#Its something I actually wanted to do a while ago

[hitlikehammers]

Rockstar!Eddie Leaves What He Had With Steve Behind in Hawkins 💔 to Chase His Dreams 🎸

(so why is it that he’s back in Steve’s bed Hawkins every couple months for ‘very pressing reasons’ that are straining Steve’s heart honestly anything but? 🫤❤️‍🩹🥺)

NOTE: this was originally a fill from @eddiemunsonbingo AGES ago, and I’m only bringing it over here NOW because something for the @steddielovemonth is going to be posted soon that is a standalone in its universe, but also very much a sequel to it ♥️

Steve really does try not to think about it in terms of…time.

Maybe that’s foolish. It’s mostly denial. Lots of it isn’t reliable anyway: the score his body keeps isn’t accurate, war-time left over from too many near-misses with a fucking alternate dimension but the popping in his joints and the ringing in his ears and the white hair he pulled out of his scalp and stared blankly at in the sink for a good twenty minutes: those are real things, but they don’t chart the passage of days, of hours, months and fucking years with any real meaning.

It’s been four years. Roughly. Depending on what the start point is. Whether it’s that Spring Break. Whether it’s the first winter. Or the spring after, when Robin begged him to go with her—there’s still time. She still begs, because they still talk given the thread inside them stays tied unbreakable to one another, oblivious to miles between. Maybe it’s measuring from the graduations, the kids—only Erica’s left at Hawkins High, now, though Steve gets calls from the whole bunch of them, Eleven the most, which was maybe surprising, then it’s a good split between Dustin and Will, another surprise. Max calls enough but her calls are calls, with a weight most of the others lack. Lucas’s calls aren’t super frequent but always long, mostly because he talks around the point forever, whatever the point happens to be. Even Mike usually ends up on the other end of the line once a month. It’s…that could be where the time starts from.

Or it could be the summer, that first summer. The one that taught Steve what it was to have a heart just to fucking break it.

Could be that. Impossible to say.

(It’s been 3 years, 7 months, and 14 days. Steve had only counted in retrospect, in the wreckage left behind, because while he’d known there was a deadline in it, to it all, he’d thought he could be enough. That he could change a mind. He’d thought…

Foolish things. Bullshit. Didn’t matter. Could be any fucking date.)

But since the point's come up, and it’s front of Steve’s mind, his least favorite (most favorite) place to find it: he hadn’t expected it. Robin liked to say she saw the signs but. Steve hadn’t watched it happen in slow motion because there wasn’t a single goddamn slow thing about it. Which was…for whatever it was worth, Steve knew falling fast and hard and with everything he was had maybe failed him every time, thus far, but at least he knows that for him?

That means it’s real. He’s all in. He might not be met equal on the other side of the equation—hadn’t been yet, maybe wouldn’t be ever, but he wasn’t having any luck trying to fucking change that fact so, learning to work with what he had was the best he could do. And he had love. He’d never been able to name it to himself so far: not before, and certainly never since. But.

Figuring out the sexuality thing had been a not-bathroom-but-definitely-floor talk on the shitty Family Video carpet sometime around November of ‘85. Slow days, idle comments, and Robin’s suspiciously-but-reliably-gentle-when-the-need-was-dire hand to his shoulder to say no, no: actually wanting to kiss people of any gender wasn’t really…the default Steve had always expected it had to be. How could anyone look at, say, Harrison Ford and not think, oh yeah, I would at least suck his face?

Turned out probably at least half the people on the planet. As in the straight guys and the lesbians. Steve had spent the majority of three days on that disgusting fucking carpet, open to close, popping up to ask Robin if she was sure because what about—

She was sure. And eventually, through a couple of needs for deep breathing and a handful of assurances that it was okay to cry—he appreciated that, but he kept the crying to his room after these long-ass shifts and if Robin stayed for some of those times, that was because she was half his head, half his heart, and she knew what he was going to do sometimes before he did.

They did end up on the floor of his bathroom, a clean one for once, at one point. Maybe because they both held to tradition. Maybe because Steve had largely come to terms with the mindfuck of yet another piece of his world, his self unravelling and rewriting itself, and thought the vodka in his dad’s liquor cabinet was a good way to celebrate. The label was entirely in Russian and Robin had been practicing on hers, said she was pretty sure it was the good shit.

Sometimes you can drink enough of the best shit on an empty stomach, though, and still spew the whole of it up.

Steve sometimes does think he drinks his dad’s best liquor that way on purpose, though. Delightful going down and yeah, it sucks to chuck it up but. The idea that it’s ultimately wasted feels…right.

Anyway: Steve had settled with it all by New Year's, and while he’d hosted the rugrats who could only blabber about their latest campaign with their epic DM, and he’d kissed Robin when the clock turned, well. It felt like a new start, a fresh page.

Something that had the chance at being a good thing.

And nothing much happened in the two-and-a-half-months that followed save for finally catching a glimpse of the D&D god who ran their little club while he was idling in his car to pick up the shitheads, this legendary DM who did not make Steve jealous one tiny bit and who was cool and was edgy and was so fuckin’ cool, Steve, did we tell you got cool he is?! and Steve had said language as monotone as he could before he squinted as out came all the metal and the ink and he’d said your club president dude is Eddie goddamn Munson and he should have kept his mouth shut because the amount of talking that ensued left him with a headache the size of Montana; but.

That was really all that happened until about…mid-March.

Then Spring Break happened.

It could be argued Eddie and Steve grew close enough to pass the acquaintances benchmark, ended up as at least tentative friends on top of necessary battle mates as early as the Upside Down. Whatever reason Eddie gave, he jumped in after Steve. Whatever speech Steve landed on, he didn’t want Dustin orEddie hurt.

It could be argued Steve wasn’t paying attention and didn’t stop in time and landed in the land of Tentative Friends You Wouldn’t Mind Added Benefits With after the…at least after the way Eddie leaned in close and his lips we so red and he called Steve big boy and…

Yeah.

When Steve carries what may or may not be Eddie’s still fucking corpse out of the Upside Down—he can’t tell, every time he tries to check again his own heart's too loud, his own breaths too shaky—but by then, they’re family. Bound in blood. Steve would die for him, like the others. He won’t let him die, if he can fucking help it.

Between him and Max, Steve almost crashes, breaks. Steve’s there when Max’s fingers twitch and he laughs with tears in his eyes and hands over hands and tells her he loves her and he’s sorry and he’s there, tries to talk around the letter he opened and resealed without evidence because Steve knows some tricks too, okay, and her words had broken him but now he could live up to what she thought she was leaving behind, could make sure she had every goddamn thing she thought she was giving up in spades, to roll around in in abundance. He was going to take care of her, whatever she needed. Whatever it took.

Her lips had quirked and the doctors called coincidence, don’t get your hopes up but; Steve knew Max. That was all her.

And there were more tears, he let her fucking feel them; he fucking hoped she’d notice, and remember, and give him so much shit.

Eddie takes longer, pulls out of the woods enough to exhale a few days later, and the way Steve slips out to find the hospital chapel, the only goddamn place he won’t be found by anyone he knows, and bawls his goddamn eyes out?

It’s family, and it’s love because it’s family but…it’s been so quick. It’s been intense, and that probably speeds it along but…

Shit. Shit.

That’s when Steve knows he sets a new goddamn record for himself and falls hard and heavy and stupidin, like, a week and change. Jesus Christ.

It’s in the recovery that they build something though. Something that’s not trauma or terror or the threat of imminent death. Steve spends most of his hours between two hospital rooms listening to progress reports and taking notes and the kids gravitate toward Max—Dustin would have been the outlier but Steve knows he’s not ready, and so he gives his own updates just to his brother when he drives him home after visiting hours—but that means Steve’s Eddie’s most common conversation partner. They talk about bullshit. Steve defends a-ha to the last breath he has. Eddie’s rendered speechless for a second and then frantic when challenged to pick his favorite band. Again when it’s his favorite song, from his favorite band. And again when it’s his favorite song of any song, ever at all. Steve's heart swells in the watching. He’s foolish enough to bask in the glittering of Eddie’s eyes when Steve indulges in talking, scene by scene as guided by the master in the bed beside him, about what his opinions on Star Wars really were. And then guided by no one, just invited to share what his opinions are on the last movie he saw and loved: which was Weird Science, the last movie he watched in a theatre because he and Robin had gone to face their fear or some shit after Starcourt and it was easier than he’d expected. Eddie listens, and nods, and asks if they can rent it when he’s out, before making sure to add  but you should really have a new choice like, eight months later, man, you work at a video store.

Steve was mostly just focused on Eddie more than implying, of his own volition, that he wanted to have a movie night.

Eddie’s released before Max, largely for mobility reasons, so they both go to visit her now. Robin’s put on the night shift when they schedule their movie night and Steve immediately moves to reschedule but she says no, she’s seen it, make Eddie suffer this time. So it’s just them.

They sit closer than they have to, on the couch.

And it’s little things that build from there. Max’s physical therapy is a government secret, like some fancy space-age protocol that has real hopes to put her on her feet again so she needs a ride, and while they could take turns, Steve and Eddie just take turns as to which vehicle they hop into to drive her. They stay when she needs them—not when she asks because she’s Max and she never asks—but it ends up three days a week back and forth and during: together.

And a lot of nights, for a movie or a smoke or a nightmare or a pulled stitch before they’re all taken out: together.

And shifts where Steve doesn’t even bother to bring his own lunch because Eddie Munson, unpredictable and wholly forgetful super-super senior—who Nancy and Hopper and most of all Joyce convinced the School would be finishing his final senior year at home save for tests, and only that once he was cleared by his doctors—that Eddie Munson brought Steve something every single time he worked. A burger, a chili dog, chicken fucking nuggets. A PB&J clearly homemade and cut diagonal.

So yeah. It starts out how it does when Steve’s in trouble. But it builds like…Steve’s never known before.

They kiss in May. Maybe so that it’s not their first, and a total cliche, when Steve kisses him for graduation behind the bleachers.

The sleep together after graduation, high on the thrill of it, and that’s maybe a cliche but Steve could not give a shit less.

And then they're EddieandSteve, only to find out they have been for a while; and this is just something a little deeper, a little bit more.

In ways that mean everything.

Looking back, Steve knows Eddie never minced words about his plan to leave Hawkins in the fall. With a mixtape and a prayer if I have to, Stevie-boy, he’d said once even, and Steve had laughed.

He’d fucking laughed.

So he’d known.

But July bleeds into August and Steve…Steve’s in love, okay, for real in a way that he’s never felt before. Right in a way he’s never felt before. He kinda just…overlooks it. Because Eddie seems to be at least on the same wavelength. Touches him first, reaches for him first: wants him. Looks at him with not just desire or attraction but…something no one’s ever looked at Steve with before.

And so he hopes. More than hopes.

But when Eddie starts packing, Steve can’t breathe.

He buys a set of luggage and goes home to start the same, has half of his not-excessive possessions shoved in when he realizes:

He’s not invited. Eddie’s never asked him to come.

Looking back, he’s afraid he wasted too much of those last weeks. Scared of giving too much away, the hurt from so many sides and the heartache that’s already taking root, but also: the way he clings, but tries not to make it obvious.

Fuck; but of course it was gonna be obvious, and how much energy did he waste, how many opportunities slipped by, because Steve was trying not to give away that Eddie leaving—to get away from a town that hated him, to try and make a real go with his music, to be anywhere without Steve so he could live out the dreams that predated Steve, that Steve had no place in—to try not to give away that all of it; it’d fucking destroy him.

Steve doesn’t know, to this day, how he stood and let Eddie kiss him breathless out the driver-side window, how he waved until Eddie was out of sight. He doesn’t know.

Kind of like he doesn’t know how he fucking keeps doing it.

Eddie throws tapes to every radio station with Van Halen or other top-played bands written on the insert in sharpie like that gives nothing away, and sneaks a demo in every underpaid delivery boy’s hands to record executives as he drives to the West Coast, sends Steve postcards what seems like has to be every goddamn day, filled up with his rambling until there’s no space left, has to draw lines around Steve’s address to make it clear where the damn thing’s going lest it get confused. Like they’re SteveandEddie still. Like only…only the things that changed after graduation are gone.

Steve sobs after about a month of it all, grateful and resentful, hateful and still so goddamn full of love it’s sickening. Literally, it makes him feel nauseous. He…

He keeps every postcard.

When one of them comes to say some idiot in San Francisco accidentally played Corroded Coffin on what’s apparently an important station, and Eddie got a letter in response from one of the labels, he says he’s coming back for the boys, they need to be ready. Steve knows he’s not one of the boys, but.

Eddie wouldn’t have told Steve he was coming if it wouldn’t matter to Steve. And maybe Eddie wasn’t in love with him anymore, maybe never was in love with him.

But he’d be lying if he said he thought Eddie didn’t love him. In a different way. A…you-don’t-get-to-come-with-me-but-I’d-still-want-to-see-you-when-I-stop-back kind of way.

And Steve…Steve’s not a fucking monk or anything. But even Robin doesn’t try to push him when he finally just tells her what he feels, lovesick and pathetic as it is:

I gave everything I had to someone else, and it’d be different if I wanted to back, to give again, but…I don’t.

I don’t want it back, not from him. Not if any part of him, wants to keep any part of it.

And because she’s Robin, she knows he means something else when he says ‘it’. And because she’s Robin? She’d push if she thought it was worth it.

She just holds him, and that’s really the best thing he could ask for.

But it becomes a thing. The boys go with Eddie, and they record new shit to impress...whoever. And they do. They come back for Halloween, because Eddie loves it. The label’s dragging its feet, but they’re not deterred, they’re energized. They come back for Thanksgiving because Wayne loves it—except he doesn’t, Steve knows that, Wayne actually hates trying to make a bird and Eddie had lamented more than once that they ended up with lunchmeat cut into cubes one year when Wayne was particularly frustrated with the process. They go out East, and try a few studios in New York. They come back for Christmas.

Eddie spends most of his time with Steve. Steve doesn’t fucking fight that; wants it…like…

There’s nothing to compare how he wants it to. Nothing exists that fits.

Eddie spends most of the time that he spends with Steve, though?

In Steve’s bed.

And here’s the thing: Steve had a decent amount of experience to compare to, but once they’d fallen into a rhythm, got past the awkward bits, the learning curve? Sex with Eddie had been a goddamn revelation. Not just because he was a man—after he’d left, Steve had forced himself to try, and dispelled that possibility quick as hell—and now?

Now, it’s like they never stopped. Every fucking time, it’s like they never stopped.

Steve’s not surprised in the slightest that he remembers every give and tell of Eddie’s body—of course he goddamn does—but that Eddie doesn’t miss a beat in touching, sucking, licking, worshippingSteve’s? That’s insane. That’s…

Unexpected. Every time it’s unexpected and every time Steve’s shown he wasn’t forgotten when he probably should have been. Eddie’s building a life that doesn’t include him.

He’ll only get in the way.

But Steve is selfish and stubborn and maybe it’s often, like almost strangely so, but it’s only a week or two at a go so he tells himself he’s allowed. He tells himself that it felt like making love in the beginning because Steve was in love, and that it still feels exactly the same because Steve…Steve never stopped.

Steve is still just as goddamn in love.

So yeah. Steve sleeps with Eddie and it’s like…it’s like rationed air. He gets a regular taste and he gets to keep breathing.

And it’s okay. Probably more then. Because he gets Eddie—even a little bit. Even just in scraps. When he has Eddie?

He has him, even for moments that were never made to last.

It’s Easter, this time. The band put out their first record in January. It’s doing really well. Eddie’s over the moon. Someone called about a magazine cover for a publication in Cleveland that’s apparently kind of a big deal, Alt..something. Steve will buy every copy in a fucking 100-mile radius. 200 miles. 500—

It’s Easter. Eddie didn’t lament not celebrating it after Spring Break in ‘86 but he’s back every year now. And if it’s just…come to mean something, or maybe did then and circumstances won out against it? Steve will be here. Steve will be comfort and a reprieve or a hot as hell romp with a familiar body, Steve will…

Yeah. Steve will do whatever’s needed. Wanted. Anything.

Pathetic.

But so much better than nothing.

Case in point: they’re both naked, sweat mostly dried, sharing a joint and it’s comfortable. It’s quiet and gentle and put up against sitting alone on a weeknight, not with Eddie?

It’s heaven.

“So when’s the dream happening?”

Steve looks cross-eyed toward his lips; he hasn’t smoked this thing long enough to have heard wrong. He squints up at Eddie, whose chest he’s laid out on, confused. Offers him the smoke but he waves it away.

“The dream?” Steve asks finally, when Eddie doesn’t seem to want to answer on his own.

Eddie looks at him weird. Not weird for its own sake but like: like he’s staring into him, and then like he’s disbelieving, but then also like he’s seeing him for the first time.

That kind of weird.

“Getting the fuck out of here,” Eddie answers like it’s obvious. “White picket fence. Little nuggets.” He spreads his hands as wide as possible without tossing Steve from where he lies. “See the sights.”

And Steve’s response is immediate. Doesn’t even require a thought.

He laughs. Like, ugly-laughs.

“Man,” he shakes his head as he catches his breath, and passes the joint off this time with purpose, not an offer or a choice as he snorts a little; “that’s not the dream.”

When Eddie doesn’t grab the smoke, Steve finally looks up. Eddie…

Eddie looks like what Steve’s always struggled to understand the word ‘poleaxed’ to mean. He thinks it might be this.

He looks…like something stuck him through the gut. Slapped him silly across the face.

“What d’ya mean?” And it’s just three words, one that’s a cheat, and he says it slow enough to take an age.

Steve breathes out, and then, if he’s gonna be honest, and if he has to keep holding the damn thing anyway, decides to take another drag before speaking:

“Figured out what the dream was, inside the dream,” Steve says, wondering if he’ll get away with the vagary; knowing he won’t.

“All we see or seem?” Eddie jokes a little, but it falls flat, his tone eerily kinda…strained but hollow.

“I like poetry.” Steve smiles up at him, soft, and offers the joint again straight to Eddie’s lips. He takes it this time.

“It was about family. It was about stability, not,” Steve shakes his head, stops talking half-assed around the lungful he’s holding, and lets it out slow; “not in a place, fuck, not in a house, but,” a person he doesn’t say, but he hears it in his head; “it was about sharing it.”

And that's it. That’s the simplest, most straightforward truth. Steve doesn’t think there’s anything complicated, or offensive in it. Hard to swallow. Even if he’s come to terms with it. Is mostly at peace with it.

Which is why it’s weird, that Eddie feels suddenly rigid beneath him.

So Steve turns, and braces his hand on Eddie's chest for balance, and frowns when he doesn’t even have to push down to feel the way his heart’s a fucking riot.

“What?” Steve asks, gentle; Eddie’s face is a portrait of conflict, of distress and Steve can’t fucking figure out why, they just came like four times between them and are sharing some very nice Cali weed—they’re nestled close, they’re together, it’s…

Eddie’s quiet, his breath disconcertingly steady for how his pulse pounds, and then he breathes out slow before covering his face:

“I don’t think I can fuck this up any worse than I already have, so,” he mutters, dejected for reasons Steve can’t even guess, then he laughs, humorless, shakes his head:

“Let me try, I guess.”

Steve frowns, uncomprehending, until:

“I’ve been in love with you forever.”

Steve thinks the world stops. His heart does, at least. Suspended. Silent so he doesn’t miss a syllable.

“And I told myself,” Eddie bites at his lip, worries at the bottom swell; “end of that summer, from the very first, I said: don’t ask him to come with you, even if it breaks your heart,” and oh god, oh god after all this time: Steve doesn’t think he’s projecting to hear the genuinely broken heart in those words for just remembering.

“Don’t ask him to settle, you’re not even in the same universe of what he wants,” fuck, what lies Eddie’s saying; did he believe them? Has he always—“what he needs.”

But Eddie is everything he needs, always was, will always be—

“You’ll never have the picket fence. You can’t give him his nuggets. You should never be trusted to park a Winnebago.”

They could have had a shitty studio apartment. They could have had the kids in college. They could have run the BMW until it died, or sold it to put toward a better van for equipment. They could have—

“You’re selfish, Munson, you’re a rat fucking bastard but,” Eddie’s still going, heart still hammering under Steve’s touch even as Eddie swallows hard and fails to smile, looks ill with the attempt like it hurts to try: “you love him too much for that.”

Oh. Oh god.

“It didn’t break my heart, though,” Eddie clears his throat and glances away, to the ceiling, eyes too bright: oh fuck; “broke my goddamn soul,” and a tear falls, and Steve can’t help but wipe it away, and kiss the track. Even just once.

So he does.

“When I saw you again that first time back,” Eddie starts again, voice rougher and shakier as he reaches a hand for Steve’s. “I could have asked the boys to fly out, the execs offered, but,” and this time, the attempt to grin is more successful, like a weight’s lifted from it: “and you smiled at me, it felt like,” and when he shakes his head this time it’s for disbelief, but the kind that comes with awe; “and when we slotted back together like we’d never been apart, it was…”

Eddie’s voice trails, but it cracks at the end—Steve doesn’t know which does more to stop his words.

He’s grateful, relieved, when they come back. He’s powerless but to give when Eddie touches his cheek so gentle and breathes:

“And I had to tell myself again, and again,” he murmurs, stroking Steve’s skin like he’s precious: “you love him too much to take his dream away from him.”

“What did it matter?” Steve can’t help but ask, no malice in it, just the need to understand. “You had your dream, you have—“

They have a contract. They have an album climbing the charts. They’re not just on their way—they’re there. The only next step is to get bigger, and bigger, and—

“Dreams within dreams, wasn’t it?” Eddie murmurs close to Steve’s cheek, where maybe he’s pressing to be close, or maybe he’s hiding a little, so Steve strokes his hair because he can either way and relishes how Eddie leans, melts into it like always. “Inside the dream?”

Steve nods, more to encourage more words. More Eddie.

“Break my dream open and there’s you with me, every step,” Eddie whispers, his lips warm on Steve’s skin. “Break my heart open, same damn thing,” and that causes Steve to shudder, and his heart to pick up now, too. “Both just kinda crumble if you take out the center.”

Steve can’t quite believe what he’s hearing. Wants to. Doesn’t think they’re lies. It’s just, he…

“Those,” Steve tries to speak but his voice cracks; he clears his throat and kicks his lips while he tucks Eddie into his neck, under his chin: “those would be good lyrics.”

“No,” Eddie shakes his head and nuzzles Steve’s throat with the motion and this can’t be happening.

This can’t be happening, can it?

“No, those words were only ever meant just for you.”

And Eddie kisses the pulse point close to his mouth and holds there, like a sentry and a miser, and holy shit.

Holy shit.

“And I don’t know,” Eddie’s saying more, but it’s pitchy, thready, like he’s barely holding the words together at all; “I don’t know if it’s nostalgia, or convenience, or routine,” his voice breaks again and the sob’s in the word when it comes even if it’s not streaming down on his cheeks: “pity,” and no, no, not fucking ever, how—

“I was never your dream then, and I don’t even know if I can be your inside-dream now, and,” Eddie’s rambling, and he does that when he’s desperate, when he’s overwhelmed and overfull with feeling—and Steve knows that. Steve knows that about him.

Steve knows. Better than he knows himself, Steve still knows him.

“I just want the world for you,” Eddie whispers, stroking up and down Steve’s jaw; “my sweetheart. My sunshine,” he smiles so real and soft and Steve melts, like the heart in his chest starts spilling through his ribs, warm and liquid: “you deserve more than the world, more than fuckin’ me and I,” Eddie shakes his head again, more this time like he’s stopping himself, like it’s a defense mechanism and Steve reaches for his cheeks, broad palms on either side to hold him still because…he doesn’t want Eddie to stop.

Ever.

“Did I ruin it?” Eddie breathes, and barely at that, eyes so wide and swimming and oh, god; “did I—"

And Steve can’t help it. He can’t help but kiss him with all he’s got, even if it couldn’t be all Eddie’s worth in all the world. Steve can’t contain all that Eddie’s worth.

But he can give everything, because this is the man who already has it.

“What the hell was I supposed to be to a rockstar?” Steve tries to talk through his own tight throat, his own growing smile, his own threat of tears bubbling close to the surface. “How the fuck was I ever going to measure up, ever do anything but hold you back when you could have—“

“I come back to you, for you,” Eddie answers immediate; it’s not what Steve’s asking but he won’t lie and say he didn’t want to know, at least a little. “The handful of times I’ve tried,” Eddie shakes his head once now, definitive; “I have always left my everything with you.”

The idea that Steve’s spent all this time feeling empty, and hollow, and missing the best of himself where it lived in the man he loved—the idea he was wrong, that they both were so fucking wrong is…insanity.

“I had a bag half packed.”

Steve doesn’t need to explain further. The noise Eddie makes is pure pain.

“Baby,” he nearly croons, falls into Steve somehow closer, wraps him up tighter; “I wanted to kidnap you in the night.”

“I sobbed in my bed after you were out of sight.”

“I pulled over before the town sign, because I couldn’t see the goddamn road.”

And Steve…Steve doesn’t really have a decision to make about what he says next. What dream he wants; always has.

“I never got rid of the luggage.”

And Eddie hears everything he says in those words, because after everything, Eddie Munson knows him, and…yeah.

Steve’s been kissed in a lot of ways before. By this man in particular, even.

But this: if leaving broke Eddie’s soul, if somehow the lack of Steve somehow did that?

This is…this is the body meeting another body, heart to heart and tasting the way a soul slides back in place. It's Eddie’s hands in his hair like hell never let go and he’s happy about the idea; blissful for it, even. It’s—beyond anything Steve’s ever known. So: yeah.

It’s not a decision. It’s just a fucking given.

♥️

🎸also on ao3

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[bestalbertcamuslover]

In the Name of Commitment

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︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶

✯ pairing:  Sebastian Vettel x GF! Reader ✯

✯ content warnings: none ✯

︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶

The sun glowed a bright orange as it dipped below the horizon, drinks and laughter flowed effortlessly among her group of friends, each accompanied by their current partners. It wasn’t something they often did, but every once in a while, the group would invite their significant others to join.

Sebastian’s arm rested casually on her thigh, completely at ease. He knew what her friends were like—cynical, much like her, the kind of women you’d call quintessential 21st-century women: independent, versatile, open-minded, and, as previously mentioned, deeply cynical.

“Yeah, she’s on her second marriage already,” one of her friends commented, or rather gossiped.

“I just don’t get why people keep getting married,” another friend interjected with a soft chuckle, sipping from her drink.

“Exactly. It’s just a piece of paper,” the first friend added.

“A piece of paper that seems to screw everything up,” y/n chimed in with a subtle grin. “Like, how many people do you know who are actually happily married?”

This wasn’t an unfamiliar conversation for the group of friends, but their respective partners seemed more surprised by the topic. Sebastian, at least, was. His future plans undoubtedly included marriage. Still, he stayed quiet. The conversation was lighthearted, and there was no need to turn it into a debate. Yet, he remained silent for the rest of the hangout—offering occasional nods and smiles, but not much more. He was definitely pondering what her aversion to marriage might mean.

She squeezed his thigh after buckling her seatbelt, a gentle smile on her face. “You okay?”

He glanced at her, instantly noticing her contentment from the hangout—the kind of brightness someone exudes after having a good time. “Yeah,” he said, “just exhausted.”

“You want me to drive?” she asked with a subtle smirk.

“Yeah, not happening,” he chuckled, still remembering the scratch that had magically appeared on his car the last time she drove.

She shot him a playful glare as he started the car. Silence filled the space again, hovering somewhere between comfortable and uncomfortable.

“Seb, are you sure you’re okay?” she asked again.

He glanced at her for a split second before turning his eyes back to the road. “Yeah, yeah,” he said, his tone lacking firmness. “It’s just… something you mentioned has been nagging at me.”

“What thing?” she asked, her voice tinged with subtle amusement.

“The stuff you and your friends said about marriage,” he replied, looking at her briefly before focusing on the road again. “Marriage is in my future plans, and so are you.”

“Oh,” she said, her tone softening with a hint of apology. “So, you want to get married someday?”

He nodded. “It’s what most couples do, you know?” he said, his tone a mix of seriousness and dry humor.

“I mean, don’t you think it’s a bit archaic and pointless? It’s just an institution that lost its true meaning a long time ago,” she argued.

He glanced at her again, an amused expression crossing his face at her sudden expertise on the topic. “And symbolically? Nowadays, it’s about commitment. Don’t you want that?”

“Do we really need to get married to symbolize commitment?” she asked with a subtle grin, giving his thigh another gentle squeeze after noticing how seriously he was taking this.

“Well, yeah,” he replied, still a bit serious.

“It’s not like I’m against it. If it’s something that matters to you, then it’s fine,” she conceded.

Sebastian glanced at her again, his expression softening. “You’d do it just because it matters to me?”

She shrugged, a teasing smile tugging at her lips. “Marriage might be pointless, but making you happy isn’t.”

He huffed a quiet laugh, shaking his head. “That’s the most cynical yet romantic thing I’ve ever heard.”

She grinned. “I contain multitudes.”

He let out a deep breath, some of the tension leaving his shoulders. “You know, it’s not just about the piece of paper or the tradition. It’s about standing up in front of everyone we love and saying, ‘Hey, this is my person. And I choose them, forever.’”

She bit the inside of her cheek, studying him for a moment. He meant that. Every word of it. And damn if that didn’t make her heart squeeze a little.

“Forever’s a long time,” she mused.

“With you?” He shot her a small smile. “Not long enough.”

She giggled, resting her head back against the headrest. “You and your sentimental one-liners.”

He laughed, the tension between them dissipating entirely. “You love them.”

She rolled her eyes but squeezed his thigh again, this time lingering a little longer.

︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶୨୧︶︶⊹︶︶⊹︶︶

✯ authors note: I've been watching too much SATC lol

English is not my first language and I hope you liked it <3

[mysims-mod]

Unused Essences - Part 1

Seven(!) years ago I wrote about the unused Hedgehog essence and mentioned that there was one other noteworthy unused essence to write about at a later date. It is now later.

But in the seven(!) years since I wrote that post, I discovered a whopping six(!) more unused essences that were previously unknown! I won’t be saving those for later though, I don’t want to wait until 2032! 😩

I originally wanted to do this all in one post. But I hit the 30 image power post limit! So instead I am splitting this into two parts. Part 1 will cover two essences that were previously known but I hadn’t written about here as well as two new unused essences and how these new discoveries were made. Part 2 will cover the remaining four new unused essences.

This is still going to be a long one, so without further ado, here’s Part 1 below the cut.

So first up we have Wood! Just wood.

This essence itself isn’t technically unused. But it isn’t accessible like other essences.

When building an object in the workshop in addition to using essences as paint, you also have access to a “default” swatch.

This is treated by the game as an essence of its very own, complete with its own DEF file and a unique <IsDefault> tag not seen in other essences. 

By copying most of its properties over to a brand new essence file, it can be used like a normal essence!

The only things of note though is the flair model and the icons which are otherwise unused and never seen by the player.

The flair icon, strangely enough, is the same as the paint icons that can be seen in-game. The paint icon showcases an earlier style where they resembled actual paint pallets, as seen in some early footage.

The paint icon also showcases an earlier set of textures they planned to use. Unfortunately the textures for these no longer exist in the files though.

Fun fact about the wood essence model, is that it can be seen in some different early footage. Which is pretty neat!

Next up we have the Acorn, an actual unused essence.

This essence does not have any leftover data, and has to be reconstructed to be accessible in-game. Something that will have to be done for all of the remaining essences to discuss.

By copying and modifying an existing essence file, we can load it up in-game and see that it has a paint set! Sort of. The two patterned swatches work, while the flat swatches are pure white, just like the hedgehog essence.

There’s also a flair model leftover as well! Giving us a good look at what the Acorn essence would have looked like if it was finished.

These are the essences that have been known about already, in fact they have been on the Cutting Room Floor page for several years now. But these next five essences were completely unknown even to myself until just recently. But before I discuss the next few essences, let me explain how I was able to find them in the first place.

These new discoveries were actually made possible thanks to the Cozy Bundle, after “obtaining” a copy of the game, I was able to dump the ROMF, and look through all of the files. From there using Switch Toolbox, I could export all of the new HD textures to regular .PNG files, and amazingly enough, the original file names were intact!

Amazingly enough, all of the essences received new high-resolution textures, even though they are unused. Which is what I will be using for this blog post because seeing these in high resolution is just so much more pleasing to the eye.

Previous methods of dumping textures from the 2008 PC version of MySims did not retain the original file names. While all of the files necessary for these few next essences are inside the 2008 PC version, since the file names were unknown, they couldn’t be reimplemented, until now of course.

This little guy, called ‘applewood’, has a full paint set with fully working flat swatches unlike the previous essences, making it more complete than the other essences discussed so far.

There is also a paint icon leftover! But no flair icon to be seen…

Now internally while it’s referred to as ‘applewood’ the leftover text strings refer to it as ‘Light Wood’ instead, suggesting it was either an earlier incarnation of the final Light Wood essence, or had its original text strings overridden before a new entry made was made for the final Light Wood essence.

This next one is called ‘oakwood’, and with this one we’re back to only having two full pattern swatches and pure white flats.

But thanks to a leftover paint icon, we do know what they would have looked like. And it's brown and beige.

Interestingly this also has the same quirk as Applewood, where internally it is referred to as ‘oakwood’ but the leftover text strings refer to it as ‘Dark Wood’. Suggesting it was either an earlier incarnation of the final Dark Wood essence, or had its original text strings overridden before a new entry was made for the final Dark Wood essence.

Unfortunately This is where I have to cut off for Part 1.

Part 2 will have even more unused essences to discuss, and they get much, much more interesting from here.

You can read Part 2 here.

[riddlerosehearts]

i'm honestly not really into gacha games, just twst and a3! act addict actors--the game i was referring to in my tags. but a3 has... so many cards for every character. if you want an example of just how many, take a look at this page for my favorite character--and then also take note of the fact the a3 wiki, for various reasons, isn't even fully up to date and doesn't actually have every card on it! and to be completely fair, a3 just had its eighth anniversary while twst is only about to have its 5th, but the difference is still massive.

a3 is no longer available outside of japan so i exclusively keep up with it through fan translations and such, but it keeps getting new cards all the time. events are much more frequent than in twst and regular scouts with themed cards that have nothing to do with any event are... well, a frequent thing, which twst doesn't even really have--there's the clubwear cards, but those drop so infrequently that i got into twst two whole years ago, and i believe the pop music club and basketball club (except for floyd, iirc) already had all their cards released back then. and yet two years later we still have to wait for the equestrian club, the board game club, and the film research club and i'm getting a little tired of waiting for them at this point tbh especially since my top 3 favorite characters are in those clubs 😭

getting cards based on things that happened in the main story isn't really something twst did until book 7 either, unless you count how ortho got a school uniform R card when he became an official student at the end of book 6! and even then we're only getting cards for a few characters and not for all of these other cool alternate outfits. halloween-exclusive characters and staff members getting cards is a pretty new thing as well. and twst just... doesn't even have big events all that often, really. a3 has so many events, each one with decently lengthy multi-chapter stories, that i have to keep a spreadsheet in order to track which ones i've read, and just looking at my spreadsheet i see that they usually have events every couple weeks or so and never really go a single month without one. in 2024, twst JP had: sam's new year sale in january, master chef with jack and vil from the end of jan to the start of february, the crowley magical assault practice thing from late feb to march 1st, the fourth anniversary event in march, tapis rouge in april, master chef with azul and ortho from late april to early may, the third tsum event from late may to mid june, magical assault practice with crewel from late june to early july, a unified exam event in august, nothing in september except reruns and birthday scouts, the lost in the book with nightmare before christmas event from october 1st to mid november, and then, like, a holiday gift campaign in december.

many of these are very small events with short stories or barely any story at all (master chef/culinary crucible events have almost nothing to them, especially if you don't get the cards and read the vignettes, and anniversary events are extremely short) and i'm honestly not really familiar with the magical practice assault events but as far as i know they don't have stories attached to them at all. each of these events do have at least one card for them, though! whereas unified exam events let you unlock voice lines from the staff members but they don't have event stories or cards. neither do the winter holiday gift campaigns. so yeah, twst just doesn't really get new cards or events all that often. i believe the character with the most cards is jamil, at 22 cards, but if you exclude the birthday cards that number goes down to 17.

i don't think twst should have nearly as many cards as a3, or whichever other game you came from, because twst has very high quality art that i'm sure they wouldn't be able to have if they were releasing so many cards all the time. but i do wish it had actual important events with decent-length stories a little more frequently, that it would occasionally just drop some cool cards without there having to be an event (like the clubwear cards, but, you know, more of them), that R cards had groovies so it wouldn't feel so disappointing if your fave is in an event as an R card, and also that every card had a vignette...

anyway the fact that we don't have a card where riddle looks like this is just... wrong. deeply upsetting. an affront to me personally. i only just found out this concept art existed 5 minutes ago but now i'll forever be dreaming of the power that he could have. how unbelievably hard he could slay.

[xxplastic-cubexx]

erik will genuinely jump at any chance he can to steal charles' last name and be so catty about it i know this for a fact WHAT is his deal

[Magneto (2011)]

[puppppppppy]

its so hard to watch time pass when things like careers and assignments exist. what do you mean im supposed to take that seriously

[seraheart]

I kinda wish that the DetCo canon would do more with the fact that the relationship (I don't mean this in the shipping sense) between Conan and Haibara has been, or at least logically should have been, really strained for a long time.

Originally, they had this development where Haibara was really messed up, overly cautious and trying to force her maladaptive survival psychological issues onto other people, and generally not good at positive interactions. Then, slowly, Conan and the others started gaining her trust (not entirely though), and also her general mental health improved (never completely though).

But then it turned around, and started getting significantly worse. Haibara isn't really in a healing arc anymore. If Aoyama still took her seriously as a character (which, to be fair, I don't think is the case), she would be in a retraumatization arc. Conan and his allies are limiting Haibara's agency, invading her privacy, dismissing her concerns about all this, and pretending that this isn't happening while she can obviously tell that it is happening.

I think the really obvious turning point was the Mystery Train arc. Haibara even called Conan and Agasa out on it and stated that she wouldn't forgive if she were to be treated like that again. Instead of taking her hurt seriously, they just told her she should "be thankful", and dismissed her hurt as "tsundere", refusing to take her trauma seriously after using it and using her as a mere chess piece in their plans (and Akai even triggering her more by gloating about it).

Since then, Haibara has been trapped under the constant, violating supervision of these people who have demonstrated that they don't respect her, and also refuse to acknowledge that the problem even exists. It's not a situation where her recover arc could realistically continue. By all logic, she should be spiraling, getting worse again.

And maybe this is on purpose; Aoyama definitely didn't plan the manga to get this long when he introduced Haibara, and originally the slow-burn of her recovery was a good way to postpone a scenario where Haibara could actually trust Conan enough to give him the kind of information that would lead to the finale arc. But... eventually, even with the extreme slow burn of DetCo, Haibara's recovery arc and relationship development with Conan would have gotten to the point where her continued withholding of crucial information would no longer make sense... and, I guess, rather than start concluding the story at a humanly reasonable rate, Aoyama just opted to nuke Haibara's whole recovery arc and character and relationship development (not only with Conan but also Agasa).

Which could have been tragic but realistic (albeit kind of a major downer out of tune with the manga's usual tone, and upsetting to anyone who had been invested in the slow-burn mental health improvement arc), but then Aoyama can't even be arsed to take it seriously, and is now just pretending that the situation with Haibara and her relationships with Conan and Agasa are still "normal" instead of FUBAR.

It's regrettable and really shows how much everyone dragging out this franchise to milk it for more money just... doesn't actually care about the story anymore, hasn't in a long time. They'll eventually just kill central, fan-favorite, long-running story arcs rather than actually letting them conclude or evolve in a satisfying manner if that would mean risking their precious status quo (which has warped beyond all recognition anyway, so I'm not sure why they bother).

[icewindandboringhorror]

examining a seemingly normal image only to slowly realize the clear signs of AI generated art.... i know what you are... you cannot hide your true nature from me... go back where you came from... out of my sight with haste, wretched and vile husk

[squeakadeeks]

if i had a dollar for every time a religious missionary knocked on my door to "spread the good news" while i was actively in an acute mental health crisis i'd have 2 dollars, which isnt a lot but also. how many times does this have to happen before they stop coming.

[crystalkitty1220]

Man I wonder where the leader of the fear realm could've gone, it's alMOST LIKE NEVIN HAS AN

[hydrossity-zone]

you guys wont be mad if/when I post super bloody violent stuff right

[theunconcernedembalmer]

so. leans on the counter. gate huh. slips off the counter and falls flat on my fa

[nexttothelamp]

...

[obnoxiousarcade]

I have a longing to be understood more than anything else i think

[strawberryfaced]

I NEED. TO DO. OR MAKE SOMETHING. PLEASE

[bokuwadekinaiko]

cw post / tags. sorry

i don't even know if i have the words

to express this

she's gone

and its all my fault