#billy hagrrove angst

[gutterdreams]

Like Lions, Like Lambs

As all of you know by now, I’m fully obsessed with @stevesharrlngtons. I asked her to pick a prompt because I love her. She chose “I don’t like your friends” and “She’s moving further away from you”. This was supposed to be drabble, but it’s not. So I hope you enjoy. There’s some language. It’s 1.7k. I don’t own the GIF. 

THIS IS FOR MY WIFE.

Frustrated, Billy hung up the phone by crushing it against the receiver on the kitchen counter. He grumbled an inaudible string of curses under his breath and started to leave back to the living room where the television was on the channel he left it. On the floor, taking off her shoes after skating around the neighborhood, Maxine also mumbled quietly to herself.

“What was that?” Curtly, Billy stopped in his tracks and attacked.

Max held her breath in her throat for a moment. She debated whether or not to say anything, but she knew she couldn't back down around her bully of an older brother. So, she fixed a look of courage on her face and raised her eyes to him, “I said...of course, she didn't pick up.”

“You know something I don't?” After asking, his mouth hung open as he awaited for her to say something that he assumed would be stupid. Billy gripped the counter and stood impatiently as Max picked herself up off the welcome mat by the front door.

“I know you don't see the look on her face every time you pick a fight.” Max mused before trying to move past him. He turned as she headed to her room though, following her slowly, but surely. His footsteps were firm and wouldn't let her go away after a comment like that.

“She say something to you?” Privately, Billy quite liked that you and Max got along well. He didn't trust Susan to keep a shrub alive, let alone guide Max through the inevitable hardships that high school would bring her. He thought it was better that Max go to you with any questions or problems she had. He knew he didn't want to hear any of it.

“No.” Max shook her head, her squinting eyes suggesting his question was stupid. “While you were busy knocking that kid's teeth out in the parking lot today, I was watching [Y/N]. I saw her give up on you and start walking away.” Max had been in the backseat of the Camaro at the time. She assumed you would be with them on the way home, but before Mitchell Durtiz's first tooth had fallen in front of Billy's boots, you started walking away.

Billy looked like he was about to charge at Max for what she said, but she kept talking and held him in his place.

“She's moving further away from you because you're a psychopath.” It wasn't unlike anything she had said before. She had told him once when he lost his temper and picked a fight with you about how much time you spent with your friends over him that he would lose you. Max always stood by her opinion that Billy was all the worst parts of his dad, but with thirty more pounds of monster on him.

With that said though, Max slammed her door and pushed a chair up against it so that he couldn't cross the threshold and continue to bother her. She left Billy alone in the rest of the house to be the grump that he usually was.

Billy went back to the couch, groaning to himself about what a stupid little sister his dad had forced him to have, but he couldn't concentrate on the girls washing cars on TV. Max's words were taunting him in his head and his eyes kept looking to the phone, wishing you would just call him already. He wanted you to say that she was wrong. He wanted you to beg to see him and tell him how much you needed him now. The phone didn't ring once though. Billy sat on the couch until Susan came home, a whole forty five minutes, and drove himself crazy.

As soon as Susan was in the house with her grocery bags on the kitchen counter, Billy was out of the house. He didn't have to watch Max any longer, so he climbed behind the wheel of his car and took off to where he assumed you were. You had told him that morning that you needed to study after bombing a science pop quiz and that the only way you would be able to do that was by being on your own in the library.

Billy stormed through the place as if it wasn't universally known for being quiet. He scanned the small library twice before catching you in the very back, head in your hands, and staring frustrated at your notebook in front of you.

“Why didn't you let me drive you home today?” Billy didn't waste any time. He pulled up a plastic blue chair right beside you, his knee knocked against yours, and asked. His eyes quickly checked your notebook over to make sure it was chemistry notes and not ideas on how to dump him.

“Pardon me?” Blinking rapidly, you breathed out. Billy had completely caught you off guard and made your heart flutter.

“I couldn't find you after school. Max said you walked home.”

“You looked busy.” Remembering coming out of the front doors of Hawkins High to see your boyfriend tossing a kid from his gym class around like a tether-ball was enough to change your demeanor. You returned your focus back to the notebook and acted as if he hadn't interrupted.

“You don't like when I fight, huh?” With Max's thirteen year old wisdom ripe in his mind, Billy continued to press.

“I've told you that before.” There was a time where it felt like you were harping on him. It was every other day where you would sigh as he washed blood (his or someone else's) off his shirt in the sink, recalling what a pussy the other guy was, and you were hurting your voice telling him to be the bigger person and just walk away.

“Mitchell was talking shit, saying I'm California trash, so - “

“So, you had to punch out his teeth?”

“I had to let him know.” Billy leaned in, trying to bring your face back to him, but you were glaring at your notebook with fire in your eyes that stemmed from your heart. Studying had been a good distraction until Billy came along. It had calmed you down after being ready to dump Billy in front of the whole school in the parking lot.

“Well, I think you made your point.” Uninterested, you told him and picked up your pencil to underline a few main points on your paper.

“Can you stop studying for a second?” His voice was a sharp snap and it gave him the attention he wanted, your eyes widening over his face. You weren't smiling or soft, you weren't the girl who saw stars when she saw him. You were pissed. “What do I do? I feel like you're a million miles away.” He could see it now when you looked at him with so much disappointment. Maxine was right. You were moving away from him.

“I don't like your friends.” Tommy, Carol, Craig, and Mandy. “You try to impress them, they egg you on, they rile you up, and tell you bullshit so you perform for them. You think you're their king, but they play you. You're the jester.” It was a dangerous thing to say, but watching Mitchell bleed out while Carol and Tommy laughed against Billy's car had completely shot your composure. Billy was a monster in that moment and not the boy that promised you he would work on his temper.

“I don't like them either.” Defensively, Billy assured you. He didn't like being lonely and he liked attention, but it wasn't as if he actually cared about them. They were means for survival in Hawkins.

“I can't be with you anymore if you are going to be crazy. I can't go away to college and spend all my time wondering if I won't see you on break because you're in jail for assaulting someone.”

“I'm going wherever you go. You wouldn't be visiting me on break.” Billy ignored the hisses to be quiet from other studiers and readers in the library. He was fighting for you even if he didn't even realize it yet.

“I don't want to go with you if this is how you handle things. What happens when I piss you off?”

“Don't say that.” Billy put up both his hands, finally putting space between you both.

“What happens when you shoot first and ask questions after, but I'm the target?”

“You think I'd knock your fucking teeth out? I love you!”

Three simple words that Billy had never told anyone since hitting puberty. You had told him that you loved him once, in passing, as you two walked from Tommy's house to his parked car. In response, he squeezed your hand and kissed you with relish. Since Billy wasn't terribly romantic, it didn't hurt like your friends thought it should.

Much to the other library patrons, silence took over between the two of you. Your heart was beating rapidly underneath your sweater and making it challenging to focus on your notes. Billy was searching the side of your face as you had returned to looking at  your homework over him again. His knees were shaking under the table with his hands clutching his knees. They were all he could hold onto at the moment.

“I have to study.” As if he hadn't just admitted his feelings or you hadn't just dug into him, you clearly and casually said.

“Fuck studying. I'm talking to you.” Billy put his palm on top of your notes and pushed the book away.

“I don't want to talk right now.” You tried pulling it back by the corner.

“[Y/N].” Teeth together, Billy growled your name and held the paper down.

“I have to study.”

“Too bad.” Billy was refusing to give up. He could be like a dog with a bone at the best of times. “We're figuring this out.”

“You fucking scare me, Billy!” Screaming for the whole library to hear, you stunned him silent. “I’m scared of you.” Like you should have said the other words, you whispered so softly the words were cotton on your tongue. 

His bicep weakened and Billy let you take your notebook back. You swore you could hear pain as it grew from his stomach deeper into the rest of his body. The words had come out by accident, waiting inside to be properly repressed. You clutched your science notebook to your chest and started grabbing your pencils off the table. Once every writing utensil was in your bag, you grabbed it from the floor and rushed by Billy, leaving him in one of his least favorite places with an emotion he didn't know how to handle properly.