#steve harrington's deaths (and the times he maybe saved the world)

[badpancakelol]

spoilers without context, for my steddie time loop saga ;)

[psychotic-nonsense]

"I'm sorry."

It's the first thing Steve says after everything.

After getting Vecna Cursed. After nearly dying. After a hallucination of Eddie saved him. After running through a looped forest. After finding sanctuary in Steve's memory of that Starcourt bathroom. After Eddie reveals himself as Eddie.

It's the only thing he can think of. It's not big enough to fit everything, but it's the only thing that fits in his mouth.

"Don't be."

Maybe that's the only thing Eddie can think of too. The only thing Eddie can bear to say.

Because don't be can't stop Steve's eyes from watering when he sees the vest in his closet. Don't be can't stop Steve's feet from dragging him to the cemetery every evening to clean Eddie's graffiti-covered tombstone. Don't be can't stop Steve from sitting beside Wayne and listening to him talk about the Eddie he remembers. Don't be can't stop Eddie's body from showing up in Steve's dreams, nor Eddie's corpse from his nightmares. Don't be couldn't keep the pain away enough, didn't stop Vecna from latching onto it while Steve was walking alone in the woods.

Don't be isn't enough for what Steve wants to hear. But even stuck here waiting, hoping, for someone to get Steve out, there just isn't enough time.

"I miss you."

"...Why?"

Eddie says it back so quickly, so quietly, like it's just unfathomable to him. Maybe it is, considering their last memories. But their eyes meet and he looks just as sad, just as longing, as Steve.

"You were my friend."

Steve can't help but say it like that. Like they were friends for years instead of days. Like Eddie was that important to him in their final moments. Like his heart really aches for Eddie every second of the apocalypse.

Can't help but say it like he means it.

"I wish we could've had more time..."

Steve's voice cracks a little there as he turns away, hiding. It's all he wants. It's all Vecna used to entice him with. It's all that's keeping him going, to finally fulfill the last request Eddie made. It's all he has left to feel close to Eddie.

The Eddie that's sitting right next to him, silent, his sight weighing on Steve's skin. Conscious and aware and the real Eddie. Trapped in Vecna's head as a backup power source, yet who still risked everything to come save Steve. Who Steve will never see again because killing Vecna means killing Eddie for good, and his heart doesn't want it, is begging for another solution...

But for once, his broken head overpowers his shattered heart.

"Maybe we did."

Eddie takes Steve's hand. Meets Steve's surprised look with his own small smile of hope. They're both suddenly tearing up, eyes glistening with life in this gray stall.

"Maybe in another world, we got a second first chance. A first second chance. Maybe even a third, or fourth. Maybe in a different life, we had everything we wanted. Because you, Steve Harrington, are too good for me to be doomed to meet just once."

And for a moment, Steve sees it. Feels it. Versions of them connected through the universe.

Little kids playing in the lake. One with bruised skin and shaved hair, loud but unfathomably lonely. One with a bruised heart and soft eyes, timid but stubbornly hopeful.

A rockstar with glittering chains, center stage in the spotlight. A set of eyes in the crowd or behind the curtain, watching only him.

A werewolf and a vampire, two cryptids of horror, meeting in the dead of a full moon night to feel safe with the only other one who understands.

A future where they won, where the only death was the one that mattered. A process of healing and learning, coming home to a family every single day.

A world without pain, without their hell, where two high schoolers found freedom from their shackles and company in each other. Hiding away together in the dark corners of the town.

Steve even sees other versions of them. Versions that he knows were originally never supposed to meet, yet forces so much greater than them pulled them together.

A metalhead drug dealer, constantly getting into trouble with one nail-bat-weilding cop.

A criminal's fugitive nature leading him to a rugged trailer park, and the dangerous owner within one such home.

An eccentric king in an old coliseum, always choosing one particular warrior as his champion.

A young programmer being pulled away from his work by sobs above his apartment, running upstairs to check on the law student that recently moved in.

Two actors, finding an easy friendship in the months of filming one season of a show that would change their lives.

In that moment, Steve's overwhelmed by the closeness he suddenly feels with the soul beside him. Falling into tears, he pulls Eddie into a tight hug, holding him so so close to convey everything he can't say. Feeling Eddie hold him back, hearing everything Eddie can't say in return.

Familiar music comes on outside the stall. Robin's voice calls out to him, telling him to come home.

And when he does leave, Steve hopes that someone out there will understand that he never can. Because here in Eddie's arms is the only place that will ever truly feel like home.

"Thank you... for everything, Eddie."

Thank you, Steve. For everything and more..."

--------------------

- List of AUs, in order, after, "Versions of them connected through the universe": Childhood Friends / Rockstar!Eddie / Werewolf!Steve & Vampire!Eddie / Eddie Survives / No Upside Down & High School

- List of Multiverse Steddie AUs, in order, after, "...yet forces so much greater than them pulled them together": Eddie x Gator / Baron x Michael / Geta x Sean / Keys x Eric / Quinn and Keery

[flowercrowngods]

it’s steddie yearning hours

🤍 also on ao3

It’s a little fucked up, maybe, the way Eddie can’t seem to tear his eyes away from Steve‘s sleeping form. He’s a sight to behold — curled up on his side, making himself as small as he can; his hair is a mess, hiding his face from the world but not from Eddie, not quite. The room is dark except for the light of the lamps outside that comes in through the blinds, landing right on Steve, and Eddie thinks how fitting it is that Steve would be found by the light even in total darkness. He would be found and unaware of it.

And Eddie Munson is left to lean against the doorframe, arms crossed in front of his chest like that would save his heart, keep it where it is, keep it for himself. He shouldn’t be looking at Steve like that. Not when they’re hardly even friends, not when what they have is only remnant of a world ending. A world saved. A world forever changed.

He sighs, leaning his whole weight against the frame, clenching his fists in his t-shirt, doing everything to stop himself from stepping closer to the bed, running fingers through Steve‘s mess of hair, brushing lips to his forehead and climbing in bed with him.

The doorframe holds his weight, his sanity, his heart, and Eddie slides down with another heart sigh that the poets would have called wistful. Yearning. Longing and belonging.

He hits the ground and hopes that it would break the haze. But nothing can. There’s a heaviness inside him that makes it hard to breathe and leaves him wishing that Steve weren’t in his bed, in his heart, in his life. Not like this.

He wants to be friends with Steve. Real, actual friends. People who don’t have to hold each other through nightmares, people who go to the arcade together and make fun of each other. Who exchange their favourite tapes and go on trips together.

He doesn’t want to be bonded to him by trauma and horrors unimaginable alone. He wants to fall in love slowly, gently, wants the secret smiles and the fluttering inside his chest that he overheard the girls at school talking about.

He wants another chance with Steve. Another try. Without monsters, without death and dying, without saving and being saved. He wants Steve Harrington to choose Eddie Munson for who he is, not for what they went through.

He wants Steve to choose. To have a choice.

Breathing through a lump in his throat has become second nature to him lately, and he finally looks away from this boy that has yet to drop the other shoe on Eddie.

After who knows how long, Steve stirs, stretching with an adorable little groan until he stills, his eyes on Eddie. He can feel them. He doesn’t look up to meet them, can’t be responsible for whatever Steve would find in his eyes.

“Hey,” he hears, Steve’s voice incredibly soft despite the rasp of disuse that’s marking it.

Eddie shivers a little and finally looks up. “Hi.” A beat. You’re beautiful. “Sleep well?”

“Mm-hmm,” Steve nods, yawns again, then curls up some more on his side, scooting over to the edge of the bed so he can better see Eddie. “How long was I out for?”

Two hours, forty-eight minutes. “‘Bout two and a half hours,” Eddie says, smiling when Steve’s eyes widen. “There’s dinner. If you’re hungry.”

He’s holding his breath, shallow as it is, because his lungs cannot be trusted around Steve anymore. Not with the way he smiles every time Eddie makes dinner. Not with the way he hides said smile behind the blanket a little bit, like he doesn’t want Eddie to see, like he can’t believe he’s smiling in the first place.

Eddie wants to get up and hold him. Trace that smile with his fingers. Make it stay.

What are we doing, Steve? What are you still doing in my life? Why did you make yourself a home like it’s worth staying here?

Slowly, still a little clumsy from his prolonged nap, Steve gets up with the blanket in his hands and drops it on Eddie’s lap. Must have mistaken his shivers for being cold. Then Steve steps over him, ruffles his hair as he does, and Eddie wants to cry a little bit at the way Steve snickers at it. He’s ridiculous. Eddie is ridiculously gone for him. It hurts more than it should.

“You hungry, too?” Steve asks, fingers finding Eddie’s hair to comb through the curls he just messed up. Eddie doesn’t have it in himself to move his head, to put a distance between them, to confront Steve about what this is, what they’re doing, what it all means.

All he does is nod — slowly, so Steve’s fingers stay where they are. They do. Eddie pinches his own fingers to stop from reaching out and snatching Steve’s hand, bringing it to his lips, making him stay. Stay here. Stay in his life forever. Stay and never realise that there’s no reason for him to do that.

He meets Steve’s eyes even though that’s dangerous business. “Starving.“

Steve’s face does this thing again. That thing where he softens so visibly, his eyes shining a little, his lips twitching into both a smile and a frown. It’s mortifying. It’s liberating. It’s being seen by Steve.

“You didn’t have to wait, Eddie.” His voice is soft. Chiding and grateful all at once, and Eddie’s heart flutters.

“I know,” he shrugs, and that’s that because he bites his tongue. I wanted to. I’ll wait. I’ll always wait.

Steve huffs and then he’s gone, rummaging around in the kitchen before he reappears with two plates of lasagna in his hands. Instead of asking Eddie to come join him at the table or settling back in bed, Steve hands one plate to Eddie and then slides down the other side of the doorframe so they’re face to face, their thighs pressed together. It’s a tight fit, but their bodies are angled just so, making this as comfortable as it gets.

It’s one of the first things they figured out together, sitting in the door like this. Wayne comes home sometimes to find them like this, even joined them on some occasions. Just to talk, just to be there.

Steve reaches over to grab the blanket again, draping it over both their laps, and Eddie shoves a large forkful of lasagna into his mouth to stop himself from saying something stupid.

What are we doing? When does it end? When is the last time I get to sit with you, share my blanket with you, get you to eat my lasagna? Tell me; just tell me so I can prepare. Tell me you won’t stay so I can stop dreaming.

They eat in silence and Steve’s eyes are on him for most of it, but Eddie doesn’t look up. It’s heavier tonight, heavier than usual. Heavier because Steve’s cheeks are streaked with the imprint of Eddie’s pillow, heavier because his hair is a wild mess, heavier because Eddie wants to breathe him in and hold him forever.

But Steve is awake, and they only hold each other when they have a nightmare. Because that’s why they are in each other’s lives. There is no room for feelings, for romance, for yearning when their smiles only exist to keep each other alive.

“Are you okay, Eddie?” Steve whispers, his plate empty while Eddie barely touched his own, too busy not looking at Steve that he forgot to be a person in the process. It’s nothing new, really, but he’s gotta get a grip.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah?”

See, that’s the thing about Steve. He always gives you two chances to say something. The first try for all those impulse answers, the things you wish for yourself, the hand wave of dismissal. And then the second chance without judgment.

And Eddie loves him. Can’t lie to him again, so he just shrugs. His second chance not yet taken. Steve bumps their knees and Eddie’s eyes water. He eats his lasagna with stinging eyes and slightly shaking hands, because Steve can’t know. But Eddie might explode if he doesn’t.

“Wanna go for a walk?”

And, see, that’s another thing about Steve Harrington and the way he sees you. He knows Eddie hates being still, can’t talk when he’s sitting down. Can’t talk about anything meaningful when the world is quiet and dark and still.

Steve knows what Eddie needs. And it’s a little fucked up, maybe, but Eddie knows that Steve secretly needs it, too.

And he should say no. Should swallow his emotions, his thoughts, his fears, his aching and yearning and longing and belonging, should swallow it all and smile it away, bump his knee into Steve’s and propose they watch a movie together.

But he doesn’t. He can’t swallow tonight, not when there’s a lump in his throat, not when Steve is so warm against him, not when—

“Okay,” Steve smiles, climbing to his feet. “Let me go get ready, you finish your lasagna. Can I, uh. Can I borrow a sweater?”

“You know you don’t gotta ask.”

Another smile and he ruffles Eddie’s hair again. It makes his heart jump. “Thanks, man.”

“Of course,” Eddie whispers, barely audible, and not for Steve’s ears, just for his own need to say something. Anything. To make this real.

Ten minutes later, Eddie closes and locks the trailer door beside him and they start walking. The night is quiet even though it’s only just past eleven, and it’s a tad colder than Eddie expected. Beside him, Steve sticks his hands into the pockets of his jacket, fluffing up the hood of Eddie’s sweater so it covers his neck from the light breeze. Feeling Eddie’s eyes on him, Steve smiles and cocks his head down the street.

“Shall we?”

Eddie only hums but sets the pace. They’re both looking down at the ground, neither of them really caring where it is they’re going. It’s not about getting anywhere, it’s just about moving. Walking. Talking without looking at each other, finding excuses and answers in the night sky and the swaying treetops.

They walk in silence for a good half hour before Eddie finds his courage, his words, his peace with the possible answers. The night can cover for him and convince the daylight of little white lies that sound a lot like, I’ll be fine.

“You know you don’t have to do all this, right?”

Beside him, Steve’s steps falter a little. Maybe he didn’t expect Eddie to talk after all. “Do what?”

“This, I don’t know,” Eddie sighs, opening his arms to indicate the entirety of his life, really. “Sticking around. Staying.”

Steve frowns a little but he keeps his steps in sync with Eddie’s. That’s the whole point of their little nightly walks. No stopping, no looking, no seeing.

“Do you not want me to?”

God, how he wants Steve to stay! But also… Not like this. Not like he thinks Eddie might break if he leaves. Which Eddie will. But it shouldn’t be what makes Steve stay.

And there’s no way to say that. So all he does is shrug.

There’s a little pained noise from Steve, and Eddie scrambles for words that evade him, truths that make him too vulnerable, too real, too much.

“Okay,” Steve says after a while, and he sounds so small when he does. Eddie looks over and sees him pinching the bridge of his nose, nodding slowly, his mouth opening and closing with words unsaid. “Do you… Should I go home?”

Maybe you should, Eddie thinks. Get back to people you can be friends with; real friends.

“Maybe,” he says, slowing to a stop, looking away from Steve. “But I don’t want you to.”

“I… Okay? I don’t—“ Steve sighs and stops as well. “If it bothers you that we’re friends, then you can just—“

“Are we?” Eddie interrupts him, wincing at the way his own voice sounds. “Are we?” he repeats, quieter this time, opening up the question to honesty and vulnerability rather than disbelief and challenge.

Steve frowns again, confused, and Eddie remembers why they don’t do this in the quiet of his room; why they don’t do this while looking at each other. He can’t look at Steve and ask these questions. It’s too much.

So he turns and keeps walking, following the familiar road they’re on. Steve follows, a bit behind, and it leaves Eddie feeling horribly alone.

“You know,” Steve says after a while, scoffing, sighing, breathing until he tries again. Eddie waits. Here comes the other shoe. It’s finally there. “You know, I should be used to it by now, but it doesn’t really stop hurting when people keep questioning your intentions. With the kids, I kinda get it. There’s, like, years separating us. I get it when they’re hesitant to call me their friend.

“And with Robin, you know, she spent weeks after Starcourt just waiting for me to drop her. To be like, ‘Alright, thanks, it was good while it lasted but you’re an actual nerd and I don’t care for that shit at all.’”

Steve laughs and Eddie frowns, No laugh should sound so hollow.

“I had no idea she was so obsessed with the idea of me leaving her. She didn’t trust that I would stick around, that I actually loved her, that she’s my best friend and— God, she… I just, I don’t get it, y’know?”

Steve turns around because Eddie’s steps had slowed while Steve sped up, and Steve is walking backwards with his hands in his pocket, looking at Eddie with a hurt, confused expression.

“And now you’re telling me you don’t want me to stay and that I should go home, but that you don’t want me to do that either? You’re asking me if we’re friends, Eddie? What the hell else would we be? I’m…” He shakes his head and spreads his arms. “What do I have to do for anyone to believe me I just wanna spend time with them because they’re cool and I feel really fucking good being around them?”

Eddie doesn’t wanna look at Steve, but he can’t look away either. They’ve stopped again, a few feet apart, and Steve looks so open, ready for Eddie to answer, to tell him, to talk, when all Eddie wants to do is run away. Run to him. And he can’t do either. Can’t tell him.

“It’s not that,” he says lamely.

He gets to watch as Steve’s face scrunches up, crumbles, and then falls until there’s nothing left. His expression empty.

“I’m going home now, Eddie.”

“Why?”

Steve shakes his head and swallows. “Because I’m hurt. And confused. And I don’t wanna talk anymore, not when you don’t.”

And with that, Steve turns around. Walks down the road, disappearing into darkness until the next street light catches him. Attracting light even in darkness.

And Eddie breaks finally. He runs down the street, halfway catching up with Steve until he’s close enough to make sure the other boy can hear him.

“I’m terrified,” he says, making Steve stop. He doesn’t turn around yet, but it’s enough for Eddie to keep going. “I’m so fucking terrified that you only think you have to be my friend because we nearly died together. Terrified that you’ll leave because this thing between us is so heavy, loaded with trauma and memories. I’m terrified that you won’t come over anymore one day, that you’ll be done, that you’ll find friends that are not bonded to you like I am. Or like the kids and Robin and the rest are. I’m… Stevie.”

His voice breaks a little and he approaches Steve’s form, the light catching in his hair, making Eddie feel like a moth on his way to the flame.

“I wonder if we’re friends not because I doubt you. It’s because I know I have nothing to offer you. Nothing but, like, an open ear for your memories or open arms for your nightmares. Nothing but shared memories, which I know are only a fraction of what you’ve been through. That’s not how friendship works, Stevie, that’s not what will be enough in the long run.”

He sighs, rounding Steve until he’s in front of him, but Steve’s looking down at the pavement.

“I want to be your friend, Stevie. But I have this gnawing feeling that that ship has sailed.”

Steve shakes his head when Eddie is done. Says something he can’t quite catch.

“What was that?” Eddie asks, his voice tender, his eyes watery, his breath heaving. He hates being so vulnerable, but he hates even more the thought that Steve would just leave and think Eddie never cared for him.

“You make me dinner,” Steve says then.

He sniffles. Reaches for Eddie’s hand until he seems to think better of it. Eddie feels the emptiness, the cold air on his skin, and longs to be brave enough to take Steve’s hand now. He isn’t. But he thinks about it. He thinks about it all the time.

“You make me dinner and let me sleep in your bed. You make me smile and when I’m at work, I think about you sometimes, just to think nice thoughts. I don’t… There’s nothing you have to do, Eddie. You don’t have to do or be anything to be my friend. And I don’t want you around me just because you know what it’s like to drift off in your head, or just because you don’t question it when I can’t talk. I want you around because you make me laugh and you make me happy and if I could get paid for spending my days with you and with Robin, I would do nothing else in life. Because you, Eddie Munson, are good. And you’re enough. You’re a dork and a nerd and a fucking menace, and you’re kind and good with the kids and you’re a great friend. A great friend, Eddie, fuck!”

Steve is crying, but that’s okay because so is Eddie. Sincerity is scary, scarier than facing down the demo-bats, scarier than telling Wayne he’s queer, scarier than just about anything he’s ever done. But it also allows him to take Steve’s hand and pull him against his chest.

It makes him laugh when Steve sounds so frustrated when he says, “I don’t know why I’m crying.”

It makes him pull back and wipe away the tears from Steve’s cheeks, ignoring the ones on his own.

“It’s okay, sweetheart.”

He hums in surprise when that makes Steve lean in again, hiding his face in Eddie’s neck.

“I’m… I don’t know what to say,” he whispers into Steve’s hair.

“‘S okay,” Steve says. “That was, uh, a lot.”

Eddie laughs, feeling light and elated and a little hazy, the words still catching up with him, his limbs tingling with sensation just thinking about Steve thinking about him at work.

It does nothing to dissuade him from yearning and aching and longing to brush a kiss to Steve’s hair that is so close to him now. His hand comes up to the back of Steve’s neck, and the world slows down. Steve’s breath hitches, and Eddie’s heart jumps.

“I’m… I’m gonna say something, too, okay? Gonna try, at least. Stop me whenever, okay?”

Steve doesn’t react, but his hands begin to move in slow, minute movements along Eddie’s back. It gives him courage. Makes him dream.

He closes his eyes and draws in a deep breath. “I make you dinner because I like to take care of you. I let you sleep in my bed because… because it’s gonna smell like you. I like the way you smell. I make you smile because that makes me stupidly happy. Stupid, really. You make me a little stupid sometimes, Stevie. Because I want to be your friend more than anything in the world, but lately I also… I wanna climb into bed with you and hold you even when there’s not a nightmare. Just to hold you. I wanna tuck that rebellious strand of hair behind your ear just to touch you. I wanna touch you all the time, Steve. It’s a little crazy. Drives me crazy.“

He sighs and goes for the kill because they’re in too deep now, he can’t stop. Steve knows anyway, Eddie is sure, but he wants Steve to hear, too. He wants to say it. Wants to make it real.

“I wanna kiss you,” he breathes, and it’s too real for even the night to disguise it later. “All the time. And you should know that. You should know that maybe we can’t be friends after all.“

The words leave his mouth and he’s ready for Steve to push him away, to let him down gently with regret in his face and repeat his words from earlier, let go and go home like that would solve Eddie’s predicament.

But Steve doesn’t move from the tight embrace. Or, the doesn’t move away.

His hands on Eddie‘s back begin to wander more, leaving goosebumps along the way from his shoulder blades to his hips. His face where it’s tucked against Eddie‘s neck turns slightly until his nose connects with his collarbone. Steve straightens and his nose is replaced by his lips, connecting with Eddie‘s throat, his neck, his jaw.

And then Steve pulls back. Looks at Eddie with hooded eyes, hands moving from his shoulders to his jaw. Cradling Eddie‘s face like he’s something precious.

Eddie is holding his breath, tracking Steve’s every motion, not daring to move or even breathe too deeply lest he scares him off, breaks the spell, bursts the bubble.

Steve swallows and looks down at Eddie‘s lips. “What if I told you that I wanna kiss you all the time, too?”

“Then I would call you crazy.”

Steve smiles and leans in to rest his forehead against Eddie’s, breathing into the night, “Call me crazy, then.”

“You’re crazy.”

It’s the last thing Eddie says for a while before he tilts his head forward to capture Steve’s lips with his own. Steve hums and smiles into the kiss, opening his mouth to let Eddie in deeper, holding him so close there’s no room for doubts or regrets.

[fastcardotmp3]

thinking bout firefighter steve tonight but specifically firefighter recruit steve.

because there is something very very interesting to me about Steve going into a very intense training program for a very intense and important job when his body has only ever known high intensity situations as not just life-or-death, but also end of the world.

throwing that guy into these training exercises that throw his body back in time to being nineteen and dragged under water or eighteen and burning a monster alive while fighting a concussion or seventeen and swinging a bat with thirty seconds warning without actually being any of those situations?

It could be disastrous. It could be retraumatizing as hell. It could throw him back ten steps in his recovery and make him feel small or weak or useless.

But it's Steve, right? And there is something so very interesting about the idea that maybe this sort of thing would actually be healing.

Reminding his body as well as his brain what it's like to go into a fight with the sole intention of saving rather than killing; reminding every broken piece of himself how to work together for the good of it.

Reminding himself that some tragedies are preventable, that some lives can be saved by regular people who put in the work, that even though the kid who fell through the ice or the cat stuck in the tree aren't world ending that saving them still matters.

It's not about being big and strong and tough, even if he doesn't mind the teasing he gets from friends that he knows mostly do it to cope with their own fears of watching him go into those kinds of situations again at all, it's about the trying.

The helping.

The "I just want to help."

That's why Steve Harrington becomes a firefighter. That's why the endless list of hard parts of the job are worth it.

Because maybe the war in Hawkins was always about saving the little guy too, and maybe that realization can be the thing that saves his life.

[steddio]

Eddie can’t listen to music anymore. God knows he wants to, would give anything to lose himself in a particularly intense guitar riff, or bang on the steering wheel of his van like it’s a drum kit, or just generally annoy those in his vicinity by refusing to turn down “that noise” (as his neighbors call it). Music was his life, his sanctuary, his whole reason for being on this stupid, fucked up planet.

But now, music makes him jumpy, panicky. Hands clenched into fists, the back of his neck prickling. He can’t help but look for the threat, for the reason music is being played. Eddie finds himself sitting in silence now, when before he couldn’t stand it. His bedroom eerily quiet, cassettes shoved in a shoebox, stereo covered with an old t-shirt. He drives with the windows down, radio off, listening only to the mundane sounds of small town Indiana.

He can’t even play guitar. Three days after he woke up covered in bandages, head aching, Wayne had brought Eddie his sweetheart, mumbling something about not wanting Eddie to be bored in the hospital. Eddie had tried to play, he really had. But just touching the strings sent him back into that life-or-death mindset, and suddenly his mouth felt like it was filled with blood and he couldn’t breathe, and the nurse had to rush in and help him release his death grip on the guitar, take deep breaths, count to ten.

After, he threw the provided pamphlets about Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in the trash and tried to convince himself he didn’t really need to play guitar anymore. As Dustin is so fond of reminding him, he already lived the most metal moment of all time, embodied it, played for the lives of everyone he loves, for Chrissy’s death, for Hawkins’s survival. His sweetheart helped save the world, and now it’s enough that she’s only decoration in their new government payout trailer. It has to be enough, because he can barely look at her, can’t touch her without shaking, without almost throwing up.

His friends must notice. They must, because he’s been avoiding band practice, hasn’t scheduled any D&D sessions, staying far away from everything that used to bring him joy because it doesn’t. Not anymore. And sometimes he wishes they would say something, that anyone would acknowledge this 180 degree shift in Eddie’s entire being. But Jeff and Gareth are giving him space, letting him heal. And the kids are kids, dealing with their own trauma and shit. So it’s just Eddie and the silence.

—

Eddie is listlessly staring at his bedroom wall, actively trying to think about nothing, when he hears a car horn honking. He ignores it, sure that it’s irrelevant to him. The horn honks again. Then a third, fourth, fifth time, followed by, “Munson, dude, I know you’re in there!”

And what the fuck. Because Eddie knows that voice, and there’s absolutely no reason for Steve Harrington of all people to be outside his trailer. They’re not even friends! They’re just… trauma bonded. Or whatever. Maybe Eddie should have read those pamphlets.

He peeks his head out the window to see Steve shading his eyes with one hand, the other on his hip. Eddie waggles his fingers in a hesitant wave, even more surprised when Steve’s face breaks out into a grin.

“There you are, buddy! Come on, let’s go!”

Eddie begrudgingly grabs his jacket, swinging it on as he slams the door of the trailer behind him.

“Um, dude, what’s up?”

Steve only waggles his eyebrows in response. “You’ll see, but c’mon, we’re running late.”

Eddie slides into the front seat of Steve’s BMW, eyes glancing to the radio, which is blasting some Top 40 station that not only sounds like nails on a chalkboard but is already making Eddie uneasy. Steve hops in the drivers seat and, as if he can read Eddie’s mind, turns the radio off before pulling out of the trailer park.

The ride is quiet, but comfortable. Steve has the windows down, it’s a breezy summer day, and Eddie feels something underneath the listlessness that has infiltrated his brain like cobwebs. Anticipation, maybe even excitement.

Steve pulls into the Wheelers’ driveway, and Eddie follows him inside the house, down to the basement, where Dustin, Mike, Lucas, and Will have set up their D&D table, Will at the head wearing… is that a wizard hat?

“Welcome back from banishment, Eddie!” Dustin shouts as soon as he sees him, smiling widely. And Eddie can’t help but smile back. Because these are his kids, and he missed them, and he really did feel banished even if it was somewhat self-imposed.

Four hours later, after part one of a thrilling campaign led by Will (who really is a promising DM, Eddie has to admit), he no longer feels like that. He’s glowing, breathless, warm. The feeling buoys him through the car ride home, Steve having left and then returned to drive Eddie back. And if that good feeling allows Eddie to glance a little too long at Steve’s hair blowing in the wind, his left hand loosely resting on the steering wheel and his right on his thigh, then that’s Eddie’s business and no one else’s.

They fall into a routine. Steve picks Eddie up, drives him to the Wheelers’ house for an afternoon of D&D, and drives him home. Eddie tries not to be too obvious in his appreciation of Steve in the summer sun but he’s just a man, okay, and Steve didn’t earn his reputation for nothing.

Every time, Eddie offers to drive himself, but Steve just laughs, shakes his head. “Get in the car, Munson.”

And every time Eddie does, Steve turns the radio off. Doesn’t say anything, doesn’t acknowledge it, but their car rides are blissfully quiet. Light and easy in a way that silences aren’t when he’s alone.

—

It’s pouring rain one afternoon, rattling the roof of the trailer. Eddie is contemplating whether he can get away with smoking out his bedroom window when he hears a familiar car horn. As he approaches the car, Eddie hears what can’t be, but what is unmistakably the sound of Steve… singing? Softly, almost under his breath, Steve is singing along to the radio. He cuts off when he sees Eddie, offering a half wave and a lopsided grin. As Eddie slides into the front seat, Steve turns the radio off.

“Hey why do you do that, man?” The question slips out before Eddie can stop himself.

“Do what?” Steve looks confused.

“Turn the radio off. When I get in the car.” Now that he’s asked, Eddie finds that he needs to know. Why of all possible people, it’s Steve who’s been the most accommodating.

Steve shrugs, puts the car into drive, turns onto the main road before answering. “It bothers you,” he says simply.

Eddie must look confused when Steve glances over because he continues. “I never see you listen to music anymore. I figured it must bother you. And hey man, if anyone understands fucked up reactions it’s me. I can’t hear fireworks or see Christmas lights anymore.”

Eddie barely manages to nod his thanks, to present a facade of normalcy while his mind is racing a million miles an hour. He knows that Steve has been through some shit, clearly he had even before Eddie walked headfirst into whatever the fuck is going on in Hawkins. But he never expected Steve to be so… observant. Not of him at least.

The D&D session takes his mind off the mortifying knowledge that Steve is paying attention to him. They’re approaching Will’s grand finale, and Eddie is caught off guard by how normal it feels. To be excited about a campaign, to mess around with the kids. To laugh, unironically.

The ride home is tenser than usual but as they pull into the trailer park, Eddie musters the courage to reach out. To touch Steve’s arm and mumble a quiet but sincere “thank you.” He doesn’t stay to see if Steve responds, but the pads of his fingers burn where they met Steve’s bare forearm, and he falls asleep that night with the ghost of a pop song in his head.

—

A week later, Eddie finds himself in the backseat of Steve’s car, his usual shotgun seat occupied by Robin. In situations like these, it’s hard not to feel left out, like a third wheel. Steve and Robin orbit around each other in a way that Eddie never has with anyone. But their jubilance is addictive and Eddie can’t help but be drawn in. A lone planet in their binary star system.

They’re telling some inside joke, something about Muppets, and Steve is glowing in the way he only ever does with Robin or Dustin, beaming like a carefree teenager instead of gazing sadly out of eyes that look too old for his face. Eddie is breathless, finds himself laughing along, eyes glued to Steve’s mouth (his smile, not his lips, Eddie lies to himself). Robin launches into song and there’s a moment when Steve joins in, and it’s ridiculous but possibly the most glorious thing Eddie has ever heard because it’s music. It’s music and it makes him feel safe.

After a blissful few seconds, Steve cuts off, as if catching himself, turns to meet Eddie’s eyes, face halfway between joy and panic. Robin doesn’t seem to notice, and Steve has one hand up as if to stop her before Eddie shakes his head slowly, starts to smile. Steve’s face begins to relax again, one eyebrow raising in question.

“Don’t stop,” Eddie mouths.

Steve turns back to Robin, picking up the thread of their foolish imitation. And maybe Eddie is still lying to himself because is this really music? But he thinks it might be the most beautiful sound regardless.

They drop Robin off at home and Eddie climbs up to the front seat, winking at Steve’s feigned outrage about “the leather, dude!” Steve backs out of Robin’s driveway, gets halfway down the block before he pulls over.

“Hey I’m sorry about earlier,” he starts softly. “I got carried away. I hope—. Well. I hope you’re okay, man. I know music bothers you.”

Eddie feels a blush rising at this ridiculous, lovely man and his concern. Steve is looking at Eddie, brow furrowed, assessing every minute detail of his face as if searching for evidence of injury. Eddie wants to reach out and smooth it with a touch, to make Steve laugh again in that carefree way. He settles for reaching out in a different way, laying a piece of himself bare.

“It doesn’t. Bother me, that is. Not when it’s you.”

The silence that follows is expectant, Steve’s expression hard to read. They’ve been on the precipice of something for weeks now, and Eddie has stepped off the ledge. But as always, Steve is there to catch him. His grin is lopsided, eyes warm, as he sings softly,

“But I know, uh-huh, that you're sad. And I know I'll make you happy with the one thing that you never had, baby I'm your man.”

And Eddie has half a second to think Wham!? Really? before they’re kissing. They’re kissing in the front seat of Steve’s car and Eddie has the sudden, embarrassing, wondrous urge to turn the radio on. So he does.

[loveinhawkins]

They’re sitting in the grass, home-made weapons cast aside in favour of trying to enjoy the last of the daylight. Eddie had found one last can of Pringles leftover from the food (… and drink) shop he’d asked for, and he’d done a stupid little celebratory dance, holding the can above his head, just to make the kids laugh.

“Dude,” Dustin says now, around the last Pringle, “you keep humming.”

“Oh.” Eddie often finds himself humming along to something unconsciously. He tilts his head in thought as he listens to himself, then snorts. “That’s your fault, man. ‘Cause you keep mentioning The Upside Down.”

“Huh?”

Eddie grins, leaps to his feet dramatically. “Upside down,” he sings, adopting a ridiculous falsetto, “boy, you turn me inside out, and ‘round ‘round.”

Nearby, he hears an honest to God cackle. He turns and is delighted to find that it’s Steve, that he can actually get an ugly laugh out of him. It’s a fucking spectacular laugh, Eddie thinks.

“God, why’d you have to do that?” Steve says. “Now it’s gonna be stuck in my head.”

“Aw,” Dustin says, dry as the Sahara, “maybe we don’t need your guitar, Eddie. We can just sing that and embarrass Vecna to death.”

Before Eddie can even begin to act all mock offended, Steve laughs again and says, “That’s rich coming from you, Henderson.”

And well, Eddie knows a story when he hears one. “Oh?” he says, giving Dustin an over the top waggle of his eyebrows. “Have I been missing out on your dulcet tones?”

Steve grins. “Something like that.”

“Nope!” Dustin gives Steve a harsh glare. “That information is classified and it’s, uh, not essential to the lore, okay and—”

“To the what?”

“—and,” Dustin presses on, “Eddie still thinks I’m cool, don’t you, Eddie?”

“Coolest person I know,” Eddie says, and though he delivers it tongue in cheek, he does mean it.

Steve’s teasing grin softens into a genuine smile, like he can hear Eddie’s honesty. “Fine, fine. You’re safe for now. But Eddie is owed a dramatic reenactment at some point, dude.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Dustin waves Steve aside, runs off to play an impromptu game of tag with Erica. He calls back, “Keep it for after we’ve saved the world! Again.”

Eddie chuckles. “Very cool kid,” he reiterates.

Steve scoffs, but nods fondly. Then, after a moment, he says, “Damn you, it is in my head.” And he gives Eddie a tiny wink, and does the world’s most ridiculous little shoulder shimmy as he sings under his breath, “I said, ‘Upside down, you’re turning me, you’re giving love instinctively…’”

Eddie almost wishes he could invent time travel, just so he could tell his younger self that one day Steve Harrington will sing fucking Diana Ross to him.

And maybe it’s foolish, to feel so happy right now, in this moment, but Eddie can’t bring himself to care. All he knows is that his stomach gives a little swoop as Steve trails off from singing into more laughter, and it feels warm. Feels something like hope.

[lovebugism]

❛ i’m telling you all of a sudden, but it isn’t new to me. i love you. ❜ with our boy Steve Harrington please?

i wrote this after watching little women, so this is like that one laurie and amy scene but stranger things coded <3 hope you like it!! (this is 5k words btw and barely proofread 🫣)

The R.V. smells like coopery blood, alternate dimension muck, and nine teenagers who haven’t showered in three days. But despite all that, Steve Harrington is next to you, smiling. 

As if there’s anything worth being happy about now. 

He tells you about a dream with a hopeful gleam in his honey eyes, like he believes it’ll all come true — like death is staring him in the face. “I know it’s silly, but I… I always dreamed I’d have this really, really big family. I’m talking like, uh— a full brood of Harrington’s. I don’t know, five… Maybe six kids?”

“Six?” you repeat with an incredulous laugh. You turn your body in the passenger seat to face him more, shoulder pressing into the worn pleather. You’ve got your brows raised to your hairline in shock at his admission and a beam on your face you don’t realize is there.

“Uh-huh. Six little nuggets. Three girls, three boys,” he says with an assured nod. There’s a distant smile hinting at the edges of his lips, and he looks at you with it for a moment before turning back to the road again. 

“And every summer, I figured all of us Harrington’s, we’d pack into something like this, and… just see the country. You know, the Rockies, the Grand Canyon, maybe Yellowstone. We’d end up in some beachside town in California and spend a week parked in the sand, maybe learn how to surf or something.”

You can picture the dream so effortlessly, almost like it’s one you’ve had yourself. 

In some ways, you did.

Steve Harrington was the kind of boy that filled you with butterflies and childlike daydreams. It was more innocent than lusting, more significant than a teenage crush. There was a time you’d wanted to be with him so badly that you could barely breathe. It kept you up at night, fantasizing about a future with a boy that didn’t want you. It haunted your dreams just as often.

You were, perhaps a bit begrudgingly, a part of that stereotype — a girl who wanted all of the things adults thought girls wanted. You longed for a pretty white dress and a husband that cried when you walked down the aisle. You wanted a small house with a white picket fence, a home that’s always loud with laughing children and barking dogs and loving parents.

It was a future you only wanted with Steve.

But he didn’t love you. Not the way he loved Nancy.

Not the way he still loves Nancy.

It’s not a crime he needs to confess to for you to know he’s guilty of it. You can see it written all over his face, in the way he talks about his future family and flits his gaze from the winding backroad up to the rearview mirror to look at her. He’s picturing her in his head the way you picture him in yours.

Knowing someone else is a part of this dreamt-up family and not you is a bitter pill to swallow.

It has you looking back too, at the gang of ragtag soldiers you’re about to save the world with. You glance over your shoulder at all of them, finding them dozing or outright sleeping in the back of the R.V. 

You don’t blame them. The past few days have been hell.

You’re just glad Max has finally found a moment of peace. The redhead lazes between Lucas and Dustin on the couch in the very back. She rests her head on the former boy’s soldier, but you can’t tell if she’s sleeping or not. Lucas has his eyes closed but a smile on his face as he lays his cheek on the crown of her head.

Dustin, on the other hand, looks dreadfully out of place among the two lovebirds. His head is tilted back and his mouth is wide open. Soft snores spill from his throat.

Erica, Robin, and Nancy all sit at the tiny table beside the tinier kitchen. Their heads are either resting on their folded arms or pressing against the window.

The small cushion adjacent to the couch is taken up wholly by Eddie. 

Your Eddie.

His long legs are spread and his back is slouched against the side of the R.V. He’s taking up every bit of room the thing has to offer, which wasn’t very much to begin with. His pink lips are parted and slightly chapped. He blows soft exhales from them that make his chest rise and fall with even breaths. 

Your hands begin to ache with the want to run them through his wild strands of hair, to ease his head to your chest and let the sound of your heartbeat chase away the nightmares that threaten to plague him.

You want so badly to sleep alongside him, but you know that slumber won’t come as easily to you.

Despite the exhaustion that weighs down your tired bones, whenever you close your eyes, you can only see Chrissy’s mangled body on the ceiling of Eddie’s trailer. The image of broken bones and sucked-out eye sockets is stained on the back of your mind.

It’s something you’ll never forget. Not in a billion, trillion lifetimes.

You’re scared you won’t ever sleep peacefully again.

But you’re glad Eddie’s finally resting. Even if you can’t. 

And maybe that’s what love is.

…Love.

You almost can’t believe you’re calling it that. It’s not like you’ve told him as much or anything. You haven’t been together very long, only a few months, but you’re not sure what else to call this feeling. Is it normal for you to want to fight the most powerful dark wizard known to man with your bare hands as long as it means keeping Eddie safe?

The realization that you’re actually moving on from Steve is perhaps more shocking. You were starting to think you’d be fawning over him for the rest of your life, destined to be alone forever while he got married and had kids. But then Eddie came out of nowhere. He swept you off your feet without even trying.

You’d spent so much of your life in love with Steve that you’d forgotten how it felt to be loved. But Eddie reminded you, most ardently so, and you’ve never been happier.

And Steve can see all that.

He can see how you’ve gone to hell and back — quite literally — to keep Eddie safe. He can see how Eddie still manages to make you laugh so hard your stomach hurts, even though death looms overhead like a big, gray storm cloud. It almost makes him angry. Not at Eddie, exactly. And certainly not at you. He’s more so mad at himself for waiting until you were out of his grip entirely to need you like air.

Steve wasn’t an idiot; he knew how you felt about him. He’s known for years. But Nancy was the only girl in his purview for… an embarrassingly long amount of time. Maybe that’s because she didn’t want a single damn thing to do with him at first, and it wasn’t like Steve to back down from a challenge.

But you? You were easy. You were always going to be there. Your love was the only constant thing in his life.

And then it just… wasn’t.

It was like his center of gravity had suddenly shifted or his feet had been knocked out from under him. The loss of you, of something that was never his to begin with, jarred him like he’d been awake with most vigor. Now, he finds himself living in a nightmare — forced to watch you fall in love with someone else while he ebbs slowly from your mind.

You sit with him now — with Eddie — while he and Dustin fuck around with the shields they’d crafted out of tin garbage can lids. You watch them with a smile on your face even though you’re shaking your head at them and telling them something that Steve can’t hear. 

You’ve got a sword in your hand, and you sharpen its steel with a rock. The too expensive thing had been hanging on the wall at The War Zone, and you told Eddie you just had to have it. 

“I’ll just… take up extra shifts at Wayne’s shop,” you reason with a shrug, gaze never leaving the bladed weapon.

“Do whatever you want,” the brunette boy responded nonchalantly as he dropped four cases of ammunition into the red basket in your hand. He smiled down at you. “That just means I’ll get to see you more.”

It hurts Steve for you to be so far away from him. 

You’re just across the small clearing. All he’d have to do is walk over to you, really, but it’s more than just the distance. No matter how close he gets to you, or how far you get from Eddie, your soul’s always going to be with him. 

Steve will never have you like that, and that’s what hurts the most.

He thinks he’s doing a pretty good job of keeping a stiff upper lip about it. He thinks he’s keeping some deep, dark secret, having no idea that he’s all but spilling his guts to Robin. Honestly, he’s just trying to make conversations while they make homemade bombs out of gasoline and glass bottles, but he’s more than obvious. As per usual.

“How long do you think they’ve got?” Steve asks her out of the blue while he pours the chemicals through the funnel and into the flask Robin holds out for him. He doesn’t wait for an answer. 

“Because I thought they’d be over forever ago, you know? I mean… it’s Eddie. She’s, like, totally out of his league, right? But I’m pretty sure they just had an anniversary or something because I saw him buying flowers at Bradley’s Big Buy the other day…”

Robin opens her mouth to get a word in, but Steve just keeps on going going going.

“Unless you think they were for someone else? But let’s be serious, right? He’s a freak, but he’d never do that to her. I don’t know… Maybe he’s just the sorta guy that gets her flower for no reason, and it hasn’t been as long as it feels.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure they—”

“Let’s face it, if he’s doing that for her, they’re probably gonna make it, right?” the boy laughs bitterly to himself. He stuffs a rag into the neck of the bottle. “God, I’m such an idiot… Maybe if I’d done those things, I’d still—”

“I swear to god, if you say you’d still be with Nancy, I’m gonna punch you in the forehead,” Robin snapped suddenly. She’s got a foreign sternness to her tone and a glacial hardness in her blue eyes. She glares at him with it. “You don’t love Nancy, Steve. And she doesn’t love you. So stop going for the easiest thing when you know it’s not what you want.”

He sighs. He knows she’s right. “I just—”

“I get it. It sucks being lonely. I’m pretty sure I’m destined to spend the rest of my life alone, so join the club,” Robin smiles, a tad bit cynically, at him. “It sucks being in love with someone you can’t have. Trust me, I get it. But you need to move on.”

Steve swallows. He almost winces at the thought of that — of never having you. He shakes his head as though to get rid of the idea entirely. “I can’t… I can’t do that, Rob.”

“Then what are you gonna do, Steve?” she asks him with a mirthless, but not unkind laugh. 

She nods her head over to you. You laugh as Eddie spins you in his arms, both of you marveling at how you’ve just nailed a tree on the far edge of the clearing with the knives you’d thrown at it. Steve can hear the sound of your bubbly laughter from where he sits. Its brightness rivals that of the setting sun. 

“Look at her. She’s happy. Finally. So… Just let her be happy,” Robin advises with a shrug. She sets the glass bottle in the box with the rest of them. “I mean, we’re about to stop a dark wizard from ending the world, you know? Some of us probably won’t make it out—”

“Don’t say that,” Steve scolds.

“Some of us probably won’t make it,” she repeats, firmer this time, like it’s something he really needs to hear. “Something could happen to Eddie. Something could happen to her. Do you really want to be the selfish asshole that ruins what could very well be everyone’s last moments together just because you’ve got a bleeding heart?”

She’s being harsh. He knows it deserves it. Now is virtually the worst time to tell you everything on his mind — just when you’re starting to really settle down with Eddie and about to fight some wizard in an alternate dimension.

Something could happen to her. Those words left Robin’s mouth and stabbed him in the heart like a thousand unforgiving knives. Steve can’t fathom anything ever happening to you. Even with the end of the world, with all of you about to fight a war, it never crossed his mind. He can’t picture his life without you in it.

He can’t lose you without telling you how he feels — that he loves you, that he’s always loved you, and that he’s an oblivious idiot who learned that too late.

He can’t lose you at all.

So, against his better judgment and Robin’s sound advice, Steve abandons his work with her and hikes the relatively short distance over to you.

Eddie hasn’t yet let go of you. He keeps his arms tight around your waist and hugs you from behind, pressing the back of you to his chest while his chin sits along your shoulder. His chocolate eyes are stuck on the bullseye you’d carved into the bark of the tree on the far side of the clearing. The four knives you’d thrown, now stuck at the very center of the target, stare back at him.

“This is probably a bad time to be turned on, huh?��� he half-jokes, chin bobbing against your shoulder with every word.

“Eddie!” you scold as you wrench yourself out of his grip.

Dustin’s face screws up from where he lounges on the grass beside the both of you. “Gross…” 

You walk away from the two boys to collect your knives from the poor oak tree. Eddie whistles lowly at you while you go — as though he’s never seen you in a pair of jeans before. You throw your middle finger over your shoulder at him in response.

That’s when Steve catches you, when you’re finally alone, and with a tiny white lie of needing to go back to the R.V. for more gasoline. You offer to walk with him, just like he figured you might, because none of you wants anyone to go off alone. Not with Vecna potentially watching you.

You walk alongside him through the thick wood, dodging low-hanging branches and uplifted roots. Steve notices the distant smile dancing on the corners of your lips — a beautiful stain Eddie’s left there.

“What are you gonna do?” he asks you suddenly. “You know, when this is all over?”

Your brows raise at his question, mouth falling softly agape and eyes widening with a far-off look. You look stumped by the simple inquiry, like it’s something you hadn’t thought of yet — of any of this being over.

“I don’t know…” you murmur. “Go back to work, I guess.”

Steve laughs. “We’re gonna save the world tonight, and you’re gonna be back in the office on Monday?”

“Who knows? Maybe I’ll take a sick day,” you joke, just to hear him laugh again.

He lifts a splintered tree limb to get it out of the way for you, then ushers you to walk ahead of him. You mutter a low and shy “thank you” as you walk beneath it. He lets the branch fall again as he follows behind you.

“What about you, then?” you retort. “What are you gonna do after? Since going back to a nine-to-five is so unreasonable.”

“Actually, I was thinking about writing an opera,” Steve quips with a straight face. “I would be the main character, of course—”

“You’re such an idiot,” you giggle with the shake of your head. The airy, sunshine sound makes him smile down at you. His honey-tined gaze swims with longing. You don’t catch it because you’re not looking back at him.

“What do you want me to do, then?”

You tilt your head to catch his stare. Your eyes sparkle and your brows arch with a look both soft and stern. “Honest answer?”

“Of course.”

“I think you should go work for your dad. Try and… I don’t know… make something for yourself—”

“Alright, that’s not…”

“—Because you can’t work at Family Video forever, Steve!”

“You’re not playing fair,” he concedes quietly, laughing under his breath and shaking his head.

He shouldn’t have expected anything less — you did preface an honest answer, after all. It doesn’t make him feel any less bad about it, though.

You’d supported Steve through a lot of shit. Every mindless fight with his parents, every breakup that had him swearing he would never love again, every aspect of his douchebag phase that almost ruined your friendship. You were always soft with him, but never dishonest.

So when he told you that his dad offered him a well-paying job in Indianapolis, it didn’t surprise him when you told him to take it. Despite all the other shit (his broken relationship with his father and his incessant daydreaming of settling down with Nancy, namely), you knew he wasn’t happy in Hawkins.

“Fuck your dad, Steve. This isn’t about him,” you’d said. “You should take it! Starting building your life in the city! And when you’re finally making more money than your stupid dad, you can rub it in everyone’s stupid faces.”

Steve, of course, ended up turning it down.

The salary was high — too high for a boy just out of high school — but he figured no amount of money was worth a wounded pride. 

Steve was scared that it was all a ploy, another thing his dad could hold over his head, another accomplishment that wasn’t really his. And, truth be told, he was less enthusiastic about leaving Hawkins without you. He isn’t quite sure where he’d be in life without you guiding him through a significant portion of it. It made it nearly impossible to picture a life that didn’t have you at the very center of it.

He happily took to be Robin Buckley’s schmuck at Scoops Ahoy (and then again at Family Video) and Dustin Henderson’s unofficial chauffeur instead. He didn’t mind being a casualty of rattrap small town as long as it meant he didn’t have to stray too far from you.

But here you were now, right next to him in this lonesome forest, and still so far away.

You meet his boyishly forlorn expression with a sincere, tight-lipped smile. “You know that I’m right.”

“Yeah, I do,” he scoffs in response. “That’s the problem.”

“When we kill Vecna and save Hawkins for the… thousandth time… You should take that job. I mean, screw your dad, you deserve a life outside of all this shit—”

“So do you,” he argues.

“I’ll make it without you, Harrington. I’ll try to, anyway,” you quip, turning your gaze up to the family of birds sitting high in an oak tree and wishing you were one of them. You shrug to yourself. “I’ll keep on being a secretary at the car shop… Maybe settle down with Eddie.”

That makes Steve stop dead in his tracks. He laughs bitterly to himself, a quiet and venom-coated scoff. “Right. Because living with his uncle in a one-bedroom trailer is such a dream.”

It makes you stop, too, and turn on your heel to face him. You’re surprised to find him so many paces back. Steve sees a flash of hurt strike like lightning across your features, but he’s too hurt to apologize.

“I get it,” you concede with a small, cynical smile. “You don’t like him. You never have. But… He’s a good guy, Steve. If you just got to know him—”

“It’s not that,” he mumbles, cutting you off before he has to suffer through a list of reasons why Eddie’s so much better than he is. The boy’s gaze falls to the forest floor. He kicks a bunch of green pine needles with the toe of his sneaker rather than meet your prying gaze.

“Then what is it?” you retort. “Because I was just trying to help you. I didn’t say to, like, hurt your feelings or whatever. I just know that you want a life in the city, with a big house and a whole bunch of kids—” A laugh spills from your lips as you remember the dream he was telling you about. “You want that picture-perfect life, right? Now you can have it!”

“You don’t know what I want,” he counters quietly.

“Oh, please. I know you better than you know yourself, Steve Harrington—”

“Break up with him,” he blurts.

Your playful smile fades almost instantly. Your eyes search his face for any hint that he might be joking, but all you find is a deeply heartbroken boy. His bushy brows are scrunched together, his eyes glimmering with unshed tears, a puppy-like hurt painting each of his features.

You match his expression of grief with your own. Your face scrunches with a mixture of confusion and sorrow. “Wh… What?” you manage to stutter after realizing you’d been holding your breath.

“I don’t want you to settle down with Eddie,” Steve confesses. A secret he thought he’d take to his grave before ever telling you.

You’re quiet. For several long moments, you’re eerily silent. Even the forest hangs on bated breath. Birds stop chirping, the wind stops blowing, leaves stop rustling. It’s just you and him and a great big world waiting on the both of you.

A frown pulls down the very corners of your mouth. Your eyes go glassy and wide, like a heartbroken baby, and your head jerks back softly, still defensive and unsure.

“Why?” you force through a tightening throat.

“Why?” Steve repeats, finding it somehow within himself to laugh. He takes several short strides to stand with you again. With him closer now, you can see the sadness in his smile and the flush that blotches his cheeks. “You know why…”

You only shake your head in response. The words are far harder to get out. “No…”

“I just… I know it feels like I’m saying it all of a sudden, but it’s… It’s not new to me, you know?” Steve tries his best to explain to you why he’s choosing now, of all moments, to pour his heart out to you. His eyes are as wide and hopeful as the palms he waves out in front of him. “I don’t wanna go into this without you knowing how I feel about you—” 

“Steve,” you agonize in hopes of ending his rambling. “Don’t.”

“—And I just want you to know, in case something happens, that I love you.”

“No,” you say with the defiant shake of your head, your chin quivering and your gaze ice-cold.

“Yes,” he replies, just as stubborn.

“Steve…” you choke out when the name gets hung in your throat. 

A warm tear falls from your lashes and onto the very apple of your cheek. You wipe it away with the back of your hand and use your free one to bat Steve away when he tries to reach out for you. You stumble back from him, heading back the way you came — back to Eddie.

“Don’t, Steve. Just stop it.”

“Why?” he grieves in the softest voice he can muster, wet and warm with his hurt.

“You’re being mean,” you scold.

“I’m being mean?” he echoes with a sad sort of laugh.

“When it comes to you… I have always been second to Nancy. Always. And I won’t be the person you settle for just because she doesn’t want you, Steve,” you rant, voice fragile like glass or flower petals. 

He wants to tell you that he doesn’t want Nancy — that being with the person he loves won’t be settling — but you continue in your lament, and he misses the chance.

“I can’t… I won’t do it, okay? Not after I’ve spent my entire life loving you,” you confess to him, face scrunched in anger. It’s a subtle sort of rage, pointed both at him and yourself.

He watches, feeling totally helpless, while you wipe bitterly at your damp cheeks. Steve’s seen a lot of assholes make you cry. He never dreamed he’d be one of them. 

Robin was right. He’d ruined everything. It seems to be the only thing he’s good at these days.

“I’m sorry,” he calls to you as you walk away. “I wasn’t… I didn’t say it to make you sad.”

“You shouldn’t have said it at all!” you shout back, angrier than you’ve ever been with him. You take in a stuttering breath and exhale a shakier sigh, trying to calm yourself down again. “I just don’t get why you waited so long…” you agonize, words wet with tears. “Why did you wait until I was happy? Eddie… Eddie’s so nice to me, Steve. And you just… You just throw this shit at me right before we... That’s not fair.”

“I know…” he murmurs. “I know…”

The world starts turning again. 

Birds sing their songs, sounding somehow sadder than before, as though in lament for the brokenhearted boy. The wind begins to whistle as it brushes through the trees. It’s only half successful in breathing air back into your lungs.

A rustling of the brush gains both of your attention’s. It sounds like something is slithering somewhere in the thick laurel — a rabbit, a snake, a dark wizard out to kill a bunch of sad teenagers. 

You and Steve are alone, heartbroken, and clear targets for a monster who feeds on traumatized kids.

Though it’s entirely unlikely that Vecna has crawled out from the depths of the Upside Down and into these woods, you and Steve reach for your respective weapons anyway — him for the axe strapped to his back and you for the knives hanging on your belt. You’re ready to protect each other despite your distant anger.

But instead of some shriveled skin creep, you find freaks of a different kind.

The pale human faces of Dustin and Eddie peek out from the brush with curious smiles. They maneuver through the thicket and try to avoid the thorns. “What’s going on over here, huh?” the oldest boy wonders with his signature sparkling grin.

It’s almost scary how you so easily contort your features full of grief into a sickly sweet, artificial smile. You swipe the back of your hand over your face again to clear the tears clinging to your lashes, though it looks like you’re only wiping away sweat.

“Nothing,” you answer quickly with the innocent shake of your head. “Steve was just being an idiot—”

“Imagine that,” Dustin scoffs.

“—And saying stuff he doesn’t mean.”

“That’s not true,” Steve mutters, then clears his throat when the words come out more choked than expected.

“Just wanted to make sure you weren’t out here making moves on my girl, Harrington,” Eddie lilts with a playful smile. He reaches you and wraps a heavy arm over your shoulder to tuck you into his side. 

His sudden touches stopped surprising you a long time ago. You realized early on in your relationship that he can’t go without touching you for very long.

Eddie squints teasingly at Steve. “Go get your own.”

The boy doesn’t have a comeback at the ready. He isn’t sure of what to say, anyway. Eddie’s jokes aren’t as funny when they aren’t jokesanymore. He was just sort of professing his love to you and getting his heart stomped on in the process. He should probably be used to the feeling by now, but it stings like it’s brand new.

You���re grateful for Eddie’s appearance and the bickering that seems to follow him wherever he goes. It’s easy to get lost in his words, let all the sarcasm run over you, and forget the bullshit that came before it.

“We should head back before the others think we got abducted by Vecna or something,” you urge, desperate to get away from these woods and from this moment.

Dustin listens to you without question because he always listens to you. And Steve listens because he wants an escape just as much as you do. He’d rather go back to Robin and all her “I told you so”’s than keep watching Eddie hold you like he is now.

“What do ya say we skip this joint and have our own fun out here?” the wild-haired boy jokes, already leaning down to press a kiss to your mouth.

“Eddie, don’t—” you huff, but otherwise don’t fight him. It’s only an innocent peck, a loud smack upon your lips, that makes Dustin mutter “gross…” under his breath as he walks away. 

And if he heard it, that means Steve heard it.

You keep your eyes open all the while. You feel a bit numb, actually. A little like you’ve just kissed a ghost. You feel as cold as one, as distant and not all there. Eddie holds your hand the entire walk back to the clearing, but you have a hard time feeling it.

You feel a bit like woods surrounding you. You’re all crowded and heavy with sadness. You can’t tell if your grief is your own or if you’re feeling Steve’s too, because you can’t seem to take your eyes off him.

There’s an entire forest within you, you find, and Steve’s carved his initials into every tree.

[morganbritton132]

Eddie starts a live stream by sticking his head into the living room where Steve is looking for something to watch on Netflix like, “Do you want to go on an adventure with me?”

Steve is reluctant to go because Eddie won’t give him any details about it but ultimately gives in because well, it’s Eddie. His reservations return when he gets in the car and Robin is sitting in the backseat, and when he asks about it Eddie just says that she’s there for ‘damage control.’

Like, “What the hell does that mean? She’s not calming and have you seen her walk? She is the damage.”

“Hey!”

“Rob, I love you but that’s true. She’s here for emotional support.”

“What does that mean?!”

Eddie tells Steve to trust him and Steve gives in because well, again. It’s Eddie.

Steve would accompany Eddie to Mount Sauron, or whatever, any day of the week. So he puts his seatbelt on and gears up the playlist they made for when it’s the three of them in the car, and they drive.

Eddie explains to Steve and to his live-stream that he’s doing an impromptu meet-and-greet at a mystery location. He’ll drop some hints over to the course of the drive and if it’s your area and you can figure it out, come out and meet him.

Steve thinks that’s actually a pretty cool idea and thinks it’s great that Eddie is interacting with his fans again after all the death-threat drama. He pokes Eddie in the arm and tells him, “That’s really cool, babe.”

Eddie flashes him a grin that doesn’t quite gel with the nervous tapping of his fingers, but that thought slips from Steve’s mind when Robin punches him in the arm and points, “Look, cows.”

Steve smiles, “I’m naming that one Kirby.”

“It looks more like a Janine.”

Other highlights of the road trip live stream include the three of them absentmindedly singing along to Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls, the three of them singing passionately to Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, rest-stop stopping so Ozzy can get out and run around for a bit, and Steve outlawing Punch Buggy after Robin and Eddie punched him in the arm three times in a row.

The whole time Eddie keeps dropping vague little hints like ‘taking it back to where it all begins’ and ‘we’re treading old territory’ and Steve initially thinks that they’re heading to the bar in Indianapolis where Corroded Coffin was discovered. So maybe he didn’t really pay attention to the rest of Eddie’s clues or maybe he’s really bad at connecting the dots because he feels winded when they come upon the Welcome to Hawkins sign.

He feels increasingly more winded when they turn down streets that have changed a lot but feel the same. He doesn’t notice how the car went quite or how Eddie keeps sneaking glances at him, just the streets they’re taking. Every turn they take that he’d taken a hundred times before.

“Eddie,” Steve breaths out like he’s just taped the pieces to a treasure map together and discovered ‘X’ was home all along. He inhales in time with the click of the blinker as they turn onto Loch Nora, “What’s going on?”

Eddie doesn’t actually answer that question until after they’re parked outside of Steve’s childhood home. He doesn’t answer until after he gets out of the car and circles the other side, and he holds Steve in his arms.

He says, “You told me that you will never work through this thing with your mom until you understand why she’s like this. If she won’t come to you, babe, then you gotta go to her. You gotta do this to get peace.”

Steve is always shaking his head no because he can’t. He can’t just walk up to her door after twenty years and asks her for an explanation. He doesn’t even know how he’d – he doesn’t –

Eddie tilts Steve’s head up until they’re eye to eye and he tells him like he can hear all those half-formed questions in his head, “You are Steve fucking Harrington, baby. You fight monsters and you save the world, and you are brave beyond words. There are worst things out there than this, so you got this. You can do this.”

“It’s not going to be easy,” Eddie continues. “But it has never been easy, and… This is it, babe. This is the last battle you got to fight and then we leave it all behind. I’m sorry I tricked you, but you wouldn’t have come if I told you.”

Steve takes a deep breath and then another, and maybe a third. He shakes the nerves out of his fingers and he hugs Eddie as tight as he can without hurting him, and he says because he knows he’ll mean it later, “Thank you.”

“Take Oz with you,” Eddie tells him and kisses him in broad daylight like he was never able to do on this street. He tells Steve that his meet-and-greet is at high school, and that Robin’s going to stay here with the car, that they’re going to Hopper and Joyce’s after, “If you need anything, call me immediately.”

Eddie stays with Robin to watch Steve walk up to the door and knock. He doesn’t move an inch until the door is answered, and then he smiles at Robin, “That went better than expected, right?”

Robin asks, “Did you end your live stream?”

“Shit.” 

[novacorpsrecruit]

I’m With You

@steddielovemonth prompt: love is protection

wc: 1,061 | Rating T | cw: brief homophobia, fighting, wild Tommy Hagan appearance

Steve didn’t know he was in love until it happened.

After the events of Vecna, Eddie’s near death experience and Steve’s matching infected bat bites, the two grew closer. They shared a hospital room, pumped full of morphine and antibiotics as they healed.

Eddie’s name was cleared, thanks to the shady government, but Eddie wasn’t sure if that was enough. Most of Hawkins had already looked at him funny. He wasn’t sure if the cover story of almost dying by the hands of Victor Creel like Chrissy, Freddie, Patrick and Jason would be enough to save his name. Steve’s told him plenty of times to not to worry about other people. If anyone bothers Eddie, Steve will protect him.

They made plans, lying in the hospital beds covered in bandages to move out of Hawkins before the end of the year.

And maybe morphine promises are all what they’re worth.

Two months have gone by, summer coming in full force. The two were near inseparable. Spending late nights in Eddie’s new trailer or in the Harrington home. Sharing a bed, maybe a little too close for just friends. Waking up to share breakfast or maybe lunch. Dinners with Wayne. Nights at the drive in. Steve wouldn’t trade this friendship for the world.

Steve was back working at Family Video, picking up extra shifts to get a little extra money stuffed away for their escape. They talked about moving out of Hawkins sooner. Eddie’s had a hard time finding work after graduating. Not many people wanted to be associated with him. He was lucky that he didn’t cause Wayne to be fired.

So often, he spends his time with Steve at work. Steve didn’t mind at all. It made the day go faster. He brightened up every time Eddie walks in, ready to bug Steve and Robin. Plus, if anyone gave Eddie any shit, Steve would be right there to help him.

Robin told him he’s hopeless. Steve didn’t quite understand that.

Not until now.

They were around the corner, taking their smoke break. They passed a single cigarette, something they do now, while they shoot the shit. Talking about nothing felt like talking about everything. Sometimes about the latest campaign Eddie’s planned. Or if they should look into a place at Indy or a place in Chicago. Or what they were going to do when Steve closed up for the night.”

“Gareth’s brother’s got a place in Chicago,” Eddie said, exhaling smoke. “He said we could stay with him for a few weeks while we look for a place.

“We could get jobs there,” Steve offered. “Earn a little more to get a place.”

“Yeah,” Eddie nodded. “You want to do it?”

“Yeah,” Steve said, taking the cigarette from Eddie’s hands and putting it to his lips. “Let’s do it.”

Eddie’s smile, big and wide with excitement, faded quickly as his eyes darted to the side. They weren’t alone.

“Harrington,” a familiar voice sneered. Steve turned to glare at Tommy, back from college. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

“At my place of employment?” Steve deadpanned.

“With him,” Tommy corrected. “I figured you’d still be chasing after Wheeler.”

Something in Tommy’s tone boiled Steve’s blood. “I’m on break, Tommy,” Steve said, inhaling on the cigarette, letting the smoke fall from his lips. “Go inside if you want something.”

“I want to know why you’re with him,” Tommy said, venom on his tongue. He took a step forward, into Steve’s space. “You’ve heard the rumors.”

“Steve,” Eddie said. “Let’s go inside.”

“Eddie was a victim of Creel,” Steve said, not stepping down from Tommy. “He didn’t do shit.”

“Not those rumors,” Tommy said. “The ones from school. Five dollar handy, ten for a blowjob, twenty for a — you get the picture.”

“Shut the hell up, Hagan,” Steve warned.

“How much you paying him?” Tommy asked, gesturing to Eddie. Then, something clicked in Tommy’s head as a smirk grew across his face. “I heard your dad cut you off. You making money from him?” Tommy shoved Steve’s shoulders, pushing him back against the wall. Hard. Steve felt his head hit the back of the brick building. Steve let out a gasp in pain. “You sucking his —“

Eddie had lunged forward, swinging his fist across Tommy’s face. His rings dug into his cheek, breaking skin. Tommy stumbled back. Eddie swung again. Tommy fell to the ground.

“Touch him again, Hagan,” Eddie spat. “I dare you.”

Tommy tried to stand up, Eddie shoved him back down. He wasn’t done.

“You lost him, Hagan,” Eddie snapped. “He’s never gonna like you like that. Go fuck yourself.”

Then, there were gentle hands on Steve.

“C’mon,” Eddie said softly, picking Steve up off the ground … When did he fall? The world felt like it was spinning and his only grounding touch was Eddie’s hand on his arm, guiding him in through the back door. A gentle hand came to the back of his head, with a slight hiss. “Shit.”

Steve was sat down at the breakroom, while Eddie grabbed paper towels from the bathroom. He pressed it against the back of Steve’s head, a slight sting was all Steve needed to know that Tommy broke skin.

“You with me, Stevie?” Eddie asked gently, kneeling down next to Eddie. His big brown eyes looking up at him with a look that made Steve feel whole.

“I’m with you,” Steve nodded, feeling Eddie keep pressure on the back of his head. “You’re with me.”

“I’m with you,” Eddie repeated gently. He brought his free hand to gently squeeze Steve’s thigh. “I’m with you for as long as you’ll let me.”

Then it hit him.

Steve loved Eddie.

He wanted to do everything he could do to protect Eddie. Fight off those who still believed in the rumors surrounding spring break, those who bullied him for being different, for being himself. Hell, Steve would fight a demogorgon for Eddie. He carried him through hell and back.

Eddie stood up for him. Eddie protected him from Tommy. Eddie fought back and won.

Maybe Eddie loved him, too.

Steve let himself fall into a carefree smile. He leaned his head, ever so gently until his and Eddie’s foreheads met. “For the record,” Steve said softly. “I’m never letting go.”

Eddie broke out into a grin. “That’s what I hoped for.”

[storiesbyrhi]

Witch!Reader x Bat/Vampire!Eddie Munson Series Masterlist The Grimoire The Timeline

Warnings: canon typical violence, horror genre typical violence/some infrequent gore, swearing, animal death, no beta, death in childbirth (mentioned, not described), abusive parents, suicide, spiders/bugs, grief/mourning; light smut; warnings updated each chapter.

Synopsis: No witch has stepped foot in Hawkins since 1845, but when Vecna opens the ground and poisons the town, a voice begins to call to you. Have you been brought back to this cursed place to heal the townspeople’s wounds, to save a hexed bat that always finds its way to you, or to redefine your history with a reunion 150 years in the making?

Chapter Summary: Homeward bound. 2738 words.

1986

Every now and then, you’d catch a glimpse of Eddie swooping by, keeping pace with your car. It was mid-afternoon by the time he grew tired, burrowing into his front seat nest and sleeping until twilight. As soon as the sun was safely locked away on the other side of the world, Eddie chittered and you responded by turning him back into himself.

He stretched out, making dramatic noises and pulling faces.

“You okay there?” you asked him, laughing at the show of it all.

“Only trying to make you smile, my little witch.”

Damn.

“So, you were right,” you changed the subject. “About not being the only non-witch,”

“Wolf, right? I could smell him.” Eddie’s face screwed up in disgust.

“What happened to the support group for monster lovers?”

“I draw the line at lycans.”

The seriousness of his expression made you laugh. “Well, you’ll have to redraw it, because Ev has it bad for him. The others already knew all about it too,”

“And we believed we were special,”

“I mean… We still are… Witches and werewolves aren’t mortal enemies…”

“Of course. Wolves’ mortal enemy being their own tail and all,”

“Eddie! Stop,” you laughed, hitting him with the back of your hand.

He grinned at you, then looked out at the road. “And the other?”

“That one is a bit more of a secret. Ash is seeing one of the fae folk. It’s still very new. Taking it slow… Making sure they’re not actually trying to lure her into some centuries old curse. You know how they are,”

“Trickster sprites,”

“Exactly,” you nodded. “And then there’s Steve fucking Harrington… who has elected to inexplicably haunt Mel,”

“Why? I assume he never met her,”

“Yep, but she came and asked me if the ghost in her house was him. It was. He says he’ll leave her alone but had this stupid puppy dog look on his face… So… Maybe there is a whole new world of witch romances to come.”

Eddie grinned, he liked the sound of it. Though, he really didn’t want a werewolf as a brother-in-law. “Do you want me to take over?” he asked then, pointing to the steering wheel. “I’ve been practicing,”

“And here I was thinking you disappeared in the middle of the night to eat,”

“Oh, I do. I find the worst person I can. I eat them. Then, I take their car for a lesson,”

“A two birds, one stone, kind of thing, huh?”

Eddie nodded with a disconcertingly innocent smile on his face.

“I was thinking about that actually. I think I can help,”

“With which part?” he asked. “The eating or the thieving,”

“Neither. The choosing.”

The joy left Eddie’s expression. He looked away from you, suddenly studying the hardly visible horizon out his window. “You don’t need to be a part of it. You don’t have to have it on your conscience,”

“Neither do you. Not in the same way, at least. What if I can take some of the guesswork out of picking who is, you know, bad,”

“It’s not guesswork. I watch them. I find them while they’re-”

“I know. But what if you didn’t have to wait for them to do something bad? What if you could tell what they had already done?”

Eddie stayed quiet. There was a gas station up ahead, the lights shining brightly. You pulled in and cut the engine.

“I know it’s always going to be on you. You’re always going to have to make that call, about if they have sinned and if the sins are…”

“If they justify death,” Eddie finished for you solemnly and still not looking at you.

“Yes. But what if you could see them? The sins. If you could, I don’t know, just touch someone and see the worst of them. And only when you wanted to. Would that help?”

He was clicking two fingernails together, pensive or maybe anxious. Eddie got out of the car and looked around. There was a family inside the gas station. The kids were screaming about peanut butter cups and soda.

“Would it help you?” he asked after you’d got out and walked around to him. His hands were shoved into the pockets of the sweatpants he’d been getting in and out of, vampire then bat then vampire then bat. “It might make it more precise. But it’s still conjecture. Still a judgment. Still a human death.”

You tried to read him, but he’d locked you out for the moment.

He continued, “Sometimes it hurts. Or, sometimes I think it hurts. Or, I think it should hurt. I don’t know if I can tell the difference. I don’t want to hurt anybody. I can stop myself from hurting them. But I don’t know, really know, if it weighs on my conscious. I don’t even know if I have one.”

It had been easy to get lost in Eddie’s goodness. It had been the important thing to show your coven. But it was never going away, the darkness. He might have been a good vampire, not a properly made monster, but it didn’t change the fact that he was still a vampire.

“If I say it would help me-”

“Then, I am sure, it would help me. What is good for you is good for me,” Eddie told you. “But I can tell which of them are more like me than you. I can see it in their faces. But if this makes you feel more in control of it, then I’ll do anything you ask of me.”

The neon sign of the station buzzed and crackled, the cicadas trilling back at it. The family got in their car and hit the road again, the radio turned right up to drown out the noise of bickering children.

You could see the station’s clerk watching you and Eddie from behind his counter.

“Loving you doesn’t make me feel guilty. I’m not ashamed of what you are,” you told Eddie then, looking back at him. “I’m not trying to make you into something you’re not.”

He nodded. “I know.” He saw it on your face, a flash of exasperation. “What are you trying to do?” he asked. “Because I’m not ashamed of what you are either… You don’t have to be a lawful, virtuous witch.”

There was a small smile playing on Eddie’s lips and you knew it meant he’d cottoned on to the fact that the seed of darkness that lived inside you was working its magic.

“It’s not just about making things easier for you or for me. It could be… A kind of justice…”

“Ohhh,” Eddie almost laughed. “I am your weapon, and if you can point this blade in the right direction, then well fuck, it might work faster than the humans’ courts and witches’ spells?”

Eddie had only recently started to swear, a habit he was picking up from you most likely. Fuck, in particular, sounded terribly good coming from his mouth.

You looked at him and slowly nodded. He threw his head back and laughed into the night. The gas station clerk sighed in relief at the sudden change of atmosphere around you both.

“Oh, my little witch. You do continue to delight me.”

Eddie pulled you into a rough kiss, letting the tips of his sharpest teeth run along your bottom lip. You were warm and tasted so sugary. He had been itching to eat you up since leaving the Catskills.

“I love you,” you said breathlessly when he let you come up for air.

“I love you too. Entirely.”

…

Waking up alone was bittersweet. Although you missed the weight of Eddie next to you, the immediate crawl of his body to yours, it did mean he was likely up to something. Mostly, it was innocent domestic work.

Pre-turning, Eddie never really had a place to call his own. As a vampire, the idea of home meant something different too. But now, the boy could nest. He cleaned and picked flowers to put in vases and glasses all across the trailer. He was also dabbling in cooking, though he could not eat the fruits of his labor.

So, mostly, it was domestic work, but now and then, you would wake up to him doing something different. A week after returning from the Catskills, you and Eddie had fallen back into routine, but this morning was out of the ordinary.

Eddie had stacks of books crowded around him. Pages of handwritten notes were spilled across the coffee table, your altar supplies stacked neatly below it.

“Looking very witchy there,” you greeted, voice gravelly with sleep.

“Hi, my love,” he replied without looking up. “I’m almost finished.”

Looking around, you realised it wasn’t just the books Eddie had been combing through. Herbs and other potion-brewing bits and pieces were lined up along the kitchen bench.

“Almost finished what?” you asked.

“The spell.”

Nodding slowly at him, you waited for the explanation. It never came. Instead, you let him work on his craft and went about your day.

By mid-morning, he was ready.

“Little witch!” Eddie yelled loudly. You were outside, watering your potted plants and herbs. “Little witch! Come!” There was childlike enthusiasm in his voice and it made you smile.

“Where do you need me?” you asked him, but he was already ushering you to the couch.

“I have written you a grounding spell,” he announced.

“A grounding spell?”

“Yes. Something to reconnect you to the natural world. To promote health and healing.”

Eddie was wide-eyed and on the verge of mania. He had a little dirt smeared across his cheek, and it was caked under his nails. Although his hair was pulled back in a bun, single coils of curls had fallen out throughout the night. He was beautiful.

“Go on,” you urged.

“It starts with malus domestica,” he began.

“It always does,” you noted, already holding back a giggle. He could have just said apple. Still so very dramatic.

“They connect you to the earth. Sacred. Biblical.” He really had been doing his homework. “Then, black hellebore root.” Eddie was at the kitchen bench, holding up a jar that he’d already dug through. That explained the dirt.

“I hope you’ve been careful with that,” you warned.

“I know. Extremely toxic. Even witches sometimes wear gloves to handle it,” Eddie said, reciting one of the books he’d read. “But it is also symbolic of rising from the past. And has a long history of use in witchcraft.”

Eddie had read about hellebore poisoning, how it brought on hallucinations but could also cure mental affliction. He read about how it could be harnessed and used in banishing spells and for purification. About white versus black hellebore and all the folklore surrounding them.

“Okay. What do we do with this apple and root?” you asked, playing the part of a captive audience.

“Core the apple and thread the root through it. Let it air overnight, by moonlight. Come morning, it gets wrapped in willow then cooked,”

“Willow?” you tested.

“Willow that is strong and true. Willow that takes pain and fever and grief and releases you from it.”

You nodded and smiled.

“When the apple is cooked through, falling apart, you take the hellebore root and powder it,”

“Then what?”

Eddie hesitated. “Alas, I do not know…” he admitted. “I can’t find a way to close the spell,”

“Do you have any ideas?” you asked, standing up and coming to the kitchen counter. You looked at everything he had pulled out of the apothecary.

“Moreso, bad ideas. What not to do. Consume it, for example,”

“Yeah. That could kill me. Maybe even turn me into a werewolf,” you joked. The look on Eddie’s face was priceless. “Kidding. Hellebore is an active ingredient in lycanthropic ointment though… Mostly it’s used in what we used to call flying ointment, or magic salve. So no, I cannot consume it,”

“Yes… Well… I thought then, returning it to the earth. Burying it. That didn’t feel right,”

“Mmmhmm… I think you have a clue here,” you told him, pulling a bowl of eucalyptus seed pods forward. “Did you read about these?”

Eddie shook his head.

“They’re kind of amazing. Eucalyptus trees are native to Australia, but are planted ornamentally around the U.S. They produce a highly combustible oil through their leaves. Little fire bombs, basically. They catch ablaze easily. But, these little seedpods are fireproof, and when threatened with fire, they drop lots of seeds and fertilise the scorched ground. Within a couple of years, the burnt earth is already returning to its gloriously green form,”

“Very smart of them,”

“Very smart,” you agreed. “Maybe we can learn from them. We can not just withstand the blaze, but add fuel, let it all burn, and start again,”

“The powder… we let it go free…” Eddie said slowly, catching on to what you’re saying.

“Ah-huh. We give it to the wind.”

Working side by side, you and Eddie cored apples and filled the void with black hellebore root. You set them on the kitchen windowsill ready for the moonlight. (You’d have to take down all the window’s covers though, sunproof house and all.)

Eddie was proud. It was written all over his face.

“Now who’s the little witch?” you whispered to him, stepping up to his body, pressing yours to his.

In reply, Eddie pulled you close, wrapping his arms tightly around your frame. He kissed the top of your head then pressed his cheek to it, resting on you.

“Thank you. Nobody has ever written a spell for me before… Well… Not a good one…” You looked up at him. “You are good, Eddie. And you’re allowed to be. You can be… both. Everything,”

“Everything,” he repeated quietly.

“Yeah… So… What now? We can’t work on them until tomorrow.”

Eddie swept you off to the bedroom by the time you opened your eyes after your next blink.

“But it’s not bedtime,” you said voice saccharine and purposefully dumb.

Eddie grinned. “It’s not. I don’t want you to go to sleep now anyway,”

“No?” You sat on the edge of the unmade bed, looking up at Eddie.

He stood between your legs, reaching out to cup your face in his hands, his thumbs running softly across your skin. He smiled wide, teeth sharp. “I’m very, very hungry.”

Eddie rarely let himself taste your blood, though the occurrences were becoming more regular. He was scared of a multitude of things. Not being able to stop. Seeing something in your magic blood he couldn’t unsee. Pissing off some ancient and unknown creature that would resurrect if ever a vampire munched on a witch.

Sometimes, if you begged pretty enough, you’d get a small bite out of him. But it was better when he came asking for it. The soft inner thigh was his greatest weakness.

Lifting your arms up, Eddie followed the instruction and took your shirt off. You fell back against the bed and let him push your skirt up. He dropped to his knees and kissed the tops of your thighs. Up, up, up, until his mouth was bruising the skin above where the femoral artery was pumping blood.

You still didn’t know how he did it, how he could make it feel so good. You didn’t want to know. It was his own secret vampire magic and it was one mystery that would never appear on your murder board.

Eddie’s teeth sank in and your hot, red blood began to flow. He pushed you further back on the bed, then held your leg up, so the blood would pour down towards where you were already wet. His tongue lapped at blood and arousal fast. He didn’t waste a single drop.

You writhed under him, eyes screwed shut, and body on fire. The vibration of his tongue was pulling you ever closer to climax, but he wouldn’t stay in one spot long enough to let you get there.

Eddie grabbed your hand and smashed it to where he’d bitten you. “Heal it,” he growled, barely able to form words. You did what he said and he licked your palm clean of blood as a thank you. He hooked his arms under your legs and ripped you back to the edge of the bed. Then, he was positioned exactly where he needed to be to let you get there.

End Note: We're back in Hawkins... Now what? Reblogs and comments are appreciated!

Fic Taglist:  @paranoidmunson  @idkidknemore @paprikaquinn @stardustworlds @loz-brooke @wyverntatty @vintagehellfire @dark-academia-slut @scarletwitchwhore @becks1002 @mrsdollardog @heyndrix @luceneraium @rosaline-black @devilinthepalemoonlite @goldencherriess @iamwhisperingstars @wiltedwonderland @blueywrites @breezybeesposts @jadehowlettthewolf @spikesvamp79 @foreveranexpatsposts @tortoiseshellspells @wingedpeachjudgegiant @stardustmunson @live-love-be-unique @fangirling-4-ever @reanimated-alice @b-irock @gh0stlybunnie @myown-worstenemy-2003 @woozzz @cyberxlust @hiscrimsonangel @buckysbarne @m00nlight101 @word-wytch @spicysix @briasnow-blog @goth-cowgirl-03

All Eddie Taglist: @solomons-finest-rum @ruinedbythehobbit @sweetpeapod @thorfemmes  @corrodedhawkins @grungegrrrl @lilzabob  @averagemisfit03 @ches-86 @ilovecupcakesandtea @onehotgreasymechanic @hazydespair @mel-the-fangirl @eddies-hid3out @siren-lungs @aheadfullofsteverogers @hiscrimsonangel @dashingdeb16 @cultish-corner

[lavenderstobins]

Here’s a masterlist of all the Stranger Things fics I’ve posted! Mostly Robin/Nancy and Steve & Robin 💜

Last updated: 21/09/24 | AO3 | Twitter | ☕️ Ko-Fi

🪻Highlights

➤ love will tear us apart Steve & Robin | T | 12k Robin gets Vecna'd. ➤ leave the speaker on and stay Steve & Robin | T | 8.6k | stobin month 2023 Steve and Robin meet in 1984 instead. ➤ through the years we all will be together (if the fates allow) Steve & Robin | T | 19.6k Steve and Robin work on Christmas. Everyone brings a little bit of Christmas to them.

🩵 Series

Josieverse

Robin raising her daughter

➤ bright as the morning sun Steve & Robin & Josie | G | 1.4k | stobin month 2024 A slice-of-life oneshot revolving around Robin, Steve and Josie.

➤ here's to my future (here's to my yesterday) Steve & Robin & Eddie | T | 3.3k Robin’s three months pregnant and still only two people know. They’ve been invited to Dustin’s Halloween party, though. She can keep it a secret. Probably.

➤ all for freedom and for pleasure Steve & Josie & Eddie | G | 0.8k Eddie discovers that Robin’s daughter has learnt how to blackmail people.

➤ what you fear the most Steve & Robin & Josie | G | 1k Steve comes home to find Robin and her daughter Josie seemingly trapped.

➤ somebody that you used to know Robin/Valerie, Steve & Robin | M | 1.9k Before Josie was born—before everything changed—Robin had had something with Valerie. Nothing serious, nothing labelled, but it mattered all the same.

Spider-Man AU

Steve and Robin grapple with being superheroes

➤ in the web that is my own, i begin again (WIP) Steve & Robin | T | 5/11 | 29.3k Steve has powers. Robin doesn't... yet.

Dragon Age AU

Stranger Things in the world of Thedas

➤ in war, in peace, in death Steve/Eddie, Steve & Robin, Robin/Nancy | T | 7.8k Steve realises Robin's alive, trapped in the Fade.

Apocalypse AU

On top of everything else, there's zombies

➤ HOW TO SURVIVE THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE: A GUIDE BY DUSTIN HENDERSON Dustin & everyone | G | 2.5k Dustin's guide to the apocalypse.

🌿 Multichapter Fics

➤ you're out of touch, i'm out of time Steve & Robin, Robin/Nancy, Steve/Eddie | T | 12/12 | 75.5k Steve and Nancy travel back in time to 1983 and try to fix things.

➤ one more or one less (WIP) Steve & Robin | T | 1/? | 2.5k After Starcourt, Steve realises that Robin's missing.

➤ holding my last breath (WIP) Nancy/Robin | M | 1/13 | 3.6k | A Scream AU When teenagers start being killed in Hawkins, Nancy’s determined to solve the mystery.

➤ chasing visions of our futures (WIP) Stevie/Eddie, Stevie & Robin, Robin/Nancy | T | 2/7 | 4k Stevie's dead set on nudging Robin and Nancy together. She's not expecting to realise her feelings for Eddie along the way.

➤ separation brings us awfully close Robin/Chrissy, Robin/Nancy, Chrissy/Nancy, Chrissy & Eddie | T | 3/3 | 9.8k Chrissy learns the hard way that Spider-Woman can’t save everyone.

➤ you’re someone (who knows someone i once knew) (WIP) T | 1/3 | 4.4k Steve Harrington dies. Decades later, Dustin Henderson resurrects him. This is not that story. That story’s already been told. No, this is about what comes after.

🍊 Oneshots

➤ you got light in your eyes Steve & Robin | T | 7.2k | Sequel to Out of Touch Steve can't stop thinking about what Mr. Hauser had told him about Robin.

➤ the pleasure, the privilege is mine Steve & Robin | T | 7.6k Robin won’t let Steve go alone. Not even at the end of the world.

➤ share the same space for a minute or two Robin/Nancy | G | 2.4k Nancy isn’t yet sure what to do with herself now that the world isn’t ending. Robin helps.

➤ the future's unwritten, the past is a corridor Nancy & Eddie, Steve & Robin, Robin/Nancy, Steve/Eddie | T | 26.3k Robin and Nancy have just moved into their new house with their son, next door to Steve, Eddie and their daughter.

➤ guess i'm a coward (i just want to feel alright) Steve/Eddie, Eddie & everyone | T | 7.2k When the bats attack, Eddie sticks to the plan, and he runs, and he lives. He thinks, maybe, that he’ll hate himself forever for it.

➤ cracks in your ceiling Robin/Nancy | T | 9.9k Nancy has a movie night with friends, invents a new disease, and quite possibly has her life ruined by Sigourney Weaver.

➤ now i've found a real love  Robin/Nancy, Nancy & Mike | T | 8.7k Nancy Wheeler deserves a good Christmas. In fact, they all do.

➤ used to be you but now it's you and me Steve & Robin | T | 2.4k | twin stars stobin zine contribution It's only natural to cry on your birthday.

➤ 'cause i'm gonna be free and i'm gonna be fine Steve & Robin | T | 7.5k Two decades after the Upside Down closes for good, Steve's daughter goes viral on TikTok, and things quickly escalate from there.

➤ this dream isn't feeling sweet Lucas & Robin, Robin/Vickie | T | 13.1k Lucas finds himself struggling at the post-championship game party.

➤ there’s joy not far from here (i know there is) Steve & Robin, Steve & Robin & the party | T | 3.7k Steve, Robin and the party have an important discussion about homophobia.

➤ this is how we'll dance Steve & Robin & Eddie, minor Robin/Carol, Steve & Dustin | T | 1.8k Prom night 1985 from Robin, Eddie and Steve's perspectives.

➤ hold onto hope if you got it Wayne & Eddie, Wayne & Everyone | G | 2k When the trailer park is destroyed, Wayne loses his mug collection of twenty years. Eddie decides this is unacceptable and must be rectified.

➤ you will surely be the death of me  Steve & Robin, Steve & Robin & The Party | G | 4.4k When Eddie plans to go out of town, Robin and Steve finally agree to play a D&D campaign, on the following conditions: 1) it’s one session, and 2) Robin’s the DM.

🌹 Smut fics

➤ if this feeling flows both ways Robin/Nancy | E | 9.1k Nancy accidentally receives a sext from Robin and can’t stop thinking about it.

➤ i’d suffer hell if you’d tell me Robin/Nancy | E | 8.8k It’s been a while since Nancy’s had time alone with Robin. She intends to make the most of it.

🌸 Rarepairs

➤ every time it rains Steve/Kali | G | 1.6k Kali wouldn't class herself as someone fond of walks, but she is fond of Steve.

➤ neck full of mockingbirds (WIP) Robin/Carol | E | 9/? | 7.5k Carol and Robin, from start to end.

➤ i wanna be adored Nancy/Eden | G | 1.9k Nancy's lonely. Eden's there.

[badpancakelol]

“No!”

The sound pierces through the sky. 

And, you know, they’ve lost before. Barb had died, and Bob was killed, and Billy was torn apart, and Alexei was murdered, and Eddie was mauled, and Max died in a coma. They know loss like an old friend, unwelcome, unwilling to let him in, but he forces through regardless.

They know the Upside Down. It screeches and it takes, and it breaks everything in its wake. They know how to fight it. With little girls with superpowers, too young, too battle hardened, nail bats in hand, guns cocked, fists raised. They know this. 

(He thought they knew this. Thought that this was all they ever had to fight).

Time moves slowly around him. Will’s face is falling in the doorway to safety, and El is dropping to her knees, and Jonathan is racing to the spot that was once occupied with—

Steve.

His body drops to the ground, the back of his head crunching against the road. And then time is moving at ten times speed, and Hopper just wants to be able to fast forward, skip this part, forget it, pretend it never happened, skip this part, please, please, please.

It feels like he’s watching himself move around in the madness of it all. He registers his hands reaching for the forgotten gun limp in Steve’s grasp, slips it back into the holster. Jonathan is on his knees and sitting the kid up, and Hopper is grabbing onto his shirt, his arm, lugs him back to the house.

“Barricade the door!”

It’s not him who says it. It should be. He should be commanding these kids, just kids, oh god, and Steve is still laying limp against his arms. Hopper sees Will push the plates and the food, Steve’s cooking, Joyce’s drinks, across the table, tumbling to the floor. He hears the slide of bookshelves and couches and heavy furniture behind him.

“Get him up, get him up!”

And Jonathan and Hopper are pulling Steve up onto the table, laying him down as gently as they can, blood stains and horror and love taking over. It feels like he’s been thrust back into his body, because as soon as Hop lays his eyes on Steve’s face, his forehead, he breaks. 

He turns away, tears his eyes away from the body of the kid, to look at Jonathan and Will and El. 

(The kids who have just lost their mother, the kids who have just lost their friend, preparing for battle and victory and death).

Hopper turns the safety on for the gun. Wishes that he could throw it out the window and never see it again, because it was all his fault, his weapon, his fault—

They know loss. 

And they know the Upside Down. They know the two to be so incredibly interconnected, taking and taking and never giving anything back, and Hopper never thought, should have thought, should have known better, that it wasn’t going to be the Upside Down that killed Steve Harrington.

(He should have noticed. He should have payed more attention. Maybe if he had just talked to him, and reassured him, and made sure that he was held in the way he held the kids, urged him to move out of Hawkins, told him that he was proud—)

“El. El, he’s not—”

“No, he can’t, I’m not letting him—”

“Please, El, please—”

“I— I brought Max back, I can. I can do it! Please, let me—”

Hop turns back to the scene. Of El pressing her palms against Steve’s face, painted in red, rivers flowing down his cheeks. Jonathan, hand on her shoulder, arm around his brother, averting his eyes. Will, pleading and begging, arms reached out for anyone.

“He’s gone.” Hopper says. “Kid, he’s— he’s not coming back.”

(He hits fast forward. 

They make a battle plan. Will calls the party. They make their way to the Byers house. Robin is the first one there, and she’s snuck around the back. She makes her way in, armed with an axe, bag slung across her shoulder, and her face is hard and determined, and she’s opening her mouth and then her eyes swing across to the living room, to Steve. 

And she stops. And Hopper places his hand on her shoulder. And she crumples to the ground. And then Jonathan had made his way over, and lowered himself, and Will was standing in the doorway, and El was still holding Steve’s hand, and the rest is a blur.

Nancy came, at some point. Last. After everyone else was inside the home. Had taken one look at everyone’s faces, the lack of Joyce and the lack of Steve, of warmth, of love, reassurance. Built her walls up, made a plan, didn’t cry, didn’t waver, until after they had won.

Won. They had won. 

Why doesn’t it feel like it?).

At the end of it all, the edge of the world, the wisps of monsters disappearing into cracks in the ground, Hopper cries. When he closes his eyes he sees it, feels it replay in his head. Spine against pavement, gunshot ringing in his ears, a skull against road. 

The sun makes its way up. Hopper can feel it through the broken window in the Byers house, tries to think, to stop thinking, to rationalise. What does he do now? What is he meant to do now?

Steve’s body lays cold against the table. Hop checks his watch. It’s nearly been a full day since—

He runs his fingers through Steve’s hair. Tries to imagine a smile on his face. Hop grabs a rag from the kitchen, runs it under the sink. He sits down next to Steve’s face, presses it gently against his face.

I’m sorry, he wants to say. I’m sorry I wasn’t here. I’m sorry I didn’t notice. 

The world flickers in and out of view, and Hopper wonders if this is what dying feels like. He sees flashes of smiles and death, laughs and tears. He sees an image of Joyce, fringe in her eyes, hands holding his, mouth moving in a word that he cannot hear. He sees El, hair above her shoulders, wearing a patterned jumpsuit, dancing with Max. 

He sees Sara. He sees her laughing with her mother.

And then the images are slowly fading, swirling and twirling, like blood washed down the drain. Hopper feels like he should grasp onto them, hold them close to his chest, but he lets them go. Watches them mesh and mould into—

Nothing.

— — —

The kids are all crowded around in the cabin, tucked between the couch and the floor. They have pillows and blankets and sleeping bags strewn across the small space from the armchair to the TV, and it’s messy — popcorn and spilled soda, and Hop is pretty sure that his favourite flannel is being used as a towel.

It was an effort, fixing the cabin. There was a hole in the roof from where the physcial Mindflayer had broken through and tried to kill everyone, but Hopper tries not to think about it too hard. It took a while for everything to be habitable again, months of going to thrift stores and accepting gifts, and learning how to make furniture out of wood scraps.

It’s cosy, warm. Homey. 

The kids are all huddled together in a mess around their little nest that they’ve created, and they look happy. Hop thinks he can hear them gossiping about Steve and Eddie, has half the mind to tell them to knock it off, but their voices are filled with so much warmth.

“But it was so real—”

“Max, it’s probably just a nightmare.”

Hopper leans against the kitchen counter, pretends to be busy making breakfast. The kids voices have shifted, and they’re quiet, whispering, soft.

“No, I,” It’s Will. Soft-spoken. Hopper can barely make him out amongst the noises of the cabin. “I had one, too. A dream of Steve dying.”

It feels like a cool flush has taken over him. The pancake mix is abandoned as he turns around to walk towards the kids. The image of Steve laying across the dining table, of wiping away his blood with a wet cloth, of Sara and Joyce and El and Nothing flooding into the forefront of his brain.

“Will,” He swallows. “Did it happen at your house?”

The kids have turned to look at him. They look warm and safe and complete, and Hopper hopes to god, hopes to anyone that will listen, that the thought he had was just that. 

“Yes. You and Jonathan and El were there, and Steve was—”

“I saw it, too, kid.”

Hopper sits on the ground near them all. Brings Will close in his arms. They don’t cry, don’t speak. The rest of the party shift, correct themselves to hold each other, not crying. 

Max is looking at Hopper, eyebrows drawn, before she’s speaking, “We should tell him.”

There are murmurs of agreement throughout the group, but they stay like that, holding each other, mourning a death that doesn’t exist, mourning for someone who fought so hard for them to live.

(Later, Steve knocks on the door, and the kids are mildly apprehensive and melancholy. Hopper watches as his eyes dance around the room, realises the down mood, adjusts and smiles and laughs and plops himself down into the nest of warmth and blankets.

Nobody says a word. Maybe it’s because they see how hard Steve is trying (succeeding) to make them feel better, or because they don’t know how to approach the topic. He floats to the kitchen and uses the pancake mix, and serves breakfast, and laughs and jokes, eyes filled with so much love.

Hopper looks at the scar on his forehead, remembers the piercing sound of a gun, of body falling on asphalt).

— — —

He isn’t the one to tell Steve. Too busy with helping Enzo settle in, and filling in one year gaps with El. Hop goes to bed each night after the vision, the memory, and feels a blossoming of guilt eat through his skin. He tells himself it is because he’s too busy.

When he’s finally ready to confront Steve, to invite him over to the cabin and to talk about how things are starting to come back, how they are starting to remember his deaths— he receives a letter in the mail.

There are only a handful of people who knows where he lives, all of whom he trusts, so he knows it isn’t spam (laughs a little at the thought of spam mail and shitty tabloids tracking him down, just to advertise). 

The letter is sealed, chicken scratch handwriting with his name on the front. When he opens up the envelope, sits in the armchair by the TV, he wants to weep.

It’s a list. A long, long list. Each dot point is labelled with a number and a name, and Hop flicks through the pages until he reaches the end, sees over two-hundred entries. There are two copies within the envelope. One for him. One for El.

Deaths. It’s a list of Steve’s deaths.

(Hopper wants to cry, then. He wants to know which of the kids had to tell their Steve about what they had saw, that they had remembered. He flicks the envelope back over and catches Eddie’s handwriting, knows that, at least, Steve didn’t go through this alone).

There’s a small note, tucked behind the two lists. It’s written in Steve’s unruly handwriting, blocky and soft. 

“Turns out the scars aren’t done showing up, and I maybe-might-have-died a couple hundred times, and you guys maybe-might-be remembering my deaths? I’m really sorry about  I would say I’m sorry, but Eddie is a bully, and isn’t allowing me to.”

Hopper laughs. He’s glad that, at the very least, Eddie is making sure that Steve knows this isn’t his fault. Was never his fault. He turns back to the note.

“We made a list, Eddie and I. It probably would have been a good idea to just… give you the deaths that you would be a part of, but that’s kinda a lot of work and it’s like, 2 AM or something. Everyone just gets the whole shebang. 

It’s… a warning? Caution? I don’t really know how or when you’ll remember it (or if you’ll even remember it at all!), but I just wanted everyone to be ready. I’m sorry that there’s so many pages.

Love,

Steve Harrington.”

-- -- --

or: chapter one of Steve Harrington's Deaths (And the Times He Maybe Saved The World).

[acowardinmordor]

So Steve gets grabbed and pulled through watergate. The girls hesitate for a moment longer, pause to grab a weapon, to tell the kids, something. They follow, but when they get there, Steve is gone. Not dead. Gone. They can see tracks and a bit of blood and a dead bat-thing, but no Steve. Of course they’re going to look for him, they wouldn’t just leave him, but the bats start to swarm over head, and the three of them have to run for the trees.

They look while they head for Nancy’s and they look while they bike across town, and they’re not abandoning him, but even Robin knows they need weapons and supplies if they’re going to search for real. She’s nearly hysterical when Nancy’s eyes roll back, and she is hysterical when Nancy tells them what she was shown.

The kids are trying not to make it obvious that this is harder without Steve. Eddie manages to act more confident than he is, and they make a plan. Somehow, they still decide to send Robin and Nancy after Henry, with Eddie and Dustin as a distraction.

Henry dies in time for Eddie to only be heavily bleeding, not on the edge of death, so he’s already limping back to the trailer when he hears Dustin scream. Not for him though.

Nancy and Robin were in trouble in the Creel house, nothing they were doing was having any effect. Then Steve showed up. Saved them. Helped them take down Vecna. He looks like crap, and says he’s starving, wants to get back to the real world as soon as possible, but he’s alive. Robin and Dustin and Steve are tangled in hugs every possible second.

And maybe it’s just because Eddie is recovering in the Harrington place. Maybe it’s because he didn’t care about him as much as the others do. Maybe it’s because he’s just flat out cursed in life, but it only takes a day or two for Eddie to be sure that whatever came back, it is not Steve Harrington.

[imfinereallyy]

cw: drugs, morally grey characters

The bathroom doesn’t give the kind of quiet Steve needs right now.

What should have he expected in a club on Friday night?

Fuck, think Harrington. What would Robin do?

She probably wouldn’t have gotten caught in the first place, that’s what. God she is going to kill him if he doesn’t check in later.

Steve takes a deep breath, trying to get comfortable on his spot on the toilet. His jeans are going to be disgusting later.

The bass thumped loudly throughout the bathroom. The walls shook as the music makes its way in as the door swings open with each patron rushing in out.

He is never going to get the kind of privacy he needs to get out of this.

The red glow of the lights seems more fitting for a place for people to fuck in rather than take a piss, but Steve supposes that maybe it’s the point.

Coming to blank, the point was to either get fucked or get fucked up.

Running his hands through his hair, Steve went over his options.

1. He has a knife in his boot. Steve isn’t afraid of the consequences of killing a man, his soul lost the right to be saved a long time ago. But he doesn’t feel too good about killing someone at random. Death should have a point if it is coming from the hands of a man. He’ll leave the pointless deaths up to a god he doesn’t believe in.

2. He can try and make a break for it. He only has a sea of partiers to get through, at least half of them on coke or molly. And make it to the parking lot without getting caught by security, and then find a way to get home.

Fuck.

3. Dump the drugs, flush them down the toilet. Worry about money later.

Considering the guy after him is a fucking FBI agent, and Steve would love nothing more to get rid of a glorified cop, he doesn’t feel like putting his face on the top of FBI’s most wanted list.

Flushing it is.

Steve takes the baggies of coke out of his pockets. Sure, he won’t go away for long if the agent caught him with it, but it will give the bureau an opportunity to try and get him to talk, and Steve despite popular belief isn’t fucking stupid. He isn’t going to talk.

Even if he wants to, Steve is sure that his head would have a pretty little bullet hole in it before he even steps into court for arraignment.

No matter who his father is. Maybe especially cause so.

Steve can feel the sweat start to pool at the bottom of his shirt. He hasn’t taken anything tonight, maybe he should thank that mythical god he doesn’t believe in for that one. But Steve’s stress is going up with the temperature of the room.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Steve stands and kicks up the rim of the toliet, he can’t afford to miss.

His head starts to pound with the base.

Bump. Bump. Bump. Slam.

The world crashes with noise. Steve has no time before his stall door is thrown open. Steve forgot to lock the fucking door.

Steve throws his hands up, baggies still in his hands, sweat dripping down his back. Chest heaving up and down, Steve is frozen at the sight in front of him.

It’s not the FBI, which is good.

It’s not his boss, which is better.

But in front of him, is one of the most beautiful men he has ever seen. A dark shadow lit up but the red lights. Long, curly black hair falls upon a red silk shirt. Tattoos, rings, piercings…everywhere. Big brown eyes staring directly at Steve.

Gorgeous…

Unfortunately he’s not only one of the most beautiful men out there….

“Hey there princess.”

…but also the most dangerous..

“I believe you have something that interests me.” The man all but growls.

Eddie fucking Munson.

Steve finds the courage to speak, “Yea, what’s that?”

A wicked grin spreads across his lips, “A ticket in.”

Steve’s worried he might have to make a deal with the devil.

🪩🫧🍸 🔪🥂🫧✧˖°

[hbyrde36]

Caught in the Undertow

Hi, 👋 Welcome to another old fic made new again! I promise this is my last re-write, but in similar fashion to Times Like These I found myself fixated recently on giving this fic the more practiced hand it deserves. I hadn't planned on posting much about it until the full re-write was done, but with the Steddie big bang deadline rapidly approaching, it's going to take a little longer than I thought. (And being a slut for encouragement, I figured why not start sharing the first 5 redone chapters now while I work on the rest, in hopes someone will enjoy it.)

Summary:

Against all odds, Steve Harrington saved Eddie Munson from certain death. And Eddie doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to forgive him for it.

Chapter One

WC: 1980 | R: Explicit | TW: Suicidal ideation/depression | Ch 1/10 | AO3

~Eddie~

On some level, Eddie had always sort-of wanted to die. 

He never planned it out, and he wouldn’t actually do anything about it—probably—but he fantasized about it a lot. 

Which was maybe something he should unpack with a therapist at some point, but that type of thing wasn’t really in the budget for a kid who lived in a trailer park and sold a little weed on the side for extra cash.

Sometimes, on the really bad nights just before falling asleep, he found himself wishing, praying even, not that he really believed in such things, to just not wake up again. And deep down he knew that if he were ever faced with the opportunity to bow out, so to speak, especially in a way that wouldn’t burden anyone—bonus points for a blaze of glory—he’d take it.

The idea came to him as he was helping Dustin to climb up the sheet rope and into the safety of the right-side-up, the thumping sound of the bats throwing themselves into the sides of the trailer, trying so desperately to get in, grating on his already frayed nerves.

It had truly been the week from hell. 

He was cold, dirty, and scared. Overwhelmed with the new reality he’d been forced to accept with exactly zero time to process, and having to come to terms with the fact that there’d been a whole other world existing right under his feet for fucking years, all while on the run from the cops, as well as a community calling for his head on a pike. 

It left him with that all too familiar feeling—weary down to his bones in a way that no nap or good night’s sleep could ever cure.

It wasn’t even a debate in his mind.

Eddie pulled his switchblade out from one of the many pockets on the snazzy green vest Harrington had picked up for him from The Warzone, and slashed the rope, ensuring that Dustin couldn’t follow him—ensuring the kid’s safety before rushing out into the dark to lead the bats away.

Life sure was funny, he thought wryly as he mounted one of the bikes they’d left behind during their last jaunt into the Upside Down, it can take you to places you never even dreamed of, and yet you’ll still wind up exactly where you’re meant to be. 

He peddled as fast as he could, trying to get the bats as far away from the gate as possible.

This was it, the chance he’d always longed for, and at least this way he could leave knowing his life meant something. His sacrifice would keep Dustin safe, keep the demobats out of their world, and buy more time for Harrington and the girls to kill Vecna.

It was a win-win.

And really, what sort of life would he be going back to anyway?

Devil worshiper, cult leader, freak, murderer. It was too many labels, too many things to overcome, just too much, the way he’d always been too much. Too loud, too different, too broken for anyone to want to get too close. 

Worse—when he wasn’t busy being too much, he wasn't enough. Not smart enough, clearly. Who takes this many tries to graduate high school? Not a good enough son, if his parents dumping him on Wayne’s doorstep and never looking back was any indication.

Wayne.

Thinking of the older man caused a brief stab of guilt. Uncle Wayne would be sad when he was gone, no question. The old man wasn’t shy about his love for his only nephew, but honestly this was for the best for him too. One less thing to worry about, and one less mouth to feed. It couldn’t have been easy on his uncle all these years. Raising a kid was never easy, surely, let alone raising someone else’s, but Eddie had no doubt that he’d posed an especially unique challenge.

It wasn’t long before Eddie’s legs failed him, exhaustion making them feel like lead, slowing his pace to the point that the bats were right on his tail, the bulk of the swarm a swirling black cloud above him. One of the little fuckers peeled away from the group, swooping down to knock him from the bike. He flew over the handlebars, hitting the dirt hard, rolling several times before coming to a stop and scrambling back to his feet. 

Eddie screamed his pain at the advancing hoard, banging his shield and raising it against the onslaught of gnashing teeth and beating wings. 

He stood his ground. 

He didn’t give up.

He fought to the very end, until he was overtaken and brought to the ground, laid out like a feast for his unsightly foe.

Later—minutes or hours he had no sense of time anymore, as he lay there dying, soaking the ground beneath him as he bled out, Eddie wondered at his own actions. It must have been a reflex, some long dormant base instinct to survive popping up at the last second, because why else would he fight so hard when it would have made more sense to not? When the writing was on the wall, when this was what he wanted?

Eddie had wanted this.

Hadn’t he?

~Steve~

Steve was soaring. 

He was fucking ecstatic. 

They did it, they’d killed Vecna. 

They fucking won for once, their years-long nightmare finally over for good. 

He, Nancy, and Robin smiled at each other, laughing in hysterical relief as they bounded down the crumbling old steps of the Creel house, the criss-crossing vines that decorated nearly every surface laying dead and dormant. 

The walk back to Forest Hills was spent recounting every detail of their battle. Each one of Nancy’s expert shots, and every molotov cocktail that Steve and Robin had thrown. So sure he was that their little group had had the most dangerous job, save for maybe Max, it didn’t even cross Steve’s mind to worry about the others just yet. He couldn't wait to see Dustin's face, to celebrate this victory with him and the rest of the twerps. 

It wasn’t until they were nearly back to the trailer that he realized something had gone terribly, horribly wrong.

He heard Dustin’s cries long before he saw him, and Steve didn’t hesitate to take off running as fast as his legs would carry him in the direction of the sound, trusting that the girls would follow. 

Steve’s heart dropped when the scene finally came into view—Dustin with his head bowed, sobbing as he knelt over the lifeless body of Eddie Munson.

“What happened?” Steve asked, skidding to a stop at their side, dropping to his knees next to the younger boy.

“H-he said he was gonna buy more time. The bats started getting into the trailer and he made me go through the gate first—he made me—and then he cut the rope and then he—” Dustin's voice shook, his eyes shining and red rimmed as he raised his head to meet Steve’s gaze. “He’s gone.”

Those two words broke something inside Steve. 

He couldn't allow this, wouldn’t accept it. They fucking won goddamn it. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. If any one of them wasn’t going to make it out of this place alive, it should have been him, not Eddie.

“Not if I have anything to say about it.”

Steve bent over the prone figure, listening closely for any signs of breathing while pressing his fingers to Eddie’s neck to check for a pulse. He found neither at first but didn’t let that deter him. Eddie’s skin was still warm and Steve's hands were shaking, his own heartbeat pounding so loudly in his head that it could feasibly be drowning out signs of life.

He gently nudged a still silently weeping Dustin aside and began CPR. 

“What can I do?” Robin asked from his left. She and Nancy must have finally caught up, he hadn’t even heard their approach. 

Steve kept an even rhythm, concentrating all his effort on his compressions as he replied. “Find something to wrap his side, I think that’s where most of the blood is coming from. Then take Dustin back through the gate and call an ambulance. I want them waiting on the other side before I try to move him.”

Robin quickly jumped into action, slipping her jacket off to remove her button down, and with Dustin’s help began working it around Eddie’s middle.

“Steve," Nancy whispered his name, carefully, gently. She was kneeling down on Eddie’s other side, her ear practically pressed to his mouth. "He’s not breathing and he’s lost a lot of blood. I’m sorry, but did he even have a pulse when you got here?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said immediately.

“Steve–”

“Just go! Please, Nance.”

Steve wasn’t sure how much time had passed when Robin finally came back, and if Dustin had put up a fuss at being made to leave, he hadn’t heard any of it. His entire focus narrowed down to his hands on Eddie’s chest, pumping, his eyes locked on Eddie’s face as he counted to thirty, the taste of blood on his lips as he administered rescue breaths. 

Lather, rinse, repeat… 

“The ambulance is five minutes out, how do you want to do this?”

He could have kissed her in that moment—in the most sisterly way of course. 

She didn’t waste any time questioning if they should be doing this, or if Eddie’s condition had improved. Accepting that Steve had made up his mind and she was going to do everything in her power to help him make it happen. 

The thing was, Steve had felt a faint tap against his fingers the last time he’d checked, and he was 99% sure Eddie did have a pulse now, even if he hadn’t before, and it could have been his imagination but he could have sworn he heard the other boy take a few shallow breaths on his own too.

Together, he and Robin hauled over a piece of discarded corrugated metal, moving Eddie onto it as gently as possible, using it like a stretcher to carry him back to the trailer. 

Getting him through the gate was a bit trickier. Even more-so with the rope being cut, but Robin and Nancy had shoved a bunch of furniture under the hole in the ceiling, and Steve somehow managed to climb up the precarious tower one-handed while balancing their unconscious friend on his back.

When they made it to the other side, Steve carried Eddie in his arms all the way to the ambulance doors, insisting on riding along with them to the hospital. He must have been a sight, sweaty and out of breath, covered head to toe in muck and the other boy’s blood. The EMTs didn't even argue, except to insist Dustin come along too once they noticed his limp. 

Robin and Nancy followed behind in the RV, promising to pick up the others on their way so everyone could regroup at the hospital.

Things changed drastically once they arrived at Hawkins General, and the staff realized just who their patient was. Thankfully the paramedic in the ambulance had managed to stabilize Eddie before he was recognized. Steve shuddered to think about what might have happened otherwise.

Though unconscious and in critical condition, Eddie was treated like the dangerous criminal the whole town thought he was—handcuffed to his hospital bed, and an officer posted up at his door. 

No visitors allowed. 

Once Dustin was released, ankle wrapped and with orders to take it easy for a few weeks, their group was asked in no uncertain terms to leave. Told that no updates would be given on the suspect's condition.

Suspect. 

Steve wanted to throw up, but at least Eddie was alive. 

Chapter 2

Thanks and love to @penny00dreadful and @pearynice for all your help and encouragement with this.

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[artiststarme]

Don't Dream It's Over

Back at it again with the angst! I hope you guys like it and please leave your thoughts in the comments. (FYI Kleenex are recommended).

~*~*~*~

Steve had given a lot of thought into how he’d die. He had a lot of time alone that he could put towards thinking about the worst outcomes and circumstances. Usually, he would envision passing away in the empty house devoid of love and affections. He would imagine his house filling with dangerous levels of carbon monoxide that would take him out in his sleep. Or maybe a passerby convict would choose to rob his house and murder him, smother him in his sleep or something. His mind would whir over the plentiful possibilities that would result in a world with him no longer in it. 

On the bad days, his thoughts would get a little darker. He’d think about stepping off the quarry or getting too close to the edge and falling to his death. He’d think about drinking too much to experience alcohol poisoning and overdosing on pain medication. Sometimes, he would stare into the chlorinated water of the pool and consider sticking his head in the water until water filled his lungs. Morbidly, he wondered how long it would take for anyone to find him afterwards. With friends who didn’t care about him and parents that never came home, he wouldn’t be surprised if no one found him at all. 

After he found out about the Upside Down, he could only picture himself dying to save the kids. He’d get chomped on by a demogorgon or ripped apart by demo dogs while they ran away in the other direction. He would do anything to protect those brats, especially at risk of losing his own life. 

Every year he got closer to his thoughts becoming reality. Billy, the Russians, the demobats, with every fight he got closer to the end. It was like the entire universe was pitted against him, like he was just created to be a means to an end. As long as the kids survived though, he was fine with it. 

He hadn’t considered that he would die for a stranger. That he would put his life on the line in an effort to save someone other than the kids. But when he jumped in front of Eddie in the whirlwind of bats, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. He could feel Eddie fighting at his back but Steve continued to use himself as a human shield against the barrage of mutated creatures.

He wouldn’t change the skin that the bats were sinking their teeth into, wouldn’t exchange Eddie’s neck for his when the tail wrapped around the marks on his throat and started to suffocate him once again. Even as he screamed hoarsely when the bats dug further into the wounds in his sides, he wouldn’t change his decision to give his life for Eddie’s. 

Steve Harrington had thought a lot about his death throughout his life. He could only ever dream that he would go out in a blaze of glory, recognized and cherished by his friends. As he saw Eddie’s crying face above his and heard Dustin’s screams of desperation, he knew that his dreams had come true. His life was ending but at least it meant something, at least people noticed and would remember him. 

As his eyes slipped shut and the sounds faded from around him, he felt a flash of regret for thinking so much about his death. It would’ve been nice to focus on his life while he still had it. 

(He appreciates his life a lot more once he wakes up to realize he still has it… and a lot of explaining to do to his friends.)

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