#eddie munson slowburn

[portaltothevoid]

Foolin’ (20//20) eddie munson x ofc

Summary: Eddie and Kat make their relationship known to all of Hawkins High. He continues her birthday celebration that night at The Hideout.

Word count: 6.6k

Warnings: brief mention of some kinks, some ass slapping, the tiniest bit of voyeurism, lil kiss here, lil kiss there, and fluff, ooo is this fluffy

Taglist: @munchabunch @madaboutmunson @riffcrusader @michele131

A/N: Well my fabulous readers, this is a wrap on Foolin’! Keep an eye out for playlists to appear on my masterlist post! I just wanna thank anyone and everyone who checked out even just one chapter, who left one note, or reblogged this story, and especially those who’ve left comments. It’s relit a creative fire in me that I wasn’t sure where I was gonna find again. My fantastic four in my taglist: your love of Kat and this story kept me going and made me so eager to keep writing. Oh? Wait? You’re really thinking this the end of Kat and Eddie’s story? My dear readers, this is only the first part! I’m not stopping here! We have a Christmas special coming up and....everything from season four! The Kat Ramsay Chronicles are far from over. The best is yet to come.....

The jarring sound of the alarm clock Kat forgot to turn off jolted her awake. She flailed her arms as she was startled, hitting something next to her, which caused her to jump even more.

“Ow..?” Eddie groaned. “You gonna shut that off?”

Once Kat finally woke up enough to remember everything that happened, she reached over and turned off the alarm. “Sorry I slapped you,” Kat giggled.

“No, it’s fine. Love being roughed up first thing in the morning.” They both looked at each other before bursting out laughing. Eddie rolled over wrapping his arm around Kat’s waist as he snuggled his face into her neck. She reached up and ran her fingers through his hair.

“Ugh, we should get up and go to school.” Kat sighed reluctantly. 

“Noooo,” Eddie’s voice was muffled into her shoulder.

“Yes!” She said as she tried to peel him off her. “Do you wanna repeat your senior year for a third time? Get up.” Slithering out of bed successfully, she grabbed the blankets and threw them half off the bed, which made Eddie let out a yelp as the cold morning air hit his skin.

“But it’s just one day!” He protested.

“And so was yesterday, which you also missed!” She was rifling through her closet, trying to find a shirt.

“Okay, so… it’s just two days!”

Pausing, Kat turned around to glare at him, before going back to what she was doing. “Ah! Found it. Here.” She threw a shirt at him. “It’s big on me. Might fit you. Don’t make me force you out of this house. We’re going.” Grabbing her own outfit, she left the room to change in the bathroom. 

“You’re lucky this is an Iron Maiden shirt!” Eddie called to her. 

“You’re lucky I just have good taste in music.” She said, handing him her toothbrush, which Eddie just looked at. “Go on, take it.”

“But that’s…” 

Kat rolled her eyes. “I think after last night, you can use my toothbrush. I’ll meet you downstairs.” She said, shoving it at his chest. Eddie smirked at her as she left the room.

“Yeah, okay, good point.” He mumbled to himself.

When Eddie finally went downstairs, Kat had her backpack on and was eating a poptart. She slid a plate with two of them on it over to him. “Well, aren’t you sweet?” He said as he helped himself.

“Sweet as pie.” Kat batted her eyelashes at him.

“Don’t I know it. Got a taste last night.” He smirked at her. 

“Alright, alright, hurry up, we gotta go.” She shoved his keys at him, pushing him towards the door. 

“You really are persistent, you know that?”

“Mhmm.” She murmured as she eyed Sherri across the street watching them like a hawk. “Well, I can’t take you back to LA with me after graduation, if you, ya know, don’t graduate.” Eddie stopped short, causing Kat to bump into him. He spun around to face her. “I mean, totally, like, only if you want to…” 

“You want me…to go back to LA…with you?” He asked slowly, making sure he heard her right.

“Duh? Seriously, Eddie? Someone with your talent will rot away if you stay in a place like this.” She said as she emphatically gestured around her, turning in one full circle. “And, I for one, will not stand to see your talent wasted.” She poked his chest to put emphasis on each of her words.

“We really are a packaged deal now, huh?” He responded as he held her chin in place as he kissed her.

“Yup.” She smiled dreamily, staring up at him for a few seconds. “A packaged deal that needs to graduate. Move it, Munson.” As she rounded the van to get into the passenger seat, she locked eyes with her neighbor. “Good morning, Sherri! Be sure to tell all your gossiping friends what you just saw! You have a nice day now!” Eddie gave her a confused look. “She’s the bitch that complained about your van to my aunt. Oh, you know what? Next spring I should kill all her flowers. Make her front lawn look ugly as shit.” She mused out loud. Eddie shook his head and laughed as the van’s engine roared to life.

Before they were even off Kat’s street, she went into her backpack and pulled out a cassette. She switched whatever was in there already, popping the one she had brought, which of course, was Dokken’s newest. She just looked at Eddie, grinning like a Cheshire cat. “You’ll learn to love them, I promise.”

“I never said I didn’t! They’re good. Metallica is just more my speed. And I will have you know, I know all the words to ‘In My Dreams.’” He nodded matter of factly.

“Oh yeah?” Kat gave him a challenging stare as she leaned over to fast forward the tape to track three. 

Immediately Eddie began singing right along. He smirked at Kat in between verses. “What was that? Did you dare doubt me, Ramsay?” He threw his head back in a small fit of maniacal laughter before dropping the theatrics to start singing again. His antics earned him one of Kat’s signature eyerolls, only they were now usually followed by a small chuckle. 

Midway through their morning drive, Eddie turned down the radio. “Hey, so you’re gonna come to the Hideout tonight, right?” He asked almost hesitantly.

“Of course, it’s Tuesday. Why wouldn’t I?” She eyed him suspiciously.

“Just wanted to make sure.” He shrugged.

“Hm, I’ll only go if you go to school the next day.” That made him just slowly turn his head to stare blankly at her. “Don’t give me that look! How many times am I gonna say this today?” Kat laughed. “You need to graduate. This year.”

Eddie put one hand over his heart and leaned his head in Kat’s direction. “Aw, I’m feelin’ the love, Mom. I’ll make sure I go to school tomorrow.” He returned his attention to the road, his face slightly pursed at the thought of school.

“I’m just lookin’ out for you! And ew! Do not call me ‘mom.’” She scoffed in disgust. “I’m not into that shit.”

Eddie let out a short chortle and batted his eyelashes at Kat. “Well, just so you know, I’m into it if you call me ‘daddy,’ sweetheart.” 

“Oh my god.” Kat said as she playfully backhanded Eddie’s shoulder.

“Aw, now she’s blushing. Look at that.” 

“Eddie!” Kat yelped as she hit him again, a little harder than before. While he just laughed it off, she added, “Just shut the hell up and drive, would you?” She turned away from him to look out the window with a small smile that never left her face.

Eventually the duo made their way into school with Eddie’s arm around Kat’s shoulders and hers around his waist. Their display earned them quite a few head turns, eyerolls, and looks of repulsion. Ignoring it all, they stayed in their own little world. 

As per their usual ritual, Eddie was leaning on one arm against the locker next to Kat’s. She was laughing at Eddie for something he said when Robin came charging up to both of them. “Munson! What the hell is wrong with you!” She said harshly as she put both of her hands on his shoulders, shoving him backwards.

“Ow?” He grunted. “What is with everyone doing that to me today?” He said as he regained his balance, shaking his head.

“Hey, Kat.” Robin turned to smile at her, before she directed her attention back to Eddie with her face pulled into a grimace.

Kat laughed at the spectacle and with a smirk on her face, said, “Oh, come on, you’re loving being roughed up. Admit it. Hi, Robin.”

“Not. Helping.” Eddie said sideways through gritted teeth at Kat. That just caused her to laugh more.

“How could you forget Kat’s birthday? You know you really have some nerve showing up here today. Empty handed at that! You should have seen her. If it wasn’t for Dustin–”

“Okay, okay, Buckley, hold up. Uh, Kat, a little help here?” Eddie tried to interrupt Robin’s rant.

“No, no. I think Robin should continue.” She encouraged with a smug look as she was enjoying this a little too much.

“–then the poor girl would have been all alone and it was all your fault! And! It was your turn to drive Dustin home yesterday, you know. But, you’re over here making…googly eyes at her all the time and then you’re just MIA? Who does that! Who does that!” Robin was waving her hands as she talked and then slammed them down by her sides, her hands forming fists. To punctuate it. She then blew her bangs out of her face all the while staring Eddie down. Kat was stifling giggles as Eddie kept looking between the two girls. His expression somehow pleading to Kat to help him and slightly scared of Robin. “Wa-wait. Kat, you’re way too amused by this. I had this whole speech planned out in my head, in case I said something too insensitive that I shouldn’t. But you– you’re…Both of you…Kat doesn’t look mad. And…and you look– you’re not groveling. I’m missing something here. Oh god, was I too late for my rant? Here I go again! Get your shit together, Buckley!” At this point, Kat was in stitches. Eddie still looked hopelessly confused.

“Robin, Robin,” she began as she put her hand on her shoulder. “I appreciate you defending me. Really. But we’re good. He redeemed himself in the final hour.”

“What?” Robin looked at them both dumbfounded.

“I tried to tell you..” Eddie shrugged timidly. Kat shut her locker and took her place right next to Eddie so they were both facing Robin.

“It’s all good. We’re good.” Kat leaned her head on Eddie’s shoulder. He brought his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to him, and kissed the top of her head. Kat did a jazz hands motion and quietly went, “Ta daaa!”

“Oh…Oh! So you’re… you guys are finally a thing now?”

“Wait, what does she mean ‘finally’?” Eddie asked.

“Come on. Anyone with eyeballs could see the chemistry going on here.” Robin moved her hand around in a circle in front of the two of them. 

Kat giggled into Eddie’s shoulder as the first warning bell sounded. She put her hand on his chest as she stepped on her tiptoes to kiss him before they parted ways. “I’ll see you later. Robin, you’re the best.” She said, giving her friend a squeeze on the arm as Kat walked away towards her first class.

“It's gross how adorable you two actually are together.” Robin quickly shook her head. “You’re lucky, Munson. I was ready to have it out for you.” 

As she started to walk away, Eddie stopped her. “Buckley, wait. Uh, so, I am planning this thing for Kat at the Hideout tonight. I think she’d be happy if, you know, you were there. I don’t know, maybe bring Harrington along. I’m making all of Hellfire go.”

“Ah, so, now you’re planning the party.”

“Hey. Sometimes business gets in the way of pleasure, okay? Just, uh, think about it.”

“Well, I’m only going for her.”

“That’s the only reason I’d ask you. Something tells me metal just isn’t your scene. 7:00 tonight. Our guest of honor is getting there at 7:30!” Eddie called out to her as he turned the hallway going off towards his class.

“The things I do for my friends…” She mumbled to herself.

Yet again, Kat and Eddie were the talk of the school with the rumors confirmed and all. Lunch was surely going to be fun. As Kat was leaving chemistry, she heard a small voice calling her name. “Kat! Hey! Wait up!”

“Hey, Chrissy, what’s up?” Kat smiled.

“So, um, are you and Eddie, like, officially a thing now?”

“You heard it here first. It’s officially official.”

“See, I knew you’d warm up to Hawkins eventually.”

“Hang on, Chrissy. No one ever said anything about warming up to this town.”

“You know what I mean!” Chrissy giggled. “I’m just happy for you, that’s all. You seem really happy.” Kat could see Chrissy smiling, but there was a sadness behind her eyes. Despite being a part of the school’s “it couple,” she could hear the longing in Chrissy’s voice. Kat could sense she didn’t want to be a part of high school royalty as much as she just wanted to be happy. Before Kat could even utter a reply, Jason came up alongside Chrissy.

“Now, tell me, my girl isn’t talking to some freak.” Kat rolled her eyes so hard she thought they might have made their way back to California.

“Jason! Stop it. I was just… uh–”

“She was just double checking what our chemistry homework was,” interrupted Kat, saving Chrissy from having to explain their conversation to Jason. “Don’t worry, I’m not converting your precious girl into a freak. Even though, if I may add, we do have much more fun. I still will never understand what a sweet girl such as her sees in a wastoid like you. Hm, not every mystery is meant to be solved…But, uh, yeah, read chapter five and answer the questions. That’s the homework.” Jason started to breathe heavily through his nose as he clenched his jaws at Kat’s words.

“Ramsay you little–” He started before Chrissy put her hand on his arm.

“Jason, don’t do this. Just leave her alone. Come on.” Chrissy tightened her grip on his arm, pulling him forward as she quickened her pace. She tried to avoid bumping into Kat as they went past her, but still grazed her shoulder. When they were far enough away, she quickly turned around to mouth “Sorry!” to Kat. She held up her hands and mouthed “All good.” back to her.

This little event made Kat the last one to arrive at the Hellfire table. Concurrently, while that was happening, Eddie took advantage of Kat’s late arrival.

“Gentlemen, I require all of you to be in attendance at the Hideout tonight. It is mandatory.”

“Aw, do I gotta?” Gareth sarcastically groaned.

“I can’t make it, I have a gig.” Jeff added to the sarcasm.

Eddie rolled his eyes. “I do not need your sarcasm. I was mainly talking to them.” He pointed his thumb at the freshman sitting at the table.

“It is a special occasion. We are celebrating Kat’s birthday. So. You all had better be there.”

“Oh so now you’re deciding to–” Dustin started.

“I went through this with Buckley already, I’m not doing it again. Henderson, we have made amends. I’ve redeemed myself. Kat and I are more than good. We’re great, actually. So. Figure out a way to get there. 7:30 tonight. Ask Harrington or something to bring you two. Maybe you can convince Buckley to go. And. Just so we’re clear. The setlist tonight has been in the works for a while, so don’t think I didn’t–” Eddie was cut off mid-sentence as Kat walked up to the table and tousled Eddie’s hair. “Babe! Not the hair! Come on, that’s the money maker.”

Kat laughed as she took her seat next to him. “Babe. You see that Dustin? That’s a pet name. Not…” Kat waved her hand in circles at him, like Robin did to them earlier. “...Not…whatever it is you got going on.” Mike bursted out laughing before he started humming “Never Ending Story.” Kat just looked at him funny.

“Alright, come on guys. We can all have our things…” Dustin pleaded.

“Anyway, what’s been in the works for a while?” Kat asked, repeating what little she heard when she joined the group.

“Our current campaign I’ve been working on. It’s almost ready.” She just nodded, completely oblivious to Eddie’s white lie.

“So uh, guys? Why is everyone looking at us and then whispering?” Mike leaned in to ask the table in almost a whisper.

Kat dramatically threw her head back and rolled her eyes. “Oh Christ, can these people just find something else to talk about?”

“Hawkins’ newest celebrity couple. Right here.” Eddie said, pointing between him and Kat.

“Gross…” Dustin said, shaking his head.

“Like you’re one to talk about gross Dustin,” Kat scoffed.

“There is a difference–”

Dustin was cut off by Jason kicking Eddie’s chair as he walked by. “Oh look, if it isn’t Mr. and Mrs. Freak.”

Kat immediately slapped her hand on her heart and hunched over. “Jason! You wound me with your pathetic, uncreative insults!” She quickly turned off the dramatics to give him a look of utter annoyance.

“You lookin’ to start somethin’, Queen of the Freaks?”

“Oh, see, now that one I like! I’m not, but clearly you are. Boys, clear the runway. Trays to the edge.” She commanded as she pushed her seat back and stepped up onto the table, careful not to step in anyone’s lunch this time. “Good afternoon, everyone! It seems that we– Eddie, care to join me up here?” She asked holding her hand out to provide Eddie with leverage as he then also got up on the table. “–are the talk of the town. Still! Since,” Kat cupped her hands over her mouth, “clearly the jocks care so much about our relationship!” Eddie stayed at his end of the table, but he could tell Kat was planning something. Kat marched forward. “We have all lunch period! We will be holding a Q&A to answer all your burning questions! Because as much as you all talk shit about us ‘freaks,’” Kat brought her hands up to form air quotes energetically, putting emphasis on the word, “you all just can’t seem to get enough of us!” Kat spun around on her heel. Her hands went up like she was a puppet as she trotted back down the table, stopping just a couple steps before Eddie so he was easily within her reach. “Hopefully though, this will answer your most burning question.” Eddie knew exactly what she was about to do. An absolutely shit-eating grin blossomed on his face. In her dramatic fashion, she twirled around, facing him again. She nodded at him as her way of asking if he was ready. He gave her one nod, which was all she needed. Planting her hands on his shoulder, she hoisted herself up and wrapped her legs around his waist. While he seamlessly wrapped his hands around her thighs, she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him deeply – in front of the whole cafeteria.

There were some audible gasps and many eyes were averted from the show. The Hellfire club panicked, looking to each other for what they should do. Dustin scrunched his face at the display of affection. Taking the lead, Jeff started a slow clap and the rest of their table followed suit until it was just the sound of five people’s applause. Kat broke away from Eddie, grinning widely at him. She hopped off of him and no sooner had she turned to face her wide audience, she felt a slap right on her ass. Whipping around, she gave Eddie a look and whispered, “Now, now…” Before she again faced the crowded room. “And there you have it, folks. Again, we are available for the remainder of the period if you have any further questions.” Eddie hopped off the table, holding his hand out for Kat. “Okay, show’s over.” She said just before she grabbed his hand and hopped down.

Once they were both seated, Eddie looked at Kat adoringly and said, “You’re fucking amazing, you know that?” 

“So amazing and yet you still forgot my birthday…” Kat said teasingly.

Eddie groaned and put his head down in his arms on the table. “I’m never gonna live this down, am I?”

“Not for a while, babe. Not for a while.” She said as she ruffled his hair again. He shot up and squinted his eyes at her, before smiling and sighing.

—-------

“Alright… this is weird,” Kat said aloud to herself as she pulled into a spot at The Hideout. There were a few more cars than usual, which she found suspicious. She shrugged it off, thinking that maybe for once a few more drunks were posting up shop here tonight. As she got out of her Mustang, the cold November air stung her legs causing her to shiver. At least half of the front of her legs were exposed due to the massive rips her high waisted black jeans had. The fishnets underneath did nothing for warmth, but Kat thought it looked hot as hell. She locked her car and tugged at Eddie’s battle vest, which he left at her house that morning, in a sad attempt to shield the cold from her on the small distance to the entrance. She completed tonight’s ensemble with her shirt from Metallica’s Ride the Lightning tour. For jewelry, she had on her anatomical rib cage ring, along with a vampire bat ring, a black onyx coffin ring that sat conveniently on her ring finger, and a choker that resembled a barbed wire chain. Her hair was teased to the gods of all pantheons and she gave herself the smokiest of smokey eyes. 

Halfway to the entrance she saw someone scurry inside quickly and heard muffled voices. As she went to grab the door handle, she heard a hush fall over everyone inside. She hesitated with her hand around the doorknob, finally realizing what she was walking into. “Oh god, here we go…” She muttered as she swung the door open, walking inside.

“SURPRISE!!!” Everyone yelled at her. Crowded in front of the stage was Dustin, Mike, Lucas Steve, and Robin. All of Corroded Coffin are already on stage getting ready for their set.

“I just, uh, want it on the record here that I did in fact plan a party for the amazing, the talented… the utmost caring… Kat Ramsay!” Eddie said into the microphone, earning an eye roll from about half of those in attendance.

“Nice save, man!” One of the bar flies yelled.

Eddie pointed at him. “Thank you, Tony! He gets it. The man gets it. Happy Birthday, m’lady. Hey– that’s where my vest went!” 

Kat erupted into the biggest smile as her Doc Martens scuttled across the floor over to her friends. “Aw, look at that! I doubled Coffin’s usual crowd! I expect a cut from tonight, ya know.”

“Yeah we’re here for you, Kat, not them. I don’t even know how I’m gonna get through this, but anything for you!” Robin said as she hugged Kat. 

“You’ll warm up to it! Give it a chance, Robin!”

“I can’t, it’s too loud. And makes me all nervous. I mean maybe I’ll try…Kat, you are the only one who could even make me consider this!”

Kat laughed as she gave everyone else a hug. “Hey, thanks for coming, Steve.”

“I mean, who else was gonna drive these ragamuffins here?”

“Hey!” Robin said as she slapped him upside the head. “Dingus. I’ll remember that.”

“Ugh, I meant the kids. Not you!” Steve said, throwing his hands in the air walking away in a huff.

“Yeah. Exactly what I thought!” Robin said as she followed Steve, casting a knowing nod back to Kat. 

Eddie had finally jumped off the stage and made his way over to Kat, wanting to give her time to greet all her beloved party guests. At some point she had been turned around, so her back was to the stage. Distracted by Dustin’s excitement to see Corroded Coffin for the first time, Kat let out a small yelp when Eddie grabbed her from behind, lifting her off the floor as he pulled her to him. She turned to him when he let her feet touch the ground again, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Hope this makes up for yesterday. A little bit? Maybe? I was planning this whole time, I swear.” He whispered to her. 

She nodded enthusiastically. “I love that you got Robin and Steve here.” Kat could feel Eddie’s smile widen.

“Anything for you. You know that, right?” He said as he gently pushed her back in order to see her face.

“Don’t worry, I know.” She said right before she gave him a light kiss.

Eddie tutted. “Such a tease tonight.”

Kat raised one of her eyebrows. “How so?”

“Well, first, you’re in my vest, which while it doesn’t look as good as it does on yours truly,” he said before he leaned in, “a new kink has been unlocked,” he gruffly whispered in her ear. Not completely sure if it was his tone, what he said, or both, but Kat snapped back immediately, her eyes almost bugging out of her head. “You need to–” she started, but was interrupted by Eddie pulling her close to him again. “Then, you’ve put a patch of a skeleton making devil horns in quite the interesting place…” He trailed off. The heat of his breath lingering on Kat’s neck.

She pushed him away, just enough so she could look him directly in the eye. “You need to chill! Right now! And– and if you don’t… If you don’t, Mommy is not going to be happy when she gets home.” She looked up at him sternly, pointing a finger at him. He could only just blink at her. He was half enamored by what she said and half trying to rewire his brain back to normal after it just short circuited. Kat broke their embrace, keeping her face stern. “Don’t you have a show to start? Get to it!” She said as she walked around him and slapped him hard on the ass, making him yelp.

Gareth, only hearing the last part, played a “ba dum tss” on his drums. “Thanks Gareth!” Kat yelled. Eddie spun around not knowing which of them to call out. 

“Yes. No. I mean– I–” Eddie stammered. “Oh, you’re so gonna get it later for that one.”

Kat gave him a devilish smile and responded with a simple, “Good.” She then trotted over to the rest of where the group mingled. 

Eddie couldn’t help but shake his head and take a deep breath in. “Jesus H. Christ…” he muttered before returning to the stage to check the sound of his guitar one more time. 

Upon hearing the sound, Kat winced. “Uh, what’s wrong with you? Don’t you go to, like, a million gigs?” Steve asked.

“Yeah and I know what it’s supposed to sound like. And trust me, it’s not that!” 

She marched over to where the sad excuse of the front of house sound mixer was. “Yeah, hi. Birthday girl here. You mind if I take a peak at that?” She asked, her voice sweet as honey, as she shuffled her way into the booth, not taking no for an answer. 

The old guy there just stood up, immediately admitting defeat. “Sure,” he scoffed, “knock yourself out. Don’t know what a girl like you would know about sound anyway. Kids these days think they know everything…” He mumbled.

“Excuse you. I’ll have you know I worked front of house at both the Troubadour and Whiskey A Go Go in LA, where I’m from, thank you very much. So rest assured I mean it when I say your sound is garbage.” She glared at the man who only just grunted in response and made his way over to the bar. “Hm. That’s what I thought. Okay, let’s try this…” Kat murmured to herself as she began to adjust the levels of this and that. “Alright, Eddie, try it now!” She yelled over everyone. Eddie played a few riffs from a Corroded Coffin original and his jaw dropped. Everyone’s head snapped towards the stage. Kat sat back smugly. “Haven’t lost my touch!” She said as hopped off the stool to head towards the bar. 

“Whatever you want, it’s on the house. This place hasn’t sounded this good in years. Jimmy, you’re fired,” the bartender said in awe as soon as Kat was within earshot. The original sound guy just rolled his eyes. 

Kat went right up next to him and said “I’ll have a shot of Jameson,” to the bartender, before she turned and directed her attention at Jimmy. “Don’t know what an old man like you, out here in the middle of nowhere, knows about sound, but sounds pretty good out there, no?” She reached over and downed her shot in one go, not even flinching, while Jimmy stared at her slack-jawed. “I’ll have another.”

The bartender shook his head. “You messed with the wrong girl tonight!”

After Kat had her second shot, she said, “And a Jameson and coke for the road, please, my good sir!” Once she had her drink in hand, she turned to Jimmy, and patted him on the shoulder. “Pleasure to meet ya, Jimbo. Don’t touch the soundboard, ‘kay?” With a final pat, she joined the rest of her party.

“Well, now that we actually sound like a real band,” Eddie began into the microphone. 

“You wish, Munson!” Robin yelled. Eddie just flipped her off in response. 

“Pleasure to have you here, Buckley. Before we start off Kat’s Birthday Bash with a Corroded Coffin– That’s us in case you didn’t know. I’m looking at you, Harrington. With a Corroded Coffin original…” Eddie started playing the intro to the song.

“Why does he think I don’t know? I know their name.” Steve said defensively.

“Sure, Steve. It’s okay.” Dustin said, patting Steve on the back.

“They played the middle school talent show. It was– oh forget it.”

“Would you all do me the honor and join me in a song you all should know…” Eddie led the room in serenading Kat with Happy Birthday. Usually, she hated this part of anyone’s birthday, but today, she was eating up the attention. “Well, now that that’s out of the way… Here’s ‘Imprisoned Heart!’”

With the band jumping right into their own song, Kat was bopping along and singing. Robin was wincing. Steve just looked confused as always, probably trying to figure out how they were actually halfway decent. Dustin and his friends were head banging. Kat looked over and pulled them more towards the center of the dance floor and began to teach them how to properly mosh. Of course, their set started out normal, but midway through, Eddie revealed one of the last few tricks he had up his sleeve.

“Alright so, this is a new cover song for us,” Eddie addressed the audience as he moved aside some of his curls that had stuck to his face. “These fools didn’t want to play it at first, but! I, being the master of persuasion, convinced them otherwise.” Kat quickly went back to the table to finish off her Jameson and Coke.

“We were threatened!” Gareth yelled from behind his drum set. Eddie turned around with his mic still in hand.

“I would never do such a thing. Unless you count sabotaging our next campaign so they all die within the first fifteen minutes of it. Then yes, yes I did that. And I still stand by that. Anyway, this next one is for the birthday girl. Happy Birthday, sweetheart.”

A silence fell over the Hideout only to be broken by Gareth’s counting off the beat and Eddie’s intake of breath before they started singing,

“In my dreams--it's still the same

Your love is strong, it still remains

In my dreams--you're still by me

Just the way it used to be.” 

Now it was Kat’s turn to be slack-jawed. That little shit! That’s why he knew all the words! Kat thought to herself. When the guitar and drums kicked in, Kat felt like she had to pick her jaw up off the beer stained emerald green carpet. Once she snapped out of her mini trance, she rushed back to the stage. She sat herself down, putting her head in her hands, and stared dreamily up at Eddie. He shook his head, smiling as he was singing. When the first verse started, she sang along, raising her hands in the air, and swaying. Jumping up when the chorus kicked in, she began dancing. 

When Eddie stepped away from the mic and played the guitar solo, Kat’s eyes widened and she froze in her place. She never got tired of seeing Eddie center stage, getting absolutely lost in whatever song he was playing. Him playing her newest favorite song? Forget it. She was awestruck. When the beat kicked back in, Eddie encouraged everyone to clap along to the beat. When he sang the final chorus, he motioned for Kat to get on stage. She hesitated at first, not wanting to steal the spotlight from him. When the music stopped briefly, and they kept singing “In my dreams…,” Kat made a run for it. She grabbed the mic from Eddie, who had never looked happier in all his life. She belted out the outro, “It’s still the same, You’re still by me, Just the way it used to be, What can I say? You’re still by me, And in my dreams you’ll always be, In my dreams you’ll always be, Your love is strong, It’s still the same.” She ended with a larger than life vocal riff that had everyone chanting her name. Eddie was bowing at her feet. 

“Shit, thanks, guys. Hey, now you can say you’ve played to six drunks! Woo! Corroded Coffin’s moving up in the world!” Kat laughed into the mic, which Eddie motioned for her to give back as he playfully rolled his eyes. Once she did, she turned to leave the stage, but Eddie put the pick in his mouth and grabbed her by the wrist, pulling her towards him. Taking the pick back in his hand, he kissed her and whispered, “Happy Birthday.” Kat felt her knees go weak, if only for the briefest of moments. 

Into the mic, Eddie tutted. “The birthday girl isn’t getting away that easy. We also might have prepared something else for you…” He presented her the mic, which she took.

“This better be good…” She warned.

“You’ll know it.” Eddie said, looking to Gareth to begin counting them in. Corroded Coffin’s lead guitarist began a riff that mimicked the infamous synth line that started Take On Me. Taking the mic away from her mouth, she gave Eddie a disbelieving look. “Are you kidding me?!” She exclaimed before immediately taking center stage. “Robin, you know this! I better see you singing! I wanna see everyone singing with me! And yes, I’m talkin’ to you too, JimBob!” 

Whether she was working behind the scenes or center stage, Kat was a performer through and through. Music was her raison d’etre. Right there, at the Hideout that night, surrounded by her newest and dearest friends, she had never felt more alive.

After completing Hawkins first metal cover of “Take On Me,” Kat ran over to Eddie, tackling him with a hug as tight as she could manage with a guitar between them. “This is the best fucking birthday of my life.” She said so only he could hear.

“Wait til later to say that, Princess.” He whispered back to her. Knowing he was under the guise of her giant mane of hair, he gave ear the slightest of nibbles. She dug her black painted nails into his arm. Her eyes rivaled the size of the cheap stage lights above them. He just winked at her.

Kat spent the rest of the set on stage. It wasn’t until the last song that Eddie revealed his final trick. “I’m sorry to say, Hawkins, but we have reached our final song of the night.” Everyone booed, even Robin. “I know, I know. But we’re here every Tuesday! Come back! You never know when our newest member will join us.” Eddie paused to wink at Kat, just before he took off his guitar. “This right here,” he said as he held out his baby to the audience, “is my most prized possession in my life. No one, and I mean no one has ever been allowed to touch her. Except one night, someone went right for her and before I could even utter one word, I knew I found the exception to my rule. Our last song, my gracious audience, will be led by none other than the woman of the hour.” Eddie handed Kat his guitar and pick as everyone cheered her on. He put the mic in its stand. “Ladies and gents, I present to you a cover of ‘Rainbow in the Dark.’” He bowed to Kat as he hopped off the stage to join the youngest members of Hellfire in the small moshpit. 

“You ready?” Gareth called out.

“Let’s fucking do this.” Kat said. 

Robin and Steve were left in awe at how masterfully she was able to play. Eddie loved nothing more than just watching her up there playing with a full band behind her. He knew she was a star just as much as she knew he was one too. The rest of the gang looked up to Kat like she was their new hero. 

Once the song was done, everyone bombarded the stage to engulf Kat in the biggest group hug of her life. Of course, it wasn’t without Eddie quipping at everyone to watch out for his guitar, which he hurried over to take her from Kat. Everyone said their goodbyes, as Steve reminded the freshman it was in fact still a school night. Really, he was just more concerned about getting them home before their parents became agitated. Kat gave everyone a final hug and thanked everyone profusely for celebrating with her. 

When the van was all packed up and Corroded Coffin was ready to head home, Kat was staying right by Eddie’s side. “Hey gimme your keys, I’m gonna have Gareth drive my van to yours, and then we can drive him to his. I’ll drive your car so it’s at your place, sound good?” She nodded, still basking in the utter happiness she felt from everything that happened today. “Alright, come on.” He grabbed her hand as they walked over to her car. Gareth was already starting up the van.

Just before Eddie went to open the door for her, she stopped him. “Eddie?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for… for everything.”

He couldn’t help but pull her in for a hug. “Always.”

“No. I mean it. You… This… This was quite possibly the most fun I’ve ever had. And just… Eddie, you are the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I don’t know if that’s too soon say, but I’ve… Never in all my measly nineteen years have I had anyone in my life like you in any way.” Kat was known for her tight hugs at this point, but she was holding onto him like her life and his were depending on it.

Gently, he broke the hug so he could look at her. “So, can you finally say moving to Hawkins was one of the best things to ever happen to you?”

“Only because I found you.” Eddie felt like his heart was just going to fly right out of his chest right then and there. Never had he admired and cared for another person so much in his life. There was just something about Kat. They brought out the best in each other.

“Hm, well, if you could change one thing, would you change anything?” He asked her, trying to savor this moment for just a little while longer.

Kat pulled him in, by the collar of his shirt, for a passionate kiss. After, she looked him right in the eyes with a smile on her face said, “I wouldn’t change a goddamn thing.”

[sp0o0kylights]

Part One

The drive's short one. 

Steve gets out of his car, opening the passenger door for Chrissy and escorting her up to the house, quietly envisioning what Jason would look like if a real monster got him.

What would he say, staring down the crazy, five-starred head, filled with teeth and drool? Would he turn back? Or run?

(Steve swears he doesn't take great pleasure in imagining Carver getting eaten, but he'll admit to taking a little.)  

"Chrissy do you have any idea--oh." Mrs. Cunningham startles, grasping her robe at the front as she spots Steve standing next to her daughter.  

"Hi Miss Cunningham." He says.

"Hello." She says suspiciously. "And who are you?"

"I'm Steve Harrington, ma'am." He watches as her mother straightens immediately at his name, and sinks right into the ol' Harrington charm, knowing instantly it will work. "I know you were expecting Jason, but I'm afraid he wasn't able to drive Chrissy home." 

"Oh, Steve! It's so late I almost didn't recognize you." She titters, suspicion gone. "Your mother and I are on the same charity board." 

Of course they were.

"I thought you were dating that nice Nancy girl." She says with a squint that mimics Chrissy's, because even in the midst of a crisis he can't escape the gossip that is Hawkins upper echelon. 

"Nance is waiting in the car." Steve lies smoothly. "I just wanted to make sure Chrissy got home safe." 

"What happened?" Chrissy's father appears, ushering them both in while blatantly peering around them, eyes sweeping the street before closing the door.

Steve recognizes the move. He's checking for nosy neighbors. 

"Jason and I broke up." Chrissy admits.

"What?" 

"We..." She falters in front of her parents. 

"What happened to Jason?" Her father asks, tuning back in once they're safely away from peering eyes.

"I'm afraid Jason and some of his friends brought beer to the party." Steve steps in to explain.  

"Oh Chrissy, it's a high school party. That's no reason to break up with him." Her mother fusses, face flushing in embarrassment. Her eyes dart from her daughter to Steve and back, and Steve knows he needs to start damage control. 

If he plays it right he can burn Jason while he's at it. 

"He was horrible, mom. Just awful." Chrissy says, but Steve can tell she's shrinking under her mothers gaze. 

"He drank quite a lot, Miss Cunningham." With a theatrical wince, Steve turns to face Chrissy's dad, lowers his voice and says "I'm going to have to talk to Coach about it." 

He gets the intended response, which is a raised eyebrow. "That bad, huh?" 

Steve nods once, painting a pained smile on his face. "He made a real fool of himself tonight, Sir. The basketball team has a reputation to uphold." 

"Oh." Mrs. Cunningham says, hand fluttering in front of her face. "I never would have thought…"

"He's normally a good guy. I don't know what got into him." Steve has them both eating out of the palm of his hand, attention neatly off Chrissy and onto the story he's feeding them. 

Its worth it to see her shoulders relax. 

"I couldn't let him take Chrissy home in the state he was in Sir, and he got very…" 

Steve pauses. 

Fills his voice with tempered disappointment, channeling his dad. "Belligerent. Said some nasty things."  

"Really?" Mr. Cunningham says, with a low whistle, and Steve knows by his tone alone that he's bought in.

Hook, line, sinker.

Steve nods once. "I have to get back to my girlfriend, but Chrissy'" He turns earnestly here, to let her know he's not faking this next bit. "Let me know if Jason bothers you at school. I'll set him straight again if I have to." 

"Thank you Steve." Mr. Cunningham says, as Chrissy's mom hustles her daughter towards the kitchen. 

Steve shakes his hand, then waves at Crissy as she calls her own thank you over her shoulder, before disappearing out the door and back to his car.

The same one where Nancy very much isn't. 

That's a problem for tomorrow Steve.

xXx

Tomorrow Steve gets into an argument with Nancy. 

She can't recall that Jonathan took her home, or that he's bullshit, their whole relationship, bullshit--

But she also can't tell him she loves him.

So Steve snaps at her. Storms off.

 Play’s more basketball.

It takes less than two hours for him to get mopey and another three for him to spiral into deciding he was wrong somehow.

That's what his mom said all the time anyway, wasn't it? The man's always wrong Steven, and he's the man here so…

He gets flowers, chocolates, and fucking waylaid (by Dustin Henderson with his Grow a Monster) and things go sideways from there.

 Train tracks and a junkyard and demodogs make time speed up. An encounter with Billy and a dinner plate causes Steve's recollection of the evening to be fuzzy. 

He just knows that in the middle of dodging death, he has the realization that Nance wants to break up with him.

That he should let her. 

Even if it hurts, even if he doesn't want to. 

She wants to be let go.

So Steve does. He respects her, and when he has a moment after its all over, he tells her to go with Jonathan.

(At least he permanently gets the squirts out if this. Or at least everyone but Mike.

Even if most of them are shitheads and one of them's Hargrove's step sister.

It's--something.

But when Dustin keeps pestering him, demanding Steve drive him all over Hawkins and then drags him to the movies, well.

It might be the best something Steve's had in his life so far. )

xXx

"Oh shit. Is that from Caver?" Eddie asks, popping up near Steve's car like the clown in a jack in the box. 

"Carver can't hit for shit. This was Hargrove." Steve replies, attempting an eyeroll before remembering that his entire face is a bruise. 

One, giant, never ending bruise. 

"I guess his step sister gave him the slip to come hang out with these kids I watch sometimes. I didn't know she wasn't supposed to be there." Steve shrugs, because it's the technical truth. 

If you turn it sideways and squint anyway. 

"Asshole tried to threaten the kid Max is into by slamming him into a wall and screaming shit, so I stepped in, and--" He waves at his face. 

The same one he's already getting looks for. 

"I was winning." Steve sighs theatrically. "He broke a plate over my head."

The story seemed to freeze Eddie but he recovers with a quick shake of his head. 

"You poor thing." He tuts. "Let me guess--you were more worried about the hair than the wound?" 

Eddie's hands flutter like he's going to touch Steve's head but he seems to contain himself at the last minute.

The hospital threatened to buzz it for stitches." Steve says darkly, playing into the bit. 

(He had not gone to a hospital. 

None of them had.)  

"What would our King be without his crown of hair?" Eddie laments, in a falsetto that was half insult half oddly sincere. It was jarring in that it was hard to get a read on, but the more Steve was around the guy the less it seemed malicious and the more it came off  as just….goofy.

Eddie Munson, Steve decided, was not a freak.

 He was a dorky little weirdo, just like all the other kids Steve now hung out with. 

Just older, and with slightly better hair. 

"Hey Eddie." Another boy calls out, approaching cautiously. 

He's got a leather jacket on, and if Steve thinks hard enough he can sort of conjure up a memory of the guy at Eddie's lunch table, throwing a piece of bread at a pale sophomore decked out in plaid. "You good man?" 

"Yeah Jeff, just checkin' in on the Hair here." Eddie sticks a thumb towards Steve, who raises his hand and waves. 

The falsetto comes back, somehow higher as the older boy swoons over Steves arm. "Soothing his poor soul after that brute Hargrove almost killed him." 

"Has anyone ever told you you're a lot like Bugs Bunny?" Steve asks, the thought leaving his mouth the instant he had it.

(He doesn't care, it's a legitimate question.) 

It has the effect of making Munson look downright chuffed. "I have actually, but only by my Uncle." 

"Why are you checking in?" Jeff interrupts, before seeming to realize he said it out loud. " Ah, I mean--"

"Oh he didn't tell you?" Steve says, as casually as he can muster. "Eddie claimed me and Chrissy at a party last weekend." 

See Munson? Two people could play the weird bit game. 

They've attracted more of Eddie's friends now, two more boys in leather jackets edging closer like frightened deer. 

(One of which is the aforementioned younger man Jeff threw bread at, and Steve vaguely thinks the guy's name starts with a g.) 

"Apparently we're his minions now." Steve tells Jeff in a rather put upon manner. 

"It was just you, the fair maiden chose otherwise." Eddie counters dismissively, voice dropping down low. 

Steve snorts. Hums a sarcastic; "Like you'd let us choose." 

Eddie finally abandons whatever voice that was supposed to be (a villain, Steve thinks, and wonders if it hurts Eddies throat to drop from a false high to a deep low that quickly.)  to say:

 "Mock me all you like, Harrington, but you can't deny the bit worked." 

Steve automatically went for another eye roll, and gets a flash of pain for it. "Who said I was mocking you, you dork? Just stating facts." 

Yet again, Eddie reacts weird to the comment. He looks almost bashful for a second, before he recovers, tugging his hair in front of his face as he plays with it.

The bell rings once in warning, and Steve makes a face towards the doors. 

"I gotta go, Mrs Clicks out to fail me. See you around, Eddie. Jeff." The way his eyes are bruised up he can't quite make out the face Jeff makes at that, but Steve's pretty sure the guys mouth was open. 

"She's a nasty one, my minion, best stay on your toes around her." Eddie calls, and Steve waves a hand in the air to show he heard. 

"What just happened?" Jeff asks, far too loudly for how close Steve still is. 

It makes him chuckle a bit, even as one of the other guys says something in a far quieter voice that has Munson squawking and flapping his arms like a bird. 

The winding little feelings in his chest squeeze his heart, and Steve shakes his head, refusing to be fond of Eddie Munson. 

xXx

College rejection letters come in, one after the another.

Steve could have made it into a few schools he's certain, except he hadn't really applied to any.

Not that any college other than Penn Hurst mattered. His dad wanted him to be a legacy, come hell or high water.

Steve's punishment was hand picked by his parents, and he gets the sailor outfit his new minimum wage job requires is supposed to be a part of it--that his dad made him apply because it was the most embarrassing thing he could think to subject Steve too-- but honestly? 

It's not that bad. 

Not even with Robin, the manager he met yesterday, and who positively, completely and totally, hates Steve’s guts.  

He figures he has time to win her over. 

All the time in the world, now that demons aren't trying to eat his, or any of the kid's, faces. He can focus on the small things. Build himself back up.

Figure out the person he wants to be, now that he's no longer King Steve. 

It’s the thought that kept him from attending any graduation parties. To go felt like backsliding into old habits. 

‘If the kids--if it comes back again--’ 

Getting drunk at night in a random house seemed almost irresponsible.

Particularly not with people Steve has history with, without anyone he really cares about being present. Certainly not Nance and Jonathan, who he wishes he didn’t know are at some end-of-year game night one of Nancy’s friends is hosting. 

(Steve can’t think about that for a number of reasons. 

When he does--because of course he does-- he makes sure to focus on the weirdness that is Jonathan Byers being someone he cares about, instead of the fact he can’t seem to kill his love for Nancy. 

Or that he's horrifically jealous of their relationship. 

That the best sleep he had ever had was between them, two nights after the lab, when they crammed themselves into Jonathan's bed because they all couldn't quite believe it was over.

That night had been so incredibly weird, but grouping together felt safer. Smarter.

Better.

Not in a way Steve wants to put into words. 

Not in a way he wants to confront at all.) 

His parents hadn’t been able to make it home to watch him walk at his graduation--his father landing a last minute meeting with some important person or other. 

Faked apologies were given, money transferred, and Steve, not wanting to sit in his too-huge house, had meandered to Family Video. 

Tried to forget his father’s cold voice in the background of his mother’s call, loudly announcing he’d have made it a priority to see Steve graduate-- if he’d gotten into Penn Hurst. 

Steve just shakes his head. Pushes those thoughts into the back of his head, into the same place all his other weird thoughts live.

The glare he gets from the tall, pimple-ridden guy working the rental counter was expected.

Chrissy Cunningham, was not. 

"I thought you’d be at one of the parties.” He tells her, when he turns down the romance aisle and finds her staring blankly at a shelf. 

She startles, before recognition flits over her face and a warm smile is directed his way. 

“I'm honestly not a fan of parties." She confides in him, hand clutching a tape in her hands."Not those kinds, anyway.” 

"More slumber parties, less keg stands your speed?" Steve guessed, blatantly turning his head sideways in order to read the title.

She awards him with a wider smile. "Exactly." 

"Chrissy Cunningham. Are you renting Jaws?" He teases, leaning in just a touch.

She flushes, but turns and squares up to him. Steve's delighted to see it. 

"Why yes I am. I'll do you one better and even admit it's one of my favorite movies." 

Steve grins at her, and sees the way she lights up on response, eyes bright. 

This is the Chrissy that Carver had tried to kill. The strength and pure fun that radiates off her enhances the beauty she has to something almost otherworldly. 

Steve has seen enough beauty in his life to recognize when it will stay. That Chrissy wil one day be 80 years old, with gray hair and knit sweaters, and she'll still be able to light up a room. 

"Like sharks killing people that much huh?” He teases. And it’s easy, slipping into this part of himself around her. The part he’s been trying to get back. 

The confidence that he walked with, before monsters crawled out of the ground, and Nancy put a hole in his heart.

"I'll let you in on a secret. ." Chrissy leans in, dropping her voice low enough that Steve has to lean in a bit too to hear. "My favorite character is the shark." 

Steve playfully gapes at her, and for the first  time in a long time, feels like things will be okay. 

He’ll be okay.

He won’t be King Steve. He’s not Nancy's Boyfriend Steve either--but someone else. Himself.

A Steve who exists outside of Hawkins High, outside his family name. 

He likes it.

"I told you that was his car. Steve!" A too familiar voice calls and Steve can't mask the despair that hits him as he turns to his (now least) favorite shithead, whose storming through Family Video’s doors. 

"Dustin." He identifies, with an edge to his voice he can only pray Chrissy doesn't pick up on. "Other brats. What are you doing?" 

Mike stands stubbornly at Dustin's right, Lucas nervous at his left. 

Will Byers is situated next to Mike but Steve's not as familiar with him, and has no idea how to interpret the kid. 

If he had to guess based on the face he’s being sent, Will’s more nervous then the rest--but equally determined. 

(This does not make Steve feel better. It in fact, somewhat convinces them they’ve run headfirst back into trouble.) 

"Well we were going to go to Lucas’s, but now, we're bumming a ride from you!" 

"I'm busy." He says flatly. 

"Ste~eeeve!" 

"I didn't know you had a brother." Chrissy says, hand covering her mouth. 

Looking back at her, Steve's pretty sure she's trying to physically hold back laughter. 

If one could shoot lasers with their eyes, Steve would be nailing Dustin for ruining--whatever it was that was happening here. 

"He's a rescue" Steve says flatly. "It’s not working out though. We're planning on returning him to the shelter.” 

"Wow Steve." Dustin returns, offended. "First of all, if anyone's rescuing anyone I rescued you, or did you suddenly forget that you show up to family dinner every Thursday at my house like a sad orpha--mmpphh!" 

‘Mmpphh’ because Steve had taken several long strides across the store to smack his hand over Dustin's mouth. 

"Sorry Chrissy, it would appear the asshole children I am paid to babysit escaped whoever is supposed to be watching them." He shakes Dustins head, in lue of strangling him. “Hit me up later we’ll discuss the shark’s best kills.” 

“Will do.” Chrissy says, as Steve begins the process of shoving his four smaller friends out the door. “Drive safe!” 

“No you don’t, and you’re gonna prove it by swinging through McDonalds for us.” Dustin sing-songs, swinging himself into the passenger side of the Beemer. 

“You assholes owe me, big time.” Steve hisses, as Lucas and Mike instantly begin making kissy faces the second they’re out into the parking lot. "I had plans tonight!"

“Do you have McDonalds money?” Steve asks, only to immediately wince at himself because fuck did he just sound like a soccer mom. 

“I have money I took out of my mom’s wallet.” Mike says as he settles into the car with his friends.

“Fine.” Steve sighs in defeat, starting the car. 

He determinedly does not ask if the idiots walked here, because there is a suspicious lack of bicycles, if only because he hit his mom quota for the day and Steve refuses to say anything else that might edge out his cool persona.

The one he swears he still has.

Supposedly. 

("Does my mom really pay you to watch me?" Dustin asks a while later, when the other brats are distracted. His voice is painfully honest, and softer than it normally is. 

"In food, yes." Steve says, because he’s not that much of an asshole--and maybe, because Dustin is truly his only friend right now.

Steve honestly looks forward to those Thursday dinners, helping Ma Henderson and having her fuss over him in a way his parents never had. 

In a way no one ever had. 

Dustin lands a solid kick to his ankle, making Steve curse. "That's not payment you ass!"

"Ow, God Dustin--" 

"Just admit you're my actual friend, you dick!" 

"Language! I swear your mom stole you from wolves, you animal--" Steve swatted at him. 

Maybe, possibly later, he will go on to admit that yes, Dustin is his friend. 

He will even agree to making up a stupid handshake for it. 

It involves lightsabers and gore at least, which Steve insists is very cool.)

[maelialuv]

Call It What You Want, Steve Harrington

Summary: Going to a party at your bully's house had to be your worst nightmare come true. But you know what they say; don't get over someone, get under them.

Warnings: SMUT! slow burn filth. I need a hot shower level. breeding kink if you squint. unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it!) fem!reader :)

NOTE: some characters have been aged up, like chrissy, so that everyone is in senior year at the same time :)

Word Count: 5.9K

You loved a party. Couldn't get enough of the heat of a group of people, the roar of laughter overlapping with the excited chatter of friends reuniting. The inevitable crash of dropped glass making the whole crowd hush before resuming their nestled talk. You were, in every sense of the word, a party girl. But that wasn't always the case.

Before this year - your senior year at Hawkins High- you'd been riding the coat tails of your childhood best friend, Nancy Wheeler, all throughout your school life. You were the sad little puppy that followed her around, but Nance never minded. She was always happy to have you by her side, or just behind her. Everywhere she went, you were there a few seconds later. That was until she started hanging out with, and later dating your sworn enemy.

Steve Harrington.

The guy had tormented you since middle school, along with his minions Tommy and Carol. The two of you used to make fun of people like them, stuck up and out of touch, and then she became one of them. Just like that. You could tell she felt guilty, by the way she would send you a furrowed glance at lunch as if to say 'I'm sorry, I have to!', like she had no control over who she surrounded herself with. As if she had no choice but to curl up beside the guy that broke your elbow in seventh grade.

Like she couldn't help but fall into the arms of the guy that had made your life a living hell for more than six years.

You still occasionally spoke to Nancy. After all, you lived across from one another, and thus had to see each other at some points. She would sometimes invite you to study, but you had started to make excuses after you had seen Harrington climb the garage roof and into her window, not liking the thought of his impulsive tendency for a romantic rendezvous interrupting a study session whilst you were there. You didn't want to put Nacy through the grief.

Your 'Lost Lamb' persona left you the moment you started hanging out with someone you never thought you'd consider a friend in your wildest dreams, or nightmares, Chrissy Cunningham. Expecting her to be a total Queen Bee, she was nothing of the sort. She was warm and kind and sisterly, all the things you missed from your friendship with Nancy. She sat with you at lunch, went to the movies with you, and eventually secured you a seat at the table with the rest of the cheerleaders, their boyfriends and the rest of their gang. They welcomed you with unexpected sincerity, and that was that.

You started going to house parties on Saturdays, diners on Wednesday nights with the girls, study sessions with some of the basketball team that couldn't quite pass a class or two. People waved at you in the halls, remembering your name for once. You and Chrissy would have sleep overs, and you felt the hole in your heart that Nancy left slowly start to heal. More or less.

But then you got that stupid invite.

"Gotcha!" Chrissy closed your locker door, scaring you senseless.

"Jesus, Chris!" you stacked your books in your arms. She was smiling wide, as always, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "What?" you said, a raised brow and half a smirk making its way across your lips.

"Before you say anything, just let me talk," she made tiny praying hands to her chest, puppy dog eyes gleaming. "Promise?"

"Okay," you sighed.

"There's a party this weekend, and we're all going, and we all really want you to come." You looked at her with raised brows, as if to say 'go on?'. "It's Steve Harrington's party."

You'd managed to avoid almost every one of Harrington's parties with some believable, and some not so believable, excuses in the past year since your surge in popularity. "I don't know, Chris, I'm so busy with college applications this weekend-"

"Who needs them!" she cried, "We all know you're gonna get into Yale or Hardvard or Brown or whichever super crazy smart college you want to go to." She grabbed your hand, swaying it back and forth, like a child begging their mother for a candy bar at the grocery store. "Pretty please?" she did the puppy eyes again, knowing it would sway you to agree.

"Fine."

"Yay! I'll come to your house at nine tomorrow to get you!"

And that's how you found yourself in your old bullies house, red solo cup in hand, full of whatever lethal punch one of the football players had concocted. Already tipsy, lingering by the kitchen so that the constant stream of drinks wouldn't slow. Bodies moved ungracefully around you, shimmying and shoving through to the living room or to the ruckus of the back yard where people were throwing each other into Steve Harrington's large pool. You sipped on your drink thoughtfully, feeling the confidence built over the last year slip away from you as you returned to your old wallflower state.

"Why are you hiding in here, silly?" Chrissy came to your side, the shimmery pink eyeshadow on her lids making her green eyes luminous in the low light of the kitchen. "The gang's all next door, come on!" She grabbed your hand with surprising strength, dragging you into the large living room. Deep sofas lined the walls, each with a basketball player and their girlfriends curled up on one. On the one furthest from you, was Nancy and Steve. Next to them, Tommy and Carol. It made your stomach turn to see her with him. You avoided her persistent gaze. But Harrington's gaze, raking you in and eyes darting up and down, was harder to lose. He stared at you adamantly.

When the buzz of chatter died down, a few of the basketball players and their girlfriends left to find more entertaining activities, it was just a handful of people left in the living room. Including you, Nance and Steve. Tommy had the glint of wicked amusement in his eyes, and it made you uncomfortable. "I know what we should do," he said, eyes falling to you. "Let's play a little game." Carol perked up beside him, as if their minds were connected in some twisted way. "Yeah, let's do something fun."

"Games, come on guys," Jason, Chrissy's boyfriend, spoke up. "We're not in middle school anymore." Carol got her own wicked smile.

"Oh, certainly not." her eyes fell on you , analysing how your style had changed. You were wearing dark make up, smoking out your eyes and giving them an alluring pull. You showed off skin, knew how to present yourself. Her eyes narrowed, her smile a venomous sneer. "No, if this were middle school, I wouldn't be caught dead at a party with her."

You simply cocked your head to the side, giving carol a tight lipped sarcastic smile. Inside, you felt thirteen again. Instinctively, you grabbed your elbow, as if you could feel the pain of the break there now. Tommy barked out a laugh at Carol's comment. "Yeah, who knew the black sheep would turn into a black swan, huh?"

You felt gross as he raked his eyes over you, unashamed as he stared at the place where the hem of your dress ended.

"Fuck off, Tommy." you retorted, voice calm but heart racing a million miles a minute behind your ribcage. You felt like you were a lamb on a platter for the lions, ready for the slaughter.

"She speaks!" Carol squawked. Next to them on the couch, Nancy squirmed. Never one for confrontation, she excused herself to grab a drink. You caught her eye as she left. She looked guilty. You wanted to follow her, grab her by the shoulders and tell her to wake up. Tell her that her friends, and her boyfriend, were assholes. But she never listened before. She just couldn't admit it to herself.

"Been a while since we've seen you, babe. Where've you been hiding those legs, huh?" Carol smacked her gum as she spoke, obnoxious and loud.

"I found some better people to hang out with." Beside you, Chrissy stuck her arm over your shoulder. Her face was hard. It made her look older, the serious glare that she was sending Carol. Carol sneered at her, and the expression aged her terribly.

Steve caught your eye, shifted hard away from Tommy. He was gripping his beer with a tight knuckled grip. His eyes slithered down your neck, over your chest, and landed similarly to Tommy's. You grabbed the hem of your dress and yanked downward.

"One of the cool kids now, are you? Not following Wheeler around like a dog anymore?" Tommy took a long sip of his beer.

"We drifted apart." you said simply.

"Oh yeah? Since when?" Carol chimed in again and you felt your blood boil beneath your skin. Steve continued his obvious oggling.

"Since she traded her spine for a shiny new basketball player"

Nancy stood by the door, drink in hand. Her eyes were wide, like a deer in headlights. The whole group erupted into astonished laughter, Chrissy struggling to hold back as she clutched her stomach. Steve glared at the floor, as if willing it to say a comeback that would sting you back. Nancy sat down beside him, silent.

"Woah, you gonna take that Wheeler?" Carol guffawed.

She remained silent as a mouse at Steve's side.

"Nance was never one for speaking up anyway. "

You grabbed your cup and flittered out of the living room, the atmosphere suffocating you. You needed another drink, a cigarette, and some alone time. Drink secured, and obscenely strong, you crept up the stairs to the second floor. Once you found a room that didn't stink of puke or had two people sucking face in, an ensuite bathroom, you locked the door and sat in the tub.

Shutting the shower curtain, doc martens resting on the taps, you lit your cigarette. You still couldn't believe you were in Steve Harrington's house - let alone one of his bathtubs - after everything that went down all those years. Yet there you were. Nancy lost to the dark side, you in with the cool kids. Your middle school self wouldn't believe it. You rested your eyes for a moment, breathing in the smoke and taking gentle sips of your drink.

Your thoughts were interrupted by muffled yelling in the next room. You stubbed out your cigarette, trying to get out of the tub as quietly as possible, when you heard your name. It was Steve and Nancy, and they were fighting. About you.

"Why are you bringing this up now?" Steve said, exasperated.

"You guys were awful to her, Steve!"

"Yeah, like you did anything about it, huh Nance?"

You recoiled back into the tub, feeling invasive but caring more about what Nancy had to say for herself than your moral compass. It was a years' worth of pain cementing your form in the tub, ear preened toward the doorway.

"You tormented her!"

"And you watched! If anything, that's worse!"

"How is that worse than what you, YOU, did to her Steve?!

There was a pause. You could imagine Nancy's face; pouted lips, furrowed brow, cheeks blotchy from an ill-fated attempt to hold back her angry tears. Steve laughed humourlessly. It was a cutting sound, and you could hear Nancy take deep breaths.

"What we did, sure, it was stupid. Do I regret it? Of course, we never meant to get her hurt back then."

"You're still awful to her!"

"And there's the kicker," Steve chuckled darkly. "She always stuck up for herself. That's why we did it, we knew she'd give us some fun." There was a long moment where no one spoke. "You never stood up for her once, Nancy."

His words hung in the air like smoke, seeping into your clothes and clogging your throat.

"You never defended her, then or now."

Nancy was flustered, stuttering over her words.

"You never stood up for your best friend? Thats...awful, Nance."

You could hear as Nancy struggled to find a defence, as she used to with you. She would blubber to you, relaying how guilty she felt with enough tears that you eventually ended up comforting her, forgetting that you'd even come to her for help.

"Fuck you, Steve." You could hear as she grabbed her things, storming out of the room with vibrant language. The loud declaration that "it was fucking over" made a laugh - vindictive and partly delighted - rise in your chest.

You smacked a hand over your mouth in realisation. Your movements froze, fear jolting through your bones as you heard Steve pattering about the next room. His movements stopped abruptly as your foot knocked a bottle of shampoo off the edge of the tub.

In a split second - idiotic- decision, you decide to make a run for it. You rip back the curtain, jumping to the floor and striding for the door, the door you had so stupidly locked. A warm hand grabbed your wrist in a vice like grip.

"I wouldn't do that, if I were you."

His voice was low, deep. It echoed in your chest. It made your heart thump. It made your blood boil.

"Get your hand off me." you seethed. His grip remained, making the skin of your wrist tingle. His touch was firm yet feather light. Unwilling to let you go, but not trying to hurt you. When his hand remained unmoving, you struggled against his grasp. "Get off, Steve."

He was leaning over you, shoulder blocking the door. He hovered above you, taunting, as he looked you over again. His gaze was relentless, inescapable. Confusing.

"Let go, Steve." You sighed out, defeated and embarrassed as he held you in place. You felt unnervingly calm. Strangely glued to the floor under his honey brown eyes as they bored into your own. You wanted nothing more than to move your feet - maybe stomp on his own so he would release the grip on your hand- and get out of the claustrophobic bathroom. You risked a glance up at the boy.

Christ.

Steve was never unattractive. Never had an awkward phase. He was always tall, athletic and tanned. Your hatred for the boy hadn't blinded you to the painfully obvious. But in the dim green light of the bathroom, shadows accentuating sharp cheekbones and jawline, you saw it. Saw it as the other girls did. Steve Harrington was gorgeous. He was painfully attractive, in every sense of the word. From the symmetrical lines of his cupids bow to the dark lashes framing honey eyes, he was hypnotic. And he had you completely under his spell.

"How much of that did you hear?"

His voice was aggravatingly quiet, gentle. Intoxicating. There was a gap between the two of you, small enough that you could feel the warmth of Steve's breath on your cheek as he spoke. You felt like a child being scolded by a parent, guilt driving you to complete honesty. It was the same tone that would make you confess to a teacher, had the same soft lilt.

"Enough." You replied, and your voice was hoarse. Rough, like you needed water desperately. You did, you felt as though your throat was bone dry. "Enough to hear you chew out Nancy."

Steve's eyes were inexplicably soft as he looked at you, and at the mention of Nancy they hardened almost imperceptibly. "Yeah, well," he sighed, languid and frustrated, "that was gonna happen, no matter if it was about you or not." When you raised as brow - both in shock at his willingness to detail the state of his relationship, and as a sign to continue- he went on. "All we do is fight."

"Hmm."

""What?"

"Karma came and bit you both in the ass."

The look Steve gave you made you feel bad for saying it, but it was overruled by the vindictive joy you felt at hurting his feelings. The way he backed up slightly, as if he'd not expected you to say something, made your heart jolt a bit. He'd been so awful to you for so long that the knowledge of his relationship being far from perfect made a smile creep its way across your lips.

Steve huffed, frustrated again.

"You are incredibly hard to understand." He said, the same sickeningly sweet voice at play. "You're very different...to how you used to be."

"You mean I'm not a loser anymore?" You quirked a brow.

"You were never a loser," he stepped closer to you, hand still on yours. "You were just...," he trailed off. His gaze was unashamed, staring straight down at your lips as he spoke. "Different."

'What a crock of shit,' you thought. This coming from the guy that bullied you all throughout middle school, even through high school. it was the biggest load of bullshit you'd ever heard. But your ears rang with the rush of blood behind your ears as your heart hammered inside your chest. Steve Harrington was a flirt, and a good one. You were experiencing his best lines. And they were working.

"Different?" there was hardly any space between the two of you now, Steve's lips brushing over yours as he shifted. You didn't stop him when his hand brushed your sides.

"Yeah," the hand that had been holding your wrist against the doorknob came up to cup your cheek. Steve's top lip was on yours as he spoke, "different."

The two of you crashed together with teeth and lips, a brawl of desperate hands and angry grudges. Fingers tangled in hair immediately, tugging and scratching. Steve tasted of smoke, beer and something innately Boyish. His hands settled at your waist, grasping the fabric of your dress there. His lips were pillowy and soft, addictive. You suddenly understood why Nancy put up with it; kissing Steve Harrington was like having your own personal drug. The kiss deepened as you shifted heads, turning for better angles and access.

Steve groaned as his tongue slid across yours, and the way he so clearly enjoyed the kiss made you feel powerful. He backed you up against the bathroom counter. "Jump," he whispered, your bottom lip between his teeth as he nipped the skin there. You did as he said, his voice husky and hypnotic, and he lifted you to rest on the sink. Legs parted, Steve rested between your open knees. One hand resting there, one working on shrugging you out of the jacket that clung to your shoulders. He pulled away from you, an amused smirk on his face as you whined, to rip the jacket away. Shoulders and neck exposed, Steve got to work on the skin there.

You were suddenly way more aware of what you were doing.

"You better not leave a mark, Harrington." you panted out, as Steve nipped a particularly sweet spot just below your ear. He chuckled, and the sound sent a shiver down your spine.

"Why?" he asked, smug lilt to his words. "Afraid of people knowing?"

"More ashamed than afraid," you said, choking on your words as Steve nipped at the skin of your throat. "Can't have people thinking just anyone can have me."

Steve pulled back, and god you melted right there. Hair a mess, eyes blown wide, and lips swollen. It was a glorious sight. "And I'm just anyone?" He was smug, overconfident. Irritatingly attractive.

"Yeah," you gripped the belt loops of his jeans, yanking forward. The bewildered look on his face made you grin. "so this stays between us."

"Aye aye, Captain."

And off you went again, lips colliding in heated snarls. There was a primal anger behind it, driving you into his strong arms as he encased you. Was this self sabotage? Maybe so, but it was the hottest thing you'd ever experienced. Steve's nimble fingers caressed their way up your back, finding the straps of your bra with ease. He snapped one against your shoulder, making you yelp and using the sound to slip his tongue back into your mouth. If it didn't make your bones feel like jelly, you would have chastised him for the cheap move. Carnal desire taking over your mind, you let your cold hands scrape up his chest, lifting the hem of his shirt to graze his stomach.

He tensed up at the touch, a stuttered breath fanning your face as he sighed. His two hands landed firm on your knees, creeping up your legs and stopping as he stroked your inner thigh with his forefingers.

"Permission to come aboard?"

You nodded, arousal coursing through you like a stake to the heart.

"Words, please...Captain."

"You find yourself funny, don't you?"

"Very." His fingers were so close yet so far from where you wanted them. "Do you want to?"

"Yes, I do."

"There we go."

He kissed you again, this time slow. It was harder than before, and as he swiped his tongue over your bottom lip, Steve slipped your underwear down your legs. He groaned into the kiss as he felt you, excitement clear by the wet patch on your panties. "God, you're wet."

You should have been embarrassed. You should have pulled your panties off the floor and run out of the house and all the way home without looking back. But you were putty in his hands as Steve slipped a finger inside of you, hooking upwards and finding that special spot almost immediately. A high pitched whine - one that shocked even you- made its way out of your mouth, muffled as you buried your head in Steve's neck as he set a slow pace. "What a pretty sound," he groaned, catching your face in his hand as you threw it back against the mirror. "You gonna keep making 'em like that?"

You nodded, breathless, and then he was out of your sight.

Steve kissed down your chest, shoving your dress over your stomach and kissing the skin as he went down. His fingers intwined with yours as they gripped the marble counter. You sat up to catch his eye, and what a pretty sight it was. Steve Harrington, pupils dilated with lust, with his head between your thighs. He kissed your thighs, and you mewled; so close yet so far.

"Please," you moaned. Embarrassment crept up on you, and you could feel the blood rush to your cheeks. "God, please Steve."

Steve dug his fingers into the skin of your thighs, toying with them. He kissed his way to your knees, enjoying the sight before him as you writhed about. "Please what?" he said, and had you not been desperate for him to bury his head between your legs you would have kicked him. He grinned as you fought the urge to beg. "What do you want?" He left surprisingly tender pecks to your knee.

"I want you."

"Where do you want me?" he was taking his time with you, partly for himself - savouring the moment, rejoicing in the way you fell apart before him- and partly to tease you into insanity.

"Jesus Christ," you groaned as he nipped the supple skin of your thighs.

"Steve is just fine." He laughed, putting you out of your misery as he licked one broad stripe up your centre. It was the stupidest, most reckless thing you could be doing, which made it even hotter as Steve hooked his hands under your hips, holding you on top of the counter as your legs wrapped round his head and your hands wove themselves into his hair. Almost immediately you understood Steve's reputation, and you felt a pang of possessiveness as his lips encased your clit, humming as he went. Your back arched off the tiles, mouth agape in a silent 'O' shape. Harrington knew what he was doing, that much was clear as your first orgasm crept up on you.

You could hardly muster words, the only sound in the jade coloured bathroom being the obscene wet sounds and your whimpers as Steve continued to ruin you on the counter. "I'm gonna - oh shit, Steve." The way you moaned his name - like it was the only one you knew, the only one that mattered- made Steve's jeans feel impossibly tight, palming himself for something, anything to relieve himself. He was just as desperate, just as wanting, as you were - if not more. The thought of what was to come made you clench around Steve's fingers, exploding in a white hot scream on his tongue. You fell back against the mirror, hairs sticking to the sides of your face, cheeks flushed with both heat and bashfulness. Steve crept up your stomach again, stealing a kiss when he made it to your lips.

You could taste yourself as he kissed you, slow and deep. His hands swiped the hair from your face, in a gesture entirely too sweet for a boy that had just ravaged you in his bathroom. It bothered you. That wasn't part of the interaction - there was no sweetness involved. It almost took you out of the moment, but as your hips bucked into Steve's, and he let out a strangled groan, the moment was saved. As his lips found purchase on your collarbones, your hands made work of unbuttoning his shirt - purposefully slow, you enjoyed watching his stomach tense as you grazed it. The sharp intake of breath as you began unbuckling his belt made you feel powerful, made your stomach do flips. "Here?" you asked, kissing down his neck to the space where it met his shoulders, "or somewhere else?"

Steve's eyes lit up like a christmas tree at the prospect that this - whatever this was- wasn't over just yet. He gripped your hands on his belt buckle. "Not here." With little effort, he hoisted you over his shoulder - much to your shock and dismay. You swatted his back but couldn't help the swell of arousal as his arm tightened round your waist. He set you down on the edge of the bed, standing in front of you with one hand on your cheek. In the dim light of his bedroom, Steve Harrington was devastatingly handsome. The soft glow of peaches and oranges made his eyes a molten chocolate, skin peppered with a red hue from...exertion.

"It's rude to stare." he said, voice void of the smugness from before. It made your ribcage rattle, heart thudding with the weight of his stare. It felt like he was looking at your soul, and it made you shiver. The boy who'd tormented you for years, was seeing you. Staring right back at him, your hands made their way to his belt loops. It was your turn to make him writhe a bit.

"Can't help it," you said, voice all airy and entirely foreign to your ears. It dripped with a lust, husky and soft. "You're somewhat of a looker."

You ripped his jeans open, nimble hands ridding him of the garment in seconds. As you grabbed the waistband of his boxers, the outline of his cock straining against the fabric, his hand stopping you. "As amazing as that would be," he said regrettably, "if I don't get you on that bed, I think I may lose my mind." He said it so breathlessly that it made your thighs clench together. He wanted you so badly. You cocked your head to the side, half playful and half serious as you said, "Do something about it then."

Steve didn't need to be told twice. He dove into you, hand steadying your head as your lips locked together - an irritatingly perfect puzzle piece finding another. You were a tangle of legs, arms, and lips as the two of you buried yourselves in Steve Harrington's bed, ridding each other of the clothes that stopped your from touching one another completely. His knee found its home between you, shifting your legs apart to make room for hips. You were encased in Steve; his scent, the feel of his lips on your skin, his legs locking yours in place. His hips rocking into yours as he kissed your neck with sinful skill.

Your hands grew restless, tugging at the hairs at the nape of his neck as if he would understand the morse code in the pulling. "Steve," you groaned as he knocked his hips into yours, "please."

You were begging, and you were embarrassed. You couldn't bring yourself to say the words- couldn't stand the thought of asking your middle school bully to fuck you in his bed at his own party. But the boy had other ideas.

"Say it." he toyed with your clit, thumbing it as you whined. When you stayed silent, he pinched one of your nipples between his fingers. he smirked at how quickly they puckered underneath him. "Say you want me."

Your cheeks burned with shame. You couldn't - wouldn't- beg him.

He hovered over you, hands either side of your head, nose brushing yours. You could feel the ghost of his lips over your own. His hand came to rest on your chin, thumb sliding over your lip, tugging it down and letting it slide back. "Open."

You did as he said, opening your mouth wide enough for Steve to slide his thumb into your mouth, a teasing smile on his face as you swirled your tongue around it. "Say you want me to fuck you." He pulled his thumb out of your mouth slowly, grinning as it made a satisfying pop. He leaned down to the shell of your ear. "Tell me you want me to ruin you," he whispered.

The burn in the pit of your stomach raged as Steve kissed the hollow of your throat, waiting for you to speak. Your breath was shallow, eyes closed as you whispered into the air, hoping the buzz of the party below would swallow your words.

"I want you to ruin me."

Steve grinned, wolfish and smug, as he lined himself up with you, locking eyes with you as he pushed himself in. You knew you were gone when he moaned your name like a prayer, said it like it was the cure to his troubles. Like you were something to treasure. One strong arm gripped the headboard as he panted. "God," he grunted out, "you feel incredible."

There was something electric about hearing praise from the boy that tormented you for years, something wickedly delightful about watching his mouth hang open with pleasure as he bottomed out inside you. You clenched around him, desperate for any friction to satisfy the burning between your legs. "Can I move?" he groaned.

"Yes, please."

In public, Steve was an athlete. Behind closed doors, under the sheets, he was an Olympian. He set a fast pace, hitting your sweet spot with every thrust, deeper inside of you every time. The sounds of the party- the drunken teens stumbling, the music blaring- were drowned out by the slapping of skin on skin, of your whines and Steve Harrington's moans as you fell apart beneath him.

"Shitshitshit- man, you're amazing." he moaned as he rutted into you. You were frozen in pleasure, mouth open from silent screams of pleasure. You bit your lip, so hard you would have tasted blood had Steve not being everything you felt in that moment. "Oh, fuck," you groaned at a particularly deep thrust, "I'm s-so close."

"Me too," Steve whimpered, and you were sure it was the hottest thing you'd ever heard. "Where should I-"

"I'm on the pill." you sputtered out.

Steve's eyes darkened, delighted at the permission, determined to get you to your peak before he fell apart himself. "Yeah? You gonna let me come inside?" His hand reached between your conjoined bodies, rubbing tight circles on your clit. "Gonna come for me?"

Your back arched off the mattress, the coil in your stomach snapping at the same time Steve collapsed on top of you, his stuttering as he came. You both panted, recovering from the exertion. Rolling over onto his back, you and Steve stared at the ceiling, the weight of what you had done sinking in.

It was wrong, so wrong. He'd just broken up with Nancy, seconds before you let him crawl between your legs. You would have felt terrible, like you'd betrayed her, had it not been so good.

You would have felt guilty, had you not felt the shake of your legs still reeling from the intensity of your orgasm.

Steve turned his head to face you. You turned to look at him.

"I'm sorry about how I treated you, before."

You snorted.

"You don't have to apologise just because we had sex, Steve." The ridiculousness of it made you laugh. "Thanks, though." You were both silent for a while, just laying there. You tried spying your clothes across the room. "Where's my underwear?"

"Oh," Steve mumbled, getting up from the bed and into the bathroom. You couldn't help but stare at his retreating form, back muscles flexing as he stretched. You did the same, a soreness washing over you. Steam filled the bathroom, the sound of the shower running loud against the dying party below. Steve returned in his jeans, smirking as pulled your lavender lace panties from the back pocket, tossing them at you. You caught them with one hand.

"Perv," you said, sliding them back up your legs. Steve smiled from the bathroom doorway. He was looking at you that way again. It made your stomach uneasy. "What?" you said.

"You can, uh, clean up here. If you want." He scratched the back of his neck. He gestured to the shower. You stomach flipped again. You rose from the bed, using the sheet to cover your chest. You stopped in front of Steve, who was struggling not to look down at your loosely covered front.

"This is not a thing, okay?" you said slowly, as if saying the words aloud would make them true. As if hearing them from your own lips would stop the way your lips yearned for Steve's the second they left your own. "This goes nowhere else."

Steve nodded, mockingly serious.

"Aye aye, Captain."

He grabbed your hand, making you drop the sheet, and led you into the steam filled bathroom. You let him wash your skin, all soap and too much affection given who he was to you. You didn't stop him when he kissed below your eye, on your nose, or when he placed an all too tender kiss on your lips for just a second. But it was long enough. You let him wrap you in a towel, drying you with gentle hands. You didn't object when he dressed you in his old basketball shorts and a tattered sweatshirt. You let him tuck you under his sheets, didn't flinch away when he tucked your hair behind your ear.

You let him wrap his arm over your waist when he returned, having kicked the last stragglers out of the house. You let yourself fall asleep in his bed, warm and soft and all too inviting, much like its inhabitant.

What you wouldn't do was let yourself fall for this, you thought. You wouldn't fall for Steve Harrington. Wouldn't fall for his moves, his overused lines. Wouldn't get wrapped up with the wrong guy.

But as morning came, and you turned to see Steve already looking at you, that look on his face, you thought that maybe it was too late. And by the looks of Steve Harrington, it was too late for him as well.

[curiositydooropened]

Wildfire • Searing

A trip to the Ether brings force new pain and horrors, and you spend time in quarantine remembering truths of the past.

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader

Chapter Wordcount: 9,356

Warnings: There's a flashback this chapter! I marked it off and hopefully it's easy to understand, but please let me know if it's confusing! Thank you! • enemies/rivals to lovers, second chance romance, slooooowburn, made out scene that goes nowhere fun, unrequited love, so much pining, blood, gore, character death, best friend!disabled!Eddie Munson, character injuries, trauma, PTSD, hallucinations, drowning, concussion, hurt/comfort, fire, panic attacks, insomnia

Fic Masterlist • Navigation • Masterlist

Chapter Four: Pyre • Chapter Six: Combustion

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NOW

September 1988

Byers hummed under his mask, the low rumble of his chest against your arm that shook like the truck bed over treacherous and unpredictable terrain. Your eyes were closed in attempt to quell the nausea of motion sickness. The soft vibrations of the boy’s voice combined with some foreign sixth sense you could feel in the marrow of your bones, steeling the claws of terror that shredded your esophagus. 

The truck came to a halt, and you peered one eye open to take in your surroundings. The streets of Hawkins were black on a still night, moon casting shadows down alleyways and across the back side of The Hawk’s marquee. Harrington pulled himself to two feet, reaching a hand to help you up. You took it, pack weighing you down.

“Argyle, radio on?” Nancy hopped from the tailgate and spoke into the receiver clipped to her shoulder strap. Her voice echoed to the one on your chest, and Steve’s, a handful more of Scorch team as you all stepped onto pavement, dust kicking up at your heels. 

“Copy that, Scorch lead,” Argyle repeated, and then you heard the slow crank of his window before he shouted. “Hey, be careful out there. I’m just a call away.” His demeanor had sobered entirely.

Jonathan met him at the window, and they exchanged an intimate handshake. 

You had to look away. 

Your breath tasted of oxygen from your tank and tequila without the buzz, adrenaline taking over and burning through the calories before it could hit you properly. Your ears rang a bit, struggling to focus on the crunch of asphalt beneath your feet. You were moving before you’d even realized, a steady walk.

Something tingled in your fingertips, a magnetic pull. You halted your steps and clenched your fist, released, clenched again. With a frown, you glanced forward at the gaping wound in concrete, a pulsating wall of wet and vines, a whisper that sounded like home. 

Something snatched your wrist, and you pulled back to find Steve’s eyes on you, big brown and worrisome. 

“Alright, we go in, find the source, torch what we can, and get back to the Gate.” Nancy’s voice cut through the air. She stood before the gash in the wall, the steady pulse of red flashed across slender features. “Stay in your groups. Watch your feet. If anyone gets bit, you call for immediate quarantine.” She paused and looked out on the group before her before saying, “Stay alive.”

The torch end of her gun split through the thin membrane, and the vines began to slink away, leaving the space gaping and cold. Again, it pulled you to it, tugged on your sleeve opposite Steve’s grip, led you forward. 

“Hey, are you good?” He asked, voice low, breath too warm against your ear. He sounded underwater. 

You grit your teeth and offered a curt nod, pulling him with you through the gash. That swoop rocketed your stomach, but backwards, a tug at your navel that felt right, like pieces were falling back into places, like someone had reversed the fall of a Jenga tower. The bits that wobbled and swayed now firm and planted like your boots to the grey matter of the Ether. 

“Steve,” Jonathan called, far off. “You two are with us.”

—

 The Ether was a desolate landscape of ash and ruin. Vines overtook the charred remains of your comrades and their own kind. Not as thick as they had been, dust remained, still in the damp atmosphere. No wind kissed at cheeks. No cloud moved, an overhead shadow of burgundy and black. 

You felt the next quake before it settled, a buzzing in your fingertips, a rumble in your stomach. The only movement in a statuesque world. Then the asphalt rolled, cracked. You gripped Steve’s shoulder strap to hold him upright as Nancy and Jonathan barreled into one another for support. 

Nancy shouted orders, muffled by her mask, but you watched her two fingers pointing for cover. Northbound, a semi upsized, jack-knife becoming a rickety shelter. 

One-by-one, you filed in on unsteady footing, the Ether quaking around you. The crackle of broken limbs split the air as widow makers were shaken from nearby trees, branches stabbing into decaying Earth at right-angles. A power line groaned and snapped, loose line slapping against asphalt a handful of meters away. 

“What exactly are we looking for?” Steve asked, voice too loud, breath fanning your ear. 

“Sign’s He’s back,” is all Nancy could muster before her hands came flying near your face. You crouched out of her way just in time to see her slapping Steve’s mask back onto tanned cheeks. “Keep your mask on.”

“You mean signs like an Earthquake…” Jonathan snapped. Mid-word, the low rumble stopped, settling your stomach, an ache in your knees. 

“Let’s keep going,” Nancy instructed, peeling herself from beneath the truck bed to scout the road once more. 

“Do you feel anything?” Steve’s voice came muffled this time, still inches from your cheek, and you felt his hand, once again, around your wrist. He held you back, allowing the other two to gain quite a distance. 

You swallowed, adjusted your straps. You felt everything: the prickle of your skin beneath his clammy fingertips, the damp chill of stagnant air, that all-to-familiar set of eyes between your shoulder blades. The smell of death and decay somehow stronger. 

Steve stepped into your sight line, jaw tight, brown eyes full of worry. His plastic mask cut into the bridge of his nose, past smile lines you hadn’t seen in years. He released your wrist, but the steady burn of his knuckles against yours grounded you, pulled you right-side up. 

Then you heard her voice. Vickie spoke your name. Her breath fanned your cheek. Her nose nuzzled your ear, sent chills down your spine.

Steve had heard her too, maybe he’d even seen her. You watched as brown eyes went wide, face flashing in terror. He lurched forward, forearm shoving at your bicep to get you out of his way. “Jonathan!”

Everything else happened in slow-motion: the turn of your heel as you crashed to the ground, pack weighing you down and bouncing off cold asphalt, Steve’s footfall echoing as he scrambled for the trigger. Fifteen feet away, a demodog crouched on its haunches, flower-like face opening one petal at a time, claws extended before it sprung.

Jonathan Byers cried out, a sound that pierced the dull throb at the base of your skull. The meat of your palms turned to pulp as you caught yourself, hands and elbows bloodied, but the taste of iron filled your mouth like copper pennies, mixing with saliva and the soft meat of human flesh.

You sputtered, spraying the pavement red, and scrambled to your feet.

Steve kicked at the beast, hard, sending it flying from the gaping wounds on Jonathan’s side. It caught itself in a slide. Another one leapt from the ruins of the semi trailer, the sound in its throat guttural, dark, bone chilling. 

“Steve!” You called, pulling your gun from its holster.

Nancy was faster on the jump, knocking it from the sky with her fist. 

Jonathan managed to fight off a third, smacking it over the head with the butt of his weapon with a distinct grunt of pain.

“All clear?” You called from behind the first two, thrower heavy in your hands, finger on the trigger. 

“Clear!” Steve and Nancy confirmed, taking two steps backward until they were backed into Jonathan.

With a deep breath, you squeezed the trigger. There was minor kickback, nothing you weren’t used to, and the surge of power as you sprayed the creatures with a stream of liquid fire. The heat burned at your mask, the tops of your cheeks, your lashes, a sensation you were all-to-familiar with, had made peace with, found home in. But as the flames stuck to the gooey flesh of the monsters, as the smell of ash and decay met your nostrils, something worse settled into the pit of your stomach, seared beneath your own flesh, charred your bones.

You dropped the device in your hands, unable to maintain hold. Your breath had been stolen from you, replaced instead with unbearable, all encompassing pain. Was this what Vickie felt when you stripped her flesh from her bone? Was this white hot the same that she felt in her last moments, fire on her last breath? You fell to your knees. 

“Harrington to base, we need emergency evac immediately.” Steve’s voice stuttered over the radio on your chest. You heard your name and Byers’. “Requesting medic and mandatory quarantine.”

You ripped your mask from your face and gasped for air, trying to see past the blur of your eyes. The horrible image of Vickie’s death flashing in your mind again and again and again.

“Copy that, evac on its way,” Argyle’s voice was high-pitched, cut-off on the end as he undoubtedly hit the gas. 

“Harrington, it’s Munson. What’s going on out there?”

Two hands grasped your face, cold, clammy, a plunge of relief despite the fire still rattling inside you. Soft thumbs swept at the tops of your cheeks, and when your eyes focused, Steve was inches from your face, his own expression wrought with worry. 

“Harrington!?”

“Demo dogs,” Nancy answered for him. You glanced over the man’s shoulder to see her tightening a tourniquet around Jonathan’s thigh. She reached for her radio again, hand slick with her partner’s blood.

“What do you mean dogs? Alive?” Hopper’s voice came through the radio this time, and it wasn’t until he’d said it that you realized. You hadn’t seen a single living creature in the Ether since Vecna died. No demogorgon walked the scorched Earth, no demo bat patrolled the skies. For over a year now, this place was desolate, empty. 

“Hey, look at me,” Steve squared your chin back to him while Nancy explained your team’s predicament back to base. “Are you in there?”

“I could feel it,” you croaked, voice shaking. “The fire, Steve. I felt it.”

“I know,” he frowned. “You were screaming.”

Just like Vickie had screamed, engulfed in flame, calling your name, pleading for you to stop. 

Your stomach rolled, and you shoved your partner out of the way as it emptied its contents to the asphalt, as black and bloody as the heap of dog charred not fifteen feet away. 

“Is she flayed?” Nancy approached, ever the investigator. “Are you flayed?” 

“No,” Steve stepped between the two of you. 

“Nancy,” Jonathan warned from his place on the ground. He was holding his side together with one hand, and his face was growing increasingly pale. 

“I just want to know what we’re dealing with here,” she explained, teeth grit to turn her jaw sharp as glass. “Is he back? Is he talking to you?”

Steve glanced over his shoulder at you, and you shook your head, wiped your mouth on the back of your hand.

“Well, you’re clearly connected to the hive mind, so -” 

“Nancy!” Jonathan called, sending a chill down your spine. His partner rushed to his side, and he gripped her hand. “Help me up.”

“Steve,” you rasped, staggering backwards, out of earshot. “Maybe she’s right.” 

“Stop it,” your own partner held his hand up before he helped Nancy pull Jonathan to his feet. 

“I mean, what if he can see all of this through me? What if I lead him right to base?”

“You won’t,” Jonathan grit his teeth, leaned on Steve’s broad shoulder. “I’ll keep my eye on you.”

Steve scrubbed his face with his hands, and you watched his measured gaze point Nancy’s direction. She wiped blood on her pant legs and nodded, adjusting the straps of her pack. 

“You’re not staying out here,” you argued. “There are dogs, bats, probably. Who knows what else.” 

“Someone has to stay and figure it out.” Nancy pointed out.

Before you could come up with more excuses, more reasons to pull Steve back with you, back to the base and back to safety, Argyle’s set of wheels squealed into view. He reached out the window to pop open the door handle to the rickety old pick-up, a distinct scowl darkening his features. 

“What the fuck didn’t you understand about ‘be careful’, Byers?” But there was no meanness in his tone as he scurried to help Steve pull Jonathan up and onto the open tail gate of the truck bed. 

Nancy followed, heaving his pack up beside him. 

You waited a long moment, turning to face the beasts you’d helped gun down. They felt eerily familial now, some kin you’d betrayed with the tug of your finger. They lay before you charred and pock-marked, flesh bubbling to a sludge of goo beneath their forms. A shiver on the wind caught your shoulder tops. 

“Let’s go, buddy! We gotta get this idiot stitched up, pronto!” Argyle called, drumming the side of your caravan back to the real world, your real home. 

You lifted yourself up and over a wheel-well, pack weighing heavy against your lower back. Someone tossed a handkerchief your way as a means to blindfold yourself. You gripped it tightly in one hand, willing your trembling fingers to still. 

Over the red cotton, you caught a whispered moment between lovers. Jonathan told Nancy not to worry, begged her to be careful, pressed a chaste kiss to her forehead, her cheek, her salted lips, her pointed jaw clutched in a grimy hand. 

You bit back emotion that welled, this need that pitted itself somewhere dark, somewhere deep. You turned your cheek away from the couple and found a honeyed gaze, brown eyes beneath a crumpled brow. You opened your mouth to speak, but something latched to that need, somewhere dark and deep, lurking on the water’s edge, a predator waiting to strike. 

You grit your teeth and dutifully brought your handkerchief to your eyes. Strong hands replaced yours at the back of your head, maintaining a knot that wasn’t too tight, and you felt the warmth of Steve’s breath against your ear. “Keep it contained.” 

With the wrap of a fist to the tin roof, your stomach lurched, and you were off. Steve’s words and Jonathan’s hummed tune playing tennis in the recesses of your mind. 

———

THEN

One Year Earlier

September 1987

The music was so loud. Pop ballads blasted through overhead speakers that once called fire drills and announced containment breaches. Chatter echoed against concrete walls between each break in song. The occasional whoop and holler accompanied the clinking of plastic cups and pouring of more liquor. 

Your own glass of lukewarm bourbon stung like smoke, only sweeter, and hung at your side. You were tucked into a folding chair in the corner, watching the party rage on in an echoing cafeteria, the bitter taste of defeat on your tongue.

Your best friend clung to the shadows on the far side of the room, pressed against a pillar with her face buried in her girlfriend’s throat. The smiles on both of their faces were the only consolations you’d allow yourself to celebrate.

“Hey, don’t know if you heard, the Wicked Dick of the Upside Down is dead,” Eddie Munson slid into your purview, all curls and dimpled smile. He returned your non-response with an eye roll, and ordered you to hold his walker steady so he could dip into the seat beside you.

He slumped against you, his denim jacket jingling with the amount of pins stabbed through it. “You’re seriously harshing my mellow.” 

“Oh, am I?” You rolled your eyes and continued your stare into the middle distance, watching the steady pulse of happy party goers. “I’m not stopping you from enjoying your night.” 

“Yes you are,” he whined. “Because the little dark rain cloud over your head is bumming me out.” 

“Yeah, well, I don’t feel like celebrating,” you sighed. 

Eddie hummed, nodded, all hair in your periphery. He shifted in his seat, and you caught a glint of light out of the corner of your eye. He’d pulled a flask from his pocket and twisted the cap off, tipping it against the plastic brim of your cup. “For Gutierrez and Ramsay,” he mumbled low enough for you to hear.

Emotion clawed at your chest at the gesture, wetting your eyes, thus far the only remembrance you’d heard for your fallen compatriots. Your team leads fought fire with fire, and died at the hands of the Devil. When you closed your eyes, you could still make out the sharp angles of their necks. Hank cradled his partner. Staring at their lifeless bodies, Vickie’s hand tugging you to retreat, you wondered if you’d succumb to the same fate. Bodies twisted and torn, in the arms of someone you loved.

With a shaky hand, you brought the sticky sweet beverage back to your lips. 

“You know, Linda told me we can’t carry the burden of every life lost. It’ll just weigh us down.” Eddie sounded about as convinced of the bullshit as you were. 

You rolled your eyes and took another swig for good measure, the bourbon stinging like ash at the back of your throat. “Fuck Linda.”

A laugh caught your attention, a private moment that was probably too far for you to catch, but your subconscious was listening for it. Steve Harrington was perched on a cafeteria table, all long limbs and head thrown back in delight. A smile lit up his tanned features as he took what you could assume were slicing insults from Erica Sinclair. 

Her own lips were pursed into a shy smile, a rare expression on her sweet little face that had your own heart swooping. The girl’s arms were crossed, face tilted downward to hide the smile before it spread across all of her features.

You watched Steve toe at her knee with his shoe until she looked up, and he offered his fist in some form of solidarity or congratulations. She returned the gesture with knocked knuckles before the two of them erupted into a more intricate secret handshake. 

The entire exchange warmed your insides more than the drink in your cup ever could on a day like this.

“Hey, dickheads,” Eddie’s call startled you back into focus.

You cowered into him, as to not be seen by wandering eyes, and noticed the couple of teens he’d called out for. Dustin Henderson and Mike Wheeler inched by, red solo cups in their hands. 

Eddie beckoned with long, ringed fingers. “Are you both insane? If Hopper caught you with those, you’re dead men.” 

“Hopper can’t do anything about it,” Wheeler scoffed, but he kept his volume low. 

You snorted.

“Uh huh,” Eddie cocked an eyebrow, unconvinced.

“We were bringing them for you guys,” Henderson informed a little too loudly, the most obvious lie he’d told.

Wheeler kicked him in the shin. 

“Thanks so much, Henderson. We were running dry.” Eddie’s face split into a grin, and he held his hands out to receive the kids’ drinks. 

Shoulders slumped in defeat, the two boys handed over their drinks. 

You noticed, with the faintest glint of light, that Eddie had exchanged them for his flask. “You bring that back to me tomorrow, or else.” He hissed, but couldn’t manage to hide the look of mischief from his brown eyes, the curve of his mouth.

With a matched grin on their faces, the boys scurried away down a secret hallway to partake in their own form of celebration.

“Eddie Munson, you big softy,” you snorted, elbowing his side. 

He sighed, taking a long sip of something bright red from the cup in his right hand. You managed a chuckle at the cringe of dramatics on his face at the taste, tongue stained neon within seconds of the liquid touching his lips. He chased it with whatever he held in the left.

“Did you just confiscate these from the children?”

Robin and Vickie approached the two of you, hand-in-hand, matching lovestruck looks on both of their faces. Eddie extended the cherry concoction, and Robin took it with a matching look of mischief in her blue eyes. 

You felt a familiar sneaker tap against your own, and managed to greet your best friend with a sad smile. Her head was tilted toward you, pretty orange hair cascading over her shoulders. She took two fingers to the rim of your cup to tip it towards her, peering over to see just how much you hadn’t drank.

“Did Steve find you?” Robin asked, licking neon from the crease of her plush lips. 

Something odd kicked in your chest, not unfamiliar, just dormant, and your face warmed. You avoided Vickie’s gaze as she tapped your foot again, and you shook your head. You peeled your cup from her grasp to take another drink.

“Oh, well he was looking for you,” Robin shrugged, but you noticed the smirk meet her lips simultaneous to her own cup. 

You narrowly avoided Vickie’s waggled eyebrows as you glanced over your own cup to search for Steve across the bustling caf. He was no longer perched tabletop, Erica long-since distracted in a conversation with her brother. But it didn’t take long for your eyes to attract like magnets to those broad shoulders, the gloss of his hair, the curve of his tricep. 

He stood toward the center of the crowd, locked into a conversation with Nancy Wheeler. Dim light was cast across her pointed features, and she seemed engaged in their conversation, a lightness on her brow you hadn’t seen since you’d met her. She seemed relieved, celebratory, maybe even a tad shy as she spoke, hands tucked beneath her arms. 

“I think I might go to bed,” you swallowed, sliding Eddie the remainder of your drink before pushing into Vickie’s space to stand. 

“I’ll walk you up,” your best friend seemed too eager, a frenetic energy buzzing under her skin. 

You tried to ignore the kiss she shared with her partner, letting Eddie offer a loving bite to your wrist like a feral child in his form of a goodnight. You patted his hair, and Robin took your spot beside him, cheersing you with a red cup and lips stained pink. You nodded. “Night.” 

-

The stairwell echoed in silence, that swell of a pulse in your eardrums that matched the tandem steps of you and your best friend. The steel door slammed shut behind you, quieting the ruckus of the celebration down below. An odd chill coursed over your shoulder, and you glanced behind you to find nothing and no one but the vast expanse of concrete and steel spiraling for floors below. 

“They’d want you to be happy, you know,” Vickie cut the silence, chewing the smile from her face with extreme difficulty.

You rolled your eyes and continued your climb. “I know, Vic. It’s just… complicated.” 

“Have you talked to him since?” She pressed. 

She referred to a drunken night one week earlier. You’d fallen asleep in Steve’s bed, nose-to-nose, large fingertips tracing hidden circles into your skin. 

“No,” you avoided her gaze, despite her neck stretching to catch you. “But it’s fine. We’ve been busy.” You’ve been avoiding him, sinking yourself in training, in Scorch, in fighting. Secrets shared between covers felt insignificant compared to a fire-fight with hundreds lost, minuscule in comparison to the ache from your grief and the confusion you’d attached to a win you weren’t sure would ever come. 

“Sure, okay,” Vickie scurried to round the landing before you, to stand a few stairs ahead and box you in. “But like, I don’t know, it really looks like it’s over. You know? Like really over. Which none of us thought would happen, and maybe it’d be good for you to consider what you’re going to do next, right? I just think you really need to seize an opportunity. And I’m not just saying this because you’re my best friend and he’s Robin’s best friend. I just want you to be happy.” 

She was nervous, rambling. 

You glanced around, her voice echoing up the staircase, and you gripped her wrist to lead her back up beside you. “Okay, I get it. Take a deep breath.” 

“Sorry,” her shoulders relaxed, bumping your own as you continued your climb. A soft breath of a laugh fell from her lips.

You pushed open the heavy steel door, holding it for her to pass through before you fell back in step, sneakers tapping against linoleum flooring, dimly lit by the escaping sunlight. 

Vickie walked beside you, gaze a little far-off, hands wringing in front of her, twisting at a ring on her middle finger.

You pulled your key on its lanyard from a pants pocket, and your dorm door clicked open. “You want a glass of water?”

You fell easily into your roles. You filled her a plastic cup of water while she tidied discarded books and pages, piled your laundry into a basket. She smiled at your eye roll, and you watched as she drained the cup. She caught a bead of water as it fell from her lip and released another of those nervous laughs, the ones that prickled the hair at the base of your neck, the ones you knew preceded confrontation. 

“Vic, what’s going on with you?” You scoffed, crossing arms over your chest. “You’re being cagey.”

She rolled her eyes, but you saw the chew of her lip. Caught, she turned her back and paced toward your bed before slowly lowering herself at the foot. “You really think this is done? Do you really feel like he’s dead?” 

This woman had fought monsters. You’d watched her jump into action on dozens of occasions, leading hundreds of innocent people to safety. You’d seen her face covered in char and sweat and ash as she scorched the remnants of her hometown. You’d seen tears spring to her eyes as the landmarks of your shared childhoods crumbled into matching piles of ruin. Never had you seen as much concern etched across her soft features. 

You swallowed, nodded. “He’s gotta be, right? We watched him burn. Eleven said…” A chill swept over the back of your neck as you watched Vickie twist her ring around her finger once more.

“I know, but I don’t know. Do you think he could have like… jumped onto someone else? Maybe he’s in hiding without a body somewhere.” Her tenor was starting to quicken, the breadth of her sternum rising and falling too rapidly.

You reached out for her, and she jumped under your touch. “Hey, why are you so worried about this?” 

Her eyes were wide like saucers, dark circles beneath them that you’d honestly all possessed over the last few particularly grueling weeks, but in this moment, hers felt pronounced. 

You swept hair from her long eyelashes, tucked it behind her ear. “What’s going on?” 

She shook her head, scrubbed at her face with her hands, and peeled upward and out of your grasp. “It’s nothing, it’s stupid.” 

“Nothing’s stupid. Come on, talk to me.” You reassured her, taking her seat on the foot of your bed, preparing for the worst. 

“It’s…” She paused, back to you, shoulders rising and falling with a deep breath. When she spun to face you, her demeanor had changed, lightened. The rain cloud that hovered before seemed to drift away. “I just want this to be over so bad. Robin and I have been talking about what we’re going to do, when this is all over. It used to feel so far away, and now it’s right here, and I’m scared, I guess, but excited, but also just anxious, and - “

“So tell me about it,” you cut her off, somehow managing a smile despite the repeated reminder that this was over and soon you’d be floating in a world who didn’t understand what you’d gone through, and odds are, you’d be alone. 

She chewed on her bottom lip, a habit her mom had scolded her for since she was a child, but that aching smile fell back over her features, and she crossed to collapse on the bed beside you. The mattress harrumphed under her weight. “We talked about going to school together. We both got into IU.” 

“Yeah?” You fell backwards beside her, staring up at the stained dorm ceiling panels. 

“Yeah,” she nodded, “I’m nervous, but like, excited, you know?”

You swallowed back that lump growing in your throat. “You were excited before. You still want to be a music teacher?” 

Vickie always had her plans, organized chaos in the form of binders stuffed with mail-in applications, the gentle push and prod of you to apply with her. You could never decide, stuffing envelopes into that floorboard beside your bed, lying about acceptance letters when she’d received her own. You’d sipped vodka out of matching Betty and Veronica mugs and tried not to imagine her off in the big city without you. 

“Or art,” she confirmed, fingers tracing lines in your ceiling like the constellations you used to lay out and watch.

You sighed simultaneously, and snorted in response. 

She muttered your name, and you glanced sideways to catch the pale yellow light cascading across high, freckled cheekbones, a soft sadness in her eyes. “Do you think I’m being reckless?”

You frowned. 

She caught your gaze and swallowed. “With Robin, I mean. I think I might ask her to move in with me, and I know that sounds crazy because we’re literal children, and - ”

You caught her wrist mid-air, gave it a squeeze, managed a dry laugh. “Vic, you literally followed her into War.”

The laugh that poured from her at the irony was warm enough to pull a genuine smile to your lips, a gesture that was growing more and more foreign as this fight continued. Your grip loosened on her wrist, and she moved to interlock your fingers, her little silver ring scratching between roughed-up knuckles, blistered and burned. 

“You know I’ll never leave you, right?” 

You bumped her with your forehead, her visage blurring in the proximity. “Couldn’t get rid of me when you moved to Hawkins, what makes you think you can get rid of me now?”

Satisfied with your answer, she brought the back of your hand to her lips for a peck and release. 

“Good,” she tutted, rising from the foot of your bed to open the tiny wardrobe beside you. She pushed aside a couple of grey tank tops and pulled a black v-neck from the rack, holding it to herself as if she didn’t have forty in her own closet to match. “Then I can talk to you without you getting mad at me, right?” 

The challenge prickled your skin, competitive nature over-wrought with irritation at the shift of her tone from sincere to playful, mean, even. “Probably not,” you snapped, propping yourself on your elbows to catch the shirt she tossed your direction. 

“Put this on, it makes your boobs look amazing.” 

You groaned and flopped back to the mattress, suddenly warm and exposed under her gaze. You hid your face in the t-shirt, hangar still attached, and shook your head. Her name slipped from your mouth in annoyance.

Yours was repeated back to you in a mocking tone. “What if tonight’s the last night?”

The rustle of your drawers pulled your focus from around a sleeve. “What?” 

She was bent over a pair of jeans you hadn’t worn in well over a year. A tear had pulled through the fibers on both knees, and you were positive the waist band wouldn’t fit now. “What if it really is all over?” She tossed the denim beside you. “What if this is the last night we’ll be in this building? What if it’s the last night we celebrate with these people? What if it’s your last chance to talk to everyone?” 

You knew she didn’t mean ‘everyone’. 

“I get that you’re sad, okay? I’m sad too. I’m going to miss them just as much as you are.” Vickie’s hands found your knees, and she jostled them. “And I understand if you’re tired. We’re all exhausted. I yawned about twenty times dancing with Robin in there. She yelled at me.” Her face lit up with something fierce. “But I’m asking you to get dressed and come with me back to the party, because tonight might be your last night, and I don’t want you to miss your chance.” 

You scoffed and tossed the shirt aside. “Miss my chance for what?” 

Her mischievous gaze was hard to avoid, and she leaned in even closer. “I don’t know. What do you want to happen?”

It was a question you’d asked yourself several times over the last week, when avoiding Steve meant slipping into the girl’s locker room and excess of times or taking the rickety elevator to avoid him on the staircase. You thought last time would be the ‘last time’ so-to-speak, and all the other times before that. That’s just how life worked under fire. 

And last time, as with each of your last times, you’d ended up exchanging truths under government issues linens, chuckling soft breaths against one another’s mouths, making promises of honesty and protection. You weren’t sure you needed more than that. 

Of course, you wanted to feel the coarse pads of his fingertips draw circles just north of the insides of your knees. You wanted to feel his breath fan your pulse points. You wanted to hear the way his breath caught when you dug your nails into his scalp.

You’d settle for soft kisses to the temple after long runs through the Ether, like the ones you’d caught him press to Robin’s sweat-slick hair. You’d settle for the elaborate high-fives he’d give the children when they’d reunite after nights in Quarantine. You’d settle for half-smiles across the caf like the ones he’d give you when you’d finally caught his gaze. 

“Okay, forget about it,” Vickie glossed over your non-response. “Just come downstairs and hang out with me. We’ll find Robin and Eddie and get you another drink and just pretend like we’re stupid kids again. Maybe we’ll sneak into the pool.” 

Her optimism was always so difficult to crush, her rosy lips split into a grin, and you knew she wouldn’t cease fire until you complied. 

With a resigned sigh, you reached your hand for her to help you up, and you nodded.

She took your hand with a grin and tugged you to your feet. 

-

The party below spilled upwards into living rooms and dorms. Music on overhead speakers was transferred to boomboxes and acoustic guitars. Instead of echoing off concrete walls, laughter was absorbed into threadbare couches. Hallways dimmed to the red glow of Exit signs. Footfall faded, stumbled behind locked doors. 

You perched on a comfortable sofa in the living space, waving Eddie goodnight as he waggled his fingers. Vickie and Robin had sandwiched you in sloppy kisses before they slunk off hand-in-hand, whispering sweet nothings. You sunk further into the cushions, hugging one tightly in your lap as the lights turned off and your world was cast in moonlight from a nearby window. 

You sat there for ages, maybe the entire night, staring out at the greyscale world beyond, those treetops tinged in golds and rubies in the daylight. You thought of your friends, hand-in-hand, and of Pedro and Hank, arm-in-arm, and of the emptiness that lingered when you recognized life, as you lived it, was coming to a close. 

You pondered and mourned in silence, starlight the ever-present reminder that you were Rightside Up and safe, somehow, a promise Steve had kept without realizing it. 

“Hey,” a voice full of recognition startled you from your reverie, and you turned to face Steve. His strong features were silhouetted, but you knew the curve of his shoulders, the dip of his jaw. 

“Hey,” you offered a smile, shrinking further into your seat. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” He asked, gesturing for permission to join you.

You nodded, shrugged. “Not really.”

He crossed slowly before sitting, his weight on the springs shifting your own. He was close, warmth radiating off biceps pressed against yours. “I was looking for you.” He touched his knuckles to your knee, a sensation that shot electricity through you. 

“Oh?” Your voice squeaked, throat dry. 

“Yeah,” he nodded, and you ventured a glance his direction. The moonlight poured in, pale yellow against his features, his nose, cheek, the swoop of his chestnut hair. “I know you and Hank and Pedro were really close, and I wanted to make sure you were okay.” 

His eyes shone, and you had to pull yourself from his gaze to process his words. He cared. The thought brought a smile to your cheeks despite the grief you felt in your soul. You tipped your face away from him and played with fraying of the canvas lining the pillow in your lap. 

You contemplated lying, reassuring you both that you’d be fine, but something about his warm presence settled beside you, the soft lilt of his voice, had you speaking freely. “I will be,” you nodded, a sentiment you hadn’t even realized until you spoke it into existence. “I just haven’t had time to think about what my life’ll be like without their… guidance.” Orders, teasing, coaxing, care.

“I get that,” Steve sighed beside you, head tilting to rest on the furniture at your backs. “It’s been kind of nice not having to make decisions for myself.” 

“What were you going to do, before all of this?” You gestured to concrete walls, a singular window, a common space long since vacant. 

His gaze trailed the room before landing on you, and you warmed under it. With another sigh, he looked outward again. “I thought I had a plan for when it was all over, but that was a year ago.” He waved it off. 

You nudged him with your elbow. “What was it? Maybe it’ll give me some inspiration.”

He snorted, shook hair into his eyes. “Ah, yeah. I doubt it.” 

“Come on, Harrington,” you goaded. “What was it? Become an actor? Join the circus?” This felt better, right, the tease of competition between you settling the tension that was building with each passing glance.

“Try marrying the girl of my dreams and having six kids?” That popped the bubble. You couldn’t hide the face of disgust and unease that settled after his comment, knowing all you knew about him already. “Yeah, bad, right?” 

You stuffed back a remorseful chuckle, tried to keep a strange bout of jealousy at bay when you remembered his conversation with Nancy earlier, how engaged the two of them looked, how hopeful her blue eyes were. 

You cleared your throat, made firm eye contact with your pillow, shrugged. “I don’t know. Seems like you aren’t the only one with those aspirations. I’ve heard Rob and Vic might move in together.” A harmless bean spilled surely wouldn’t rile up your best friend. 

“Wait, how do you know that? I thought Robin was going to wait to ask her…” Steve trailed off, and when your eyes met, you both rolled them in exasperation for the gushy love shared between clueless women. 

“So what about you?” Steve asked after a moment had passed, little finger soft once again to your knee. “If this is really all over, what’re you going to do?” 

You glanced back over the parking lot, the trees, Scorch course off in the distance. “That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out… where I fit. You know?” You locked your fingers together above your pillow, as Vickie had done earlier, but without the lightness of her touch, yours were bruised and calloused and burnt. Your knuckles were sore.

“Right here,” he said.

His eyes were dark, brow soft, yet pensive, and under his watch, you couldn’t breathe. It was the same panic you’d felt all week when you’d watched him cross the caf or climb into the bed of a truck, that fight or flight ramping up within your rib cage. 

“I’m serious,” he shrugged, shoulder knocking your own. “What if you fit here?” He pressed a large finger into the pillow on your lap for emphasis. The skin of your wrists and hands lit up with proximity. “You’re so good at this whole thing, and we know it isn’t over. The Upside Down didn’t close up when Vecna died like we thought it would. There’s still a mess to clean up. Who says you have to leave? That you have to move on right now and make some huge life plan over night?” 

You blinked back at him because you hadn’t considered any of that, and maybe it’s because this existence had been something everything was counting down the chance to run from. You’d all been thrust into this life when the world opened up (or earlier), and you followed orders because that’s what kept you safe, what kept you alive. You’d never considered that maybe you were made for this. Although, when Steve mentioned it, things did sort of kick back into place. 

His knee knocked yours. “It’s not like you’d be alone.” 

The implications rendered you silent, a splash of cool water across skin that had been set ablaze, filling the space with steam. Your breathing was shallow, mouth dry, and you couldn’t unstick your knuckles from each other, though his hand remained centimeters away, picking at that same tear in the fabric you’d been playing with moments earlier. You felt yourself go stock straight, rigid against the warmth of his bicep. 

“Did I make you uncomfortable last week?” His voice was barely a gravel, a shockwave of electricity sent through you.

You swallowed in vain, shook your head. 

His eyes trailed your features, and you bit hard on your lip when he stopped there, before he found your gaze again. “Because I meant it when I promised I’d keep you safe.” 

Your reaction to Steve Harrington was reckless, always had been. Volatile, even, the way your heart raced, the heat that churned through you like water boiled over. There was always something in his tone that challenged you, always something in his gaze that riled you up. He pushed you over the edge you teetered on with an eye roll and a smug smile, arms pinned over your head against the mat or mask over his face on the Scorch course. 

Maybe that’s why neither of you were surprised when you reached across the space and pressed your lips to his. Neither of you stiffened at a first kiss, noses bumped and knuckles. Simultaneous, you parted for a breath and dove back for something stickier, something warmer, something more dangerous.

He was sweet, whisky and something softer, ice cream, maybe. His lips were warm, and a bit dry, but plush. And when you finally sunk your fingertips into his silky hair, you coaxed a breathy whine that sent warmth pooling through you. 

“Is this okay?” You hissed between kisses.

He hummed in agreement, hands reaching for your middle to tug you into his lap. He massaged your thighs with oversized hands as you bracketed his hips, pulling another loud groan from deep in his throat.

You had him pinned beneath you now, hips rolled, and his head thrown back against the sofa, pupils blown with your fingers in his hair. The moonlight cast shadows across his chiseled features, a constellation of freckles down his left side. The way he watched you, lips licked, sent a wave crashing through you, another sizzle to fan the embers burning within you.

His hands found your hips, and your ribcage beneath the t-shirt you’d been forced to change into, and you thought of Vickie’s encouragement, her optimism that this would be the last of it.

The warmth of Steve’s palms coaxed you forward until he caught your mouth with his once more, and his words echoed in your mind beside her, a chorus of contradiction. This is your last night here. You fit right here. I’ll never leave you. It’s not like you’d be alone. Two truths pulling at you like a rope over a line, neither would exist while the other did. 

Steve sucked in a breath, harsh, and you blinked your eyes open to see him licking a tender lower lip. You’d bit down on him without realizing, that ever-present competition fresh between you. He didn’t seem to mind, already going back in, but you pinned his shoulders back, pushed off of him to stand. 

“Whoa, it’s okay,” he wiped at the corners of his mouth, ran a hand through his hair to replace yours. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” you nodded, stumbling backwards until you almost tripped on a coffee table. You managed to side-step it, feeling claustrophobic surrounded by so much canvas furniture. 

He stood to catch you in case you fell, and the reach of his arms had you backing even farther into the shadows of a long corridor. He recoiled, scratching at the back of his neck. “Are you sure? Because um… I didn’t mean to push anything if you weren’t…” 

You shook your head, that familiar panic clawing at your chest at the mess you’ve created. “Steve, it’s fine. I just don’t think I should do this right now.”

A crease formed between his brows, concerned, pitying, and he shoved his hands into his jean pockets. “Okay?” 

You sighed, scrubbed at tired eyes, tried to ignore the taste of him that lingered on your lips. You’d already taken it too far, already scratched the itch that had been growing within you for months now.

“I can wait.” His voice was soft, almost imperceptible, and his brown eyes held that same hopefulness you’d seen in Vickie’s.

Guilt rattled your rib cage, searing. You nodded and said goodnight. 

-

The night remained sleepless, starring at water-stained ceiling tiles while you contemplated next steps. The feeling of Steve’s hands ghosted your ribcage. The image of Vickie’s hands twisted in your own burned behind your eyes.

Knuckles wrapped against your door, and you pulled your watch from the beside table to look at the time. 08:25. With a resigned sigh, you buckled it over your wrist and answered the door. You startled to find Nancy Wheeler on the other side, brown crinkled and hair curled around her slender features. 

“Hopper wants us.” She informed you, managing the softest of smiles. 

You swallowed, nodded, and went for your room key on the countertop.

After the loss of Gutierrez and Ramsay, your Scorch team needed new leaders, and there was still so much Ether to scorch.

———

NOW

September 1988

Stains on pale yellow walls churned at a bread-and-broth full stomach as cigarette smoke wafted in beneath the broken seal at the bottom of the door. The lone light flickered, exacerbating a migraine that had lingered for weeks now, maybe months. Two familiar faces sat on the other side of the plexiglass, wrinkles between their brows, smoke swirling round faces. 

“How you feeling, kid?” Hop asked, voice gruff, concerned, paternal. 

“Sweaty,” you winced, peeling your tank top from your sternum. “Hope I don’t smell. My shower is one scalding pressure wash every morning.”

Hopper snorted, a cloud of smoke exiting each nostrils and floating skyward. “I know. It’s Hell.” 

Hell was the Ether. Hell was the tug between your shoulder blades. Hell was lurking somewhere deep, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. 

“How is everyone? Byers?” You grit your teeth, pushing back the wave of nausea and slumping against the glass that fogged on your side. The water bottle, lukewarm, was the only reprieve you’d been given from your sauna, refilled at frequent intervals to ensure you stayed upright and alert. 

“Jonathan’s fine, but he’s not out of the woods yet. We’ve got him holed up too. Huntley and Miller are dead. Dog fight this morning on the county border.” 

You cursed under your breath, squeezing your eyes closed to push back the visions of yourself lashing out against the two Scorchers, gnawing on their flesh, the fresh squeeze of hot blood between your teeth. “I was hoping that was just a dream.” 

“Are you having any visions right now?” Owens asked, voice gentler than his gruff counterpart.

You shook your head. “Same as yesterday and the day before. I can see her,” you gestured to somewhere in your periphery, where the wave of fiery hair stood out, just beyond your reach. “And I can feel him.” That tug in your shoulder, the bend in your spine that itched and ached. You rolled your shoulders and pushed it back. “But I don’t see anything unless I’m asleep. Even then it’s just roaming the Ether. I can never see him. He’s not coming out.” 

“What happens when those fuckers catch fire?” Hop asked, wrapping his knuckles against the glass. By the look in his eye, he was testing the strength of it, making sure it’d hold you back.

You took another sip of water. “I wake up.” 

“Maybe we do a bit of uh… what do they call it? Remote viewing? Put her under, have her tap in.” Hop spoke under his breath, but you knew he was talking about Eleven. He knew Hop was talking about Eleven. You felt the itch under your shoulder and shuddered again. 

Owens caught your movement and stopped Hopper with a hand up. “Alright, miss. Are you comfortable if we take another look at your back?” 

With a sigh, you pushed yourself upright and turned your back to the men to pull your shirt up and over your head, holding it to your front with what little sliver of modesty you could maintain. Although, at this point, you’d lost your will to care. 

For days now, you hadn’t noticed growths on your back, no indication that you’d been Flayed or that this parasite was growing within you. Nothing showed itself beside this feeling you had that you couldn’t explain, that no one could understand. 

“Thank you, dear,” Owens wrapped his knuckles to the window to tell you it was safe to put your shirt back on. 

You did so and turned to face the men again. Both of them offered characteristic grimaces: one of pity, the other of disdain. You slumped back into the chair next to the window. “So, what’s the prognosis, doc?”

The older man shrugged, scratched at his forehead. “Unfortunately, we might just have to keep you in here until we discuss further plans. We kind of have to keep you out of the loop, kiddo. Can’t risk him hearing us.” 

You understood. You shook your water bottle, tapped it against the glass, and said, “Empty.”

“Fresh water, coming right up,” he smiled and stood. “Jim?” 

Hopper waved him off, stamping his cigarette out on the seal. You watched ash scatter the ground. He stood, chair groaning beneath him, and he towered over you on the other side of the glass, teeth ground into a clenched jaw. He scratched at the stubble on his chin. 

“Harrington and Nancy make better partners than you two did. He actually listens to her.” 

You snorted, rolled your eyes. “That doesn’t surprise me.” 

“He and Munson ask about you constantly. I caught Wheeler and Henderson trying to hack into your security camera footage.” He wrapped his knuckles against the glass again, pointing toward the camera that had been watching you. He waggled thick fingers, and you mirrored him, trying to hide the swell of something lighter within you. 

“Keep holding him back,” he ordered, your commanding officer once more.

With exchanged nods, he exited down the hallway with Owens, and you slumped back against the fogged glass. You swallowed and stared up at the bright green bulb that glowed just beneath the lens of the camera.

—

Days had gone by. Maybe nights had too, but you couldn’t tell under the buzzing fluorescents. You had no windows to the outside world, probably miles beneath the Earth at this point, just on the precipice of that churning, horrific world on the other side. 

You tossed and turned on your cot, sheets stained with sweat that clung to every inch of you. Cries echoed a few boxes down, unfamiliar voices of more and more faces sequestered into quarantine, their fates somehow worse than your own. 

All you wanted was to stay awake. If you stayed awake, he stayed away. But the ache of your eyelids added to the dull throb at the base of your skull, and every so often, the rake of fingertips down your arm coaxed you into a slumber. 

Feet sputtered down the hall, steady, a run, and your heartbeat matched it. You launched from the unsteady rock of your cot and met a figure as its hands slapped against the glass of your window, steadying itself.

“Harrington?” You frowned at your partner on the other side. His palm met yours, thick glass in between, and his chest rose and fell as his breath fogged the glass. “What’s going on?” 

He shrugged, slumped into the chair Hopper had been in. It creaked beneath him, and he glanced down the hallway for on-lookers before turning back to you. “Are you okay?” 

“Are you?” You scurried into your own chair, leaning in to get a better look at him.

The bruise around his eye was yellowing, and his hair looked good pushed off his brow. He maintained that signature scowl, but there was something soft in his eyes as he observed you the same way you looked him over. “Are you suffocating in there?”

“Only a little,” you shrugged. “Why are you here?” You glanced back down the hallway, as much as you could see, to find it the same as it always had been, empty. 

“We had a bad firefight yesterday. Ten dogs or so.”

You did another cursory glance of his person. That you could see, there were no bandages. His hair wasn’t burned or singed. Any soot had been scrubbed from the creases on his face. 

“Could you feel it?” 

You shook your head and watched his shoulders relax. You wished you could soothe him further, reassure him you were okay, that you were safe, but the two souls attached to you lingered in the periphery. Instead, you tapped your fingertips to the glass. “I thought of something yesterday.” 

Steve adjusted in his seat, glanced down the hallway once more before leaning in to read your lips.

“You remember the party, the night after he died, or at least, we thought he did?” You asked, feeling that presence heavy over your shoulder. 

Recognition flashed behind your partner’s eyes, and he shied from your gaze, scratching at the back of his neck.

You warmed, tried to forget the feeling of your hands there, of his warm hands against your sides. Something prodded your shoulder. You cleared your throat. “Vickie made a weird comment that night, off-handed. She was acting really shady, and she asked if he could have latched himself on someone. The body died, but maybe the soul didn’t?”

He looked back up at you, brow crinkled, understanding sinking into him, and you watched his ribcage deflate. His knees began to bounce, and he buried his face into his hands. 

“And if that’s true, she had him for almost a year. It had nothing to do with the flower. He just latched on to the nearest thing, and when she died,” you gestured to yourself. “Maybe he’s weaker now.”

Steve was shaking his head, arms crossed over his chest. “You couldn’t save her.” 

You swallowed back emotion that boiled at that slap in the face. “She didn’t tell us. None of us could, but I’m telling you.” You hoped he couldn’t hear the desperation in your tone.

“This happened to her, and you murdered her.” His voice was lower, graveled. 

You balled your fist, swallowed back that panic which seared at your ribcage.

“What do you expect to happen to you?” Finally, he met your eye, his own brown replaced with piercing blue, cloudy. The smell of charred flesh stung at your nostrils. The taste of ash filled your mouth. 

---

[A/N: Remember when I said hiatus cuz of NaNo and then I wrote this chapter? *insert eye roll here* I can't help it! This story wants to pour out of me, and I want it to, too. I love these two more than anything. They bring me endless joy. And they kissed! I made them kiss! In a flashback, but still. Maybe they'll kiss again, who knows? Maybe the reader dies a horrific death like Chrissy, who knows? I do. I know. And I love it so much. Thanks, as always, for reading xo]

Fic Masterlist • Navigation • Masterlist

Chapter Four: Pyre • Chapter Six: Combustion

[frankenstein-ate-my-left-shoe]

thinking a wHOLE LOT about this video by @/usu_mimi on tiktok

(i’m assuming @usumimi here on tumblr, but they haven’t posted in a while! please let me know if it’s not 🥰!!)

[radiosteve]

Something, Everything

Summary: You and Steve Harrington were best friends, and then you were more, and then you weren’t. When it seems like the world is about to end for the fourth time will you be able to set aside the past to help save your friends?

Note: I haven’t posted on here in a super long time, but I’m kind of back! This story is inspired by Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren, which I highly recommend. I’ve changed a lot of the details from the book (especially the timeline) but the basic premise is still there. I just wrote this for fun and it ended up being kinda long. I hope you enjoy!

Warnings: 18+, no use of y/n (reader is referred to as Honey), smut, unprotected sex, dry humping, friends to lovers to enemies(?) to lovers, language, some cannon divergence, fluff, angst, death, slowburn, naked photo.

Pairings: Steve Harrington x reader,  some Eddie Munson x reader

Word count: 16.6k

It all started the night Will Byers went missing. Well, actually it started fourteen years ago, but that cold day in early November 1983 kickstarted the chain reaction that brought you here. Face to face with the one and only Steve Harrington. Your ex-best friend, your ex-almost, your ex-something, your ex-everything. 

When you were startled awake by a phone call from your best friend Jonathan Byers asking if you knew where Will was, you instantly knew something was up. You skipped school, sticking by his side as him and Joyce continued their desperate search for any trace of Will. So when Nancy Wheeler squeezed her way in, bringing up monsters without faces and her friend Barb, you tagged along hoping like hell for any sign of Hawkins’ missing persons. You tried to ignore the part when Nancy said Barb was last seen at Steve’s house, and where Nancy so happened to be when Barb went missing.

It wasn’t until after Will’s funeral, when Lucas pulled you aside and told you about the girl they’d been hiding in Mike’s basement, that you got split up from Nancy and Jonathan’s monster hunting. After you were all briefly reunited in the middle school gym, the new dynamic duo secretly slipped away again, carrying out their plan while you stayed unknowingly with the kids. By the time the people from the lab were taken out and the dust settled from Eleven destroying the demogorgon, and seemingly herself, Will had been found and the world felt a little less upside down. 

Jonathan caught you by the arm, pulling you into Will’s hospital room before you could join the others in the waiting room. With a quick ‘what the hell’ look and a mutter about Steve Harrington and nail bats and fire, you gladly took your seat across the room from Will’s bed until he woke up. You managed to avoid Steve again that day, something you had gotten really good at since that one day the previous year, but that bond that formed between you all that week was something that couldn’t be severed. It didn’t matter if you hadn’t seen him at all or that he only jumped into it at the last second. There was now a select group of people that understood why Hawkins was so different from other small towns and that group now contained the both of you.

When Halloween rolled around you took the kids trick or treating while Jonathan went to Tina’s stupid party. He didn’t even try to convince you to go with him. Knowing Steve would be there was enough to keep Jonathan from even thinking about asking you. But when Jonathan and Nancy came up to you with their plan to get justice for Barb, you were all in. When you all finally got back to Hawkins, noticing the romantic shift in the air between your two partners in crime, all hell had seemingly broken loose. And when none other than the devil himself came tramping out of the woods followed behind Dustin, Lucas, and the new girl Max, you knew for sure that nothing good could follow. 

Despite going to the same school, you had managed to narrowly avoid Steve the past few years. You were in upper level courses while he barely coasted by in the lowest classes possible. It was the first time you had seen each other in nearly two years and it was like the wind had been knocked out of your lungs and spilled out onto the pavement below. He looked like he was about to say something when Dustin finally opened the gate and Chief Hopper came speeding out, effectively saving you from having to talk to Steve. Even back at the Byer’s house you found ways to keep him away. When Eleven came to the rescue, Will was no longer possessed, and the gate was closed, you managed to come out of it all without exchanging a single word or even sparing a passing glance. What you didn’t know was that he pestered Dustin with questions about you on the daily and when he dropped Dustin off at the Snowball that year it took all his willpower to tear his eyes off of the glimpse he got of you through the window. 

By the summer you had gotten a job at the record store downtown, running over to the Hawkins Post to visit your favorite couple on your lunch breaks. It didn’t take long to recognize a few regulars at the record store, one of which being Eddie Munson, who so charmingly explained to you one day why he had to repeat his senior year a third time. He was cute, and a good way to take your mind off a certain hairspray obsessed boy that you heard got a job at the new ice cream place in the mall. So you and Eddie became about as casual as causal can be. He even had you pressed against the wall in the record store’s break room when Nancy came barreling in spewing nonsense about exploding rats and chemicals. 

It wasn’t until you were dragged all across Hawkins and nearly killed a few times that you ended up in the mall and saw Steve Harrington’s beaten and bruised face for the second time since sophomore year. Even you had to admit that despite the blood and vomit stains, he looked damn good in that sailor outfit. But even as Steve drove into the side of Billy Hargrove’s car, saving you all from being driven into head on, you still couldn’t let go of the pain he caused you at the end of sophomore year. And when the dust settled and Chief Hopper was thought to be dead, you couldn’t help but avoid him again, slinking away to comfort Max and El. 

Having no money meant staying in Hawkins and going to community college instead of all the out of state schools you had been accepted into. Nancy stepped up, filling as much of the Jonathan sized gap and becoming your best friend when he moved off to California. You told each other all your secrets, including both of your history’s with Steve. By the time spring had rolled around Eddie had become almost as much of a constant in your life as Nancy. Despite never saying those defining words, you somehow still found yourself curled up against him most mornings. It was because of how close you had both become that you woke up to a frantic phone call from Dustin about Chrissy Cunningham and Eddie and Reefer Rick’s. 

As soon as you opened your car door and stepped out onto the pavement, you instantly wished you never picked up the phone. You silently curse yourself for ever entertaining the idea of monster hunting back in 1983 because now you’re stuck with Steve Harrington and this time there’s nowhere to run. Your eyes trace along his figure while you close the distance between you and the others. He’s changed a lot, although you suppose that you have too. His chest fills out those dumb polos a lot better now and his arms are definitely bigger too. His hair is still the same, although maybe a bit longer, but the stubble above his lip is new. You’re pulled from your silent stare by Robin pointing to the boathouse. 

Following along quietly, you can’t help but notice Steve’s eyes flickering over you the same way you had done to him. Even as he jabs an oar into a tarp covered boat, his gaze still catches on you. It isn’t until Eddie has him pinned against the wall with a bottle to his neck that Steve snaps his focus away from you. As everyone shouts at Eddie to let Steve go, he doesn’t listen until he hears your voice.

“Eds, please let him go. We just want to help,” your calm words bring both Eddie and Steve’s eyes to yours. Eddie gives a slight nod, slowly releasing Steve. As much as you know you should rush to Eddie, you find yourself sliding in front of Steve. “Are you ok?” Steve swears that he can feel his heart stop for a second. The last time you ever spoke directly to him was now almost three years ago, and god did he miss the sound of it.

“Yeah, I’m alright,” Steve finally managed to barely get out after way too long. You nodded, finally listening to the little voice in your head telling you to get the hell away from Steve and check on Eddie. It isn’t until you’ve crouched down beside Eddie, placing a gentle hand on his arm that you’re reminded of something.

“Are you ok?” your voice rang out into the roaring sound of the classroom. It was the first day of kindergarten and before you sat a red in the face, wailing Steve Harrington. He looked up at you long enough to stop crying for a minute and take you in. You were dressed in a pair of well-loved overalls with a striped t-shirt that was clearly way too big stuffed underneath them. As Steve wiped the tears from his eyes he realized that he hadn’t answered your question.

“I’ve never been away from my mom for this long. I- I miss her,” he squeaked out before fresh tears began to well in his eyes. Your eyebrows furrowed as his face turned red again. 

“Is your mom your best friend?” you sat down in front of him now, crossing your legs so that your knees just barely touched his. Steve thought about it and then slowly nodded his head. “My mommy’s my best friend too. Why don’t we let our mommies be our best friends at home and then we can be each other’s best friends here?” you shot Steve a small smile and noticed that his tears had suddenly stopped.

“My mommy calls me Stevie, so if you’re going to be my best friend you have to call me Stevie too,” Steve sniffled out, wiping his nose with his hand. 

“Well then you have to call me Honey since that’s what my mommy calls me,” you held out your hand for Steve to shake.

“Ok Honey.”

You’re dragged from your thoughts by the sound of Eddie’s unsteady voice as he explains what happened the night before. Eddie’s shaking hands find their way into yours as he tries to calm down. There’s a flicker of a frown on Steve’s lips that he quickly corrects as he eyes Eddie’s hand enclosed around yours. Despite all of Steve’s nagging and prodding, Dustin never disclosed the nature of your and Eddie’s relationship, knowing it would do more harm to Steve than good. Steve’s gaze lingers on you for a moment longer before he hears talk of spells, curses, and Vecna.

“Who’s Vecna?” you can’t help but find his eyes as a now frightened Dustin slowly explains. And you know with each word that spills from his lips that your spring break just got hijacked by freaky monsters and gates and the Upside Down. 

After a while, the rest of the gang takes off on a grocery run, leaving you to stick behind with Eddie. He watches you from the corner of his eye as you walk around the boathouse, silently picking through everything littered around the place. You’re caught off guard when his arms wrap around your waist from behind and his nose buries itself in your neck. 

“I really wish I’d taken you up on your offer to come over and watch a movie on Friday instead. Then we wouldn’t be in this mess,” he says, placing a gentle kiss to your cheek before you twist your way around in his arms to face him. 

“Well, maybe you wouldn’t be, but I can guarantee I would’ve been dragged into this one way or another. We’re kind of like a club now except our meetings only really take place just as the world’s about to end.”

“Sounds like a fun club,” the sarcasm drips from Eddie’s words and he leans in, slowly closing the distance between your lips.

“Super fun,” you meet him in the middle, soft lips dancing across his, making him groan as he pulls your body closer. He keeps kissing you as his hands find their way to your ass, giving it a quick slap that causes you to jump a little. Eddie pulls away slowly, just enough to see your face clearly.

“So, you and Harrington?” the question hangs in the air even as your eyebrows furrow and your head shakes side to side.

“What about me and Steve?” you search his face for any sign of what he means, but Eddie’s always been pretty good at hiding his true feelings behind those big doe eyes.

“I know you two have a history. Clearly I have no idea what actually happened because you’re very secretive,” you open your mouth to argue but he cuts you off. “No, no. You so are. Maybe not about most things, but you are about him. I know we’re not technically dating, but I just want you to know that I’m not the jealous type,” now you’re definitely confused. 

“What are you even talking about?” a small giggle escapes your lips while Eddie’s eyes widen into saucers.

“All I’m saying is that if you and Harrington want to make goo-goo eyes at each other from across the room it won’t bother me,” now you’re fully laughing, and Eddie pulls you tighter to him while a grin breaks out across his lips. “What’s so funny, Honey?”

“Steve and I were not making goo-goo eyes at each other. And honestly you saying you’re not jealous only makes me think that you kinda are jealous,” you manage to stop laughing but you can’t hide the smile etched across your face.

“You wish,” Eddie pulls you in again, gently cupping your cheeks in a smiley kiss that’s quickly interrupted by the sound of the door slamming open. The two of you tear apart and Eddie grabs for his glass bottle again, pulling you behind him. It only takes a second for you both to realize it’s just the others returning from the store with food for Eddie. You don’t miss the way Steve’s gaze lingers on Eddie’s protective hand on your wrist as he files into the boathouse with the others. 

Eddie goes to town munching on the food Dustin graciously handed him while they explain that the cops think he killed Chrissy. Eddie shoots panicked glances your way and Robin tries to comfort him with words but ends up making it worse. Even Steve jumps in and despite your hard glare, he and Dustin do nothing but add on to the sense of hopelessness that now fills the air. It isn’t until you all hear sirens in the distance that they finally shut up and Eddie jumps back under the tarp in the boat. You rush to the window, not noticing Steve close behind, and see the cop cars blowing past Reefer Rick’s house. As you peer up at Steve you know that there’s something else going on. 

You slide into the back of Steve’s BMW with Dustin and Max on either side and Steve hits the gas until you see the red and blue lights approaching in the distance. Being in the middle seat means you're the last out of the car and the last to notice Nancy surrounded by police officers. She offers you all a small wave as your feet carry you forward, past the police barriers, and into her arms. Nancy lets out a small sigh of relief and squeezes her eyes shut at the feeling of your embrace. The others catch up and you move your way into the trailer park, sitting at a picnic table close to Eddie’s trailer. A place you’d been a thousand times, now crossed off with police tape. 

Nancy talks about Fred, Dustin talks about Venca, and you do everything you can to ignore the lingering gaze of Steve Harrington. Your attention snaps back as Max makes the connection between Fred and Chrissy and everyone heads back towards Steve’s car. You follow Nancy as she keeps walking away from the others until you hear Steve’s voice  and turn back around.

“Where are you guys going?” Steve’s question is directed at both of you, but his eyes only flicker over to you.

“There’s just something I want to check out first,” she says pointing over her shoulder towards her car.

“And I’m not letting her out of my sight with all this going on,” you speak up next, glancing towards Nancy to avoid looking at Steve.

“No way it’s too dangerous. There’s safety in numbers. You guys need someone to…” he trails off, turning to throw his keys to Robin. “I’ll stick with these two, you guys take my car and go check out the shrink,” Steve heads over to you and Nancy before Robin chimes in about not having a license. Steve squabbles with them all before Robin makes the executive decision that she’ll join you and Nancy instead. 

Nancy explains her discussion with Wayne Munson and his thoughts on Victor Creel during the drive to the library. While you go along with Nancy’s hunch, knowing she’s usually right, Robin questions each and every detail of the theory. You can tell Nancy’s getting annoyed as you wait for the keys to the basement archives, stifling a laugh when she turns to you with ‘help me’ eyes. 

The three of you search through newspaper after newspaper and you try to tune out Robin as much as you can. She’s nice enough but she talks way more than you remember. Nancy, clearly unable to put up with anymore of Robin’s babbling, goes downstairs to look for more newspaper reels, leaving you with a curious Robin.

“So, Honey…” her voice echoes through the now silent room as you set down the book you were looking through about D&D lore and Vecna.   

“Why’d you call me that?” 

“Everyone calls you that.”

“No, my friends call me that,” Robin opens her mouth in faux shock, bringing a hand to her chest.

“Are we not friends? Wow, you’d think saving the world from a human flesh monster and burning down a mall with someone bonds you for life, but I guess I was wrong,” you can’t help the small smile that crosses your lips at Robin’s theatrics. 

“Alright, we can be friends,” a smile lights up Robin’s face and you mirror it back. 

“Good. As your friend, you have to answer all my questions. Why doesn’t Nancy like me?” your smile drops from your face and your hands start to fiddle with the pages in front of you.

“Nancy likes you just fine.”

“I’m not an idiot.” Her eyes bore into yours. “Plus, what’s that thing the kids all say to each other? Friends don’t lie?” you curse Mike Wheeler under your breath for his stupid insistence on honesty.

“She probably just doesn’t like you because she thinks you’re dating Steve and she has other ideas of who she thinks Steve should be with,” it comes out pretty hushed and embarrassed, but Robin hears every word.

“I’m not with Steve. Not in a million years. He is so far from my type. I’d rather let the human population die out before being with Steve,” Robin’s words flood out in a rush of reassurance.

“You’re not a very good wing woman, you know that?” a smirk graces your lips as Robin’s face flushes. “And you don’t have to worry, I know you’re not with Steve.” Robin raises her eyebrows silently asking you ‘how.’ “Unfortunately I know Steve Harrington well enough to know when he’s interested in a girl and he’s not interested in you.” 

“Do you know Steve well enough to know that he’s interested in you?” your breath hitches in your throat and your eyes meet hers.

“Yeah, I do,” you choke out, your mind stopping with the wisp of a memory. 

“You’re so predictable, I really don’t get how she didn’t see right through you,” Steve puts the phone down and turns to you at the sound of your giggles bouncing throughout the room. 

“I have no clue what you’re talking about, Honey,” Steve’s tone is serious but the smile stretching his lips says otherwise.

“Stevie, please. You use the same moves on every girl. If I had a deeper voice and your dumb polo I could pretend to be you, ask a girl out, and she’d never know the difference,” Steve steps closer to you. You’re sitting on his bed folding the laundry he left in a pile on top of it. 

“Hey my polos are not dumb and I am not predictable,” he sits down on the bed next you, nearly knocking over the pile of sweatshirts you just folded. Steve grabs a shirt from the pile as you laugh at him again.

“You so are. You’ve been asking girls out the same way since third grade. We’re almost eighth graders now, you really should switch it up,” you snag the shirt from his fingers when you notice he can’t fold for shit. “Plus I can easily tell when you like a girl.”

“No, you can’t,” there’s something different about his voice now as he pulls his attention towards you. You brush it off, continuing your focus on his laundry.

“I totally can. You make up excuses to be around her, you laugh at all her jokes, especially when no one else does, you constantly nag everyone to tell you about her when she’s not there, and you get all moody when she’s with other guys.” you cross your arms over your chest and plaster on a satisfied smirk when Steve’s mouth drops open slightly. “See told you I could tell.”

“You do realize that you just described how I am with you, right?” the question hung in the air, and you found your jaw dropping just like Steve’s.

“Stevie,” it comes out as a whisper. Steve’s eyes shift from your eyes to your lips as you take a shaky breath. “Are you- do you like…” Steve silently nods, too afraid of what would happen if he tore his gaze from you. Your heart thuds in your chest and the world falls quiet around you. You’d harbored a crush on Steve ever since you figured out that boys do not indeed have cooties. It bothered you that he asked out other girls and never you, but it wasn’t your place to butt in. You were happy with as much of Steve as he was willing to give you. 

Just as Steve was about to lean in, the phone rang, filling the silence. Without tearing his gaze from yours, Steve reached behind him, grabbing the phone from the nightstand and holding it to his ear. With a quick ‘Harrington residence’ and a muffled response from the other end, Steve handed you the phone. You held it up to your ear, hearing your dad’s quiet voice through the receiver. This pulled you out of your trance, tearing your eyes from Steve, until they fell on the folded clothes before you.

“Can you come home sweetie? I picked up an extra shift and need you to take care of your mom for a little. I can leave you a little money to order a pizza for dinner,” you agreed, hanging up after a promise of being there in 10 minutes. Steve’s gaze roamed over you with a sadness you hadn’t really seen before. 

“I better get going,” you spoke softly, getting up from your place on the bed. The moment was gone. You’d both brush it under the rug like nothing happened. You wish something happened. Steve wished something happened. You collected your things scattered around the room and pulled on your shoes. Reaching out for the doorknob, you turned back, catching Steve’s sad eyes. “Bye Stevie, see you soon,” with that you left, heading downstairs and through the door, out to your bike waiting for you in the grass.

“Honey?” Robin snaps you from your trance and you jump a little in your seat. “I said, Steve never told me what happened with you two, but whatever it is, he seems really sorry. Like down on his knees pleading, crying, snot bubbles dripping down his face, sorry,” you scrunch your nose at the image.

“Are you always this descriptive?” 

“Only when I’m nervous,” Robin gives you an awkward smile as you shrink back into your chair. What the hell is taking Nancy so long?

“No need to be nervous, Robs. And no need to try getting Steve back into my good graces. Our history is, uh well, history. I’ve moved on from it,” she eyes you wearily, trying to read your expression. 

“Moved on enough to be with him again?” you shoot her a glare and she backs down. As you open your mouth to talk, she interrupts you. “I know about you and Eddie. Steve doesn’t, but I do. And I know that you're not really dating so don’t try to make any excuses. If you could just hear him out it could clear this whole thing up and you can live happily ever-” Robin’s sentence is interrupted by Nancy bursting back into the room and you’ve never been more thankful to see her. In her hand she holds the slides for the Weekly Watcher, making you even question her a bit. After scrolling through page after page, Nancy finally stops on a story titled “Victor Creel Claims: Ancient Demon Killed Family.”

“I know that I should’ve learned my lesson by now, but from this point on I’ll never question you again Nancy Wheeler,” you chime in, leaning over Nancy and Robin’s shoulders. Between the three of you, you manage to connect the dots between the ancient demon the article described and Vecna. Rushing out of the library, Robin radios to the others, finding out that they broke into the school. Nancy speeds over to the school as fast as she can and you catch up to a very freaked out Max describing her vision and her corresponding symptoms. Your hand reaches out for hers and she’s about to let you take it before a noise echoes through the empty school hallways.

Following Steve and his trusty lamp, everyone piles into the hallway, coming face to face with an out of breath Lucas Sinclair. He explains that the basketball team is on a manhunt for Eddie and Dustin. You’re all about to shuffle back out to the cars and head to the Wheeler’s when Nancy stops with an idea, grabbing Robin’s arm and pulling her back. 

“What are you doing,” you stop, turning to face them as the others keep walking. She gives you a look, one you know means that you’re not going to like what she says.

“Go with Steve and the kids. I’ve got a plan and I need Robin,” she urges you forward, and Robin shoots her a look that you can’t quite read. 

“I meant what I said, Nance. I’m sticking with you.”

“Go Honey, we’ll be fine. Plus, I think it’ll help for Max to have you with her,” you want to argue with her, but like usual Nancy’s right. You pull her in for a quick hug before chasing after the others and sliding into the back seat of the BMW next to Lucas. In order to keep your distance from Steve, you head up to take a nap in Nancy’s bed once you get to the Wheeler house. It isn’t until much later that Nancy and Robin show up in the Wheeler’s basement explaining their plan to talk to Victor Creel.  

“Please don’t leave me here with him again. Nancy, I can’t take it,” you plead, following her up to her room. She purses her lips as she roots through her closet trying to find an outfit for Robin.

“Come on, Honey. It's been three years; you need to at least learn how to be civil with him. I know he hurt you and that he’s got his flaws, but I really do think he’s changed. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to give him a second chance,” she pulls out a shirt, looking it over before shoving it back on the rack and continuing her search.

“Geez you sound like Robin,” you mutter under your breath and she shoots you a tight lipped look.

“Who sounds like me?” Robin steps through the door, immediately drawn to the cassettes on Nancy’s nightstand and all her other little knick knacks littered throughout the room.

“I was telling Honey to suck it up and stay with Steve,” Nancy glances over her shoulder at Robin messing with her stuff.

“Oh yeah, totally. I think he’d throw a fit if you didn’t. He’d probably complain about being stuck as the babysitter again and we’d never hear the end of it,” Robin moves over to Nancy’s music box, letting out a squeal as a tiny ballerina pops up.  

“Maybe you can find it in your heart to at least listen to his explanation of what happened. You never did give him a chance before,” Nancy’s eyes dart between you to Robin, who is still rooting through her stuff. 

“This is just because you don’t like Eddie,” Robin snaps her head up, clearly intrigued by your assertion. You feel guilty bringing him into this argument. With all the craziness surrounding you, you’d nearly forgotten about the frightened Eddie left all alone at Reefer Rick’s.

“I like Eddie just fine. It’s you that doesn’t like Eddie, otherwise you would actually be dating at this point. Although he doesn’t really seem like the type to settle down,” Nancy shrugs, handing Robin a frilly blouse and skirt that causes Robin to scrunch her nose. You open your mouth to protest but you’re quickly cut off by Nancy’s glance towards her bed. “Did you sleep in my bed this morning?” you shoot her a guilty smile before making an excuse about checking on Max and sprinting downstairs.

After Nancy and Robin leave, you join the boys in awkwardly watching Max hunch over a desk for a few minutes before she gets up to pass out her letters. Your heart breaks with each word that trickles from her lips and the feel of worn paper between your fingers. Max argues with Steve about going to the cemetery until you chime in.

“If you won’t take her I will,” all eyes shift to you, holding out your hands for Steve’s car keys. He gives you a pleading look to reconsider before giving in and heading out towards his car. You give Max a playful nudge and she flashes you a grateful smile. When you get out to the car Max slides into the back, leaving the only empty seat upfront, next to Steve. He looks at you when you get in and you swear you can see the hope in his eyes.

Following a pitstop at Max’s house, the drive to the cemetery isn’t too long, but you can tell everyone is pretty restless by the time you get there. Max argues with Steve about going to Billy’s grave alone and you, once again stick up for her before sliding back into your seat in the car. Steve opens the door, following suit while Dustin and Lucas make up an excuse about needing fresh air and get out. You’re about to grab the door handle yourself when Steve’s voice cuts through the silence.

“Honey…”

“Don’t call me that,” you stare straight ahead, almost too afraid to look at him. Steve takes a second to hide his shock, his face returning to its normal shade after its flush of scarlet at your words.

“I honestly don’t think I can call you anything else,” his voice is quiet and it makes you finally turn your head to him. You realize that he’s nervous, more nervous than you knew Steve Harrington was capable of being. Even in the face of demodogs and other dimensions, Steve had never seemed this overwrought. “I just want to talk, please. I’ve wanted to explain, tried to explain, ever since that day, but you’ve never let me. Just, please, let me,” he sounded desperate, and if you were any less stubborn, you might have actually let him. 

“Now’s not really a good time, Steve,” he shifted back in his seat, processing what you said. Steve. Not Stevie. Steve. He wondered if maybe Vecna had cursed him and all of this was just some long, drawn out nightmare. But here you are, sitting in his car, looking more beautiful than he remembered, and he knows this is real. He wants to say more, but the words get stuck in his throat. Steve feels like he’s about to choke when you look past him, eyes landing on Max, sitting stiffly in front of Billy’s headstone. “Somethings wrong,” you throw open the door, calling for the boys and running towards Max. Her haze covered eyes make you recoil back for a second before you grab her shoulders, shaking them as hard as you can.

“What’s wrong?” Lucas nearly plows into you, trying to look at Max himself. You regret not listening to Steve and letting her go by herself. Steve shouts at Dustin to radio Robin and Nancy while you keep trying to break Max out of her trance. After a minute Dustin shouts something about music and favorite songs, throwing Max’s Walkman and cassettes on the ground in front of you. Sorting through cassettes, Lucas hands Steve a Kate Bush album, clicking it in, putting the headphones over her ears, and clicking play. Everyone stops for a second as the faint sound of Running Up That Hill comes from Max’s ears. 

You think it might be working for a second until Max’s body starts to rise from the ground, no matter how hard you try to hold her down. A scream rips from your throat as you watch what could be Max’s last moments. You think back to the girl in the Mike Myers mask on Halloween a few years ago as tears brim in your eyes. Losing hope with each passing second before you hear a gasp above you and Max tumbles down from the sky. Lucas wraps her in his arms and you all reach out to hold her in some way. 

As the minutes pass and everyone’s breathing returns to normal you realize that in the chaos of the moment your hand found its way into Steve’s. With one glance his way you can tell he’s more than aware that you’re holding his hand and will do anything to keep you from letting go. It takes every fiber of your being to hold back a small smile at how easily you can read him. His hand is warm, but you remember that his body has always run on the warmer side. You can’t help but find yourself getting caught up in a distant memory.

The Snowball hadn’t originally seemed like it was going to suck, but now that you were here, it definitely sucked. Brent Majors had made a big deal of asking you to go with him in front of the whole school at lunch. So you reluctantly agreed, wishing Steve had mustered up the courage to ask you first. He ended up asking Kat Connors to go with him, and despite the fact that she would’ve rather gone with friends, she accepted.

Steve arrived first and was immediately ditched by Kat who got sucked into her group of friends by the punch bowl. With a sigh, Steve plops himself down at an empty table and begins staring at the clock, willing the night to end. He loses himself in the hands of the clock until he hears the gym doors slam open, you emerging behind them. Steve’s breath catches in his chest, the same way it had a million times before, as he takes in the way you sparkle in the beautiful purple dress that your mom picked out for you on one of her good days. It isn’t until his eyes find your arm linked with Brent’s that his heart drops.

When Steve finally catches your eye you shoot him a wide smile and a small wave. Brent drags you past Steve, over to a table across the gym that was already packed with Brent’s friends. After about twenty minutes you realize that Brent has no intention of dancing with you so you get up and excuse yourself. Steve is still staring at the clock, trying his best not to look over to Brent’s table, when you sit down in the empty chair beside him.

“It seems that both of our dates are absolutely against dancing with us,” you speak up, nodding your head over to where Kat still stood engulfed by her friends.

“It appears so,” Steve breathed out, leaning back in his chair. He turns towards you, finally getting a chance to look at you up close.

“It’s as if they come from a town where dancing is illegal or something,” you joke, provoking a smile to appear on Steve’s lips. His lips that you now couldn’t stop staring at.

“That would make a great movie.”

“Are you kidding? That would make an excellent movie,” you smile now, seeing Steve break out of his stupor. “Come on,” you get up, holding out your hand for Steve to take. He gives you a look before you continue. “Let’s show ‘em how to dance,” Steve rises to his feet, gently taking your hand as you pull him towards the dance floor.

The two of you dance circles around the other kids, clearly enjoying yourself way more than all the others. You’re having so much fun with Steve that you completely miss the death stare Brent sends him from across the room. As the night winds down the songs start to slow. When one slow song in particular comes on, Steve grabs your hand and pulls you close. You sway back and forth, enough room between you for the chaperones to not intervene, but not enough for you to not feel the heat radiating off of him. 

“Your hands are warm, Stevie,” a confused smile etches itself onto Steve’s lips, leaving you to scramble for words. “It’s not a bad thing. I mean all of you is warm. You’re always warm,” you feel heat rush to your face and your eyes dart around the room, landing anywhere but Steve.

“Thank you, I think,” he laughs at you now and you can’t help but join. “It’s a good thing that I’m always warm because you are always cold. You need someone to warm you up,” the smile still lingers on his lips, and you can’t help but look at them. Overcome with the closeness of the moment, you take a leap and say something bold.

“What if I said my lips were cold?” you ask, hearing Steve’s breath hitch despite the loud music.

“I guess I would have to warm them up for you,” Steve shakily breathes out, eyes shifting over you. He leans in slowly and you do too. When your lips collide it’s soft, softer than you envisioned it. And as much of a joke it had been, Steve’s lips really were warm. You find yourself lost in the feel of Steve’s mouth on yours, not wanting to ever pull away, until you hear a throat clear behind you. One of the chaperones stands behind you, clearly embarrassed to witness your kiss with Steve.

“Three inch minimum please,” the woman speaks authoritatively before turning on her heel and walking back to the side of the gym. You turn to Steve again and find him already cracking up. It doesn't take much for you to join him.

When the air settles around you and the sun starts to fall behind the trees, Max stands on shaky legs, heading back to the car. No one is in the mood to talk anymore. Even Dustin keeps his mouth shut. The only thing you hear besides the car engine is the faint sound of Kate Bush’s voice coming from Max’s headphones. 

Back at the Wheeler’s basement, Steve falls into an armchair, curling into himself and falling asleep as you sit on the floor beneath him. Nancy and Robin arrive shortly after, reading the room and quietly joining the silence. After a brief conversation about setting up shifts to watch over Max, you find your eyelids growing heavy. You lean back into the space by Steve’s legs, catching a glimpse of Robin and Nancy’s shared look at the sight. Too tired to care, you let your head lull to the side as sleep washes over you. 

Nancy’s hushed words spoken into the walkie talkie wake you a few hours later. The warmth radiating from your shoulder pulls your attention from her. Steve’s leg is pressed up against your right side and it seems as though you’d fallen asleep against it. Sitting up properly now, you shift away from Steve, caught off guard when Nancy shakes Dustin awake next to you, frantically asking about Max. Pushing yourself to your feet you quickly follow them upstairs, finding Max at the table with Holly.

With a mumble about a shower, you head upstairs making a beeline for the linen closet, and pull out a towel. You head to Nancy’s room, finding the toothbrush you left there last time you stayed over and setting it with your towel on the bed. Just as you lift your sweater over your head, Nancy’s door swings open, making you scramble to cover your chest with your arms. Steve stands in the doorway, mouth hanging open in surprise as his eyes stay glued to your chest.

“Steve, what the hell?” you shout, knocking him out of his trance.

“Shit, right. Sorry,” he blurts out, averting his eyes to the ceiling. You quickly shove your sweater back on while he continues. “Max and Nance found something so we’re leaving,” he glances back at you now that your shirt is back on.

“Found what?”

Getting out of the car you find yourself staring up at Victor Creel’s creepy ass house. Breaking in was easy, fighting the chill that runs down your spine as you walk in was not. After a look around, you break off into groups, quickly following Robin and Nancy to avoid being paired with Steve. You can hear his displeasure in being partnered with Dustin again from his voice echoing up the stairs. Exploring the house sets your nerves on edge and it’s only amplified when Steve bursts through a door beside you, running into you and mumbling something about a spider before pulling the door shut. A giggle rises in your chest when you catch sight of the array of spiderwebs littering Steve’s hair.

“You got something,” Steve quickly turns his back to you, angling his head to grant you better access to his hair. Robin and Nancy walk past you reaching to grab a spider web from Steve’s locks. They both shoot you a look while Steve tries to brush off the comment Robin makes about spider eggs.

“So, you two are like friends now?” you hum in agreement. “That’s cool, that’s cool. Maybe when this is all over Robin will finally wear you down enough to let me explain what happened,” you stiffen behind him, plucking the last spider web from his hair. Steve turns to face you, clearly a little disappointed at you shutting down at the mention of your shared past. He’s about to say something when you hear Max and Lucas call for you all downstairs.

Standing in a half circle, everyone watches the lights flicker, making the connection that Vecna must be in the house. Splitting up again you spread out trying to find where he’s moved on to next. Robin finds Vecna first but it’s Steve who’s flashlight leads you all the way upstairs to the attic. The flashlights start to pulse and shatter with intensity, scaring the shit out of everyone. Shaken and scared, you all file back into Nancy’s car heading off to finally shower and get some sleep.

In the morning Nancy drives you to your house to get some clean clothes since your car is still over parked at Reefer Rick’s house. After a quick shower the two of you head back to her house where the others are waiting. When it’s time to pile back in the car to deliver Eddie more groceries and bad news, Nancy stops you from getting in the front seat. She points to the trunk where Steve was already getting in, trying not to make it obvious that he was watching you. With a sag of your shoulders and a dramatic eye roll, you climb into the trunk with Steve, making a point to keep as far from him as possible in such a tight space. You swear you see Nancy smile to herself through the rear view mirror. Best friend my ass. 

Robin does what she does best and rambles on about all the bad news to tell Eddie, doing a bit to distract you from how Steve’s eyes haven’t left you once. Noticing that Nancy has started to slow down, you peer through the windows, seeing the news vans and cop cars. The group hops out, hearing enough of Powell’s speech to know Vecna claimed another victim and Eddie's name was released to the public as the prime suspect. Just then Eddie’s voice cracks through the static of the walkie talkie, telling you all to meet him at Skull Rock.

Back in the car your thoughts race over Eddie. Poor Eddie who’s now witnessed two of Vecna’s murders all while being chased by the police. You can’t help but shift restlessly in the trunk and it’s sure as hell doesn’t help that Steve’s leg keeps brushing against yours. Overcome by anxiety you lean up a bit to look at Nancy through the rear view mirror again.

“Nance, can you maybe drive a little-” your sentence gets cut off as Nancy takes a sharp left turn towards the woods, throwing you into Steve’s lap. Your head hits the window and you let out a moan as your hand shoots up to cradle it. “Faster,” you finish, slowly realizing you’re now practically laying on top of Steve. His eyes are blown wide looking up at you with a hint of lust and recognition. It’s then that the memory resurfaces, making you want to curse under your breath and scramble back up.

After the kiss at the Snowball, everything seemingly went back to normal. Neither you nor Steve were brave enough to bring it up, meaning that you continued to push down your feelings and stay friends. Now you sat on his bed, reading a book while he paced around the room.

“I still can’t believe you wouldn’t let me see you on your sixteenth birthday,” he huffs, stopping at the edge of the bed to glare down at you. You groan, placing an old receipt in between the book’s pages and closing it in your lap.

“I told you Stevie, Mrs. Byers planned out a whole thing and you don’t like Jonathan so I figured you and I could just hang out another day,” Steve, who had returned to his angry pacing, stopped again.

“I don’t dislike Jonathan,” he defends and you let out a laugh. “He just spends a lot of time with you. Time that you could be spending with me,” you roll your eyes at that, about ready to pick up your book and go back to reading before Steve starts talking again. “Why would Mrs. Byers even plan out stuff for your birthday?”

“Because I’m extremely likable ,” you shoot Steve a cheesy grin and he fake laughs in response. “And I’m pretty sure she felt bad since my parents forgot. She just wanted me to enjoy my birthday,” Steve’s face changes at your words. His eyebrows furrow, eyes growing wide and glassy while his lips part. He takes a seat next to you on his bed, offering you his hand, which you gladly accept.

“Your parents forgot your birthday?” his voice is soft and unbelieving. That’s something he’d expect from his parents, not yours. You nod slowly, feeling a burn in your throat.

“I mean, it’s not their fault really. Dad is working crazy hours to try and pay off mom’s medical bills. I don’t think he knows what day it is normally, let alone on my birthday. And with mom-” your throat clogs a bit, trying not to cry as you cast your gaze down at your lap. “With mom we’re just lucky enough if she remembers to put clothes on in the morning. I didn’t really expect her to remember,” you finally look back up at Steve, his hand reaching up to brush a stray tear from your cheek.

“Honey, I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize your mom was getting that bad,” you nod again, not trusting your words. A moment of quiet stretches between the two of you. The feeling of warmth from Steve’s hand comforting you as much as his presence. “You know what?” he stands up slowly pulling his hand from yours. “You’re right, it’s probably a good thing I didn’t come to the Byer’s for your birthday. You probably would’ve spent too much time doing stuff with Jonathan and I would’ve gotten jealous. I mean boring stuff too, like reading,” he reached forward grabbing your book from your lap.

“Stevie! Reading is not boring! Give that back,” you shift onto your knees, trying to get the book from Steve’s grasp. He jumps off the bed, standing just by the side opposite you and waves the book in the air. In a split-second decision, you leap from your spot, tackling Steve onto the ground where he still manages to hold the book out of your reach. Steve flips you over so you’re pinned beneath him as you continue to flail for your book.

A smirk graces his face at the sound of your giggles. He has you caged in with his limbs and despite your squirming, it’s impossible to escape. You try to move up and get the book but you stop at the feeling of your hips brushing against Steve’s. He stops too, stunned into paralysis as the book drops from his hand above you. You lock eyes with Steve, feeling your face heat up, completely forgetting the now abandoned book. As you go to stutter out an apology, Steve mimics your action, grinding his hips into yours slowly. You can feel that he’s already hard after one or two brushes against each other. A gasp escapes your lips and you close your eyes in pleasure.

“Tell me to stop,” he breaths out above you, clearly feeling as good as you are. Steve looks down at you and you peel your eyes open to meet his.

“I don’t want you to stop, Stevie,” he smiles, continuing the motion as the two of you grind against each other, fully clothed on the floor of his room. You both let out moans and gasps as Steve steadies his pace. “Faster. Please, Stevie,” Steve’s heart pounds as he picks up the pace for a few more strokes. 

“Shit, fuck,” he breaths out, quickly standing up and bolting towards the bathroom. You lay confused on the floor, still breathing heavily as you turn your head to look over at the bathroom attached to Steve’s room. Scrambling to your feet, you make your way over to the door, giving it a soft knock.

“Stevie, are you ok?” you’re met by silence when it finally clicks into place. “Shit, did you just-” the door swings open, revealing Steve wearing a new pair of sweatpants while his other pair sits crumpled up in a corner.

“Yeah,” his voice is still breathy and his face is flushed. “It was the way you said it that tipped me over the edge,” he takes you in, with your messy hair and heaving chest.

“Said what?” you ask, confusion overtaking your expression.

“Faster.”

“Shit, are you two ok back there?” Nancy’s question hangs in the air and you can hear all the others turning around to see you still laying on top of Steve. You quickly move up, retreating back to your side of the trunk as your face burns with embarrassment.

“We’re fine, Nance,” you call back, avoiding all eye contact with Steve, who can’t seem to tear his gaze from you now. After another minute or two Nancy stops the car and you waste no time in getting out. You try to ignore the sight of Steve’s deflating shoulders as you scramble as far away from him as you can. Moving deep into the woods, you hear Dustin pick a fight with Steve over which direction leads to Skull Rock. 

“You do realize that Skull Rock is like a super popular make out spot, right?” you trail a bit further behind the two of them with Nancy and Robin beside you.

“Yeah, so what?” 

“Yeah well it wasn’t popular until I made it popular,” Steve says, making you roll your eyes in response. You’re more than familiar with the rumors that spread throughout the school of King Steve taking girls up to Skull Rock. The rumors only started after you stopped talking to Steve and they only made you hurt more. Steve leads the way, much to Dustin’s dismay, and shortly after you all arrive at Skull Rock. There’s no sign of Eddie until Steve says something about Dustin being a butthead.

“I concur, you, Dustin Henderson, are a total butthead,” Eddie jumps down from a nearby rock, and you all turn to look at him. He hugs Dustin first before his eyes fall onto you. Eddie practically sprints towards you, wrapping his arms around you and spinning you into the air. A laugh escapes you when he sets you down, leaning in to give you a quick kiss.

“I’m glad you’re ok. Sorry it took us so long to get back to you,” your arms fall from around his neck, trailing down towards his hands.

“Don’t worry Honey, you’re here now and that’s enough for me,” Eddie pulls you back in for another kiss and you hear a throat clear behind you. Dustin stands watching you both with a face of disgust, while Steve tries to pretend he didn’t see anything. It doesn’t take a 20/20 vision to see the angry red splotches on Steve’s skin and the slight glassiness in his eyes.

Eddie dives into the bags of junk food Nancy hands him and starts to explain the previous night’s events. You can’t help but notice Dustin’s incessant pacing behind you. Nancy connects the dots between the lights in the Creel House and Vecna’s attack on Patrick when Dustin starts shouting and rambling on about magnets and a gate. He leaves it up to Eddie who, after a Lord of the Rings reference, agrees to start the search for the gate to the Upside Down.

Eddie has his arm wrapped around your shoulder the entire trip through the woods, whispering dirty words in your ear to make you giggle. The sun fully sets by the time you reach Lover’s Lake and Dustin’s compass goes crazy. Nancy determines that Vecna must leave an opening behind from his attacks, similarly to the demogorgon. Eddie and Steve pull the hidden boat over, helping Robin in before Eddie hops in offering Nancy a hand. You step over the motor, stumbling a bit and Steve grabs your back to steady you. Eddie eyes him wearily as you mutter a thanks and take a seat next to Nance. Eddie stops Dustin from getting in the boat, which doesn’t stop the flood of protests before Dustin eventually hands over his compass.

“Sorry,” Steve shrugs towards Dustin, pushing the boat away from the shore and settling in next to you. Robin and Eddie paddle out towards the middle of the lake when the compass starts to go crazy. They slow to a stop as you all peer over the edge of the boat. The kids radio out and Robin updates them while Steve starts to strip off his socks, determined to be the one that dives down. After a small fight you all give in and Steve stands, taking off his shirt. An audible gasp escapes your lips at the sight of shirtless Steve and all but Steve’s head turns your way. It’s almost too dark to see the shared smirk Robin and Nancy shoot each other, but you still notice. Eddie tosses Steve a flashlight before he dives down and Nancy counts the seconds on her watch. 

After what feels like way too long, a breathless Steve pops up grabbing the side of the boat. He rushes out words of a snack size gate as something tugs him down for a second. He grips the boat harder, sparing one last look your way before he gets pulled under. With a shout of his name, you leap in after him, pushing through the water as fast as you can until you find the glowing gate. You break through, adjusting to the dim light of the Upside Down while you look for Steve. He’s a few yards away, being attacked by a bunch of bats. You pick up an oar from the boat on the ground when you see Nancy, Robin and Eddie appear from the gate as well. Wasting no time, you swing the oar as hard as you can, taking out a bat at Steve’s side.

“Hey Stevie,” you say breathlessly, before swinging the oar again to smack another bat out of the way. Nancy, Robin and Eddie all attack the bats around you with whatever they can find as well. Eventually Steve is able to get up, tearing the bat from around his neck with his teeth. He spits out blood before meeting your eyes again, and for something that shouldn’t be hot, that was really fucking hot. Nancy starts for the woods when the bats start to swarm the gate and the rest of you follow. 

Huddling under Skull Rock, Steve starts to sway, tripping into the side of it. You reach your hands up to balance him and he tries to brush you off, claiming he’s fine despite the blood loss. You set him down and remove your flannel, leaving you in just your tank top and overalls. Robin rambles to Steve about rabies as you rip the worn fabric and tie it tightly around his waist, covering the bat bites. He stares down at you, chest heaving and eyes wide.

“Too tight?” you ask, trying not to sound as nervous as you feel to be this close to Steve.

“No it’s perfect, thanks,” he sends you a soft smile that you can’t help but reciprocate. You help him stand as Eddie and Robin throw questions at the rest of you about the Upside Down and how it works. Nancy comes to a quick conclusion that you all need to go to her house, retrieve guns, and kill the bats to get back home. Steve takes a step closer to you, reaching over to wipe some blood from the bat fight from your face. You freeze, wide eyes looking up at him as your breath hitches in your chest. The moment is interrupted by Eddie launching his denim vest at Steve’s face mumbling something about modesty. 

The ground starts to shake beneath your feet and Eddie tries to lunge toward you but Steve wraps his arms around you first, pulling your back flush against his chest. Steve backs into the rock behind him, holding it for support until the shaking subsides. The echo of the bats rattles through the air, reinforcing the idea of needing guns. Steve slowly retracts his arm from around you, letting you move away from him. Despite the distance you’ve purposefully created between the two of you for the past three years, you find yourself not wanting to pull away from him. You feel safe in his arms. The way you once did. The way you always did. You catch Eddie’s eyes on you and Steve before he quickly redirects them away.

“What are we waiting for?” Steve says, bringing out the flashlight from before and clicking it on. The rest of you follow him as he leads the way through the woods to Nancy’s house. As you all keep walking, Steve ends up falling into step with Eddie a little ways behind you, Nancy, and Robin. You can’t hear them from how far away you are, but it’s nearly eating you alive wanting to know what they’re discussing.

“What do you think they’re talking about back there?” you break through the silence the three of you created. Nancy and Robin quickly glimpse back at the boys then turn their attention back to you.

“You. Definitely you,” Nancy replies with a small smirk on her lips. 

“Oh shut up,” you give her a playful shove and she giggles.

“I’m serious though. I mean they only have two things in common. Their love for Dustin and their love for you,” you stumble over your own foot at Nancy’s words, making Robin laugh. You shoot her a glare before Nancy goes on. “And since Dustin’s not here I think it’s safe to say they’re all about you at the moment. They’re both clearly jealous of each other,” you open your mouth to argue that Eddie’s not the jealous type but Robin interrupts first.

“Seriously, Steve looked like a kicked puppy when Eddie kissed you earlier and the way Eddie threw his vest at Steve definitely had something angsty behind it,” your gaze trails over to the boys behind you, taking in the sight of Steve and Eddie’s faces while they talk animatedly back and forth. They stop walking for a minute and the ground begins to shake again. The force of the earthquake slams you into a tree, knocking you on the ground. Nancy takes off before the shaking stops, heading for the edge of the tree line where she can see her house. Eddie hooks his arms under yours, pulling you up from behind and the rest of you take off after her.

The Wheeler house, a place you’d been to a million times, looks frighteningly different, covered in vines and in such low light. Nancy rushes upstairs, followed by Robin, Eddie, and Steve in front of you. Steve stops halfway, turning his head towards the dining room, catching your attention too. You and Steve share a look, hearing Dustin’s voice echo from that direction and run back down the stairs. Steve calls out to him, progressively getting louder with each try. The others hurry downstairs and you try to explain while Steve continues shouting for Dustin like a crazy person. Nancy brings up Will and the lights, fiddling with light switches that won’t work.

“Guys,” everyone turns towards you as you point at the now shimmering chandelier. They gather around while you stick your hand into the shimmering air, igniting the air around it in a soft light. The others join in, feeling the tingling sensation that it brings when you touch the light. 

“Does anyone know Morse code?” Nancy’s question is met with a chorus of no’s until Eddie shifts to look at her. 

“Wait, does S.O.S. count?” you all turn towards Eddie, hopeful for the first time since you dove after Steve into Lover’s Lake. It only takes a minute or two for Dustin, Lucas, and Erica to notice your signal for help. Talking back and forth on Holly’s Lite-Brite, you all come up with a plan to meet at Eddie’s trailer where there will hopefully be another gate. The five of you rush outside, grabbing the bikes from the Wheeler’s garage. 

“Wait, there’s only four,” you point out, everyone hopping on a bike but you. Steve turns to look at the back wheel of his bike, noticing that his bike belonged to Mike. 

“Mine’s got pegs on the back that you can stand on. Hop on,” he motions you over and your desire to get out of the Upside Down overrides your reluctance to be near Steve. Putting one foot on the first peg, you grab Steve’s shoulders for support, lifting the other foot next. “Hold on tight, ok?” you nod and Steve lifts his feet from the ground to start pedaling as the others follow. You wrap your arms around Steve’s torso, doing your best to avoid the bat bites on his abdomen. Even bloody and shirtless in the Upside Down, Steve still radiates warmth, keeping you comfortable now that you don’t have your flannel to wear. 

Steve’s out of breath by the time you get to Eddie’s trailer, coming to a quick stop in the grass. He helps you off and drops the bike down, following closely behind as you burst through the door. The gate is bright and red as something starts moving beneath it. Suddenly, whatever it is bursts through causing you to jump back, right into Steve’s arms. He moves you behind him, slowly approaching the hole that now covers most of the ceiling. You inch up behind him with Nancy at your side. Dustin’s hat is the first thing you see, making you burst into a bright smile at the sight. You notice the others share a similar look of relief.

The kids bring out Eddie’s stained mattress and you can’t help but catch Eddie’s embarrassed glance your way, knowing that you’re both very aware of how some of those stains got there. Dustin throws a rope made of tied bed sheets through the gate, finding that it defies all laws of physics and holds in place. Robin goes first, falling onto the mattress below. Eddie looks around at you, Steve, and Nancy before moving to go up next. He flops down, being pulled up by the kids. Nancy’s about to go next when she freezes up next to you. You and Steve share a look before looking back at her, seeing foggy eyes and a blank expression.

“Nancy?” you place your hands on her shoulders, trying to  shake her awake. “Nancy, come on, wake up. Nancy!” you shout panicked with Steve next to you, looking equally worried. The others start scrambling, trying to find a cassette tape in Eddie’s trailer that has a song on it that Nancy would actually know. Suddenly, Nancy gasps awake, and you pull her into your arms as her legs give out beneath her. “We’re right here, Nance. You’re ok now. It’s ok,” tears spill from her eyes and you pull her into a tight hug. When she calms down enough to climb through the gate, you help, giving her a boost from below. You go next, catching Steve staring at your ass from the corner of your eye as you climb the rope. 

Once you’re all back right side up, everyone sneaks over to Max’s trailer, not wanting to stay so close to the gate. Nancy heads for the bathroom, needing a minute alone to pull herself together after being trapped in Vecna’s mind prison. Eddie grabs your hand asking Max if he can use her room for a minute.

“As long as you don’t do anything gross in there,” she gives him a glare and he responds with a fake gasp, hand shooting to his chest. 

“When have I ever done anything gross?” Eddie asks in mock offense.

“I mean look at your mattress for one-” Max begins but you cut her off with a promise that nothing will happen in her room. Eddie pulls you in, careful not to touch anything considering how you’re both covered in goo from the Upside Down. He looks nervous, fiddling with his hands as he looks up at you. You are about to speak up and break the silence when he starts.

“No, no. I talk, you listen. Ok?” you nod, meeting his gaze. “When we started hooking up, that was all we intended for it to be. Then we became friends and started hanging out even when we weren’t looking to hook up,” he pauses, searching for the right words.

“Eds,” you begin, but he holds up a hand to silence you.

“Honey, I’m not one for relationships, you know that. And I’m also not one to get in the way of one,” you’re thrown off. When he started talking, you were sure he was going to ask you to be his girlfriend, but now he’s pulled a total 180. “I don’t know what happened between you and Steve. Hell, I might never know, but I see the way he looks at you. More importantly, I see the way you look at him,” he gets quiet, eyes searching your face and waiting for your impending push back. 

“But I like you, Eds,” you choke out, not realizing that you started crying. He lets out a breathy chuckle, holding your hand in his. Eddie’s hands were always ice cold. You’d always thought it was because of those metal rings he wore, but you could never tell.

“I like you too, Honey. So much,” he breathes out a shaky breath, looking down at his shoes and you notice a tear streak through the dirt caking his face. “But you love him,” he looks back up at you and you swear your heart stops beating. “Do you even realize what you called him earlier?” you shake your head, not following. “Stevie. What you used to call him. Back when you were friends. Back when you-” Eddie stops, slowly dropping your hands. “Go get him. Go be happy again. Then I can be happy for you,” he gently cups your cheeks, pulling your head forward to press a kiss to your forehead before leaving you alone, standing in the middle of Max’s room. 

After taking a minute to pull yourself together and wipe the tear streaks from your cheeks, you step back into Max’s living room. All eyes land on you as you settle on the floor next to Robin. She notices your red rimmed eyes and places a comforting hand on your knee. Letting out a breath, you lay your head on her shoulder and she gladly lets you. Nancy emerges from the bathroom. Sitting in a chair that gives you all a good view of her. She describes what Venca showed her, putting two and two together to realize that Vecna is only one person away from fulfilling his master plan. 

Max tries to call the Byer’s, but she’s met with a busy signal again. Nancy becomes hell bent on going back in and killing Vecna, and after a rambling of protests all around Max speaks up, offering herself as the bait. Your heart breaks, realizing how much she’s grown in the time you’ve known her. She’s different now, you all are, but she’s taken more hits than some of the rest of you. Reluctantly, you all agree, forming a plan to get weapons and take down Vecna. Eddie hot-wires his neighbor's camper, throwing Steve into the front seat to drive. Nancy rushes into the seat next to him while the rest of you hold on to anything you can find. You get thrown onto the bench in the back, falling in between Max and Dustin as Steve maneuvers out of the trailer park in the direction of the War Zone. The road stretches and the boys in the back keep a steady conversation.

“I wish Will were here. He’d be able to spy on Vecna for us and make this a million times easier,” Dustin says looking at the trees passing by out the window. 

“I’m glad he’s not here. Poor kid has already been through enough. He doesn’t need to go through this shit too,” you speak quietly, looking up from your hands in your lap to find Lucas, Dustin, and Max staring back at you. “We could use Mike though. One conversation with his sassy ass and Vecna would be ready to abandon Hawkins for good,” a smile creeps onto Max’s lips, knowing her distaste for Mike’s attitude. 

“What would you know about Mike being sassy? He’s hasn’t been rude to you ever since he developed a crush on you back in third grade,” Dustin chimes in, causing your eyebrows to shoot up to your hairline.

“Wha- so just because he’s not here you’re gonna spill all his secrets? Some friend you are,” you joke, still freaked out by the idea of a young Mike Wheeler crushing on you. 

“No, I’d tell you if he were here too. Like this,” he stops talking, eyeing Lucas across the aisle. “Lucas has had a crush on you since second grade,” Dustin receives a pillow to the face thrown by Lucas.

“Dustin’s liked you since fourth grade. Ever since you started helping Will draw out our D&D characters,” Lucas smirks back at Dustin until Dustin tackles him to the floor. You look over at Max who is laughing at the two wrestling each other. Getting up, you move to the front, hanging over the back of Nancy’s seat.

“What are they doing back there?” Steve asks, looking in the rear-view mirror to see Dustin and Lucas still rolling around on the ground.

“Dustin told me that Lucas likes me, then Lucas told me Dustin likes me and now they’re fighting I guess,” you gesture over your shoulder and Nancy turns to see what you’re talking about.

“That’s weird, I’m pretty sure Mike has a thing for you too,” Nancy says, shifting back in her seat to look up at you.

“Seems like you’ve got some competition there little Stevie,” Robin calls out from her seat behind you and Steve’s face turns beat red. The War Zone appears on the right much to Steve’s luck, effectively ending the conversation. Nancy decides that you, her, Steve, Robin, Erica, and Max should all go in to pick out weapons. You file out of the camper and through the glass doors, overwhelmed by the amount of people crowding the aisles. You beeline for the crossbow section, filling a cart with a new crossbow and as many arrows as you can get your hands on. Robin runs past you as you fill your cart, Steve trying to catch up to her. 

“Is she ok?” you ask when she runs through the doors leading outside and he gives up chasing her. 

“She’ll be alright. Just saw someone she knows,” he reassures you, looking at the stuff you’ve piled into your shopping cart. You look up, eyes scanning the room to see what else you need when you spot a familiar face. 

“That makes two of us,” Steve glances towards you, finding your eyes wide. He turns to see who you’ve spotted but you grab and turn him towards you, trying not to pull the person’s attention your way. “Brent Majors,” you whisper and Steve stares at you in shock.

“No way. That asshole’s here?” you nod, glancing back over in Brent’s direction. Just then Brent’s eyes shoot up, locking with yours.

“Shit,” you try to duck behind Steve, but Brent still sees you and starts heading your way. Panicked, you pull Steve closer. “Kiss me,” you plead, Steve freezes in your grasp.

“What?” 

“Brent’s coming over here. He’s always been jealous of you, especially after the Snowball, and maybe if you kiss me he’ll get the idea and-” Steve cuts you off, slamming his lips to yours. It’s better than you remember. Warm lips encasing yours as his chest presses flush against you. Hands trailing down your sides until they find your lower back, pulling you as close as physically possible. You don’t want to pull away, but you’re also painfully aware that you’re now making out with Steve Harrington in a weapon supply store at what very well might be the end of the world. Your hands gently push his chest back when you hear a throat clear beside you. Erica stands next to you with a small look of panic on her face and Brent Majors is nowhere to be found.

“We gotta go,” she gestures over her shoulder to Jason and his basketball goons rifling through the shelves. You nod, quickly pushing your cart over to the checkout area and getting out of the store as quickly as possible with Steve following behind. Steve bursts through the camper doors helping you throw everything you bought inside and making sure everyone else is back and seated before driving off. You end up parked in a field, all the others split off into groups as you stand alone near the trees, testing out the crossbow. Aiming for the tree branches, you shoot over and over, hitting them perfectly almost every time. Your mind keeps trailing back to Steve. The feel of his lips on yours, all the soft touches from the last few days, what Eddie said earlier. Giving in to your racing thoughts, you head over towards the camper where Steve sits with Robin making Molotov cocktails.

“Can I talk to you?” you ask, Steve’s head shooting up to look at you. He nods right away, turning back to Robin.

“You’ll be alright doing this by yourself, right?” Robin nods and Steve stands, opening the door to the camper for you to step inside. He follows behind you, closing the door and sitting next to you on the bench in the back. You close the curtains, shielding the bright sun from your eyes. “Look, I know that you’re mad about everything and you have every right to be, but please let me explain,” he starts, careful to put some space between you.

“No. Not yet. I have to tell you something first,” you look at him, his soft caramel eyes searching over you.

“Ok, tell me,” he says, nodding his head. So, you do.

After the incident on the floor, something had changed between you and Steve. You weren’t quite dating, or at least no one had explicitly said so, but you also were definitely more than friends. No one really knew what was going on between the two of you, but you sort of liked it that way. It was almost as if it was just you and Steve in your own little world. He had his head resting in your lap, letting you lazily trace your fingers through his hair. There were only two more weeks left before the summer, not that you could tell based on the weather. It was too hot outside to do anything. Even the thought of walking the few feet between Steve’s house and the pool in his backyard made you sweat. So you stayed inside, enjoying the A/C and lounging around. Steve had fallen asleep about ten minutes ago, looking so peaceful and calm in your lap. You lean down, placing a small kiss to his lips, making his eyes shoot open.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake-” you’re cut off by Steve pulling you down for another kiss. This one is deeper, more passionate than the peck you initially gave him. Steve shifts beneath you, sitting up and pulling you to straddle his lap. His kisses are warm and fiery, lighting a heat in you that only his touch could bring. Steve tugs on your shirt and without a second thought you lift it up over your head, revealing your bare chest. His eyes widen at the sight and his shirt comes off next, joining yours where it now lays on the floor. You grind into his lap, chasing the same feeling you had that day on the floor.

“Stevie,” you whimper, his hips snapping up to meet yours. His eyes swim with lust and love, finally about to feel you in a way he’s wanted to for so long. 

“Baby, Honey, I’ve wanted to do this for so long,” his words come out in breathy moans beneath you. Steve’s fingers coming up to play with your nipples. “I don’t wanna rush though. Wanna take my time with you,” he continues thrusting against you and you let out a loud moan.

“I know Stevie, but I need you. Need you so bad right now,” Steve stops grinding up into you, so unbelievably turned on. You sit up, removing your shorts and panties, allowing Steve to do the same. Now you sit, completely naked on your best friend’s lap. A small giggle escapes your lips at the thought, a giggle that Steve returns, feeling the exact same way as you. He pulls you closer to him, cutting off the giggles with his lips against yours. His fingers reach down to your entrance, teasing around the outside before gently dipping in. A gasping moan pulls from your chest as Steve pumps his fingers in and out of you a few times. 

“You’re so wet for me already, baby,” his lips latch onto your neck, relishing in the sound of your moans.

“Stevie, feels so good, but I need you in me,” Steve nods, slipping his fingers from you and taking them in his mouth to suck your juices off. He groans at the taste, popping them from his mouth and lining himself up with your entrance. Steve enters you slowly, sinking you down onto him as you wrap your arms around his neck and press your chest to his. You both moan as he bottoms out, wasting little time before Steve starts to pound into you from below. 

“It’s like you were made for me, fuck,” Steve moans out and you clench around him. He increases his speed, thrusts getting sloppier, but you couldn’t care less. You’re on the edge of your orgasm, about ready to tip over. “Fuck, I love you, Honey,” Steve rushes out, giving one last hard thrust before spilling himself into you. The combo of Steve’s orgasm and his words pushes you to the edge, letting out a gasp of Steve’s name as he pulls you back a little from where you cling to his chest. His eyes watch you as you reach your peak. A whole range of emotions rush through him at the sight, but mainly lust and love.

“I love you too, Stevie,” you finally say when you’ve come down from your high. He pulls you back into him, wrapping you in a tight hug before leaning back to give you a bruising kiss. He’s still buried deep inside you as he dips his head, littering your chest with hickies. You laugh through your moans, pulling him back up after a few bruises bloom in order to kiss his soft lips again. Eventually, Steve lifts you off of him and you whine at the emptiness. He lays you on his bed about to get up to grab a washcloth to clean you up when he stops. He grabs his Polaroid camera from his nightstand, holding it up to you in a question. You give him a nod and he kneels over you on the bed, taking a picture of you in your fucked out state. Your chest littered with hickies, hair a wild mess, and legs spread out with Steve’s cum leaking from between them.

“I’m so saving this for later when you're gone,” he says, shaking the photo when it pops out from the camera.

“You gonna keep it with your stack of Playboys?” You ask teasingly and he’s taken aback.

“What Playboys?” 

“The ones under your mattress,” you pause, leaning up with your elbows. “You know, there’s the one with the picture of a girl in it that kinda looks like me? That page is super sticky by the way, you might want to get a new one,” Steve laughs at you, leaning down to press his body back onto yours.

“I’ve got my new one right here,” he waved the photo over you, leaning in to give you a peck on the lips. 

“So romantic,” you respond through his lips, smiling as he gives you kiss after kiss before hopping up to go towards the bathroom. 

About a week and a half later there were only three days left before the end of the school year. Pushing through the school’s front entrance, you immediately spot Steve at his locker with Tommy and Carol. You were never a big fan of either of them but got along with them fine enough for Steve’s sake. 

“Hey Stevie,” you say, joining them at his locker. His eyes soften when he sees you and he wants nothing more than to kiss you, but he knows Tommy and Carol would tease him for it, so he doesn’t. 

“Hey Honey, was just thinking about you,” Tommy wears a shit eating grin as he speaks and you know that it can’t mean anything good. 

“Really? What a coincidence then,” you reply, trying to get out of this conversation as quickly as possible. It’s then that you see Steve looking at Tommy as inquisitively as you feel.

“Well you see, ever since I saw this little number it’s been hard not to think of you,” Tommy holds up a Polaroid picture in his hand and you don’t even have to look at it to know what the picture is of. You reach out, grabbing the photo as quickly as you can, looking around to make sure no one else saw. “You finally came through, King Steve. After years of talking about getting her in the sack, you finally did. Kinda sucks for her though, seems like she’s developed some feelings for you,” Tommy lifts his hand for a high five and Carol belts out her witch cackle beside him. You back away, tears springing in your eyes when Steve turns to you.

“Honey, I didn’t-” Steve begins, but you don’t hear the rest. You take off down the hall and out the doors, running directly into Jonathan. 

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Jonathan asks, seeing the tears in your eyes. You choke out a sob asking him to take you home. Jonathan’s car is pulling out of the school parking lot when you see Steve burst through the front doors, Tommy and Carol snickering behind him. Jonathan pulls up to your house, making you promise to tell him what happened when you feel better before letting you out of the car. You notice your dad’s car is still in the driveway, which confuses you since he should already be at work. Stepping through the door you hear a small sob coming from your parent’s bedroom. Your heart drops, already knowing what you’ve walked into. Fresh tears form in the corners of your eyes when you see your dad laying with his head pressed against your mom’s chest. He hears your footsteps and lifts his head.

“She’s gone, sweetie. In her sleep last night,” your dad sobs out, snot bubbles and tears spilling onto your mother’s nightgown. And that was it. It was too much. Steve and your mom, both gone all at once. After that day you couldn’t think of Steve without thinking of your mom. So, it just became easier to not think of Steve at all. You avoided him, slinking through the shadows at school. Hiding from the hurt that the memories brought you. Insisting on not seeing him again, not even a glimpse, until that night outside the lab when the world nearly ended for the second time.

Steve’s quiet when you stop talking, processing everything all at once. Taking in the information that you’ve had to sit with for nearly three years, while he’s only known it for about a minute now. 

“I didn’t know,” his voice is quiet, attention directed towards his hands in his lap. You’d both inched closer somehow while you had been explaining. “I mean, I knew your mom died, but not until a year and a half later. Not until Nancy told me. And even then, she didn’t tell me that it happened that day,” Steve’s eyes meet yours, tears brim his lashes, clearly feeling guilty in some capacity.

“We didn’t really have a funeral for her. Didn’t post an obituary either. If we did then that would’ve made it real, I guess. Dad and I couldn’t really handle that. So, we had her cremated and kept her name out of the paper,” your voice is quiet, but calm. You’ve grown with time, learned to live with loss no matter how much it still aches from time to time. Steve clears his throat, one tear slipping down his cheek. You wipe it away gently, moving your hand back down to your lap.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers and you shrug, as if to say ‘it’s not your fault’. “About the photo,” Steve begins, not really sure how to bring it up. “I didn’t give it to Tommy, I swear. I’m pretty sure he found it the weekend before when we had that end of the year party at my house, remember? Him and Carol went up to my room to-” he stops clearly disgusted at the thought. You let out a small laugh at the look on his face, which blooms into a smile at the sound he missed hearing so badly.

“I figured. Well, not at first, but the more I thought about it, the more I knew you never would've done that,” Steve nods, inching the slightest bit closer, hoping you wouldn’t notice. You did.

“And the stuff he said about me that made it sound like I only wanted to sleep with you, that wasn’t true. I loved you, so so much. I still love you, Honey,” he looks worried as the words spill from his lips, but he keeps his gaze locked with yours.

“I figured that out too. I knew you cared too much about me to just want sex and nothing more. We were practically dating at that point anyway,” you stop, knowing Steve was still waiting to see if you’ll say those three little words. Those barriers you’d built up so long ago to keep Steve out, slowly crumbling down. “And I love you too, Stevie,” Steve smiles, at what you said, at your voice, at the nickname, at your cute little overalls, at you. He surges forward, crashing his lips to yours in a kiss that could set off fireworks in the sky, burn down a brand new mall, save a boy from being possessed, fight monsters, and kill an evil wizard from another dimension. It was everything you’ve felt for the last three years and everything else beyond that. Steve pulls back reluctantly, his chest heaving and his hands on your cheeks.

“Eddie,” he breathes out. “You’re with Eddie,” you shake your head and his eyebrows furrow.

“We were just hooking up, but don’t worry, he told me to go for it,” you say, and Steve gives a small nod before pulling you back into another searing kiss. Clothes are stripped in a hurry, Steve’s hand roaming your body. 

“God, I’ve missed you so much,” Steve whimpers, pulling you on top of him, just like before. It’s better than the first time. The two of you are more experienced now since you’ve both slept with other people, but you’re still just as in love, if not more. Steve fits perfectly into you, hitting you just right with every thrust. It doesn’t take long for you to both hit your highs. Coming down in a fit of giggles when a loud knock rattles the door.

“Hey, if you two are done, we’ve got a town to save and a telekinetic to kill,” Robin’s voice filters through the shut door. You share a look with Steve, bursting out into laughter again, getting up to get dressed again. You open the door as Steve sits in the driver's seat. Everyone files in with the weapons and you take the seat across from Steve. He sends you a wink before he takes off, driving away from the field. Max, Lucas, and Erica get dropped off at the Creel house first and Steve continues driving until you get to the woods next to the trailer park. You all go over the plan again, leaving the camper to enter Eddie’s trailer and go into the Upside Down the same way you came out of it no more than 24 hours before. Once you’re all through the gate, everyone goes outside the trailer and Steve stops, giving you, Dustin, and Eddie a lecture about not being heroes. He pulls you to the side so the others can’t hear.

“I still don’t feel good about you staying behind. You should come with us, these two can handle themselves,” Steve looks worried at the prospect of leaving you.

“Are you kidding? They need all the help they can get,” you say, hearing a soft ‘hey’ from Dustin. Ok, so maybe they’re not quite out of earshot.

“It’s just, I just got you back. I don’t want to lose you again.”

“You won’t, Stevie. I promise,” you pull him in by his shirt, kissing him passionately. A few wolf whistles sound off beside you, but you couldn’t care less, flipping them off before you pull away. “Good luck,” you push him back towards Robin and Nancy, the goofy smile on his face from your kiss slowly returning to his more serious expression from before. 

“Make him pay,” Eddie calls out to Steve, who nods in return, giving you one last look and setting off towards the Creel house. You, Dustin, and Eddie make quick work of boarding up the trailer and setting up Eddie’s amp. Eddie starts playing Master of Puppets by Metallica, a song he hasn’t shut up about since it first came out. Eddie’s killing it as you and Dustin both listen along, keeping an eye out for the bats. When they’re close enough, the three of you barricade yourselves in the trailer. It seems to work at first but they start to break through. Dustin jumps through the gate and you’re about to as well when Eddie takes off muttering something about buying more time. 

“Eddie!” you shout following after him as he bursts through the front door, grabbing a bike and peddling away quickly, drawing the bats away from the trailer. You take the crossbow from your back, unloading arrow after arrow into the bats swarming around him. Dustin pops up behind you, swinging his staff at the bats surrounding the two of you, protecting you both while you protect Eddie. A bat knocks Eddie off his bike and others start to swarm around him. You and Dustin creep forward as Eddie stops running away and tries to defend himself. Eddie gets pelted to the ground, a bat taking a bite out of his side before you can shoot it. You take out the others that swarm around Eddie as he keeps trying to smack them away. Suddenly in some kind of miracle they all drop to the ground. Dustin sprints over to Eddie with you close on his heels. He’s still sprawled out on the ground, but not bleeding too badly. 

“I’d offer you my flannel to cover that up, but Stevie beat you to it,” you offer him a hand to sit up which he gladly accepts, placing a hand over the wound with a slight wince.

“It’s not too bad, could be way worse,” he removes his bandanna from his head, pressing it to the wound and standing all the way up. “Is it too late for me to take back what I said about you and Harrington earlier? The sight of you with the crossbow has me all hot and bothered,” you give him a light shove as Dustin gags from beside you.

“Shut up, Munson,” the boys are about to follow you back over the trailer when the ground starts to shake. They both grab onto you, trying not to fall as the ground cracks open, right through the trailer. From then on it’s all a blur. Between Steve, Robin, and Nancy meeting up with you, explaining what happened with Vecna, going back through the gate that now stretched across town, getting Max to the hospital, and finding a better hiding spot for a now patched up Eddie, it all floods together. It isn’t until two days later, when a van with a surfboard on top pulls up in front of Nancy’s house that everything begins to clear up a bit. Out of the van comes Will, Mike, Eleven, Jonathan, and someone else that you don’t know. You wait your turn for Jonathan to hug Nancy before getting over to you. Will’s next, squeezing you tightly and you realize how much he’s grown since you saw him last. El throws her arms around you and your hands find her freshly shaven head. She laughs when you tell her that you’ll figure something out to help her hair grow out faster. Mike approaches you last, enveloping you in his long arms. 

“You know,” you say when he pulls back. “A little birdie told me you’ve got a thing for me. Better not let El find out. I’d hate to see what she’d do to you now that her powers are back,” his smile falls and his face is overcome with anger.

“Dustin!” he shouts, going over to the boy, berating him loudly. You laugh while watching them argue back and forth. Steve comes up next to you, slinging his arm around your shoulder and letting out a chuckle. 

“You had to tease him about it?” Steve smiles over at you and you place a hand on his chest.

“Will looked a little upset and I can guarantee he’s the reason why, so he kinda deserves it,” Steve laughs, rolling his eyes and placing a kiss on your lips. When the reunions are done, you pile into the car with boxes full of donations. You, Steve, Dustin, and Robin enter the high school gym, quickly dropping off the donations and finding places to help out. Robin is making pb&j’s and Dustin is talking to Wayne Munson while you and Steve sort through clothes. You hear Robin talking to a girl at the sandwich station and it all clicks.

“Oh,” you breathe out, Steve’s eyes following yours. “I get it now,” you grab for the shirt Steve is trying, and failing, to fold.

“Get what?” 

“A few days ago at the library. Robin kept going on and on about how you’re not her type and that she’d rather let humans die off than be with you,” you nod your head towards her and the other girl. “I get it now and you definitely aren’t her type.”

“She really said that? Some wing woman she is,” Steve mutters and you chuckle at him, pulling his face towards you to place a soft kiss on his cheek. It’s then that you hear murmurs erupt over by the big windows. You wander over with Steve and Robin close behind you. What looks like snow falls from the sky, but you’ve seen this stuff enough to know it’s not snow. Steve’s hand finds yours, squeezing it tightly in his warm grasp. You look at him and he looks back at you. His expression says all the same things that you're thinking. That whatever’s next, you can make it through. Together. You can do anything as long as you have Steve beside you. Your best friend. Your boyfriend. Your something. Your everything.

[afewproblems]

Warm my Cold and Tired Heart (Part Three)

Part One and Part Two

After that night, it’s as though Eddie has taken it upon himself to ensure that Steve is never alone, he's just always…there?

The kids want ice cream on a random Saturday? Eddie is there to tag along. The kids D&D matches of course go without saying, Eddie had even gone so far as to dust off an old character to join the party and let Will run a campaign for old times sake. 

Robin drops by with the classifieds for the pair of them to peruse, Eddie invites himself along and shows up later with a six pack and a story of his own experience for nearly every type of listing that Robin has circled. 

When Eddie leaves Robin whirls around slapping Steve's arms with wild hands, Steve yelps and raises his own to defend his vulnerable face, "Robin! What the F--"

"You like him!" She hisses in Steve's face, "when were you going to tell me?"

Steve stills, which only seems to fuel Robin's indignation and she tosses her hands in the air above her head and stands up. 

He feels so much smaller as she paces back and forth in front of him, rambling out a list, something to do with music taste, and numbering off her fingers with each point, the words trail off as Steve bends forward with his face in his hands. 

"Robin," he says through his fingers as she walks towards him. She kneels in front of him, peering into his hidden face. 

He can't, saying it out loud, right now, it's too raw, too real. Eddie is too nice…

And Steve? Well, it doesn't matter.

Robin reaches out and gently peels back his hands, keeping hold of them in her small ones. Her eyes linger on his own before she scowls briefly and sighs. 

"Okay, okay dingus," Robin says softly as she squeezes his hands, "but we are going to talk about this". 

It comes out as more of a question which makes Steve grin at the absurdity of it all, he's reduced Robin, wonderful, brash Robin to this quiet uncertain person kneeling in front of him.

And he just can't do that to her. 

Steve takes a deep breath through his mouth and releases it slowly through his nose, it helps with the churning of his stomach and the anxious racing of his heart.

"No, no its okay Rob, we can, I can, talk about it," he hesitates and rubs a hand roughly over his mouth, "not really much to talk about though, it's stupid and it'll go away". 

Robin tilts her head and narrows her eyes at him, "What does that mean?" She asks, as she crosses her arms loosely, her posture seems relaxed but she can't hide the tension in her shoulders.

"It'll go away, I don't, it doesn't matter Robin, really," Steve grits out, "Eddie is just…"

"Just what?" 

Too funny, too sarcastic, a better friend to the kids, a good listener, always knows how to cut the tension with a joke. 

Too good for Steve. Just like everyone else.

"Just a crush Rob, and those don't mean anything okay, maybe it's not even a crush, maybe it's just like," he fits his hands together, intertwining his fingers, the words stop short though as Robin's eyebrow raises.

Steve sighs and shakes his head, "I don't know what to do Robbie," he whispers and something in his tone softens the expression on her face. 

"Well, I can't say how helpful my advice on a 'non-crush' will be," Robin hums, throwing up exaggerated finger quotes as she continues, "but, I've been told I have the potential to be an excellent listener if you just want to talk or vent or whatever".

Steve laughs and reaches out to push her face gently away with his one hand, the other rises to catch her own flailing arms as she squawks and valiantly attempts to defend herself. 

They dissolve into thrown elbows and giggles, Robin fights dirty, pulling the back of Steve's shirt over his head, Steve concedes as they both attempt to catch their breath on the floor of the Harrington living-room.

"Thanks Robbie," Steve mumbles after he removes the edge of his shirt from his head, he ruffles a hand through his staticy locks and grins widely at his best friend. 

Robin smiles back and knocks a gentle fist into his shoulder, "anytime doofus".

Eddie's presence continues unimpeded, Steve both loves and hates it. 

He loves being around Eddie, his energy is infectious and never fails to make Steve smile. 

But, a small vicious voice never fails to creep in, just as an evening ends or they part ways to drop off the kids, a voice that reminds Steve, you don't deserve nice things, nice things never stay nice for long.

It was the Arcade this time around, Eddie offered his van to cart the kids all at once while Jonathan brought Will, El, and Max in the Buyers station wagon. Steve was surprised when the invitation extended to him as well.

“It wouldn’t be the same without you Stevie, plus if Lucas thinks I’m going to be able to help with the hoops shooter then he’s dreamin’,” Eddie says with his trademark dimpled grin, the one that fills Steve’s gut with warmth at the sight, he laughs and knocks into Eddie’s shoulder with his own. 

“Such a hardship, what would you do without me I wonder,” Steve says with a smirk. 

It's easy today, he’d managed to get a good six hours of sleep the night before and Dustin’s mother, Claudia, had even sent Steve home from their last hangout with a green bean casserole - which he’d immediately stuffed into the freezer to make it last longer. Green beans or not, it was a home cooked meal Steve didn’t have to make himself. He tried not to think about the ever expanding empty spaces in his pantry. 

As soon as they pulled into the parking lot the kids tear out of the van, their voices melding with the chorus of laughter and soft top forties mix trailing out from the open doors of the arcade. Steve smiles at the joyful laugh that bursts from Eddie at the kids' antics. It’s nice to hear that laugh more and more Steve finds.

Lucas hangs back at the van watching his friends walk through the doors, he puts his hands in his hoodie pockets and leans back against the vehicle. 

“Lucas, you’re not heading in?” Steve says as he opens the passenger door and steps out, Eddie is not too far behind him as he pulls a cigarette out of his vest pocket and brings a silver zippo to his lips. 

“I’m waiting for Max, she still needs help sometimes getting out of cars,” Lucas says with a shrug, “would’ve been easier if she had just come with us”. The words come out bitter but soft, he crosses his arms and leans back against the van heavily, kicking a rock by his foot with more force than necessary. 

Steve’s eyes dart from Eddie and back to Lucas, the kid can certainly be cagey and hot headed when he wants to be, almost giving Mike a run for his money, but Steve hasn’t seen this side of Lucas in awhile. 

“Well,” Steve says slowly, stepping into Lucas’s space and leaning against the same door of the van, “we definitely didn’t have enough room for all of us to go in Eddie’s van, and I know that Max and El wanted some time to catch up with each other,” he tries to catch Lucas’s eye but his face remains steadfastly pointed towards the ground and the rock the now lay out of reach. 

Steve spots the Buyers car heading down the road, closer and closer towards the parking lot, he tilts his head towards the oncoming car, “You have about thirty seconds to decide if you want to be a shit about it, or if you want to spend a nice day with your girlfriend”. 

Lucas rolls his eyes and throws his shoulders away from the van, his face twists into a fierce glare at Steve, “I’m not being a shit,” he snarls, his fingers curling into fists.

Steve raises his hands in front of him, palms up, “Lucas, relax, you can be mad but you can’t take it out on other people, so fifteen seconds, what’s it gonna be?”

All at once the fight drains out of the kid, his shoulders droop as though the taught strings holding him up have been severed. He nods, his head bowed, refusing to make eye contact. 

Steve sighs, he runs a hand through his hair and quick as a whip uses his pointer finger to poke Lucas’s chest before bringing the same finger up to catch his nose, the action startles a laugh out of the kid.

“Better?” Steve says quietly as Jonathan pulls into the space across from them, El waves from the backseat with a jubilant expression on her face, Will smiles through the windshield and waves as well, although it's a more sedate wave than his sister. Jonathan gets out of the car and heads to the back to open the door for Max on the driver's side.

“Thanks Steve,” Lucas says quietly as he takes off to help Jonathan with Max. The doctors said she would not need crutches or a wheelchair long term but she still has a long road to recovery ahead of her mobility and the loss of ninety percent of her vision. Max needed as many people in her corner as she could get. 

“You’re really good with them,” a voice in his ear says lightly, he jumps at the sudden proximity of Eddie at his shoulder, “handled that like a champ man”.

Steve shrugs and turns away from the others. Eddie drops the nearly finished cigarette and snuffs out the faint embers with his shoe; the smell of smoke curls around him like a cat, clinging to his wild hair and the jean fabric of his vest. It isn’t necessarily even a nice smell, but it’s synonymous with Eddie, and Steve can’t help but breathe in deeply when Eddie steps back into his space. 

“Nah, that was easy, you want a real challenge you should try getting Mike to agree to anything you say,” Steve huffed with a small laugh, “you could tell him that the the sky was an amazing shade of blue and he’d be over here insisting it was actually purple and you were a moron”.

Eddie cackles and swings an arm out to wrap around Steve’s shoulder in a tight side hug that leaves him breathless, a bubble of nervous laughter rolls out of Steve, he can feel his ears and cheeks slowly heat at the sudden touch. 

“You’re hiding a genuine sense of humour under all that hair Stevie,” Eddie says as he reaches up to card the fingers of his free hand through Steve’s hair. 

The flush running over Steve’s ears and cheeks lights a trail of pink down his neck towards his chest, this was…new?

Eddie had certainly been physical before, from high fives, to play-fighting with Dustin, to doling out hugs after he had finally woken up at the hospital; but this was different. His hands were one of the more expressive parts of Eddie, he gestured wildly as he spoke, letting the frenetic energy ping from limb to limb when he was particularly excited about something. 

They were small events, something that wouldn’t even register if Robin or even Dustin had done it, a hand on the small of his back, fingers in his hair --well maybe Steve would be hard pressed to let either of those two touch his hair like that but…this was Eddie.

“Hey,” he squawks, batting Eddie’s hands away and ducking his face to hide the flames that have seemingly engulfed his entire being as Jonathan and the kids make their way closer to the pair of them, “I’m plenty funny, my wit is just wasted on the plebeians around me most of the time”. 

“Plebeian? Don’t hurt yourself there Harrington, don’t you usually work within a two syllable maximum?” Eddie crows with a smirk, his brown eyes crinkle at the corners as the dimples reveal themselves, he ducks away from the shove Steve sends his way. 

“Shut up, I know lots of words,” Steve grumbles, stuffing his hands into his pockets.

“Yeah like, You-Are-A-Dork,” Max calls out, counting off on each finger with a shit-eating grin. The kids and Jonathan walk slowly to give Max just a bit more time to catch up with the crutches. Lucas walks beside and just ahead of her, looking ready to catch her each time her feet catch on a loose rock on the asphalt. 

“Everybody’s against me,” Steve huffs as Eddie cackles and Jonathan grins with an exasperated shake of his head.

El waves at something behind them and takes off, skipping across the parking lot, Mike appears at the main entrance hollering at everyone to ‘hurry-the-hell-up!’ or the best games would be taken.

Steve rolls his eyes.

They were at the arcade…on a Saturday…and with it being one of the few places on mainstreet that had suffered minimal damage during the near-apocalypse - the place was always packed.

Will jogs ahead as well, though he stops momentarily to wait for Lucas and Max. 

“Oh you heard him,” Max grumbles, she adjusts the crutches under her armpits and swings them forward to continue, “All the best games will be gone, well that would just be the worst thing that could ever happen to us. Oh wait”. 

Lucas and Will laugh as the three of them follow after El and Mike, disappearing through the doors.

“I don’t know how someone so small can be so sarcastic,” Jonathan says, the words soft and smooth as he leans in conspiratorially, “your turn Harrington”. 

Steve snorts and tries to ignore the knot of anxiety that tightens in his chest. Things have been okay with Jonathan --they aren’t unfriendly with each other, especially now after everything they’ve all been through, but they aren’t exactly close. 

It was certainly better than getting his face smashed in though, he’d take awkward small talk over a back alley brawl any day. 

“Buyers,” Eddie says, lifting his hand into a high five that Jonathan slowly returns, a bewildered expression on his face, “taking over as chauffeur for Stevie over here?”

Eddie brings an arm around Steve’s neck, tilting his whole torso down and throwing him off balance with the sudden change. Steve barks out a laugh that sounds vaguely like a yelp and grins widely as he is pulled closer into Eddie - nearly tucked into his side. 

The fading cigarette smoke clings to Eddie’s hair and denim vest, it mingles with something spicy that makes Steve want to pull closer and shove his nose behind Eddie’s ear.

“Yeah, uh it's fine,” Jonathan says, the words are mild but the tone is strange, Steve freezes and shifts to stand up straight, mourning the loss of warmth from Eddie’s arm as it drops to let him go easily.

“I just have a shift tonight,”Jonathan continues, clearing his throat as he speaks, “so as long as you guys are still okay to hang with the kids for their game, my mom’s working and Hopper’s going out with Callahan tonight so,” his eyes move from Steve’s face to Eddie’s and back again, a small furrow grows between his brows as he scans Steve a second time. 

“Hey, Harrington and I got it, don’t we big boy?” Eddie says with a wolfish grin, knocking his shoulder into Steve's own. 

Steve freezes at the words, just like the first time, and fights the wild grin that itches to spread over his face.

Jonathan's eyes narrow slightly, flicking back and forth between Steve and Eddie. They linger on Steve for a moment before he shrugs, dropping his hands into his jeans jacket pockets.

"That's fine with me," Jonathan hums in his soft voice, "I mean between the two of you I'm sure they'll survive," Jonathan laughs as Eddie squawks and claps a hand to his own chest, the picture of indignation.

"How dare you Byers," Eddie hisses as he steps away and places his other hand against his forehead, "I can't believe this, are we going to take that Stevie?" Eddie says, pitching his voice in mock despair.

Before he can stop it, a thought blooms in his mind, spreading like ink through water.

'Oh…I love you,' 

It's different than what he had felt for Nancy, than what he had felt for Robin, it's softer than before. Like the embers from a fire warming him from within. It should be scary, but it's not.

For the first time in awhile Steve feels comfortable.

"No way man," Steve says with a wry smile, "between the two of us, we can keep them alive until Max and El change their minds and then, we're done for." 

Jonathan laughs brightly and taps his finger against his nose, Eddie huffs but he's still smiling broadly. 

They can handle tonight. 

***

Steve ascends the stairs from the basement two at a time, balancing empty cans of pop from the kids' latest D&D session in his arms, he smiles lightly at the chorus of laughter that trails after him and pushes the door to the main floor open. 

Warm light hits his face as he crosses the living room of the Byers-Hopper temporary household, he steps deliberately into the plush high-pile area rug and wiggles his toes into the fibres for just a moment, everything about this home screams comfort, softness - it’s everything his own empty staged house isn’t. The pillows are mismatched and nearing threadbare, the recliner in the corner, covered in corduroy patches and a permanent divot in the middle where Hopper spends his evenings with Joyce and the kids. 

This is home, this is safe. 

Steve sighs and continues towards the closed door of the kitchen before hushed voices catch his attention, through the serving hatch two voices trickle into the living room alongside the brighter white fluorescent light that pools on the carpeted floor and his socked feet. 

“I’m just saying--”

“I got it Buyers, ‘be careful’”

Eddie’s voice takes on a syrupy quality, fake and condescending to Jonathan, Steve frowns, the elder Buyers must have been back early from his shift at the pizza place on the far side of town.

“I mean it Munson, just be careful with Steve, I’ve seen the way he’s been looking at you--”

“Jesus,” Eddie growls, the syrup in his tone dissipates with the sudden heat flooding his words, “I got it under control, relax man.”

Steve swallows, not daring to breathe, why would Eddie need to be careful around him? Why would Jonathan be warning Eddie about him, weren’t they past all that?

Granted, it's always easier for the person who made the mistakes to want to move on from them, put a bandaid on and pretend everything is normal, of course Jonathan isn’t over it. 

How could he be, it wasn’t as though they had ever really talked about it, the cruel words that Steve had thrown in his face, the rumours fueled by anger and hurt that he had spread with the help of Tommy and Carol.

Steve thinks of Jonathan and Will now, how Jon had given the kid a quick hug earlier in the afternoon before he had left for work, how he had let one arm travel up so he could cup Will’s head to quickly ruffle his hair - but this had distracted Will for long enough to give him one last squeeze. 

If there was something in his life that Steve wished he could undue, that he could take back, it would be the rumour that Jonathan had killed Will himself. 

Jonathan was right. 

He was right to warn Eddie, to let him know about who Steve really was, what he was capable of. 

Steve swallows past the lump that begins to solidify in his throat. He stands for just a moment longer, still awkwardly holding the empty cans he collected from the kids. He breathes in once, twice, before turning on his heel and heading for the front door. 

Jonathan was home now, as was Eddie, it wasn’t as though the kids would be alone at this point. 

Steve knows Joyce will be annoyed with him for leaving, especially without saying goodbye to her or the kids, but he just can’t be in there anymore. Not where he doesn’t belong.

Steve unlatches the front door and lets it close behind him with a soft snick. He places the cans gently on the step, behind the pillar so the wind wouldn’t take the empty aluminium and toss them around the yard, and that’s when he remembers.

“Of-fucking-course,” he hisses with a shudder, they had all come with Eddie. Steve’s car had been left with Wayne two days earlier, having finally been convinced by Robin and Eddie to let him take a look at it. 

Leaving him effectively stranded, useless, without wheels. 

Steve shiveres as a particularly rough wind tears over the gravel driveway, a hint of moisture in the cool spring breeze threatens as droplets hit sporadically across his face and the thin grey bomber jacket he left the house in earlier that day. 

Steve turns back to the house for a moment, soft light streams through the gaps in the curtains illuminating half of his face in the dark of their driveway. 

 He turns and walks down the remaining length of the driveway until the last sliver of light illuminating his figure disappears, allowing him to be swallowed by the shadowy lane. 

Steve zips up his jacket, letting the zipper nearly pinch the skin of his neck in his haste to shut out the cold. He reaches up to cup his ears, cursing the wind as it picks up around him. Steve hadn’t bothered with a hat earlier, content to ride in the warmth of Eddie’s van with the kids, listening to their excited buzz around Will and his new adventure he had planned with Eddie’s advice. 

It was better this way, he should have stuck to what he knew, hung back more rather than let himself be coddled and sucked into this strange family he had found himself in. 

He’d let himself forget, allowed himself to want too much and hope. Steve swallowed against the tightening feeling in his throat, he’d still have Robin, and Dustin of course. But this was always a temporary thing, and now that it was over… 

‘Snap out of it,’ he thinks to himself in a voice that sounds, once again, eerily like Robin, ‘a pity party isn’t going to make any of this better. Just go home and go to bed, nothing good ever happens after 11:00PM’. He shakes himself roughly, though it turns into a full body shiver as a biting wind collides with him, sending Steve stumbling into a gravel patch, his shoe slides with the rocks pitching his legs forward and out from under him. 

He careens to the asphalt, turning just in time to let his shoulder hit the ground first rather than his head --he didn’t need another concussion on top of everything else. 

“Fuck,” Steve breathes out, the lump in his throat pulls on the single syllable, drawing it out into a moan. 

Headlights from an oncoming truck on the other side of the highway illuminate his position on the road, Steve manages to roll to his knees, grimacing at the pinch of gravel that stick to his jeans and hands as he tries to stand. His ankle throbs, as does his shoulder from the impact.

“Harrington? Steve?” a familiar voice calls out, the car turns out to be Hopper’s pickup, the voice belongs to Hopper.

Hopper, who has exited the vehicle and approaches Steve from the side, slowly as one would a wild animal. 

“You hurt kid?” Hopper asks, in a voice Steve would never have associated with the gruff man in a million years - and certainly not directed his way, it’s soft and gentle -- his El voice, his Will voice, Joyce calls it.. 

“No,” Steve mumbles brushing off his pants, releasing the dust and gravel that remained from his fall, “I’m good Hop,” 

Hopper looks down the road, down in the direction of the Buyers house before he turns his attention back to Steve, his blue eyes scanning his face reminding Steve of just who he was talking to.

“Yeah,” Hopper sighs out, his moustache twitches as he quirks his mouth to the side, “normally I don’t appreciate someone lying to my face like that, but I think I’ll let it go for tonight, you look like you need a bit of a break, huh kid?” 

Steve lowers his gaze to the ground before shrugging, he shoves his hands into his pockets and keeps his mouth firmly shut. 

Hopper sighs again, for a moment Steve thinks he’ll turn around entirely, get back into the car and leave him there.

“Get in the truck Steve,” Hopper grunts at him as he steps forward to offer a large hand for Steve to take. 

He grabs it reluctantly and slowly gets to his feet with a small hiss of pain, his ankle protests slightly from the strain.

Steve limps over to the passenger door, waving off Hopper as he tries to walk him around the vehicle, he's certainly had worse than road rash, this is nothing.

It's tense inside the vehicle as Steve shuts the door and buckles himself in, he brushes his hands against his dusty jeans and grimaces as additional gravel and grit comes away. 

Hopper keeps glancing at him while Steve stares out the passenger window, his forehead placed against the cool glass.

“So," Hopper says after clearing his throat abruptly, "you wanna tell me why you left the kids early?”

“I didn’t leave them alone," Steve blurts out defensively, as he sits up properly, "Jonathan is there, and so is Eddie--”

“You’re not in trouble Steve, relax, I know you wouldn’t have just left them alone, you’re not that kind of kid".

“Not anymore,” Steve mutters quietly. He can feel eyes on him again but Steve tilts his head away once more to stare resolutely out the window, not daring to make eye contact. 

Hopper turns his gaze back to the road, he seems to chew on the words he wants to say before thinking better of it.

Hopper clears his throat again, “Look, I’m not the best person to talk to about,” he gestures with one hand and a circular motion towards his chest, his other hand remains resolutely on the steering wheel, “feelings or hard shit like that but you know you can come to any one of us about what you’re going through alright?”

“Joyce is better at this,” Hopper says in that soft voice again, “but we’re here kid? I know you’re folks aren’t like that for you but we are, we can be, if you want?”

“It's fine Hop--”

“Is it Steve?" Hopper cuts across him, his voice climbs in volume, "The kids are worried about you, Wayne told us about the house--”

“That's none of your business," Steve hisses, horrified by the traitorous heat and painful sting behind his eyes, "and since when do you guys talk to each other?”

Hopper says nothing for a moment, but his large hands grip the steering wheel with white knuckles and Steve tries not to panic.

“So it's true then?” Hopper grinds out eventually, he shakes his head and Steve's stomach drops as shame curdles in his stomach.

“So what if it is?” 

“Dammit Steve," Hopper shouts, throwing his right hand against the steering wheel with a crack, "Why haven’t you told anyone what is going on with you? What are you going to do if it sells?”

The crack of the hand against the steering wheel is the last straw, Steve grapples with his seatbelt buckle and pulls at the fabric running across his chest, it's too much.

“Let me out," Steve says harshly, "I’ll walk the rest of the way".

“What? No, what is the matter with you," Hopper's voice climbs even higher, "I’m trying to--”

But Steve isn’t listening any more, his heart pounds to the words, ‘Get-Out, Get-Out’, that resonate over and over inside his head, he unbuckles himself clumsily and flings open the door before jumping out. 

Hopper, realizing what is happening, slows down just enough that the impact Steve's feet make against the pavement does nothing to slow his movement as he takes off down the residential road, once again putting his track skills to the test. 

Steve ignores Hopper's voice as he throws himself down the sidewalk, one foot in front of the other, running like the devil and the gaping maw of Hell are hot on his heels. 

Steve doesn’t look back.

He had never really liked the track team, or the sport that much, swimming and basketball had been easier to get into, easier to lose himself in the movement or the plays the coach would give them.

But track, running, always left his mind to wander, and that was never a good thing. 

It was too much, the house, the nightmares, the kids were pulling away, Robin was busy with her own life, Nancy and Jonathan had come back together like nothing had ever happened, Eddie had healed and put himself back together so easily. 

And Steve was stuck. In danger of being left behind if he wasn’t careful. It would happen again, just like his parents had abandoned him there in Hawkins, these people he had come to think of as family, would eventually leave him too. 

There are tears pouring down his face by the time he stumbles home, his lungs burn and the ankle he had most certainly twisted could no longer support his full weight. He limps the rest of the way, nearly collapsing up the steps to his front door.

Steve pulls his keys out of his back pants pocket with shaking hands and bites down a sharp breath that catches wetly against his tongue. He runs his hand over his face, under his nose from his knuckle to the crook of his arm to catch all the snot and tears that had gathered there, pitiful, gross, get it together Harrington, he thinks lowly. 

He shoves the key into the lock roughly and steps into the entryway before closing the door behind him and locking the deadbolt. 

As the door closes, it’s as though the other shoe finally drops. The deadbolt slides into place, sealing the entryway behind him, and Steve Harrington falls apart.

Part Four - Final Part Up!

[steddilly]

established steddie, my love 🥰

[mrspasser]

Steddie Big Bang 2023

Behold: my fic for the Steddie Big Bang 2023!!

Home is where your heart is

Just shy over 80k, this baby took a lot of effort to get out into the world. Luckily I had @roomwithanopenfire to cheer me on. Thank you!! And of course there's @themeanderingty with their unique artwork. It's amazing to see my words translated into a visual image!

This was my first time participating in a Big Bang. It was a lot of fun to work with a team (thanks again!!!). It was a great experience, even though having a deadline is in no way benificial to my creative process.

Art by @themeanderingty Get a better look at the artwork on A03.

Some fic goodies are waiting for you underneath the line!

I have some fun fic related stuff to share:

These gems of knit sweaters (featured in the fic!) are from the 1986 British pattern book 'Wit Knits'. There are so many amazing sweaters in this book, I didn't even pick the most outrageous ones! Also, I very much want someone to knit the one with the bookworm for me, or the sweater vest with the frog. You can find the sweaters in the fic in the third chapter. They're a Christmas present ;-)

And these are some of the songs that play a part in the fic:

[resident-bowie-bitch]

just posted the seventh chapter of Soccer Dads if you'd like to read :)

Sometimes as a single parent, you gotta look out for other single parents. But sometimes Steve and Eddie look out just a little more than usual.

[candied-cae]

The First "Like" and First "Love"

Chapter 1/1 - - - Read it on AO3

Word Count : 2,250

Summary: When the end of the world is over and everyone can feel alive and like themselves again, Steve and Eddie drift together to find something all their own. 

... Aka, the first time Steve tells Eddie "I like you" and the first time Eddie tells Steve "I love you".

More ST Fics -----------------------------------------------------

It started with Steve and Eddie hanging out, as so much often did those days.

The two of them gravitated to each other after it was all over. Between matching scars and babysitting shifts, they found themselves having more in common than just surviving the Upside Down. Steve talked to Eddie, and Eddie talked to Steve. Whenever they did that, it was like they made their own little bubble. Just a little pocket of air in the world they shared. Of course, if the group was present, they’d quickly find something thrown at them for ignoring their kids and friends.

“Rude!” they’d call the two for not sharing the attention.

So they started to find those little pockets on their own sometimes. Late nights were spent in either's house. Sitting together after movie credits rolled, neither bothering to get up and change the tape or ask if someone needed to leave. They never seemed to want to head off anyway. So, as the night dragged on, they'd talk. Form those little bubbles of just themselves in between hits of weed and the kind of talkative that only comes when they were too tired to keep their mouths shut. Honesty spilling out unabashed under the cover of starlight.

Vulnerability and self-discovery went hand in hand on nights like those.

It was the end of one of those very nights when Steve suggested they get out of the house. It was nearing three in the morning, middle of June, so the sun wasn’t up yet, but it would be in a matter of time. And for some inexplicable reason, Steve just wanted to be outside for the sunrise.

“Where should we go?” Eddie asked, his voice starting to go rough after hours of after-joint conversations, which they couldn’t interrupt for something as silly as getting something to drink.

“Somewhere quiet.” Steve suggested, head lazily lolling on the couch,” Somewhere pretty.”

He was being vague and unhelpful; he knew he was. But almost every place he knew in Hawkins was either tainted with memories of fighting for his life or had absolutely no view to watch the sun. He had no clue where he wanted to take them. Steve just wanted to get Eddie there and be by his side when the world changed.

“I might know a spot like that,” Eddie answered anyway, a smile tugging at his cheek in the sneaky way he liked to wear it as he reached for his keys.

They climbed into Eddie’s van, and he took them away. Steve just closed his eyes and hung his head out of the rolled-down passenger window, letting the wind play with his hair as they made their way to… somewhere. They ended up arriving at this hill off the highway on the edge of town. Eddie parked them off the shoulder and waved Steve to follow him as they went over the mound, settling on the other side that faced east. The grassy pile completely separated them from the road and pointed them right at the sight to come. The sky was already brightening, becoming that baby blue it does when the sun has almost breached the horizon.

It was quiet. It was pretty. It was perfect.

It overlooked this little glade that was bustling with colorful wildflowers and weeds. All sorts of beauty just sitting in this bypassed patch in Smalltown, Indiana. And it was just theirs. There was no other sound, no other distraction. No one else was up, or if they were, they weren’t driving on the highway yet. It was like the whole world had faded into the background, and it was just the two of them. Together. Waiting.

They waited in comfortable silence, laid down but propped up against their arms as the sky started gleaming with yellow. ‘The Golden Hour’ Steve recalls this moment is supposed to be. Or at least, that’s what people like Jonathan called it. Something about the way the light reflected or the angles or the color or something about it was just supposed to make for the best pictures for portraits. Makes people look that much nicer, he supposed.

He’s never thought much of it himself. Dawn, for him, always meant things like driving to early morning swim practices or the end of all-nighters spent defeating monsters or coming off of ragers. But when he looks to his left and sees Eddie. Sees the way the sun is lighting him up against the breathtaking backdrop… he gets it.

And suddenly, it's all he can do. Just look at Eddie. There wasn't any other option his mind could conjure. And he felt this pull he’d been feeling before. This tug to get closer. This need to be more. To be more than Eddie’s friend, a feeling he barely diagnosed himself and knows could overtake him.

But it's all he can think about.

“Golden Hour,” he let the words absentmindedly slip from his lips as he gazed upon the other man's profile.

Eddie heard the mumble without catching the words, so he followed the sound to look back over at Steve.

And Steve almost felt bad. He almost had the decency to be embarrassed to be caught staring. He almost regretted letting the words out to expose him.

But now Eddie’s looking at him and not the sun. Now he got to see those deep brown eyes looking back at him while Eddie’s face was glazed with that magical morning glow. And he can’t bring himself to be anything but happy his thoughtless mutter brought Eddie’s attention to him.

"What's up? I got something on my face?" Eddie asked him, rubbing a hand across his cheeks and chin.

"I like you."

Steve said it quickly, like ripping off a bandaid. Like he couldn't stand another minute not saying it. Because he really couldn’t.

"Like, I really like you.” They’ve just been lounging on a hill for the last hour, but even so, he said it breathless and urgent with veins pumping with adrenaline,” And it doesn’t make any sense, because, look at us. There's no reason we should've even talked long enough to get to know each other. But we did. And now we spend time together like we're the only people in the world. And when we aren't alone, you know and care about all the people I can’t imagine living without. And you’re so fun and exciting, while also finding ways to be warm and kind. And you know what I’ve been through, my past, and I know yours. And you challenge me to be a better person without making me feel guilty for taking so long to figure it out. And you do all these incredible things like they just make sense, like they are all that makes sense to you. And now, I can't stop myself from thinking, every time we're together, how much better it'd be if I could pull you in and-"

Eddie ended his runaway words with his hands, one on Steve's cheek, the other at the base of his neck.

It was everything he’d ever wanted to hear from Steve. His own longing returned. And it wasn’t just a passing interest, it was a real confession. Dripping with praise and adorn and meaning in every word. It meant something to Steve. Eddie meant something to Steve.

"Shut up and kiss me already," Eddie said, voice near begging as they looked at just each other, sunrise forgotten.

And before Eddie could wish for anything more, Steve was quick to comply with the request as they bathed in sunlight and summer air and shared their first kiss.

-

Then they were dating. They’d been dating for a while, announcements to their friends and begrudging support while they all grappled with how annoying the two would be about it. It was fun being annoying as boyfriends. It was fun doing anything as boyfriends.

Now, it’s important to note that Eddie’s never figured himself impulsive.

Not really.

He enjoyed the methodical planning and thought he could put into something before presenting it to someone's bated attention. The work and time invested to make something truly spectacular… it was intoxicating to make all the effort worth it. He loved practicing a kind of faux-impulsivity too. Like slipping on an outfit that said he was some wild thing, one who lived his life at the behest of passion without reason. To curate the story. The one that said he was a freak, just like everyone expected him to be. But it was all carefully, strategically planned.

There was just so much beauty in the attention spent to do something right.

So much power in the intention put in so it was perfect before it was seen.

Even when it came to Steve, he loved the planning part of being a boyfriend. Spent his alone time brainstorming date ideas, writing love notes and songs, preparing surprises, and practicing flirtatious lines. All of it. Plotting something to sweep Steve off his feet was half the fun of doing it.

All this to say that he always figured he'd do something big and dramatic the first time he said 'I love you'. Grand gestures, the size of plot points in love-sick movies kind of dramatic. Like maybe he'd say it at a holiday party or on an anniversary to make it public and showy on a special occasion, or he could fill a house they shared with roses and candlelight and whatever romantic idols he deemed worthy in a few years to make it private and intimate. He figured it'd be something like that.

Because, well, he always figured he'd need a few years to feel ready to say it.

He could wax on about how handsome Steve is, how dedicated, how kind, selfless, caring, strong, and just about every other good word there was. He could do those things, spend days regaling to Steve how amazing he finds him, how enraptured he is. And yet, he never figured it’d be easy to say ‘I love you’. He’d never said it before, aside from Wayne when Eddie felt particularly softhearted. But that was a different kind of love, he knew. Eddie never had someone right enough to say this kind of love to. So, surely he’d need a lot of time to build to it, to really understand something so new, to declare it was love.

But, in opposition to everything he figured about himself... one night, Eddie was just bursting with the need to say it.

They sat slumped together under a shared blanket. Steve was all spread out on the couch where Eddie laid mostly beside him but a little on top of him, held in his arms while he rested his head on Steve's (sadly covered) chest. His ear was planted right over Steve's heart, hearing the slow thumping that told Eddie how comfortable they both were. No fears between them. But Eddie's pulse started to pace, and it had nothing to do with the movie on the screen.

"Steve," Eddie called for him as he lifted his head.

His boyfriend looked back at him, patiently waiting for the rest of what he had to say while a woman on the tv screen started crying those pretty movie star tears over something Eddie didn’t bother to pick up.

In the space between the words, Eddie's brain reminded him that they'd only been together a few months. That it’s still too soon to say such a thing. That he doesn’t want to scare Steve off because he’s just feeling too much. But then his heart reminded him how he felt, and he couldn't bring himself to care less about how little time they’ve shared so far.

"I love you.” He said,” I know it's a lot and we haven't even-"

"Really?" Steve asked him, his hands clutched around Eddie tighter now, eyes wide and... scared.

Eddie just nodded his head," Yeah."

"Say it again."

"What?"

"Please."

But Steve’s voice didn't sound commanding. It was begging. His eyes grew misty and such a sight threatened to break Eddie's heart.

"I love you." He repeated, taking Steve's hand in his own and lifting it to his lips to press a kiss into his knuckles.

And Steve cried.

He curled up into Eddie and cried tears full of both joy and fear. He remembered the days long past when Nancy said she loved him and the days that followed when she said it was all a lie. Steve had been afraid for a long time that no one would love him. Or that maybe no one could.

And then Eddie goes and says it.

Like it’s nothing. Like it’s meant to be and makes sense. Like it’s easy.

And even though Steve’s scared, even though he is crying all over this milestone in their relationship, Eddie’s there. With his arms around Steve now, fingers running through his hair and saying nothing. Just letting Steve feel all the things he needs to feel without judgment. And Steve stopped worrying that it could be another lie.

When Steve ran out of tears, he pulled back. Looked up at Eddie with puffy eyes and pink cheeks. And he sighed a deep, feeling everything kind of sigh. Then he reached up to grab Eddie’s face, and just before he planted a kiss on his lips, Steve whispered back,” I love you, too.”

And it was the truth.

They loved each other.

What a beautiful thing to share.

[maelialuv]

oh my god. can i pretty please get a part two to Call It What You Want (steve harrington)? steve fails to disregard his feelings towards the reader after sleeping together, but how long can he go until he breaks after seeing she’s completely neglected his existence. smut! (rough sex, but very passionate cause why not lol, perv!steve, jealous!steve and pls add anything if you’d like! thank you love :’)

So It Goes, Steve Harrington .

(part two to Call It What You Want)

Sumarry: Hooking up with your old bully was never on the cards. But Steve Harrington has a habit of getting in the way of plans.

Warnings: SMUT! this is FILTHY! slowburn! breeding kink! perv!steve (a teeny bit), angst! steve is hopeless with women, fluffy ending <3

Word count: 9.5K (ohmygod)

It had been one week since you'd done it. One week since you'd done the most reckless thing in your whole life. Seven days since you'd lost your head and slept with your old bully. Seven days since you'd slept with your, supposed, best friend's ex-boyfriend. Just seven days since you'd slept with Steve Harrington, King of Hawkins High.

The morning after replayed in your mind like a broken tape, in torturous clarity thanks to not having a hangover. The way you ran from the Harrington residence played behind your eyes without end. The walk home, unkindly long and silent with nothing but your thoughts - memories of him, and the way he touched you- to keep you company. The way you ran to your bathroom, stripping down and tossing his clothes in your hamper as if they were toxic waste, and the way you scrubbed your body in the shower as if the soap would somehow remove the feeling of his hands on you from your head. You didn't know if you were more disgusted with yourself for doing it. or for the fact that somewhere inside, you wanted it to happen again.

You felt different, like someone else, as you got ready in the mirror each day that proceeded the party. Felt guilty as you looked at the arch of your neck, the feeling of Steve’s lips there still as strong as they were that night. You felt a pit in your stomach as you looked at your nose, remembering the way Steve had placed a delicate kiss there , feather light, as he washed your skin in the shower. You now saw yourself as a reckless idiot, driven by some unknown desire for what? Closure? Or was it power that your subconscious so desperately wanted?

You only hoped your mindless scrubbing in the shower, skin red as you zoned out, would tell you the answers. You found no solace in the space between the tiles, only lime build up.

You wouldn't tell a soul. Your parents were none the wiser, as were your friends, to the battle your brain was at with your heart.

An aggression had settled over you, a dark looming cloud any time he was mentioned. You became snippy, unjustifiably short. Chrissy assumed you were pissed off about the party, still reeling from the belittling interaction with Carol and Tommy, as well as Steve.

She had apologised relentlessly in the days following. On and on, despite your reassurance, Chrissy swore she would never let "the redheaded witch and her flying monkey" talk to to you ever again.

The week had gone that way, Chrissy sending you an apologetic glance any time Harrington, the party or anything relating to them was mentioned. You felt guilty that she felt guilty, but you could never tell her what happened. You already felt like a massive hypocrite, you couldn't bear to have another person know it too.

You'd been stood by your locker, thankful for the lack of a certain basketball player in the halls, having had been able to avoid him for the full school week, when Chrissy bounded over to you. Without a word, she grabbed your hand and - with surprising strength- dragged you into the nearest bathroom.

"Did you hear?" she said, voice a mix of shock and curiosity. Immediately paranoia spread over you like hives, certain that Chrissy was doing damage control. "Steve and Nancy broke up at the party on Saturday." Her voice was even, no hint of suspicion or knowledge or anything, or anyone, that you had done.

"Woah," you said, hoping only you heard the waver in your voice as you tried your best to keep your face void of guilt, "what happened?" you asked, knowing that any account you heard would never be as accurate to the front row seat you had to the argument.

You hardly heard Chrissy as she spoke, her animated words falling on deaf ears as you realised that nearly every person was going to be talking about Nancy and Steve. The It Couple, King and Queen of the school, had fallen apart. Every girl was going to be fawning over Steve again- not that Nancy had stopped them, now they would be more overt- and Nancy would be the One that Got Away. You felt angry when Chrissy mention there were whispers that Steve was holed up in his house, heartbroken over the split. You felt even worse when she told you that Nancy was already dealing with a rehash of last years cheating rumours.

Nancy had to hold you back from ripping Steve's head off last fall over the, now, infamous 'Nancy 'The Slut' Wheeler' graffiti.

This wasn't part of your plan. You'd made such good friends, come out of your shell, cemented yourself as a somebody. Nancy was happy, you were happy and everything was fine just the way it was.

And Steve Harrington was messing it all up.

Your first classes went by in blurry seconds, your attention focused on the cracks in your desk or the clouds outside as you thought about the whole nuclear explosion of a situation. You wished you'd never agreed to go to the stupid party. You wished you'd just shrugged out of Harrington's grip and run downstairs and gone home. You wished you hadn't kissed Steve back when he leaned in, wished you'd pushed him off instead of tugging him closer.

You wished you could rewind time and not allow him to touch you, make time stop and slap yourself for loving it so much. You hoped you would forget how he made you feel; the white hot burning on your skin as his lips travelled across your stomach, the gentle touch of his hands as he dried your hair and dressed you in his clothes.

You hoped you would forget everything about Steve Harington.

Deciding on a healthy dose of ditching, you made your way out to the school's parking lot, intent on walking home and enjoying the empty house whilst your parents worked.

Then you saw him sat on the hood of his car, a cigarette dangling from his lip as he brushed a frustrated hand through his hair. Your feet felt as though they were glued to the floor as his eyes met yours, unable to move like his gaze willed you to stay there. It was the first time you'd seen him since then. It was only when he raised the carton to you - a peace offering- that you were able to move your limbs and walk over to Steve. He was wearing a blue sweatshirt and jeans, and your mind was cast back to the sweatshirt sitting in your hamper getting buried under clothes like that would make it disappear. When you took a cigarette, Steve held the lighter out and lit it for you. An entirely too flirtatious gesture given the gossipy climate.

"You took off on Sunday," he said, a statement and not a question. His voice was indifferent, but his brows furrowed as he spoke. "Left your clothes behind."

"Yeah, I did." You took long drags, hoping the edge in your voice was a clear enough message to Steve that you didn't need to talk about that. He scooted over on the hood, an invitation to sit. You remained standing, and Steve pursed his lips.

You didn't need to be told to relive the awkwardness you felt when you'd woken up. The way Steve was already awake , tall silhouette in the doorway as he brushed his teeth in the bathroom. The room was suddenly too small, Steve's clothes suddenly suffocating. You heard the shower turn on, sensing time for escape. You'd thrown on your shoes, crept out of the room and booked it out of the Harrington house. Steve had watched as you disappeared down the street from the bathroom window. You'd caught a glimpse of his figure as you threw a nervous glance over your shoulder, fearful of prying eyes seeing you do a walk - or run- of shame from the house.

"Been looking for you, you know." He said, almost shy as he squinted into the sun.

"Not very hard, clearly." you scoffed. When Steve just looked at you, eyes soft, you went on. "Why?"

"Why do you think," it was Steve's turn to laugh, though his was not mocking. It was sincere, too kind. Real. "I want to talk to you."

Knots formed in your stomach, and your brows knit together in a tight line. "What is there to talk about?" you said harshly, feeling a pang of guilt as Steve recoiled, "we slept together, Steve. It happened, cool. End of story." You said, turning to walk away when Steve reached for your elbow.

"Well, hang on there a second," Steve said, stubbing his cigarette out and standing, hands on his hips, "I think there's some stuff to talk about." He looked around, nervous for prying eyes. "Like the fact that that," he said, astounded, "was the best I've ever had." He took a step closer to you. You shrugged him off when he rested a hand on your arm. "There's clearly something between us, here."

You hated to admit it, or agree with him in any way, but Steve was right. You'd had your share of guys, but Steve was unlike any of them. The sex was incredible, as was the chemistry. You'd had to re-live it, in excruciating detail, most nights since the party. But Steve was not a good guy to get involved with, and not someone you could forgive yourself for forgiving. So you remained stand offish, cold, to the boy.

"Sex is sex , Steve, you'll find another 'best' in a month." You dismissed, wishing you'd ignored him and gone straight home. His face was pleading, and it made him look younger, like a lost child looking for their mother. “Look, it was a one time thing. Go back to Tommy and Carol, and forget it ever happened. Got it?”

Steve’s face contorted, a mix of frustration and confusion and a little bit of anger. This wasn’t how it was meant to go. He was meant to find you the day after, be there at your door with a speech prepared about how truly sorry he was for how things went. But he was so taken a back by your escape, the only proof that you had been there being your clothes strewn about across his bedroom floor, that he just sat by his pool staring into space. He was meant to call you, convince you to come over so you could talk it out. But then he couldn’t find your number - and god forbid he call Nancy to get it.

Steve was conflicted. He was heartbroken about his breakup with Nancy. He loved her , or thought he loved her, with everything he had. But this part of him, this nagging part that wouldn’t shut up, was more hurt by you leaving. Upset that he couldn't drive you home or kiss you goodbye or convince you to stay just a little longer. He regretted not saying more in the moment, because maybe then you wouldn't have skipped out on him. If he'd just talked more, maybe stood up for you a little, then perhaps you would have stayed.

"Can we just go somewhere and talk?" he said, eyes pleading and a little desperate. "Please?"

His begging made your stomach churn. You had to get away from him, before whatever magnetic bullshit he had on you went into full effect and you threw yourself into his arms and agreed to hear him out. You stubbed your cigarette out with your shoe.

"I'm going home, Steve."

You hoped that your curtness would deter him. A nagging part of you felt bad, worrying that maybe - just maybe- you should have heard Steve out, that you were robbing yourself of some kind of closure both for your past and for that night. The other, more logical, half felt firm and strong. Finally, finally, it was you making Steve Harrington feel defeated. For once it was him feeling wronged.

You threw his clothes in the laundry when you got home.

It was seven thirty when Chrissy called you, and you were laid back on your bed. Her sudden excitement caught you off guard. "Woah, Chris, slow down," you said, "in English please."

"We're going to a pool party tomorrow!" she all but yelled, and you could imagine her riffling through her dresser for swim suit options. "And before you say no, it's the last pool party of the season before it gets so cold that we have to look like artic explorers for the next three months." There was a clunk, and then Chrissy let out a euphoric squeal. "Found it!"

You rolled over on to your side, twirling the phone cord in your hand as you laughed at your friend. "Okay, okay, I'll go. Who's throwing a pool party this close to Halloween?" you asked, face screwed up at the thought of the late October breeze on bare legs.

"It's Steve Harrington!"

You sat right up in bed, almost dropping the phone off the side of the bed. Of course, of course, he was throwing another party. And of course, you'd already agreed to go. "Oh," was all you could say.

"Look, I know Saturday was pretty intense," Chrissy argued, not realising just how correct her statement was, "but you can just stick with me, and even Eddie is going so he'll be there if you feel the urge to kick Harrington into the pool."

The knowledge that Munson - a long time friend and supplier of party materials for you and Chrissy- would be in attendance made the nausea somewhat subside. But the thought of going back to the Harrington residence, the thought of seeing Steve there again after the way today had gone, made bile rise in your throat. "Okay," you said to Chrissy, knowing you would be able to show your face for twenty minutes before convincing Eddie to let you smoke in the back of his van before getting a ride home, "I'll see you tomorrow."

You fell back on the bed, wishing the mattress would swallow you. It was like you were an alcoholic going into a bar, or rather a masochist for allowing yourself to relive what had caused you significant pain. You didn't even know if you had swimsuit still.

Digging through your dresser, finding sparkly denim from middle school, you thought your search was over. But then, in the very back of the bottom draw, you found your old prized possession.

The red sports illustrated bikini from 10th grade.

You'd bought it as a joke on a hot summer's day in 1983, a mall trip with Nancy on one of the many days you spent together attached at the hip. The poster next to the rack of bikinis had Brooke Shields, posed flirtatiously on a rocky beach, in the red suit. "You should get this for the pool!" Nancy had suggested, picking up the material and holding it to your chest. "It would look amazing!"

Your eyes practically bulged out of your head as you looked at it in Nancy's hands. "Are you kidding?", you exclaimed, holding the flimsy bikini in your hands, "it looks like an eye patch!" You fought with Nancy over it, citing that your mother would have a heart attack if she saw you wearing it. In the end, Nancy bought it for you, told you that you should save it for "knocking boys dead in college." At the time, you agreed with her. Looking back, it was a put down.

Nancy was an expert at the accidental back handed compliment.

Holding the suit in your hands, your senior body much more equipped for the top than your 10th grade self, a sly smirk etched its way on to your lips. You were going to knock the boys dead, after all.

You had arranged with Eddie that he would pick you up the next night at 7:30, parked down the street near the pay phone. The Munson boy called you at 7:25, letting you know he was on the corner of your cul-de-sac, ready to roll. When you walked to his car, Eddie rolled down the passenger side window with a slack jaw. He looked you up and down without shame, eyes wide. You were wearing a pair of denim shorts, the red bikini top and a denim jacket.

"How much for a ride around the block, sweetheart?" he smiled wolfishly, fishing his wallet out of his jeans.

You smacked his shoulder as you buckled your seatbelt, though you knew he was being tame. "Careful , Munson, before my mother hears you from the house." Eddie let out a hysterical chuckle.

"Oh, I think we both know you can drop the innocent act, sweetheart. Let's not forget I've seen you dance on bars after some Special K." He started the engine, music blaring through the speakers. Turning the corner of your street, he looked at you. "You're not fooling anyone."

You hoped you would fool some people, as the ride to Steve's house seemed impossibly shorter than the week prior. You gripped the seat next to you as Eddie found a spot on the street to park. You felt worse than last Saturday, entirely out of your depth and swallowed by nerves. Eddie cut the engine, a worried knit in his brow. "You good?" he asked, waving a hand in front of your eyes.

"Eds," you said, worried waver in your voice. "What...have you got on you now?" You said, eyes speaking the words the nausea prevented you from saying. "I think I need a boost."

The crinkle between his brows deepened. In the years that Eddie had known you - both loner and in your party days- you had never asked him for supplies before a party. There was a small, but concerned, frown on his face. "What's going on man?", he asked, turning completely toward you, "you freaked or something?"

You wracked your brain for any excuse other than the obvious. You'd known Eddie a long time. If anyone was going to let you spew your guts, without judgement, it was Eddie Munson.

"Listen," you started, " I did something really stupid at that party last week. Like, catastrophically stupid." When Eddie stayed silent, you went on. "I'm going to tell you something, and you have to swear you won't tell anyone."

"Who am I gonna tell?" He laughed, cutting himself short when you face hardened. "Okay," he said, "I swear. Girl's Scouts honour."

You told him everything. From the interaction with Carol and Tommy, to hearing Steve and Nancy break up. You told him about the kiss, the bathroom counter.....the shower. You told him how you'd run the next morning, how you'd been so sick from guilt. You told him every last excruciating detail. Eddie's eyes were wide, in an unreadable mix of shock, confusion and almost pride.

"What....the fuck," he whispered, a teasing smile on his face. "That's intense, and I'm not judging, but," he leaned in close, whispering to you. You leaned in as well. "You let Steve Harrington shoot his load in you?"

The way he said it, unforgiving and entirely true - making you realise just how reckless the entire thing was- made you cringe inward, hiding your face in your hands. "Eddie!"

"Hey, no judgement....," he grimaced a little, another laugh causing him to smile, "except maybe a little judgement here, the dude's a tool!" When you continued to hide your face, Eddie pulled a small bag out of his pocket. "Just a little alright? Lord knows I'd need it if I were you."

That's how you ended up doing a few bumps off a Motley Crue CD in the passenger seat of Eddie's van. You were raring to go, the nausea lurking back into its hiding place as you went through the side gate to Steve Harrington's back yard. You called Chrissy's name from the pool steps when you saw her playing chicken with Jason and a few of the other cheerleaders. The moment Chrissy locked eyes with you across the pool, her own jaw went slack.

"HOLY SHIT."

Her exclamation made almost every head turn your way. You'd taken off the jacket, giving Eddie the job of holding your things - which he begrudgingly excepted-, your red bikini top now on full display. Several eyes on you at once, the buzz of Eddie's special K and the continuous thrum of the music made you feel exceedingly alive. What's more, you felt a certain someone staring daggers into the side of your head, having noticed him in the corner of the pool the very second you stepped foot into his back yard. You kept your eyes forward, looking anywhere but at him.

This was a party.

Chrissy jumped off of Jason's shoulders, sending him flailing back into the water as she swam over to you on the side. Hoisting herself up, she enveloped you in a dripping wet hug. "Just where have they been hiding, huh?" she said, eyes darting to your chest and back again. You laughed at her candour, her inability to hide her every thought. "Don't just stand there, come get a drink! Mind if I steal her, Eddie? Promise I'll give her back." She said with a giggle, swaying your connected hands between the two of you.

"She knows where I'll be," he said, placing a hand on your shoulder. "Come find me if you need me, alright?" He said. You smiled at him, thankful that he had been there for you. You felt tons lighter now that someone else knew your secret.

Chrissy dragged you to the make shift bar on a table by the grass, coolers of beer and the notorious punch bowl calling your names. She grabbed you a glass, giving you a generous ladle full of punch that was so strong it had a resemblance to the smell of paint thinner. "So," she said, getting herself a drink, "what's going on with you and Eddie?" You nearly choked at her words.

"Me and Eddie, no way," you said, turning to look at the boy. He was wearing dark swim trunks and his guitar pic necklace. His chest full of tattoos was on full display, earning him the attention of several girls. "There's nothing going on there." Chrissy was watching you intently, the way your eyes travelled down Eddie's toned chest, lingering on the ink closest to his hip bones, pool lights accentuating their v shape. "No way."

"His eyes are up there, babe." She said, giggling as you turned back to her with a face the same colour as the red solo cup in your hand.

Eddie and you had been friends for too long, seen each other in every awkward phase, to be anything more than close friends. Sure, you both found each other attractive. That much was clear from the occasional oggling you each gave each other. You had even kissed once in 9th grade, the memory of said interaction haunting you both so much that any thought of being anything other than each other's friend sent a ghostly shiver up your spines. You'd been denying dating accusations from your mother and Eddie's Uncle Wayne for years. Uncle Wayne still had his suspicions, citing that no two teenagers needed to spend that much time in Eddie's room with a locked door. He just didn't know you were doing Special K and not each other.

"No way," you said again, taking a large swig of your drink, "way too much history there." Beside you, Chrissy smirked. With a quirked brow, she looked from you to the Munson boy, then back to you.

"Whatever you say," she said , tone full of disbelief. She bumped your shoulder with her own, prodding a teasing finger into your still flushed cheeks. "But I've got a radar for these things."

You held back a laugh, self deprecating and and entirely inappropriate, as you thought of how off Chrissy's radar was last weekend, how you and a certain brown eyed boy had completely forgone her so called sixth sense.

The party was in full swing by the time someone suggested a Keg Stand. You were in the pool with Chrissy and the other cheerleaders, laughing as the boys - including Eddie, which made you smile as he'd never gotten along with Jason and the basket ball players- relentlessly splashed you. All the while, you continued to feel a pair of eyes on the back of your head. You hadn't spared him a glance , enjoying the water and the company and the drinks without the reminder of the pit in your stomach. A circle was gathering round the edges of the pool as Tommy was picking his contenders for the Keg Stand, always too much of a coward to attempt and embarrass himself. "Jason, my man! Come on, show us how its done!"

Jason rolled his eyes at Tommy's antics. "I don't know man, someone's gotta be a designated driver."

"Come on, don't be such a pussy, Jase."

A serge of confidence - maybe down to the heat of the moment, or maybe the two bumps in Eddie's van- made you raise a high hand.

"I'll do it. I'm not driving." You were already hoisting yourself over the edge of the pool as Tommy stuttered over his words, trying to find a reason to say no, or a way to put you down. It was every guys fantasy - a girl in a dripping wet bikini on a keg. You may as well have been the sports illustrated cover you bought the swimsuit from.

"Alright, then. Steve!" Tommy called, and a cold jolt rain through you, "we found you a competitor!"

You felt him stand next to you, felt the heat of his body radiating toward you. You didn't dare look at him. An awkwardness threatened the air, looming. You risked a word.

"May the best man win."

You were hoisted up on to your keg by Jason, the rest of the basketball players gathered round and cheering you on. Steve was thrown on by Tommy, Carol next to him, and a gaggle of girls had come to watch. "Alright, " Tommy began, "two minutes for the whole keg. No breaks. Loser has to leave the party."

"It's my party, dip shit." Steve barked, frustration clear through his gritted teeth.'

"Guess you better win then, Harrington."

Your hands tightened on the side of the keg, knuckles going white with nerves. Tommy counted down from three, blowing a whistle to mark the start of your time. You were never a beer girl, but in the face of loosing to Steve Harrington in front of a crowd of people it could have been mistaken for your favourite drink. You chugged the cheap booze like you were a desert explorer stumbling on an oasis. The cheers of the crowd were silent on deaf ears, your only focus being the tube in your mouth and your grip on the keg. Your eyes were closed, the world drowned out. You were definitely going to puke, and you were definitely going to loose. Your brows scrunched in anger at the thought of the humiliation. Steve Harrington, getting the glory again. It made your eyes burn with the threat of angry, embarrassed tears. It made you question why you'd even agreed to come tonight.

The tug on your legs brought you back to earth, jovial cheers from both Chrissy and basketball teams as they pulled you down before lifting you on to Eddie's shoulders being the first indicators to your short circuiting brain. You'd finished your keg in one minute and thirty two seconds. The pool was alive with celebratory splashing. The crowd around the kegs began chanting your name, following Eddie's lead as he cupped his hands and heckled.

"All hail the new Queen of Hawkins!"

You caught Steve's eye as he glared at the scene unfolding around him. He tossed his cup on the ground - you had to hold back a laugh at his childish antics- as he stormed off, disappearing inside the open door at the edge of the house. A smug grin stretched from one ear to another as Eddie let you down to the ground. "You showed him who's boss, that's for sure," he chuckled, eyes following Steve's retreating figure. "Who knew he was such a sore loser."

"Maybe I should go and talk to him." You said, the beer telling you it was a fantastic idea. The devious smile on Eddie's face told you otherwise. "Oh yeah, because there'd be so much talking going on," he said, making an O shape with his hand before shaking it, "so much to talk about, isn't there."

You nearly ripped his arm off. The look on your face was murderous, and Eddie's laughter only grew louder.

"I'll be back in ten minutes."

"Ouch!", Eddie cried, devilish grin driving you nuts, "Lucky boy!"

You made your way to the kitchen of the Harrington house, which was the last place you saw Steve go. He wasn't there, no body was. The whole lower floor was desolate, every room a ghost town of empty cups and discarded shoes. You braved a peek up the stairs, craning your neck to see if he was lingering on the landing, to no avail. You crept up the stairs, foot steps leaving damp spots on the carpet and creaking on the old wood. Just as the rest of the house was, it was deserted.

All doors were shut tight. Harrington clearly did not want to be found. You would allow him space to wallow in his loss, already missing the glory and attention of the pool. You were reaching for the banister when a warm hand grabbed your shoulder and dragged you back into a linen closet.

With a yank of a light, Steve's face was illuminated. His face was stony, annoyed, eyes dark. It would have been scary, had you not just seen him throw a tantrum like a toddler.

Your hair dripping water on to the floor of the closet was the only sound other than the both of you breathing ragged, laboured breaths. There was a long silence before either one of you spoke.

"You sure have a flare for the dramatic," you said, gesturing to the light and the confines of the closet. "You couldn't fit in the pantry?"

Steve just looked at you, jaw set in a tight line. His eyes, however, darted all over your face; your eyes, lips, nose, cheeks. Bored of his silence, you tried for the door. He stepped in front of you., You got a dreadful sense of deja vu. "Okay, we're not doing this again."

"Hell yes we are," Steve finally said voice gruff. He had a brooding stare in his face, eyes frustrated and a little desperate - fearful. It looked as if he were worried you'd skip out on him again.

You glared up at him, irritated beyond measure.

"I came up here to see if you were okay after your little outburst out there, but you're acting like a real entitled douche here, Harrington." You pushed his shoulder - a little harder than you intended, only meaning to move him. He stumbled back a bit, the stacks of towels on the shelves cushioning his back. "Get out of my way."

He finally stepped to the side.

You were twisting the door knob when he spoke, barely above a whisper and muffled by the sounds of the party. "I cannot, and I mean cannot - as hard as I try- stop thinking about you."

Your head was screaming at you to go. To run down the stairs, say goodbye to Chrissy and find Eddie to drive you home. Every part of you was telling you to go. The door was open a crack, you could hear the voices of people outside more clearly now.

"You're all I can think about," Steve continued.

'Move', you thought. 'Move, god damn it.'

You felt Steve behind you. You could feel the warmth of his skin brushing against yours, feather light in touch, as he stepped closer to you. When you didn't move away, not an inch - part of you electrified at the scene unfolding before you- Steve's arm came over yours, hand resting on top of your own. "Close the door," he said, lips against the shell of year as he spoke. You shivered as his breath tickled your skin. With deliberate slowness, his hand on yours closed the crack in the door, shrouding the space in the warm glow of the singular lightbulb hanging from the ceiling.

It was as though your whole body was on fire. Every nerve in your body on full throttle, tingling with anticipation.

"I tried to stop," Steve began, "thinking about you, I mean." His voice was quiet, soft. Ridiculously alluring. "Tried going back to how it was before. Tried to hate you again." He looked down at this feet, as if the words he was so desperately trying to say would be written in the carpet. "But I just couldn't stop thinking about it. Us."

"Steve-"

"Then you show up here with Munson? Of all people, to what, rub it in my face a little? Make me feel worse?" He raised his voice a little, his sudden and overt jealousy making your stomach flip. "Felt like my chest was gonna explode, I was so pissed." He sighed, crossing his arms and leaning on the wall. "Munson, of course." He muttered.

"There's nothing going on with Eddie, Steve."

"Oh, spare me," he said, "I saw you two together. The way he touched your shoulder? Earlier, by the pool?"

"Oh god, not my shoulder." You said, voice mocking.

"Come on, I see the way you guys watch each other." Steve argued, arm waving up in annoyance. "He looks at you like you're his girl!"

"And that bothers you because?"

Steve was silent after that, unable to speak the words he really wanted to without sounding like a jealous lunatic.

You took a step closer to him. His eyes met yours, frustrated and wide and even a little tormented. In a strange way, you liked it, that he was so beaten up over you. It made you feel a little better about being so haunted by the encounter, as well. Another part of you was revelling in the knowledge that Steve Harrington was hung up on you, after only one night. With a gentle hand, you grabbed Steve's wrist. "Steve," you said in a low voice, "there's nothing going on between Eddie and I. Okay?"

"How do I know that for sure?" he whispered, insecure.

You lifted his hand, eyes on his, and placed it on your shoulder. When you let go, his hand remained there. "Because," you said, " a shoulder means absolutely nothing."

Steve visibly relaxed, his shoulders became less hunched and he took a big sigh of relief. All the while, his hand remained on your shoulder.

You took another step toward Steve then, brain screaming at you to run, but the fire in your stomach telling you to stay, stay, stay. You leaned up on your tip toes, lips an inch away from his ear. "Besides," you said, "my shoulder is reserved just for you."

Steve sucked in a ragged, deep breath.

"You really shouldn't have said that." His voice was hoarse, gruff. It fanned the flames in your stomach to a blaze.

"And why's that?" you taunted, head cocked to the side as you looked up at Steve. A wicked, wolfish grin had stretched across his lips. He backed you into the wall, almost no space between you as his nose brushed against the shell of your ear. "Because," his lips grazed over your temple, "if you thought before was good," his hand grabbed your chin, making you look him in the eyes. "We're just getting started."

It was as if a switch flipped inside him as Steve crashed his lips to yours. While he was passionate before, now he was animalistic. He was all teeth as he kissed you, nipping your bottom lip in a way that said 'this is something only I get to do', and it made you groan aloud. Your hands crept up to his hair, only for him to grip your wrists and pin them above your head.

"Uh uh," he said, teasing and with entirely too much enjoyment. "Those stay right there."

You panted, out of breath, staring into Steve's lust blown eyes. You were completely shocked by this side of him. It was, quite possibly, the hottest thing you'd ever witnessed. In the brief pause, the quiet catching of breath, Steve's face came closer to yours.

"Is this okay?" He said, concern on his face, realising he may have been too intense. His brows were knit together in a soft V shape. You nodded, slow and sure. You were perfectly content to have Steve do anything he wanted to you. "Yeah, it's okay." You whispered. The teasing smile crept back on to his face. "Alright then."

And then he was kissing your neck, most definitely leaving marks as he sucked and nipped the skin on the hollow of your throat. You bit your lip at the thought of having to hide them, of being marked by him, thankful for the approaching cold season and the invention of turtle necks. One hand on your wrists, Steve's free one crept up your sides and found purchase on your hips, gripping them tightly. "God," he groaned, "do you have any idea," - a particularly hard bite on your collar bone- "how much I've thought about you this week?" His grip on your waist was impossibly tighter in the moment, pulling your hips into his own. Your only response was a breathy moan as he bucked into you.

He loosened the grip he had on your wrists, allowing your arms to slide down the wall and into his hair - he fell apart at the way you touched him, having thought about it all week. "I thought about you," he dropped down to your chest, placing kisses there. "Every," - a kiss to your torso- "single"- one to your stomach- "night." He sank down to his knees, staring up at you with swollen lips and blown out eyes. "It's like I was haunted by you. Couldn't get you out of my head." He kissed his way back up to your lips, his fingers tugging on your bottom lip with a twisted smile. "Thought about you so much, had to throw out your panties."

"You pervert." You said against his mouth, but the thought of Steve, bent over in pleasure, as he jacked off into your panties made you throb.

His hands toyed with the strings on your bikini bottoms, the flimsy material begging to be ripped off. He raised an eyebrow at you - a silent ask- and you nodded hurriedly. He pulled the knot free at an agonizingly slow pace, taunting you as your chest heaved in anticipation. He was torturous. Devilish, even. You loved it. He ripped the other knot open off hastily, making you gasp. Your lower half was completely exposed. "Do you want me?" he asked, and though his voice was hoarse and undeniably confident, his eyes wavered as he looked into your own with the slightest hint of uncertainty. You nodded, breathless and a little desperate. Steve tilted your head with his hand, thumb resting on the column of your throat, mocking smile on his lips. "I'm not touching you 'til you say it."

"Yes, God yes, I want you Steve."

"How much?" He was getting cocky then, and as much as it irritated you, it turned you on immensely. "Tell me how much."

"I thought about you, too," you said, breath hitching as he trailed a finger up and down your leg. "Couldn't help myself." That same wicked smile was on Steve's face as you spoke. "Couldn't get the feeling right again, tried so hard."

"Show me."

When your eyes darted to his, you could hardly see his irises. His eyes were practically black with lust, mouth agape as he took you in. When you didn't move, half embarrassed and half in disbelief, he guided your hand to your centre. "Show me how you touched yourself," he pushed your hand down, thumb swiping your clit. You gasped, desperate for any friction as the ache in your stomach flared. "He placed a kiss right under your belly button, eyes boring into yours. "Show me."

You felt the heat of embarrassment creep up your neck and on to your cheeks, thankful for the dim light. You sank you hand down, closing your eyes to save some semblance of your dignity. Steve Had other ideas. "Uh, uh, uh," he said, taunting. "Eyes on me."

You opened your eyes to see a completely, utterly hypnotised Steve. Every twitch, every half-movement was caught by his eager eyes. Knowing that you had so much power over him gave you a power trip, a major boost of confidence. The sight before you - a wild haired, wide eyed, practically drooling Steve Harrington- drove you crazy.

You dropped your hand down your stomach, fingers tracing the skin as they got ever closer to where you needed them most. You thought back to the nights after the party, the way you'd arched your back off your mattress pretending it was Steve's fingers getting you there, that it was Steve making your legs tremble.

You grazed your clit with your index finger, sighing as you made small circles there. You moaned, your pace picking up as you grew more impatient that Steve wasn't the one touching you and more embarrassed as time went on. You rested your head against the wall, gazing at Steve across the small space. He was shifting the front of his swim trunks around, growing impossibly more aroused every second he looked at you. Your chest began to tighten with short breaths as your hand grew quicker, the band in your stomach on the brink of snapping. You were sent over the edge at the sight of Steve palming himself, mouth in a silent 'O' shape as he watched you fall apart. The small closet felt like a sauna as you caught your breath.

"Jesus Christ," Steve said, a hoarse whisper as though his throat was bone dry - which it was. He'd never seen anything so hot in his life. "Get over here."

You launched yourself at him, throwing your arms around his neck as his own caught your waist. Your lips met in a brawl of need, smothering yourselves in one another. Steve gripped your face with a strong hand, guiding your chin so that his tongue could slip into your mouth with ease. He backed you against the wall, hands roaming all over your skin. You may as well have been on another planet, the raging party below having no influence on either one you letting out loud moans and groans. You felt on fire, sure that if you opened your eyes and looked down your body would be a scorched mess. Your core ached, desperate for any friction as Steve's clothed front rubbed against your centre.

"Steve," you whined against his lips, loud and high pitched. He was pressing into you now, and you felt you were going to go crazy if you weren't thrown on a bed in that very second. "Let's go somewhere else." When he pulled away to look at you, he quirked a brow cheekily.

"Aye aye, Captain."

Stuffing your bottoms in his pocket, Steve cracked the door ajar and peaked out. The coast was clear. He threw you - naked from the chest down- over his shoulder, and ran to the bedroom closest to the closet. It was his own, thank god. The door closed with a slam, and then you were against it, head cushioned by the coats and towels hanging from the hook.

"If you don't do something in the next thirty seconds," you said, voice desperate as Steve kissed your neck whilst his hands trailed up and down your bare back - fingers fiddling with the draw string of your bikini-, "I'm outta here, Harrington."

"Oh yeah," Steve challenged smugly, "to do what?"

You felt like pushing his buttons, testing him. His dominance displayed in the closet made you unbelievably wet, and you were hoping it was going to reappear. "Well," you began, voice full of mock innocence, "not what, rather who." Steve's arm tensed up around your body. His head whipped toward you, eyes darkening with lust and annoyance. "Who knows, maybe Eddie can help me out-"

You didn't even have to finish your sentence before Steve was scooping you up in his arms, limbs wrapped tightly around your middle as you both crashed on to the mattress. He was hovering above you with the most addictive expression on his face - a look that said "I need you, I crave you,"- and you wished that every time you closed your eyes you would see that look. Steve ripped off his shorts in a flash, stroking himself as he leaned down to you.

"You think it's funny, huh? To tease?" he said, voice wracked with desire as he watched you. You'd begun to slowly peel off your bikini top. He pulled the strap back and let it snap against your skin, grinning when you yelped. "You're in for it, babe."

The nickname had your stomach swirling with arousal, and you were sure you were leaking on to Steve's sheets from how turned on you were. He made his way between you, knee up against your clit as he ground in to you. When you bit your lip, he smiled. He sat up on his knees, stroking himself as he looked down at you. A rosy glow had donned your cheeks, both from the heat of the room and the heat of having a very attractive man tease himself in front of you. A sheen had begun to cling to your hair line. You looked entirely wrecked, and Steve had hardly touched you. His stomach flipped at the sight. He pushed your legs apart with his knee, pressing the head of his cock through your folds , delighting in the whiny pleas you let out.

"Say something for me," Steve asked, hissing as his head brushed your clit as he bucked into you.

"Anything, god, please, Steve." You would recite a whole Shakespeare play in that moment if it meant that he would fuck you. "Anything."

"Say you forgive me."

You suddenly weren't miles away. You were now hyper aware that you were in Steve's bed, in Steve's house, with Steve. Steve, who had ruined your life for so many years. Steve, who had stood by people and watched as they hurt you. Steve, who had taken your best friend from you. Steve, who had bared a piece of himself to you. Steve, who had wanted you. Steve, who had shown you who he really was. Steve, who you also desperately wanted, despite your complicated feelings about the past you both shared. The room was silent for a nano-second, before you grabbed his face in your hands.

"I forgive you."

In the midst of a very heated moment, Steve leaned down and pressed a very gentle kiss to your lips. "Thank you" he said.

Then he pushed into you, all the way, without warning and your choked moans filled the room. The stretch, while slightly painful, was glorious. Steve filled you up entirely, and you felt as though you were being split open while simultaneously feeling whole. With both hands beside you head as he hovered over you, Steve panted ragged breaths. "Oh my god, you feel amazing," he groaned. His face contorted in pleasure as you clenched around him. "God, can I move? Please, baby, can I?"

"Yes, god, move." Was all you could stutter out before Steve was rocking into you , pace wild and hard. The head board of his bed clanged against the wall, and you were thankful for the thrum of music outside. You held back screams as Steve hit that spot inside you with every single thrust.

Your legs felt like jelly as Steve grabbed your thighs, pulling himself into you with vigour. "Fuck," he moaned, unapologetically loud and undeniably hot, "fuck, I'm not gonna last long." You hands were gripping the sheets, hardly aware that he was talking as his stomach grazed your clit with every movement.

"Let me on top then," you said, and Steve wasn't a religious man, but he swore that was the moment he died and went to heaven. Steve flipped the two of you over, his back against the head board with your chest in his face. 'Heaven,' he thought as you swung your legs over his and grabbed him in your hands, sinking down on until he was all the way inside of you. "Oh my god." You said breathlessly, the feeling entirely different and absolutely better than before.

You used Steve's shoulder for leverage as you moved up and down on him, whining out high pitched moans as he thrusted up to meet you, gripping your hips tightly. You felt the coil building in your stomach. You looked down at Steve, his eyes drawn to where your bodies connected. "That's the hottest thing I've ever fucking seen," he said, eyes dilated and face red. He was right, it was unusually hypnotic to watch as your aching centre swallowed Steve's cock with every movement.

Steve's brows were knit together, determined to last but the reality that the two of you were going to come undone was fast approaching. "I wanna fill you up, wanna see my cum drip out of you. Can I cum inside you, baby?" he panted into your hair, pulling you close and wrapping his arms around your torso as he sat up, thrusting even harder up into you.

"Yes, yes yes, please Steve," you cried as his fingers crept down and began fast, tight circles on your clit. "Cum inside me, fill me up, god, please please please."

Steve let go the second you did, one final - particularly deep- thrust sending you over the edge and into Steve's chest. You felt as hot ropes of his cum shot deep into you, felt as it began to drip out o you and down your thighs. You panted into Steve's ear, chest heaving as you both came down from your highs. His hand, still between your legs, swiped up your centre, gathering the mixture of your arousals. He ran the same finger across your lips. "Open, " he said, grinning wickedly as you sucked his finger clean. "Dirty, dirty girl."

You hopped off of Steve, legs numb as you collapsed next to him on the bed. You didn't bother to cover up, the two of you no longer shy. There was a brief pause, and you felt like the prickly stickiness of sweat- and other things- on your skin. You mustered the strength to stand, stretching as you did, and made you way to the bathroom connected to Steve's. When Steve remained in bed, you turned over your shoulder as you stood in the door way. "You coming?"

Steve moved faster than you'd ever seen, practically tripping over himself, to meet you in the bathroom. Gazing at the shower, you opted to run the taps of the bath instead. The room quickly filled with steam, the mirrors fogging up. Once the tub was full, you hopped in and sat down, sighing as the warm water covered your sore legs. Steve sank down behind you, legs coming to rest beside your own, and you didn't move when his arms wrapped round your waist. Instead, you leaned back and rested your head on his shoulder.

Steve's hands ran soap up and down your arms gently, rinsing and repeating with mindless softness. he just wanted the excuse to hold you longer, feel you against him more. When his hand came down your arm again, you caught it. You fiddled with his fingers, a shyness washing over you slightly. Steve just intertwined your hands, and continued to rinse the soap off of your skin.

"What is this now?"

Steve's question hung in the warm air like the steam clung to the mirror glass. It was like you could see it in front of you, floating in a taunting cloud. It was the thing neither one of you wanted to ask, perfectly content to stay in the bath and ignore every nagging though that urged both of you to ask the other 'do you want me outside of these walls?'

You sucked in a deep breath, turning to look at Steve from where your head rested on his shoulder. "I don't know." You admitted. You didn't want to say the wrong thing and ruin the moment. "We can talk about that, though."

Steve smiled gently, resting his head on top of yours. "What do you want it to be?" He asked softly, your hand still in his.

"Is this your very long winded way of asking to be fuck buddies?"

"No," Steve chuckled to himself, "no, it's not." He sat up slightly, facing you more. "I'm saying that," he paused, struggling for the right words. "I know how I felt when I thought you and Munson were, whatever I thought you were." He said, eyes soft as he looked at you. "I know how much I missed you being round after you left."

You dropped your gaze , ashamed of your behaviour. Steve's hand moved your chin to meet his eye again, smiling that stupidly attractive smile. "I know I want you."

"I want you too, Steve." You said, almost sadly.

"Then we have something in common," he smiled again, and you rolled your eyes at him. "We can start there, and see where we go."

You didn't talk about what people might say, how you'd probably have to hide in his room or yours, secluding yourselves in VHS tapes in living rooms and candle lit dinners in kitchens. You didn't talk about how hard it would be, to keep the secret, to not talk about one another for a while. You didn't mind though. The two of you enjoyed the idea of the coming winter, the cover of darkness that meant you could walk to one another. The image of you huddled in one of Steve's sweaters as the first snow fell flashed through Steve's mind, and he felt his heart thud in his chest as he looked at you.

Warmth spread through your chest as you imagined Steve beside you on the tiny couch in your living room, fighting over the last slice of pizza as the credits rolled on a cheesy movie he'd rented. You revelled in the thought of getting to know Steve, not the King of Hawkins High, just Steve. And the thought of him knowing you as you were now, the matured and hardened version of you, made you stomach do flips as you looked at him.

"We'll see where we go." You agreed.

-----------------------------

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[curiositydooropened]

Wildfire • Spark

After a less-than-ideal first week in training with your new partner on the sparring mats and in the swimming pool, it's time to flex your skills on the Scorch course. When Eddie discovers terrifying evidence to the face you saw in the swimming pool, you learn a bit more about what it means to be Flayed. Harrington learns some truths about the day Vickie died. 

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader

Chapter Wordcount: 9,765

Warnings: enemies/rivals to lovers, second chance romance, slooooowburn, unrequited love, so much pining, blood, gore, character death, best friend!disabled!Eddie Munson, character injuries, trauma, PTSD, hallucinations, drowning, concussion, hurt/comfort, fire

Fic Masterlist • Navigation • Masterlist

Chapter One: Ember • Chapter Three: Ignite

---

NOW

August 1988

Indiana thunderstorms came in soft and slow, the call of wind and blooming, teal clouds. They wet tarmac and corn fields first. A cascade of large drops that melted against windshields and abandoned shopping carts. Then came the downpour, hail and rain that ricocheted off tin roofs, just beyond the safety of underpasses and covered porches. 

Before the world opened up, you delighted in them. You and Vickie, in matching raincoats, would run into the street and spin and spin until the world wet fuzzy and your teeth chattered. You’d laugh and dive into puddles, soaking your canvas shoes and the socks underneath. You’d sing and play until dad warned you about lightning strikes and called you inside. You’d shriek in delight under the warmth of your covers while electricity buzzed the power out. 

And after, you peered beyond the safety of double paned glass and watched, watched for red lightning, for ash, for tell-tale signs that you weren’t right-side up. Your breath fogged the glass in front of you, arms crossed over your chest. The massive cloud, in its slow approach, shadowed the far end of the asphalt, faded yellow parking spots shining wet. 

“Hey,” a voice startled your focus, and you turned to see Eddie, brows furrowed, leaning against the left side of his walker. “I need to show you something.” 

Something urgent in his tone, laced with concern, almost had you forgetting the storm outside, but a voice on the wind called your name and you turned your attention back out the window one last time, watching the cloud loom in teals and greys. A large flash lit up the sky, sheet lightning, blinding white. You startled.

Eddie led you down darkened halls, everyone busying themselves in separate dorms or a rec room somewhere, out and away from the storm outside. He didn’t try to make small talk, or manage any of his signature quips. His silence only perpetuated the static you felt on the back of your neck, the breath that chilled you to your core.

“In here,” he gestured to a doorway marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY, and you reached for the handle to push it open. You glanced around the empty hallway, checking for some sort of surveillance, before following him into a room lit only by a single television, it buzzed with that same static. 

“What’s going on?” You asked, pulling up the rolling seat Eddie gestured to before he popped a tape into a deck. 

“Wheeler copied this for me, and erased the original. So if we get caught, we’ve officially tampered with government property.” As if that was an explanation.

“We?” You tried to get comfortable in the chair, suddenly feeling eyes on you from all angles. 

Eddie reached forward and hit play, and the sound of the tape winding preceded the screen going black. Then, slowly, banks of lights were being turned on, and you recognized the pool, however many stories below you now. Harrington took several strides before dumping his rucksack poolside. Then, he busied himself around the room, checking levels and cleaning where he could. 

“Eddie,” you swallowed. “What is this?” 

Eddie responded by hitting fast-forward, and you watched as Harrington stripped from his day clothes and jumped into the pool. He did a few laps, quite a few, before squeezing the chlorine water from his hair and got dressed again. Eddie hit the button once more, and Harrington waited around for quite a while before the doors swung open again, and you arrived. Eddie hit play. 

The video was silent, but you’d seen it all play out, you’d been there. You watched Harrington drop the brick. You watched yourself strip to your underwear. 

“We can fast-forward,” you instructed, clearing your throat as you tried not to dwell on the pudge around your middle, the unflattering angle of the security footage. 

Eddie did as instructed, and you watched yourself go through your trials, Harrington spurring you on. Until Harrington jumped back in, and you knew what you were looking for.

“There, stop.”

Eddie paused. The freeze frame was blurred with static, the edges of the camera blurred with mist and condensation. The ripple of water took up the lower half of the frame. Your head was barely above water, mouth agape to take one final gulp. And there was no one on the tiles. 

“Watch,” Eddie muttered, playing frame-by-frame. His fingertip stretched to the screen, pointing for you to keep your eyes on the steel double doors. And you watched, in horror, as they swung open. Exactly as you remembered.

Only, no one entered. No one walked to the edge of the pool to smile down at you. No one was watching. It was all in your head. 

“So what? A draft?” You prayed. 

“That far underground?” Eddie hit play, and you watched the door swing on its hinges for only a moment. Then, your limp body was being hauled upright, a dark bead in the water must have been the blood from your head (the dull ache hadn’t quite disappeared). Harrington lifted you onto the tile and leapt up after you. 

Your best friend paused the video and turned to face you, half of his face glowing blue in the light, features gaunt, terrified. “Have you heard his voice?” 

You knew who he meant. 

“Have you heard the chime of a clock? Have you been seeing things other than Vickie? Hearing things?” He was frantic now, hands tangled in curls, good knee bouncing. 

You clutched his thigh to stop the movement. “Ed, stop. He’s dead. Eleven killed him. He’s not coming back.” 

“We don’t know that,” he shook his head.

“We do,” you nodded, though you weren’t sure which of you needed to hear it more. “We know that he’s gone, and I’m not hearing voices. I’m not hearing chimes. It’s just her, and it’s just PTSD or whatever bullshit Linda’s telling me, okay?” 

“Then what’s with the door?” He gestured back to the screen. 

You didn’t know, and you didn’t love the pit growing in your stomach, that lingering feeling of being watched. You tried to push it out, force it down, but couldn’t manage to answer Eddie more than a shrug. “Wheeler’s not going to tell Hopper, right?” 

“Nah,” Eddie scrubbed at the stubble on his jaw. “I sold him pot last week. He owed me.” 

You snorted. 

The tape was ejected, static buzzed on the television once more, the screen illuminated in blues and grey. “I’ll keep ahold of this until we show Steve.” 

Your stomach sunk further. You swallowed. “What?” 

Your name left his lips in a scold you haven’t heard since you were in high school. “You have to tell Steve. He’s your partner, and if this shit is the asshole we hope it isn’t, we’re all in danger. He deserves to know.”

You avoided his gaze, running a tired hand down your face. 

“If you don’t tell him, I will.” 

—

The heat was oppressive, humidity that stuck your clothes to your skin and wet the hair at your temples. The plastic mask surrounding your nose and mouth was fogged, and you peeled the suction from your skin, letting it dangle around your throat to rub sweat from your eyes. You winced at the burn and peered ahead at the giant concrete structure before you, bathed in the neon orange rays of the setting sun. 

The Scorch practice building wasn’t much more than concrete and rebar, four levels high with no roof. There were no glass in the windows, just holes shaped into the four sides with views of stairwells and open rooms. It was about as dark and desolate as any structure in the Ether, and just as imposing. 

“20:04,” Harrington spoke beside you, voice muffled by the mask around his face, sweat sticking his hair likewise to his tanned skin. He was looking at the watch around his wrist, and you did the same to yours, clarifying his time as second hand ticked. “Twenty minute run.” 

You nodded and placed the mask back over your features, the elastic too tight around your skull. You adjusted your fuel pack next, a thirty pound tank that slipped against your tank top at the slick of your back. You tightened the shoulder straps and buckled the strap at your chest, constricting your bosom even tighter.

You and Harrington pulled the hoses from their holsters simultaneously and stepped forward into the abandoned building, and it was like stepping back into that world.

The structure had been manufactured for these purposes, faux vines made of rubber tubing stretched across the surfaces, outward and upward, curling like they would in the Ether. You weren’t to step on them, weren’t to let them know of your presence as you made your way through the building looking for bigger things, darker worries, greater enemies. Trainers would rearrange it after each run, a new horror around new corners. 

You had every iteration memorized. Muscle memory kicked in the moment your heavy boot went over the threshold. Finger on the trigger, the sound of your breath in your mask, you curved to the North, around the first corner into a room staged as the kitchen. They like it cold.

No lights, only an island covered in the charred remains of fruit and tin cans, vines melted to fixtures that had been stolen from once-happy homes. From the corner of your eye, Harrington side-stepped to round the refrigerator, but you knew it’d be too obvious. 

“Clear.” He instructed, two fingers saluting to proceed into the formal dining space.

You shook your head and flicked open a blackened corner cabinet. You managed to dodge an egg as it rolled from its perch and onto the countertop. There, you hit the trigger. A surge of energy burst down the length of your arm, bright orange and white hot, like Vickie’s hair and autumn nights and agony, screams and cries of agony and the shatter of your heart and -

“Good job,” Harrington affirmed as he passed you, something unforgiving in his tone, something trepidatious.

You swallowed back the fear crawling up your esophagus and followed.

Harrington discovered a nest in the dining room, two dogs watching television, and another egg sack at the top of the stairs to the next floor. You hadn’t pulled your trigger again, letting him get the kill as you followed on, clearing bedrooms and hallways up to floor three, your heart pounding against the mask, sweat blurring your vision. 

A demogorgon waited, split through the walls of an upper floor bedroom, made of vinyl and something else toxic, and Harrington laid into it, spreading fire across the ceilings and concrete bookshelves, and the fire licked at your cheeks and forehead too hot, too close, too much. 

“Harrington!” You roared over the sound of his machine buzzing, flame thrown from his grasp. 

He took his hand off the trigger and looked back at you with furrowed brows, sweat striping the dirt across his features. 

You shook your head and gestured to the fresh char marks, the fizzle of embers against the stone. “It needs to be more contained. You spread it that much in the Ether, the whole structure’s coming down on you.”

“I’m trying to be thorough,” he argued, rubbing at his own stinging eyes. 

You continued to shake your head. “Thorough doesn’t always mean safe. You wait for it to jump out of the wall, then you scorch it.” 

“If it gets down here, it has a higher chance of killing me,” he propped his hand on his hip. 

You rolled the side of your tank top up to expose a long, spindly scar on your hip bone that you knew continued down your thigh. “Get clawed or get killed. Keep it contained.” 

The words echoed around your own skull, a buzz like nicotine or caffeine, something sharp and spiky that hadn’t left the jitter in your hand since you first pulled the trigger, since you stepped foot in here. Those muscle memories, all those hours training fellow toy soldiers, fuel strapped to their backs, the sickly sweet stench of lighter fluid, the only thing you’d ever felt you were meant to do.

You left Harrington fogging up his mask, back to the wall, feet avoiding the vines on the ground like they were second nature, like you’d always known where they were because you put them there. You turned into a bathroom, pulled open the cabinet under the sink. “Clear,” you shouted before scurrying into the final room. 

A demodog decoy stood on the bed, flower-shaped head bared, legs squat. A hatchet was stuck through his middle. Your finger tugged the trigger, second-nature, the surge of energy a warm, familiar buzz against your forearm, the breath on your tongue metallic. You’d been born for this. Keep it contained.

“The rest of this floor is clear,” Harrington’s gruff tone filled your space again, a jostle of your pack indicating he was too close. If you were fire, Harrington was water, a quench of cold rigidity that doused that which ought to have been fanned within you, that need to burn. 

You followed him for the final climb, these walls cast in pinks and reds and oranges, the twilit sky looming beyond. A breeze trickled in, cooling the sweat that lined your décolletage. You licked salt from your upper lip, burned remnants of paper and cloth crunched beneath your feet.

The hall split in two, doorways littering either side, tattered vines, sun-stained pale grey, bathed in red, trailed up the walls, flapping in the breeze.

“South,” you called out, and Harrington nodded, turning right when you turned left. Your packs knocked against one another. 

Room one was clear. Room two was clear. You heard Harrington call similarly from the hall, and the sound of fire scorching something he had found in his third room. You edged your way around the corner and into the final open space. There, you found five mannequins. 

Stood in perfect formation was a family, two parents and three children. The paleness of their skin had all been blackened around the edges. Some limbs were missing: the smallest one teetering on one leg, the mother missing an arm. Faces were in various stages of melt, dark grimaces on misshapen heads. One of the children remained eerily in tact. Her eyes glowed blue, hair a shock of red, smile twisted in delight, the strap of her blue tank top slipped down a melted shoulder.

“What the fuck is this?” Harrington’s voice was unmuffled, and when he stepped into your periphery, you saw he’d pulled his mask down to hang loosely around his neck.

You swallowed and held your weapon at your side. The red haired girl stared back at you, unblinking. “They’re flayed.” 

“Is this some kind of sick joke?” He scoffed, adjusting his pack, bumping you with his elbow.

You shook your head. You’d been the one to set it up, Vickie’s suggestion, pulling mannequins from the old mall site. Trainees needed to practice. They didn’t know what they’d be up against, or who. You swallowed. “Put your mask back on.” 

“What? No. We aren’t burning them.” 

“We can’t risk contamination.” You thought of the video tape, of the face above the water, of that gnawing on your skull where you impacted the tiles. 

“Contamination? They’re mannequins. Have you lost your mind?” 

Maybe you had. You licked your lips, tried to ignore the shadow looming just beyond the figures, just beyond the girl with the red hair and the smiling face, just beyond the memories of Vickie’s screams, the taste of ash, the smell of flesh. “If you can’t do it in here, how can I trust you to do it out there?” 

“Eddie survived,” Harrington argued, and suddenly the buzz in your skull silenced, a splash of ice cold water to your bones. You were drowning in it, the disdain that dripped from his tongue. 

You turned to face him, pulled your own mask from your face. “You know he’s an exception. We don’t know how he got out.”

“But he did,” Harrington’s jaw was clenched stone-tight, he wasn’t looking at you. “He survived. He was flayed, and we got him out.” Everything that wasn’t said was caught in between words, context oozing with mistrust, with the truth he believed about you, about Her.

“Well, she couldn’t have been saved,” you spat, that vine crawling itself up and out of your chest, like fire and agony and screams. “By the time I found her, she had a hole in her chest the size of my arm. There was black shit spilling out of her mouth. She was -” You couldn’t breathe, eyes blurred with sweat and red hot sunlight, the heat was suffocating, the smell of smoke and ash.

You squeezed your eyes shut, tried to will away the images of her begging for help, pleading for you to end it, telling you they knew, they saw, telling you it was time because if you didn’t kill her, they’d know where to find you, all of you. She was a spy. 

When you opened your eyes again, Harrington looked pale, nostrils flared, stone faced, but processing the horrors you let slip. You felt a modicum of triumph at knowing he’d experienced even a sliver of it, a piece of it broken from you and transferred as a weight to his shoulders now too. Consider it a bonding experience. 

You glanced down at the ticking hands of the watch on your wrist and said, “20:25. Twenty-one minutes. Mission failed.” Before you shouldered away from him and back down the stairs, ignoring the lingering itch over your right shoulder, that presence that reared its head all the times you wanted to be left alone.

—

The halls were eerily silent on Scorch days, when the majority of the team had been sent from the building in twos to repel through gates and torch the boundaries of another dimension. You weren’t used to the silence, having spent nearly two years on those vehicles, adrenaline pumping and back aching from the weight of your pack. The past four months had been spent outside the War Room, pacing, waiting for an inch of hope, an eavesdropped morsel of what was going on down there. 

Today was no different, nursing stale coffee from a styrofoam cup, watching blips on a fuzzy radar screen from behind several panes of glass. At one point, you’d made eye contact with Hopper, frown creased between his brows and beneath his mustache, and he shooed you away with his hand. 

You’d memorized the names on the call sheet, muttering silent prayers that they’d all make it back safe, unscathed, untethered. Harrington’s words echoed in your mind, louder and louder as the day progressed and your legs grew weary of propping you against concrete walls and linoleum floors. His insinuation that Vickie could have been saved hung heavy on your shoulders like the straps of a fuel pack.

Eddie sat with large headphones over his ears, scribbling things onto notebook paper, wrapping his eraser against the page in a way that made you wonder if he was listening to radio frequencies or heavy metal music. You knew it calmed him, knew it brought him back from Vecna’s grasp. 

You tried not to think of the song that left your chapped lips, the rough scratch of your vocal chords against the ash and ruin as you tried to bring Vickie back to you, back to the light. 

You rubbed at tired eyes and pulled yourself off the wall and continued to pace. You thought of Harrington again, of the look on his face when you’d shared your truth about Vickie, of the obstinance you received when teaching him how to properly scorch, of the sass he spewed ad nauseam. You rolled your eyes and glared back through the glass at the balding patch on the back of Hopper’s head. 

The scuffle of feet startled you from your thoughts, and you spilled cold coffee down your forearm. You looked up from the splash on the floor to two gangly teens who rounded the corner with hushed whispers and hands in the pockets of their tactical pants. They seemed twice as scared of you as you were of them. 

The Wheeler kid’s eyes went wide like saucers when he recognized you, and the tips of his nose and cheeks flushed a deep red. Remembering the tape he procured for Eddie, you fumbled to speak and ended up sandwiching your tongue sharply between your molars. 

“Hi,” Will Byers attempted to diffuse the tension with the quirk of his smile, and you swallowed back the saliva flooding your mouth. 

“Hi,” you managed to wince through the pain and toss your scrunched styrofoam into a nearby trash can, wiping your forearm on your pant leg.

“Any news?” Wheeler managed, scratching at the back of his neck. The boys approached the glass and peered in. 

“No. Your siblings out there?” You asked, as if you didn’t already know, as if Nancy and Jonathan hadn’t replaced you and Vickie as Scorch team leaders, as if you hadn’t watched Nancy zip her tac vest and tie her laces. 

“Yeah.” Joyce turned from her spot and caught her son’s face outside the glass. Her weary smile showed so imminent danger, and she flexed her fingers in a wave. 

Will waved back, relief relaxing broad shoulders. “No news is good news.” Then, he turned to you. “So, how are you? How’s training with Steve?” 

You swallowed and glanced back at Wheeler. Suddenly, the bean pole found something on the floor very interesting. You sighed and lied through your teeth. You’d done it with Linda, why not the Byers kid too? “Yeah, great. Harrington’s a really hard worker. He’s a good asset for our team.” 

“Jesus, you guys script that?” Wheeler snorted. Will elbowed him in the ribs. 

“We talked to Steve earlier today,” Will explained. “He had similar nice things to say about you. Seems like a good match.” 

You nodded, the words that once would have flipped your stomach now souring the taste in your mouth. Or maybe that was the blood pooling from your tongue. 

“We better get back to El,” Wheeler bounced on the balls of his feet, elbowing Byers back. He offered you a bored nod and started back down the hallway. 

Will pushed off from the window with another understanding smile. He’d nearly followed his friend around the corner before you heard the squeak of his sneakers as he paused and turned around. “Hey, I’m really sorry, by the way. About Vickie.” 

Your stomach lurched, the flash of fire and screams echoed in your mind’s eye. 

“I’m here if you ever you know, need to talk to someone.” 

Eddie survived. Eddie survived and so did Will. Will Byers, Zombie Boy, the original spy, the reason for all of this. You swallowed back the bile surfacing and tried to will your eyes to focus on the features of his face, but your mind was reeling with information. You just nodded and somehow managed to croak out a thank you. 

“See you around,” Will waved and stepped slowly away.

—

Harrington was a wall of meat, the slap of skin to skin, gulps and gasped breaths, heaving chest, sweat trickling down the column of his neck, sticking wild hair to the sides of his face. His jaw was tight, brown eyes black as he watched you down the scar-split bridge of his nose. His fists were clenched, the muscles of his forearms and biceps glistening under the fluorescents.

You huffed, grit your teeth, and swung on him again. You felt the whoosh of air brush your knuckles as he, once again, dodged your throw. You squared your shoulders, pivoted on your back leg, watched for weakness. 

You found it in an open-mouthed exhale, a moment of respite on his end, a wheeze through salvia-slick lips, and you swung on him again, your knuckles cracking against his collar bone. 

He cursed, backed off, rolled his shoulders, massaging the bruising bone.

“Ouch, that had to hurt!” Eddie cheered you on from the sidelines, balanced on a stool just off to the right of the sparring mat.

Harrington didn’t appreciate the commentary. He made that explicitly clear with a side-eye to the audience for every quip. 

You waited for him to square up again, bouncing on the balls of his feet, fists ready. You swung and he dodged, catching you on the backside with a jab to your kidneys. You stumbled, but otherwise felt no pain. You huffed in frustration. 

“Steve, you’re pulling your punches.” Jonathan spoke freely from his spot beside Eddie. He sported a bright red burn mark on his left temple, but otherwise managed to return from the Scorch unscathed.

Harrington’s fists dropped to his side, and he fully turned his attention to the crowd. “Will you two get out of here?” 

You took the pause in momentum to get a drink, quenching your dry throat with a spray of water. You swished it, lukewarm, against your molars before swallowing.

“He’s right. You’re taking it too easy on her.” You flipped Eddie the bird, and he grinned back at you, dimple exposed, hair shaggy in front of mischievous eyes.

“Believe me, I’m not,” Harrington argued, cracking his knuckles beneath un-torn athletic tape. 

“You are, though,” you piped up from your spot, readjusting the torn edges of your own tape. The adhesive had all but slipped from sweat-slick wrists, and had more than cracked from your knuckles on your right side. 

“What?” He snapped, unimpressed, hands to his hips like a mom at a kid’s dance recital.

You shrugged, let your water bottle slip from your hand back to the ground. “I barely felt that last one.” 

“Yeah! A love tap,” Eddie argued for you. “She’s been hit harder than that in the bedroom.” 

“Okay,” you cut him off, feeling the buzz of embarrassment tickle at your chest. You pointed at the grinning idiot on his stool. “Don’t you have somewhere to be? Strategizing to win this war?”

Eddie made a face of mock confusion, though it wasn’t convincing past the grin of delight that he’d gotten under your skin. “No… no, that doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Come on, man,” Byers snorted, patting Eddie’s shoulder as he stood from his own stool. “Let’s leave these two alone. Maybe he has stage fright.” 

“Oh fuck off,” Harrington scoffed, earning bright grins from both of the chuckleheads. 

Byers helped Eddie from his seat and muttered something under his breath. You couldn’t quite hear it from your distance, but you caught something about owing Nancy money.

Eddie caught your eye from over his shoulder, expression suddenly changed to something much more serious. He eyed you and then Harrington, an unspoken question that had your stomach lurch. 

You shook your head and warned him with your eyes. Now wasn’t the place nor the time to tell your new partner about the encounter you’d had in the pool. In fact, you hadn’t seen anything else all week, too preoccupied with intense training hours. You and Harrington had an unspoken truce. Nothing was said. Punches were made, laps were swam, decoys were set ablaze, and not a word had been shared between you. 

Eddie gave you one more warning glance before settling his shoulders and pasting his smile back onto squirrely features. “Well, I’d ask you not to kill each other, but I don’t think Harrington has the balls.” 

Harrington rolled his eyes at the quip, and you waved Eddie off, waiting until he and Jonathan had made significant distance before turning your focus back to your partner. You found yourself glancing over their shoulders at the large steel door, half-expecting it to burst open. 

“What was that about?” He broke the truce. 

“Nothing,” you responded, tight-lipped, peeling the adhesive from your skin for one more adjustment.

“Whatever,” your partner sighed. “We done for tonight?” 

You glanced up at the big clock on the far wall. You’d been at it for just under an hour, the time slipping quickly away. You rolled your shoulders, the joints in your spine cracking. “Fine. Same time tomorrow?” You tugged on the athletic tape instead to unravel it, a bit at the back ripped some hair from your forearm.

“No.”

You sighed. “Why not?” 

“I have psych tomorrow with Robin.” Harrington’s voice was quiet, measured, as he removed the wrap from his own wrists. 

“Oh,” you swallowed, hoping that was the end of it.

“You did good today,” a compliment that should have you preening, instead felt ice cold. 

You rolled your head back to quell the chill that settled there. “Byers is right, you’re pulling your punches.”

“I know, I’ll work on it.” 

A douse of cold. You blinked back at him, but he refused to make eye contact. He just grabbed his water bottle and walked off the mat. 

—

A charcoal sky flashed crimson. Something called in echo, a signal for others of its kind, a signal to the hive. Your throat itched, nostrils burned, eyes stung, ears rang. Your palms, slick with sweat, gripped a railing to pull you upward, knees weak. You weren’t prepared, couldn’t catch your bearings. You didn’t recognize anything, endless trees and vines. You couldn’t make out any landmarks, couldn’t find yourself, couldn’t find anyone. 

Then you heard a voice, felt it really, booming, deep, yet familiar. It chilled you, quelled your thirst. His voice, Steve’s voice. You turned to find him stumbling out of the woods toward you, legs weak beneath him. You caught him, clutched the lapels of his vest, screamed his name. 

“Help me,” he whispered. “He’s got me. You have to help me.” 

You scrambled frantically, called over your busted walkie to receive no response. 

Steve sputtered. Black ichor fell from pink lips, tipped down his chin and stained the front of his shirt. 

You screamed. 

His lips curled upward then, teeth blackened, and he reached for you, hand too large to be his own. 

You pulled the trigger.

—

The load was too large, drum banging against the walls of your spin cycle as your clothes rinsed of ash and grime and blood. You’d woken from your nightmare with a nosebleed, something you’d grown accustomed to in the past few months. You’d shed your sheets, your pillow case, knowing you wouldn’t be able to fall back asleep.

The detergent smelled stale, but the water seemed hot enough to rid your clothes of their stains, and the loud beat of metal was enough to silence the dull thud in your skull. Your eyes blurred on the steady shake of washing machine, and your throat was dry from the screams you’d undoubtedly released in your sleep.

It wasn’t the first night terror, and you knew it wouldn’t be the last, all of them flavored with the same dystopian horror that tainted your waking life. Sometimes Vickie would be herself, you forced to live out the worst moments of your life again and again and again night after night. Sometimes, Vickie would be replaced with your mom, your dad, Robin, Eddie. Harrington made his first cameo the night Hopper announced you’d be partners. 

Sleepless nights were spent up in bed, reading a single page of a book dozens of times, only managing to focus on a sentence or two. You’d take yourself to the track and run into your legs jiggled. You’d tiptoe to the common area and fix yourself a bowl of cereal, Vickie’s favorite, and sob over the first bite. Once, it’d been bad enough that you’d crawled into Eddie’s bed with him. He smelled of old cigarettes and something spicy, but it was the only night you’d managed to fall asleep, knowing he’d be alive when you woke back up.

The buzz of the machine indicated you could switch, and garment by garment, you shoved your items into the wider drum of a stand-up dryer, one of three in the facility. You separated your sheets into another, ensuring everything would dry before the sun came up, and you slipped your coins into the slots before turning the machines on. 

Out of your periphery, the laundry room door opened. A crack at first, just enough for someone to slip in and out, and you backed yourself into the corner, watching and waiting. Maybe you hadn’t woken up, maybe you were still dreaming, maybe this is when you’d see the face smiling back at you. 

Only, Harrington entered, grime free, in fact the cleanest you’d seen him maybe ever. His hair was nicely coiffed, an old grey Member’s Only jacket shoved over broad shoulders. “Oh good,” he said, “you’re awake.”

His eyes trailed your body, scrutinizing the tactical pants you’d shoved over the breadth of your hips, the tank top, the sport’s bra holding you together underneath. That crease formed it’s way between his brows again. “You got any other clothes?” 

“In the dryer,” you gestured to the steady rhythm of the dryers.

“Okay, that’s fine. Let’s go.” He swung the door open, and you heard the stomp of his feet up the tiny staircase. 

You blinked, slow in processing from your lack of sleep, but followed him to the doorway instead. “What part of ‘my clothes are in the dryer’ do you not understand? What’s going on?”

He turned back to you, hands on his hips, and rolled his eyes. “You’re the only one I know who does their laundry in the middle of the night. If anyone steals them, there’s a hundred percent chance of finding them and shaking them down for you belongings. Now, come on.” He gestured like a pestilent child taking their mother down the toy aisle. 

You cursed, debated whether this was worth an all-out brawl, and decided to follow him, closing the door behind you.

He didn’t let you catch up, remaining a handful of steps ahead until he was leading you up, across a darkened gym floor, and out a large steel door. 

The night air coated your skin in gooseflesh. A single flood lamp illuminated the tops of a dozen or so cars in the parking lot, abandoned and unused, aluminum rusting under an ever-present cloud, sun set hours ago. The air smelled somewhat less foul, the sulphur and decay cast away on a cool breeze that brushed between your legs and pebbled your skin. You were unable to hold back a shiver. 

Harrington crossed the lot to a little maroon BMW, waving you over with an impatience only he could exude. “Hurry up, we’re on a time crunch.” 

You scurried after him, boots crunching on gravel, and waited for him to reach over to unlock your door before you opened it and settled in. “What is going on?” You asked through grit teeth, slamming the door. 

The car smelled of him, that cologne you once found intoxicating, and when the engine turned over, the speakers blared Queen’s greatest hits, and you were thrown back against plush seats as he took off, peeling out of the little parking lot and out and away from the facility. You glanced at the compound out the back window, the looming concrete structure you called home fading into the horizon. 

“Where are you taking me? Will you slow down?” You buckled your seatbelt and gripped the door handle while he shifted gears, racing along curves in backroads he’d memorized years ago. 

If he could hear you over the speakers, he acted like he couldn’t, fingers wrapping to Roger Taylor’s beat.

You had half a mind to shut the music off, to pull the emergency brake, to get him to answer you. But something in you felt more settled here than you had been for months, the warmth from the heater fanning your chest, comfortable seats, Freddie’s dulcet tones bringing you back to reality, shielding you from any more horrors. 

—

Roadie’s Roadhouse stunk of spilled beer and fried food, the sweet tang of barbecue that lured you further in and grumbled at a hungry stomach. You followed Harrington’s broad shoulders to two empty seats at the bar, behind which a rotund woman in a jean vest offered a gap-tooth smile. 

You glanced sideways at a group of pool players, balls clacking against one another atop patchy green. Steer horns coated one wall, the wall beside it collaged in autographed photos of celebrities. A blues guitarist sat lonely upon the world’s tiniest stage, picking out a wholesome tune.

Harrington cracked a wry smile, holding two fingers to the woman who was already removing the caps off two beer bottles with her bare hands.

With the chill of wind at the back of your neck from the open door behind you, a few stragglers entered whooping and hollering, slapping hands in greeting with the men playing pool. 

“You lovebirds lookin’ to eat tonight? Kitchen closes in twenty.” The woman whistled, leaning too far into Harrington’s personal bubble. He didn’t seem to mind. Your body wracked with another shudder of disgust.

“Two briskets please.” He offered a smile, sticky sweet glazed. 

“All the fixin’s?” 

He nodded. 

“Comin’ right up, sweetheart.” 

You waited for her to head to the kitchen. “Harrington,” his name fell from your lips drowning in disdain. “What the fuck are we doing here?” 

He sighed and brought the amber bottle to his lips. You watched his Adam’s apple bob as he drank, wiping foam from the corners of his lips when he’d finished. He glanced at you sideways, shrugged his shoulders, and set the glass back on the bar top. “It was Robin’s idea.” 

Another gust of cold air blanketed your shoulders, and you spun in a panic. Bikers exited with raucous laughter. Your heart thundered in your chest, your skull. You weren’t ready to face her, to see the hatred in her blue eyes. Had she brought you out here for payback? Far away from the compound where no one could hear your screams?

“Hop said he wants us closer than the Sinclairs,” Harrington took another swig, eyes rolling into the back of his head. “So Robin suggested I buy you real food and ‘get to know you’.” He put the last phrase in air quotes, head tipping back with another drink.

You took a few steadying breaths to soak in what he was telling you, glanced around the room again for any sign of Robin, any sign of Vickie, any sign that you were still dreaming. “You already know me,” you scoffed, bringing your own beer to your lips. It was cheap ass beer, more water than anything else, but it satisfied that unease in your stomach, gave your hands something to do as you ran your thumbnail over the ridged bumps of the glass at its base.

“Do I?” His voice was almost imperceptible against the glass, but it struck its intended target.

And maybe he was right. You considered through the fizz of alcohol. The woman you were now was certainly different from the girl he’d once held in his arms, scarred over and changed forever. One soft and cocksure, thirsty for adventure, you were now hardened, eroded by the elements, carved into the stone hearted being that sat beside him. 

You chugged the rest of your drink, holding back a burp with the back of your hand as the fizz bubbled up, and you slid the bottle back to the lip of the counter. “What do you want to know?” You breathed. 

Harrington eyed you for a moment, and you waited under his scrutiny, staring at your own reflection in the stained mirror behind shelves of liquor bottles. 

You were nothing like the girl he’d met. Your jaw was sharper, shoulders broader, biceps sculpted and scarred. Your eyes were cold, lifeless, with permanent bags beneath them, grey etched through your hair at the temples. You were tired, ridden hard and left out to dry. 

“Do you remember Dina Lampenelli’s eleventh birthday?” 

Your brain rocketed back in time, doing hurdles over mental math to try to remember one date so many years ago. Dina had been a schoolmate of yours, K through 12, a rich-y with serious self-esteem issues. You’d responded to her bullying with a few bloody noses back in the day, a fist to her precious nostrils for being a homophobic bitch. You were the reason her mommy and daddy shelled out so much for a nose job. 

“At the skating rink?” 

You tried to will any memory to surface. The amount of hours spent at that skating rink, eyes glazed under the disco lights, speeding around and around and around, kissing boys in glow-in-the-dark corners. You swallowed, shook your head. 

“Of course you don’t,” Harrington scoffed, turning his body toward you. “You shoved me over a banister, knocked me on my face. Had to get six stitches.” You glanced to see him jut his chin upward, a thin scar pock-marked the perfect flesh there, where jaw bone met his thumb. “Should’ve known you’d be my living fucking nightmare.” 

You couldn’t hold back the laugh that spilled out, or the ignition of sparks throughout your body as you watched the corners of his mouth upturn. “Always in my way, Harrington,” you tutted, leaning against the bar while he coughed his smile away behind a large hand.

You swallowed back your own, chewed on the inside of your lip and tried to stir up memories you’d had, breezing past late nights and whispered secrets under heavy quilts and heavier intoxication. You bit back another smile, and asked, “Do you remember Samantha Hardy’s sweet sixteen?” 

Harrington’s eyes narrowed in thought, mouth hung agape.

“You hooked up with that girl,” you snapped your fingers. “Was her name Lita?”

“Letty Beaumont?” 

“That’s the one!” You nodded. You could still see the curve of the girl’s ass cheeks in the wide palms of his hands, the connection of their mouths silhouetted in moonlight. 

“We didn’t hook up,” he shook his head, a strand of hair falling into his eyes. “Some psycho tried to run us over with their car.” 

Again, you couldn’t help the aching grin that spread across your face with your nod, and you hid another wry laugh from behind your hand. “That was me.”

“What?” He didn’t look impressed, brow furrowed, mouth hung open like you’d told him you were guilty of feeding his pet hamster to your pet snake. 

You shrugged. “You guys were making out on the hood of my car, and I had a curfew.”

The bartender came back, uncapped two more bottles and slid them your direction. 

You both thanked her, and you took another long swig, all bubbles first, and then ice cold beer. The taste quenched the tingle in your fingers, the tremor of your hands with nerves at what this was, what this could be.

A prolonged silence lingered between you, almost long enough to have you panicking, that your confession would be held against you, that a he’d want to get up and leave, that you’d started another brawl, here in the roadhouse. But instead, he turned back to the bar, arm bumping yours, and asked, “How’d you get that scar on your thigh?” 

You shifted your legs on your barstool and glanced over at him. He was staring straight ahead, peeling the label from his bottle with absent fingers. 

“Demodog in the back room at Melvald’s. Had to lure it out before I scorched the room down on top of me.” 

He didn’t respond, just offered a curt nod, an unspoken tit-for-tat. He asks, you answer. Your turn. 

“Have you been to your house? On the other side?” You’d often wondered if you were alone in that, you and Vickie splitting from the party at too early a stage, stumbling into her backyard to see how it had changed, to see how the vines had devoured it. 

Harrington’s jaw turned to stone at that, eyes glazed with memory. He blinked back to reality, took a long swig, cleared his throat. “Once, with Nancy. Barbara Holland was dead in my pool.” 

You cursed into your bottle, forgot the details that had drawn them all in.

“Do you like brisket?” He asked, gesturing at the woman coming at you with two heaping plastic baskets lined with newspaper.

—

Stomachs full of brisket and beer, you stumbled past the buzzing neon of Roadie’s and onto the graveled pavement toward Harrington’s car. You waited in the cold breeze, hugging your arms to your front while he leaned over to unlock the door for you, and you hauled yourself in to the promise of heat.

Contrary to earlier’s drive, he’d reached to turn the volume down before thrusting a hand to your headrest to watch over his arm as he reversed from his parking space, slow and steady. You watched burgundy lights bounce off his jaw, the planes of his cheekbones. He caught you watching, that permanent crease in his forehead, and when he pushed the car back into first, he didn’t race himself back to the compound. He took his time. 

You’d compared war stories over sticky sweet barbecue, scar for scar. You’d bonded over the smell of lighter fluid and the acrid tang of demo-bat blood, and you’d cheersed to fallen comrades. It all felt sardonic, engorging yourselves on good times, guitar music in the background, when those you’d loved most were all gone now, burned up and tangled in vines that never went away. 

You’d noticed the dance, too, the unspoken truce, a tiptoe around questions neither of you wanted to touch, feelings you didn’t want hurt or muddled, questions you were terrified for the answer too. But somehow, darkness imposing on the countryside around you, Ether looming in your near future, you felt a little braver. 

“Harrington,” his name caught on your vocal chords, coated in something, ash. 

He hummed, and you found your eyes lulling to the sound, a warmth blanketing your chest and arms, and you remembered why you were in this mess in the first place. 

“You ever have nightmares?” 

He snorted at that, an unfriendly sound, lips curled into a grimace. “You ever have good dreams?”

“Not since,” you admitted. Not since the city split open and the sky rained ash, not since you starting training, not since you murdered your best friend. You squeezed your eyes shut, swallowed the bile that crawled its way up. 

“We have our first trial on Monday.” Harrington said after a long silence, his knuckles still wrapping a rhythm against the steering wheel, volume too low under the rumble of his engine, tires to gravel. 

The trial was your first exam, a monitored test of your teamwork. You were to go through the abandoned streets of Hawkins, Right-side Up, and prove you could work together, could communicate, could be seamless. You hummed in agreement, having no confidence in your abilities as a team. 

“I have to ask you something.” 

That plunge of cold water, the sting in your lungs, the wash, the crack of skull against tiles.

“Did you see any signs before that day? Nightmares, nosebleeds, hallucinations?” His tone remained so calm, so light, and you fought back the panic that tightened in your chest, restricting your air flow. He meant Vickie, he meant were there warning signs in Vickie, but you couldn’t help but equate them to yourself. 

You clawed at the collar of your tank top and leaned forward to turn down the heater, shaking your head, staring straight ahead at the blurring road, the silhouette of trees looming on either side. “No, not at all. If I had known, do you really think I would have let her go down there?” You hated the way your voice wavered, hated the feel of eyes over your shoulder.

“Well then how did it happen?” Again, his tone remained calm, measured. “If it didn’t happen before you left the compound, when did it happen?” He wasn’t watching you, his own eyes on the road, hands wringing the steering wheel, 2 and 10.

You swallowed, tried to stay present, tried to match your energy to his. “I lost her.” A crack. You cleared your throat, forced it back before the spillway opened. 

“What?” A little louder, a little less steady.

“That day, we were sent on a mission near Roane County, farm country. She said she was going to scorch the barn while I did the house, easy procedure. When I cleared the house, I checked the barn and she wasn’t there.” 

You could still see the roof ablaze, desaturated, sepia-toned scarlet that licked and fanned at your skin. You swore you saw her, a shock of orange through the treeline. You followed. You tripped on a root, pack heavy you fell face-first into the dirt. You scraped your knee, the meat of your palms, the soft skin where cheek met jaw. 

“Why did you split up?”

You shrugged, seatbelt suddenly too tight against your chest, air too muggy, suffocating. “We always did. We were team leaders. We got cocky.” The same answers you’d given Owens, Hopper, filing your official report.

“Why didn’t you call for help?”

“I found her quicker than I thought. She’d gone back to her old house, the one on the county line. I saw her pack outside the garage.” You bit back the rest, pressed at the blur in your eyes with the palms of your hands. Keep it contained.

“You should have called for help. You shouldn’t have split up. I don’t understand how you could have lost her? You lost her?” Harrington’s voice sped up, became as frantic as you felt. “How do you lose someone you’re supposed to be accountable for?” 

You grit your teeth. He asked as if you hadn’t been asking yourself the same questions for four months, as if you’d ever make those mistakes again. Minutes ago, he seemed so understanding, so accepting of the truths and overlaps of both of your existences, and now he’d exiled you again. 

You clung to the seatbelt and rested your head on the headrest, and didn’t say another word. You waited for the push of his foot to the gas pedal, for the sanctuary of solitude.

—

“You’re such an asshole,” Eddie scoffed from his chair beside you, shuffling his deck of cards for the twentieth time. “I can’t believe you made me your accomplice.”

You let your feet dangle from your perch on a tabletop and shrugged. “Hopper told me to wait here. You’re just keeping me safe until Harrington finds me.”

Eddie tutted, shaking shaggy hair and pulling an M&M from your outstretched palm. “Speaking of keeping you safe,” he glanced around the now-empty War Room. All higher officers had left for their dinners, leaving you two alone. “Have you told him yet?” 

“How can I tell him if it takes him,” you glanced at your watch, “four hours to do anything?”

You’d been hiding in the War Room almost as long, having managed to bum a ride back to the compound mid-trial. Harrington didn’t understand how it was easy for you to lose your last partner, so you figured you’d give him a taste of his own medicine. Hopper was more than agreeable when you’d shown back up on your own. 

Eddie smacked your thigh with the back of his hand, placing the cards facedown on the table. “I’m serious. Have you seen anything new? Heard anything?”

You sighed, shook your head, “No, I really don’t think it’s anything to be worried about. It was just a draft, a couple of nightmares, it��s fine.” 

He tilted his head to catch your gaze. “What kind of nightmares? Like the one you had? Have you told Linda?” 

You shooed him away with a hand, picked a brown M&M out of the bunch. “Yes, I’ve told Linda. It’s normal. PTSD. Remember? I assume you’ve been having them too.” 

“Not as frequently.” He argued. 

You shot him a look. 

His shoulders relaxed, and he nodded. “Okay, okay. But you promised me.” 

You shifted in your seat, pouring the rest of the candy coated chocolate into his hand. You wiped the melted colors off on a pant leg. “I know. I’ll tell him. I will.” 

The walkie talkie startled you both, the sharp sound of a signal far too close, and the echoed sounds of Dustin Henderson’s frantic calls from somewhere down the hallway. “Eddie, do you copy? Eddie, is she there with you? Incoming. I repeat, INCOMING.” 

You jolted upright to see Harrington approach, Henderson hot on his heels. Eddie rolled himself a few feet away, shielded behind a pane of glass. 

Harrington looked like he’d seen better days. He was positively drenched in sweat, a soft v painting the front of his t-shirt in dark greys. His hair stuck up at odd angles, in desperate need of a cut and a wash. Grime streaked from his sideburns down his throat. Harrington rubbed at bloodshot eyes, and you noticed a tear in each of his knuckles.

“Oh, there you are.” You bit back the smile to match, sickly sweet, ignoring the sink of guilt that made its home in the pit of your stomach. 

“Is everything a fucking joke to you?” 

You swallowed back the panic, flames licking at your chest and throat and cheeks. 

“Hey, man, this was Hopper’s idea.” Eddie defended from his hiding spot. 

“You can fuck off, Munson. I’ve been calling you for hours.” Harrington pointed a finger the other boy’s direction. 

You glanced at the phone on the table from where you sat and placed the handset back on its receiver. 

That must have been the last straw. Harrington let out a strangled huff before storming past Henderson, nearly knocking the boy over, and taking off down the hall. 

Eddie whistled, and you flashed an apologetic half-smile Henderson’s direction before taking off after your new partner. You called out after him once, twice, three times. He didn’t stop, just kept going until he had shoved his way through the double doors at the end of the hall. 

You followed, a burst of humid air hitting you in the face. It was charged, static, the roll of an incoming storm. You could just make out the teal grey of the cloud overhead, just beyond the tree line. 

“Today was bullshit.” He was seething, chest moving up and down with rapid breaths, hands placed on his hips like he was ready to give you a proper talking-to. “You have no idea what I went through.”

You clenched your jaw, crossed your arms over your chest. “I don’t understand how you could lose someone you’re supposed to be accountable for.” You hoped the words had hurt him as much as they’d cut you, rolling over and over in your head for the past day.

Harrington stared you down, jaw clenched, eyes a little glassy, dark. He was inches from you, you could smell the salty sweat, it mixed with the brine in the air, that ozone layer that had your skin crawling. 

Half-hearted applause startled your stand-off, and you were ripped from Harrington’s glare by the voice of your superior. Hopper rounded the corner, pulling a cigarette from the chest pocket of his shirt and placing it beneath that mustache. “Congratulations, you two. You’ve survived trial number one. Hope you learned a thing or two about communication.” 

He pulled a lighter from his pants pocket, and you watched the end burn hot orange. He took a drag and blew a billowed cloud skyward, to mix with the impending storm. “Everything good here?” 

“Yes, sir,” you flashed a smile fake enough to have the older man snort. Harrington didn’t respond.

“Good. I’ll see you two tomorrow.” And with another cloud of smoke, a pat to Harrington’s dejected shoulder, Hopper was strolling inside, whistling a merry tune. 

You both waited until you could no longer hear the squeak of rubber against linoleum, until it seemed like you were finally both alone, and you opened your mouth to snap something, but Harrington beat you to the punch, his voice calm, soft, measured. 

“I promised her I’d keep you safe.”

He wasn’t looking at you. His bloodied hand was itching at the bridge of his nose, covering half his face, and you weren’t honestly positive you’d even heard what he said. 

You leaned forward to catch his eye, instinctively reaching to tug his wrist away. “What?” 

“Vickie,” he said. You watched the bob of his Adam’s apple. “The morning she died, she made me promise I’d keep you safe.” His eyes remained avoidant, finding interest in the blood on his knuckles, the touch of your hand to his forearm. 

“What? When? Why?” You were frantic, gripping his arm harder to get him to look at you, to tell you everything, pleading. Had she known? Had she know this would happen? Why him? Why then? 

He shrugged, eyes finally finding yours, warm honeyed light in the dark, a gasp of fresh air. He shook his head. “I don’t know. We were gearing up, and she pulled me aside.”

“Why -” You swallowed, tried to push back the image of her pleading, asking you to scorch her. “Why didn’t you tell me?” 

He huffed a breath then, head shaking, hair falling into his eyes.

“What?” You grounded your heels deeper into the gravel. “You don’t think I deserved to know that about my best friend?” 

“You shut us out, remember?”

A deluge. With his words, a crack of lightning and the downpour started, big, fat, wet drops, illuminated in a stark flash of white. You jumped, suddenly crowded by Harrington’s frame as he hunched over you, doing his job, protecting you from the torrent of rain. You gripped his shirt out of instinct, pulling him into a safe hiding space just beyond the double doors. 

Another crack shuddered through the both of you, the low roll of thunder to follow, the rat-tat-tat of hail against concrete, against parked cars, against the asphalt. 

You tried to steady your breath, tried to see beyond the lightning that had stained your vision, all whites and blues. You could almost hear your name on the wind, could almost see that familiar face just beyond the glass, in the tree line, beckoning. The hand at your side, white-knuckled, rested in the heavy grasp of your partner, bloody knuckles intertwined with your own, thumb tracing calming circles to your wrist as you both stood and watched the storm. 

---

[A/N - Ooooh boy, this chapter was soooo good for me. I learned so many juicy little secrets as I wrote, and I love uncovering this story so so much. Thanks for reading, and as always, come bug me about it PLEASE! xo]

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Chapter One: Ember • Chapter Three: Ignite

[great-fictionsworld]

#55 Steddie

the lathe

“This time, do it right. This time Eddie won’t bleed out in his arms, in anyone’s arms. This time, Steve will do it right.”

-or, Steve relieves the day they try to kill Vecna over and over, and Eddie just can’t seem to stop dying. Steve finds this totally unacceptable.

probably my new favourite fanfiction ever. Written by the incredible @palmviolet

[resident-gay-bitch]

mommy issues

part 12 / contents

eddie was out the door before he could even process standing up. somehow his pants were back on, and his sneakers were loosely on his feet, and his keys were in the ignition and - okay, he needed a second to think.

what the fuck was he doing?

did he make it up? he probably made it up. you wouldn't... there's no way... but...

god. he smacked his head against the steering wheel a few times, groaning. okay, so, the picture was pretty vivid in his mind now. yeah, get home drunk, let you help him change, said something horny and inappropriate which led to you being your confident self and telling him... holy shit, you wanted to fuck him.

you wanted to fuck eddie.

eddie the freak.

your stepson.

eddie was positively losing his goddamned shit.

what was he doing? he had no idea. but the van was in gear and he was zooming down the makeshift road of the trailer park before he could let his thoughts get to him. he was horny and obsessed and if there was any chance that what you had said was true, he was gonna take that fucking chance. he needed you so fucking bad, you consumed him entirely.

he pulled up at your place a lot sooner than he should have, defiently having ran a few stop signs, maybe a red light or two. who knows? he didn't care. not now. not when his virginity was on the line.

he quickly checked himself over in the mirror, fixing up his bangs and random strands of hair to look his best for you. thankfully this was a good hair day.

he clambered out of the van and bounced up the steps to your apartment in a flash, giving his hair a little shake and his fingers a crack before he was knocking on the door. not a single thought other than you in his head.

"bunny?" you smiled at him as you opened the door, "didn't expect to see you so soon, didn't we just talk?"

eddie nodded his head and stepped into the apartment, watching you close the door behind him. he was a little scared, now that he was here, and you were there, still looking as gorgeous as you did at the video store.

"you okay, sugar?" you asked, stepping a little closer.

eddie loved the way your hips swayed when you walked. they looked even better in those goddamned jeans. he nodded his head a few times before frantically shaking it no.

"what's going on?" you asked, hands reaching out to sweep back his hair.

he preened into the touch, letting your soft palm cup his cheek. he couldn't take his eyes off of you. he was hard and needy and nervous as fuck.

"i... i remember."

"remember what, baby?"

"what you said." eddie swallowed, "what we... talked about, when i was drunk."

your eyes widened a little, and you smirked, "oh you do, huh?" eddie nodded, "and you raced over here to tell me?"

eddie swallowed and nodded again.

you chuckled in that malicious, teasing way that drove him insane, "you've been waiting for it, haven't you?"

eddie nodded his head again, words apparently weren't things he knew how to say anymore.

"what made you remember?"

"i was... uh..." eddie averted his eyes for the first time since he got here, cheeks pink and warm, "i was about to jerk off."

you grinned, and it was so goddamned sexy, "were you gonna think about me?"

eddie didn't move, too afraid to say yes, and too afraid to lie.

you nodded your head once, "nervous, sweetie?" you placed your hand over his heart, feeling it race.

eddie shrugged, "should i be?"

"i don't know, you tell me."

he swallowed, "you said you didn't want to fuck me." he stated blankly.

you furrowed your brow, "when'd i say that?"

"in the bathroom." eddie pointed to it, "after danny broke my nose. you... you said you don't fuck pathetic people willingly."

you grinned, "correct." you shrugged, "but when did i ever say you were pathetic?"

eddie's lips parted with shock, "you don't think i'm..."

"well," you tipped your head to the side, "you do get a little pathetic when i'm around. follow me around like a lost puppy, but it's endearing. makes me feel special." you winked and he just about melted, "you're not pathetic, you just get a little pathetic around me."

eddie whimpered.

you grabbed his chin lightly, tipping it up, and even though he had to look down on you, he was falling victim to your control, "just like that."

he licked his lips, mouth dry and breath short. he didn't know what to say. he didn't know what to do. he was way in over his head and painfully, painfully horny.

you placed your hand on his chest and shoved him backwards a few steps until the back of his knees hit the couch, and he was falling down into it. you straddled his thighs in swift motion, and he barely comprehended it before you were up against him, body warm against his.

your hand was in his hair, tugging it back so he had to look up at you, his mouth was parted open and holy shit was he done for. he felt like he was about to bust in his jeans.

your face was so close to his, he could feel your warm breath on his lips and cheek. his head felt dizzy and he definitly wasn't in control of his mind or body anymore. but that's okay, because you were. and he'd do absolutely anything you said, without question.

"you feelin okay, bunny?" you asked, a seductive whisper that made his spine tingle.

he nodded his head, a pathetic hum that sounded more like a moan worked it's way out.

your hand wrapped around his neck loosely, sliding up until it forced his head back more, you were holding him still. making him look up at you like you were some divine thing. and in eddie's eyes, you absolutely were.

"you sure, baby? because you don't sound too good." you smirked, and fuck, eddie was already addicted to your teasing, "what pretty sounds your making, hmm. can't even talk. look at you."

eddie didn't try to stop his whimper then, nor the moan that followed. he wanted so desperatly to buck his hips up, to have you grind against him, but he was so scared that you'd tell him off if he did. that he was reading this wrong. that he was way in over his head. so he forced himself to be still, listen to you, do as you said.

"so naughty, aren't you?" you'd asked, whispering in his ear, "thinking of your stepmommy to jerk off."

eddie pouted his pretty pink lips, looking at you with his soft doe eyes. he felt horribly, guilty. so fucking guilty. but holy fuck was he hard.

"so bad, hmm. you gonna think about me touching you whilst you stroke your cock, baby? hmm?" your breath was hot on his ear, your nails digging into his scalp and his neck, and eddie was definitely in heaven, "do you cum to the thought of me bouncing on your cock a lot, bunny?"

eddie swallowed, looked you in the eye. he was nervous, he was so nervous to say yes but he couldn't bare to lie to you. not anymore. not when you looked at him like that.

he nodded his head, "all the time."

you grinned, thumb reaching up to pull at his bottom lip, "oh, how pathetic."

eddie whimpered, pouted some more, "m'sorry. m'so sorry-"

your hand was gripping his face, nails digging into his cheeks and forcing his lips to puff forward. he had to shut up, both from the shock and the literal inability to keep talking.

"what would you do if your daddy found out about that, huh?" you asked, eyebrows raised, "he'd be so mad you tried to steal me from him, wouldn't he?"

eddie nodded, eyes fixated on you. he was hypnotised.

"don't you think it's wrong, bunny? to think of mommy like that?" you pouted your lip at him, "all this time you've been thinking about fucking me and haven't bothered to tell me. isn't that just mean?"

he really wasn't sure what to think.

"poor baby." you sighed, "poor, sweet, baby. shame, coulda-"

you were both so rudely interrupted by the door being opened and danny walking inside. of course, you had just told him you needed to rush home before danny finished work. eddie was stupid. so fucking stupid.

and he was scared, so scared he was about to get another beating and that you would get a worse one for being like this with eddie. it was all his fault. all his stupid fucking fault.

if he hadn't have been so goddamned horny and just thought for a moment, maybe given you a call!

but lucky you were a quick thinker. you lifted your hips so you were kneeling, not sitting on him anymore. and your hands were on his face, thumb tugging on eddie's cheek just below his eye, blowing in it softly.

"there, eddie, think it's gone."

"what're you doin?" danny asked, door slammed shut.

you swiped your thumb under eddie's eye, wiping away the 'tear' you pretended was there, "eddie got an eyelash in his eye, it was bugging him so much. feel better, sweetheart?"

eddie blinked a few times and nodded, "ah, yeah... thanks."

"no problem." you smiled sweetly, as you always do, and hopped off the couch and over to your fucking husband, "hiya baby, how was work?"

danny pulled you into an embrace, kissing your lips softly, "good love, how was your day?"

"got lot's done around here." you smiled, scratching your hair and turning to look at the clean apartment, "cleaned your boot's up."

danny smiled, pet you on the ass and headed off for the kitchen. you glanced over to eddie, who was now sitting with a pillow over his lap and red, red cheeks. you touched your lips softly, covering up the smile you knew you shouldn't have had. you walked over to the kitchen, busying yourself with the dinner you had previously been preparing and making small talk with danny. but eddie didn't care to listen.

he was too busy thinking about you.

you on his lap, so close, whispering those sinful things in his ear. he felt like he was about to combust.

he was broken out of his horny daze when you shrieked. he was ready to jump to your aid, defend you from his fucktard of a father again.

but he looked at you, and you were in danny's arms, being spun around and smiling.

ew.

you kissed him, and then again, muttering thank you's inbetween. danny sat you down on the kitchen counter, hands on your hips and he kissed you more. eddie watched. you pulled back, but danny squeezed your ass and pulled you back in with a dark chuckle. he kissed you again, and eddie could hear the wet slap of your mouths on eachother. your eyes were open, and you looked at eddie, a sadness in them. but only for a moment, then it looked like you were smirking.

eddie couldn't deal with this.

he was up and heading for the front door, ready to cum and cry all in one. he was fucking done for.

"no, bunny-" you pulled back from the kiss, only to be pulled back in, but you shoved him off, "danny, ed-"

"don't worry about him-"

"ed!" you called, trying to hop down from the counter.

eddie slammed the door before he could hear anything else. he wiped his eyes as he bounced down the steps, rage, hate and hurt swarming his body. he didn't know what to think. one minuet you wanted him, the next you didn't. one minuet you hate danny's guts, the next your thanking him and initiating make out sessions.

eddie slammed the door of his van once safe and inside and pressed his palms into his eyes. god, why did he want to cry? this was so fucking pathetic.

he writhed, still so hard from you. from everything about you. it was mean. you were so mean to him, teasing him constantly, saying such dirty things and never giving him the satisfaction of relief. not even a fucking kiss. though, eddie couldn't blame you. no one fucking wanted him, it was entirely his own fault for being attracted to you. but god, it fucking sucked right now.

he couldn't even care less anymore, his dick hurt so much and there wouldn't be anyone around at this time, here. so he unbuckled his jeans and started to rub one out, he couldn't wait the whole five minuet drive home.

he closed his eyes, head tipped back, grip tight on his angry cock as he jerked off to the thought of you. of you on top of him again, whispering those things, whispering more. he pictured you naked, he pictured you on your knees, looking sinful and sucking on your fingers with those red nails that drove him mad.

you were the definition of every single wet dream eddie had ever had and he couldn't last. not any longer. he bit his lip with the subtle moan of your name as he came.

right as someone slamed their hands on his side window, their face pressed up there too in an attempt to scare him.

his cum shot up on the window and... gareth screamed, jumping back and falling on his ass, dragging jeff and grant with him.

eddie quickly tucked himself away and grabbed an old napkin to wipe it off the window and door, and his hand... and the steering wheel.

"shit- shit, shit. shit."

"dude!" gareth shouted, "fucking public indecency or whatever!"

"sorry!" eddie groaned, winding the window down because it wouldn't wipe away properly, and that way he could just cover the evidence until later.

he tossed the used tissue and wiped his sticky hands on his jeans.

"why the fuck are you jerking it in your car?" jeff asked, tending to gareth who looked petrified.

"because i was fucking hard." eddie gripped the steeringwheel.

"it's feral." gareth whined.

"oh, ease up." eddie sneered at him, "you know the amount of time's ive walked in on you jerking off?"

"yeah..." gareth scrunched up his face, "but if that window wasn't closed i would have been covered in it."

eddie laughed, "you'd fucking like that, wouldn't you?"

"jackass." gareth mumbled, shaking himslef off.

"what are you even doing here?"

"we wen't to yours to hot box, remember?" grant asked, "wayne said you'd probably be here."

"shit, yeah, forgot." eddie hummed.

"you okay, man?" jeff asked.

eddie shrugged, "fuckass of a dads probably fucking my stepmum right now, what do you think?"

"thanks for that mental image," gareth walked around the van to the passenger side, "are you trying to scar me?"

"yes." eddie pointed at him as gareth clambered into the van, "that is my main goal in life."

"hmm." gareth nodded.

eddie turned to the back of the van to see jeff and grant climbing in through the doors and pulling them shut.

"so why were you here?" gareth asked, pulling the joint he stole from eddie's room out of his pocket and lighting it.

eddie shrugged, "was horny, wanted to see her."

"wow." jeff laughed, "you're fucking desperate, man."

"she's hot, alright?" eddie said, snatching the joint from gareth, he really needed it, "fuckin sue me- you know, i caught her renting porn today?"

"no fuckin way, girls don't watch porn." gareth shook his head.

"yeah, they do." eddie furrowed his brow, taking another hit before handing it back to jeff.

"they do." grant agreed, "i've seen my sisters collection, it was horrifying."

eddie snapped his fingers and pointed at grant.

"no way." gareth said, "porn's gross."

"girls are gross." jeff shrugged, "don't you remeber maya last year… we went to her house and i accidentally found her vibrator and shi- oh, no you weren’t there.”

“you what?” gareth asked, “and no one told me of this?”

“she asked us not to!” eddie wailed.

“when have you ever cared about that? i could have used that as an in.” gareth argued.

“we told you to make a move on her afterwards for weeks, but you were too pussy.” grant said.

“yeah.” eddie shrugged, snatching the joint back, “we only followed her request to not tell you because she had a picture of you in the stash. so like… bro code.”

“are you joking?” gareth asked.

“nah man,” jeff laughed, shaking his head, “for real. we tried to hook you guys up for months but your both idiotic pussies.”

“fuck.” gareth groaned.

“yeah.” grant laughed, “your loss.”

“no shit.”

��how’s stephanie going anyway?” eddie asked, passing the spliff gareth’s way, “fucked her yet?”

“yeah.” gareth nodded his head, “last night, actually.”

“hey!” jeff slapped him on the shoulder, “way to go, g. stealing innocent girls virginities left front and centre.”

gareth laughed, “i know. took me three weeks to get past fingering and shit. like, is there that much difference between my dick or my tongue?”

“apparently.” eddie shrugged, “i wouldn’t know.”

gareth laughed, “loser. you keep this crush on mommy dearest up forever your never gonna lose it.”

“fuckin tell me about it.”

“speak of the devil.” grant nodded his head out eddie’s window, and they all turned to look.

there you were, in your tight jeans and wedges, your shirt buttoned wrong and untucked this time, your hair a little less put together.

“walk of shame.” jeff whispered, laughing to himself.

“what i’d give to see that leaving my bedroom.” gareth hummed, resting back in his seat and taking a hit.

“lay off,” eddie slapped him in the chest, still looking at you, “she’s mine.”

“oooohh.” grant leant forward between the seats, “possessive.”

jeff laughed, “get a grip, eddie.”

“shut the fuck up.” eddie hissed at them before leaning out his open window, folding his arms on the frame and grinning, “he’s scared ya off for good? finally running away? need me to hand him the divorce papers?”

his voice seemingly caught you off guard, making you jump and clutch your keys to your chest with a shriek. eddie found it cute, he liked the way it made your hair bounce, and- god, get a fucking grip, eddie!

you giggled, the sweetest sound eddie had ever heard, and took a deep breath after realising it was just him, “you caught me!” you smiled, flashing your arms out a little, “no, i was actually on my way to find you, bunny.”

eddie felt either jeff or grant - he couldn’t see which - prod him in the back at your little nickname. he heard all three of them quietly snicker. he clenched his jaw, preying they didn’t scare you off like the bunch of jackasses they were.

“oh, really?”

you nodded, waking a little closer, “you kinda just… stormed out. was worried about you. thought i might be able to catch you at a red light, danny’s pretty quick.”

eddie shrugged, pouting his lip slightly, “thanks for that mental image.”

you giggled softly, “what? just emphasising how shit it is to be with him.”

he nodded, “just didn’t need to see you necking my dad, is all.”

you shrugged, taking a few slow steps closer, a shit eating grin printed on your pretty lips, “why? you jelous?”

eddie turned pink. another hushed snicker erupted from behind him, someone - presumably gareth - kicked him in the back. eddie tried his best to stay calm, he sat up straight, trying to block out the fuckwits though the window.

you stepped up, resting your elbow on his side mirror, and then your cheeks turned pink too. eddie had never seen you flustered before.

“oh, you have friends- i mean, of course you have friends! i just-“ you laughed nervously and it caught him off guard, “shit. sorry.”

“n- no. it’s fine.” eddie shook his head, he didn’t know how to go about your nervous state.

you were always so confident, so sure of yourself.

you cleared your throat, seemingly switching it back on, “boys.” you smiled at each of them, “getting up to no good, i presume?”

jeff shoved the joint behind his back, “…no.”

you rolled your eyes, reaching your perfectly manicured hand into the car and beckoning him forward with two fingers, “hand it over.”

jeff grumbled and huffed and passed it to you. eddie heard grant grumble something about how he thought you were cool, and eddie elbowed him. you smirked and took a hit, blowing the puff into the van before shoving it between eddie’s pert lips. he heard jeff and grant whisper a never mind, she’s cool.

“why you back?”

“never left.” eddie shrugged.

“no?” you asked again.

“i was about to, when these lugnuts popped up out of nowhere.”

gareth leant forward with his most confident grin, “we figured we’d find eddie here, lucky we caught him right as he came to his car.” he eyed eddie.

eddie scrunched up his face, clenching his jaw at his best friend.

“ah, timing.” you grinned, leaning on the window seal now, “just hot boxing?”

jeff nodded his head, “yeah, missus thomas.”

you gave him a weird look, “don’t call me that shit, makes me sound old… and happy.”

eddie laughed, “maybe you are old.”

you grinned at him, “compared to you, baby, but i’ve still got a lot of life left in me.”

eddie shied away. he didn’t know why, perhaps it was your eyes, they seemed to always have an effect on him.

“you most certainly are not old.” gareth swooped in with his flirtatious sucking up, as always, “how old are you, anyway? you look a little young to be married to that douche.”

“i am.” you grinned, “but whatever pays the bills, right?”

“okay, now i’m curious.” jeff lent forward, “how old are you?”

“yeah?” grant leant forward too.

“hmm, guess.” you smiled.

“twenty three.” gareth guessed, leaning back against the window and eyeing you up a little.

eddie glared at him, she’s mine.

gareth shrugged and continued to flirt, if you don’t make a move, i will.

“you're sweet.” you giggled, “but not even close.”

“no way.” gareth shook his head, “you can’t be over twenty five.”

you seemed to be glowing, cheeks a dusted pink and a satisfied smile on your lips. eddie wished he could put that look on your face. instead it was stupid gareth.

“i most certainly am.”

“twenty six.” jeff asked, narrowing his eyes.

you shook your head.

“twenty seven.” grant asked.

you shook your head again.

“twenty eight?” gareth asked.

you giggled and shook your head no.

eddie groaned, throwing his head back, “can you stop flirting with my step mum, please, g? we get it, she’s pretty!” eddie looked back at the other two, “and i don’t get why your flirting, your both in a committed relationship with eachother!”

“i’m just genuinely curious now.” grant huffed.

“she really doesn’t look any older than… twenty nine?”

you shook your head again, laughing at their teenage antics softly.

“g. cool it.”

“can’t help it.” he grinned, shooting you a wink that made you giggle, “i see a beautiful lady and i need to woo her.”

“i’m flattered, really gareth.” you smiled, wiggling your hand out, “but i’m married, and your eighteen.”

gareth pouted, “eighteen with the experience of a twenty five year old.”

“oh yeah?” you asked, leaning on the frame with a cocky smirk and eddie felt very jelous, “fuck a lot of girls, baby?”

gareth nodded, “so many.”

you gave him a look that made him think like he had won, “then i suggest an std test, baby. can never be too careful.”

gareth huffed, sinking down in his seat, and the other guys laughed. eddie grinned at you, feeling quite proud. you chucked him a little wink.

eddie leant his elbow on the window beside you, resting his head against the door so he could look down at you softly. take in your prettiness. he couldn’t work you out, but he was never going to stop trying.

“thought you didn’t willingly fuck pathetic guys.” eddie said, recapping himself from before, watching your face morph into something a little left of happy, “seemed pretty eager before.”

you smiled at him softly, ignoring the whispered commentary coming from inside the van, “danny and i got into it again thismorning… something stupid and minor, but sex is the easiest fix.” you shrugged, reaching into your back pocket, pulling something out, “i prepared for his arrival, bunny.”

eddie took the sheet of silver from you to inspect. viagra. you were on fucking viagra. that’s why you were so desperate for danny.

that’s why you came onto eddie the way you did.

his cheeks went pink, and he couldn’t tear his eyes from the packet.

he’d totally just humiliated himself up there because you were on goddamned viagra.

gareth snatched the packet from him with a laugh, “fuck. danny can fucking suck it.”

“yeah.” you laughed, scratching your forehead, “makes it a little easier.”

eddie nodded his head.

“hey, ah…” you shrugged, “you boys want some dinner?”

“don’t wanna go back up there with him.” eddie muttered, eyes still fixed on his lap.

“he’s napping.” you smiled, reaching out to hold his hand softly, “c’mon. got a good meal up there. we can watch some movies? danny’s heading up to indy tonight anyway.”

“why?” jeff asked, handing the packet back to you.

you grinned, “he’s buying me a car! a real sweet one too apparently. and it’s all legal, i believe.” you clapped your hands together, “it’s gonna be amazing.”

“hmm.” eddie nodded.

“c’mon baby, come have some food. you’ll brighten up.” you smiled at him softly.

eddie sighed, nodding his head. the boys all began to clamber out of the van, and you took a couple of steps back. eddie grabbed his keys and started to wind the window back up without a second thought. he was looking at you as he did, giving you a happy smile. he couldn’t keep his frown around you for too long.

but his smile dropped when the big smudge of cum stuck to his window obscured his view of you. he saw his friends all break into uncontrollable laughter around you. you leant back to whisper something to them, which eddie assumed was to ask what was on his window. you giggled softly when eddie jumped out the van.

“you okay, eddie?” you’d asked, acting as if nothing had happened.

“yup, so good.” he nodded, locking the van.

“okay, cool.” you smiled, rubbing his back softly as he walked up beside you, all of you started walking for the steps, “how about you come upstairs now?”

his fiends all burst into another fit of laughter and eddie turned so red.

“aww, nothing to be ashamed of, baby.” you smiled, squeezing his hand, “sometimes things can get a bit hard.”

another laugh from the boys.

“please shut up.” eddie whispered, closing his eyes.

you grinned, leaning into his space to whisper with a teasing smirk, “just couldn’t wait for me, huh?”

eddie looked at you a little weirdly, his heart racing.

“shame your friends showed up.” you shrugged, taking another step forward, “if you’d made it back to the trailer, maybe you’d be painting me rather than the window, huh?”

you had to still be on the viagra.

you grinned, bouncing back up the stairs to open the door. leaving eddie at the bottom of the staircase, on the gravel, hard again.

what the fuck!

**

part 13

taglist: comment to be tagged :) @starcourtcass @bibieddiesgf @cherrycolas-things @littlepotatobeansworld @bl4ckt00thgr1n @emmalee-01 @perfectlymellowthing @daniellabrandt

[afewproblems]

WIP Wednesday

I'm actually posting on WIP Wednesday, the stars have finally aligned in my favour!

Thank you to @outpastthebrakers for your tag today and @steves-strapcollection for your multiple tags before - its finally lined up today!!

Here is Part Two of my follow up to this Post (Steddie Breakup) hopefully with a Steddie makeup/fix-it future!

(Also! Important to note, season four - specifically the stuff with Vecna- Never happened in this AU)

***

Two Years later - 1987, Chicago, IL

Steve picks up another box from the back of the beemer. This one has, 'Steve's Obnoxious Hair Care,' neatly printed on the side in bold black sharpie --Steve snorts at the sight and vows to never let Robin help him pack ever again. 

He walks up the three flights and through the propped open front door to the two bedroom apartment.

It's small, just barely enough for two people, but in downtown Chicago, it's a steal at the price. 

And it's theirs. 

"Hey Birdie," Steve calls out from the kitchen, he sets the box down on the counter, turning his head to the left slightly to listen for her shuffling. The dull ringing in his right ear makes it more difficult, present ever since he left his parents house for good.

It had gotten even worse since their Russian encounter, but if he's weighing the pros and the cons of that night, he's glad he got Robin out of the deal.

Steve steps into the living room just off the kitchen, "Robin?"

Bright sunlight streams through the curtainless windows bathing Robin in a warm yellow glow. 

She stands in the center, facing Steve, with a pensive expression, her eyes scanning the space around her. 

"Hush Dingus," she mutters, holding up her pointer finger to her lips, "I'm visualizing". 

"Ah, of course," he concedes with a fond smile as Robin walks towards him slowly counting her steps. She lines her feet up as she moves, touching the toe of her right foot to the heel of her left. She wobbles slightly as she makes it to where Steve is standing, he reaches out to steady her with a laugh.

"I told you the living room was more than ten feet!"

"Robin, do you think that a 'foot' is literally your foot?" 

Robin sucks her teeth and rolls her eyes, before plucking the measuring tape from where it was clipped to her back pocket, "you have no concept of joy, you refuse to let me live".

"Yeah, yeah, so hard done by," he snorts as she sticks her tongue out at him and leans down to pick up one of the empty boxes.

She sighs and looks around the space again with a contented expression before looking at Steve, "well, Dingus, I think we did good".

Steve nods and tries to smile back but the expression doesn't quite meet his eyes, Robin tilts her head, turning the box over in her hands at the corners.

"What's wrong?" She says softly, anxiously, her blue eyes dart over his face, "is it a migraine? Do you need your meds?"

Steve shakes his head, wincing before he can stop himself, he knows Robin's brain would come up with the worst case scenario first. And, to be fair to her, she had seen the worst case scenarios and after effects of the Russian interrogation, she'd held his hand after spilling his guts from the nausea and halos in his vision, she'd insisted he buy blackout blinds for his room because, 'you never know when you'll need them Dingus, you won't always get one of these at night'.

Steve shakes his head, "no, it's not a migraine, relax Robs," he huffs as she levels him with a disbelieving stare.

"I just," Steve chews his lip for a moment as he drops his gaze to the floor. Robin steps closer, tilting her head to the side as he struggles to find the words.

"I love that you came with me, that we get to be here, but," Steve sighs and runs a hand through his hair. It's longer than it had been two years ago, the gold and copper from his time in the warm summer sun slowly fading back to brown.

"Eddie always talked about leaving Hawkins someday, and I always thought it would be with me".

"This was our plan," he says softly, lifting his eyes to meet Robin's own, her brows pinched in a small frown.

"And I managed to screw that up like everything else," he trails off softly.

***

"I just don't understand why you have to go to this thing, you aren't even interested in his stupid job?" Eddie growls as he tosses the pencil up at his bedroom ceiling, it stays for just a moment before falling back into his waiting hands. Pock marks litter the tile from previous throws and Steve is sure Wayne's told him to knock it off more times than he can count.

"It's complicated," Steve says lowly, he pictures his dad's thunderous face, the same square jaw and straight nose that Steve has, they could be identical but for their ages and the cold grey eyes his father has. 

Steve took after his mother in that area, inheriting her large hazel eyes and long lashes. 

"No it's not," Eddie says stubbornly, he throws the pencil with more force this time and it hangs in the ceiling between them, "you could tell him to stuff his job up his ass".

"Eddie--"

"No, no, you know we had a show tonight, and you're choosing to go to your dad's fundraiser instead?"  

Steve sighs and bites the inside of his cheek, tamping down the urge to argue with his boyfriend.

But, they've never really had this talk before, Steve's never told anyone about his father and his homelife. 

Right now he wishes he had.

"It's not like I have much of a choice," he huffs as Eddie rolls his eyes and scoffs, "and not all of us have someone like Wayne to encourage us to do whatever we want".

"That's such bullshit and you know it," Eddie hisses ignoring the slight flinch from Steve, "you always do this". 

What?

"You never want to come to our shows, you never want to sit in on Hellfire--"

"That's not true," Steve growls, crossing his arms over his stomach, he hunches in on himself slightly but Eddie shakes his head.

"Yes it is! When was the last time you came to a show?"

Steve wracks his brain, trying to remember the name of the bar they had played at, it wasn’t the Hideaway, it had been a bit of a drive to get there. It was a dive bar that had sounded like it was straight out of Robin Hood, The Red Lion?

"See!" Eddie takes his silence as victory and throws his hands up in the air, "what did I tell you?"

"Jesus, it was a bar show just like all of them Eddie, it's not like you guys were playing on MTV or something," Steve snaps, the last threads of his patience wearing thinner and thinner. 

"Oh fuck off, MTV is part of the problem, do you not listen when I talk?"

"I always listen to you!" Steve cries out, his voice climbs in volume and his hands shake as adrenaline spikes, "sometimes you just talk and talk and talk and you say nothing important but I always listen to you!"

"Woooow, fuck you," Eddie scoffs as he turns on his heel and opens his bedroom door, Steve follows him, fuming but wary.

"Since everything I say is bullshit, apparently, and you don't want to come to our shows or spend time with me then maybe you should just go!"

Steve halts in his tracks.

Eddie stands by the open front door to the trailer, his cheeks are red and his mouth is a flat line carved in the middle of his face.

Steve feels his heart rate tick up as he stands there frozen.

They've had disagreements before, small petty arguments but this feels big. Much bigger than any fight they've ever had. 

"Eddie-"

"Nope, unless you tell me you're coming tonight, we're done".

Oh.

And just like that, it hurts just as much as when Nancy had told him she didn't love him the previous year. It's too much, he needs to leave.

"Yeah, you know what Eddie, I don't need this," Steve says so softly that Eddie leans forward to hear before reeling back as though struck, "I don't," he shakes his head and walks past Eddle towards the open door. 

Eddie's hands twitch as though he wants to reach out to Steve, to pull him back into the trailer, but they remain at his sides.

"You're right," Eddie yells after him as Steve walks down the gravel drive to his car, "you don't need us, we don't need you, go crawling back to daddy just like always".

Steve stops walking and looks back at Eddie. The metal-head's wide brown eyes are shiny with angry tears. 

Steve feels his own angry tears pooling along his lash line.

He gets in the car and drives away, ignoring the tightness in his chest as he heads home.

***

"Okay, first of all," Robin says sharply as she drops the box at their feet and pokes him in the chest with a rigid pointer finger, "you're damn right you're happy I came with you, I am a catch!" 

Steve rolls his eyes as Robin clears her throat imperiously until he raises his hands in surrender.

"Second, he found out about your dads shit, saw you beaten to hell and back, and didn't even want to have a conversation? Fuck that noise".

"Birdy, you weren't there, and you don't even know Eddie--"

"I know you though," she continues, staring him down, "and I know if the roles were reversed, you would have at least heard him out".

Steve holds back a wince, attempting to keep his expression as neutral as possible. He knows she isn’t right, he knows he made a mistake that night walking away, they should have talked, they should have had it out. 

Steve should have told Eddie the truth. 

Then again, Eddie dropped him like it was nothing so maybe he was better off in the long run.

Strangely enough this thought doesn’t make him feel better.

"Robin," Steve sighs wearily, crossing to the wall of the living room before leaning his back against it to slide down to the floor. 

"Tell me I'm wrong," she says softly, walking towards his spot on the floor, she settles beside him and nudges his shoulder with her own.

"Tell me I'm wrong and I'll drop it," she says again, firmly this time.

Steve breathes out a sigh and brings his knees to his chest, looking towards the window. 

The view isn't much, just the street and other buildings, but the Chicago skyline seems to stretch for miles ahead of them.

"You’re not wrong," he says eventually, ignoring the crow of triumph Robin makes, "but you're not right either".

She scoffs and leans her head against his shoulder, the soft waves of her hair tickle the skin on his bare arm but the weight and warmth of her is comforting.

"Besides, it was years ago," Steve mutters, "I'm sure he's forgotten all about me by now".

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