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unfinishedslurs · 2 years

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jock on jock violence (past steve/tommy)

“Just leave people alone, Tommy,” Harrington says lowly. Dangerously. Harrington’s always been dangerous, in the way that straight, entitled jocks have always been dangerous to Eddie, but sometimes Eddie thinks he dropped the crown to pick up a sword. There’s something sharper about him now, something that wasn’t there before Halloween. Different from the fake smiles and shifty eyes after the Byers kid went missing. Not that Eddie’s been looking.

“Leave them alone?” Hagan demands. “Like how you left me alone?” And wow, is he delusional? Did he just completely forget about his girlfriend, Hargrove, and the entire fucking basketball team?

“Not everything is about you! Seriously, man? You’re just gonna twist what I’m saying like that?” Harrington snaps, and oh, Eddie doesn’t want to be here for this. If the former king and his old lackey duke it out, he does not want to get caught in the crossfire. “Jesus, grow up. Sorry I got sick of being a total dick.”

“Oh, yeah, now you’re just sucking Byers’s—“

“You want to go there? Do you really wanna go there, Tommy?”

Shit, Eddie should not be here for this.

“Shut your fucking mouth,” Hagan says, suddenly panicked.

“I thought you liked my mouth.”

Eddie has to practically stuff his fist in his mouth to keep from sputtering.

“What the fuck, man,” Hagan hisses. Eddie knows he’s looking around, even though no one’s in the bathroom except them and Eddie. And Eddie’s never going to breathe a fucking word of this to anyone, on account of not wanting his face rearranged ten times over. “What, are you some kind of fag now? Is that what you’re telling me?”

Harrington almost sounds bored when he replies. “You would know, wouldn’t you?”

“I told you to watch your mouth.”

“You gonna shut me up?”

“What has gotten into you?” Hagan finally asks the million dollar question. Harrington’s acting like he’s got a fucking death wish. “One minute we’re calling out Byers for being a creep, and the next you’re dumping me like it’s nothing. And now you’re suddenly best buds? Even after he stole your girlfriend twice? You know how pathetic that is, right? What, do you share her or something? The slut putting out—“

There’s a rustle of clothes, and then a thud, like something—someone getting slammed into a wall.

“Don’t talk about Nancy like that,” Harrington growls. “This isn’t about her.”

“Isn’t it?”

“No, man, it’s about you being a total asshole, and I’m telling you to leave people the fuck alone.”

“Or what?” Hagan almost sounds amused, over obvious nerves. He’s not even trying to escape the hold he’s in. “I’m stronger than you, and we both know it. You’ve still got a concussion, don’t you? Hargrove told me he beat your face in.”

“Hargrove this, Hargrove that. You sound like you’ve got a crush or something. You suck him like you sucked me?”

Jesus fucking Christ.

“You can’t win this fight, Steve.”

“I don’t need to. Mutually assured destruction, asshole. You stop hurting people, and I won’t tell the entire town about us.”

Oh shit. Oh shit. Harrington sounds serious. It almost makes him sick to his stomach, even as a hysterical laugh tries to bubble out. Who woulda guessed that the former king of Hawkins High had enough guts to paint himself as a queer to their conservative, stick in the mud town?

That is, if Hagan doesn’t fucking kill him first.

“You wouldn’t.” Hagan sounds panicked now, and for good fucking reason. He’s been on the “right” end of what happens to their kind of freaks for years. How quickly would the vultures turn on him? They descended on Harrington pretty damn quick.

“Wanna bet?”

“You do that, you lose everything. Peace, daddy’s money, your precious sports scholarships…”

“I’m not going to college,” Harrington says. “Look in my eyes, Hagan. Do I look like I’m bluffing? I’ve got nothing to lose.”

Eddie has to keep in a scoff at that. If there’s one thing he’s learned, it’s that there’s always something to lose with shit like this. Namely your life.

This is fucked. This is so fucked. Eddie wants out of this stall, Jesus H. Christ. He’d take Mrs. Smith’s class anyday over knowing one wrong move will end with two jocks beating his fucking face in for hearing something he wasn’t supposed to hear. Or potentially having to jump in to try and save Harrington’s stupid fucking mug.

There’s a long pause that does absolutely nothing for Eddie’s nerves, before Hagan finally spits out, “Fine.”

“What was that?”

“Fine.”

“Good man,” Harrington says, as if they’re discussing some kind of business deal and not outing themselves in front of God and Mrs. Jenkins and everyone. “Now get the fuck outta here, Tommy.”

Rustling, quick footsteps, and then the door opens and shuts without a word.

Silence.

Eddie sighs in relief.

“Hello?” Harrington asks, voice on edge.

Shit.

His stall door swings open, and there he is, in all his fallen kingly glory. Bruise over one eye, scowl on his face, and dangerous set to his shoulders that Eddie knows all too well.

“Uhh, hi?” Eddie squeaks. He’s still sitting like fucking Gollum, feet on the toilet, unlit cigarette in hand. He drops it, and neither of them look away from each other as it rolls behind the toilet bowl.

Excellent first impression, really.

“What the fuck, man?” Harrington asks. “Were you just listening to that?”

“Look,” Eddie says quickly. “In my defense, I was here first. Also, if he saw me, Hagan was definitely going to beat me up. Except, uh, you’re definitely going to kick my ass anyway for hearing that, so I probably should just cut my losses and accept death at this point.”

Harrington doesn’t seem to know what to say to this, mouth opening and closing slowly.

“Also, for the record?” Eddie says. “I won’t say anything. I know you have, like, zero reason to trust me, but I’m really good at secrets, dude, like you wouldn’t believe. I haven’t even told Jeff that Gareth—anyways, secrets? What secrets? I didn’t hear anything. Cross my heart and hope to die.”

He gets a scathing look in return. “If you tell anyone—“

“Wait, wait, wait! You said something about mutually assured destruction, right? I get it. I get it, Harrington, fuck, you know I do. Who would believe me if I blabbed, anyway? Who are they gonna believe, the King or the Freak?”

Harrington sighs, but he must see the truth in what Eddie said because he moves away from the stall. Takes a wad of paper towels and starts running them under the sink.

It emboldens Eddie enough to follow him. “I mean, really, they’d probably just call it wishful thinking or something. Plus, I’m pretty sure most of the school would rather die than talk to me, so, like, you’re safe, man. I’ve already blacked it out in my memory, it’s gone.”

It seems like Harrington has tuned him out, pressing the wet paper towels to his forehead and eye. That’s good, because Eddie doesn’t even know what he’s saying anymore.

“Also, for the record? That was badass. I don’t think I’d have the guts to do that, even if the entire town kind of knows about me anyway. Which, wow, you were really good at hiding it. Hagan I kind of suspected, given the giant fucking boner he had for you, but you—“

“Do you ever shut up?”

Eddie’s mouth shuts with a click. Harrington sighs again and pinches his nose, looking almost like a mother trying to herd her seven rambunctious children into the minivan. His hands are shaking.

“You okay, man?” Eddie finally asks quietly.

Harrington doesn’t say anything, just presses the paper towels over both eyes, like he’s trying to stave something off. Oh, shit, is he…

“Are you…crying?”

“What? No,” Harrington says, obviously lying. “It’s the light, I get headaches. Concussion.”

“Right.”

“Look, can we just forget this ever happened?”

“Already forgotten,” he promises. “But, uh, for the record? That was really brave of you, man.”

“I wouldn’t have gone through with it.”

“That actually kind of surprises me, because I could not tell from your voice. You sounded like you were ready to march up to The Post then and there and spill all Hagan’s dirty little secrets. All ‘I’ve got nothing to lose,’ and shit.” He pitches his voice lower, in a mimic of some action movie hero or something.

Harrington finally laughs, and something in Eddie thrills at it. “I pulled that outta my ass,” he admits. “I knew he would believe it, ‘cause to him I already did lose everything. My friends, my girlfriend, my…” he waves his hand around, “my status, or whatever. And a few screws, probably.”

“Well I can attest to the screws, because I think you might be actually insane. You cornered him in an empty bathroom without checking to see if it was actually empty and threatened to out him to the entire town? I thought I was going to have to save your life, Jesus shit. Don’t fucking do that, do you have a death wish or something?”

“I did check,” Harrington snaps. “I looked under the stalls, and none of the doors were locked. Who the hell sits on a toilet like that anyway? You looked like one of those ugly stone fuckers, the ones they put on buildings and shit.”

Eddie bursts out laughing, too incredulous to be offended. “You mean gargoyles?”

“Whatever. Besides, Hagan won’t kill me. He’s too much of a coward.”

“I hate to break it to you, Harrington, but cowards are dangerous too.”

“Not Tommy’s kind of coward” Harrington says. “Not to me.” He wonders about the surety in his voice. Does he think Hagan still has feelings for him? Ex-boyfriends can be the worst kind of assholes. Hell hath no fury like a man scorned. Harrington gives him a look, like he knows exactly what he’s thinking. “He’s a bully and an asshole, but he doesn’t have the guts,” he insists. “He’s no Hargrove.”

Eddie sneers. “Hargrove. The guy’s a fucking psycho.”

“Tell me about it,” Harrington says dryly. He finally looks at Eddie, eyes him up and down. Eddie could take him, honestly, he’s scrappy and Hagan wasn’t lying when he said everyone knows Harrington can’t win a fight. Pair that with the concussion he’s sporting, and it’d probably take a love tap to take him down. But he doesn’t want to.

“You’re probably better off without Hagan anyway,” he offers helpfully. It doesn’t work, just makes Harrington look like a kicked puppy, damaged and sad and cold. It makes Eddie want to take him in as one of his little lost sheep, honestly, which is an impulse he pushes far, far down. Abdicated or not, a king is no fit for a freak’s friend. Even if he and Byers have been pretty friendly.

“I know,” he says. “But he was still my friend, you know? Like, the first one I ever had. Maybe that’s why it took me so long to realize.”

He doesn’t know what to say to that. There’s an awkward silence, where Harrington turns his focus back to the mirror. Eddie clears his throat and tries to lighten the mood. “So, you and Byers…”

The look he receives could make the Demogorgon shake in his boots. “Don’t you have a class to fail or something? You should probably go to that before—”

The bell interrupts Harrington perfectly, and he snaps his mouth shut. Eddie snorts.

“Think it’s a little late for that, but I know a dismissal when I see one. See you around, Harrington.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Hey, remember—“

“I know,” he calls behind him, striding for the door. “Mutually assured destruction!”

Leaving the bathroom feels like being reborn a whole new man. He swears the air is cleaner than it ever was before he went in. His last glance behind himself shows Harrington looking in the mirror, no sign of moving as the door shuts.

As he’s walking to his next class, he spies Wheeler and Byers huddled together, whispering. They look worried.

They both startle when he speaks. “If you’re looking for Harrington,” he says quietly, stopping next to them, “check the smoke bathroom, by the band hall. I think he’s still in there.”

Wheeler’s brows furrow, but Byers gives him a nod, already moving. Eddie moves along as Wheeler shoots him a quick look of gratitude before following, books hugged to her chest.

Eddie doesn’t know what’s going on between the three of them, but he kind of wants to now, especially considering Harrington’s non-answer when he asked. He doubts Wheeler is a cover-up, not after her and Harrington’s breakup and the quiet, lovey-dovey honeymoon phase she and Byers seem to be having. The one that kind of seems to tear Harrington to pieces sometimes, even as he sits with them and walks to class with them and even hangs out with them outside of school, if Jeff really saw the three of them at the diner together last week. Maybe Steve Harrington’s a secret masochist.

Then he remembers the bruise yellowing around his eye, the weird tension he has with the guy who beat him up last year. The way he damn near begged Hagan to beat his ass in the bathroom. Not so secret, then.

Whatever. It’s none of Eddie’s business. He’s gonna soil his reputation if he keeps focusing on Hawkins royalty like this. Never mind the way Harrington’s soiled his own reputation enough. So what if King Steve isn’t king anymore? He’s still just another pretty face.

A pretty face, with nice arms and big eyes and thighs. And he’s queer, and doesn’t seem like the kind of closeted that would have the usual jock shove him away after getting a blowie. Shit.

His lungs itch for the cigarette he never got to smoke. Too bad the bathroom is occupied.

#eddie munson #steve harrington #tommy hagan #post s2 #jock on jock violence au #stommy #onesided steddie #implied stoncy #this is the closest i ever came to finishing something if i ever write a beginning it's going on ao3 #we stay billy bashing 💪#are tommy and billy fucking? up to interpretation #i fully believe eddie would crouch on the toilet to smoke like a fucking gremlin #stranger things fanfic

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