callhermyname

[callhermyname]

he’s so pretty😭

[callhermyname]

you're not going | eddie munson x fem!reader - pt. 3

summary: after you find Eddie, you talk about the time you two first met.

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

wc: 3.8k

warnings: bit of fluff, angst, mentions of death, violence;

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It was New Year's eve, 1983. You were all at Eddie's trailer, waiting for midnight. The boys were a little drunk and you were a little tipsy yourself, but Eddie? He was full on wasted. Weed, beer, mushrooms, you name it, he took it.

You didn't really used to drink, but you needed to be at least a little drunk to do what you wanted to do. After the last events of the upside down and almost dying a couple of times, you figured life was too short and fragile for you to not shoot your shot with Eddie. Even though you're closer to Nancy, Jonathan and Steve now, you'd still hang out with Eddie all the time. It was unusual for a girl like you to hang out with Steve and Nancy's friends, so when it came to parties you only really attended the ones Eddie invited you to. He was kind, funny and loving to you in a way no one's ever been before, so it didn't take long before you found yourself falling for him. So, you figured you'd try to kiss him at midnight.

Jeff and Gareth were outside, setting up some fireworks Eddie had stolen from his neighbors. You and Eddie were in his room, he was barely able to keep himself up on his feet.

"Wooooah, hang in there big guy," you told him, trying to hold him so he wouldn't fall over. "That's enough shrooms for the night. Here, have some water."

"Thanks," he said as he sat down at the corner of his bed, taking the glass of water you'd handed to him. "I'm fine, doll, really. I'm just a little- it kinda feels like the room is spinning that's all. I guess I took the shrooms too early, they're already wearing out. It's just the weed now, I guess."

He looked at you with a goofy smile on his face that never fails to make your heart melt.

"Eddie, c'mon man, it's almost midnight!" you both hear Gareth call from outside. "It's all set, just need you to light 'em up."

"Shit, I don't think I can go outside right now," Eddie said, as he laid back on his bed. "Can you give him my lighter, so he can light up the fireworks?"

"Sure," you replied, grabbing the lighter on his bedside table and heading towards his bedroom window. "Hey, Gareth? Here, take this. He told you to do the honors."

"You sure?" he took the lighter from your hand through the window. "Damn, it's not even midnight yet and he's already that fucked up? Stupid bastard!" he chuckled, turning back and heading over to the fireworks. 

"Hey sweetheart," you heard Eddie calling behind you. "Can you do me a favor?"

"Sure, Eds. What's up?"

"Can you keep the window open? So I can watch the fireworks?"

"Yeah, of course."

You headed over to the bed, helping him seat up on the bed, his back against the wall. You crawled up on the bed, sitting beside him. 

"What are you doing?" he looked at you, confused.

"What do you mean?"

"Aren't you gonna go out there? See the fireworks?"

You shake your head.

"Nah, the loud noise kinda bothers me, I'd rather watch it from here." you turn your head so you could look at him. "Besides, I'm not letting you alone at midnight."

He smiles at you. A sweet smile, his cheeks blushing a little. You know it's probably the alcohol making its way up to his cheeks, but you let yourself think it may be because you're so close to him.

"Thanks," he says. "You're really sweet, you know that? Really really sweet, cute girl. Boop!" He stumbles over his words and boops your nose. Suddenly, you remember he's absolutely wasted.

Before you can say anything, you hear shouting and see the fireworks light up the sky outside Eddie's window. You look over to his bedside table clock.

"Hey, it's midnight!" you say, turning to look at him. 

"Would you look at that!" he looks at the clock and turns to look at you. "Happy New Year, pumpkin."

"Happy New Year, Eddie"

You look at his lips, then at his eyes, then at his lips again. This is it, you think. It's now or never. You lean in closer, slowly, watching as his eyes turn down to look at your lips and then up to look deep into your eyes again. Slowly, you start to move to close the gap between the two of you, brushing your lips over his, his warm breath tickling your nose. You wait for him to back off, but he doesn't. So you dive in, closing your eyes and giving him a gentle quick kiss on his soft lips. At first, when you back up, you expect him to get mad at you, yell at you or something like that. But he just stands still, looking at you with eyes wide as plates.

"Eddie…?"

He stays quiet, and you start to panic.

"Eddie, please say something. I'm sorry, I just figured because it's the New Yea-"

He cuts you off, holding your chin between his index and thumb and pulling you in for a deeper kiss. His lips feel soft and warm and he tastes like weed and cheap beer. You run your fingers through his hair, tugging it behind his ear and he moves his hand to cup the back of your neck, pulling you even closer. You try to open your mouth a little bit more so you can catch your breath and he takes the opportunity to slide his tongue in your mouth, wanting to taste you a little more. He deepens the kiss, now getting a little sloppy and kissing down your neck, humming against your skin, leaning into your shoulder. Then, he stops.

"Eddie?" you look down at him. "You okay?"

You try to look at his face, holding his head up, and then you realize he'd fallen asleep. He was really drunk and high, his voice was already sleepy when you took him back to his room earlier, so you figured it was better to let him get some rest. You held him in your arms, lying him back on his bed, resting his head over his pillow. Then, you climbed out of the bed and watched him for a second. He looked so peaceful, so beautiful. God, you could just watch him sleep for hours. You threw a blanket over him, making sure he would be warm enough for the night, then kissed his forehead before turning the lights out and leaving the room, hoping everything would be different the next morning. 

When you saw him again the next day, he just acted like nothing happened. You couldn't tell if he was just trying to pretend nothing happened so the boys wouldn't tease him or if he just didn't want to kiss you again and figured it would be easier to act like it never happened, so your friendship wouldn't be ruined, but you just thought it was better not to talk about it. You feared he'd be mad if you brought it up,  and you didn't want that, so you just sucked it up and never talked about it again.

—

When you first open your eyes, you're not sure where you are. Your body aches and your heart starts to race, you're shaking when you feel someone grab your wrist and you turn around, startled.

"Hey, you okay?"

You feel a sense of relief take over you when you hear Eddie's voice and see his face, returning to your senses and remembering now where you are.

"Yeah, sorry, totally forgot about the… uh… situation."

Eddie chuckles.

" 's fine.  You sleep okay?"

"I wouldn't say that… but at least I got some sleep. How 'bout you?"

He rubs his eyes. You can tell he's tired, dark  circles  forming around his eyes.

"Not really. Everytime I close my eyes all I see is…" he stops talking for a second, his eyes watery. 

"It's okay, I get it. Do you wanna try and get some sleep now that I'm up?" you offer. "I remember the first time I tried to sleep after El killed the demogorgon. Couldn't sleep for days."

"I'm okay, really." he assures. "Thank you, tho."

"It's no problem."

After a few minutes of awkward silence, you hear your stomach growl. Maybe you should go get something to eat.

"You hungry? I can go get us something to eat, if you want." you start to get up, but then you feel Eddie grab your wrist. 

"No!" he jumps out of the boat. "Sorry. I'm okay, really. Unless you- are you hungry? We can call Dustin, tell him to get you something, just… Please don't leave."

He sounds sad.

"Okay, I'll call Dustin, alright? Promise I won't leave you."

You called Dustin, asked him to bring you something to eat. While you waited for him to arrive with the food, Eddie paced around, looking more nervous than usual.

"Hey, Eddie?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you sure you're okay? You seem a bit off."

He looks at you, then at the ground, and then deep in your eyes again.

"What happened friday?" he says, his voice low, almost as if he was talking to himself.  "Why didn't you show up at the picnic table?"

You stiffen. You'd been so worried about all that went down the day before, you totally forgot about everything that happened friday.

"I uh… I told you, Robin was-"

"You don't really expect me to believe that, do you?" he says, a sad smile growing on his face. "C'mon, I know you. I know how your voice sounds when you're nervous, how you stutter and stumble all over your words. I know something happened."

"Nothing happened!"

"Look, if you don't wanna tell me, it's okay. You don't have to tell me what happened, but you don't need to lie to me either. You know that, right?"

You hesitate for a second. You know Eddie gets really hurt when people lie to him for no reason and the two of you have always been honest with each other about this kind of stuff. Maybe you should just tell him. How could that be scarier than what's happening right now, anyway? 

"I…" you take a deep breath. "I saw you and Chrissy. At the picnic table."

"Yeah, what about it?" he seems confused, his eyebrows furrowed.

"You were talking and giggling, and there was this… uhm…" you debate rather you should say it or not.

"What?" he steps closer, tilting his head like a curious puppy.

"Flowers. You gave her flowers. I figured… maybe it was a date or something. It made more sense than what you told us yesterday, anyways." you let out a small chuckle. "I didn't want to bother you guys, so I left."

"Oh", his face now enlightened, understanding what had happened. "It was not- the flowers, they were… i picked them up for you."

"What?", now you're the one who's confused.

"Yeah, I… uh", he blushes a little, looking down and fidgeting with his rings. "Just wanted to do something nice for you, y'know? As a way of thanking you for all the help with my homework and all that stuff. If i get to actually graduate this year, it's gonna be all because of you" he looks back up to look at you.

"Eddie, c'mon. It's not all because of me. All I did was  make sure you'd stick to your schedule, the rest was all you. You're way smarter than you think, you know that?"

"Still, I just…", he looks back down, before staring deep into your eyes "Thank you for not giving up on me. I know it doesn't even matter anymore, since I'm just probably gonna end up getting arrested or killed for something I didn't even do, but still. It was nice to feel like someone had faith in me for once."

You can feel your heart melt at his words, your expression softening as you smile sheepishly and walk his way, wrapping your arms around his torso. He holds you back, his strong grip bringing you so close to his chest you could actually feel his heartbeat.

"Delivery service!" you both jump, letting go of each other as you hear Dustin's voice when he opens the door. "Ooooh, are we interrupting something?" he wiggles his brows.

"No!" you both say in unison. 

"Okay then…" she says as she makes her way into the shed, followed by Steve, Dustin and Max. "Got you two some breakfast. Eat up!"

As you and Eddie eat some cereal, they fill you in. Eddie's name hasn't been publicly linked to Chrissy's death yet,  so that's a good sign. But it's probably just a matter of time until the police starts looking for him, and with that, the whole town too.

"Hunt the freak, right?"  Eddie says, his doe eyes looking lost, his voice a sad tone.

"Have you guys tried calling Joyce yet? To talk to El?" you ask.

"El? Who's El?" Eddie asks.

"She's Mike's girlfriend." you answer. 

"We usually rely on her to fix our problems when this kind of stuff happens." Dustin chimes in.

"Yeah, she has superpowers, but those went bye-bye, so there's not much she can do now." Steve said, turning to you. "We figured it was best to wait a bit before we bother them with this stuff again. See if we can do something before calling for help." 

"Yeah, our biggest problem right now is the fact that they're about to turn Eddie into Hawkins most wanted man if we don't do something." Max says. 

"Is there even anything we can actually do to avoid that?" Robin asks. "I mean, it's not like the cops  are gonna believe us if we just show up at the station with Eddie and tell them to hear him out."

"Shit, things wereso much easier when Hopper was around…" you say.

"Hopper? Jim Hopper?" Eddie quirks a brow. "He knew about this?"

"Oh yeah, big time." Dustin says.

You all turn your heads when you hear sirens sound at the distance, getting closer. When you look out the window, you see police cars and an ambulance speeding down the road.

"Shit." Steve says as he walks out the door, the others following him. 

"Tarp! Get the tarp!" Robin gestures at the boat as Eddie gets in and pulls the tarp over his head.

"Hey, where the hell are you going?" Eddie asks.

"Something's wrong." Dustin says, walking out the door right after Steve.

"We'll be right back!" Robin says following short after.

You feel Eddie grab your wrist, turning to see his pleading eyes as if he was asking you not to go.

"Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere." you say, softly.

As the time went by, you both started to get more nervous. You tried to distract Eddie, making small talk. 

"You know," you turned to face him, the both of you seated on the floor, your back leaning against the edge of the boat, "I think  you would really like El." 

"You think so?" he asks, turning to face you.

"Yeah, I do. She's really badass, you know, for a teenage girl. Looked like she came straight out of a sci-fi movie first time I met her."

"How does such a badass girl ended up dating Mike?" he snorts, playfully. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I love those little rascals to pieces, but how do nerds like Mike and Dustin end up with such badass girlfriends? Hell, even Sinclair that's like, a total jock now. Max is way cooler than him. Back in my time, losers like me did not have girlfriends at all. And now all oof the sudden they're dating geniuses and girls with superpowers? Shit!" 

It was actually kinda funny to look at it that way. 

"Tell me about it." you chuckle.

"You know, when I first saw little Henderson he was wearing a goddamned Weird Al t-shirt" he laughs. "That's how I knew he was a lost sheep in need of guidance."

"You knew that just by your first impression of him?"

"Definitely. I have a calling for this kinda thing, y'know? Finding lost kids and helping them find their place." 

You  stay quiet for a moment, before he speaks up again.

"You remember the night we first met?" he asks.

"Yeah, I do." 

Suddenly, you're both washed over with nostalgia. You talk about that night in the woods, remembering how you first met.

"It's funny to think how much I hated Steve back then." you say.

"Yeah? How come?" he asks.

"Well, for starters, that party sucked ass. Everyone was so mean, his friends were  huge assholes." 

"Yeah, I remember you telling me something about them not wanting to play spin the bottle just becaus you were playing too, wich I tought could only be a lie. Like, c'mon, who would pass that opportunity?"

You don't really know what he means by that.

"Well, it was for the best, anyway. Can you imagine having my first kiss while playing spin the bottle at Harrington's backyard?" you laugh. 

"Ha! That would've been really bad, that's for sure. Even as someone who doesn't really believe in the whole 'your first kiss should be special' kinda thing, I still think it shouldn't be THAT bad." he says.

"Yeah, well… I guess you're right. But I actually did have a very special first kiss, tho." you blush at the memory of your first kiss, at Eddie's bedroom.

"Is that so?" he asks, turning to face you again. "You never told me about that! Who was it?"

"What do you mean?" you're confused.

"Well, who was your first kiss with?" he asks, curious.

"You seriously don't remember?" you face him, not sure if he's playing you.

"Remember what?"

He looks  like he has no idea what you're talking about. Could it be possible that he didn't actually remember that night? 

"Eddie…" you look into his eyes "It was you" you say, staring at him with a very serious look on your face. "You were my first kiss."

At first, he laughs. He doesn't think you're actually being serious. When he realises you're not laughing, he notices you're actually dead serious. The look on your face says it all.

"Wait, you're- are you serious?" his eyes widen. "We kissed? When? How- Where did- When?"

"New Years, 1984." you look down at your lap as you tell him about your shared  moment he didn't seem to remember. "In your room. You were… well, you were absolutely wasted, so I guess it makes sense you don't remember it, actually. The boys were outside, lighting up the fireworks and you could barely stand on your own two feet, so I thought it would be best if I took you to your bed and layed you down for a bit, so you wouldn't throw up, and it just kinda… happened."

He seems genuinely shocked, his expression slowly fading to a soft frown.

"Wait, I was wasted? Shit, was it… was it bad?" he seems concerned. 

"Not really…" you say shyly, looking down as you play with your hands on your lap trying to hold back the smile on your face from growing wider. 

"Yeah?" his eyes shoot up, sparkling at your response.

"Yeah, it was quite nice actually. I mean, it does kinda suck that you don't remember it, but I guess I'm a little relieved that that's the reason you never said anything about it." you chuckle softly. "Always thought it was because you didn't like it." 

"Are you kidding?" he scoffs. "Trust me, sweet cheeks, if I remembered it, I would've said  something about it."

You don't know what he means by that. You tell yourself it doesn't mean anything, but deep down you actually hope he wanted something more. The two of you sit there  for a moment, exchanging looks, until you decide to break the awkward silence.

"Anyways…" you look away, back at your fidgeting hands in your lap. "Every time I think about the night we met I keep thinking about how much things can  change in such a short time." A soft smile spreads across your face. "I hated Steve so much back then, and not even a month later we became friends out of nowhere after setting whatever that demogorgon thing was on fire. It's funny."

"Yeah, it actually makes a lot more sense to me now." he chuckles.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, first time we met, I thought we'd really hit it off. But after a few weeks you started acting a little weird, started to hang out with Harrington. I thought it was kinda odd, y'know? A girl like you, so cool and different from everyone else, hanging out with that guy? I always thought it was kinda weird. But now I know that you guys have been through a lot together."

"Yeah, I'm really sorry about that. When we first met, I actually felt like for the first time in my life I had someone that saw me for who I really was. From the second we met, you were one of the most important people in my life. So that's why I felt like I needed to protect you from… all of this. Didn't want you to get stuck in the middle of this like the rest of us." you chuckle. "Guess that didn't go as I planned."

—

Shortly after, Steve, Dustin and Max walked back into the shed.

"Hey,  what happened? Where's Robin?" you ask, noticing Robin was not with them.

"She's with Nancy. Listen…" Steve started to talk, before Eddie cut him off.

"Wait, Nancy? Nancy Wheeler? She knows about this too? Jeez, was I the only one who didn't know about this shit?"

"That's not important right now, Eddie. Listen, someone else died. The same way Chrissy died. This is serious, we need to do something about it. Nancy told us to met her at the Wheeler's basement, we have to go."

"What? Right now?" you say, starting to panic. 

"Yeah, right now. Eddie, we'll be back okay? Just try to lay low." Dustin says, grabbing your wrist and dragging you towards the door. 

You look back at Eddie, he still seems a little unsure  about being alone.

"Dustin wait a sec-" you stop, trying to come up with a better plan.

"It's okay sweetheart. I'll be okay." Eddie says.

"You sure?" you ask, still worried about him.

"Yeah, 's okay. I'll be fine." he assured.

You give him a tight hug before following your friends to Steve's car. You hope nothing bad happens to him before you get back.

[callhermyname]

you're not going | eddie munson x reader, pt. 2

summary: Eddie goes missing, so you and your friends look for him

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

wc: 3k

warnings: angst, mentions of death, violence;

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

Eddie stayed still for hours. Didn't move a muscle, just layed there, hiding underneath the tarp that covered Rick's fishing boat, quietly sobbing while tears of pure horror ran down his face. He'd just seen Chrissy being killed by some invisible force right in front of his eyes. What the hell was that? He was petrified, all he could do was run away. There was nothing much he could've done, right? 

He'd been hiding for a few hours now — he could see the streams of sunlight hitting the floor of Rick's fishing shack, so that meant it was early morning. Now that the initial shock has worn out, his mind has wandered back to what kept him stuck  in his thoughts all day: you. The last few hours before what happened to Chrissy, all he could think about was how weird you were acting the day before.

When Chrissy came looking for him, he had an idea. He'd told her to meet him at the picnic table 30 minutes before the time you were supposed to meet him there, so he could make his deal with her and do something nice for you. He wanted to thank you for helping him — he had a feeling he was going to finally be able to graduate, and it was all thanks to you.

Before leaving the trailer park to meet up with you, he picked up some wildflowers you'd always say were pretty every time you went back to his place with him. He tried his best to make the small bouquet look pretty enough so he could give it  to you, as a thank you gift for being so patient with him. But you didn't show up.

He went out looking  for you, and when he talked to you on the phone, you sounded a bit off. He spent the rest of the day thinking about you — not that it was something unusual, he was always thinking about you —, worried he'd done something wrong. He couldn't bear the thought of you being mad at him.

You always took such good care of him, always managed to make him feel safe. He could use some of your comforting energy right now. Even when he was scared to death, running from whatever it was that killed Chrissy, hiding in some drug dealer's fishing shack, the only thing that made him feel some kind of comfort was thinking of you. He's definitely not a religious man, he never was, but for the rest of the day, he prayed that you'd come and find him. He knew you were the only one who could make him feel safe.

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

The morning after the game, you woke up with mascara all over your face. You should know better than to sleep with makeup still on, but you couldn't care less about that. You could feel your heartbeat pounding in your head, sitting up on your bed as you remembered all that went down the night before. As you roll out of bed, you notice you're still wearing last night's clothes and figure you should probably take a shower. Glancing over at the small alarm clock on your bedside table, you check the time. It's 10am, which means you have about an hour until your shift starts at the Family Video, so you hurry out the door to the bathroom.

As the hot water hits your skin, you try to fight the thoughts flooding your mind. What the hell was Eddie doing with Chrissy? What could possibly be a good explanation for that? You don't want to think about it, you try not to. You wash your face and your hair, feeling dirty, feeling like you deserve this. You shouldn't let your guard down like that, you knew better than that. 

You got out of the bathroom and heard the low volume of the TV coming from the living room. Your aunt and Dustin were probably already up. You hurry to get dressed up and get some breakfast, drying your hair and putting on your work uniform. When you're grabbing your backpack to head out, you hear a loud bang at your door.

"Yeah?" you call back.

"Hey, we need to talk." Dustin says at the other side of the door.

"Dustin, I'm sorry" you say as you open the door, ready to walk past him. "I can't talk right now, I'm gonna be late for work and you know I-"

You stop as you open the door and see Max standing beside Dustin. 

"Max? What are you doing here?"

"Trust me, being late should be the least of your worries right now." Dustin says, a serious look on his face.

You follow him and Max down the hallway, starting to get really worried. When you get to the living room, you see your aunt sitting at the couch looking at the TV with a horrified look on her face. When you turn around to look at the TV, you see the headline at the bottom of the screen as the reporter delivers the local news: "Hawkins High student found dead at the trailer park". Behind the reporter, you see a lot of police cars and a lot of cops, but what makes you freeze is the trailer behind them. Eddie's trailer. 

"Wait is that-" you start speaking but Dustin grabs you by your hand before you could finish, heading out the door.

"Keep it down, I don't want mom to get worried. Max will explain it to you on the way."

"On the way?" you ask as Dustin and Max hurry you out the door.

"Dusty, where are you going?" you hear aunt Claudia's voice coming from the living room.

"To see a friend." Dustin says as he shoves you out the door.

"You heard the news, it's not safe out there-" she gets cut off by Dustin, who's now running out the door and closing it behind him as he reassures her.

"Good point,  we'll be extra careful, thanks mom I love you bye!" he slams the door, Max already hopping on her bike as you and Dustin follow her, riding your bikes as well.

"Can someone please explain to me what the hell is going on?" you burst out.

"They found a body at Eddie's trailer this morning." Dustin tells you, trying not to alarm you — as if it was possible to not be alarmed by this.

"They- WHAT?"

"It's Chrissy Cunningham." you hear Max talk for the first time this morning. "I saw her come home with Eddie last night. A few minutes after that, I heard a scream coming from his trailer, and the lights began to flicker. When I headed to the window to see what was going on, I saw him running inside his van and leaving. This morning I caught a glimpse inside of Eddie's trailer before the cops could isolate it. Couldn't see her face, but it was definitely her cheerleading uniform."

You freeze, stopping your bike. Half an hour ago, the fact that Eddie took Chrissy back to his place would be enough for you to throw up, but now that's not even a problem for you. Chrissy was dead? At Eddie's place? What the actual fuck?

"Hey, come on" Dustin stopped his bike, turning back to look at you. "I know it's a lot  to process right now, but we've got to get to find Eddie. You know just as much as I do that Eddie would never hurt anyone. Something else killed Chrissy, and we know damn well what could have done it. But we need to know for sure, we need to know what happened,  and for that we need to find him. Okay?"

"Okay." you sniffled, already panicking at the thought of what could've happened, worrying about Eddie.

You follow Max and Dustin to the Family Video store — looks like you wouldn't be late for work after all. As the three of you bursted into the store, Robin and Steve turned around to look at you.

"Did you see this?" Steve asked, pointing at the TV where the news was still on, the reporter talking about the body found at the trailer park. "Someone was murdered!"

"How many phones do you have?" Dustin asked.

"Three, if you count the one at Keith's office." you told him.

"That'll do." Max said, walking around the counter.

"What the hell is going on?" Robin asked, confused.

"You wanna fill them in?" Dustin nudged you, as he threw his backpack over the counter, knocking off Steve's breakfast.

You fill your friends in and they look at you with the same look they had on the night before, but now with a little hint of panic. As the day went by and you called everyone you could think of that could know anything about where Eddie was, you couldn't help but to feel guilty. You spent the whole night worrying about your hurt feelings when Eddie was witnessing something terrible you could have warned him about. You hoped to god he wasn't hurt. You couldn't live with yourself if something happened to him. You needed to find him. 

"Hey guys" Max's voice snaps you out of your thoughts. "I think I might have something"

—

Steve pulls up in front of Rick's house and the five of you storm out of the car, headed to the front door. Dustin rings the doorbell and knocks at the door.

"Eddie! It's Dustin"

Robin holds her flashlight up the window, trying to see inside the house. You pace around nervously, looking for anything that might lead you to Eddie. 

"Dude, stop yelling" Steve says, clearly annoyed at Dustin "He's not here."

"Guys?" Max calls up to you.

You all follow her to a shed at the back of Rick's house. You push the door open, and get inside. There's fishing gear all over the place, a boat covered at the center of the shed. Steve grabs an oar that was resting at the wall and pokes at the tarp.

"What are you doing?" Dustin asks, confused.

"He might be in here" Steve says, as he continues to poke at the covered boat.

You look around the shed, a table at the corner catching your eye. You walk over to the table and see a half empty bottle of beer, some food wrappers and a half eaten bag of chips. 

"Hey, look over here" you called. "Someone was here."

"Maybe he heard us" Robin says, behind you "Got spooked and ran"

"Don't worry" Dustin said, sarcasm dripping from his voice "Steve will get 'em with his oar!"

"I know you think you're being funny, Henderson" Steve bit back, annoyed "but considering that everyone in this room has nearly died a hundred times, personally, I don't find it funny in the slightest-"

He's interrupted by someone jumping from underneath the tarp, inside the boat, throwing him against the wall — it was Eddie. He held a broken glass bottle against Steve's neck, his eyes wide and shiny, full of tears and fear.

"Whoa whoa Eddie! Calm down! It's me! It's Dustin!"

Eddie looked back at you and Dustin, who was trying his best to calm his friend down. He looked confused, terrified, you've never seen him like this before. You knew something terrible had happened.

"This is Steve, he's not gonna hurt you." Dustin assured "Right Steve?"

"Yeah, right!"

"Steve, why don't you drop the oar?"

Steve drops the oar and Eddie seems to be getting more and more nervous. 

"What are you doing here?" he asks, his voice trembling.

"We're looking for you," Dustin explains. "These are my friends, you know Robin, from the band. This is Max, the one who never wants to play D&D."

Robin and Max nervously wave at him.

"And you know my cousin too, right? I know you two knew each other way before I even met you." 

"Hey, Eddie, it's me, it's okay" you try to calm him down. "We're here to help, we're on your side."

Eddie looks at you and Dustin for a second before letting Steve go, taking a few steps back and lying against the wall, slowly dropping to sit on the floor. Dustin approaches him, trying to take the broken glass bottle away from his hands, causing Eddie to flinch at his touch like a scared puppy.

"Okay, it's okay" Dustin holds his hands up, trying to keep him calm "We just wanna talk"

"Eddie" you slowly walk towards him, kneeling down in front of him, holding your hand out to touch his. He looks at you, allowing you to touch his hand, easing his grip on the broken glass. He lets out a shaky breath and grips your hand tightly, feeling a little less scared. "We wanna know what happened."

"You won't believe me" he sniffled, tears now rolling down his cheeks.

"Try us." Max said behind you, causing him to look up at her, and then look back at you. You gave him a reassuring look, trying to make him feel safe enough to tell you what he'd seen. So he told you.

"Chrissy, she came after me, she wanted to buy some weed. At first I thought it was weird, you know? It was Chrissy Cunningham, for fuck's sake. But she seemed off, like something was bothering her, she told me she felt like she was losing her mind. Asked for something stronger. I told her I might have something, but that I don't carry it around with me in my lunchbox. She asked me where she could get it, and I- I told her I kept it back in my place. Told her she could swing by after the game to get some. When we were leaving Hellfire, she came up to me, asked me if she could go with me back to my place so I could give her the stuff. We went home, and I was looking for the stuff and she-" he took a deep breath, dropping his face in his hands "I left her alone for one minute… When I came back she was just standing there, like she was in a trance or something. Her body just… lifted up into the air and, uh… and her bones… uh, she…" he squeezed his eyes shut, also squeezing your hand, which he was still holding. You squeezed his hand back. "Her bones started to snap. A-and, her eyes man- it was like there was something inside her head, pulling and I- I didn't know what to do so I… I ran away" he lifted his gaze, looking right into your eyes, his eyes filled with pain and guilt. "I left her there."

Your eyes were now also filled with tears as you listened to him, seeing how guilty he felt. It made your heart drop, not only because you couldn't bear to see him like this, but also because you knew — once you get into this, there's no getting out. So, you let Dustin give him the talk.

After you'd told him everything, you figured it was probably time to go. Everyone was ready to walk out the door, but you just couldn't leave him there. He was scared and alone, hiding on a boat, you just couldn't walk away knowing he'd be there in such bad conditions. 

"Guys, we can't just leave him here" you said "we can't leave him alone in here, he's not okay!"

"Look, we know you want him to be okay, but there's not much we can do," Steve reasoned with you. "He's a wanted man, we can't go out walking around with him"

"I know that, but please, just- I'll stay here with him. Dustin, you can tell your mom I'm at Nancy's and won't be coming home until tomorrow morning. I figure Rick probably has some blankets or something like that, I could at least make sure he's comfortable and not alone."

"You sure about this?" Robin asked.

"Yeah, I'm sure. I'll be fine, you can go. I've got my walkie-talkie with me, if we need anything I'll let you guys know."

"Okay then" Steve gives in. "But if you need anything at all-"

"I'll let you know. Thanks guys."

They walked out of the shed, headed back to Steve's car, and you followed right behind them. 

"I'll be right back" you told Eddie before leaving him.

You found an open window and jumped inside the house, looking for some blankets and pillows. The place was a mess, it looked like no one had been there for quite some time. You found a blanket that was big enough for you and Eddie to share, grabbing two pillows from the bed. When you got back to the shed, Eddie was still exactly where he was when you left him. He looked so terrified. 

"Hey" you called "got us something to sleep on."

"You're staying here with me?" he seemed confused.

"Of course. I couldn't just leave you here by yourself. I know this stuff is not easy to take in. Trust me, I  can't remember the last time I went to bed not being sure I'd probably have at least one PTSD nightmare."

Eddie huffed, a sad chuckle leaving his lips.

"Look, I know this is nuts. But I can assure you, we'll get through this. I've done it before, I'm sure we can do it again." you reached for his hand.

He let you hold his hand, rubbing his thumb against your knuckles, looking at you with those big, sad doe eyes.

"Thank you for not leaving me." he muttered.

"It's not a big deal, really. Just wanted to make sure you were okay."

The two of you made your improvised bed on the boat, lying down side by side. You felt butterflies dancing around your stomach as you laid down next to him, even though the situation wasn't ideal. You were almost half asleep when he called your name.

"Yeah, Eddie?"

"Can you, um- can you hold me? I know it's childish but I just can't sleep like this. I'm terrified, but I know you've been through this before and I- you make me feel safe."

Your heart melted a little at his words.

"Of course, Eddie. I'm here for you." you said softly, moving closer to him, wrapping your arms around his waist as he wrapped his arms around your shoulders. You could hear his heartbeat and smell him — faded musky cologne and cigarettes. You took a deep breath, taking in his scent. "You make me feel safe too."

[callhermyname]

you're not going | eddie munson x reader, pt. 1

summary: basically the same plot of s4 ep.1; you see Eddie and Chrissy at the picnic table and get the wrong idea.

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

word count: 5.2k

warnings: MDNI!!; reader is bisexual; tiny bit of fluff, but mostly angst; Robin being the ADHD poster girl she is; crying, mentions of blood, assault, child abuse; THIS IS A STRANGER THINGS S4 REWRITE, I DID NOT CAME UP WITH THE STORYLINE!! let me know if i missed something.

a/n: this is part 1 of my stranger things s4 rewrite, so if you want to read more, you can help me by liking and rebloging this post, following my blog and telling me if you like it! If you haven't read the prologue, you can read it here. also, excuse any grammar errors, english is not my first language.

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

You've all been through a lot. After Will went missing, a couple weeks after you met Eddie, your life has never been the same, and probably will never be. Your first year at Hawkins High was hard after all the shit that went down, and you were closer to the other teens and the kids now, but you really wished you could talk to Eddie about it. You felt like he would understand.

The year after that was a little better, all things considered. After Nancy dumped Steve and he and Dustin became… friends (i guess?), you and Steve got really close too, so no one dared to talk shit about you like they used to — they knew better than to upset the girl Steve Harrington treated as a sister. When Steve and Robin started working together, the three of you became peas in a pod (especially after Robin ended up learning about the upside down and El and all that). She was your best friend, someone you could talk to about anything, and she could talk to you about anything too. When she came out to you, you felt like you could also come out to her (as bissexual) and with that you, her and Steve became best totally platonic friends.

—

"Dustin, for fucks sake, Steve has been honking outside for 10 minutes, we're gonna be late, what the fuck are you doing in there?" you banged at your cousin's bedroom door.

"Don't come in! I'm naked!" he yells back.

"You know what? We're not doing this again, I'm not losing my ride because of you, you can bike to school." you grabbed your backpack and headed out the door.

Swearing at Dustin under your breath, you make your way to the backseat of Steve's car.

"What took you so long?" Steve looked back at you "Wait, where's the little butthead?"

"He's probably talking to his girlfriend, I don't care. If he's gonna be late, he can be late. I'm not losing my ride."

"Looks like someone's in a mood today huh?" Robin teased you as Steve started the car.

"Nah, the little shit might get on my nerves but you two always end up cheering me up. Unless Steve starts talking about whatever girl he's taking out this weekend, then I'd rather just eat a handful of broken glass."

"Oh my god, that's EXACTLY what he's been doing since I got in the goddamn car!" Robin turns back to look at you, holding her hands up to her ears "If i have to listen to him talk about having sex with Linda for one more second i swear to god-"

"Heidi! I was talking about Heidi! How can you complain about me talking about something you're not even listening to?"

You just can't help but laugh at them arguing like an old married couple. You love them so much it almost hurts.

"At least I'm actually doing something with my dating life, unlike the both of you." he said in a sarcastic tone.

For the next five minutes he and Robin went back and forth about how she can't just ask Vicky out and how she definitely should ask Vicky out because of the whole "people who like boobies" thing. You space out for a second and snap your head as you hear Eddie's name.

"What about Eddie?" you ask, trying to get back to the conversation.

"See?" Robin snaps "One second she's totally inside her own little head and as soon as someone mentions him she starts paying attention. How does that not qualify as having the most heart-wrecking massive crush on someone?"

"Shut up!" you bite back, trying to defend yourself, but obviously failing, because she was right.

"Ladies, ladies! Calm down, there's no reason to get feisty. You're BOTH chickening out, not asking Vicky and Eddie out. Though I actually see where Robin"s coming from."

"Steve, c'mon-" you try yet again to tell him you're not chickening out, but he doesn't want to hear it again.

"No! Look, you listen to me, how on earth do you manage to take down three military trained Russians and still be afraid to ask him out?"

"It's not that simple!" you frown, now starting to feel like a little girl pouting over your parents giving you a lecture.

"Yeah, sure," Robin snorts "you only hang out alone with him pretty much every day to help him study so he can finally graduate"

"You know what?" you snap at them "I don't have to justify my non-existent love life to either one of you. I'm just gonna keep pretending I don't have feelings for him. Who knows, maybe he'll ask me out? That's a possibility!"

"Okay, okay. We'll drop it." Steve says, lifting his hands from the wheel for a second, in surrender.

"We just care about you, babe" Robin follows his lead "You know that, right?"

"I do."

— 

You and Robin sit at your regular cafeteria table, a couple tables away from the designated Hellfire Club table, where Eddie is yelling at Dustin and Mike about something, making it a little hard to listen to what Robin is talking to you about.

"Seriously, I'm really worried about Max. I mean, we all know she's been depressed since Billy… y'know. But she was way off today at the pep rally, don't you think?"

"Yeah, I guess" Max was to you what Dustin was to Steve, something between a friend and the little sister you never had. "I've been begging her to talk to me, to tell me if there's something I can do, but she just won't-"

You lose your train of thought when you see Eddie climb up the table, walk across it, jump off it and yell nonsense around the cafeteria.

"God, he's really worked up today, huh?" Robin says, turning her head back to look at Eddie's little scene.

"I wonder what Dustin and Mike were talking to him about. He threw at least five mini pretzels at each one of them while he was yapping about something." you chuckle and roll your eyes when he catches you looking at his performance and gives you a smile and a quick wink. "He's kinda funny when he gets mad at them."

"Funny. Right." Robin turns her head back to look at you. "You obviously think he's just funny, not cute or anything else."

"Dude, you said you'd drop it!"

"I'm sorry!" she giggles "It's just hilarious when your cheeks turn all red just because he smiled at you. You look so silly!"

You watch as Eddie pulls Dustin and Mike by the collar of their Hellfire shirts and pushes them away from the table, both of them running off the cafeteria like they're in a rush. Eddie turns around and walks towards you.

"Okay, now shut the fuck up. He's coming our way."

Eddie heads towards you with slow dramatic steps, leaning over and resting his elbows on the end of the table, an evil grin on his face. 

"Hey ladies. Whatcha talkin 'bout?"

"Nothing much," you turn to face him, now with a playful little smirk of your own. "just watching you make a fool of yourself yet again. Quite the show you got going on there."

He gasps, spreading his palm over his chest, like he's offended by you calling him a fool.

"A fool? How dare you. And yes, thank you for recognizing my performing talents. It is one of my many gifts, as you know."

"Sure do", you remember the days long D&D sessions you attended when you used to be a part of the Hellfire Club. His theatrics flooding the room as he masters his most diabolical campaigns, standing up on his wooden carved throne and emphatically yelling the lines he'd written and planned for weeks, his voice echoing the drama club room, his eyes round and wide sparkling at the dim light as he smiles with pride over one of the only things he actually felt like he was good at.

"We miss you at the club, y'know?" his voice snaps you out of your trance. He sounds almost sad.

"Yeah, I miss you guys too. But you know, I really needed the job at Family Video." Now you sound sad too. "It's a shame my shifts are not scheduled as Robin and Steve's. Can't even make plans without risking the odds of a last minute shift."

"Study sesh still up today after class right?" he quirks a brow.

"Sure!" you try not to sound too excited, but judging by the look Robin gives you, it seems like you failed.

"Great! It's a date then." he flashes you a big smile, giving you a quick kiss at the top of your head. "Thanks sweetheart, you're the best. See ya later!"

With that, he turns around to get back to the Hellfire table. Robin looks at you with something that looks a lot like pity in her eyes. "Ouch. That 's gotta hurt."

"A little." you shrug. "But it's okay, I guess. Better than not having him around."

"Oh, for the love of GOD, just ask him out already!" she says, a little too loud.

"Sure. When you ask Vicky."

"Hm. Touché, I guess."

—

You were walking out the door, headed to your and Eddie's usual study session spot at the picnic table in the woods, when Dustin and Mike approached you.

"What are you doing tonight?" Dustin asked.

"Uh… I don't know, maybe watching the game? Robin is playing with the band and Steve is taking his date, so I'll probably just tag along with them after we get off work. Why?"

"We need a sub for Lucas at the end of Eddie's campaign tonight." Mike explained. "Can you come?"

"Pleeeeeease?" Dustin begged, before you could even think about the question. "I'll clean your room for the whole spring break!"

"Dustin, you don't even clean your room. My room is always tidy, there's no way you can make it cleaner than it already is."

"I'll do the dishes everytime my mom asks you to do it! I'll clean the cat's litter box! You name it, I'll do it. Just… please?"

You couldn't help but laugh. Dustin was offering to do all those things for you, when you'd actually join them for free. Getting to hang out with Eddie was already enough to get you to agree to fill in for Lucas, but the extra bribe from your cousin sure was welcome. 

"Okay, fine. But hey, no telling your mom about our deal okay? You know she does not like it when you take care of any of the cat related chores. She knows the cat's terrified of you."

"Deal!" he jumped up and down like an excited little kid. "Thank you thank you thank youuuu!", his voice slowly faded away while he ran to wherever else he was going to now, Mike following shortly after him.

You made your way through the woods, even though you knew you were a little early. You always liked to be at the picnic table a little before Eddie, to set up your textbooks and make a checklist of all the topics you'd be helping him with that day. You wouldn't consider yourself very smart, but you always got good grades at history and literature, so Eddie asked you if you could help him study. He really wanted to graduate this year, and part of you hoped it was because he would get to graduate with you. He always talked about how school would suck even more if you weren't there anymore, so you decided to take a little of your time out of school and work to help him — not only for his sake, but also because it is the only time you get to be alone with him, close to him. God, you feel pathetic.

As you get closer to the spot, you hear his laugh. At first you're confused, because he never gets there before you and as far as you knew, he had no idea you'd always be there at least 15 minutes before him. Also, why was he laughing by himself in the middle of the woods? He usually only gets high after you're done studying, so you assume he's not high, which makes it even weirder. Before you could get close enough to ask him what was so funny that got him laughing like an idiot by himself in the middle of the woods, you hear another laugh. A girls laugh.

Silently, you walk slowly towards the picnic table, trying not to be seen. When you get close enough to see them without them seeing you, you recognise who he's laughing with. It's Chrissy Cunningham. You feel your heart drop as you watch him trying to make her laugh, the same way he always makes you laugh. What the hell is happening here? You can't quite understand what they're saying without coming a little closer to them, but you don't wanna risk getting caught, so you just watch as Eddie jumps and claps his hands and Chrissy laughs at his dramatic reaction at whatever it was she'd said to him.

You know you shouldn't feel this jealous, he wasn't your boyfriend or anything like that — hell, you couldn't even gather the courage to tell him how you feel —, and you knew Chrissy, she was a very sweet girl. She was always nice to you, even when the other cheerleaders would call you names and stick bubblegum to your hair, she was always the one to tell them to shut up and teach you a few beauty hacks in the bathroom to get the gum out of your hair without having to cut it off. But maybe that was exactly the point. She was so pretty, and so nice, you wouldn't stand a chance against her.

As Eddie turned around and playfully punched the tree behind him, you caught a glimpse of a small gathering of tiny wildflowers resting by Chrissy's side, at the bench she was sitting on — wildflowers like the ones that grow near his trailer. Did he get her flowers? Did he HANDPICK flowers? For her? —, and you feel a knot forming on your throat. He pulled at the neck of his shirt, exposing his chest tattoo and you felt your eyes filling up with tears. What was that about? Was he flirting with her?

Even though you knew it was not a good idea, you took a few steps closer, quietly, so you could hear the conversation.

"You should come see us!" you hear him say. "We play at the Hideout on Tuesdays, it's pretty cool. We actually get a crowd of about… five drunks."

You feel the hot tears start to roll down your face. You always try to go see him play at the Hideout whenever you can. You've been there the past three weeks watching them play. Why is he talking about it like no one watching them is actually important? Like you're not important?

"You know, you're not how I thought you'd be like." Chrissy laughs.

"Mean and scary?" he replies.

That was enough for you. It's not like he was doing anything wrong, but it felt like someone had punched you at your stomach. It hurts to see him treating some other girl the same way he treated you, the way you thought he treated you because he liked you, because he might like you back. You tried to not make much noise as you turned around and followed back the path you came from. There was no way you could sit and study with him like you were not heartbroken.

—

"Chrissy Cunningham?" Steve asked, still not quite believing what you'd just told them. "As in Jason Carver's little princess of Hawkins High cheerleader girlfriend Chrissy Cunningham?"

"Yes." you assured.

"Are you sure it was her?" Robin asked, also in disbelief.

"Yeah, I'm sure. Heard her voice, saw her face. It was definitely her."

"Shit, that sucks, I'm sorry." Robin tries to comfort you, reaching a hand to tap your shoulder.

"What the hell was she doing with him anyways?" Steve questions. "Doesn't she have a boyfriend?"

"Maybe she was buying some weed?" 

"Robin, c'mon." you chuckle, sadly. "Chrissy Cunningham? Buying weed? Be fucking serious."

"Yeah Robin, I hate to say it but it makes absolutely no sense." Steve agrees.

The three of you stay silent for a little too long and you feel your friends' eyes on you, looking at you with pity, and you hate it. Finally, after a few more seconds (that actually felt like hours), the silence is broken when the phone at the Video Family counter starts to ring. Robin walks away to pick up the phone and you feel Steve's arms wrapped around you.

"Look, I'm sorry about what I said earlier today in the car," he says. "I know I was a little too pushy and I know you're not chickening out. I know you're just afraid to get rejected, and us teasing you about it was not okay. I'm sorry about what happened too, with Chrissy and all. For what it's worth I still think there's probably a good explanation for it. I bet it'll be okay."

You hold back your sobs as you lean into your best friend's shoulder, trying not to stain his clothes with your tears. Even though you're still hurting, a good old bear hug from Steve always makes you feel better, like he squeezes together all of your broken pieces back into place.

"Hey, listen…" you feel Robin tap on your shoulder and you raise your head from Steve's chest. "Eddie's on the phone. He wants to talk to you."

Shit. 

"Tell him I'm not here!"

"Yeah I kinda already told him you were here, that's not gonna work."

"Shit. Fine."

You walk over to the phone and pick it up, both Robin and Steve following you to the front counter.

"Hello?"

"Hey, thank god I found you!" he sighs, relieved. "What the hell happened? I waited for you for like, half an hour and you didn't show up so I got worried because you're never late so I went looking for you but I couldn't find you anywhere," he rambles, like he does when he's nervous "so I- I went home and called your place but your aunt said you weren't there and I didn't know where else to call so I figured you were at work? Oh thank god you're there I was about to call the cops!"

"Yeah sorry about that, I was uh…" you look over at Robin and Steve, trying to come up with an excuse about why you didn't meet him like you'd planned earlier. "I- Robin! Robin had uh… band practice for the uh- tonight's the championship game so she asked me to fill in for her, sorry I forgot to tell you I was not gonna make it."

"But… wasn't that Robin who just picked up the phone?" he sounds confused. You look back and see Robin facepalming her forehead and Steve rubbing the bridge of his nose between his index and his thumb, shaking his head. Shit. You suck at lying. 

"Yes- yeah. She uh, she was at band practice but now she's here, she actually just got here. Yeah."

"Oh okay…" 

"Yeah, listen Eddie I gotta go now, talk to you later, bye!" you slam the phone back at the receiver, hanging up.

"Well, that went… well…?" Steve forces a smile.

"Sure!" Robin holds both of her thumbs up, also trying to look like she didn't think you just dealt with the situation in the worst way possible.

"Yeah sure. I'm gonna go home so I can cry in the bathroom now, I guess. Peace out." you said as you walked out the door. 

When you got home, you remembered you'd agreed to fill in as a sub for Lucas at Hellfire. Of course you did. Because you're just a stupid dumb piece of shit who couldn't pass any opportunity to follow Eddie around like a little puppy. So, you go looking for Dustin around the house to tell him you wouldn't make it to Hellfire, only to find out he's not home. You figured he's probably at Mike's, so you call the Wheelers'. 

"Hello?" Nancy picks up the phone after two rings.

"Nancy! Hey, is Dustin there? He's not home, I figured he'd be at your place with Mike?"

"Oh, hey! Yeah, they're upstairs, I'll go get him for you."

"Thanks Nance, I-" you got cut off by her screaming on the other end of the line.

"MIKE! PHONE FOR DUSTIN!" you hear her call. "So, you going to the game tonight? It's been a while since the last time we went out, we should do something after the game, I miss you!"

"Yeah, I miss you too!" you tell her. And you mean it. It's really been a while since the last time you two did something together. "I'm actually going to spend the night at Robin's tho. We can go to the movies tomorrow, maybe?"

"Sure! I can pick you up at 5, what do you think?"

"Sounds great, I'll see you then!"

"Great! Oh, here 's Dustin. See you at the game tonight!"

"See ya!"

"Hey, what do you mean you'll be at the game? Thought you were gonna come with us to Hellfire tonight" the other line now shifts to Dustin's voice.

"Yeah, about that, I'm not going anymore. Sorry."

"What? Why?"

"Something came up. Maybe you could ask Erica?"

"Erica? You know Eddie 's gonna lose his shit if I take her as a sub for Lucas."

"Yeah, I know, but it's her or nothing. Sorry, Dusty. I'll make it up to you okay? I promise."

"Fine. But you owe me one!"

"Big time, I know. Gotta go now, take care okay? See you after the game."

"Yeah, see ya." 

You felt bad about letting Dustin down. You really did. But you also knew you wouldn't last that much at Hellfire without crying, and that would be even worse.

After an hour or so of crying your eyes out, you decided to do your makeup. Even though you were feeling like absolute shit, you knew you couldn't look like absolute shit, and you usually get a boost of self esteem after getting your makeup done, and god knows you could use that right now. So, after spending half an hour doing your eyeliner on each eye, you changed into your jeans and your favorite little tank top, put on your old school black Vans, grabbed some random jacket that was hanging at the back of your chair and left to watch the game.

"Aunt Claudia?" you yelled from the front door, almost forgetting to tell her you were leaving.

"Yes honey?" she yelled back from her bedroom.

"I'm leaving to watch the championship game, probably will spend the night at Robin's, okay? You don't have to wait up for me." 

"Okay honey, have fun and be safe okay?" 

"Will do, see you tomorrow!" 

At the game, you sat right next to the band, Robin was right by your side and Steve was with his date a couple of rows back. You didn't really care for the game, you just needed to… not be alone. You and Robin had plans to go to her place after the game and watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show for the tenth time in the last few months so you could get Eddie out of your head. Before the game started, you watched as Chrissy and the other cheerleaders danced and jumped around the gym and couldn't help it when your eyes flooded up with tears again. As you tried to get yourself together, you felt Robin's hand on your shoulder.

"You okay?"

"Yeah just… fuck, I can't even hate her, she's the sweetest girl on the cheer squad."

Before Robin could say anything, everyone was standing up for the national anthem. And then you saw Tammy Thompson walking towards the mic to SING the national anthem. You held back laughter as you looked at Robin and then turned around to look at Steve, both of their jaws dropped.

"No way." Robin muttered, as she took turns looking at you, Tammy and Steve, not knowing exactly where to look at. As Tammy started to sing, you felt your eyes flood again, but this time, it was not because of Eddie or the thought of him with Chrissy, but because you were trying so hard not to laugh. She sounded exactly like a muppet.

"Oh my god I want to rip my ears out" you manage to let out without bursting into laughter.

"I told you. Muppet." you could see Steve mouthing over to Robin.

"Okay, she does sound like a muppet." Robin admits.

"Oh my god she does kinda sound like a muppet" you hear Vicky say in a low voice.

You watch as Robin and Vicky laugh at each other's jokes, until Robin lets her ADHD get the best out of her and starts talking faster than her brain's working. Even though she talks too fast sometimes, you think it's cute how she gets nervous around Vicky. They would make such a cute couple. 

After the game, you approach Lucas, giving him a tight hug. 

"That was absolutely crazy, Lucas! You just took the ball and threw it like it was nothing and then we were like 'oh god is he gonna score?' and then you DID i swear i don't think I'll ever understand how you did that so quickly, like you just-" Robin rambled, as she held her hands up, like she was tossing a basketball through the hoop. 

"That was insane, man. Really, you're a natural." Steve said like the proud mama he is to the kids. 

"Thanks guys. I-" Lucas started, but you heard someone call out to him.

"Hey Sinclair, you coming?"

"Yeah, I'll be right there!" he yelled back. "Look guys, I gotta go. But thank you so much for coming. It meant a lot to me."

The three of you smiled as he left to follow after whoever it was that called him. After a second, Robin turned to Steve.

"Hey, where's Heidi?"

"That's Brenda, Robin."

"Yeah, sure, sorry. Where's Brenda?"

"She uh…" he looked back at the crowd leaving the gym, like he was looking for someone. "She ditched me, okay? She left to talk to Tammy Thompson and then came back to tell me she was going to Tammy's to catch up or something like that."

"Ouch, ditched for Tammy Thompson?" Robin said, following Steve as he started to walk back to his car.

"Again?" you look over at Robin, the both of you laughing — not in a mean way, but playful, like the three of you always were.

"Ha ha, very funny." Steve bites back, sarcastic. "Any more jokes and the two of you are walking home."

As you walk over to Steve's car, you watch as Eddie and the rest of the Hellfire Club emerge from the drama club room, victorious. He waves at you, but you pretend you don't see it, turning over to Dustin, who's walking up to you.

"Hey, can I join you guys? Eddie said he's gotta go straight to his place tonight, so he can't drive me home."

"Steve's dropping us at Robin's, I'm spending the night out. But maybe Nancy can take you home?" 

"Oh, okay. Sure, I'll talk to Mike. See you tomorrow?"

"See you tomorrow. Night, Dusty!" you give him a hug and kiss the top of his head, watching as he runs off to catch up to Mike.

You turn around to Robin and Steve, puzzled look on your face. Eddie always takes Dustin home after Hellfire, why couldn't he take him home tonight?

You get in Steve's car and you exit the school's parking lot. You see Eddie's van a little ahead out the parking lot, where he always parks when he's doing a deal or up to something shady. As Steve drives past the van, you see Eddie holding the door open for Chrissy to hop in.

"What the fuck?" you say, maybe a little louder than you intended.

Steve and Robin turn to look at the direction your eyes were headed, also looking at Eddie as he closes the passenger door and Chrissy turns to reach for the seatbelt (and you think to yourself she probably won't find the seatbelt, because Eddie's van has no seatbelts).

"Oh shit." Robin mutters as she turns her head back to look at the van, now behind Steve's moving car.

"Hey uh…" Steve tries to get your attention. "don't- try not to think too much about it, it's probab-"

"I wanna go home." you cut him off.

"You sure?" Robin asks. "I already have the Rocky Horror VHS with me, we can watch Blade Runner too, I forgot to take it back to the store last week and I know you love it so maybe-"

"Please just-" you cut her off too. "I wanna go home. Please, take me home." you can feel your voice trembling and tears already running down your cheeks.

"Okay, it's okay." Steve talks in a soft voice, trying to calm you down. "We'll take you home."

The ride to your house is awkwardly silent, but you don't really care enough to be bothered by it. Your head hurts and your heart sinks to your stomach at the thought of Eddie taking Chrissy home. Not only because of your feelings for him (though, mostly because of it), but also because Chrissy is Jason's girlfriend. You know what Jason would do to Eddie if he finds out about this. It wouldn't be the first time Eddie gets beaten up by Jason and the rest of his party, and even though Eddie always came back laughing about his black eye, spitting blood and limping, you knew he'd spend the next few nights sleeping at the back of his van, so Wayne doesn't see him covered in bruises — so Wayne doesn't see him looking the same way he looked when his father dropped him off at the trailer and never came back to pick him up. You know he can take care of himself, you know he's strong enough to throw a punch or two, but  you couldn't stand the thought of him spending his days alone at the back of his van, not being able to see anyone because school was off. The whole situation made your heart ache.

As Steve pulls over in front of your house, you feel two pairs of eyes on you.

"You sure you'll be okay?" Robin asks, concerned.

"I'll be fine. I just need a little time, that's all. Thank you guys, for taking care of me. Sorry about the buzzkill. Get home safe, okay? I love you." you opened the door and climbed out of the car.

"We love you too. Call us if you need anything, yeah?" Steve says leaning over the car window.

"I will, I promise."

You open the door, hoping aunt Claudia was already asleep and that Dustin wasn't home yet. You tiptoe your way to your room and close the door, throwing yourself at the bed, not even bothering changing into your pajamas. Stuffing your face in your pillow, you cry yourself to sleep, hoping it was all a bad dream, but knowing it wasn't.

[callhermyname]

NOT THE “NEW KINK UNLOCKED” COMMENT SHE’S SO REAL FOR THAT

joe being awkward as fuck talking about his body

[callhermyname]

he has definitely spent way too much time around john krasinski at the AQPDO set

joe breaking the fourth wall is so fucking funny to me PLEASE

[callhermyname]

ah, yes. joseph wearing chunky rings yet again. thank god for that.

[callhermyname]

you're not going | e.m. x reader - prologue

summary: you and Eddie meet for the first time (a few weeks before the start of s1);

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

word count: 2.6k

warnings: MDNI!! mostly fluff, just a tiny bit of angst, reader is Dustin's cousin, mentions of absent father, postpartum depression, parents death, self-esteem issues, bullying (let me know if I missed anything).

a/n: HEY so this is my first fic ever so even if it's absolute garbage pls be nice to me😭 also sorry for any grammar mistakes english is not my first language. this is supposed to be the start of a s4 rewrite series, so if you want more please like this post, reblog and let me know what you think. hope u enjoy it!

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

You've been living at aunt Claudia's since you were 14. After your mom died, you had nowhere else to go — you can't even remember the last time your dad was in the picture, so when your aunt took you in, you kinda felt thankful that you got to start over, have a fresh start in another town, away from your old life (that you hated). You were still grieving, but aunt Claudia was always very sweet and caring, and soon after you moved in you started to see Dustin as the little brother you never had. It felt a little weird at first — even though your mother did her best, she never really liked the situation you were both in. She never planned to have kids, at least not before graduating from college, especially if it meant being a single mom at such a young age, so you couldn't really blame her for drowning in postpartum depression after you were born until she passed away. So, when her older sister took you in, you didn't expect for her to be so different from your mom, so caring, so gentle, so loving, such a good mom for Dustin and now to you too. 

When you first got to Hawkins, you didn't really have any friends besides your 11 year old cousin. One of his friends had a sister about your age — Mike's sister, Nancy — but, although she was always nice to you, you never really quite hit it off. She was sweet, but you didn't have a lot in common and her friends could be really mean. Will's brother, Jonathan, was always very shy and quiet, never really made conversation and you were definitely not the kind of person to force social interaction with someone that obviously didn't care for it, so you just kept it to yourself for most of the first year you spent at Hawkins.

A couple of weeks before Will went missing, Nancy was picking Mike up at your place and invited you to a party at her boyfriend's house. Your aunt overheard the conversation and was very excited to see you were making friends, so you decided to go just so she wouldn't worry about you being an absolute loser. You were always quite self-conscious of your appearance so it took some time to pick out an outfit, but you finally settled for something comfy and not that flashy, but flattering: your best Queen shirt under your favorite jeans overalls and a flannel and your only pair of shoes — basic black chuck taylors.

It was late October and the air was chilly, wind blowing through your hair and cutting your face like tiny little blades as you rode your bike to Steve Harrington's house, hoping to god Nancy was already there so you wouldn't be alone and awkward. You could already hear the music from two blocks away, and when you got to the front door, Nancy was waiting for you with her friend Barb. You knew Barb from school, you took English together, but didn't really talk about anything not school related, but she seemed nice. 

"You made it! I was already getting worried you wouldn't show up" Nancy greeted you. "You know Barb, right?"

"Yeah, hey Barb" you agreed and Barb nodded. "Sorry it took me so long to get here, my bike has seen better days…"

"It's fine, don't worry. Let's get in, I'll show you around. You can leave your bike at the back of the garage, outside of the backyard fence."

You left your bike where Nancy told you to and followed her into the house as she showed you where the bathroom was, stumbling over people coming in and out of the house, up and down the stairs. The house was so crowded, it felt like people were coming out of the walls. When she led you to the back of the house, she sat down by the pool and introduced you to her boyfriend and his friends, who were around the pool. 

From the start, you felt out of place. Steve and his friends didn't know you, but you already knew them. It was ridiculous to you how those people had made fun of you more than once at school but did not remember your face when Nancy introduced you as her friend. Maybe because you weren't wearing your big squared glasses, or because you tried something different with your hair? It didn't really matter anyways. At least they were not making fun of you. Poor Barb wasn't so lucky — they gave her a really hard time, and Nancy was just completely powerless over the situation, too afraid to say anything to try and defend her friend. After an hour, Barb got fed up and left, leaving you alone with Nancy and those assholes who were absolutely wasted and wouldn't shut up about playing spin the bottle or truth or dare.

"Come on, what are you, twelve?" Steve protested, "We're not kids man, that's just boring."

"You're absolutely right Harrington. But, we could spice it up, ya know?" Tommy offered, trying to convince Steve to play the game "For every truth or dare you refuse to tell or do, you have to take a shot of tequila. What do you say, Harrington? Wanna get absolutely wasted?"

Next thing you know, you were excusing yourself to go to the bathroom while at least 10 people were gathering around forming a circle on the floor of Steve's backyard. You didn't really need to use the bathroom, you just needed to cool off a little before getting hammered — you were NOT about to tell any truths or do any dares around these people you barely knew. Before you could go back outside, you got yourself a glass of water in the kitchen. As you threw away the red plastic cup, now empty, you heard a conversation through the kitchen window that headed to the backyard.

"So, can we start the game already?"

"Wait, where's Wheeler's  friend?"

"Barb left like, half an hour ago, Carol" you heard Nancy reply.

"No, not the chubby one, the other one, the weird one with the ugly hair."

"I think she needed to use the bathroom…?"

"Oh my god do you think she's like, brushing her teeth or something? Thinking someone's gonna want to kiss her?" Carol laughed.

"We better not wait for her then, I do NOT want to spin the bottle and end up having to kiss that weird ass bitch!" Tommy said, getting a good laugh out of everyone.

Your eyes teared up as you backed away from the window, thinking about what to do. You thought you could just sneak out and go home, cry yourself to sleep, but then you remembered you had left your bike chained up by the backyard fence. There was no way you could get your bike without anyone noticing you sneaking out. Fuck, you knew you should've stayed home reading something or watching TV.

Since you couldn't go home without your bike, you decided to wait until everyone was back inside. It couldn't take that long, you thought, it was freezing out there. But you couldn't stay inside either. Not by yourself. So, you walked over to the front door and opened it, feeling the cold air hit your cheeks. You walked out of the house and into the woods beside the house, where you could still see the backyard, but would be out of sight, a little further from the backyard fence and hidden in the dark shadow of the trees that surrounded the Harrington's property. Once you were settled, seated on the ground, you bursted into tears. Hot, salty tears running through your face as you sobbed, hating everything about yourself, hating the fact that, no matter how hard you tried, you couldn't escape the fact that you were always different. Not in an obvious way — you didn't have that much of a fashion sense that was bold enough to earn dirty looks from old ladies —, but sometimes you felt like you didn't feel things the same way other people did. You felt fragile, small, vulnerable, like you were exposed all the time. It made you feel like shit.

You were so quiet, you couldn't help but to jump out when you heard footsteps behind you and then something snapping, like someone had stepped on a branch or something. You turned around wide eyed, heart pounding, just to see a silhouette standing behind you, holding a little metal lunchbox. It was a boy, shaggy curly hair down to right below his earlobes, Iron Maiden shirt, leather jacket and denim vest, dark loose jeans and heavy black boots.

"Dude, what the fuck" you panted, trying to not look as spooked and jumpy as you were "where did you came from?"

"Shit, sorry" he said, trying to hold back his laughter "didn't mean to scare ya, normally i don't run by anyone when i take this shortcut, though it has been a while since i actually used this shortcut — see, i usually drive mostly everywhere, but i ran out of gas money for the month and i thought 'hey, i could actually use a little walk through the woods to cool my head off a little' so i just decided to- whoa, wait, are you crying? I'm so sorry I didn't mean to scare you like that!" he stopped his rambling when he noticed you were drying your tears with the sleeve of your jacket.

"No, it's not- really, i'm fine" you panicked, noticing he seemed a little hurt by your reaction "i was already crying before you- sorry, it wasn't you, i'm fine don't worry"

He walked over to you and sat down beside you, a concerned look on his face.

"I don't wanna be nosy or anything, I know you don't really know me" he started, you now realizing you did recognise him from school, how could you not? He's always drawing attention to himself "but you can talk to me if you want. I'm guessing you were at Harrington's party? Everyone down there sitting at that circle in the backyard is kinda known for being a pain in the ass"

"What gave it away?" you brushed off your tears, slightly smiling at his comment "Just didn't wanna play truth or dare with… you know, those guys. But it seems they were glad I didn't join them, so they wouldn't have to kiss me if someone decided to play spin the bottle" 

"Wait, what?" he seemed surprised "They told you that?"

"Not exactly" you explained "I was at the kitchen and overheard someone saying that outside, so i bailed"

"What are you still doing here then?- Oh, I'm Eddie, by the way." he introduced himself, shaking your hand as you introduced yourself.

You explained the whole situation to him and he offered to keep you company until you could get your bike back and go home. After an hour of nonsense conversation filled with Eddie's dramatic sense of humor, you actually got to know each other a little bit. He told you about his band and how he really liked Lord of the Rings and fantasy RPG.

"I'm not really a huge fan of fantasy books" you shared, causing him to gasp, as he was offended by your comment.

"How dare you? Are you not a huge fan of happiness too? Or maybe you hate puppies and ice cream?" he said, his tone dripping with sarcasm. "How can you not like the only way to escape this boring non-fictional world we are FORCED to live in?"

"Hey, don't get me wrong, I do like fiction. Just not... fantasy fiction."

"So what do you like then?"

"I really enjoy science fiction."

"What, like androids and shit?"

"No, not that kind of science fiction. I mean science fiction like... Clockwork Orange, or Flowers for Algernon."

"Oh so you're a nerd too!" he teased "I was almost buying all that 'not a nerd' act, but you're into Kubrick? That's so nerdy!"

"You do know Stanley Kubrick didn't write the book right?"

"Shut up, you know what I mean."

Once he started to talk about music, he just couldn't stop talking for a second. He told you about his band, and you felt as if he was the first person to ever understand your passion for music. After another 30 minutes or so of energetic conversation about how much you both liked 70s rock, he ended up telling you he only attended this kind of party to sell some weed and make a quick buck.

"Don't get me wrong, i fucking hate these people" he explained himself "but they ARE in fact my biggest costumers. Guess daddy's money might not be enough for them to feel loved, but it does buy whatever else they need to feel better about themselves. So, they always make sure I'm 'invited' to every party they want me to bring my little lunchbox to."

"Yeah, that makes sense i guess" you agreed, turning your head over to the backyard, people already heading inside due to the cold. You felt your heart sink, even though all you've been wanting was to take your bike and leave. You were actually really enjoying getting to talk to Eddie.

"Well, i guess this is it" he said, noticing as you watched everyone getting into the house "now you can go home and not listen to me and my rambling about whatever it is i was talking about. Hell, even i can't remember what the hell i was talking about most of the time" he laughed. 

"To be honest, it wasn't that bad" you laughed back "it was definitely better than spin the bottle!"

He chuckled, helping you get up and unchain your bike from the fence, giving you a dorky smile as you hopped up on your bike. 

"Well, I better get back to work huh? Got a lot of customers waiting on me" he gestured to the house as you secured your helmet under your chin.

"Yeah, I better get back home too. My aunt refuses to go to sleep until i get home safe, don't wanna keep her waiting"

"So, I guess I'll see you at school, huh?" he shifted at his feet and kicked the ground, stuffing his hands inside the pockets of his vest.

"Yeah, if there's any seats left for another nerd at your table for lunch" you chuckled awkwardly, looking at your feet.

"For a pretty one like you? Always."

You exchanged an awkward look and smiled at each other again, and with that you followed your way back home, feeling hopeful about how the next few weeks would play out. You thought you had finally found someone you could trust and spend time with, someone who got you — a friend.

For the next week or so, you and Eddie hung out a lot. Finally, you had someone you could call a friend, and things seemed to be going not so bad for the first time in months. He would always save you a seat at the table at lunch and walk you to your classes, he would even give you a ride every once in a while, when his van was not running out of gas. It was something you could get used to — at least until a couple of weeks later, when you, Nancy, Jonathan and Steve ended up trauma bonding over setting a demogorgon on fire. After that, your life had (literally) turned upside down and you didn't hang out with Eddie that much anymore. As the years went by, you would hang out more with Steve and Robin once Nancy and Jonathan started dating. You would still talk to Eddie though, just... not like you talked to your other friends. They were the only ones who actually understood what you were going through, and — even though you missed his company — it would be selfish to tell Eddie everything and drag him into that nightmare. Until of course, the nightmare caught up to him.