good measure, but somehow, being in here with him, tucked away from the rest of the world made you feel even more awake than before. It was obvious, neither of you were going to be falling asleep so easily, the tension so thick you could barely breathe through it.

Steve at least tried to fall asleep, focusing on something to dream about but you were overwhelming his senses making his nerves go into overdrive. Sure he already reeked of all of your products that he had borrowed in the shower, but now it was a combination of their scents attached to your skin and hair that was filling his nostrils. It didn’t help that you unconsciously let out those soft noises, as your body shook, not fully taking in the warmth just yet.

Shifting slightly, your back unintentionally met his forearms that rested behind you. His eyes snapped open, feeling the coolness against his skin, shifting up slightly just enough to see your face.

“How are you still freezing?” Steve yelped, pulling his arm back from your frosty skin.

You sighed heavily, repositioning your body to face him with a grunt, throwing all caution to the wind and not caring about how intimate this was. Both of you had already crossed so many lines that defined your hate fueled relationship… one more thing couldn’t hurt.

“I’m a-always cold.” You whispered, jaw wobbling through the shivers taking deep breaths to try to relax yourself.

Steve raised his eyebrows and stared at you worriedly, “So you dying is just inevitable tonight, that’s what you’re saying?”

It came out a bit too sarcastic than he meant it to be since he was just genuinely curious to know if you were going to make it out alive tonight or if you needed to get into Eddie’s van and crank up the heater.

You rolled your eyes, whispering in frustration.

“I can’t help it alright! Had I been in my tent, I’d be fine!”

Steve brushed your irritation off, instead moving his arms under the blanket, hovering his hands over your waist.

“Well you’re not, so I’m gonna swallow my pride and do something about it alright?” He said slowly letting his hands slide over your cold skin, watching as your face twisted with confusion.

“What are you… oh god.” You groaned realizing exactly where this was going – a mirror to earlier in the lake, but this time you weren’t so disgusted.

He was practically a human furnace, pulling you closer into him barely leaving inches while the warmth from his body cascaded onto yours. You tried not to tense or move abruptly, aware that his bad hand was weakly grasping your back and the last thing you wanted was to make it worse.

Instead you froze, breathing stopped for a second as you searched his face trying to see how he was feeling about this whole thing. He didn’t look displeased or annoyed that he was doing this for you, instead he was calm, cool, and collected as if he wasn’t holding the girl who tried to stab him a few hours ago.

“Do you have a better idea?” Steve suggested, looking down at you awaiting to see your next moves: either telling him to fuck off or staying silent for the rest of the night.

To his surprise, you eased into his hold, hooking your own arms under his and closing the rest of the space between you. Your chest was pressed up against his, one of your legs fastened over his hip, while the other knocked against his thigh. It was a definite contrast to the hours earlier where he practically lugged you through the lake, if only you knew things would be so different now.

“We are not to speak about this after tonight. Not even a peep.” You warned, squirming impossibly closer to him before shooting him a serious look.

He nodded, eyes shutting tightly like he was trying to dream it away.

“I’m erasing this from my memory as we speak.”

“Goodnight.” You whispered, closing your eyes, hoping that would be the end of it.

“Night.” He muttered back.

Third times a charm… or maybe not.

In this position you could feel everything and there was no way to escape it.

His warm breath fanning over your face, his chest rising and falling against yours, the soft thumpthump of his heart echoing beneath your ear, and the hair on his arms delicately brushing against your exposed skin — everything was him wrapped up in your arms. Literally.

Steve could feel it, the way you tried to control your breathing by taking a breath in when he breathed out. But you were trying too hard to time it perfectly, overthinking and making sure he didn’t notice when it’s all he could really do, your back heaving against his hands was all it took for him to speak up.

“Relax,” Steve murmured gingerly digging his fingertips into your skin with his eyes still closed

“H-huh?” You opened your eyes watching his serene features that showed he wasn’t as edgy as you.

“I can feel you…” He started, voice low and silky as he spoke, “you’re nervous.”

You shook your head as if he could see you, swallowing the lump in your throat.

“I…I’m not nervous, it’s just—this is different, we don’t do this.” You explained only partially truthfully considering you were more than just nervous.

“It’s just for tonight.” He said trying to iron out your worries the best that he could.

“No, I know, it’s just that—”

“I can feel your eyes on me, you know?”

Steve chuckled, peeking one of his eyes open, catching you in the act of trying to pinch them closed before he noticed.

You crumbled, letting out a weak laugh as you just opened them, finding him doing the same. The two of you staring at each other, the only sliver of light from the small beam in the corner of the tent, accompanied with the moonlight seeping weakly past the tarp.

Steve lifted his head just a bit, gesturing back to his bag just a few feet away from where you both were in the middle of the area.

“Do you just want to take the blanket? I have a hoodie I can use in my—” His arms ever so slightly loosed and you stopped him.

Your fingertips squeezed tenderly into back, your leg pushing down on his hip to stop him from moving any further.

“No, its fine, this is fine. I don’t mind sharing.”

“You sure?” He laughed quietly, resting his head back down on the pillow.

“Cause you don’t have to pretend you want to share? We hate each other so I’m very familiar with our dislike when we’re forced to be around one another.” He reminded you, his tone light hearted not exuding any malice this time around.

You swallowed, nodding your head reassuringly as you let up your tense hold on him.

“I know…I-I still hate you, but I can deal with this for one night.”

“And you’re okay with this? Us… cuddling?” He asked, just wanting to be extra sure because cuddling didn’t have to be a part of it if you didn’t want it.

“Positive.” You hummed, giving him one last look before you fluttered your eyes closed.

“Okay… good, good.” He hushed, nodding more so to himself content that you seemed to relax a bit more.

He should’ve closed eyes and went off to sleep, but now it seemed like all he wanted to do was watch you. Make sure that you were comfortable enough in his arms and warm enough to brave the night until morning and then you’d never have to be this close to him again.

He never took his eyes off your face, taking all of you in at once — long lashes kissing the skin under your eyes, cheek cozily pressed into the fluff of the pillow, lips relaxing in a straight smile and under his touch your breathing was stable, synchronized with his. He couldn’t believe he was holding you right now, getting the chance to see you like this — it was his biggest privilege.

You could feel his eyes, he obviously sucked at taking his own advice and he was clearly proving your point that he was a hypocrite… but you already knew that.

You knew a lot of things about Steve, mostly all of the bad and annoying parts about him, but you also knew the good parts. The ones you blocked off and stored way back in your head because you never wanted to associate them with him.

The fact that he wasn’t all that bad under those preppy button ups and head of hair.

He loved your friends, just as much as you did, treated them with kindness and savored every moment he spent with them. He knew how to take care of six rascals all by himself while also being the one they ran to when it came to all their teenage problems. He never showed up empty handed to any hangouts, always doing his best to bring anything whether it was a plain bag of chips or the camping equipment he had hidden in his garage.

Steve knew how to push your buttons, and perhaps that was the very thing that frustrated you the most — the realization that he had an undeniable effect on you. And at the same time, it was the very thing you were terrified of knowing — that if things would have been different, maybe the irritation you both had felt for each other could have just been affection from the get go.

The thick and imposing walls of animosity you’d built up for each other, was just a defensive mechanism. A weak hollow barrier that tried to disguise what you really felt, something so strong that only now broke through the bounds and unleashed a flood of emotions.

What was one more line crossed, when you both already jumped bridges?

“Steve?” You called out to him, hoping he wasn’t pretending to be asleep.

“Yeah?” His reply came swiftly, and his eyes flickered to watch your lips form the next set of words.

“You still hate me right?” You suspected, running your tongue over the bottom of your lip as you waited.

He nodded his head obviously though you couldn’t see him.

“Y-yeah. Why?” He furrowed his brows puzzled by the sudden question.

“What do you hate about me?” You pressed on.

A deep breath fanned across your face, followed by the tsking of his tongue, “I don’t think we should—”

“Tell me, Steve… please?” Your hands pressed firmly against his back, a silent plea echoing through the touch, not because you wanted to hear the words coming from him, but because you needed them.

He swallowed thickly, watching as you waited with your brows raised up yet eyes still closed. He didn’t understand why you wanted this from him all of the sudden. Why now when all his mind could do was fill up with the parts of you that he wanted to forget? The parts of you he silently spent hyperfixating on because you thought more about the people around you rather than yourself and he wished he could be half the person you were.

He liked to joke that you were his competition, his rival of sorts, but in actuality, he could never measure up to your level of compassion and he was more than fine with that. Settling for watching on the sidelines with a convincing snarkiness on his face, while on the inside his bones weakened and his brain went haywire wondering how you could ever exist in the same lifetime as him.

There was nothing he truly hated about you, he didn’t think there ever could be.

Mindlessly his fingers moved along your back, rubbing small circles and sweeping across your soft skin before he cleared his throat from the roughness and finally spoke into the millimeters between you.

“I umm, I hate the way you never forget about something I did.” He started, mind wandering to the afternoon where you reminded him of such instances with Dustin.

“Hmmm.” You hummed, nodding your head along and relaxing your features now that he was working with you.

“I hate the way you always remind me to slow down when I’m driving around with the kids.” He admitted, guiltily confessing to his occasional speeding when they were running late and so was he.

You grunted, snickering weakly, “I need them all in one piece.”

He agreed, a faint smile tugging at his lips, acknowledging your concern.

His fingers stalled against your back, taking a sharp breath in, letting the words rest on the tip of his tongue whilst he gave himself a moment. A moment to take you in, to see you as such, to give himself a little longer with the mystery hanging in the air wondering if you could feel what he felt and understand what he was about to say.

“And I hate the way you look at everyone except me.” He said it so quietly that if you weren’t listening close enough you would have missed it.

But how could you ever let something like that float away so easily?

You flickered your eyes open, looking up at him past your lashes, staring into his orbs for all he was worth. Like he was the only thing to ever exist before your eyes and all you wanted to do was memorize him.

“Like what?” You whispered, never breaking eye contact.

“Like this…” He proclaimed, pulling his injured hand away from your back and bringing it forward to cradle your face ever so gently.

His thumb traced your cheek, your breath catching in your throat, letting him gaze at you in a way he never had before. It was concerning how quickly you established that from this moment on, Steve was the only person who would ever have the privilege of seeing like this. Stripped down in the confines of a stupid tent, that somehow felt like its own little oasis away from the rest of the scary world right outside.

It was just you and him and your own world.

“You look at everyone with these eyes, so eager and happy.” He said, trailing down to the corner of your lips, brushing his thumb across delicate skin.

“You smile at them like they’re everything to you.” he said, nearly letting his hand slip away as if he was unworthy of such a feeling.

But before he could, you brought your hands up, wrapping gently around his wrists to keep him there like your life depended on it. Wanting nothing more than to show him that he could — he was willing and able, and had all the permission from you to stay here, as long as you could get him to.

“I hate that you don’t look at me like that.” He swallowed, shaking his head more so himself, because all he ever wanted was this and for so long he pushed it away.

“I am right now.” You finally spoke, almost breathlessly, trying to reassure his anxieties about the past, the same ones you were feeling.

“Hate that it took this long.” He confessed with a weak laugh.

You smiled half apologetically. “Me too.”

It was all the confirmation you both needed.

No more lines.

No more bridges burnt.

Nothing keeping you both from the truth.

He had bit the bullet and you had jumped into the deep end and there was no going back from here. Time wasn’t stopping for either of you despite the intensity of the moment. There was clearly a beginning, you and him having a rough one, but that didn’t mean that your ending had to be so treacherous.

The gentle gesture of him pushing the strands of hair that fell over your face, sent shivers down your spine, a sort of electric touch that should have had you running away but all you felt was the need for more. He didn’t miss the way your eyes shot down to his lips, staring at them wondering his next moves before you met his again.

“I’m gonna kiss you now, if that’s okay.” He whispered the words ever so quietly, leaving them to linger in the space as a delicate invitation hoping it was one you’d accept.

“More than okay.” You nodded, closing your eyes, feeling his face inch closer to yours.

The first touch of his lips upon yours felt like sparks flying, holy ground beneath you both as you took your time, exploring everything in between — what you imagined it would be like and the unexpected that had you both going down the twists and turns just trying to familiarize yourself with each other.

His lips moved against yours unhurried, gentle but deliberate, not daring to miss even an inch of you. You felt as if he was taking your breath away, leaving you to succumb to a sort of poise that usually never came this easily. With every press and swipe across your lips, you were jumping and falling into somewhere you never wanted to leave.

You nearly wanted to cry when he pulled away, leaving you only to catch your breath, his chest moving up and down deeply, while you were ready to go again and again and–

“W-was that okay?” He asked, fighting the urge to kiss you again and make you go dizzy.

You smiled like an idiot, lips blushing with a pink as bright as your cheeks.

“Perfect. Can we do it again.”

“Yeah.” He beamed, moving to hover up on his elbows with his face above yours, giving you the access to wrap your arms around his neck and pull him into you.

The second kiss was filled with hunger, the both of you trying to make up for the lost time you had spent at each other's throats when you could've been glued to each other's mouths. But you were positive you would both be able to make up for it eventually, and tonight felt like it was going to be the first of many.

His teeth barely grazed over your bottom lip, prompting a moan to rip through your throat before you pulled away breathlessly.

“I—I want you.” You spoke, voice full teetering between desperation and confidence.

Steve wasn’t expecting it at all despite the circumstances that just took place with the kiss. He’d be fine if all you wanted to do was spend the rest of the night making out like depraved teenagers or if you wanted to cuddle until you fell asleep.

He swallowed, looking into your eyes searching for any hesitancy on your features but you were positive that there wasn’t anything you wanted more than Steve.

“Are you sure?” He implored, desperately wanting to hear the words fall from your lips.

“With everything inside of me.” You nodded with a smile bringing your lips back to his once more, not being able to help yourself.

You could feel his grin against yours, a self indulgent one that still couldn't wrap his head around the fact that he was kissing you with every fiber of his being hoping that with each press and slide it would compensate for how much of an asshole he’d been to you.

He moved his lips, creating a trail of kisses over your jaw and down your neck, gently sucking the skin to pepper you in love bites.

“P-please, Steve,” You moaned, moving your head to give him more access to the sweet spot on your neck, “Need more.”

He licked over the hickey, pressing a quick kiss to the developing bruise before he unwrapped your arms from his neck, placing them on your sides. Nudging your shoulder a bit, you laid fully on your back while he moved onto his knees, staring at you with a look so promising and true.

“You don’t have to beg, at least not for tonight. I swear.”

His fingers smoothed over your sides feeling the warmth coming to you quicker now.

“I want you…so so bad.” You pouted, reaching for his hands to intertwine in yours.

“You have me.”

He brought yours up, placing a chaste kiss on the back of your hand before he let go and hovered above the waistband of your shorts.

“Can I?”

You nodded, lifting your hips slightly as he glided them off your legs, stripping away one layer of clothing yet revealing another — a black, lacy, number that definitely wasn’t planned for tonight, but he wasn’t complaining, in fact he found it a little humorous taking into the account the occasion.

“You packed a thong for camping?”

Steve snorted lightly, kissing the inside of your thigh as you blushed, tucking your cheek into your shoulder.

“I…I was rushing and packed it accidentally.” You told him, silently thanking the universe and your horrible planning that somehow got this perfectly.

“Lucky me.” He rasped, toying with the lace around your hip bone, peppering kisses across your thighs, not making any move to strip you free of them yet as he wanted to worship all of you first.

You sat up slightly, running your hand over his covered shoulder blade.

“C-could you take your shirt off?”

“Course I can.” He nodded quickly, sitting up just enough to work his arms through the shirt.

The garment was quickly pulled off his body, thrown off the side wherever he had flung your shorts.

“I can take mine off, too—” You started, moving up a bit more as you pulled at the bottom of your cami but before you could get any farther, he stopped you, squeezing your wrist gently.

“Only if you want to, s’okay if you don’t.” He assured you, wanting to know this was all about you being comfortable.

You smiled warmly and shook your head at his politeness, still trying to take all of him in, not just for the body before you, but for how attentive he had been towards you.

“No, I do… I just—just wanted to feel more of you, that’s why I asked.” You explained with a light laugh.

“You’re cute.” He chuckled, rubbing his hands up and down your thighs as you pulled the material over your head discarding it.

Absentmindedly your arms wrapped around yourself, bashfully trying to hide away as if that would make Steve forget that you were topless in front of him. Finally he got to see what the slivers of skin that was hidden away beneath clothing or in this case, made an appearance just hours ago.

“Don’t hide. You’re so beautiful.” Steve spoke softly, reassuring you of whatever nervousness you were feeling, slowly lowering your arms down letting him see you completely.

You could see and hear it in the way his breath hitched in his throat, eyes stuck on your chest before a smirk played on his features and he finally trailed them back up to your eyes.

“So you’re always excited to see me, then?” He teased, reaching up to run his hands along your ribcage, feeling your laughter rumble beneath his skin.

“Shut up.” You chided, pushing playfully at his shoulder.

“You got just the thing for me to do just that.” He tilted his head down and you nodded, giving him the green light to do what he pleased.

His lips wrapped around your sensitive skin, peak hardening in this mouth while the other was met with the flick and roll of his fingers. You were sure by the end of it, your chest would be littered with love bites of all shapes and sizes. Steve made the extra effort to glide across your chest, showing both breasts the attention they so rightfully deserved with his mark left behind.

“Mmm, S-steve.” You moaned, arching up into him and nails grazing at the nape of his neck.

“Gotta make up for lost time.” He mumbled against your, sucking another hickey but this time right above your sternum, completing the other half to make a lopsided heart that you’d see in the morning.

“I want more.” You begged, finally getting the courage to pull him away, eyes peering down at him.

He smacked his lips, nodding as he leaned up and pecked your lips, murmuring against them.

“I got you, princess.”

His kisses trailed down your body, taking his sweet time leaving your skin with a plethora of hickies, some small and subtle, and others that would settle darker by morning. Something about it, the possessiveness of it all added to the longing, knowing he was marking you as his — and he was the only person you wanted to belong to right now… forever even.

Placing a final kiss above the waistband of your intimates, he looked up at you, toying with the fabric.

“Let me get these off you, yeah?”

You hummed, letting your feet sit flat on the comforter, slightly lifting your hips up to help him. His fingers slipped under the lace, tugging them away from your core and off your legs, putting them off to the side.

“So fucking pretty.” He murmured, gently pulling your knees wider apart enough for him to slot himself between them and lay on his stomach.

His eyes were fixated on your core, taking you in with such hunger but at the same time awe, as if he was admiring the most beautiful work of art just before he would dig his claws into it. No ones had ever looked at you like that, taking their time and drinking you in, it almost made you want to shoo him away with all the attention he was giving you.

“Steveeee.” You whined, laughing behind your hands that covered your face.

“Why’re you hiding?” He puffed out a short laugh, splaying his hands over your stomach rubbing gently.

You pulled fingers apart, staring at him timidly. “I—I don’t know, I just never thought that we’d… you know.”

Stop pretending like we hated each other and confessed our feeling then deciding to fuck in a dingy tent in the middle of nowhere? Yeah he totally knew what you meant.

“I know what you mean,” He placed a reassuring kiss on the inside of your knee.

“We can stop whenever you want okay? No questions asked, you say the word and I’ll stop and we’ll put our clothes back on and—”

“I don’t want to stop. Promise, just a little nervous.” You assured him, sitting up slightly to bring your hand to his cheek, thumbing the freckles peppering his skin.

“Don’t be, I’m gonna make you feel so good. I promise.” He smiled, leaning into your touch and kissing the pulse point on your wrist.

Steve nodded, silently telling you to lie back and let him fulfill his promise which you were sure he was going to over deliver on. And god were you right.

His tongue swiped between your folds, shuddering beneath him you couldn’t help pinch your eyes closed trying to bottle up the feeling and keep it in your memory forever.

“F-fuck,” You moaned, relished in the feeling of each pass and kiss, “Feels so good, Steve.”

His thumb swiped over your clit, breath fanning over your skin as he watched your back arch with a smirk on his face.

“Told you so, princess.”

He dove back in, tongue flicking over your sensitive button while he worked two fingers into you slowly. The stretch of his thick digits and the mixture of his warm tongue sent your hands flying, in search of something to grab and immediately you went for Steve’s hand.

Somehow through the pleasure you didn’t feel the tape on his hand, that is until you squeezed and felt the layer blocking the contact of skin on his. The tape slightly crumpled in your hold causing your eyes to fly open, staring down at him.

“S-shit, I’m so sorry!” You whispered, quickly letting go of his hand nearly backing away from Steve thinking that you hurt him.

His fingers abruptly left your core, quickly slinging his arm over your hips stopping you from moving away from him. The bad hand immediately reached out for yours, intertwining your fingers together despite your uncertainty that didn’t want to immediately hook between his.

“S’okay, I’m okay, promise.” He assured you, kissing your mound before shooting you a wink as he squeezed yours.

“You can grab my hand, squeeze as tight as you want. The nurse who wrapped it up did a hell of a job, thing isn’t gonna hurt me.”

It made you giggle, kissing his knuckles, murmuring against them, “Hmm, still, I’m sorry.”

He shook his head, lips brushing against your center as he got back to work.

“Shhh it’s okay.”

Steve was always more of a giver, something he usually bragged about and you thought was absolute bullshit, but now you understood seeing as though he was definitely giving you something to come back for, in more ways than one.

His tongue dipped lower, dragged up from your aching hole to your sensitive clit.

“You like that?” his voice vibrated across your sensitive skin, sending your body into squirms.

“Yes…p-please, right there,” You moaned, gripping his hand tightly as he repeated the action. “Just like that, baby.”

“Say it again.” He demanded though it more so came out as a desperate plea.

“Baby?”

He let out a groan, nipping at the inside of your thigh, “I love hearing it from you…c’mon, let me get you there, baby.”

It was the end of the beginning from then on out with one goal in his head. Feasting on you like you were his last meal trying to savor your sweetness and all at once engrain the image of your blissful face in his mind and those addicting moans that dared to get louder with every second that passed.

“I’m so close.” You whispered, trying to keep your voice down, “I—I, Steve, baby, please.”

Your thighs began shaking around his head, stomach heaving in deeper and twisting tightly, teeth digging into your lip trying to muffle the sounds of pleasure that wanted to escape, and your hand clutching onto his for dear life – the only thing grounding you while his mouth sent you into ecstasy.

“Cum for me.” He vibrated against you, lips wrapped around your bud as he sucked and watched you explode.

“Baby, f-fuck.” You gasped, looking down to meet his eyes before it was too much for you to handle.

Euphoria washed over you, similarly to the colors of the sunset. Bright oranges and pinks flashed across your vision, painting your skin with the feverish warmth before it fizzled out into darkness, specks of white making their appearance as your body buzzed.

Steve didn’t pull away until you stopped moving your hips into and away from him, trying to chase and escape the pleasure all at once until you came down. Even then he didn’t dare to leave you just yet, taking his time to wait until you came down from your high. He pressed gentle kisses over your inner thighs, making his way up to your midsection, resting his chin there, your chest moving beneath him as you caught your breath.

“Hey pretty.” He murmured, your eyes peeking open to see him — lips and chin coated with a sheen of you in the best way possible.

You swallowed, giving his hand three squeezes and you cleared your throat from the hoarseness, “H-hi Stevie.”

Stevie. It was a stupid nickname you used against him all the time because he hated it, but right now it seemed to have the same effect on him as you calling him baby just a little while ago.

Using his elbows as leverage, he scooted up to you chuckling as you pulled him down bringing his lips to yours as you tasted your essences on him. Your legs hiked up around his hips, bringing his clothed crotch down to your core, just a piece of fabric separating you both, but even then the tent in his pants wasn’t hard to pick up on.

“Lay down for me, please.” You mumbled against his lips, poorly attempting to roll him on his back despite his sheer strength.

He pulled away only slightly, furrowing his brows at you. “Baby, baby, we don’t have to if you—”

“I want to, so bad,” You pressed your hips up into him, inducing a moan to rip from his mouth, though still he didn’t roll over just yet.

You frowned, loosening your legs, hoping you didn’t cross the line, “Do you not want to?”

Quickly he shook his head, moving to hold your face in his hands. “I do, sweetheart, you don’t know how badly I want to have you. But I kinda feel horrible here,” He grimaced, face twisting with embarrassment.

“W-was hoping to have our first time together in a bed, preferably mine but yours could work too, but–”

“Wait!” You cut him off with surprise, lips curling up.

“You thought about this?” You suspected with a grin, teasing him with a poke on the cheek.

He tried to play it off with an unconvincing scoff that didn’t cover the croak in his voice, “M-maybe?”

You beamed, running your thumb along his bottom lip, batting your eyes up at him. “Well if you’re okay with it, we can totally use your bed the next time, and the next, and then the—”

“Of course.” He agreed quickly, making you laugh as you pushed his chest away

“Lay down for me, baby.”

He did as you said, taking your spot as you sat up on your knees pulling at the waistband of his sweats, working them off his ankles. His cock sprung up, the tip blushing with a bright read, aching and throbbing to be inside of you.

“Commando? And you want to call me naughty?” You teased, licking the palm of your hand and wrapping it around his length, pumping slowly.

He let out a shaky laugh, cursing at himself, “Kinda was regretting it earlier.”

“Why’s that?” You began shifting to lay flat on your stomach.

“Was worried you’d notice.” He mumbled.

His hands reach out to run up and down your back, soothing your skin desperately wanting to touch you despite the closeness already.

“Notice what?” You hummed gazing up at him.

“How hard I got when y-you wrapped me up.” He admitted, shuddering when you licked a stripe from the base to his glistening tip.

“Me serving you do it for you?” You half-joked, pepping kisses back down.

“Fuck no, that wasn’t it…” He shook his head, sitting up slightly to watch you.

“You just—f-fuck, you knew what you were doing and you took control and you…you fucking called me big boy and t-the way you bit the tape off.”

Clearly you wounded him up so much, something you never thought was capable, but alas the hate you both supposedly shared for each other had no bounds when it came to this sort of tension.

“Make a mess for me big boy, and I’ll clean it up, yeah?” You winked, finally giving him what he wanted, wrapping your mouth around him.

“S-shit, baby.” He hissed moving your hair towards one side to see you clearly.

“Making me feel so good, princess.” His hips resisted the want to thrust up into your mouth, controlling himself knowing that good things always took time and you were already making him feel great.

“So big.” You murmured, messily kissing the tip of his cock, giggling at the way his hips stuttered up knocking closer to your lips.

“Just right for you though right? Only yours baby.” He groaned, throwing his head back onto the pillows.

“Mhmm,” you hummed, wrapping your lips around the tip, sending vibrations up his sensitive length.

“Pretty too.” You whispered, pulling away teasingly.

He let out a hoarse laugh, shaking his head ridiculously. “Can’t be when I’ve got the prettiest sight right here.”

The compliment went straight to your core, the need to make him feel good was the motivation in your movements. Your wrist moved over the part that you couldn’t quite fit in your mouth.

“That's it baby, taking me so well,” He praised lowly trying to keep his voice quiet enough for just you to hear.

His fingers threaded through the roots of your hair, neither pulling or pushing, just holding you there and letting you go at your own pace.

“Shit, babe, y’gotta stop.” He hissed, tugging you off his length as you moaned, pouting up at him.

“Want to taste you…please Stevie?” You begged, mouth trailing down to his heavy sack, taking one of them in your mouth, before popping off only to mumble against them, “Let me taste you, please baby.”

How was he going to deny you, then?

“F-fucking shit, yeah, okay doll, I’ll give it to you.” He moaned, nodding more so at himself, trying to starve off the orgasm as long as he could knowing he was going to burst any second now.

You grinned, releasing his balls with a pop, quickly taking him into your mouth again.

“I’m c-cumming, fuck—”

He let the rest die in his throat, knowing that if he went any longer he’d wake up your friends and cause an even bigger mess that he nor you wanted to clean up right now.

“How was that?” You grinned, swiping your thumbs over the inner corners of your mouth, sucking off the remnants of him.

The act alone made his cock twitch, somehow springing back up ready for you.

“C’mere, you minx.” He whispered with a smirk, threading his hands towards the back of your head to gently tug you up to his face.

“Hmmm, Steve.” You giggled, letting it get cut short with his lips pressing deeply onto yours.

“You’re making it very hard for me to hate you.” He accused, pulling away from you with a playful smirk.

“You or your dick?” You wiggled your brows, eyes lowering between the both of you where his hardness rested against his thigh.

“I’m kidding… about the me hating you thing, not you making me hard.” He clarified, holding your chin between his forefingers.

It was clear that the both of you couldn’t really hate each other.

“You wanna be on top? I think it’ll be easier for you to control it at your pace.” He suggested, giving your hips a squeeze before letting his hands roam across your bottom.

“Okay.” You whispered, forehead resting against his as he snuck a hand between you both, pumping his length one, two, three times before slowly lowering yourself on him.

Taking in a deep breath, your eyes pinched closed, a gasp leaving your mouth feeling his breach your walls.

“S’okay, baby, take your time.” He murmured, kissing the tip of your noses while his hands rubbed comforting circles over your hip.

“Y-you’re so deep already.” You whined, chest heaving as you tried to catch your breath, overwhelmed by the stretch.

His bottom lip jutted out, pouting at you with his eyes so soft, though his mouth spoke a tune so condescending and downright filthy.

“Aww baby, I know, but you’re taking it so well right?” He went a step further, resting his palm over your cheek, prompting you to look him in the eyes as you nodded quickly, wanting nothing more than to feel all of him.

Your fingers wrapped around his wrist, pulling it away from your cheek, “Touch me, please? I-I just need a little—”

He understood immediately, dropping the cocky facade for just a moment to make you feel the most comfortable knowing the first time was always the most intense.

“Shhh, I got you, I’m right here.” He swiped his tongue over two digits, working them between your bodies until he found your clit, rubbing gentle circles over the bud, just enough to help distract you from the initial stretch.

“O-oh, fuck, Steve.” You keened, focusing on the pleasure and stretch jumbled all in one.

“That’s a good girl.” He praised lowly.

You tightened around his girth, eyes shutting blissfully at the overwhelming feeling and the praise that spilled past his lips. He noticed it right away, chuckling more so at himself because all of the times he had called you pet names for fun, perhaps you liked it more than you let on.

“You like being called a good girl?” He challenged, his free hand tightening around your hips to stop you from rocking against him.

You whined through a nod, opening your eyes and pleading for him to let you keep up the movements.

“Words.” He urged, still not giving into you until he heard what he needed to hear.

You swallowed thickly, lips parting as you whispered softly. “Y–yeah, like when you call me that.”

He smirked, leaning up just enough to peck your lips, mumbling against them as his arm loosened from your hips and he settled comfortably on his back. Slowly but surely your hips proceeded where they left off, moving experimentally taking the time to adjust to his sheer size.

“Atta girl, gotta tell me what you like so I can make you feel good baby.”

“L-like it when you talk to me.”

“You do?’

You hummed quickly, nodding your head, “So much.”

Growing needier you lifted your hips up slightly before fucking yourself back down onto him. Your lips parted with a pleasurable moan while he growled, throwing his head back against the pillows.

“Oh, there you go sweet girl. Fuck, already taking me so good.” He said, digging his fingertips into your hip bone.

“F-full, m’so full of you.” You sighed, slowly repeating your movements trying to make it last as long as you could.

“But you love it right?” He murmured, words soothing and arousing at the same time.

You nodded admittingly, “Please don’t stop…S-steve please,”

The shake of your thighs and the uneven grinding told him all he needed to know, and he was more than happy to let you sit back and give you your second fix of the night.

He pressed himself off his back, arms wrapping around your body and hugging you close. Your limbs enveloping his neck while you rested your forehead against his, breathy moans leaving your lips as the new position pushed him deeper within you if that was even possible.

Steve’s lips brushed yours, an oath tumbling past them, “I won’t baby, promise. Just wanna make you feel good okay? Be a good girl.”

It was all you needed to hear before the waves of pleasure came crashing down with no breaks. You were practically putty in his hands, your hips moving against him the way he wanted you to. He set the pace and found the rhythm that had you nearly slumping against him.

“So fucking tight, your pussy’s squeezing me baby,” He muttered, lifting your hips higher as his own thrusted deeper from below.

“Making me feel so good, princess. Does it feel good for you too? Just what you need right?”

If you weren’t so blissed out with pleasure, perhaps you would have the ability to actually give him the words he wanted to hear, but you felt an entire universe away, so caught up in Steve and everything he was making you feel. His words were only taking you higher, adding to pleasure and bringing you closer to the end.

You managed to take a sharp breath in, jaw shaking as your teary eyes blinked at him, “J-just need you now…only want you.”

He moaned darkly, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as he tried to starve off his own orgasm that was teetering the edge. The only thing keeping him from letting go was making sure that you got there first, just so he could watch you unravel and hear the sweet sounds that could never be erased from his memory.

“C’mere, sweetheart,”

His thrusts slowed just enough for one of his hands to snake up towards the back of your neck, pulling you in for a kiss before guiding your head into the juncture of his neck.

“It’ll go deeper this way,” He murmured, placing a quick peck to your cheek before continuing the onslaught of ecstasy.

“Oh God…Steve….” You whimpered, nails digging into his skin.

“You’re mine now.” He said through gritted teeth, fingertips practically bruising your back, “no one’s gonna get you like this except me, got that?”

All you could do was nod against him, humming out an agreement as you tried to keep your voice down, finally aware that your friends would be able to hear you both if you didn’t try to get a semblance of control.

“Fuck, shit babe, so perfect, just taking all of me inside you huh? You’re the only one who ever made me feel this— shit, so good.”

He was just making it harder for you to keep quiet at that point.

“O–only want you…I–I only want you like this.” You murmured, pulling your face away from his neck just enough for his eyes to catch yours.

Steve couldn’t help himself, thrusting up into you with a slow yet deep vigor, bringing his lips to yours and stealing your breath away. He never quite imagined that this was the way you both would be confessing your feelings and begging to finally be each others’ but he wasn’t complaining — he just wanted to seal the deal and show you how real it was to him.

“Cum for me, baby. Be a good girl and do it for me…just me.” He mumbled against you, feeling the tightening around his shaft, the convulsing of your walls signaling your release.

“F-fuck! Oh my god, Steve.”

Your body shook, eyes shutting tightly as your hips rutted against his stilled ones letting you ride out your orgasm as he held your tight and shushed your moans soothingly.

You slowly opened your eyes, staring at him dazingly, “Wanna feel you cum, give it to me, please.”

He nodded, letting your face untuck itself from his neck and instead grabbing his cheeks to keep his eyes on yours. Eyes silently begging for his release while your lips parted with shallow moans still feeling the aftershocks of your orgasm followed by a small ripple of pleasure that came again.

His thrusts became frantic, nose flaring with a deep breath taken, pushing his hips as far as they could go forcing you to collapse against him as he filled you.

“That’s it, baby…hmm, so deep.” You smiled lazily into his chest, nails raking down gently across his shoulders and down his arms as he came down.

His heartbeat rang through your ears along with the uneven breathing the both of you were sharing, letting the

“Well,” He huffed, staring down at you, smoothing your tousled hair down, “That’s one way to warm up.”

You rolled your eyes playfully, smacking his cheek with a soft pat, “Hypothermia wasn’t gonna kill me. You almost did.”

“Did I really fuck you that good?” He smirked smugly.

“Don’t make me start hating you, again.” You threatened with a yawn, eyes fluttering shut and relaxing into him.

“Kidding babe,” He said, kissing the top of your head before patting the small of your back, “Let me get some clothes on you.”

He pulled out of you, quietly apologizing for the emptiness before cleaning you and himself up. His t-shirt covered your body and he managed to slip your underwear back over your legs. Steve settled for his sweatpants, no shirt, just letting the blanket and your body heat keep him warm throughout the night.

“We’ll talk about this more…in the morning? O–or when we get back home?” You proposed sleepily, snuggling deeper into his body, weakly throwing one of your legs over his hips.

His big hands came down under the blanket, caressing your skin with soft passes as he hummed pulling you closer, “Yeah baby, we’ll talk about it, then.”

There you and Steve Harrington were, spending your first night together but not as mortal enemies — you guys had practically fucked the hatred out of each other, but really... it never existed in the first place.

BONUS SCENE:

You did a one over at the trunk of the van, mentally ticking off every item and looking back at the campsite to make sure you all didn’t leave anything behind. Steve was busy checking the tires making sure they all had enough air for the drive back that way there would be no issues. You shut the trunk closed, making your way over to the passenger door that was kicked open with Eddie smoking a cigarette.

“You’re in my seat.” You cross your arms over your chest, foot tapping against the asphalt as Eddie stared at you confused.

“You’re mistaken…this is my seat.” He retorted with a chuckle, gesturing to himself before blowing out a puff of smoke into the air.

“Not anymore.”

“It’s literally my van.”

You rolled your eyes, lamely gesturing back to the site where the tents were once set up, “And you literally kicked me out of my tent to almost freeze to death, therefore you owe me. Now get out of my seat.”

“I’m not moving.” He said, standing his ground.

“Move.” You commanded, reaching to tug him by the arm though he didn’t budge.

“Nope.”

“Fine,” You huffed, dropping his arm before calling out, “Steve!”

He came around the front of the van, dusting his hands off and jutting his chin towards the both of you.

“What’s going on?”

You pouted deeply, eyes sulking towards your friend who tsked and rolled his eyes at your feigned innocence. “Eddie won’t let me sit in the passenger seat.”

“My van, my rules.” Eddie smirked, tapping the hood of the car.

Steve stared at you both, shaking his head in amusement before turning to his friend, “Dude, c’mon, just let her sit up front this once.”

Eddie’s face twisted in betrayal, obviously Steve was already wrapped around your pinky and he just couldn’t believe he was this easy. “You’re shitting me right? I thought I was your right hand man Harrington?”

You snorted, eyes glancing up at Steve with a blush coating your cheeks, “Oh trust me he doesn’t need a right hand anything when he has me—”

Eddie faked a gag, finally relenting and stepping out of the seat. He stubbed out his cigarette on the gravel and waved his hands in surrender.

“Take it for all I care! Just keep your goddamn hands to yourself, and I mean it Steve, both hands on the wheel!” He shouted, whipping the back door open and cramming himself between the rest of your friends who laughed at him for thinking that Steve was going to save his ass.

“You must be proud of yourself, huh?” Steve chuckled, giving you a hand as you stepped up the siding and slid into the seat comfortably.

“Very.” You responded, bending out an inch to peck his lips not caring that your friends saw the act.

Steve smiled against your lips, hands coming to rest over your waist, practically lurching himself across your body as you whispered quietly for only him to hear.

“Now come on… you promised we would use your bed the next right, remember.”

His eyes widened, cheeks turning red as he swallowed and finally pulled himself away from you, “Oh I remember.” He smiled, tapping your knee before he shut your door, “Buckle up, princess.”

💌 reblogs, tags, comments, + likes are greatly appreciated! leave a comment and let me know if want to be added to my taglist!! 💌

a/n: so this is my very first enemies to lover fics...(at least i think it is????), this was actutally supposed to be very short and brief, almost a one shot/blurb kinda thing but it turned into a feature length fic...is anyone surprised hahaha. anyways, i hope you guys like this!!! i don't usually write smut because I feel like i suck at writing it and describing it but i hope i was able to do this fic justice -- let me know what you guys think and thank you so much for sticking around <;3

taglist: @translatemunson @kennedy-brooke @manda-panda-monium @tvserie-s-world @givemeth @steveharringtonswife @the-alchemys @loving-and-dreaming @awkotaco24 @engenelxver @elfiaaaa @pbs-theundeadmaggot @johnricharddeacy @gaysludge @keerysfolklore @micheledawn1975 @ihatepeanutss @bakugouswh0r3

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kentopedia · 1 year

Text

♰ his parliament's on fire — dazai osamu

.𖥔 ݁ ˖🕸️🕷.𖥔 ݁ ˖ KINKTOBER NO. 1 - nightclub owner!dazai

every man in yokohama has a long list of crimes they’d commit to be with you, but none quite as long as dazai’s.

contents. fem!reader, nsfw minors dni, port mafia boss!dazai, port mafia member!reader, bsd typical blood / violence, unprotected sex, established relationship, takes place before doa, dazai & reader are a lil unhinged bc they're in love, praise, soft dazai, riding dazai, sub reader, v slight breeding kink oops — 10.1k

The music shook your chest as you watched people head to the front of the club for a dance, a combination of those that were regulars, and those who were just desperate to blow their money on an evening in one of the finest night clubs in the country.

It had grown hot in the club, even for an autumn evening in Yokohoma. There were more people filling the tables than usual, standing only to swing their partners around on the dancefloor. A woman sung sultrily to the crowd, a song that you hadn’t heard in ages. Even for a Saturday, it was crowded, the capacity met, and then surpassed, packed to the brim as a group of foreign billionaires weaseled their way in by paying twice the entry fee.

You swirled your glass, sitting alone at the bar with your legs crossed, the tight, red dress rising up on your thighs. Beside you, a man was puffing a cigar, blowing the smoke back in your face so frequently that it took all your effort not to cough. Still, he paid you little attention, too enraptured by a skinny young woman that giggled every time he touched her arm.

A few more individuals made their way to the dancefloor, tracking unaccompanied dancers like prey, hopeful that they could score a partner for the evening. It was amusing, really, how often you’d seen some of the same men come back. They’d throw stacks of money on the table in a desperation to acquaint themselves with beautiful, upper-class women, even if they’d go home unhappy and broke.

Ice clinked against the sides of your glass as the last drop disappeared down your throat, warming you up for the rest of the evening. Already, you had caught the glimpse of several men in the club. But those who knew who you were knew to keep their distance, and they never tried to sneak more than a subtle glance in your direction.

Those who didn’t usually noticed nothing but your striking beauty and the allure of darkness that seemed to follow you. They were drawn to you easily, smiling at you like they were entitled to gawk at your appearance, like it would be criminal for anyone so beautiful to shield herself away from the world.

Rarely did that ever end well for them.

You handed your empty glass off to the bartender—a dear friend that you’d convinced to work for you at the club—and made your way over to the dance floor. The crowd parted for you with quick glances and slackened jaws, stumbling on their own feet to get out of your way. Once you passed, the world seemed to resume itself. Everyone continued about their business, averted their gaze, even if they were careful not to get too close to you.

Something about that made you smile.

For a while, you danced on your own, grinning carelessly to yourself as you twisted your hips, unbound yourself to the music and the alcohol that ran through your veins. It was a different kind of freedom, and though you’d once been wary of the watchful eyes, they no longer bothered you. You loved losing yourself in the rhythm, loved feeling transported to another realm.

The setlist for the evening included a few of your favorites, and you carried on until there was sweat on your forehead, a single bead trickling down your temple, one that you hastily wiped off. Breaths came to you more stiflingly, heaving inhales and exhales that paired with your thirst.

Finally, the tempo of the music slowed, just enough to snap you back into the present, and the energy zapped out of you as your mood darkened. The time of the evening had passed when you realized that it was no longer fun to dance alone.

You sighed, and with a frown, let your gaze trail across the room to find the cool brown eyes that you loved more than the music you spun in circles to. But Dazai was already in a conversation with someone else, tapping slender fingers against his glass full of amber liquid. He listened intently to a conversation between two men twice his age.

Beside him, Chuuya stood at the edge of the table like a loyal bloodhound, his arms crossed as he leaned back against the wall. You caught his eye instead and smiled to him, though not a single muscle in his face twitched. It seemed as though he was intent on keeping up the charade for the evening.

As much as you wanted to smile even more sweetly and taunt him mercilessly, you didn’t let yourself get too distracted. Instead, you refocused your sights on your other goal.

The stocky, tall man was right where Dazai said he’d be, sitting with a couple woman and a few empty glasses in front of him. He had a neatly trimmed, graying beard, sporting a watch that was, at least, a couple million yen.

You caught him watching you over the edge of the table, his smile slow as you bat your eyelashes at him, sauntering past him with a perfectly coy expression. Eyes lingered on the curves of your hips; the smooth skin of your legs revealed by the dress. The lust came in near waves off of him, thick and heavy as they reached you.

It made your job easier, the obvious attraction that they never tried to hide from you. You smiled to yourself, and felt a sense of satisfaction, despite his disgraceful leering.

The seats at the bar had been filled up when you returned, leaving no room for you and your new companion to retreat.

A younger regular, one with an overabundance of nerves and an awkward smile, spoke in hushed whispers to his friend, one that was dressed in a suit far too cheap to be in this club.

You tapped him on the shoulder, smiling at him in the way that had everyone bending over backwards for you. “Excuse me?”

He looked over, irritated for a fleeting second before realizing who it was that had approached him. Immediately, he was to his feet, stammering over a greeting while his friend gawked at him with incredulity.

“Sorry to bother you,” you said, softening your voice. “I was wondering if I could have those seats. I hate to—”

“No, no,” he said, practically shoving the other man away, pushing him out of the chair while he sputtered confused nonsense. “Take them! We’ll be out of your hair.”

You thanked them before placing yourself neatly back onto the stool you’d occupied before. It was far too easy.

The bartender sent you a knowing look, all too familiar with your games, before going back to mixing a drink.

Moments later, you felt the presence of another behind you, an overwhelming smell of tobacco and pine assaulting your senses. He was taller up close, taller than Dazai, at least, and older than you’d originally thought. Deep wrinkles weathered his skin, his eyes, and though there was still a hint of black in his dark hair, it was slowly being overtaken by the signs of a life that was twice as long as yours.

“Pretty dress.” That was the first thing he said to you, letting his eyes wander over your chest, lips curling into an ugly smirk. “It suits you nicely.”

You wouldn’t be won over so easily, so you merely smiled at him, nodding in thanks. Though, that had him coming on twice as strong, as if the simple eye contact that you’d made earlier had been a full invitation to fuck you. He took the seat next to you, signaling the bartender over.

“Let me buy you a drink,” he said, and though it was a kind proposition, it always made you laugh. You received a million free drinks from strangers here.

Still, you shrugged and let him, unsurprised that he knew what you’d been drinking earlier. It was a clear sign that he’d been watching you since before you even got up to dance.

“What’s your name?”

“Should I give it away that easily?” Your voice was silky in your response, unimpressed, but luring him in, nonetheless.

He laughed, and offered you his own instead, Tanaka, as if you didn’t already know it. You’d been planning on springing him into this trap since the moment he’d arrived that evening. It was a target and a plan that had been set in motion for days.

His grin was uncomfortable, but he thought so highly of the way his lips curled, seemingly luring you in.

In reality, you weren’t sure how any woman could stand to get down on her knees for that.

Half an hour passed as you talked with him, preening under his endless string of compliments, wishing that you could string him on for a little bit longer. You enjoyed the words well enough, just another thing to stroke your ego, but the minute he moved closer, you inched away, placing distance between you before he could touch you.

It was obvious it frustrated him, but one look at the flash in his irises had you knowing that he enjoyed the chase.

He droned on, careless conversation about hobbies you didn’t want to understand, and though you smiled, pretending to be interested, your focus drifted to the table where Dazai sat.

His conversation had shifted to Chuuya, the two other men from earlier gone. It seemed strained between them, sharp words spoken as they glared at one another, visibly at odds about something.

Despite the clear dispute, anger cleared away from their expressions within seconds, Chuuya straightening like a board beside his boss once again.

Dazai looked up; it was less than a second that your eyes met, but your knees had weakened, heart stuttering in your chest as it skipped a pulse.

A soft exhale left you, and you longed for Dazai, craved the feeling of his strong palm on your skin, the kiss of his lips on your neck. You had half a mind to say fuck the mission and walk right over to the table and plant yourself on his lap.

It would certainly cause a scene, especially when there were so many new customers there who knew about Dazai but didn’t know about you.

Still, you knew Dazai wouldn’t object. He’d merely smile into your hair and curl his hand around your hip, continuing on with his conversation like nothing was out of the ordinary.

You looked away. If you were to make it through the rest of the night, you couldn’t get distracted by the beautiful man just feet away from you. “Sorry,” you said, turning back to Tanaka. “What were you saying?”

His interest in conversation had already waned, and he faced Dazai, displeased by the uptick of fascination within your expression. “Found someone more interesting already?”

You laughed, shaking your head as you pressed your palms into your thighs. You may have longed for Dazai, been so desperate that you couldn’t spare him another glimpse, but you could still play this role well. There couldn’t be another slip, every move had to be precise.

“I’m just curious,” you said, puckering your lips in a pout. “He looks important.”

Tanaka took a sip of his drink as you spoke, nearly spitting it back out when your sentence concluded. His eyes were hard, narrowing at the sight of Dazai just meters away, surrounded by a security of sorts, “You don’t know him?” He coughed.

You frowned, tilting your head. “Should I?”

“That’s Dazai Osamu. He owns this place.”

There was room for a theatrical pause. You took that moment to pretend to think. “Oh, of course. What a silly question,” you said, humming, and set your chin down on your hand to glance back over at the table of Port Mafia personnel. “I hear he owns a lot of things.” You tilted your head, gauging the man with siren eyes. “Is that true?”

Tanaka huffed, but he didn’t deny it, looking down at his two-million-yen watch like it was nothing more than a trinket. “A pretty girl like you shouldn’t worry about him.” He seemed irritated, though he didn’t let it show, his voice the only indicator that you had upset him. “But I can tell you it sure gets hard to run a business in Yokohama when the Port Mafia owns half the city.”

You widened your eyes, leaning forward. “You’re telling me the Port Mafia owns this place?”

Tanaka laughed, loud and haughty, looking at you like you were just a poor idiot from the countryside, even if the dress you wore cost just as much as his entire suit put together. “Oh, hon, if only you knew.”

The condescending tone sent a screech through your entire body, momentarily halting any proper responses in your current act. But he was unfazed, already moving onto the next topic of conversation, telling you all about the business dealings that you’d known about from the long list of jobs within his file.

There was, truly, nothing about him that you hadn’t already dug up. It was boring you immensely, but you smiled on, nodding enthusiastically as he spun the most lackluster story you’d ever heard.

Dazai, across the room, stared at you as you conversed, clenching his jaw at the way the man eyed you, the gaze that scoured your body like you were nothing more than a piece of meat.

Oh, he would certainly enjoy tearing him apart later, even if he would be too easy of a case to break.

“When are we leaving?”

Chuuya’s voice snapped him out of his onlooking, and Dazai leaned back in the chair, shedding the tension in his shoulders to resume a comfortable position.

“Not until they’re both in the car and I can confirm with Tachihara and Gin that she’s safe,” Dazai said, crossing his arms over the table. He couldn’t forget that there were others around him, those who would never say a word to him, but knew who he was, knew what he stood for. Even here, he couldn’t let his guard down.

“Safe?” Chuuya laughed, though it was without any humor. His irises flashed dangerously, steely grey darkening into a deep silver. “You trust that idiot not to lay a hand on her? He’s undressing her with his eyes.”

Chuuya seemed intent on irritating him that evening, as usual.

“I don’t trust anyone who comes here.” Dazai scowled. “Don’t be a fool.”

A moment of silence lapsed between them, and Dazai became sickened by the way the man was eyeing you. Though you took it all in stride, leaning just far enough away so his knee didn’t graze yours, and his palm didn’t brush against your own, it still lit a fire deep within him.

It was all the better, he supposed, to feel such deep hatred for his enemies. It made it easier to tear them apart without any guilt.

“How long are you going to make her do this, huh?” Chuuya spoke up once more from beside him, his voice nothing more than a grumble as he whispered down to Dazai. “This charade you two are carrying on has lasted long enough. I mean, you’re whoring out your wife for fuck’s sake—”

Dazai reacted without a thought, despite not wanting to take his eyes off of you for even a second. He gritted his teeth and turned on Chuuya, his hand gripping the gun in his pocket, finger tight on the trigger. Enough of a warning for him to know how sincerely the simple comment irritated him.

“Don’t ever insinuate that I don’t love my wife, Chuuya, or it’ll be the last thing you ever say.” Dazai spat the words out carefully, just under his breath, holding Chuuya’s piercing gaze without blinking. “You may be a valuable asset to the Port Mafia, but I will not listen to your opinions on matters that don’t concern you.”

Chuuya stared, setting his jaw before turning away once more. The two of them looked back to where you were smiling, leading the other man out of the room, though still not touching, placing a respectable distance between you.

“I’m just surprised, Dazai.” Chuuya leaned back, crossing his arms as he titled his head, watching your figure fade into the shadows. “You love her so fiercely, and yet, you watch as this carries on time and time again. I don’t understand.”

Dazai stood from the booth, tucking the gun back into his waistbad, under his coat. He straightened his shoulders, inhaling deeply. “I think you’re underestimating her if you truly believe she doesn’t have a handle on the situation.” His hands slipped into his pockets as Chuuya followed, grumbling from just a few feet away. “Besides, I’ve never forced her into anything. It was her idea in the first place.”

“Why?”

Dazai sighed, though it was almost wistful, the mere thought of you enough to turn him into a lovesick fool. “Perhaps it is because there are many men that seem to think they can crawl into her bed so easily, and she enjoys their humiliation when they realize that they are so far beneath her.” Dazai shrugged, and smiled lightheartedly, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “Perhaps, she just wants to make everyone’s lives a little easier, including yours. You should thank her sometime.”

Tanaka sat beside you in the car, his hand lingering in the leather seat between his thigh and your own. Night had fallen deep across the city, the sky a navy through the haze of streetlights. Though it was nearing one o’clock in the morning, there were crowds of people out and about, lines at all of the much more affordable clubs in the area.

It hadn’t taken much to get him to come with you. You’d batted your eyelashes, smiled at him from under them, and told him you had a car waiting out back.

That was enough. When you’d pulled yourself down from the barstool, he’d followed after you, eyes blown wide as you’d begun leading him out of the room.

All it took was a dress that hugged your curves and a small grin, and he was in the car with a man that worked for you, heading to a building that your husband owned.

“Do you live far?” Tanaka asked, itching to put his hands on you, even though you’d convinced him to hold off until you got back to your room.

You placed your chin on the inside of your palm, glancing out the window at your own reflection. “Not too far.” You turned back to him, offering him a shy smile. “Why? Are you getting impatient?”

He grinned wolfishly. Your stomach churned anxiously at the sight of it, even when he was no match for you, nor all the other, powerful individuals that surrounded you. “I don’t think I need to answer that.”

Through the rearview mirror, Tachihara met your eyes, and they softened, just barely, silently showing his support from the front of the vehicle.

It was, in a way, a relief. You relaxed, regained a sense of composure, and let your ruby red lips spread over your teeth, cocking your head as Tanaka indulged himself in whatever fantasy was milling about in his mind. His eyes were cruel, though the darkness in them was nothing compared to what you were used to.

Idly, he made comments in your ear of all the things he wanted to do to you, his unpleasant breath tickling the skin there as you tried your best not to recoil. The smell of him was growing heavy in the car, overwhelming and nauseating. You sat even more stiffly, pressing Tanaka away with a palm to his chest as you giggled to yourself, pretending to enjoy his vulgar words.

Tachihara pulled the car around to the back of the building, letting the two of you out as he put it into park.

Any fool should’ve known where they were, what the dark building in the middle of the city stood for, but Tanaka was all too focused on you, intoxicated and inattentive. The mafia headquarters loomed overhead, dark, and unassuming, a triad of buildings stacked perfectly against one another.

“Thank you,” you said to Tachihara, winking at him as Tanaka turned his back, too disoriented to take in anything but the sight of you right before him.

The car drove away, then, and you were left to guide your guest into the building, towards the room that you had already planned to meet Dazai in. When you reached the elevator, Gin was waiting for you, dressed in female attire, this time, charading as a worker instead of the trained assassin that she truly was.

“Impressive building,” Tanaka said, as if not noticing all the obvious signs of the mafia base. “You must come from quite a wealthy family.”

You smiled at him over your shoulder, curious as to why he didn’t assume you’d come into the riches on your own. “I suppose you could say that.”

Gin opened the elevator, then began typing a message to her boss, alerting him of your arrival. Tachihara had taken the longest route back, giving Dazai just enough time to arrive home before you.

“Are you a renter?” he asked, staring as the numbers on the elevator increased, climbed higher while you went towards a floor that was only two below the penthouse.

“We own it.”

Tanaka turned towards you, eyes wide with surprise, perplexed even further by the alcohol running through his veins. “You didn’t say—”

Abruptly, he cut himself off. Whatever comment he was about to make was overshadowed by the fact that he’d met you at the Port Mafia’s night club. That was certainly no place for anyone that didn’t have a million yen to spare in their pockets.

Finally, the elevator dinged, and you relaxed at the sight of the familiar hall, the carpet that had recently been replaced, the paintings that you’d personally added, ones that had been purchased at an auction. There were traces of you everywhere, and though it belonged to many members of the mafia, it was, inherently, your home.

You grabbed Tanaka’s hand, realizing just how cold it was, wrinkled with calluses and dirtied nails. It took everything in you not to grimace as you pulled him towards the fourth door on the right, the one that had been used for every interrogation over the past two years.

It had become something of a holding cell for the mafia’s enemies, and most didn’t remain here long. You doubted that this man would be of any exception.

Tugging him along, you increased your speed, an invisible string guiding you right back to Dazai. He was your fiery beacon, and though you were still separated by walls, your heart thumped at being so near to him.

“Eager, are we?” Tanaka asked, and when he grinned in the lights, you realized how slimy it was, a hunger dripping off the edges of his yellowed teeth.

You smiled right back, but it was forceful, painful as it etched its way onto your cheeks. An itch started in the cracks of your palm, willing you to snatch it out of Tanaka’s hand and scrub it clean. Still, you held on, remembering that this was for the Port Mafia, this was for Dazai and everything you’d worked for over the years.Your determination increased tenfold. “It’s just around the corner.”

Finally, you reached the room where you knew Dazai would be waiting, and just like every other time you’d done this, every time you’d brought another willing victim into a den of wolves, you could finally relax.

You entered the room, not bothering to flip on any of the light switches. There was furniture, but it was dusty, bloody, and it would make it far too obvious that you were not leading Tanaka back to your bedroom. You didn’t want him turning tail too quickly, running when he discovered you had no intention of rolling around in the sheets with him.

He shut the door behind him with a quiet click, advancing on you like a hunter. It would’ve been threatening, intimidating perhaps, if you had not been able to sense Dazai on the other side of the wall. You knew that whatever control Tanaka thought he had on the situation had quickly evaporated, and it was only a false blanket of security that he’d wrapped himself up in.

“Can I get you anything? Maybe a drink?” you asked, stopping Tanaka with a flat palm to his chest, not allowing him to come any closer. “The alcohol in me is starting to wear off.”

He ignored your wishes entirely, upon you once more. One larger hand ripped yours from his chest, pulling you just another inch closer. “I’ve had enough tonight,” Tanaka said, teeth flashing in the dim starlight. “I’m dying to fuck you.”

You frowned, eyebrows wrinkling. “Well, I’d like a drink first.”

“I’m not in the mood.” He yanked on your hand again, and this time, you knew he’d kiss you, knew he’d plant the cracking pale lips of his own on yours. The thought of it made you ill.

Without thinking, you slung a fist across his face, a crunch sounding from his nose at the force of your hit. Blood trickled from one nostril, flowing in a fast stream over his lips, into his teeth.

He bent over, and you stood, straighter, staring over him as he cursed. The punch had been much more forceful than you’d intended.

“What the fuck.” He was angrier than before, and though his pain was immense, it did little to dissuade him. You kept your face hard, inching backwards as he stood tall, so much bigger than you’d remembered. It wouldn’t take much for him to lift you, throw you onto any surface he wanted.

You’d use your ability if you had to, kill the man if it was necessary, but that would mean the entire plan had gone to waste.

“You bitch—”

Without letting any fear cloud your face, you took a step back and bumped into something solid and warm. A cologne more familiar than Tanaka’s enveloped you in a safety net.

The older man made it one step further, aggressively, before every ounce of determination waned from his eyes. He staggered, tripping over himself and stared back at the man that had slowly come up behind you. The one that was brushing soft fingertips between your shoulder blades, his steady breath tickling the crown of your head.

Dazai smiled, in a way that was so menacing that your heart thumped twice in its chest before resuming its natural melody. Tanaka took a step back, scrambling away, nearly tripping over himself in the process, eyes dilated in fear.

“You,” he breathed. “Dazai—” Tanaka didn’t finish his sentence, too stunned as he stared between the two of you. “What’s going on?”

Dazai stepped forward, letting his hands fall away from you as he cornered the newest addition to his long list of enemies. Already, you missed the warmth of Dazai’s touch, the security that came with his proximity.

Tanaka cowered before him, suddenly so small, weak under the breadth of Dazai’s power. A sense of twisted satisfaction curled within you, lightning up every pore under your cold skin.

“I believe you owe my wife an apology,” Dazai said, and his tone was even, hard, not a hint of amusement laced within the words. Tanaka’s eyes darted to you, where you stood with your arms loose at your sides, eyes softer, every inch of you more delicate now that Dazai was in the room.

“Wife—” The word tumbled from his mouth before he could stop it, hesitant. “You said you didn’t know him. You asked me questions about him.”

You slid the ring back onto your finger, the one that you’d kept tucked away in the pocket of your bag. It glimmered in the beams of the moon, the diamond and rubies sparkling. “I can lie just as easily as a man can.” Crossing your arms, you sighed, and stared at Dazai’s taut back, the strained muscles in his shoulders as he stood over Tanaka. “You’re all so stupid sometimes. It only takes a simple question, and you never ask it. Anyone in that club could’ve told you who I am.”

He balked, considering his own ignorance, and followed your eyes back to Dazai, who had gone just a few steps behind you, to the small storage of top-shelf alcohol that you kept locked up in the room. “What is this about?” he asked, shaking his head to clear away his distress. “You’ve obviously brought me here for a reason. What is it?”

“I find it funny that you think you’re the one in control of the situation,” Dazai said, turning his back to fix himself a drink. He didn’t doubt that you would watch Tanaka for him with careful eyes. Even the smallest twitch of his eyebrows would be telling. “You don’t get to ask questions.”

“I haven’t done anything,” he said, and though his voice was hard, there was underlying panic. “I’ve stayed well out of the Mafia’s business, as promised—”

“Perhaps.” Dazai interrupted smoothly, coolly. “Our agreement wasn’t broken, per se. I just happen to think that working with outsiders is an act of much higher treason.”

Tanaka blinked, faltering. His jaw went slack, a mere second ticking before he replied. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t try to lie to me.” Dazai glanced over his shoulder, dark eyes narrowing. “I’m talking about Dostoevsky. The rats that are trying to take over my city.” He tsked, rolling the glass around on the counter, clinking it against the granite. Then, he popped a crystal bottle open, letting it fill a quarter of the glass. “Such a shame. You’ve built quite a name for yourself in Yokohama. Is this really worth losing all that?”

Tanaka stuck both hands in his pocket, shaking his head vigorously. His fingers flexed against his sides. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know who that is, I’ve never crossed anyone by that name.”

Seeing an opportunity while Dazai’s back was turned, Tanaka began to pull out a pistol from his coat; one you had, stupidly, forgotten to check for. It seemed he doubted that you were a threat, and if he could just kill Dazai, you’d be an easy target.

You moved without thinking, making the single-step distance between you and Dazai. There was a gun relaxed at his waistband, and you stole it, knowing exactly where he kept it hidden. Before Tanaka could point his own at the head of your lover, you’d acted first, aiming Dazai’s gun, your jaw tense and back straight. “Put it down.”

Tanaka, caught off guard, locked his jaw, and his fingers twisted tighter around the handle of the gun, inching towards the trigger. For a moment, he contemplated, but even without knowing the thoughts in his mind, you could read his actions.

You wouldn’t give him the opportunity to do as he wanted. Instead, you fired your own gun, digging the bullet into his fingers, shattering them, blood spattering as Tanaka dropped the pistol to the floor in a ghoulish scream.

For a second more, he writhed in pain at your own hand, once again. You held your arm taut, before letting the gun drop to your side as Dazai hummed behind you. Tanaka had fallen to his knees, tears welling up, his vision glossy as he dropped the maimed hand to his thighs.

Dazai came up beside you, smiling at you, and brushed his fingers down your arm. Slowly, he took the gun, placing it back into his waistband, his touch electric on every centimeter of your skin. “You’ve handled it beautifully, my love.” Dazai squeezed your hand, tilting his head so dark hair cleared away from his eyes. “I can take it from here.”

You nodded, and though Dazai was, by no means, pushing you out of the room, he could see how exhausted you’d become by the whole ordeal. If you wanted to leave—and you did—he wouldn’t object.

“Will you be long?” you asked, just a whisper over Tanaka’s heavy breaths of pain.

Dazai laughed easily, his breath ghosting the bridge of your nose. “Akutagawa will be here soon.” A touch lingered on your hands for a minute longer before he pulled away completely. “Then, I’m yours for the rest of the night.”

It was already late, but you’d take whatever time you could get with Dazai, even if you were drained. You nodded, and he turned away, going back towards his enemy, pulling Tanaka up roughly by his collar. Dazai’s expression changed into a man you almost didn’t recognize, if it hadn’t been for the moments that you’d had to see him shift into the underworld’s fearsome demon.

You left the room, yawning, Dazai’s voice the last thing you heard before you shut the door silently.

“Now that you’ve learned your lesson, perhaps you’ll be more willing to tell me everything you know,” he said.

Despite Dazai promising to leave once Akutagawa arrived, he’d been gone for nearly two hours, with no indication that he’d be returning anytime soon.

You waited for him in the penthouse of the Port Mafia headquarters, the home you’d come to know well in the past few years. A glass of imported wine was beside you on the nightstand, resting between a book you’d been too tired to read before bed.

You sat up, unable to fall asleep, and chewed your lip thoughtfully. It seemed ridiculous, really, for you to already miss a man that you woke up next to and fell asleep beside every night.

Still, you couldn’t help the desperation in your chest, the need to see him, to brush the mask of the Port Mafia boss away so Osamu could take his place.

You finished the wine, then headed towards the door. The room felt cold and lonely, and if Dazai wasn’t going to return soon, you’d just find someone else to bother on the lower levels of the building.

Though, just as you were about to slip on a pair of shoes, the door unlocked, swung on its hinges, and Dazai stepped through the threshold, a vision of gore and violence and every ounce the man you adored.

“Osamu,” you said, and even when you’d said his name a thousand times before, it still left your lips like a prayer. A smile formed, and you dropped your shoes, eyes sparkling, as you regarded the mess that he was in.

Dazai took one look at you and relaxed, shoulders falling as you closed the distance between the two of you. “Sorry it took so long, sweetheart,” he said, craning his taller frame down to kiss you.

You gripped the lapels of his coat, holding on tight as you pressed into him, deepening the kiss. Dazai’s bloody fingers cupped your cheeks, smearing red along your jaw, ruining your clean skin. Though, as you exhaled a sigh deep into his mouth, you couldn’t have cared less.

“I thought you said Akutagawa was going to take care of it?” you asked as Dazai released you, offering you a small, almost defeated smile.

He walked past you, towards the bathroom, feet dragging as he shrugged off his dark coat. Under the crisp top, his muscles were stiff, strained from all the stress. He wiped another hand over his face, doing little to clean up the mess of red that remained on his cheeks.

You followed him, trailing a few feet behind, feeling silly for wanting to cling to him so tightly. Yet, you couldn’t get enough of him, and you watched as Dazai remained silent, pausing in front of the mirror to regard his own appearance. He made a face in the glass as he gazed back into his own expression, sticking his hands under the faucet. The water ran in a steady stream, staining the sink a rose color as he scrubbed the blood from his fingers, his nails. There were parts of his bandages that had been soiled, and he ripped them right off, exposing pale wrists that hadn’t seen the sun in ages.

You mimicked his action, washing your hands in the second sink before scrubbing the blood from your face, clearing away the smear of maroon that he’d put there. The water shut off, briefly, and Dazai regarded you, frowning as you rid the evidence of his crime from yourself.

“I sent Akutagawa home.” Dazai finally answered your previous question and sighed, frustration evident. He stretched his hands over his head, the bones popping in one fell swoop. “Tanaka cracked right open; he really didn’t know anything.” He blinked at himself in the mirror once more, tidied his hair, then scowled. “He’s just a low man on the totem pole, and he paid for it with his life.”

Dazai seemed at odds with himself, and he drummed his nails against the countertop before patting his hands dry. The blood had been cleaned from his skin, and even though his hair was still unkempt, it was the only evidence that any wrongdoing had happened at all. Nothing but a speck of blood remained on his collar, the rest garnishing his coat instead.

You shifted, leaning against the counter. “Did you get anything out of him?”

“Names, a location.” Dazai clenched his jaw, fists tight at his sides. “He wasn’t lying, but who knows if they’re real or not. He could’ve been given fake locations. I’ve asked Ango to check on it.”

Dazai, once again, left you standing, contemplative, in the bathroom. You could hear him shuffle around in the other room; he released a small sound of relief as he stretched out his sore muscles.

When he’d finished moving around, you returned to the other room, and he was settled in the red armchair, legs spread out in front of him. Dazai rested his head against the back cushion, his eyes closed in serenity, a deep exhale expelling the tightness in his body.

It was almost a sight too serene to spoil.

“Do you want some space?” you asked, and though you’d always respect his wishes, that was the last thing you wanted to give him. You wanted to consume him completely, to press yourself against every crevice of his being and swallow him whole.

Dazai opened his eyes and blinked at you. Instead of replying, he smiled, slowly, and gestured to his thighs, sparing a glance at his knees.

Your heart pounded, launching its way up your throat, and you scrambled over yourself to crawl into his lap, straddling his thighs, the muscle strong beneath you.

Gently, he smiled at you, and brushed your hair over your shoulder to rub your neck. You let your arms rest on his shoulders, and slowly, you removed the bandage from his eye, hating whenever he tried to hide any part of himself from you.

You waited for him to protest, but he relented, and let you kiss his forehead, the very darkest parts of himself on display for you alone. It was hard not to collapse under the weight of your love for him.

You discarded the bandages, tossing them onto the table as Dazai tapped a pattern in the crevices of your skin.

For a moment, neither of you said a word. You noted every feature of his that you loved so dearly, and Dazai just watched you study him, tried hard not to smile against your lips when you kissed him.

If only he could see how beautiful he was, surely, he would understand that he deserved a life so much better than the one he’d been dealt. That someone with a smile brighter than a dying star shouldn’t have it taken away by years of endless anguish.

Finally, Dazai spoke, whispering your name in a tone he never used on any word but that one. “You don’t have to do this anymore if you don’t want to.”

“Hm?” you asked, tilting your head, so distracted by the endless galaxy within his eyes.

Dazai huffed, placing a possessive hand on your hip. His thumb grazed the bone and you shivered, smiling at him in confusion.

“Sweetheart, I don’t ever want you to feel like you’re obligated to do something just because you’re my wife.” He looked past you, an uncertainty beneath his words that he was ashamed of. “If you don’t want to take on any more assignments—"

“I told you already, Osamu,” you began, brushing the hair at the back of his neck that was hidden beneath the collar. “I don’t mind.”

“I know, but—” Dazai hesitated, his gaze steady on the doors behind you, the ones that led to your bedroom. Somehow, he seemed to think all the answers would be there, a script written out for him to recite to you. “Chuuya brought it up to me earlier. He said that I’m…” Dazai swallowed the words, shaking his head. “Look, it doesn’t matter. I just want you to promise me that you know if you want to stop, you can stop. Even if you wanted to quit the Port Mafia altogether, I’m happy to give you whatever you need.”

You smiled, kissing the wrinkle between his eyebrows in the hope that it would ease the anxiety in his expression. The tension was such an unusual thing for anyone but you to see, as Dazai had such trouble revealing his vulnerabilities to the world.

“I promise.” You swept your thumb over his lip, watching as it bounced right back into place, so soft and lovely. “I just don’t want to quit.” You leaned back on his lap, so you were able to see the entirety of his face.

Dazai’s eyebrows drew together once more, putting that worry right back on his appearance, and a part of you hated that of all the things he had to be stressed about, it was something as silly as you not wanting to quit your job.

“Why?” Dazai asked, tilting his chin, searching the depths of your soul for an answer that would appease him. “I don’t understand. You hate them; you tell me you hate them every time they try and lay a finger on you.”

He wasn’t wrong, certainly not about something like that. You loathed that men looked at you like you were something that they could just steal away, like they were entitled to the subtle way that they brushed your hip in passing, caressed your back when they walked behind you.

You just didn’t hate everything about the work you’d been doing. After all, it was your idea.

“I just don’t want to,” you said, looking over his shoulder to the open curtains, the bright expanse of Yokohama laid out before you. Twinkling star lights from skyscrapers and the port in the distance. “It doesn’t matter.”

It was your home, your city, and it always would be. You wouldn’t let Dazai die, wouldn’t let anyone take him from you—including himself. You’d continue to do whatever it took to protect that. Whether or not you used your appearance to achieve those ends didn’t matter. When it was all said and done, Dazai’s enemies would be dead, and you’d still have him to come home to.

“It matters to me.”

You shook your head, chewing on your lip thoughtfully. There were a million different ways you could’ve explained it, but none that were intelligent. “It’s embarrassing, ‘samu.”

Dazai laughed, a genuine noise, and kissed your shoulder as you sighed, relaxing into him once more. “I can’t think of anything about you that could possibly be embarrassing.”

You held his gaze, wishing for him to relent, to just give up and let you have this one. Instead, he just smiled back patiently, hoping you’d reveal another part of yourself to him as he slowly traced your hard collarbone.

Those pools behind his eyes were too distracting, the thumb on your neck dangerously close to your throbbing pulse. You swallowed, letting him feel every movement as your throat bobbed up and down.

“I guess,” you said shyly, “I like it. I like leading on your enemies, letting them think that they could possibly have a chance with someone like me. I like the look on their faces when they realize they’ve been made a fool of, that the girl who they wanted so badly belongs so completely to the boss of the Port Mafia.”

Dazai studied you for a moment as you shrugged the revelation off, his deep brown eyes darting over every crevice of your face. “You want to make them jealous of me?”

“Maybe.” Your cheeks heated, and though you’d been together for years, loved him for even longer, you still shied under the weight of your own desire for him. “I don’t know. Maybe I just want them all to know that I’m as much the boss of the Port Mafia as you.” You wound your arms around his neck, anchoring yourself to him, the only person you’d ever need in the dangerous world. “They’re blind to their desire, and they refuse to see that I have complete control over them.” You smiled, lazily, fondly. “Don’t they know that this is my city, too?”

Dazai’s strength made an appearance then, and he gripped your cheeks, holding you with a spiraled mix of possession and affection. “It is,” he whispered, ghosting his lips across your own, “and I’d burn it all down before I let anyone take it from you.”

Your heart stuttered in your chest at his deepened tone, the seriousness that drew on his normally playful inflection. You grew hot, and a twist of desire started deep within you, spreading down easily, slowly turning your thoughts into a muddled mess.

“I know,” you said, trying to keep your words steady as Dazai drew lazy circles up and down your sides. “Everyone knows.” You met his eyes, soft, yet dark, clouded with a longing you weren’t unfamiliar to. “The woman who brought them to their knees is still nothing more than a simple fool for Osamu Dazai.” You inhaled drawing your fingers to his open collar, the crisp bandages around his chest. “What could they ever do to deserve that kind of devotion?”

Dazai waited, watched your smaller hand run across his neck, his smirk slowly growing on his lips. “I’m a lucky man, indeed,” he said, drawing the words out slow and lazily. He tipped your chin down to him, his smile displaying the almost sharpened points of his canines. Slender fingers caressed your hipbone, pressing you farther down onto his thigh.

You let out a small sound, not taking your eyes off of his as his expression grew wily, and the slip you wore slowly began to rise up your thighs, exposing the softer skin of your leg.

“I admit, I can’t stand that everyone in this city wants you so fucking bad.” Dazai sunk his lips to your neck, kissing the space between your shoulder and jaw. “But I can’t blame them. My beautiful angel.” He smiled under your jaw, gripping your hips harder, forcing you to drag against his thigh. A puff of air left your throat as Dazai grinned, spiking your arousal. “It’s for the best, isn’t it? I’ve ruined you for anyone else.”

Your eyes flashed; Dazai bounched his leg, just once, his eyes shining, every move calculated. He’d always known exactly how to touch you, and he’d never forget, never stop enjoying the way you jerked so easily under his palm, the way you were already trying to rub yourself against him.

“Osamu,” you began, desperate for just a moment of friction, to feel his rigid muscle drag against your cunt. You wanted him so badly that your heart stumbled over itself, all the love you held, locked up there and looking for a way out.

He made a sound of disapproval, holding you still with a tight grip on your hips. His fingers dug into the bone, but it did little to ease your aching need for him.

“See?” Dazai’s kisses were light as he whispered against the shell of your ear, the sound nothing more than a breath of air. “I barely have to touch you and you’re a whimpering mess.”

You swallowed, tugging at the hair at the base of his scalp, trying to remain steady, if only for him to give you what you wanted.

Dazai seemed to be in a generous mood, worn from the previous mission, and he was grinning lazily, two fingers slipping under your dress.

His grip loosened, and you shifted, letting him pull on the strap of your panties, drag them down your thighs, over your knees, to discard beside the chair. Already, there was evidence of your desire, a spot of wetness obvious against the red satin.

He let the garment hang between his fingers before he looked back at you, watching as it softly fell to the floor. “If only they knew how easy it was to get you wet,” he said, shrewdly, “they’d want you twice as much as they did before.”

You let out a soft whimper, trying to direct his beautiful hands back between your thighs. Though, Dazai kept his fingers away, and in an act of desperation, you pressed your forehead to his, conveying every ounce of your affection for him.

“Osamu,” you breathed, blinking into his warm irises, a shade of brown that had easily become your favorite. “I’m so crazy about you.” You kissed his cheeks, smearing your lip gloss all over the skin he’d just wiped clean. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you all night. Everyone in Yokohama watches me, but I ache for you.”

His eyes flashed, pleased, and he relented, nudging his thumb to the inner most part of your thigh. The smile was still mocking, but he gave you at least some relief; Dazai let you sink back down on his thigh, the pressure just enough to have you clawing your nails into his chest.

He kissed your nose, but kept you where you were, perched on the middle of his leg and much too far from his cock. “What would you ever do if I wasn’t here to take care of you, hm, darling?"

You softened; even if his gaze was taunting, there was utter devotion between his dilated pupils.

All those men who fell for your act may have been complete fools, but Dazai was even worse off than them: he was a fool in love.

“It’s so hard not to crawl into your arms every time you’re around,” you admitted, grabbing the buckle of his belt to undo it with a clank. The mere sound, the feel of the leather between your fingers, nearly had you salivating. “I’m stronger than a lot of men in Yokohama.” Your features contorted then, eyes vulnerable as you looked up at him through delicate lashes, no longer a vision of authority, but of someone who desperately wanted to be taken care of. “Not you, though.”

Dazai’s grip on you relaxed, and something in his eyes shifted, lips parting as an exhale left them. He said nothing as you removed the belt, and instead, let himself sink deeper into the cushion, bearing your weight.

Hastily, you pulled down the zipper of his slacks. The weight of his heavy cock in your hands was so familiar. You stroked him gently, watching for any reaction, and while his face remained steady, you could sense the change in his heartbeat.

“I don’t need you to be strong around me,” Dazai said. His voice had deepened, your name leaving his lips, raspy by the end of his sentence. “You can fall apart if you want to, my love.” His erection grew slowly in your palm, and he brought you closer, your bare, soaked cunt dragging against his thigh. “I’ll always be here to put you back together.”

You smiled, flushing as he hardened, his breath growing uneven. When you had him leaking within your palm, you shifted forward on your knees, grinning at his reddened cheeks. Dazai’s eyes drifted towards your chest, just inches from his face.

Uncertain, you hesitated, even though you wanted him, needed him with every fiber of your being. It was an unfamiliar position. He could take control of the situation at any moment, but you weren’t usually the one looming over him.

“Osamu—”

“What?” he released with a sigh, and in one swift motion, lifted your hips so he was positioned at your entrance. “You walk around my nightclub in those dresses I buy you, force those pretty tits into other men’s faces, but now you’re too shy to fuck your husband?”

You made a face, knowing he was just trying to get a rise out of you, and if only to prove a point, you sunk down on him, your folds slick. Dazai slid into you easily, a sinful noise breaking the silence between you as he grinned. “I’ll f-fuck you,” you stuttered, swallowing under the heat of his watchful eyes. “It’s just…” Your words failed again as his cock went deeper in you, your focus entirely on your own pleasure.

“Just what?” He stopped you for a moment, planting you on his thighs, his cock still straining, filling you. Glaring, vibrating with need, you opened your eyes, lips parting as he whispered against your mouth “Finish your sentence, sweetheart.”

“It’s not my fault, Osamu,” you said, on the edge of a whine, squirming within his hold. “I can’t help that they stare.”

He laughed, then, and it was just a brush against your swollen mouth, the one he kept coming back to. “They can stare all they want,” Dazai said, tilting your chin up. “As long as they know who you belong to.”

Finally, he let you go, his hands tracing the edges of your knees, and you started a slow, steady pace, gasping as you held onto his neck tightly. He bowed his head into your collarbone, and kissed you once, before leaning back lazily, watching you take and take and take.

“Doing so good, angel,” he said, watching you with such a passion that it was distracting, as he let his palms rest simply on your thighs. “You always look so pretty stuffed full of my cock, don’t you?”

“Feels so good,” you muttered.

“I know.” Dazai seemed too devilish with his dark hair fanned out against the red chair, grinning in a way that twisted up your insides, sweat beading down your forehead as you tried to reach your orgasm.

You were hot with his piercing gaze upon you, but he didn’t bother to move his hands, did nothing to even pretend like he was fazed. You sunk down faster, heart racing, as the muscles of your hips strained, burned. Already, you were growing tired, sleepy from a full evening, but still so desperate to come around him.

You leaned forward, trying to angle your body, gain some relief from the position. Though it did little, and instead you were left sighing in frustration, wishing that he would do anything, instead of just look at you with a lust blown smile.

With every moment, the pain began to grow, the ache in your legs far too much to give way to pleasure. You started back at Dazai, frustrated, eyes glossy with need.

Dazai laughed at you then; it wasn’t quite mocking, but it wasn’t kind either. “Don’t tell me you’re already tired.”

Frustrated and impatient as you dripped down your own thighs, you grabbed his throat, thrusting his head into the back of the chair.

Dazai, eyes wide with surprise, stopped smiling as you curled your hand around his neck, his fingers digging into your thighs.

“Are you just going to sit there, Osamu?” you said, your words high-pitched and desperate. “Or are you going to—”

The end of your sentence was cut off by him gripping the back of your hair, smashing your lips into his own. The hand on his neck fell away, drifting to the lapels of his bloodstained collar, as he brought you down hard on his cock, hitting a place deep inside you that you hadn’t been able to reach with your own strength.

Dazai’s fingertips left bruises on your skin as he devoured the inside of your mouth, bringing you down over and over, stretching your walls with each movement.

“So pretty and desperate for me,” Dazai laughed, but he was breathless, his own tenacity crumbling from adoration. “Can’t do anything by yourself, can you, baby?” His kisses were sloppy as he dragged them across your neck, tongue grazing the sharp vein under your ear.

“No, but you said—” you were losing your breath and your words. “You said you’d take care of me. I don’t want to cum all on my own, ‘samu.”

Dazai groaned, his gaze drifting down to the space between your bodies, where you were sucking him back in, your own body aligned with your heart, never wanting to let him go.

“Fuck,” he said, slamming you back down on his thighs, his eyes hazy with love. “Of course I’ll take care of you.” One hand guided your hips as the other curled around your jaw, setting the pace with half his strength. “You’re my whole world.” His words stuttered, aching cock twitching inside you. “I’m nothing without you, understand?”

You nodded, but you weren’t quite thinking straight, the words a jumbled mess when they entered your mind. “I love you,” you said, gasping the end of his name. “I love you, Osamu, need more.”

Dazai breathed, just as heavily, softening as he regarded you. He’d always loved the look on your face as you came apart. “You take it so well,” he said eyelids fluttering over hazy eyes, and he kissed your forehead. You dragged your hands all over his chest, just wanting to touch any part of him. “Wish you could see yourself. You’re so beautiful.”

You groaned, pulling him closer, until there was nowhere left to go, surrounded completely by Dazai; the smell of him, the taste of him. “Say it back,” you muttered, “say you love me too.”

He choked on a laugh, and the lewd sounds of your wet arousal were loud as he came in and out of you. “I love you, angel, you know how much I love you.” Dazai kissed you, then, and your heart sped at how hoarse his voice had become, how easily it was for you to make the most powerful man in Yokohama fall apart at the seams. “You’ve got a pretty ring to prove it, don’t you? I don’t want anyone but you. I never will.”

“Come inside me.” Your eyes squeezed shut as his cock reached impossibly deep within you, stretching you, your legs shaking as you tried to ignore the dull ache within your tense muscles. Tears sprang to your eyes, coating your lashes; it was almost devastating how much you loved him. “Please. Feel so full, ‘samu.”

“Yeah?” He reached between you to play with your clit, and you were so close, crying out a broken moan as he touched you. “Need to remind everyone that you’re my girl, hm?” He knew just how you liked to be touched, how easy it was to get you to come when he fucked you like you needed. “Want me to put a baby in you next, sweetheart? Shit.” He curled his fingers, bruising your mouth as he stole the oxygen from your chest. “Everyone would know then, wouldn’t they? How could they doubt you’re mine when you’re carrying my child.”

You cried out, then, breaking, spasming around his cock as you fell onto his chest. Dazai said your name, kissed the top of your head, but you were too full of love for him. You breathed heavily as he brought you down once more, twitching against him from the ache in your sensitive cunt.

A moment later, Dazai jerked, then came inside you, spilling his warm cum against your folds, the white ropes dripping down your thighs, staining his dark, wrinkled slacks. Slowly, he pulled out of you, letting you rest on his chest as you breathed, your legs sore. A gentle touch ran up and down your spine as Dazai wrapped his arms tight around you, his cheek resting against the top of your head.

“God, you’re perfect,” Dazai said, and his voice sounded almost broken, devastatingly emotional. “You can’t ever leave me, okay, angel? I need you right here by my side.” Lips grazed your temple, so sweetly, gently. “What’s the point of all this if I can’t share it with you?”

You smiled, resting your head in the crook of his neck, eyes full of tears as you kissed him. “I’m not going anywhere, Osamu. I promise.”

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tag list: @satohruu (hannah i planned this one bc of your tags on my last pm dazai fic HDSFHSFH) @cha0thicpisces

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