#Soft Steddie September

[alicetallula]

Soft Steddie September 2024 - Week 3 : Anniversary - 17.09.2024

Here's my little contribution to the @softsteddieseptember 😊

Week 3 : Anniversary - Steddie Anniversary Gifts - 17.09.2024

I went with something simple with them offering each other's jewelry for the occasion

Done using ink pense, alcohol markers, gel pens a graphite pencil and an acrylic paint pen

AO3 post / DeviantArt post / Instagram post / Pillowfort post / Twitter post

The Smutty Aftermath

[steveseddie]

full circle

steddie | rating: t | wc: 3,8k | cw: mention of throwing up | tags: pre-season 4, different first meetings, eddie is afraid of heights, steve is a sweetheart, holding hands, first kiss

for week one of @softsteddieseptember using the prompt “facing your fears” 

read on ao3 here

Jeff and Gareth stumble out of the Ferris Wheel and Eddie snorts out a laugh.  

Jeff is struggling to keep them both upright as Gareth leans all of his weight on him, his face alarmingly green. Jeff manages to get them to the picnic table where Eddie is sitting without Gareth barfing but when he plops down next to Eddie he scoots away, putting some distance between them just in case. 

“Shouldn’t’ve gone on the Ferris Wheel after swallowing three fucking corn dogs, Gare,” Eddie sniggers, taking a drag of the cig he’d been smoking while his two friends were spinning fifty feet from the ground. 

“Don’t-” Gareth mumbles, cutting himself off with a gagging sound that makes Eddie sit on top of the table just to put more space between them. “Don’t mention corn dogs. Or food,” he finishes meekly, hunching forward and burying his face in his hands.  

Jeff gives him a pat on the shoulder. “It’s your fault, man,” he tells Eddie, who gasps, affronted by the accusation. “If you didn’t fuck off to go take a piss then Gareth wouldn’t’ve had to go on it with me.” 

Eddie shrugs, the cigarette dangling from his lips. “Whatcha want me to say, Jeff? When you gotta go, you gotta go.” 

(The truth is Eddie didn’t have to go. 

He lied about it and then wandered around the fairgrounds aimlessly until he was certain Jeff and Gareth had gone on the Ferris Wheel.

Because Eddie is terrified of heights, a fact no one but his uncle is aware of given how cool and unmetal it is.)

“Ugh, I gotta go,” Gareth grumbles, stumbling over to some bushes before throwing up all over them. 

Eddie recoils with a grimace. “Dude!”  

Gareth pulls himself together. He wipes his mouth and glares at him over his shoulder. “Shut up, Ed, you wouldn’t be doing any better if it was you who went up-” He pauses, narrowing his eyes at Eddie. “Wait, how come I’ve never seen you go on the Ferris Wheel?” 

Oh crap. 

“I’ve been on it,” Eddie shrugs, lying as convincingly as he can. “Many times.”

Jeff studies him curiously. “No, no, Gare, is right. We’ve been coming here for three years and you’ve never been on it with us!”

“I’ve been on it,” Eddie insists. “Just you know with other people.” 

They both snort. “Oh yeah?” Jeff asks. “Who?” 

“Yeah, Eddie, you don’t have any other friends,” Gareth adds. 

“I do!” Eddie protests, waving his hands like it will make names appear out of thin air. “I have Freak!”

Jeff raises an eyebrow. “What’s his real name?” 

“Uh-” Eddie shrugs. “Freak?” 

Gareth shakes his head. The color is back on his face but Eddie wishes he’d go back to hurling his guts out. “If I didn’t know any better, Eddie, I’d say you’re afraid to go on it.” 

“Pfffft,” Eddie slaps his knee with a laugh. “I am not.”

“Prove it then,” Gareth says, crossing his arms over his chest.

“What?” 

“Go on the Ferris Wheel now.”

“Uh, can I finish my cig first?” Eddie asks, trying to stall.

But his friends won’t let him. “No,” they say at the same time. 

Well, shit.

“Ugh, fiiiiiine,” Eddie says, throwing his arms up in a tantrum before snuffing the cig against the table.

He stands up and, flanked by his two friends, starts walking towards the Ferris Wheel. As he does, he considers the pros and cons of fleeing- he’s gotten very good at running from people and neither Gareth nor Jeff are as quick as some of the jocks he’s had to outrun before.

But Eddie realizes he might not need to run away when they reach the line just as the guy manning the ride opens the last car to let the last two people in.

“Won’t you look at that!” Eddie whirls around, clapping his hands together. “It’s full! Oh well, there’s always next year!” 

He throws his arms around Jeff and Gareth and starts dragging them away. Only for them to stop in their tracks when there’s a voice behind them. 

“We have one spot left!” The guy announces. “One spot left! Who wants to ride?” 

Gareth whirls around. “He does!” He says, pointing at Eddie who curses inwardly. “He’ll do it. Right, Eddie?” 

Through gritted teeth, Eddie mutters ‘if you insist’ because what other fucking choice does he have?

He makes his way to the front of the line like a man stepping into the gallows, jaw clenched and hands balled up into fists at his sides pausing again just as he’s about to get on. 

Because sitting on the Ferris Wheel car is no other than Steve fucking Harrington.

He wants to do this even less now knowing that Harrington will be sitting next to him as he tries not to shit his pants. The last thing he wants is the King of Hawkins High to go around sharing that with everyone.

“Dude, are you getting in or not?” The guy asks when Eddie just stands there, an annoyed tilt to his voice. 

Eddie glances over his shoulder to find Gareth and Jeff giving him two thumbs up, matching smirks on their faces. He flips them off, ignoring the scandalized gasp from a mother waiting in line with her son. 

Then he glances back at the car- at Harrington, who is staring at him with an impatient bitchy look. The King probably isn’t happy about sharing a Ferris Wheel car with the Freak.

Yeah, well, the feeling is fucking mutual. 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m going in,” Eddie says anyway, sliding into his seat. He does his best to ignore Harrington as the guy lowers the safety bar on their laps- as well as the dread that has settled on his belly. 

It only grows as they start moving. 

“Enjoy your ride,” the guy tells them with fake cheerfulness. 

Eddie fights the urge to flip him off too. 

“Fuck,” he mutters, grabbing the safety bar with a death grip as their car starts to rise. They keep rocking back and forth and Eddie’s stomach falls out of his ass every time. “Fuck me.” 

Next to him, Harrington lets out a snort. “At least buy me dinner first, Munson.”

Eddie snaps his head towards him- Harrington is leaning back against his seat with a smirk, seemingly not caring at all about the fact that they’re about to be thirty feet from the ground. Asshole.

“Hardy-har-har, Harrington,” Eddie says through gritted teeth, trying not to let his voice waver.

As far as comebacks go, it’s a lame one and Harrington must notice. “Geez, man. Are you okay?” 

“Yeah, I’m- I’m fine.” 

Harrington glances down at Eddie’s hands on the safety bar with a pointed look. “Really? Because you look like you’re trying to snap that bar in half.”

Eddie glances down and sees that he’s white-knuckling the safety bar. He loosens his hold a little. “I’m fine,” he says, voice clipped. “Mind your own business, Your Majesty.” 

“Christ, Munson, what’s your problem?” Harrington huffs out a sound halfway between a grunt and a laugh. “And don’t call me that. You don’t hear me calling you Freak.”

To Eddie, they’re not the same. He thought someone like Harrington would enjoy being reminded about his popular status in high school- even if Eddie’s tone is mocking. But it seems the whole King thing struck a nerve.

“My problem is-” Eddie starts, meaning to tell Harrington that it’s him even if Eddie hasn’t had a problem with him in particular since he graduated but then their car jerks and his words trail off into a whimper. 

“This fucking deathtrap, shit. Okay, I’m not fine,” he admits, eyes screwed shut as they reach the top. “I'm like terrified of heights, okay? Which is fucking lame and super unmetal of me so go ahead, laugh it up.”

He waits to hear it- Harrington’s laugh but there’s only silence. 

Eddie peeks at him through one eye.

“I’m not gonna do that,” Harrington says, his eyebrows knitted in a way that’s frankly kinda cute. 

Cute? Jesus Christ, Eddie, not the time.

“Why not?” He asks. “It’s what you jocks do.”

“Yeah, well, I haven’t been a jock for a while, man.”

Eddie guesses that’s true. Even before he graduated, Harrington had stopped being a jock under Eddie’s definition of the word. He still played basketball, but he didn’t pick on Eddie or the other nerds and now he’s not laughing at him for being afraid of heights even though if the roles were reversed Eddie would probably get a few laughs in himself. 

Maybe he should cut Harrington some slack.

“Why are you riding the Ferris Wheel anyway?” He asks after a short silence. “If you don’t like heights?” 

Another mind your own business rests at the tip of Eddie’s tongue but he did just say he’d cut him some slack. Besides, Eddie is slowly realizing that talking to Harrington is helping keep him distracted from where they are right now. 

“Well, my friends think I’m scared-”

“You are,” Harrington interjects with a smirk.

“Yeah, yeah, I am,” Eddie accepts with an eye roll even if he feels his mouth tick up. “But they don’t need to know that, I have a reputation to uphold.” 

“With your friends?”

“With my friends, the school.” Eddie clicks his tongue. “ Society.”

Harrington snorts out a startled sort of chuckle, eyebrows raised in amusement. “Well, I won’t tell society,” he says with a conspiratorial smile. “Your secret’s safe with me.” 

He bumps their shoulders together and it makes the car tip forward. Eddie bites down on a very embarrassing scream. Harrington grimaces. “Shit, sorry.” 

“Why are you- why are you riding the Ferris Wheel?” Eddie asks. “You can’t possibly enjoy this, man.”

“It’s not so bad,” Harrington shrugs. “I like the view, especially at sunset.”

“Ah,” Eddie smiles teasingly. “I bet you bring all the pretty girls up here, hold their hand if they get scared.” 

Harrington raises an eyebrow at him. “Are you suggesting I hold your hand, Munson?” 

Is he? Eddie looks down at Steve’s hands. They’re nice hands and Eddie has to admit that the thought of holding one of them right now doesn’t exactly make him want to jump off this car. 

It makes his heat build in his cheeks actually. “Fuck off, no, I’m-” 

“Because I would,” Harrington interjects, “if you wanted me to.” 

Eddie’s eyes go wide. “I- uh. You- no, you wouldn’t.” 

Harrington tilts his head, watching Eddie with a mixture of amusement and something else. If Eddie didn’t know any better he’d say Harrington finds it endearing- how nervous Eddie is. What the hot fuck?

Harrington holds out his hand, palm up, in the space between them. 

Eddie can only stare at it like it’s going to bite him or like Harrington is going to jerk it back and laugh at him for falling for the joke. He does neither. He wiggles his fingers and Eddie, who might be oxygen-deprived from the height, lets go of the bar with one hand, wipes it on his jeans, and grabs Harrington’s. 

He links their fingers together loosely and gives Eddie a little half-smirk, half-smile that he bets left a girl or two giggling back in the day. Right now it makes Eddie’s heart stutter in a wildly different way than being this far from the ground does. 

The ground, which is currently far, far away. Shit. The reminder makes him grip Harrington’s hand tighter and it’s really nice- warm and soft instead of cold and hard like the safety bar. Eddie looks down at their joined hands, and focuses on that- on how big Steve’s hand is and how many freckles are dusted over the back of it, how he doesn’t seem to mind that Eddie’s rings are probably digging painfully into his skin with how hard he’s holding on to him. 

“Better?”

“Yeah,” Eddie admits with a shaky laugh. “Um, thanks, man, for not laughing and like, not being a dick about this.” 

“Yeah, well, I’m trying to be less of a dick these days.”

“And how’s that working out for ya?” 

Harrington’s nose scrunches up. “I’m alone at the Ferris Wheel, Eddie, so what do you think?” 

Eddie chuckles. “Oh, so what am I? Chopped liver?”

“No!” Harrington counters quickly. “Just not who I thought I’d end up riding the Ferris Wheel with.”

“Oh how you wound me, Steve,” Eddie says with an exaggerated pout. 

“Shut up, you’re the one who’s wounding me,” he says playfully, using his free hand to gesture at where his other one is still trapped by Eddie’s. “Think you’re cutting off circulation to my hand.” 

Eddie loosens his hold a little, his cheeks pinking up again. “Fuck, sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” Steve says, giving it a squeeze. “Robin and I went to see this gross movie once called The Thing and I’m pretty sure I almost lost all my fingers from how hard she was gripping my hand.” 

Eddie blinks. “Robin Buckley? From band?” He asks and Steve nods. “I didn’t know you two were friends or is it- are you two like-” 

Jesus, why do you even care, Munson? Talk about minding your own business. 

“Oh no,” Steve replies even if Eddie didn’t finish the question. “I love Robin, but she’s just my friend. My best friend. It’s tectonic.” 

Eddie tilts his head. “Do- do you mean platonic?” 

“Yeah, that,” Steve says, snapping his fingers and shooting a single finger gun in his direction. “She’s actually down there somewhere with- um, with someone else.” 

“Oh, Steve,” Eddie says, shaking his head. “You’re third-wheeling your band nerd best friend? How the mighty have fallen truly.” 

Steve groans, throwing his head back but not before Eddie sees how his mouth twitches. “It gets worse, dude. I’m also here babysitting a bunch of fourteen-year-olds who are also nerds. Except for Max, she’s cool, she doesn’t play that- dorks and dweebs game the others are obsessed with.”

“Hold on, I’m sorry, do you mean Dungeons and Dragons?” Eddie sputters, trying to wrap his head around everything he’s learning about Steve- horror movie enjoyer, nerd-sympathizer, a babysitter who sort of knows what Dungeons and Dragons is.

Steve purses his lips. “I think I like my name better.”

“Sure, buddy,” Eddie says with a snort. “Well, I’m sorry to inform you that I run an after-school club for that game so by hanging out with me your cool-o-meter just took an even bigger nose dive.”

“Well, goddamn it, Munson,” Steve says jokingly. 

“Bet you wish you got stuck with a pretty girl instead of me, huh, big boy?”

Steve falters at the name that truth be told slipped out of Eddie’s mouth without him realizing. A slight pink tinge shades his cheeks.

It’s nothing compared to the deep shade of red Eddie’s cheeks turn when Steve says, “Actually being stuck with a pretty boy is fine by me.”

A nearly hysterical laugh rushes from Eddie’s lips before he can help it. “A pretty- uh. What?” His heart is doing summersaults in his chest and Eddie tries hard to get it to calm down. Steve could be fucking with him. Fuck, is he? “Are you- Steve. Harrington. Are you fucking with me? ‘Cause you might’ve graduated and you might not be a jock anymore but I know you know what your teammates called me, man, you know I’m- and you fucking with me like that is not cool-”

“Woah, Eddie, hey. I’m not,” Steve assures him, pretty brown eyes wide like a startled deer. “It’s true, okay? You are pretty.”

Oh. 

An ugly strangled noise escapes Eddie. “Oh. Okay. Uh.”

Steve runs a hand through his hair and shifts nervously in the seat. “Fuck, just forget I said that, I didn’t want to make things weird, okay? Just- yeah, forget it.”

“Who says I want to?” 

Steve’s eyebrows meet in the middle. Cute, Eddie thinks again. Oh, maybe it was the time after all. “Um, your face, man? You look like I splashed you with water and then threw a toaster at you or something.” 

“That’s- that’s actually a good way to describe how I feel, yeah,” Eddie agrees. Steve cringes slightly. “Not in a bad way! I’m just surprised! I didn’t know you-” liked boys? liked freaks? liked me?

Whatever he means, Steve gets it. “Yeah, I do,” he says, the tips of his ears turning pink. “It’s fine if you don’t or whatever-”

Eddie opens his mouth to assure him he does in fact like boys and freaks and Steve who might be a freak himself if this Ferris Wheel ride has taught Eddie anything-

Before he can though the Ferris Wheel screeches to a halt, their car rocking in place at the top. 

“Why- why are we stopping? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Steve says, squeezing Eddie’s hand. “It’s the last spin, they’re probably gonna stop each cart at the top for a few minutes.”

Eddie whines pathetically. “What? Why?”

“So people can watch the sunset? Make out?” Steve blushes. “Or something.”

The wind picks up and makes the car rock back and forth and Eddie groans. “Fucking great!”

“Hey, what do you need?” Steve asks, rubbing his thumb over the back of Eddie’s hand. It’s almost enough to distract him from being stuck at the top. Almost. 

“To be back on solid ground? Or a distraction. Please distract me, Stevie,” Eddie says, feeling panic bubbling up inside him. He doesn’t even notice when the nickname slips out. 

Steve’s eyes flick over his face looking for something. He either finds it or gives up. Either way, he takes a deep breath. “Please don’t punch me for this.” 

“Punch you for-”

The last word dies in Eddie’s throat because Steve leans in and presses a kiss to his mouth, effectively shutting him up.

For a beat, neither of them does anything. Then Steve’s free hand cups Eddie’s cheek and he moves his lips. Eddie makes a soft, needy noise in the back of his throat, his eyelids fluttering shut, and then he’s kissing Steve back. 

It’s a slow and lazy kiss but it’s enough to make Eddie forget where he is or that he’s supposed to be panicking. He even lets go of the safety bar just so he can get his fingers in Steve’s hair. 

They don’t break apart until the Ferris Wheel starts moving again, their car making its way down so they can finally get off this stupid thing. 

(Though it might be starting to grow on Eddie. Just a little.)

When they stop again so that the people in the next car can have their go at the top, Eddie’s stomach merely swoops and it might have more to do with the way Steve licks his pink, wet lips than with anything else. 

“Well, that’s one way to distract someone,” Eddie says, his voice coming out a little breathless. “Thanks, Stevie.”

Steve snorts, hanging a hand from his neck. “Thanks for not punching me.”

“I’m a lover, not a fighter, baby,” Eddie says and watches delightedly how a flush creeps up Steve’s cheeks at the pet name. “I’d never punch you, your face is too pretty for that.”

A startled laugh tumbles from Steve’s lips. “So I could kiss you again?”

“I could be persuaded to do that again, yeah.” Eddie tilts his head, eyes darting a little anxiously over Steve’s face. “First I gotta know if this is like a ‘what happens in the Ferris Wheel stays in the Ferris Wheel’ kind of thing, you know?”

“Nah,” Steve says with a smile that edges on soft. “I was actually gonna drag you with me to the Hoop Shot game after this. Impress you a little.”

“Oh yeah?” Eddie asks, grinning widely. “Gonna impress me with your jock moves?”

“Mhm. By winning you a stuffed animal too.”

Eddie clicks his tongue. “Stevie, Stevie, Stevie, I told you, I have a reputation to uphold-”

“With society, yeah, yeah. Don’t worry, I’ll get you something metal like a bat! Or a dragon.”

“Hm,” Eddie taps his finger against his chin. “Get me both and it’s a deal!”

Steve’s eyes twinkle. “Does that mean I get two kisses?”

“Oh, sweetheart,” Eddie says, pitching his voice low and deep. Steve’s eyes widen slightly. “You can have way more than that.” 

They’re almost at the bottom now which is probably why Steve doesn’t lean in for another kiss right then and there when it’s clear that he wants to. This close to the ground, people could see and the last thing they want is an angry mob waiting for them at the bottom. 

They’re happy to just hold hands for what’s left of the ride. Despite Eddie not being scared anymore, neither of them considers letting go, not until the guy from before yanks the safety bar off their laps, stares curiously at their clasped hands for a second before his expression turns bored again, and waves them out of the car. 

Eddie climbs out and jogs down the steps, past the people waiting in line. His eyes dart over the people hanging around the Ferris Wheel, looking for Gareth and Jeff but his friends must’ve gotten bored and wandered off at some point because they’re nowhere to be seen. Whatever, he was gonna ditch them to hang out with Steve anyway. 

But Steve gets the wrong idea when he sees Eddie scanning the crowd. He scruffs his Nike against the ground and hangs a hand from his neck. “It’s okay if you wanna find your friends-”

“Fuck, no,” Eddie says quickly. “They’re big boys, they can get home on their own. Or not and it serves them right for forcing me to go on that deathtrap!”

“Oh, come on,” Steve says with a playful grin. 

“Fine, I guess it wasn’t that bad,” Eddie says, rolling his eyes, the corners of his mouth ticking up. “What about you? You don’t have to find your baby nerds and make sure they’re okay?”

“Nope, those shitheads can take care of themselves,” Steve says. “I have more important things to do.”

“Like me?” Eddie asks with a ridiculous waggle of his eyebrows. It makes Steve tip his head back with a laugh. Eddie’s eyes zero in on the moles in the column on his neck, thoughts drifting to wanting to kiss every single one of them. 

“Maybe later,” he tells Eddie with a wink. His stomach swoops and this time it has nothing to do with gravity and heights. “C’mon, man, let’s get you that bat.”

Eddie holds his finger up, wagging it in front of Steve’s face. “And the dragon!” Eddie says, getting all up in Steve’s space as he starts walking in the direction of the Hoop Shot game. “Don’t forget the dragon!”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say, Munson.”

(Steve gets him the bat. And the dragon. And cotton candy. And later follows Eddie home after dropping off his herd of fourteen-year-olds. Eddie lets him have two kisses and more just like he promised.)

(And he rides more than just the Ferris Wheel that day.)

[scoops-aboy86]

Your Smile Is My Favorite

Prompt Used: Summer reading (@thehairandthebanished) and cheesy pickup lines (@softsteddieseptember) | Your Smile Is My Favorite | Rating: T | CW: mild body image issues | Additional Tags: chubby Steve Harrington, gay Eddie Munson, pining, bizarre communication through intricate pickup line rituals, Robin loves these two idiots

I wrote most of this while on a 11 hour car trip, I’ll post it to ao3 later. 🥱 Still the 4th in my time zone though!

It’s hard to stay absorbed in a book when Steve Harrington is swimming laps in his little red shorts, but Eddie is managing. 

Sort of. Kinda. 

Okay, not really. Or at all. 

But he’s read Return of the King so many times before that he can fill in any paragraphs his eyes accidentally skim over from memory, so it’s fine. And he definitely rolled high on stealth by being smart enough to bring sunglasses, because Middle Earth has nothing on his view of Steve’s chest while the guy does the backstroke. 

Earlier in the summer Steve would have been poolside with Eddie and Robin, sprawled out in the sun snacking on pizza and chips with them and letting Eddie draw him into their umpteenth debate on which is better, Coca Cola or Mountain Dew. Now he’s going at it in the pool like he has something to prove, or diving in over and over while complaining about his form. 

Which, Eddie thinks, is a very fine form indeed. He’s thickened up some since their harrowing adventures last Spring Break, transformed from merely good-looking to downright beefy in a way that makes Eddie’s mouth water and fingers twitch with the urge to rake through that tantalizing chest hair, test the give of Steve’s deliciously softer pecs and stomach. It’s starting to become a problem. 

As if Aragorn, son of Arathorn, would have an easier time concentrating on a book about the Party’s adventures if Arwen were parading around in front of him while scantily clad, Eddie thinks, trying to make himself feel like a little bit less of a pining loser. 

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Robin says, sounding bored from the next lounge chair over. She hasn’t even looked up from her own book. 

Eddie considers protesting. He could; they’ve never actually discussed the way they’d clocked each other as queer during Spring Break, he has plausible deniability. 

Instead, he says, “Got a camera you can loan me, Birdie?”

She snorts, sliding her bookmark into place as she turns towards him on her lounger. “No, but now that we’re talking about it, can we talk about how your crush is visible from, like, space?”

“He is not!” The protest tumbles out of him before Eddie even thinks about it, and his cheeks immediately flare red under layers of sunblock. It’s not like Robin would talk about the way her platonic soulmate had recently put on some extra weight like that, Eddie is just a moron. Well, he’ll just have to blow past it and pretend he’d been… bluffing about his crush not being Steve. Yeah. “Uh, I mean. Fuck, I’m not being too obvious, am I?”

Robin’s grin is smug, and definitely a little bit at his expense. “Not really. You’re super easily distracted when there’s more people around, so the kids haven’t picked up on it yet.” She glances back at the pool and the expression softens to amused affection. “It’s written all over your face right now, but I’m pretty sure dingus over there has this fixed idea about your type being all dark clothes and leather and tattoos. He’ll never figure it out on his own, completely hopeless.”

That’s a relief to hear. Eddie relaxes beneath the shade of his poolside umbrella, glances down at his book again… 

And snaps it shut and scrunches up on his side to face her too. He’ll be able to find his place again later, more or less. The occasional splashes of Steve reaching one side of the pool and flipping around to swim back fades into the background for the first time all day in the face of this new, unexplored conversational territory. 

“So,” he says matter-of-factly. Because he’s reconciled with this a long time ago: Robin has literally helped save his life a number of times, she’s safe. “Clearly you’ve got me all figured out. And there’s no way you could be around that all the time and still get anything done without being… oppositely inclined.”

She nods, and the teeny tiny bit of him that had been braced just in case he was wrong relaxes. “Yeah. I don’t see the appeal, but I’ve literally seen a few girls walk into things when they catch sight of him.”

Eddie snickers, like the hypocrite slightly wired on nerves and relief that he is. Curbs, trash cans, the glass doors of Family Video… he’s been there, done that, and been forced to turn it into a bit so no one catches on to what all of those instances had in common. (Steve smiling at him. Steve looking at him. Just, Steve.)

“Not as many lately though,” Robin confides, a little sad. “Shallow bitches.”

“Shallow as hell,” Eddie agrees. One hundred percent. “They have no idea what they’re missing out on.”

“It’s taking a toll on him,” she continues. “You know, how his hair kinda deflates a little when he’s bummed out? Those great big puppy dog eyes come out and it’s all—” her voice drops in a possible Steve impression “—‘Is it me, Rob? What am I doing wrong?’”

Eddie huffs a wordless disagreement with that whole sentiment. Wrong with Steve? Wrong with Steve? There’s nothing wrong with Steve, in his opinion. Badass scars, heart of gold, hair of the gods, and a little more meat on his bones making him even more solid and dependable? Sign Eddie the fuck up. 

Sure, there’s also the nightmares and a general jumpiness whenever the phone rings or lights flicker or a radio starts to crackle, but the same can be said of pretty much everyone in the Party, Eddie included. It’s perfectly understandable after everything they’ve been through, the number of times they’ve helped save the world. 

“I think that’s why he’s leaning so hard into swimming again,” Robin adds. And even though she seems totally casual, there’s something… not pointed, exactly, but definitely not dull behind her words. She’s giving him a look that Eddie can’t figure out, because he just doesn’t have the same kind of in-tune-ness with her that she and Steve display on a regular basis, having conversations with nothing but stares, blinks, and funny eyebrow twitches. 

He tries anyway. Even pushes his sunglasses up into his hair for a clearer look, but message not received. Frowning, he glances over his shoulder at the pool again. “Because he’s… upset about not going on dates lately?”

Not that Eddie had been paying attention or anything. Not that he’d daydreamed hopelessly a few times that it was because Steve was hung up on him, lingering a bit more than necessary when dropping off and picking up the kids on Hellfire days. Inviting Eddie to hangout days like this. Taking Eddie up on it whenever he offers to smoke the guy out, usually when they both have dark circles from sleeping poorly blooming under their eyes and everything about the no longer in peril world around them feels like too much. Springing for fast food whenever they get the munchies, since Eddie supplied the grass…

“Because he thinks there’s something wrong about him,” Robin corrects, “that he needs to work out.” 

Oh. What—oh. Eddie blinks, reorients, and realizes that the thing he hadn’t been able to read before is concern. “But… he looks so good,” he says dumbly. 

Steve is self-conscious about his weight? Oh no, that won’t do at all. Eddie’s mind is already racing through ways to reassure their friend that he looks great, fantastic, amazing, all the positive adjectives that he knows. He wants to build Steve up, make sure he knows that there are definitely people who would absolutely jump at the chance to be with him. 

Or, you know, right here. Or something. 

Splashing sounds draw his attention back to the pool, and it’s Steve wading up the shallow end towards them, apparently tired out for the time being. And Eddie… panics. 

“Damn, Harrington,” he blurts out, “is it hot out here or is it just you?”

Which is. It’s. Something out of that terrible pickup lines book one of the Corroded Coffin guys found at a yard sale a few weeks ago—he can’t remember who exactly, maybe Jeff?—that they’d all howled over, reading the worst ones out loud in ridiculous voices. Why the hell is that what popped into his head?

Steve pauses with one foot still in the pool, squinting at him. “Uh… It’s definitely hot today. Are you… overheated or something? I could get you some ice water.”

“No, I’m good,” Eddie manages. And then, because he’s an idiot, he continues, “Have I told you lately that you’re very attractive? You must eat magnets for breakfast.”

He catches a glimpse of Robin out of the corner of one eye. For a second he hopes that she might step in and save him from himself, but nope; her face is frozen in a look of appalled fascination. No help coming from that quarter. 

“I,” Steve starts, stepping the rest of the way out of the pool and putting both hands on his hips like he doesn’t know what else to do with them. “Dude, are you high?”

If only he were. The proximity of Steve’s naked, dripping wet chest and the gentle roll over the top of his swim trunks seems to have roughly the same effect on him though. 

“Nope,” Eddie squeaks. His face feels incandescent, and he can’t even blame it on a sunburn. And still he opens his mouth again, because he’s already gone this far, might as well commit to the bit. “But we should smoke up later, sweetheart. I think weed be really good together.”

That one wasn’t from the book. It’s an Eddie Munson original. If death took him now, he would not hate it. 

Steve looks to Robin, who shrugs and throws him a towel. He catches it and starts drying his hair, returning his attention to Eddie with a perplexed look. “Low blood sugar?” he asks, and it takes a second for Eddie to place that Steve is still trying to guess why he’s being so weird. 

As if the Freak of Hawkins needs something so pedestrian as a reason. 

“We can order pizza,” Robin suggests in a strangled voice. She’s trying so hard not to laugh, which is good. Probably. 

Eddie can muster a little gratitude for that, right up until he opens his mouth again and “Oh, are you craving pizza? Because I’d love to get a pizz-a you” falls out. 

… Maybe he does have low blood sugar. Or, like. A brain tumor or something. 

Steve sends Robin another look, then shrugs and heads inside the house. Presumably to order pizza, and hopefully for Eddie’s sanity to put on a shirt. 

As soon as the glass door slides shut behind him, Robin whips around and whisper yells, “What the hell was that?!”

Eddie throws himself back on his lounger and covers his face with both hands. “I don’t know. I wanted to cheer him up, make him feel good about himself or something, but—”

“And you thought hitting on him would do the trick? Very badly, I might add!”

“Oh, like you know anything about what works when hitting on dudes!” Eddie shoots back, even though she’s right. So very right. Cruelly correct, to a poor gay man who is suffering. 

He rolls over on the chair, only putting a knee or elbow through the plastic straps beneath him a few times before flopping face down and tugging his own unused towel over his entire head. It’s almost restful under there. The lounger cradles his face a little too high because the back is still angled slightly up for, you know, lounging… and Return of the King is dry and solid under one shoulder, twisting his frame a little oddly, but other than that…

~

By the time Steve comes back outside, Eddie barely notices. He feels slow and drowsy from the heat, everything muffled by the towel. But he does hear a scrape over the concrete beneath him and cracks an eye open to peer through the gaps in the chair. 

It’s a slice of pepperoni and extra cheese on a paper plate, positioned directly below his head, right where he can smell it. 

Fuck, okay. He can’t not get up for food freely offered. It’s just not how Wayne raised him. 

“There you are,” Steve says brightly when Eddie emerges and resituates himself with the plate in hand. “Feeling better? Seemed like the heat was getting to you there.”

“Must’ve,” Eddie replies with a weak laugh. “Thanks.” For the pizza, and for allowing him some semblance of dignity to fall back on after… whatever that had been. Because Steve, above all else, is a good dude; something Eddie has been all too aware of for over a year now. 

Steve passes him a can of Mountain Dew and taps his own Coke can against it like a toast. “Don’t mention it. And, uh, Eds…” He’s starting to smile, just a little. “I know this is going to sound cheesy, but I think you're the gratest.”

Somewhere to Eddie’s other side, Robin chokes on her drink and has to cough a few times to clear it. 

Eddie just stares, jaw dropped open and feeling flushed all over, heart in his throat. Even with his hair still wet and smelling strongly of chlorine, Steve has somehow retained that signature swoop. Maybe he fixed it while he was inside, procuring pizza and slipping into an old and raggedy high school gym shirt that makes him only slightly less biteable. 

And that smile, fully bloomed now and brighter than the afternoon sun. Like he’s decided, playfully, to meet Eddie at his level no matter how dumb it is. 

“Alright,” Robin rasps. “Okay. I’m just gonna go inside to finish my summer reading while you dingi do… whatever this is.” Followed by the creak of her chair as she clambers off. 

“Don’t mess with the thermostat,” Steve calls after her. He turns slightly to do it and releases Eddie from his tractor beam stare, letting Eddie breathe again—when had he stopped doing that? And then those hazel eyes are back on him, hypnotizing. “Well? Cat got your tongue, or do you have any more?”

The words are… different, now that they’re alone. Quieter. Steve is leaning forward slightly, legs over the side of the chair as he faces Eddie. Elbows on his knees and Coke can dangling forgotten from one big hand. His stare is intense in a way that is almost too terrifying to try to read into. 

Eddie wets his lips nervously. “No, I… I’ve got more.” He sits up a little straighter, turns to put his feet down on the shaded but still warm concrete and face Steve head-on. “I’m no photographer, but I can picture us together.”

It sounds, feels, almost terrifyingly like a confession. 

Steve’s grin gets impossibly brighter and Eddie is back to not daring to breathe, because what is happening. “Are you a camera? Because every time I look at you, I smile.”

Which is. That’s. Does he? Eddie is having some sort of out of body experience trying to think back. 

The part of him that’s still anchored in bones and nerves and skin takes a deep breath. Committing to it. 

“Of all the beautiful curves on your body, your smile is my favorite,” he hears himself say, and it’s probably the plainest, most honest words he’s uttered in his entire twenty-one years of life. 

It’s not like he thinks Steve is going to punch him for saying it. Or even for saying it like that. Good dude, inescapable. But he wasn’t expecting the guy’s eyes to go big and molten, or for him to swallow hard, all while that amazing smile never dims. 

“I’m… Shit, I’m going to give you a kiss, Eddie. If you don't like it, you can return it.”

And then Steve leans forward, and does. 

~

Half an hour later, Robin comes back outside to check on them and finds the two young men twined together on one lounger. Steve is sprawled half on top of Eddie, who looks like he’s holding him in place with both legs and teasing a half eaten slice of pizza against Steve’s mouth. Steve snaps at it with his teeth, and Eddie yanks it away but then goes back in to tap it against his lips anyway with a laugh, loose and easy. Happy. 

They both look so happy together. 

She knew it. All she’d had to do was get those two pining idiots talking about something real—even if Eddie had surprised her with a deeply unexpected means of doing so. Whatever, he’s weird, nothing new there. The important thing is that her plan to end her two best friends’ ridiculous mutual pining for one another had worked. 

And Steve hadn’t believed her when she’d insisted that the metalhead definitely doesn’t think it’s a bad thing that his clothes all fit a little more snug these days. Ha. One more tally on her own You Rule column. 

Feeling magnanimous, Robin decides to wait until they’re done with lunch to turn the hose on them. 

Permanent tag list: @hotluncheddie @lawrencebshoggoth @sofadofax @irishvampireboy @oatmilk-vampire

@wheneverfeasible @hamiltonswiftie @grtwdsmwhr @yesdangerpls @theseaofdespair

[steddie-island]

Through the Pines

Combined prompts for week 2 of @softsteddieseptember (road trip, dreams of the future, confessing your feelings) and @steddiesmuttyseptember (soft and slow, bruise, backseat) Rating: E | WC: 3,016 | Tags: Pining, not actually unrequited love, idiot 4 idiot, wingman Robin Buckley Divider credit

Find the rest of the fic and the complete list of tags on ao3!

Saying goodbye to Steve was never going to be an easy thing.

Eddie had known that even before he'd agreed to go on the college tour with Steve and Robin, when he'd agreed to look at dorm rooms and apartments with them.

There had been weeks of listening to the two of them make plans about what they would do in the city. There would be new coffee places, bars, classes where they would meet people who would get to know the two of them— get to know Steve— in a way that Eddie never would.

It hit him the hardest on the mornings when he was the only one still awake, when Steve was passed out in the passenger seat, the sun warming his face and bringing out the golden shades of his hair. At least Eddie got to see him like this. He wouldn't get to see Steve in a little cafe in Seattle, but he got to see the golden boy drooling onto his own shoulder and hear the little breathy sounds he let out when they hit a bump in the road.

This was temporary, Eddie had known that from the beginning. At least now there was an entire catalogue of moments from the summer that felt so small and inconsequential— Steve and Robin throwing gummy worms at each other, Steve sitting on the hood of the car while they ate greasy diner food, Steve starfished out on one of the motel beds with his face smushed into a pillow and his glasses pushed up into his hair— tucked away in the back of his mind, hidden in the darkest corners to be pulled out when he needed to feel warm again.

It was their last night together, and Eddie found that he was having to pull those moments out now, as he stood smoking and watching the dying light of the sun.

There was Steve, stripped down to his underwear, running towards a lake with Robin following after him. Steve, laying on the ground on one of Eddie's t-shirts, letting the sun dry him off.

Steve, tucked close into his side in the backseat while Robin was the one behind the wheel. They had touched from shoulders to knees, and Steve's fingers had settled warm and heavy against his arm. Eddie pictured the way Steve had breathed out as he'd drifted off to sleep, and he let the smoke pass through his own lips in time with the memory of Steve's breathing.

It had startled him at one point, how many of these cherished memories were of Steve sleeping, but that that was the only time he could look his fill. He could let his guard down and didn't have to worry about how much of his heart he wore on his sleeve. It was one thing to joke, to make big boy comments and shoot little winks at each other when Steve was awake. It was another beast entirely to stare in a way that he knew could only be described as wanting.

"He wants you to stay with us, you know."

[softsteddieseptember]

Thanks for joining me with Soft Steddie September!

this event will take place for the month of September with weekly prompts to choose from; pick one, a few, or all of them! This is a sister event with @steddiesmuttyseptember so with that in mind, it is an 18+ event, so minors...gtf please.

If your age is not in your bio, you will not be reblogged or added to the queue.

No minimum or maximum word count but the fluffier the better as far as I’m concerned. If you go over 1500 words though, please put it under a read more.

Interpret the prompts however you want with the stipulation that this is supposed to be wholesome and G or T rated.

Please list your prompts, and rating at the top of the page and tag @softsteddieseptember so it can be added to the queue for rebloging. Also please use #soft steddie september

IF: you choose to combine prompts from this event and Smutty September that’s fine but please do the following:

Mark your ratings M or E and put any explicit content under the read more and tag @steddiesmuttyseptember so it can be added to the queue of reblogs.

a '🥹' will be commented once your post has been seen and added to the queue. please send this blog or @mugloversonly a message if you don't see the emoji comment within two days of your submission.

You can add your submissions to Soft Steddie September AO3 once you receive confirmation of it being added to the queue on here!

ARTISTS!

art submissions are welcome! same rules apply:

must be rated G or T and should follow at least one of the prompts for the week.

a ‘🥹’ will be commented once the art is added to the queue and masterlist.

WEEK ONE PROMPTS (September 1st-7th)

cheesy pickup lines | Facing your fears | First date | Meet cute | Watching a sunset

WEEK TWO PROMPTS(September 8th-14th)

Telling someone about the relationship | Blind date | Dreams of the future | Confessing your feelings | Road Trips

WEEK THREE PROMPTS(September 15th-21st)

Anniversary | Choosing them | Fluff | Matchmaker | Saying I love you

WEEK FOUR PROMPTS(September 22nd-28th)

Dancing in the rain | Making something for them | Proposal | Protection | The golden years

WEEK FIVE PROMPTS(September 29th-30th)

Adoption | Buying them flowers | Cooking dinner | Overheard Conversation | Wedding

If you have any questions, feel free to ask the blog or @mugloversonly

If you want to look at the sister event, Smutty Steddie September it's here thank you Mickala and to @wynnyfryd for helping me out with this!

The softer the better! - Mugs 🥹

[miss-bushido]

sweet surrender is all that I have to give

Week 2 of @softsteddieseptember using the prompt ‘Dreams of the future’

Rating: T

October 31, 1986

Steve glanced at the clock on the mantel. It was 8:40. He had about twenty more minutes before Eddie got home from his job. Eddie had found work at a record store shortly after they moved into their bungalow, and was actually enjoying going to work. There he was able to talk for hours with other like-minded musicians and metal heads: discussing the intricacies of the guitar work on ‘Master of Puppets’ vs ‘Ride the Lightning’, and got into good natured arguments about the fact that ‘Screaming for Vengeance’ was the superior Judas Priest album, no matter how much the customer argued that it was actually ‘British Steel’.

Eddie was happier than Steve had ever remembered seeing him. Having a job he actually wanted instead of one that he had taken only out of necessity certainly helped. Along with the fact that they were no longer living in Hawkins. Funny how moving away from a place where everyone who was openly hostile to you helped your mental health. Steve owed a debt of gratitude to Chief Hopper for getting them in touch with Dr. Owens. Owens had been able to pull all the strings to allow them to both move from Hawkins to a neighborhood just outside of Indianapolis in early September.

Owens had set them up with a 3 bedroom bungalow: it had a fireplace, a garage, a nice yard for gardening. Best of all, it was theirs: Owens had put both Steve and Eddie’s names on the deed to the house, and had bought it outright for them. No one could ever take it away from them.

Steve was emotional over this, but Eddie more so. Steve had always lived at his parent’s home, but Eddie’s home life had been in an upheaval since his Mom died when he was a kid. The most stable home he’d had was living with Wayne, and that was only consistent after his Dad had abandoned him two years ago. He’d cried in Steve’s arms their first night in the house, worried it would be taken away from them. It had taken at least three weeks for the worry to ease, for Eddie to sleep through the night soundly.

They had set up their home pretty quickly with help from their friends and loved ones. The master bedroom was easy enough, as all it required was Eddie and Steve to combine their own bedrooms. One of the other bedrooms was set up for guests, and the third one was an office slash music room for both of them to use. The Wheelers and the Hendersons had gotten them set up with bed and bathroom linens, lamps for the living room, a dining room set of table and chairs, and two dinnerware sets with flatware, cups, plates, and bowls. Chief Hopper and Joyce Byers had combined their money and gotten them a few things for their kitchen: a kettle, two pans, two pots, and basic cooking utensils. Owens had even given them a large area rug, end and coffee tables, two couches, and two armchairs, both of them new.

All of these things meant that they had zero to no worries about money to furnish their house. They could focus on getting settled in their new neighborhood, getting their new jobs, and settling into their domestic life together. In addition to Eddie’s work at the record shop, Steve was working part time as a substitute teacher for the local middle school. He also was a shift supervisor at the local supermarket. His pay was also decent at both places and the extra bit of cash let them start building up their savings.

Before they’d moved to this house, during the midst of their intense romance that had begun in April of that year, they’d talked about future plans. Steve told Eddie that he wanted a future with him. He’d said that he wanted to get him a ring that he deserved. And after two months of looking, he’d finally found one.

He’d found a ring he wanted to use to ask Eddie to marry him.

They couldn’t get legally married. Both of them knew that, but Steve wanted to do something. Even something like getting a ring for the person he wanted to marry. And wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

The fact that Steve wanted to get married at all spoke to how much growth he’d had as a person. Seeing how toxic his parents’ marriage was as he grew up had initially soured him on it. Being with Nancy had changed his mind a little bit, but it wasn’t until his relationship with Eddie started that Steve saw what he wanted for his future.

And exactly who he wanted it with.

He heard the key turning in the lock and stood up as Eddie came in humming. He looked up at Steve and gave him that grin, the dimples on full display. “Hey, baby,” he said, closing the door and putting his keys away. As he walked,he shrugged out of his leather jacket and held up the plastic bag. “I stopped by the grocery store and got us some chocolate. I have to assume the trick or treaters cleaned us out?”

Steve nodded, brushing his hair back from his face as he closed the distance and gave Eddie a soft kiss on the lips. “They did. The Reese’s got decimated, but they left us with a lot of Butterfingers.”

Eddie kissed him back and laughed. “Just as planned.” He liked all candy, but Butterfingers held a special place in Eddie’s heart.

“You were right,” Steve agreed, running a hand through Eddie’s curls and kissing him once more. “Give me the chocolate. Why don’t you sit down, and I’ll go get us something to snack on.”

“You’re the best,” Eddie said, kissing Steve, with teeth this time before he reached behind and grabbed his ass. “Don’t be too long. I want to watch ‘Fright Night’.”

“Of course,” Steve agreed, giving Eddie his own ass grab before he took the bag of candy into the kitchen. He set the bag down on the counter and sighed shakily.

He was going to do it. And though he had a feeling he knew what the answer would be, asking the question scared him to death.

A few minutes later, Steve came back into the living room holding a tray laden with the bowl of candy, two unopened beers, and a medium sized jack-o-lantern, with the face turned towards him. He had lit the candle inside but his body blocked the light.

This ended up being a good thing, as Eddie had turned off the main lights in the room, leaving the only light in the room coming from the two jack-o-lanterns, and the glow of the TV. “Very spooky, babe,” he commented, setting the tray down on the table, leaning back against the couch.

“I thought so, too,” Eddie said, eyes flicking to the table. “Is that another jack-o-lantern? Why is it turned away?” He started to reach for it when Steve grabbed his hand.

“Don’t turn it around just yet,” Steve said, rubbing his thumb over the back of Eddie’s hand. “I wanted to talk with you about something. Something good, I promise.”

Eddie blinked, but didn’t let go of Steve’s hand. “Okay…” he said, scooting closer on the couch.

Steve was silent, licking his lips to try and gather his thoughts. “This time last year, I couldn’t have imagined I’d be where I am now: in my own house, living with a partner I’m absolutely in love with.” He gave Eddie a shy smile. “Watching my parents as I grew up…it was hard to want to have a relationship with anyone. They had to be really special to me. They had to be someone I could be myself around, I could spend all my time with and not get tired of, as mean as that might sound.”

Eddie smirked. “I mean, yeah, it doesn’t sound that good, but I get what you mean.”

Steve nodded. “So, when you and I started dating, it was like everything clicked into place. We didn’t have the best experiences with one another in high school, and then being thrust together like we were in March? Not the best experience there, either. As I’m sure you know.”

Eddie answered by squeezing Steve’s hand, frowning a little. He kept his eyes on Steve, knowing that there was more to whatever Steve had to say to him.

“I’m not really sure when it was, but I was drawn to you, pretty early on. You’re a hard person to ignore. Getting to know you when we went through all of that. And then spending time with you after…That night you came over in April? I’d been thinking about kissing you for a while. And then…we did, and more, and ever since, I’ve felt as though I’ve been having the best dream of my whole life.” He swallowed, feeling emotion beginning to build, but he wanted to get through this.

“I fell for you so hard and so quickly, but it didn’t scare me. Everything with you has felt good, and right. And…well, I feel as though I’ve found the missing part of myself.” He brought Eddie’s hand up to his mouth and kissed the back of it, not letting go when he set it back down. “You’re who I dream about, the first person I think about when I wake up, and the last person I think about when we fall asleep…and I don’t want to be with anyone else. I want to be with you for the rest of our lives.”

Eddie’s brown eyes were shiny with unshed tears, and Steve could feel them in his own eyes, so he knew he had to make this next part quickly. He let go of Eddie’s hand to reach over to the jack-o-lantern on the table. As he turned it around, showing that there was no face, but the words MARRY ME carved into it, he asked, “Eddie, will you marry me?”

Eddie let out a sob and leaned forward, wrapping his arms around Steve, kissing him hard. “Yes, yes, yes, of course! Of course I’ll marry you!”

Steve was also crying as he returned Eddie’s kisses, pulling him on top of him as he lay on his back on the couch. They were laughing and crying in equal measure, cheeks red with emotion.

“This was so goddamn sweet, Steve,” Eddie said, voice watery as he calmed down.

“Well, thank you,” Steve said, brushing some hair out of Eddie’s face. “I was worried you would think it was corny.”

Eddie giggled. “Some would say it’s a little corny, but I can’t imagine anything better. And on Halloween?! Babe. You’re the best.”

“Oh, I know,” Steve said, smirking a little. “And because I’m the best, I got you this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a little grey velvet bag. Eddie took the bag, his lower lip beginning to quiver. “Oh, sweetheart,” Steve said, voice soothing. He re-situated them so that he was sitting up, Eddie straddling him. He opened the bag and pulled out the ring: it was a thick silver band, with a square onyx stone. There were carvings around the stone setting and along the side of the band. As soon as he saw it in the store, he knew it was the right one for Eddie.

“Give me your hand, baby,” Steve said. Eddie put his left hand forward, shaking as Steve slid the ring onto his left ring finger. It was a perfect fit.

“Oh, Steve,” Eddie gasped, putting his right hand over his mouth. “Oh my God I love it so much. I love you so much!”

Steve smiled. “I love you, too, honey.” He was still holding the bag. “You should look in the bag again. There’s something else in there.”

Eddie swallowed, reaching into the bag. His eyebrows went up as he pulled out a similar ring, but with a dark green stone instead of onyx. It was also at least a size bigger, so it could only be for Steve. “Stevie,” Eddie sniffled, a tear sliding down his cheek. He grabbed Steve’s left hand and slid it onto his ring finger.

As soon as Steve’s ring was on, he pulled Eddie in for another kiss, wrapping his arms around his body. “Let’s go upstairs,” he whispered, voice thick with emotion. “I want to make love to you.”

“Yes,” Eddie breathed, kissing him hard. “I want you all night.”

“You’ll have me all night,” Steve promised. “Tonight, and every night after.”

Eddie smiled against Steve’s lips. “I can’t wait.”

[talanashta]

Cheesy Pick-Up Lines | T

For Week 1 of @softsteddieseptember, just a short lil thing, 230 Words

Steve sat at the bar sipping a beer as he watched Robin dancing with a girl on the dancefloor. They’d found about this place from a feminist/queer bookstore that Steve still wasn’t 100% sure how Robin had found out about. She’d told him about it in whispers at work, and he agreed to take her this weekend. It wasn’t bad. Honestly, it felt like any other bar, just with a more diverse clientele.

He’d looked around a bit, checked out a couple guys. He hadn’t seen anyone he really wanted to approach yet. As he took the last sip of his beer and turned to ask the bartender for another, a guy with shaggy, dark curls approached him and hoped onto the barstool next to him.

“Hey, man,” the guy said.

“Hey.” Steve lifted a hand in greeting.

The guy looked around a moment before turning to Steve. “Have we met?”

Steve scanned the guy up and down, not recognizing him. He was about to say that too, before he was cut off.

“Because you look exactly like my next partner,” the guy said confidently.

He can’t help himself, Steve started cracking up.

The guy gave Steve a bright grin. “I’m Eddie.” He held his hand out.

Steve shook it. “I’m Steve. Nice to meet you.”

“Let me get your next drink,” Eddie said as the bartender came back over.

[midsummer-semantics]

come fly with me

Here's my week 1 submission for @steddiesmuttyseptember and @softsteddieseptember 🫶🏼

Prompts: Mile High Club, Meet Cute, Watching the Sunset

Rating: Explicit

Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Las Vegas, Meddling Robin Buckley, Gay Steve Harrington, Gay Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington is a Sweetheart, Eddie Munson is a Sweetheart, Meet-Cute, First Meetings, First Dates, Blind Date, Eddie and Nancy are siblings, background Robin Buckley/Nancy Wheeler, Mile High Club, Steve Harrington Has a Breeding Kink, Eddie Munson Has a Breeding Kink, these men just want to get each other pregnant so bad, Condoms, because they're still smart about it, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Happy Ending, it's kind of cracky but whatever, Daddy Kink, almost forgot that one. it's only once but it's there

Summary:

Steve cannot believe he let Robin talk him into this. Honestly, of all her meddling and insane plans in this past, this one really takes the cake. A blind date is bad enough, but a blind date where he’ll be stuck having dinner in a plane for an hour with no way to leave if it goes bad? Steve doesn’t mind the flying aspect, it’s the idea that he can’t make an excuse to go to the bathroom and run if the guy turns out to suck. What’s he supposed to do? Do they have parachutes for this kind of thing?

————— Or: Robin and her girlfriend Nancy set Steve and Eddie up on a romantic date in the sky... or do they?

https://archiveofourown.org/works/58667440

[estrellami-1]

Steddie Microfic

September prompt: shower

399 words

Rating: G

No warnings apply

@steddiemicrofic

Steve groans as he peers up at the sky on his drive home. It’s not that he hates rain, necessarily—he’s not a huge fan of storms, but rain’s usually okay—but it’s just one more thing he doesn’t need today. He hates trying to run inside without getting wet. It never works and he feels stupid for doing it—he can’t avoid every raindrop—but he also doesn’t feel like getting wet today. And of course, the umbrella that’s usually in the car had broken, so he’s got no covering.

He makes it home just as the sky opens. In a second everything is soaked, and he leans back in his seat and groans again, shutting his eyes for a moment, trying to steel himself for the dash inside.

He hears a faint whoop over the sound of the rain, and he opens his eyes and turns to see Eddie running towards him, grinning wide and wild.

“What are you doing,” Steve demands as he gets out, grinning at the absolute loon that is his husband. “You’re getting soaked!”

“Isn’t it great?” Eddie agrees.

Steve makes a face. “As long as it doesn’t turn into a storm, I guess.”

“Nah, it’s just a shower, baby. Now come dance with me in the rain!”

Steve laughs as he lets Eddie drag him out into the street, his slacks and button down clashing with Eddie’s oversized tee and sweatpants. He loves his husband an insane amount.

He laughs as Eddie spins him around, as Eddie dips him, at Eddie’s flail and squawk as Steve dips him. He laughs as he feels his shirt stick to his skin, as he feels his shoes fill with water.

But they’ll dry, and he’s got other shoes to wear until then, so he lets Eddie continue to dance with him, first humming some Metallica then somehow switching smoothly into a song from that U2 album Steve likes.

“I love you,” he suddenly murmurs, and Eddie stops humming to grin and reply.

“And I love you.” He nuzzles Steve’s cheek. “Always.”

“Always,” Steve agrees, sighing as he relaxes into Eddie. Eddie starts slow dancing with him, small steps and sways instead of the exuberant movements from before. “I was upset at the rain. On my way home. I didn’t think I wanted to get wet.”

“Baby, you should’ve told me-”

“No.” Steve smiles, kisses Eddie. “I just needed you.”

[medusapelagia]

Steddie Events September Update

New month new update!

Steddie Microfic ( @steddiemicrofic ) This month's prompt is shower | 399 words Event info

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[steveseddie]

home run

steddie | rating: m | wc: 3,6k | no warnings | tags: post-season 4, love confessions, first kiss, first time, dry humping, coming in pants, car sex, or technically van sex

for week two of @softsteddieseptember “confessing your feelings” and “road trips” and week two of @steddiesmuttyseptember “backseat” and “clothes on”

read on ao3 here

Steve’s fingers tighten around the grab handle as Eddie’s van skids dangerously on the wet road. “I really think we should stop, Eddie,” Steve says, finally voicing the thought he’s been having since they got caught in the rain.

Eddie leans forward on the driver’s seat, struggling to see the road through the sheets of water slashing at the windshield, the wipers failing to keep up. 

At first, Steve thinks he didn’t hear him over the heavy pitter-pattering but then he waves dismissively at him. Steve flinches when he lets go of the wheel and the van swerves.  

“No way, Stevie, if we stop we won’t make it in time for the game!”

“If we don’t stop you’ll drive us off the road,” Steve says in a bitchy tone. “And then we won’t make it to the game either because we’ll be dead.”

Eddie groans, using a rag to wipe the fogged-up windshield. “But-”

“Pull over, Munson.”

With a defeated sigh, Eddie hits the warning lights and stirs the van to the side of the road. “As Your Majesty commands,” he says, matching Steve’s bitchy tone. 

“Hey, don’t get pissy on me,” Steve protests when Eddie kills the engine. “It’s not my fault the sky opened up on us!”

Eddie slumps into the driver’s seat, air puffing out and making his bangs flutter. “No, it’s mine.”

Steve snorts. “What? You suddenly control the weather or something?”

“No, but I made us stop for lunch and waste time and got us trapped in this fucking downpour!” Eddie crosses his arm over his chest, pouting. If Steve didn’t think Eddie would throw him out of the van for it he would lean over and pinch his cheek and call him adorable. 

“We had to stop for gas anyway,” he says instead, shrugging. 

“Yeah, but we could’ve had lunch in the van!” Eddie throws his arms up, almost hitting Steve in the face. “It’s called a road trip for fuck’s sake. And now we won’t make it to the game, so it was all for nothing!”

Not for nothing, Steve thinks. They spent the last couple of hours bickering over who got to pick the music and then singing along horribly to whatever they picked to annoy the other one further, which is one of Steve’s favorite parts about driving around with Eddie. That and watching him while he drives, less worried about being caught staring at him. Not to mention the milkshakes they had at the diner where they stopped for lunch were the best Steve’s ever had. Even if they miss the game, which was the whole reason for this trip, Steve would be okay with it. 

But Eddie sounds genuinely upset about it so Steve turns to face him and puts his hand over his knee. “I bet we can catch the rerun at our hotel in Chicago.”

Eddie huffs. “That’s lame, Steve.” His eyebrows knit into a frown. “You were supposed to be there and watch it live, maybe get hit by a ball or something.”

“Eds, why are you so butthurt over this?” Steve can’t help but ask. Missing a basketball game—even a big one that they drove all the way to Chicago for—shouldn’t be getting under Eddie’s skin like this. “You don’t even care about basketball.”

“No, but you do,” Eddie says with a sigh. “And you- you’re always doing things for the kids and for Buckley and for me so I just wanted to do something for you. Wanted us to do something you want for once. That’s why I got the tickets.” 

It’s Steve’s turn to frown. “Wait, I thought Wayne got the tickets from someone at work.”

Eddie hangs a hand from his neck, watching the rain fall through the window, not meeting Steve’s eyes. “Er, no, I asked him to get them for me like a month ago when he drove to Chicago for a job,” he explains shyly. “’Cause, you know, you need a credit card to get them on the phone and well, obviously I don’t have one and neither does Wayne, so-”

“Why?”

Eddie blinks at him. “Because we’re poor?” 

“No, Eds, why- why did you lie about the tickets?” 

“’Cause I knew you’d get all—” he gestures wildly at Steve, “—you about it and offer to pay for them or something and that wasn’t the point. The point was me doing this for you, y’know? Driving four hours just to sit and watch a game that I don’t give a fuck about because you give a fuck about it and I give a fuck about you. Many fucks, in fact.” He lets out a shaky laugh in the middle of his rambling. “Fuck, Steve, I actually love-”

And then Eddie snaps his jaw shut so hard that Steve is surprised he doesn’t bite his tongue off. 

One minute he’s looking at Steve like a startled deer, big cow eyes wide and spooked, and the next he’s flinging the door open and stepping out into the rain before Steve can do anything to stop him 

He blinks at the empty driver’s seat. “What the fuck?” 

He watches through the windshield as Eddie paces anxiously in front of the van, muttering to himself as the rain hammers down on him, soaking his hair and clothes. With a sigh, Steve grabs his jacket from the backseat, zipping it up before following Eddie out of the car.  

“Eddie! What the hell are you doing?” 

“I’m drowning myself,” Eddie says, running a frantic hand through his rapidly soaking hair and talking just loud enough for Steve to hear him over the rain. 

“Why?”

Eddie whirls around to face Steve. His bangs stick to his forehead because of the rain and Steve wants to reach over and brush them back. “C’mon, Stevie,” he says, shaking his head. His expression is open, vulnerable, terrified. “You’re smart enough to know that was a love confession. And a shitty one at that.”

Steve blinks, feeling droplets of water fall from his eyelashes. His heart hammers in his chest. “You- you love me?” 

A laugh escapes Eddie’s lips—a mix of amusement and incredulity. “Sweetheart,” he says, his lips curling into a sad smile. “I’m so in love with you that I was down to drive us through a torrential storm to watch dudes throw balls into laundry baskets with you.”

Despite the rain soaking Steve’s clothes by the second, he feels warmth spreading through him at Eddie’s words. “Eddie-”

“I don’t expect anything, Stevie,” Eddie interjects. “You don’t even have to let me down gently or apologize-”

Steve tries again, taking a step forward, but Eddie instinctively takes a step back. “Eddie, I’m not-” 

“I know-”

Steve growls, exasperated. “No, you don’t know,” he snaps when Eddie keeps interrupting him. “God, you’re infuriating sometimes.”

Eddie laughs but it’s a little shaky. “Big word, Stevie. Twenty points for you.”

Steve shakes his head. He closes the distance between them in two long strides, trapping Eddie against the hood of the van. Eddie looks spooked at the proximity so before he can run away Steve cups his cheeks, keeping him in place. 

Eddie’s eyes go wide. “Uh, Steve?” 

“I need you to shut up, Eddie,” Steve says, brushing his thumbs over Eddie’s cheekbones. His lips part, undoubtedly to make another remark but Steve beats him to it. “‘Cause I’m trying to tell you I’m also in love with you.”

Eddie’s mouth snaps shut immediately.

“There you go,” Steve says with a chuckle. His stomach flip-flops in anticipation. “Eddie, you know I love basketball-”

The words make Eddie frown. “This isn’t the love confession I imagined-”

“Christ. Shhh!” Steve presses his finger against Eddie’s lips with an amused chuckle. Eddie yelps but otherwise stays quiet. 

“I said I love basketball,” Steve starts again, “but I’m happy to watch it just on TV, y’know? The reason why I agreed to a four-hour drive for a game was you. I wanted to go on a trip with you. We hang out all the time and it’s never enough. I’m fucking- obsessed with you! Christ, I love you!”

His finger leaves Eddie’s lips, telling him it’s okay to talk, but Eddie just blinks at him, and for a moment, all they can hear is the rain falling around them. 

Finally, Eddie clears his throat. “And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you do a love confession,” he says in an awed voice.

“Do I get another twenty points?” Steve asks with a chuckle.

Eddie giggles. Steve has to fight the urge to pinch his cheek again. Adorable. “You get all the fucking points, sweetheart, that was romantic as fuck.”

His thumb brushes over Eddie’s cheeks, warm and pink despite the cold. “Do you know what’s more romantic than a love confession in the rain?” He asks. Eddie shakes his head, water dripping from his bangs. “A kiss in the rain.”

Eddie’s eyes widening in realization are the last thing Steve sees before he surges forward, all but mashing their lips together. 

There’s barely half a second of Eddie’s frozen shock before there are hands in Steve’s hair and lips moving slowly and tenderly against his own. Steve moves closer, pinning Eddie against the hood of the van, one of his hands leaving Eddie’s face to settle on his waist. He wants to move even closer but the angle is a little uncomfortable, and he can’t lay Eddie down against the hood the way he could do if they’d drove the Beamer. Also, the rain isn’t stopping and Steve is starting to get cold after standing under it for so long.

So he breaks them apart despite wanting to kiss Eddie longer but keeps their foreheads pressed together. “Can we get back in the van now? Before we drown for real or catch pneumonia or something?” 

“Whatever you want, baby,” Eddie says in a deep voice. The way Steve shivers this time has nothing to do with the cold and everything to do with how Eddie sounds and what he just called Steve. 

Hooking his fingers through Eddie’s belt loops, Steve drags him towards the passenger’s side, pausing to kiss him every few steps. There, instead of reaching for his door, he reaches for the sliding door handle. 

Eddie frowns. “Wait, I thought-”

“It’s still raining.” Steve kisses Eddie’s cheek. “We’re not going anywhere for a while.” He kisses the other one. “So I thought we could keep this going in the backseat.” He places one final kiss on his lips.

Eddie’s eyes widen and he nods fiercely, grabbing a fistful of Steve’s jacket and pulling him inside. They land on the backseat, Steve on top of Eddie, and while that’s exactly what Steve was after when he led them to the van, he still needs to get the door. Eddie doesn’t seem to care about that—he hooks his arms around Steve’s neck, pulling him down for a kiss. 

Steve lets it happen for a moment, already addicted to kissing Eddie but he must put a stop to it when he feels water starting to get into the van. He pushes himself up, his hands on either side of Eddie’s head, and effectively separates their lips. “Gotta get the door, Eds,” Steve says when Eddie whines. 

“Hurry up,” he says impatiently. With a nod, Steve goes about sliding the door closed and then he’s back to hovering over Eddie, leaning down to bring their mouths together again. This time he licks the seam of Eddie’s lips, and when he parts them immediately, Steve slides his tongue inside, licking into Eddie’s mouth. 

Eddie makes a small needy noise in the back of his throat and Steve takes it as approval, kissing him harder, letting one hand snake under Eddie’s wet shirt, feeling him up, while he holds himself up with the other one. Eddie’s hands make their way to Steve’s hair, fingers tangling in the wet strands, tugging lightly on them, making Steve momentarily break the kiss so he can let out a moan when the tug goes straight to his dick.

Eddie looks up at him with dark eyes. He gives his hair another tentative tug to see if he can drag that sound from Steve a second time. 

He can. 

“Fuck, Steve,” he whispers like he can’t believe this is happening. “You’re a dream.” 

Steve desperately wants to hear Eddie too, so he starts kissing his jaw, his neck, his collarbone. Eddie tips his head back with a heartfelt groan, exposing the column of his throat. Steve takes that as an invitation, sucking at the pale skin until a mark starts to bloom. He bites lightly at the skin and soothes the sting with his tongue, listening to Eddie’s delicious string of gasps and whines.

His legs come up to wrap around Steve’s waist, pulling him closer until Steve is lying on top of Eddie. 

Eddie who is hot and close and already hard against him. 

Steve is hard too, he can feel his dick pushing against his wet jeans. He knows they should probably get out of their wet clothes soon but right now he doesn’t have enough patience to do that. He doesn’t want to waste any time that could be spent kissing Eddie, not until they’re satisfied. If the way Eddie is wrapped around Steve like a needy koala means anything, he doubts Eddie wants that either. 

So instead Steve slowly moves his hips to meet Eddie’s. 

A whimper slips past Eddie’s lips at the friction. “Oh, fuck, Steve,” he pants against Steve’s lips. The way Eddie moans his name goes straight to Steve’s dick, making it twitch as it begs for more friction. He rolls his hips again. “Jesus, fuck- I’m- sweetheart-”

“You okay?” Steve asks when Eddie can’t seem to finish a sentence. When he rolls his hips again, Eddie makes a noise like he’s dying, failing to utter any words. “Want me to stop?”

“No!” Eddie protests, shaking his head, hair wild and fanned out on the seat. “Don’t stop. Just uh- fair warning, I’m about to embarrass myself and come in my pants like- fuck, like this.” 

Steve groans. “Fuck, that’s hot.”

“Yeah?” 

Nodding enthusiastically, Steve starts rolling his hips at a steady pace. “Yeah, I want it. Wanna make you come, Eddie. Wanna see you.” 

“Holy shit, Steve,” Eddie swears. On the next thrust, he pushes his hips up just as Steve grinds down and they both moan loudly.

They fall into a rhythm after that, approaching the edge quickly. Hoping to make Eddie come first, Steve wedges his hand between them, cupping Eddie’s hard dick with his palm. It feels big and Steve’s brain feels like it’s melting out of his ears when he so much as thinks about touching Eddie without his jeans and his underwear in the way, about blowing him, about Eddie fucking him. His own body jerks almost involuntarily against Eddie’s thigh. 

He does his best to rub the length of Eddie’s dick as best as he can through his clothes, pressed so close together. Eddie lets out a string of moans and whines that shoot sparks of pleasure down Steve’s spine.

“God, Eddie, you’re so- you sound so good. So fucking hot.”

Eddie shudders against him, his breaths coming quick and short. “Don’t stop,” he pleads even if Steve has no plans to stop what he’s doing, not when he’s so close to giving Eddie what he wants. Instead of stopping, he squeezes the head and strokes him faster. “Fuck, Steve, I’m close.” 

“Yeah, come on, Eddie,” Steve urges him on. Eddie sobs against Steve’s neck, hips jerking along with the movement of Steve’s hand. “Come for me, baby. Let me hear you.”

Eddie whines, high-pitched and needy. “Steve, I’m gonna-” He bites out just as Steve squeezes the head of his dick, his words trailing off into a moan as he tips over the edge. Steve watches Eddie come undone for him—head thrown back as his eyes roll into his head. It’s the hottest thing Steve has ever seen. It’s too much. He needs to come.

He grinds against Eddie’s hip, hard and desperate, chasing his own release as Eddie catches his breath. He’s so close already. 

Eddie must realize it too. “Your turn, sweetheart,” he tells him, his hand finding its way back to his hair, brushing it away from his face. “Fuck baby, you look gorgeous like this. Flushed and needy. Humping my leg, so desperate,” he whispers, kissing Steve’s cheekbones, his jaw, his neck. Little whines escape Steve’s lips as Eddie starts to run his mouth.

“Can’t wait to do this somewhere else, Stevie, someplace where I can drop to my knees and blow you.”

Steve’s breath hitches, his dick twitching when he pictures Eddie on his knees for him—lips wrapped around his dick, eyes molten as he looks up at him. “Oh my God.”

“Yeah? You want that, sweetheart?” 

Steve nods eagerly. “Y-yeah. Wanna blow you too.” 

One of Eddie’s hands cups his cheek. He runs his thumb over Steve’s bottom lip. “‘Course, baby. You can do anything you want to me.” 

Steve’s hips stutter, his brain foggy as he gets closer. “Y-you too. Anything. Fuck, Eddie, please.” 

“I got you, baby, c’mon,” Eddie whispers. His hand travels down until he’s cupping Steve’s ass, urging him to grind harder against his hip. Steve feels like he’s on fire. He’s so close, he can feel it, he just needs something more-

That’s when Eddie tugs harshly on his hair at the same time Steve grinds down, and just like that, he’s done for—he moans Eddie’s name as he spills into his boxers. Eddie kisses him through it, whispering praises against Steve’s lips that make shivers run down his spine. 

Steve can’t kiss him back at first, the aftershocks of his orgasm leaving him feeling a little stupid, yet Eddie doesn’t seem to mind—happily taking control of the kiss, licking into Steve’s pliant mouth. 

Once his brain comes back online, Steve kisses him back lazily until his neck starts to hurt and the arm holding him up cramps and he has to lower himself on top of Eddie, his head resting on his chest. 

They’re quiet for a moment, the only sound in the van is their labored breathing, as well as the rain falling outside, though not as hard as before. 

Eddie runs his fingers through Steve’s hair, which is slowly starting to dry. “We might’ve missed the game—” Eddie starts, and for a moment Steve is confused, having completely forgotten about it, “—but that was definitely a home run.” 

Steve snorts. He gives a weak slap to Eddie’s shoulder. “That’s baseball, you dork.”

“Eh, whatever. I won, ‘s what I’m saying.”

“You lost your money though,” Steve says, absently playing with Eddie’s curls.

“Worth it!” He says, and Steve can hear his grin in his voice. “Hey, it’s not raining as hard anymore. We can try and make it for the last few innings.” 

“Again, Eds, that’s baseball,” Steve giggles. Eddie shrugs, jostling him slightly. “And I told you I’m fine watching it in our hotel. I prefer it, actually. Can’t do this—” He props himself up on his elbow and kisses Eddie, “—at the game.” 

“Good point.”

Steve smirks. “Can’t fuck me at the game either.” Eddie splutters, his eyes nearly bulging out of his face. Steve laughs. “You okay?” 

“Yup! I just- I think my brain broke just by thinking about fucking you.”

“But you want to?” 

A hysterical laugh falls from Eddie’s lips. “Do I- Steve, sweetheart, baby, that’s the understatement of the year. Of the century even!”

Steve smiles, pleased. “Then it’s settled, we skip the game and head straight to the hotel.” He pauses, thinking something over. “Maybe dinner first. It can be our first date.”

“You don’t need to wine and dine me, baby,” Eddie says, “you already got into my pants.” 

Steve glances down at their still wet clothes. “Technically, I didn’t.”

Eddie snorts. “Guess you’re right. Okay! You can take me out to dinner, big boy. Though we should probably change first.” 

Steve shifts, grimacing when he feels the mess in his boxers. The fact that his clothes are soaked only makes him feel more gross. “Yeah, let’s do that.” 

They dig through their duffel bags for dry clothes and use the back of the van to change. Steve lets himself look at Eddie in a way he never allowed himself when he stayed over or when they hung out at the pool and finds Eddie staring right back, both of them smiling—giddy and slightly disbelieving. 

By the time they change, the rain has stopped completely so Steve steps out so he can move to the passenger seat. Eddie simply climbs to the front and flops gracelessly onto the driver’s seat. Steve watches him maneuver his long limbs with a fond smile, reaching over to smooth his hair down. 

Eddie smiles back at him, dimples digging into his cheek. Steve can’t help but lean over the space between them and kiss each of them before finally kissing Eddie’s lips. 

“Are you sure you’re not even a little sad we missed it?” Eddie asks when Steve pulls back. 

He shakes his head, leaning back against his seat. “No, Eds.” He grabs Eddie’s hand, interlacing their fingers together in the space between the seats. “As far as I’m concerned, I already won tonight.” 

“Steve Harrington, you sap,” Eddie teases yet he squeezes Steve’s hand, placing them on top of his leg, refusing to let go, going as far as using his other hand to switch gears as he starts the van. “Let’s make sure you score a few more times tonight.”

“Oh yeah, baby, talk sporty to me,” Steve says in a deadpan tone that makes Eddie cackle loudly.

But despite the two of them joking about it, they score again that night.

And a few more times after that. 

[scoops-aboy86]

Southern Hospitality

Prompt Used: aftercare (@steddiesmuttyseptember) and and fluff (@softsteddieseptember) | Southern Hospitality | Rating: M | CW: weight gain, belly kink, stuffing kink, belly play | Additional Tags: chubby steve harrington, fat steve harrington, feeder eddie munson, alcohol, referenced spanking, masturbation, food as a love language, hedonism, steve harrington has bad parents, brief nancy being tactless

Steve’s parents make an implied appearance here, but not enough to fully tag for. He probably shouldn’t have driven home but no way was he staying overnight with them, so sorry for the suggested driving home intoxicated. 

The fluff is in how Steve feels instantly better when he gets home, even though Eddie is asleep. 🥰 

Also this was first inspired by an ask that I’ll post in a minute and link here. Thank you September challenges for giving me the kick to work on this again!

It’s not that Steve didn’t know Eddie knew how to cook before they’d moved in together. He just hadn’t realized the sheer scale—or he’d thought Eddie didn’t realize, at first. That the whole “It’s bad luck to have leftovers, Stevie” was a smooth redirect to encouraging him to enjoy more, savor everything, again and again. Eddie is phenomenal in the kitchen so it’s not like it’s a hardship or anything. 

Maybe it’s a little bit that Steve is still smarting from Robin moving clear across the world for school, abandoning him. Far be it from him to actually voice any of those feelings… He’d just thought they were forever, you know? Platonic soulmates, attached at the hip for life. A bond that even some super cool P.h.D program in Europe couldn’t come between. She’d never asked him to come along, not even as a joke. But he’s not… He wouldn’t say that he’s hurt, it’s not her fault that he has a life and a boyfriend here tying him down. He just misses her like a lost limb is all. 

Maybe it’s because when Nancy, Jonathan, and Argyle had swung through Indy for a visit, and Nancy had eyed him up and down saying, “You’ve, um, grown!” Which Jonathan had elbowed her for, and Eddie hadn’t even heard because he’d been in the other room getting everybody drinks. Argyle might not have even been paying attention because he’d immediately asked if anyone wanted some Purple Palm Tree Delight—which, to be fair, had soothed Steve’s ruffled feathers immensely. He might’ve better if Robin had been there too,  agreeing wordlessly with him that sure, maybe he has put on some weight, but that’s because he’s finally able to sleep through the night again and can stomach three homemade meals a day instead of being hung up on Upside Down trauma all the time. The trusty old nailbat that used to live in the trunk of his car, or sometimes under his bed, has been retired to a cobwebby corner of the garage. Why can’t Nancy just be glad for how far he’s come?

(She is, Steve knows. It was just a blip, though a prime example of why they probably wouldn’t have worked out even without all the Upside Down crap. And Nancy hadn’t apologized—for that, or anything else really but that’s water under the bridge—but she’d at least let it go. Which is a lot, for Nancy Wheeler, Investigative Journalist.)

Anyway, that had just been one night. One night, when every day Steve has Eddie. Wonderful Eddie who always kisses him first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Who makes him breakfast, lunch, and dinner so he doesn’t have to worry about it, and doesn’t shy away from the unhealthy but delicious side of Southern cuisine. They have chicken and waffles once a week, with Steve absolutely soaking his in syrup. And the desserts—holy fucking christ, Eddie has so many recipes and they’re all stored seemingly endlessly in his brain, every one of them a winner. 

Whatever the reason, either the little stings or the healing balm of things going wonderfully in his relationship, Steve hasn’t bothered to note the signs. Overall, everything is fine. Why worry about anything when he’s so happy?

The sex they have after especially heavy meals have become Steve’s favorite; the kind where he’s left so full he almost doesn’t want to, could just as easily take a nap instead, but Eddie takes the time to tease him until he’s squirming, whining for it. Sometimes Steve plays up his reluctance a bit just to stretch things out even further, the thrum of anticipation in his veins and taste of good food and Eddie on his tongue. Sometimes he could swear that Eddie has extra hands because of the way he’s so comprehensively everywhere—buoying him up, holding him down, introducing him to pleasure after pleasure until Steve is spilling over with it and yet somehow Eddie still catches him, all of him. 

Though it’s funny… for someone who thinks leftovers are bad luck, Eddie always seems to prepare way too much food for two people. Steve has never been one to turn down a home cooked meal when he can get it so he always gamely does his best. It’s not like Eddie ever makes a big deal if he can’t finish, just sympathetically rubs his overtaxed stomach whenever he admits to being too full. 

And willingly hands him anything he changes his mind about if the rubbing soothes his burbling tummy enough. 

So yeah. Steve knows he’s gained some weight, but it doesn’t bother him. He’s happy, he’s healthy, and putting a relative value on his waistline would just be an exercise in manufacturing stress. He’s had enough of that shit to last a lifetime. 

The denial about just how much weight he’s gained lasts right up until a particularly long evening at his parents’ house. It’s one of those ‘social gathering’ things they like to do, basically a dinner party without calling it that. Steve only goes because there’s one last matter of his inheritance that he needs to clear up with his dad before he can basically cut ties with them indefinitely; he’s not there for the collection of eligible young ladies his mother has invited for the occasion, after all, and hadn’t even bothered passing along the half-hearted invitation to bring his ‘roommate’ along. Eddie hates these things almost as much as Steve, and has an early shift at the garage tomorrow anyway. 

The food is crap. He doesn’t bother telling his mom to fire the caterer, just drinks too much and goes home hungry despite making quick work of quite a few trays just for something to do between his lines in the mind-numbing small talk. Thinks he might’ve been rude to some of those poor girls whose only real fault was not being Eddie, but, oh well. At least now they won’t try to call. 

On the drive back to his and Eddie’s apartment, he cranks the windows and leaves them open the whole way in an attempt to sober up. It kind of works. 

~

Steve finally gets home around three in the morning, shuffling into the apartment, stripping out of his stupid formal clothes piece by piece and step by step as soon as the door shuts behind him. It’s expensive fabric, and it’ll wrinkle being thrown around like that—he doesn’t care. Had distantly registered hours ago that the suit was a little tight, even though he could’ve sworn the tailor at the dry cleaners had taken it out enough just last week. But, again, Steve doesn’t care. He’s distracted. 

His stomach is growling. He's down to nothing but his briefs and socks and he needs real food, not puff pastry appetizers with more air than filling or weird under-seasoned crap piled onto limp endives. Eddie is long asleep, but if he’s quiet…

Yes, jackpot. Steve leans into the glow spilling out the refrigerator door, scanning hungrily over the stacked Tupperware containers labeled with Eddie’s swooping, spidery handwriting and grins. Bad luck my ass. This is the best thing that’s happened to him all night. 

The only thing he bothers to put in the microwave is the gravy boat. Eddie’s gravy is so good hot he could literally drink it—can and has and will again—but the rest is good regardless of temperature. Or at least, that’s what he tells himself as he pulls a stack of containers out and starts popping lids. Pancakes and bacon and breakfast sausages from that morning, too eager to bother finding a fork and instead just popping each bite straight into his mouth with his fingers. Chicken salad from lunch, which he piles up between hefty slices of homemade bread and eats with one hand while fisting a beer in the other, eager to wash the taste of offensively expensive whiskey from the back of his tongue. Bite, swig, bite, swig, bite, swig… until he finishes the can with a muffled belch, crams the last bit of sandwich in his mouth, and sets himself back up with another of both. He can’t help it, Eddie’s food is so good, almost an acceptable substitute for the man’s presence. 

Almost. But Steve doesn’t want to wake him when he has an early day, so he’ll take what he can get. 

The microwave beeps, and the chicken salad is all gone so Steve redirects himself to fried chicken and gravy. Still not bothering with silverware, he dunks each piece straight into the boat and keeps having to lap up the gravy that drips down his fingers, his wrists, his arms. Wipes it from his face with the back of his hand and licks that up too with a little moan. Another beer, another few belches, and he has plenty of room left to empty the entire large container out. So fucking good—his tastebuds tingling, he barely takes the time to breathe between shoving more greedily past his lips. Steve loves leftovers actually, because they’re like bonus food. You don’t have to order it, or make it, or do anything other than get and eat. It’s perfect. Maybe that’s why Eddie always makes sure they have some after all, because he knows how much his sweetheart enjoys the extras at times like this. Eddie takes such good care of him…

Such good care, in fact, that behind all the Tupperware there is a pristine and exquisitely frosted cake. German chocolate, Steve’s favorite. His mouth waters, but. He’s not quite ready for dessert. 

First, he guzzles down the last of the gravy. It goes down thick and heavy, leaving him panting when he finishes and pleasantly aware of that heaviness in his stomach. The perfect antidote to a stuffy evening surrounded by pretentious assholes, he thinks, already feeling warm and hazy with the comfort of being full. And right back to the far side of tipsy now. 

Now it’s time for cake. He really doesn’t intend to eat the whole thing… He’s finally starting to approach his limit, for one thing. It’s better, easier to eat dressed down like this, because any of his pants would be digging into his middle by now. That happens enough lately that he’s kind of getting used to it, kind of uses it to gauge whether he should stop—but tonight he has no desire to even touch the brakes, not now that he’s gotten going. Not when it’s a delicious overload in all the best ways, even down to the smears of achingly sweet frosting and perfectly moist chocolate cake around his mouth as he works his way through slice after slice. 

Halfway through (not that he’s keeping track), he pauses to get the milk out of the fridge too. Instead of pouring a glass he puts the cardboard spout to his messy lips and pours it straight down his throat in sloppy gulps, desperate to wash it all down so he can fit more. More, because it’s all so good and his full stomach feels good and this has been practically all he could think about all through that stupid party that wasn’t called a party and celebrated nothing. None of those people know how to fucking live. 

And yeah, Steve is also vaguely aware that his belly juts out and sags over the waistband of his briefs, pushing them down in front. He knows he’s reaching the point of overfull where he has to stand differently, big round gut moving as a unit with every breath because it’s packed so tight. He leans back against the counter and finds it bumping into the softness of his back sooner than he expected. His entire midsection hangs, and he keeps absently touching it, smearing chocolate where it juts out at top as he tries to coax more burps out. He’s hit that wall where it’s kind of a slog to keep going, an endeavor, a challenge; he keeps going. Ironically, following the same competitive urges that had made him a decently successful high school athlete. 

Because he’s hungry all the time now, even when he’s full. Doesn’t give it too much thought that his belly has taken over for his brain: there’s food, he wants it, he’s eating it. Loves the flavors and textures, the act of chewing and swallowing, having something in his mouth at any opportunity. 

And then, finally, he reaches for more cake and finds only crumbs and frosting that he scrapes off the platter with still-greedy fingers. Grabs the partly empty milk container, a whole goddamn gallon, and goes to work gulping it down. Feels it settling into the last of the gaps and his tired knees go weak; he slides down the kitchen cabinets to plop heavily on the floor while he finishes. 

Or, almost. There’s still maybe a cup or so left when he finally throws in the towel, because he can taste it in the back of his throat with every strained swallow. 

Steve’s head lolls back, finally sated and bloated from all that dairy, his skin hot and stretched and thrumbing. He gingerly feels over the top of his belly and it’s tight, no give at all. But the rest of him…

Okay. Maybe he’s put on more than just a little weight. His belly rounds out before him so far that he can’t see his own lap, and as firm as it is on top it’s soft on the bottom, teardropping between his meaty thighs to kiss the cool linoleum floor. He slips a hand underneath and lifts, testing; drags his palm over the more-than-just-a-spare-tire spilling over his underwear and bulging out over the sides until his hand passes the widest point and it drops free with a jiggle that affects almost every part of him. Gives it a slap, to more jiggles and a bitten-off groan because it jars his stomach, but not in a bad way. Like when Eddie spanks him, something Steve sometimes has to go out of his way being bratty in order to earn, and there’s pain but following it is a warm rush that makes his jaw drop and cock twitch. 

Like it’s doing now, and Steve realizes suddenly that he can’t reach it. His big, wide, doughy belly is in the way, too stuffed for him to comfortably manhandle out of the way. Too heavy to lug his weight off the floor. Too glutted to care, even as he rocks into the hang of his own fat, pressing wherever he finds provides a little extra pressure against his weak grinding. The fabric of his briefs, he realizes, is wet through with how much he’s leaking, as if his full stomach is pressing directly on the pleasure centers of his brain, a satisfaction so complete that it’s already got him halfway to the edge. 

And that’s how Eddie finds him, smeared with the evidence of his late-night-early-morning snack and breathing so heavily he’s practically moaning. Lazily humping his fat—because he is, Steve’s gotten fat and it feels so fucking good. He’d ignored all the signs because he hadn’t wanted to slow down. Still doesn’t want to, not ever. Indulging feels too amazing. 

Eddie finds him just in time to catch the finale, all of Steve shaking and quivering as he reaches his peak. Comes so hard in his briefs that it seeps between his thighs where they try to rub together on one final, savoring squirm. Bows forward a bit, but hiccups weakly between shallow gasps and sags back against the cabinets when it puts too much pressure on his distended gut. Heaving to catch his breath, blasted out of his mind on pleasure, floating but so decadently heavy at the same time. 

When Eddie comes to him, kneeling down and cupping his pudgy, chocolate-smeared cheek in one hand, Steve can’t even process what he’s saying. It’s like the adults in Charlie Brown, all wah-wah-wah or whatever. Instead of trying to make sense of it, he turns his head slightly and mouths at his boyfriend’s thumb. He sucks the whole thing into his mouth as soon as Eddie lets him and immediately wants more. 

He always wants more these days. It’s like he can’t stop. Even though he knows Eddie has work in the morning and should be sleeping, feels kinda bad that he must have woken him up, he’s by no means disappointed to see the man. 

“N-need you,” he manages between gasps and hiccups. Each of the latter is like another slap, or maybe a squeeze—something hard and fast, whatever it is, like a spanking but like. An internal one. He’s already twitching, starting to get hard again. 

What he wants is Eddie to fuck him, but there’s no way he’s moving right now. Instead, Eddie pulls himself out of his sweatpants and tucks the front of them behind his balls, lazily fisting his cock at about the level of Steve’s panting mouth. And oh, he thinks, starting to drool a little, even better. He licks his plump lips, groaning at the sweet smears of chocolate that light up his taste buds, then lets his tongue loll out in invitation. 

He’s willing to beg for it if he has to. 

Because Steve has gone beyond wanting—he needs Eddie’s cock. It’s all he can think about as Eddie nudges against his wet tongue, smearing his blushing cockhead until all Steve can taste is  that familiar, musky bitterness. Needs to be filled even more, really unhinge his jaw and let everything Eddie cares to give him go straight down his throat just like all the rest. Whines around him when Eddie finally pushes in properly, sucking and licking and nibbling. Grabbing clumsily for Eddie’s hands so he can move them to dig into his hair. It’s already a mess, just like the rest of him. 

A moaning, quivering, empty-headed mess. 

And it feels so good. 

~

Steve comes back to himself some time later, smacking his lips absently and rubbing both hands over his swollen middle with a pleased sigh when he feels clean, recently lotioned skin. His throat feels rough, but no more sore than his jaw. 

He barely remembers Eddie cleaning him up with a series of warm, damp kitchen towels after they finished, murmuring a steady commentary on how flattering it is that Steve likes his food so much. His underwear’s gone, and the dip of the bed beneath his ass is a lot more forgiving and comfortable than the kitchen floor. Fuck, he must’ve been seriously blissed out to not even remember climbing the stairs like this, so stuffed that he aches. 

Working at the mechanic shop has really been paying off for Eddie to get him upstairs in that state, Steve thinks with a pleasant shudder. 

When he lifts his head, he can’t see over his domed, still quivering belly at all and that—

“How come you didn’t tell me I got fat?” Steve asks, slurs a bit, not sure if it’s because of the alcohol in his system or how wholly, blissfully sated he feels. He rubs hands over himself, grabbing and pawing and even slapping a little, transfixed by the idea of achieving perpetual motion, of leaving a handprint somewhere he can’t even see without the help of a mirror. 

Eddie’s hand joins his, a fingertip circling idly around his navel. Little electric jolts of pleasure roll through Steve whenever his boyfriend’s callouses from years of playing guitar rasp against the rim of his increasingly sunken belly button, nudging him towards another hard-on until he’s squirming from something so simple. 

“You really didn’t know?” Eddie murmurs, sounding amused. 

Steve burps, moans, shrugs. “Mm—sort of. Not really. Don’t care, though. Feels good. Your food is the best, Eds, I could eat it all day.”

A Cheshire grin spreads across Eddie’s face, but all he says is, “Thanks, sweetheart.” He doesn’t need to comment on the fact that Steve often does spend all day eating his cooking. That the excesses have started to paint red stretch marks on Steve’s belly and thighs—some of which Steve has found with his fingertips and is stroking, not concerned but definitely curious. 

“It’s like that new thing Robin keeps telling me about,” Steve continues dreamily. (There’s always a new thing for his best friend to talk his ear about whenever she calls, chattering fast to avoid wrecking complete havoc on their phone bill.) “About love languages? Like, how you show it to other people and how you want to hear it back… I think your love language might be food, baby.”

Because he’d come back from his parents’ house starving, and now he’s so blissfully full of his boyfriend’s cooking he’s had two orgasms about it, lazily contemplating a third. So that sounds about right, as metaphors or whatever go. 

“Making it, sure,” Eddie agrees, still teasing his belly button and eliciting the occasional shiver or gassy burp. “What’s yours?”

Steve grins beatifically and shifts to spread his legs, feeling over the lowest curve of his belly. He’s aware now that he’s had it, that he’s been big for a while; doesn’t know how he hadn’t quite realized before tonight, because the way his own body gives and squishes and springs back as he explores his fatness is electrifying, all-encompassing

Tomorrow he’ll track down a scale and see how much he’s gained. Maybe do some clothes shopping before his next shift, size up his wardrobe as needed. Most likely get more groceries. They’ll definitely talk about this: both Steve’s not so little journey of self-discovery tonight and how on board Eddie already is with it. 

For now, because he doesn’t remember the official love languages Robin had told him about, Steve just says, “Pretty sure mine is eating it and then wanting you to fuck my brains out. I know you have to be up early, but—”

Eddie growls deep in his throat, lunging for the lube in the nightstand drawer before shoving Steve’s thick thighs further apart and planting himself in between—exactly where they both want him. 

Permanent tag list (ask to be added/removed): @hotluncheddie @lawrencebshoggoth @sofadofax @irishvampireboy @oatmilk-vampire

@wheneverfeasible @hamiltonswiftie @grtwdsmwhr @yesdangerpls @theseaofdespair

[steddie-island]

Do it for him

Written for week one of @softsteddieseptember Prompt: Facing your fears WC: 1,517 | Rating: T | Tags: Hurt/comfort, Steve has a fear of doctors, Eddie Munson lives See ao3 for the full list of tags Dividers by @steddiecameraroll-graphics

It should have been easy, something he didn't need Eddie here with him for, but it wasn't.

The room was cold, and despite the layers of clothes and the crinkly paper beneath him, the table was somehow even colder. There were goosebumps over Steve's arms that weren't brought on by the cool air.

It should've been fucking easy, but Steve was fighting the urge to throw up.

"Hey." Eddie's arm came up and wrapped around his shoulders, tugged him closer. "I'm right here."

Steve didn't trust his voice, could only find the energy to give a quick nod. It wasn't that he didn't trust Eddie, or that Eddie didn't make sitting there easier.

Steve hadn't seen a doctor since Starcourt. Since he and Robin had been tied back to back, since he'd been tortured and they'd come thisfuckingclose to being dissected. Even after Vecna, after he'd been chewed up and spat back out by the bats, Steve had insisted on not going to a doctor. Hopper had gotten it. He'd had stitched Steve up, had gotten him a prescription.

Their experiences might've been different, but the scars and the nightmares were similar enough that he didn't push. Steve had seen the effort it'd taken, too, for him to sit there while he sewed Steve back together. Every comment had been bitten back, the only sign that there was something to hide in the way the sheriff released his breath.

Steve had sat by Eddie's side in the hospital, once he'd been given the okay himself, but that was different. He could watch. Could guard.

Could use his bat if anyone so much as looked at Eddie the wrong way. That'd taken some convincing, too, to get the nurses to let him keep it in Eddie's room with him. Steve still wasn't sure what Hopper had said, but after the second or third day they'd mostly stopped paying him and his weapon any mind.

Steve's grip only loosened when Eddie's eyes opened up again.

It was a long road to recovery. It took a week for Eddie to not sleep through most of the day, then another week for him to eat anything more solid than chicken noodle soup. Week three they (albeit reluctantly) declared everything healed enough for him to get out of bed long enough to be wheeled down to Max's room to sit with her for a while.

After the hospital came months of physical therapy. Steve was right there, making sure Eddie made it to every appointment. Even on the days when Eddie shouted, when Eddie threw his books at the wall to try and push Steve away. Even on the days when Eddie broke down, because it was hard, and it fucking hurt, and the progress was so goddamn slow he was going crazy.

Steve was there when Eddie stopped fighting him, because even though the pain didn't go away he could feel the changes happening to his body, could finally tell that he was getting better.

Somewhere between one appointment and the next, over cheeseburgers and milkshakes and joints shared in the middle of the night when neither of them could sleep, something shifted between the two of them. Neither of them could remember who actually made the first move, but it didn't matter in the long run.

Now Eddie was the one doing the pushing. He was a better pusher, really didn't have to push much when he could just turn those deep, wide eyes on Steve.

"I'm worried about you," he'd whispered in bed one morning, when Steve was in that soft space between sleep and wakefulness. "I know your hearing is getting worse, and you need glasses… I know you didn't get looked at after everything, and I get why, but…" He'd kissed Steve's hair, his temple, his cheek. "I can't lose you. Please, Stevie. For me?"

That was all it had taken for Steve to crumple— something Robin had bitched about later, because she'd been begging Steve to go to the doctor for literal years. Eddie hadn't even had to mention the chronic migraines that put him down for days sometimes.

Once Steve had agreed, Eddie and Robin did the calling around, did the appointment making.

Now there they were, and Steve wanted to be sick. When he'd agreed he hadn't actually expected anything to happen, but of course his soulmates hadn't let him get off that easily. He hated them.

He loved them so much it was a physical sensation deep in his chest sometimes.

"I'm right here," Eddie reminded him. He had time to brush a kiss over Steve's temple before the door was opening and a man in a white coat stepped inside.

It wasn't just one doctor's visit. There were more physicals, there were x-rays and MRIs and visits where they checked his eyes and his ears. Eddie was still right there for every appointment, holding on to him when he could. When he couldn't actually be by Steve's side, he spoke to him from where the doctors said he could stand. That wasn't as good, but it got Steve through without him melting down right then and there.

The meltdowns always happened later, when they were in bed together, when Steve could let the stress of the day go and fall apart in Eddie's arms. Eddie held him, kissed his tears away and whispered how good Steve had done, how proud, and how grateful he was that Steve was taking care of himself, especially since he was doing it for someone else and not for himself.

Sometimes Steve fell asleep with Eddie whispering those sweet things into his hair. Sometimes he calmed down enough for Eddie to let him go, to start kissing down his neck and start sliding down his body, beneath their comforter. "You took care of yourself today, now let me take care of you, too."

Sometimes Steve ended up crying after that, too, but it was for a different reason. It was for how hard Eddie loved him, how softly he was touched, as if he were the most precious thing in the world.

Because Eddie believed he was the most precious thing in the world.

"What do you think?" Steve blinked at Eddie from behind his new glasses. They were simple, round gold frames he'd picked out with Robin.

With his new hearing aid he didn't have to strain to hear Eddie's small intake of breath.

"I didn't know it was possible for you to look better than you already did," Eddie said. He cupped Steve's face between his palms and tipped his head this way and that, getting a look at the glasses from every angle. "You're so fucking beautiful, sunshine."

Steve wrapped his arms around Eddie and buried his face against the worn fabric of his shirt. "Thank you," he murmured.

"For liking your glasses?" Eddie shook his head. "You don't have to thank me for that."

"No, not for— for that." Steve lifted his head and brushed his bangs out of his eyes. "For staying with me. For helping me through this. I know it wasn't easy. I wasn't easy, but you stayed with me." His fingers fidgeted nervously with Eddie's shirt. "You didn't have to, but you did."

"Wasn't easy?" Eddie pressed closer, so Steve's back bumped against the counter behind him. "It was the easiest thing in the world for me. I hated seeing you upset, but it meant you weren't letting these things stay unchecked." His thumbs stroked Steve's cheeks, and Steve leaned into the touch. "We have a baseline now, to know if things get worse. You have medicine now, so you won't have to suffer through a migraine the way you did before. That was easy, sunshine."

Steve felt more than saw Eddie's smile as he was pulled against his boyfriend's chest again.

"Even if you would've been as much of a pain in the ass as I was, even if you'd yelled and pushed me away, I would've stayed. Because you stayed, too. You made me take care of myself."

Steve sniffed softly— he wasn't sure when he started crying, but he could feel the tears that weren't trapped behind his glasses soaking into Eddie's shirt. "You fought so hard to stay alive, couldn't let you give up."

"You did, too." Eddie kissed the top of Steve's head. "You've been surviving for so long, making sure everyone else had what they needed. It was time someone returned the favor."

Steve lifted his head, and Eddie brushed over his cheeks again, wiping away fresh tears. "And here I thought that's what you've been doing all this time."

"I had a lot of favors to return," Eddie said. He brushed the tips of their noses together gently.

Steve tried to argue sometimes, when Eddie talked so sweet to him, but as Eddie leaned in to kiss him again, the arguments died in his chest.

Maybe Eddie was right, and it was time to let himself be taken care of after all.

And maybe this time, he would do it for himself.

[softsteddieseptember]

Soft Steddie September Week Three

WEEK THREE PROMPTS(September 15th-21st)

Anniversary | Choosing them | Fluff | Matchmaker | Saying I love you

[miss-bushido]

Every color illuminates

This was written for the Soft Steddie September prompt 'watching the sunset'. This is my first time participating in it, and I had so much fun! You can read below or find it on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/58786024

Soft Steddie September @softsteddieseptember

Prompt: watching a sunset (week one)

Rating: T (kissing, love confessions)

Eddie pulled the blanket off of his shoulders, shaking it in the air before he set it on the ground. Recent autumn rains had ensured anyone who was unfortunate enough to sit down on the grass would have a wet butt. Some more unfortunate than others would have a muddy butt, and, well. No one wanted either, but especially not the latter.

He lay down on his back, letting out a contented sigh as he put his hands behind his head. He closed his eyes, letting his other senses take precedence for the moment.

“Comfortable?” Steve asked, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. He maneuvered so he was on his knees next to Eddie. He leaned over Eddie’s body, setting the thermos of hot chocolate and small bag of sweets he’d brought with him on the grass to Eddie’s left.

“Not yet,” was the response as Eddie opened one eye to look up at Steve. He waited until the food was on solid ground before he reached up with both hands and pulled until Steve was on top of him, their chests pressed together.

“Well, this can’t be comfortable for you,” Steve said, a big grin on his face.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Eddie grinned back, moving his hand into Steve’s hair to gently pull him down for a kiss. He normally wasn’t this bold in public with his affections. The delicate sensibilities of the townspeople couldn’t handle two guys kissing. Much less the guys in question being Eddie Munson- town deviant and Satan worshipping drug dealer- and Steve Harrington- golden boy and favorite son of the town. They’d probably accuse Eddie of being a witch and putting a spell on Steve to make him go against everything wholesome and decent. All those American values gone up in smoke because the Munson boy got his claws into Steve Harrington.

The reality was that Steve was the one who had made the first move. And if anyone was bewitched, it was Eddie. The way Steve made him feel, the affection he freely offered, his insatiable appetite for everything having to do with Eddie Munson. It would have been overwhelming in anyone else, but there was something so very Steve about it. He gave himself fully and freely. Nothing was held back from his lovers.

The look in his eyes belied the outward affectation he showed to the town at large. Cool, confident, effortlessly charming. Steve was all of those things, but he was also sensitive, loving and eager to please. Both of them could be the truest versions of themselves around the other. Which is all anyone could ask for in a relationship, really.

Steve kissed him a few more times before he pulled back, his face flushed. “Okay, hot stuff. Let’s save this for when we get back to your place.”

Eddie made a whimper as Steve pulled away, but relented. He pushed himself up and looked at the sky. They were here to watch the sunset. It was a date idea that he’d thought up about a week ago, and their schedules had finally aligned for this blustery autumn evening. It was Friday afternoon, quickly turning into evening, and most of the town was, or would be, at the high school football game.

Another championship game. Maybe Hawkins would win. If Eddie, or even Steve, gave two shits about that.

But the fact that everyone in town was otherwise occupied, they didn’t have to worry about someone coming along and catching them. Sneaking around sucked, but it was better than the alternative.

“It’s so vibrant,” he said, drinking in the golden hues of copper mixing with the rose and vermilion currently coloring the sky. Eddie had always loved sunsets. The world bathed in that golden hour light as the day faded. From the time it took for the sky to light up until the sun sank below the horizon, it was as though all the bad shit was hidden, and the world showed how beautiful it could truly be.

Not the least because he had the most handsome guy in town sharing this experience with him. Eddie wrapped an arm around Steve’s waist, anchoring himself to his boyfriend. “The wind’s picked up,” he said, nuzzling his head against Steve’s broad shoulder

Steve hummed in agreement, wrapping his arm around Eddie’s shoulder. He gave Eddie’s forehead a kiss, not taking his eyes off the sky.

“I wish I was good at art,” Steve said after about twenty minutes. “I’d love to be able to paint this, so I could always remember it.”

“Just the sunset, or…”

“This whole moment. The sunset. The hill. You.” Steve turned to look at Eddie again, his hazel eyes almost green in the light. “I want to paint it so I can disappear into the memory whenever the world gets dark and terrible.” The hand on Eddie’s shoulder moved up into his hair as Steve spoke. “You help make it not terrible, Eds.”

Eddie blushed. “Could say the same for you, Stevie.” Since they’d begun dating, Eddie had felt more secure in himself and his place in the world than he had before. “I don’t know when I’ve ever felt so happy. I really l-“

“-Love you,” Steve finished at the same time Eddie did.

Both of them gawped at the other for a moment before the smile on Eddie’s face felt as though it would crack. “You love me?” he asked, scared that he was mistaken. That he was imagining what he’d heard and what he wanted to hear.

“Of course I do,” Steve said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I’m just so glad you love me, too.” He looked a little sheepish. “I was worried…” Steve didn’t finish the thought, but Eddie knew what he didn’t say.

Instead of using words, Eddie pulled Steve to the left so he could kiss him. Touch him. Make him realize how much he was loved and deserved the love people gave him. “I could never love anyone more than I love you, Steve,” he breathed against his lips. “You’re everything to me.”

“Eddie,” Steve said, the emotion in his voice evident. “I only want you. All of our days and nights. Sunrises and every sunset we can have. It doesn’t have to be here. Just as long as we’re together.”

He felt like he was going to cry. Steve looked like he was two seconds away from doing that as well. “Well, you have me, Steve. We can start all that. Right now.” He kissed him hard, feeling the tears slide down his cheeks as he closed his eyes.

He pulled back, and glanced to the left. “The sunset’s almost over. We can make this our first. How’s that for a memory?”

Steve nodded, blinking away his own tears. “And just think: I didn’t even have to buy any paint.” He smirked a little, and gave Eddie another kiss before wrapping both arms around him.

They held one another as the golden hour light faded into the plums and indigos of the evening.

Their first sunset, huh? The others had a lot to live up to. And neither of them could wait to see what they might have in store.

[runninriot]

missed wiggly wednesday again, so here's a Smutty Steddie Songfic September snippet instead 😇

“I’m telling you, Stevie! That guy had no shame whatsoever. Didn’t even hesitate to pull blank in front of me to show off that ridiculous tattoo right above his dick. It was horrendous! I even offered to cover it up for free but he declined, said the ladies dig it.”

Eddie snorts and shakes his head. The things you have to put up with sometimes in his field of work never ceases to amaze him.

   “But hey, can’t say I didn’t like the overall view. A feast for my imagination. I’ll definitely use it the next time I’m ‘feeling lonely’.”

He uses his fingers to sign quotation marks and wiggles his eyebrows, delighted at the blush creeping up Steve’s cheeks when he realises what Eddie means by that.

Steve’s always been a little shy when it comes to talking about these things but they’ve been friends long enough for him to have gotten used to Eddie’s big, unfiltered mouth.

Eddie loves to rile him up, just a little, never so much that it makes him truly uneasy but enough to get a little kick out of it himself.

Steve’s cute when he blushes.

He’s damn fucking pretty, always, is the thing.

So what if Eddie stares a little too obvious? It’s not his fault Steve is so-

Nevermind.

He averts his gaze, takes a sip from his drink to cool off, giving Steve the chance to change the subject to something else.

  "Sometimes I fuck you in my head."

Eddie splutters his mouthful of beer half over himself, half over the table, can't believe he heard Steve right.

No. That must be a mistake because he can't possibly have said that.

Right?

   "I don't know why, it's just- sometimes when I touch myself, I think of you, you know?"

Eddie does, in fact, not know. Because what?

   "Steve, dude, look at me. Did you take something? Without me?"

He must've. There's no way he'd talk that much bullshit if he was sober. But they've only been here for ten minutes, fifteen max, both still on their first beer and there is no way in hell Steve is already that drunk.

So this must be something else.

Because it is absolutely impossible that his straight best friend would ever fantasize about anything other than boobies and soft lips and long lashes and, hell, maybe even a tight juicy ass – a woman’s ass – to get him going.

Steve Harrington does not think about guys when he touches himself. And most certainly not about Eddie.

He’s messing with him, that must be it. A little revenge for Eddie being insufferable.

   “Hah, that was good, Harrington. For a moment I really thought you’d lost your mind,” Eddie laughs half-heartedly in a weak attempt to cover up the slight tremble in his voice.

    For a second you got me thinking my pining ass died and went to heaven, is the thought he keeps to himself.

Another second goes by and Eddie is still waiting for Steve to laugh, to maybe swat his arm and tell him ‘Ha! Got’cha! You should see your stupid face.’ but that doesn’t happen. Instead, the air thickens and the tension between them makes Eddie nervous.

Then, finally, after what feels like an eternity, Steve opens his mouth.

But somehow, that only makes it worse.

   “Is- is that bad?”

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