#robin Buckley x OC

[stranger-things-x-oc-blog]

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BROWSE RECS BY x CANON CHARACTER (will be updated regularly)

Eddie Munson

Steve Harrington

Billy Hargrove

OC & WRITING RESOURCES

[lavendermunson]

Could you write fluff alphabet for robin?:)

of course!!

fluff alphabet - robin buckley

cw none, just fluff!!

a/n found a lot of versions of the sfw alphabet but decided to go with this one! i hope you like it!! ty for requesting ♡

prompts by whumptydumptysatonawall 

Affection – What do they do to show affection?

Robin loves to tell you every little detail she knows about the things she likes, movies, and books. But lately, she has been reading the French to English dictionary you got her for her birthday.  She has been studying it in her free time at Family Video, and with the time she has had, she has learned fully formed sentences.

One day, she surprises you at lunch with a couple of flowers in her hand and your favorite candy. When she hugs you, she whispers, “Tu es l'amour de ma vie." Your knees buckle as her words tingle against your face, and she leaves a peck on your cheek. 

You ask her what it means, and she says it’s your turn to use the book. You smooth the grin off her face with a kiss, asking her to tutor you instead, and she agrees, not knowing you already know what that phrase means.

Beauty - what do they admire about their s/o? what do they think is beautiful about them?

Everything. It’s true that when Robin saw you for the first time, she believed in love at first sight. She got close to you with the time, and thanks to you joining the friend group, she was able to talk to you and ask you on a date. On one of those dates, Robin always mentioned how beautiful you are, but she still has so much to tell you.

She loves how smart you are. She loves how kind and sweet you are. She loves your shiny eyes, your adorable cheeks, and your soft lips. Robin is also obsessed with your body, she worships you every day, and she motivates you when you want to get out of your comfort zone and try a different outfit. She loves the way her jewelry looks on you when you try on one of her necklaces and decide it looks so much better on you.

Cuddles - How do they like to hug their s/o? Can include a visual.

Robin loves to hug you behind your back when you are entertained baking some of her favorite cookies. 

She also loves to be the little spoon whenever you sleep together, she loves it when you press your chest against her back and the way your arm wraps her in a tight hug. As the night passes, you are completely tangled with her, your leg is hugging her too, and you cling to her as you have sweet dreams and breathe against her neck.

Discrete - What's their opinion on PDA?

Going out with Robin is always fun, she is always by your side, and you love it. The only thing that bothers you is that you have to know where you can show your affection in public. You're too tired of people’s glances and whisperings. 

But when you are in a safe place, she can’t stop. Robin always has an arm around your shoulders or your waist. She always leaves a peck on your cheek, on your forehead, and on your nose, and when she kisses you, she makes sure to press your chest against her to feel you as close as possible. She loves to feel your warmth.

Everything - You are my _____. (Ex. World, Life, etc.)

Robin always says: “You are my princess, you are my world, you are my love,” and when you hear those words fall from her lips, it always feels like the first time. Your heart is thumping against your chest, and you are running towards her to pamper her face with thousands of little kisses.

Family - Do they want a family?

She has seen you taking good care of the kids, especially Erica and Holly, since they’ve always wanted to play with you or show you something new they got. She knows they get so excited to see you because being with you is fun, and you don’t fear the kids when they are being mischievous. She is scared of how good she will be as a mom, but she knows that by your side, anything will be alright.

Gifts - What types of gifts do they give their s/o?

Mostly books, because you love them, but she loves giving you flowers because you get so happy when you see them. She also buys food for you, ice cream, and milkshakes when you go out. Robin isn’t good with gifs, she gets especially anxious about picking gifts. She would rather take you out on a nice date, even when she ends up being the passenger princess.

Hands - Do they like holding hands? Can include a visual.

She loves it. When you walk around the lake, looking for a quiet break from all the noise of the town, she takes your hand. She is a big fan of interlocking her fingers with yours to keep you close.

When you are around town, at the mall, or at school, she would rather walk with you holding her arm. This way, you are closer and don’t call for too much attention.

Injury - What do they do if their s/o gets hurt?

Funny band-aids, she is always looking for the ones that have little drawings, and they work so well. Whether you scraped your knee or cut yourself with a paper sheet, she places the band aid and kisses the part where you got hurt. She loves being so cheesy.

Jealousy -  Do they get jealous easily? How do they deal with it?

Robin used to get jealous of everyone. She was always jealous of people getting to talk to you because she didn’t know how to get close to you. She used to get so nervous. Now, she isn’t jealous at all because she knows your love for her is as big as her love for you.

Kisses - Are they a good kisser? What was the first kiss like?

YES! The first kiss is funny, she didn’t plan on you initiating the kiss. You were at Steve’s house, hanging out with your friends, and you went inside to get more beer. Steve pushes Robin and tells her to join you. She asks if she can try some of your chapstick. You ask her if she wants to try, and she nods. You end up taking her face between your hands and kissing her, she gets a sweet taste of your chapstick and you.

Love - When did they know that they loved their s/o?

One day she fell sick. She was in bed with a runny nose and a terrible headache. She called to let you know she wasn’t going to school, and you ended up skipping too, climbing your way to her bedroom to give her some warm soup and freshly baked cookies. You took care of her the way no one else had, and for that, she was so grateful. At the end of the day, she was feeling better, and she knew it was all because of you.

Memory - Do they want to get married? How do they propose? What would the marriage be like?

Robin makes a paper ring with a pink paper sheet. She spent at least 20 minutes perfecting the paper ring, and when she got you on the spot for your date, you saw her dropping on one knee and smiling. She asks for your hand, you say yes, and she places the paper ring on your finger. “I’ll get the real one, I promise,” but you don’t need it, this one is already perfect.

Nicknames - What do they call their s/o?

Robin loves nicknames, she always calls you princess because you are her princess. She calls you sweetheart, baby. But when she sees you baking for her or any of your friends, she calls you sugar.

Orange - What color reminds them of their s/o?

Your favorite color—since Robin knew about it, she knew her mind would catch on pretty quickly. Every time she sees a coat, a toy, a candy, or an umbrella of your favorite color, she thinks of you. It's even more special when she finds it in tiny details around her day, reminding her of you when she misses you.

Proposal - How did they propose?

As mentioned earlier, she invites you to a cute spot. It’s pretty, and the view is the best thing. You thought it was one of many other dates, but this was special—her paper ring in hand, symbolizing her heart and your whole future ahead.

Quirk - Some random ability they have that’s beneficial in a relationship.

You love Robin’s rambling, even more so when she gets creative and decides to tell you a story when you can’t fall asleep. Her soothing voice helps you fall asleep in her arms, take a nap after a long day, or sleep after a nightmare.

Romance - How romantic are they? What would they do to make their s/o happy? Cliché or rather creative?

You are both romantic, but Robin knows you love cliché things. She writes notes with tiny poems on them and puts them in your locker. When you show them to her, she always says, “You have a secret admirer,” but you recognize her handwriting, and every note is even more cheesy than the last one.

Supportive - Are they helping their s/o achieve their goals? Do they believe in them?

When the imposter syndrome takes control of your life, she is there to cheer you up. She helps you study, and she takes care of things like washing the dishes or making your bed when she knows you are stressed about another thing. She knows you would do the same for her, she is so sure of it.

Time - What are their future plans?

Robin wants to travel the world with you by her side. First, she wants to go to New York, and then she wants to take you to Paris, Italy. She would love to have a lot of adventures by your side. Make a book for your memories so when you have kids, you can show it to them.

Understanding - How good do they know their partner? Are they empathetic?

There will be times when you fight, or have arguments because you disagree on some things. You're sure that Robin is always going to be open to having a conversation and fixing whatever’s wrong.

Value - How important is the relationship to them? What is it worth in comparison to other things in their life?

You are her favorite person. She is so grateful for you, you made her life so much better. Robin knows you feel the same, that’s why you’ve both made sacrifices for one another.

Wild Card - A random Fluff Headcanon.

I love thinking of Robin as the little spoon, but she is a switch, for sure. When she is the big spoon, she loves pampering you with kisses. She kisses your cheek, your neck, and your shoulder and tickles you to bother you.

Xylophone - What song describes their relationship with their s/o?

“Every Breath You Take” by The Police. She sang to you one time while drunk, and there was an open karaoke at The Hideout. Everyone was cheering for her, and she was looking at you.

Yearning - How will they cope when they’re missing their partner?

She always has a piece of you. A scarf, a cardigan that smells like you, or listening to the mixtape you made for her birthday. She misses you a lot when you aren’t there, but she looks forward to hugging you again and not letting you go for a while.

Zebra - Do they want a pet? What kind?

She always suggested having a dog, a cat, or a little hamster with a silly name. She is aware of her clumsiness, but sometimes she gets distracted easily, so you decide to test her by giving her a stuffed bunny. She has to have it all day, and if she has it in perfect condition by the end of the month, you promised her you could adopt a pet.

tags: all @munsonology @emistrash @livsters @paybacksawitch @ali-r3n @keeksandgigz @babybatlover @fanfictionlover277353

please please reblog to support your creators! comments are appreciated !! my ask is always open if you have any feedback. thank you so much for reading ♡

[schrijverr]

Self-Promote Saturday

Old fics can still be fun, so to keep the fandom ecosystem alive, I’m promoting one of my own today. This week’s self-promote saturday fic is: The Queer Lives of the Party (112k)

Jonathan turns into a famous photographer, however he took more photos during the late 80s and early 90s. Photos of his family. These photos featured queerness at their center and could not be published. Now, some years in the future these stories can be told, so he publishes them in a book with the writing of Nancy. This series contains said book as well as modern day expansions of the universe after publishing it.

This is probably one of the works that I've written that I'm the most proud of. I especially love writing about queerness and this was kind of a love letter to queer people through the party. I tried to incorporate all sorts of hardships, but also the hope and the joy that was in the domestic moments. I love looking at pictures of queer people just living their lives both from now, but also from the past, so this is inspired by that.

It's an extended universe of non-traditional story fics. I've got the book, letters, interviews, YouTube videos, social media, and museum exhibits.

And it was just so fun to built these lives for all the characters, from the moment canon ends until the mid 90s, how each of them react to the aftermath of the Upside Down and move on and slowly move away from Hawkins, how they come to relate at to each other, the relationships they get into and the careers they work towards. Jonathan naturally goes into photography and Nancy into journalism, but having Eddie be a musician, Will an artist, Dustin a scientist, Max an activist, Erica into politics etc., was really enjoyable.

And then I left them up with hopes and aspirations, things they achieved, which I got to pick up in the late 2010s. See how they were dealing now that they shared that life they lived then with the world (even if they censored the Upside Down). How they've settled into middle age, have nice domestic lives. It's just so thoroughly enjoyable and joyous to have those futures.

I would certainly recommend you check it out, because it's truly a great work (if I may brag a little xp) <333

[joesbnbg]

everybody wants to rule the world (a platonic stobin x ocs fic)

the summer of 1985. two best friends. an unlikely pair of ice cream slingers. evil russians threatening the end of the world. what can go wrong?

masterlist:

part one - cruel summer

part two - peace in our world

part three - coming soon!

[roanofarcc]

PROJECT SUNSHINE CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT → THE FUTURE IN COLOR

summary: steve harrington x oc | on ao3

when another product of Hawkins National Laboratory escaped a long-survived nightmare alongside her sister, she crashed into one unsuspecting teenage boy and dragged him deeper into the dark mysteries that made up their hometown.

word count. 5.6k || masterlist

warnings: cannon typical violence, child abuse, horror, gore, and depictions of mental illness. parts of this story were written pre-season 4 release. cannon divergence.

a/n: we’re officially in season 3!! this season is the most fun to write and I cannot wait to continue sunshine’s story. this season things get fun, flirty, and a little more traumatizing! buckle up :)

previous chapter ← → next chapter

It was Hopper’s fault. He was the one who decided to buy the three kids, cooped up inside the cabin, an unholy number of craft supplies to keep them from flinging books off the shelves or causing town-wide power outages; that happened only once when Mike Wheeler decided to scare the daylights out of Leia after they had just finished some slasher film. With the craft supplies came tubes of glitter, and how was Sunshine supposed to know glitter was so messy?

“Oh, my God!” she cried, scrubbing her hands feverishly in the kitchen sink as Leia laughed manically on the floor, clutching her stomach with hands stained with pink and white glitter. The light above the dining room table flickered in the rhythm with Leia’s giggles, only enhancing the headache that bloomed inside Sunshine’s skull; it wasn’t a power-induced headache, but rather a babysitting-induced one. 

Glitter clung to her hands, it itched her cheek, and out of the corner of her eyes, she spotted it tangled in her hair. “This stuff won’t come off! I’m supposed to go to the mall after I leave here.” She didn’t want to waltz into Starcourt, the newest attraction in Hawkins, looking like a rouge art project. Since the summer started, the mall had been swarmed with masses of teenagers and she felt like, no matter how she presented herself, their eyes lingered on her judgmentally. She was an outsider; it was like they could smell it on her. All Sunshine wanted to do was blend in with the teenagers with pretty teased hair and clunky jewelry. The glitter would not help keep eyes off of her. It was hard enough with her hand-me-down clothes she didn’t know exactly how to style and her struggle to understand people her age. 

Leia eventually ended her fit of laughter and sat upright. “Who cares? It’s not like Steve’s going to refuse to serve you ice cream just because you look like a disco ball.” That only made Sunshine groan louder in frustration. Leia picked herself off the ground and began to clean off the counter of their glittery mess, but she paused and let out a huff of air. “The door’s closed again.” 

If Sunshine’s abilities had been anything like Leia or El’s, triggered by their emotions- she probably would have illuminated the cabin with a solar flare. Luckily, they weren’t, and instead of causing any damage, she turned off the sink and hastily grabbed a dish towel to dry them as she marched toward El and Leia’s shared bedroom. She gave El and Mike three knocks before she swung the door open. 

A twin set of wide brown eyes and flushed cheeks stared back at her. Tossing the dishrag over her shoulder and placing her hands on her hips, Sunshine looked between the couple with pure exasperation clearly written on her lightly tanned face. “The door stays open! How many times do I have to tell you guys that?” 

Mike rolled his eyes and leaned lazily against El’s side. “Come on, Sunshine. That’s Hopper’s rule and he’s not here.” El nodded her head along with Mike’s words and smiled sweetly at her sister like she thought she could persuade her like easily. 

“I don’t care. It’s still Hopper’s house and he only has, like, three rules you guys have to follow. So please, just keep the door open, okay?” 

Rule one: Eggos are not a proper meal (unless it is breakfast). Two: No using your abilities on your siblings or others unless it’s a life-or-death situation. Three: Boyfriends can only be in the bedroom if the door stays open. 

Hopper’s list of rules, which he left written and stuck to the fridge with a magnet, was small and simple. He also heavily hinted that it was more than okay for Sunshine to drag Mike out of the house by his ear if she wanted. 

“Why are you being such a stick in the mud?” he asked. Between the glitter stuck to her, the fact that Luke hadn’t left his room all day, and the smirk on Mike’s face, Sunshine was close to losing it. Babysitting used to be fun, and she still enjoyed the kids more than she cared to admit to them, but boy did they know how to push every single one of her buttons. 

She refrained from dragging Mike out of the cabin, though. Instead, she turned to her sister and said, “Keep the door open. Got it?” 

El sighed but agreed, and Sunshine left the two of them alone to continue kissing and giggling like they were the only two people left on planet Earth. 

Back in the kitchen, Leia was cleaning the glitter from the floor and quietly humming to the tune of one of Hopper’s old records. She looked up at Sunshine’s footsteps, her eyes falling onto the skirt of the dress she wore. 

“You’re spreading this shit like it’s a disease,” Leia snorted. “It’s on your dress now.” Sunshine looked at where her hands rested on her hips and saw little sparkly flecks left behind. She threw her hands up in defeat and fell into one of the dining room chairs. Her fingers went to her hair, and she started pulling at the knots, untangling them from the wind on her bike ride over and, hopefully, pulling some of the glitter out before she left for the mall. 

Her dark curls had grown out to about the middle of her chest, and she could easily pull it back and out of her face, which she hadn’t been able to do since she was a little kid. Her mom enjoyed braiding Sunshine’s hair and teasing it up into all kinds of different styles. It was a simple thing, but it allowed both women to get back some of the mother-daughter time that was stolen from them. 

It was funny, in a sad kind of way, how something as simple as hair had become so important to Sunshine. In the Lab, their hair had been forcibly shaven, but she hadn’t thought much of it at the time. Since her time before the Lab was so blurry, she hadn’t remembered what it was like to have hair long enough to run her finger through. Her shaved head was all she knew. When her operations were over, her hair grew out just slightly. She would trace her fingers along the pretty figures inside picture books they had inside the Rainbow Room with long hair and wish long to mirror them. Then, she and El escaped, and her hair became the last of her concerns. But when the threat of monsters was gone and she was no longer riddled with the guilt and sorrow of her sister’s death, Sunshine had time to think about mundane things such as hairstyles and how she looked. Her hair was the one thing she felt she had full control of. There was still an internal struggle with her mind and her body; she felt tainted, like both her mind and body didn’t completely belong to her. But her hair was hers and only hers. 

She pulled the soft curls back and off of her neck and tied it up with a blue scrunchie she borrowed from Leia. 

“I don’t know what El sees in him,” Leia said, loud enough that the couple probably heard. “I mean, why do she and Max want to spend all of their time with stupid boys?” 

Sunshine shrugged her shoulders. “They really like their stupid boys. One day, you might also find a stupid boy you like.” 

Leia scrunched up her face in disgust. She shook her head as if that was the most insane thing anyone had ever said to her. “No way! Not happening. If I wanted to waste my time kissing something full of Cheeto dust and no common sense, I’d kiss one of the chairs at the arcade.” 

“Gross.” 

“It’s not more gross than kissing Mike or Lucas. Or Dustin, Will, any of ‘em.” Leia sounded sure of herself, so Sunshine didn’t push it any further. It wasn’t like she was in any place to dish out relationship advice. Her thirteen-year-old sister knew more about relationships than she did. All of Sunshine’s knowledge came from the cheesy romantic movies she wanted, or what little she’s heard about them from Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan. It was another aspect of life that she felt behind on, but she was a bit too scared to explore the ideas of boys, both because she figured it’d be impossible for her to have a normal dating life considering her circumstances and because she didn’t take much interest in the boys she saw around Hawkins. 

Sure, Sunshine recognized a cute boy when she spotted them, or when Nancy pointed them out and tried to get Sunshine to talk to them, but the idea of dating some random boy she met at the mall made her feel odd. She liked to think it was because she was still trying to find her footing in the world, but she wasn’t entirely sure that was it. 

“You don’t think it’s gross, the whole kissing thing?” Leia asked curiously, sitting at the table across from Sunshine. 

“I don’t know,” she shrugged. “I haven’t gotten the chance to kiss a stupid boy, yet.” And she definitely hadn’t thought about it…at all. 

“Really? You haven’t kissed anyone yet?” Leia looked at her oddly with narrowed eyes before she leaned back in her chair and said, “Huh, weird.” 

A light scoff came from Sunshine; she was a little offended. “It’s not weird! I just…I have other things to worry about.” And even if she did take an interest in the boys in the mall or around town, she doubted they wanted to kiss the weird girl who came back to life after ten years. 

“No, that’s not what I mean. I just figured…” Leia trailed off, biting her tongue and shaking her head. “Never mind.” 

“What? You figured what?” 

Leia sighed. “I figured you would have kissed your stupid sailor man by now! I mean, you and Steve are practically dating at this point.” The casualness in Leia’s voice caught Sunshine so off guard. Heat instantly rose to her cheeks and her eyes widened almost comically, she was sure. 

“What? No!” she choked out. Leia cocked her head to the side as if to say ‘really?’ but Sunshine held firm to her answer, which was the truth. “We are not dating! And we definitely kissed! Steve is my friend. We’re friends!” 

Holding up her hands in defense, Leia tried and failed to hide the smirk that tugged on the corners of her lips. “Okay, geez! No need to get so defensive. I’m just saying, if you wanted to kiss a stupid boy, I’m sure he’d volunteer.” 

Sunshine pushed herself up from the table and retreated to finish cleaning the kitchen. She didn’t quite understand why her face felt so hot or why the mere thought of kissing Steve made her feel…weird, which was ridiculous. Feelings were a messy thing that she was coming to realize. And they were very confusing to one girl who still had a lot to learn about the world.

She didn’t want to think about it anymore. “I’m going to check on Luke,” she said before she climbed the ladder that led into a small loft in the cabin that Hopper had converted into a room for Luke. He hadn’t been out of his room since Sunshine had arrived that morning. Hopper had told her Luke had been awake most of the night from another nightmare. He had tried to coax Luke out to talk about it, but the nightmares he had were not of monsters or the Lab, they were about the future of others. 

Standing at the top of the ladder, Sunshine knocked against the railing. It took a moment, but his voice floated from the far end of the loft, telling her to come in. She crawled inside and saw him sitting in front of a painting easel with dark circles under his glassy, blue eyes. 

The loft was covered in drawings, but they were the glittery ones Leia and El decorated their room with. Instead, Luke only drew what he saw in his visions. That’s what he said, anyway, but to Sunshine they all looked like thick, messy strokes of pain that were impossible to make sense of. He pinned them to his walls, left them in stacks on his nightstand, and scattered across his floor. 

“Are you ready to talk about it?” Sunshine asked, carefully watching as her brother hung his head and let his pain brushes rest on the floor beside him. He pulled up his legs to his chest and hugged them. “Hopper said you were up most of the night. You know, you can talk to him too, right?”

It was more of an adjustment for Luke than Leia to be taken in by Hopper. Leia was warmer and more welcoming to the idea of a home and someone to take care of her. Luke, on the other hand, had taken up the responsibility of looking out for his sister. In many ways, he acted like the older siblings, even though they were twins, and no one knew who was technically born first. Without the distraction of taking care of Leia, Luke was left to get lost inside his head more, and sometimes he fell so deep into his mind that it was impossible to pull him out. But Sunshine tried every time.

“I know,” Luke sighed. “But he won’t get it. No one does.” Sunshine sat beside him, as close as she could without touching him. She grabbed one of his shirts left discarded on the floor and wrapped it around her hand before she reached out and grabbed a hold of Luke’s hand. He squeezed her hand through the fabric but kept his gaze on his newest painting hung on the easel. 

“Just because he won’t understand exactly what you’re feeling, doesn’t mean he won’t listen. He cares about you, Luke.” He buried his head in his knees and said nothing for a long moment. Sunshine was patient. She stayed at his side, rubbing her thumb across the back of his hand through the fabric. She wanted to wrap him up in her arms and pull every awful nightmare-vision from his delicate head. Maybe if she had been given abilities like Ivy, she could have helped. But there was nothing more she could have done than hold his hand and listen to him.

After a couple of minutes of silence, he looked at her with an unreadable expression. “I’m just trying to figure things out before it’s too late. I can’t be too late.” 

“Too late with what?” 

He didn’t answer. He looked at his easel and pointed with his unoccupied hand to the two pieces of paper that hung side by side on it. “Do these look like they match up? Do they look like, maybe they could be from the same event?” he asked. 

The painting on the right was a little easier to make out. A white silhouette stood at the bottom of the page with one arm raised in the air. The figure was surrounded by thick strokes of white and yellow that encased most of the page. Black paint bordered the page like it was being pushed back by the white and yellow. The painting on the left was similar but opposite. A slightly larger, black silhouette was at the bottom of the page, surrounded by a mix of black, gray, and dark red that was only broken by white and yellow paint along the corners of the page.

“Maybe,” Sunshine answered, not sure what she was looking at exactly. “They look sort of similar. Was this what was in your nightmare last night?” 

He looked conflicted for a moment but decided against hiding his worries from her. “Sort of.” The words came out strained from his lips as if they were hard for him to get out. Sunshine gave his hand a reassuring squeeze and waited for him to continue. “It wasn’t like the dreams of my visions that I’ve had before. I felt like my brain was trying to…to pair up visions, maybe? They played out together, the visions like it was one singular vision and not from two different people. I think it was trying to show me something I needed to know.”

“And that’s never happened before?” 

Luke shook his head. “I don’t know how to explain it, exactly. They’re usually cut up and when they do come together, which is rare, I can easily tell the difference between them and who they belong to. But this time, I knew they were from two different people, but I couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began because…because they were happening at the same time.”

Sunshine had never seen Luke so distraught over one of his visions, not recently. “Who’s futures are they?” 

“Max’s,” he said, chewing down on his bottom lip. “And yours.” Sunshine swallowed thickly. It was her future that was keeping him up at night. She couldn’t help but feel guilty about it. 

Luke scooted closer to his paintings and pointed at the white silhouette. “That’s you. It took me a while to realize it, though, the scene happened so fast that I almost forgot about it until I saw Max’s future. They came together last night. And this,” Luke pointed to the black silhouette on the other page. “Is Max’s stepbrother, Billy.”

Unease ran down Sunshine’s spine, but she tried to hide it on her face. Why could she and Billy share a piece of their future? She was sure their issues with him had ended after the fight last fall; since then, he had left all of them alone and resorted to tossing looks in her and Steve’s direction inside of fists. 

Sunshine’s fingers toyed with the sun pendant around her neck out of habit and in an attempt to calm her nerves over the whole ordeal. “Are you sure that you didn’t see the fight that happened at Will’s last fall?” Even if Billy, heaven forbid, tried to do something to Max or Lucas, he was still just a teenage boy and wasn’t exactly a colossal threat to Sunshine. His temper was terrible, but she was confident she could handle him fairly easily if need be. 

“Max grabbed my hand after the fight. I don’t see the past, only the future, which means, whatever this is, it hasn’t happened yet. But it didn’t look like you were fighting him, necessarily. Like I said, it happened so fast and hard to see. It was dark, then light, then smokey. Or blurry? It was a lot.” He rubbed his tired eyes and stifled a yawn. “But both visions, from you and Max, held the same feeling. It made my chest feel tight and I couldn’t breathe. It was awful.”

His frown and glassy eyes made Sunshine feel helpless. There was only so much comfort she could give him. Her thoughts drifted onto Ivy and how she, despite not having anyone to hold and comfort her, always knew how to make Sunshine feel better under the worst circumstances. She wanted to do the same for the kids, but it was difficult to ease the worry that followed Luke around like his shadow. 

“Listen, whatever happens, you know there’s a whole group of people who are here to help us. Whatever you saw, we’ll deal with it, and we’ll get through it together.”

Luke hung his head once more. “You can’t promise that.” 

“Yes, I can.” Sunshine had known most of their little Hawkins group for almost three years, and that was more than enough time to know they’d be at their side in an instant if something else were to go wrong. She understood the weight on Luke’s shoulders, to want to save everyone all on his own, but she wouldn’t let him or any of her siblings fight that burden alone. 

Standing up, Luke crossed his bedroom and pulled down a painting from the wall. He handed it to Sunshine and hovered anxiously above her, with an expression that had shifted from worry to stone. 

The painting was drenched in blood-red paint and little shadowy figures that looked vaguely human were dotted throughout the page. “What is this?” she asked, despite being a little afraid of the answer. 

“If I don’t figure out what happens in our future, there might not be one.” 

Sunshine’s gaze flickered between the painting in her hand and the one on the easel. Her stomach turned uncomfortably as the images filled her with a familiar dread that had been following her around since she escaped the Lab. The future was supposed to hold something sweet and light after their freedom from Dr. Brenner and the Lab, but it didn’t seem to be changing. But maybe it still could; maybe there was still time to change their future. 

Standing up, Sunshine placed a careful hand on Luke’s sweatshirt-clad shoulder. “I know that you feel like all of this is on you, but it’s not. None of this is.” She gestured to his painting-filled room. “You have us. We’re always going to have us.” 

Luke took the painting back from her and ran a finger across the page, deep in thought. Sunshine could tell he was still fighting a battle with himself inside his head, but he nodded and tossed the painting onto his bed, probably too tired to think about it anymore. 

“Come on, I’ll make you lunch,” Sunshine said. 

“Can we have Eggos, please?” She supposed breaking one of Hopper’s rules wouldn’t be the end of the world. 

…

“I think taking an ice cream cone to the eye would be less painful than watching you try to flirt.” 

Steve sighed deeply as three girls left his new job with ice cream cones and his dignity. He was positive that the world was out to get him, why else would he be stuck in an awful sailor uniform and manage to strike out with every single girl that entered Starcourt Mall? And, to make things even better, his two coworkers spent more time squishing any of his remaining dignity underneath their stupid, doodled-on Convers. 

“Question,” Tamera Willow asked, leaning against the back counter with a smirk on her lips. “Have you ever talked to a human woman before? Or is this your first time?” 

Steve groaned and replied, “I hate you guys.” He didn’t know what was wrong with him. Normally, hitting on girls was his specialty. It used to be so easy for him. Granted, most things had been easier before he discovered that monsters and other dimensions existed. Had monster hunting somehow ruined his flirting abilities? Or had Billy Hargrove knocked them right out of his brain when he smashed a dinner plate over his head? 

“Lighten up, dingus. At least you get another tally.” Robin Buckley, Steve's other obnoxious coworker, uncapped a dry-erase marker and added another tally under the ‘you suck’ column on the whiteboard. They had turned his life into a humiliating game for their own amusement. He was 0-2 that afternoon, and he had a feeling his luck was not going to turn out before his shift was up.

Ignoring Tamera and Robin, Steve settled his gaze out among Starcourt’s food court. The mall had quickly become the hot place to be that summer. It was constantly flooded with people and illuminated with neon lights. Kids were left to roam free, teenagers spent their days either working at one of the many shops or spending their parent's money, and adults were either dragged around by their youngest kids or they used the mall to escape the summer heat. Normally, somewhere like Starcourt would be favored by Steve, but his dad forced him to get a job and of course, he ended up at the one with the worst uniform and coworkers.

“Do you want some real advice?” Tamera asked, to which Steve immediately replied, ‘No.’ She didn’t care, though, and gave it to him anyway. “You’re coming on too strong, Popeye. Like, I think you’re scaring customers off. Even if you want to get into someone’s pants, don’t make it obvious.”

Steve sighed and spun around to face the two girls. “I don’t want in anyone’s pants. I’m just…ugh! I don’t know what I’m trying to do.” He really didn’t, which was weird for him. Steve tried to flirt, and to be fair, he probably did come off too strong. But, at the same time, he wasn’t as into it as he should have been. It was like he was ruining his own chances, and he couldn’t figure out why. 

“Oh, hey! It’s Steve’s better half,” Robin said, confusing Steve for a moment before a familiar voice rang out. 

“Ahoy!” Sunshine greeted them with a smile, which Steve found himself mirroring out of habit.

She was more dressed up than usual, in a light pink dress and brown flannel- probably borrowed from Hopper- tied around her waist. She waved at them as she entered and showed off her series of strategically placed bracelets to hide the little tattoo on her wrist. 

As the spring had shifted into summer, Sunshine seemed to be fitting in even more with the teenagers of Hawkins. Of course, she was very much unlike anyone in Hawkins, for a multitude of reasons. It was like watching someone become more of their person and grow more comfortable with themselves. Everyone seemed to be moving on from their runs in with monsters and other horrors of their past. Sunshine seemed to be enjoying life in Hawkins more with the return of her siblings, who had been taken in by Hopper. It was almost like they’d all been around forever. 

“Hey Sunshine,” Steve said. “How was babysitting?” 

Her shoulders slumped slightly as she approached the counter. “I feel like I’ve aged ten years in one morning.” 

“Well, you know what they say,” Robin jumped into their conversation. “Kids suck the life right out of you.” 

Sunshine laughed softly. “Yeah. Mike and El refuse to leave each other alone for five seconds. I’m worried they’re going to suffocate from all their kissing.” 

“The honeymoon phase will wear off eventually,” said Steve. “Hopefully.” According to Sunshine, the new couple was either connected at the hip or talking about the other every chance they got.

“Honeymoon phase?” Sunshine furrowed her brows, and Steve caught sight of silver glitter that dotted her cheek and temple, probably from another one of Leia’s art projects. Apparently, the kid had taken up painting, like her twin brother, but she took her own creative liberties. 

“Yeah, it’s like when a relationship is new and exciting and you don’t want to be away from that person for, like, even a second. And I guess you can’t blame them for that after…” Steve trailed off not wanting to violate any of their NDAs in front of Tamera or Robin. 

Mike Wheeler had to watch his superpowered girlfriend nearly die defeating a monster before she showed up again nearly a year later dressed like someone from MTV only to have to close the Gate before they all died. That was a lot for anyone, especially for a kid. He couldn’t fathom being in Mike’s shoes. Well, he did believe his superpowered best friend was dead for ten years, and not a day went by where he didn’t want to spend it with Sunshine. Maybe he a Mike weren’t too different. 

“I know. And I’m happy that El’s happy but Mike is a piece of work sometimes. I’m afraid that he’s one snarky comment away from Leia-” Sunshine cut herself off, probably about to mention something related to Leia’s powers. “Kicking him out of the cabin and locking the door.” 

Out of Sunshine’s three siblings, Leia was the only one Steve had come to know the most. It started after he let Sunshine borrow his Walkman and Leia found it in her room. She ended up accidentally frying the thing and then broke down in tears when she was apologizing. Steve had to convince her it was okay, but he felt so bad about the whole thing that he ended up buying her own Walkman for what she and Luke deemed as their birthday. Since then, Leia and he have been swapping cassettes. 

“Well, what about Luke?” Steve asked. Her brother was a lot harder to place. He never said much, at least not the few times Steve has been around him.

As soon as Steve asked, Sunshine’s whole demeanor changed. It was quick, probably not even noticed by Robin or Tamera, but Steve saw it. She brushed it off with a half-hearted laugh and said, “Oh, you know, the usual crisis.” That was all she needed to say for Steve to understand. The idea of someone being able to see the future was a tough pill to swallow, but from what Sunshine had told him, Luke was plagued with visions of it and he had a hard time dealing with whatever he’d seen. And that led to Sunshine worrying over him. 

“These kids sound like a blast,” said Tamera. Sunshine replied with a nod and played with the chain of her necklace.

Changing the subject, Steve pointed his ice cream scooper toward the tubs of ice cream in the case. “You want the usual?” She didn’t even answer before Steve started making her order, which he as quickly memorized due to her frequent trips to the mall. Once he was done, he handed the cup of strawberry ice cream with whipped cream to her. The two lulled into their usual small talk as Robin and Tamera retreated to the backroom.

Tagged List. @sattlersquarry , @leptitlu , @drunkengodsofslaughter

[hawkinsglasscloset]

Sappho Punch | Bottoms x Stranger Things AU

Chapter 1: All is Fair in Love and War

Word count: 2k

Warning: strong language, mention of SA, mention of violence and blood.

A/n: So my obsession with the movie Bottoms and my obsession with the show Stranger Things came together to create this baby. I hope you all enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Comments are greatly appreciated :3

Fall came, but the weather was still pretty summer-like. There was a soft breeze and a sky sprinkled with stars, making that night the perfect night to finally talk to the girl of your dreams. The only issue was... maybe the girl of your dreams was also the girl of your best friend's dreams. 

Hazel and Robin had been friends since third grade, they bonded over being tomboys and eventually their friendship grew deeper, but never into a relationship. They simply could not see each other in that way, not to mention they both were more into femmes, which led them down a long road of falling in love with straight girly girls. 

They usually went for the opposite type, it definitely made things easier when it came to relationships (or the lack thereof, in their case since they were both virgins), they never fought over a girl in all their years of friendship. 

Robin was more into petite redheads and blondes who could sing or play some instrument. Meanwhile, Hazel liked brunettes or girls with colorful hair, taller than her and on the chubbier side.

Unfortunately, as there's a first time for everything, this time they were both in love with the same girl. She wasn't exactly Robin's usual type, neither was she Hazel's usual type. 

Men usually say bros before hoes, straight girls say chicks before dicks, what do gay girls say? Chicks before clits? Well, something of the sort was decided between the two friends. They were definitely NOT gonna fight over some girl. 

And if she ever happened to show interest in any of them... the other would have to gracefully accept it and move on with no hard feelings. All is fair in love and war, but losing someone who has been in your life before you could even do long division was a price they were not willing to pay for coochie.

"If you don't say hi, I'm gonna say hi," Robin said with a nonchalant shrug. 

"She's definitely straight! What are you even thinking?" Hazel cried nervously as she fidgeted with a big roll of tickets and waited for her cotton candy.

"She's British! Maybe that's how British people are... straight looking," Robin shook her friend by the shoulders. 

"I don't think so, I think in Britain they're even gayer looking than usual," Hazel took the cotton candy and shoved part of it in her mouth. "Look! PJ and Josie!" 

The unpopular, supposedly untalented, lesbian crew of Rockbridge Falls was almost all there after the two arrived, Sylvie was the only one missing, but... nobody really wanted Sylvie around (except for her stepdad, of course). 

"What happened to your arm?" Hazel asked, seeing that Josie had a cast on. 

"She ate shit," PJ laughed. 

"She ate literal shit? What the fuck?" Hazel chuckled. "Did you get beat up again? Were you jumped? Was it spy camp? Did you go to juvie?" 

"Yeah, we went to juvie," PJ sarcastically sneered. 

"OH MY GOD, IT WAS JUVIE?" Hazel gasped just as Jeff, their golden boy from the football team was introduced in the most ridiculous fashion, making all the girls scream and beg him to fertilize their eggs. 

"Why are people so obsessed with him?" Robin mumbled. "He has a round jawline... like a girl." 

"I don't get why girls like boys like that. They're like dogs or pigs or... what's the grossest animal?" PJ huffed while the Viking players passed by them without caring if they bumped into someone. 

"The human being, no animals are gross" a soft voice answered her question.

"Naomi!" Robin nearly screamed.

"Where?" Hazel turned and squealed when she was met with the girl she'd been dreaming of for about a year since she moved from London with her mother. 

Naomi was the British straight girl in question. She was tall, taller than both Hazel and Robin (who was already quite tall), but in a delicate way. Her many curves were perfectly hugged by her bellbottom jeans and a crop top that said vegan women taste better. 

She had long jet-black hair and pale skin which gave her a Snow White quality that made both Hazel and Robin lose their minds.

"Hey, mate," Naomi smiled, as her cheerleader friends, Isabel and Brittany joined her. 

While PJ and Josie fumbled to talk to the other two, Hazel and Robin stared at Naomi without knowing what to say. It was like she always stole all the words from their brains. 

"I see you're vegan," Robin pointed at the shirt. 

"Yeah, I don't like to take part in any kind of animal exploitation," Naomi sweetly replied. "They are friends, not food." 

"Did you know Hazel worked all summer on her uncle's farm? In the slaughterhouse!" 

"Shut up!" Hazel hissed and then put a smile back on. "I didn't... I worked at the National Meat Association." 

"That's well bad," Naomi frowned. 

"I know, right? I don't even eat meat-"

"Yeah you do, your favorite food is steak," Robin said before being elbowed right in the boob by her friend. 

"Meat is murder... I just needed a job," Hazel tried to save face. 

"If you don't mind me asking, how much do you get paid there?" Naomi tilted her head. 

"Fifteen bucks an hour, it's pretty good," it really wasn't, not for handling guts and blood for hours and coming home every day looking like the final girl from a slasher film. 

"Say what, if you're interested, the golf course I work at needs new caddies, they pay twenty quid an hour plus tips. The old guys usually tip well if you laugh at their bad jokes."

"Wait, seriously? And I'd get to work with- with you?" Hazel's eyes lit up, not even caring if the old men in question happened to be pervs or not. 

"Yeah, kinda. I drive around serving drinks, we'd see each other all the time."

"Yes, please! I'd love that! The job, I'd love that job!" 

"I'll give you my manager's number tomorrow and you can give her a call to apply, you have the right build for it," Naomi said, eyeing the cotton candy. "Can I get a little bit?" 

"O-of course! Take all of it!" Hazel handed her the remaining of her treat.

"C-could I get a job?" Robin asked timidly. 

"I thought you worked at the video store, you don't like it there?" Hazel quirked an eyebrow at her friend. 

Before Robin could answer, PJ and Josie stormed out, snatching the big roll of tickets from Hazel and giving it to Brittany. 

"Hey, no, steady on," Naomi took the big roll of tickets back from her teammate. "These are Hazel's." 

"She knows my name," Hazel whispered to herself.

"But the little Dutch boy gave it to us," Brittany protested without any heat behind her words, as usual. 

"Don't be a twat, go buy your own," Naomi handed the roll back to Hazel and followed her friends to the nearest ride. "Have fun!" 

"Don't you work at the video store?" Robin repeated in a mocking tone once they were alone. "Fuck you, Hazel! Eat a bag of uncircumcised veiny dicks!" 

"You did way worse! You told her I eat steak!"

"You do!"

"I can stop."

"Isn't your mom throwing a barbecue tomorrow?"

"I can stop... after tomorrow. Anything for love!"

**

The next morning, when school finally started, Jeff showed up in crutches. He looked completely fine with the exception of a nasty black eye, which left PJ and Josie puzzled. 

Yes, they had technically driven into him the night before, but the car barely touched his leg, how the hell did he get hurt like that? He refused to explain anything more than the fact that he was supposedly run over.

That's what they tried to explain to Principal Meyers, but he wasn't having it, he had to protect their perfect quarterback... to escape expulsion then, Josie made up a story. 

She said they were just practicing for their self-defense club, to help the girls be prepared to face Huntington players that might want to hurt them, which had already started to happen. 

"I can't believe they're letting you guys start a fight club," Hazel chuckled as she ate her lunch next to Josie and PJ on the bleachers. 

"No, they're not, we are not!" Josie shook her head, too scared to even think about it. 

"Of course we are! Did you see the way Brittany and Isabel were looking at us?" PJ countered.

"Wait... girls were looking at you because they thought you ran over Jeff?" Hazel asked, her interest piqued.

"Hell yeah! Nothing makes a girl wetter than displays of power and strength," PJ nodded. "If we get this fight club going, we can get whatever girl we want. We just have to learn how to fight..." 

"You guys probably fought girls in juvie."

"We were lying about that, obviously!" 

"About juvie? Why would you lie to me?" Hazel asked, unintentionally looking like a mistreated puppy. 

"You assumed, I just didn't correct you," PJ rolled her eyes. "We just need to teach girls how to not get punched in the face, easy, and they drop their panties!" 

"Hey, hey guys! Did you hear?" Robin ran towards the trio suddenly. "Huntington shot up our books so the library is out of order again this year!" 

"No, actually... we're discussing creating a fight club to teach the girls self-defense," Hazel squinted, her blue eyes hurting from the sun hitting her face. "We can start with taekwondo, which I got covered."

"Wait, why are we even doing this? This sounds dumb," Robin started eating the sandwich her mother packed in a plastic grocery store bag. 

"We teach a bunch of girls how to defend themselves against the evil Huntington killers. They are grateful to us, we build a community, we bond, we share, we connect," PJ explained while gesturing with her hands and her hips. "We're punching each other, adrenaline is flowing, next thing we know Brittany is kissing me on the mouth!" 

"I take it back..." Robin shared a look with Hazel. "We definitely need a fight club. Hazel, bring Stella-Rebecca! She'll attract the cheerleaders."

"You know Stella-Rebecca?" Josie sat up, starting to consider the idea.

"We're family friends," Hazel shrugged.

It was true, but before even thinking of Stella-Rebecca, Hazel and Robin had bigger priorities.

"Naomi will be so impressed, she'll need to bring an extra pair of underwear to practice every week, cause she'll soak through the first!" Robin cheered quietly. She was usually shy and nervous, but they had a real shot this time, she couldn't throw it away.

"Shhh..." Hazel held a finger in front of her lips when she heard Naomi's voice coming from the principal's office. 

"I'm really sorry," she said. "But he tried to grope me."

"He's a boy, Naomi! He doesn't know any better!" Principal Meyers argued. "We won't make any of this public because it would hurt Jeff's image, but you can't just punch someone for their natural instincts.

"Naomi gave Jeff the black eye!" Hazel whispered. 

"Shit... it won't be as easy as we thought to impress her with our sexy fighting skills," Robin mumbled, but then she smiled. "But on the other hand, she has sexy fighting skills!" 

Hazel nodded, understanding right away and as soon as the principal's office door opened, Naomi was stopped by both girls. 

"Hey! Don't you think there's a lack of female solidarity at this school?" Robin asked, trying to sound casual. 

"Um... what?" Naomi narrowed her eyes. 

"You know, that Huntington player who fucked that girl's face up, we should do something about it," Hazel suggested, almost as if she just had that idea on the spot. "Hey, why don't you come over to our self-defense club after class?" 

"Self-defense club?" Naomi breathed. 

"Yeah, like a fight club! You can beat up people in the name of feminism!" Robin nodded excitedly. 

"Today at 3:15," Hazel added. 

"Okay, I guess it sounds nice. I'll be there," Naomi smiled as she walked away. "See you guys later!"

"May the best tomboy win?" Robin held out her hand.

"Oh, I will," Hazel teased, shaking her friend's hand.

Tag List: @mrprettywhenhecries @elliethesuperfruitlover

[strangerficsxx]

Chapter One: Suzie, Do You Copy?

story:Midnight Rain wc: with a sudden power outage, jennifer begins to suspect something bad is coming, suspecting the gate has been opened, things turn upside down when she go through a bought of depression -- hiding her feelings from steve.

[a/n: all characters, plot, etc. are not mine. The only thing I own is my original character. credit to gif owner.]

{ June 28, 1985 }

Coming back from the restroom, Jennifer puts on her Scoops Ahoy sailor hat as she enters the shop. She walk past Robin, leaning against the counter and sees a group of kids walking up to the counter of the ice cream parlor as she watches from afar. Jennifer recognizes the group of kids from the events of last year, smiling at Max who smiles back. Robin leans against the counter as a raven-haired kid rings the obnoxious bell that sits by the register.

"Hey, dingus. Your children are here." Robin calls.

"Again? Seriously?" Steve asks from the staff room.

Annoyed, Steve lets the kids through anyway as they trudge through the white vague corridor. Jennifer steps behind the counter, helping two teens select their ice cream before handing them the cones. They pay before walking out of the shop, looking back she watches her boyfriend bring the group of kids with him. He sneaks the group of kids in through the back of the mall, coming back into view as he smiles at his girlfriend.

"Wow, such a good mom," Jennifer jokes.

Steve rolls his eyes, annoyed.

"Well, when you've been doing it for the last two years, you get experience."

Smiling, Jennifer walks in the room and sits down, fumbling with her keys as her eyes well up with tears. Steve approaches and kneels in front of the brunette as they make eye contact.

"Are... Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm-I'm fine."

"No, you're-"

"Dingus. Get out here, there's a group of girls that are annoying me,"

"Okay, just a second. I'm a little busy here."

"Making out with Jennifer? No. Hurry up, dingus."

Steve rolls his eyes as he looks back at Jennifer. The peck their li[s before rising, standing behind the counter. He takes another order, beginning to scoop ice cream when suddenly the lights flicker Jennifer glances down at her arm, seeing the scar that she got from her boyfriend's backyard in 1983. The lights then shut off completely. Looking up, she watches as Steve walks over to the light switch, flipping the knob up and down.

"That isn't gonna work, Dingus."

"Oh, really?" He asks, flipping the switch at an even faster pace.

Suddenly, the light turn on in the mall. A nautical tune plays from the radio as Steve glances at the lights above then looking at Robin and Jennifer.

"Let there be light,"

Even though Jennifer couldn't see Robin's face, she knew she was making some kind of expression toward Steve. The three employees get back to work as Jennifer counts down the hours of work before being able to go home and crash.

——

{ June 29, 1985 }

Jennifer suddenly awakes, looking over at the clock. She sees it sitting ten after eight as the realization sets in, she forgot to reset the clock the previous night due to the power outage. Not only that, but she's very late for work. Throwing the covers off, Jennifer stumbles out of bed and over to her closet where she throws on her Scoops Ahoy uniform and does some light makeup since she'll sweat the makeup off later that day.

Grabbing her keys off her shelf, she leaves without eating before exiting the house. Sliding in the driver's seat, Jennifer puts the key in the ignition as her vehicle starts. Pulling out of the car port and drives down the road and towards the mall, parking in an empty spot as she removes the keys from the ignition and her seatbelt from the latch as she hops out of her car. Striding towards the entrance the sweat forms on her hairline as well as her chest. She walks in and towards the entrance of Scoops Ahoy. Robin notices the sweaty brunette as she smiles, Jennifer smiles back. Steve enters from the back door and greets his girlfriend with a kiss. Pulling away, Jennifer smiles at him as the short haired girl stares at them in disgust.

"Alright, love birds break it up."

"What? It's not like we're making out, or having sex." Jennifer says.

"I don't care, you're abusing company policy."

"Fine, we'll just greet each other like two friends."

"Okay.."

Jennifer rolls her eyes, stepping behind the counter as she holds her keys as she watches as Robin slings a single scoop of ice cream into a cone, handing it to the person. Later, the brunette sits in the back as Robin straightens up and Steve is slinging ice cream in the front. Jennifer overhears his conversation with two girls.

"Alrighty, one scoop of chocolate. That's a buck-twenty-five." He says. "Ooh, Purdue. Fancy."

"Yeah, I'm excited,"

The girl chuckles.

"Yeah, you know, I considered it, Perdue, but I was like, you know what? I really think I need some real life experience, you know, before I hit college, and see what it feels like." He rambles, continuing on. "Kina, like uh, I don't know, see what it's like to earn a working man's wage."

The register beeps as Jennifer giggles, continuing to listen. Steve apologizes to both girls.

"I think that's really important."

"Yeah, totally."

"Yeah, anyway, its so fun. We should kind of like, you know, I don't know maybe hang out this weekend or-- oh, sorry about that. Uh.." The change clatters as it hits the counter.

Jennifer's smile begins to fade as she hears her boyfriend ask a girl out. The awkward male continues talking as the girl turns him down. Robin grabs the white board filled with tally marks and sets it on the counter top.

"Another bites the dust," She says. "You are 0 for 6, Popeye."

"Yeah, I -- I can count."

"It means you suck," Robin comments.

"Yep, I can read, too." Steve says.

Jennifer rises, standing next to Robin as Steve approaches them.

"It's this stupid hat. I am telling you, it's blowing my best feature."

"Yeah, company policy is a real drag." Jennifer responds.

"You know, it's a crazy idea, but have you considered... telling the truth?" Robin asks.

"Oh, you mean, that I couldn't even get into Tech and my douchebag dad's trying to teach me a lesson, I make three bucks an hour, and I have no future? That truth?" He asks.

Jennifer notifies them that a group of girls are approaching as Steve and Robin look towards the entrance. Steve turns to face the two brunettes again.

"You know what? Screw company policy." He says, taking his hat off and tossing it past Jennifer.

"Oh, my god, you're a whole new man."

He turns away and approaches the group of women. Jennifer begins to think about breaking up with Steve as she begins to feel sad, almost on the verge of tears as Jennifer turns away. A stray tear falls from her eye, wiping it immediately. However, Robin notices.

"You okay?"

"Oh, me? Yeah, I'm fine."

"No, you're not. What's going on? Are you... jealous?"

"What? Jealous? Me? No. No, I'm not. I've been... I've been struggling, wondering if I should even keep going with the relationship. I'm beginning to think about breaking up with... him."

"Oh, my God."

"Oh, please. Don't act like you care."

"I do care, or I wouldn't be asking if you were okay. And, wouldn't be standing here listening to you talk about how you want to leave the relationship."

"I mean... should I though? It's just we've been through so much, and that's something we have in common. But, the other part of me wants to end it and see what else is out there."

"You do what feels best to you, okay?"

Jennifer nods, tears streaming down her pale cheeks before wiping them away. Steve notices and rushes toward her, wrapping Jennifer into a hug.

"Steve, I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah,"

"Okay, I just wanted to comfort you."

"I know, but this... this really isn't a good time. I.. just need sometime to think." Jennifer says, pulling away from Steve and rushing out of the shop and into a nearby Girls bathroom.

——

That night, Jennifer finishes up for the night as she makes her way out towards out of Scoops Ahoy, pulling the cap off her head. She walks toward the entrance of Starcourt Mall as Steve catches up to her, stopping Jennifer in her tracks.

"What is it Steve?"

"Earlier... you seemed upset, and I wanted to make sure everything's fine."

"Everything is.. is okay. I promise,"

"Okay,"

Jennifer walks out to her car and enters, closing the door beside her. She puts the key key in the ignition as the car starts, blowing out cold air. Jennifer turns the AC off as she sits and stares in the distance in front of her. Tears cloud her vision, the anxiety creeping up on her as she sobs into her hands as the radio begins playing the soft tune of 'I Wanna Know What Love Is' by Foreigner. With tear stained cheeks, Jennifer slides her seatbelt on and pulls out of the parking lot and drives to Roane Hill Cemetery.

Walking toward Wilhelmina's headstone, Jennifer sits in the dry grass and stares at the stone in front of her. Tears stream down her cheeks as a graduation cap sits atop the headstone, the tassel blows in the musty wind. Jennifer sniffles before clearing her throat. Though, she couldn't say another word, Jennifer lays down and cries to herself quietly before drifting off to sleep.

——

Jennifer stands in the bus with Wilhelmina and the kids as the doors on the bus opens and Steve steps off, wielding the bat. Metal creaks around him as he spins his bat before holding it close. He creeps through the junkyard, chittering continues. Steve swivels around and sees two creatures fanking him as they growl. Dustin opens the bus door, shouting for him to abort. Dart charges as Steve rolls across a car’s hood. One falls through the windshield as he hits another one with his bat. At the bus’s door, Jennifer, Max, Lucas and Dustin motion to steve as he scrambles inside, but Billies pushes past them and runs for her life but gets attacked by one of the demo-dogs.

Jennifer is still in shock and panic, not knowing what to do next until she sees Billie lying lifeless on the grass. She rushes toward her and sees the massive pool of blood forming under her body. Tears well up in Jennifer's eyes as they meet with Billie's.

"Je.. Jennifer?"

"I'm here, I'm here. I'm gonna get you to the hospital, just hold on."

"N-no, I... this is my time, Jennifer." She sniffles. "Don't wait for me, go. Save everyone I... I'll be... okay."

"Billie, don't say that. I'm getting you help." Jennifer cranes her neck. "Steve! Help me."

Steve rushes over, telling the kids to stay on the bus before dropping to his knees.

"Jennifer," He says.

"No, no. We... we have to save her. She's... she's gonna die. Steve, please?" Jennifer pleads, tears running down her cheeks as the air feels thicker with each breath she takes.

Jennifer picks Billie up and rests her body on hers, blood seeping into her shirt. She makes eye contact with the blonde.

"Jennifer... Jen... It's okay, let me fly with the angels. I... love you." Billie says, her head rolls to the side.

"Billie," Jennifer calls. "Billie. Wilhelmina, please, wake up. No!" Jennifer cries, holding a dead Wilhelmina close.

As Jennifer gently places Wilhelmina on the ground, she cries harder as Steve brings her into his embrace. The kids begin to approach as they feel saddened by the moment.

——

Suddenly Jennifer wakes up as she starles before looking around in the twilight. The moon is full and the heat is wet. Sweat forms on her forehead and her breathing is ragged. Craning her neck, Jennifer sees her boyfriend Steve down on one knee. She calms down a little as tears stained her cheeks.

"Steve?"

He brings Jennifer into his arms as she sobs silently in his chest. She wraps her arms around him.

"I'm here,"

"I-- I had -- I wasn't meaning to fall asleep. I was trying to say goodbye to B--Billie, but I slipped into a slumber."

"It's alright,"

"No, it's not. I-I wish she were still here."

"I know. but she's gone, and you couldn't help that."

"I know,"

Her and Steve stay there for a little bit longer before pulling away, helping Jennifer to her vehicle before she takes off down the road as she wipes away the tears that stream down her cheeks.

[strangerocsbymouse]

ship meme thingy — rowilla edition

“ 𝐓𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐡𝐮𝐫𝐭 𝐛𝐞𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞, 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐚 𝐛𝐞 𝐬𝐮𝐫𝐞. ” — waiting for a girl like you template | jellie version | ambeddie version

[stranger-things-x-oc-blog]

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[palmtreesx3]

Act 1 - Foreplay

Aphrodisiac (Robin's Chapter)

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Summary: (6.8K) The pair are settling in at The Hideout but not without some bumps in the road, and are exploring the city and sampling a bit of all that it has to offer. Steve is trying hard to find things that he likes to do and he's totally baffled to see Robin so effortlessly spreading her wings. Robin's got a date. A real legitimate, public date and she quickly gets fixated. Meanwhile Steve's got another lonely evening by himself. The pair - well maybe just Robin - gets in the mood in this Robin-centric installment of Act 1. 

Warnings: it's a sex shop and generally just NSFW so 18+. Sex toys and self-exploration, female masturbation, shop talk, fluffy affection, LGBTQ acceptance (which isn't much of a warning, it's a goddamn right), self-loathing, mild depression and *you* make your first appearance.

Almost-July, 1993

What Robin failed to consider when wagering a digital pet bet with Steve Harrington is that this boy was born and raised competitive. She forgot that in the Harrington household "lose" wasn't in their vocabulary. She also forgot just how forgetful she is. Ironic. So it should have been no surprise that in the last 24 hours, her Tamagotchi has been sick three times and was always beeping incessantly. 

"Rob, you're a horrible mother. You're gonna owe me 5 drinks before we even get our first paycheck." Steve gloats, tucking his healthy, happy, bouncing pet into his pocket before sitting down to lace up his sneakers. 

Meanwhile, Robin who is shoving her feet unceremoniously into her Chucks ignores the shit talking and dishes out some of her own. "Dude, we have to do something about this." She kicks her chin in his direction as he smooths out his clothes. 

"What?" Steve snaps back.

"I can't believe you still dress like that. Honestly. 1984 called, they want their Sears Catalog back." 

"Ok Robin, sorry I didn't know you also got a job as the fuckin fashion police."

"I'm just saying, small town Indiana polo fashion ain't gonna cut it in the big city, boy. You wanna keep bagging hotties like you did the other weekend, we'll have to do something. You don't have to dress for mommy anymore." And as she says the last bit she immediately winces "Sorry. Sorry. I didn't mean … "

"No it's okay, Rob. I know what you're trying to say. Maybe. Maybe once we have some extra money I'll get something new. You can help me. Deal?"

After a few weeks of exploring, Robin and Steve have zeroed in on quite a few of their own places. A bench they prefer in the nearby park, nestled in the shade of a swaying willow tree; a greasy corner store that sells the best breakfasts to sop up what's left of an evening out; an arcade that makes them nostalgic and think of the kids at home and gives them something to talk about when they call; and this place - a nice little coffee shop tucked in between towering complexes and quaint stores just one block over from their place. There are always records playing of the baristas favorite bands, the coffee is good and strong and cheap and they're always open when they need it. 

Steve and Robin have gone to the coffee shop almost daily since they found it. But this time Robin was out on an errand herself so she popped in on her own to grab two cups to-go and bring back to the apartment, where Steve, no doubt, was still sleeping. Perusing the wall of records in rotation while she waits for her order, Robin is startled by a quiet voice beside her, whispering closer in her ear than she's used to from a stranger. "This week it's good stuff, huh? I'm loving The Smashing Pumpkins new one." the voice says. 

Robin's eyes dart to her left and quickly back up to the wall of vinyls, the stranger's proximity and attention making her squirm just a bit. "My last .. girlfriend. She was into all the pop stuff. Not really my vibe, ya know." And at that, Robin's eyes rise to meet the womans who is standing next to her. There's not much that can actually shut Robin Buckley up, but here's a few: a really fuckin' beautiful girl, eye contact and someone casually talking about their sexuality. It was the perfect storm. 

Robin bit her plump, pink lips and nodded at the stranger, feeling a little ridiculous at the interaction so far. What is she supposed to say? Do I ask her about her ex- GIRLFRIEND? Do people really talk that openly here in the city? I don't even know her name! Robin's voice may be silent but her brain is going a mile a minute.

"Alex." The stranger says. Just as the barista shouts Robin! Your order is up! in the background. 

As Robin reaches across the counter for the two steaming cups, Alex counters "And I'm assuming you, are in fact Robin." with a grin. "No boyfriend today?" She says, and as Robin's eyes twist in confusion, she pipes up again "No no, I'm sorry, I'm not being weird I swear. I just come here a lot and I've seen you guys. Nothing freaky I promise."

"No." Is all Robin awkwardly says, totally deadpan. 

Alex waits for more, but nothing comes. After a moment she chuckles, picking up her own cup of tea and raising it to her lips to take a sip, but not before whispering out "No, what?" in a question. 

"Ha. No. No he's not my boyfriend." Robin says as she plays with the hem of her denim cutoff shorts. 

"Ah, too bad. He's a hottie." Alex shrugs and Robin stands confused. It's happening before she knows it started and Robin's dumpster fire of a brain starts rambling. 

"Wait. What? No he's not my boyfriend he's my roommate and yeah we come here, we're still kinda new in town. We're actually from a small town - Hawkins - but what… I'm sorry I thought you said your ex-girlfriend liked pop music so… "

"Yeah. That's what I said." Alex takes another nonchalant sip of her steaming mug. 

" So .. but Steve. He's… " Robin stutters out. 

"Well he is hot isn't he?" The woman counters. 

"I mean, yeah I guess. He has no trouble with the ladies if that's what you mean. Always Mr god-damned Popular cause he has perfect fuckin' hair but I swear they should see him in the morning, it's not all rainbows and butterflies then!" and the words just keep spouting out of her mouth uncontrollably. 

Alex looks on at her, almost endearingly, as she lets her go and spit it all out. "You done?" She asks. 

Robin nods, mutters an apology for her rambling and starts to head towards the door "I should go. Nice to meet you, Alex."

She shuffles her steps quickly in an attempt to bolt as far away as she can from the pretty girl who she just made a fool of herself in front of. God, I'm gonna have to tell Steve we need to find a new coffee place. Shit. 

"Wait! Wait, sorry. I can be intense." Alex muses, kicking her feet at the chair next to where they stand, before looking back at Robin's flushing face. "Yes, I did say ex-girlfriend. I also said your whatever he is is hot. I'm not stalking you, I just must get my tea when you guys get your coffee and, I hope I don't make you totally run off in terror when I say this next part, but I'm gonna anyway - I have just been distracted by you guys. I thought you were both pretty hot and I was distracted by the coffee shop couple every time I'm here. You were solo today so I thought I'd break the ice. Sorry. I hope I'm not making this weird "

Robin's mouth is absolutely hanging open right now. 

"Yeah, so the tables turned pretty quickly and I'm thinking I'm the one that should be embarrassed right now so, hopefully I see hot coffee shop couple around and I didn't totally scare you away from this place. " 

"Oh God, no. The coffee is too good and too cheap for us to stop coming here. He's not my boyfriend. Steve is 100% my roommate and that's it, no coffee shop couple here. Yeah, he's hot but don't you ever tell him that. Christ, he doesn't need a bigger ego. And the last time I talked to a girl like you I think I peed my pants, so excuse me I'm going to go hurl myself off the Willis Tower, if that's okay with you?"

Alex lets out a deep laugh. A genuine one. She reaches out to touch Robin's forearm, to keep her there… or ground her, she's not sure which. "Please don't. I can't have you falling if it's not for me." and at that Robin's eyes go wide as saucers. "Are you free tomorrow? Maybe we could get dinner? Downtown. Meet here so it's not weird and sketchy first…that is, if your hot roommate doesn't mind I borrow you for a bit?"

She's stunned. Robin has never been asked out on a date before. Is this a date? Holy shit.

She musters up every ounce of courage she has to smile and nod. "I get off work at 6, so can we make it 7?" Only to be interrupted in that moment by the shrill chirping on her keychain signifying yet another dead digital pet. 

A wide, sparkling smile spreads on Alex's face as she starts to head out the door, turning back to shout out "7:00, meet you here. Can't wait! "

And as soon as the bell on the door dings and she's sure it's shut, her brain starts catching up and Robin drops both cups of coffee on the floor. 

Today, Murray is not entertained by Steve. Usually the banter between the pair has remained humorous and for the most part, friendly. Today Steve is just pissing him off. 

First Steve dropped an entire shipping box of condoms, spilling single wrapped rubbers all over the floor. It took him an hour and twenty three minutes and three side-eyeing customers stepping over him to clean them all up. Then Steve knocked over the mannequins like dominoes after he struggled with the BDSM display Murray assigned to him for the second part of their shift. Robin snickered as Murray delegated the task to Steve, knowing damn well it was just to make the boy suffer. Robin watched gleefully, sitting at the register, resting her chin in her hand as Steve grumbled through the entire task. At one point, he was fumbling so much with all of the straps and buckles and ties that before he knew it the head of the mannequin he was attempting to gag toppled off its shoulders and knocked three other mannequins down in its wake. All Steve could do in response was throw the ball gag to the side as he stormed off, yelling back "Tell that asshole I took my 15! I'll deal with the bondage when I get back!" 

As he marches off in anger, Murray does in fact slide over and lean down next to Robin. "How's Casanova doing? BDSM not his thing, I see?" He chuckles. Robin cocks a sideways grin at him shaking her head. "He doesn't even know what his thing is, Murray. He's just a lost little puppy."

"What about you, Red. You doing good?"

"Yeah, yeah I am. I think he's stressed because he's not really finding his thing. He's used to things coming easy for him and they're just… not here."

"What does Mr Hometown Heroes' emotional journey have to do with how you're doing, huh?"

"A lot, actually. He's absolutely a bumbling fucking idiot, but he is the kindest person I've ever known. He has a weird way of showing it, but that's because his parents are Grade A assholes. He's been more supportive to me than anyone on this planet and I am trying so hard to help him but I don't know how." 

"Well, Red, this is a journey of lifelong self-discovery. Ya gotta learn to love thyself before you can love another. That goes for both of you, ya know?" and with that, he pushes off the glass countertop and saunters back to his office while humming an indistinguishable tune. 

When Steve returns from his break Robin recognizes the look on his face. It's the one that comes back ready with his head in the game after an excruciatingly awkward pep talk he gave himself - out loud. If anything, all those years of organized sports at least gave him a method to get himself back on track. 

That's why it was so abysmal to watch as he confidently tried to help a young customer, flowing brunette hair curled and brushed out into bouncy ringlets, asking in a tiny voice behind batting eyes to be pointed in the direction of the Ben Wa. 

"Oh yeah, I got you covered on this! Haven't been here long and I never heard of those before our manager got one for us and just the other day I stopped in at this place that looked interesting… "

The customer's eyes narrow, not sure where Steve is going with this conversation just as Murray joins in next to Robin to watch the drama unfold. He brought popcorn this time and was audibly chomping on it with an open mouth behind a gaping smile. "I gotta see where he's going with this." Tilting the bag towards Robin in an offering as they watch. 

"Yeah, so if you just go down the block a few more streets you'll see a place on the corner. It actually says Ben Wa on the window, so you will definitely see it when you get there. I was surprised at how much I liked it!" Steve says to the miffed young lady as she is heading for the door. "Have a great day! Enjoy!" Steve yells after her.

"What the hell man! Where'd you send the good paying customer!" Murray outstretched his arm towards the door before reaching into his bag to throw a kernel of popcorn right square into Steve's forehead. 

"What the fuck, Murray. She wanted to know where to get a fuckin sandwich. Last time I checked we don't sell sandwiches!" He yells as he spins his outstretched arms from left to right, showing off the wares inside the shop. 

"A sandwich? You fuckin' small town nincompoop, no! Ben Wa. Ben Wa balls. She wanted to put 'em up her coochie you idiot!"

Beet red from holding back, Robin finally lets out a cackle that fills the entire store. "Oh my God, someone get me a white board! You gotta be shitting me. This is better than watching him sink at Scoops, hands down."

"Wa-what are you talking about? Ben Wa - like the sandwich from that Korean place? You got it for us for lunch three days ago!"

"Oh for the love of God. You're pretty but you're dumb. BAHN MI. Say it with me BAAHHHN MEEEE" he overemphasized.

"I-i… well.. what… what the fuck man! I don't know!" 

Meanwhile, Robin is on the floor with tears in her eyes from laughing so hard. 

After Robin gets her shit together and Steve returns to his normal shade of sun kissed peach, ever the educator, Murray fills the pair in on what the customer was actually looking for. Pulling them over to a display case in the rear, a menagerie of colorful metallic, glass and silicone balls are laid out for viewing. All the sizes as big as or smaller than an egg, Murray explains both their practical use as well as how they can be used for pleasure. 

"See some ladies come looking for these after they have a baby, nothing to do with getting off… for now at least … everything to do with tightening things back up again. Just a run of the mill afternoon at the vaginal gym shesh." Steve grimaces as the analogy but nods in understanding. "Girls …or guys - might use them to stretch themselves out a bit and train their holes." Robin looks on, fully engaged and taking all the information in earnest. "They have little weights inside though, so if you're wearing them for a while or they're jostling around there's a whole lotta movement in there if you know what I mean. A few tugs on those strings and you got yourself a party." 

The rest of the day goes off without a hitch, but gnawing at the back of Robin's mind are a bright red pair of Ben Wa balls from the display case, round and smooth and silicone, shaped like two cherries on a lime green stem. She's never owned a toy before, and she's feeling kind of intrigued, so while Steve is in the employee room gathering his things and clocking out, Robin seizes the opportunity to pull the toy from the case and ring it up quickly. She rings up the amount, and hastily keys in her employee discount before slipping them into her satchel just before Steve returns to the floor. 

Robin has increasingly spent her free time idling around town and making her own discoveries. She finds herself often at a community park enjoying some local outdoor music that pops up regularly on the weekends and has stumbled upon a vintage bookshop a few doors down from the coffee place that she has made a comfortable home in their reading nook a few days a week while also making fast friends with the laid back cashier there on the weekends. 

Meanwhile Steve has failed at any attempt to casually find something he likes to do on his own and, as evident today at work, there's something that's got him stressed and Robin thinks this is it. He tried to join her at the community park, but he has yet to get into any of the music they're playing and he joined her once at the bookstore when she excitedly wanted to share her big find with her friend, but he just didn't get the hype after sitting there thumbing through a book he had no interest in actually reading. The apartment doesn't have any cable, and there's only so much coffee shop and Tamagotchi a guy pushing 30 can handle. Needless to say, city life isn't coming as naturally for Steve as it is for Robin and that is throwing him for an absolute loop. 

After a long talk on the fire escape over a cigarette, Robin actually had some wise insight into Steve's problem. "Dude, it's because you don't have any hobbies! Tell me one thing you've ever done because you chose to do it?"

"Robs, I played sports for years! Of course I have hobbies!" 

"No. That's not what I mean. Who signed you up for those? Who made sure you made the varsity team your first year? Who told you to run laps? Do you still play them now? Just cause you convinced yourself you liked it, doesn't mean you actually did."

And that resonated with Steve. He thought about why he actually liked all the baseball, all the nights on the basketball court and all the swim meets - it wasn't because he actually liked the sports, he liked how it made him feel to win. For his dad to give a shit every once in a while. For his teammates to need him. So Steve stayed up late that night, gazing at the stars on that fire escape and thinking long and hard about how he has spent his time - team sports that his dad got him into that eventually made himself feel useful, dialing up radio stations that played music he heard at other people's parties and cassette tapes of other people's favorite songs in his glove compartment, cooking meals that he has to or else he wouldn't be fed. 

The only damn thing he ever chose to do himself was watch out for those godforsaken kids back home and even through all his griping about them, it was always worth it. But driving a bunch of preteens around doesn't constitute an interest. "Fuck man, I don't even know myself." He muses into the late night sky, taking one last long drag before closing the window behind himself and idling off to bed. 

The next day, the two had a late start at The Hideout, and Robin threw her satchel over her shoulder while yelling out to Steve "Dingus, I'm going out to the bookshop for a bit. Need anything while I'm out?" 

"Nah Robs, I'm good."

"Kay - don't miss me while I'm out and you're home sulking!" She pokes, and the door clicks shut behind her leaving him in the quiet. Steve reaches for the radio and as he dials the station over to filter out the static and he's immediately back to thinking about last night. Why am I even putting on this station? I don't even think I like these songs, do I? He thinks to himself. So Steve sets out that morning to try and figure something out about himself. 

Inspired by the records displayed every week at the coffee shop, Steve finds himself fingering through bins of Vinyls at a record shop he found as he walked about the neighborhood. "Anything we can help you with, man?" the employee asks as he approaches. 

" Uh yeah. Actually I think…I mean, I think I want to get some records."

" Oh bud, happy to help! What are you into and what kind of player do you have?"

Steve stares at the man, stubble on his jawline, in a fitted yellow Queen T Shirt that looks worn and soft coupled with his ripped denim. A man that looks like he knows what he likes. Steve's stare is blank and he's absolutely at a loss. "I'm sorry, I have no idea. I should go."

"My brother, music is for everyone. Let me hook you up and we'll figure it out. No need to stress."

The man spends the next hour showing Steve how to use a basic model record player. They try out a few different vinyls to see what he might like. After a while, the pair have a stack piled up next to the record player - Queen, Fleetwood Mac, Tears for Fears, Red Hot Chili Peppers and a few others littered with popular music and rock artists he didn't really know by name before - and Steve is checking out. 

As he's getting ready to hand over a stack of cash to the man that helped him discover what kind of music he likes, they're interrupted by a deep hum, "Now that's a nice stack you got there." Steve turns around and is a little taken aback by what he sees. It's you…and you're standing there all casual and comfortable, looking very at ease in the record shop. "Hey Brian. What's up?" You nod in the kind man's direction.

"Hey hot stuff, I got what you came for back here. Just let me finish up with this guy and I'll get you taken care of. "

"Hi" Steve waves in your direction. "I'm sorry." No one quite sure what he's actually apologizing for in the least.

"No need to be sorry, you were here first. I just came to pick up the new Pearl Jam record and I am in absolutely no rush."

"Pearl Jam?" Steve questions. 

"Yeah man. Eddie Vedder? You might actually like it, all things considered." The man named Brian motions to the eclectic stack Steve has accumulated during his visit. 

Looking back at you standing there, not impatiently, just smiling brighter than the sun, he mutters "Yeah cool. Yeah I mean, if you have another can I add that? I'll give it a try."

And as Steve loads up his wares in his arms and turns to leave, your charismatic smile finds him one last time, " I hope you like it… ." You draw out waiting for him to fill in the blank. 

"Steve." He finishes for you.

You nod, "I hope you like it, Steve"

The next night at the apartment, Robin is gearing up for her date and she is absolutely in her head about it. She has asked Steve one hundred times today if he's sure this is a date. "But Stevie's she .. I really think she might just want to hang out and be friends." 

"Robin, I swear to Christ if you don't just STOP this." Steve sucks in a clipped breath before continuing on. "It's a date. I'm one hundred percent sure this girl asked you on a date and you're going. Relax, please! Fuck, you're stressing me out and I have nothing to do with any of this!" Steve shouts for the last time tonight, leaving Robin in the bathroom doorway, staring at herself in the mirror trying to make herself presentable.

Through the damp hair falling into her vision and the steam still speckling on the mirror after her shower, the girl is trying desperately to hype herself up and get ready to spend time with Alex. But Robin is not a confident creature. She's starting to feel herself crawl back inside the cave forged deep in her personality and carved into the bedrock of Hawkins, Indiana. "I gotta fuckin' snap out of this." She says to her reflection, splashing water on her face and retreating back to her bedroom. 

She hears the new and welcome sound of vinyl scratching from Steve's bedroom, before the reverberation of Fleetwood Mac's The Chain blares loudly through the walls. She sighs, sitting there still wrapped in her towel from after her shower, mind wandering to Alex and her tall, thin frame. Still not sure how a girl like that was referring to her as the hot one, Robin's thoughts drift to the deep black of the woman's mascara, fanning her eyelashes out and emphasizing her deep green eyes. She thinks about how she was too much of a spaz to appreciate the curve of her cupid's bow and she's still not sure if she was imagining the softness of the swell of her hips or not. 

Mixed up in thought, Robin's forearms graze the front of her towel and the rough material scratches at her exposed nipples underneath. She lets out a wispy gasp, not realizing just how turned on she was until that second. Her mind is racing. She looks at the clock and sees she has 20 minutes until she needs to head downstairs to the shop to meet Alex. Immediately she eyes her bedside table, knowing those deep red, cherry Ben Wa balls are sitting just inside. She thinks about what Murray has been saying and all of his preaching about “loving thyself before you can love another, Red!" and with one last racing thought of the woman who actually wants to take her on a date… out in public, she's clamoring for the drawer. 

She has never been more grateful that Steve has picked up a new interest, and that it was a loud one, because as she lets the towel draping her body loosen while she's leaning back into her soft cotton pillowcases she lets out a soft whimper before she's even touched herself once. Robin tentatively lets her soft hands and glossy nails trace the outline of her slit, delicately rubbing and pressing on where she needs it most and experimentally flicking the hood of her clit. After considering things one last time, she purses her eyes closed tight and holds her breath as she guides one of the cherry balls inside her opening. 

The gasp that leaves her throat this time isn't soft and quiet and she finds herself gyrating and writhing as she rubs and tugs at the cherry stems attached to her toy. The weights inside are rolling and undulating just like Murray said they would, sending vibrations up and back down her body. Robin feels filthy, thinking about Alex as she uses her free hand to rub at her clit while still pressing in and tugging at the ball with her other, but not filthy enough to deny how much she is enjoying this game she is playing with herself. 

Robin's eyes are rolled back in her head as her orgasm rushes over her, the weights of the ball continuing to move and rattle inside coax her through her comedown. Thighs shaking and breath stuttering, she lets out a deep sigh "Holy fuckin' shit. I love my job." 

Fumbling and running late after her little self-love session, Robin bounds through the doors of the coffee shop a little dramatically. As part of her grand entrance, she knocks her hip into the chair of the two-top situated right inside the entryway and doubles over at the pain. "Shit." She means to whisper, but instead says at a volume loud enough to reach the back of the shop, and if the entrance alone didn't alert Alex to her arrival, she certainly would have heard that.  

The barista greets Robin cheerfully by name just as Alex walks up to greet her with her hand outstretched, coffee cup there as an offering to break the ice. "I thought you might need a pick me up after work. She hooked me up with your usual order, so… "

Robin feels her freckles burn at the gesture, like they do after a day at the lake in the sun. She catches Alex's eyes scanning her body and she feels her chest flush, no doubt accentuated by the emerald green satin tank that's cut a bit lower than she usually ventures. The deep color making her hair, her eyes and her fair skin pop, covered by a cropped denim jacket DIY frayed at the edges has definitely caught her date's eye. 

"I wanted to pop into this Gallery I really love, if you don't mind indulging my creative side tonight? It's a great spot and… there's a graphic artist showing there now I just gotta check out before it's gone. It's this amazing social commentary on pregnancy as a lesbian. Like a totally butch lesbian decides to get pregnant with her partner, so what now? It's just… I gotta see it. The diversity at this place is phenomenal."

Robin's wide eyes are not white in astonishment this time, but instead they're with pure intrigue and reverence. Knowing that not only are there people like her in this city, but enough people that feel the same or respect it enough to go to an art gallery to check out doodles about a pregnant butch lesbian and it's not the butt of a homophobic joke is… enthralling to her. She nods vehemently "Hell yeah, that sounds…  really amazing. I mean… I'm not used to that kind of transparency, so, yeah. Let's do it."

And as they turn to leave the shop, coffee and tea in respective hands, Robin feels the tickle of a finger brushing her open palm. Barely registering what is happening, she finds herself in a brief yet unnecessary panic as she feels Alex's hand settle in, intertwined with hers. She can't help but scan her surroundings for passerby oggling the two women holding hands and walking down the sidewalk, but she saw not one the whole walk down the block to the train platform. The thrill of holding a pretty lady's hand out in public is sending tingles up her spine, or maybe it's the gentle, internal humming of the Ben Wa balls she opted to keep inside for the evening, but Robin could definitely get used to this. She smirks at herself as they ascend the steps towards the incoming train and asks curiously,"So tell me, what's this artist's name?

Meanwhile, Robin just missed Steve on the same platform not 10 minutes earlier. Shortly after Robin finally headed out, Steve found himself standing in the kitchen staring at a barren refrigerator - nothing more than a carton of milk, some OJ and a row of eggs left in there for him to choose from. He tries not to be irritated at his current situation, but he can't help the groan he lets out as he reaches for the phone, readying himself to order way too much pizza for one lonely guy on his couch late at night. 

Before he finishes dialing he shakes his head, thinking about how he doesn't have to keep himself cooped up here. He has done so much on his own, but all of that was such a… necessity. Is it really that crazy to go off and do something alone without it being totally pitiful? "I mean, Robin goes places by herself all the time." He muses to himself. 

So that's how he found himself hopping off the train downtown and wandering into the first restaurant that looked reasonable and …  good. Not just food but something he might actually enjoy tasting. It's a quaint Italian place. Authentic, by the looks of it. Walls lined with corked bottles of olive oil and limoncello, twinkle lights strewn over the white lattice work ceiling, the unmistakable smell of carbohydrates and garlic. 

This is yet another something he hasn’t ever done before. Not just a quick bite or a fast food, but instead going out to a proper restaurant and sitting down for a real meal. Solo. Alone. Alone but NOT lonely, he thinks. In the past 24 hours since Robin pointed out that he never does anything for himself that he enjoys, he has done a lot of introspection and has made it a point to seek out new experiences hoping something will stick. Sitting at the cozy little restaurant place downtown adorned with faux plants, and filled with tables of other guests, he finds himself so grateful to have Robin’s perspective and support. So instead of worrying about how he's not sharing the table with a date, or Robin or anyone else for that matter, he's toasting to her, in absentia.  

On the other side of town, Robin and Alex find themselves tucked into a booth at a dimly lit, definitely more trendy than she’s ever experienced before in her life, kind of bar. Alex has the table filled with an assortment of bites to eat and has ordered up all of the bartender's signature drinks on a mission to get Robin to broaden her horizons and shake that small town dust off of her coattails. “Ok, so, we have to find something here that you’re into. You can’t just tell me warm beer or straight shots are your drinks of choice - every city girl’s gotta have their go-to cocktail.” 

Robin first confidently grabs at the Manhattan from the selections laid out in front of hrr, recognizing the deep amber of the liquid and the familiar smell of whiskey that reminds her of Steve. It is quickly after she brings it to her lips that she sputters it back out, spraying the cocktail over her hand and most likely, her date. Alex says nothing about it, eyeing the ruby red blush on Robin’s cheeks and chest, but she stifles a small laugh before she says “Got it. No whiskey cocktails. Check. Here, here…cleanse your palate.” She says, handing her a small plate filled with creamy green, roasted artichokes splayed out like a lotus flower. “They’re the best in the city. Stuffed artichokes - ya know? They’re my favorite. Doesn’t hurt that they’re an aphrodisiac, huh?”

And if Robin hadn’t already spit out that whiskey drink, she definitely would have at that. So bold. So brazen. Dumbfounded that even at how blatant Alex has been with her flirting all night, it didn’t prepare her for that comment and the implications it held behind her eyes. And when Robin didn’t move to immediately grab a bite, Alex instead responded by picking up a delicate stuffed petal and holding it out to Robin’s pillowy lips, urging her to open up. She tentatively parted those lips and took a bite, wide-eyed at the flavor and simultaneously at the way Alex’s eyes remained locked on hers. 

Before the end of the date, Robin had successfully spilled a cup of water, knocked over the salt shaker and tried sips of 6 different cocktails before she settled in with a bright orange and red drink in a highball glass, lips wrapped around the straw and playing with the stem of the cherry hanging over the side of her glass. “This one is definitely a winner.” She grins, as she turns to look at Alex, excited to have found something that she likes while simultaneously excited that she finds she doesn’t really care that she did no less than 10 embarrassing things on this date anymore. She doesn’t feel embarrassed in the least and that is still a pretty new feeling for her.

“Why am I not surprised? I should have known.” Alex laughs out.

Robin shrugs, a questioning look in her eye as she sucks down the last of the drink, rattling the ice as the straw drains the cup of the last of it, loud enough to turn a head in the booth next to theirs when she forgets she’s someplace a certain level of chic that Hawkins must repel just by its sheer podunk nature.

Alex leans in close, right next to Robin’s ear to whisper, but makes sure she pulls back just as quickly to watch the flush spread over her freckled face like she knew it would “I should have known you’d like Sex on the Beach.” Sealed with a wink. 

And with that, the ice wasn’t the only thing rattling anymore, as Robin is keenly reminded as she feels the shudder travel up and down her spine that she chose to keep those Ben Wa balls.

"And she said what to you? Oh yeah, your date wants to get in your pants. For SURE.” Steve said as the cool edge of a frosted mug hit his tongue. It was a long day at The Hideout and they barely had time to shoot the shit between odd jobs and a colorful group of customers, and Robin got in so late last night that he didn’t even get to grill her about her date when she rolled in. Disregard the fact that Steve was tucked soundly in his bed after a nice warm belly full of pasta and red wines (who knew, he liked red wine? He sure didn’t). After such a long day, and the bet hanging in the air, the pair stumbled upon a local dive bar on their walk home and that’s where they find themselves now - unwinding and finding themselves totally relaxed in the warm, dimly lit and unceremonious Benny’s Taproom.

“God, Steve, I don’t want to talk about it!”

“What do you mean, you don’t want to talk about it? You owe me three drinks and you’ve gotta spill your guts, Robbie.” 

“Ahhh, I don’t want to hear about the bet, Steve! I’ve been a little distracted. My keychain has been the least of my worries, genius.”

“Excuses, excuses.” he winks, the beer tasting even better knowing it was his prize for caring for his tamagotchi much better than his friends, just as he suspected. Robin cycled through three whole pets so far, while Steve’s has grown into a thriving, young thing and he gloats about it every moment he can. “Now, spill it. I need to know the details about your date, Robin. Stop avoiding this.”

As they sit there arguing over digital pets and sharing (or avoiding) stories of their night prior, a gravely ahem comes from over the bar as the gruff, stone faced and bearded man behind it places his hands wide on the counter in front of the two friends. “If you’re in my bar, drinking my drinks, then you gotta share, missy. This place is boring lately, and you guys are fresh meat, so please…entertain us with your stories. I gotta live for something around here.” he sternly says to the two, before he smiles wide and says “If you’re here, you’re family, so listen to your friend and give us the scoop, for God sakes!” 

Robin tells them about her first date - about all of the coy flirting, about all of the embarrassing things that didn’t feel so terribly embarrassing in front of her date, about all of the appetizers and cocktail tastings, about the menu items spread out on their table with double entendres and that Alex kept ordering things she kept referring to as Aphrodisiacs “I swear I thought aphrodisiac was another word for Oysters, and then I thought that it meant something sexual just because … oysters. They’re like…ya know.” as she blinks her eyes downwards to her lap.

“Oh honey, he is into you.” Jim breathes out as he adjusts to lean back against the sink with his arms crossed.

Maybe it was Robin’s tight-lipped smile in response to that, or maybe it was how Steve gargled his last sip of beer right back into the mug before setting it down on the ratty old, stained coaster on the bar, but Jim’s eyes flitted between the pair looking for the information he must certainly be missing. 

“Ah!” He claps his hands together as he takes Steve’s mug, swirls it around eyeing the backwash, throws it in the sink and fetches another one. He immediately moves over to the tap to refill it while noting “Alex…. He’s a she…isn’t she?” 

Jim leans over the bar, braced on his elbows and spends the next twenty minutes telling her that she's just had a taste of what the city has to offer. .. a taste of dating. A taste of Alex. And if she's feeling like that - if one taste is making her feel so so good, it's worth embracing it and diving right in.

TAGLIST: @livsters @katie-tibo @johnricharddeacy @angywritesstuff @k-k0129 @tisthedamnseason69 @middle-of-the-earth @thebrazilianatheist  @mochminnie @micheledawn1975 @falling-throughthe-hourglass @rafaaoli @ash5monster01 @gabessock @onyxslayss

The artist referenced in this Chapter is A.K. Summers who did, in fact host an exhibit at a Chicago Gallery in 1993. See her work Pregnant Butch here

[mrprettywhenhecries]

ghost stories

Billy Hargrove ✘ Win Lewis (OC) // Eddie Munson ✘ Lydia Bellamy (OC) // Robin Buckley ✘ Blossom Bellamy (OC)

⇾ w.c. 3.5k words ⇾ warning(s). canon x oc pairings, spooky stories, drinking, suggestive themes, but nothing explicit ⇾ a/n. a little halloween collaboration with @super-unpredictable98/@hawkinsglasscloset, featuring my Winnie and her Lydia and Blossom.

"Wow, great place to get murdered. Nice one, Win," Blossom huffed as Billy parked in front of the lonely cabin. 

"Chicken!" Lydia teased. "What’re you scared of?  This is the middle of nowhere, nobody will come here to kill you." 

"That is precisely why someone might come here to kill me!  I've never done drugs, I never drank alcohol or smoked, my organs are valuable!" Blossom cried.

“Oh, come on!” Win exclaimed, grinning as she got out, excited for their weekend away. “It’s not as bad as it looks!” she insisted, opening the door for Blossom.  

"You're right... it's worse!"  Blossom walked in and ran her finger over the mirror right by the door.  "Not only is it creepy, it's filthy too. Only you guys can drag me to these things."

“It just needs a quick dusting, that’s all,” Win said with a shrug, opening the curtains to a cloud of dust. 

“Don’t worry so much, B,” Robin said, joining her girlfriend inside, bringing their bags in. “We’re gunna have fun!”

"I hope so."  Blossom softened seeing her girlfriend. " Anywhere is perfect with you."

Eddie’s van pulled up moments later, parking behind the Camaro.  “Hey, guess I wasn’t as late as I thought I’d be,” he said, grinning excitedly as he jumped down from the driver’s seat.

"Hey, sexy!" Lydia called, rushing to greet her boyfriend, practically jumping into his arms.

“Hey, missed you,” Eddie exclaimed, lifting her off her feet, greeting her with a kiss.

"Missed you too!" Lydia took his arm once he set her back down. "I can't wait to have you holding me in front of the fire while we make s'mores."

“Mmm, sounds perfect,” Eddie mused, a lopsided grin tugging at his lips. “Then we can go back to our room and have some fun,” he drawled, his hands slipping down to give her backside a squeeze. 

"Aaah!  You naughty boy!" Lydia giggled, giving his hair a little tug. "Come on, it's getting cold out here."

"Don't want my lady getting a chill now, do we?" Eddie asked, shutting the driver's side door and pulling open the side panel to unpack the supplies. "Can you help me carry in the food, babe?" he asked, handing her one of the large canvas bags while he grabbed the large cooler. 

"Yeah, but that'll cost you a treat," Lydia winked before taking the bag to the cabin. "A special secret treat."

"Oh?" Eddie chuckled, tilting his head as he followed her inside. 

"This place is awesome, so cozy," Billy mused as he brought his bag and Win's inside, joining the others. 

“I knew you’d like it,” Win said, letting her eyes roam the room.

"Perfect place, nobody can hear you screaming my name," Billy whispered teasingly, leaning into her. 

“Yeah, other than our friends,” she pointed out, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Nah, I have a feeling they’ll be a little too preoccupied to notice,” he replied with a smirk, pulling her down with him to the old dusty couch. "They'll be busy playing their own dirty games."

Win laughed, collapsing into his lap. "I guess that’s true," she agreed, fighting back a grin.

“It’ll be a nice break from everything,” Robin said, pressing a kiss to Blossom’s temple.

"A break from Steve," Blossom laughed, wrapping her arms around her girlfriend. "I could use a warm shower."

"I hope his date goes well," Robin said.  As much as she loved teasing Steve about his string of bad luck with women, she did hope he could find someone that made him as happy as Blossom made her.  "Why don't you take a quick shower and we'll get a fire going," she offered.

"I hope so too, he's so nice, he deserves it," Blossom nodded, stealing a kiss and turning to find the bathroom.

"Have a nice shower," Robin called, giving Blossom's ass a soft smack as she walked away. "Okay, who wants to help me start a fire?" she exclaimed, heading for the hearth.

"I will," Billy offered, giving Win a quick snuggle a kiss to the tip of her nose before getting up to help Robin get wood for the fireplace.

Win scrunched her nose at him, sitting up to watch them, resting her chin in her hand as she let her eyes follow her boyfriend's ass.

Billy looked over his shoulder to find his girlfriend observing him. "Enjoying the view?" he teased.

"Always," Win replied, winking at him. "Do you guys need any help?" she asked, pushing herself up. "I think we got it," Robin answered, tucking her hair behind her ear as she added some wood slowly to the small flame that Billy had started.

Billy was gonna say something about letting the men take care of it, but he quickly held his tongue, remembering Robin wasn't a man and not wanting to offend her.

"What sort of treat would you like?" Eddie asked his girlfriend, dropping the cooler in front of the fridge to unpack it. 

"Surprise me," Lydia grinned, taking the food from the bag and putting it on the counter.

Eddie smirked, handing her an ice cold beer. "That what you had in mind?" he teased, kicking the fridge door shut with his foot as he leaned across the counter.

"Shhhhh!" Lydia giggled, pressing her finger against his lips though she nodded in agreement. 

Eddie grinned against her fingers before licking them teasingly and cracking the beer open. "You want any?" he asked.

"Yeah... but only if you give it to me," Lydia said pointedly, wetting her lips slowly. 

Eddie glanced up at the others who were pretty distracted by the fireplace before taking a long draw from the can and pulling Lydia closer, his lips slotting with hers. 

Lydia drank from his mouth, and though the beer was cold, warmth spread through her body, stemming from where her lips met his.

“You’re welcome, you looked parched,” Eddie chuckled, drinking some more for himself.

"I feel a lot better," Blossom announced as she left the bathroom, wearing a big fluffy robe and pajama bottoms.

Robin straightened when she heard her girlfriend, grinning proudly as she dusted off her hands. “Look, we’ve got fire!” she exclaimed, gesturing to the hearth as Blossom joined them. 

“You guys are so handy,” Win laughed, pulling Billy back to the couch with her.

"You've seen nothing yet, wait until it's time to wash my car in the summer... you'll be drooling," he teased.

“I can’t wait,” Win murmured, tugging his shirt collar down to press a kiss to his collarbone. 

"My hero!” Blossom cried, throwing her arms around Robin’s neck before lowering her voice to a whisper.  “You're so hot when you do manual work.”

Robin chuckled. “The place feeling a little more welcoming now?” she asked. 

"Definitely and it's nice and warm... you know, I could fall asleep out here in your arms," Blossom pulled her down to the couch as well.

“That sounds nice,” Robin murmured, breathing in the scent of Blossom’s shampoo.

“So what do we wanna do now?” Win asked, looking around at the others.

“Once it gets dark I say we play some drinking games and share a few ghost stories,” Eddie suggested, pitching his voice low as he wiggled his fingers ominously, a grin tugging at his lips.

"Oh come on, no ghost stories, I don't like attracting that sort of thing," Lydia groaned. "It's all bullshit anyway." 

"Who's the chicken now, huh?" Billy laughed. "If you don't believe in them, there's no harm in telling a few."

“Yeah, c’mon Lyds, don’t be a buzzkill,” Win said, giving her friend a mischievous look. 

“Don’t worry, babe, I’ll keep you safe,” Eddie teased, wrapping an arm around her.

"Fine, whatever, I don't believe in ghosts," Lydia insisted, rolling her eyes. "But just for the record, you all suck." 

"Some of us more than others," Billy said, making a blowjob motion with his hand.

A laugh burst from Eddie at Billy’s innuendo and he pressed a wet kiss to Lydia’s cheek. “Got that right,” he agreed smugly. 

Lydia stuck her tongue out before going back to the kitchen to heat up their dinner. 

"Don't mind her, she doesn't like horror stories since our brother told her about something called Alice Human Sacrifice," Blossom laughed.

“Sounds spooky!” Robin said, tickling Blossom’s sides. 

“Well, I’m excited. I like being scared,” Win said, stealing Eddie’s beer can to take a drink.

"It's just a silly tale Simon made up," Blossom laughed. "Our dad is always encouraging him to write more crazy stories." 

"Who is Alice though?" Billy asked. 

"Nobody," Lydia shrugged, offering each of them a plate of lasagna. "Simon made them up."

“So, what’s the story?” Win asked, accepting the food eagerly.

"There was once a little dream, and being afraid people would stop dreaming it, it decided to bring people to itself in a sort of wonderland," Blossom began, setting the tone as she slowly glanced at her friend’s faces. "Each person lured in was an Alice,” she explained.  “The first Alice was a singer who was adored all over the land and that made him quite arrogant.  Until one day a madman shot him, making a red blood rose bloom from his head." 

"The second Alice were a pair of twins, a girl and a boy who were lured by their curiosity," Lydia continued, rolling her eyes. "But the land warped their vision and pit one against the other until they killed each other with their bare hands, never to wake from their deep slumber."

"Interesting," Win murmured, wondering if there was more or not.

"That would suck killing your twin..." Robin mumbled, chewing her lip.

"Yeah, I think killing anyone would be sorta bad, but especially your twin," Blossom ageed.

"It doesn't make much sense, but Simon is just like that..." Lydia huffed softly. "He watches too much anime." 

"Yeah, that sounds like him," Win snorted, taking another bite of lasagna.

"Who wants a drink? I say it's time we really get this party started," Eddie exclaimed, glancing out the window, noticing how dark it was growing outside.

"I'll have a beer," Billy said, raising his hand nonchalantly. 

"Me too," Lydia winked at her boyfriend. 

"Yeah, same," Blossom nodded. "Oh!  Did you guys read Tomie? It's a new horror manga that just came out in the Monthly Halloween magazine."

“Hon, I think you and Lyds are the only ones that have read that,” Robin pointed out with a grin while Eddie handed out several cans of beer.

"Ugh, people have no taste!  This guy should be famous," Blossom huffed, taking her drink to go with her dinner.

"Maybe one day," Lydia agreed, taking a sip from her own can.

“Anyone else got any scary stories?” Robin asked, looking pointedly between Billy and Eddie.

“Oh, I do,” Eddie said, his grin widening. “But first I think we need a little ambiance,” he drawled, turning off the lights, leaving only the fire to see by.

"Oh, here we go..." Lydia breathed. 

"Now it's getting good," Billy chuckled, reaching around behind Blossom and discreetly running his fingers up her back like a spider, making her scream. 

"ASSHOLE!" She cried.

"Billy!" Win chastised, giving his shoulder a shove as Robin stuck her tongue out at him, pulling Blossom into her arms to comfort while Eddie plopped down on the floor in front of the fireplace. 

"So..." he began, waiting to make sure all eyes were on him, a feral grin on his face. "It was a dark, cold night, much like this one--" he said, glancing around the room from under his long bangs. "--and a group of friends, much like us, decided to camp in the middle of the woods. They were having a fun time, everything was going well, until night fell--" he said, his voice dipping low.

"How surprising," Lydia snorted; she knew his storytelling skills were off the charts. She’d seen him as the dungeon master for his epic campaigns and she loved it. 

"What happened when it got dark?" Blossom asked.

Eddie turned his grin on Blossom, glad to see she, at least, was hooked, while Robin looked vaguely uneasy and Win was watching him intently. 

“The moon came out from behind the clouds and shone down brightly, its light filtering through the foliage to the forest floor beneath. A couple of the group decided to go get some more firewood and they ventured out further along one of the trails. Soon they came upon several dead animals,” he said, pausing for effect. “However, they could see no apparent cause of death, no blood or wounds, no sign of attack, and yet there were more than one, spread out along the trail.”

Lydia put aside her fear and skepticism and decided to enjoy the story as if it wasn't a load of wank. "That's... intriguing," she murmured, curious to know what was causing the deaths.

Eddie raised an eyebrow at her, determined to at least give her the heebie jeebies. 

“Unsettled, the couple hurried back to their campsite, telling the others what they saw, but their friends dismissed it, laughing at them for being too jumpy.” Here Eddie paused to take a drink, exhaling deeply before continuing.

“All seemed to be back to normal, the friends drinking and partying late into the night, when a twig snapped nearby and the rustling of leaves announced something approaching. The friends jumped to their feet, their hearts in their throats as their eyes swung to the sound. Moments later a deer came into the clearing and stopped, its ears perking up as it froze. The friends watched it, not wanting to startle it, when suddenly, it fell to the ground, dead. Nothing having touched it,” he exclaimed.

Lydia took Blossom's hand; now both sisters were hooked and slightly disturbed by the image formed in their minds. Billy on the other hand, saw where the story was headed and was already planning a little stunt that would for sure freak the girls out.

“Oh shit—“ Win breathed, slipping her arm around Billy’s, as she leaned into him, though her focus was all on Eddie. Eddie, however, noticed the glint in Billy’s eye and nodded to him before continuing.

“Now thoroughly spooked, several of the teens began to wonder if they should leave or find a new spot to camp, but the others argued, not wanting to pack up camp in the middle of the night. Besides, they figured the strange animal deaths were probably caused by some sickness or maybe poison they had gotten into. 

“Talked into staying, at least for the night, everyone went to sleep, crawling into their tents. The next morning, when one of the girls awoke to take a piss in the woods, she tripped over a large dark shape not far from the smoking fire pit. At first it appeared to be a pile of clothes, but upon further inspection, it was one of her friends, their body cold and eyes wide open and staring.”

"What was it? How did they die?" Lydia exclaimed, jumping slightly when she saw a shadow pass by the window.  "I saw someone! There's something out there!" she cried, pointing toward the dark window pane.

"I'm sure it's nothing," Billy huffed dismissively, winking at Eddie.

“You’re just jumping at shadows!” Robin exclaimed, though her voice wavered, rising in pitch as her eyes darted to the window.  Eddie’s grin widened and he leaned in closer to finish off the story, enjoying the way he had them in the palm of his hand. 

“As soon as the girl realized what she’d tripped over, she screamed, scrambling away from the body. But by the time the others roused from their tents, alerted by her cry, she too was already dead, not a mark on her.  

“Frightened senseless, her friends ran, fleeing into the woods, chased by an unseen attacker. And one by one, their screams too were silenced, and to this day, no one knows what happened to them, their bodies never found.” Eddie’s voice was near a whisper now and the flames behind him danced, casting eerie shadows against the walls of the cabin. 

“Now, there are some who think the mysterious deaths of the teens and the animals were caused by a toxic airborne chemical leak, but others, others say it was the work of an old hermit who lived deep in the woods, hidden away from the world, who conversed with spirits and demons. They say he could steal your soul just by touching your shadow.”

"Your shadow? That's... um, that's stupid," Lydia said, clearing her throat, but she screamed when she heard a knock on the window. 

There was no one there except for a tree branch that looked a bit like a hand. 

"Who's there?" Blossom asked, seeing another dark figure flashing past the opposite window.

"I’ll go check," Billy said, disentangling himself from Win’s grasp before getting up and slowly walking to the window. 

“Billy, wait—“ Win began, her words dying on her tongue as he peered through the glass, his eyes going wide and his mouth falling open in a silent gasp before he suddenly collapsed.

“Billy?” Win called, frozen in place on the couch, fear clutching her chest.

“Oh haha, very funny, Billy,” Robin said, her voice slightly hoarse. 

“Yeah, very funny,” Lydia agreed, though there was an edge to her voice. 

Eddie, however, jumped to his feet and hurried across the room, dropping to knees and leaning over Billy, listening.

“He’s not breathing!” he exclaimed, and Win shared a frightened look with Lydia and Blossom. 

“Eddie, watch out!” Robin exclaimed when she saw the shadow of a hand silhouetted through the window, its thin fingers reaching toward Eddie’s shadow on the floor behind him.

"Eddie!" Lydia shrieked,  jumping and tackling him, rolling with him to a darker corner. "Fuck! Stop playing, it's not funny!" 

"Stop messing around, Billy! We know you're alive!" Blossom said weakly, trying to believe it. "Wait, Robin, don't go over there, stay in the dark where there’re no shadows!"

“I’m not playing!” Eddie exclaimed, fighting back a grin as he pulled Lydia atop him. 

Robin hesitated, but Win didn’t, pressing her back to the wall and edging closer to the window to peer outside. There was definitely someone out there; she hadn’t been hallucinating the shadow of that hand. 

“Billy,” she exclaimed, dropping down to her knees and crawling beneath the windowsill to his side. He still hadn’t moved, even when she poked his stomach. “Playing dead, huh?” she grumbled under her breath. “Maybe this will revive you,” she said, leaning down to kiss him.

Billy’s lips curved beneath hers and he kissed her back.

"Call me Snow White, babe... cause your kiss just saved me," he joked, pulling her closer to kiss her again. "You totally believed it for a second!  Come on, it was a great joke!"

"You're lucky you're cute or I'd pummel you for that joke," Win exclaimed, pinching his arm before kissing him back. 

"Aww you love me," Billy chuckled, rolling atop his girlfriend. "It was just an elaborate plan to get a kiss." 

“Oh really? That’s kinda dumb seeing as I kiss you all the time,” Win huffed, though she wore a small grin, her fingers tangling in the chain of his necklace to pull him closer. 

"Happy Halloween!" Steve exclaimed, opening the window from the outside, waving with the hand-shaped branch. "Henderson! Come here! You need to see their faces!" 

"Steve? Dustin?" Blossom narrowed her eyes, fixing her glasses. "What the hell are you doing here?" 

"You arse! I fucking hate you! That was so not funny!" Lydia cried, smacking Eddie's chest with an angry huff.

"Yes it was!" Eddie cried, howling with laughter. "You should have seen your face! And you thought it was bullshit when I started," he reminded her.

"Steve!? You lied to us? You like to me?" Robin gasped, her mouth falling open. "Did you even have a date at all?" she exclaimed. 

"No, Eddie asked us to help out with his prank so we just... you know," Steve jumped into the cabin and helped Dustin inside. 

"It was bullshit! I didn't believe it for a second, I was just... pretending!" Lydia exclaimed, folding her arms over her chest. "You're not getting any tonight."

“Awww c’mon, Lyds!” Eddie exclaimed, pulling her into his lap and kissing her neck. “I could protect you from the monsters,” he murmured.

“We’re gunna get you back for this, you know that right?” Robin said, throwing Steve a level look.

"Yeah, we expected that would happen," Dustin chuckled, his eyes crinkling with amusement. 

"You're all so done," Blossom warned while Lydia turned her head with a little humpf, though she didn't push Eddie away. 

"You'll need to spoil me a lot tonight,” she muttered.

“Oh trust me, I have some things up my sleeve,” Eddie purred, kissing his way up Lydia’s jaw.

“Yeah, don’t even think about talking to us!” Robin exclaimed, though she wore a goofy grin, pulling Blossom into her arms to comfort her. 

⇾ taglist. @elliethesuperfruitlover @b1tchygh0sts @heartbreak-sandwich @vampyreddiemunson @everybodylovessteve

[schrijverr]

Day 7 of R&R's Honeymoon

[Robin is again on one of the beds in their hotel room. She has the phone against her ear as she excitedly talks to whoever is on the other side, a happy grin on her face. She’s in a black shirt with the sleeves rolled up and her boxers, despite it being the afternoon.]

RobinM1968 Day 7: After our hike the day before, we took a day of rest to lounge around, partake in the joys of life that can be found inside. And I called Steve for the 7th time, which is a given, but more PG to show y’all.

-

Also, as of today, this series is doubling as a protest, because Jonathan let Steve and Eddie talk about their wedding and not me and I demand that he also invites me to do so

~~

<<Prev On AO3 Next>>

[witchersoldier]

I've been wanting to write oc fanfic (because it comes easier to me) but I'm afraid people won't read it bc it's oc not reader insert 😭 help me out with this one

[roanofarcc]

PROJECT SUNSHINE CHAPTER FIFTY TWO → PROCLAMATIONS OF “LIKE” ON BATHROOM FLOORS

summary: steve harrington x oc | on ao3

when another product of Hawkins National Laboratory escaped a long-survived nightmare alongside her sister, she crashed into one unsuspecting teenage boy and dragged him deeper into the dark mysteries that made up their hometown.

word count. 4.7k || masterlist || ocs moodboard

warnings: cannon typical violence, child abuse, horror, gore, and depictions of mental illness. parts of this story were written pre-season 4 release. cannon divergence.

previous chapter ← → next chapter

Attempting to blend in with the mall goers was a little more difficult than Sunshine anticipated. They all were sweaty, their clothes wrinkled, and their appearances rather disheveled. She had wiped off most of the blood on her face, but she felt the light bruising forming around her nose and out through her cheeks. Dustin and Erica could pass off their appearances as kids who played a little too hard, but their small group was certainly odd as they ducked and weaved across the mall, trying not to be seen while searching for a missing Steve and Robin.

Sunshine told herself, and the kids, that they probably just wandered off and nothing bad had happened to them, but she wasn’t so sure. Her heart raced uncomfortably inside her chest as they searched. She made sure Dustin and Erica stayed close and they all kept their heads down whenever someone who looked even just slightly out of place passed them.

“They couldn’t have gotten far,” Erica said, looking side to side along the mall corridors. 

“They wouldn’t have gotten anywhere if you had been watching them,” Dustin snapped. 

“Oh, so this is all my fault?” 

“Yes!” 

“Shh!” Sunshine silenced them with a sharp hiss. “We’re trying to blend in here, remember. No fighting, please.” The kids said nothing more, only a couple of grumbles under their breath that she didn’t hear. She sighed and said, “It’s no one’s fault, okay? We just need to focus on finding them before anyone else does.” The Russians were the biggest threat, but she also didn’t want someone finding two red-eyed and giggling teens wandering around the mall. The last thing they needed was a mall cop throwing them in Starcourt jail and calling either one of their parents. There was no reasonable or believable explanation anyone could give for the state they were in. 

The trio rounded a corner and nearly slammed into two mallgoers. Reflexiably, Sunshine grabbed Dustin and Erica’s arms, pulling them to a quick stop. For a split second, Sunshine’s mind ran through a series of thoughts. At first, she worried they had been caught, then she thought they had found Steve and Robin, but it was neither one of those things. They had run into Calum Miller and Tamera Willow.

Tamera was in her Scoops uniform, looking shocked to see them. Beside her was Calum, who was also wide-eyed and startled. 

“Danielle?” said Tamera. “H-Hi.” She glanced sideways at Calum and nudged his arm, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he just stared at Sunshine for a little too long. Tamera cleared her throat and plastered on a tight-lipped smile. “We were actually just looking for you. We, uh, really need to talk to you.”

“We’re a bit busy…” Sunshine answered, trailing off as she noticed the car keys that dangled between Calum’s fingers. “Wait, did you drive here?” 

Calum still didn’t answer; his eyes looked glossed over and unfocused. She wasn’t sure if it was just the lighting of the mall, but he looked a little paler than she recalled, despite it being summer. 

“Sorry,” Tamera sighed out. “He’s a little out of it. But yeah.” 

They had a way out, a car, and a driver. “Can you drive?” she asked Calum. 

He finally spoke, replying with a quick. “Yeah.” 

Sunshine couldn’t help the sigh of relief fall from her lips. “We need a ride and some help.” 

“Why?” 

“It’s a long story,” Sunshine said, feeling antsy. It wasn’t safe for them to linger in one place for too long. They needed to move and find Steve and Robin. 

Tamera crossed her arms, sharing another look with Calum. “Okay. We can help and even give you a ride but under one condition.” Sunshine nodded, not caring what she was agreeing to. “You have to answer our questions and answer them truthfully. No bullshit.”

She didn’t know what they were talking about, but she didn’t care. “Sure, okay. But we need your help first,” she said. “Have you seen Steve or Robin around here in the last ten minutes or so?” 

Calum’s gaze narrowed, focused on the skirt of her dress. “Is that blood?” 

“Have you seen them?” Sunshine asked, pleadingly, and ignoring Calum’s question of the blood on her dress. 

“No,” Tamera answered. “They blew off their shift today and Robin didn’t answer her phone when I called her earlier to ask where she was.” 

Where could they have gone? 

Sunshine tried to think, running a stressed hand through her hair, but as her fingers brushed against the back of her head, she winced as they touched a tender knot on her skull from where the Russians had knocked her out cold hours ago. She felt like a disaster, unraveling with each second they stayed stuck in the mall. 

“We need help finding them. They’re here somewhere, but we’re not sure where. But it’s really, really important that we find them, and fast,” Dustin explained. “And after we find them, we need a ride out of here.” 

“And you’ll answer our question?” Tamera asked once more. 

“Yes.” What kind of questions they had, she didn’t know but she couldn’t waste time wondering. 

Tamera nodded. “All right then, we’ll help.” 

“Great,” Dustin said as he quickly scanned the corridor. “They’re still in their sailor costumes, so keep an eye out for that. Oh, and also keep an eye out for anyone who looks suspicious or Russian or suspiciously Russian.” 

Calum blinked, slow and confused. “Russian?” 

“Let’s move,” Sunshine said, not waiting for a reply before she took off once more in search of their missing members. 

☀☀☀

On the floor, crammed in a dirty bathroom stall, Steve felt everything from the last twenty-four hours crash down on top of him. The horrible taste of vomit and blood was stuck in his mouth, his eyes were even more swollen, a couple of his ribs were bruised at best and broken at worst, and the slightest movements of his face hurt like a bitch. But he was out of the military base, which was a plus, even though they were still stuck in the mall and his car keys got stolen. His dad was going to kill him for losing them, but he much rather face the wrath of his dad than another Russian soldier. 

“The ceiling stopped spinning for me. Is it still spinning for you?” Robin asked from the next stall over.

He looked up and was relived to find that his vision had stopped spinning. “Holy shit. It did stop. Do you think we puked it all up?” 

“Maybe. Ask me something. Interrogate me,” Robin said, faking a terrible Russian accent. Steve cracked a small smile. 

“When was the last time you peed your pants?” 

Robin didn’t hesitant to answer. “Today.” 

“What?” 

“Yeah. When the Russian doctor took out the bone saw.” She laughed, her voice raspy. “It was just a little bit, though.” 

Rubbing his sore nose, he chuckled. “Yeah, it’s definitely still in our system.” He felt like he had returned to his body but there was still a slight air of disconnect that swam around him. Steve knew what it felt like to be high from a couple of times he and Tommy H. bummed weed from some kid at school who kept it inside a metal lunch box and only made deals in the woods behind the school. But what the Russians have given them was much more intense and with his luck, probably toxic or something. He was just glad it hadn’t killed him or Robin, yet. 

Robin shifted inside her stall and the toes of her doodled Convers peaked into Steve’s stall. “All right, my turn,” she said. “Have you ever been in love?” Damn, she wasn’t going easy on him. 

He sank back against the side of the stall as a subtle pain settled in his chest. The memory of last Halloween, followed by the next day in the alleyway outside the Hawkins High gym with Nancy filled his mind. He wasn’t in love with her anymore, but their relationship was still a tender spot in his heart, not fully healed. They had brushed over everything and exchanged quick apologies to be civil but any deeper conversation was overshadowed by the events of that November. They never talked about the issues they had or why their relationship had failed. It wasn’t necessarily either of their faults. Their relationship became tangled in the disappearance of Will, the reappearance of Sunshine, and the death of Barbara Holland. They couldn’t untangle it, thus leading to their slow, drawn-out downfall. 

“Yep,” he answered. “Nancy Wheeler, first semester, senior year.” 

“Oh my God,” Robin groaned. “She’s such a priss.” 

Steve smiled softly to himself. Maybe sophomore year Nancy was a priss or came across as one to people who didn’t know her, but the Nancy he knew now was far from it. “Turns out, not really.” 

“Are you still in love with Nancy?” 

“No.” The answer was easy from his lips and from his heart. He had moved past that part of his life. No matter how hard he tried to cling to it, to her, to the life he knew before everything and a sense of normalcy, it was long gone. Maybe before Hawkins was revealed to be cloaked in various nightmares, the two of them were supposed to end up together. Maybe before monsters turned out to be real, he and Nancy were meant to end up trapped happily behind a picket fence in some Indiana subdivision and become their parents. But then Nancy lost Bard and found Jonathan. Steve had lost his best friend at age six and found her again in the same woods ten years later. Their lives diverged from what could have been if everything had remained painfully and peacefully normal.

“Why not?” 

“I think it’s because I found someone a little better for me.” Someone who hadn’t left his thoughts since the first night she crashed into him in the woods two years ago. Someone who he came to trust more than he trusted himself. 

Robin was quiet for a beat before she said, “Danielle?” 

When they were little, she had been Ellie, back when it had been just the two of them running through foggy memories in the back of his mind.

“Yeah,” he said. “We were friends when we were kids, and I don’t really remember much from back then. But I do remember thinking that she was the coolest person I knew because she never seemed to be scared of anything, and I was scared of everything.” There were a few fractured memories he hung to after all the time that had passed. 

Sunlight poured down from the sky over two little kids, encasing them in a golden glow as the sun said goodbye for the day. Steve stood at the base of a tree, peering upwards with a nervousness gnawing at his stomach. The tree was tall, too tall, he thought. Its limbs stretched toward the sky for what looked like miles. He wanted to chicken out, head back home, and call quits on their quest.

Balancing on the lowest branch was Ellie. Her dark hair was braided in two pieces that fell down to her waist, secured with little white bows. Sun trickled through the thick of leaves, casting a little halo around her head. There was an ever-present smile on her lips and a million freckles across her cheeks that always reminded him of stars. She gazed down at him, expectantly, waiting for him to follow her up through the maze of branches until they could touch the clouds. But the height was dizzying and made Steve lose any courage he had walking out to the tree line behind his house.

Ellie must’ve noticed his hesitation and stretched out her hand toward him, using her other one to steady herself on the branch. 

Steve sucked in a breath and swallowed down his fear before wrapping his fingers around her hand. She pulled him up as he dug his sneakers into the tree bark and avoided looking down. He kept his gaze upwards, locked with Ellie and the painted sky behind her. She squeezed his hand and didn’t let go as they climbed higher, letting the warm summer breeze wash across their young, unbothered faces. 

The memory filled Steve with a strange mix of comfort and longing. He wished he had a childhood full of memories like that one, where Sunshine had always been there and nothing bad ever happened in Hawkins. He wished, almost more than anything, that he or someone, anyone, could have saved her from the childhood she had. 

Neither one of them were kids anymore, but she hadn’t been one in a long time. 

“And then, one day, she was just…gone,” Steve continued. “I couldn’t figure out why I felt like something was missing. I almost forgot about her completely, but that feeling never really went away. And then, you know, she came back, and I don’t think I’ve felt this complete since I was six.” 

“It sounds like she means a lot to you.” 

“Yeah,” he sighed. “I don’t want to screw it up.”

“What makes you think you will?” 

“Our lives are…they’re complicated.” That was a massive understatement. “I don’t think it’ll never not be. That, and I guess I’m just scared.” The truth came out too easily, but it felt nice to get it off his chest. He didn’t really have anyone he could talk to like that. He had Sunshine, of course, but that wasn’t exactly a conversion he could have with her. Having Robin to talk to was nice. 

“You’re scared that you’ll lose her all over again?”

“Yeah.” He could hardly handle the thought of that alone. Their lives were a mess of government labs, monsters, and now Russians. They both had nearly died one too many times and every time, no matter how beat up she was, Sunshine always placed herself between everyone else and the monsters, no matter what they looked like. It terrified him that night at the junkyard when they were swarmed by Demo-Dogs, how easily she told him to leave her behind. Or how she tried to take out an army of soldiers only hours ago to try to save them. He admired her for all of that, but he feared that it was only a matter of time before she placed herself between someone or something too big to take on alone, but she’d try anyway because that was just the kind of person she was. Steve hated his feeling like he was always running out of time with her. 

And then there was his own issue of ruining relationships. What if he said something or did something stupid and lost her that way? There were too many variables; it stressed it out. But he was stuck in limbo. Not telling her and not being with her sucked almost as such the possibilities that hung over his head of running out of time or screwing up what they already had. 

Robin sucked in a loud, shaky breath before her shoes were pulled back into her stall. “Do you guys get kidnapped by Russians often?” 

He couldn’t help but laugh. “I don’t think it can technically be called kidnapping if we broke into their place. But no, the Russians are new.” Interrogations were new too; Steve didn’t care much for them. He was just surprised that they didn’t run into a monster on top of everything else down there. 

Suddenly, another strong wave of feelings washed over him as he was brought back to his and Robin’s conversation before they were drugged, lying on the floor in their overturned chairs. He hung his head as a pang of guilt welled up inside his gut. “I’m sorry.” 

“For what?”

“For bringing you into our mess in the first place.” None of them knew that they’d end up being interrogated by a horrifying, cartoonish Russian Doctor and soldier, but Steve felt responsible for not shutting down their operation sooner before it got out of hand. That wasn’t the only thing he felt bad about too. “And I’m sorry for telling all that, about Sunshine. What you said back there, about Mrs. Click’s class…” He trailed off for a moment, searching for the right words. “I like you, Robin. I mean, I feel like this summer is the hardest I’ve laughed in a really long time. But I just…I don’t like you like that. I’m sorry.” 

He did wish he had noticed Robin in Click’s class. Maybe then they would have been friends before that summer. Maybe he would have been less miserable in the latter half of high school, in the wake of his fallout with Tommy H. and Carol and the crumbling of his and Nancy’s relationship. Maybe things in his life would have worked out a little differently had he made a real friend in school who he didn’t hate half of the time. 

Robin was quiet for a long moment, too long, and Steve immediately felt like he had said something wrong. There was no right way to let a person down. Steve just wanted to do it without losing Robin and the odd but nice friendship they had gained in the middle of their Russian investigation.

“Robin, did you OD over there?” 

“No,” she finally said. “I’m still alive.” 

Steve waited for her to say more, but she went quiet again, and he couldn’t handle the silence. He slid underneath the stall and into hers. She scrunched up her face and moved her legs to make room for him. “The floor’s disgusting,” she said.

“Yeah, well, I already have a bunch of blood and puke on my shirt so…” He met her eyes. She looked pale like she was going to puke all over again. “I’m sorry-” 

She cut him off with a sharp shake of her head, hugging her knees close to her chest almost like she was trying to make herself as small as possible. “Don’t,” she said. “Don’t apologize.”

“I do want to be your friend, Robin.” He really, really did. Steve hadn’t had a genuine friend, aside from Sunshine, in what felt like forever. And as different as he and Robin were, they fit together nicely. They worked well together, and Steve didn’t want that to end after their night was over. “I think you’re funny and scary smart-” 

“Stop, please,” she pleaded, looking down at the floor. “You don’t even know me. And if you did, like, really know me, I don’t think you’d want to be my friend.” 

Steve thought that was outrageous. Just because they were a little unconventional didn’t mean much of anything to him. His current friends consisted of a girl he had a crush on and a gaggle of fourteen-year-olds. “What? Of course I would.”

“Listen to me, Steve. It’s shocked me to my core, but I like you too. I really like you, but I’m not like your other friends.” 

“That’s exactly why I like you.” She wasn’t like Tommy or Carol, obsessed with the social hierarchy of Hawkins and making other people as miserable as they were; that was all bullshit anyway. Robin was fun to be around, no matter how badly she teased him. 

She dropped her gaze and hesitated. Steve couldn’t understand why she looked so scared. “What I said about Click’s class and me being jealous and like obsessed with you wasn’t because I had a crush on you.” Relief washed over him, followed by confusion. “It was because…b-because she wouldn’t stop staring at you.”

“Mrs. Click?” 

A small, breathy laugh fell from Robin’s lips, but it was still a little sad. “Tammy Thompson. I wanted her to look at me, but she couldn’t pull her eyes away from you and your stupid hair. I didn’t understand because you would get bagel crumbs all over the floor. You asked dumb questions and were a total douche bag! And you didn’t even like her. I would go home and just scream into my pillow.” 

Steve tried to wrap his head around what she was saying, but it wasn't making any sense. He didn’t understand what she was saying. “But...Tammy Thompson’s a girl?” 

Chewing down hard on her lip, Robin stared at him with her still slightly bloodshot and watery eyes. Her chin trembled slightly as she whispered, “Steve…” 

It took a minute, a long minute for her words to sink into his brain and for his brain to then make sense of them. But once they did, Steve felt nauseous for the hundredth time that day. And it wasn’t because of what Robin meant with her words. It wasn’t because she just confessed to like-liking Tammy Thompson, a girl. Steve was sick to his stomach because he was suddenly face to face with the awful words his dad spewed about people like Robin, and how Steve had spat those same words back at Jonathan Byers in the alleyway two years ago. Steve felt sick because Robin looked more scared to admit that than when they were down inside the Russian base.

It was the look on her face that struck him, hard, much like the soldier’s punch to his gut. She looked like she expected him to turn away in disgust or take back every nice thing he just said about her, rescinding his want to be her friend. He felt sick because if he had been two or three years younger, be probably would have done just what she was so scared of. 

“Steve, did you OD over there?” 

He shook his head slowly. “No. I, uh, just thinking.” 

The thing was, Steve wasn’t the same person he was a couple of years ago, and he certainly wasn’t his dad. He didn’t feel any different about Robin or about wanting to be her friend. Steve liked Robin, honestly and truly; there was nothing else to it. 

“I mean, Tammy Thompson’s cute and all, but she’s a total dud.” 

Several different emotions flashed across Robin’s face as she sat up a little straighter, no longer curling into herself. “She is not!” 

Steve laughed and Robin’s shoulder’s untensed just slightly. “Yes, she is!” Then, another round of questions flooded his brain. “Wait, hold on. Are you and, you know, Tamera…” Obviously, he had no idea if the rumors about Tamera were true, and he never asked or even thought about asking. But the rumors had followed her around since middle school. Carol used to act like Tamera had some kind of disease, and Steve never cared enough to tell her to shut up. 

“What?” Robin’s eyes widened and Steve panicked. He was so underprepared for every aspect of that conversation. The was blood on the collar of his uniform, the taste of vomit in his mouth, and Russian drugs lingering in his system. He didn’t want to sound like an asshole for assuming that the only other person in town that he knew potentially liked girls had something going on with Robin, but they had worked together all summer, constantly making their own little inside jokes and spending almost every lunch break together. It made sense, in his head at least, but there was a good chance he was on concussion number three and had misread their whole dynamic. 

“Oh, no! I just mean…because you know…” He shook his head. “I’m gonna stop talking now.”

Robin rolled her eyes. “We’re not. She’s cool, and funny, and pretty but-” 

Steve gasped, sitting up taller with a shit-eating grin. “You are totally into her!” He saw the light blush that spread across her cheeks. 

She looked ready to protest, but with the drugs still in their system, that was hard to do. “Maybe a little.” 

He wanted to ask more questions but was stopped by the sound of the bathroom door being swung open. He and Robin jumped to their feet quickly with the worry that they had been caught by the Russians again. But when they stumbled out of the stall, only familiar faces stared back at them. 

Dustin threw his hands up and shouted. “Okay, what the hell?!” 

Before they could say anything, Sunshine pushed through the odd group gathered just inside the door and threw her arms around both Steve and Robin’s shoulders, pulling them into an almost bone-crushing hug. She sighed deeply in what Steve assumed was relief. “Oh, God. Please, don’t ever do that again.” She pulled away just slightly, still holding onto them like she was scared they’d run off again. “Are you guys okay?”

“Oh, yeah,” Robin replied, still looking a little flustered. "We’re fine. I think we got it all out of our system.” 

Sunshine looked at him, waiting for his answer too. “We’re all right, Sunshine.” 

As he looked at her, noticing the bruises that started to form around her nose, he was struck with the God-awful sound of her screams that had echoed down the hall inside the base. He was suddenly filled with panic, even if she was standing right in front of him. “Holy shit, are you okay?” His hands found their way to her shoulders, looking her over for any less obvious sign of injuries. There was a blood stain under her nose and dark circles under her pretty eyes. Nasty red marks decorated her wrists, and a look of subtle exhaustion plagued her features. Yet, despite all of that, she smiled softly at him. 

“I am now.” 

A couple of feet away, someone cleared their throat and Steve’s gaze was pulled onto the two people who joined Dustin and Erica. Calum and Tamera. He flickered his gaze between them and Robin, who simply stared at the pair looking just as confused as he felt. 

“We found them,” Tamera said. “Now,” she looked pointed at Sunshine. “You-” 

Dustin cut her off. “Not now. We need to leave.” 

“W-Wait,” Calum said. He looked rough, with wide and glossed over eyes and shaking hands at his sides. “Who beat the shit out of you?” he asked, looking at Steve. Steve opened his mouth to respond with something besides the truth, but a rush of words tumbled from Calum’s lips before he could. “Who the hell are those kids?” He looked to Dustin and Erica. “Why didn’t you two show up to work today?” He looked at Steve and Robin. “And what the hell was that thing in the woods?!” His voice grew louder with each question. Steve had no clue what he was talking about. 

No one answered him, though. “Dustin’s right,” Steve said. “We need to get out of here.”

Tamera suddenly looked panicked. “We’re running out of time to do this!” she said to Calum. 

“To do what?” asked Robin. 

Tamera sputtered for a response, but Calum beat her to it. He stepped forward, two of the three older teens, and waved a shaky finger at Sunshine. “W-What is your deal, man? What is the deal with that tattoo on your wrist, Double-Oh-Seven?”

Steve’s hand instantly went to Sunshine’s. Calum’s question took all of them by surprise. 

“I-It doesn’t mean anything,” Sunshine answered quickly. 

“No way,” Tamera said. “That’s bullshit and we know it. This whole thing can’t be a coincidence.” She raised a hand quickly, causing Sunshine to flinch back, bumping into Steve. He squeezed her hand a little tighter. “It’s you! It has to be you in that file. You were at Hawkins National Laboratory, weren’t you?” Her words came out sharp, ringing loudly inside the bathroom. 

There was no way they could have figured that out. Steve narrowed his gaze as best he could with only one good eye and stepped just slightly in front of Sunshine. “What are you talking about?” The four teens stared at each other in something of a stand-off, tense and quiet. 

It was Erica who broke it. “We don’t have time for this!” she snapped. Steve knew the kid was right. Their clock was ticking. 

“We-” Calum began but was swiftly and harshly cut off by Erica. 

“Shut up!” she yelled. “We just spent the last twenty-four hours trapped in a commie hellhole! I’m tired. I’m hungry. And I want to go home! So, all of you nerds are going to shut your mouths, we are going to leave this stupid mall, find your car, and go home. Then, I don’t care what you do! Got it?” No one said a word, but Steve felt his lips quirk upwards slightly. She took their silence as her answer. “Good. Now, Dustin, commence operation Plan B.” 

Tagged. @sattlersquarry , @leptitlu , @drunkengodsofslaughter

[hawkinsglasscloset]

Practice Run (OC X Canon Kiss Week 2024)

Word count: 2k

Warning: none

A/n: My second collab with the most amazing @mrprettywhenhecries for @theocxcanonweek day 6: An Intimate Moment. This is part of our Stranger Timeline Verse with Stranger Things characters. Hope you all enjoy it <3

[Masterlist]

"If you had to pick a boy from school to date... who would you pick?" Blossom asked, not sure if she'd wanna know the answer. She was lying on her stomach, flipping through a magazine in Robin's bedroom where they held one of many slumber parties.

"Uh..." Robin hesitated, not knowing what to say. She was so tired of lying to her best friend about her feelings, but what was she supposed to say? That she was in love with her?

"I don't think I'd pick anyone. They're all either ugly or boring, the only nice and sorta good-looking one is Dustin but he's too young for me," Blossom murmured. Truth was she never liked a girl before, but when Robin was there she felt... something different.

"Yeah, me either. They're all too... immature," she exclaimed, glad that Blossom had answered the way she had, not only to find out she didn't like anyone else, but so she could latch onto her answer as well.

Blossom sat up to face Robin with a little smirk. "But have you ever dated anyone?" The question definitely had ulterior motives, she desperately wanted to know if her friend liked someone and if so, what her type was.

"Not... exactly. Okay, no, I haven't," Robin exclaimed, making a face. "Have you?" She wondered reluctantly.

"I've dated one guy but it didn't last too long..." Blossom murmured. "It was just a little weird with him, you know? Like that's not how it's meant to be."

“Oh?” Robin asked, perking up before quickly clearing her throat. “I mean, why was it weird?” She asked, crossing her legs under her.

"He didn't treat me like I wanted to be treated, I felt attracted to him, but... it's like boys have a few nice bits and are attached to the rest, which is trash." 

Robin couldn’t help but laugh. “I won’t disagree with you there,” she snorted.

"But um... does that mean you never kissed a boy before?" Blossom asked, feeling a little flutter in her stomach, even though she didn't fully understand it.

“I’ve… never kissed anyone,” she admitted, her face flaring brightly and suddenly feeling very hot, her palms starting to sweat.

A little gasp left Blossom's lips when she noticed how flushed (and absolutely adorable) her friend was.  

"That's okay, everyone has their moment, nothing wrong with that," she assured. "But I don't get it. You're so beautiful, you're like... waking up in the morning and seeing the most wonderful day out the window. Your smile is like the sun, your freckles are so cute, and your eyes are gorgeous! Who wouldn't wanna kiss you?"

“I—“ Robin’s voice faltered and she only felt more flustered. “I’m none of those things!” She exclaimed, bleating an awkward laugh.

"You are though, you're also intelligent and funny and kind. You're like the whole package, anyone who doesn't ask you out is stupid."  

Oh my God, it's me... I'm stupid, was all Blossom could think.

“You’re biased cause you’re my friend,” Robin argued, trying to calm her racing heart. Why did it feel like her friend meant all those things she’d said… in more than a friendly way? 

"If you were ugly and uninteresting, I could've just kept my mouth shut so I wouldn't hurt your feelings," Blossom pointed out. "I'm not the most experienced kisser ever, but I mean... I know a few things if you ever want tips."

"Oh, uh, what kind of tips?" Robin asked, intrigued, but a little nervous.

"I don't know, like what to do with your tongue and your hands... stuff I wish I knew before," Blossom shrugged.

"Okay, I guess I could use all the help I can get, though I really doubt I'll be kissing anyone soon..." she mumbled.

"You never know. I'd tell you to let the other person take the lead. Your tongue shouldn't be too present, but also not stiff. Try to caress the neck or the hair with your hands so it adds to the sensation."

"Wait, how do you mean, your tongue shouldn't be stiff?" Robin chuckled, a little confused by her explanation.

"If can't be stiff, like hard. It needs to be relaxed, but not relaxed like a thirsty dog just... soft."

"I think I get what you mean, but it's hard to really understand without doing it, I guess," Robin mumbled, looking down at her legs when she realized how that sounded -- like she wanted Blossom to show her.

"Why don't you try it? I can show you... just for practice," the other girl suggested, trying to sound extra casual, as if she wouldn't jump at the first chance to kiss her best friend.

Robin's face flared bright red. "Wait, what?" she exclaimed, swallowing thickly, hastily trying to work moisture back into her mouth.

"Sorry, that was a stupid idea. I'm so sorry, I just thought... it would be easier to show you with practice," Blossom had to resist the urge to hide under a pillow, she felt like such a creep. 

"N-no! No, it's okay! It just took me by surprise is all," Robin exclaimed quickly, not wanting her friend to feel bad. However, she also didn't want her to know how eager she was to kiss her. "We can do that," she said, having to take a steadying breath.

"You don't have to if you think it would be gross or something," Blossom murmured, moving closer to her and taking her hand.

"I don't think it would be gross," Robin assured her, a little too insistently. "So... how do we...?" She murmured, barely able to breathe as they shifted closer.

"Just relax and give it a try like this," Blossom whispered slowly approaching her until their lips touched softly. The kiss was slow and delicate, almost as if they moved in slow motion. 

Robin didn't think her face could get any hotter, she nearly felt as if she were about to faint. Blossom's lips were softer than she could imagine, and she had imagined.

Slowly, Blossom parted her lips and her tongue found Robin's. She didn't mind her inexperience, it didn't take away from the moment and how amazing it felt. That was definitely what a kiss was meant to feel like.

“Oh—“ Robin gasped as her friend's tongue brushed softly against hers, but she didn’t pull away, her hands balling in the blanket beneath her, fighting the urge to kiss her deeper and make a fool of herself by shoving her tongue down her throat.

"That was pretty good," Blossom finally pulled away, looking quite red in the face. "But you can use more of your tongue, that was a little shy. Let's try one more time."

“I was just afraid of-of using too much,” Robin replied shakily, wetting her lips before leaning back in.

"It's okay, if it's too much, I'll let you know," Blossom murmured, burying her fingers into the other girl's hair. This kiss felt more passionate, more heated. Even though it was just for practice... of course.

Robin's breath hitched as she leaned into the kiss, feeling a little more confident this time, her hands grasping at the other girl's waist, losing herself for a moment in the kiss.

And just like that, nothing else mattered, it felt like they were meant to be, two princesses in a romance novel. Nothing had ever felt more right. "Yeah, I think you got it," Blossom breathed. "That was perfect."

"Oh, right," Robin breathed, coming back to her senses as they parted, remembering that this was just practice and that it wasn't supposed to mean anything. "You really think so?" she asked, trying to steady her voice, not wanting her friend to catch the hint of disappointment behind her words.

"I do, I think anyone would be very lucky to kiss you," Blossom said, fighting tears as she realized Robin would probably never want to kiss her again. Maybe she should've lied and said it wasn't good enough... just to get a few more practice runs.

"Wait, B, are you okay?" Robin exclaimed, noticing the tears caught in her lashes. "What's wrong?" She asked, her chest suddenly tight with worry, afraid she'd upset her.

"I'm fine, really, I'm okay," Blossom nodded, wiping her eyes quickly and looking the other way. "I'm sorry, I don't know what got into me. So silly."

"Hey, you're not silly," Robin insisted, gently turning the other girl's face back to her and instinctively reaching out to brush the tears from her cheek. "Please tell me?" She whispered.

"I can't," she murmured, more tears rolling down her cheeks. "If I tell you, you might never wanna see me again or be my friend and I can't do that."

"Nothing you could tell me would make me not wanna be your friend anymore," Robin assured her, nearly choking on her words, her hands still cupping her friend's face. "Even if you killed someone. I'd help you hide the body," she joked though her voice wavered.

"I never felt like this before," Blossom started, taking a deep breath to gather the courage to admit what had been in her mind for months. "But when I'm with you it's like the rest of the world doesn't matter and everything is perfect. You fix what I never knew was broken... I like you."

Robin blinked. She suddenly felt like she'd been dunked in an ice bath. She had to be dreaming. All the times she'd imagined Blossom saying those words, she'd never really thought it would happen. 

"You... do?" She breathed, almost afraid to speak, afraid if she did the bubble would pop and the dream would end.

"I do, I think you're the coolest, most amazing, prettiest girl in the world. Not an army of Daryl Hannahs and Sissy Spaceks could change my mind. Your laugh and your voice are the first things I wanna hear in the morning and the last I wanna hear before bed."

Robin's eyes fluttered, a tear rolling down her cheek and when she opened her mouth to speak a sob came out instead. "I like you too, Blossom," she finally whispered, her voice cracking. "I've liked you for so long, but I was afraid--"

"I was afraid! I thought you liked that boy from Canada you told me about. I didn't know exactly what was going on, I've liked boys before, but I like you. I don't know if that means I'm a lesbian... a half lesbian? Is there such thing as a half lesbian?"

"I only made him up because I didn't want you to think I was pathetic. This whole time, I only liked you," Robin exclaimed, letting out a wet laugh. "I think that means you're bisexual," she said, pressing an overjoyed kiss to Blossom's mouth, kissing her urgently.

The other girl, in turn, kissed her back with the same enthusiasm, almost getting on top of her as she caressed the back of her neck and her dirty blonde hair.  

"You could never be pathetic, you're like... like a gorgeous mermaid goddess that I can't get enough of," she giggled.

Robin let out a full-bodied laugh. "You're the gorgeous mermaid goddess!" she exclaimed, kissing all over Blossom's face giddily. "Fuck, I can't believe this is really happening!" she cried, holding tightly to the other girl.

"Me neither, you're like a dream," Blossom leaned against her shoulder. "I wanna keep you all to myself and never share with anyone ever again."

"I'm okay with that," Robin laughed. "Does that mean... we're girlfriends?" she wondered, falling to the bed with the other girl in her arms.

"I think it does... we're girlfriends!" Blossom shrieked in excitement. "You're all mine now! This is perfect."

Robin couldn't stop the giddy laughter that filled her chest and she pressed her forehead to her girlfriend's, her cheeks hurting from how much she was smiling. "You know... I think I might need some more practice at this kissing thing. Think you could help me some more?" She teased, tracing the line of Blossom's jaw with her finger.

"What sort of teacher would I be if I refused?" She winked, pulling her closer again.