• i never hated you like i do right now •
Christmas morning, 1986.
Robin, Nancy, Jonathan, Will, El and Mike arrived at Steve's house at 9 am, a little after their agreed time but they figured no one would mind.
But, once they entered the house, they saw all the other people; Dustin, Max, Lucas, Erica and Argyle, in the living room.
Steve was nowhere to be seen.
"Hey guys! Where's Steve?" Robin questioned the group, wondering where her best friend had hidden himself.
"Upstairs, he hasn't come down yet." Dustin explained, eating a gingerbread man from the kitchen, as the latecomers entered the lounge, where all the presents were laid out and labelled with names corresponding to attendees of the gathering.
Although, Nancy noticed, there was no Christmas tree. Odd, she thought to herself, given Steve's extremely Catholic upbringing. Nancy also noticed the absence of a certain curly-haired metalhead, who was usually the first one in attendance.
Robin nodded in understanding of Dustin's response before heading upstairs to find Steve.
"Steve?" Robin questioned softly, lightly knocking on his bedroom door. She had no idea of the scene that was waiting for her on the other side.
She slowly swung it open to peer inside, finding him sitting on his bed with his knees up to his chest and dry, salty tear-tracks down his face.
"C'mon, Dingus. What's wrong?" Robin asked softly, gently perching on the bed next to him.
" 'm not good enough." He whispered, staring at the end of his bed where the comforter tucked into the bed frame. His voice was flat and devoid of any of his usual charisma or 'Harrington-charm'.
"What are you talking about? Of course you're good enough. Everyone here loves you, Steve. That's why they're here." Robin responded, her response almost routine with how much Steve doubted himself.
"Eddie doesn't even want me anymore." Steve said numbly. The pain was still sitting in the middle of his chest, hard and painful, reminding him of how he wasn't good enough and of what he had lost.
Reminding him of losing the love of his life.
"I'm sure he does. Whatever you think is going on-"
"He broke up with me." He finally declared, voice wavering and lips trembling, daring himself to look up at Robin, aware of how awful he looked.
He was sure that his face was puffy, his eyes were red and that he had crusted tear stains on his cheeks. But Robin didn't care.
"I can't even bring myself to hate him, Robs. I love him so much." Steve whispered, a fresh tear trailing down his cheek, dripping onto the bedspread.
"Tell me what happened."
"Merry Christmas, Eds!" Steve happily greeted his boyfriend with a loving kiss before welcoming him into the house.
When the door closed, shutting out the cold December air, Steve handed Eddie his Christmas gift. And he was very excited for Eddie to open it to see his reaction.
But.
A sinking feeling of dread set deep in his stomach when Eddie laid the gift down on the nearby side-table.
"Steve.. we want different things from this relationship. So, I think it's better for both of us if we go our separate ways." Eddie said flatly, getting straight to the point.
That was the first crack in Steve's heart.
"We can work it out though, can't we?" Steve questioned, cursing himself for the tears that were already forming in his eyes.
"No, Steve, we can't. I can't do this shit anymore." Eddie answered, crossing his arms over his chest, closing off his body language.
"Eds, wh- are you breaking up with me?" Steve asked, trying to hide the way his voice wavered from the tears threatening to spill over.
"I'm sorry, Steve." Eddie responded, the only indication of him feeling the same way was the tears in his deep brown eyes.
This wasn't how it was supposed to go. They were supposed to be together forever.
So, why was Steve's heart slowly shattering into a million pieces?
The final piece of his heart broke when he heard the sound of the front door closing behind Eddie for the last time.
"Did I do something wrong, Robs?" Steve asked weakly. He looked so broken.
"No. Steve, you did nothing wrong. This wasn't your fault, okay? You are an incredible person and any guy or girl would be lucky to have you. Eddie is an idiot for not realising that." Robin reassured him, a hand gently resting on his knee.
"Agreed." Nancy said softly from where she'd been listening from the doorway after following Robin upstairs.
Nancy gently wiped his eyes with her cardigan sleeve, trying not to dwell on how her breaking up with him way back in 1984 probably received a similar reaction.
Robin brought him a tissue and a bottle of water so that he could blow his nose and rehydrate himself after crying for almost fourteen hours.
"There are seven kids down there who are clueless as to what happened. So, you're gonna put on a show for them and pretend like nothing is wrong, alright? I know that you're probably in a lot of pain, but you can't let them catch on, yeah?" Robin instructed him as he took small sips of the water, relishing how cool it felt against his scratchy throat.
He nodded silently as he ran his fingers through his hair in a poor attempt to place it in its usual style without any products.
Fixing his clothes didn't take long. He took a hoodie and pulled it over his head, immediately regretting it. The hoodie smelled of Marlboro Lights. Eddie.
Robin took his hand as they went downstairs to the ground level of the house, where the commotion of everyone else talking, laughing and listening to Christmas music filled his ear.
"You got it, Steve." Robin said kindly, placing a hand on his shoulder, gently nudging him towards the living room.
And although his heart was breaking, he steadied himself with a deep breath, and he put on the best damn act of his entire life.
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