#A Handful of Dust (1988)

[nightsinbluevelvet]

Hello there

Rupert Graves and Kristin Scott Thomas in A Handful of Dust (1988)

[undinecissy]

Gettyimages released very beautiful pictures of A Handful of Dust(1988).

Photo taken by Murray Close on October 1st, 1987.

[oscarwetnwilde]

Rupert Graves and Kristin Scott Thomas as John Beaver and Brenda Last in A Handful Of Dust. (1988)

[pinkrelish]

𝐭𝐡𝐞 "𝐲𝐞𝐬" 𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐲.

singledad!mechanic!eddie x fem!reader

✶What happens when Eddie tries to hide the less-than-fun side of being a single parent from you, and you discover Miss Mouse can't always save the day?✶

NSFW — angst with a happy ending, reader wears eddie's hoodie, comfort, kissing, 18+ overall for smut, drug/alcohol mention/use

chapter: 11/20 [wc: 14.2k]

↳ part 01 / 02 / 03 / 04 / 05 / 06 / 07 / 08 / 09 / 10 / 11 / 12

AO3

Chapter 11: In the Beginning...

——Then——

In the beginning…

It was January 31st, 1988, and Wayne had come in to check on him again. And maybe he had a reason to when Eddie continued to stare at the pockmarked ceiling, dressed in the same clothes as three days prior, laying on the same bedsheets last washed by well-meaning, pre-aged, liver-spotted, wrinkled hands gnarled from factory work after being tanned on a big rig’s steering wheel for decades.

No music played from the stereo record player; The Doors still sat with the album art turned, stopped mid-spin. The paperback on the nightstand remained unfinished, its dog-eared page trapped as a placeholder from New Year’s Eve. Dust and cigarette ash clung to the room as if saving it in a time capsule of the morning he was arrested, and any movement would disturb the illusion.

“Eddie?” Wayne called out to him with his Free name; one that shouldn’t hold a stigma, because Eddie was a free man, wasn’t he? He was innocent. Even if they hadn’t caught the other guy yet. “You okay if I go?”

Tracing the bumpy lines of the most recent tattoo on his stomach, he answered, “Yeah, I’m fine,” and his uncle breathed as he usually did when he was wringing his mouth with indecision.

Wayne twisted the doorknob, uncertain. “If you’re sure.. And, uh, I’ll stop by the hardware store and pick up somethin’ for the spray paint on the trailer if the cookin’ oil trick doesn’t work, don’t you worry about it.”

Whatever rude thing someone wrote this time, Eddie hadn’t gone outside in days to know.

After a long silence, Wayne cleared his throat and gave a gruff, “I’ll see ya after work,” and left, as foretold by his rackety truck fading further into the night, and the deadness of winter taking over. A staleness of midnight inactivity in the crisp air invading the guitars and amps and magazines Eddie never touched anymore; the ceramic of his bedside lamp, the model car next to his lighter, the binders stacked on his desk with a pencil he hadn’t sharpened since it broke six weeks ago. He didn't get much relief from his routine of ignoring, shutting down, isolating, and desperately trying to get tears to form when he had none left to give, so he wept agape and dry, spiraling downward.

The phone rang.

He wasn’t going to answer—he hadn’t since December unless under obligation—but in case it was Wayne, he did.

“Hello?” The other end of the line was equally hesitant to answer his unrecognizable voice, gone hoarse from disuse. “Hello?” he repeated.

“Eddie?” A beat. “I guess I’ll get this over with. Look, uh, do you remember selling to a girl at Brad’s party a couple months back? Not the Halloween one,” they said, definitely a young woman’s voice, but with each word spoken she lost her fluttery nervous edge and replaced it with a direct tone, leaving no time for him to dawdle.

He hurled his mind into searching his memories before the ones made in the weeks prior, only grazing past the details which haunted him, and registering the question he was asked. “Uh, yeah, yeah I think so. Ah, Sarah? Something generic like that. Sold to her a couple times before. Why?”

Her severe silence loaded the chamber. His forthcoming nature pulled the trigger, never learning when to shut his mouth and keep information to himself. There was no telling who he was speaking to, or what happened to the girl he sold to, or why he was the subject of interest. His stomach clenched in knots at the whiff of gunpowder. He was too relaxed at the prospect of a normal conversation. He said too much. It was happening again. The police sirens would wail any minute now. Whatever happened to Sarah—or whoever—was bad, and he incriminated himself. Oh God. Oh God. Oh God.

But it was her next words that fired the shot. Rang in his ears. And he knew then, as the cold sweat took over his body and bile stung his throat quicker than his heart leapt black spots to his vision, life as he knew it was over.

“I’m pregnant, and it’s yours.”

————

In the beginning…

It was March 7th, 1988, and Eddie walked out.

It was better than listening to Wayne blame himself for not doing enough, or being involved enough, or whateverthefuck he was saying about failing Eddie, because soon those judgments would turn into nags about how Eddie’s irresponsibility got himself into this mess, and those arguments would become shouting matches about his lack of preparedness for raising a baby, and Eddie would end the fight with his fist through the hallway closet door, where his piece of shit father’s jacket swung on the hanger and fell to the floor.

Following the Munson name.

————

In the beginning…

It was April 29th, 1988, and Eddie left his motel room to drive forty-five minutes outside of Hawkins to sit across from a woman in a dimly lit restaurant with her hand laid atop her round belly, and his cold chicken alfredo. The cheese in his oval shaped dish had coagulated, but he wasn’t hungry anyway.

The entire time his mouth ran sentences, he kept his gaze focused on a crumb dirtying the white tablecloth as the candle flickered shadows through their untouched water glasses. Yet, his tone remained animated and optimistic, though a bit hollow. “—So, uh, with the money from workin’ at the gas station, and what I have saved from that graveyard shift I picked up at the laundromat, I can afford the crib no problem. Maybe you could, ah, come with me to pick it out! I don’t really know what I’m supposed to be looking for, but whatever you want, you got it. And—And I’ll start stocking up on diapers, and stuff. Y’know, different sizes. Some clothes. Could even get a nice baby blanket, or somethin’. I guess cribs have those teeny mattresses, so we’ll need sheets for that, too. Um, one of those, y’know, things that hangs over it and spins, puts them to sleep.” His lips hinted at his first smile in weeks at his dumb explanation for a mobile. “And with your job, you have health insurance, don’t you? That’ll.. That’ll really help us out,” he emphasized by bugging his eyes, and nodding. “There’s a position open at an auto shop in town that I’m gonna apply for, but I don’t think insurance will kick in until I work there for a certain number of days. Sucks, but it’s decent money. Better than what I make now, anyway. Um..” Thinking, he sorted through his plan for the future in his head, making sure he didn’t forget anything important—

That’s when he made the mistake of looking up, and a different type of heartache wrung his chest.

Indifference powdered her shimmery beige eyelids, darkening to smoky apathy at the outer corners with a touch of heavy mascara weighing her eyes half-closed. She appeared bored—he wished she appeared bored—but in the eternity he glanced at her, she resembled a loaded chamber moments from cutting him off.

Continuing, he said, “I can also handle the small stuff like bottles, and bibs, and pacifiers. Depending on how much the crib is, I can probably swing the carseat too, just gotta sell my other guitar, and—”

“Eddie,” she stated. He winced.

There was no trace of his smile left on his lips; trembling and licking at the sore metallic-tasting spot he bit out of habit. The first sign of rejection welled behind his eyes. A sense of shame clogged his throat, but he tried, “Are people still bothering you about me?” he asked, so meek and defeated.

Her words were a merciless killing, “Does it matter?” He shrugged, running the side of his hand along the table’s edge, concentrating on the crumb. “And don’t bother buying anything.”

“Why not?” he faltered. “I’m not gonna be some deadbeat who doesn’t provide, okay? I’m good on my word.”

“You know why.”

The cruelty, the truth he denied, struck him.

“You don’t want to try?” His voice went watery, and the candles swam in his vision. “We’re having a baby together, and you don’t want to try and work something out between us?” There was a reason he avoided addressing where the crib would go, or what the arrangement was after coming home from the hospital. In the first few calls they had, she seemed interested when he rattled off the list of cheap apartments he found around Hawkins scribbled into his notebook, and when he lightened the bleak mood with a joke, she laughed, sort of.

Though, he was always the one to call her, and her answers were refined to short words such as yeah, or no. And she did pick up the phone less often, but she was busy with University or her career or there was a family thing that had come up or she was just headed out the door, so he stuck with planning their future by himself, aware of the ugly reality twisting his stomach with dread.

Maybe he was being naive, but he thought she’d come around by now. See how responsible he was being, and maybe.. maybe..

“I’m not interested,” she dismissed him in monotonously stern frankness.

“I thought you said you liked me,” he reminded her, on the verge of something pathetic, “at the party.”

The corner of her jaw twitched from an emotion she ground between her teeth.

That was the final straw.

She swung her gaze around the restaurant, releasing a hard sigh of frustration, and shaking her head. Dropping her hand to the bottom of her belly, she leaned forward, and eviscerated any hope he had for them being together. “I’m not interested,” she hissed under the susurration of nearby tables, “in raising a baby with someone whose reputation is for giving girls discounts when they flirt with him.”

Eddie shrunk into himself, not expecting the hit below the belt.

“You’re just the loser dealer that all the guys send their girls to because they know you’re too lonely to turn them down. I wish I stuck with flirting, because let me tell you, having a couple of smarties to get me through last semester wasn’t fucking worth it.” She motioned at her stomach, he assumed. “I almost missed my finals because I couldn’t stop puking.”

Fat drops wobbled his vision. Anxious sweat from holding his breath prickled his hot face. His knuckles hurt from clacking them against one another, punching bone-on-bone in his lap to distract himself from letting the venom win. Biting impressions of his teeth into tongue from the weight of his one chance at normalcy slipping through his fingers.

The ache of deep-seated rejection stung worse, built worse, escalated worse with every heartbeat echoing in his head: not even someone who’s having your kid wants to be with you.

Chairs skid across the tiles behind him, and a family stood to leave. Eddie faced the stained glass window as they passed, pretending to admire the intricate details while warm tears spilled over the dam, and onto his cheeks in steady drops like rain. Drip, drop, drip, drop..

Embarrassment, failure, freak..

Even before he was wrongfully arrested, his reputation was trash.

Pathetic loser not good enough for his dad, his uncle. Can’t pass fucking high school, or get a girl to stick around for more than a few weeks; just long enough to feel the safety of attachment, learn their likes and dislikes, what their favorite flowers were, and then they’d leave too..

“Doesn’t matter,” she exhaled. One, two—she took two calming breaths through her nose while his was running, and he was trying to not sniffle through the grossness of crying.

Composed and diplomatic, she sat up, smoothed the buttons of her burgundy maternity blouse stretched across her swollen middle, and informed him “I’m giving her up for adoption.”

Eddie froze.

Her.

Tiny tines of salad forks ceased clinking on plates. Silly dull knives unworthy of much else sank into whipped butter, and stopped. Pretty laughter faded, leaving red lipstick kisses staining the rims of wine glasses.

Her.

He froze. A strange cliche to explain how his body reacted. How his heart pounded, and tears splashed onto his clenched fists. How his brain latched onto one word, one word only, and the blood drained from his cheeks to pool liquid rage in his empty belly. How his temper surged like a wave, and crashed, again and again on the shore of fate. How he was thinking sharper, seeing clearer, smelling the raw flame of the candle being snuffed out from his sudden movement.

The tableware rattled when he planted his elbow next to his forgotten dinner, and pointed a stern finger at her stomach. “That’s my daughter, and you will not—”

“C’mon, Ed—”

“No,” he cut her off. He didn’t give a damn if another tear rolled from his wide eyes when he said it, he put conviction behind his voice even when it cracked, “That’s my daughter, and you are not giving her up for adoption.”

“Be serious,” she spat back. “You don’t have the means to take care of a baby. I’m doing this as a favor for the both of us. Mostly for you.”

Eddie sucked his bottom lip inward and chewed the flesh. Shivers of indignation trembled his body, and his nostrils flared from the absolute power he invoked to rein his voice from the snap, bite, snarl his upper lip suggested. “I don’t care what you think is best,” he maintained through the viscous tar coating his refusal in the abhorrence she deserved. “That baby.. She’s mine.” He nodded until the motion was ingrained, and her expression changed. Pointing to himself, now. “She’s mine, and I want her.”

There wasn’t much thought put behind his decision. It was done. It was innate. It was automatic, and her soft warning—”You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into,”—was as heeded as the candle’s flame.

He paid for the date. It cost five hours of his minimum wage. That was all his money. He was hungry when he got back to his shitty motel; opening the door to darkness, and a suitcase of dirty clothes he’d need to sort before going to work at the gas station at the edge of town where his boss cut his hours last week because it was making customers uncomfortable to see a criminal serve them at the till, and a new sound replaced the ding of the cash register: loser, loser, loser..

Already, he couldn’t afford diapers.

Already, he failed.

Already, he was worthless.

Already, he was alone.

Not even the woman he was having a baby with wanted to be with him.

——Now——

Eddie hung up the phone, and you watched his shoulders rise and fall for long moments, listening to the rain pattern shift above. The storm spilled its sorrows on the tin roof, uncaring if the structure could handle the stress of another trial when it was weak and susceptible. It poured, and poured. Ruthless. Vicious and brutal as nature could be, targeting the vulnerable and strong alike.

His back broadened with a breath, and finally, he dropped his hand from the yellowed plastic, staring at the dial pad as his arm went limp at his side. Absorbed by his thoughts as the old night rolled into another low growl of thunder, and whatever was on his mind reflected heavily in his vacant appearance.

“Ed?” You waited for him with a kind lift to your brows, but as soon as his glance landed, your chest tightened.

The emotion in Eddie’s eyes was heavily guarded, communicating little as to what caused the tenseness in his jaw when he averted his gaze to the floor, walking fast and purposefully away from you standing half-dressed in his kitchen, and stopping at the front door with his head down. Going through the motions of buttoning his pants, and buckling his belt, rigid and rough, snapping the leather against itself.

“Is Adrie okay?” you asked, voice coming out painfully shallow, like when you were using it to diffuse a customer service issue with the breeze of happiness and a plastered smile.

Leaned over, he shoved his feet into his boots, and began lacing. “She’s fine.”

Blunt, and closed off. Not like your Eddie from an hour ago. And you didn’t know how to navigate asking him what was wrong, and easing him into opening up to you, coaxing him back to that place of union and understanding.

Left feeling confused, you gleaned that this wasn’t the time to bother him about it, and mumbled, “Okay,” and assumed the rest. You dragged the whispery ends of the blanket across the floor, and picked your sweater off the carpet, having that particular sense of embarrassment as if you’d missed a cue, and should’ve read the room sooner, and been clothed and leaving without him asking.

You dressed in silence, doing up the buttons on the cardigan he so skillfully slipped you out of. Treading over linoleum to wash the evening off your hands and mouth. Making yourself small to fit next to him in the entryway, and putting on your shoes in a state of quiet obedience, missing the warmth of his hands and the comfort of his lovesick grin. Wilting under the coldness of his attitude, and wanting nothing more than to reach out, and soothe that bit of regret knotted between his eyebrows.

He regarded the exposed skin of your upper chest, and handed you his black hoodie from where it hung next to his canvas work jacket. “Here.”

Here wasn’t much of a break in the distance he resurrected between you, but you pulled the heavy scent of cigarettes and cologne over your head, and he almost found himself braving eye contact to tell you, “I’m dropping you off first.”

“What? No,” you blurted, “I’m going with you to pick her up. She’s just scared of thunderstorms, right? No big deal, you can drop me off after.” Which seemed like the right thing to say; that you were fine with Adrie crying, but when he set his gaze on you, a small image of yourself swam in his endless pupils, and your stomach clenched at the animal warning in his unbreakable stare.

Eddie shook his head an imperceptible amount, only enough to loosen the curtain of curls tucked beneath his jacket’s collar, and shift the lamp’s glare at the edge of his bitter coffee eyes. It was a threat to back off. Leave well enough alone. Stop encroaching on the parts of his life he hid, and keep the illusion intact.

“I wanna go,” you assured gently.

However, your support fell short when challenged against the aggressive shine swallowing you whole. He looked at you. Really looked at you with the same intensity as when his hands were on your hips and you rocked yourself in his lap, chests flush together with a lazy prayer of your name on his tongue; when nothing mattered more than honoring each other with lips and teeth, tasting sweat on necks and sucking bruises until moans were spilled from heads thrown back. But instead of unraveling you in shocks of pleasure, the ignorance of your child-free lifestyle softened the harsh lines of his face, and slowly, slowly, the shine dulled. The fight left him.

He saved his apology until his back was turned, and the squeaky doorknob gave under his heavy palm—turning it with too much force—and he cracked open the world beyond the two of you, dousing the lingering tenderness of your affection on his skin with frigid mist. “Sorry tonight ended this way.” The door banged open on the rusted iron handrail, caught on a gust.

The trailer park was bright with daylight. Flash, after flash.

Eddie’s silhouette eclipsed the doorway, outlined in lightning. He stood impossibly taller—like the animal threat still lurked within his structure, and caution stayed within your subconscious, altering how you perceived his lanky frame into something more imposing. His shoulders carried many burdens, bulked from five years of hard labor, possessing strengths you couldn’t imagine. He stepped to the side, insisting the door stay open with the spread of five fingers only, and his body no longer shielded you. You were exposed to the cold splash of rain on your shins. His palm was firm at your lower back, and you peered up at the hard set of his jaw feathering the muscle at the corner, sweeping the bone in a mature edge of stubble. Strands of his frizzy hair whipped in the wind. Droplets speckled his nose like freckles. His gaze, anchored on his car through the downpour, brewed with resentment.

His deep timber resonated in your chest beneath the safety of his hoodie, “Car door’s open, I’ll lock up behind you.”

And you were pushed.

Beaten down to a hunch, you took careful strides in your heeled shoes down the concrete steps and into the soft mud, covering your head as best you could from the cloud’s assault, and flinching at the closeness of the strikes darting around the boundary of treetops surrounding the trailer park. You tried the handle, and the car welcomed you into its dry insides. Guilt followed your tracks of caked on mud, leaves, and dead weeds on his nice red interior, but when you shivered to the bone, you didn’t care as much. Curled in on yourself, you spied Eddie’s vague shape through the waterfall blurring the windshield, and listened to his heavy boots trudge up to the door, and soon, the car sank with his weight too.

The engine roared to life. Heat wouldn’t come from the tiny AC units for some time, but the promise of such gave you hope. Eddie, beside you, drenched beyond measure, did not match your enthusiasm. Shadowed streams snaked across his pinched expression, swimming down his heavy brow, and splitting his raw lips. His bangs stuck to his forehead, and his cheeks trembled from his clacking teeth.

Soft music played from the radio station.

Riders on the Storm.

Two booms of thunder ended your small attempt at a smile from the timing.

Leftover adrenaline pulsed in your veins, fumbling your grip on the seatbelt. Wet earth and unease stroked your skin like skeletal hands, muddying your tights, and soaking his hoodie, weighing it down to your crushed sweater beneath. You wanted to speak; to poke, to prod, to press him to talk to you. The questions were there. On your tongue. At the ready; inviting him to tell you why his mood soured over a situation out of his control, other than the obvious weather.

But Eddie’s face was carved with irritation, baring his teeth as he attempted to buff circles into the icy fog on the windshield, only for it to cloud over in an instant. “C’mon..”

The wipers couldn’t keep up with the powerful current, and the tires struggled to find traction. “Fucking—damnit,” he said, interrupted by him slapping the steering wheel, cascading water off his work jacket, and onto every surface around him.

You twisted your hands in your lap at his mild slip in temper.

Now was not the time to bother him.

In a lurch, your shoulder bumped the door, and your head rocked side to side from the car backing over the swell of mud behind the tires. With another frustrated stomp on the gas, it evened out on paved road, and though the visibility was low, you were off towards the nicer side of Hawkins.

For once, he drove responsibly. Street signs could be read before he passed them. Fallen limbs in the road could be avoided, not ran over. His rings tinked off the glass when he rubbed at the thin fog, and the music was dialed to a somber ambiance behind the deep sighs through his nose. Dark stretches of treetops bent to the wind’s will. Short buildings sat so dim beyond the faint streetlights, they might as well have been deserted. Each red light was a necessary break for him to shove his fingers in the air vents to thaw them.

He never spoke. Never looked at you. He kept himself busy with tasks, and when those tasks were over and his hands were defrosted and the windshield was mostly clear, he regressed within himself. Unnervingly quiet. Turning onto streets with heavier regrets sagging his features the longer he crawled in front of white picket fence houses, and stopped.

The two story home was lit beautifully by the ornate sconces placed on either side of the doorway. Their lawn was manicured, and the sidewalk was free of weeds. No cars were at the mercy of the storm, they were parked inside the two-door garages. There was activity behind the embossed curtains hung in the living room of the residence. Presumably, the biggest shape was the father who called over the phone.

Someone who wore a business suit to the preschool’s Thanksgiving play lived here.

Eddie stalled. He remained seated forward, hands gripped at 10 and 2, squeezing the steering wheel as rain echoed in the belly of the car, battering the roof inches above your damp hair. There was a pause in his movements, his breathing. An awareness in his silence at the questions you didn’t ask. Tension in his pursed lips, rubbing them together as he surveyed the street.

He opened his mouth. Then, he thought better of it, and got out.

Your earnest call of his name was swallowed by the sea cleansing his body of your night together.

Leaping up the bullnose brick stairs, Eddie raised his hand, but before he could knock, the artisanal stained glass shimmered with movement. The immaculate door opened to a winced face. The man’s glasses were askew on his aged eyes, and his peppered hair hung over his eyebrows, no longer gelled back. He exchanged a few tight words with Eddie as Adrie was handed over, and Eddie, of course, shuffled into a meek posture, dipping his head, apologizing profusely. Almost bowing to this man dressed in matching pajamas and a robe. In horror, you watched the door close during one such apology. You could tell it happened in the middle of him speaking, because you had to sit through the agony of Eddie animatedly explaining something only for him to look up, straighten at the realization, and stand there for a few more seconds until the sconces dimmed off.

Worse, still, he cowered in the nook as cruel rain belted his back, doing his best to bundle Adrie in her tattered quilt and securing her on his hip, keeping all of her dry except her little legs wrapped around his middle. She buried her face in his neck, and he hesitated on the balls of his feet, judging the distance between the house and the car. His large palm covered the blanket over her head. All he had was his jacket.

Lightning revealed his weary frown.

At the clap of thunder, he sprinted.

Back in New York, at the going away party your friends threw in your and Robin’s honor, they warned you about moving to the Tornado Alley, and what to look for if one were to appear—green skies and all—but most importantly, they told you an incoming tornado sounded like a train. Being city dwellers, they wouldn’t actually know, but Robin confirmed it. And now you could too, because the piercing wail coming towards you could only belong to a natural disaster, not a four-year-old girl.

Murky water flooded to Eddie’s ankles from where it rushed against the sidewalk, sloshing in with his boot stomped to the floorboard for balance as he ducked inside amidst the fuss. He got Adrie into her carseat as quickly as possible. In the chaos, her overnight backpack fell somewhere in the dark, her quilt was chucked aside, and he cursed when the buckle bit into his thumb. She had a fistful of his hair, tangling it, making it harder to see what he was doing. He may have even threatened her full name to let go. It was hard to hear on account of the shrieking.

“Daddy!” The vowels were elongated, broken by hiccups. He shut the door, and in the small space with no escape, her big emotions rang louder. “Daddy!” Again, the y was screamed with the full power of her lungs, which would be impressive for their tiny size if it wasn’t for the pounding in your skull. She hollered louder when he sat heavily behind the wheel, “Daddy!” He didn’t shush her fourth tantrum spilt on his name; he accepted it, knowing it was futile.

It took all your strength to blink. Sat half-turned in your seat, frozen, gaze unfocused, marveling at your brain’s ability to function. You shifted your attention to Eddie’s face, a surprising few inches from yours.

The heat of his concentration scorched shame to your cheeks.

Avoidant no longer, your reaction to Adrie’s meltdown was the sole subject of his interest. Zeroed in on, dissected, and picked apart by just his eyes alone. Didn’t matter which eye you shied from, you were pinned in both, your discomfort blatant for him to witness. Your clamped mouth, your apologetic withdrawal, your fidgety fingers on your skirt; all of it. All of it was captured in his periphery because he didn’t dare break sight as he turned the key in the ignition, and started a raucous engine you couldn’t remember being turned off.

Humbled by the girl assaulting your senses, your questions were answered.

This was why he didn’t want you to come. This was why he slighted you with a pointed look from the recesses of his annoyance when you trivialized his daughter’s behavior as ‘No big deal.’ This was why he kept you separate from his parental sphere where everything wasn’t made of sunshine and rainbows. This—coming to terms with your inexperience staining each uncontrollable contortion of your unprepared expression—was why he never let anyone near his heart.

Adrie could no longer form his name through her open-mouthed cries, resorting to plain, wet screams which trilled past your eardrums, resulting in a throbbing headache.

At that, he grasped the gear shift, put his boot to the gas, and cut fat lines through the river overflowing the pampered neighborhood streets.

Eddie’s anger was a presence. His embarrassment, too. Just like at the auto shop when problems stacked and stacked into an unbearable weight on top of his sleepless nights and long mornings, he turned inward to delay his outburst. To feel everything so fully in his fists wringing the leather covered steering wheel until it creaked, and teeth gritted until they begged no more. Just that one second to release his frustration, and then it was suppressed from sight. But you felt it. His ire rested below your braced muscles, beneath your clammy palms and in your shallow breath. It invaded the tidy home you kept behind your ribs, taking up residence in your hammering heart.

The humiliation of having the date end when it did paid its dues in his bad mood. Disappointment radiated off his narrowed eyes, and slack frown. “Adrie,” he warned in a low tone.

She bawled louder, shriller than the crack of lightning.

The immense pressure to adapt was upon you. There was no sense in parsing what he expected you to do in this situation, it was clear he was soured by your ineptitude the moment you let it show on your face, but.. Only two short weeks ago, he relied on you to divert Adrie’s meltdown before DND night. And sure, she had already stopped crying by the time you got there, but you could come to his rescue again, couldn’t you?

You twisted around in your seat, proud of yourself for thinking of a solution, and showed him you could handle a modicum of parenthood. “Adrie, look!” you tamped down your children’s television host voice to a delightful, excited cheer, “I’m here. Miss Mouse is—!” Shocked with your hand reaching towards her, shooting pain traveled up your arm from her swift kick to your wrist. You recoiled, rubbing at your forearm without blame. It wasn’t her fault. She wasn’t even looking at you. Her fit was directed at the window she couldn’t peel her attention from, dropping tear after tear from her swollen eyes at the thunder shaking the car. “Adrie?” you tried softer, but she beat her hands on the carseat harder. Wailed until you were defeated to a wince. Yelled until you accepted a unique heartbreak you weren’t prepared for.

Miss Mouse couldn’t always save the day.

Acute twists of rejection wrung your chest. Eddie wasn’t the type to say I told you so, he wasn’t mean like that, but when you sat forward and your gazes moved past one another, never quite meeting, you knew what he was thinking.

Little else stung worse than his obvious cynicism at how this date was concluding.

Exacerbating the issue, Adrie escalated to screeching her distress. Every open sob of hers pulled your focus, invaded your brainspace, overpowered any thought before it began, and set your teeth on edge from the high-pitched squeals you swore vibrated in your bones. Her behavior seeped into your nerves, winding them up, scratching them with the very tip of a brittle nail, inciting a riot. The need to flee crawled under your skin. Breathing was uncomfortable. Your ankle hurt. There was to break in between the blinding pulses of your headache. The car was too hot, too cold, too swerving from the high winds buffeting it sideways. Your tights were too tight. His hoodie too stifling. Itchy yarn from your sweater chafed your damp neck. Alarms of panic battled inside. Louder, louder, louder—Adrie cried louder. Eddie’s lips tugged down at the corners, chin wrinkled, tensing his face from a sadder response. Your lashes fluttered from the chokehold his frown had on you. Fingernails bit your palms. You tried to bide your time, to resist snapping. Dug down deep for something, something you could do, something.. innate. Some answer within you to fix it all. To get her to stop. To get him to relax. Something, something, something—instinctual.

“Pull over!” you barked; Eddie had every right to whip his head around at your sudden demand, but in your panicked state you only cared about the road ahead. “Ju-Just—just—” You scanned the dark parking lot outside the hardware store, and stabbed your finger on the cold window, pointing past it. “The gas station! Under the roof-thing.”

When it wasn’t clear he heard you, you turned towards him at the same time he leaned forward to catch your eye. Justifiable skepticism burdened his brow, tightening the edges of his crow’s feet. His lips hung parted with a confirmation hesitating between them; however, it was silenced after you maintained your need, and the fight against the wind won.

Soppy pebbles scraped wet asphalt, muddied in the bump and grind from Eddie turning too sharply into the sloped driveway, banging into a pothole, and rattling the innards of his already rocky cargo. He careened towards the closed convenience store with its row of dim fluorescent lights inside. Pulling up alongside the gas pumps, he slammed the breaks. A second later, he slapped the windshield wipers OFF, violently shushing their grating squeak.

His patience strained thinner. Working through the sensory overload festering like infected wounds on blistered skin, he rumbled a shallow apology past his aching teeth. Quickly, it devolved into a barrage of doubt. “Look, I’m sorry she—Wait, where’re you—?” The instant fear of rejection shot past his octave. “Wait! Please don’t—”

Cruelly, he thought; heartlessly, he knew; the sun-faded black cotton draped about your shoulders was the last image his adrenaline latched onto, playing it over, and over, door slam and all. He wasn’t parked for more than a clock tick, and you hurled yourself out into the storm, leaving him behind. His first assumption was gentle. Kind whispers stroked the angst in his chest, telling him you needed a break from the noise, that was all. Then the hatred of abandonment gutted his center.

“Giving up already?” he asked aloud in a conclusion only meant to hurt himself when no one was there to answer.

As if sensing his hopelessness, Adrie sniffled into the worst of her hyperventilated cries. Broken disjointed things. Sinking him deeper, deeper into his seat, crossing his arms over his caved chest, shuddering at the hot sting wobbling his vision at his own inadequacy.

Never good enough for anyone to stay.

Tremors of repressed memories wakened the churn of nausea making him sick.

“Baby, baby, it’s okay,” soothed a voice behind him, trickling in with the splash of faraway drops. “It’s okay, sweet baby, I’m here. I’ve got you. I’m here.”

Eddie jerked his chin up and stretched his neck to see into the rearview mirror. The wall of water teetering on his lash line made everything blur, so he tugged down the slick skin beneath his eyes to suck back the tears, and almost allowed them to spill at the scene behind him anyway.

In the reflection, you crawled across the backseat and unbuckled Adrie’s carseat, learning how to maneuver the straps from watching him. She reached for you, your hair, your clothes; small fists belying their strength. You didn’t care. You calmed her struggles with pretty words. “It’s okay, yeah, you can hold on to me, baby. Let’s get you wrapped up nice and warm. There we go.” Shhh. “Let me see your face, so I can clean you up.” Shhh.

“M–M-Mizz Mou—se,” Adrie got out between body-wracked sobs.

“Mhm, I’m here.” Shhh. “Miss Mouse is here.”

—Oh.

“Baby..” So modest was his whisper when so resolute was his yearn.

He leapt into motion, flushed with adrenaline.

The ripple effect of your actions caused tidal waves to swell and crash over him; body hitched in the place where his past convinced him he lost it all, only to collapse into a stuttered exhale of acceptance, understanding there was someone out there who cared about him to this degree; throat constricting with gratitude he could only express by stumbling out into the foggy cold, throwing open the door, and sliding into the backseat with you.

His fingers grazed the baby hairs at your nape on their way to the side of your head, using his wide palm which took up too much room to cradle you steady with a gentleness unknown to his tough skin. He trusted you to forgive him for how hard he knocked his forehead to your temple, and smashed his nose to the soft of your cheek. He need not worry. Beautifully, you adjusted to the bulky arm behind your neck, leaned into the crook of his body he hollowed out for you, and filled the familiar place at his side. You worked diligently to clear his daughter’s face while he passed a strong hand over her back and dropped it to shape his grip at the end of your thigh, curving his fingers in and slotting them to the underside, behind your knee.

“S’okay, Adrie,” you cooed, wiping at the sticky grossness clinging to her nose. “I’ve got you,” you continued the mantra, albeit with a lapse in motherly tenderness as a result of trying not to gag too hard.

Outside the car, the gas station’s tall canopy provided enough coverage to stop the rain from pounding the roof. Harsh winds howled past, encouraging the woeful sobs dropped onto your breasts, but the lightning stayed within the clouds, and the thunder faded in the distance. “Look at me,” you guided, sweeping the hoodie’s cuff over her puffy cheeks glowing splotchy red from the neon beer signs in the postered up convenience store windows. “We’ve got you. Nothing bad can happen when we’re here.”

Eddie lips pulled thin against your skin, breath stuttering damp and thick on your neck like a smothered cry.

“Nothing bad can happen when we’re here, okay?” Repeating the union of you and him, you went on, “We’ve got you. You’re safe with us. Nothing bad can happen when we’re here. Right, sweet bean?” You tucked the quilt around her feet, and held her close. “We won’t let anything bad happen to you, ever.”

With her hands latched into the folds of fabric around your neck—cotton, yarn, and canvas—her big coughs were cushioned by your arms snuggling her to your front while Eddie’s chest was at her back, embracing her between your two bodies converging to protect her in a toasty nest. Warm air hummed from the vents, shooing off the stale chill clinging to the backseat, now disturbed by activity and plucky guitar strings playing over the radio.

Across the Universe.

Undertaking the complexities of the man rubbing his forehead into your hair with the same sort of neediness as his little girl wringing your clothes, you assumed the responsibility of consoling them both. “Nothings gonna change my world,” you mumbled the lyrics into the patchwork quilt covering Adrie’s curls. “Nothings gonna change my world,” you sang to Eddie, face tipped up and eyes falling closed, seeking out his nose to trace the tip of yours along the soft bumps in a devoted offering after the turbulent events causing you both inner strife.

His fingertips became an imposing force spread across the scope of your cheek, turning you toward him, capturing you in a deeper kiss than you were ready for. It was demanding, hard with desperation, misaligned and urgent. Born out of necessity in the moment. He kissed you in front of his daughter, where she could see if she picked her face up from your chest, and a dart of surprise lit your heart at the recklessness. You kept a level hand atop her head in case he’d come to regret the decision, but he didn’t seem to notice, or care. He sighed into a second helping, and at the sound of the wet smack, she stirred.

Adrienne hooked her fingers into your collar and sniffled hard, soothing herself from further cries by hugging you tight, huddling into your comfort, oblivious to what was happening around her.

Easily, you fell into the third kiss. Became what he needed, mouths mashing together at the odd angle, your lower lip plush between his. Dizzying amounts of reverence manifested in his spontaneity. He packed a lifetime’s worth of bottled up feelings into the affection he was privileged to. Giving, and taking. But his impulses were still a puzzle. When he’d drank his fill, he squeezed your leg, broke apart from your lips in a silent slick slide, and drew a deserved breath.

“Sorry, no one’s ever just.. done that for me before.” He shrugged his hand off your thigh at the poor summary of the millions of things on his mind, and left it at that.

Spurred by the praise, you seized the opportunity for communication. “Remember how before we played DND that night, I told you to call me first next time you needed help?” you reminded him, and something vulnerable, maybe even pleadful, entered your tone. “I want to be someone you can rely on, Eddie.”

An unfortunate amount of complicated emotions passed in his eyes. There wasn’t much to garner from them, nor his soft grunt when he dropped his nose to the column of your neck, above Adrie’s head, and regressed into his quiet self. Reserved. Hard to decipher. He did speak up once to warn you she would fall asleep with how you were holding her—same as he did most nights on the couch while Late Night with David Letterman aired—and you embellished your promise to him with a kiss to the stringy curls frizzing at his scalp, “That’s okay.”

And it was okay, truly, when the storm raged heaves of rain against the car, spraying the windows with shocks of water. You dabbed Adrie’s cheeks. Wiped her nose. Rocked her in the same tempo as the backs of Eddie’s fingers stroking your cheekbone, flexed bicep behind your neck. Thunder occurred. Lightning happened. But with your quick thinking, lulling gestures, and genuine effort to speak past the fondness clogging your throat, you calmed her. Calmed her so well, in fact, her hands went limp and her body relaxed, fatigue claiming her victim to the numbered sheep hopping over fences in her dreams. After her tantrums, she was taxed out. Drained.

Stuck in the cramped middle between Eddie and the carseat, you rearranged your legs before they went tingly numb from her weight on your lap, and shifted the pressure off your heels. It was sweet having her fall asleep on you. Her slow breaths filled your arms as a reward for your efforts to hush her. The quilt smelled of their home, cozying itself in your lungs and sweeping you in a sense of longing for the humidity in his kitchen after making soup.

Though, as much as you thrived on the temporary role you played as parent—taking over for Eddie and dwelling on the fact Adrie slept propped on your chest like the many times she napped on his stained coveralls—you could do without the additional pain of him leaning on you too.

You groaned at the sharp twinge in your spine from slouching sideways, and conveniently, your movement roused his consciousness. He launched into a sleepy inhale. Robust, filling his lungs to the brim, too loud, too silly and sweet. He primed you for a solid press of the bridge of his nose to your jaw by thumbing you towards him, after which he pulled away, separating himself from you fully.

Eddie rolled his shoulders, stretching out from the uncomfortable position, and faced the window. He commented in a sincere tone, “You’re good with kids.”

“I know how to entertain kids,” you corrected him. “I don’t know how to do any of the hard shit you do.”

The streetlights painted strokes of dotted orange on his complexion cast in shadow. He played with the tips of his fingers, squishing each one in a line as he ruminated, staring elsewhere, perspiration blurring the outerworld, sealing yourselves in this crowded car together. “You do a good job,” he reassured, petering out in a hoarse whisper.

Ceaseless nerves gnawed at his absent-minded ring spinning. Not a big production like when he wrung his hands or bit his nails, but enough to show he was getting anxious. You’d expected his leg to be bouncing by now, but it was laying softly against yours. Something big was on his mind.

You bumped your knee into his. “Talk to me.”

Talk to me. Yes, you asked the world of him. You knew it, too. Encouraging his gaze to flick to Adrie bundled in your arms, and back to the window. His eyes weren’t wide with fear, just larger than normal at the subtle confrontation. It was time he opened up to you. There wasn’t a concrete ultimatum if he didn’t, but there was a mutual understanding that if this were to continue, he needed to trust you to be there for him. No more reluctance.

He extended his hand towards your knee, patting twice before claiming it in the great breadth of his palm, stroking his thumb over the thin pantyhose; bridging the gap from his earlier behavior, but not yet apologizing for the soreness he caused.

Sorting his thoughts, his throat bobbed twice on the swallow.

And of all the questions he could ask, of all things he could say, of all the topics he could choose, he picked, “Did you ever want kids?”

Heat swam to your cheeks, blood rushed to your ears. Buds of true belonging bloomed at the question, adorning stems of untended longing first planted during the Christmas party at work, ever growing. Your heart pumped faster at the inherent past and implied future of the subject. His curiosity was a mild prod, perhaps not meant to encourage these leaps in logic considering he announced it in the same buckled cadence of someone who was asking about the weather—and yet, the hold it had on you was impossible to deny. A blend of you, Adrie, and him, just like now, but in different contexts—different meanings other than sitting in the back of his car—something domestic, like being piled together on the couch watching Disney movies; that’s what was pushed to the forefront of your mind.

But, despite those instantaneous fantasies, this was a place for honesty, and the significance of your pause between his question and yours was an entity of its own, stiff like his posture.

“Are you ready for this conversation?” you checked. He fostered an anxious glance and nod. “Having kids is not something I ever saw for myself, no.”  The consequence of your answer marked his immediate dropped eye contact, but ever patient with him, you continued strongly, “With how I dated and moved around, I didn’t think it was for me, that sort of lifestyle. It’s just not something I put a lot of thought into except when my friends were having kids, and really, they kinda turned me off of the idea. Pregnancy sounds.. daunting. Or—you know—really fucking scary. They’d always talk about how awful it is, all the complications you could have, the risks, the near death experience in one case,” you broke off in a squirm. “And then you don’t even get the relief once the baby comes. Like, seriously, taking care of a newborn sounds straight up terrifying.”

Eddie cracked. His hiss of laughter was a welcomed reprieve, especially when it sank to his chest, gripping his shoulders in a hearty shake. “Y-Yeah,” he got out, face crinkled in all the ways you adored, “it is straight up terrifying.”

You giggled in the softest way, careful to not disturb Adrie’s shallow breaths, and careful to not swoon too head-over-heels over the image of him rocking a baby. “It seems easier when they’re older, though,” you said, broaching the real crux of the conversation with your chin dipped to the top of her head. “Like it’s not as bad when they can actually communicate why they’re crying, or tell you what’s bothering them.”

“Not necessarily easier, just different,” he clarified. “It’s less about making sure this little tiny thing that can choke on its own snot survives the night, and more about the emotionally draining problems like her telling you about her day at preschool, explaining a situation where a group of kids kept giving her tasks to do that sent her away, and she’s smiling so big when she’s telling you, thinking it was a game, but deep down you’re just waiting for the heartbreak years down the line when she realizes they gave her errands to run because they were excluding her, and the reason they were laughing every time she came back was because they took joy in being mean to her.”

Wilt tinted your faint, “Oh..”

“Yeah.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” He upped the pressure he used to pat and rub your knee. “S’part of life.”

Consumed by his side profile, you studied the scope of his impassive expression set on the premature lines edging his face. The urge to find the right thing to say amidst the convoluted churn of anger on his behalf, and sadness on Adrie’s, itched something fierce beneath your skin. Ultimately, no words of inspiration came.

Eddie took an anticipatory breath.

The radio garbled advertisements for the station’s sponsors.

“Still wouldn’t trade it for those first months when she was a newborn, though.” Pursing his mouth thin, he rolled his lips inward with a hardened brow, releasing and scrunching tension around his nose as he shook his head slowly, addressing the memories of those days with a shine of pain to his eyes, and a loud smack of his tongue. “The moment I found out Adrie’s mom was pregnant, I wanted to do the right thing—y’know?” He took his hand off your leg to demonstrate the narrow path he followed. “Kept my head down, stayed focused, didn’t bother anybody, got a real job, and kept my mouth shut. Lotta places didn’t wanna hire me, obviously, but I applied anywhere I could, and when I got the job, I’d go get another one on a different shift, and another one on a graveyard shift. Sold whatever I had—guitars, ‘nd shit—bought what I could with the money. I wanted to be a good man. Be a provider. Be worth something.” Scrubbing his shaky fingers over the stubble on his chin, he aimed to calm himself, but when bringing up the Hell he went through during those times, there was little to stop his pitch from wavering. “Still wasn’t good enough.”

A verdict aimed at him flippantly, yet the impact on his self-esteem was immeasurable.

Gathering himself, he licked the inside of his cheek, and explained, “In the beginning, when Adrie was born, I tried to make it on my own. Locked in this little motel room with a crying baby. Couldn’t go to work. Didn’t have anyone to call to watch her for me, y’know, didn’t.. didn’t have anyone to rely on after walking out on my uncle, and isolating myself from my friends. The people at the bullshit resource center said I wasn’t eligible for benefits because they were for single moms, not dads. And child support was taking too long to kick in. Not like it mattered when it couldn’t pay for a single canister of Similac. I didn’t have fucking anything. Or know anything.”

His shame was only beginning to unravel.

“There were these free classes at a clinic for expecting parents, but I..” He dropped his knuckles to his thigh and fed them along the coarse cotton, using the friction to burn away the guilt. “I-I didn’t go. I didn’t want to go alone. Be the only guy there, by myself. Have all these people w-who might know who I am fucking.. fucking staring at me.” With how he was looking down at his lap, rocking slightly with his movement, he stood no chance against the wall of tears damming at his lashes. “I didn’t want to go because of my sense of pride, and my baby suffered because of it.”

“Eddie, that’s not true—” you stepped in.

Three effective beats of his fist on his leg, and you were left to witness his face crumple from the utter contempt he had for himself.

“It is true,” his volume fluctuated in jumps. “She wouldn’t eat. She wouldn’t fucking eat and keep it down.” Droplets splashed his jeans in unyielding splats. Drip, drop, drip, drop.. They slipped and spread in splotches of salty remorse he couldn’t wipe away quick enough. “Nothing worked. Couldn’t get her to latch onto a bottle, and, and—I didn’t know, I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to microwave the formula, but she wouldn’t take it room temp, so if it was too hot she’d just scream at me until it wasn’t, and I–I just—I was having these breakdowns, I don’t know. I blacked out, and next thing I knew, I was at Harrington’s, and Nancy was taking care of her for me.” The emphasis alluded to much, though the fact their son was only a year older, and Nancy would still be producing milk said it all. 

Frantic breaths which wouldn’t catch were pulled past grimaced lips parted on the unrefined sob his confession emerged on. “I never wanted to be with Adrie’s mom, but proving what she said was right, th-that I was a fucking loser who didn’t know what he was doing, it-it-it.” In a desperate flourish, he pointed at his temple, It lives in here, and another tear clung to the tip of his nose, smeared by the back of his wrist.

Stunned useless by the suffocating urge to help him, you blanked. Sat still while your favorite mechanic reduced himself to the wrong opinion of others; the same person who showed his gentle nature by picking worms out of the garage after a heavy rain so they didn’t dry out. Remaining frozen while silent pain wracked your friend’s held breath, heaved and shuddered out as a cough into the same palm he used to catch your ankle when he challenged you to a race on the creepers, and he had to cheat to win before you beat him to the service door. Saying, “Baby, no,” to the man who snuck a smirk over his daughter’s head when he caught you doting over her as she sat on his hip, and the smell of Christmas potluck embedded itself into the memory of Eddie’s eyes hinting at a deeper glint than the tease on his grin.

“I am a fucking failure,” he seeped out his regret. “C-Couldn’t give her what she needed. I still can’t. Still can’t give her what she wants, ever. T-T-Tellin’ her I can’t get her something when she asks for it—and the disappointment. Just a piece of shit who disappoints her. Never good enough—” There was another high-pitched stutter, but it was muffled behind his trembling hands covering his face, and smothered by your intervention.

“Eddie, Eddie, Eddie,” you shot out, hand and voice working together to untangle the trauma his knotted fingers attempted to hide. “Listen to me.” No please, but no lack of kindness, either. “You are not a disappointment. Not then, not now, not ever. Do you hear me? You’re not any of those things.” You tugged at the canvas jacket around his stiff arms tucked tight to his body, and rocked him away from his huddle against the door.

In the aftermath of your scramble to comfort him, Adrienne startled awake. Her soft hmm? became a grunty whine when the sensation of slipping backwards disoriented her. “Daddy?” One of her fists found your hoodie for balance, but her groggy curiosity dealt a heartbreaking blow.

She traced the wet trail on his cheek, encountered a tear in its path, and broke the droplet’s surface tension on her finger, wondering aloud, “Why’s Daddy crying?”

Thinking quickly, you used your muscles earned through unloading car parts from delivery trucks, and scooped her from your lap onto his, diverting the nuance of grown-up-problems by fumbling out, “Daddies cry sometimes, too. Have you told him you love him today? Can you tell him? It’ll make him feel better. Please, Miss Adrie?” Whether or not it was the perfect phrasing wasn’t important. What mattered was the unsuspecting gratitude laden at the base of his frown.

“I love you, Daddy,” Adrie said, latching her arms around his neck. “I love you.”

“You’re a good man,” you added, and rolled onto your hip, fitting your body to his side. You nosed through his long, frazzly curls, and spoke earnestly, but softly into his ear, “You’re a good man, Eddie. Look at how well you take care of her. Look at how well fed, clothed, and happy she is. You make her so happy.. You make me happy, too. You’re the best dad I’ve ever met. No one else compares.”

He dragged a sniffle from his last sob into an unintelligible mumble.

“I’m here.” Shh. “I’m here.” You included Adrie in your hug as you brought your hand up to the other side of his flustered hot face, blending your fingers through the hair stuck to the sweat and stubble on his jaw. “We’re here for you. We’ve got you. Nothing bad can happen when we’re here.” Sweet with conviction, “It’s okay, handsome, I’ve got you.”

Overwhelmed by the small I love you, Daddy, on one side, followed by You’re a good man, on the other, his inhale shivered, and he cuddled Adrie to him for a watery, “I love you, too.” Croaky and real, and mouth agape on an ugly cry he let you witness until his needy reach cupped the back of your head, and smushed you to his wet cheek, scratching the same sentiment into your nape, just like you were rubbing it into his scalp, exchanging the affection without words.

Us and Them funneled through the car, mellowing the heightened emotions with its dreamy saxophone opener.

“I’m so glad to have met you,” you prized in tender sweeps of whispers and thumbs. “I actually look forward to coming into work because of you, even when you hide my pen cup, and tickle me when I go to reach for it on top of the Coke machine. Which is unfair, by the way.”

“Yeah?” he asked for dear reassurance, and distraction.

Humming against the intimate corner of his jaw, you nudged the prickly scruff, and melted into his uncoordinated pets over your ear. “I see your sacrifices, and trust me, Eddie, you’re doing a great job at raising your daughter. Stuff like buying her toys, or cookies, or whatever doesn’t matter. The love you show her is better than any of that. She’s so lucky to have you.”

Another tear dropped to the tattered quilt. Another, another dropped. He squeezed his eyes shut and more fell. Hindered breaths let go in stuttered huffs shook his chest, swayed his damp hair. You circled your thumb over the rivers on his sensitive skin, and found a dry section of your sleeve to clean the price he paid for being a good father without the proper support he needed. Soothing him with fond shushes and feather touches. Forming a ball of comfort around him: cramped in the tiny car, a cast of solid fog on the windows for privacy, Adrie’s blanket draped about your jumbled legs, and her lanky arms wrapped around his neck where precious words were stoked from the embers of a fire which he built. “I wanna color with you to-mah-rrow,” she pronounced. “You can have the dinosaur book, because I want the kitty cats. Deal?” Deal, he nodded.

Your bottom lip introduced a blessing at his sideburn, “You deserve to see yourself how we see you.”

Recovering from the unbearable throb his stuffed sinuses drove to his headache, he tried—“Thank you, baby,”—though the letters were mashed together, and further pulped by the thickness in his throat. Loud, however, was his hug. Crushing you both to him with honed strength; flexed forearms demonstrating the power lying dormant in the track of muscle he snaked around your waist. Groans were earned from his expertise. Bones protested the gesture, begging to be released. It took several seconds of your heartbeat pumping visibly at the edge of your vision, but he let go. Afterall, there was no praise to be had by flattened lungs.

“That hurt,” Adrie complained.

“Ow,” you agreed.

“Sorry,” he said in non-apology.

At a change in tone, you fawned, “But that was a nice hug.”

Adrie rated it, “An 8 out of 10.”

Crowded together, the bond was unmatched. His arms were spread like a greedy dragon hoarding its wealth. Chest open, collecting his most remarkable treasures to the roaring furnace locked within the confines of his body, ready to share the warmth to those who could appreciate its value. Clasped in your hand was Adrie’s ankle, gaining squirmy kicks for each smile and giggle traded under Eddie’s chin. Dressed in his well-loved hoodie, the crook of his elbow fit to your figure, and the backs of his fingers strummed your bicep in a trained motion. None of it was perfect, no. The hoodie could smell less like cigarettes, his forearm stuffed behind you meant you couldn’t recline comfortably, and when he patted your hip, he awakened the dull throb of the bruising grip he left during earlier events.

Those weren’t bad things, though. They were as real as human flaws. Accepted as such, too.

“Are you feeling better?”

Sporting a grin favoring one cheek more than the other, Eddie’s eyes were framed by clumped together lashes after being stripped to his barest self and given the grace he needed. “Yeah,” he answered Adrie in fondness, “I’m feeling better now.” Not forever. He wasn’t cured. But with time, he guided his gaze to the velcro shoe you were wiggling back and forth onto her heel, and climbed his soft study up to the plump concentration on your bottom lip after you released it from between your teeth.

Perceiving his attention, you clocked him with a sneaky grin. “We’re a sardine family.” Brightening at the bewildered noise he made, you tapped Adrie’s knee, and imparted your wisdom as if he should know it too. “Yeah, you know, you, me, and Adrie. Jammed packed back here like a tin of sardines. All squished together.”

They blinked at you. You blinked back.

“And I thought I was supposed to be the one with bad jokes,” Eddie offered after some thought. You cut him a look. “But I like the image,” he amended.

“I like sardines,” Adrie chimed. She didn’t know what sardines were, but you appreciated her enthusiasm.

The conversation waned from there. Drowsiness from the old night seeped into your collective huddle, slouching you all towards one another. Heavy limbs went boneless. Tender brushes of thumbs came to an end. The sound of deep breaths were heard between the local ads for Indiana’s finest antique mall and an uptick in the rain smacking the paved street. Near the edge of sleep, you convinced yourself to get Adrie up and into her carseat. Eddie sat back and watched you go through the steps of buckling her in, listening to her plea for Fluff in her backpack, tucking the quilt around her just right, and hitting your head on the roof in pursuit of making her happy. Taking care of his kid. You collapsed beside him, far closer than would be proper for coworkers, and basked in his approval, noting the pride in his charged gaze. The emotional rollercoaster of the evening took its toll on his swollen face—nevertheless, romance novels could learn a thing or two from the way his stare rendered you weak.

“Should get you home before the storm gets worse,” he warned in an attractive thrum of sternness. He might call you lil’ lady next. Or remind you he promised your father he’d have you back on time.

Floating in the fizzy pool of your crush's attention, you nodded your dizzy head, and observed without need, “Yeah, should get home before it gets worse.”

He laughed. You swam in his laugh, in the instinctual desire based in his mood after watching someone nurture his young. A silly thing to rock you into a sultry sweat considering the outcome of your second date. Luckily, when you stepped out of the car, the frigid mist stole your focus, hosing you down and keeping you from reading too much into the odd chemical imbalance that must be happening in your brain.

The night was really fucking long.

Driving with the radio on low, Eddie drifted his ringed fingers over your forearm whenever they weren’t being used on the stick shift. A small gesture letting you know he was thinking about you when there wasn’t anything to talk about, not that it was needed. The calm was nice. The storm behaved en route to the Buckley’s, avoiding the occasional tree limb blocking a lane. He removed his touch from your person, and with a glance, you were assured it wasn’t the last.

“You didn’t have to walk me to my door,” you gasped, posing with your arms stuck out, useless against mother nature sagging your soaked clothes.

A puddle formed on the wood planks where he wrung his hair. “And make you do this run all by yourself? C’mon, sweet stuff. I’m a gentleman.”

Shivering on the covered porch, your shoes were partially to blame for the slipping incident(s) in the muddy driveway. The lack of the house lights on was another, slowing down your sprint into a crawl. A yellow cast from a lamp in the back room lit the hallway, but other than its soft glow, that was it. Clearly, no one expected you to come home.

“Is it okay if, uh,” you began, “Is it okay if we kiss in front of Adrie?” Oh, how your awkward pointing from yourself to the car came to a charming halt, fingers caught in the stiff fabric of his jacket, under his spell.

Plush pink lips warmed by vented heat promised your worries away.

“I think she’s asleep anyway.” His voice was playful, tugging syllables in the way his lopsided grin ought. “But,” he softened, “yeah, we can kiss in front of her.”

The permission washed over you. Weeks and months in the making. Brewing tension under the surface in your daily interactions—and now? You kissed him. Just for fun, just to show off. You kissed him again. Gentle, pretty brushes. Tame, refined, and for the sake of exploring the lack of boundary before saying goodbye.

Working man arms defined your waist.

Fingers calloused from gripping pens grazed his steady throat.

He swallowed, and spoke endearments with his busy mouth, “Could kiss you all day, baby.” Your lips kicked into a smile which he devoured, kiss after kiss. Neat little things. Virtues, maybe.

“Could’ve kissed me since the day we met,” you answered, feeling the squeeze around your back when his belly pressed you into his embrace. Though, his dismissive snort caused you to frown. “I’m serious. Coulda had me back then. Or at least you could’ve kissed me when we were slow dancing in the garage, or standing under the mistletoe at the Christmas party. Like, seriously, way to make me feel rejected.”

His wide passionate eyes shared common ground with his genuine smirk at your feigned agony. “Excuse you, but I am not having our first kiss be at work.”

“Then why not at DND when everyone left?”

“Because, sweetheart,“ his cadence loved those two words most of all, “I knew I only had a few minutes with you. And I needed a helluva lot more than a few minutes with you.”

“Or, what about when—”

Crazy how you strove to be silenced by his mouth. Craved it like no other, provoking him into eager unions, fulfilling the itch and providing the scratch with your bottom lip between his, just how he liked.

You shifted. Your inner thighs rubbed through your ripped tights. The untimely circumstances bringing you to Robin’s door lived on the surface of your chilly skin; ushering you to reality, and he as well.

“I’m sorry for how all this turned out.” Eddie’s sincere apology pitched his voice to something sorrowful, something deeper, and maybe you underestimated how much the night ending when it did upset him as a man.

“There’s nothing to be sorry about.”

He shuffled his stance, scraping his boots in dissatisfaction. “Baby, you didn’t even get anything,” and you knew what he meant. And it annoyed you he’d even brought it up.

Combing your fingers up from his nape through his hair, you drove him into you, chasing the molten ooze pooling at your center in effort to shut him up. Wet, hard, nipping kisses at his plump lips until they were raw like his tear-stained cheeks. You forwent air. Mouths melding as one, then apart as two, then one, then a set of awake eyes boring into his drunk ones. “Our date was perfect. We needed this.” The trust, the experience, the uncomfortable glimpse into his life and how you handled it. His breakdown, his shame, his face when he finally let go and ugly cried in front of you. “I don’t regret how our night turned out.”

Nodding into a nudge of his nose stroking the side of yours, he was honest with himself, “I don’t regret it, either.”

“Well, you might regret it in the next half-hour if this storm keeps up, and you’re stranded with Adrie in the car because a tree fell across the road.”

“Shit.” Indeed, the weather was turning again. If luck were on his side, he could deal with the high winds and sheets of rain until he got home, but, more likely, he drained his luck over the course of the date, and lightning was about to start again.

Eyeing the sky with hesitance, he asked, “Can I call you tomorrow? Or—today?”

“I’d be upset if you didn’t.” Acting as an endorsement to get going before things worsened, thick forest branches creaked in the distance, popping like warnings. You followed it with snappier affections doled between your palms fitted to his jaw. “Please be safe, Eddie.”

“I will, I will. Kay?” Urgency swept him from kiss to kiss—needy, and intense, treating them as the last. “I adore you, baby. Tell me you adore me.”

Mushy under his tender affirmations, your body went pliant and he accepted your weighty lean on his chest, making it harder than it already was for him to leave his sweetheart behind. “—dore you too, handsome,” you moaned into his mouth, sending him off on a proper goodbye.

“Jesus Christ, woman.”

Ever the lovestruck fool, he stayed rooted on the porch watching your figure move from shadow to light within the home, eyes glued to sways and curves as you met the hallway and bent to peep inside Robin’s room. It was the single lamp being turned off which broke his greedy gaze, and ended his fun. Oh well. His Monday morning was booked with penciled in meetings for his admiration and your assets.

Eddie spun on his heel and stopped stalling. He didn’t bother throwing his arms over his head, he accepted his fate, and ran. Sloshing through puddles, slipping in mud. He wrenched open the door, and fell inside the car. The heater made him sticky warm in the gross way, so he turned it down, and got comfortable behind the wheel, adjusting, adjusting.

Pulling oxygen into his outkissed lungs, he heaved a solid breath, and sank into his seat, unable to comprehend the recent events carving out a new path for him to consider where there wasn’t one before.

——Then——

In the beginning…

Summer died to autumn, and it was time to move on from Steve's. Eddie tried to make it on his own in the motel room over the three day weekend break from work, but his wallet was empty, his baby was dressed in another family's blue sailboat onesie, and come Tuesday morning at 7AM, he needed someone to watch Adrie who wasn't an overworked Nancy Harrington.

Infant in hand, pride left behind in his boyhood, Eddie knocked on his uncle's door, and in Wayne's usual manner, he answered by clearing his throat when neither words nor greetings failed to repair the strained relationship.

“Can I live with you?”

Taking in the marks of fatigue under his nephew's averted eyes, Wayne said, “Of course, son,” and welcomed him inside with a swung gesture.

The walk to the single bedroom humbled what spirit Eddie had remaining. Or, crushed what was left of it. He passed by the kitchen table which still had his chair cocked out, noticed the patched-up hole in the closet door, and flicked on the lightswitch, grazing the curled edge of a poster he hung over a decade ago. His stomach sank at the familiarity.

Blazed by the ornate lamp hung in the corner, standing out like a behemoth beside his white desk, was the crib he was never able to afford.

Adrie grunted awake in her carseat. Looking down at her would spill his tears, so he cranked his head back to stare at the ceiling, steeling himself after spotting the new bedsheets stretched across his mattress, and he knew—he knew—if he turned around, the pullout bed in the living room would still be set up.

His uncle never took his room back.

Defeated by the routine pang of worthlessness, impressed to have any self-esteem left to be stolen from him at the point, Eddie sank to his childhood mattress with his three-month-old daughter at his feet, undressed himself from his boots, and made a clear spot for them both on the bed, away from blankets or pillows. He laid on his side, legs crossed and knees bent with an arm beneath his head. Same position he assumed on the motel’s carpeted floor yesterday when Adrie experienced a milestone: rolling over. Not from her back to her stomach, she wasn’t coordinated enough for that yet, but with enough powerful kicks and wiggling, his paranoia coaxed his other arm around her.

He molded himself to be her protector. Chest sunken on a shallow breath, forearm spooned to her side closest to the edge, and gaze trained on her chubby cheek. Her babbly noise of happiness brought him a sense of reward, and though the newborn smell had faded in the weeks where motor oil stung his nostrils, he put his nose to the top of her head for a whiff of a sweet scent that wasn’t there, and felt the peace it brought him anyway.

Wayne shuffled into the room with a sizable stack of chunky hardcover books between his hands. “I, uh, checked these out from the library. Been doin’ some readin’ while you were gone.” He set them down on the bedside table, and pointed at a few of them. “Learned a lot from the one on the bottom, but they were all, ah, educational, I s’pose.. Some lean more religious than others,” he grumbled. “But, uhm..”

The expectant pause in his uncle’s speech drew Eddie’s awareness.

“Can I hold her?” Wayne asked.

“Yeah.” He almost had the strength to clear the rasp from his throat. “You can hold her.”

Putting his new knowledge to good use, Wayne first worked his palm under Adrie’s head before scooping her into his folded arms. Eddie took his shame in small doses, glancing at his uncle meeting his grandchild for the first time, and looking away when he cooed over her. Three months and his only family member had yet to meet his baby. Three months spent avoiding this trailer, and depriving his uncle from making these memories.

Self-loathing boiled under Eddie’s skin, and still, there was a fleeting desire to brag about Adrie’s neck strength, and how it wasn’t so necessary to be wary of her head falling back.

But he stayed quiet. He pushed his overgrown bangs out of his eyes, and read the book’s titles, wondering what sparked enough interest for Wayne to stuff receipts between the pages, or mark them with paper clips if they were particularly interesting.

Speaking in his gruff smoker’s voice with an edge of seldom heard unease, Wayne introduced a conversation, “I read in that yellow book there that babies shouldn’t sleep in the same bed as the parent. Dangerous, with how tired you are, ‘nd all. Should I put her in the crib?”

As gingerly and delicately as one could be when discussing the reality of a child suffocating to a parent who was well aware of the risks, Eddie regarded him with an annoyed expression, and Wayne shut his mouth in apology.

“I’ve gotta do her night routine again, so I’ll be up for a bit.”

“Yep.” A solid statement, and conclusion, to the conversation.

Bending down, Wayne positioned Adrie in the hollow Eddie created for her, and mentioned there were leftovers in the fridge on his way out. He shut the door behind him. It didn’t take long for tiny fists and tinier fingers to find a lock of his hair, and pull it into a drooly mouth. Didn’t take long, either, for his exhaustion to kick in and for the emotions to crash through his walls.

Tears slipped sideways along his features. Cresting over the bridge of his nose, colliding with his other eye, and joining the wetness at his hairline, dotting the bedsheet. He pressed his face to his baby who was too innocent for this world. “Daddy loves you,” he whispered, tasting the word for the first time. Daddy. It didn’t feel right when Steve stepped in as a father figure, but he could acknowledge it now. He was a dad. A momentous occasion followed by, “I’m so sorry you’re mine.” An apology uttered on a wet hiccup—borderline unintelligible—but after coming back to this trailer, and enduring his memories trapped between its thin walls, he promised, words slurring to a constricted squeak in his throat, “Daddy’s gonna get us a nice house, okay? Your own room. Your own bed. Daddy’s gonna do it. Just give me some time, okay? I’ll do it, I swear. Daddy loves you so much. So fucking much.” The promises bred dread even then, living in the pit of his stomach as future disappointments, knowing he would fail.

Perhaps sensing his distress, his little girl used the last of her energy to kick his arm in a fair warning before her face scrunched, and the wet coughs preluding her wail for food began.

He dried his face on the bedsheet. In this moment, it was hard to continue crying when he had another human relying on him. It was time to move on. Time to bury the pain, and move on. Time to neglect himself, and move on. Time to give up, and move on. Kiss her chubby cheeks so fucking much he feared he’d never be able to stop, and move on.

——Now——

Now, he checked the rearview mirror and Adrie was looking back at him, possessing a curious pinch between her brows at his reflection.

“You were kissing Miss Mouse,” she accused and questioned.

“I was,” he confirmed.

“What does that mean?”

“It means, ah,” he filled the pause with another ah while he searched, “It means we’ll be seeing more of each other. She’ll be coming around more, and stuff. Hanging out with us.”

Ever ponderous, ever candid, ever blunt, she asked, “Does that mean she’s my–”

Crazy Little Thing Called Love blasted their eardrums.

Eddie’s fingers slipped over the volume dial by accident—totally by accident—as he reached for the stick shift, turning the music on high and drowning out the last word of her sentence.

—Mom.

No way in hell was he ready for that conversation after the emotionally grueling night he’d had.

“Whoops,” he pretended, “Sorry, couldn’t hear you—but, uh! Hey, do you wanna start our bedtime story early? Should I go with the princess one, or the Sesame Street gang running their own bakery? Hmm.." He drew out his hum until he was in the clear of the Buckley's mailbox, swearing he wasn't the reason it was laying flat in a ditch. "How about we pick up where the princess one left off? So! The firbolgs have declared alliances with Toadstool Kingdom, and.." Throwing it into first gear, Eddie raced home as quickly, but responsibly, as possible, talking non-stop. His parched throat begged for a drink by the time he pulled into the trailer park—a scratchy pain made worse by his nervous chatter in the elusive quiet of his parked car.

He wrapped Adrie in her quilt as best he could while securing her on his hip and booked it through the rain, unlocking the front door and ducking inside right as an unlucky flash of lightning came.

And when nature’s nightlight died, he blinked and blinked at the spots in his vision.

It was unfathomably dark in his living room.

Stumbling over a small shoe in his way, he patted the wall for the lightswitch, and flipped it. And flipped it again. And harassed it some more. Sighing heavily in defeat, he grabbed the giant flashlight on the kitchen counter, and lit the way. "Looks like we're camping tonight." (Their codeword for when the power was knocked out.)

"Okie dokie," she said, ignorant to the cruel world of no pancakes for Sunday breakfast when the electric stovetop was out of commission.

In the meantime, he got them both ready for bed with the added pain of doing it by a single wobbly light source, ready to pass out the second his body sank to the mattress and his head hit the flat pillow—

But of course, Adrie rocked his shoulder incessantly, goading him into giving her attention at her whim, sanity be damned. "Mm?" he grunted, coating the noise in mild annoyance.

"Daddy?" she checked.

The wait for her question grew excruciatingly long.

He almost wasted an eye roll. "Yes, my child?"

"I wish Miss Mouse was here."

Surprised more so by his yawn than the request itself—and then surprised again when his heartbeat remained calm when confronted with the reality of Adrie noticing too much—he struggled to stay awake in his best interest, perhaps giving an inappropriate answer, and unwittingly feeding into her inner wishes, "I do too." He was fading, and quick. The hard rain had returned, droning white noise on the roof, soothing his eyelids closed over the dry sting they drew. Rolling, fighting the stiff sheets tucked around them both, he threw an arm over her before the doom-roll of thunder came. Sweet dreams greeted him in a pair of tiny arms folded to his chest. Brain shutting down. Night, night. Asleep.

"I wish she was my mom."

"Goodnight, Adrie," he stressed.

[bellaxgiornata]

How Far Does it Go; When Does it End?

Pairing: Matt Murdock x depressed!fem!Reader Word Count: 4.5k

Warnings/tags: 18+; depiction of depression, suicidal ideation if you squint, confession of feelings, and angst with a hopeful ending [please don't read if any of this could be triggering]

Summary: It's been weeks that you've just been going through the motions day by day. But when you decline yet another invitation to Josie’s with your friends, a worried Matt takes it upon himself to check up on you.

a/n: This one is a little bit depressing because I've been going through some things and have been craving angst, but I promise the ending is hopeful. As mentioned in the tags, please don't read if you believe it might be triggering. Feedback and reblogs are always appreciated!

tag list: @1988-fiend @geminadeckerwritesstuff @flowher @sleepysleepymom @kezibear @writtenbyred @moncherriis @a-half-empty-g1rl @beezusvreeland @da3m0nsneverstop

Unsure how long you'd been sitting there entranced by the snow steadily accumulating along the tops of the parked cars lining the street below, you stared at the flurry of snowflakes blowing outside of the window. Tonight Hell's Kitchen was set afire by the orange glow of its street lights, the haunting warmth of them reflecting off of the snow banks. A few cars were carefully making their way through the mess of slush and ice along the road, otherwise it seemed bleak and lifeless in the city this evening.

Personally you’d always hated how little sunlight there was during the winter months. On weekdays you rose in the mornings to get ready for work before the sun had even risen. By the time you'd even managed to leave the office after work, the sun had already set. For you, most days this time of year passed by with you barely seeing more than a sliver of sunlight–because your small cubicle certainly didn't have any windows. And it wasn't likely that you would ever find yourself working anywhere with an actual view.

Resting your forehead against the chilled glass of your living room window, you released a nearly inaudible sigh as you stared out into the blackness of the night. You probably should have been doing a number of other things right now–cleaning up the dishes that had piled in your sink, taking your growing load of laundry to the laundromat a block over, or even compiling a grocery list to stock your empty fridge. But instead you just sat there leaning over the armrest of your couch, losing count of how many taxis you'd seen skid across the icy road while imagining what it might feel like if one of them just lost control and careened straight into you on the crosswalk below. 

You were so far tucked into your mind that when a dark shape dropped down onto your fire escape mere inches from your face, you had barely even reacted. Instead your eyes slowly rose up, your gaze gradually trailing its way up along the black-clad figure. Though you didn't need to see the mask covering the man's face to know who'd just landed on your fire escape. The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen–or rather, one of your best friends and the subject of your unrequited affections, Matthew Murdock.

“Do you mind?” Matt's muffled voice came from outside, a hand gesturing to the window. “It's kind of cold out here.”

Pushing yourself away from the glass, you rose from the couch and stepped over to the window, reaching up and unlatching the locks. You began to slide the window up as high as it could go before stepping aside to let Matt in. A frigid gust of air and a flutter of snowflakes followed behind him as he slipped through the opening.

Sinking back into the same spot on your couch without a word, you watched as Matt turned and shut the window after himself. A dusting of snow sat along his muscular shoulders, the white a sharp contrast to all of his black. For a moment all you could do was stare at the little flecks of white, watching as they slowly began to disappear, melting into the darkness.

The sound of Matt clearing his throat broke through your daze, pulling you back to reality. He looked good standing in your living room wearing his makeshift vigilante costume. Honestly a part of you hated whenever he stopped by your apartment dressed like this solely for that reason. Because it physically pained you to look at him, especially as you watched him reach a gloved hand up to remove the mask from off of his head, the cloth giving way to reveal his face. 

He was still the most beautiful thing in your life.

“Hey,” Matt greeted, sounding slightly winded. He tossed his mask onto your coffee table, running a hand through his mussed hair as he strode towards the couch to take a seat beside you. “We missed you at Josie’s tonight.”

You fought down the doubtful scoff at his comment. It seemed highly unlikely that Matt, Karen, and Foggy had truly missed your melancholic presence at the bar tonight. The three of them could often hold full conversations before they even remembered you were silently sitting at the table with them. Which was partly why you hadn't felt like meeting them again tonight for drinks, because you were tired of feeling like the often forgotten fourth wheel of the group. 

You shrugged weakly. “Wasn't in the mood for Josie’s,” you simply said.

“Seems you haven't been in the mood for Josie’s for awhile,” Matt gently pointed out. “It's been weeks since you last joined us there.”

“Oh,” you replied.

Truthfully you didn't know exactly how long it had been since you'd last met them all there for drinks after work. The days had all blurred together lately. Maybe that explained why Matt had been so persistent on the phone when he'd called after work and continued to try and convince you to join them. But even he didn't succeed.

“Is everything alright with you?” Matt asked, his brows creasing together as his eyes fixed somewhere around your chin. “Because you seem…distant lately. Quieter than usual.”

“I'm always quiet,” you countered.

“Yes, well,” Matt said, shooting you one of his charming smiles meant to ease the tension in the room. “You seem like you're even more lost in thought than usual.”

You shrugged again before slumping back into the couch cushions. “Is that so wrong?”

The frown on Matt's mouth deepend further. “Depends,” he answered.

“On what?” you asked.

You noticed his brief hesitation, the slight pause as his head titled just a bit to the side. His eyes were scanning you now, traveling around the space you occupied beside him. 

You knew what he was doing. Reading you. Reading your body with his senses in a way that only he could. Usually that made you uncomfortable whenever you caught him doing it because you were uncertain what he might learn–like your feelings for him. So generally you called him out on it. But not tonight. Tonight you just…didn't have the energy for it.

“It depends on what you're thinking about,” Matt finally answered.

“Nothing really,” you told him. 

Matt's shoulders dropped at your response, the corners of his lips twitching downwards. You caught the way his eyes tightened in something akin to frustration. It was obvious what was coming next–the patented Matthew Murdock attempt to pry too hard for answers. Though fortunately for you he wouldn't be using his fists to get them. 

“Talk to me,” Matt ordered, shifting on the couch to face you more fully. “What's going on? Why are you shutting yourself off from everyone?”

You pulled a face at the accusation. “That’s not what I’m doing,” you argued. “Besides, isn’t that the kettle calling the pot black or something?” 

“You've been avoiding all of us for weeks,” Matt pointed out, ignoring your attempt to divert his attention. “Always making some excuse not to come out, or that you’re too tired for anyone to stop over. And you've been ignoring all of our calls.”

“I have not,” you disagreed. “I spoke to you on the phone earlier tonight.”

“Yeah,” Matt swiftly agreed with a nod. “But that was only because I called you about eight times before you finally answered.” 

His lips pursed tight together, looking as if he was internally conflicted for a second like there was more he wanted to say. You wondered why he’d even hesitated because in all the time you’d known Matt, he wasn’t usually the type to hold his tongue. 

“I've noticed you're always in your bed when I pass by at night,” he finally said. “Earlier than when you’d usually go to sleep. And I know you're not actually sleeping.”

Your chest tightened at the knowledge that Matt had been checking in on you in the evenings without you knowing. How much had he overheard while you’d been in your apartment? 

Eyes dropping down to your hands, you began to nervously pick at your fingernails. “I have a hard time falling asleep,” you mumbled.

“I can smell the tears,” Matt told you. “Even from outside your apartment. You can't hide them from me. For weeks now I've noticed you lying in bed just crying at night.” He paused, shaking his head and briefly wincing before he continued. “Something is going on and you're shutting us out. I'm not stupid. I know what you're doing. So just–just tell me what's going on. Please.”

You contemplated lying even though you knew he'd be able to tell. Then you contemplated making up something just to get him to stop asking questions. You even contemplated telling him off for eavesdropping before cursing him out for invading your privacy. But what surprised you was how you felt compelled to just tell him the truth. Because you were just too damn tired to do anything else.

“Why?” you asked weakly. “Why do you want to know?”

Matt’s entire face tightened, looking as if he was offended you'd even asked him that. Then seconds later his expression abruptly shifted to irritation and you braced yourself at the sight of it.

“Because I care about you!” he snapped, his frustration finally coming out. “We all do! And we're concerned about you! How do you not get that?”

You flinched at the volume of his voice, shrinking in on yourself on the couch. Matt had never spoken to you like that before and it had taken you by surprise. Clenching your jaw tighter, you began to pick faster at your nails. Beside you Matt released a sigh, his head dropping down towards his chest as one of his gloved hands reached up, the heel of it rubbing at his temple.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I’m just worried, okay? I didn’t mean to yell. I just want to help.”

“Sometimes you can’t.”

The words had slipped out of your mouth before you could stop them. Like a knee-jerk reaction. Out of your peripheral you saw Matt’s head raise up again, his eyes landing near you on the couch. You froze, your fingers halting their fidgeting.

“What?” he asked softly. 

“Sometimes you can’t,” you repeated. “Sometimes there's people you can’t help, Matt.”

His eyes narrowed back at you. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Tongue feeling heavy in your mouth as you tried to swallow back the lump forming in your throat, you knew there was no turning back now. He’d only pry harder if you tried to push him away at this point. Being as stubborn as Matt was, you wouldn’t put it past him to sit on your couch until the sun came up waiting for you to tell him what he wanted. 

So with a heavy sigh, you finally gave in.

“Do you ever feel like you're just…making it?” you hesitantly asked Matt.

Finally tearing your eyes from your hands, you looked in his direction, though your gaze didn't quite land on him. Rather it hovered somewhere just over his shoulder as you stared at a patched over spot on the wall. Ever since you'd moved here you’d often wondered how it had gotten there. 

“How so?” he questioned.

“Like you're just getting by–day to day, week to week?” you explained. “As if your life isn't actually going anywhere? Like you're barely holding it together and you're just one little thing from it completely falling apart? And maybe you’ve finally just, I don’t know, become numb to the fear of that happening? Because who cares, really. What does it matter?” 

Matt shifted a bit closer to you on the couch, moving slow and careful like he didn’t want to startle you. “Is that how you’ve been feeling? Like things don’t matter?”

Your eyes slid over from the patched up space on the wall and finally landed back on Matt’s face. You recognized the look there instantly. Genuine concern was written in the way his eyes were pinched tight and fixed along your chest; the firm set of his lips as his head tilted marginally to the side proving how gravely invested he was in the conversation. It was the same way he looked whenever he was intensely focused on someone out in Hell's Kitchen in need of help. You’d seen it on his face in the past when he was here as the Devil, right before he’d jump out of your window to go find whoever it was that needed him. 

But right now he was using that look on you. The gravity of it had you sitting there with your lips parted feeling like you were on the verge of either fully opening up or completely closing yourself off to him. 

And then, somehow all at once, everything poured forth from you like a teetering cup finally spilling over.

“I mean I get up, brush my teeth, get ready for work, see all the neverending and overwhelming terrible shit on the news in the morning like that's normal while I drink down a massive coffee just to survive the day. Then I go to work, smile at all the right moments, make inane small talk while feeling utterly invisible busting my ass knowing that I'm never getting that damn promotion let alone a pay raise just so I can afford to actually live out here,” you continued, everything you'd been holding back just falling out of you in a rush of words. “Then I what? Go home and cook and eat and wash the dishes and go to bed? Except going to sleep is a chore. Trying to quiet my mind is exhausting. Facing the same demons in my sleep night after night is too much. And then,” you said, aware that Matt's face had fallen, his hands gently gripping your knees even though you hadn't felt when he'd actually grabbed them, “the morning comes.”

When you didn't elaborate further Matt's head curiously tilted to the side.

“Isn't that good?” he questioned. 

“Is it?” you asked in return. 

There was a long pause, a silence filled with so many unspoken words. As you sat there staring at Matt, you could see the thoughts racing in his mind. You kept quiet as you wondered which one would eventually win out. Because you knew Matt. You knew he'd have something to say. But for some reason that also scared you a little.

When he finally spoke he said your name, the sound of it different than usual as it rolled off of his tongue–somehow tender and delicate. It took you entirely off guard, something stirring within you at the way he'd spoken it. There was an emotion struggling to break past the dam that had been staving your feelings off for weeks now, but you chose to push it back down in the moment. With your own mind spiraling, you continued on.

“There’s like this–this emptiness,” you confessed. “It’s heavy but it feels like nothing at all. You know? And it just sits right here–” You laid a hand flat across your chest, noticing the tears building in Matt’s eyes as they followed the movement. “It’s like there’s a hole. Like a blackhole just sucking everything into it lately. Everything . And I can’t do anything about it. Do you know what I mean? It’s just there .” 

You paused, licking your lips as you felt the heaviness of that metaphorical blackhole in your chest weighing you down even now. It wasn’t until Matt’s hands gripped your knees tighter that you remembered he was still touching you.

“It’s just always there,” you said, slowly losing momentum. “And I’m just left wondering how far does that emptiness go? Does it ever end?”

A long, heavy silence filled the room when you’d finally quieted. Gaze dropping down to Matt’s gloved hands still gripping your knees, you suddenly found yourself feeling ridiculous for having spilled all of that to him. You’d never gotten that personal with Matt before, certainly not about your struggles with depression. And now here you’d just dumped it on him all at once.

“I'm sorry,” you blurted, shaking your head. “That was–”

“Stop,” he ordered.

Mouth still hanging open, you stared back at him dumbfounded. He was sitting there on the couch with tears brimming in his eyes, his lips quivering as if he was struggling not to start crying himself. You felt horrible for having unloaded on him like that, for making him feel like he currently felt.

“I’m sor–”

“ Stop ,” he repeated.

Matt's hands released your knees, sliding up the outside of your thighs so carefully before they made their way towards your back. Before you'd known what was even happening, he was pulling you straight into himself on the couch, drawing you right into his chest. You didn’t fight him, not even as his strong arms encircled your waist and held you tight. Your own arms remained at your side, your cheek pressed right up against Matt’s firm shoulder as you sat there uncertain how to react. 

“I didn’t know,” Matt whispered. 

You frowned, shaking your head against his shoulder. “It wasn’t on you to know, Matt,” you replied. “I didn’t want anyone to know. That was the point.”

“Yes, but I’d heard you crying for weeks now–”

“Probably shouldn’t be eavesdropping then,” you muttered.

“–and I didn’t piece anything together,” he continued. “I figured maybe you were going through a breakup or something. From one of those dating app things you use. I didn’t know it was something much more serious.”

“I’m fine ,” you assured him. 

“No, you’re not,” he countered, his arms holding you even tighter to the front of himself as if that alone could keep you from falling apart. “You’re not, not if you feel like that. And maybe–maybe you should talk to someone,” he suggested carefully. “Because you know it's okay if you need to. There's nothing wrong with seeking help.”

“What do you mean?” you asked. “Like a therapist?”

“If that's what would help, yes,” he answered. “But you know you're not alone, right? I'm always here. Always . So are Karen and Fog. You can talk to us, too.”

Turning your head, you attempted to hide your face against his shoulder. With your nose pressed against his spandex shirt, you could easily smell his sweat from his evening running around the city. The scent of it surrounding you felt both oddly comforting and strangely intimate. 

“I don't want to put this on any of you,” you mumbled into his shirt. 

“You know,” Matt began slowly, resting his chin lightly atop your head, “it's okay to let other people in. You don't have to keep everyone at a distance like you usually do. Some of us want to get closer to you.”

“Not to this part of me,” you whispered. “Not to this…dark part of me.”

“I let you into mine,” Matt quietly pointed out. “You might have accidentally discovered I was the Man in Black, but the rest of it? The heightened senses? The night I started going out like this? My childhood?” He shifted above you, turning his face so he could bury it against the top of your head. “I showed you the darker parts of me. I let you in.”

You knew he was right the moment he'd said it. Matt had told you so much about himself after you'd accidentally uncovered his big secret. He'd revealed so much about his dad's passing and the pain of his mentor, Stick, disappearing on him. He'd told you about his struggles hearing the people of Hell’s Kitchen in need of help and how he just couldn't ignore it any longer. He'd even told you about his ex, Elektra, and how she'd abandoned him like so many others in his life. But you'd never understood why he had.

“Yeah,” you agreed softly. “You did. Though I've never understood why you let me in like you did. Because you definitely don't let others in, either, Matt. Foggy doesn't even know most of what you've told me.”

Above you Matt shifted, turning to rest his cheek against the top of your head. You sat in his embrace with your arms awkwardly at your side, that strange feeling he'd stirred awake in you just minutes ago steadily demanding to be felt.

“I thought it would have been obvious,” Matt began. “Because I'm always stopping by to see you here when I'm out. Always calling and inviting you out to Josie’s because I want you there. Letting you see all of me when I don't show anyone else.”

Your face scrunched up at his words, uncertain if he was getting at what you thought he might be getting at. Bottom lip rolling between your teeth, you began to nervously gnaw at it as you felt one of his hands begin to absently rub a soothing circle on your back.

“I care about you,” he confessed. “As more than a friend. I have for a long time.”

You nearly stopped breathing at his surprising admission, your body going still in his arms. This was not how you saw the evening going when he appeared on your fire escape. 

“I always just figured the whole Man in Black thing was too much for you,” he continued. “So I never said anything. But I always thought you knew that's how I felt.”

“I–I didn't,” you whispered, still stunned.

Matt cleared his throat, his hand stopping its absent movement on your back. You missed the comfort of it immediately. 

“I'm sorry, this isn't the time or place for this conversation,” Matt apologized. “I just…always thought you knew.”

Your own arms hesitantly found their way around Matt’s waist, finally hugging him in return. Somehow you felt his hold on you tighten further in response, a small smile slipping onto your face.

“You're right, it's not the time,” you agreed. “But for the record, I've always cared about you as more than a friend, too. I just figured you didn't feel the same or were just too busy to, you know, want something more.”

Another silence fell between the pair of you as you sat there curled around each other on your couch. Your eyes closed when his hands once more began their comforting movements along your back, your own hands fisting around the material of his shirt. For the first time in a long time you didn't feel so alone. For once you felt seen. 

“You know something,” you whispered, breaking the stillness of your apartment.  

“What?” Matt whispered against your hair.

“I get it,” you told him. Shifting in his arms, you unburied your face from its place against him, once more resting your cheek against his shoulder instead as you spoke. “I get why you do it. Why you go out at night like this,” you told him. “Because of the pain raging inside of you–the same thing I feel sometimes. And because of how it feels like the world is sometimes falling apart around us. Because it's hard to just sit back and feel like there's nothing you can do, nothing you can change.” 

You paused, your own arms holding onto him a little tighter. Matt had gone still though, as if he was intensely focused on everything you were saying.

“If I could go out and save a life, or stop a mugging, or save a child from their parents’ abuse, or rescue a young woman from an assault, I would.” A tear slipped out of your eye as you paused to exhale a shuddering breath. “And if I could hear so many others in pain, I would be going out and doing something about it, too. So I get it, Matt. Why you do what you do. And I honestly don't think that's dark at all despite how you often talk about it.”

“No?” he whispered.

“No,” you replied. “I think it's admirable. I've always thought that.”

At first Matt didn't respond, and as the silence grew around the pair of you, you wondered if you'd finally said too much tonight. Gone too far. But then you felt something gently fall into your hair, and then another and another. It took a moment before you realized they were droplets of tears.  

Crying. Matt was crying. 

“I'm sorry,” you apologized automatically, your arms attempting to unwrap from around him as you tried to pull away. “I'm so sor–”

“I said stop,” he croaked out, his arms still encircled around you, keeping you in place against his chest. “Stop apologizing.”

“I–I don't–” you stammered in confusion. “I didn't mean to upset you, Matt.”

“I'm not upset,” he explained, removing his face from where it had been pressed to the top of your head. “It's just hearing that from you,” he began slowly, “it…means more than you know. Because I–I have always thought there was something wrong with me.”

“There’s nothing wrong with you, Matt,” you immediately assured him.

“Well there's nothing wrong with you, either,” he told you. 

Tears brimmed in your eyes instantly. The dam that had felt like it was holding back all of your feelings lately–the dam that had been keeping you numb–suddenly felt as if it had finally broken as the first few tears slipped down your cheeks.

“Like I said, I know this isn't exactly the time for this conversation, but I just wanted you to know that you matter to someone,” Matt confessed. “Because you matter to me.”

Hands gripping firmly onto Matt as if he was grounding you as all your emotions came surging forth, your tears continuing to fall, you whispered back, “You matter to me, too.”

You felt Matt's mouth lightly press a kiss to the top of your head. As his lips lingered, an unexplainable weightlessness filled you. 

“And while I don't have an answer for how you're feeling,” he said softly, “I want you to know that I'm here. Whenever you need me. However you need me. Okay? Because you're not alone. You're never alone.”

Eyes slowly closing as you began to finally relax in his embrace, you felt the tears spill in steady streams down your cheeks. Maybe not everything was quite as bleak as your mind had led you to believe lately. Maybe there was still some good in the world to be grateful for. And maybe you did need to finally reach out and get some help. 

But for now, you just liked the idea of not crying alone in your bed again. 

“Is it too much to ask you to stay with me for a bit?” you asked hopefully. “I wouldn't mind having some company tonight.”

Matt placed another soft kiss into your hair.  “I'll stay as long as you want, sweetheart,” he promised.

[mjwhisperer]

𝚁𝚎𝚌𝚘𝚗𝚌𝚒𝚕𝚎

*Requested*

1988

New York City

Word Count: 13.5k

It had been four agonizing days since you'd last spoken to him, since you'd even allowed yourself to think of him. His presence, once so comforting, now felt like a jagged wound. Each memory of him was another shard of glass piercing through you. The betrayal, the heartbreak—it felt like your chest had been crushed, shattered into a million tiny fragments, impossible to piece back together. He had called you "My Girl," made you believe you were his everything, but after that night, everything was tainted. What once felt like a dream was now an unrelenting nightmare, one that played on repeat in your mind, tormenting you with every passing moment.

That night was plastered everywhere—on television screens, across newspaper headlines, whispered about in conversations you couldn't escape. That kiss, her kiss, replayed over and over in your mind, like a cruel loop. The sight of her lips on his still burned into your vision, making you nauseous with every flash of recollection.

Why did she kiss him? And why did he just stand there, unmoving, as if her lips on his meant nothing? A thousand questions raced through your mind, all of them worse than the last. Had he been cheating on you this whole time? Was every sweet word, every whispered promise, a lie? Had the love you thought was so real never even existed at all?

Now, you sat stiffly at the dinner in his honor, your presence at the event feeling like a punishment. It was being hosted by the United Negro College Fund, an evening meant to celebrate his success, but for you, it felt like your heart was being laid bare before a crowd. His mother, Katherine, had insisted you attend, had even personally invited you. She held your hand now, her fingers warm and gentle, silently acknowledging the depth of your pain. She knew. She understood what it felt like to see the man you loved kiss someone else in front of thousands of people at Madison Square Garden, to have that image seared into your memory. It was unbearable.

Every second in that room felt suffocating. It was as if his eyes were always on you, watching, piercing through you with a burning intensity that made you sick. You could feel your pulse racing, the bile rising in your throat as you fought back the urge to scream, to cry, to demand answers from the man who had shattered your heart. The weight of your grief was suffocating, and it sat heavy on your chest, trapping you in place.

You hadn't spoken to him since that night. You couldn't. The moment the scene had unfolded in front of you—her lips pressed against his, his frozen reaction—you'd fled. Your heart pounding, your vision blurred with tears, you'd rushed back to the hotel, barely registering your surroundings as you packed your bags with shaking hands. The ache in your chest was unbearable, suffocating, and the thought of being near him, breathing the same air as him, felt like it would destroy you. So you ran, found another hotel, anywhere that offered an escape from the tormenting replay of that kiss.

But no matter how far you went, no matter how many doors you closed between you and him, the truth clung to you like a shadow. You had once believed—truly believed—that he loved you, that you were his everything. Now, that belief felt shattered, crumbled into dust by the cold reality of what you had witnessed. The love you had trusted in so completely now seemed like nothing more than a cruel illusion.

"Relax, hun," Katherine's soft voice broke through your spiraling thoughts. Her hand, warm and steady, gave yours a reassuring squeeze.

You swallowed hard, fighting back the tears that threatened to escape. The knot in your throat tightened as you forced out, "I'm trying... it's just... looking at him, being here... I don't know if I can do this."

Katherine turned slightly in her seat, her eyes soft but searching as they met yours. "Have the both of you talked?" she asked gently, her voice filled with concern.

You shook your head, unable to find the words. The weight of everything unsaid pressed down on you as you glanced up, only to see Michael standing at the front of the room, now wearing a cap and gown—a doctorate cap and gown. He had earned this moment, a recognition of his achievements, but the sight of him—his eyes locking with yours, that familiar smile beginning to spread across his face—made your heart lurch painfully in your chest. You quickly looked away, focusing on the folds of your dress, anything but him.

Katherine's voice was patient but firm as she spoke again. "Sweetheart, you both need to talk. Holding it in won't help. It'll only eat you up inside."

Your throat tightened, and you turned to her, your voice trembling as you admitted, "If I talk to him, I might cry the whole time... I don't know if I can do it."

Katherine's eyes softened with understanding. "And it's okay to cry. Let it out if you need to. Michael didn't mean any of what happened that night. The girl only did it to get under your skin, to make you angry. She knew exactly what she was doing, and she got what she wanted. Michael fired her that same night—he wanted to tell you, but when he came back to the hotel, you were already gone."

You could feel your heart clenching, torn between hope and doubt. "What if he's lying to you?" you whispered, barely able to get the words out. "What if... what if he's seeing her? What if there's something going on between them, and I'm just too blind to see it?"

Katherine shook her head with conviction, her grip on your hand tightening just slightly. "I know my son," she said softly but with a quiet strength. "When I looked into his eyes that night, I knew. He wasn't lying to me. He was devastated, sweetheart. He made a mistake by not stopping it fast enough, but he's not seeing her. I can promise you that."

Her words offered a glimmer of reassurance, but the doubt still gnawed at you. The memory of that kiss, of the crowd, of the betrayal—it was all so fresh, the wound still too raw. Could you trust him again? Could you even bear to hear his side of the story, knowing that it might break you even more? The thought of facing him, of letting him see your tears, felt too overwhelming to contemplate.

But somewhere deep inside, you knew Katherine was right. Holding everything inside would only deepen the hurt. If you didn't talk to him, the questions would never stop, the pain would never heal.

"I can't believe I'm nervous," Michael's voice reverberated through the speakers, deep and familiar, sending a shiver down your spine. It was a sound you had been avoiding, a voice that used to be your comfort, now stirring a mixture of longing and pain within you as if you hadn't heard it in years.

The crowd laughed softly, charmed by his humility, and even Katherine smiled, her hand still wrapped securely around yours, her thumb grazing the delicate skin of your knuckles. Her touch was gentle, but it tethered you, grounding you amidst the swirling emotions threatening to pull you under.

Michael cleared his throat, his voice softer this time, almost vulnerable. "But I really am embarrassed. I appreciate everyone coming tonight... all these great friends, the people who've supported me through thick and thin. My dear mother and father, who are here in the audience."

Applause erupted as Michael gestured toward Katherine and Joe. The room seemed to collectively turn their attention to them, but his eyes—they were locked on you, unyielding, even as he smiled for the crowd. "Stand up," he encouraged, his voice echoing with a certain pride that you couldn't bear to acknowledge.

Katherine gently rose, her hand never leaving yours, as if she knew that if she let go, you might crumble. Joe stood as well, a grin spreading across his face as they soaked in the crowd's cheers. But you remained seated, stiff, still staring at the ground. It felt as though if you met his gaze, even for a second, you'd break apart, and you couldn't afford that—not here, not in front of all these people.

Katherine squeezed your hand tightly as she sat back down, her fingers still clutching yours, protective, like a mother shielding her child from the storm. You clung to that gesture, feeling like something small and fragile, lost and unsure.

You tried to focus on anything but him, but even as you lowered your gaze, you couldn't escape the memories flooding your mind. You stared down at your dress, the one he had picked out for you, his exact words echoing in your head: "I know you'll love this." It had been perfect—he had known your taste so well, had known you so well. But now, that once-beautiful gown felt like a weight, something forbidden, a painful reminder of the intimacy you had shared, the deep connection that had once defined your relationship.

Michael continued to speak, his voice rising and falling as he delivered what must have been a carefully crafted speech. But you didn't hear the words. You couldn't. They blurred together in the background, distant and meaningless, drowned out by the roar of your thoughts.

You tried to remember, tried to grasp at the fragments of what you had once shared. The way he'd make you laugh with just a look, the secret touches under the dinner table, the nights where your heart felt like it would burst with the intensity of your love for him. The connection, the trust, the bond that had seemed unbreakable. But now... it all felt so far away, like a faded memory, an echo of something that once was. The love that had once filled your heart felt hollow now, emptied by doubt, by betrayal, by the haunting image of her lips on his.

What had once been so vibrant between you—so pure and unbreakable—now felt tarnished, a cracked reflection of everything you thought you knew. As Michael's voice echoed through the room, each word from his speech felt like a weight, pressing down on you, making it harder to breathe. The ground beneath you seemed to shift, unstable, leaving you with nothing solid to cling to. Every memory, every smile, every promise hung in the air like fragile glass, threatening to shatter at any moment.

Once the speeches ended, there was a collective sigh of relief from the audience, but for you, the tension only mounted. Michael made his way to his parents, his smile warm and effortless as he embraced them. Katherine's hand slipped from yours as she stood to greet him, and that single moment of separation hit you with a force you hadn't expected. It was as if the last tether holding you together had snapped, and reality crashed down like a tidal wave, merciless and cold.

The tears you had fought so hard to contain finally escaped, hot streaks running down your cheeks, betraying the calm façade you'd tried to maintain all evening. You hastily grabbed a napkin, dabbing at the moisture before anyone else could notice, but it felt futile. The ache inside you wasn't something you could wipe away.

And then, there he was. Kneeling before you, Michael's presence consumed the space, suffocating in its intensity. His hand reached out, gripping yours firmly, as if trying to anchor you back to him, to that version of you that had once believed in him so completely. The warmth of his touch was like fire against your skin, burning through the layers of hurt you had tried to bury. It ignited something deep inside, a rush of emotions you weren't ready for.

You pulled away quickly, instinctively, like his touch was too much, too overwhelming. But it was already too late. Just that brief contact had opened the floodgates. The dam holding back your tears collapsed, and the pain you had suppressed came rushing to the surface. The weight of it all was unbearable, the heartbreak, the betrayal—it all came spilling out in an uncontrollable torrent.

Without a word, you stood abruptly, your chair scraping against the floor as you pushed back from the table. You could feel eyes on you as you moved, but you didn't care. The only thing you could focus on was escape. Each step you took felt heavy, your heels clicking against the cold marble floor like a drumbeat in your chest. Faster and faster, you walked, your breaths growing shallow, desperate, until you found sanctuary in the women's restroom.

The door swung shut behind you with a dull thud, and for a moment, the silence felt deafening. You stumbled over to the sink, gripping the cool porcelain edge for support as you turned on the faucet. The sound of rushing water filled the space, drowning out the quiet sobs that had begun to escape your throat. You stared at your reflection, but the tears blurred your vision until all you could see was a distorted image of yourself—lost, broken, and heart-wrenchingly alone.

The pain was suffocating, wrapping around your chest like a vise. Every breath felt labored, your heart pounding erratically in your ribcage, a wild, desperate beat that matched the chaos inside your mind. Why had you come? The question looped over and over, each repetition deepening your regret. It felt like a cruel trap—an elaborate game you had been pulled into without ever realizing the rules.

The bathroom door creaked open, and the soft sound of it locking echoed through the room. You froze, your tears momentarily pausing as dread pooled in your stomach. You looked up at the mirror, but your eyes were still too blurred with emotion to see clearly. All you could make out was a figure, the deep red of their clothing catching your attention.

The figure approached, each step deliberate, but you couldn't move. You stood there, helpless, until they reached forward and turned off the water with a quiet click. It wasn't until you felt the familiar warmth of his hand brushing against your cheek, wiping away the tears, that you realized—it was Michael.

His touch was gentle, tender, as he carefully dried your eyes with a paper towel, his gaze never leaving yours. For a moment, the world around you seemed to still, the storm of emotions paused as you stood there, facing the man who had caused so much of your heartache. His presence was overwhelming, filling every inch of the room, and despite everything, a part of you still ached for him, for the connection you had lost.

Michael's large, warm hands cupped your face, his fingers spreading over your cheeks with that familiar tenderness that once made you feel safe. His touch was a comfort you had longed for in your sleepless nights, yet it now felt like a betrayal. You wanted to melt into it, to give in to the sensation of being cared for, but something inside you resisted—an ache too deep to ignore. You pushed him away, your hands trembling as they met his chest.

"Leave," you whispered, but even your voice betrayed you, cracking with the pain you had tried so hard to conceal.

Michael's brow furrowed, his expression softening as he took a step back. "Can we talk, please?" His voice, so pleading, felt like a dagger. He moved toward you again, cautiously, as if afraid you might shatter. "All I need is five minutes."

Your tears blurred the edges of his figure, but the hurt inside you was sharp and clear. You wiped at your eyes furiously, your hands shaking. "Just five? Just five minutes?" You laughed bitterly, though it was choked with emotion. "All you need is five minutes to fix what you messed up? Five minutes to fix a six-year relationship?"

"Baby, listen, I—" he started, his tone desperate, but it only fueled your rage.

"Don't 'baby' me, Michael!" Your voice echoed in the small space, each word laced with the bitterness of betrayal. "I'm not your baby after you kissed that... that girl on stage, in front of everyone—your fans, the world." Your voice wavered as the images you had tried to block out resurfaced, haunting you. "I have to see it every day, Michael. Her lips on yours, pulling you in close, like she was claiming you, owning you. Why? Was I not enough for you? Was I not the one you wanted, the one you needed?"

Your voice cracked with the weight of those questions, and the tears that you had tried so hard to hold back began to fall in earnest, hot and relentless. You could barely breathe through the sobs that wracked your body, each one pulling you deeper into the pain. Before you could step away, Michael was already moving toward you, wrapping his arms around you in a way that was both protective and suffocating. He held you close, his hand gently caressing your back in soothing circles as you broke down completely.

"Let it out," he whispered, his voice low and soft, like a lullaby meant to calm a storm. He didn't try to explain himself just yet, knowing that words would only make things worse in that fragile moment. He simply held you, absorbing the tremors of your sobs, allowing you to cling to him like he was the only thing keeping you from collapsing.

You buried your face in his chest, the fabric of his red blazer damp with your tears. The scent of him filled your senses—familiar, intoxicating—pulling you back into memories of better days. Days when his presence alone was enough to silence all your fears, to make the world feel right. But now, even with him so close, that feeling of security was gone, replaced by an overwhelming sense of loss.

Michael lifted your chin gently, his thumb grazing your skin as he tilted your face up to meet his eyes. There was a softness there, an apology unspoken but clear in the way he looked at you. "Give me an hour," he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper. "But we can't talk here. Come with me back to the hotel. Please."

"An hour?" you asked, your voice hoarse from crying. You weren't sure you had the strength to relive everything, to open the floodgates again, but something in his voice, in the way he held you, made you pause.

Michael nodded, his expression resolute. "Maybe all night if that's what it takes," he added, his voice soft but firm, as if he had already resigned himself to whatever consequences might come from this conversation.

You hesitated, every muscle in your body screaming for you to run, but instead, you found yourself nodding. "Okay," you whispered.

Michael's hands moved with care as he grabbed another paper towel, gently drying the tears that still clung to your skin. His touch was almost reverent, as if he were handling something fragile and precious. He wiped away the last traces of your tears, even brushing softly over your lips, his fingers lingering for just a moment longer than necessary.

"Don't cry," he said softly, his eyes searching yours for any sign of forgiveness. "I promise I'll explain everything to you."

You didn't respond, your throat too tight, your heart too numb. The words he spoke felt distant, as though they belonged to someone else, someone who hadn't been hurt like you had. You weren't sure if you could believe him anymore.

You followed Michael out of the bathroom, your hand limp in his as he unlocked the door and guided you into the dimly lit hallway. The cool night air hit your skin as you stepped outside, the gentle breeze doing little to ease the storm inside your chest. His limo sat waiting at the back exit, a sleek, black vessel that felt like a temporary escape from the emotions swirling in your mind. The driver, ever the professional, opened the door wordlessly, giving you a brief, respectful nod.

Michael let go of your hand, his touch lingering in the empty space between you, before he gestured for you to step inside. You hesitated, just for a moment, your mind racing with second thoughts, but the exhaustion from your emotions made the decision for you. You slipped into the cool leather seat, the familiar scent of luxury filling your senses. Michael slid in beside you, and the door was quietly closed behind him, sealing you both inside the small, intimate space.

Without a word, he reached over and pulled the privacy screen shut, his long fingers steady and deliberate. It was something he had always been particular about—privacy, especially when it came to you. He didn't want the world prying into moments like these, moments that felt too raw, too personal for anyone else to witness.

For a few beats, silence hung in the air, thick and heavy between you. The hum of the car's engine barely registered in the back of your mind, drowned out by the whirlwind of emotions swirling inside you. The weight of everything—the betrayal, the hurt, the confusion—sat like a stone in your chest, making it hard to breathe. You stared out the window, watching the city lights blur as the car began to move, but even the distraction of the outside world couldn't quiet the ache inside you.

Michael shifted beside you, his gaze burning into the side of your face, but you refused to meet his eyes. You weren't ready, not yet. The thought of confronting everything he had done—everything he had ruined—was too much. You could feel the tension radiating off him, the way his body tensed as if he wanted to reach out to you, to fix what had been broken, but he held back. He knew better than to push you right now.

Finally, the silence broke, his voice soft, almost pleading. "I know you're hurting," he said, his tone careful, measured, as if afraid to say the wrong thing. "And I know I'm the one who caused it. But if you give me a chance... just one chance... I'll explain everything. I owe you that much."

You didn't say anything, your mind racing with a thousand different thoughts, none of them offering any clarity. A part of you wanted to scream, to tell him that no explanation could fix what he had done. But another part, a smaller, quieter part, still yearned for the Michael you had once known—the Michael who made you feel loved, cherished, like you were the only person in the world that mattered.

He reached for your hand again, his fingers brushing against yours with a tentative touch, but this time, you pulled away, folding your arms tightly across your chest as if trying to protect yourself from the vulnerability that came with being near him.

The limo continued to glide through the streets, its quiet hum the only sound between you. Minutes stretched on, and the weight of everything unsaid felt suffocating. Finally, you spoke, your voice barely above a whisper. "Why did you do it, Michael?" You didn't look at him, your eyes still fixed on the window. "Why wasn't I enough?"

Michael's hand reached out, gentle yet insistent, turning your face toward him. His touch was familiar, tender, and his gaze was pleading. "You are enough," he whispered, his voice soft but filled with an intensity that cut through the silence. "Every bit of you is enough. Enough for me."

For a moment, your eyes met his, and in that brief exchange, you saw the sincerity—the regret—etched into his features. But it wasn't enough. You pushed his hand away, your gaze falling back to the cityscape outside the window, the lights blurring into streaks of color. "I don't feel like it," you murmured, barely loud enough to be heard. "If I was enough, you wouldn't have kissed her."

His breath hitched, and you could hear the quiet shake in his voice as he responded, "She kissed me. It wasn't meant to happen. She didn't stick to the script. I only went along with it because... because I didn't want to embarrass her. But deep down, I wanted to push her away. I should have pushed her away."

You turned further from him, the weight of his words doing little to ease the ache inside your chest. "You should have," you whispered, the bitterness of it lingering on your tongue. The image of him with her, of their lips meeting, replayed in your mind, a loop that wouldn't stop. How could he not see the damage it had done?

"Baby, I wasn't going to embarrass her," he said, his voice growing more desperate as he reached out again, this time resting his hand gently on your thigh. The touch sent a shockwave through you—his warmth seeping through the thin, delicate fabric of the red satin dress he had chosen for you. "But I knew I messed up the moment you walked out that night."

You didn't respond. Your silence spoke louder than words. The flood of emotions that had been brewing within you—rage, hurt, betrayal—clashed violently with the part of you that still ached for him, that still longed for the man sitting beside you.

Michael withdrew his hand from your thigh, his fingers curling into a fist as he turned his gaze away, his expression one of defeat. You could sense his guilt, the deep regret that radiated from him. He was lost in the silence, unsure of how to make things right.

But then, without fully understanding why, you reached out, your hand hovering for a moment before gently covering his. The warmth of his skin beneath yours was a reminder of everything you had shared—the love, the intimacy, the trust. It wasn't a solution, not yet, but it was something.

Michael's head turned slowly toward you, his eyes searching yours as if trying to find hope. When he saw your hand resting over his, his gaze softened. He didn't say anything, didn't dare break the fragile peace that seemed to settle between you. Instead, he turned his hand over, his fingers intertwining with yours, holding you tightly, as though afraid to let go.

In that moment, it wasn't forgiveness—not yet. But it was a step. One small step toward something that felt like it could be mended, if only you could both find the strength to rebuild what had been broken.

The limo coasted to a stop in front of the Helmsley Hotel, a place that once held memories of fleeting happiness and painful betrayal. The hotel's grand entrance loomed before you, a reminder of the night you had fled, desperate to escape the life you thought you'd be leaving behind. Yet, here you were again, back in the same place, back with the same man who refused to let you go. Michael wasn't going to let you slip away—not this time.

The door opened, and Michael stepped out first, his hand extending toward you. His grip was firm yet gentle, pulling you close to him as you both walked toward the hotel's towering doors. Inside, the rich red and gold decor filled the lobby, the marble floors gleaming beneath the soft lighting. Each step echoed in the space around you, the weight of the moment heavy on your shoulders.

Michael's hand remained on the small of your back as you approached the elevator. He pressed the button with a deliberate touch, the soft light glowing beneath his finger, a subtle reminder of the path ahead. You glanced down at your feet, the polished tips of your heels reflecting the tension you felt building inside. His thumb brushed over your knuckles, a small gesture meant to comfort you, but it only reminded you of the ache still lodged deep in your chest.

The elevator doors slid open with a quiet ding, the polished interior welcoming you inside. Michael stepped back, letting you enter first before following closely behind. He pressed the button for the top floor—the floor where his suite awaited—and the doors closed, sealing the two of you in together. The only sound that filled the space was the low hum of sensual jazz, its smooth notes creating an intimate backdrop for the tension that lingered between you.

Without a word, Michael moved closer, his arms encircling your waist from behind, pulling you against his chest. His hands rested gently on your front, holding you as though afraid to let you drift too far. You felt the warmth of his breath against your neck, his steady breathing grounding you in the moment.

You glanced down at his hands, resting atop yours. His thumb grazed over your engagement ring, the one you had nearly taken off that night—the night you'd left him. It felt heavy now, a symbol of something you weren't sure you could still hold onto. Yet, in his touch, there was familiarity, a longing that whispered of the connection you both shared despite the pain.

The elevator doors slid open, revealing the hallway to his suite. Michael loosened his hold on you but kept your hand firmly in his as you both stepped out, walking in silence down the plush carpeted hall. His grip tightened just slightly, his thumb tracing gentle circles over your palm as you reached the door. He pulled the key card from his pocket and slid it into the lock, the soft click echoing in the quiet corridor. The door opened, and he let you step inside first, flipping the switch to bathe the suite in a soft, dim glow.

He followed behind, closing the door with a soft thud, the sound of the lock turning a subtle reminder of the privacy now surrounding you both. You walked across the room, your heels sinking into the plush carpet as you approached the tall glass windows. Outside, the city of New York stretched before you, the night alive with lights and movement, a stark contrast to the stillness you felt inside.

Michael stood back, watching you. He didn't want to disturb the fragile peace, his gaze lingering on your silhouette as you stared out at the city. You heard his soft footsteps retreat, but the tension between you remained thick, unspoken.

"Michael..." your voice was barely a whisper, the sound cutting through the stillness.

He stopped, turning back toward you, his eyes searching yours. "Yes?"

"I—" You hesitated, the words catching in your throat. You glanced back out at the city lights, the answer to your question lost somewhere in the blur of emotions. "Never mind," you murmured, turning away from him again.

Michael's sigh was heavy, weighted with regret and weariness as he took a step toward you. Each movement felt deliberate, as if he feared that closing the physical space between you might shatter the fragile calm. The soft rustle of his clothes brushed against the silence of the room, but it couldn't bridge the emotional chasm that now lay between you both—vast, like an ocean neither of you knew how to cross.

"You can talk to me," he murmured, his voice low and earnest, as if he was trying to coax out the words you were holding back. "You can say anything you need. I know you're mad. Frustrated. Angry. Upset. You have every right to be." His hand hovered for a moment before it gently brushed against yours, tentative, like he was afraid you'd pull away.

When your eyes finally met his, the tears that had welled up moments before threatened to spill over. His eyes softened, dark and pained, pleading in a way that unsettled you. It wasn't just the guilt—it was the rawness, the fragility you weren't used to seeing in him. And for a second, it almost cracked the walls you'd built.

"I mean it, deep down with everything I have, I swear to you—" His voice wavered as if the truth was burning him from the inside out. "I didn't want to kiss her. It wasn't supposed to happen. She didn't stick to the script. I had to fire her. She's off the tour, I made sure of it." His voice held the weight of a promise, but you weren't sure if you believed it anymore. Could promises still matter when trust had been shattered?

You looked at him, your gaze trying to pierce through the layers of his words, searching his face, his eyes, for something—anything—to tell you if he was telling the truth. His eyes, wide and glistening, held that familiar warmth, the warmth that once made you feel safe, but now felt distant, like a memory you couldn't quite grasp.

You let out a sigh, heavy and exhausted, your gaze drifting back to the window. The city lights blurred behind your tears, a mess of color and light reflecting the turmoil inside you. Michael stood there for a moment longer, watching you, before he reached out again—this time, his hand found your chin, the touch tender yet firm as he turned your face back to his.

"Can I ask you something?" His voice was quieter now, more fragile, as though he was treading on dangerous ground.

You swallowed hard, feeling the tension in your throat as you tried to suppress the anger that threatened to spill over. "What?" Your voice came out sharper than you intended, but you couldn't help it. The weight of your hurt clung to every word.

He held your gaze, not backing down. "Do you trust me?"

Silence. The question hung in the air between you, thick and suffocating. You didn't answer, couldn't answer. Trust? How could he ask that now, after everything?

He stepped back slightly, his voice even softer now. "If you don't, I'll leave you be. But I need to know... do you trust me?"

The words stung. Part of you wanted to scream that you didn't, that he'd lost that right when he let her lips touch his. But something inside, something small and wounded, still wanted to believe him. "I trust you," you whispered, the words feeling both true and false all at once.

Michael took a small breath, relief flickering in his eyes, but you weren't done. "Look at me," he said, his tone a little firmer now, pulling you out of your thoughts. His hand, still on your chin, tilted your face just enough so your eyes met his fully.

"Do you still love me?" His voice cracked ever so slightly, and you saw the tears begin to well up in his eyes, though he fought to keep them from falling. His vulnerability was heartbreaking, but the question cut too deep.

Your hand fell from his, your body going cold as the gravity of his question hit you. It wasn't just about trust—it was about everything. Love, broken promises, the future you once saw together, now clouded with doubt.

Michael blinked rapidly, trying to push back the tears that threatened to spill over. "Please don't do this," he whispered, his voice shaky and desperate. "Tell me you still love me. Tell me you still want to be my wife." His words came out in a rush, like he was afraid if he stopped speaking, the silence would swallow him whole.

Your throat tightened, the lump there almost unbearable. Your heart pounded in your chest, the rhythm erratic and painful. You did love him—you couldn't deny that, even if you wanted to. Every piece of you, every broken part, still loved him. Even the pieces that hurt the most.

But the question wasn't whether you loved him—it was whether you could move past this, whether you could still be the woman who stood by his side, the woman who once trusted him so completely.

The air between you felt thick, almost suffocating, as you took a step back. Michael's desperation was palpable, his movements quick as he closed the distance you tried to create. "Do you still love me?" His voice cracked, raw with emotion. "I will get down on my knees and beg!" The intensity in his eyes made your chest tighten, and for a split second, you saw him lower himself, his knees threatening to meet the floor.

"Don't do that," you murmured, your voice barely above a whisper, but firm enough to stop him. You took another step back, instinctively, as if space could shield you from the weight of his plea. But Michael wasn't giving up. He moved closer, his presence overwhelming, and before you could retreat further, his hand caught yours.

His fingers wrapped around your hand, holding on as if he feared you might disappear if he let go. "Tell me you still love me, please..." The way his voice wavered, like a man on the edge of losing everything, sent a shiver through you. "Baby, please!" His grip tightened, his words almost echoing off the walls of the suite, as though he needed the room itself to hear his cry for mercy.

Your eyes drifted to where your hands were intertwined, his large, calloused fingers enveloping yours. You felt the tremor in his hand, the desperation coursing through him. Slowly, your thumb brushed over his knuckles, tracing the familiar ridges and veins, grounding yourself in that simple touch. When your gaze met his, the raw vulnerability in his eyes nearly unraveled you.

"I-I still love you," you whispered, the words barely escaping your lips, but they carried the weight of your heart.

Michael's face softened, but the wariness lingered in his gaze. He wasn't sure yet, wasn't certain if you meant it fully, and you could see the question hovering in his eyes. "Do you mean it?" His voice was soft, almost afraid to hear the answer.

You nodded, feeling the burn of unshed tears in your throat. "I do. I-I could never stop loving you. Not even the bones in my body could stop loving you." The words flowed softly from you, but they felt heavy, laced with the depth of the love that still lingered, even after everything.

Relief washed over Michael, and he stepped even closer, his body just inches from yours now, the warmth radiating off him in waves. "Do you forgive me?" The question lingered in the air, heavy and full of hope.

You hesitated only a moment before nodding. "I forgive you," you said softly, feeling the weight of the words lift from your chest as you released them.

Michael exhaled a long, shaky breath, like a man who had been holding it for far too long. "You still my girl?" His voice was tender now, searching for the reassurance that you were still his, that he hadn't lost you completely.

You met his gaze, your heart swelling with emotion. "I'm still yours," you whispered, the truth of it ringing in the space between you.

Michael's hand cupped your face, his thumb tracing the curve of your cheek with a tenderness that made your heart ache. "I love you," he murmured, his voice full of sincerity, each word wrapped in the emotion he could barely contain.

You couldn't help but smile, the corners of your lips lifting softly. "I love you," you replied, the words a balm to the cracks in both your hearts.

He moved even closer, his breath warm against your skin, his lips hovering just inches from yours. "Can I kiss you?" His voice was playful now, a slight grin tugging at the corners of his mouth, though the intensity in his eyes never wavered.

A soft laugh escaped you, shaking your head lightly. "You don't have to ask me that. You can kiss me," you teased, the lightness between you returning for the first time in what felt like forever.

Michael chuckled, the sound low and warm. "I wanted to ask first," he teased, leaning in just a little more. "I don't need you biting my head off." His words were playful, but the look in his eyes was one of deep, unwavering affection. He wasn't just asking for a kiss—he was asking for the chance to heal.

Your lips curled into a faint smile as you closed the remaining distance between you, your breath brushing against his. "I wouldn't bite your head off," you whispered, your voice soft yet teasing, "unless this took a completely different turn. You should be lucky your mother saved your ass." You moved even closer, feeling the heat of his body wrap around yours like a warm blanket, grounding you both in that moment of vulnerability.

Michael wrapped his arms around you, pulling you flush against him as his forehead rested gently against yours. "She told you, didn't she?" His voice was low, laced with guilt, yet there was a tenderness to it that tugged at your heart.

You nodded slightly, feeling his breath mingle with yours. "She did," you whispered. "But I didn't want to hear it from her. I needed to hear it from the man who put this ring on my finger and promised to love me."

His lips hovered just over yours, brushing against them softly, barely a touch, but it sent a wave of warmth coursing through your veins. "I do love you. All of you," he murmured, his voice thick with emotion as he finally closed the gap, his lips meeting yours in a kiss that was tender, yet filled with the desperation of a man trying to make amends.

His lips were warm, soft, and comforting, moving with a gentle urgency that conveyed everything words couldn't. He kissed you deeply, pouring everything he had into that moment, as if trying to kiss away the pain, the hurt, the doubt. You felt your body melt against his, the tension in your muscles unraveling as he pulled you closer, his arms wrapping around you like he never wanted to let go.

As the kiss deepened, you felt your legs grow weak beneath you, your resolve crumbling under the weight of his affection. With a practiced ease, Michael scooped you up into his arms, cradling you as if you were the most precious thing in his world. Your lips never parted as he carried you, the soft click of his shoes echoing in the suite as he led you both down the hallway.

You kicked off your heels, the soft thuds as they scattered across the floor barely registering in your mind. All you could focus on was him—his warmth, his touch, the way his lips continued to claim yours with a passion that left you breathless.

Michael nudged open the bedroom door with a soft kick, closing it with another, the quiet click of the door signaling the intimacy of the moment. He walked over to the bed, laying you down with a gentleness that belied the intensity of the kiss still lingering on your lips. He kissed you again, deeper this time, his body hovering over yours as you sank into the plush mattress.

His hand roamed your arms, fingers trailing over your soft skin, igniting a fire everywhere he touched. Slowly, he reached for the straps of your dress, pulling them down with deliberate care, his lips never leaving yours. You lifted your arms, letting the dress slide off, pooling in a rich, crimson stain on the floor, leaving you bare save for the delicate lace of your black panties.

Michael's lips moved from yours, trailing down your cheek and along your neck, each kiss sending a shiver of pleasure through you. His breath was hot against your skin as he found the pulse point at your throat, sucking gently, his touch igniting every nerve in your body. The intoxicating mix of your pheromones and the familiar scent of your skin only spurred him on, heightening the moment as his kisses grew more fervent.

Your hands found their way into his hair, fingers tangling in the soft curls as you let out a quiet gasp. He pressed his body against yours, the heat between you almost unbearable, and yet, you craved more. The way his lips worshipped your skin, the way his hands explored every inch of you—it was as if he was trying to memorize you, to make up for every wrong with each kiss, each touch.

With each breath, each kiss that grazed your skin, Michael was more than just a reminder of the love you shared—he was a force pulling you deeper into that connection, a tether to something unbreakable, even in the face of all your doubts. His lips moved like a soft whisper, trailing reverently down the curve of your body, leaving a path of heat in their wake. As his mouth traveled lower, the ache in your chest, the heaviness of the past few days, began to unravel, replaced by the overwhelming presence of him—of the man you could never stop loving, no matter how hard you tried.

Michael paused at your chest, kissing delicately down the valley between your breasts before continuing his descent. His movements were unhurried, savoring every inch of your skin as if committing it to memory. When he reached your stomach, his breath warm against your skin, he shed his red blazer in a single fluid motion, the soft rustle of fabric hitting the floor echoing faintly in the room. The air felt charged between you, a silent promise hanging in the space as his lips continued downward, inch by inch, until they found the sensitive skin of your lower abdomen.

His teeth grazed the waistband of your panties, latching onto the delicate fabric as he slowly, teasingly, tugged them down your legs. The sensation was tantalizing, every movement deliberate and filled with purpose. You felt the cool air brush against your bare skin as the lace fell away, pooling on the floor beneath you. Now, you were laid completely bare before him, vulnerable and exposed in a way that left your heart racing, but trusting him entirely.

Michael's hands found your thighs, his grip firm yet gentle as he guided your legs back toward your chest, your knees brushing softly against your skin. He kissed along your inner thighs with a tenderness that nearly undid you, each press of his lips a silent declaration of his love, his devotion. The heat of his mouth sent shivers up your spine, a delicious contrast to the cool air of the room, and your body instinctively arched toward him, seeking more of his touch.

"Michael..." you breathed, the sound barely a whisper, your voice heavy with longing. You could feel the intensity of his gaze, the weight of his attention fully focused on you, on pleasing you, on reminding you that his love had never wavered.

With slow, measured care, he spread your legs wider, revealing the most intimate part of yourself to him. His eyes darkened with desire as he kissed the soft skin around your center, brushing his lips against your folds in a way that made your breath hitch. The anticipation coiled tightly in your core, your entire body attuned to every movement he made.

When his tongue flicked out, tasting the arousal that had already begun to glisten on your skin, a shuddering moan escaped your lips. "Oh God," you gasped, your head falling back against the pillows, fingers tangling in the sheets as pleasure rippled through you.

Michael's fingers slid between your folds, his touch firm yet tender as he parted them, exposing you fully to him. His tongue found your clit with an expert precision, flicking it in quick, teasing motions that made you gasp for breath, your body instinctively arching into him. He sucked gently on the sensitive nub, his lips moving with practiced ease, as if worshipping the very core of your pleasure. The sensation was overwhelming, every nerve in your body alight with the intensity of it.

His tongue moved lower, dipping into your entrance, thrusting slowly in and out as he tasted you, the warmth of your walls clenching around him with every movement. The sensation of his tongue exploring you, combined with the rhythmic strokes on your clit, sent waves of pleasure coursing through you, building with each passing second.

"Don't stop," you begged, your voice breathless, desperate, as your fingers found their way into his hair. You tugged gently, not wanting to hurt him but needing something to hold onto as your body teetered on the edge of release.

Michael groaned softly against you, the vibration sending another shock of pleasure through your core. He doubled down, flicking his tongue with more intensity over your clit while thrusting it deeper inside you, his lips moving in perfect rhythm. The pressure was building, an inferno in your belly, and you could feel yourself spiraling toward release, your hips beginning to move in time with his mouth, chasing that edge, that moment of bliss that was so close you could taste it.

Your breath hitched, your chest rising and falling in rapid succession as the pleasure built with a tantalizing intensity. Your body trembled, hips instinctively grinding against his face, chasing that elusive release he was masterfully guiding you toward. The tension in your core twisted tighter, every nerve electrified, every sensation amplified as you teetered on the edge of bliss.

Michael's fingers slid inside you with ease, his middle and ring fingers curling just right, hitting that perfect spot with every thrust. His tongue, slick and warm, moved back to your clit, the soft flicks sending sparks of pleasure shooting up your spine. His pace was steady, controlled, each movement deliberate as he pumped his fingers in and out of you, your arousal coating them in a glistening sheen.

He rested his head against your left thigh, the warmth of his breath fanning across your skin, grounding you in the moment. His tongue moved lazily over your sensitive nub, each slow flick driving you mad with need. He was edging you, teasing you with the slow, deliberate pace, keeping you right on the precipice without allowing you to fall over.

"Michael, I'm so close," you moaned, your voice trembling with desperation, your body arching toward him, begging for release.

But instead of giving you what you craved, he slowed down. His fingers moved inside you with an agonizing slowness, his tongue tracing languid circles over your clit, drawing out the moment. The tension in your core tightened even further, the pleasure building but never quite reaching that peak. He was toying with you, pushing you to the brink and pulling you back, and it was driving you wild.

"Michael, please!" you whimpered, your voice raw with need, your fingers digging into the sheets as you writhed beneath him, desperate for more.

He lifted his head just enough to meet your gaze, his eyes dark and molten with desire. Those big, brown eyes—eyes that had always held you captive—drew you in even deeper, pulling you into the depths of his love and passion. His gaze was intense, filled with a hunger that matched your own, but beneath it all was the tenderness that had always made your heart ache for him.

"Mmm, you taste so good, baby," he murmured, his voice thick with satisfaction. His tongue flicked lazily over your clit again, drawing another desperate moan from your lips.

"Michael... please, I want to cum," you begged, the words tumbling out in a breathless plea. Your body was trembling, your thighs shaking with the effort of holding back, your core burning with the need for release.

A small, wicked smile tugged at his lips as he curled his fingers inside you again, pressing deeper, finding that sweet spot with precision. You gasped, your entire body shuddering as pleasure flooded through you, your walls clenching around his fingers. His tongue resumed its slow, torturous rhythm on your clit, flicking over it with deliberate care, driving you closer and closer to the edge.

"Let go for me," he whispered against your skin, his voice barely audible but filled with command, "I want to feel you fall apart."

With that, he curved his fingers even more, pressing into that perfect spot inside you while his tongue picked up speed, flicking and swirling over your sensitive nub. Your body jolted, every muscle tensing as the pleasure built to a breaking point. You were so close—too close.

And then, with one final flick of his tongue, everything snapped.

A wave of euphoria crashed over you, your body convulsing as you came undone beneath him. You cried out, your back arching off the bed, your fingers tangling in his hair as your release washed over you in powerful waves. Your walls clenched around his fingers, your thighs trembling as the pleasure consumed you, white-hot and overwhelming.

Michael didn't stop, his fingers and tongue continuing their relentless assault, drawing out your orgasm until you were a quivering, trembling mess beneath him. He coaxed every last bit of pleasure from your body, his touch firm but gentle, his mouth worshipping you as you rode the high.

Finally, when you could take no more, your body spent and trembling, he slowed down, his fingers slipping out of you with a wet sound as he kissed his way back up your body. His lips brushed softly against your skin, each kiss tender and loving, a contrast to the intensity of the pleasure he had just given you.

He hovered above you, his breath warm against your cheek as he looked down at you with that same, unwavering affection. "I love you," he whispered, his voice hoarse but filled with sincerity.

You smiled up at him, still breathless, your chest rising and falling rapidly as your body continued to hum with the aftershocks of pleasure. "I love you too," you whispered, your voice soft but heavy with meaning, your heart swelling with the fullness of the moment.

Michael's dark eyes never left yours as he stood straight, the intensity in his gaze making the room feel smaller, the air thicker with anticipation. Slowly, he began unbuttoning his black shirt, each flick of his fingers deliberate, almost torturously slow, revealing the smooth expanse of his bare chest beneath. Your eyes followed every motion, captivated by the way his muscles shifted under his skin, the light catching on the sheen of sweat that still lingered from earlier.

He shrugged the shirt off, letting it fall to the floor without care. The fabric barely made a sound as it crumpled at his feet, but the sight of him standing there, shirtless, was enough to steal the breath from your lungs. His hands moved to his belt, the soft click of metal as he unbuckled it echoing in the quiet room. The leather slid from the loops with a quiet hiss before joining the shirt on the floor with a muted thud, forgotten in the heat of the moment.

You shifted, sitting up on the edge of the bed, your pulse quickening as you watched him with wide eyes. Michael didn't say a word as he reached out, his large hands wrapping gently around your waist as he pulled you to your feet, the warmth of his skin seeping into yours. The moment his lips met yours, the world around you melted away. The kiss was deep, fervent, full of passion, his lips moving against yours as if they were searching for something, something only you could give him.

A soft moan escaped your lips, muffled by the kiss, as his hands tightened around your waist, pulling you closer to him. The heat of his body, the firmness of his chest against you—it was intoxicating. You could feel the pulse of his need radiating from him, mirrored in the way your own body responded.

Your hands found the waistband of his pants, your fingers trembling as they unbuttoned them. The sound of the zipper lowering was lost in the fervor of the moment. With practiced ease, you slid the pants down, but before you could go any further, Michael caught your hand, guiding it beneath the waistband of his briefs. The heat of him was startling, the hardness unmistakable as your fingers wrapped around him, feeling him pulse and grow under your touch.

A shiver ran through you, your pulse quickening as the kiss deepened, your lips moving in a frantic dance of passion. You backed Michael up, the two of you moving in sync, until his back met the wall with a soft thud. He pulled away from the kiss, his breath coming in harsh pants, his forehead resting against yours as he gazed into your eyes.

"I love you," he whispered, the words rough and raw, filled with all the emotions that had been building between you.

Your eyes flicked from his lips, now swollen from the kiss, to his eyes, dark and full of longing. "I love you," you whispered back, your voice barely more than a breath as you gave his hardened shaft a teasing squeeze.

Michael's breath hitched, his hand coming up to cup your face gently, his thumb brushing over your cheek as he leaned in, capturing your lips again in a slow, sensual kiss. The intensity of it sent a jolt of electricity down your spine, and before you knew it, he was guiding you back toward the bed. Your body gave way to the soft mattress, the sheets cool against your skin as you collapsed onto it, your breath coming in short gasps as you watched him shed the rest of his clothes.

The sight of him standing there, fully bare, took your breath away. His body was a masterpiece of lean muscle, every curve and line a testament to his years of dancing. His abs were defined, his skin smooth and glistening under the soft light. His chest rose and fell with heavy breaths, the slight sheen of sweat catching the light. But it was the way his hardened length stood thick and proud, the veins running along its length prominent and pulsing, that had your pulse racing.

"You're so beautiful," he whispered, his voice soft but filled with awe as he moved toward the bed, his eyes never leaving yours.

You shifted, dragging yourself up toward the headboard, watching as Michael climbed onto the bed, his movements slow, predatory. He hovered over you, his breath ghosting over your skin as he kissed his way down your body, his lips leaving a trail of fire in their wake. Each kiss, each flick of his tongue, sent shivers racing through you, your body arching toward him, craving his touch.

When his lips reached the apex of your thighs, he paused, his eyes flicking up to meet yours, dark with desire. He placed a soft, lingering kiss against your folds, his breath warm against your skin. The sensation sent a shockwave of pleasure through you, your body trembling with anticipation.

Michael held his hardened length in his hand, stroking himself slowly, his eyes never leaving your face as he teased you with the sight of him. His tip was slick with precum, the thick skin pulling back with each stroke, revealing the sensitive head that glistened in the low light.

He kissed his way back up your body, his lips brushing over your stomach, your chest, until finally, they found your neck. His body pressed against yours, his warmth surrounding you, the weight of him a comforting presence as his lips found yours again.

You could feel the heat of his shaft against you, the swollen tip brushing teasingly over your slick folds, sending a pulse of raw desire coursing through your body. The anticipation was electric, the air between you humming with unspoken longing as his breath mingled with yours, every brush of his skin against yours a promise of what was to come.

The teasing glide of his tip against your entrance had your heart racing, your core tightening with every soft, deliberate movement. His gaze held yours, intense and unwavering, making you feel like the only person in the world.

"You ready?" His voice was deep, laced with both tenderness and need, as he continued to nudge himself against your entrance, his precum mixing with the wetness that had already begun to gather there. The slick friction of him against you made your breath catch in your throat, and you could only nod, the words barely able to form on your lips.

"Yes, Michael," you breathed, your voice soft, trembling with the weight of desire. You wrapped your arms around his neck, pulling him closer, your fingers threading through his hair, anchoring yourself to him.

Michael's hand moved with practiced ease, gently lifting your left leg and draping it over his shoulder, the position opening you up to him completely. The warmth of his body was overwhelming, the sheer size of him pressing into you making you shudder with anticipation. Slowly, carefully, he guided the tip of his length inside, his every movement deliberate as he stretched you, inch by agonizing inch.

You gasped, your head falling back against the pillow as he filled you, the sensation both overwhelming and exquisite. The stretch, the fullness of him inside you, made every nerve ending in your body come alive, your slick walls pulsing around him, adjusting to the invasion.

"Shh, relax, baby," he whispered, his voice rough with restraint. His eyes, dark and full of heat, flickered up to meet yours before dipping down, captivated by the sight of himself sinking deeper into your warmth. He took his time, easing in slowly, savoring every inch as your body stretched to accommodate him.

The feeling of being completely filled sent a shudder through you, your body tightening around him as he bottomed out, his hips flush against yours. The fullness, the delicious stretch of him inside you, was overwhelming, and yet, all you wanted was more. His slow movements in and out were almost torturous, dragging out the pleasure, making you hyperaware of every inch of him.

Your eyes followed his, both of you transfixed by the sight of your bodies joined so intimately. His thick shaft glistened with your arousal, every movement making it shine under the soft, dim light. The way he slid in and out of you, slow and steady, left a trail of slick wetness that only added to the growing intensity of the moment.

Michael's breath came in shallow gasps, his mouth hanging open slightly as he watched your bodies come together again and again. The look on his face, the pure, unfiltered desire, sent a thrill through you, your own breaths turning into soft, shaky moans. Each thrust, each pull, was deliberate, his hips moving in a slow, sensual rhythm that had you climbing higher and higher.

He reached out, his hand cupping your face gently, his thumb brushing over your cheek as he leaned in, capturing your lips in a soft, lingering kiss. The connection made your heart stutter, your body arching into his as he sank even deeper, the pressure building inside you unbearable in the most delicious way. Your moans were muffled against his lips, the sound of them only making him chuckle low in his throat.

He broke the kiss, his lips hovering inches from yours as he whispered, "You feel so good, baby."

And then, he went deeper, pushing past the point of teasing, hitting that spot inside you that made your vision blur, your body jerking in response. A cry escaped you, your hand flying to his abdomen, fingers splaying against the hard planes of his stomach in an attempt to steady yourself. But the truth was, you didn't want him to stop; if anything, you wanted more. Needed more.

Michael's chuckle was dark, knowing, his hand slipping from your face to your waist, holding you firmly as he thrust deeper, his pace still slow but each movement precise, deliberate. The tension was coiling tighter inside you, the heat building with every second. You could feel the pressure mounting, every nerve in your body on fire as you teetered on the edge, waiting for that final push.

"More, Michael," you pleaded, the need in your voice thick and trembling, your nails pressing into his skin with desperation. Every inch of your body was taut, straining toward the release you craved, but Michael was in control, holding you just at the edge.

"You want more?" His breath was hot and teasing against your lips, his deep voice vibrating through your chest. You nodded eagerly, your body arching into him, but Michael's dark chuckle made your heart flutter with both frustration and desire.

"I'm taking my time tonight, baby," he murmured, the words a slow, deliberate promise as his hips rocked forward again, his thrusts measured, almost torturous. "I'm not rushing anything."

A gasp tore from your lips as he pushed deeper, his tip brushing against your cervix with each precise movement, sending shockwaves of pleasure radiating through your body. Your muscles tensed, clinging to him even tighter, your breaths coming out in ragged, desperate pants.

"Michael..." you gasped, your voice a broken whisper as you held onto him like a lifeline, his warmth and weight grounding you amidst the overwhelming sensations.

His lips found the crook of your neck, soft and slow as he pressed tender kisses against your skin, the heat of his body melding with yours as he shifted, pressing deeper, stretching you further. Your leg still rested over his shoulder, his grip on your waist firm but gentle, pulling you even closer.

Each thrust was slow, deliberate, designed to make you feel every inch of him. It was maddening—the way he held back, savoring the moment, pouring all of his unspoken emotions into the rhythm of his hips. This wasn't just about pleasure—it was about making up for everything, about showing you just how much you meant to him. The love and regret hung between every breath, every deep plunge inside of you.

"Oh god, Michael..." you moaned, your voice cracking as your nails dragged down his back, leaving faint marks in your wake. His name was a soft plea, a prayer, whispered against his ear. The sound seemed to ignite something in him, urging him on, though his pace remained maddeningly slow, each thrust a steady, rhythmic beat like the pulse of a heart.

Your bodies were slick where they met, a sheen of sweat and arousal coating both of you, making the friction both unbearable and intoxicating. You could feel every inch of him, the thickness of his shaft stretching you to your limit, his tip pressing against all the right spots. Each slow retreat left you aching for more, but when he filled you again, it was like he was made to fit perfectly inside of you, his length pulsing in time with your own heartbeat.

He could feel the way your walls clenched around him, slick and hot, gripping him tighter with every slow thrust. The pressure inside of you was building, the tension coiling tighter and tighter, threatening to snap with each deliberate movement of his hips.

"Tell me what you want, baby," he whispered, his breath hot against your ear, his lips brushing the shell of it as his hand cupped your chin gently, forcing you to meet his gaze. His dark eyes were filled with heat, with the need to hear you say it.

You moaned in response, unable to form words as his lips trailed over your neck, each kiss sending jolts of pleasure down your spine. His hips continued their slow, devastating rhythm, driving you mad with need. "Tell me," he coaxed again, his voice low and rough, a command hidden within the soft plea.

"I want you," you finally gasped, your voice broken and breathless, your body trembling beneath him. "All of you," you moaned, your words spilling out between labored breaths.

Michael's lips brushed against your ear, a soft kiss filled with reverence and need. "You have all of me," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "Everything." His words were a vow, one that made your heart swell as his hands gripped you tighter.

Your nails dug into his back, pulling him closer, your moans vibrating against his skin. He responded with a deep groan of his own, his body pressing harder into yours as he buried his face in the curve of your neck. His tongue flicked out, teasing your skin, before his lips latched onto your throat, sucking gently but firmly, his intention clear. He wanted to mark you, to claim you all over again, as if the love you shared could somehow be stamped into your skin.

His slow, deep thrusts had you teetering on the edge, your core burning with the need for release. The tension inside you was unbearable, your body trembling as the pressure mounted, threatening to break. You were so close, so desperately close, and he knew it. He could feel it in the way your walls clenched around him, could hear it in the breathless moans that escaped your lips.

Michael's lips hovered just above your ear, his breath hot and tantalizing as he whispered, "I can feel it, baby. You're so close. Just let go for me."

The sound of his voice sent shivers down your spine, the rumble of it vibrating through your core. You were on the edge, teetering on that precipice of pleasure that only he could push you over. "Michael, please..." Your voice cracked, laced with desperation, the heat in your body growing unbearable. You clawed at his skin, nails raking along his back in a silent, aching plea for more.

His mouth lingered at your neck, his breath teasing your sensitive skin, and his voice dripped with both power and tenderness. "What is it, beautiful? Tell me what you want."

You could barely breathe as you looked up into his eyes, pupils blown wide with need. "Harder," you whispered, your voice shaking as you tried to find the strength to speak. The tension between you was almost unbearable, a heavy, charged silence that echoed in the room.

For a moment, he just watched you, his dark, molten gaze searching your face, savoring every flicker of emotion. His slow, deliberate thrusts continued, each one calculated, driving you wild with the need for more. He was holding back, teasing you, savoring your frustration. Then, without warning, his pace changed. His hips snapped forward with a force that took your breath away, his body slamming into yours with raw, unbridled intensity.

The shock of it ripped a cry from your throat, the sound broken and jagged, your moans turning into desperate, breathless screams that echoed off the walls. His name left your lips in a shattered gasp, "Michael!" The sharp, rhythmic slapping of skin on skin filled the space, each powerful thrust driving him deeper, harder, shaking you to your very core.

His hand found your chin, gripping it possessively as he tilted your face upward, forcing you to look into his eyes. There was fire there—an intensity that left you breathless. He leaned down, his lips rough as they claimed your neck, his teeth grazing your skin in a possessive mark. Each kiss felt like a brand, a reminder of the connection, the tether that held you both together in this feverish moment.

"You feel that?" he whispered against your skin, his voice a deep, dark growl that sent a shudder through your body. "I can feel how close you are... just let go, baby. Let it out."

You tried to resist, tried to hold on to the last thread of control, but it was slipping, unraveling with every brutal thrust of his hips. Each time he moved inside you, he hit that perfect spot, the one that had your body trembling, your mind slipping into a haze of pleasure. The tension inside you snapped all at once, a white-hot wave crashing over you as your body shattered. You convulsed beneath him, your muscles tightening around him, your release coming in violent, uncontrollable spasms.

Your hands flew to his back, nails digging into his skin as you cried out, your voice lost in the storm of sensation. You could feel your own slickness coating him, your release mixing with his as he kept moving, unrelenting, drawing out every last bit of pleasure from you.

"Oh, just like that," he groaned, his voice a low, guttural growl as he felt your body responding to him. The tight, pulsing grip of your walls drove him closer to the edge, his movements becoming more erratic, more desperate. His arms wrapped around you, holding you against him as his body tensed, the muscles in his back tightening under your hands.

With a final, powerful thrust, he spilled into you, his release coming in deep, shuddering waves. His moan was raw, broken, his breath ragged against your neck as he emptied himself inside you. Each pulse of him inside you sent another ripple of pleasure through your body, your walls milking him for every last drop, the heat of him flooding your core.

Michael collapsed against you, his body heavy as he buried his face in the crook of your neck, his breath still ragged and uneven. He was still moving inside you, slow, languid thrusts as he rode out the last waves of his release. The sensation was overwhelming, your body trembling beneath him, utterly spent.

You could feel his seed seeping out of you, mingling with your own, slicking the insides of your thighs and the rumpled sheets beneath you. The air in the room was thick with the scent of sweat, sex, and the aftermath of what you had just shared.

For a few long moments, the two of you just lay there, tangled together, the only sound the soft, heavy rhythm of your breathing. His heartbeat pounded against your chest, still racing, in sync with your own.

Slowly, Michael pulled out of you, his length slipping from your body with a wet, slick sound that left you trembling. He carefully lowered your leg from his shoulder, his hands trailing down your thigh, his touch soft, gentle in the aftermath. The cool air hit your skin, making you shiver, your body feeling strangely empty without him inside you.

He pressed a soft kiss to your hip, then your stomach, working his way up to your chest, leaving a trail of tender kisses in his wake. Finally, his lips found yours again, capturing you in a deep, lingering kiss. "I love you," he whispered against your mouth, his voice rough with emotion. "More than anything."

Your body was too exhausted to respond, but you smiled softly, your heart swelling with the warmth of his words. He eased off the bed, disappearing into the bathroom for a moment before returning with a warm, damp washcloth. Gently, he wiped away the sweat and the sticky mess of your shared release, his movements slow and careful, full of love and tenderness.

Once he was done, he discarded the cloth and slid back into bed beside you, pulling the covers over both of your bodies. He wrapped his arms around you, pulling you close, his chest pressed against your back, the warmth of his body soothing your trembling limbs.

His lips found your ear once more, brushing against your skin as his breath came in soft, warm waves. The simple, quiet intimacy of the moment felt profound as he whispered, "Hey."

You stirred in his arms, your body moving instinctively closer, seeking the comfort of his embrace. The bed felt like a sanctuary, the covers a cocoon around you both, holding you in this fragile moment. Your hand slipped out from beneath the blankets, your fingers trailing across his chest before coming up to his face. Your touch was gentle, delicate, as if you were tracing the very essence of him.

The room was bathed in a pale, silvery glow from the moonlight streaming through the window, casting soft shadows across his face. His strong features were softened by the light, the sharp lines of his jaw now gentle curves under your thumb as you traced the rough stubble there. His skin was warm, and you could feel the subtle tension in his muscles begin to relax as you caressed him.

"You mean it, right?" His voice was barely above a whisper now, the vulnerability in his tone raw and exposed in a way you didn't often hear. It trembled slightly, a hint of insecurity laced beneath the question. "You still love me?"

The weight of his words lingered in the air, fragile and heavy at the same time, like he was afraid of the answer despite knowing it deep in his heart. You nodded slowly, your fingers moving across his jaw, brushing lightly against the stubble that you loved so much. The texture beneath your fingertips grounded you in the moment, in the depth of your shared history.

"Always," you whispered, your voice quiet yet resolute, filled with all the love and assurance you could offer. The word hung between you, a promise as enduring as the years you'd spent together, filled with passion, struggle, and unwavering devotion.

A look of pure relief washed over his face, and his lips curved into a soft, almost shy smile that melted something deep inside of you. His dark eyes softened, the intensity in them easing as the tension that had been gripping his body finally released. He leaned in slowly, the warmth of his breath mingling with yours, his nose brushing against yours in a gentle, playful gesture that was so quintessentially him.

Then, he closed the distance between you, his lips pressing against yours in a kiss that was achingly tender. It wasn't a kiss of passion or heat but one of love—deep, abiding love that spoke of shared memories, of moments when words weren't enough, of the bond that had grown stronger through every trial. His lips moved against yours slowly, reverently, sealing the love you both carried for one another, a love that had withstood time and trials, unshaken.

When he pulled back, the soft smile remained on his face, but his eyes held a spark of playful curiosity. "Good," he murmured, his lips grazing yours as he nuzzled against you, the warmth of his body wrapping around you like a blanket. "Because I didn't want to lose you. I don't think I could handle that."

You smiled at him, the affection you felt bubbling up inside you, and pressed your forehead against his. The closeness between you felt magnetic, an unbreakable bond drawing you together. The warmth of his skin, the scent of him, the sound of his breath—it was all so familiar, so comforting. You could feel the steady thrum of his heartbeat, beating in time with yours.

"You never will," you murmured softly, your voice a gentle promise that you both knew was true. Your fingers traced the shape of his lips before resting on his cheek, feeling the slight roughness of his stubble beneath your palm. "But, like I said, thank your mother. She was a big help in all this."

Michael let out a quiet chuckle, the sound rich and warm, and his smile grew. The tension that had been hanging between you seemed to melt away completely, replaced by a sense of peace and lightness. He leaned in even closer, his nose brushing yours again in a playful, teasing gesture.

"Yeah, I guess I owe her one," he replied, his voice still low, but filled with affection and gratitude.

Before you could say anything more, he closed the distance between you again, this time with a kiss that was deeper, more intentional. His lips moved against yours with a gentle firmness, conveying everything that words couldn't—the gratitude, the devotion, the love that had claimed you both so completely over the years. There was something timeless about the way he kissed you, like each kiss was a reaffirmation of what you had, of what you would continue to build together.

As he pulled back, his forehead rested against yours, his breath mingling with yours in the quiet of the room. The love that tethered you both was palpable, an invisible thread woven through years of memories, trials, and triumphs. And in that moment, in the quiet darkness, you both knew that it was a love that would last—still strong, still meant to be.

[metalhoops]

Steddie Week Day 4:

Familiar / Hurt/Comfort / Here Come the Tears by Judas Priest

Eddie and Steve had never been close before the world went to hell. They’d known of each other, as everyone knows everyone in small town, middle America. They’d gone to the same school, smoked behind the same abandoned buildings and knew all the best places to make the worst decisions, but they hadn’t done it together. They were disparate figures, drifting around each other’s edges. That all changed in 1986 when through fate or chance the two boys had been flung together. 

By the summer of 1988, they’d grown into and around each other like vines beneath forest foliage. They’d become inseparable, familiar. Steve showed up outside the garage at closing time, the Beamer tearing down the gravel path, leaving a trail of dust in its wake. When Robin and the kids weren’t around, Steve drove fast, throwing caution to the wind. No one else knew that about him. Eddie did. 

He didn’t know what to do with all of the pieces of Steve that were uniquely his. He felt the illogical urge to write them down, catalogue each one as though designing a character for a new campaign. He wanted a record of each minute detail of Steve. 

“Your yuppie boyfriend’s tearin’ up the drive again, Manson,” Eddie's boss, Frankie, hollered from his spot behind the service desk. 

In the year he’d worked at the garage, he’d never seen the guy move from behind his desk, yet his hands were always grease-stained. Eddie hated his boss, but the job paid well enough. He was saving up to high tail it out of Hawkins, where nicknames like ‘The Freak’, and Frankie’s newest addition ‘Manson’, as in that Manson, the one with the cult in the 60s, weren’t so widespread. 

“I was off twenty minutes ago, Frankenstein. You want him to stop kickin’ up dust you could just let me off on time,” Eddie grumbled, grabbing a spare rag and trying to scrub the worst of the grease and engine gunk from his hands and overalls.  

“You think that carburettor was going to replace itself? You wanna finish on time? Work faster,” Frankie noted, punctuating his point by kicking his feet across the desk. Charming. 

Eddie made his way to the car, drummed his knuckles against the passenger door and waited as Steve leaned over to push it open, his precious seats covered haphazardly with one of Eddie’s ruined bandannas. This was their habit, how the two worked. Steve was wearing sunglasses, which usually meant he was fighting off a migraine. They’d been more frequent in recent months. Eddie blamed the hot weather. 

“How was your day?” Steve asked, starting the car.

Eddie flopped into the passenger seat and groaned. He let his body lay slack and boneless as the leather seats cradled him and the cool air from the A.C. took his breath away.

“That good, huh?” 

“Everyone’s cars decided to break down on the hottest day of the year and Frankenstein’s still giving me shit about being a cult leader. I think the dude used to hold out hope for you since you were the town's golden boy, but now he thinks there’s some kind of Stepford wife thing going on.” 

Steve snorted as he turned onto the familiar street leading to The Harringtons’ house. 

“I saw Dustin today. The kid wanted me to remind you, you’re picking the twerps up on Monday,” Steve informed, drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. The guy had no sense of rhythm, but Eddie never had the heart to tell him. 

“Remind me why you can’t,” Eddie muttered as Steve’s house came into view. 

“Because I work late and you get off by two.” 

“I thought you said my van was a ‘death trap’. I could always take your car,” Eddie proposed with a devilish smirk. 

That car was Steve’s baby. Not even he was allowed to drive it, save that one night in Indianapolis when Steve was drunk and Robin broke her wrist. They’d spent five hours together in the emergency room. It’d brought back all the wrong kind of memories for Steve and Eddie could tell. 

Steve and Eddie talked about everything except Eddie’s stay in hospital and defining the liminal space between platonic and romantic, their relationship had been drifting for the past six months.  

“In your dreams, Munson. You staying at mine tonight?” Steve asked, pulling up and walking around to open Eddie’s door for him. 

He always made excuses about Eddie getting engine oil all over the passenger door, but he thought Steve liked playing chivalrous in the same way he liked playing up his less-than-stellar reputation.  

Steve kept asking him to spend the night. Eddie had his own drawer in Steve’s room. He couldn’t help but feel like he was asking him to move in. Eddie kept turning him down, not because he didn’t want to, but because he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life in Hawkins, even if it was with Steve. He’d tried to convince himself he’d be able to do it, so they could get out of their goddamn stalemate and get on with the rest of their lives. Yet, Hawkins had always been inhospitable for the likes of people like him and the person Steve was becoming.

“If you’re cookin,” Eddie agreed, unbuttoning his overalls.

By the time Steve found his keys, Eddie had managed to strip the sweat-slicked clothes from his body and dumped them unceremoniously on the front stoop. The good thing about rich people’s houses? No neighbours for miles. 

They followed the same old routines. Eddie made his way upstairs to shower while Steve started prepping for dinner. Once Eddie didn’t smell like the inside of a boys' locker room, he returned to find Steve spaced out in the kitchen. 

Eddie’s heart was a hummingbird in flight. Steve’s body was stock still, his eyes a thousand miles away. 

“Steve,” Eddie breathed, signalling his approach. 

He tried to focus on the kitchen. This wasn’t two years ago. Vecna was dead. 

He laced his fingers into the crook of Steve’s elbow and finally caught the boy’s attention, the pot on the stove having boiled dry. 

“Migraine?” Eddie asked as Steve’s eyes snapped shut, frown lines marring the landscape of his forehead. 

“Yeah,” Steve confirmed through gritted teeth as Eddie guided him to the couch, switching off the lights on the way.

“Looks like you’re going to have to put up with the Munson special then, eggs on toast,” He breathed, sitting down beside Steve and guiding his head into his lap. 

He’d sat through a couple of Steve’s migraines. Sometimes they were fast and painless as a sun shower, other times he’d spend hours disorientated and puking up his guts. There wasn’t much Eddie could do for him, but sit there and be with him for it. In sickness and in health, all that crap. Eddie wasn’t sure when he’d become close enough to Steve that he’d sit through anything with him, but he knew now he would. 

“Stevie, you know when I get outta this hellhole, I’m taking you with me, right?” Eddie breathed, feeling the sudden need for candour. 

Sometime in the space between getting to know Steve and getting to love Steve, they’d crossed the line from familiar to familial.

Steve’s face nudged against Eddie’s palm, his forehead beaded with sweat. 

“I’d like that,” he confirmed. 

“We’d have to take Robin with us, though,” Steve added after a beat, causing Eddie to let out a breathy chuckle and dip down to press their foreheads together.  

“Fine by me, long as you’re there.” 

[xx-lemon-drop-xx]

𝓕𝓸𝓻𝓰𝓮𝓽 𝓜𝓮 𝓝𝓸𝓽 ↬𝕮𝖍𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖊𝖗 𝕱𝖎𝖛𝖊

“Love in light may not last forever, but love in shadows lasts a lifetime."

. . . ⇢ ˗ˏˋ[quote stolen from @rachellerosziel] ࿐ྂ

→1988 words

┗━•❃°•°❀°•°❃•━┛

"He said I might be part fae."

The sandwich tasted excellent despite the fact it didn't seem Lilia could actually cook food aside from putting together sandwiches. The food tray he'd brought in had all sorts of foods on it. A sandwich cut in halves, a small bowl of fruit, some crackers and cheese, and a cookie. He'd also brought in a glass of Orange Juice.

"Is that so? I suppose I may have to stop calling you child of man, then." Malleus said, interest piqued. "Hmm.." His low hum bubbled through his chest and rose into the air almost like a purr of sorts.

"I bet you'll come up with a new nickname eventually. Besides, we don't know for sure if I am part fae yet. I don't mind being called Child of man either way, though." A smile dusted (Y/n)'s features, and he returned it. "Sometimes, you remind me of a cat."

"Oh? How so?" Malleus asked with interest. She thought for a moment, before shrugging. "I don't know. You just give off that vibe. Prideful but not overbearingly so, usually alone.." She trailed off at the look on his face.

"Being alone isn't something you choose, is it?"

She asked, voice small and somber. Malleus lifted his gaze to meet hers, a fragment of something unknown and mysterious flashing across his face. (Y/n) wanted to figure out what that emotion was. She felt the urge to pull out every thought, every emotion, every ache and worry and pain filling his head and dissect it. She wanted to know everything about him at that moment. What did he like, what made him tick?

"Some things, you don't get to choose." He answered, casting his gaze to the side. "Sometimes, it is just something you have to bear and deal with. You can't choose to just make people like you. You can change yourself, but you'll get tired of the persona you put up quickly. Even worse if you become this persona. To lose yourself amidst the need for self love and the want of acceptance from others- that's where the dangers lie."

(Y/n) popped a cracker with cheese into her mouth, chewing thoughtfully. "Have you ever wanted to change yourself, Malleus? Not like change yourself, but to be a different person entirely. Would you ever give up the life you had for something different?"

"No." Malleus' answer was immediate, and powerful. Flowing with confidence. "The people I know and the memories I harbor aren't worth ever giving up. The select few people I have are more than enough for me. And what about you?"

(Y/n) thought for a moment, a pang in her chest of anxiety. "I'm scared I'm going to have to choose one day. Or maybe I'll never even get the chance to choose. What if I can never go back? Aunt Jen.. And my pets. My old life. What if Crowley isn't able to find me a way back? Or what if the mystery about my dad unravels and I do ultimately choose to go back home?"

Malleus watched on with pursed lips. Perhaps he'd never given it a thought before, how potentially terrified (Y/n) was. Waking up one day in a whole new world, finding out her father was originally from this world, and finding out you may never be able to return home. That must have been horrifying.

"I believe you will have your answer at the end of this journey." Malleus said, settling a hand onto her shoulder and giving a small squeeze as an act of reassurance. Or could it possibly have been one of affection as well?

"Take it slow. No one can have the answers to everything in just one day," He stood up, grabbing the empty food tray and cup. "Live in the moment but don't forget to also have fun while living in the moment. I wouldn't want this journey to all be a nightmare for you. Let me show you to the spare room, you look tired, (Y/n)."

"I am tired." She admitted, giving a small smile. The walk was a quiet but comfortable one. Malleus had snapped his fingers at one point, proofing away the tray and cup of half gone orange juice to the sink to be washed later.

The room was simple but nice. A large bed, a dresser over in the corner, and a desk in another corner. Some candles lit up the room with a green glow, she had a feeling they were powered by Malleus' magic but (Y/n) didn't say a thing as she sat down on the cushiony bed.

"I will see you tomorrow?" Malleus said from the doorway. (Y/n) smiled over at him. "I'll see you bright and early, Mal." She concluded. The Dragon Fae nodded and closed the door after wishing her peaceful dreams.

-

It was a Hustle.

Bags and bags were being packed and moved around, according to Lilia they were going to take them all in one trip through the portal to Briar Valley. Realizing it was probably a good thing to pack some of her belongings for the trip, (Y/n) looked back at Malleus.

"I'm going to Ramshackle to pack some belongings. Do you want to tag along?"

With a nod, they were off.

The walk was mostly a quiet one, though once in a while Malleus did point out the architectural facts about certain things. It was mainly about gargoyles, though. It wasn't that hard to figure out how much he'd taken a liking towards gargoyles, though she didn't mind listening either.

"That gargoyle is fairly new, only around sixty years old at most," He pointed out, "Though the gargoyles in and around Night Raven Collage are typically older." "How old?" (Y/n) asked, looking up at him in interest. Malleus smiled down at her, his range showing slightly.

"Well I'm glad you asked. Typically the gargoyles around the school can be close to Five Hundred years old at most. Lilia remembers hearing about them first being put in. Some gargoyles had feared down to the point they were a danger to falling over and breaking off the tops of buildings, that's why some gargoyles look newer, they'd replaced the old ones."

The gate creaked open as Malleus opened it for her, and they both walked through, heels clicking against the cemented steps towards Ramshackle. "Are there some things people mistake for gargoyles a lot?" Malleus nodded at this question. "Many have issues depicting grotesques and gargoyles apart, though in all honesty the differences are there." "Like what?" (Y/n) urged him to keep talking, which Malleus didn't seem to mind all too much. In fact, he seemed open to talk about his hobby.

"Gargoyles are used to protect the building from water damage. They are waterspouts that project from a roof to carry rainwater away from the building. While Grotesques serve no architectural purpose but to be a decorative carving."

"That's very interesting. To be honest at first glance I don't think I would've known the difference. So that's why gargoyles are always typically found on a roof then?" The door gave way with a loud creak of neglect as (Y/n) opened it. She'd made the old abandoned dorm look a bit more liveable, though it was still badly damaged. Cups, bowls, pans and pots were set around to catch the water dripping from the ceiling and a tarp was placed over a large hole in the roof as a temporary fix. Though it was likely to become an issue at one point once filled with water.

"Precisely.. My, this dorm certainly is.." Malleus trailed off, (Y/n) picking it up for him. "Broken down, unlivable?" "In a way, yes. I would've expected Crowley to have at least helped you out some." She shrugged, walking up the stairs to her room and greeting the ghosts on the way past.

"Well, he didn't but I don't think there's much to be done in this dorm to fix it. It's been around too long for simple repairs." She opened her dresser and grabbed her book bag off the ground, emptying it before starting to shove in clothes. Malleus settled down on her bed, and they talked back and forth as she packed a few belongings. Clothes, some perfume and other accessories. When she came out of the bathroom carrying two boxes, he was intrigued.

"What may those be?" "Oh, just some pads and Tampons. I'm supposed to be getting my period sometime towards the middle or end of this week. Crowley was nice enough to pick me up some." She wasn't shy about it, she was a lady after all, it was normal for her.

"I see. I have not seen feminine products in quite a while. They've certainly evolved." She laughed at his words, stuffing them in her book bag and zipping it shut. "Yeah, they certainly have. I can't say they're much different from the ones in my world."

"It's kind of surprising, you don't seem all too bothered by the fact we're talking about my period." Malleus looked up in confusion at her statement, "Is it usual for people to be disgusted by a natural thing? Your body is simply shedding the skin of your uterus. That's normal."

"Uh.. I guess you can say so. Men usually make a big deal of it. They think it's disgusting. Or whenever we're upset they whine that it's our periods."

"Those aren't men then. Those are little boys pretending to be men." Malleus stated. (Y/n) resisted the urge to chuckle, "I guess there's a lot of boys in my world, then." He nodded in agreement, "I suppose so."

-

"It's not what I thought it'd look like."

"What did you think it'd look like?" Malleus joined her at the window of the large castle, peering outside of it with her. The town was pretty dark itself, that was something (Y/n) did expect. "Well.. I kind of expected it to be covered in thorns or something."

He hummed, the commotion of his servants behind him long forgotten about. Malleus' eye was focused on her, his newest companion as of now. How intriguing it was to have someone from a different world treat him with more kindness and love than anyone in the school ever could have accomplished. It wasn't something he'd expected even in the slightest.

"You seem tense." Malleus commented, a hand settling down on her shoulder. He'd half expected her to pull away- in horror or in disgust he didn't know which one, it was welcomed when (Y/n) didn't. "I'm just.. Thinking." She replied.

"Do feed my curiosity."

Oh, it's really nothing. Some things just look.." She trained off, gaze sweeping over Briar Valley from the window, it was fogging over from her breath, and Malleus heard the squeaking sound as she rubbed it off. "Similar?" Malleus finished for her.

"Yeah." (Y/n) answered, "A little bit. Not too much but.. Enough."

"Would you like to take a walk with me later? Perhaps your memory will be jogged if you are able to view the town. The brain always remembers certain types of scenery. Even if you don't think it does."

"Do you think it's possible I'm from here?"

"Perhaps. Only time will tell." He offered her an arm, "Come, it will only be a brief walk. We'll be back before lunch. Lilia," Lilia looked up at the mention of his name, the teacup warm against his pale lips. "Would you mind tagging along?"

"Khehe, why not? A little stroll couldn't hurt anyone." He set his teacup down on a small plate, (Y/n) had seen them before in movies, she didn't know what they were called and frankly, she didn't care.

Lilia stood to his feet, stretching and cracking his back. "Let us be on our way."

[curiositydooropened]

Wildfire • Searing

A trip to the Ether brings force new pain and horrors, and you spend time in quarantine remembering truths of the past.

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Reader

Chapter Wordcount: 9,356

Warnings: There's a flashback this chapter! I marked it off and hopefully it's easy to understand, but please let me know if it's confusing! Thank you! • enemies/rivals to lovers, second chance romance, slooooowburn, made out scene that goes nowhere fun, unrequited love, so much pining, blood, gore, character death, best friend!disabled!Eddie Munson, character injuries, trauma, PTSD, hallucinations, drowning, concussion, hurt/comfort, fire, panic attacks, insomnia

Fic Masterlist • Navigation • Masterlist

Chapter Four: Pyre • Chapter Six: Combustion

---

NOW

September 1988

Byers hummed under his mask, the low rumble of his chest against your arm that shook like the truck bed over treacherous and unpredictable terrain. Your eyes were closed in attempt to quell the nausea of motion sickness. The soft vibrations of the boy’s voice combined with some foreign sixth sense you could feel in the marrow of your bones, steeling the claws of terror that shredded your esophagus. 

The truck came to a halt, and you peered one eye open to take in your surroundings. The streets of Hawkins were black on a still night, moon casting shadows down alleyways and across the back side of The Hawk’s marquee. Harrington pulled himself to two feet, reaching a hand to help you up. You took it, pack weighing you down.

“Argyle, radio on?” Nancy hopped from the tailgate and spoke into the receiver clipped to her shoulder strap. Her voice echoed to the one on your chest, and Steve’s, a handful more of Scorch team as you all stepped onto pavement, dust kicking up at your heels. 

“Copy that, Scorch lead,” Argyle repeated, and then you heard the slow crank of his window before he shouted. “Hey, be careful out there. I’m just a call away.” His demeanor had sobered entirely.

Jonathan met him at the window, and they exchanged an intimate handshake. 

You had to look away. 

Your breath tasted of oxygen from your tank and tequila without the buzz, adrenaline taking over and burning through the calories before it could hit you properly. Your ears rang a bit, struggling to focus on the crunch of asphalt beneath your feet. You were moving before you’d even realized, a steady walk.

Something tingled in your fingertips, a magnetic pull. You halted your steps and clenched your fist, released, clenched again. With a frown, you glanced forward at the gaping wound in concrete, a pulsating wall of wet and vines, a whisper that sounded like home. 

Something snatched your wrist, and you pulled back to find Steve’s eyes on you, big brown and worrisome. 

“Alright, we go in, find the source, torch what we can, and get back to the Gate.” Nancy’s voice cut through the air. She stood before the gash in the wall, the steady pulse of red flashed across slender features. “Stay in your groups. Watch your feet. If anyone gets bit, you call for immediate quarantine.” She paused and looked out on the group before her before saying, “Stay alive.”

The torch end of her gun split through the thin membrane, and the vines began to slink away, leaving the space gaping and cold. Again, it pulled you to it, tugged on your sleeve opposite Steve’s grip, led you forward. 

“Hey, are you good?” He asked, voice low, breath too warm against your ear. He sounded underwater. 

You grit your teeth and offered a curt nod, pulling him with you through the gash. That swoop rocketed your stomach, but backwards, a tug at your navel that felt right, like pieces were falling back into places, like someone had reversed the fall of a Jenga tower. The bits that wobbled and swayed now firm and planted like your boots to the grey matter of the Ether. 

“Steve,” Jonathan called, far off. “You two are with us.”

—

 The Ether was a desolate landscape of ash and ruin. Vines overtook the charred remains of your comrades and their own kind. Not as thick as they had been, dust remained, still in the damp atmosphere. No wind kissed at cheeks. No cloud moved, an overhead shadow of burgundy and black. 

You felt the next quake before it settled, a buzzing in your fingertips, a rumble in your stomach. The only movement in a statuesque world. Then the asphalt rolled, cracked. You gripped Steve’s shoulder strap to hold him upright as Nancy and Jonathan barreled into one another for support. 

Nancy shouted orders, muffled by her mask, but you watched her two fingers pointing for cover. Northbound, a semi upsized, jack-knife becoming a rickety shelter. 

One-by-one, you filed in on unsteady footing, the Ether quaking around you. The crackle of broken limbs split the air as widow makers were shaken from nearby trees, branches stabbing into decaying Earth at right-angles. A power line groaned and snapped, loose line slapping against asphalt a handful of meters away. 

“What exactly are we looking for?” Steve asked, voice too loud, breath fanning your ear. 

“Sign’s He’s back,” is all Nancy could muster before her hands came flying near your face. You crouched out of her way just in time to see her slapping Steve’s mask back onto tanned cheeks. “Keep your mask on.”

“You mean signs like an Earthquake…” Jonathan snapped. Mid-word, the low rumble stopped, settling your stomach, an ache in your knees. 

“Let’s keep going,” Nancy instructed, peeling herself from beneath the truck bed to scout the road once more. 

“Do you feel anything?” Steve’s voice came muffled this time, still inches from your cheek, and you felt his hand, once again, around your wrist. He held you back, allowing the other two to gain quite a distance. 

You swallowed, adjusted your straps. You felt everything: the prickle of your skin beneath his clammy fingertips, the damp chill of stagnant air, that all-to-familiar set of eyes between your shoulder blades. The smell of death and decay somehow stronger. 

Steve stepped into your sight line, jaw tight, brown eyes full of worry. His plastic mask cut into the bridge of his nose, past smile lines you hadn’t seen in years. He released your wrist, but the steady burn of his knuckles against yours grounded you, pulled you right-side up. 

Then you heard her voice. Vickie spoke your name. Her breath fanned your cheek. Her nose nuzzled your ear, sent chills down your spine.

Steve had heard her too, maybe he’d even seen her. You watched as brown eyes went wide, face flashing in terror. He lurched forward, forearm shoving at your bicep to get you out of his way. “Jonathan!”

Everything else happened in slow-motion: the turn of your heel as you crashed to the ground, pack weighing you down and bouncing off cold asphalt, Steve’s footfall echoing as he scrambled for the trigger. Fifteen feet away, a demodog crouched on its haunches, flower-like face opening one petal at a time, claws extended before it sprung.

Jonathan Byers cried out, a sound that pierced the dull throb at the base of your skull. The meat of your palms turned to pulp as you caught yourself, hands and elbows bloodied, but the taste of iron filled your mouth like copper pennies, mixing with saliva and the soft meat of human flesh.

You sputtered, spraying the pavement red, and scrambled to your feet.

Steve kicked at the beast, hard, sending it flying from the gaping wounds on Jonathan’s side. It caught itself in a slide. Another one leapt from the ruins of the semi trailer, the sound in its throat guttural, dark, bone chilling. 

“Steve!” You called, pulling your gun from its holster.

Nancy was faster on the jump, knocking it from the sky with her fist. 

Jonathan managed to fight off a third, smacking it over the head with the butt of his weapon with a distinct grunt of pain.

“All clear?” You called from behind the first two, thrower heavy in your hands, finger on the trigger. 

“Clear!” Steve and Nancy confirmed, taking two steps backward until they were backed into Jonathan.

With a deep breath, you squeezed the trigger. There was minor kickback, nothing you weren’t used to, and the surge of power as you sprayed the creatures with a stream of liquid fire. The heat burned at your mask, the tops of your cheeks, your lashes, a sensation you were all-to-familiar with, had made peace with, found home in. But as the flames stuck to the gooey flesh of the monsters, as the smell of ash and decay met your nostrils, something worse settled into the pit of your stomach, seared beneath your own flesh, charred your bones.

You dropped the device in your hands, unable to maintain hold. Your breath had been stolen from you, replaced instead with unbearable, all encompassing pain. Was this what Vickie felt when you stripped her flesh from her bone? Was this white hot the same that she felt in her last moments, fire on her last breath? You fell to your knees. 

“Harrington to base, we need emergency evac immediately.” Steve’s voice stuttered over the radio on your chest. You heard your name and Byers’. “Requesting medic and mandatory quarantine.”

You ripped your mask from your face and gasped for air, trying to see past the blur of your eyes. The horrible image of Vickie’s death flashing in your mind again and again and again.

“Copy that, evac on its way,” Argyle’s voice was high-pitched, cut-off on the end as he undoubtedly hit the gas. 

“Harrington, it’s Munson. What’s going on out there?”

Two hands grasped your face, cold, clammy, a plunge of relief despite the fire still rattling inside you. Soft thumbs swept at the tops of your cheeks, and when your eyes focused, Steve was inches from your face, his own expression wrought with worry. 

“Harrington!?”

“Demo dogs,” Nancy answered for him. You glanced over the man’s shoulder to see her tightening a tourniquet around Jonathan’s thigh. She reached for her radio again, hand slick with her partner’s blood.

“What do you mean dogs? Alive?” Hopper’s voice came through the radio this time, and it wasn’t until he’d said it that you realized. You hadn’t seen a single living creature in the Ether since Vecna died. No demogorgon walked the scorched Earth, no demo bat patrolled the skies. For over a year now, this place was desolate, empty. 

“Hey, look at me,” Steve squared your chin back to him while Nancy explained your team’s predicament back to base. “Are you in there?”

“I could feel it,” you croaked, voice shaking. “The fire, Steve. I felt it.”

“I know,” he frowned. “You were screaming.”

Just like Vickie had screamed, engulfed in flame, calling your name, pleading for you to stop. 

Your stomach rolled, and you shoved your partner out of the way as it emptied its contents to the asphalt, as black and bloody as the heap of dog charred not fifteen feet away. 

“Is she flayed?” Nancy approached, ever the investigator. “Are you flayed?” 

“No,” Steve stepped between the two of you. 

“Nancy,” Jonathan warned from his place on the ground. He was holding his side together with one hand, and his face was growing increasingly pale. 

“I just want to know what we’re dealing with here,” she explained, teeth grit to turn her jaw sharp as glass. “Is he back? Is he talking to you?”

Steve glanced over his shoulder at you, and you shook your head, wiped your mouth on the back of your hand.

“Well, you’re clearly connected to the hive mind, so -” 

“Nancy!” Jonathan called, sending a chill down your spine. His partner rushed to his side, and he gripped her hand. “Help me up.”

“Steve,” you rasped, staggering backwards, out of earshot. “Maybe she’s right.” 

“Stop it,” your own partner held his hand up before he helped Nancy pull Jonathan to his feet. 

“I mean, what if he can see all of this through me? What if I lead him right to base?”

“You won’t,” Jonathan grit his teeth, leaned on Steve’s broad shoulder. “I’ll keep my eye on you.”

Steve scrubbed his face with his hands, and you watched his measured gaze point Nancy’s direction. She wiped blood on her pant legs and nodded, adjusting the straps of her pack. 

“You’re not staying out here,” you argued. “There are dogs, bats, probably. Who knows what else.” 

“Someone has to stay and figure it out.” Nancy pointed out.

Before you could come up with more excuses, more reasons to pull Steve back with you, back to the base and back to safety, Argyle’s set of wheels squealed into view. He reached out the window to pop open the door handle to the rickety old pick-up, a distinct scowl darkening his features. 

“What the fuck didn’t you understand about ‘be careful’, Byers?” But there was no meanness in his tone as he scurried to help Steve pull Jonathan up and onto the open tail gate of the truck bed. 

Nancy followed, heaving his pack up beside him. 

You waited a long moment, turning to face the beasts you’d helped gun down. They felt eerily familial now, some kin you’d betrayed with the tug of your finger. They lay before you charred and pock-marked, flesh bubbling to a sludge of goo beneath their forms. A shiver on the wind caught your shoulder tops. 

“Let’s go, buddy! We gotta get this idiot stitched up, pronto!” Argyle called, drumming the side of your caravan back to the real world, your real home. 

You lifted yourself up and over a wheel-well, pack weighing heavy against your lower back. Someone tossed a handkerchief your way as a means to blindfold yourself. You gripped it tightly in one hand, willing your trembling fingers to still. 

Over the red cotton, you caught a whispered moment between lovers. Jonathan told Nancy not to worry, begged her to be careful, pressed a chaste kiss to her forehead, her cheek, her salted lips, her pointed jaw clutched in a grimy hand. 

You bit back emotion that welled, this need that pitted itself somewhere dark, somewhere deep. You turned your cheek away from the couple and found a honeyed gaze, brown eyes beneath a crumpled brow. You opened your mouth to speak, but something latched to that need, somewhere dark and deep, lurking on the water’s edge, a predator waiting to strike. 

You grit your teeth and dutifully brought your handkerchief to your eyes. Strong hands replaced yours at the back of your head, maintaining a knot that wasn’t too tight, and you felt the warmth of Steve’s breath against your ear. “Keep it contained.” 

With the wrap of a fist to the tin roof, your stomach lurched, and you were off. Steve’s words and Jonathan’s hummed tune playing tennis in the recesses of your mind. 

———

THEN

One Year Earlier

September 1987

The music was so loud. Pop ballads blasted through overhead speakers that once called fire drills and announced containment breaches. Chatter echoed against concrete walls between each break in song. The occasional whoop and holler accompanied the clinking of plastic cups and pouring of more liquor. 

Your own glass of lukewarm bourbon stung like smoke, only sweeter, and hung at your side. You were tucked into a folding chair in the corner, watching the party rage on in an echoing cafeteria, the bitter taste of defeat on your tongue.

Your best friend clung to the shadows on the far side of the room, pressed against a pillar with her face buried in her girlfriend’s throat. The smiles on both of their faces were the only consolations you’d allow yourself to celebrate.

“Hey, don’t know if you heard, the Wicked Dick of the Upside Down is dead,” Eddie Munson slid into your purview, all curls and dimpled smile. He returned your non-response with an eye roll, and ordered you to hold his walker steady so he could dip into the seat beside you.

He slumped against you, his denim jacket jingling with the amount of pins stabbed through it. “You’re seriously harshing my mellow.” 

“Oh, am I?” You rolled your eyes and continued your stare into the middle distance, watching the steady pulse of happy party goers. “I’m not stopping you from enjoying your night.” 

“Yes you are,” he whined. “Because the little dark rain cloud over your head is bumming me out.” 

“Yeah, well, I don’t feel like celebrating,” you sighed. 

Eddie hummed, nodded, all hair in your periphery. He shifted in his seat, and you caught a glint of light out of the corner of your eye. He’d pulled a flask from his pocket and twisted the cap off, tipping it against the plastic brim of your cup. “For Gutierrez and Ramsay,” he mumbled low enough for you to hear.

Emotion clawed at your chest at the gesture, wetting your eyes, thus far the only remembrance you’d heard for your fallen compatriots. Your team leads fought fire with fire, and died at the hands of the Devil. When you closed your eyes, you could still make out the sharp angles of their necks. Hank cradled his partner. Staring at their lifeless bodies, Vickie’s hand tugging you to retreat, you wondered if you’d succumb to the same fate. Bodies twisted and torn, in the arms of someone you loved.

With a shaky hand, you brought the sticky sweet beverage back to your lips. 

“You know, Linda told me we can’t carry the burden of every life lost. It’ll just weigh us down.” Eddie sounded about as convinced of the bullshit as you were. 

You rolled your eyes and took another swig for good measure, the bourbon stinging like ash at the back of your throat. “Fuck Linda.”

A laugh caught your attention, a private moment that was probably too far for you to catch, but your subconscious was listening for it. Steve Harrington was perched on a cafeteria table, all long limbs and head thrown back in delight. A smile lit up his tanned features as he took what you could assume were slicing insults from Erica Sinclair. 

Her own lips were pursed into a shy smile, a rare expression on her sweet little face that had your own heart swooping. The girl’s arms were crossed, face tilted downward to hide the smile before it spread across all of her features.

You watched Steve toe at her knee with his shoe until she looked up, and he offered his fist in some form of solidarity or congratulations. She returned the gesture with knocked knuckles before the two of them erupted into a more intricate secret handshake. 

The entire exchange warmed your insides more than the drink in your cup ever could on a day like this.

“Hey, dickheads,” Eddie’s call startled you back into focus.

You cowered into him, as to not be seen by wandering eyes, and noticed the couple of teens he’d called out for. Dustin Henderson and Mike Wheeler inched by, red solo cups in their hands. 

Eddie beckoned with long, ringed fingers. “Are you both insane? If Hopper caught you with those, you’re dead men.” 

“Hopper can’t do anything about it,” Wheeler scoffed, but he kept his volume low. 

You snorted.

“Uh huh,” Eddie cocked an eyebrow, unconvinced.

“We were bringing them for you guys,” Henderson informed a little too loudly, the most obvious lie he’d told.

Wheeler kicked him in the shin. 

“Thanks so much, Henderson. We were running dry.” Eddie’s face split into a grin, and he held his hands out to receive the kids’ drinks. 

Shoulders slumped in defeat, the two boys handed over their drinks. 

You noticed, with the faintest glint of light, that Eddie had exchanged them for his flask. “You bring that back to me tomorrow, or else.” He hissed, but couldn’t manage to hide the look of mischief from his brown eyes, the curve of his mouth.

With a matched grin on their faces, the boys scurried away down a secret hallway to partake in their own form of celebration.

“Eddie Munson, you big softy,” you snorted, elbowing his side. 

He sighed, taking a long sip of something bright red from the cup in his right hand. You managed a chuckle at the cringe of dramatics on his face at the taste, tongue stained neon within seconds of the liquid touching his lips. He chased it with whatever he held in the left.

“Did you just confiscate these from the children?”

Robin and Vickie approached the two of you, hand-in-hand, matching lovestruck looks on both of their faces. Eddie extended the cherry concoction, and Robin took it with a matching look of mischief in her blue eyes. 

You felt a familiar sneaker tap against your own, and managed to greet your best friend with a sad smile. Her head was tilted toward you, pretty orange hair cascading over her shoulders. She took two fingers to the rim of your cup to tip it towards her, peering over to see just how much you hadn’t drank.

“Did Steve find you?” Robin asked, licking neon from the crease of her plush lips. 

Something odd kicked in your chest, not unfamiliar, just dormant, and your face warmed. You avoided Vickie’s gaze as she tapped your foot again, and you shook your head. You peeled your cup from her grasp to take another drink.

“Oh, well he was looking for you,” Robin shrugged, but you noticed the smirk meet her lips simultaneous to her own cup. 

You narrowly avoided Vickie’s waggled eyebrows as you glanced over your own cup to search for Steve across the bustling caf. He was no longer perched tabletop, Erica long-since distracted in a conversation with her brother. But it didn’t take long for your eyes to attract like magnets to those broad shoulders, the gloss of his hair, the curve of his tricep. 

He stood toward the center of the crowd, locked into a conversation with Nancy Wheeler. Dim light was cast across her pointed features, and she seemed engaged in their conversation, a lightness on her brow you hadn’t seen since you’d met her. She seemed relieved, celebratory, maybe even a tad shy as she spoke, hands tucked beneath her arms. 

“I think I might go to bed,” you swallowed, sliding Eddie the remainder of your drink before pushing into Vickie’s space to stand. 

“I’ll walk you up,” your best friend seemed too eager, a frenetic energy buzzing under her skin. 

You tried to ignore the kiss she shared with her partner, letting Eddie offer a loving bite to your wrist like a feral child in his form of a goodnight. You patted his hair, and Robin took your spot beside him, cheersing you with a red cup and lips stained pink. You nodded. “Night.” 

-

The stairwell echoed in silence, that swell of a pulse in your eardrums that matched the tandem steps of you and your best friend. The steel door slammed shut behind you, quieting the ruckus of the celebration down below. An odd chill coursed over your shoulder, and you glanced behind you to find nothing and no one but the vast expanse of concrete and steel spiraling for floors below. 

“They’d want you to be happy, you know,” Vickie cut the silence, chewing the smile from her face with extreme difficulty.

You rolled your eyes and continued your climb. “I know, Vic. It’s just… complicated.” 

“Have you talked to him since?” She pressed. 

She referred to a drunken night one week earlier. You’d fallen asleep in Steve’s bed, nose-to-nose, large fingertips tracing hidden circles into your skin. 

“No,” you avoided her gaze, despite her neck stretching to catch you. “But it’s fine. We’ve been busy.” You’ve been avoiding him, sinking yourself in training, in Scorch, in fighting. Secrets shared between covers felt insignificant compared to a fire-fight with hundreds lost, minuscule in comparison to the ache from your grief and the confusion you’d attached to a win you weren’t sure would ever come. 

“Sure, okay,” Vickie scurried to round the landing before you, to stand a few stairs ahead and box you in. “But like, I don’t know, it really looks like it’s over. You know? Like really over. Which none of us thought would happen, and maybe it’d be good for you to consider what you’re going to do next, right? I just think you really need to seize an opportunity. And I’m not just saying this because you’re my best friend and he’s Robin’s best friend. I just want you to be happy.” 

She was nervous, rambling. 

You glanced around, her voice echoing up the staircase, and you gripped her wrist to lead her back up beside you. “Okay, I get it. Take a deep breath.” 

“Sorry,” her shoulders relaxed, bumping your own as you continued your climb. A soft breath of a laugh fell from her lips.

You pushed open the heavy steel door, holding it for her to pass through before you fell back in step, sneakers tapping against linoleum flooring, dimly lit by the escaping sunlight. 

Vickie walked beside you, gaze a little far-off, hands wringing in front of her, twisting at a ring on her middle finger.

You pulled your key on its lanyard from a pants pocket, and your dorm door clicked open. “You want a glass of water?”

You fell easily into your roles. You filled her a plastic cup of water while she tidied discarded books and pages, piled your laundry into a basket. She smiled at your eye roll, and you watched as she drained the cup. She caught a bead of water as it fell from her lip and released another of those nervous laughs, the ones that prickled the hair at the base of your neck, the ones you knew preceded confrontation. 

“Vic, what’s going on with you?” You scoffed, crossing arms over your chest. “You’re being cagey.”

She rolled her eyes, but you saw the chew of her lip. Caught, she turned her back and paced toward your bed before slowly lowering herself at the foot. “You really think this is done? Do you really feel like he’s dead?” 

This woman had fought monsters. You’d watched her jump into action on dozens of occasions, leading hundreds of innocent people to safety. You’d seen her face covered in char and sweat and ash as she scorched the remnants of her hometown. You’d seen tears spring to her eyes as the landmarks of your shared childhoods crumbled into matching piles of ruin. Never had you seen as much concern etched across her soft features. 

You swallowed, nodded. “He’s gotta be, right? We watched him burn. Eleven said…” A chill swept over the back of your neck as you watched Vickie twist her ring around her finger once more.

“I know, but I don’t know. Do you think he could have like… jumped onto someone else? Maybe he’s in hiding without a body somewhere.” Her tenor was starting to quicken, the breadth of her sternum rising and falling too rapidly.

You reached out for her, and she jumped under your touch. “Hey, why are you so worried about this?” 

Her eyes were wide like saucers, dark circles beneath them that you’d honestly all possessed over the last few particularly grueling weeks, but in this moment, hers felt pronounced. 

You swept hair from her long eyelashes, tucked it behind her ear. “What’s going on?” 

She shook her head, scrubbed at her face with her hands, and peeled upward and out of your grasp. “It’s nothing, it’s stupid.” 

“Nothing’s stupid. Come on, talk to me.” You reassured her, taking her seat on the foot of your bed, preparing for the worst. 

“It’s…” She paused, back to you, shoulders rising and falling with a deep breath. When she spun to face you, her demeanor had changed, lightened. The rain cloud that hovered before seemed to drift away. “I just want this to be over so bad. Robin and I have been talking about what we’re going to do, when this is all over. It used to feel so far away, and now it’s right here, and I’m scared, I guess, but excited, but also just anxious, and - “

“So tell me about it,” you cut her off, somehow managing a smile despite the repeated reminder that this was over and soon you’d be floating in a world who didn’t understand what you’d gone through, and odds are, you’d be alone. 

She chewed on her bottom lip, a habit her mom had scolded her for since she was a child, but that aching smile fell back over her features, and she crossed to collapse on the bed beside you. The mattress harrumphed under her weight. “We talked about going to school together. We both got into IU.” 

“Yeah?” You fell backwards beside her, staring up at the stained dorm ceiling panels. 

“Yeah,” she nodded, “I’m nervous, but like, excited, you know?”

You swallowed back that lump growing in your throat. “You were excited before. You still want to be a music teacher?” 

Vickie always had her plans, organized chaos in the form of binders stuffed with mail-in applications, the gentle push and prod of you to apply with her. You could never decide, stuffing envelopes into that floorboard beside your bed, lying about acceptance letters when she’d received her own. You’d sipped vodka out of matching Betty and Veronica mugs and tried not to imagine her off in the big city without you. 

“Or art,” she confirmed, fingers tracing lines in your ceiling like the constellations you used to lay out and watch.

You sighed simultaneously, and snorted in response. 

She muttered your name, and you glanced sideways to catch the pale yellow light cascading across high, freckled cheekbones, a soft sadness in her eyes. “Do you think I’m being reckless?”

You frowned. 

She caught your gaze and swallowed. “With Robin, I mean. I think I might ask her to move in with me, and I know that sounds crazy because we’re literal children, and - ”

You caught her wrist mid-air, gave it a squeeze, managed a dry laugh. “Vic, you literally followed her into War.”

The laugh that poured from her at the irony was warm enough to pull a genuine smile to your lips, a gesture that was growing more and more foreign as this fight continued. Your grip loosened on her wrist, and she moved to interlock your fingers, her little silver ring scratching between roughed-up knuckles, blistered and burned. 

“You know I’ll never leave you, right?” 

You bumped her with your forehead, her visage blurring in the proximity. “Couldn’t get rid of me when you moved to Hawkins, what makes you think you can get rid of me now?”

Satisfied with your answer, she brought the back of your hand to her lips for a peck and release. 

“Good,” she tutted, rising from the foot of your bed to open the tiny wardrobe beside you. She pushed aside a couple of grey tank tops and pulled a black v-neck from the rack, holding it to herself as if she didn’t have forty in her own closet to match. “Then I can talk to you without you getting mad at me, right?” 

The challenge prickled your skin, competitive nature over-wrought with irritation at the shift of her tone from sincere to playful, mean, even. “Probably not,” you snapped, propping yourself on your elbows to catch the shirt she tossed your direction. 

“Put this on, it makes your boobs look amazing.” 

You groaned and flopped back to the mattress, suddenly warm and exposed under her gaze. You hid your face in the t-shirt, hangar still attached, and shook your head. Her name slipped from your mouth in annoyance.

Yours was repeated back to you in a mocking tone. “What if tonight’s the last night?”

The rustle of your drawers pulled your focus from around a sleeve. “What?” 

She was bent over a pair of jeans you hadn’t worn in well over a year. A tear had pulled through the fibers on both knees, and you were positive the waist band wouldn’t fit now. “What if it really is all over?” She tossed the denim beside you. “What if this is the last night we’ll be in this building? What if it’s the last night we celebrate with these people? What if it’s your last chance to talk to everyone?” 

You knew she didn’t mean ‘everyone’. 

“I get that you’re sad, okay? I’m sad too. I’m going to miss them just as much as you are.” Vickie’s hands found your knees, and she jostled them. “And I understand if you’re tired. We’re all exhausted. I yawned about twenty times dancing with Robin in there. She yelled at me.” Her face lit up with something fierce. “But I’m asking you to get dressed and come with me back to the party, because tonight might be your last night, and I don’t want you to miss your chance.” 

You scoffed and tossed the shirt aside. “Miss my chance for what?” 

Her mischievous gaze was hard to avoid, and she leaned in even closer. “I don’t know. What do you want to happen?”

It was a question you’d asked yourself several times over the last week, when avoiding Steve meant slipping into the girl’s locker room and excess of times or taking the rickety elevator to avoid him on the staircase. You thought last time would be the ‘last time’ so-to-speak, and all the other times before that. That’s just how life worked under fire. 

And last time, as with each of your last times, you’d ended up exchanging truths under government issues linens, chuckling soft breaths against one another’s mouths, making promises of honesty and protection. You weren’t sure you needed more than that. 

Of course, you wanted to feel the coarse pads of his fingertips draw circles just north of the insides of your knees. You wanted to feel his breath fan your pulse points. You wanted to hear the way his breath caught when you dug your nails into his scalp.

You’d settle for soft kisses to the temple after long runs through the Ether, like the ones you’d caught him press to Robin’s sweat-slick hair. You’d settle for the elaborate high-fives he’d give the children when they’d reunite after nights in Quarantine. You’d settle for half-smiles across the caf like the ones he’d give you when you’d finally caught his gaze. 

“Okay, forget about it,” Vickie glossed over your non-response. “Just come downstairs and hang out with me. We’ll find Robin and Eddie and get you another drink and just pretend like we’re stupid kids again. Maybe we��ll sneak into the pool.” 

Her optimism was always so difficult to crush, her rosy lips split into a grin, and you knew she wouldn’t cease fire until you complied. 

With a resigned sigh, you reached your hand for her to help you up, and you nodded.

She took your hand with a grin and tugged you to your feet. 

-

The party below spilled upwards into living rooms and dorms. Music on overhead speakers was transferred to boomboxes and acoustic guitars. Instead of echoing off concrete walls, laughter was absorbed into threadbare couches. Hallways dimmed to the red glow of Exit signs. Footfall faded, stumbled behind locked doors. 

You perched on a comfortable sofa in the living space, waving Eddie goodnight as he waggled his fingers. Vickie and Robin had sandwiched you in sloppy kisses before they slunk off hand-in-hand, whispering sweet nothings. You sunk further into the cushions, hugging one tightly in your lap as the lights turned off and your world was cast in moonlight from a nearby window. 

You sat there for ages, maybe the entire night, staring out at the greyscale world beyond, those treetops tinged in golds and rubies in the daylight. You thought of your friends, hand-in-hand, and of Pedro and Hank, arm-in-arm, and of the emptiness that lingered when you recognized life, as you lived it, was coming to a close. 

You pondered and mourned in silence, starlight the ever-present reminder that you were Rightside Up and safe, somehow, a promise Steve had kept without realizing it. 

“Hey,” a voice full of recognition startled you from your reverie, and you turned to face Steve. His strong features were silhouetted, but you knew the curve of his shoulders, the dip of his jaw. 

“Hey,” you offered a smile, shrinking further into your seat. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” He asked, gesturing for permission to join you.

You nodded, shrugged. “Not really.”

He crossed slowly before sitting, his weight on the springs shifting your own. He was close, warmth radiating off biceps pressed against yours. “I was looking for you.” He touched his knuckles to your knee, a sensation that shot electricity through you. 

“Oh?” Your voice squeaked, throat dry. 

“Yeah,” he nodded, and you ventured a glance his direction. The moonlight poured in, pale yellow against his features, his nose, cheek, the swoop of his chestnut hair. “I know you and Hank and Pedro were really close, and I wanted to make sure you were okay.” 

His eyes shone, and you had to pull yourself from his gaze to process his words. He cared. The thought brought a smile to your cheeks despite the grief you felt in your soul. You tipped your face away from him and played with fraying of the canvas lining the pillow in your lap. 

You contemplated lying, reassuring you both that you’d be fine, but something about his warm presence settled beside you, the soft lilt of his voice, had you speaking freely. “I will be,” you nodded, a sentiment you hadn’t even realized until you spoke it into existence. “I just haven’t had time to think about what my life’ll be like without their… guidance.” Orders, teasing, coaxing, care.

“I get that,” Steve sighed beside you, head tilting to rest on the furniture at your backs. “It’s been kind of nice not having to make decisions for myself.” 

“What were you going to do, before all of this?” You gestured to concrete walls, a singular window, a common space long since vacant. 

His gaze trailed the room before landing on you, and you warmed under it. With another sigh, he looked outward again. “I thought I had a plan for when it was all over, but that was a year ago.” He waved it off. 

You nudged him with your elbow. “What was it? Maybe it’ll give me some inspiration.”

He snorted, shook hair into his eyes. “Ah, yeah. I doubt it.” 

“Come on, Harrington,” you goaded. “What was it? Become an actor? Join the circus?” This felt better, right, the tease of competition between you settling the tension that was building with each passing glance.

“Try marrying the girl of my dreams and having six kids?” That popped the bubble. You couldn’t hide the face of disgust and unease that settled after his comment, knowing all you knew about him already. “Yeah, bad, right?” 

You stuffed back a remorseful chuckle, tried to keep a strange bout of jealousy at bay when you remembered his conversation with Nancy earlier, how engaged the two of them looked, how hopeful her blue eyes were. 

You cleared your throat, made firm eye contact with your pillow, shrugged. “I don’t know. Seems like you aren’t the only one with those aspirations. I’ve heard Rob and Vic might move in together.” A harmless bean spilled surely wouldn’t rile up your best friend. 

“Wait, how do you know that? I thought Robin was going to wait to ask her…” Steve trailed off, and when your eyes met, you both rolled them in exasperation for the gushy love shared between clueless women. 

“So what about you?” Steve asked after a moment had passed, little finger soft once again to your knee. “If this is really all over, what’re you going to do?” 

You glanced back over the parking lot, the trees, Scorch course off in the distance. “That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out… where I fit. You know?” You locked your fingers together above your pillow, as Vickie had done earlier, but without the lightness of her touch, yours were bruised and calloused and burnt. Your knuckles were sore.

“Right here,” he said.

His eyes were dark, brow soft, yet pensive, and under his watch, you couldn’t breathe. It was the same panic you’d felt all week when you’d watched him cross the caf or climb into the bed of a truck, that fight or flight ramping up within your rib cage. 

“I’m serious,” he shrugged, shoulder knocking your own. “What if you fit here?” He pressed a large finger into the pillow on your lap for emphasis. The skin of your wrists and hands lit up with proximity. “You’re so good at this whole thing, and we know it isn’t over. The Upside Down didn’t close up when Vecna died like we thought it would. There’s still a mess to clean up. Who says you have to leave? That you have to move on right now and make some huge life plan over night?” 

You blinked back at him because you hadn’t considered any of that, and maybe it’s because this existence had been something everything was counting down the chance to run from. You’d all been thrust into this life when the world opened up (or earlier), and you followed orders because that’s what kept you safe, what kept you alive. You’d never considered that maybe you were made for this. Although, when Steve mentioned it, things did sort of kick back into place. 

His knee knocked yours. “It’s not like you’d be alone.” 

The implications rendered you silent, a splash of cool water across skin that had been set ablaze, filling the space with steam. Your breathing was shallow, mouth dry, and you couldn’t unstick your knuckles from each other, though his hand remained centimeters away, picking at that same tear in the fabric you’d been playing with moments earlier. You felt yourself go stock straight, rigid against the warmth of his bicep. 

“Did I make you uncomfortable last week?” His voice was barely a gravel, a shockwave of electricity sent through you.

You swallowed in vain, shook your head. 

His eyes trailed your features, and you bit hard on your lip when he stopped there, before he found your gaze again. “Because I meant it when I promised I’d keep you safe.” 

Your reaction to Steve Harrington was reckless, always had been. Volatile, even, the way your heart raced, the heat that churned through you like water boiled over. There was always something in his tone that challenged you, always something in his gaze that riled you up. He pushed you over the edge you teetered on with an eye roll and a smug smile, arms pinned over your head against the mat or mask over his face on the Scorch course. 

Maybe that’s why neither of you were surprised when you reached across the space and pressed your lips to his. Neither of you stiffened at a first kiss, noses bumped and knuckles. Simultaneous, you parted for a breath and dove back for something stickier, something warmer, something more dangerous.

He was sweet, whisky and something softer, ice cream, maybe. His lips were warm, and a bit dry, but plush. And when you finally sunk your fingertips into his silky hair, you coaxed a breathy whine that sent warmth pooling through you. 

“Is this okay?” You hissed between kisses.

He hummed in agreement, hands reaching for your middle to tug you into his lap. He massaged your thighs with oversized hands as you bracketed his hips, pulling another loud groan from deep in his throat.

You had him pinned beneath you now, hips rolled, and his head thrown back against the sofa, pupils blown with your fingers in his hair. The moonlight cast shadows across his chiseled features, a constellation of freckles down his left side. The way he watched you, lips licked, sent a wave crashing through you, another sizzle to fan the embers burning within you.

His hands found your hips, and your ribcage beneath the t-shirt you’d been forced to change into, and you thought of Vickie’s encouragement, her optimism that this would be the last of it.

The warmth of Steve’s palms coaxed you forward until he caught your mouth with his once more, and his words echoed in your mind beside her, a chorus of contradiction. This is your last night here. You fit right here. I’ll never leave you. It’s not like you’d be alone. Two truths pulling at you like a rope over a line, neither would exist while the other did. 

Steve sucked in a breath, harsh, and you blinked your eyes open to see him licking a tender lower lip. You’d bit down on him without realizing, that ever-present competition fresh between you. He didn’t seem to mind, already going back in, but you pinned his shoulders back, pushed off of him to stand. 

“Whoa, it’s okay,” he wiped at the corners of his mouth, ran a hand through his hair to replace yours. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” you nodded, stumbling backwards until you almost tripped on a coffee table. You managed to side-step it, feeling claustrophobic surrounded by so much canvas furniture. 

He stood to catch you in case you fell, and the reach of his arms had you backing even farther into the shadows of a long corridor. He recoiled, scratching at the back of his neck. “Are you sure? Because um… I didn’t mean to push anything if you weren’t…” 

You shook your head, that familiar panic clawing at your chest at the mess you’ve created. “Steve, it’s fine. I just don’t think I should do this right now.”

A crease formed between his brows, concerned, pitying, and he shoved his hands into his jean pockets. “Okay?” 

You sighed, scrubbed at tired eyes, tried to ignore the taste of him that lingered on your lips. You’d already taken it too far, already scratched the itch that had been growing within you for months now.

“I can wait.” His voice was soft, almost imperceptible, and his brown eyes held that same hopefulness you’d seen in Vickie’s.

Guilt rattled your rib cage, searing. You nodded and said goodnight. 

-

The night remained sleepless, starring at water-stained ceiling tiles while you contemplated next steps. The feeling of Steve’s hands ghosted your ribcage. The image of Vickie’s hands twisted in your own burned behind your eyes.

Knuckles wrapped against your door, and you pulled your watch from the beside table to look at the time. 08:25. With a resigned sigh, you buckled it over your wrist and answered the door. You startled to find Nancy Wheeler on the other side, brown crinkled and hair curled around her slender features. 

“Hopper wants us.” She informed you, managing the softest of smiles. 

You swallowed, nodded, and went for your room key on the countertop.

After the loss of Gutierrez and Ramsay, your Scorch team needed new leaders, and there was still so much Ether to scorch.

———

NOW

September 1988

Stains on pale yellow walls churned at a bread-and-broth full stomach as cigarette smoke wafted in beneath the broken seal at the bottom of the door. The lone light flickered, exacerbating a migraine that had lingered for weeks now, maybe months. Two familiar faces sat on the other side of the plexiglass, wrinkles between their brows, smoke swirling round faces. 

“How you feeling, kid?” Hop asked, voice gruff, concerned, paternal. 

“Sweaty,” you winced, peeling your tank top from your sternum. “Hope I don’t smell. My shower is one scalding pressure wash every morning.”

Hopper snorted, a cloud of smoke exiting each nostrils and floating skyward. “I know. It’s Hell.” 

Hell was the Ether. Hell was the tug between your shoulder blades. Hell was lurking somewhere deep, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. 

“How is everyone? Byers?” You grit your teeth, pushing back the wave of nausea and slumping against the glass that fogged on your side. The water bottle, lukewarm, was the only reprieve you’d been given from your sauna, refilled at frequent intervals to ensure you stayed upright and alert. 

“Jonathan’s fine, but he’s not out of the woods yet. We’ve got him holed up too. Huntley and Miller are dead. Dog fight this morning on the county border.” 

You cursed under your breath, squeezing your eyes closed to push back the visions of yourself lashing out against the two Scorchers, gnawing on their flesh, the fresh squeeze of hot blood between your teeth. “I was hoping that was just a dream.” 

“Are you having any visions right now?” Owens asked, voice gentler than his gruff counterpart.

You shook your head. “Same as yesterday and the day before. I can see her,” you gestured to somewhere in your periphery, where the wave of fiery hair stood out, just beyond your reach. “And I can feel him.” That tug in your shoulder, the bend in your spine that itched and ached. You rolled your shoulders and pushed it back. “But I don’t see anything unless I’m asleep. Even then it’s just roaming the Ether. I can never see him. He’s not coming out.” 

“What happens when those fuckers catch fire?” Hop asked, wrapping his knuckles against the glass. By the look in his eye, he was testing the strength of it, making sure it’d hold you back.

You took another sip of water. “I wake up.” 

“Maybe we do a bit of uh… what do they call it? Remote viewing? Put her under, have her tap in.” Hop spoke under his breath, but you knew he was talking about Eleven. He knew Hop was talking about Eleven. You felt the itch under your shoulder and shuddered again. 

Owens caught your movement and stopped Hopper with a hand up. “Alright, miss. Are you comfortable if we take another look at your back?” 

With a sigh, you pushed yourself upright and turned your back to the men to pull your shirt up and over your head, holding it to your front with what little sliver of modesty you could maintain. Although, at this point, you’d lost your will to care. 

For days now, you hadn’t noticed growths on your back, no indication that you’d been Flayed or that this parasite was growing within you. Nothing showed itself beside this feeling you had that you couldn’t explain, that no one could understand. 

“Thank you, dear,” Owens wrapped his knuckles to the window to tell you it was safe to put your shirt back on. 

You did so and turned to face the men again. Both of them offered characteristic grimaces: one of pity, the other of disdain. You slumped back into the chair next to the window. “So, what’s the prognosis, doc?”

The older man shrugged, scratched at his forehead. “Unfortunately, we might just have to keep you in here until we discuss further plans. We kind of have to keep you out of the loop, kiddo. Can’t risk him hearing us.” 

You understood. You shook your water bottle, tapped it against the glass, and said, “Empty.”

“Fresh water, coming right up,” he smiled and stood. “Jim?” 

Hopper waved him off, stamping his cigarette out on the seal. You watched ash scatter the ground. He stood, chair groaning beneath him, and he towered over you on the other side of the glass, teeth ground into a clenched jaw. He scratched at the stubble on his chin. 

“Harrington and Nancy make better partners than you two did. He actually listens to her.” 

You snorted, rolled your eyes. “That doesn’t surprise me.” 

“He and Munson ask about you constantly. I caught Wheeler and Henderson trying to hack into your security camera footage.” He wrapped his knuckles against the glass again, pointing toward the camera that had been watching you. He waggled thick fingers, and you mirrored him, trying to hide the swell of something lighter within you. 

“Keep holding him back,” he ordered, your commanding officer once more.

With exchanged nods, he exited down the hallway with Owens, and you slumped back against the fogged glass. You swallowed and stared up at the bright green bulb that glowed just beneath the lens of the camera.

—

Days had gone by. Maybe nights had too, but you couldn’t tell under the buzzing fluorescents. You had no windows to the outside world, probably miles beneath the Earth at this point, just on the precipice of that churning, horrific world on the other side. 

You tossed and turned on your cot, sheets stained with sweat that clung to every inch of you. Cries echoed a few boxes down, unfamiliar voices of more and more faces sequestered into quarantine, their fates somehow worse than your own. 

All you wanted was to stay awake. If you stayed awake, he stayed away. But the ache of your eyelids added to the dull throb at the base of your skull, and every so often, the rake of fingertips down your arm coaxed you into a slumber. 

Feet sputtered down the hall, steady, a run, and your heartbeat matched it. You launched from the unsteady rock of your cot and met a figure as its hands slapped against the glass of your window, steadying itself.

“Harrington?” You frowned at your partner on the other side. His palm met yours, thick glass in between, and his chest rose and fell as his breath fogged the glass. “What’s going on?” 

He shrugged, slumped into the chair Hopper had been in. It creaked beneath him, and he glanced down the hallway for on-lookers before turning back to you. “Are you okay?” 

“Are you?” You scurried into your own chair, leaning in to get a better look at him.

The bruise around his eye was yellowing, and his hair looked good pushed off his brow. He maintained that signature scowl, but there was something soft in his eyes as he observed you the same way you looked him over. “Are you suffocating in there?”

“Only a little,” you shrugged. “Why are you here?” You glanced back down the hallway, as much as you could see, to find it the same as it always had been, empty. 

“We had a bad firefight yesterday. Ten dogs or so.”

You did another cursory glance of his person. That you could see, there were no bandages. His hair wasn’t burned or singed. Any soot had been scrubbed from the creases on his face. 

“Could you feel it?” 

You shook your head and watched his shoulders relax. You wished you could soothe him further, reassure him you were okay, that you were safe, but the two souls attached to you lingered in the periphery. Instead, you tapped your fingertips to the glass. “I thought of something yesterday.” 

Steve adjusted in his seat, glanced down the hallway once more before leaning in to read your lips.

“You remember the party, the night after he died, or at least, we thought he did?” You asked, feeling that presence heavy over your shoulder. 

Recognition flashed behind your partner’s eyes, and he shied from your gaze, scratching at the back of his neck.

You warmed, tried to forget the feeling of your hands there, of his warm hands against your sides. Something prodded your shoulder. You cleared your throat. “Vickie made a weird comment that night, off-handed. She was acting really shady, and she asked if he could have latched himself on someone. The body died, but maybe the soul didn’t?”

He looked back up at you, brow crinkled, understanding sinking into him, and you watched his ribcage deflate. His knees began to bounce, and he buried his face into his hands. 

“And if that’s true, she had him for almost a year. It had nothing to do with the flower. He just latched on to the nearest thing, and when she died,” you gestured to yourself. “Maybe he’s weaker now.”

Steve was shaking his head, arms crossed over his chest. “You couldn’t save her.” 

You swallowed back emotion that boiled at that slap in the face. “She didn’t tell us. None of us could, but I’m telling you.” You hoped he couldn’t hear the desperation in your tone.

“This happened to her, and you murdered her.” His voice was lower, graveled. 

You balled your fist, swallowed back that panic which seared at your ribcage.

“What do you expect to happen to you?” Finally, he met your eye, his own brown replaced with piercing blue, cloudy. The smell of charred flesh stung at your nostrils. The taste of ash filled your mouth. 

---

[A/N: Remember when I said hiatus cuz of NaNo and then I wrote this chapter? *insert eye roll here* I can't help it! This story wants to pour out of me, and I want it to, too. I love these two more than anything. They bring me endless joy. And they kissed! I made them kiss! In a flashback, but still. Maybe they'll kiss again, who knows? Maybe the reader dies a horrific death like Chrissy, who knows? I do. I know. And I love it so much. Thanks, as always, for reading xo]

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Chapter Four: Pyre • Chapter Six: Combustion

[thefreakandthehair]

@eddiemonth prompt, oct 22nd:  First concert | Triumph of King Freak - Rob Zombie | Eager a/n: a missing scene from an older fic, counting stars (when I look in your eyes)! post-canon fix, eddie pov, established steddie, fluff with a dash of angst, mention of eddie's late mother read on ao3 + ao3 masterpost | tumblr masterlist

December, 1988

“Why does your acoustic have that written on it? ‘This Machine Slays Dragons’?” Steve asks as he watches Eddie strum without looking at his hands. It’s a bit mesmerizing, the way his fingers glide along the strings of their own accord. 

The song stops and Eddie slaps the body of the guitar in his lap. 

“This old girl is an homage to one Woody ‘This Machine Kills Fascists’ Guthrie. Ever heard of him?” 

“He did ‘This Land Is Your Land,’ right?”

Eddie claps his hands together and points two finger guns his way. “Ding ding ding, we have a winner. Yeah, he wrote that and a shit ton of other political critique folk music.” 

“I didn’t know you liked that sort of thing. Sounds pretty far removed from Metallica, y’know?”

“Only in delivery. You’d be surprised how much overlap there is in meaning. But yeah, my uh—” Eddie stops and pulls the guitar closer to his torso and swallows the dust in his mouth that’s gathered from years of not talking about his mother. “My mom was a big fan of it. She loved Guthrie, Baez, Dylan, Grateful Dead, Cohen. You name it, she loved it.” 

Steve’s heart tries to claw its way out of his body to run towards Eddie sitting on the floor with his back against the wall, timid smile, and fidgeting hands. 

“That’s really cool, man. She sounds awesome. How come you don’t talk about her more?” 

“It just—I don’t know. It still hurts, I guess. Which is stupid, I was eight when she died so it should get easier, right?” Eddie laughs humorlessly and stares at his strings like they hold answers to questions he didn’t know he had. He wants to crawl on top of Steve, desperate for warmth and comfort now, and looking at him makes the urge damn near impossible to beat back. So he doesn’t look up. 

Steve adjusts his position on the bed, subconsciously making room. “Hell no, that’s not how grief works, Ed. Wish it was that easy but I’ve seen a lot of death personally and with work, and it changes people. You can tell me to fuck off if I’m like, overstepping here but you were a kid. You’re allowed to be sad about her death, and you’re allowed to talk about it.” 

Eddie pauses for a long moment, considering the validation and how much he trusts Steve. He trusts him with his life, his soul, his heart, his  everything. Maybe everything could include his past, too. His voice is wistful when he starts.

“She used to sing Dylan’s ‘Forever Young’ around the house.”

December, 1974

Eddie sits cross-legged on the floor, threadbare couch behind him as he flips through a comic book gifted to him by his Uncle Wayne. The page crinkle with each turn and he traces the illustrations of each villain and superhero, the words a bit lost on him but the pictures jumping off of the page. Varying shades of saturated reds and blues disappear and reappear beneath his pointer finger and grins. He hasn’t read the story yet– he prefers to make up his own first– but he can see that the good guy is about to win. 

Happy endings are just so rare in real life. 

His mom is in the kitchen, singing softly and stirring something on the stove in a corroded aluminum pot. Eddie picks up the delicate scents of tomatoes and peppers, maybe some kind of meat. She’s been in a bright mood today, singing as she cooks, singing as she did her best to clean up the beer cans and bottles that litter the living room. Eddie even heard her singing in the shower that morning.

It’s not lost on him that his dad’s been gone for a few days. Hell, that’s the only reason he’s able to sit in the living room: there’s room for him. 

His dad is always too loud, drowning out the soft soprano of his mother’s voice. Everything she sings sounds like a lullaby, so it’s fitting that Eddie closes his eyes to listen. 

Eddie loves when his mom sings, especially the song she’s singing now. 

May you always be courageous

Stand upright and be strong

May you stay forever young

May you stay forever young

She never tells him, but he feels like she sings it just for him. 

November 1990

Steve hasn’t been this nervous to give Eddie a Christmas gift since that first Christmas of theirs two years ago. Funny enough, the gift then had been related to his late mother, too. Maybe he has a pattern. The envelope shakes in his hands as he sits next to Eddie on the couch– their couch, actually. At least as of a few months ago when they’d put down their down payment on the small, one-bedroom apartment in the heart of Indianapolis. 

Eddie glances over and sees Steve’s right hand nearly crumpling whatever his gift is, his fingertips white and his smile tight. Whatever it is must be time sensitive, since he’s insisted on giving it to Eddie so early. 

“What is it, Steve? You look like you’re gonna shit yourself.”

Steve laughs, nervous and breathy. “I actually might, and we just bought this couch, so. Just– here. Open it.”

He pries the envelope from Steve’s hand and tears it open, Steve having to caution him against ripping it in half and voiding the fucking the gift. Three rectangles fall out onto his lap, full of typewriter style font. 

“Oh shit, concert tickets!” Eddie smiles and knocks his knee against Steve’s. “Why were you so nervous? This is awesome!” 

Steve nods at the tickets. “Did you see who it is?”

Eddie’d been too excited about finally getting to a proper concert, one that he doesn’t have to set up and break down with Gareth, Jeff, and Frank. When he looks down and actually reads the headliner, his heart stops. 

University of Dayton Arena Presents: BOB DYLAN TUESDAY, NOV 13 1990 7:30 PM

“Steve… is this…?” He can’t find the words, buried and lodged behind the lump forming in his throat. 

Steve watches him carefully as he traces the letters with one finger, a habit he’s picked up on over the years, and gently rests a hand on his thigh and gives it a squeeze. “You okay?” 

Eddie nods. “Yeah, yeah, I’m definitely okay.” 

Okay is an understatement. He’s bewildered, he’s humbled, he’s ecstatic. When Eddie tears himself away from the small rectangles that sit on his lap like the gold bars they are, he looks at Steve with wonderment. First, the music box. Now, this. How is he ever going to keep up? 

“I know it’s your first concert but I saw that he was coming around and I just figured it’d be cool, y’know? I don’t know who he’s touring with or anything–” 

He does this, Steve knows. He knows that he rambles when he’s nervous or when he’s put himself out there and for some reason, giving Eddie these tickets feels incredibly vulnerable. Even years later, even after Eddie’s constant reassurance that he could never, Steve would hate for Eddie to think that he’s encroaching on special memories. 

Before he can finish his stream of thought, Eddie kisses him. Just leans over, tickets still in his lap, and claps both hands on either side of his cheeks as Eddie plants one on him. Then again. And again. And again. 

Eddie peppers every inch of Steve’s face with kisses, interjecting in between each one. 

“You’re–” Kiss to the nose. 

“So fucking–” Kiss to the cheek. 

“Perfect–” Kiss to the forehead. 

When he finishes, Eddie rests his forehead against Steve’s and wraps his arms around Steve’s neck, feeling them shake beneath him as Steve laughs. “Always so dramatic.” 

“And you love it. But, wait,” Eddie pulls back and picks the tickets back up. “Why are there three?” 

“Do you honestly think Wayne would ever speak to me again if I got tickets for Bob Dylan and didn’t include him? C’mon, man. Christmas would be so fucking awkward.”

[love-kurdt]

Swooping, Sloping, Cursive Letters: 23

word count: 674

PLEASE READ THIS IS ME TRYING FIRST, AS THIS STORY RELIES HEAVILY UPON THE CONTEXT OF TIMT

June 27, 1989

Dear Will,

I’m not gonna lie, I thought things between us would get at least a little awkward after you came out. I thought that maybe you’d stop wanting to hang out as often, that you’d pull away from embraces faster, or you’d start calling me “bro,” and “man,” to distance yourself from me, like you had during the Vecnapocalypse after the Almost Kiss™. But none of those things happened, and the fact that things are so ordinary is confusing the hell out of me.

I think I’m starting to imagine things. Things as in reciprocated feelings. The signs are all there. When we’re together, we’re always engaging in a form of physical contact; whether it be leaning against each other, laying in each other’s laps on the couch, or even holding hands (this only happens when we’re alone, but I’m gonna let it count), we always have to be connected in some way. When we’re talking with the Party, they often acknowledge us as a pair; we’re MikeandWill, not Mike and Will, and neither of us ever make it a point to correct them. When you came out, we all formed a group hug around you. But when we pulled away, everyone’s eyes drew to me for some reason. It was like they were waiting for me to come out, too, and they looked kind of confused when I didn’t say anything except “We love you, Will,” and “We accept you, no matter what.” But then again, I’m probably just fabricating all this in my head. I guess that makes for good content for my stories. Author problems, am I write? Get it? …I’ll see myself out.

Speaking of the Party, they have become absolutely fucking insufferable when it comes to discussing your love life. You claim there’s nothing to discuss, but the constant wagging eyebrows and teasing vocal inflections of our friends tell me otherwise. For instance, the other day, they were asking you about your dream man and the characteristics he’d have, both physically and personality-wise. In short, they wanted to know your Type™. I began to think of what they’d look like. What were their names? Were they creative too? Were they gay or bi? Did they watch Star Wars for Han or Luke? Did they like popcorn or pretzels? Or did they prefer a psychotic combination of the two like you do?

I braced myself for the impact, not wanting to hear what you had to say, because I knew I’d inevitably get hurt. And yeah, I know I said in one of my previous letters (Exhibit A: September 18, 1988) that I’d be fine if you’d just rejected me and I’d be grateful to have you just as a friend, but the more I think about it, I’d probably be just a little bit destroyed… demolished… decimated. Vocabulary. Cool.

But you took a deep breath and said, “Guys, this is kind of ridiculous. I don’t even have a type.” Dustin and Max called bullshit immediately, to which you responded, “Even if I did like someone, I wouldn't tell you guys who it was. If you must know, I like guys who are confident, emotionally intelligent, and tall. That good enough?” Everyone else seemed pretty satisfied with that answer, but while the conversation shifted to another subject, my mind could only focus on one word: tall. 

I’m tall. Six feet and three inches tall, to be exact.

Yeah, I know, I’m not exactly confident (that version of me died when I came to terms with my feelings for you and what that meant in a wider social lens) or emotionally intelligent (maybe I am on paper, but in conversation? I have the emotional intelligence of a speck of dust), but I’m tall. I’m really fucking tall. So at least I have that going for me… right?

God, I sound so juvenile and desperate. But what the hell, I have one third of a chance with you, and that’s better than no chance at all.

Love,

Mike

-

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[undinecissy]

A vintage programme.

Faust, performed at The Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith, London From March 1988.

It starred Simon Callow in the title role. Also in the cast were Alyson Spiro, Peter Lindford, Paul Brightwell, Caroline Bliss, Jack Ellis and a very young Andy Serkis.

One of the inserts has two signatures. One is James Wilby and the other is Rupert Graves who were in the audience and friends of Simon Callow.

I guess it was during the period when they filmed A Handful of Dust.

That reminds me of the famous scene in the British Museum with Mr. Ducie. LOL

[oscarwetnwilde]

A Handful of Dust: Grief.

[willothewispwisteriadawn]

I'm intrigued by your comparison of tsh, the great gatsby, and heathers, would you care to share some points?

Golly gee! I’m glad you asked, Anon!

(Obvious major spoilers for the three of these things. Also, I’m using the 1988 film for Heathers. I like the musical, but I like the movie a bit more, and it better suits my points here. There are a few differences in tone between film and musical especially regarding J.D.)

(This talks about triggering topics seen in each of these stories.)

/Opening/

All three of these stories provide critical looks at certain communities, and all of them focus on at least one character whose goal is to reach a particular worldly ideal, to achieve a certain aesthetic lifestyle. Gatsby goes about this in a very reflective and melancholy way. Heathers uses humor and satire. The Secret History uses elements of both.

I really like Joseph Campbell and Thomas C. Foster who analyze character archetypes and tropes. Their points are not that this is necessarily copying or unoriginal but that human storytellers often get attracted to the same concerns, ideals, and concepts— we end up revisiting frameworks such as the hero’s journey or the “vampire” archetype for characters. But what is enriching is the author’s own way of commenting on these things. If we look at, say, Henry, Gatsby, and J.D, they are all wildly different people but the same character type. So let’s go though how the stories are all saying the same thing but exploring it differently.

/Great Gatsby vs Secret History/

Let’s start with TGG and TSH. Richard mentions early on that he identifies with Gatsby, and that this is his favorite novel. I’ve seen a few people question this because Richard is much closer to Nick Carraway. And, from a POV perspective, he is. They’re both outsiders attracted to the mystique of another character. And they’re just neutral enough that different characters can approach them about things. But Richard seeing himself as Jay Gatsby is also accurate, because Gatsby has a similar internal struggle to Richard himself. Richard’s flaws and goals are exactly Gatsby’s. Both men resent the lives they were born into, viewing them as dull and not a reflection of how they see their own identities. They take matters into their own hands to achieve their ideal regardless of the methods. They both become liars who slowly work at making their lies more truthful. Richard finds himself attracted to the Greek class, and particularly awestruck by Henry, because Henry is a Gatsby-type too. And it’s more Henry who functions as Gatsby in a POV way. Henry does what he must to achieve his desired Hellenistic lifestyle, just as Gatsby chases after the American dream.

The stories also make similar points about the effect of this behavior on other people, particularly women. A big reoccurring topic of TGG is carelessness. It’s seen through the symbolism of cars. The characters are reckless with their vehicles. Cars are stylish and exciting, but also linked to violence. We see this general concept with Julian who is careless with his teaching methods. Him leaving at the end, with dead and broken people in his dust, reminds me of Daisy and Tom at the end of Gatsby, and Nick saying: “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up people and things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made…” Julian does something similar.

Obviously, Camilla and Daisy fill similar roles. They’re women who aesthetically match the lifestyle the male characters want. Daisy is a stunning American socialite. Camilla is a pretty classics student who plays the roles of big name Greek ladies (notably Clytemnestra) in the class’s readings. Gatsby, Henry, and Richard seem to have varying levels of love for these women. But the idea is the same: “In order to fully complete my own self-transformation, I need to have a woman emblematic of my ideals.” Even Charles fits into this because his views of Camilla get twisted by his toxic and Romanesque concept of what it means to be a male head of household. Both Camilla and Daisy are aware of their own lack of agency. Daisy’s famous line saying the best thing a girl can be is “a pretty little fool” isn’t meant to be taken as the author’s own opinion, it’s Daisy saying she wishes her daughter will be too stupid to realize what an awful situation she’s been born into due to her gender. Camilla and Daisy know that they eventually just need make a plan and go with the man that will make their life easiest. For Daisy, that ends up being Tom. For Camilla, it’s Henry.

As a side note, I saw someone drawing Gatsby comparisons from TSH, mentioning that Charles is Tom. I do understand the connection made here (Charles becomes an antagonistic figure for Henry, and they fight over a woman), but it seemed slightly off to me, and I realized it’s because I view Charles way more like George Wilson. Wilson is incredibly impacted by the immorality going on around him, and views the eyes of T.J. Eckleburg as a constant reminder that God is watching them all. In the end, he has a mental breakdown, victimizes his wife Myrtle and then loses her. Wilson and Charles come to the same conclusion at the end: which is to attack and kill Gatsby/Henry with a firearm. There are obvious differences. For example, Wilson is wrong that Gatbsy killed Myrtle (that was Daisy) and wrong that Gatsby cheated with her (that was Tom). But the backbone is there: a man is haunted by the existence of objective morality. He then concludes that he must violently seize control and kill the one he sees as responsible for his misfortunes.

/Heathers vs. Secret History/

While Gatsby focuses on a desire to be part of an American upper class and TSH focuses on a desire to be part of an erudite class, Heathers focuses on what I’m going to call teenage politics. Jocks, mean girls, bad boys, etc. The cliques of high school. Veronica is a member of the popular girl group at school and is mistreated by her clique. What she craves is to be part of what J.D. represents. He’s a mysterious outsider who is intimidating but also recites poetry and likes Bach. The way he’s introduced is very “Hey look at this guy. He’s not shallow like the Heathers, Kurt, and Ram. He’s layered.” Veronica very much falls into the trap of believing a damaged, edgy boy is somehow deeper than everyone else. She wants to be dangerous and above the other high school cliques. Veronica is exactly like Richard because she knows J.D. is excessively violent the day she meets him when he threatens the football players with a gun, but she believes there’s something cool and beautiful in that. She sees that his opinions are more cultured than her friends, but doesn’t stop to analyze what kind of person would fire blanks at people during school. Well, surprise, it turns out the bad boy is… well, literally just an awful person. There’s no hidden heart of gold like in the movies. Heather Chandler was terrible, but her death shows that people like J.D. are worse.

The situation with Bunny and Henry is similar. Both protagonists go along with the killing (I say this because Veronica was kind of sucked into it more than a premeditated accomplice like Richard), because they were abused by the victim and want to avoid jail time. But it’s also noteworthy that that victim represents a type of person who is opposite of the protagonist’s ideal. Bunny is an uncultured slob; Richard wants sleek intellectualism. Heather Chandler is a shallow mean girl; Veronica wants cool people of substance. Both protagonists eventually realize that the person they’ve partnered with is the bigger threat.

Heathers and TSH also unfold similarly. Both the Hampden and the Sherwood (Westerburg) communities react to the murder in a way that is absurdly off-the-mark. The Sherwood community mistakes Heather’s death as a suicide then proceeds to project deep feelings onto her and rationalize her rude behavior (sometimes in hysterical ways), because tortured souls are deep. They hold all these suicide prevention spectacles that the viewer can see are not really about preventing suicide at all. They’re about showing that people are feeling things; they paint Westerburg High as a place full of psychologically complex people. Bunny’s death gets mistaken as drug usage and similar circuses ensue. There are people projecting onto Bunny because he died young. The whole section in TSH where they do the national drug trivia competition to raise awareness, and Hampden College dominated was HILARIOUS in its irony, and I though, “This is so the tone of Heathers” when I read it.

The way the stories handle the “idealism” character is similar too. Henry and J.D. come across as so wise and above worldly nonsense at the start. You’re distracted by their language and finer tastes. Then, you see that they’re clever when they are able to get away with murder. But the story starts to show you that they’re actually quite one-note in ways. Henry and J.D. both become almost embarrassing to watch, because you start to see how horribly unaware they are. Henry is focused on what book to bring to his FBI meeting—as if that matters—and he seriously thinks the psychic lady might catch them. J.D. starts to come across as so silly because you see how often he speaks in trite little poetic statements that are stupid in context, but that he clearly thinks sound good (“People will look at Westerburg and say there’s a school that self destructed not because society didn’t care, but because that school WAS society. Pretty deep, huh?”). Both Henry and J.D. meet their downfalls because they’re after random, insubstantial “profound” things. Henry goes out with a suicide tied to a tender kiss with a woman, to prove that he could become the perfect Hellenistic figure Julian wasn’t. J.D.’s suicide was a similar thing: a message to Veronica about how complex and world-rejecting he is. (This is a part that differs in the musical. J.D. is actually self sacrificial there. I respect that the musical had to make J.D. softer to accommodate his songs, but the film character’s actions stick more firmly to the point of the story).

Heathers is more of a comedy than TSH is, but they both poke fun then take steps back. Bunny’s funeral is a complete clown show, but there are moments of genuine sadness. Richard acknowledges how evil the thing he did was. There’s a funeral in Heathers where Veronica and J.D. are giggling because they know the things being said about their victim are stupid. Then Veronica catches sight of a crying little girl and stops, shocked by the sudden reality of what she’s done.

Both stories also comment on group mentality. The Hampden community and Westerburg community are prone to ridiculous conclusions and nonsensical actions because of how quickly stupid ideas get latched onto. The Greek class murders Bunny because they’re all downplaying each others’ best traits and drawing out the worst. I listened to an interview with Tartt where she points this out and states that nobody in the class would have become a murder on his or her own. There’s a well-written scene in Heathers where Heather McNamara attempts suicide because she’s depressed but also influenced by what she thinks were her friends’ suicide. Veronica stops her and says “If everybody jumped off a bridge, would you do it?” McNamara gives a very honest and defeated, “Probably.” Both stories explore how people can and often do go against rational judgment due to the infields of the group.

/Tying it all together/

At their core, these stories are all doing the same thing: they’re showing how easily humans can be influenced by romantic ideals, and how easily they lose control of their moral judgment. The works all show that people can so dearly love the aesthetic of a person and what he or she represents that they create an illusion that masks the person’s flaws. Gatsby goes about this in a very respectful, dignified way. Heathers is full of dark humor and moments that are meant to be shocking and hilarious rather than realistic. The Secret History does a bit of both. It’s not as formal as Gatsby but not as outwardly making fun of itself and all is characters as Heathers is. It’s also partially satire but not at the level of Heathers. Heathers is literally making fun of its own genre (teen romance films). It presents itself as a cliche movie then just swerves violently into insanity and a tone that mocks all its character archetypes. TSH and Gatsby are both much more up front. As a result, there are some scenes in TSH that strike me as very Gatsby (scenes where Richard is being more reflective and philosophical) but there are also scenes that are so wild they seem to be working how moments from Heathers did.

Back to archetypes and tropes: While these stories have the same skeleton (a character facing reality after being caught up in romantic ideals), they explore things differently due to different social constructs and narrators of different backgrounds. We have an 30-year-old upper class man whom everyone treats as a secret-keeper. We have a new adult who desperately wants to put his lackluster and abusive childhood behind him. Then we have a teen girl who lacks a perspective outside the drama of high school. These narrators have personality differences and varying levels of culpability in the violence, with Richard having the most since he was a knowing participant in a murder. Veronica is next because she was part of a murder. She stuck with J.D. longer than she should have, and she covered things up, but she was also repeatedly tricked into killing when she didn’t want to. Nick rocked the boat but wasn’t a direct part of any death. It’s Veronica whotakes back the most control at the end. She lights her cigarette on the explosion that killed J.D. (which, wow, metal). She tells J.D. she wants “cool guys” out of her life then goes to get new friends and move past what happened, as arguably unrealistic as that is. Richard ends up with the least control, because he CAN’T move on; the events of the story have permanently damaged his psyche. These endings lean into different concepts: Heathers lets the protagonist triumph and embrace her lesson. TSH focuses on how immorality has lasting effects on the soul. TGG ends by showing pity for people like Gatsby.

This is the same for J.D., Gatsby, and Henry. They’re very different kinds of people which provides variation to the concept they represent. TGG doesn’t present Gatsby as evil, just tragic and wrong. He did hurt others with his shady dealings, but he’s painted as a man who still has his soul. J.D. and Henry actually have pretty intense evil in them and a clear lack of concern for human life. Nick and Richard still hold love for Gatsby and Henry, even after all that happened. Veronica completely denounces J.D.

I mentioned this in the previous post, but I just love stories like this. I love characters who get these kinds of reality checks, and I love characters who have such strong passions that they have to struggle with. All three of these stories are sharply crafted and oh so clever. They’re each so unique in the presentation of these similar ideas that none of them feel like a discount version of another. Their methods of story-telling are different, and their focuses, allusions, settings, tones, and motifs vary as well.

Wow, this is not even all I had to talk about. I could genuinely write a 40 page paper on this.

[queer-writers-poll]

OCEAN VUONG (1988 - ): poet, essayist, novelist

Works: On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, Time Is A Mother, Night Sky With Exit Wounds

_____

EVELYN WAUGH (1903 - 1966): writer, journalist

Works: Vile Bodies, Brideshead Revisited, A Handful of Dust

[carloskaplan]

Rupert Graves, Kristin Scott Thomas e James Wilby na adaptación da novela de Waugh, A Handful of Dust (1988)