#platonic stobin mind-reading au

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU Part 2

Part 1

The house is quiet when Steve slips in. It always is, now.

He toes his shoes off, unable to bend over enough to untie the laces. His ribs protest the slight hunch of his shoulders, stomach roiling in queasy warning to not curl in further.

The house is quiet, but Steve can almost feel the warmth of an arm around his shoulders. And he doesn’t feel alone. He looks around the foyer, almost waiting for his parents, or hell, the ghost of Hopper to appear. Nothing does.

He’s leaving smatterings of blood and mud with every step, speckling the white carpet in signs of life as he flicks on every lightswitch on his way toward the stairs. He pauses at the bottom, staring up at the insurmountable obstacle to his bed. With a sigh, he turns his back on the climb and stumbles his way toward the couch in the living room, collapsing down into it. Blood is already smearing into the velvety green of its cushions. He ignores the little voice in his head that sounds alarmingly like his Mother, berating him for leaving so many signs of life in her pristine house for lifeless dolls.

Steve falls asleep, alone in his empty house. The comforting weight is still around his shoulders.

It’s still dark when he wakes up, gasping around a nightmare he doesn’t remember having. His stomach roils with fear, like he’s still down in the Russian bunker, begging to keep his fingernails attached to his body. There’s no more comforting weight across his shoulders. He still doesn’t feel alone.

Steve leans across the couch and vomits. There’s very little left in him, popcorn dissolved into green stomach acid. The carpet’s beginning to look like Christmas come early. If she comes back, his Mother will not be pleased.

He doesn’t get up to clean it, exhaustion hitting hard even as the fear persists. He falls back asleep, wakes up mid-nightmare to a pounding at the door.

He stares at the ceiling, stuck still half in nightmare with the pounding of demodog feet echoing through the bunker where Robin and Steve are still tied back to back, her head pressed to the back of his own, Dustin’s screams filling the air as Steve writhes desperately to free himself and protect the kid.

Someone is still pounding at his door. He stumbles off the couch, ribs screaming, head spinning, ears buzzing, eyes half closed against the light as he opens the door, unable to even see who’s in front of him.

“Dingus, where have you been?” they say. Steve forces his eyes open wider past the light and pulsing of his head, willing his swollen eyes to make out Robin’s face. “I’ve been knocking for like five minutes! I was starting to think you were dead! And I was getting so scared that you’d gone off in the woods to die. Cats do that, you know.”

Steve blinks at her, struggling to keep up with her tirade. “Huh?”

Robin rolls her eyes. She steps into the house, making to shove past him where he’s blocking her entry. “Oh just let me in, it’s so hot out–”

She stops talking when her elbow hits his forearm. Stops moving too. Steve stares past her into the empty driveway, wisps of her hair tickling his cheek.

There’s relief coursing through him, thoughts running through his mind that can’t be his own–Thank god he’s alright, I thought he died, what would I have done? Thank god–can’t believe I care about Steve the hair Harrington enough to show up at his house uninvited, what kind of bizarro world are we living in, this is weirder than that flesh monster I swear to god–

Steve stumbles back, spine connecting painfully with the doorknob as the door swings back loudly into the wall with the force of his weight. Robin’s looking at him, eyes wide. There’s a bruise blooming on her cheekbone. Even past the confusion, he’s overwhelmed with the relief that she’s here, standing in front of him, whole and alive.

She reaches her hand out slowly, like he’s a stray cat that could be spooked at any moment. Her fingers latch onto his forearm, curling around it tight enough that her fingers dig into his flesh.

–that supposed to be what a demodog looks like? Dustin was really underselling it, I think I’d take Russian’s any day, aww Dingus was worried about me, wait wait wait, how do I know that he, did he sleep in that stupid outfit? where are his parents? why can I see–

Steve wrenches his arm free, ignoring the stinging of Robin’s fingernails scraping across his flesh. They stare at each other. Steve can feel himself breathing too fast. Wisps of Robin’s hair are sticking to her forehead with sweat. The door is still open.

“Dingus?”

“Good thing you’ve gotta breathe or I don’t think I’d ever get a word in,” Steve says without thought.

Robin brings her hand up to her mouth, eyes widening impossibly further. “Were you thinking about the demodogs?”

“Were you thinking that us being friends is weirder than the mind flayer?”

Robin drops her hand and smiles. “We’re friends?” she asks, voice chipper. “Wait, no! What is going on!”

They stare at each other some more. Robin looks manic, like she’s trying to pop her eyes out of her skull with the force of her stare. Steve, without looking away, reaches behind himself for the knob still pressed into his spin and slowly closes the door.

“Did you have a nightmare last night and throw up?” Robin nods. “Did your Dad have his arm around your shoulders?” Nod. “Well, shit.”

He finally turns away, stumbling back to the couch and gently settling down, leaving enough room for Robin beside him.

They settle like two, hunched quotations, knees settled together, hair brushing with how closely they’re eying each other.

“Anything?” Robin asks.

Steve hums, squinting his eyes with the focus of his concentration. Her eyes are blue, unlined but all but the barest remnants of smudges from her usual make-up. She looks a wreck. He’s pretty sure he loves her.

Are you excited right now?” he asks because he feels it bubbling up his throat, like someone’s just barely holding back a deluge of words, and it’s not him.

She scoffs, rolling her eyes up toward her head. “How are you not?” she demands, pulling her hands away from her knees to gesticulate in the scant air separating their bodies. “This is like superpower territory, Steve! We can read minds!”

Steve swallows around the excitement, feels his own warmth curl up in his chest at her joy. “So far only each others.”

Robin jolts, hands coming to clutch at the fabric across her chest, fist tight. “Oh,” she breathes. “Is that what you’re feeling?”

There’s something else clogging up his throat now. Not words. Tears, maybe. Steve looks down at his own bloody hands, trying to make words where only feelings exist, then remembers he doesn’t have to. He reaches out, snatches her hand, and lets himself feel.

“Why are you picturing us making Thanksgiving dinner together?” she asks, laughing even as tears bubble out of her eyes. Always a sympathetic crier, his own begin to well.

“We’re like, stuck together now, right?” He lets go of her hand, gets rid of the distracting feedback loop of two minds thinking around each other. “That like makes us–family?”

Robin sobs and launches herself into his arms. Unfortunately, the pressure on his ribs is violent enough to almost make him vomit again. Maybe he makes a noise of pain, or maybe she gets some sense of the way his vision is whiting out from pain through his thoughts, but she scrabbles backwards instantly, hands shuffling her further and further away until her back hits the armrest at the other side of the couch.

“Sorry! I’m sorry! I just got caught up in the moment, and forgot you’re totally fucked, and dingus! Shouldn’t you be in the hospital? Because all I saw there was a white light, and that doesn’t mean you’re dying, does it? Did I kill you?”

Steve laughs but it comes out more as a cough as agony falls back into the bearable threshold of pain. “I’m fine, Robin,” he says, eyes squeezed closed as he eases himself back into a fully seated position. “I got checked out in the ambulance, same as you.”

Robin, uncharacteristically, doesn’t respond. When Steve opens his eyes, all signs of tears are gone from her face, replaced with a look that clearly shows how done with his bullshit he feels. “And they told you that you were fine?” she demands.

“This all just needs to heal on its own,” he says, gesturing from his face down his torso.

Robin scoots back over to poke his cheek with her finger. He can hear her thinking about the likelihood of him being full of shit, the pros and cons of kidnapping him via her Dad’s SUV. Steve slaps her finger away, but whatever she must’ve gleaned from his own mind satisfied her enough that she doesn’t make a move toward the door or the phone.

She eyes him up and down, gaze traveling down his bloody form, to the splotches he’s left on the couch, and the slowly-developing stains on the carpet, grimacing in disgust.

“Okay, Dingus,” she says, clapping her hands sharply enough to make his ears ring. “Game plan time. You need a shower and a change of clothes pronto. Then–have you eaten?”

“I’ll be in trouble if I don’t clean this up.” He’s too worn out to even bother gesturing at the carnage surrounding them, much less bending around his ribs to scrub.

A furrow forms between Robin’s eyebrows as she contemplates him, mouth pursed like she’s trying to solve complex algebra. Or no, she’smart enough for that to be a breeze. So more like she’s trying to figure out how to scoop his brain out and blow on it until it works better.

“Where are your cleaning supplies?” she asks.

“Robin–”

“No. You’re hurt, and I’m fine. Go take a shower.” Like she can sense him looking, her hand jumps up to cover the singular bruise on her cheekbone. “It’s not the same. Where are the cleaning supplies?”

Her words are so harsh, that he speaks before thinking: “down the hallway in the closet.”

She jumps up, walking with her usual frenetic energy as Steve tries and fails to will himself to get up and stop her. It’s only a few moments after he hears the closet door click open that she shouts, “go shower!”

He goes.

Steve has to peel his uniform off. Mud and puke and blood have dried and merged to his skin. Scabs open where he pulls until he can leave the whole thing crumpled into the smallest ball he can manage in the trash can, salvaging only his nametag as a keepsake, wondering idly if Robin will switch him.

The shower hurts, but he feels divinely clean as he bends over just enough to shuffle into clean sweatpants and an old Hawkins swim team shirt from sophomore year, washed and worn enough to be soft against his skin. He doesn’t put products in his hair, doesn’t even brush it, all remaining energy used in stumbling down the stairs to stop Robin from overworking herself needlessly.

The air smells like a janitor’s closet, enough concoctions mixed together on his Mother’s carpet to wage chemical warfare. Robin’s on her hands and knees, scrubbing ferociously with a scrub brush at the grout between tiles at the entryway. Steve steps around the couch, peering down at the carpet, off-color with cleaner instead of his various bodily fluids. The couch is similarly immaculate, velvety cushions rubbed roughly against the grain from Robin’s ruthless cleaning.

“I threw away your shoes,” Robin calls as she gathers up the cleaning supplies surrounding her and stumbles her way back toward the closet. “There was a concerning amount of blood pooled in the soles, Dingus. Ain’t no way that was all coming out.”

Steve looks around at his clean living room again. All this work, and all he can feel from Robin is pleased satisfaction. Steve feels like he’s going to cry.

“I threw away my uniform.”

Robin laughs. “It’s not like we’re gonna need them anymore.”

Steve pulls the nametag out of his pocket. The stupid anchor is flecked with blood but otherwise it’s pristine. He holds it out to Robin when she troops back into the room.

“You can be me,” he says.

Her eyes light up as she takes it and immediately affixes it onto the front of her shirt. She shuffles back to the side of the couch where she’d tucked her backpack and riffles through it, murmuring quietly enough that he can’t quite make it out. She gives a cute little Ah-ha! When she finds whatever she’s looking for before skipping back over to him, grin crooked it’s so big.

“We can trade.” And there, tucked in her palm is her own, slightly charred name tag. She pins it to his shirt, pricking him with the pointy end before finally settling it in place. “You can be Robin, and I can be Steve!”

It settles easy around his shoulders, like he really can take a step back. Be someone else. Breathe. “I’m Robin,” he murmurs.

She smacks his chest over the nametag, gentle enough to barely hurt.

“Well Robin, what’s for lunch?”

They eat sandwiches in front of the TV. Robin complains about his movie collection, even as she jumps up and down excitedly and puts in Grease. It’s comfortable, easy to forget who’s dead, and who’s injured, and how fucked up their brains are now. It’s between The Breakfast Club and Fast Times that Robin gasps, sitting bolt upright and slapping his thigh.

“Truth serum, Steve! It was truth serum!”

“What was?”

“They wanted to open our minds!”

Steve, up until this point, had thought that was obvious, didn’t realize that for once she was trailing just a bit behind him in the obvious revelations category. “Yeah, and they did.” Robin’s nodding like she can’t stop. He puts his palm flat on her head and holds it still. “Opened them so wide we swallowed each others.”

Steve can’t tell who’s thinking it, but suddenly he's picturing two brains in horrible sailor outfits and terrible mouths that hit a little too close to the demogorgon. One’s mouth is open wide enough to eat the other whole. Then they’re laughing, uproariously, like they’re watching the same funny little show, like the television hasn’t turned to static in front of them.

“Now we can’t keep any of the truths from each other,” Robin says at the same time she’s thinking about that embarrassing crush she’d had on her seventh grade teacher.

In a bid to even the playing field, Steve thinks about little Sally Perkins who he’d liked so much in fourth grade that he’d smashed a grasshopper into her hair and had to miss out on the rest of recess. She’d never talked to him again.

Robin laughs but still shuffles away so his fingers aren’t touching her scalp anymore. Her thoughts flit away, but her hazy contentment lingers.

Steve gets up to switch out the movies, brain buzzing away. “Okay so I feel what you feel, right?” he asks, not waiting for a response. “And I can hear what you’re thinking when we touch.”

“You can hear it?”

Steve starts up the movie and sits back in his place on the couch. Robin looks horrified by this. “You can’t?”

“No!” she shouts, forgetting herself enough to smack her hand into his shoulder, jostling his numerous injuries. Robin grimaces, “Sorry, it’s just, you can just hear what I’m thinking? You can’t like, see anything?”

“You can see things?” Steven demands.

“Holy shit!” Robin bounces up on her knees and just keeps doing it, like a kid excited to open presents on Christmas. “Do you know what this means?”

Steve looks over at her, eyebrow furrowed. “That you’re a–girl?”

“No!” Robin stops bouncing. “I mean, yeah. But no, Steve. What the fuck?”

“I just mean that’s like the only difference between us, right? What else could it be?”

He can feel amusement bubbling up in her stomach, but Robin just stares at him, like she’s too stunned to laugh. “I just meant that some smarty pants scientist should like study us. Because like, we’re proof that some people think differently right? Me all in words and you all in these fancy schmancy pictures! That has nothing to do with our genders, Harrington. That shit’s made up!”

Steve doesn’t know how he feels about being studied by scientists. He’d heard about mini Byers time with those Upside Down quacks and wasn’t sure he was interested in his own stay. It would be nice to have someone who knew what they were doing to help them navigate whatever minefield they’d found themselves in but not at the cost of Robin’s safety. But if they just need a smarty pants who think they know everything then–”Henderson’s smart.”

“You want to call your children?” Robin asks, laughing.

“Think about it!” he replies, slapping the couch. “The lab people are all sketchy, and I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready to be locked up without sunlight for the next hundred years.”

“Okay, yeah but–”

“Your parents aren’t in the know, and I’m practically an orphan. Hopper died.” Steve cuts out, choked up over the thought just like he had been in the mall parking lot when he’d first been told. Robin squeezes his calf. “That takes Joyce out of the running since she's grieving and shit. That just leaves the kids!”

“What about Nan–”

“Things are still kind of weird with Nancy and Jonathan, Rob!” he says, running his fingers through his hair and pulling sharp enough to burn. “If we have to, sure, call her, but I don’t know if this counts as the kind of life or death scenario I would do that in.”

Robin sighs, folding over until her head’s on his thigh, stomach pressed into his calves. “Can we call him tomorrow?” she asks, voice muffled by the cotton of his sweatpants. “My head’s killing me and that kid is so shrill.”

Steve runs his fingers through her hair, coming it back from her face. His fingers come in contact with her forehead long enough to get a quick burst of–feels nice, I wonder if this is why all the girls liked him, or if it was all those rumors I heard about his mouth, eww eww gross don’t think about–before her thoughts cut out. “Tomorrow,” he agrees.

They settle in to keep vegetating, Steve slumping further into the arm rest, Robin turning her head and wrapping her arms around his calf. The quiet lasts for ten more minutes before Steve just has to ask, “What do you mean gender is made up?”

Robin cackles.

[thefreakandthehair]

@eddiemonth prompt, oct 12th: Soulmates | Eight - Sleeping at Last | Perceptive a/n: steddie, soulmates au (phillia + eros). eddie & jeff as platonic soulmates, stobin soulmates mentioned always. un-betaed because I’m challenging myself to write these in under an hour. read on ao3 | link to masterpost on ao3

Soulmates, Eddie scoffs to himself as he doodles in his notebook at the back of the coffee shop. Bullshit. 

He knows it’s actually not, that people walk around every day hand-in-hand with beautiful, swirling tattoos that grow in intricacy and detail the more time they spend with their soulmate. Most days, Eddie doesn’t mind that the simple snake design on the inside of his wrist never so much as slithers, but today? Today, he minds. 

Dating in the world of soulmates is challenging. He tries to just focus on how feels, on if the person sitting across from him is compatible with his lifestyle, on if there’s any kind of spark, but it’s inevitable that at some point, both he and his date look down at their wrists to find nothing. 

His coffee date had gone well enough but, like always, was a dead-end. How many paths can one person try before the destination seems moot? 

So he sits and scribbles in his notebook, hoping that perhaps staying in the coffee shop rather than returning home to the apartment he shares with Jeff will provide some inspiration. That tattoo, the one that’d started as a small star on his ankle, has grown into a whirling galaxy since moving in with Jeff– a philia connection if he’s ever seen one. But if his eros tattoo won’t build upon itself naturally, he’ll do it manually with a tattoo gun. 

It also helps that the barista is perhaps the most beautiful man Eddie’s ever laid eyes on, enough so that it’s… actually a little intimidating, if he’s being honest with himself. Intimidating to the point that Eddie’s yet to approach him for a refill since the girl who’d given him his first sugary abomination finished her shift. Besides, the mystery barista must’ve already found his soulmate. His entire left arm, from fingertip to at least his elbow, is covered in delicate, colorful designs that twist and wind about his skin, curling around each finger and looping gracefully up his arm.

I can still enjoy the view, he justifies to himself, taking a sip from his cup and remembering for the third time that it’s empty. 

He sighs and sets it back down, clearing his throat. It’s as good a time as any, he supposes, as he stands from his little corner table by the window and strolls across the room to the counter. 

“Hi, what can I get started for ya?” The barista asks, his name tag now visible and proclaiming Steve. 

“Uh,” he starts. “Salted caramel mocha, please?” 

Steve��s smile is bright and he leans on the counter, leveling it straight in Eddie’s direction. All Eddie wanted was a refill on his sweet treat disguised as coffee and instead, it feels as though he’s smacked in the head.

“Comin’ right up,” Steve replies, turning around to get his order going. “You’ve been sitting over there for a while, how’d that date go?” He asks with the confidence and familiarity of someone Eddie’s known his entire life. 

“Watching me, were you?” 

Steve grins over his shoulder, shrugging. “A little.” 

“I’m flattered. Well, I’m still here and they’re not so that oughta tell you everything.” 

Steve hums and turns back to the machine, finishing up his order. Eddie’s heart beats rhythmically, somehow slowing and quickening all at once and his lungs feel buoyed by something more powerful than his breath. When Steve faces him again and hands him his cup, exchanging it for the empty one in Eddie’s hand, they both freeze. 

Eddie’s snake begins to move. 

A clear, serpentine movement at the center as small, geometric lines begin to appear in the background. 

“Holy shit,” Eddie whispers, setting his full cup down so he doesn’t spill it. 

“Yeah, holy shit.” Steve places his other arm on the counter, the blank one, and Eddie sees that it’s not blank. There’s a small, barebones tree on his forearm whose leaves begin to blossom and shake, different shades of greens and oranges appearing before his eyes. 

“But– your other arm?” Eddie chokes out, eyes flickering between his own wrist, Steve’s forearm, and Steve’s other, fuller arm. 

“Philia. That’s Robin. But this one, this is eros.” Steve smiles again, matching the one Eddie can feel spreading across his own face as he looks up from his forearm. “I’m Steve.”

Steve smiles again, matching the one Eddie can feel spreading across his own face as he looks up from his forearm. Eddie looks in wonderment, searching for any sign of lie or trickery in Steve’s eyes and finds nothing but warmth and familiarity. 

“I’m Eddie.”

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is: ghosttotheparty! @ghosttotheparty has 72 fics in the Stranger Things fandom and 61 of them are in the Steddie tag!

@estrellami-1 or anonymous nominator recommends the following works by @ghosttotheparty:

love me softly

a mess of holy things

pretty girls (series)

hideout

fate

"This author has captivated me from day one. I’ve since gone back and read and re-read everything they have in fandoms that I am a part of, and I’m highly considering reading everything, regardless of fandom!" -- @estrellami-1

They also had this to say: "It was so hard to just pick five fics—I’d easily pick all of them if I could!! These five are just a few of their fics that I come back to, time and time again. This author’s way with words is absolutely stunning, and I want to be like them when I grow up! 😉" -- @estrellami-1

Below the cut, @ghosttotheparty answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

I honestly just adore them so much. Characters that are opposites have always been something I’ve loved; Nico di Angelo and Will Solace are the first to come to mind. I’ve loved them since middle school (I’m in my third year of uni now), and I’ve apparently drawn some connections between their dynamics and Steddie’s. I also feel like Steddie just has so much potential in regards to different dynamics. There are so many alternate universes in which they’re entirely different from the way they are in the original show but there is still a consensus within the community of what kind of people they are and how they behave, speak, or interact. Despite writing the same characters over and over and over, I’ve had so much fun being able to experiment with different personalities and dynamics.

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

I think everyone knows at this point that I lovelovelove hurt/comfort. Physical injury and wounds, nursing the other back to health, trauma recovery, nightmares or flashbacks, sub/dom drop, panic attacks or breakdowns, give me all of it. (Bonus points if this is pre-relationship and the comforter calls the other a pet name (cough baby cough) for the first time in the midst of it all. God.)

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

See above. In all honesty, I love intensity. Heavy emotions like grief and anguish and rage are my fucking thing, and I think most of my longer fics involve at least one heavy scene with a panic attack or emotional breakdown. Something about the release and expression of emotions followed by tender patience and sweet comfort is just so cathartic for me.

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

I write more fics than there are fics that I read, unfortunately, but the first fic to come to mind was in my life by mourningshowers (@keycarabiner on tumblr). Sososo sweet and tender. It ripped me apart and then stitched me back together and gave me a lollipop as a treat. I also adore the series The Rush of Thunder (That Brings You Under) by callmejude (@callmejude on tumblr). The pacing and characterisation and dialogue were fucking phenomenal. Print this whole series out and bury me with it when I go.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

I have a few AUs that I haven’t actually explored quite yet; one involves teacher!Steve and another is about punk!Stobin (platonic, Obviously), and yet another involves artist!Eddie. But more generally speaking I would like to explore some heavier themes in the future when I have the guts.

What is your writing process like?

Good question. I have no idea. I write pretty much every night, usually with Youtube or Netflix on next to me (typically playing things I’ve already seen so I don’t have to pay full attention to follow along, but my main go-tos are documentaries/docuseries), and I tend to just get as much out as I can. I write most linearly; I tend to not skip ahead and go back, but occasionally I’ll have an idea for a scene that I need to scribble out to make sure I don’t forget it. But my plotlines and focus points tend to shift as I’m writing, so sometimes these scenes end up changing as well.

Do you have any writing quirks?

I hadn’t noticed any, but Bee (@jewishrat420) pointed some out to me: - I consistently use the word ‘press’ - I phrase actions in lists with commas and a finalising and. - I tend to have repeating themes (for example, warm and cold and the quiet journey a character makes from their loneliness to the warmth of someone else). I’ve also noticed that I really like writing visceral imagery; even in fics for other ships I’ve mentioned one character longing to claw open their partner and climb inside them. I love bloody imagery, which Steddie are perfect for.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

If I’m uploading a fic with multiple chapters, I generally try to stay ahead of my posting schedule with at least one to two chapters already written in advance of posting. For my current wip, though, I’ve decided to post only when it’s complete, and to post on a schedule just in case I get behind or lose track.

Which fic are you most proud of?

Probably a mess of holy things.

How did you get the idea for a mess of holy things?

Ah, my love. The inspiration for this fic came from dirty paws by inifiniteorangepeel (@infinite-orangepeel on tumblr). Her version of Steve had me by the fucking throat, and I genuinely could not stop thinking about him even though I think this was before she even started uploading actual parts of the fic. I knew that I wanted to write some kind of religiously traumatised Steve, naive and curious about Eddie fucking Munson, and the haze of an idea snowballed into whatever this fic became.

When writing a mess of holy things, what was something you didn’t expect?

Honestly, I wasn’t expecting how confrontational it would feel. I was raised Catholic, and I put Steve’s parents in a category of religious people that I’ve never really known well. I was never forced to go to church or Sunday school (in fact, I think I only went to Sunday school for, like, three weeks), and for the most part as a child, my relationship with God was amicable. My abuela was very religious when I was young (my mother likes to say, “She was more Catholic than the Pope”), but I never felt as though her faith impeded upon my own life. She would tell me that my artistic skill was a gift from God, and she would pray over me when I had tummy aches, and even though I wasn’t very faithful, I found comfort in it. I also have always found a peace in holy buildings; churches and church graveyards are some of my favourite places to just sit in silence. So I wasn’t expecting the emotional whiplash writing holy things gave me. Writing from Steve’s point of view at first felt like writing fantasy, making it up as I went because I couldn’t write from experience; I have healthy relationships with both my parents, and even though my father had a very difficult childhood, he’s done everything he could to be a good father to me and my brother, so Steve’s father was entirely made up. It wasn’t until I got further along in the fic that I actually realised how big an impact even a slightly religious upbringing had on me as a queer person. My parents never taught me anything hateful, never complained about anybody in regards to God, but somehow this general religious disapproval latched itself to my ribcage, and I hadn’t realised I’d been carrying it around with me my whole life. And I was forced to confront it, along with the distrust that I’d inadvertently developed toward religious people.

What inspired love me softly?

My darling!! This fic started as a random one-shot about Eddie bitching to Gareth about having a crush on a normie, but the feedback was so lovely I decided to write another part. And then another. And then another. At some point the vague idea of a plot appeared, and this universe became very dear to me. I still have ideas for follow-up one-shots, which I keep in a collection on AO3. I think this fic is also what started my love for Tommy Hagan, who I’ve since claimed as an OC. He’s mine now.

What was your favorite part to write from hideout series?

While I was writing this series, I found that I love secret relationships. The idea of Steve having something in his life that he could turn to for some sense of normalcy despite everything in his life literally being straight out of a science-fiction movie was something I loved, and writing the majority of it from an outsider point of view was a fun experiment/exercise.

How do/did you feel writing fate (series)?

Oh, GOD. I love angst. I had the idea for Eddie’s death, specifically him singing the Tennessee Waltz and the whole “Do you think God’ll let me in?” thing, and I worked from there. I actually considered leaving the fic at Eddie’s death, but as much as I love angst, I also love happy and hopeful endings. Even though my heart hurt the entire time I wrote this whole series, I loved it all. Wayne’s point of view was a fun (ish) shift in perspectives and I’ve since included sections in his point of view because I love him so much. (I do also have a one-shot specifically about him living in my head, but I have yet to put it into words.)

What was the most difficult part of writing pretty girls (series)?

I don’t know if I would really consider it difficult, but it did require some actual thinking to write Steve as transfemme, or genderqueer in the opposite direction as me. To take my own experiences and feelings and shift them so they’re upside down was definitely interesting.

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

This is from one of my less known fics, spill my guts: “And I’m so fucking high right now, but Steve, I— I think I love you.” It just feels so representative of Steddie as a whole. (Honestly the whole scene kind of feels very Them: both of them high out of their minds and suddenly confessing their undying love in the most dramatic fucking way possible. Ugh. I love them.)

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

I’m working right now on a fic that involves priest’s son!Steve and recovering addict!Eddie, and that’s all I’ll say on that <3

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

Not entirely relevant, but I make playlists and pinboards for almost all my fics (if I don’t have one of either for a fic that you’d like one for, literally just hit me up and I’ll put one together); here are the ones I made for Steve & Eddie <3 S - https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3dW3wTo8nD11RuqKs9aj52?si=9f98f4a287394152 https://www.pinterest.co.uk/ghosttotheparty/king-steve/ E - https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4eWRFi07VIEKIoeaGwfFI5?si=791fa1f2dd6a4f7e https://www.pinterest.co.uk/ghosttotheparty/eddie-the-banished/

Thank you to our author, @ghosttotheparty, and our nominator, @estrellami-1! See more of @ghosttotheparty's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[thisapplepielife]

Secret Santa

Written for the Second Annual Spicy Six Fanworks Challenge hosted by @thefreakandthehair.

Prompt: Office Party | Word Count: 6025 | Rating: E | CW: Explicit Sexual Content, 18+ Only | Tags: Steddie, Steve POV, The Office AU, Office Setting, Semi-Public Sex, Sex Toys, Bathroom Sex, Mutual Assisted Masturbation, Holiday Party, Secret Santa, Background Jancy, Secret Relationship, Platonic Stobin, Platonic Hellcheer, Eddie & Gareth Friendship

Can also be read right here on Ao3.

This definitely has vibes borrowed from The Office. If you're familiar with that, you can picture Steve's desk as in the same location as Jim's.

Steve slumps behind his computer monitor at his desk, trying to make himself as small as possible. It's days like today that he really wishes their office had private cubicles instead of an open floor plan, because that'd actually give him somewhere to hide. As it is, with all of them out in the open, it means he's a sitting duck. No flimsy temporary wall to crouch down behind, no nothing at all between him and the horror that is lurking on the other side of the room.

And right now, he really wants somewhere to hide. But unless he wants to crawl under his desk, the room really doesn't offer much protection.

Honestly, he usually doesn't mind their setup at all. He likes the openness of it. He likes to see his coworkers all day. His friends. He likes to be able to talk, and yeah, to avoid work. He's nosy. He wants to see what insanity everyone else is up to every day. That always gives Robin and him things to gossip about later, and that's one of their favorite pastimes. He can look over at Robin behind the receptionist desk, and they can have long conversations with each other, using just their eyes. 

They can talk about a cute new girl (or guy, if Steve's the one looking) that's been hired. They can bitch about stupid policy changes. Or a co-worker being a fool. Anything, everything.

But not today. 

Today, Steve scoots down further in his chair, hoping that maybe he can make himself totally invisible, if he just wishes for it hard enough. 

Because right this minute, Nancy's on the party planning warpath, and he wants no part of it. Party planning isn't anything he's ever been good at, well, beyond hosting a few laidback keggers as a teen, he supposes. Those all went as expected. But office parties? No way. That fact should be obvious to all of them after they forced him onto the party planning committee back in August, and his choices just made them all clutch their pearls. 

Steve didn't know that even though there's a full list of silly, made-up holidays to choose from each month, apparently not all of those days are actually on the Nancy-approved list. Steve definitely didn't know that was an unspoken rule for the monthly morale party, so for August, he picked Work Like a Dog day, and convinced half of the office to show up in dog costumes. 

Nancy Wheeler didn't find it funny. At all.

That's okay, Steve thinks it was hilarious. 

If it wasn't actually an option for a party theme, then they shouldn't have put it on the goddamn list. 

And what the fuck does it matter, anyway? Honestly. The monthly staff party is just an excuse to have cake, punch, and thirty minutes longer for lunch. Nobody really wants to attend these office parties, anyway. Might as well make them a little more unpredictable, a little more fun.

The theme can't possibly matter. It's all bullshit. 

But now, here they are in December, and this is the annual holiday party they're talking about. Not a random monthly party. Oh no, this is the big one. The one that takes place after hours. 

And to Nancy, and the rest of the party planning committee, it matters. 

A lot.

So, Steve's hiding. Like a coward.

"You're such a coward," Steve hears from across his desk, a low, taunting hiss pointed in his direction. 

He doesn't look in the direction of the voice, because he's smart enough to not fuck this up with any sudden movements. He's aiming for invisible, after all, but he can't resist slowly raising his hand, flipping Eddie off in slow motion. 

Eddie laughs, so Steve knows the message landed, loud and clear, even if Steve never looked in his direction.

Fuck him for reading Steve's mind. Of course he's being a coward, but there's no reason to announce that fact. That's just rude.

Steve and Eddie share space, in their little group of desks. Steve sits on the end, and then there's two desks facing each other in front of him. Eddie is to his right, and it's really not so bad. Steve's had some weird fucking deskmates over the years, so much so, that having Eddie Munson at his side has been a breath of fresh air in comparison. A relief, even. Eddie's just loud, and messy.

Steve can handle loud and messy, even if Eddie's shit is apt to spill over onto Steve's desk most days, crowding him out of his own space. Steve can hold his client binder on his lap. That's no problem. Hell, he doesn't even get all that mad when Eddie gets too loud and gets them both disapproving looks. At least it's always fun while it's happening.

Gareth sits on the left, right across from Eddie, and right now he's slid down so far in his chair that he's practically under their desks, just like Steve. Smart kid, he's learning. 

Steve dares to glance over and see what's happening across the room. 

Nancy is leaning over Jonathan's desk, and Argyle is making faces behind her back. Nancy has eyes in the back of her head, so she definitely knows he's doing it, and Argyle is just asking for trouble. He's gonna get put on the party planning committee if he isn't careful. Which, Steve supposes, is a way better outcome than him getting recruited.

Nancy has her hand resting on Jonathan's shoulder as she talks to him, ignoring Argyle completely.

Steve isn't supposed to know that Jonathan and Nancy have been sneaking around the office, fucking in all the secluded corners of the warehouse, with far less stealth than they think they have. He doesn't blame them. He knows they don't want to go to HR and fill out the paperwork informing the company about their relationship.

Steve gets that. Because he also feels like it's none of the company's business who he fucks on his own time, and definitely wouldn't volunteer that information up willingly, either. None of them ever want to go deal with Murray for anything at all if they can help it. He asks far too many personal questions. It's always uncomfortable, and best to be avoided at all costs.

However, Steve thinks it's mighty funny that Nancy Wheeler, the rule-follower that she likes to pretend she is, is currently breaking them left and right. It honestly makes him like her even more.

And he does like her. Don't get him wrong, just not on party planning weeks. During those weeks, she's the enemy and must be wholly treated as such.

"Steve," Steve hears his name, a hushed whisper, and he turns to look at Robin sitting behind the reception desk.

He waves her off with a small hand movement. He needs to make sure Nancy has settled on haranguing Jonathan and Argyle before he dares to stick his neck out in the open.

Before Steve can say anything back to Robin, The Boss comes out of his office behind Steve's back, clapping his hands together for attention, and they all turn to look in his direction.

Bob Newby is kind of a goofball, and just a little bit doofy, but he's well-meaning. At least Steve's pretty sure he is. He doesn't seem to have a mean bone in his body. As far as bosses go, they could all do way worse.

"Hey there," Bob says, clapping his hands together again, "I told Nancy to make the holiday party this year a big one. A fun one. A special one. And to do that, Steve's gonna help her. Right, Steve?"

Well, Steve wants to strangle Bob, now. Well-meaning, his ass. He's not only mean, he's evil. He's a filthy traitor that Steve would feed to wolves given half a chance after this utter betrayal.

But Steve nods, because he's not actually gonna tell Bob no. It's not worth the pitiful face he'll get in return. Eddie is laughing, and if Steve gets the angle right, he's pretty sure he can kick Eddie in the shin under their desks without even looking.

He hits the mark and Eddie hisses at the blow, and Steve bites back a smile. Eddie had that coming, the asshole.

Then Steve has a better idea, a meaner idea, and he sits up straighter in his chair, and turns and looks right at Eddie, pointedly, "Yeah, and Eddie offered to help me!"

If looks could kill, he'd be dead, but Eddie gets what he deserves. If he wants to be a jerk, he can just help Steve out with planning this shitshow. 

Bob is pleased at this though, and announces, "Great! Just don't pick anything scary, guys. I hate scary." 

Steve grins, wide. That's a directive for Eddie, not him, and it amuses Steve greatly. 

"Got it. Yeti and Krampus are out," Eddie says, with fake sincerity. 

Chrissy squeals with delight that they are both actually willing to help with this party. Willing is definitely a stretch of the imagination, but Steve and Eddie both smile at her. She's sweet, and Steve knows Eddie will do anything she asks him to, because he's that wrapped around her little finger.

That's okay, Steve's just as wrapped around Robin's, if not more, so he can't really throw any stones in Eddie's direction about that.

Steve nods, and gives Chrissy a tight smile. They'll make this work. It looks like they have to, since they definitely lost this round of office politics.

Nancy is glaring in their direction, suspicious, "Well, fine. We'll just have to plan for every possible disaster with you two in charge."

"Hey! The dog party was a barking success," Steve yells at her, and she huffs and spins around away from him. Annoyed. 

He smiles, and looks over at Eddie, and he's smiling back. 

Maybe this won't be the end of the world after all.

Later, after the dust has settled, Steve leans on Robin's desk, looking down at her, disapproving. He's eating his lunch standing up at her desk, both of them sharing what they have, passing things back and forth. 

Looking across the office, Steve can see into the break room, and Eddie is sitting at the closest table to the windows with Chrissy, both of them digging around in his metal lunchbox. They can leave for lunch, and sometimes they do, but most of the time they all just pack lunches and hang around. Sometimes, they'll all chip in and do a group order, running out to pick up burgers or pizza, but that takes advance planning, and that isn't exactly Steve's strong suit. 

Eddie is digging around in his lunchbox, and Steve wonders what Eddie has packed in there today, pretzels, maybe a sand-

"Focus, dingus. I tried to warn you," Robin hisses, and his attention is drawn away from Eddie and his mystery lunch, when Robin taps her hand on the counter in front of him.

Steve turns to look back at her, glaring. She's his best friend, but right now, she's definitely the enemy as Bob's secretary. She could have stopped this if she'd wanted to, he's absolutely sure of it.

"You're on the party planning committee," he accuses, "and you have Bob's ear. Why didn't you make this go away for me?" 

She wrings her hands, "I tried! Bob liked your dog party!"

Well, Steve has to laugh at that. That's what he gets for being smartass, he supposes. He tried to poke Nancy with a stick so he'd never have to have a turn at party planning ever again, and inadvertently just ended up coming across as a fun party planner to Bob. 

Goddamnit. That was not the desired effect he'd been hoping for.

So, now he's stuck. And this is his own fault, it seems. But at least he took Eddie down with him. That's the silver-lining, for sure.

Steve will make it work. It's only a week of hell. He can survive a week.

"Trust me, we tried. None of us wanted you in charge again," Robin snaps.

"Hey!" Steve shouts back, offended, and she just laughs. 

"Seriously. Nancy has standards, expectations, and dog parties aren't part of the playbook."

Steve smiles, "Well, I guess I should be left off any committees from now on."

"No such luck," Robin snarks, "but Nancy, Chrissy, Barb and I will definitely make sure whatever you two try to plan isn't dog party levels of weird."

"Gee, thanks. If you want to micromanage it, why don't you just do it yourselves? Wouldn't that just be easier for everyone involved?"

Robin shrugs, "Just make Bob happy. It's Christmas."

"Yeah, yeah," and Steve glances back, looking for Eddie again, and now he's sitting there playing finger football with Gareth as Chrissy watches. Both of them flicking a paper triangle back and forth across the break room table, trying to hit field goals through each other's finger goal posts. 

That's about the extent of any sports that either one of them has ever played, Steve's pretty damn sure.

Gareth, the new kid, started a while back, and Eddie took to him immediately. Steve has tried not to be jealous. But it was hard. He still kind of wanted Eddie and his attention all to himself, as selfish as that sounds.

But he's had to learn to share, both Eddie and their desk space with Gareth, and he's watched as Eddie has tried hard to shape Gareth into a good salesman. 

Robin's desk phone rings, and she picks it up, and he takes that as his cue to walk away. He heads towards the break room, and leans in the doorway, watching them play.

"I've got winner," Chrissy says, "but you can take on the winner of that match, if you want."

Steve nods and smiles, and walks on in, sliding into the only remaining chair left at the table.

When four-thirty rolls around, Bob comes over and sends Steve and Eddie off to start planning this party they are now in charge of together. At least they get a half-hour of paid nonsense time, Steve guesses.

So, now they sit in the empty meeting room at the long table, and just look at each other.

Finally, Eddie breaks the silence.

"Okay, smart guy, what's your big plan this time? Cat party?" Eddie asks, raising an eyebrow, challenging Steve.

"Yep. Pussy party," Steve says, deadpan, and Eddie tosses his head back and laughs, hair flying. 

Work has definitely been more entertaining since Eddie Munson showed up last year, all long-hair and lackadaisical attitude. Eddie doesn't conform to any sort of standard expectations, won't, but he can sell like a motherfucker. He has a silvertongue that Steve only wishes he possessed. Steve can sell, too. But he has to lean heavily on being earnest. That's his angle. 

But it's not Eddie's. No, Eddie can just bullshit his way through sales with anyone on the fly, easily meeting his quota and walking away with a damn good commission check every payday, and that hardly seems fair. Steve's been here forever, but Eddie took to it so much quicker.

"Pussy hats for everyone, and the party favors? Pocket pussies," Eddie states, still exploring this party idea with a shit-eating grin, and it makes Steve giggle.

If only. 

Though, this still might be fun to plan together, even if that can't actually be the theme. Nancy would murder them both.

They better do something safe, like Secret Santa. Bob always likes that, and this is really for him more than it is the staff, Steve's pretty damn sure.

They can just go traditional, make everyone happy and save themselves a lot of grief. 

That doesn't mean they won't sit here and bullshit, like they are really talking this thing through in great detail.

"Secret Santa? That's the theme?" Robin asks later, clearly disappointed.

"Classic. Easy peasy," Steve says, leaning on the tall counter that runs around her desk. He's waiting for her to finish up so they can leave together. 

Tonight, they're all going to happy hour at Chili's. They do that from time to time. Most of the office meeting up after work to drink and let loose.

"Lazy, uninspired," she taunts, and he reaches out like he's going to flick her ear, but she dodges his hand, laughing. "Bob's gonna be disappointed in you."

"He won't. He'll love it," Steve says, and Robin knows it. She's just being difficult. "Will you make up the slips so we can draw names, or not?" he asks, trying to give her the eyes. They don't really work on her, not anymore. But he still tries.

"Fine, but this is not fun. I was expecting dog party levels of unhinged theming from you both. You disappoint me."

"You love me," Steve counters.

"Of course I do, dingus. Now leave me alone so I can finish up and we can get the fuck out of here."

He presses his hands together, bowing to her, just a little, and then heads back to his desk. Eddie is still on the phone, wheeling and dealing, like a pro. 

Making money, even after hours. 

Asshole. 

Gareth is sitting at their desks, watching Eddie with wide eyes. 

"He's good, right?" Steve asks, and Gareth nods. "It's okay if it's hard to make sales, especially at first. It's hard for all of us, except Eddie. But he's a freak."

Eddie hears him, and sticks his tongue out, not missing a beat of his phone call.

"You'll get better. I promise," Steve says, turning to look at Gareth.

Gareth nods again, and Steve smiles. Steve was probably not that much younger than him when he started working here, and it looks so young now, seeing it on Gareth. He never thought he'd still be here, all these years later. 

But he's made friends here, good friends. His best friend. If he never worked here, he'd never have met Robin, and that'd be a goddamn tragedy. 

And he met Eddie, so honestly, he doesn't have too many complaints.

Turns out, Nancy loves the Secret Santa theme, which Steve isn't surprised about. It's right up her alley. Normal, basic, a classic. No dog costumes to be found.

"What's the price limit?" she asks, holding her notepad in hand, and Steve looks at her. Is he supposed to decide that? He feels like that's a job for her, or maybe even Bob.

"Twenty-five dollars?" he offers, and she thinks about it for a minute, then nods, writing it in her notes, apparently agreeing with his assessment. 

Great.

"And, is it a traditional Secret Santa where we draw names, or a white elephant situation?"

"Um, traditional?" he hazards a guess and she nods, happy. Apparently that was the right answer, again. He's on a roll today. Hot damn. Maybe he needs to buy a lottery ticket.

Steve sits at the high top table at Chili's, sharing an Awesome Blossom with Robin and drinking his third margarita. Eddie didn't show up. Steve is pretty sure he said he was coming, but now Eddie, Gareth, Chrissy, Jeff and Goodie are all no-shows. 

That's okay. 

But he would have gone home instead of coming himself if he knew Eddie was bailing. Not that he isn't enjoying spending time with Robin and everyone else, he is, but still. 

He raises his finger, ordering one more drink. Robin's definitely gonna have to drive him home. 

The next morning, Nancy drops off a list of party vendors for him to call, and Steve pushes it towards Eddie. He's the one with phone magic.

And Steve's a little hungover. Eddie's not. 

Not to mention Steve's still a little mad at Eddie for deciding to skip happy hour without telling him. 

"Hey, don't be pushing your chores off on me," Eddie says, pushing it back across the desk in Steve's direction.

They both push on the paper, in a stalemate, wrinkling it under their fingers.

Steve gives him the eyes, "C'mon. You know you'll have better luck. We'll get an awesome cake, and a great meat and cheese plate if you call. You know it."

"Which is ironic, because if the little old ladies working could see me, and then see you, it'd be you they'd be falling over themselves to please," Eddie says.

Steve rolls his eyes. Little old ladies love Eddie, at least after they look past his clothes and hair. He's too charming for them to not love him. He's got a chivalry that is innate, and Steve doesn't have that at all. He likes to think he's nice, but he's not as charismatic. The Harrington Charm is a different beast than whatever Eddie has going on, that's for damn sure.

Eventually, Eddie takes the paper, and picks up the handset of his phone, and starts dialing the first number, and Steve just grins, pleased.

He listens, and tries to ignore the dull headache that's plagued him all morning.

When Eddie hangs up the phone, he looks at Steve, "Shoulda came to Poor Richard's with us, like you said you would, and then you wouldn't have a hangover from all that chain restaurant cheap well tequila."

Steve glowers at him. They've been over this fifty times. Nobody said they were going to Poor Richard's last night. It was Chili's, and the fact that everyone else showed up at Chili's except for Eddie and his friends, is all the proof Steve needs.

Eddie didn't listen, and they ended up at different bars. 

But Steve forgives him as he keeps making calls, and before long they have everything in order for next week's party.

And a week later, they all sit around in a circle of chairs like they're kindergarteners, which feels foolish. But Bob is clearly having fun, dressed in his full Santa suit, as he pulls the wrapped packages out of the bag and passes them around to their rightful owners.

It's fine. Lots of generic gift boxes. Hot cocoa samplers. Summer sausage and cheese gift sets. Blankets, mugs, candy. A foot bath. Just stuff. More things that nobody really needed, Steve's sure, but it makes Bob happy, so they all at least pretend to be excited about whatever they've gotten.

They all thank their Secret Santa, and it's all very normal. Boring. So boring. 

But Steve has a plan for later that he thinks won't be quite as boring as this has been.

The gifts all opened, Steve holds open the plastic trash bag as Eddie picks up the wrapping paper off the chairs, the floor. Tidying up while the rest of the committee goes and starts getting the bar set up.

Steve isn't sure how Bob swung it, but they actually get to serve alcohol this year. 

Jeff and Goodie volunteered to play bartender, and that's great with Steve. He was sure he'd get stuck doing it, with Eddie's help if he was lucky. But this is better. Way better. They'll be able to just enjoy themselves.

As soon as it's up and running, Steve and Eddie are first in line for a drink. Steve goes easy on them, but Eddie's trying to order things they definitely don't have the supplies for. The budget was limited and they decided to stick to the most popular basics. 

Goodie listens to Eddie lists off his third try at an elaborate drink order, and then just pours Eddie a Jack and Coke.

"Just what I wanted," Eddie says, picking it up with a snarky grin.

They're a few drinks in, and the music has been turned up, when Steve nods towards Eddie, ready to slip away during the confusion. Steve shakes a wrapped gift in his hand, and Eddie quirks an eyebrow, curious, and follows him out into the hallway. They ride the elevator up one floor in silence, and then Steve leads Eddie into the empty bathroom on the floor right above their office space.

They can hear the thumpa thumpa of the music down below, feel it vibrating beneath their feet. Gareth and Argyle have teamed up to play DJ, and Steve is sure Nancy hates the music choices. They definitely aren't playing classic Christmas tunes, that's for damn sure.

Steve pushes the wrapped gift into Eddie's chest, and Eddie sits his drink down on the sink.

"What is this?" Eddie asks, looking down at the gift in his hands. He wasn't expecting it, clearly.

"Well, I didn't draw your name for the official Secret Santa, but I still wanted you to have your party favor," Steve says, trying to keep a straight face. This is a ridiculous thing to do. Especially at work. "Open it."

He watches while Eddie tears off the wrapping paper, throwing it onto the bathroom floor, and then Eddie's looking down at the fleshlight he's holding in his hands. 

And he promptly blushes a deep crimson.

Holy shit. 

Steve had no idea that Eddie could blush. Maybe this wasn't a great idea. Maybe he's about to lose his job for sexual harassment at work. At Christmas, no less.

Then, Eddie laughs. Loud and amused, eyes lighting up.

"Well, there's a first time for everything, I guess," Eddie says, turning over the toy in his hands, walking into the open stall. Steve follows.

"Not a sex toy guy?" Steve asks, crowding a little closer to him.

"Not a pussy guy," Eddie answers, then laughs, "I thought you knew that, Steve."

Yeah, Steve knew that. But he pretends he didn't.

"Oh no, do they make pocket assholes? Maybe we could exchange it, get you what you really like," Steve teases.

And Eddie grins, dimples showing, as he presses the toy back into Steve's chest, and Steve takes it. 

"This one is just my favorite, and I thought you might like it," Steve says, looking Eddie right in the eye, standing nearly nose-to-nose in the cramped bathroom stall. 

And Eddie is looking back at him, with an expression Steve can't really read. It looks like he's maybe surprised Steve is cool. Which is crazy. Steve's cool. Steve's been fucking guys since he was in college, girls even earlier than that. He's not really all that fussed about it. Boys, girls, both at the same time, once. 

That was an interesting night, to be sure. Not one he expects to repeat anytime soon, but it's definitely an experience he's glad he had. 

Steve holds the toy in his hand, studying it carefully, and then he looks up into Eddie's eyes. 

"You wanna try it?" Steve asks, raising his eyebrows in question.

"Now?" Eddie asks, dropping his voice low, sounding shocked at this suggestion. 

Steve shrugs, and Eddie eventually nods, slowly. 

"Yeah. Yeah, let's do that," Eddie says, putting both of his hands on Steve's arms, squeezing.

"Are you sure you want to do this here? I was just kidding," Steve asks, even if he wasn't, not really. But he still wants to make sure this is something Eddie is actually interested in doing with him, here and now, and not something he's pushing onto him like a big, fucking creep.

Eddie nods and smiles, so Steve presses him back against the wall of the bathroom stall, Steve's palm firm on Eddie's shoulder. He hands the fleshlight back to Eddie, and digs a packet of lube out of his pocket, handing that over, too.

Steve reaches for Eddie belt, his zipper, and carefully, slowly, undoes his pants. Pulling them down over his ass, boxers going down with them, and then he's just looking. Staring. Wanting.

Eddie's already drizzled lube into the opening of the fake silicone pussy, so Steve takes it from him. Steve doesn't touch Eddie's dick, although it's straining, red and flushed at the tip, begging for Steve's undivided attention.

And as much as Steve wants to give it that attention, wants to drop to his knees, throw the toy aside and suck Eddie's dick, he doesn't.

Instead, Steve grips the pocket pussy in his hand, and angles it, lining it up as best he can. He nods at Eddie, and holds it steady as Eddie pushes into it. Unsure at first, but after a few test thrusts, Steve feels the pressure, the force, behind the snap of Eddie's hips with every thrust. And Steve thinks about what it'd be like if it was him Eddie was pushing his dick into, instead of this toy.

His own dick is hard, so fucking hard, just watching this happen. He can't tear his eyes away. He watches Eddie's dick go in and out.

Eddie groans, leaning forward and resting his forehead on Steve's shoulder, still moving his hips. Still fucking, still pushing his cock into the toy in Steve's hand. Again, and again. 

Steve can't see now, but he can feel it. Can hear it.

It's noisy and loud, making a filthy, wet, squelching sound that sounds even more scandalous as they're hidden away in a public bathroom. Like they might get caught any second, doing this devious thing together.

Eddie winds his arms around Steve's back, and holds on tight. The action brings them even closer together, which is making it harder for Steve to maneuver his hand and the toy between their bodies, but Steve will make it work. He keeps a good grip on the fleshlight, making sure Eddie can keep moving his hips, keep pushing his dick into it, over and over again, even as he leans his weight on Steve.

"That pussy feel good?" Steve whispers, pressing his face into Eddie's hair. He smells good, and Steve leans into him.

Eddie whimpers, and nods against Steve's shirt, and Steve twists his hand, just a little, and Eddie moans. 

"All pretty and pink, wet, begging for your cock," Steve whispers. "It's a pretty cock, you've got. You know that?"

He just yammering, and he's pretty sure Eddie isn't even listening. That's okay, Steve's happy to do the heavy lifting here. 

"I bet it feels good. All tight, hugging your dick the whole way down.. Are you pretending it's a girl?" Steve asks, then lowers his voice, right next to Eddie's ear, "Or are you pretending it's me?"

Eddie's hips stutter, and then he pushes harder against Steve's hand.

"Steve," Eddie breathes out, and Steve smiles.

"I'd bend right over for you," Steve says, "beg you to push your cock in me."

Steve can tell by the change in Eddie's breathing that he's getting close to coming. Goddamn. That's a pretty sight and sound.

Steve's own dick is straining in his pants, wanting.

"Would you come inside me?" Steve asks, and that's it. Eddie groans, and pushes his dick into the toy as far as he can, coming. Steve presses his face in Eddie's hair, kissing the side of his head.

Eddie pulls back from Steve's body, and then slides his dick out of the toy with a sloppy, wet sound, and they both laugh. Steve looks down at Eddie's heavy cock, spent and wet, and wants. Wants to put his mouth on Eddie, wants to lick him clean.

He thinks he will, but Eddie interrupts his thoughts.

"You want sloppy seconds?" Eddie asks, and Steve nearly comes in his pants as he nods. 

That's not something he had thought of, but he hands the toy to Eddie, and reaches for his own zipper. He pulls his neglected dick out, palms it, strokes it. It's so hard. Eddie's made him so fucking hard, so horny, he can't even think straight.

"Look at you, big boy," Eddie says, and he doesn't keep his hands to himself. He strokes Steve once, twice, and then helps guide him into the used toy.

It's still kind of warm inside, sloppy and wet with Eddie's come, and Steve feels like a deviant, but doesn't really give a fuck. Not really.

Because this is good.

So goddamn good.

Eddie presses his mouth to Steve's, and they kiss while Steve thrusts into the toy in Eddie's hand, and it's one of the dirtiest things he's ever done in his whole life.

Steve's just getting into a nice rhythm, when Eddie takes the toy away, and replaces it with his mouth. Goddamn, that's better. That's so much better.

Eddie pulls off, and looks up at him, "You taste like me."

Steve groans, letting his head fall back against the metal wall of the stall, closing his eyes as Eddie sucks his dick, then slides it back into the fleshlight, alternating. Dragging this out, extending it, and it's beyond anything he could have ever dreamed up.

He had a small idea, a basic one, and Eddie has taken that and crafted it into a fucking experience of a lifetime.

Steve tangles his hands in Eddie's hair, and looks down to meet Eddie's eyes, as he continues to work his cock, over and over. 

"You gonna come in my mouth or in the pussy?" Eddie asks, hand stroking Steve's dick lazily, looking up at him for an answer. He wants both. How can he choose?

But if he doesn't choose, he's gonna come in Eddie's hand. Still good, but a distant third among the options available. 

"Your mouth," Steve finally says.

"Good choice, Harrington," Eddie answers, and slides his mouth over Steve's dick again, and again, until Steve can't hold out any longer. 

He comes right against Eddie tongue, and Eddie pulls off, looks up at him, and swallows.

Merry Fucking Christmas to him. Jesus.

They straighten their clothes, try to smooth out all the wrinkles, and Eddie takes a gulp of his now watered down whiskey sitting on the bathroom counter, swishing it in his mouth, and spitting into the sink.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" Steve asks, holding the wet and freshly washed fleshlight in his hand.

"Take it home. Use it later and think of me," Eddie says, holding out the box Steve had wrapped it in. 

Steve puts it back, and takes the box from Eddie's hands.

He'll do just that.

Eddie pushes him against the bathroom door, and kisses him again, and this is the best night of Steve's life, he's pretty goddamn sure.

They ride the elevator down, and when they're back in their own office, Steve shoves the now unwrapped box into his desk drawer and follows Eddie back towards the rest of their partying co-workers.

Their friends.

Eddie starts bouncing on his feet, dancing with Chrissy and Steve smiles as he watches. Everybody seems to be having fun, and Steve decides this was a success. 

Later that night, long after the party had winded down, Steve crawls into bed at home, and curls into Eddie's side.

"Have fun tonight?" Steve asks, and Eddie runs his hand up and down Steve's arm.

"Yeah, I especially liked the part where my boyfriend acted like we've never fucked before," Eddie says, throwing his leg over Steve's hip. 

"Very funny."

Eddie laughs, "We're gonna have to file our relationship with HR sooner or later. I'm pretty sure my poker face is horrendous, and they're gonna figure it out."

Steve nods. He knows. Though, he's pretty fucking everyone in the office knows already, anyway. Gareth clocked them his first week, not realizing it was a secret. So, it's obvious. Eddie loves him, and Eddie can't hide that look on his face, not at all. It makes Steve so fucking happy that Eddie feels that way about him, like he loves him so much that he can't pretend he doesn't. 

That they love each other this much.

So, they're gonna have to fess up. That's okay, he doesn't actually give a shit. They aren't gonna fire him, and they definitely aren't gonna fire Eddie. He's unorthodox, but he brings in tons of cash and clients.

And they're just co-workers, there's nothing saying they can't be together. 

"I can't believe you wrapped your pocket pussy and dragged it to work," Eddie laughs, burying his nose in Steve's hair.

Steve grins.

"Surprised you, though?" Steve asks, turning his head, to smile at Eddie.

"Definitely surprised me," Eddie answers, grinning right back.

Notes: Nancy seem familiar? Yeah, she was definitely inspired by Angela from The Office, with that party planning committee vibe, lol. I needed someone to be that character, and Nancy seemed more likely than Robin or Chrissy. And the "prepare for every possible disaster" line is a Angela-ism, from the S2 ep, as told by Ryan. I like to think Dwight, or a Dwight-like character, was Steve's deskmate before Eddie.

And Nancy and Jonathan's whole secret (Dwight and Angela style) relationship random mention was added just so I could accurately tag secret relationship, but that it might slip past that I was also referring to Steve and Eddie, lol. Could you have known they were together before Steve did the sex toy thing? For sure. Was it more fun for me to imagine, just for a second, that he was just being very forward and inappropriate with co-worker Eddie who wasn't expecting it? Of course.

Work Like a Dog day is August 5th if you want to add to your calendar, lol.

Bob! ❤️ I think this might be the first time I've had a place to use him in a fic.

Chili's and Poor Richard's were both shout-outs to The Office, many thanks to them for lending me their set-up for this fic. As soon as I chose this prompt, The Office, was the first idea in my head.

And trying to pin down the exact year this is set in made my head hurt. It must be, like, 1999. Then fleshlights exist, but cell phones aren't glued to our hands quite yet. But pussy hats are much more modern. But then Awesome Blossoms are discontinued. I don't know. It's an alternate universe. Go with it. 🤣

Thanks for reading! ❤️

[inairbinad]

I Don't Think It's Contagious

5.3k words, also on ao3

Just some Pre-Season 2 Platonic (obviously) Stobin-centric fluff because they deserved to be friends sooner. With Steddie and Buckingham pining sprinkled in. All part of my magical fairy dust AU where Barb lives. Never Quite as it Seems helps to set this up, but it's not necessary to read first.

Life had gotten weird for Robin in the tail end of her sophomore year at Hawkins High. Weird because not only had she and Barb revived their friendship, but eventually Barb also confided in Robin that she was a lesbian, and dating Nancy Wheeler. It was the first inkling that Robin had ever gotten that she might not be terribly alone in this godforsaken town, which was nice, if not wildly surprising. Then, to top that particularly stunning revelation off and to really make Robin feel like maybe she’d lost her mind, she ended up friends with Steve Harrington, of all people. 

The revelation that Steve was capable of caring about people other than himself had come one dragging afternoon in the spring of '84. One minute things were normal; Robin was minding her own business and trying to get her shit from her locker and get out of there as quickly as possible. The mundanity got tossed like a salad, however, when Tommy H and Carol decided they wanted to cause a scene and harass Steve for deigning to talk to Barb. It seemed less about Barb, and more like she was just unlucky enough to get caught in the crossfire of the ongoing chill between Steve and his former minions. No one really knew why the three of them were on the outs these days, beyond the fact that back in November, Steve had abruptly started hanging out more with Jonathan Byers than he ever did Tommy H. anymore.

Robin watched the whole exchange while half-hiding behind her locker door, flinching at Carol tossing the d-word around, and then nearly having a stroke as Steve stood up for Barb. Even though Carol had just loudly declared for everyone to hear that she thought Barb had stolen Steve’s girlfriend. Steve shrugged it off, and said he’d rather be friends with Barb than the pair of goons that had followed him around like puppies for as long as Robin could remember.

That night, Robin tried to call Barb for the first time in years just to check on her. Whether what Carol had said was true or not didn’t really matter, and at the time Robin had no idea either way. Regardless, she felt the keen sting of being called out like that in front of a huge crowd of people, feeling the blow hit a little too close to home. Barb hadn’t answered her call, but Robin couldn’t exactly blame her there, either. 

Then Steve and Barb had showed up the next morning, blasting We Are Family through the windows of Steve’s fancy car, and the former King had cemented his new reputation. No longer was he known as royalty, or The Hair. No, now he was Steve “Dyke Defender” Harrington, and he apparently wore that badge proudly. 

It was enough to make Robin wonder if maybe there was something more to Bagel Crumb Boy. 

Eventually, Barb got back to Robin, and they started talking again like no time had passed at all. Not only because eventually Barb admitted to Robin that the rumors about her hadn’t exactly been wrong, but also because Robin hadn’t realized how much she’d missed having Barb to talk to. Even though she hadn’t been brave enough to come out herself, yet, she knew Barb would be in her corner regardless, and that gave Robin a sense of peace she’d never really known before.

————

Now that it was the fall and she was starting her junior year, most mornings Robin woke up trying to make sense of how her life had changed so drastically. After a summer of hanging around each other thanks to the persuasive powers of Barb, somehow Robin had reached the point where she could consider herself Steve Harrington’s friend. That was surprising enough on its own, but she also liked him. He was funny, and they had startlingly similar senses of humor, and he really seemed to give a shit about Robin and her feelings, which was new. 

Somehow, by complete accident, she’d ended up in a group of friends that felt like kindred spirits.

Before Robin knew it, she was in a world where she sat next to Steve Harrington at lunch every day, laughing at his corny jokes and watching him try to flirt with whatever girls still liked him, post-dethroning. There were still a lot more of them than Robin thought were strictly warranted, but that might have been her old friend jealousy perking up to say hello. 

Today was different, though. 

Today Steve was hung up on a boy. Or several, rather.

“Did you and Jonathan have a fight, or something?” Barb asked, following Steve’s gaze to where Jonathan Byers stood in the lunch line. Robin assumed that, like most days, he was only briefly stopping by to grab his food before taking it somewhere he wouldn’t have to interact with people much. 

Sometimes Jonathan sat with them, too. But usually he used their lunch break to decompress and go take photos of something before he got thrust back under the fluorescent lights and rigidly dull boredom of a classroom.

It was one of the reasons Robin found Jonathan wildly relatable. 

Robin still wasn't sure how exactly the little foursome of Steve, Jonathan, Nancy, and Barb had ended up being the best of friends, seemingly overnight, but she was pretty sure she'd get the whole story eventually.

“What?” Steve asked, startling at the sound of Barb’s voice alone, even though she was nearly talking at a whisper.

“You’re staring,” Barb pointed out. “And looking kind of miserable about it.”

“Oh. Well,” Steve chewed his lip, then quickly glanced around to see if anyone was paying the four of them any attention. They weren’t, because they were largely irrelevant, as far as social circles went. “We didn’t have a fight. I’ve just been having some…thoughts.”

“Dangerous,” Robin quipped, and Steve shot her a half-hearted glare. She took a little bit of pride in watching how the corner of his mouth twitched into a tiny smile all the same. 

“What kind of thoughts?” Nancy asked, though she had that look on her face that she got when she already knew the answer.

“The kind that make me wonder if I’ve been hanging around you two too much,” Steve muttered. Robin snorted, knowing exactly where this was going. 

“I don’t think it’s contagious, dingus,” she said, patting him on the shoulder. Although, even though Robin wasn’t out to any of the others yet, she did wonder if maybe their collective queerness drew them together like a magnet.

“What is?” Barb asked, not yet up to speed.

That was another thing about Steve—he and Robin seemed to ride the same wavelength at all times. Whenever the two of them thought something was obvious, it usually took an extra explainer for the others. 

“I just think he’s cute, is all,” Steve sighed, and Barb’s eyes went wide. Not because they hadn’t talked about Steve’s realization that he was also attracted to boys already. They’d actually spent a good chunk of the summer on that revelation, particularly on rather scorching days spent lounging at the pool while Steve stared agog at most people who walked by. He’d ask Robin, ironically enough, if he was crazy when he found a particular guy attractive. She’d done her best to pretend to have taste in boys, in the name of being supportive while staying safely ensconced in her own closet. Nancy's way of showing support, by contrast, was doing enough research to convince Steve that being bisexual was, indeed, a thing.

Today, Barb merely seemed surprised to hear Jonathan’s name mentioned in the context of Steve's thoroughly examined sexuality crisis.

Nancy started easily nodding along, taking in Jonathan’s profile from afar. Eventually she said, “I can see that."

“You can?” Barb asked her girlfriend, her surprise growing bigger still. 

“Yeah,” Nancy shrugged. 

Barb stared between Steve, who was absently picking the crust off his sandwich and trying not to make eye contact with anyone, and Nancy, who was obviously trying not to laugh at Barb’s reaction. Finally, Barb landed back on Steve.

“You want to date Jonathan?” she whispered so low that Robin could barely even hear her, despite the fact that they all had their heads bowed together across the width of the lunch table. 

“I didn’t say that!” Steve countered quickly. “I just…am noticing more, now, who I think is cute around here. Or letting myself notice, I guess.”

“Who else are we talking?” Robin asked with her eyebrows raised. She was honestly still flabbergasted that this was even something Steve talked with her about at all, given that she wasn’t out to him yet, either. But apparently all of her gay friends seemed to trust Robin to keep their secrets. It was enough to make her wonder if they had some idea about her, anyway.

“I mean, that new guy is hot,” Steve admitted as he leaned back in his chair. “He seems kind of like an asshole, though.”

“Definitely is one,” Barb muttered. “He’s already got Tommy and those guys hanging off him.” 

“Right, see?” Steve huffed. “That's why I’m very much in a look but don’t touch mode right now.”

“Really? There’s no one at all you’d want to shove into a locker and make out with?” Barb asked. She had a glint in her eye that let Robin know Barb already had a candidate in mind, and she just wanted Steve to own up to it. The way Steve glared at her before determinedly starting at his sandwich again told Robin that he knew that, too.

“Okay, fine. Maybe this guy in my English class.” Steve mumbled it so thoroughly that it all came out as one syllable, though. Barb and Nancy immediately turned to Robin for her to translate.

“This guy in his English class,” Robin obliged, enunciating to the best of her ability. 

“Say it a little louder, Rob,” Steve grumbled at her. 

“Okay, dingus. THIS GUY—” she started at an absurd volume, but Steve clapped a hand over her mouth with a truly tortured sounding sigh. It perked Robin up innumerably. 

“You should talk to him,” Nancy suggested, cheerfully redirecting them with practiced skill. 

Steve was already shaking his head, though. “I can’t do that.”

“Why not?” Barb asked. 

Because even if he did, he runs the risk of getting shoved into a locker himself, but in the bad way. And probably much worse, if he’s too obvious about it, Robin thought cynically. She kept her mouth shut, though.

“Because he probably hates me,” Steve said. 

Robin rather sourly admitted to herself that this was likely true, too. At least, it probably was if this guy hadn’t already been one of King Steve’s worshipers. And if he was one of those, that likely meant he didn’t deserve the actual Steve that Robin had come to know.

Weird, Robin told herself. She still couldn’t adjust to liking this guy enough to think he deserved the best a boyfriend or girlfriend could give him. But she did. 

“Why would he hate you?” Nancy asked.

“Because most smart people around here do,” Steve said glumly. “And he’s really smart.”

“Um,” Barb cleared her throat, then leveled Steve with a stern look. “You’re sitting with possibly three of the smartest people you’ll ever meet, Steve. None of us hate you.”

“But you all used to,” Steve pointed out flatly.

“And now we know you,” Barb argued. “And that changes things. Right, Robin?”

Barb kicked her under the table, and Robin jolted up out of her slouch.

“Right!” Robin agreed. Even though she wasn’t entirely aware of how to deal with this new version of Steve Harrington, she had begrudgingly admitted that she actually liked him a lot quite a while ago. “You’re much less of an asshole than I thought.”

“Thank you,” Steve deadpanned. 

“You’re welcome,” Robin said in as chipper a tone she could muster. “They’re right, though.”

“About?”

“The mystery man,” Robin clarified, even though she couldn’t believe she was doing it. This felt like playing with fire, but the funny thing about that was that it still warmed her heart. “If you talk to him, get to know him, he won’t hate you. Maybe he already doesn’t.”

————

After school, Robin was having particular trouble wrestling her bike lock open. She really needed a new one, but she also couldn’t afford it. She was about thirty seconds from giving up and walking when Steve crouched down beside her.

“Need some help?” He asked, flashing that annoyingly charming smile of his at her before he got to work unsticking the lock. He didn’t wait for Robin’s reply, she noticed. She didn’t argue, though, instead choosing to watch the way some of his stupid hair flopped over his forehead while he freed her bike from its prison. The lock finally popped open with a click. “There.” 

“Thanks,” Robin said, taking Steve’s offered hand as she dragged herself up off the ground. He held on to her for just a fraction too long, probably aware that Robin took at least an extra two-to-three seconds to get her bearings compared to everyone else. 

“No problem,” Steve smiled again, then leaned against the brick wall of the school. Robin tensed. She only ever saw Steve lean against things when he was flirting. “You want a ride? We can go get some ice cream, or something?”

“Um,” She stalled, now seeing his helping hand and the gentle grip on her waist in an entirely different light. Especially when he kept smiling at her like that. “What happened to the guy from English class?”

“What?” Steve asked, pinching his eyebrows together in confusion.

Robin didn’t quite feel like waiting for whatever telepathic thing they had going on to kick in, so she just said it outright.

“Just because I don’t think you’re a douchebag anymore doesn’t mean I think we should date, is all,” Robin managed to get out. 

“Um,” Steve scratched his neck and let out a small squeak of a laugh. He looked almost apologetic, and Robin realized she’d probably taken a wayward turn, somewhere. “I wasn’t asking you out. Just thought we could…hang out. Like friends do? Like we do?”

“Oh,” Robin said, feeling like an idiot all of a sudden. She’d gone and had a minor freak out just because Steve leaned against something. She thought maybe the only way to stop the mad awkwardness spreading like a virus through her mind was to tell him the truth, and soon. It was starting to make Robin paranoid, letting people think she was straight. Which was ironic, because it used to be the other way around. 

“Yeah,” Steve nodded with a small smile. “Oh.”

Robin shuffled her feet uncomfortably, feeling like maybe she owed him an apology now, but Steve saved her the trouble. 

“So. Ice cream?” he asked again, still wanting to hang around her for some reason.

“Sure! Right. But, um,” Robin chewed her bottom lip. “What about my bike?”

“It’ll fit in the trunk,” Steve shrugged, then nodded in the direction of his car, inviting Robin to follow.

“How come I’m the only one you let eat in here?” Robin asked around a mouthful of mint chip, twenty minutes later. They were sitting in Steve’s car in the parking lot of the local ice cream shop, since Steve insisted their cookie dough was better than anything Dairy Queen could come up with. “I’m the clumsiest person you know, waving the messiest thing you can eat around your leather interior.”

“Buffalo wings are the messiest thing you can eat,” Steve corrected her with a grin. “Or maybe crab legs. Not ice cream in a cup.”

“Okay, rich boy,” Robin groaned. “Answer the question.”

Steve rolled his eyes at her and shoved another spoonful of ice cream in his face before he bothered to reply.

“You might be the clumsiest person I know,” he admitted without fanfare, “but I also happen to like you the best.”

“What?” Robin asked, nearly choking. “Really?”

“Yes, really,” Steve scoffed like that should have been obvious to Robin. It totally wasn’t, though, especially since he wasn’t trying to hit on her.

“Why?” she blurted.

“You’re cool,” Steve started, but had to pause in light of how loudly Robin snorted. He didn’t argue with her disbelief, though. He just kept going. “You’re funny, you’re crazy smart, you’re always honest, and you don’t fuck around with people’s feelings. I’m always laughing with you, even when no one else gets our jokes. You’re kind of my best friend, Robin.”

Robin really didn’t know what to make of that, except for the fact that she was surprised to find she felt the same way. That didn’t mean she wouldn’t give him some shit for it, though.

“Oh, am I?” She asked, tone teasing. 

“Yes,” Steve grumbled. “Am I not yours?”

“Pft,” Robin blew out a puff of air. “Not even close.”

“No?” Steve gasped, putting on a pout now.

“Nope,” Robin said simply.

“Not even top five?”

“Eeeeh,” Robin wobbled her hand midair, like maybe Steve could tip the scales if he tried harder. 

“You’re meaner than I thought,” he said flatly, but couldn’t hold a grin off his face for too long. Neither could Robin.

“You’re nicer than I thought,” she countered. Steve chuckled to start, a soft appreciative little laugh. But then they made eye-contact and lost control of themselves. They tumbled into silly, senseless laughter, just spurring each other deeper into whatever they both found so hilarious in that moment. Robin wasn’t even sure that she knew, beyond maybe being on a sugar high. She only knew Steve’s laughter was contagious.

It always made her feel lighter, to be around him like this. So by the time they both calmed down, she decided to be upfront with him.

“I haven’t really had a best friend,” Robin admitted. “Not for a long time, anyway. Maybe not since Barb, the first time around.”

“The last best friend I had was a dickhead, so,” Steve lifted one shoulder in a shrug, “maybe they're overrated.”

“They’re not,” Robin disagreed, hiding a smile by staring down at the spoon in her hand. Eventually she was brave enough to look back up at Steve, to find he looked both confused and hopeful all at once. It was pretty cute, in an overwhelmingly platonic sort of way. “You’re mine, too, dingus.”

Steve’s smile was all-encompassing, taking over his whole face in an instant. Robin still didn’t know how to handle the little bubble of warmth in her chest that it gave her, so she gave him an affectionate punch on the arm, and changed the subject.

“Speaking of which. Do you have notes from Click’s class?” Robin asked of the only class they shared together. For the second year in a row, the powers that be at Hawkins High decided that Steve and Robin were on the same skill level for learning history. Robin wasn’t sure what that said about either of them.

“Um, no?” Steve answered, surprised like it was the first time someone had ever asked him for notes. “No one’s ever asked for my notes, before.”

Robin bit down on a laugh, not wanting him to misconstrue it as her thinking he was stupid when it was really just his voicing her exact thoughts again. They’d only declared each other to be best friends all of a minute ago, but Robin knew Steve was sensitive about that. In fact, she was kind of surprised he didn’t have notes.

“How is that possible?” she asked. “You’re constantly writing in that class!” 

“Doodling, mostly,” Steve laughed. “Why don’t you have notes, smarty pants?”

“Oh, I haven’t been paying attention in there all semester,” Robin answered a little too quickly. Now she’d have to come up with a reason for that, because Steve was absolutely pursing his lips to ask.

“Why not?”

“No reason…” Robin hedged. Just because they were best friends didn’t mean she was quite sure how to admit that she liked girls, and that Tammy Thompson so thoroughly distracted Robin that she turned into a bumbling buffoon at every turn. For two semesters running.  

Steve could have pressed it, Robin even expected him to, but he took his time finishing his cookie dough before saying another word. Then he surprised her.

“Want to know a secret?” he asked, smiling at Robin conspiratorially.

“Obviously,” Robin said. 

“The guy from English? He’s in history with us, too,” Steve admitted, and Robin felt her eyebrows shoot off her forehead and into orbit. She barely had time to squeak before Steve continued with a worried look on his face. “Don’t tell Barb or Nance, though. Barb already suspects who it is and if she finds out for real she’s gonna make me talk to him. Like that would ever go anywhere.”

That was a lot to process, but Robin didn’t really feel the need to make it clear she understood the concept of a secret. Of course she wasn’t going to tell anyone else. Instead, she asked, “Why are you so hellbent on thinking this guy hates you?”

For some reason, Steve’s mouth pinched right after Robin said hellbent, and she thought there might be a clue to suss out there. She started sorting through her mental Rolodex of everyone else that was in that class with them. The problem was she rarely paid attention to anyone but Tammy in those hours, let alone any guys. Usually Robin’s lens of focus was limited to the chain of her staring at Tammy staring at Steve. Apparently she’d have to extend that to see who Steve was staring at, too.

Robin picked at the last dredges of her ice cream and wondered if maybe anyone would ever stare at her. 

“It’s not just that,” Steve sighed. “I mean. Even if he doesn’t hate me, and we end up friends? It’s not like I can actually shove him against a locker and make out with him.”

“Well, maybe not with anyone around,” Robin amended. 

“What are the odds of him being into dudes, too?” Steve let out a bitter laugh. “I mean, really. This is Hawkins.”

“I wouldn’t make too many assumptions there, Steve,” Robin all but whispered. Even knowing she was about to tell Steve the truth, all of it, and knowing she was safe to, Robin still felt her throat closing up around the words. 

“Why not?” Steve asked softly, not missing how her demeanor had changed for a second. 

Robin took a deep breath, then let it out in a rush.

“Because apparently there are more of us around than I realized,” Robin said, turning to give Steve a tight smile. She managed to keep her tears from spilling over, which she counted as a win. Robin sat there, holding her breath and waiting, as Steve paused to absorb what she was saying. At first Robin thought she hadn’t been clear enough, but Steve mouthed the word ‘us’ to himself, and his eyes widened as he put the pieces together.

“Oh,” he breathed, before breaking out in another little smile. “Really?”

“Yes, really,” Robin nodded. She felt like her whole body was full of pins and needles.

“That’s cool,” Steve mirrored her nod, smiling at Robin like she really was his favorite person. It finally made her relax again. 

“Thanks,” Robin chuckled. "I know you're a staunch defender of us lesbians."

"That's me," Steve deadpanned, but offered Robin a wry smile. She reached across the center console to ruffle his hair, relishing the relief of having finally said it aloud to someone flooding through her. Steve made an affronted noise, quickly turning to fix his hair in the mirror, and Robin just laughed at him harder. 

“Is there anyone that you want to shove up against a locker?” Steve parried once he felt he had his pride and joy back under control. When Robin’s only response was a groan, his eyes lit up again. “Ooooh! Who!”

“Nope,” Robin rejected this idea on principle, shaking her head furiously as she did.

“Oh, come on,” Steve whined, really pouting now. “I’ll tell you mine!”

“I already know yours,” Robin scoffed, bluffing. To compensate, she rolled down her window and threw her empty ice cream cup into the trash can they were parked next to. Then she folded her arms across her chest and tried to give Steve a stern look. 

“Nah,” Steve shook his head after narrowing his eyes at her for a beat. “You don’t know.”

He was right, of course, but Robin was sure she could figure it out if only she gave it enough thought. So she stared Steve down, thinking about the kind of people she already knew he found attractive. Nancy, for one, but that wasn’t entirely helpful considering he tended to like any pretty girl. He did tend to skew towards brunettes, though. Then of course there was the Jonathan revelation, which was interesting. Robin would have assumed Steve liked more polished types, like him. But the new guy, Billy something or other, wasn’t exactly preppy, either. His whole vibe screamed badass, even if it wasn’t necessarily in a good way. There were better options for pretty but with leather in Hawkins, even Robin had to admit.

Then Robin remembered how Steve’s mouth pinched when she’d said hellbent. Almost like he thought she might say hellfire. She broke out in a victorious grin, already knowing she had Steve figured out.

“Eddie Munson?!” she half-shrieked. Even if Robin hadn’t already been sure, the way the tips of Steve’s ears turned pink would have convinced her.

“How did you…?” He didn’t even bother to finish the sentence, opting instead to stare at Robin, mouth agape. 

A whole litany of examples of proof came flooding into Robin’s mind at that point, like that bit of information clicking had opened a door to all the shit she must have subconsciously picked up on and filed away when she was wondering what Tammy Thompson’s lip gloss tasted like.

She was happy to list them for Steve’s benefit.

“You stare, for one,” Robin said, ticking off fingers. “You laugh at his obnoxious jokes, even when no one else does. I’ve seen him make you blush, more than once, come to think of it. And you kind of have a type.”

Steve just kept staring at her, without objection. Robin thought maybe she could stun him out of his silence, since that was how she’d put him in it in the first place.

“For what it’s worth? I think you have a shot,” she said. Robin didn’t know much about picking queer men out from a crowd, obviously, but Munson spent a whole lot of his time paying attention to Steve, too. 

That only seemed to stun Steve further, though. He grunted, sort of, though it sounded a little bit like a whimper. Then he turned the ignition and pulled out of the parking lot. It didn’t seem like they were headed anywhere in particular, but Robin didn’t mind.

After a few more minutes of silence, Robin was starting to worry that she’d broken his brain when Steve finally spoke again.

“You don’t have to tell me who you like,” Steve said simply, rescinding his earlier demands. It seemed like he was actually starting to drive in the direction of her house, now. “But I am glad that you told me about you.”

“Me too, dingus,” Robin said. It was possible she’d never meant anything more sincerely. 

By the time Steve pulled up beside the curb outside her house, Robin threw caution to the wind. 

“Tammy Thompson,” she admitted aloud, for the first time ever. Somehow it was more nerve-wracking than telling Steve she was gay at all.

“What?” he half-yelled, twisting around in the driver’s seat to face her. “How? Why?”

“She’s pretty!” Robin defended her taste as much as Tammy. She kind of thought that would have been enough for Steve, but he was still eyeing her skeptically. So she added, “And she can sing.”

“She sounds like a muppet, but okay,” Steve drawled. 

“She does not!” Robin exclaimed. Despite her indignation, she couldn’t quite keep the laugh out of her voice. Steve caught it, and laughed with her.

“She totally does,” he chuckled, then tilted his head at her. “I totally thought you were gonna say someone like…I don’t know. Chrissy Cunningham.”

“Chrissy Cunningham doesn’t even know I exist,” Robin said scornfully. “Talk about playing above my league.”

Steve was wildly shaking his head back and forth, though.

“Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope,” he said. “No talk like that in my car. You’re very much worthy of a Chrissy Cunningham. Plus, even if she doesn’t know you now, I bet she’d want to. She likes everybody, as long as you’re not a complete asshole.”

“So does that mean she hates you, then?” Robin opted for the joke instead of continuing to debate the merits of her switching to crushing on everyone’s favorite cheerleader. 

“Asshole!” Steve volleyed back at her with a laugh.

“And me too, apparently,” Robin grinned.

————

Robin still didn’t have any notes for Mrs. Click’s class, so she was really trying to focus on anything but Tammy, and Steve, and now Eddie, so she could actually take in some of this crap she had to memorize long enough to repeat it back on a test. 

It wasn’t going great, because now she was invested in the Steve and Eddie story line. Particularly since they were passing notes back and forth at the moment. Every time Steve bit his lip or tinted slightly pink, Robin was dying to know what they were saying to each other. But every time she kicked the back of Steve’s chair to try and get his attention, he shooed her off and went back to scribbling out a reply to Eddie.

Eddie, for his part, seemed equally affected by Steve, as he frequently slouched even lower in his chair or hid a smile behind his ever-growing hair whenever he read one of Steve’s replies.

They were almost sickeningly cute. She was happy they were getting along, at the very least, but it seemed like flirting from where she was sitting.

“Oh, you’re asking for it, big boy,” Eddie said then, looking up from whatever Steve had written last with a little bit of astonishment in his eyes. 

Robin rolled hers. Definitely flirting. 

Even though she was happy for Steve, it still sent a pang of jealousy coursing through her. She wondered if Steve was just abnormally lucky, or if she wasn’t looking in the right places for a crush that might acknowledge her. When she realized she was drifting away from the point of this class again—history, not finding a girlfriend—she gripped her pencil so hard it snapped the tip off. 

Groaning aloud over it, Robin leaned over to try and find another one in her bag. Before she got it fully unzipped, though, someone tapped her on the shoulder. 

Robin looked up to find none other than Chrissy Cunningham smiling down at her over the edge of her desk. Robin stared up at her for half a beat too long, noticing how Chrissy's signature ponytail dangled over her shoulder and gave Robin a lungful of the citrusy smell of her shampoo.

“Here,” she said, offering Robin a spare pencil. Hesitantly—probably too hesitantly—Robin reached up and accepted it. She was pretty sure she was gaping at Chrissy’s having acknowledged her, though, because Chrissy laughed a little nervously.

“Sorry, I was staring a little,” she whispered. Then she paused, eyes widening, and course corrected. “At your bracelet, I mean! It’s really pretty, by the way. Um. So I noticed the—” Chrissy stopped to mime snapping a pencil in half, adding a little cracking noise along with it.

It was adorable enough to be a whole new kind of distracting.

“Right,” Robin managed a smile that she hoped was friendly and not completely creepy. “Thanks.”

“Anytime,” Chrissy smiled again. 

This time, Steve had to kick Robin’s desk to get her to even remember what world she was living in. 

[fastcardotmp3]

Hi! I'm a big big fan of your writing and these amazing atmospheres you weave with the characters. I was wondering if you'd ever write a Robin and Steve fic - their relationship is so so important to me and I love the way you write the two of them no matter how much they feature in a fic. Or even if you have thoughts about them and their platonic soulmate realness beyond the end of this show, I'd love to pick your brain!

this is so kind of you to say, thank you really and truly anon🥹💜

I've written about them in a couple of ficlets (here & here & here for a start) and they're having their own little arc in my "The Bear" AU wip, but I know I will certainly write about them again!

I think one of the things that's most interesting about their dynamic for me (and something I wish I saw more of in fanon stobin) is that the platonic soulmatism of it all isn't something that comes naturally.

It's a choice that they make! It's this decision (and a courageous one at that) in the face of tragedy and trauma to lean towards each other rather than away, when the latter would actually be easier.

This is a person who Robin saw beat half to death, who Steve saw be the bravest girl on the planet, and that is the only true context they know each other in beyond the masks of high school, but you know what they do with that?

They don't run away from the reminder of what they've been through, they don't let themselves lock it all up by avoiding the only other person who knows what happened in that cell. They CHOOSE each other!!!

All of their ease and familiarity by the time we see them in season 4 isn't because they're pre-ordained to be friends, they themselves are aware that they're decidedly not, but it's not about what they're built for, it's about what they build for themselves

It's not mind reading, it's figuring out how to be vulnerable with the guinea pig new-best-friend who's already seen you at your worst, so what's left to lose?

It's not fate, it's work, and that's the coolest fucking thing about these two kids finding home in each other. So many relationships on this show are pre-packaged in that they know each other before we as an audience know them-- family and childhood friends and even just small town awareness-- but Steve and Robin happens right there in front of us!

Messy and weird and with all their individual baggage falling into the same disorganized pile, they deserve to be just as complicated and imperfect in their love for one another as everyone else and we deserve to see it!!!

They won't always agree, they won't always like what the other has to say, they won't always know what the other is thinking or know how to fix their problems, but they will always choose to be there for it all.

They'll always choose to try. To do the work.

That's my take on Stobin, basically, that they'll always choose each other. You know?

[marvel-ous-m]

Hi! I’m Em! Thanks for stopping by!

I use they/them pronouns. This blog is mostly a place where I reblog fics or art that I come across in the Stranger Things fandom, as well as a place where I post my own writing from time to time. 

You can also read all of my full fics on my AO3.

I occasionally post 18+ content. Minors Do Not Interact.

My ask box is open! Please drop some prompts over there, either from a universe I've already written in or for an idea that you're eager to see come to life. I'm almost always willing to write, most of the time I just need a good idea and some spare time! (I am only writing for ST at this time)

I am a graduate student and I work full time, so please exercise patience when I’m posting my work! I promise I’m just as eager to post it as you are to read it, however my school and work obligations must take priority.

(More info about me under the cut!)

Main ship: Steddie (Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson).

I also like/incorporate into fics: Ronance (Robin Buckley/Nancy Wheeler), Buckingham (Robin Buckley/Chrissy Cunningham), Lumax (Lucas Sinclair/Max Mayfield), Jarglye (Jonathan Byers/Argyle) and Byler (Will Byers/Mike Wheeler).  (All ships involving minors in the show are only EVER incorporated in ways that are age-appropriate).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Some of my most used tags:

#my writing (all of the self-written fics on my blog can be found under this tag!)

#em speaks (this is where I rant about my life)

#steddie (pretty self-explanatory... you will find many posts under this tag, lol)

#elementary school steddie au (this is where I post blurbs/ficlets within an ongoing universe about elementary school librarian!Eddie and 3rd Grade teacher!Steve) 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Past Projects: 

Time Will Tell (Steddie Established Relationship, Steve struggles with finding a gift for Eddie's Birthday, and learns a few things about how healthy relationships work) (Tumblr Link / AO3 Link)

(i wish i could) talk to you (Platonic Stobin Mind Meld prompt for the Stranger Things Writer's Guild April Fools Day Fic Swap!) (AO3 Link)

Summer Child (My Birthday Fic- it's Steve's birthday, he's in his feels about it, and Eddie helps in more ways than one) (Tumblr Link / AO3 Link)

Closer to Fine (Steve has a PTSD episode. Eddie helps him through it). (Tumblr Link / AO3 Link)

Eddie Munson’s Guide for How to Adopt a Jock in Four Easy Steps (S2 early Steddie meeting, 5 chapters) (Tumblr Link / AO3 Link) 

Don’t Cry Over Spilled Tang (Steve Learns to Cry) (Steve can’t cry- until he can, and then he can’t stop, established Steddie) (AO3 Link)

We Fell In Love In October (That’s Why I Love Fall) (Eddie has a nightmare about telling Steve his feelings, Steddie) (AO3 Link)

Current Projects: 

Tumblr Ask Box Prompts (2/∞) (AO3 Link) (#AskBox)

Something's In My Mind (and I'm Focused On You (Baker!Steve/Tattoo Artist!Eddie Enemies-to-Lovers Modern AU Fic) (21/27) (AO3 Link)

Steddie Micro Fic Collection (I love participating every month in the prompts from @/steddiemicrofic!) (AO3 Link)

Steddie Big Bang 2024 (This is a secret project until Fall, but I'm plugging away at it and can't wait to share!)

[stregoniconiconii]

Personally I don’t understand Steve or Robin centric fics that don’t at least have a throw away line about their friendship lol or fics where they’re close to someone else instead/never became really friends at all. Weird.

It’s still not quite as bad as those fics, where it’s focused one of their romantic relationships, usually steve’s, and the other is kinda just there to be the other’s “homophobic dog”, usually robin, and then not be mentioned again in the fic after that.

i can’t stand it it literally makes me so sad it’s like i’m reading about at most 3 quarters of steve or robin like it’s just sad. intellectually i understand that anything pre season 3 would have them at odds but it’s our duty to give them a harebrained scheme to bond over. a pre s3 steve centric au that doesn’t mention robin? fine i can grit my teeth and bear through it bc i know that they will meet and fall in platonic love but a robin centric fic set pre s3? she was still obsessed with steve like that’s literally canon why is she not even trying to light his precious hair on fire with her mind. unrealistic tbh

also i used to be able to stand fics that do the bare minimum throwaway line about their friendship but now i can’t like it’s literally too important for me now. it’s stobin centric or bust for me these days

i’m soooo sick of robin being treated as like an accessory or someone just to help another person in their sexuality discovery or their romantic prospects like it really makes me so sad bc she’s everything to me and she deserves so much more. when i see an authors note like and i brought robin in early too like they expect a pat on the back for it but it means nothing to me if robin isn’t actually doing anything like if she’s just there for some quips or lesbian decoration i have to hit the backspace i’m sorry

[demigirljoycebyers]

For the exchange:

URL:

frogboyandzombieface

Ao3 Handle:

clearskiies

Nickname:

Tilly

What kind of content would you like to receive?


Fic, art, or moodboard,

Which Stranger Things content have you watched/read/listened to?

Season 1, season 2, season 3, and season 4 trailers

What are some of your favorite ships, characters, moments, theories?

byler, elmax, lumax, max mayfield, mike wheeler, robin buckley, platonic stobin, stonathan, stoncy, kali x nancy

Are there any ships or characters you do not, under any circumstances, want to write or receive content for?

harringrove, romantic stobin

Favorite tropes, AUs, or other guidance to give your partner?

fluffy stuff really !! i don't mind

Any other questions/comments?

im very excited i think this is gonna be great :)

Thanks for participating! Let me know if you have any questions

@frogboyandzombieface blue and yellow these bitches gay etcetera etcetera =^-^=

wills is hard to see so normal outline =^-^=

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU Part 1

Steve doesn’t notice anything is wrong at first beyond the obvious. His ears are ringing, his eye’s so swollen it feels like it’s going to pop from its socket, and his lungs don’t seem to expand fully before the pain in his ribs makes them shrivel back into themselves. 

The injection site pulses, like the viscous blue liquid is still squirming its way into his brain, writhing around its synapses to force his tongue to wrap around words that only hold the truth. It doesn’t make sense. But neither do demogorgons or demodogs or the way thoughts have been leaking out of his ears since Hargrove bashed his skull in with a kitchen plate.

He doesn’t feel truthful. If he was truthful, he’d be telling Robin about the blood slowly pooling into his sock, or how he’s pretty sure she’s the best thing that’s happened to him since Dustin Henderson showed up uninvited at his house and derailed his life. Instead, he listens to Robin come up with more and more outlandish ways that this drug will kill them. It’ll erode their brains until there’s nothing left. Their organs will explode. They’ll have to keep talking until they slowly dehydrate and die. Steve hums along, thoughts trailing along too slow to keep up with her. 

The mystery drug isn’t helping. He’s got that same giddy feeling he remembers from Friday night blunt rotations in crowded backyards, surrounded by his usual brigade of assholes. The likelihood of overdose or dismemberment ia much higher than they usually are when he feels the way, but hey, the company is better.

The overhead lights are trailing along in his vision, his cheekbone is throbbing with every invigorating heartbeat, and Robin’s head is shaking with laughter where it’s resting firmly against his own. 

Then they’re being interrogated and even as Steve talks, a little voice in the back of his head is screaming at him to shut up. He doesn’t, can’t think past the drugs and his exploding eye, and the way he’s pretty sure if Robin moves her head away from his own he’ll explode.

Then noises and screaming and Dustin fucking Henderson.

They’re running.

They’re in the back of a cart.

They’re in an elevator.

Steve experiences each in little snapshots of coherency between laughing with Robin, and holding Robin’s hand, and–he can’t seem to think past Robin. It’s like Nancy all over again but more. Concentrated. The way he can only seem to think right now when it’s in tandem with her. 

Then movies and popcorn.

Then water and a lightshow.

Then the bathroom. His thoughts are coming faster now, almost completely formed before they flit out his ears. And Robin is there. He still can’t think past her, and this is what love is like, isn’t it? The way he feels right when he’s sitting next to her. 

But even as he’s confessing he can feel a little worm squirming through his stomach, uneasy with his words as they settle between them. And as Robin drops her secret between them like a gauntlet, Steve feels the squirming feeling ramp up into gut-churning fear. He doesn’t know why he’s afraid, or how he can almost feel himself glaring at the back of his own head in Mrs. Click’s class sophomore year, or the way he can perfectly remember how Tammy Thompson’s hair curled in the diluted sunlight of the classroom when before this moment he didn’t even remember her name. 

It doesn’t matter, when He’s got Robin across from him, curling in on herself more with every second he doesn’t react.

The feeling ebbs into something softer as they make fun of a singing voice he can only barely remember. Something slides into place in the moment, like the weight of her skull on the back of his head while they’re tied back to back. Like the wisps of her hair tickling the side of his face. Like legs pressed together in a bathroom stall.

Then, Dustin fucking Henderson, and everything goes a little too fast after that. They survive by the barest threads of their little sailor suits. Billy dies. Hopper dies. 

Steve goes home.

Part 2

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

Hi, I'm Koko <3 This is a Stranger Things dump blog. Certified Steve girl, with a soft spot for Robin, Eddie, Nancy, and Carol as well.

You can find me on ao3 at theheartofthekoko and my main Tumblr under the same name!

Feel free to shoot me fic requests! Sometimes, it's nice to have something new to work on when the project of the day isn't hitting it.

Fanfic Masterlist:

In progress:

Aro4Aro Stancy Break-Up AU - Or: Steve Harrington and Nancy Wheeler are both aromantic. Neither realize this. Poor Jonathan Byers ends up in the middle.

Parts - 1, 2,

Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU - Or: the Russian truth serum has some unexpected side-effects. Steve and Robin cope with the fallout.

Parts - 1, 2,

A Ghost Story (name pending) - Or: Steve Harrington dies in the battle of Starcourt, leaving Robin to pick up the pieces of her life alone. Across town, Eddie Munson makes a new incorporeal friend.

Parts - 1,

Complete:

A Litany for Survival (Steddie Upside-Down AU) - Or: Steve and Eddie get pulled into the Upside-Down and have to become reluctant allies. For survival.

Parts - 1 - 124, ao3

Steddie Upside-Down AU Oneshots:

open your mouth for me, sugar - Eddie gives Steve a blowjob.

Cause You Had Nothing Better to Do - Carol & Barb have a sleepover.

Oneshots

Fine Line - El's having troubles adjusting now that the Upside-Down is gone. She talks to Steve about it.

Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)  - Max calls El.

You, Me & Jeff Makes Three - Gareth interrupts Steve and Eddie mid make-out session.

Gifs Masterlist:

Ashes, ensemble cast

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

🌷Writing Patterns🌷

tagged by @stellarspecter & @queenie-ofthe-void <3<3<3

Rules: Share the first line of your last ten published works or as many as you are able and see if there are any patterns!

Eddie doesn’t even know why he’s at this stupid party. (A Litany for Survival)

Just like the water balloon Will had overfilled last summer, El feels like she’s ready to pop. (sick of walkin' that fine line)

Her hands are shaking as she picks the phone up off the hook. (from my window to yours)

Steve’s been crouched in the janitor’s closet for five minutes by the time Eddie finally skulks through the door. (You, Me, and Jeff Makes Three)

“What are you doing, Munson?” Steve asks, tone teasing enough to keep away the sting of being last-named by his boyfriend. (open your mouth for me, sugar)

There’s a fucking bat full of nails clutched between her palms and Carol Perkins swears she just coughed her entire fucking heart up onto the broken-down bus Barb had just ditched her on. (Cause You Had Nothing Better to Do)

It hits him like a slap. (Aro4Aro Stancy Break-Up AU - Unfinished)

Steve doesn’t notice anything is wrong at first beyond the obvious. (Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU - Unfinished)

Robin can't sleep. (A Ghost Story - Unfinished)

Let it be said that Max Mayfield never claimed she was a good driver. (The Crash Bang Incident - Unpublished)

Not really sure what, if anything, can be extrapolated here, but this was fun, nonetheless! Not sure who's already done this, but some no-pressure tags: @lavenderstobins @devondespresso @museumgiftshoperaser @wynnyfryd @strangersteddierthings

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

writing patterns

Rules: list the first line of your last 10 (posted) fics and see if there’s a pattern!

Tagged by @eriquin, thanks. This seems fun! They’re definitely not going to all be ST because I don’t have that many, but that’s okay.

Eddie doesn’t even know why he’s at this stupid party.  (Steddie Upside-Down AU, Stranger Things)

Steve doesn’t notice anything is wrong at first beyond the obvious. (Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU, Stranger Things)

It hits him like a slap.  (Aro4Aro Stancy Break-Up AU, Stranger Things)

Tobirama falls in love with a chakra before he falls in love with a boy. (Hearth-Warmed Chakra, Naruto)

Riyo had once lost the love of her life. (when everything that ticked has stopped, I Am In Eskew)

The first night on the Carte Blanche, Juno can’t sleep. (a matter of going through, The Penumbra Podcast)

Hyun-su opens his eyes to the interior of his old apartment. (the fish always die (but we’re getting better), Sweet Home)

The memories taste like diluted sunlight—the faces have blurred, tea spilled on a still-wet portrait, but he can hear them laughing clearly. (through with pictures hung and gilded, The Untamed)

It happens during a run-of-the-mill club game. (rinsed vision and second changes, Alice in Borderland)

When A-Jie used to make it, she was always smiling. (two million naturally occurring sweet things, The Untamed)

Not sure how much I can extrapolate from this list, but it seems like I am usually either setting up the setting, or the theme of the fic in the first line and not much else.

I'm going to tag, @finntheehumaneater @devondespresso and @strangersteddierthings

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

WIP Wednesday Ask Game:

Tagged by @eriquin! 💖💖💖

The Rules:

In a reblog of this post (so people can find you in the notes) or new thread (w/ rules attached) if you want to play on your own, post up to five (5) filenames of your WIPs; not titles, file names.

Post a snippet from one of them. Snippet must be words you wrote in the last 7 days. We’re posting progress here. If you haven’t made any, go make some and come back to play!

After you’ve posted, people can send you an ask with one of your file names. You must then write 3 sentences in that file. If the filename is one you can't share from (for example, an event or gift fic), write 3 sentences on it anyway, and then 3 more on another to share.

The Files:

Steddie Upside-down AU 

Stancy Aro4Aro Break-Up AU

Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU

There There

The Crash Bang Incident 

Snippet under the cut:

From the Steddie Upside-Down AU

Some of Eddie’s hair rips out as Steve pulls his hand free. Eddie groans, closing his eyes as they water involuntarily with the pain. “Fuck, Steve, ow,” he whines, rubbing the sore spot on his head.

“Steve?” Jonathan calls. It’s the tone that gets Eddie’s attention. He sounds bewildered, even in his hazed-out state.

Eddie opens his eyes, sits up straight just in time to see Steve disappearing from the yard, blending in with the trees of the forest that seems to haunt every resident of Hawkin’s backyard.

Eddie’s up and stumbling off the porch in seconds. His breathing is already ragged with panic, and his feet feel like lead. What a fucking time to be blazed to all hell. “Steve!” he yells, voice cracking with the volume.

He’s stumbling after him doggedly heading for the trees until something wraps around his bicep, squeezing hard. He’s already snarling before he turns around and sees Jonathan’s bleached face and red eyes.

“He’s gone, man.”

Tagging: @finntheehumaneater @devondespresso @strangersteddierthings @steddierthings no pressure though! 💖💖💖

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

WIP Ask Game!!!

I have been tagged by @eriquin (on main but I'm doing it here <3<3<3)

The Rules:

In a reblog of this post (so people can find you in the notes) or new thread (w/ rules attached) if you want to play on your own, post up to five (5) filenames of your WIPs; not titles, file names.

Post a snippet from one of them. Snippet must be words you wrote in the last 7 days. We’re posting progress here. If you haven’t made any, go make some and come back to play!

After you’ve posted, people can send you an ask with one of your file names. You must then write 3 sentences in that file. If the filename is one you can't share from (for example, an event or gift fic), write 3 sentences on it anyway, and then 3 more on another to share.

The Files:

Steddie Upside-down AU

Stancy Aro4Aro Break-Up AU

Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU

There There

The Crash Bang Incident

Snippet under the cut

From Steddie Upside-down AU:

Barb groans, biting her sandwich in half viciously. “It’s not the same,” she says. “They’re all wrapped up in each other.”

“Didn’t Hagan and Perkins go through a honeymoon phase?” Eddie asks. “What did you used to do when they’d go on their romantic dates?”

If anything, Steve looks more confused. “Go with them?”

“You’re shitting me,” Gareth says aggressively, like this is some weird hazing ritual.

“Wait, no. Let’s let this play out,” Eddie says, turning his back on Gareth so he can watch Steve. “So, let’s set the stage. It’s valentine’s day, 1982. Tommy Hagan has set up a candlelit dinner with Miss Perkins to celebrate their eternal love. Where are you in this scenario?”

Steve’s still got his brows furrowed like he doesn’t understand the assignment. “Have you been like, stalking me?” The little freak sounds almost flattered at the accusation.

“Are you serious, Stevie?” Eddie asks, unsurprised when Steve nods.

“So, you, Steve Harrington, showed up at your best friend’s valentine’s date last year and that was just fine?” Barb asks, deadpan.

“Usually, I help Carol do her make-up before,” Steve replies, blessedly finally picking up his burger and taking a bite. He looks over at the jock table, something small and forlorn twisting his mouth even as he bites savagely into his burger like he’s trying to kill it. “She’s not good at doing her own eye shadow without looking like a hooker.”

Tag list, but no pressure!

@devondespresso @wynnyfryd @thorniest-rose @museumgiftshoperaser

[carolperkinsexgirlfriend]

4, 15, 22 please

4. How many WIPs do you have right now?

Oh jeez. Okay, so I’ve got two for The Untamed, two for Naruto, one for The Penumbra Podcast, one for Sweet Home. I’m not going into detail on those because you guys don’t care. And also, “in progress” is generous for them, since I haven’t worked on any for well over a year. I’ll go into more detail about the uhhh, nine Stranger Things Ones?? -Steddie Upside-Down AU - this is almost done!!! So close! I’ve also partially written four smaller fics from other people’s pov’s, so those could be argued as separate! But I didn’t count them that way lol. -Platonic Stobin Mind-Reading AU - this one!!! I’ve been thinking of it <3 the name says it all. The Russians gave them mind-reading powers, but only for each other. I have no plans at all for this fic. I just want hijinks and mostly fun. -Aro4Aro Stancy AU - this one’s almost exclusively just for me <3 and the premise is, wouldn’t it be both funny and tragic if two aro people were dating each other, had never heard the word “Aromantic before” and couldn’t figure out why they were so fucking weird about each other once they broke up? -Christmas - I’m going to be honest, this was supposed to be posted LAST christmas, but it’s a character study on Nancy, Jonathan, and Steve’s relationship with each other post Stancy break-up, and the weird in-between world where you’ve fought monsters together, faced traumas together, and also hurt each other irreparably <3 Or, it’s about their reactions to Christmas lights! -The Crash Bang Incident - Max crashes the car into Eddie’s van on the way to the tunnels in season 2 with Steve passed out in the back seat. Enough said.  -There There - Steve goes back in time, but Robin DOESN’T. He has a mental breakdown about this and makes it Robin’s problem, whether she likes it or not.  -The Red Strings of Crazy - character study of Robin just sort of, spiraling about trying to figure out what the hell is going on with Steve Harrington post his introduction to the Upside Down. She admits to being virtually Obsessed with him in season 3, so I totally think she has a murder board and stalks him about it because come on. She WOULD.  -Carol/Nancy - this is just porn…..I’ll probably never post it because I’ve never written porn. But! Carol sees Jonathan’s creeper photos of Nancy, and feels a certain way about them.  -Stobin Body-Swapping AU - this has no actual words of the fic written, but I’ve got like thousands of words of contradicting world-building. Pretty much, something happens in the future that kicks them back into the past in each other’s bodies. But not at the same time??? So Robin in Steve’s body will go confront Robin in Robin’s body, and she’ll be like, dingus…is that you??? And no, it’s past Robin. And Steve does the same thing. And they completely fuck up the timeline, because by the time they GET to the inciting incident in the present, Steve and Robin have both thought the other was crazy for YEARS because of all the yelling and accusations. This one may never get written, or if it does, I might say fuck the logistics and just go for the vibes because I cannot figure it out. 

15. How do you come up with titles for your fics/chapters? 

Almost always, I start with a theme that’s prevalent in the work. For example, for the Steddie Upside-Down AU, I was ruminating on survival, and hope through adversary. Usually, I spin through my mental rolodex of poetry/songs, find one that fits both thematically and has something I like as a title (either in the lyrics/verses or the title of the work). In this case, it was “A Litany For Survival” by Lorde which is an excellent poem. I think used lines from the poem as chapter titles. This doesn’t always work, but it’s my favorite method! One of my other favorite titles I’ve found this way is an unpublished au where the main character can see ghosts, which I titled “with feet that make no sound,” from the poem “Haunted Houses” by Longfellow. Sometimes, a title just comes to me without this method, but creating chapter/fic titles is like my least favorite part, so this is the go-to method. 

22. Do you know how your fic will end before you start writing?

Sometimes, but rarely! I know how the Aro4Aro Stancy AU is going to end. The Steddie Upside-Down AU was entirely a wild card. Often, when I’m writing, I’m telling the story to myself at the same time as I’m telling it to any readers. So, if something wild happens, we’re experiencing it together!