#Steve harrington fanfic

[andvys]

The edges of your soul (I haven't seen yet) ⭐︎ chapter seven

⭐︎ Fall back into place. Fall back...

Warnings: hurt/comfort, mentions of sex, mentions of sex toys, post apocalypse au, mentions of death, mentions of cheating (past relationships), grumpy x sunshine

Pairing: Steve Harrington x fem!reader

Summary: Your first solo trip with Steve goes a little wrong and yet it pushes you closer... much closer than ever before.

Word count: 10.6k+

Author's note: Things are heating up y'all, we're getting closer and closer to the good stuff hehe. give @hellfire--cult some loving she deserves it, she helped and wrote a lot here !!!!

series masterlist ⭐︎ previous chapter

☀︎

“There’s a gun store about two miles from here. If we go now, we can make it back before it gets dark.” Eddie explains as he points his finger at the map, tracing the road on it to the required destination. “If not then we gotta find shelter for the night but we’re definitely not getting through that with the RV.” The look on his face is skeptical as he looks up at the blocked highway. Time froze here just like it did in most places. Cars and trucks litter the highway, making it impossible to find a passageway in between. 

Nancy’s eyebrows are furrowed as she looks down anxiously. 

“Can’t we just try our luck somewhere else?” She asks knowing that you can’t all go together, someone will have to stay back with the RV. 

Steve shakes his head at her. 

“We need the ammo, we have barely any left and who knows what we’ll run into out here.”

“Yeah and we got a long wasteland ahead of us,” you mumble as you fidget with your fingers. 

“Who says we’ll get lucky?” Nancy questions, looking between you and Steve before her eyes fixate on Eddie. “The store might be empty and the town might be crawling with infected.” 

“We have to try, Nancy. We’re also low on food, it’s been weeks since we found anything.” 

You are surviving off your savings now. You’re not sure how many cans of food you got left in the cabinets of the RV. The last time you got lucky was the day you taught them how to successfully kill the infected. You’re just glad that you were able to find water and gas and stock up on that since then. 

But you need more, more gas, more food, more ammo, more guns or else you won’t survive this winter – or barely. The moment you find your way back on the highway with miles and miles of no towns ahead of you, you will be doomed, all of you. You have no option but to try your luck in the nearest small town. 

Nancy sighs, looking up again, she looks between you all before nodding. 

“Fuck. Yeah, yeah okay.” 

A small smile appears on your face and you nod at her, bringing your hand up to her shoulder. 

“Who knows, maybe we’ll find some gas,” you shrug, glancing at the abandoned cars on the road. “I’m sure there’s plenty in the tanks. We’ll just siphon it.” 

Eddie raises his eyebrows at you, his brown eyes flashing with curiosity as Steve eyes you up and down. 

“And what do you know about siphoning, sweetheart?” He smirks a little. “You ever done it before?”

You shake your head, chuckling softly as your eyes meet the curious ones of Steve. He opens his water bottle and brings it up to his lips. 

“Nope. Can’t be too hard though right?” You shrug as you begin to make your way back inside the RV to get your backpack ready. “Just need a hose and do some sucking, easy peasy.”

Steve nearly chokes on his water when Eddie looks at him suggestively after those words leave your lips. His cheeks flush red as the metalhead wiggles his eyebrows at him. 

In the past few weeks, Steve has suffered relentless teasing from him and it’s starting to get on his nerves. Not only do his comments make him feel flustered, they also make him blush… constantly. Ever since he saw you stuffing those panties into your backpack, his body had been acting weird. His stomach constantly flutters, his cheeks heat up when he sees more of your skin than he should, when his eyes unwillingly fall onto your butt whenever you bend over to tie your shoelaces or to pick something up. 

Steve knows that he is deprived. That his body craves to feel the touch of another, to feel the warmth of someone else, to feel the touch of gentle hands on his skin. You happen to be the only option around he can fixate himself on in this way. At least that’s what he tells himself. 

By the way Eddie’s lips curl into an evil smirk, Steve just knows that something dirty is about to fall from his mouth. 

“Bet she knows a lot about that,” he cackles as he folds the map and presses it against Steve’s chest, forcing him to take it. “Who knows, maybe you’ll find out.” Eddie shrugs. 

Steve huffs at the metalhead, shaking his head in annoyance. Though his cheeks still flush a deep red. 

Nancy rolls her eyes at them both, uncrossing her arms, she walks away from them both and follows you inside. 

“Guess it’s me and her then?” Steve murmurs, avoiding the teasing eyes of his friend. 

Eddie hums, still smirking. 

“Yep, you and sunshine,” he chuckles as he taps his shoulder. He looks up into the sky, noting the dark clouds. “And you better not waste any time, looks like luck isn’t on our side today.”

Steve furrows his eyebrows, and he tilts his head up. A frown appears on his face, the grey sky indicates incoming rain. The gust of wind that hits him is cold, icy. 

“Alright,” Steve nods, having hope that you will make it to the town and back before it starts to rain. “We better get going then.”

Eddie nods. 

“We’ll park the RV behind the trees over there and wait there until you get back,” Eddie points out to the nearby forest. 

Steve looks to where he’s pointing at and he nods. 

“We might have to set up camp somewhere else if it starts raining… or worse storming.” Steve mumbles, not feeling very fond of the idea to spend a night with you alone. 

When he turns back to Eddie, he finds him smirking yet again, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. 

“Oh, I’m sure that’s gonna be such a problem, man. Forced proximity with a hot girl? That’s awful. Hopefully your clothes stay on.” 

Steve wants to hit him. He wants to hit him so badly. For teasing him the way that he is. For calling you hot. 

Eddie chuckles at the glare that is directed at him. He is enjoying this more than he probably should. 

He slaps Steve’s shoulder, pushing him back towards the RV. 

“Come on, grab your protection, you’ll need it.” Eddie mumbles, trying not to smirk at his own words. He feels Steve’s eyes on him and when he tilts his head at him, he finds him glaring harder than before. 

Eddie lifts his shoulders innocently, “what? I was talking about your gear. Get your mind out of the gutter, King Steve. Jeez.” 

Steve huffs, rolling his eyes. 

“Mhmm sure you were, Munson.” 

Nancy arms are crossed, her back pressed against the wall beside the window as she watches you. You seem unfazed, fastening your thigh holster and securing the gun inside before you reach for your jacket. A leather jacket Eddie had found in an abandoned car a few days ago, claiming that it was made for you. 

“Are you sure you wanna do this?” 

You turn around to face Nancy, instantly noticing the worried look in her eyes – she tries not to show it but it’s there. You know the worry is mostly reserved for Steve. 

“We have to.” 

You throw your backpack on and step closer to her, placing your hand on her shoulder. 

“I’m used to scavenging. I’ve survived big cities before. This is nothing,” you shrug, smiling at her. “And don’t worry about Steve, I’ll bring him back in one piece.” 

Nancy tilts her head to the side, furrowing her eyebrows. 

It’s not just him she worries about. 

“I want both of you back in one piece.” She frowns, shaking her head a little as she uncrosses her arms. “I don’t like it when you go out there.” 

Your eyes soften. A comfortable feeling spreads inside of you, something warm. 

Nancy is confused by the look of surprise in your features. You’re eying her like you don’t understand why she is so worried about you. 

She doesn’t know that no one ever did, no one except your family. 

You shrug and slowly back away, smiling reassuringly. 

“I always come back.” You grab onto the straps of your backpack. “Nothing can get me.” 

“That…” Nancy hesitates, frowning even deeper than before. “That doesn’t comfort me in any way.” 

A chuckle falls from your lips as you start to make your way out of the RV. Walking down the steps, you look over your shoulder. 

“The glass is always half empty for you isn’t it? Have a little faith in me, Nancy.” 

She rolls her eyes at you, though she can’t hold back the smile. 

“I do.” 

Eddie’s chuckle grabs your attention. You turn towards him to find him whispering something into Steve’s ear. The latter pushes him away, rolling his eyes and scoffing loudly before he walks away from him and past you, mumbling something about grabbing his stuff. 

Normally, you would have thought nothing of it but the flushed cheeks and the embarrassed look in his eyes reminds you of the day when he walked into the half naked mannequins. 

Both your eyes and Nancy’s follow his figure until he disappears into the RV. 

Nancy looks amused as she turns to Eddie, whose grin is wide and his eyes are filled with mischief. 

You raise your eyebrows at the metalhead, questioning him with your eyes but he only shrugs at you. 

“What…” 

“Ready?” Steve comes back out with a backpack slung over his shoulder, his nailed bat tucked into it. He fixes the strap on his rifle as he stops beside you. 

You nod, trying to look into his eyes though he avoids your gaze. You notice how flushed his cheeks still are. You know that whatever Eddie had said to him, flustered him and you wondered what it could probably be. 

You breathe in slowly and take another look at the smug metalhead. He winks at you, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively which only makes you more confused, especially when Steve scoffs again. 

“Uh… yeah, I’m ready.” 

“Alright,” Steve murmurs under his breath. He nods at Nancy and then at Eddie but not without rolling his eyes at him once more. He taps your back two times, nodding at the road ahead of you. 

“Let’s do this.” 

-

Another house, another disappointment. Even the stores are almost empty, except for a few cans and bottles here and there. You haven’t made it to the gun store yet but you already know that Steve lost hope already, he didn’t say it but you can see it in his eyes and how the hope slowly fades after walking out of yet another building with empty hands and an unfilled backpack. 

You’re strolling through empty streets, of something that once used to be a busy town – you can tell by the many stores on the main street. Broken windows and messes litter the little shops that once were neat and pretty to look at. Cars are parked in front of the stores, windows broken and doors left open. 

There is nothing here. 

It’s a ghost town, just like any other you have come across. 

The sound of your footsteps and Steve’s heavy sighs are the only sign of life here. Not even monsters or infected seem to be around. 

You tighten the grip on your machete, still looking around, trying to spot something that could be of importance.

“I hate to admit it,” you pause and take a deep breath. You avoid his eyes when you feel them on you. “But maybe Nancy was right.” 

To your surprise, Steve chuckles and shrugs. 

“Don’t tell her that, she’ll say ‘I told you so’ with that annoying smug look on her face.”

A soft laugh falls from your lips, and you nod. 

He looks under the cars to make sure that nothing won’t crawl out from under there. The two lines between his eyebrows are prominent. His shoulders are tense, his whole body is. 

There is a shop on the far end of the street, right next to something that once used to be a liquor store. It peaks your interest. You furrow your brows and squint your eyes, trying to see better. 

“Let’s check this out,” you murmur and lift up your machete, pointing at the shop with the sharp end of your blade. 

Steve’s eyes follow where you’re pointing, and he can’t tell what it is from this distance. His sight is getting blurry every time he tries to look far ahead. Consequences of the many concussions he probably had through the years.

“Lead the way,” he states and quickly comes to regret it when only a few steps later, you both halt before the shop. It takes him a minute or two to realize what you have led him to. His cheeks warm at the sight of things displayed on the showcase. The red colors, the fuzzy material, the… toys. He blinks a few times, trying to swallow the embarrassment creeping up inside of him as he looks up at the sign that once used to glow in the night; Girls, Girls, Girls. Adult Store.

A giggle falls from your lips, pulling him out of his thoughts. He tilts his head down and looks at you. He doesn’t know why but the sight before him feels a little unexpected. He didn’t think that your eyes would shine at the sight of… well… that. He also didn’t think that you would react so calmly to something like this, especially compared to him. 

He doesn’t have to look at his own reflection to know that his cheeks are a furious red. 

And it’s not that he’s a stranger to… sexual things but he has also become very timid as he got older. The past few years have also changed for him, he can’t even remember the last time he touched someone or even thought about touching someone. 

As he stares at you, at the mischievous look on your face, the sparkling eyes and the teasing grin that begins to form on your lips, he wonders about you. He wonders about the experiences you had before this world or even after. He wonders what you have been like and what kind of things you have been up to. If you had been dating around, if you had something serious going on or if you preferred casual. 

He never asked himself these things before and with good reason but now he can’t help but wonder and let his mind race.

He always deemed you as shy, maybe even innocent. 

But it doesn’t seem like it now, quite the opposite. 

“We should go inside–”

He opens his mouth to speak, wanting to protest and stop you from making his case even more awkward but he doesn’t even get the chance to. You grab your crowbar from your backpack, putting your machete away, you easily pick the lock. 

Steve brings his hand up to the back of his neck, scratching it awkwardly as he looks around. He clears his throat as he tries to sound casual, nonchalant, when he is anything but. 

“W-What’d you want in there, sunshine?” He asks and almost cringes at himself for the shakiness in his voice. 

You open the door with ease and step inside after taking a peek first, making sure that it’s not infested with something. You look over your shoulder, grinning widely as you wiggle your eyebrows. 

“I don’t know but the dildo section is funny.” You say before you walk inside, leaving him in the doorway stunned. 

His eyes are wide as he stares at your back, bouncing back and forth on his feet as something flushes deeply through him. 

So this isn’t your first time visiting one of these shops. 

Steve closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, shaking his head. 

“We’re wasting time here… or are you trying to take out infected with dildos in the future?” 

Your giggle sounds through the store, making his own lips curl slightly, easing the tension within him. 

“It’s worth a try! Now come inside, Steve!” You call out to him. “Please…!”

This is insane. This is crazy. Not even before all this, before the world went to shit, did Steve step foot inside a sex shop. He can’t lie though, it always made him a little curious. 

He sighs and takes another look around before he decides to step inside. 

“Fine..” He murmurs under his breath and closes the door behind him. He clears his throat as he follows the sound of your footsteps. “Where are you…?”

His cheeks are still flushed, heating up more and more after each step that he takes. Toys, whips and chains are all across the store. A variety of handcuffs hang on the walls. A section of roleplay outfits are on his left. This seems to be the only store untouched. 

“Guess sex shops aren’t a hit in the apocalypse,” Steve mumbles quietly, though loud enough for you to hear. 

“Not many freaks around… or at least those kinds of freaks.” 

He follows the sound of your voice and your laugh. 

The fact that you even suggested trying your luck here tells him that you are one of those freaks left in this world. Not in a bad way. 

Steve halts in his tracks when he finds you in the little adult movies section – it’s similar to the one back in Hawkins in Family Video, minus the red curtain. You already grabbed one of the cowboy hats from the roleplay section and put it on your head. Steve would have laughed if he didn’t feel so flustered about this whole situation. 

“Everyone I did last summer.” 

Steve furrows his eyebrows as he stares at the back of your head. 

With a giggle you turn around to look at the man behind you, holding up the tape in your head, showing him the title. 

“Is that your movie?” 

Steve’s face falls into a glare, his head falls to the side as a humorless laugh escapes his mouth, “ha ha.” 

Your eyes crinkle and you laugh again, turning back around. 

He places his hands on his hips and sighs. He can’t remember the last time he did someone, certainly not this year or last. 

“The Sperminator,” you snort. 

Steve looks up at the ceiling, huffing. “Jesus Christ.” 

“The Bone Ranger–”

“Sunshine, we’re wasting our time here!”

You turn around with a frown on your face, pouting softly at him, “take it easy, cowboy. You need a little laugh.”

His eyes fall to your lips for a second before he looks into your eyes. Mistake number one.

“Do you hear me laughing?” 

You shrug and step closer to him, raising your hand up to the pink cowboy hat. You take it off and take another step closer to him. You don’t notice how his breathing hitches or how his eyes widen slightly at the sudden closeness. You rise to your tippy toes and place the hat on his head. 

For a second and only for a second, he lets himself look at you from up close. He takes in the color of your eyes, the dimple on your right cheek, the frown between your eyebrows, the softness of your skin. He digs his nails into his palms and takes a deep breath without meaning to breathe your soft scent in. He doesn’t know how but you always smell good, even without the luxury of every day showers, you always smell good. Sweet and floral – intoxicating. Mistake number two.

“There,” you smile sweetly before you take a step back, pulling him out of his little trance. “Cowboy.” 

He raises his eyebrows at the adoring look on your face and the tension slowly eases in him when he notices how you cower back slowly the longer you look at him. The smile slowly fades and your eyes shine with something different, no longer displaying the mischief from before. You are starting to look… flustered. 

Oh. 

Oh…

“You know what, sunshine?” He murmurs as his lips now curl into a smirk. “I’m starting to think you have a thing for cowboys.”

Your wide eyes and your parted lips are the giveaway. Your throat bobs when you swallow and you stutter, unable to form a sentence. 

“I…” You mumble and turn around, trying not to show your blushing face. “I don’t.” You walk away faster than you did after you walked in on him after his shower and it’s amusing to say the least. He can’t even help but chuckle… loudly. 

A part of him wants to follow you and tease you about it but he pushes his mean side away… for now. The smile still stays on his face and he continues to chuckle even as he turns in the other direction to look for the storage room in hopes of finding something valuable. Though he doubts that he will find anything of importance for this world in here. 

But to his surprise he ends up finding some snacks, some that probably belonged to the staff in here. Pringles and expired chocolate bars along with some cans of soda – it can’t get better than this. Wrong. He also finds batteries, probably for all the sex toys. He stuffs them all into his backpack. He checks out a few more shelves and cabinets before he walks back into the store to look for you. 

He finds you crouching down before your backpack, stuffing something inside that he can’t see. 

“You’re not packing whips and chains are you?” Steve asks, startling you. 

You look over your shoulder, surprised to see him still wearing the hat. You shake your head at him, holding back your chuckle. 

“No. Believe it or not but I found normal clothes – well, as normal as they can get for here.”

Steve raises his eyebrows, “you don’t say?”

You shrug and pull a pair of shorts out, showing them to him. The color reminds him of something he owned once. 

“Are these for me?”

You draw back and tilt your head to the side, chuckling. “No, silly! These are too small!”

“Oh…” He scratches the back of his head. “Uh… they just reminded me of my school shorts.”

“Primary?” You ask as you put them back into your backpack. 

Steve blinks at you, not answering the question. 

“...Middle?”

Silence. 

Your jaw drops and your eyes widen. “Holy shit, Steve! Don’t tell me they made you wear these shorts in high school!” 

Steve shrugs, chuckling awkwardly. 

“Now that I think about it, it’s kind of creepy.” 

You nod with wide eyes. You push yourself off the floor and throw the backpack on. Not saying anything for a moment as you look at him. Your mind unwillingly conjures up images of him in those green shorts, short and tight. You can’t help but giggle, which makes him frown in confusion. 

“I kinda wanna see how they look on you.” 

His wide eyes make you giggle even louder. 

“Uh yeah, that’s not happening!” 

“Why not?” You pout again, making him shake his head harder. 

“Don’t do this.” He points at you. 

“Don’t do what?”

“Don’t pout at me like that.”

You pout even deeper and bat your eyelashes at him, “why, is it working?”

Steve huffs, trying to glare into your eyes. He opens his mouth to protest but you tilt your head even further and you look over his shoulder with furrowed eyebrows. 

You push past him and he turns around curiously. 

“Holy shit, this thing is huge!” 

Steve almost chokes on his spit when you grab one of the toys, a dildo. Your hand wrapped around it tightly. 

He blinks a few times. Heat spreads within his chest and a smugness he tries to push away rises up inside of him the more he looks at the silicone dildo, in the shape of a penis. Veins and all. 

“I… uh… you’d say that’s big?”

“Yeah?! Look at it!” You say as you hold it before his face, like it’s the most normal thing in the world. 

How you are so nonchalant about this, he doesn’t understand but he is amused and even more than that, he is intrigued. 

His lips curl into a slight smirk. He places one hand on his hip as he looks down, clearing his throat. 

“Alrighty then.”

-

The gun store was empty, just like Nancy had suspected. You left nearly empty handed. The only things you have found were a few stray bullets that had probably fallen out from the boxes when people grabbed them in the rush. You found two knives, a hunting knife and a butterfly. You grabbed a new thigh holster and a belt but that’s all. You couldn’t find the ammo that you needed nor any guns or rifles. 

The only food you found was the single cans and the snacks Steve found. 

You can’t help but feel a little defeated. You hoped, you really hoped that you would find valuable things, that you could stock up on enough food and ammo for the next few days at least but you got nothing. And it worries you. The last winter was rough and you barely made it out alive. Now you not only have to worry about yourself but also about your friends. 

“Hey…” 

Steve’s voice pulls you out of your thoughts. You have been walking in silence for the past twenty minutes or so. As you lift your head to look at him, the loud rumble of thunder makes you flinch as a raindrop falls on your cheek and rolls down. 

“This doesn’t look good.” His voice is unsure and filled with anxiety as he looks up into the darkened sky. The clouds start moving faster and faster. The wind blows through the streets, whirling up all the dust and the dirt covering the ground. 

You lift your arm up quickly to protect your eyes. 

The lightning is red and the thunder becomes louder and louder, moving closer as the seconds pass. 

Your heart leaps to your throat when a loud crash sounds through the trees in the woods next to the highway. The cracking sound indicates the falling trees. 

Shivers run down your spine and you swallow harshly. 

“That doesn’t sound good either,” you murmur worriedly as you look up at him. 

He swallows the growing lump in his throat. There is a long road ahead of you both and you don’t have the time to get back to the RV in time before the storm hits. You just made it back on the highway but you still got miles and miles to your destination. 

The rain starts falling slowly at first. Rolling down your cold cheeks softly. Goosebumps rise up on your skin. 

Despite the incoming storm, Steve’s hazel eyes flash with relief, “the good thing is, we don’t have to worry about any creatures… They don’t come out when it rains.” 

“Yeah…”

Steve taps your shoulder as he picks up the pace, clinging onto the hope that you might still get the chance to make it to the RV before it starts storming. 

Your footsteps echo through the empty roads. Your breathing gets heavy and your heart starts pounding. 

When the storm hits and it will hit, you will have no shelter. There is nothing around except for the woods, which isn’t a safe option at all. The red bolts of lightning crash into the trees, causing them to fall. 

“We can–” Before he can even finish his sentence, the rain starts pouring, crashing down onto you both, soaking through your clothes almost instantly. “Fuck!” Steve curses as the cold water hits his face. 

The adrenaline that surges through you makes you immune to the coldness in this moment. You don’t feel it. Not at all. You don’t feel the chilled, icy rain. You don’t even feel the fear anymore as you both start running. 

Your boots hit the ground harshly, water splattering into every direction. 

There is nothing in sight. No gas station. No house. Just the road and the trees and the cars blocking the highway in the distance. 

“We can find shelter in one of the cars!” Steve yells through the rain, squinting his eyes. 

You nod desperately, not wanting to feel the rain anymore on your head. The water drops are heavy and strong and you cannot keep running forever. The moment you stop, you know you will become cold, and you prefer to stop inside a place than out in the rain. 

Another loud crash sounds through the streets, making your heart and your whole body jolt. Only when Steve looks over your shoulder and you take in his wide eyes, do you realize that the lightning crashed into the ground where you had been not even a few seconds ago. 

“C’mon!” He reaches his hand out to you, wrapping it around your own, he holds it tightly and pulls you closer to him as he picks up the pace. 

You don’t feel anything, not even after the crash. No fear. But you feel him. You feel the warmth of his hand. You feel safe. You feel secure, and when he gives your hand a squeeze, you feel something you have never felt before, yet you didn’t know what to call it just yet. 

You let him lead you once you make it to the blocked part of the highway. He holds your hand tightly as he looks for a car that has no broken windows. 

You both barely see through the pouring rain and the darkness as the sky takes on the color of the night. 

“There!” He pushes you towards a black BMW and opens the door to the backseat. You waste no time and get inside, pulling it at his forearm, dragging him in. He shuts the door quickly, muffling the sound of the rain and the crashing of thunder, just a little bit. 

It’s not much more silent in here as it is outside, the rain paddles so loudly against the roof of the car and the windows. You’re both panting, trying to catch your breaths. 

“Fuck…” Steve murmurs as he closes his eyes for a moment. Bringing his arms up to the front seat, he leans his forehead against it. 

“Are you okay?” You whisper, reaching out to touch his back. 

Your own heart is nearly beating out of your chest, your throat is hurting from breathing in the cold air while running. Your hands are shaking from the cold, just like the rest of your body was starting to do but you worry more about him. 

Steve nods. 

He takes a few deep breaths and keeps his eyes closed for a minute or so. 

“Yeah… Yeah, I’m okay.” He mumbles and leans back. He opens his eyes and takes a look at you. Your lips are blue and trembling, your face is soaked just like your hair and all your clothes are. You’re shaking like a leaf and he isn’t even sure if you have realized it yet because your whole face is etched with worry for him. 

His eyes soften and that unwanted feeling surges through him. Mistake number three.

The raging storm and the strong rain tells him that you won’t get out of here any time soon. You’re stuck here for the next hours, even until the next morning. 

“Take your clothes off, sunshine.” 

“W-What?” Your eyes widen, completely stunned at the sudden request. 

Steve removes his backpack and throws it on the passenger’s seat. He looks around the car, trying to find a cover or a blanket. He finds one tucked under his seat, a small one but it will have to suffice. 

He takes his jacket off and throws it into the front seat. 

“We’ll catch hypothermia if we don’t,” he mumbles as he kicks off his shoes before his hands make their way to his belt. “We can’t afford to get sick… And we’re stuck here till the morning. The storm isn’t passing any time soon and even if, we won’t go out there in the middle of the night.”

Embarrassment filled you from head to toe, but you knew he was right. You knew the two of you needed some heat, and you cannot do it with drenched clothes. You nod slowly, feeling shy and the memory of him half naked already filled your mind. 

“I won’t look.” He promises, blushing himself when he takes his soaked pants off. “Now take them off or you’ll feel even colder.” 

You push yourself out of your stupor and swallow the nervousness down. You tear your eyes away from him and look down at your wet clothes. You throw your backpack down and tear your jacket off. Only as your fingers reach your shoelaces do you realize just how cold you are. Your hands are shaking. Your whole body is shaking. 

A pained whimper falls from your lips when you take your shirt off, despite it being covered by the jacket, it’s soaked through as though you took a swim in the lake. 

Steve’s belt clinks when he throws his pants into the front of the car. 

You shiver even more when your soaked hair touches your bare back after you take the last bit of your clothes off, leaving you in just your bra and your panties. If it wasn’t for these circumstances, you would be blushing like crazy, flustered to your core. But you can’t bring yourself to care about the lack of clothes on your skin because once the adrenaline wears off, your weakness kicks in. 

Your fingers start to feel numb and the shakiness in your body refuses to subside. You bring your knees up to your chest and wrap your arms around them. 

You flinch when you feel something soft around you. 

“Here,” Steve whispers after wrapping the blanket around your shoulders without looking at you. 

You look down at the white blanket and instantly bring your hands up to it, tugging it closer. 

“I-I can share.” 

Your teeth clatter and Steve knows that this tiny blanket won’t help much. He didn’t want to look but when he turns to you and he sees just how strongly your shoulders are shaking and your hands are trembling, making his chest hurt at the sight.

He tries not to look at your skin or at the color of your underwear that peeks out from under the blanket. He tries not to look at you in that way. He tries not to look at you. Not now.

“It’s so cold…” You whisper as you rub your hands, trying to find warmth somehow. 

Steve clenches his jaw. He feels angry at himself for getting into this situation, for not deciding to look for shelter back in the town. This could have been prevented. 

He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. He ignores the rumble of thunder outside and the rain. He is too focused on you and on your trembling body and he knows what he has to do. 

He knows it. 

And it won’t mean anything. It cannot mean anything.

He just doesn’t want you to suffer like this. 

He huffs and takes another deep breath before he turns to you, reaching out to you softly. 

“C’mere, sunshine.” 

You look down at his hand before you tilt your head up to look at him as he tugs you closer. 

“Do you trust me?” 

“Yes.” You whisper without a second of hesitation, without an ounce of dishonesty in your voice. 

Another thing that makes his eyes soften and his chest warm. 

His lips twitch as he reaches both arms out, tugging you closer with ease. He grabs your sides over the blanket and lifts you up and onto his body, making you straddle him. 

To his surprise, you instantly latch onto him, curling into his body and wrapping your arms around him like it’s a familiar place. You bury your face in his neck and press your chest against his, clinging to him after wrapping the blanket around him too. 

A sigh falls from your lips, “thank you, Stevie,” you whisper into his neck. 

He blinks. 

His body is a little stiff, his heart frozen in his chest as it stops beating for a second as he feels the beating of your own. Your skin on his. Your hands on him. Your breath on his neck. Your lips on his neck. 

Only now did he realize how cold he was as well. Feeling your warmth against him, the natural heat of your body soothed him. He sighed in relief, not having noticed his own discomfort, his own shivering because he worried about you. But he tells himself that he would worry for Eddie this way too. As well as Nancy.

“Shit, didn’t think it would be so fucking cold…” He mumbles and you notice the slight tremble in his tone, making you breathe hot puffs of breath on his neck. A sigh escapes his lips as he relaxes a little more, hoping that you two can get out of this without getting sick. You can’t afford getting ill in the middle of the road, not now. 

“This– This is what we get for not wanting to waste another day–” You stutter, and you feel his hands rub up and down your back, warming his palms in the process and trying to give the same to you. His eyes are fixed on the roof of the car, begging that you would not press yourself any closer to him in the lower region because the hotter his body gets, the better his blood flows all over his veins.

But his prayers are not heard when you seek more heat, moving your hips against him. He chokes a bit on his saliva as he tries to hold in the obscene sound that are about to come out of his lips. He knew it would be a matter of minutes before you said something, so he one upped you.

“Don’t be alarmed… and don’t move a lot on me, Sunshine.” He warns, making you frown as you lift your head from his shoulder to look at him.

“What–?”

“The cold, and I’m… I’m just human. If you feel it, ignore it.” He is looking away from you, a blush all over his cheeks. You aren’t sure what was happening, your body still shivering a bit from the cold.

“What are you talk–” and you move just a bit to try to inspect what is going on, maybe on his chest, or somewhere that hurts but, no. It isn’t that. He isn’t hurting. Right under you, there is a bulge. Now that heats your entire body up in ways you haven’t felt in a while. Your shivering stops immediately, nervousness, embarrassment, shyness, all of that invades your senses, “O-Oh…”

He grunts as he shakes his head, “don’t overthink it… It doesn’t mean anything Sunshine, it isn’t like that…” 

Your ego feels squashed a bit. You understand that thinking about these things in moments like this, or with the world as it is, is not the brightest move, or even rational, but as Steve states, you are still human. Yet, the fact he made it a point that it was not being caused because of you, and just because of the cold, felt like a punch to your gut. 

Needing to be distracted, to make the tension go away, you spoke as you leaned to rest your head on his shoulder again.

“How were you before the world turned to shit, Steve?”

“Huh?” He snaps out of his embarrassment as he looks your way, turning his head. Your faces are close, but the hot breaths soothes the shivering of lips, warming yourselves up.

“Like… dating and stuff. Did you date?” He gulps as he looks forward, the rain falling on the windshield. Should he tell you? It seems like Nancy didn’t, so maybe she wanted to keep it a secret or… he doesn’t know.

“I dated once.” You tilt your head at him, curious now that he is opening up to you. One of those rare instances that he did.

“What happened?” He debates whether to tell you the truth or sugar coat it, not wanting to tarnish Nancy’s image. He clears his throat a bit, deciding to put it nice for you.

“Um… She chose someone else.” He simply says and it makes you frown a bit, still a little confused.

“While dating you?” He freezes a bit at how sharp you are, taking a deep breath in.

“We were going through a rough patch anyways… so kinda, but not quite.” He finishes and you feel anger inside of you a bit. Who would cheat like that? Why him?

“Did you love her?” He chuckles at that and moves his head a bit from side to side.

“Yeah… But it was puppy love. High school and all that…” And you nod a bit, trying to calm the nerves that appeared in your belly a bit, not knowing why. So Steve has been in love before. That was a new perspective of him that you didn’t know about and you wondered… you wondered if she knew that she might have made a mistake. You hoped that whoever she was, that she would regret it every day. You knew that Steve was hurt from this, it’s impossible he hadn’t, be it puppy love or not.

And you know that pain as well.

“Yeah… I know about that…” Your answer was not expected, making him frown a bit.

“What do you mean by that?” You hum a bit, trying not to move a lot on top of him just as he requested. The shivering and trembles are gone by now, noticing how the conversation made the two of you relax and just take in the warmth of each other.

“I had a boyfriend… not high school, but a little after that… He was nice at first…” You started and he was staring back forward as you talked with your head on his shoulder. “But then– then he called me immature… a child… too positive. Blind to reality or some shit like that. He cheated on me after that and I didn’t find out until much later.”

And Steve’s eyes widened a bit, guilt creeping up in his throat as he remembered what he called you that night, under the rain, in front of Robin’s grave. You looked distraught and now he knew the reason. He found out why it had hurt you the way it did, why you didn’t want to talk to him for so long after it. He made you remember something painful, an insecurity that someone engraved in your brain.

“Shit– I–” He started, but you lifted your head from his shoulder, shaking your head with a small smile.

“No, no… you didn’t know. You didn’t know it would strike a nerve in me because of this.” And his palm on your back tightened slightly, sending a shiver down your spine.

“I’m still sorry and– for the record, I don’t think being positive is immature…” You’re surprised at his words, frowning slightly.

“You don’t?” He let out a small chuckle, shaking his head.

“Hell no… the way you are, in this timeline, with the world ending around us… I think you are the bravest out of the four of us.” And you felt your heart skip a beat, looking at him in a way that you weren’t aware of. A way where your eyes were sparkling with stars, with amusement.

“Brave?”

“It takes balls to be hopeful nowadays… Look around you, Sunshine. It’s a wasteland, and you still get happy finding kit kats in abandoned stores.” 

You were stunned into silence as his eyes were still looking forward, not glancing at how you were looking at him. You were afraid he would be able to feel the beating of your heart, how it was slowly quickening as you stared at him.

“I–”

“Even going into a fucking sex shop, I mean– Who the fuck does that in the apocalypse?” You burst into laughter at the comment, prompting Steve to also start laughing, feeling the rumbling of his chest beneath your fingertips. The laughter died after a few seconds and you laid your head back down on his shoulder.

“I lost all hope when Robin died,” he says softly, a shaky breath leaves his lips right after. “I was scared of it… I still am. Having it means that you might end up disappointed or hurt and I don’t wanna feel that way again… I felt it too many times…”

You furrow your eyebrows as you wonder what other times he is talking about – not knowing about Nancy. About how he hoped his parents would return and come back for him, how he hoped that he could still find happiness after getting to California with his family, with his friends, with his soulmate only for it all to be ripped apart and away from him. Literally. 

Steve shudders but this time not from the cold but from your comforting hand on his bicep and from the soft look in your eyes as you looked back at him. 

“You can’t live in fear of that… You have to have some hope. If not, life will be just miserable.”

His lips slowly curl into a smile before he starts chuckling. The gaze in his eyes softens the longer he looks at you. He can’t even stop himself from reaching his hand out to your face, pushing away the hair that fell before your eyes. 

“Yeah,” he whispers as his fingertips graze your skin. “Thanks to you I started realizing that.”

Your ears burn from the touch of his hand, your stomach flutters from the look in his eyes but curiosity beats every emotion in you. 

“Thanks to me…?”

He retracts a bit, pulling his hand away again when he realizes how he craves to touch more. He clears his throat and nods. 

“I mean… I have to have hope we reach California… If I go all pessimistic about it, I will probably get myself killed.” 

You feel a tinge of disappointment, you can’t help it. You hoped his answer would be another but you understand it, so you nod your head. 

“Yeah…”

California. The community. 

That’s their destination, not yours. 

Your destination is Nevada and your childhood home. You want to see your family and be with them. That was always the plan. 

Eddie and Nancy keep telling you that you will get them and continue your way to California but you don’t know if your family will want that. 

“What’s wrong?” Steve asks when he notices how much your face fell. 

You blink and look into his eyes again.

“The community… I-I will miss you guys,” you whisper, not struggling to show your feelings. “Once I reach my house, you will continue while we… will probably stay there. I don’t think they’d ever leave their little ranch.”

And suddenly it dawns on him like it hasn’t before… at all. He has gotten so used to you in these past two months or so that he forgot that you don’t share the same destination. Dread spreads through him so quickly that it startles him. 

“I don’t want you to stay there,” he blurts out before he can even consider different words. “I-I want you to come with us, you and your family.”

Your brows pull together as your eyes widen. All the disappointment and the doubt from before disappearing easily. 

“You want me there…?”

Steve hesitates when he sees the way you look at him. Even in this darkness, he can see the softness in your pretty eyes. He can feel what it does inside of him and he can’t have that. He just can’t.

“I– yes, because… Eddie. He will look like a kicked puppy and cry in a corner.” 

Oh. 

Eddie. Not him. Of course not him. 

You can’t hide the disappointment on your face now, even when you try to smile. You lay your head back on his shoulder and breathe out slowly. 

Guilt boils up inside of him. He knows how hard you are trying to get through to him, how you’re knocking on his heart, wanting to be let in but he can’t, he just can’t let you. And yet, it pains him a little because he knows that if things had been different, if you met under different circumstances and in a world that hasn’t ruined him yet, he wouldn’t have wasted a second to go after you, even if your type is very different from who he is given the cowboy hat and all the comments. 

“Sunshine?” He whispers, squeezing your waist softly. 

“Yeah?” You murmur into his neck. 

“Why cowboys?” 

“Hmm?” You look up at him, a little surprised by his question. He looks down intensely, curious about the answer he awaits from you. “Uh… I don’t know, I just… I guess because they are so… manly and strong… I suppose I like the way they look too… I like this whole western thing.”

He can only chuckle, giving a slight nod your way.

“Understandable. Why do you like it though?” His eyes began to feel heavy, your voice sort of soothing him, calming him down.

“I don’t know, but I loved Clint Eastwood as a child. Like, literally loved him, posters and everything on my walls… Then Han Solo, even without a cowboy hat, the attire was exquisite… Then Silverado… I honestly have no clue when it really started, or why, but I found myself just liking the whole aesthetic… plus the whips… ropes… handcuffs–” You felt your cheeks flush at your words, looking at Steve with shame, only to find him breathing slowly, his eyes closed.

You tilted your head as you started inspecting him. His eyelashes were quite long, his stubble was beginning to look like it needed a shave, and a few wrinkles from his expressions showed on his forehead. Then, the freckles—so many, little moles as well. You moved your head to look around, noticing that they also went to the neck and down his chest, losing themselves in the hairs that resided there.

Your body became hot, licking your lips tentatively as you made sure he was really sleeping. His breaths were still slow, his chest rising up and down calmly, and well… there was no longer a bulge underneath you, so, it was your green light to explore a bit. 

You raised your hand, your fingertips slowly brushing over his cheek. You started to trace his features slowly: under his eyes, the shape of his nose, his jaw, and then his lips. Your heart beat fast inside your chest, and you feared he might wake up from it. Your fingers brushed over them, finding them surprisingly soft despite the lack of chapsticks and Vaseline. There was very little dry skin on the corner, but that was about it. 

He shifted underneath you, and you felt how his grip tightened all around you as if holding a teddy bear. It prompted you to lay on his shoulder again, and you could feel yourself sweat nervously as you pressed yourself against him. You heard a sigh coming from his lips, relaxed, calm, sleepy and you couldn’t help but bask in this little feeling. This closeness you had with him in this moment.

Tomorrow, you will miss this heat… but for now, you can close your eyes and be content in these arms.

—--------------------

When you two woke up the next morning, it felt as if you had the best rest of your lives. A groggy good morning from the both of you, and the warmth from outside helped the car heat up.

It was humid, but you two could not hear any more rain. You both knew you had to keep going, so you got off Steve as he closed his eyes and looked away while you, feeling a little guilty for doing so but you couldn’t help yourself, you glanced all over his body. It wasn’t the time, you had to get out to get dressed so Steve could do so as well.

You winced as you grabbed your clothes and got out of the car, the windows all foggy so Steve couldn’t see you. They were still drenched, but there was no other choice for now, so you put on your shirt, a disgusted groan escaping your lips, only for you to gasp as the coldness of the wet pants hit all over your legs. You heard Steve getting out from the other side, and then his winces as he put his clothes on again.

“Fuck, this feels horrible.” You heard him say, and you turned around to see him throwing his wet shirt on, “ugh, why didn’t we bring a change of clothes again, knowing that there was a chance of rain?”

“Cause we didn’t want to waste space in our bags but now– since we didn’t find shit, it feels fucking stupid we didn’t.” You giggled and he turned around, shaking his head, looking at you.

“We can probably get dry with the sun, at least.” He shrugged and you sighed, opening the door so you could take your belt out with your weapons, putting them on before you threw on your wet jacket, making you pout in discomfort. Steve was doing the same, wanting to ditch the jacket, but he couldn’t. He didn’t know where he would find another one like this. 

“I hate this. I hate wet clothes. I hate it, I hate it.” You complained and Steve chuckled, grabbing the backpack from under his seat, and you did the exact same. He gave a nod your way, signaling that it was time to finally keep moving. 

The clothes felt heavy on you, making it a little harder to walk. You both were breathing heavily, the disappointment of not finding anything at all, and going back in this state only made the mood plummet to the floor.

“You think we can survive with the little food we have until the next town?” He winced at your question, and the answer was no. The next big town was a week or less away, give or take, and they only had a few cans. They would probably starve for one day, maybe two.

“We will survive, but painfully… and if we don’t find anything in that other town then… we might not.” He finally confessed which did nothing to calm your nerves.

“That’s cheerful.” You responded and he sighed as you two kept walking, knowing that the rain had cleared the path for you, still glancing side to side in case something or someone jumping on you both. You looked to your right, noticing big tire marks on the asphalt, and then towards the dirt. Truck tire marks. You looked into the trees, seeing a few completely ripped apart, as if the truck had crashed into them. You stopped walking.

He took some time to notice it, walking a few steps away from you and when he didn’t feel your presence next to him, he finally turned around, frowning as you looked into the woods.

“Sunshine?” 

“I– Come on.” You diverted from your path, following the tire marks and Steve’s eyes widened, following right behind you.

“No, no, no, no. We have to go back to the RV, Eddie and Nancy are probably worried–” You stopped on your tracks and he almost hit your back, looking down at the back of your head. “What are you–”

And when he looked up, a few steps away, there was a massive truck, the size of a shipping container. Those that traveled over the seas in big ships, exporting and importing stuff. And he felt hope. He really felt it. 

“Let’s check it out, we have nothing to lose, just a few more minutes.” You slowly walk forward and Steve quickly steps up and comes in front of you, taking the bat off his belt to get ready in case this was an ambush. But you both looked side to side, not really hearing anything the more you approached the front of the truck, wanting to see if there was anything at all in the driver’s seat.

But you only found the door completely open, dried blood all over the windshield from the inside, then on the windows, and a decomposed corpse on the passenger’s seat. You winced in disgust at the smell, but your heart turned with pain at the sight. They must have been shippers, and from the looks of it, with the bloody map and the military vest on the corpse, you both could assume this was after the world went to shit. 

Steve took a long look at the corpse, and the bones were not even showing yet. Some places only, but overall, this body had not been dead for that long. But this also meant that monsters had lurked around here, and you had to check everything quickly.

“Come on, let’s check the back.” You nodded at his command and you both walked behind the truck. The chain was still secured on the handles, so this meant no one had opened it before. You handed Steve the crowbar and he immediately got to work, trying to pry open the chains to no avail. You bit your lip nervously as you saw that he couldn’t break the lock away with the crowbar. It was massive. 

“Shit…” You looked around as Steve kept trying, only for you to disappear from his side as you rushed to the front. 

“It’s no use– Sunshine?” He turned around and looked to the side of the truck, seeing you fiddle with your fingers nervously, only for you to get inside the driver’s seat. He walked towards you and he saw you search on the corpse, inside the pockets of his vest. Your nose was scrunched in disgust at the smell of it, but you sighed of relief when you felt a big metal key inside the front pocket. 

You took it out and you finally saw the surname of the person laying before you. ‘Sullivan’. You gave a slow nod of respect, a thanks for keeping the key safe. You crawled out, showing the key to Steve as you took a deep breath of fresh air in your lungs.

“Well that was mortifying.” You said and he patted you on the shoulder with a smile on his face.

“See? Bravest out of the four of us.” He responded and you felt a sense of pride swell inside of you as he walked towards the back again, you following right behind him. You bit your bottom lip as you saw him open the lock. He looked at you once and nodded, to then finally rip the doors open.

Your eyes widened as you looked inside and you both stood in silence, in complete awe. It had… everything.

Gas, tanks of clean water, food, blankets, pillows, some generators, drinks, snacks– This wasn’t just a normal shipping container… This was meant for a community… 

“Holy fucking shit…” The curse came out of your lips instinctively and Steve nodded, his mouth open in shock.

“Holy fucking shit…” He repeated after you. You two looked at each other, and suddenly smiles broke on your faces, and you giggled as you both clashed into a hug, jumping with excitement, with happiness, with so much hope. His arms were around your waist as yours were around his shoulders. 

He twirled the both of you around, and when he did is when it dawned on you that it was your first ever true hug. He was hugging you. When he put you back down, he pulled away, but he didn’t let go of you just yet. His eyes locked with yours for a brief moment, your breathing heavy with excitement and there was something creeping up on him. Something that he shouldn’t even think about. Something that would just complicate things. 

His eyes drifted to your lips for a small second, before pulling away completely.

He directed his eyes back inside the truck and you were just standing there, watching him with your heart in your throat, blinking absentmindedly. What had just happened?

“How the fuck are we going to take most of this back…?” He asked and you snapped out of your thoughts, turning towards the truck again. You shrugged and turned your head to the side to look up at him.

“We know there are no monsters now… We slowly get the RV in… and… We have the lock, so we can just close it up until we reach Eddie and Nance and then come back.” You explained and he was surprised, looking at you, a grin on his lips that he couldn’t disguise.

“Now that’s a fucking plan.”

You both hopped into the truck first, looking for clothes and gladly you found some. You changed into dry and comfortable pants and shirts, putting the wet clothes inside the bags, knowing you won’t need them if Eddie brings the RV close. 

You could now move faster, the excitement and the thrill letting you reach the RV in 20 minutes. Nancy and Eddie were confused, because you had new clothes, but you couldn’t find anything for the road. That made Eddie elbow Steve a few times on the side, his eyebrows wiggling suggestively which only earned him a smack over the head. 

Nancy was skeptical about going into the city with the RV, but you two had promised and swore there were no threats for now. 

Imagine her surprise when she saw that you and Steve were right. There was nothing to be afraid of, and when Eddie and she saw what was inside the truck– They also couldn’t help but do a little dance themselves. 

Suddenly you were all just hugging each other, jumping up and down as if you had won the lottery and in this world, in this time, you did. This was the jackpot. Of course you couldn’t bring everything, there was no space in the RV, but you managed to put gas in the tank, get some gallon cans of it and save up, fill the water tank with the water barrels that were inside with a hose, lots of food, so much food. 

You found clothes, blankets, the pillows, and– Walkie talkies. You couldn’t believe your luck. Walkie-talkies, batteries, which Steve had already gotten some back in the sex shop, but you had walkie-talkies now. This would serve you all so much for the ones patrolling and the ones who stayed back in the RV. 

You stocked up pretty heavily, even charging the battery of the car with the battery of the truck. You spotted something that was secured in blankets, something fragile inside. You opened them to find– alcohol. Bottles of vodka, rum, whiskey… You grabbed some bottles, put them inside your bag, and looked at the three others who were still giggly with everything they were taking back to the RV.

And your eyes fell on Steve. Your heart skipped a beat as you stared at his profile. His wrinkles on the sides of his mouth as he laughed, the way his hair bobbed when he talked, the way he grunted whenever he lifted something heavy… And you realized something then. Something that hasn’t happened in a while for you.

You slept peacefully. No nightmares. No bad postures. No waking up in the middle of the night just because… All because you slept cuddled to Steve… Or maybe this would happen with anybody… But you looked at Eddie, wondering if you would have felt as calm, then at Nancy, and then back at Steve.

And your heart skipped a beat again.

Oh no...

☀︎

taglist: @prettyboyeddiemunson @pretentious-blonde @thecreelhouse @tvserie-s-world @thesickestqrmydcll @crispystarfishhottub @sophal22 @definitionwanderlust @talkativecarnation @mysticalwoolenfroglegs @ariesandwolves @mortqlprojections @sattlersquarry @sherrylyn0628 @purpleeyeswithgoldensparkles @micheledawn1975 @keepingitlokiii @littleromanoff2005 @sunshine-mrk @xxladymjxx

[pretentious-blonde]

confidence

pairing: steve harrington x reader

summary: a few cocktails and an evening with Robin reveal a new side to your boyfriend, one you really didn't see coming

warnings: 18+ this contains smut, scars, alcohol consumption (reader does not partake), graphic descriptions of sex, oral f receiving, p in v, cocky steve, condescending steve (ikr!! just trust me), all around filth here, steve has one too many cocktails and runs with it

a/n: this was so fun and is my treat for putting you through all the angst (and there will be more trust me) but hey, consider this part a catharsis. we also needed to get robin involved for what comes next so this is what you get. tipsy steve is WILD you have all been warned.

series masterlist

You scramble around your flat, tossing items from one surface to the next, desperate to make sure you haven’t forgotten anything crucial. Keys, check. Purse, check. Chapstick, check. 

Whatever you have on your vanity table feels like it’s winking at you, reminding you that, no, you’re still not quite ready. But you can’t let yourself fuss any longer because outside, through your window, you catch the glare of headlights and hear the impatient beep of a horn. 

Steve’s here—and he’s been here, and you should have been ready ten minutes ago, at least.

You’re still excited, even though you’re late, because tonight is special. Tonight’s the night you finally get to meet the Robin Buckley, the person who’s been such a staple in your boyfriend’s new stories. 

He was determined to pick the “nice bar” in the next town over, the one that apparently “played the good music.” 

You had to bite your tongue. His idea of “good music” usually lines right up with the biggest chart hits, but you figure hey, if he’s excited, you’ll go along for the ride. What matters is that this night is one of his design, and you find it completely endearing that he’s gone out of his way to make it special for you and Robin both. 

He can listen to Ace of Base as much as he wants... even if you have to stifle a fond snort whenever he’s not looking. 

He’s told you so many wonderful (and ridiculous) stories about her that you practically badgered him into setting this up. Tales you hadn’t been privy to before—now slowly unravelling as he let slip new, juicy details bit by bit.

Your big chance to meet the girl who’s shared so much of your boyfriend’s humour and history. And if tonight ends up being half as fun as the pictures you’ve conjured in your head, you’re in for a wild ride.

You snatch your bag and do one last mirror check—just a fleeting glance, making sure your dress is sitting just right and your hair hasn’t decided to rebel. This time, you went for something a little more daring: a flirty dress that shows off your figure in a way you know Steve won’t be able to ignore. 

On a good day, he could barely keep his hands to himself—let alone after last weekend. Taking things all the way had only cemented his need to be close to you, and now, whether in public or private, he always had to have some part of him touching you.

And in this dress? You knew his hands wouldn’t just wander—they’d roam.

Maybe, by the end of the night, you’d let them.

Finally, you rush out, keys jingling in your hand, and clatter down the stairs leading to your shop door. You lock up carefully, tugging the handle to ensure it’s secure—no matter how excited you are, you still need to be responsible—and you pivot on your heel and walk out onto the pavement.

Your steps falter as your eyes land on your boyfriend, casually leaning against his car, arms crossed, looking completely at ease—like this wasn’t a big deal at all, just another night to unwind. But even in that brief glance, you could tell he’d put in just as much effort as you had. 

He’d told you to dress up a little and clearly, he’d taken his own advice. The oversized jumpers and worn jeans were nowhere to be seen. 

This Steve was something else entirely. 

And Jesus, he knew how to clean up well.

He’s wearing a fitted black T-shirt, the kind that clings just enough to hint at every plane and angle of his torso. Over it, a sleek black suit jacket, open in front, sleeves rolled just enough to conceal the marks, but also revealing his toned forearms.

It’s like some casual afterthought, but you know him better than that. Every detail is deliberate. The jacket’s tailoring is perfect, nipping in at the waist and broad across his shoulders. It gives him a certain sharpness, a polished edge that you’re not used to seeing in his typical laidback outfits. 

And by God, does it work—too damn well, if the heat creeping up your neck is anything to go by.

His sunglasses perch on the bridge of his nose, not because of one of his migraines—you’d recognise that look a mile away—but purely to complete the aesthetic. They’re modern, minimalist, and do nothing to hide the playful smirk curling at the corner of his lips

The glint of something metal at his wrist (a simple watch) catches your eye, and then your focus is back on his face, following the neat slope of his hair. It’s perfectly styled, golden-brown waves shaped in that signature swoop, but smoother, sleeker—like he spent real time in front of the mirror, carefully combing each strand into place until it sat just right. 

By the look on his face, he knows you’re staring—knows exactly what he’s doing to you. 

He watches you approach, eyes dragging over you slowly, drinking in the sight of you just as shamelessly as you’re doing with him.

You step toward his car, face warming at the sight of your date. He lowers his sunglasses in one exaggerated motion, revealing the hint of mischief in his eyes. A slow whistle slips from his lips, just as corny as you might have expected—and somehow twice as charming.

“Careful, sweetheart,” he murmurs, letting his gaze travel over you from head to toe, “you walk up to me looking like that, we might not make it to the bar.”

Heat seeps into your cheeks, and you roll your eyes in a halfhearted attempt at nonchalance. It’s near impossible to pretend you aren’t melting under the weight of that gaze. 

“I could say the same,” you counter. “What happened to Mr. Harrington, huh? Thought you were all about faded jeans and paint covered nikes.”

He throws back his head with a laugh, then glances at his watch, pretending to read the small face. 

“We might still have time for me to swing home and change if it's—”

You bat his wrist down before he can so much as move. 

“Don’t you dare,” you warn. Because right now, he looks so sinfully delicious you can hardly keep your focus.

“Really—it’s no problem,” he jokes, though the playful glint in his eyes betrays him. His hand slides behind your neck, warm and sure, and your breath hitches at the teasing sensation of his touch.

“It’s gonna be hard to concentrate on anything coming out of your mouth tonight,” you admit, pulse jumping when his thumb brushes a circle over your skin. Pushing his sunglasses up on top of his head, nudging some stray hair off his forehead. 

“Good,” he says, a lazy grin spreading across his face. “I’m alright with being your eye candy.” 

He leans down, kissing you in a way that makes your toes curl and your mind fog over. On instinct, you try to deepen it, hands sliding to his lapels, but he draws back with a soft chuckle.

“Whoa there, angel,” he murmurs, his voice playful. “We’ll get to that soon enough.”

You pout, bottom lip pushing out a fraction. Instantly, he shakes his head, one brow lifting. 

“Hey, don’t go getting all pouty on me.” He brushes your lower lip lightly. “You’re the one who’s been on my ass about this whole thing.”

He had a point there. 

Damn him. 

“Fine, fine, you’re right,” you relent. “But you’ve got to make it up to me when we get home.”

The shift in his expression is downright wicked as he leans in. 

“Honey, with that dress?” He tongues the inside of his cheek in a way that sets fire to your nerves. “I’ll be more than making up for it.”

The bar is chic in that slightly pretentious way—low lights, plush seating, a neon sign glowing over shelves stacked with rainbow-coloured bottles. The bass of some popular track flows through the speakers. 

You can’t help but grin when Steve, ever the gentleman, strides ahead to pull open the heavy door for you. He gives you a playful nod as you step inside, his hand warm against your back. It’s reassuring, filling you with the same confidence he seems to be sporting tonight.

“After you,” he teases, voice low, and you can’t help but roll your eyes as you pass him. Even though it’s cheesy, there’s an endearing sincerity beneath his grin.

Once you’re both settled at the bar, he presses a kiss to your temple before glancing at the bartender. 

“What’ll it be?” he asks, tipping his head toward you.

“Just a tonic water,” you say as he frowns.

“You sure?” he drawls, leaning in. There’s an irresistible tilt to his lips, a look that says he’s perfectly fine with either choice as long as you’re happy.

“Yup.” You nod. “You go crazy, though—it’s your night out.”

“Yeah, well, it’s your night out too,” he points out, turning his body to face you more fully.

“Ah, yes, but I have to make a good first impression,” you shoot him a knowing smile.  “Remember?”

He slides a hand around your waist, squeezing you into his side. There he goes with the full on physical affection. 

“You’ve got nothing to worry about,” he shrugs as his fingers trace your shoulder. “If I’m anything to go by, Rob’s got questionable taste in friends already.”

Your laugh escapes in a soft huff, and you lean your forehead against his shoulder for a moment, savouring his comforting heat. 

“We’ve gotta work on your self-deprecating humour,” you mumble into the fabric of his suit jacket.

He snorts, pressing another quick kiss to your temple. 

“I told you, angel, I am working on it.”

When he lifts his arm to catch the bartender’s attention, you let your gaze trail over him: the lean lines of his shoulders, the way his hair curls just so. You feel a stir of something low in your stomach at how ridiculously good he looks in the dim, moody lighting. 

Watching him come out of his shell was absolutely delectable—seeing him navigate a crowded room with such ease felt like witnessing a victory in real time, a step forward that was physical proof of progress.

He places the order—your tonic, his own cocktail—and is about to make another witty remark when there’s a gentle tap on his arm.

You glance over to see a brunette woman with an explosive grin, practically vibrating with excitement. She’s dressed up just enough for the night—high-waisted black trousers that elongate her frame, paired with a silky button-up in a deep, jewel-toned shade, the sleeves casually rolled to her elbows.

Her face is alight as she meets Steve’s eyes, and she looks moments away from flinging her arms around him—though she’s clearly checking herself, as if aware of exactly how he handles the unexpected. When he spins, and his entire face brightens in recognition.

“Hey, you made it!” he exclaims, wrapping her in a hug that’s enthusiastic. She squeaks as he squeezes a bit too tight.

“Oof—yeah, I did,” she laughs, patting his shoulder. “Yep—alright—good to see you too, maybe let’s not crush me to death?”

“Sorry, sorry,” he says sheepishly, releasing her. Straightening up, he glances back at you, a hint of a blush crawling across his cheeks. 

This is it—the moment he’s been waiting for. He’s known you for a few months, but somehow, it feels like so much more. This is the event he’s imagined over and over, finally introducing you to his closest friend. 

The idea of bringing a romantic partner into this part of his life had once felt so far out of reach, but now that he can? 

That’s exactly what’s fueling his confidence tonight.

“Uh, so… this is—this is who I’ve been telling you about. This is my girlfriend.”

Girlfriend.

He pauses, savouring the word like it’s something that delights him every time he says it—because it does. 

His eyes flick to Robin, and he can tell there’s something on the tip of her tongue as she takes in his expression. He knows how proud he must look, how transparent his feelings are, but for once, he can’t bring himself to care.

He steps aside for you two to be introduced properly. Her eyes are bright as she takes you in, a wide smile stretching across her face.

“So, you finally asked her?” she asks him, but she’s already beaming at you like an old friend. The excitement in her voice makes your own heart feel more at ease.

Steve’s flush deepens. “Yeah—yeah, I did.”

The girl doesn’t hesitate. She engulfs you in a hug, and the warmth of her personality radiates through every second of contact. 

“Oh my god, I’ve heard so much about you,” she gushes, pulling back just enough to look at you but still keeping her hands on your arms.

You can’t resist flicking your gaze at Steve over her shoulder, your lips curving into a playful smile. 

“Really?”

You didn’t expect any less. 

“Oh absolutely, who do you think he called after every date you guys had?” She steps back to give you a little breathing room. “You should’ve heard him. He was like—”

“Hey, hey—no,” Steve interrupts, pressing one hand to his friend's shoulder. “Can we not share all the embarrassing details of my life right now?”

“Get a few more drinks in him, and you can ask him yourself.” She snorts, rolling her eyes at you. 

Steve laughs, feeling your eyes flick up to him. He doesn’t need the drinks to loosen his tongue—he’s already so hopelessly smitten with you. That much was obvious.

Still, he’s eager to get the night started, to show you off the way he’s been dying to.

“Alright,” he says, finally breaking that little reverie, “I got the drinks, you two go find a seat.” He turns to Robin. “Rum and Coke?”

As always.

“Ugh, yes,” she says, linking her arm with yours. It’s easy, natural—there’s an immediate sense that you’ll get along just fine. As the two of you meander toward a free table, she leans in conspiratorially. 

“So… did he tell you about the ice cream uniform?”

“Oh my god, yes.” A flash of amusement dances across your face. “Please tell me there’s more?”

Her chuckle is mischievous. 

“Oh yeah, there’s a lot more where that came from.”

Time feels fluid as the three of you settle into conversation, the low thrumming pulse of the bar’s music weaving around your table, though not too loud to drown out your voices. 

It’s been a while since you first claimed your seats, and yet you barely notice the hours slipping by. Every story Steve and Robin launch into starts with them tossing playful jabs back and forth, only to pause mid-sentence and glance at you, beckoning you to weigh in. 

You find yourself giggling along, giving opinions on whether a certain scheme was more ridiculous than some ill-fated date night, or whether one of them was actually to blame for a mishap they still remember. They trade banter like it’s second nature, and you feel like you’ve been part of their duo from the very start.

At some point, the discussion circles back to their high school days—a topic they both seem to have endless material for. You’re practically on the edge of your seat, soaking in every detail they’re willing to spill. Robin leans forward, clutching her glass as she narrows her eyes at Steve with playful accusation.

“Well, this guy could have been hanging out with me a lot sooner,” she says, wagging a finger in his direction, “if he’d actually paid attention in class, that is. Did you know I sat behind him in history for a whole year? Yeah—a year.” She stretches out the word for emphasis. “Didn’t even remember it.”

Steve huffs in protest. 

“Hey now, that’s not entirely true—”

“Yes, it is,” she cuts in, her grin bright with triumph. “When we both started working together, he introduced himself to me. Honestly, like I didn’t already know who he was.”

“In my defense,” he insists, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth, “I was trying to focus.”

“You were so not.” Robin snorts. “How many tardies did you get that year?”

He rakes a hand through his hair, clearly flustered. 

“I passed, didn’t I?”

“Barely.” She arches an eyebrow, and you laugh at the indignation blossoming on your boyfriend’s face.

“Yeah, well,” he shoots back, folding his arms across his chest, “how many times did you have to take your driving test, huh? What was it—three? And who was stuck chauffeuring you to band practice before class even started?”

Robin’s jaw drops in mock outrage. 

“That’s not fair, driving is hard!” She punctuates her point by thumping Steve’s shoulder, though there’s no real force behind it.

“Yeah, sure it is,” he snickers. “Especially when you shut your eyes at a junction because you’re scared to get on the freeway.”

She shoves him more firmly this time, but her eyes sparkle with affection. You can practically feel the fondness thrumming between them. Every playful jab is undercut with closeness, revealing just how much they trust one another. 

Steve is so at ease—practically glowing. There isn’t a hint of the anxiety you sometimes catch in his eyes, no shadow of the stresses he’s hinted at before. He’s all laughter and bright colours here, the multiple cocktails probably loosening him up even more.

Watching them, it dawns on you just how special his friend is. She’s watched him become the man he is, seen him through phases you’ve only heard vague references to. There’s a sweet, sibling-like bond between them that would have made you insecure if not for how purely platonic they obviously are. 

They’re too busy ribbing each other and finishing one another’s sentences to harbour any romantic tension. And the sincerity in their smiles, the way they drift into each other’s personal space—this is the foundation that’s helped him grow. As you observe the two of them, you feel nothing but gratitude towards her.  

Does he feel this way around you too? 

Or is this kind of bond reserved for someone who’s known him since high school, who’s seen him through everything.

You lean in closer, meeting his gaze as his expression softens. As you sip your drink, you catch the way his playfully annoyed look melts into something fonder—a small, boyish smile taking its place. 

He nudges your foot under the table, a quiet little gesture just for you, as Robin continues listing her many reasons for despising driving. When he shoots you a wink, you can’t help but hope that one day, you’ll share that same camaraderie—the kind that comes with knowing someone inside and out.

The conversation drifts into a lull before Robin suddenly pipes up again, leaning toward you with a conspiratorial glimmer in her eyes. 

“Has he cooked for you yet?” She asks, wiggling her eyebrows as if preparing you for some shocking revelation. “He better have with all the work I put in teaching him.”

“Oh, he has!” You nod eagerly, sipping your tonic. “I guess I have you to thank, huh?”

“You sure do.” She leans back with a self-satisfied grin, crossing her arms. “Should’ve seen him the first time I tried to get him into the kitchen—boiling an egg was apparently a herculean task.”

The boy groans in protest, shooting her a halfhearted glare.

“They cracked! That’s not my fault.”

Robin laughs, drink nearly sloshing over the rim. 

“Yeah, because you turned the heat too high.”

“That’s exactly the problem,” he defends himself. “They get hot and break.”

Bless him.

“Uh, no, Steve.” You try to stifle your own laugh, but fail completely. “It’s because the water was boiling too hard, they bang around in the pot.”

His brow furrows in puzzlement. 

“That’s what that is?”

Robin's expression matches your own, and both of you fall into giggles again at his earnest confusion. 

God, he’s sweet. 

“Seems like I have more work to do,” she sighs, taking another sip of her drink.

“Clearly,” you agree, throwing Steve a playful side-eye. He raises his hands in protest.

“Wow, okay—” he says, rolling his eyes, “so you’re both ganging up on me now?”

He sees how it is.

Typical. 

Robin props her elbow on the table, her head tilting back with a grin that’s gone a little hazy from too many drinks. 

“Yeah, well,” she begins, voice lilting with mischief, “you have gotten better. Remember when you basically refused to go into the meat aisle? You said it smelled like the tunnels, but I asked Dustin about it and he said that—”

She’s halfway through the sentence when Steve stiffens, his foot giving her a not-so-subtle nudge under the table. At once, the mirth drains a bit from her face, and she glances over at him, clearly realising she’s stepped onto sensitive ground. 

You perk up—another piece of information. But instead of clarifying anything, it only adds to the puzzle. 

A tunnel? 

Steve had never mentioned that before, but your brain immediately tries to slot it into the story you already know. Was there a tunnel at the old mall? 

It's possible.

But that wouldn’t make much sense in the context of meat. He worked at an ice cream shop, not a damn butcher’s.

“Sorry.” Robin whispers, looking apologetic. You know you were not meant to hear that apology and you couldn’t help your curiosity. 

“What?” Your eyebrows draw together. “What is it?”

Tell me. 

“It’s nothing, sweetheart.” He forces a tight-lipped smile, shrugging a little too casually. “Don’t worry about it.”

You want to be sad, but you can’t. And you certainly can’t press him on it, not here. Not when he was so excited about tonight, so eager to show you off.

You feel his hand resting on your thigh, but now there’s a tension in it that wasn’t there before. That shift, that change from the easy one he had just moments ago, is what makes the decision for you. There will be other times for this, other moments to piece things together. But not now.

You exchange a lingering look between them—Robin mouths out another apology, and he gives her a small, forgiving nod. 

You don’t dwell on the moment. Besides, you still have a new piece of the puzzle. 

That was better than nothing.

By the time you step out of the bar, it’s just past midnight, and the cool air rushes to greet you. Steve is practically attached to your side, his arm draped over your shoulder as though he might topple over without your support. There’s a flush on his cheeks, and you can’t help but find it adorable—his usual guarded composure replaced with an open, slightly wonky, grin.

And it's hilarious to witness.

“C’mon, Steve,” you coax, wrapping an arm around his waist for balance. “We gotta get back.”

He’s clearly not ready for the night to end as he opens his mouth to protest. 

“Nooo, we can stay,” he pleads, turning big eyes on Robin, who stands nearby with her own contented smile. “Rob, tell her we can stay. She got all dolled up for this, wouldn't be fair—”

You exchange a conspiratorial smile with her. Leaning in close so Steve can’t quite hear.

“Does he always get like this?” You whisper.

"When he drinks?" Robin stifles a laugh. "Oh yeah, big time—gets super sappy."

Then, turning toward the pouting grown man beside you, she huffs. 

"I told you to take it easy with the mojitos."

Steve was clearly not listening. 

“Pssh, whatever,” he interjects, only half hearing her. “I don’t have to be up tomorrow, and neither do you,” he says, pointing somewhat dramatically at Robin.

She lifts a hand, palm out to stop his rambling. 

“Yeah, well, if I go home to Vickie like that, she’ll have more than a few choice words for me.”

He tips forward in a woozy attempt at reassurance. 

“You can… you can blame it on me?” He offers, voice trailing off into a sweet but slurred laugh, like he can't even take himself seriously.

His friend just shakes her head, clearly endeared. 

“Nice try—but no.” She says before turning to you. “You alright getting him home?”

Glancing up at your boyfriend—his eyes half-lidded, a sleepy smile hinting on his lips—you nod, your own fondness tugging at your heart. 

“I’m sure I can handle him,” you confirm with a tiny smirk. 

You’ve guided him through worse nights than this.

“Alright, Steve, let go of your girlfriend for a sec so I can say goodbye,” Robin says, trying her best to be stern. He frowns but reluctantly loosens his hold on you.

You slip away long enough for her to wrap you in a quick hug. Her voice is brimming with excitement as she pulls back. 

“We have to do this again. I haven’t even told you about working at the video store and his terrible sorting system—”

"Hey!" A spark of protest ignites in Steve's gaze. "I don’t wanna hear it, alright? It was superior to whatever—" he waves his hands in front of him, searching for the right word, "carnage you had going on."

“Alphabetical is far from carnage.”

He huffs, nose wrinkling in mock indignation, but even through his tipsy state, he can’t hide the affection in his eyes. He tugs Robin into a hug goodbye and you can feel the tenderness between them. 

And just like that, you’re left with a very happy, very tipsy Steve Harrington—who has promptly glued himself right back to your side.

You guide him, swaying on his feet, into the passenger side of his car. He flops in with a soft grunt, blinking as though everything around him is subtly moving. You close the door gently, careful all of his limbs are inside, before walking around the front of the car to slide into the driver’s seat. The interior still carries the faint trace of his cologne, a small reminder that—despite how he looks right now—he is, in fact, a put-together adult. 

Well, mostly.

“All right, Mr Harrington,” you say, scanning the dashboard. “Where’re your keys?”

He puts on an exaggerated, perplexed expression, patting his chest and shaking his head. 

“I dunno what you’re talking about…”

Rolling your eyes, you lean over, determined. 

“We are not going back in there,” you tell him, stern enough to make him give you a dramatic pout when he realises you won’t budge.

“Fine,” he mumbles, fishing around in the inner pocket of his blazer before finally producing the car key. He hands them over, and you give him a grateful smile, slipping them into the ignition.

“Seat belt?” you prompt.

“Yes, ma’am.” He sighs as though you’re asking the world of him. His voice is playful, edged with that mellow tone people get after a few too many drinks.

“You’re so bossy,” he continues in a tone that cannot be taken seriously. “Are you usually this bossy?”

“Well, sorry for caring about your physical safety,” you fire back, carefully easing out of the parking space.

“Always looking after me, aren’t you?”

He releases a soft laugh, leaning against the passenger door, his eyes remained fixed on you. 

“Someone’s gotta,” you reply, face softening as you glance over at him. “You feeling okay, or are things spinning?”

“What? I’m fine.” His eyes widen in mock indignation. “Do I not look like fine?”

You flick a wry smile his way. 

“You look drunk.”

“I’m not drunk,” he objects, though his lopsided grin and rosy cheeks tell a different story.

You look at him now—not as perfectly put together as when he picked you up, but somehow, he looks even better. 

His hair is no longer an art form, tousled and a little wild, and his posture has lost all its careful composure, slumped and comfortable. His eyes, softer now, lock onto yours, completely unguarded. 

He looks utterly relaxed—and for him, that’s something big.

It seems like the perfect time to test just how far gone he is, just a little fun—tease him while he’s in this gullible, blissed-out state.

"Good," you start, the drawl in your tone unmistakable, eyes flicking over him knowingly. "Because if you were, I would’ve stayed the night. Helped you through the hangover tomorrow."

“What?” His reaction is immediate. “You’re not staying?” He sits up straighter as if you’ve just admitted to murder.

You shrug with as much nonchalance as you can manage. 

“Not sure. I have a few things I need to get done tomorrow…”

"No—baby," he blurts out, sounding more pitiful than you’ve ever heard. "I’m so drunk, practically wasted here—can’t even see straight."

“Oh yeah? That bad, huh?"

"So bad," he nods vigorously, eyes wide with dramatics. "You gotta stay."

He tilts his head just enough to sell it. 

"C’mon, what if I wake up miserable and there’s, like, no one there to feel sorry for me?"

A laugh bursts out of you. His soulful, puppy-eyed expression tugs on your heart. For a moment, you feel a tiny pang of guilt for teasing him—but it was just so goddamn easy.

“All right, then,” you relent. “I guess I’ll have to stay—” you shoot him a sly smile, “just in case.”

His relief is obvious. A broad, boyish smile breaks across his face, and he exhales a dramatic sigh as he melts back into the passenger seat. 

By the time you park outside his place, he’s steadier on his feet—though still leaning on you for support, but you suspect it’s not from the drinks. His fingers trail along your waist and up your spine, as if he can’t bear to stop touching you for even a second. 

Once inside, you gently push the door shut behind you and help him shrug out of his blazer. He doesn’t flinch or resist—not a single indication of the usual tension that sometimes appears when his arms are exposed. 

Whatever self-consciousness he carries about his scars is nowhere to be found right now. As soon as the it’s off, his hands return to your waist, pulling you flush against him so he can bury his face in your hair.

“Steve,” you murmur, pressing a hand to his chest. “Let me get you some water.”

“In a second,” he groans, leaning down to brush his lips against your jaw. “I haven’t given you nearly enough attention tonight.”

“You’ve given me more than enough, trust me.” You laugh softly, sliding a hand up to his cheek to coax him back. “C’mon, water first, then bed.”

He lets you guide him into the kitchen, though he still can’t resist peppering little kisses along your shoulder whenever he can sneak them in.

At the sink, you fill two cups of water—familiar with where everything is kept by now—but the moment you straighten, he is behind you, his chin hooked over your shoulder, lips lightly grazing the side of your neck.

“Hey—nuh-uh," you chide, reluctantly. “We can’t right now. You’ve had a drink.”

No matter how much you want to.

“No—can’t do that to me.” He groans dramatically, pressing himself against your back. “Y'knew what you were doing with that dress. Been thinkin' about it all night…”

A flush warms your cheeks at his plea, you turn in his arms and hold out the glass. 

“Drink this, please?”

His frown is exaggerated, but he dutifully tips back the glass. Downing the water in a few large gulps, then setting it aside, blinking down at you with heavy-lidded adoration. You stifle a laugh and take a sip from your own cup while he keeps his gaze locked on you.

“You’re so pretty,” he murmurs, voice thick with sincerity.

“Steve…” Your cheeks heat even more.

It's the drink talking.

“No, I’m serious—” He shakes his head, eyes soft. “Couldn’t believe it when I saw you tonight—was just… so excited to have you on my arm, for everyone to see.”

See how far he'd come.

The statement makes your heart thump, and when he lifts a hand to brush some hair off your forehead, you lean into his touch.

“You think she liked me?” you ask quietly,. A half smile curves on your lips as you probably know the answer, but you need the reassurance that you made him proud.

“Don’t think it’s possible for someone not to like you.” He says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, and your heart melts a little further.

“You’re real sweet when you’re drunk,” you tease.

“I’m sweet all the time.” His hands trail languidly down your arms, leaving your skin tingling in their wake. You nod, breath catching slightly. 

“Yeah, you are,” you admit, cheeks still flushed. His lips graze your neck again, sending a pleasant shiver through you.

“You gonna let me be real sweet to you?” he whispers, his breath tickling your skin.

You hum, gently pushing him back just enough to meet his eyes. He’s gazing at you so intently, smitten and serious all at once. The haze of alcohol may linger in his system, but the affection shining in his expression is crystal clear.

He looks down at you, catching the hesitation in your eyes. He knows exactly what it means—you won’t do anything unless he’s fully there, fully present in the moment. And that only makes him want you more. 

The fact that you’d wait for him, that you care enough to make sure he’s in the right headspace, has him feeling completely enamored.

But he’s right—he has been patient. And the cocktails? They aren’t clouding his judgment in any way that concerns him. He’s a little fuzzy, sure, but not intoxicated. Well—maybe by you. And if he’s being honest, he’s been itching to get his hands on you all night.

He drops a soft kiss to your lips, then pulls back. 

“I’m not drunk, angel,” he insists quietly. “Just a little tipsy.”

You still look unsure, and he sees it instantly. But Steve knows exactly how to sweet-talk you into trusting him—how to make you see that this isn’t the alcohol talking, that you're gonna be safe with him.

He's choosing this. 

"I want this, angel," he murmurs, nudging his nose against yours. "Not because I’ve been drinking—because it’s you. I've got you."

His fingers trace gently along your jaw, tilting your face up to meet his gaze. You're nearly there.

The final blow.

"So if you’ll let me… I’d really, really like to show you just how much."

You cup his cheek, your thumb brushing over his warm skin. 

How on earth can you say no to that? 

“Alright, we can—”

You’re cut off by him letting out a triumphant breath and scooping you right up, hands slipping under your thighs to support you as he strides toward the bedroom. You squeal, clinging to him in surprise as you try to talk through the stream of nervous giggles.

“Steve!” you exclaim, your laughter echoing off the walls.

He just laughs in return, the sound rich and throaty, carrying you through the doorway as though you weigh nothing at all.

He practically tosses you onto the bed in his haste, eliciting a squeak of laughter from you as your back hits the soft covers. It’s immediately clear there’s something different in him tonight—he’s excited, charged, and looking at you with eyes that burn like embers. 

Before you can fully process his transformation, his mouth slants over yours in a desperate kiss that has you gasping into him. His palms roam over your body, broad and possessive, like he can’t decide which part of you he wants to touch first.

A startled giggle leaves your lips when he breaks away to mouth along your jaw. You tip your head back, giving him room, unable to stifle a grin at how single-minded he is.

“Eager, huh?” you tease, voice breathless.

He pulls back just enough to meet your gaze, pupils blown wide with desire. His hair’s slightly mussed from your fingers, his chest rising and falling in quick succession. 

“Honey—if you knew half the shit I was thinking about at the bar,” he says in a low rasp, “you wouldn’t be teasing me right now.”

A shiver courses through you—filled with pure want. There’s a spark of mischief in your veins. Something about seeing him like this, so unguarded, emboldens you. 

“Big words,” you reply, cocking a brow, “for someone who still hasn’t touched me properly yet.”

He barks out a laugh—almost incredulous, the corners of his mouth quirking like he’s delighted you’d dare to challenge him. 

“Is that how you wanna play tonight?”

He doesn’t know what’s come over him. He wasn’t lying, he wasn’t drunk, but there’s a desperation bleeding out of every part of him, something hungry and entirely focused on you.

He feels confident—only spurred on by the way you’re pawing at him, the way you were looking at him all night.

Like you belonged to him.

For once, there’s no hesitation, no fear of disappointment when he will rid himself of his clothes. He knows you’ll like what you see, and that sends a realisation through his mind, tipping him straight back into King Steve territory—sure of himself and completely in his element with something he is verifiably good at.  

Judging by the way you arch up into him, the way your fingers grip at his skin like you need him closer.

You can feel it, too.

He gently gathers both your wrists, guiding them above your head, pressing them into the bed which sends a slow, delicious shiver down your spine.

He’s testing now, feeling out this new territory between the two of you. He feels you hold your breath and his grip stays firm—but never forceful. His strength is potent, but he wields it gently, a reassurance that you could break free at any moment if you wanted to.

He glances down at you, breath still heavy, eyes searching. His fingers squeeze yours once.

Are you okay with this? 

He waits, unmoving. 

And when your hands squeeze back, the answer is clear.

You’re allowing him to do this to you.

And fuck, that sends something primal through him.

He leans down, teeth grazing the juncture of your neck and shoulder in a teasing nip that has you keening.

“Careful what you wish for, baby,” he murmurs, moving his kisses along the curve of your throat. “I don’t do halfway.”

A thrill of anticipation flares in your belly at his words. This new side of him—so sure, so hungry—has you spinning. Each nip draws a gasp, your entire body stirring under the onslaught of sensation.

After one last kiss pressed into your collarbone, he releases your wrists and skims his palms down your torso, pausing at your hips. The shift of power jolts your heart when he slides off the bed, kneeling at the edge.

He wears a crooked grin as he grabs your thighs and unceremoniously yanks you closer, your lower half practically dangling off the mattress. Then he hooks a finger under the waistband of your underwear, his gaze dropping like he’s savouring every detail of you.

He runs the pad of his thumb over the thin fabric, right at the wet patch where you’re most sensitive, and your breath seizes.

He’s gonna have some fun with you. 

“You know,” he murmurs, rubbing slow, tantalising circles, “I could be mean… take my time, really make you work for it.”

You swallow.

Hard.

Where the hell did that come from?

Steve has flirted with dirty talk before, tossing out teasing remarks that left you flustered, but he’s never drawn it out like this—never tested your patience with such slow, deliberate cruelty.

It’s so different from the way he usually is, and his look tonight only amplifies it. His all-black outfit is still visible through the planes of your thighs, a monumental contrast to the flustered, second-grade teacher you stumbled upon all those months ago—the one who could barely string together a sentence to ask you out outside his classroom.

Now he’s like this—in control, commanding, completely reveling in the role he’s taken tonight.

It hits you all at once: how much he’s changed.

How much he’s grown.

You can hardly imagine that past version of Steve taking charge the way he is now, and fuck.

It’s beautiful.

It makes you want to give in completely, to relinquish yourself to him, to let him feel what it’s like to lead again—to call the shots, to take what he wants, to be the old him once more.

“You wouldn’t,” you manage to retort, but your bravado falters the moment you see his face.

He arches a brow, amused by your statement.

“Oh, sweetheart,” he chides as he runs a hand down your leg, “you know I would." He pulls himself closer to your core, never breaking eye contact. "Not just gonna hand it to you, not tonight—you’re gonna ask for it, real sweet for me, okay?”

You’re about to fire off another witty remark when he slips your underwear down your legs, the fabric disappearing in one swift motion. Goosebumps race over your skin at the cool air against your heated flesh. 

His eyes darken at the sight of how wet you are, a muscle in his jaw ticking as he fights to stay in control. You see his throat bob when he swallows, like he’s genuinely trying not to devour you on the spot.

A surge of embarrassment rises in your chest at how the exposure, but it’s overshadowed by the torrent of desire swirling inside you.

He settles in, nudging your knees apart, and plants soft, teasing bites along your inner thighs. The gentle scrape of his teeth makes you shudder. It’s maddening that he’s so close yet deliberately avoiding the place you need him most.

“Steve… please—”

You stop, voice cracking on the final syllable, unable to fully spit out what he wants. The vulnerability of wanting something so fiercely—of needing him so shamelessly—clutches at your chest. But he only smiles against your skin, smug and satisfied.

He's enjoying this.

“Mmm,” he hums “that’s a start, baby." His large hand presses lightly on your hip, keeping you still. "But you can do better than that, c’mon.”

Christ—he’s really doing it.

Making you earn it tonight.

His words shoot molten heat straight to your core, and your cheeks burn at how easily he’s backed you into this corner. You’re used to him being sweet, doting, bending to please you. Now he’s making you work for it.

A new wave of arousal slides through you, and your pride cracks under the tension. 

“Steve, fuck—” you grit out, “I need… I need your mouth on me.”

Your voice is so pitiful, so wrecked, that it makes him pause. Just for a second. Letting your request hang in the air between you. He tips his head back, eyes shutting as the pretty words sink in, echoing in his mind, wrapping around his ego like silk.

You always ask so nicely—so sweet, like you know he’s the only one who can give you what you need.

When his gaze drifts back down to you, his lips curl into a slow, wolfish grin, full of intent and promise.

You got it, angel.

“See?” he murmurs, voice buzzing with triumph. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

His fingers grip the underside of your thighs, the press of his thumbs guiding you to spread open for him. He’s so sure in his movements—like he’s found a new rhythm to the confidence that’s always been under the surface.

His eyes flick up, meeting yours, silently asking for every ounce of trust.

“Now,” he purrs, “be good for me and hold still.”

Your half-formed reply dies on your lips the moment his tongue flicks out in a slow, deliberate stroke, and every one of your senses sparks with raw heat as you gasp.

The slick sound of him feasting on you, the wet slide of his mouth and the soft, desperate little hums in his throat—it’s a rush of sensation you can’t possibly process all at once. Your breath hitches, eyes rolling back, and you grasp at the sheets for any sort of grounding.

He’s relentless, and your responses only spur him in more, bracing his arms under your thighs and pulling you closer as he licks you in languid, thorough passes that have you panting. 

You’ve felt his enthusiasm before, but never quite like this—he’s devouring you, every flick of his tongue precise, and he's barely even started. His nose nudges in precisely the right spot against your clit, sending another wave of pleasure rolling through your body.

You can feel his smile against you as you writhe beneath him, he knows exactly how good he is, and he’s revelling in it. And he doesn’t waste a second—doesn’t tease, doesn’t draw it out—just gives you exactly what you need, slipping a finger inside your walls slowly. 

He’s reading you like a damn book, tracking every little reaction, every shaky breath, every twitch of your body. And when he feels you clench down around his digit, a quiet, broken sound slipping from your lips, he looks up—just to see the glazed-over look in your eyes, the telltale sign that your mind has emptied of anything but him.

Perfect. 

Exactly where he wants you.

A strangled moan bubbles up in your chest, almost slipping free, but your reflex is to clamp a hand over your mouth to muffle the embarrassing sound. 

Immediately, he notices your movements. He stills, bites down on your thigh—not too hard, but with enough force to jolt you out of your pleasured haze—and you gasp, eyes snapping down to meet his.

“Oh no, baby,” he admonishes, voice reverberating against your skin, “none of that. If I’m makin' you feel good, I wanna hear it.”

Flustered heat floods your cheeks. 

“I—I wasn’t—”

“Oh, sweetheart, you were,” he cuts in with a smile that’s maddeningly confident. “But that’s alright.”

He reaches for your wrist, prying your arm away from your face. The gentle kiss he presses into your palm is so achingly tender it makes your breath stutter. Then, he guides your hand to the top of his head, tangling your fingers into his hair.

“Go on,” he murmurs, sighing when your fingers scrape against his scalp. “Keep me here. Let me finish what I started.”

You don’t need to be asked twice. Your grip tightens in his hair, trying to ground yourself against the swirling sensation of his mouth and hands. He groans in approval at the tug, the vibration sending fresh sparks of pleasure dancing along your spine. 

It’s overwhelming—the sloppy sound of him working, the heady smell of desire in the air, the blazing heat coiling in your stomach that’s already coiled too tight.

The pressure builds fast, almost too much. A litany of moans and half-formed pleas stutter from your lips, and your thighs clamp around his head, unconsciously trying to pull him closer. He doesn’t let up, his mouth so perfectly focused that you feel yourself hurtling toward the brink.

“Steve,” you gasp, voice cracking as you arch your back. “Please—I need you inside—”

He pulls back just far enough to meet your wild, pleading gaze. A cocky smirk paints his face, and you’re distantly aware of how your own arousal slicks the lower half of his jaw. 

He looks downright smug.

“So bossy,” he drawls, drunk on lust and repeating the earlier sentiment. He slips his fingers out, ignoring the needy tremor that wracks your body. “But you knew how this was gonna go—first you come on my tongue. Then you get my cock.”

Jesus.

Did he really just say that?

He dives back in without waiting for your reply. Shock ripples through you at the brazen filth coming out of his mouth, but it’s drowned by the delirious pleasure of his tongue lapping at you again. A strangled moan escapes you, and you tighten your hold in his hair.

The pleasure whips through you in dizzying waves, and you can’t hold on any longer—your voice cracks on a broken cry as you cum, your muscles seizing, back arching off the bed as he drinks in your release. The sensation is overwhelming, pleasure blooming hot beneath your skin. 

He groans, feeling your thighs quake around him, but he only slows when you start to whimper that it’s too sensitive. Gently, he eases the pressure, placing a series of soft, almost apologetic kisses against your shaking inner thigh.

He could get used to this new confidence.

Especially when you reacted like that.

He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, eyes still hooded and dark, chest heaving as he looks at you sprawled on the bed. A deep flush staining his cheeks, seeming almost in awe of you—of what he’s just done.

Of what he was capable of. 

“Fuck—” he breathes, voice ragged. “That was so fucking beautiful.”

And he’s gonna make you do it again. 

He leans back on his heels, gaze tracking over your trembling form. For a moment, all he does is toy with the hem of your dress, the fabric rumpled from all his manhandling.

“Dressed so pretty for me,” he murmurs, dragging his fingertips along the edge of the material. “Should’ve been patient, taken my time peeling it off first.”

Your heart feels like it’s about to punch a hole through your chest. The desire in his eyes is thick—tangible enough that it makes every nerve in your body light up. You lift your shoulder slightly, desperate to be rid of the clingy fabric.

 “T-take it off—”

He huffs a low laugh and shakes his head, catching both of your wrists gently and pressing them back onto the bed. His grip is firm but never harsh, the contrast makes your pulse jump even higher.

“Ah-ah, sweetheart,” he chides. “Lemme enjoy it a little longer.”

You wore it for him, after all. 

Still fully clothed himself—his slacks pressing against your hypersensitive core—he leans in, capturing your lips in a slow, open-mouthed kiss that has your head spinning. You can feel the rough fabric nudge between your thighs, stoking the heat that hasn’t subsided one bit since he first put his mouth on you.

His breath warms your neck as he breaks the kiss. 

“Begged so pretty for my mouth—how 'bout you tell me how bad you want my cock?”

His voice is all tease, dripping with amusement as he watches the effect his words have on you. He holds back a chuckle when you tug at his shirt. His impatient girl.

He knows what you want.

He’s not dumb.

He just likes watching how precious you are when you're needy.

“I swear—if you don’t—”

He grins, cutting you off.

“If I don’t what?” The low rasp in his voice vibrates through you as he finally lets go of your wrists to yank his shirt over his head, tossing it aside, taking pity on you at last.

He doesn’t even register the scars covering his torso—you’ve already seen them, already traced them with careful fingers, already accepted them. Right now, that’s not what matters.

The only thing on his mind is you—how far he can take you, how much he can push with this new trust you’ve given him. He’s going to drag this out, drink up every second.

And later, when the night is over, he’ll revisit this moment again and again, replaying it until it’s burned into him,

Until it’s engraved into his eyelids. 

“You want me to take these off?” he drawls, glancing at your still mostly clothed figure, “What d'you think?” He pauses and pretends to contemplate his question. “Should I make you beg for that too?”

God no, you plead looking up at him. 

Your expression must be downright pitiful—eyes big, mouth parted—because after a few agonising seconds of letting you squirm, he exhales a soft chuckle. 

He’s not gonna be that mean. 

At least not tonight.

“Alright,” he says, voice warming, “waited long enough. Let’s get you out of this—before you tear it off yourself.”

Finally.

His hands move with purpose, helping you out of the dress in record time. The bra follows in one swift motion, baring your skin to the chilled air. The hunger in his gaze intensifies, and you instinctively cross your arms over yourself, but he gently pulls them apart with a soft, adoring look.

He might be all sharp tongues and teasing words, but he’s still your Steve—and it slips through the second he sees you like this, sees the softness in your naked body.

Every time, it wrecks him. Leaves him in awe, staring like he’s never seen anything so beautiful in his life. He has to school himself, to remind himself why he’s here.

Not just to have you.

To make love to you.

Fuck you so good you forget your own name.

He stands to rid himself of his jeans and underwear, fumbling briefly with the button in his haste. The condom he grabs from the top drawer is on in a flash, and you can’t help the breathy laugh that escapes your lips.

“Were you planning this?” you quip, arching a brow.

He smirks, bracing a hand on the mattress as he crawls over you. 

“Wouldn’t call it planning,” he admits, “more like wishful thinking.”

He looks down at you, gauging every little reaction as he settles between your thighs, his mind spinning from the way you’ve handed yourself over to him tonight.

Every teasing thought that crosses his mind? 

He says it. 

Every slow, deliberate movement? 

He makes it. 

He’s always had a quick mouth, always had a knack for getting the last word, and it turns out that skill translates pretty well in the bedroom. 

From the way you’re responding—whimpering, clinging to him like he’s the only thing keeping you tethered to reality, he understands it's effect.

He drags his cock through your slick, soaking in the way you shudder, still sensitive from your last release. The broken little sound you let out nearly ends him right there. 

He almost slows down, almost stops to check in, almost asks if you need a second—

But then he sees it. 

That look in your eyes.

Like you’re seconds away from combusting. Like if he doesn’t fill you up right now, you might actually fall apart. That puts his mind at ease real quick.

You can take it. You can take him.

You always have, every curveball his fucked up life has thrown at you and now, this is your reward. 

His tough girl—so pretty, so pliant, and all his.

“You’re so worked up, baby,” he murmurs, rolling his hips just enough to have you sucking in a sharp breath. "Fuck—bet I could make you cum again before I’m even all the way in—"

Your body clenches at the idea, but a flicker of alarm crosses your features. He notices and offers a crooked grin, leaning down to press a comforting kiss to your cheek.

You can have him now. 

"Shhh—I'll be nice, promise.” He assures, sliding his hand to the back of your neck. "I know—let me give it to you, yeah? Just how you like."

He pushes inside with deliberate slowness, guiding himself until he’s fully sheathed, and the stretch is a sharp, blissful edge that has your toes curling into the sheets. Heat flares bright as you take him in, your breath catching in your throat at the way he fills you.

"Shit," he breathes, voice wrecked, eyes fluttering shut. "You—fuck, you have any idea what you did tonight?"

His mind flashes to the bar—how pretty you looked, how fucking dangerous you stared at him, all soft-spoken and sweet while chatting with Robin, while his brain was miles deep in the gutter.

"Had me losing my fucking mind, baby—kept looking at me like you wanted me to bend you over the damn table—"

Your cheeks burn, fresh embarrassment creeping up your neck. Sure, you were flirting with him—but not to that extent, right?

The way his eyes darkened whenever you brushed against him, the way his jaw tensed, like he was barely keeping himself in check. And now, hearing him say it out loud, knowing just how much it got to him.

Yeah. 

You don’t regret it one bit.

“I-I didn’t mean to—”

His hips flex, drawing a startled cry from you. 

“No?” he challenges, leaning down so his breath skates across your lips. “Then why're you squeezing me like this, huh? Feels like you wanted it real bad.”

A strangled moan rips from your chest when he adjusts his angle, the friction almost too exquisite to bear. Your nails dig into his shoulders, leaving half-moon imprints on his skin, and he seems to relish it. It only spurs him to thrust deeper, rolling his body in a fluid, deliberate motion that has you arching up into him.

“Can you feel how deep I am?” he rasps, pressing a broad palm over your lower stomach.

You nearly wail at the added pressure, your body tightening involuntarily. Every nerve feels overexposed, and the sweet ache is already coiling again, dangerously close to snapping.

"Yes—yes," you pant, voice breaking, eyes squeezing shut like it’s too much. "Fuck—fuck, I can feel it—"

His own breathing is ragged, that confident smirk never fully leaving his face. 

"Yeah—you do," he groans, voice cracking. "Fuck—stretching around me so fucking perfect—"

He pounds you into the mattress, each thrust driving sparks of ecstasy through your veins. The headboard knocks against the wall, but all you can do is cling to him, trying to keep your mind from fracturing under the overwhelming pleasure.

“Steve—Steve, I—,” you gasp, the tension in your core reaching a fever pitch, “I’m gonna—”

“Shhh, baby,” he croons, sliding a hand under your back to pull you closer, forehead pressed to yours. “It’s okay—I got you. Been so good for me tonight—go on, let go.”

Your body locks up, the orgasm tearing through you with near-blinding intensity, muscles clamping around him in a cascade of pleasure that leaves you sobbing out broken moans. His rhythm stutters, his eyes squeezing shut as he chases his own release.

“That’s it—” he mutters, voice cracking with urgency. “Fuck, I can’t—I—”

One more thrust and he’s lost, groaning low in his chest as he spills into the condom. The two of you ride out the final tremors together, foreheads pressed, breath mingling in the heavy air.

It takes a moment for you both to resurface after his release, his chest still heaving against yours. The pleasure in his eyes slowly gives way to something gentler.

He leans down, pressing a series of lazy, heartfelt kisses to your forehead, your cheekbones, the corners of your mouth—wherever his lips can reach. Each touch is imbued with care.

“Did so good,” he murmurs between kisses, voice affectionate. “So good for me, angel.”

You melt under the praise, letting your eyes drift shut as you soak in his breathless devotion. It contrasts how wild he’d been just moments ago—downright relentless—makes his current tenderness all the sweeter.

With a gentle grunt, he pushes himself onto his elbows, brushing back the stray hair that clings to your damp forehead. 

“I’ll be right back, okay? Don’t move.”

In your blissed-out state, all you can manage is a drowsy hum of assent. He slips off the bed, and you watch through lidded eyes as he pads across the room, disappearing into the bathroom. 

You hear the tap running, the faint rustle of him disposing of the condom, then the soft swish of water in a washcloth. Your body feels utterly spent, a pleasant tingle still humming along your skin.

There’s a quiet care in the way he cleans you up. The washcloth is warm and soothing against your overly sensitive skin, and you shiver at the sensation. 

His gaze follows your every little twitch, making sure he hasn’t hurt you. You can feel his hand trembling ever so slightly—not from uncertainty, but from the flood of emotions surging through him.

“Hey,” he says, voice subdued, “that was okay?” His eyes lift to yours, a glint of worry in them. “I mean… you’re good, right?”

You let out a lazy, content laugh. 

Yeah, you're pretty fucking good.

“Think I’m gonna need a week to recover.”

“Yeah?” His eyebrows shoot up. 

“Definitely.” A mischievous curl graces your lips. “Now, come here and let me fall asleep on you.”

You really are bossy tonight. 

“Alright. Gimme a second.” He stands up, rummaging through a drawer for a pair of boxers. When he slips them on, you catch a glimpse of the faint lines of his scars, but he still doesn't seem bothered.

He fishes out a soft, worn T-shirt for you, returning to the bed to help you pull it over your head. The patience contrasts all of his previous actions.

“Better?” he asks, pressing a gentle kiss to your temple.

You nod, contentment seeping into your bones. He climbs in beside you, pulling the covers up until you’re both tucked in. He wraps an arm around your waist, drawing you close enough that you can press your face against his chest. The steady thrum of his heartbeat lulls you, punctuating the silence.

You open your mouth to say something—maybe to tease him about how he just passed some imaginary line from shy to sweet to downright insatiable—but before you can form the words, you realise his breathing has already gone soft and rhythmic. 

The drinks and all the exertion apparently caught up to him, and he’s fallen asleep, mouth parted and face slightly smushed into his pillow.

“Good night,” you murmur, a fond smile tugging at your lips, even though you know he can’t hear you. You lean up to plant a delicate kiss on his jaw.

You knew he'd appreciate it if he was awake.

He mumbles something incoherent, shifting only to pull you tighter against him, and you let out a quiet giggle that he sleeps right through. Feeling his warmth, your own exhaustion rushes in, and you finally let your eyes flutter shut.

The hungover teacher stirred with a low groan, rolling onto his side as the dull ache behind his temples made itself known. His mouth felt tacky and dry, and he blinked a few times, letting his eyes adjust to the morning light filtering through the blinds. 

Nine o’clock was the time displayed on his alarm—usually he was up before then, but after the night he’d had, it was hardly surprising.

Last night was fun.

Last night...

Last night.

Oh, God.

The realisation hit him like a jolt of caffeine. He cast a quick glance around the bed. The rumpled sheets on your side were cool to the touch, and his heart gave a lurch. He noticed right away that the clothes the two of you had tossed around last night were no longer strewn across the floor. 

His mind whirred with images of the previous evening: how he’d practically been glued to your side in the car, half-drunk and babbling. How he’d lost every ounce of self-consciousness once you got inside… 

And dear lord, that torrent of absolute filth that had poured out of his mouth.

He didn’t regret the closeness—far from it. But the specifics came rushing back, making him wince. 

He’d definitely gone too far, pushed some kind of boundary here. A flush crept over his cheeks at the recollection of the way he’d practically manhandled you, said things to you he hadn’t allowed himself to say in years. 

And the marks—no, not his—he vividly recalled leaving little reminders of himself on your skin. What if you were hurt or upset? Is that why you weren’t next to him in bed?

Fuck this is bad. 

So very very bad. 

Just as he was about to scramble out from under the covers to search for you, he heard the bedroom door creak open. His stomach flipped—and there you were, peeking in with a bright grin, two steaming mugs of coffee in hand.

“Oh, Casanova has finally risen,” you teased, stepping fully into the room.

Relief flooded him so quickly he almost felt dizzy. You were still here. 

And you looked…

Well, you looked content. 

Happy, even?

You were practically glowing.

He stayed propped on one elbow, eyes roving over the fresh T-shirt you’d thrown on, a new one from the previous night, hair still mussed. He swallowed, trying to find words, but they didn’t come. He settled for a sheepish smile as you rounded the bed and set the cups on the bedside table before perching on the edge of the mattress, near his legs.

“How’s the head this morning?” you asked, tilting your head in concern.

“It’s, uh…” He shrugged a bit stiffly, still grappling with the residual embarrassment. “I’ll live,” he managed, realising only then how dry his throat was.

You leaned back, letting out a laugh, you couldn’t help it. He looked so frazzled in the low light of the morning. Your movement caused your hair to shift, and he finally noticed the marks he’d left on your neck. 

His stomach lurched. Guilt surging through him.

Crap. 

“I’m so sorry,” he blurted, pushing himself upright. His hands slid over your shoulders, fingertips grazing the bruises with excruciating caution. “I swear, I never should’ve done that. Please tell me they don't hurt—are you hurt? I promise—”

You pressed a finger to his lips to stop his apologies spilling. 

“I’m fine,” you soothed.

He shook his head, eyes clouded with worry. He didn’t believe it, you were just being nice—too nice—like you always were. 

“Angel, you don’t have to lie to me,” he insisted, voice hushed. “I got carried away, I know I did. Just—just look at your neck. I—”

He never wanted to leave anything physical on your body. 

You batted his fussing hands away before he could delve into another apology. He felt you shift closer, sliding a leg over his lap and effectively straddling him. The contact made his heart thump in a way that was not filled with desire, but with reluctant relief.

If you were willingly crawling into his space like this, you couldn’t be too upset. 

Right?

“Hey,” you said softly, “look at me.”

He did, brown eyes trained on yours. The moment they did, he felt the tension in his chest loosen just a fraction. 

“Were you ever going to tell me where you learned to talk like that?” You teased, voice playful as you decided to steer the conversation in a new direction. 

You knew he’d be beating himself up—that’s just how he is. So, it was up to you to pull him out of it, to ease his mind from the intensity of the night before and steer him somewhere lighter, something more playful.

Also, you were definitely curious about where he got that mouth from.

A deep crimson spread across his cheeks. He remembered fragments of last night. The shamelessness of it all, the confidence, the raw desire that had him spouting every sinful thought crossing his mind. 

“… I don’t know!” He admitted, eyes shifting away but he knew you would not be satisfied with that answer. “Back in high school, I, uh… picked some stuff up, I guess. Whenever I just said what I wanted, reactions were… enthusiastic.”

“Reactions, huh?” You arched a brow. “Were you some kind of player?” You press further, leaning into him and watching him squirm. “I can imagine you had all the girls wrapped around your finger.”

Steve’s stomach knotted—he hated how this conversation was going, even if you punctuated it with a compliment. 

“I wasn’t, like, a player player,” he defended, lost as to how to word it right, “but I—fuck—I know my way around a woman, okay?”

“Way around a woman? So romantic.”

He groaned, planting his face in his hands in a thoroughly mortified gesture. 

“You know what I mean, God—” he mumbled, voice muffled. “You’re bullying me right now—this? This is bullying. Shouldn’t have introduced you to Rob, she’s rubbing off on you.”

With a grin, you gently peeled his hands away from his face, enjoying every once of embarrassment. 

“Call it payback,” you said, eyes dancing. “Because if this is bullying, I don’t know what to call your behaviour last night.”

He tried to retort, but ended up pressing his lips together. 

You got him there. 

He couldn’t bear it any longer, needed to put an end to this ruthless interrogation and wipe that cruel expression off your features. 

“Come ‘ere,” he said, voice still raw from sleep. Slipping his arms around your waist, he tugged you beneath him, rolling you onto the bed in a playful tumble. Your giggles filled the space, effectively silencing your questions.

When the laughter finally subsided, you stroked his cheek, a question in your eyes. 

“So I take it the hangover isn’t too bad?”

You’re finally done with torturing him.

“No, not too bad,” he shook his head, lips curving. “Told you I wasn’t that drunk.”

You gave him a dramatic eye-roll. 

“Yeah, alright,” you teased, leaning in to press a chaste kiss to his mouth. “Hop in the shower. I’ll make us breakfast.”

His brows rose, something like hope glinting behind his eyes. 

“You’re not gonna have one too?” He tried to sound casual, but truth be told, he was already imagining the possibility of you joining him.

“I already did,” you replied, shrugging. “You were dead to the world. Didn’t wanna to wake you.”

“Well, next time, do.” He huffed in playful protest. “I could’ve helped.”

You shot him a pointed look as you slid out from under him. 

“Somehow, I doubt that.”

He tries to follow, strong arms itching to have you back in them. 

“Depends what you mean,” he countered with a sly half-smile. “I can be very useful when I wanna be.”

You’re sure he could. 

“Go shower, lover boy.” You roll your eyes and grab a pillow, swatting him lightly. “I’ll get us something to eat.”

He laughs as he stretches up, blanket slipping to expose his torso as he clicks out all the sleep of his spine. He slips off the bed, pressing a quick kiss to your cheek before he scurries through the doorway.

You wander into the kitchen, the morning sun giving the space a homey atmosphere despite the sparse contents of the fridge. When you open it, you are met with a mildly irritating discovery.

Three eggs. 

Damn it. 

You decide he’s earned two of them for all his hard work last night. A shopping trip is definitely in order, he’s not going to survive on leftover cereal and a couple of condiments. Setting the eggs aside, you gather bread and butter for toast, determined to whip up a breakfast that’s at least semi-nutritious. 

Grabbing a small notepad from a drawer, you remember that your boyfriend tends to dump half his belongings in the console table by the entrance whenever he can’t find a proper place for them.

So you wander over, opening the drawer and flipping through random scraps of paper in search of a pen. Old receipts, a couple gold star stickers, a manual for an appliance that he apparently never installed—typical Steve Harrington clutter.

Your fingers still on something that immediately stands out. A small stack of official-looking envelopes, bold printed letters across the front. The same sender, repeated name after name on each envelope. 

The stamp—some government seal or maybe an organisation’s letterhead—catches your eye. Your heart gives a peculiar jolt. 

National Laboratory? 

You’re not entirely sure, but it’s definitely not from his school. It looks official, maybe serious. Possibly part of the story he’s only given you glimpses of. You hover there, tempted. 

It’s not your place. 

You know that. 

But curiosity thrums in your veins—if only you knew more about where these came from and how they tie into his past. You catch a snippet of text on the paper, scanning just enough to see some names that mean nothing to you—except that they might mean everything to him.

Before you can open it fully, the shower in the next room clicks off, the pipes clanging in that telltale way. Mild panic surges up your spine, and you hurriedly tuck the envelope away. 

Grabbing the first pen you spot, you practically race back into the kitchen with it clutched in one hand, notepad in the other, as though scribbling down a grocery list had been your sole focus this entire time.

Trying to steady the beat of your heart, you begin jotting random items—milk, bread, eggs, fruit?—each word an effort to keep your thoughts from drifting back to those envelopes and the million questions you suddenly have. 

You care about Steve, more than you can articulate, and you still yearn to know every piece of his history. 

A soft rustle of movement alerts you to his presence before you feel it. He steps up behind you, pressing a warm, damp kiss to your shoulder. The heat of his skin seeps through the thin T-shirt you’re wearing. You notice his hair’s still dripping from the shower, and he smells faintly of soap.

“What are you up to?” 

“What does it look like?” Feigning ease, you hold up the list. “Making sure you don’t starve here. Clearly, you didn’t plan on feeding yourself for more than a day or two.”

He leans in, peering over your shoulder at the small list, then huffs a quiet laugh. 

“Thanks,” he murmurs. “Wanna go to the store with me later? I’m sure there’s some pizza in the frozen-food section calling my name.”

You turn your head enough to catch his eye, relieved he hasn’t noticed anything amiss. 

“We should probably go soon,” you point out, recalling Sunday hours. “They won’t be open all day.”

Instead of answering right away, he skims his lips up the side of your neck,. The bare expanse of your skin prickles with goosebumps, and you fight the urge to melt against him entirely. He chuckles at your reaction, pressing a little closer so you can feel the solid weight of him.

“I can be quick,” he teases, voice dipping into the same husky register you remember all too vividly from the night before. 

“You’re not tired enough from last night?”

He’s insatiable.

“Sweetheart,” he says, leaning into you, “you’ve got me wide awake this morning.”

Your eyes flutter shut when he turns you around, guiding your hips so you’re facing him, your notepad nearly forgotten in your grip. He kisses you then, slow but with a playful flick of his tongue that reminds you he’s not quite done pushing your buttons. 

“Bet I can have you calling my name again in five minutes, tops,” he whispers, grin tugging at the corners of his mouth as he tilts his head to deepen the kiss.

You roll your eyes—though your pulse jumps traitorously—and push gently at his chest. 

“We’ve got errands now. If you wanna eat something besides toast for the next few days, you better rein it in.”

You playfully bat his hand away, though you can’t suppress your grin. He leans in for one more quick kiss before he finally heads into the bedroom to put some clothes on.

You watch him go, and he’s still the Steve you know. There’s still a layer of him you’ve only just glimpsed, wrapped up in those official envelopes, as well as Robin's previous slip-up.

That is the real Steve Harrington, the one you intend to fully understand. 

taglist: @daisy-is-a-writer @chiliwhore @kvroomi @just-lilita @negomi123 @catluver02 @tinythebunni @everythinghasafacee @irrelevantbutembarrassing @almostfullstarfish

[luveline]

does eddie know about reader getting kidnapped in the steve zombie au? i feel like it would freak him out and also he’d totally understand steve’s fussing now. i can imagine maybe robin mentioning it passing and eddie asks steve and they discuss it in hushed whispers away from r, steve finally opening up to eddie and dropping the jealousy even if for a moment.

afterwards, eddie is a bit more protective with r and she’s confused? at night when theyre cuddling before bed, she mentions it to steve and he’s get this guilty look on his face and tells her what happened. i’m just not over the whole kidnapping debacle i cant lie. it was intense and poor reader must still suffer from the pain.

thank you for requesting!! zombie au | fem, 2.5k

cw mentions of abduction and dark themes

“How long have they actually been together?” Eddie asks. 

He asks out of boredom, mostly, but there’s something else —when you and Steve first got here, together, after Eddie found you looking for antibiotics and so bravely saved Harrington’s life— he assumed you and Steve were new lovers. The way he was with you pointed to a honeymoon stage in full flux. Even now the question gets asked because he sort of can’t believe you and Steve are nearing the two year mark. In apocalypse years, that’s basically twenty. 

“Since the start, pretty much. Steve says she liked him for a while and he fell for her hard a couple of months before they found me,” Robin says, letting her book rest tented across her chest. 

If Robin weren’t a homosexual, and Eddie also weren’t a homosexual (maybe, he’s not fully decided), he thinks she’d be the girl for him. You're taken, but Eddie likes being your friend too much to care anyhow. 

“Why…” 

Across the grass, just out of hearing distance, Steve is tipping your head back. Sat behind you, talking to you, his hand held carefully against the front of your neck, thumb poking into your chin guiding you back. He looks worried. You laugh in his face and free fall backwards until you’re both laying in the dirt, your back to his chest and Steve’s spine to the ground. 

“He gets really worried about her. Like, all the time.” 

“Well, she got hurt pretty bad. If I remember it right, she fell two stories and didn’t wake up for a few days.” 

Eddie’s never heard that story. He’s heard about you getting locked in a fridge with a geek, and that you and Steve got chased by a gang of scroungers by the I-65, but, “She fell two stories?” he asks, “And she’s alive?” 

“That’s not even the worst of it,” she says with a laugh. “You know how she got the nickname killer?” 

Eddie shakes his head, ‘cos he does, and he doesn’t want the funny story, he wants to know what the hell happened to his friend. “What’s the worst of it?” 

Robin realises he’s being serious and stops laughing. It’s not like she thought it was funny that you got hurt, but it wasn’t like you were in any real danger. But Eddie’s like a bloodhound. There’s a story here and he knows it and he needs to hear it, worse when Robin stays quiet for a long time. 

“A couple of weeks after they got to the College, we had to go get her.” Robin digs her hand behind her back. “There was a man, he… sort of faked his death? And he took her.” 

“He faked his death and kidnapped Y/N?” Eddie asks, shellshocked. 

“He faked his death to kidnap her.” 

“What? Why?” 

Robin frowns at Eddie severely. “He was Steve’s partner for patrol. He was too interested in her, asked a bunch of questions Steve wouldn’t answer, and then he disappeared. We assumed he’d wandered off and died like an idiot.”

“But he didn’t?” 

“No, he… God, Eddie, I thought she would’ve told you all this stuff.” 

Eddie shrugs. Part of your charm is your poor self-esteem, he teases, how cool you are and how terrified of being a loser you seem to be, despite the inevitability of being both. Everyone Eddie loves is a massive loser, and that’s what makes them his kind of person. 

Your friendship is an honest one, but it doesn’t mean you’re forthcoming. 

“He only had her for a day,” Robin says. “I shouldn’t tell you more than that, it’s not fair, but we found her. Steve went crazy until we got her back, and he’s been like this since.” 

“Shit, Robin, I’m tempted to stand guard by her tent. Wait, what happened with to the guy?” 

“He shot himself trying to hit Christopher with his gun.” 

Eddie whistles lowly. “Got what he deserved.” 

“Yeah, I think he did.” 

Eddie doesn’t like what’s implied. He should ask you about it directly, but he’s heard your nightmares sometimes. He always assumed they were of the same variety as his own, gnashing teeth breaking the skin of his arm or leg as he tries desperately to escape from a corner. 

He doesn’t make Robin say more, and he doesn’t ask you about it. He can’t find time alone with you, and he isn’t sure what he’d say. 

Steve glares at him from across the flames of a small campfire. “What?” 

“What do you mean, what? Just standing here.” 

“You’re suspiciously quiet, Munson.” 

“I want to ask you about something but I don’t want you to bite my head off.” 

“I’m sure I will.” 

“I know you will.” But Eddie cares about you enough to chance it. He steps around the fire, digging his shoes into the hardened muck of ash and pebbles, “It’s about Y/N.”

Steve’s eyes go looking for you. “What about her?” 

“Robin told me she got taken by some guy? Like, actually taken?” 

The light in Steve’s expression just dies. “Yeah.” 

“He’s dead now, right?” 

“Yeah. Killed himself like an idiot.” Steve frowns at Eddie again, tongue poking at his lip. “He took her while she was showering. I’d just got back from a run and she told me to sleep while she was gone. I woke up that night and nobody knew where she went. I didn’t sleep, I– went through every building on the campus with Hopper and I couldn’t find her, I didn’t know where to look, but a couple of us went outside the walls anyways, Chris and Vanessa, Jonathan, me and Rob, and she left a couple of things in the woods. Buttons, bits of fabric.” 

“Smart girl.” 

“When I found her, he had her ziptied.” 

“Fuck.” 

“That’s what those scars are, on her face?” Steve brings a pinched hand to his jaw. “He grabbed her and his nails… I cleaned them out afterward but they got infected anyway, so she’ll have them forever. She used to cry for hours. Sometimes she still cries about it.” 

Steve sighs, ragging a hand through his hair roughly. “I wouldn’t tell you that stuff, but I know she won’t, and sometimes I’m not here to look after her, and I know you will.” 

“Yeah, I will.” 

“And I know you like doing tricks with that cat’s cradle stuff, so you should probably, like, be aware that she doesn’t like having her hands tied together.” 

“I won’t do anything to her,” Eddie says lightly. He feels like he and Steve are on different footing than before. “Thank you for telling me.” 

“I shouldn’t have, just–”

“She’s your Achilles heel, Harrington.” 

“Sure, whatever that means.” 

“Your one weakness.” 

Steve grins, to Eddie’s surprise, crossing his arms over his chest, their temporary ceasefire stretching a little longer. “I guess she is.” 

—

Steve is laying down in the tangle of your blankets waiting for you to press yourself into his arms. A niggling thought appears at the surface of your mind, your gaze having fallen to his collarbone, bared by his too-large sleep shirt, a worry you can’t ever seem to truly move past: Steve loves you and you can’t deserve it. It goes away when you realise it doesn’t matter. Steve loves you and you have to try to deserve it, to fall into his arms and build him up as he does for you. Maybe you already do, and your cruel head has taken too many hits. Whatever the case, the part of you that has a big crush on your boyfriend wants to rest near him. There’s no better pleasure than settling down to sleep on his side and knowing he’s going to pull at you until he’s deemed you comfortable. 

“Steve…” you murmur, placing a hand either side of his chest to hang over him. 

“What?” he asks. 

“Can you do that thing where you hold me like I’m a baby?” 

He laughs loudly. It’s ridiculous and silly and you’d never do it if Robin were spending the night in the tent with you, but you lay across Steve and he gets an arm under your legs to curl you up. It’s less like a baby (as you’re much too big and tall and he’s not nearly as gentle as he’d be with a kid) and more like a pill bug, all your weight on him, your face smushed into his neck and his arms around your back. Somehow, someway, you slot together nicely like this. “Just tell me when I’ve broken your back,” you mumble.

“As if.” 

“As if,” you repeat. 

“Do you feel like a baby?” 

“No. I just figured that was the quickest way to ask for this.” 

“I think you can just ask me to hold you,” he says, his hand spreading out between your shoulders, “and that’ll work.” 

“Mm.” You aren’t ready to sleep, and he couldn’t like this, it’s not a permanent position. Your head whirs with thoughts of the day, and the stomach-central-heaviness that comes with being body to body with someone you love. “You okay?” you ask quietly. 

“I’m good.”

“Me too.” 

“I’m really nervous about that ’expedition’, Friday,” he says. 

“We don’t have to go.” 

“Maybe we shouldn’t,” Steve says. 

“It does seem far away.” 

“Thing is, even if we don’t go, Robin’s dead set on going, and I swore we’d never be apart again. I can’t break that promise.” 

You nose at his chest. “I guess we have to spend the next two days convincing her to stay home.” 

“How are we gonna do that?” 

“I don’t know. Break her leg?” 

“Sounds like something Eddie would say.” 

You laugh into his skin, quiet and contented, because you know you’ll find a way to stay with Robin. Maybe she’ll be impossible to convince and you’ll both have to go with her, but nothing matters beyond staying together. 

“He’s been acting weird,” you confess. 

Steve’s thumb rubs the band on your bra. “Do you wanna take this off?” He doesn’t wait for an answer, pulling the clasp together under your shirt and releasing it in a move so dexterous it borders on offensive. 

You shrug out of your bra without displaying too much skin. Steve’s hand falls to your stomach, shy of your belly button, trimmed nail skimming a ticklish line. “He’s been quite gentle with me,” you say unsurely. 

“He doesn’t have a crush on you. Well, more than he usually does.” 

“I thought I should tell you, though. I don’t want to give him the wrong idea.” 

“God, you don’t,” he says, “Eddie doesn’t get wrong ideas ‘cos all his ideas are already wrong, but it’s not something you did. This time, it’s my fault.” 

“How’s it your fault? He wouldn’t fight me in the river, did you tell him not to?” 

“He doesn’t actually listen to me.” 

“So why’s he acting like I’m glass all of a sudden?” 

Steve finds your hand and holds it, pulling at it, encouraging you to lay down on him again. “I’m sorry, but I told him about what happened with… with Connor. Nothing in detail, only that it happened.” 

“Oh.” 

“I know it’s not my story to tell him.” 

“You’re half of it, though,” you suppose aloud, turning your face up to the tent ceiling, pleased when his hands adjust you and cross over your front. 

“I told him that he tied you up, and about your mouth. But I didn’t tell him about any of the things he said, or– I know I shouldn’t have said anything, I just don’t want you to be alone one day and have that secret, just in case he needs to look after you–”

“Are you going somewhere?” you ask quietly. 

“Of course not.” 

You let the quiet grow for a time, until you let out a sigh, your chest collapsing beneath his hand. “I honestly forgot that he doesn’t know all that stuff from before.” 

“That’s okay,” he says softly, hugging your chest with the same gentleness as he holds in his voice, “sometimes I forget too.” 

“We went through a lot.” 

“We still are.” 

“But things have been a lot better here, right?” you ask. “I mean, it’s not the College, we don’t have our room, but we have each other, and the porta-cabins aren’t bad. Hopper even said that next month when we choose our campground we’ll stay until after the winter, and we’ll have a cabin, right? Me and you, Robin, Eddie, Marcy, Sarah– not a bit of privacy–”

“I'm not sharing a room with that imbecile.” 

“It’ll be fun. Warmer than last winter outside.” 

Steve sighs. “So much rain.” 

“Do you think Eddie thinks I’m weak?” 

Steve doesn’t answer. He slips you from his chest and slinks in behind you, his lips under your ear. You turn your head to see him and find him close enough to kiss. 

“No,” Steve says surely. “Eddie doesn’t think that you’re weak. He’s just hearing about it for the first time, and he cares about you. Remember when you told me about the time those girls at school smashed your lunchbox and tipped milk over your head? It was years before we met and it still made my chest get all hot and achy.” 

“I can’t imagine people caring about me so much, sometimes,” you confess in a mumble. “Especially now.” 

“But they do.” 

Sweet, then, for Eddie to worry. As much as you like fighting with him in the river while you wash your clothes, it’s nice to think he might’ve refrained from his usual attempts at drowning you because he was upset on your behalf. “He’s a good guy. Maybe he can go with Robin instead.” 

“I trust him, but Robin is never leaving me again,” Steve says. “Not that far away. Nah, we’ll just go with her.” 

You couldn’t lose Robin, but you also couldn’t lose this version of Steve who has his best friend back. “Right,” you agree, burrowing against him, fingers digging under him until he lifts his back and lets you hug him. Your arm will be dead in minutes. 

Steve asks if you want to read together, so you do, until it’s too dark to read without the torchlight and you’re too tired to do more than be hugged by him. As you’re falling into sleep, he speaks, and you miss each word individually but understand the jist of it: no one’s gonna hurt you, he’s saying. He’s swearing it. Because we’re together. 

You mumble love yous and goodnights to each other. You have a nightmare that night but you’re not scared when you wake. You'll have more nightmares in the future that aren’t as easily forgotten, just, for once, the memory fades into nothingness as Steve draws your face into his hands and lays you back down. As quickly as you’d woken up, you’re sleeping. 

—

[heaven4lostgirls]

prompt: streak ✧ @taylorswiftmicrofic ✧ wc: 562

steddie (steve harrington/eddie munson) ✧ cw: swearing, mentions of upside down and slight violence and gore

“you’re cheating!” steve accuses, turning to look at eddie with a glare.

eddie lips quirk with a smile that he tries to smother, he shrugs nonchalantly but there’s a twinkle in his eyes.

“i’m just better than you harrington, nothing more to it.” eddie shrugs and steve wants to strangle him.

they’ve been playing mario kart for the past hour and eddie has somehow beaten steve at every. single. game.

let it be known that steve harrington is the king of mario kart, he has a concurrent winning streak against all of The Party including robin, argyle, nancy and jonathan.

then all of a sudden eddie munson comes along and somehow beats steve at his own game? impossible.

steve’s eye twitches at eddie’s smile and eddie breaks into giggles.

steve is still frowning when he asks, “what’s so funny?”

and eddie only waves him off, “you look like i’ve murdered your unborn child steve, it’s just a game!” he laughs

steve huffs again, “just a game” he mimics eddie’s voice, annoyed, which has eddie turning to him in an affronted manner, shoving steve into the couch.

steve yelps dramatically as if he’s about to be pushed off the couch.

“you couldn’t have even pretended to let me win?!” steve cries out aghast once he’s done with his show of dramatics.

eddie slaps a hand over his mouth to muffle the awful snort he lets out at steve’s sentiment.

“stop laughing!” steve accuses, but there’s a smile on his face, “you’ve ruined my winning streak! and i was doing so well” he whines out, throwing himself onto the couch.

eddie just rolls his eyes, pushing steve’s arm off of his leg, “you’ll survive harrington, it’s not like the world is going to end twice in the same year” eddie says sarcastically and steve lifts his head to glare at eddie.

“don’t say that, it’s like you’re manifesting it” he hisses and eddie only shakes his head.

“you’d think you were the one who nearly bled out” eddie sniffs, playfully petulant.

“oh hush you baby, you’re alive now aren’t you?” steve mocks and eddie looks affronted for a second before a mischievous look passes over his face.

he tackles steve on the couch, play wrestling with him, pinning his arms above his head as he looks down at him with a smirk.

eddie may look like a scrawny motherfucker, but it’s all lean muscle from his work at the factory.

eddie notices steve breathing a little heavier as his eyes dilate from under him and eddie’s breath hitches at the sight.

fucking beautiful is what it is.

“can i kiss you?” eddie rushes out before he can second guess himself and he watches firsthand as steve freezes.

eddie panics for a second before steve nods so hard eddie starts to think he might be a bobble head version of the boy he’s into.

eddie leans down, softly brushing his lips with steve’s, trying to aim for something less aggressive.

it lasts for all of three seconds before steve surges up, hands still encased by eddie’s above his head as he kisses eddie ferociously.

eddie smiles into the kiss and steve starts to giggle, “who knew mario kart could be foreplay?” eddie whispers against steve and steve’s laugh shakes both of their frames.

“dork.” steve replies with a small smile, cheeks tinted a beautiful shade of pink.

[mrsjellymunson]

Need A Ride?

Written for the @steddiemicrofic March prompt ‘ride’ | WC: 453 | Rating: T | CW: Vague allusions to masturbation and arousal, light swearing | Tags: pre-S4, flirty!Steve Harrington, oblivious!Eddie Munson

“You need a ride?”

Eddie stops bouncing his knee and chewing his thumbnail as Steve fucking Harrington peers at him through his Beemer’s passenger window with charmingly-squinted eyes.

Asshole.

Eddie doesn’t need this today, not on top of his van breaking down outside Melvald’s.

“Nah. Jeff’ll be here soon.”

“Tall guy? Hendrix shirt?”

“Umm, yeah...?”

“Just saw him at Family Video. He’s running mom-based errands, I said I’d relay the message.”

Steve blows his bangs off his forehead, dashingly handsomely.

Such an asshole.

“You getting in, or what?”

Initially Eddie ignores Steve’s conversation, not wanting his day to get any worse now he’s trapped in an enclosed space with his secret crush. Resigned, Steve flips on the radio to a report of an overturned tomato truck causing delays. He mumbles,

“Everyone’ll have to… ketchup.”

Eddie snorts. Rapidly camouflaging his amusement, he frowns, hard.

“My god, Steve, that was awful. I’m actually kinda embarrassed for you.”

Steve cackles as Eddie’s seriousness falters, breaking the tension. Talking, they discover new things about each other. Steve takes an occasional toke, Eddie doesn’t hate blue jeans, and there’s surprising overlap in their music tastes. Eddie eventually confesses to enjoying the Super Bowl, and internally buzzes when Steve admits he’s read The Hobbit.

To his astonishment he feels like they might even be connecting, until Steve, apparently from nowhere, starts sharing his dating frustrations.

“I mean, sure, I’ve had plenty of partners. And my hand’s fine ‘n’all, though it’s not as good as actually being with somebody. I’d just love to find someone who really gets me. Y’know?”

Eddie doesn’t know. The closest he’s got to dating is seeing a face in the Hideout crowd after their dingy bathroom hookup the week before.

Irrationally incensed at Steve’s ignorance of his privileged position, Eddie blurts, bitingly,

“Maybe you need to expand your horizons, Steve. Ask someone out who you’ve never considered worthy before.”

Steve’s hooded eyes regard Eddie’s increasingly reddening features for far too long. Smirking, he slowly raises an eyebrow.

“You got anyone in mind?”

Eddie’s brain shrieks Yeah! I do, actually! A tall, long-haired metalhead!, but his jaw clamps. His mind, however, roils, and he has to subtly adjust his position to hide his horrifyingly inappropriate chub.

At Eddie’s, Steve turns off the engine and slowly turns. Eddie’s not great at reading people’s intentions, but his expression might be… humility? Fear? Pensive optimism? Whatever it is, there’s something in that hot hazel gaze that flips Eddie’s belly. But can he really trust King Steve? After all, he’s a total assho—

Abruptly, Steve clears his throat and drops his tone low.

“You know what? I think you might be right. So, um, Eddie. You, uh… need a ride?”

Thanks so much for reading! And thanks to everyone at @steddiemicrofic for all their continued hard work 🙏🙏

A/N: Yes, I got the ketchup idea from Pulp Fiction, sue me 😜

You can find more Steddie and Eddie on my masterlist 😉

Tagging my usuals (list is open), ILY all: @joejoequinnquinn @jamdoughnutmagician @guiltyasquinn @madaboutmunson @airen256 @sunshinepeachx @the-unforgivenn @skrzydlak @comeonatmebruh @jamiecb66 @80s-addict @abellmunsonmovie @definitionwanderlust @sheneedsrocknroll92 @munson-blurbs @wonderlanddreamer @daisy-munson @maedesculpaeusoubi @kurdtbean @mediocredreams @in2tswft @micheledawn1975 @littlebebebunny @12thatsanumber @alastorssimp @the-baby-angel @eddie-is-a-god @wolfqueenxxx @losingmygrasponreality @richter-raccoon @1deverland @evileyeandthecattywhumps @3rd-conchord @bellalillyrose @katethetank @justalotoffanfiction

[whosscruffylooking]

Open Arms Chapter Nine

steve harrington x fem!reader Open Arms Masterlist word count: 4.7k Warnings: Canon typical violence. Mentions of kidnapping, blood, vomitting, and drugs. Rewrite/Character Insert of Stranger Things ~1985~

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

Pain explodes across Steve’s face, intense and blinding. His head snaps to the side, copper flooding his mouth as he groans through gritted teeth. His ribs ache, his vision blurs and the pounding in his skull threatens to drown out everything else.

“That one stung,” Steve rasps, forcing out a breath. His voice is thin, shaky — but defiant.

“Who do you work for?” The Russian’s voice is callous, slicing through the haze.

“For the millionth time,” Steve gasps, “I work at Scoops Ahoy!”

The man barely reacts; he just gives a curt nod to his partner.

Steve doesn’t even see the next punch coming. A fist slams into his stomach, driving the air from his lungs in a strangled wheeze. He curls forward instinctively, body folding in on itself. His muscles scream in protest, and his breath stutters outin a broken groan.

“Look at me!” Steve chokes out, barely able to lift his head. His voice shudders, edged with panic. “Look at this stupid outfit! You think I’m a spy in a sailor’s uniform?!”

Blood trails from the corner of his mouth, hot and metallic. His swollen eye barely opens, and the throbbing in his face grows unbearable.

Another blow — deeper this time — and Steve’s whole body bucks. The air rushes out of him in a ragged sob.

“I told you,” he wheezes, his ribs burning with every breath. “Our…our delivery didn’t come. We thought maybe it got left at the loading dock. So we — we went in to check, and there was this…this elevator and then… I don’t know, I woke up here!” His voice is breaking now, a desperate edge creeping in.

He swallows hard, tasting blood. “But I swear — I swear — nobody knows about us. Nobody saw us. Just…just let us go, okay? Shit happens and life goes on…right?”

The guards exchange a look — and then they laugh. Deep, guttural, wrong.

Steve forces a weak chuckle, trying to mask his growing panic. His ribs scream with the effort, but he keeps smiling — or tries to.

Then the man leans in, close enough that Steve can feel his breath.

“You see…” The Russian’s voice drops to a chilling whisper. “A young girl happened to stumble into our facility earlier. I think this is not a coincidence.”

The air vanishes from Steve’s lungs — not from the pain this time, but from sheer dread. His battered body stiffens, aching and sluggish, but his mind sharpens like a blade.

You.

“No,” Steve breathes. His pulse pounds in his ears. “No… please, I—”

The guard’s fist crashes into his face. The world lurches, tilts, and then everything goes black.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

A dull, searing pain pulses through Steve’s skull as consciousness creeps back in. His eyes crack open, sticky with dried blood, and the world tilts violently. The frigid bite of metal presses against his wrists, tied, again. His arms are stiff, his fingers numb.

Then he sees you.

Slumped forward in a chair across from him, your head hangs low, hair falling across your face. For a moment, Steve’s heart stutters — please, no.

“Y/N…” His voice comes out broken and delicate. He swallows hard, fighting past the tightness in his throat. “Hey… hey, wake up.”

You don’t stir.

“Come on, sweetheart,” Steve pleads, panic swelling fast. He jerks against the ropes, wincing as they bite into his wrists. “Please… just—just open your eyes, okay?”

Your body remains limp.

“God,” his voice shakes now, “no, no, no… please.” He strains harder against his restraints, ignoring the sting of the rope cutting into his skin. “Don’t do this. Don’t… don’t leave me.”

He sucks in a breath that shudders violently on the way out.

“I’m so sorry,” he chokes. “I should’ve told you… about everything. About why I’ve been… God, I’ve been so stupid.” His eyes burn, hot tears threatening to spill. “I just… I saw those pamphlets in your room and it hit me— this whole stupid idea that you’re leaving, that you’re gonna find something better than… than this. Than me.”

His voice cracks, and this time, the tears come. They sear tracks down his bruised face as he squeezes his eyes shut.

“I got scared,” he discloses. “I thought… if I kept some space, maybe it wouldn’t hurt so much when you left.” He laughs dryly, bitter and broken. “Guess that backfired, huh?”

His gaze locks back on you, and his chest narrows. “I just… I love you,” he whispers. “I love you so much and… God, I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m terrified you’ll realize I’m not enough — that I can’t give you what you deserve.” His voice falters, then crumbles entirely. “But I need you. I don’t know how to be… me without you.”

He sniffs forcefully, shaking his head. “And now you’re in this mess — this whole goddamn thing — because of me.” His voice breaks again, ragged and raw. “I’m so sorry. Please… just wake up.”

His head drops forward, and for a moment, the fight leaves him. His chest heaves as sobs wrack through him — a rare, helpless kind of crying that leaves him breathless.

“Please,” he whispers one more time, barely able to say the word.

Then, a faint sound — a breath, soft but real.

Steve’s head snaps up.

“Y/N?” His voice trembles with hope. “Hey… hey, I’m right here.” He watches as your head shifts slightly.

“Come on,” Steve breathes, eyes wide and desperate. “Come back to me baby, please.” 

“Steve?” Your voice comes out in a strained whisper, each word scraping against your throat like sandpaper. The effort sends pain slashing through your ribs.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m right here,” Steve says quickly, “I’m here.”

You try to move, but the sharp pull in your side keeps you still.

“Don’t — don’t move,” Steve stammers, his own breath hitching like he’s holding back a sob. “Just… just stay still, okay? You’re hurt.”

“Where are we?” you rasp, your head swimming.

His face twists, guilt washing over him. “Some kind of… secret Russian lab under the mall.”

Your eyes snap open. Memories rush back — the loading dock, the crates, the hands grabbing you — and your stomach turns.

“Oh my god,” you breathe. “I remember.”

Steve’s face crumples. “What did they do to you?” His voice��cracks, and tears streak through the grime on his bruised face.

“Feels like I got hit by a truck,” you murmur weakly, trying for a smile that barely comes.

Steve’s expression falters, his face twisting with regret. “I’m so sorry,” he whispers. “I’m so — this is all my fault. You shouldn’t be here.” He shakes his head, eyes dropping like he can’t bear to look at you. “You shouldn’t…”

“Steve…” You swallow thickly, ignoring the sharp ache in your throat. “This isn’t your fault.”

“It is,” he insists, voice rising. “I should’ve been with you — I should’ve… God, I shouldn’t have been so stupid.” He pulls hard at the ropes binding his wrists, fingers digging in so tightly his knuckles turn white. “I was scared, okay? I was scared I was gonna lose you, and now…” His voice breaks, breath stuttering. “Now I almost did.”

“You didn’t though,” you whisper.

“I can’t — I can’t…” His voice is barely there now, a fragile thing on the verge of breaking. “I can’t do this without you. I love you. I love you so much it hurts.”

“I think the hurt is probably from all those bruises on your face,” you try to tease, but the words come out disjointed and frail.

Steve laughs brokenly like it’s the only thing that is going to keep him from falling apart completely. “We’re gonna get out of here,” he says, but the way his voice wavers makes you wonder if he’s trying to convince himself.

The metal door groans open, and your blood turns cold.

The Russian man from earlier steps inside, and this time he’s not alone. A man in a white lab coat trails behind him, clutching a large syringe.

“No,” Steve mutters, straightening in his chair. “No, no, no… hey! Hey!” His voice rises into a shout. “You stay the hell away from her, you bastards!”

The doctor ignores him, stepping closer to you — too close. You barely have the strength to flinch.

“Don’t,” Steve growls, voice shaking with desperation. “Don’t you touch her!”

The cold metal of the needle presses against your skin. You don’t fight — you’ve learned by now that it only makes things worse. Closing your eyes, you brace yourself.

The sharp sting bursts through your neck like fire.

“Son of a bitch!” Steve cries out, his voice breaking when you whimper.

The doctor turns next to Steve, syringe still in hand.

“No,” Steve pleads now, struggling harder against his bindings. “Don’t — please…”

The needle plunges into his neck. His head jerks back, a strangled noise ripping from his throat.

Then his body slumps, and the room tilts. Your vision clouds as the heat crawls through your veins, thick and dizzying.

The last thing you hear before everything slips away is Steve’s voice, faint and distant, calling your name.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

When you come to, Steve’s voice is the first thing you hear — strained and oddly light.

“I told you,” he giggles, “I work at Scoops Ahoy.”

His head wobbles like a loose hinge, chin dipping to his chest before rolling back again. He’s laughing like he’s hearing the world’s funniest joke.

That’s when you realize you’re smiling too. Your head feels too heavy to hold up, and when you try to move, your body sways. A chuckle slips out unexpectedly. Then another. And another. Soon, you’re laughing uncontrollably, like you’re watching some twisted comedy sketch you can’t escape.

“Uh… what did you give me?” you manage to ask between gasps.

The Russian man ignores you, leaning in closer to Steve. “How did you find us?”

“Totally by accident,” Steve chuckles, dragging out each word like it’s funny just to say them.

That’s when you see the doctor reach for something, a pair of pliers.

The laughter dies in your throat. “No…” you whisper, the fog in your head clearing just enough to send panic racing down your spine.

“What is that?!” Steve blurts out, suddenly more aware. “What— No, no, no…”

The doctor grabs Steve’s hand, forcing his fingers apart. The cold metal hovers over Steve’s fingernails, and before you can react —

Steve’s scream tears through the room.

“WE HEARD A CODE!” you shout, the words tumbling out before you’ve even thought them through.

The Russian man freezes, turning his sharp gaze on you. “What?”

“We heard your stupid code,” you snap, desperate to draw his focus away from Steve. “You know, for Russian spies, you guys are amateurs. You made us, a bunch of school-age kids, look smarter than you!”

Steve’s head jerks toward you, his eyes wide with something like panic. He’s begging you not to take this on — but you can’t just sit there and watch him suffer.

“What code?” the man growls, stepping closer.

Your voice drops to something taunting, a smile curling at your lips despite the tremble in your chest.

“Неделя длинная… Серебряный кот ест… Когда синее встретится с желтым на западе.”

His eyes narrow. “Что еще вы знаете?”

“Это не сойдёт тебе с рук,” you spit, defiance burning in your voice.

Steve’s gaze flicks between you and the Russian, face twisted in confusion. “W-what are you saying?”

“I told him that he and his little friends aren’t getting away with this,” you mutter, eyes still locked on the man.

“Yeah!” Steve blurts out, suddenly energized. “Because we have a Henderson and a Hopper on our side!”

Your heart stalls. “Uh… Steve…”

“A Henderson… and a Hopper?” The man’s attention snaps back to Steve.

Steve grins, loopy and fearless. “Don’t forget Hopper’s U.S. Cavalry,” he adds, shaking his head dramatically like he’s sharing some big secret... because he is.

Before the Russian can react, an alarm blares — a piercing wail that fills the room.

The man’s face twists in alarm. He barks something in Russian, then bolts from the room in a frantic rush.

Silence settles over you both, save for Steve’s ragged breathing. He turns his head toward you, his bruised face bright with a lazy grin.

“You should speak Russian more often,” Steve slurs, voice syrupy and slow. “It’s… very sexy.”

You let out a breathless chuckle, part disbelief, part exhaustion, but then a scoff cuts through the room.

Your head jerks toward the corner, where the doctor is still standing, arms crossed and thoroughly unimpressed.

“What?” you snap, “You can’t stand the thought of two people being in love when you’re so miserable, huh?”

Steve snorts, twisting awkwardly in his chair like he’s trying to point but forgot his hands are tied behind his back. “Jealous!” he cries, jutting his chin toward the man instead. “That’s what this is! You’re jealous!”

“Oh god…” you mumble under your breath.

“You wish you were like me, huh?” Steve continues, words spilling out faster now. “Dating the most beautiful woman on the planet?” He grins wide like he’s just said something brilliant and unheard of. “Well guess what...you’re not! I am. I’m dating her!” 

He jerks forward as if he’s about to thump his chest, only to remember — far too late — that his arms are still bound. His face scrunches up in confusion before he leans back with a satisfied nod, like that was intentional all along.

The doctor’s expression barely changes, just a blank, bored stare, but Steve isn’t done.

“And...and you know what else?” He pauses, blinking hard like he’s trying to focus. “I’m gonna marry her too.”

Your mouth falls open. “Wait… what?”

“Yup!” Steve pops the “p” dramatically, swaying slightly in his chair. “I’m gonna marry her, and we’re gonna get a house — big one, with a pool and a dog! Or maybe a cat. I dunno, we’ll figure it out, but we’ll be so happy.” His smile softens, and his eyes — though glassy and unfocused — lock on yours. “Because I love her. More than anything.”

You sit there, stunned, your pulse thudding in your ears.

The doctor exhales sharply, muttering something in Russian before grabbing his things and stomping out the door.

“Well…” you mumble, your voice tight. “That escalated quickly.”

Steve grins dopily, his head rolling lazily to the side. “Yeah,” he sighs, in a hushed tone. “But… it’s true.”

Just then, a sharp scream cuts through the air, followed by the sound of rapid footsteps. The door bursts open and two small figures come barreling in — Dustin and… Erica!?

Dustin clutches some kind of cattle prod-looking contraption, jabbing it into the doctor’s side. There’s a crackling buzz, and the man stiffens before collapsing like a felled tree.

Robin barrels in right after them, wild-eyed and ready for a fight, but freezes when she sees the doctor already sprawled out on the floor.

“Oh…” Robin huffs, chest heaving. “Cool. Glad I sprinted for nothing.”

“We gotta get you out of here,” Dustin says breathlessly, rushing toward you. His face crumples with concern the second he sees you. “Are you okay?”

“Henderson!” Steve blurts out, grinning like an idiot. His head wobbles so much you’re amazed it’s still attached.  “I was just talking about you!” His head lolls back like keeping it upright requires far too much effort.

“I’m getting married,” you announce proudly, blinking slowly like you’re waiting for applause.

"To me! Did you hear that Dustin? She's getting married to me," Steve chimes in, ecstatic, "Wanna be my best man?"

“Nice spot for a proposal, Harrington,” Robin quips as she crouches beside you, fumbling with the ropes around your wrists.

“Right?” Steve slurs, swaying like a palm tree in a hurricane while Dustin struggles with the ropes. “Thought I’d make it memorable. The lighting’s great… Very… ambiance.”

“Oh yeah,” Erica deadpans. “So romantic. Nothing says forever like fluorescent lights and a sweaty Russian torture room.”

Robin snorts as she and Erica hoist you up. The room spins like a carnival ride or maybe you’re spinning, hard to say. Whatever happens next blurs together Robin's frantic voice in your ear, Erica snapping something impatient, Dustin dragging Steve upright and then you’re moving. Fast. The walls blur like smeared paint.

And then suddenly —

“Oh my god!” you squeal as the ground begins to move underneath you. “I love roller coasters!”

“No, no…” Steve grabs your arm like he’s bracing for impact. “Baby, no — this is a rocket ship. We’re going to the MOOOOON!” His hands shoot into the air like he’s leading a parade.

“Wheeeee!” you shriek, tipping sideways into Steve. Your stomach flips, and you giggle uncontrollably as Steve clings to you like an unsteady toddler. His grip is way too tight, but neither of you cares.

“Wait!” you gasp. “What if it’s a space ship and a roller coaster? Like — like we’re on Space Mountain!”

“I’m in Disney World!” Steve hollers triumphantly.

“You’re in an elevator, you morons!” Erica’s voice cuts through your bliss like a slap.

“An el-e-va-tor?” you repeat, awestruck, as if she’s just revealed the secrets of the universe.

“It’s like a metal room,” Steve explains wisely, nodding like a philosopher.

“A metal room that moves,” you whisper, eyes wide.

“You guys are very drugged right now,” Dustin says cautiously like he’s approaching wild animals.

Steve’s face scrunches in indignation. “You can’t tell me how to feel, Henderson.”

The elevator jolts to a sudden stop, and before you can process it, you’re being pulled out of the metal box. You stumble, your legs refusing to cooperate like a newborn giraffe on roller skates. You try to focus, but it’s hard to tell if it’s the spinning or the complete lack of spinning that’s throwing you off.

“Did we make it to the moon?” you whine, squinting around as if you expect to see Neil Armstrong standing next to a flag. “Oh, I sure hope we made it to the moon.” You blink, scanning the blurry shapes around you. “Where are the astronauts?”

“Nope, not the moon,” Steve says with a grin, trying (and failing) to jump in excitement. He immediately loses his balance and crashes into you. “We made it to the next best thing. The mall!”

You stare at him blankly, your thoughts still floating somewhere in zero gravity.

“Come on,” Dustin grumbles, pulling Steve upright with a look of exasperation.

They drag you into the movie theater at the mall, but you come to an abrupt stop as you gaze up at the screen. 

“There’s giants on the moon,” you say, wide-eyed.

“That’s Back to the Future,” Erica groans, shoving you into a seat.

Steve collapses beside you with a thud, sending a slight jolt through your already unsteady frame.

“Ah, time travel. That's nothing. We went to the moon.”

You turn to Steve with a frown. “No Steve, we're at the mall remember? We never made it to the moon.”

Steve looks at you puzzled, “But you just said there were giants on the moon.”

“Now, make sure you are very quiet,” Erica whispers, her voice full of authority.

“I can be so quiet,” you shout, unhelpfully loud.

Erica slaps her hand over your mouth, mumbling something about babysitting being above her pay grade.

“Do not go anywhere,” she orders before stepping away.

“Dustin!” you call over your shoulder, already trying to figure out how to escape. “I want a soft pretzel!”

“Now is not the time,” Dustin says, his annoyance turning into a full-on eye-roll as he marches off to find a seat.

You turn to Steve, who’s looking at the screen with that familiar lost puppy look. “You kind of remind me of Marty McFly,” you whisper conspiratorially.

Steve’s eyes light up, and he looks at you like you just handed him a trophy. “That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

With strict instructions to stay put, the others head off to find their own seats. For a while, you and Steve do exactly that — sort of.

But soon, your throat feels dry, and your mind latches onto one singular, all-consuming thought: Water.

“Steve,” you whisper, poking his arm. “I’m thirsty.”

“Me too,” he whispers back. “We should go on a quest.”

“Yes! A noble quest!”

The two of you clamber to your feet like a pair of newborn deer. Your steps are slow, exaggerated — sneaky in your minds, but closer to two drunks trying to out-mime each other.

“Shhh,” Steve whispers dramatically as you bump into a row of chairs.

“That wasn’t me,” you insist, blinking at the offending seats like they’ve betrayed you.

Stumbling through the darkened lobby, you finally find a water fountain. Steve leans down to drink first, completelymissing the spout and hitting his chin instead.

“You gotta aim lower, Marty,” you giggle, nearly collapsing against the wall.

“You’re so smart,” Steve slurs proudly, steadying you before attempting another drink. This time he succeeds, turning to you with a victorious smile.

“Your turn,” he says, grinning like he’s just won a gold medal.

You lean in, take a sip — and immediately start giggling again.

“Why’re you laughing?” Steve chuckles.

“Because,” you whisper, pointing to the reflection of the ceiling in the fountain like you’ve cracked some great mystery, “I think we are on the moon.”

Steve follows your gaze, both of you turning to stare up at the glowing neon signs scattered across the mall ceiling. The lights flicker and swirl, colors bleeding together like some psychedelic kaleidoscope.

“Whoa…” Steve murmurs, swaying slightly. “It’s like… the lights are dancing.”

“You see that too?” you ask, eyes wide. “I thought it was just me.”

“Nope. We’re definitely in space,” Steve confirms solemnly, gripping your arm like he’s bracing for zero gravity. “I wonder why they'd tell us we weren't on the moon.”

"The government probably," you react, it at least makes sense in your head.

The lights seem to twist and pulse, and suddenly your stomach lurches. The queasy wave hits hard and fast, like you’ve just stepped off a Tilt-A-Whirl.

“Oh no,” you gag, pressing a hand to your mouth.

“Oh no?” Steve echoes. His eyes widen in panic. “Wait, wait — oh no what?”

“I think I’m gonna—”

“NOPE. Nope, nope, nope!” Steve grabs your arm, but you’re already staggering away, one hand clamped tightly over your mouth.

You half-run, half-stumble toward the bathroom, Steve stumbling behind you like a malfunctioning shadow.

“I’ll hold your hair!” he calls after you, voice far too proud of his noble offer.

You barely make it to the bathroom, shoving the door open and crashing into the nearest stall just in time. Steve follows you inside, hovering uselessly in the doorway.

“You okay?” he asks, voice tense with concern. “Are you—”

A retch interrupts him, and Steve winces in sympathy.

“You’re doing great, babe,” he encourages. “Total pro. Like, Olympic-level puking.”

You groan miserably, forehead pressed to your arm as you try to catch your breath.

“Should I… should I get Robin?” Steve offers.

You shake your head. “No… just… gimme a minute.”

“Okay.” He pauses. “I’ll just… stay here then.”

Steve stays true to his word, sitting loyally on the bathroom floor like some dedicated guardian angel — if guardian angels wore sailor suits and reeked of sweat and drug-induced delirium.

“You okay?” he asks again.

“I think…” You pause, swallowing hard. “I think I’m done.”

“Oh, thank God,” Steve sighs in relief. “’Cause honestly…” He shifts uneasily where he sits. “I’m not feeling too hot myself.”

“You’re not?” you ask, voice still hoarse.

“Nah… but I’m good,” he insists, forcing a grin. “I’m solid. Rock solid. Like a —”

His face blanches mid-sentence.

“Oh no.”

“Oh no?” you echo, eyes widening.

Steve bolts upright like his body’s made of springs and stumbles into the stall next to yours. The sound that follows is absolutely wretched.

“Ohhh my god,” he grunts miserably between heaves.

“You’re doing great, babe,” you call weakly, throwing his earlier words right back at him.

“Don’t — urgh — don’t mock me,” he grumbles.

“I’m not!” you protest. “I’m being supportive!”

“You’re laughing,” Steve accuses, voice gravelly and pitiful.

“Only a little,” you admit.

The two of you sit there for a while, drained and miserable, slumped against the cold tile walls. Eventually, Steve’s hand creeps into your stall, blindly patting around until he finds your ankle. He gives it a weak squeeze, his touch warm even through your jeans.

“Still wanna get married?” he proposes, voice muffled.

“Yeah,” you whisper back, resting your hand on top of his. “As long as our honeymoon isn’t this.”

Steve chuckles breathlessly. “Deal.”

The bathroom smells like a war zone — a mixture of sweat, sickness, and whatever cologne Steve thought was a good idea to drown himself in earlier. He’s still slumped against the wall, his head tipped back as if he’s trying to keep himself from spiraling again.

“So…” you start, your voice hoarse. “Does that mean we’re good?”

He snorts softly, cracking one eye open. “We’ve always been good. I was just… an idiot for 48 hours.” His head thumps lightly against the stall.

Relief swells in your chest, easing something that’s been tangled inside you for days.

“I wanted to explain something to you — that night, when you saw those college flyers? Yeah, they were for out-of-state schools, but… I grabbed them months ago. I already know where I’m going.”

Silence.

Then Steve’s hands reappear beneath the stall, fingers scrambling for something to grip. A second later, he’s dragging himself under the door like some kind of exhausted action hero. He’s pale, sweaty, and his shirt’s twisted awkwardly on his frame — but none of that matters when you see the look in his eyes.

“And?” he holds his breath. His voice wavers like he’s bracing for bad news.

You smile — even bruised, battered, and smelling like death, he’s still the most beautiful person you’ve ever seen.

“Everyone keeps saying you have to go somewhere big and prestigious to have a real future,” you tell him, voice soft. “But what kind of future would I be working toward if we’re not working toward it together?”

His throat bobs as he swallows hard. “But… you have so many prospects,” he argues, voice shaky. “I don’t want you to give all that up for me and then… I don’t know… regret it later.”

You glance down at his hands, still resting on his lap. Without thinking, you lace your fingers through his, your thumb tracing slow circles across his knuckles, maybe to calm your nerves, or maybe because you can’t imagine not touching him right now.

“Steve,” you say calmly, “I’d be doing it for me. For us. I don’t have a future if you’re not in it.”

A tear escapes before you can stop it, slipping down your cheek.

Steve ducks his head, his hair flopping forward. A few tears spill into his lap, and he sniffles hard. “I felt so lost these past few days,” he mutters. “I didn’t know how to prove myself to you.”

“You didn’t have to,” you say, reaching out to push his hair back from his face. “You’ve been my best friend since we were kids. I know exactly who you are — I knew everything I needed to the night we kissed, and I haven’t looked back since.”

His hand tightens around yours. “I really wanna kiss you right now.” His eyes are warm, so full of love you almost forget how gross you both must look.

“Please don’t,” you say with a chuckle. “We just threw up for half an hour.”

Steve barks out a laugh, louder than you expect, and you can’t help but join him.

“I love you, Steve Harrington,” you declare once your laughter fades. “And I can’t wait to marry you one day.”

“It’ll be the best day of my life,” he whispers, pulling you closer until your head rests against his shoulder.

“Promise me we’ll never get kidnapped by Russians again,” you mumble sleepily.

“Scout’s honor,” Steve says, wrapping an arm around you. “I think I’ve had enough Russian drama to last a lifetime.”

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Tag List:

@xplrnowornever @brother-lauren @the-au-thor

[sacrilegesummer]

Wet, Hot, American Nights - Part 2

Take on Me

summary: It's Week 5 at Camp and you've noticed a not so subtle shift in Steve. He's happier, more helpful, and... friendlier, than you've ever seen. Maybe someone's rubbing off on him. Meanwhile, your Hell Week girls are starting to grow on you, but either way, Nancy always has your back. warnings: flirting, wide open water, mention of wild animals, cussing, alluding to sex, cussing, heights, ‘only one bed’ trope but for camping a/n: I am still VERY nervous pls be kind to me. I am trying to not describe the reader in any way besides age and gender, but if there's something written that feels like projecting a certain look, pls lmk and I will edit/fix it for the future:) More notes at the end <3

word count: 4.3k

Week 5

You woke up on Sunday morning with the inexplicable urge to go swimming. Sure, you were a lifeguard and enjoyed swimming, but normally the idea of diving straight into the turbid lake water unsettled you. But, at 7 a.m, you squeezed on your tight blue and red lined one piece and threw your sandals back on (as well as packing your shower essentials. You were motivated! Not crazy), marching to the waterfront. It was another hot but beautiful day, a clear blue sky, lit by the still rising sun. 

The waterfront was still, the surface perfectly reflecting the sky like glass. It looked endless as it blended into the horizon. You tossed your sandals and dry things on a nearby bench and padded barefoot down the dock. Looking down into the water, if you looked past the reflection, you could see the sun rays exposing the bluegills and sunfish that lived under the dock. You dunked your foot into the water, deciding it was plenty warm to dive right in. Ungracefully and lazily, you dove in, knowing exactly how deep the water was, and began to front crawl, finally disturbing the surface of Elk Bay. You watched as your arms caused ripples and waves, felt your feet kick away seaweed, and tried to calm your nerves. 

Sunday was the day all campers arrived. You knew you were a great counselor but every week came with all the same usual fears. Will they respect me? What if they hate me? How do I keep them entertained and safe? Will they like each other? One of the things you disliked about Camp Elk Heart was the change of campers every week. It’s difficult to make meaningful connections in the week you’re given with your campers, but you’ve been successful this summer. You’ve been lucky so far to have some incredible groups of girls, but you’ve witnessed other cabins and their ‘Hell Week’ cabin, and you knew that your time was coming. It was already Week 5 out of 10! Surely one of these weeks will be terrible and awful and push you to your limits more than you’ve ever been pushed before. 

You start to realize the more you try to force yourself to not think about your anxieties, the worse your mind is making them. You paused for a moment to tread, looking around the lake, and then around the waterfront. Suddenly you sense movement to your right, in the treeline. You hear the noise from the Northside of camp, colloquially known as “boys side”- and then it’s gone. A rabbit? A fisher? You prayed it was something that couldn’t swim. 

You kept your eyes on the treeline in front of Cabin 6 as you hurriedly swam in. Two weeks ago you fought off a fisher that was living under Cabin 11 and if you never had to see one again for the rest of your life, it’d be too soon. Grabbing your things and rushing to the bathhouse you’re glad the water on Northside is perpetually freezing. Some hated the cold water, but today, you found it refreshing in the humid weather. 

_ _ _ 

Your hair was still damp when you walked into the Nor’wester room for the camp-wide Sunday meeting. You were already moved into your cabin for the week and knew you were Co-ing with Nancy this week, but you still had yet to receive your camper assignments or med sheets for the week. Having new campers every week had its downside, but it also meant living and working with a new counselor every week- which you loved. You sit down in one of the only open spots on the couch next to Mae. You glance across the room, taking in everyone's faces. The people you’ve grown to love or care about, babbling excitedly to see their camper’s names and age groups.

You don’t really feel like joining in, being totally and completely content watching everyone else’s happiness and excitement. Your chest swelled with love, a feeling that seems to happen multiple times a day since you started working here. As your eyes flit across you the room, you try to ignore the pull in your chest to look at him. You didn’t see Steve after your bonfire on Friday, apparently Robin needed to go all the way back to Hawkins Saturday. You couldn’t hide your disappointment when Mae told you yesterday. You still haven’t been able to thank him for cleaning the party aftermath. 

You wonder if he left without saying goodbye intentionally. You completely avoid eye contact with Steve and, a little delusionally, you think he might be starting right at you. You wave a little at Torres, who was perched in front of the group with his arms crossed next to Southside director Darcy. He gives you a friendly smile and a little wink, his way of telling you the meeting was starting soon. You hear the door open and as your eyes move to see who entered, you catch Steve looking right at you. He looked away instantly in the opposite direction as everyone else, who were staring at the double doors. 

Tall and stocky and always sporting a backwards hat, Gavin is one of the kindest and most caring bosses you’ve ever had. He claps his hands and gives the room his signature sparking white and perfect grin. 

“Are you guys ready? What week is it?” he yells.

“First WEEK!” you and the rest of the room yells, even louder. A call and response Gavin started a few weeks back after sensing everyone becoming too comfortable with the routine.

“What week?” He cups his hand behind his ear. 

“FIRST WEEK!” the room feels like it's shaking.

“Exactly! It might be week 5 but these kids have been waiting all summer for their first week of camp! So let’s get out there! Give them creativity, compassion, and damn good time,” Gavin says as he passes out cabin assignments and med sheets. You make eye contact with Nancy from across the room, basically in Jonathon’s lap, and raise your eyebrows excitedly as Gavin passes you your list of girls for the week. 

She says something you can’t hear to Jonathon and gets up from her seat, walking over to you. You hold the papers face down, waiting for your friend and Co before looking at it. 

“What are you hoping for?” you ask the curly haired girl.

“Literally anything except the 10 year olds. They’re old enough to mouth off, but little enough to still wet the bed and that combination is just too much for me” Nancy says, shaking her head. “You?”

“I haven’t had the oldest girls yet so I’m hoping, fingers crossed, Darcy was listening when I asked for them.”

Nancy grins at you and grabs one side of the papers, “Ready? Three, two, one!” 

You flip the paper over and instantly your eyes go to the margins, looking for the ages. 13, 13, 14, 12, 13, your eyes widen in excitement at Nancy and at the same instant you both shout “Oldest girls!” Secretly though, you know you would have had the same reaction regardless of age. 

You laugh as you and Nancy dance in your seats, “Oh, my god.” you said suddenly, “Nancy,” you said, sounding very serious. 

Her eyes go wide, “What?”

“This means I can finally go across the lake! I finally have girls old enough to canoe without capsizing or crying! Should I sign us up for Elk’s Harbor?”

Nancy starts pointing at the Site Night sign up sheet across the room, “Yes, yes do it now!”

Another aspect of Camp Elk Heart that was new this year was “Site Night”. Every Wednesday every cabin has to pack out all their food and sleeping necessities to a campsite that was not on camp grounds. Some places could be quickly hiked to, meaning they could pack more for comfort and make multiple trips (and usually for younger campers). Others were miles away and usually required campers to bike, which meant all of their things would be brought to the site for them. Elk’s Harbor was a totally different beast, and campers had to be, at minimum, 12 years old to go. Canoeing across the lake, down the river and through a small series of rapids (where most campers tend to flip their canoes), to a small opening that’s hidden behind a low group of leaning trees and if you miss it, you’re basically past the point of no return. Then, portaging all of your stuff and your canoe 150 rods all uphill (just under half a mile) to the campsite. The campsite sat on the side of the most perfect rock on the edge of the lake for cliff jumping and swimming. It is highly sought after, and this was the moment for your adventurous heart and spirit to finally take it. 

You basically sprint across the dining hall to the Site Night sign up sheet, dodging people and chairs and politely as you can. Just as you’re coming up to the front of the room, you see Steve, pen in hand, calmly writing his own cabin number somewhere on the sheet. 

“Excuse me!” you shout, almost shouldering Steve out the way and grabbing the spare pen on the table. Your eyes rapidly scan the paper for Elk’s Harbor. When you do see it, you go to write your cabin but see someone has already taken it. 

“What? Who’s in Cabin Six this week?” you said, looking around for the culprit. 

Steve looked at you awkwardly, not quite understanding why you’re upset. He gave a fake cough and then said, “I’m Cabin Six. Me and Jonathon.”

“You have the oldest boys? Didn’t you have them last week?” you said, looking at him with saucer eyes, eyebrows furrowed. 

“Yeah, turns out I’m pretty good with them so I get older boys again. Are you trying to go to Elk’s Harbor?”

“Yes!” you said exasperated, “were you not just there?”

“I was supposed to go last week but my boys were too scared. Went to Quartz Creek instead, it was easier to bike there,”

“Well, if you like having the older cabins so much then you'll probably have them again, this might be my last time ever. Please, can we go to Elk Harbor instead?”

“What!? No way, I’m not guaranteed an older cabin ever again, I got lucky this time.” Steve said, bringing his eyebrows in. 

“Steve come on, you’re Watercraft Director, you could just go there whenever. You have full access to canoes all the time!”

“And you’re the Extreme Sports Director! You could just ask Gavin to go like- like- rock climb over there or something and he’d just let you!”

As your bickering was growing in volume, Steve’s words caught the attention of your Camp Director. 

“Woah woah! What’s happening over there?” Gavin called from inside the kitchen, helping the cooks with dishes before campers got here. 

“We both want to go to Elk’s Harbor but only one cabin can go at a time,” you said, a little dejected. Despite Steve being one of the more introverted counselors, Gavin adored him. Probably from bonding over their love of sports and the gym. You knew on some weekends they would go work out or run together. Steve was obviously a favorite and if it came between you or Steve, you knew who Gavin would choose. 

“Why don’t you both just go?” Gavin responds, nonchalantly. 

You and Steve looked at each other, and he said, “We can do that?”

“Well not normally, but you’re both good counselors and I trust you to behave and take care of your campers. Besides, not everyone gets the chance to go across the lake so I’d rather you both just go than one of you miss out on it,” Gavin turned back around to continue helping the kitchen prepare dinner. 

Your eyes lit up as you whipped back around to the sign up sheet, scrawling ‘Cabin 11’ in the corner of the box for Elk Harbor, not wasting a second. You turned to Steve smiling, “I’ve never done a co-ed Site Night, this will be so much fun!”

Steve looked a little nervous but smiled just a big, “Yeah, super fun! Do you think our cabins will get along?” 

“Oh of course, I’ve never had a bad group of girls, and boy cabins love me! I’m sure it’ll be great,” you turned to Nancy who was across the room, chatting with Jonathon but looking at you, and gave her two thumbs up. 

_ _ _

What had started as a group of girls who weren't super ‘outdoorsy’ had quickly turned into your first (and hopefully last) Hell Week. Despite only having 5 campers, the cabin was constantly disgusting with clothes, dirt, and sand, covering every surface, no matter how many times you and Nancy begged them to clean their stuff. They were completely disrespectful to you and Nancy, never listening, never on time, and always complaining. You could deal with the messes, the lateness, all of that, but hearing them complain for the fifth time in an hour ‘why do we have to do this, why can’t we be inside, why can’t we just tan’ was like nails on a chalkboard. Their teen voices reached decibels and frequencies you didn’t think were humanly possible when they came across frogs or bugs. 

You had truly never felt such…irritation, for a group of children. The nicest one, being the oldest 14 year old, but she was still very clearly not interested in being outside when she didn’t have to be. Your one saving grace was the fact that the girls were repulsed by the boys in Cabin 6. Despite the disgust with the other 14 year olds boys, they were utterly obsessed with Steve and were ecstatic that they’d be spending the night ‘with’ him and his cabin. 

Site Night was always pandemonium. As you walked into the Dining Hall you could barely hear your thoughts, it was that loud. Campers were talking, yelling, gossiping, all while making their dinner for tonight. You let Nancy handle your campers, food, and meds, meanwhile, you were doing all the physical tasks that needed to be prepped before leaving. You had gotten an early start, prepping the tents, canoes, and overnight bags for your launch at 3:30. You couldn’t wait to make your classic ‘hobo stew’, a conglomerate of leftovers from the last few days. You made sure to tell your campers that the secret to good hobo stew was making sure you had enough sauce, salt, and pepper. 

You were weaving through the crowd of children to your group of children when someone caught your shoulder

Steve called your name, “Hey! Are you excited for tonight?”

You looked up at him and laughed, “With my girls… I’m not sure. What about you?”

Steve’s eyebrows furrowed a little, “You’ll have to tell me what that means later. But absolutely, I mean, these kids are awesome. Blake is an Eagle Scout,” he said, starting to point to his campers, “Marcus and Eli are Boy Scouts, and, uh, Ethan and Wade are just super cool!” His cheeks were red from smiling, pride evident on his face. He had such knack for working with older campers, you wondered if he had more childcare experience than he let on. He didn’t seem the babysitting type, but you’ve been wrong about him before. 

“That’s awesome,” you flashed a big smile at the boys, “My girls are also super cool, but in the mall rat sort of way,” you didn’t even sound convincing to yourself, “I have a feeling the portage and hike are going to be pretty rough, but that’s okay! That’s the type two fun we’re always talking about!”

“No, type two fun would be if it started rain-”

You gasped and slammed your hand over his mouth, “Never, ever, ever, say that word before going on the water. Don’t you know that’s bad luck?”

You looked at him wildly as he stared back with wide eyes, he mumbles through your hand, “No…” then he licks your hand.

“Yuck! You’re such a freak!” you yelled, wiping your hands on his shirt (that might as well have been two scraps of fabric covering only the center of his chest, a fact you tried to ignore). 

“I’m the freak?” he laughs, “You keep your hands to yourself now or I’ll show you a real freak,” his face almost instantly flashed to horror at what he just said.

You laughed again, a look of disbelief coming over your face, “Yeah Steve, you’ll show me a ‘real freak’? Didn’t know you had a side like that.”

Steve groaned and grabbed your shoulders, shushing you, “I swear, everytime I make that joke it always comes out wrong. I’m not even like- trying to flirt-”

“Flirt?” you interrupt, your teasing tone filling every word, “flirting at work is prohibited Steve, you better watch your mouth.”

Steve was smiling, his face growing red with embarrassment, “Yeah, yeah, whatever go do your job or something,”

“I’m trying!” you said walking away from him. You look over your shoulder and say, “You’re just so distracting!” and send him a wink. 

You turn around and continue towards your cabin. As you approach you’re a little shocked at how… well behaved they all appear to be. Breakfast is in its bag, along with all of their hobo stews packed away. The girls didn’t seem upset or anything just very focused. Courtney, Piper, and Yvonne were staring at some journal pages from one of Courtney’s many, many journals. You couldn’t make out the writing totally but you swore you could see Steve’s name written at least a dozen times. Sarah and Alisha however, were staring in the direction of Cabin 6, but not directly at them. 

“Hey guys! How's everything going?” you glanced at Nancy, who was looking quite proud. 

“Pack out is going great,” Nancy answered, “All the food and meds are packed for the night and the girls have been doing a great job!” she said, exceptionally and oddly positive. 

“Uh huh. Well girls that sounds great! You should be proud of yourselves. Uh, Nancy, wanna help me make my dinner?” you said, gesturing to the buffet-like table of all this weeks’ leftovers. “I got uh- I got all the stuff ready to go, canoes ready to launch and all the supplies are packed in my canoe. Two canoes for the girls and one for us. What did,” you did a double take back at your girls, “what did you do to them,” you whispered into Nancy’s ear. 

“I told them if they didn’t listen to us we wouldn’t go across the lake which means… no Steve. They’ve been pretty well-behaved since then,” she proudly said. 

“Well, alright! Works for me,” you laughed. “How bad do you think this is going to be?”

“I think it’s going to be the worst night of our life. Is type three fun a real thing?”

“Type three is, what? You don’t have fun in the moment and it's not fun to remember. That’s just a bad time,” you and Nancy both laughed. 

Finishing packing up your dinner, you let the girls lead the way to the canoe launch, their quietness wearing off, and soon enough they’re gossiping and chatting again. 

“Oh my god, there’s no way he thought he could beat you in volleyball. I mean, you’re on the Varsity Volleyball team as a freshman! Ethan is like, the most unathletic Boy Scout I’ve ever met,” Piper gushed. 

“Right? As if! I’m the libero on my team even,” Yvonne gloated to the girls, who all immediately gasped in disbelief. 

“I like volleyball but I’m way better at basketball,” Courtney started, before launching into a monologue. You swore that little girl spoke faster than jets flew. 

You wished they would listen to you, but they were cute to listen to. You remembered what it was like to be a young girl again. Just as you’re getting your lifeguard tube on, Cabin 6 emerges from the trees. 

“Hey ladies,” Steve says, “heading out already?”

All of the girls’ mouths snap shut at Steve’s arrival, except for…

“Yep!” Courtney pipes up instantly, her blonde hair almost blinding in the sunlight, “We’re gonna beat you Steve!”

“I bet you are. Hey,” Steve turns and says your name, “would you mind staying back and helping me finish packing out? I promise we’ll be the first canoe in the water, but at this rate we won't leave until the sun has set,” he said, eyes pleading. 

“Let me ask Nancy real quick,” you run over to your girls. “Hey, can one of you canoe with Nancy? I’ve gotta help Cabin Six, is that okay Nance?”

She nods, “Of course. Boys are so useless. We’ll meet you there, Alisha, come join my canoe,” she said, calling to the duff in the middle of her canoe. 

Alisha groaned, but got up from her spot and trudged over to Nancy, “I was really hoping to not paddle today Nance. My shoulders hurt from the sunburn.”

“And who told you to wear sunscreen?” Nancy asked angrily, “Grab a paddle,” she grumbled. You watched as your cabin paddled away in an uncontrolled zig zag pattern, you could hear the giggles of Nancy and groans of the others as you turned back towards Cabin 6. Jonathan struggled to explain how to portage a canoe to the two non-Boy Scouts and could barely split the weight of one on his shoulders with his camper, Ethan. Steve was trying to get the attention of the rest of the boys who were chasing each other with paddles. 

“Okay guys, what needs to be done?” you yelled to the group. 

Steve yelled your name in relief, “Can you help me get the Trail Department stuff? We still need to fill the waters too,” he smiled at you brightly. “And guys!” he yelled, “make sure you go to the bathroom now! I’m not asking again.”

You both turned away from the rambunctious group and headed towards the Trail Department. Steve broke the silence first, “I really appreciate your help, they’re great kids but they’re a handful. Besides, I’ve never been very good at the whole ‘pack out’ thing. I’m not… super organized, I guess,” he said and rubbed his hand on the back of his neck. You glanced at his arms as scratched, almost mesmerized by the way his muscles moved under his skin, his tanned skin highlighted the sun and his sweat. He was still wearing the extreme cut off tee and a pair of black swim trunks that were almost a little too short. If there’s such a thing, you thought warmly. His hair was long, and looked like it had been pushed back repeatedly by sweaty hands. You didn’t realize how long the silence was, and when you didn’t say anything, he turned to you and you quickly made eye contact, trying to avoid the warmth in your cheeks.

“We can’t all be perfect!” you mustered awkwardly, moving to push the TD door open. The breeze from the AC inside pushed your hair back and it felt amazing. It was another extremely hot and humid day, but you knew the tan you would get from the sun was going to be incredible. You always canoe in your swimsuit, ‘just incase’ you told yourself, but you knew it was to avoid the dreaded farmer's tan. 

You called out to the Trail Director, letting her know you were grabbing the last of Steve and Jonathon’s pack out supplies. You and Steve began to collect his supplies; toiletries, tents, canvas bag, bear bag, and all the essentials for a night in the woods. As you walked back to the boat launch you tried to make conversation, “So, have you canoed before?”

He stares at you for a moment, a strange look on his face, and says laughing, “I’m the Waterfront Director. Yes I’ve canoed before, just not there,” he gestured to the water, vaguely where Elk’s Harbor was, and his own swim trunks. He winked at you, “that’s why I need your help, you’re the orienteer-er. A captain needs his crew.”

“I am not crew, if anything I’m the captain! I’m the cartographer mapping the stars so we don’t get lost!” you exclaimed, “besides, getting across the lake is easy, it’s the rest that’s a little more difficult.”

You began to pass the supplies to all the canoes and campers, while Jonathon got everyone settled and fitted in lifejackets. You wanted to spread the weight of supplies evenly, especially since these campers were fairly experienced cano-ers. As you finished passing supplies out Steve grabbed your canoe and dragged it into the water. He sat on the front of the boat, feet planted firmly on the ground so that you could climb in without getting wet. 

“Three points of contact,” Steve teased, angling his head towards you “Be a good role model for my young, impressionable campers,”

You giggled at him, and carefully stepped into the canoe. Good lord, he was like a brick house! You thought as you climbed in, the canoe hardly moving even as you set your full weight down. 

Steve carefully followed suit, and used his canoe to push the boat into the water. “Okay captain, lead the way!”

You laughed as you placed your paddle in the water, directing the canoe expertly from the back, meanwhile Steve was the power house in the front. Working with him felt like second nature. You glanced behind, seeing all the other canoes in the water, somewhat surprised to see how well they were handling themselves, working like a perfect team. 

Steve looked over his shoulder at you, and said your name quietly, “I really appreciate your help. Jonathan is awesome, but I could tell this was a little beyond his strengths. I think we’d still be on the shore without your help. So, thanks.”

“You’re not giving yourself enough credit! I’m sure you would have been fine, you're plenty capable,” you smiled brightly at him. He nodded his head curtly, a smile to match yours on his face, and turned around still grinning.

_ _ _

a/n: Originally i did not want Week 5 to be two chapters but it just got so lengthy i had to split it up. so chapter three to come much sooner than this one! I honestly have no idea how i want to format this fic, i've been going off vibes (I have a pretty structured plot but the formatting is kicking my ass) i want to include weeks and then weekENDS when all the juicy stuff happens, but if i have to split up just one week i might end up doing a time skip a few times. like pivotal moments you know? also, just as a disclaimer, everything that is happening/has happened in this fic either happened to me, or someone i know, or is based on either of these (sincerely, a girl who met her boyfriend as counselors at a summer camp) in case you think anything is too unrealistic. comment ur thoughts btw.

[buckysgrace]

One

Hungry Eyes Masterlist

Steve Harrington x OC (Kim Mayfield)

CW: None for this one :) will update for each chapter tho! main masterlist has the series overall warnings tho! This is a teen pregnancy fic tho!!

Kim starts her first day at her job, only to run into someone unexpected.

Kim

“Here’s the employee break room,” Pat instructed as he led her through the tiny back room, leaving her to nod her head quickly as she looked at the freezer he had quickly guided her on how to stock and remove, “And then up front is where the magic happens.”

“Cool,” she nodded her head as she held her fingers tightly together, trying not to fuss with the tight her braid was fastened into, “do I work the cashier then?” She questioned as she tilted her head, pulse still racing against the crook of her neck. She was nervous. Scared even. She’d never had a job before. She didn’t necessarily want one, but her stepfather was convinced that she was rotting inside their house. 

Which was how she ended up in the ridiculous uniform she was currently wearing. Max had giggled and teased her about it, while Susan had took what felt like a hundred different photos and proclaimed it was cute. It wasn’t cute. She was sure this would just make her more of an outcast. And she swore it didn’t fit right, too short for her long legs and torso. 

“The cash register?” Pat looked for clarity as he turned towards her, his glasses sliding down his nose. She felt her eyes widen at his clarification, realizing that she had messed her words up. 

“Yeah that!” she corrected quickly, face burning, “I am pretty good with money.” She reminded him of her math grades, hoping that might make her mistake disappear. She crossed her arms over her chest as she followed him out to the main part of the store, briefly breathing in the bright lights in front of her. 

“That’s a great skill, but not yet,” he smiled at her as he directed her towards the counter, “Steve will be showing you the ropes for today. And that’s Robin, she’ll be here if you need any help too.” He added as he gestured towards them, making her halt in her spot. 

She felt her eyes widen several sizes, her heart flutter inside of her chest as her face burned as if she had been out in the sun for too long. Steve Harrington worked here, with her. No way. She swallowed roughly, trying to pretend like he hadn’t spent the past school year drooling over him.

And he looked handsome. His hair looked slightly lighter than it had over the winter, like he had been out in the sun too long. It went along with the soft tan that covered his body as he stopped spinning the dipping spoon between his fingers, wincing as it clattered to the floor. Her eyes followed him as he quickly picked it up, his costume mirroring the same dumb one she was in.

She glanced towards the exit, wondering if she should just leave now. 

She had never actually spoken to him, well, not in a way that mattered. He had said high occasionally, and had also once congratulated her when they had to switch math tests and grade them along with Mr. Barker. 

“Kim,” he shook his head in surprise, blinking rapidly as he gripped his hat and pulled it off of his head, “I didn’t know you were working here.” He furrowed his eyebrows tightly together as he glanced back down at the dirty spoon, pausing before he dumped it into a bucket that was sitting beside Robin. 

She had a few different classes with Robin, knew her only by association from a few other people. Although, they did work on an English project together before the school year ended and that had gone well. She took a step closer to Steve, fussing with her shorter hair as her blue eyes landed on Kim. 

“I just started,” she replied meekly, cheeks burning at the way he continued to watch her, “hi.” She waved to both of them, not sure what to do when they were staring at her like she had a second head attached to her. Even Pat cleared his throat. 

“We had chemistry together, right?” Robin questioned as a little blush formed on her cheeks, her blue eyes sparkling as she moved her hands to her hips. Then dropped them again. Kim almost thought about turning and asking Pat where she could get the same uniform as Robin. They were about the same height, so she didn’t understand why hers fit so much better. 

“Yeah,” she nodded her head stiffly as she pulled a tense smile to her lips, feeling awkward as she held onto her arm, “we do. I mean, we did.” She nodded, wondering if she should add the other classes they had as well. She decided against it, not wanting to seem too desperate. 

“That’s a good start,” Pat smiled as he touched the back of her shoulder, making her jolt as he dug his fingertips into her shoulder, “if you need anything you can call, there’s a phone in the back. But you’re in good hands.” She turned towards him, wishing there was a way to shrug him off as his hand stayed glued to her skin. From being this close, she could see that his teeth were slightly yellow. 

“Thank you.” She finally squeaked out, only feeling relieved once his heavy hand was off of her shoulder. She resisted the urge to shudder, knowing that he meant no harm by it. At least that’s what she hoped. 

“And put that hat back on, Harrington.” He replied one last time before he left them standing in silence, none of them taking the initiative to speak first. Her heart was racing roughly against her bones, shaking her insides around as her nerves kept her frozen in her spot. She clenched her fingers together, her shyness leaving her tongue in a thick knot.

Her eyes drifted up just enough to observe the way Robin nudged Steve forward, making him huff as he placed the hat back over his thick hair. She shifted awkwardly, shoes digging into the tiles of the floor. 

“So,” Steve paused as he shot Robin an annoyed look, giving her a little shake as he stepped forward, “we scoop ice cream.” He stated as he held his hands out, giving his shoulders a little shrug. 

“Right.” She nodded her head as she forced herself to move forward, waiting for more of his instructions. He paused as he wiped his fist across his lips. 

“So uh here’s the flavors,” he said as he gestured about them, “it’s not like it’s magic. Or that it needs a skill. It’s just ice cream.” He motioned towards the giant tubs again, making her think of the giant freezer filled with all of them. She hoped she wasn’t expected to carry them back and forth. 

“Do you want me to start then?” She asked as she glanced around, even though it wasn’t very busy at the moment. There were a few people at tables, but for the most part people were bustling around outside the store. 

“No, you can watch since it’s your first day.” He replied as he furrowed his eyebrows together, shooting a look in Robin’s direction. She quickly turned away, making Kim worried that there was something she didn’t know. 

She stood next to him the whole time, following him back and forth just like he instructed. She felt like she wasn’t doing much to help, but she didn’t want to jump in and get in the way either. So she took to looking like she didn’t know what to do, waiting until one of them asked for her assistance. 

“Shit.” Steve mumbled as he looked down at where a glop of ice cream had fallen to the floor. He shook his head, quickly scooping it out again before he passed it along to Robin. She looked around, gripping some napkins and ignoring the way he held his hand out towards her. She could at least handle this. It would make her feel like she was doing something. 

“It’s okay, I got it.” She told him quickly as she bent at her waist, ducking down and beginning to pick the ice cream off of the floor. She scrubbed it off a second later, eyebrows furrowing as she moved her free hand back to tug her shirt down. She felt validated for a second, confirming that it wasn’t for her longer measurements. 

“I uh,” Steve spoke for a moment, sounding far away before he cleared his throat, “I’ll be back in a minute.” He scooted around her, his hip brushing against her side as he rushed away. She frowned as she threw away the discarded ice cream, then scrubbed her hands clean at the sink. 

“What happened to dingus?” Robin turned curiously towards her once she finished passing the change to a customer, leaving Kim even more confused. She wasn’t sure why Steve had rushed away so suddenly. 

“He said he’d be back in a minute.” She said as she shrugged her shoulders, unsure of what to add to that. Her cheeks burned suddenly, wondering if she had somehow managed to do something wrong already. 

“Weird.” Robin crossed her arms as she leaned against the counter, glancing behind Kim for a moment. Kim’s mind began to race for a moment, knowing that there might be something deeper brewing there. 

“He hates me.” She blurted out suddenly, surprising herself as she blinked rapidly. She didn’t need anyone else to confirm it, she had been suspicious over it for a while. And it wasn’t even her fault. 

“You?” Robin questioned, blue eyes widening, “Why would he hate you?” She questioned as Kim’s mind raced to one specific reason. She breathed in deeply, speaking out loud. She wasn’t sure why she was speaking it out loud, why she was letting it be known that it bothered her so much. 

“Billy.”

“Oh,” She nodded her head slowly, realization spreading across her features, “I heard about that. Your stepbrother, right?” She looked for clarity as Kim roughly nodded her head in agreement. She didn’t really feel like Billy was a brother, even with the step label. They weren’t really anything. They just lived in the same house.

And she did not want to be blamed for his actions.

“Did I miss anything?” Steve walked back out a second later, making her move away from the counter she had been resting on. She was suddenly worried that he would think that she had been doing nothing. 

“No,” she answered quickly, biting her bottom lip, “it’s been quiet.” She stated as she gestured out this time, showing that no more customers had come forward. That was certainly a start. 

“No!” Robin shouted quickly, making her jump back several feet. Her heart hammered roughly in her chest, eyes wide at the panicked expression on Robin’s features. 

“What?” She asked quickly, trying to figure out what she had done wrong. She looked down, trying to see if she had accidentally stepped on something. Next to her, Steve sighed loudly as he crossed his arms over his chest. 

“You can’t ever use that word.” Robin explained with a laugh, shaking her head as Kim grew even more confused. She thought back to what she had said, wondering which part of her sentence had been incorrect. 

“What word?” She asked hesitantly, pressing her fingers together as Robin quickly looked over her shoulder. As if someone might be watching them, waiting. 

“The q word.” She whispered underneath her breath, lips curling into an amused smile as Kim’s expression deepened. She wasn’t sure how a word could change the flow of the restaurant, but she certainly knew she wouldn’t ever breathe the word quiet out around Robin again. 

“She’s superstitious.” Steve responded as he leaned against the counter this time, long legs stretched out in front of him. She stared at his shoes for a moment, refusing to let her eyes trail back up towards his face. 

“Customers hear it, and they come flocking,” Robin explained, “it’s bad luck.” She nodded her head with confirmation, making a silent sigh leave her mouth. Kim knew all about bad luck. 

“I didn’t know,” she winced, hoping it wouldn’t happen, “sorry.” She apologized genuinely, even though she wasn’t quite sure if she believed her or not. She figured she would only find out over time. 

“I’ll teach you all the rules, pal.” Robin winced as the words left her mouth, cheeks turning red again as she went to punch Kim’s shoulder playfully. Only it was a little too hard, making her grimace at the feeling.

It was awkward for a few seconds as Robin quickly rubbed at her fist and Kim resisted the urge to soothe the ache in her arm. She pressed a stiff smile to her lips, reaching for the end of her ponytail to mess with instead. 

“What’s your favorite ice cream?” Steve asked suddenly, eyes darting between them as he saved them from the unbearable tension. She knew Robin didn’t mean to do anything, but Kim was too awkward to laugh it off. She was sure that her lack in social skills was beginning to shine through. 

“I like mint,” she said softly, “I love ice cream.” She sounded a little more excited that time as she glanced towards the containers, wondering if she would be allowed to dive in. She had eaten before she came in, and her pockets were currently bare. 

“Yeah, the best part about working here is the free ice cream.” He grinned as he patted the top of the counter, making her grin widen even more. Perhaps she had the appetite of a child, but she had accepted that a long time ago. 

“You never eat the ice cream.” Robin spoke up as she rested her elbows on the other side of the counter, her eyebrows furrowed together in bewilderment. Steve scoffed, features wrinkling up in annoyance as he shook his head. 

“I sometimes do.” He argued back as he fully looked towards Robin this time, leaving a rush of jealousy to fill Kim’s insides. She observed them for a moment, wondering if they were together. Or maybe they just seemed really close. Either way, she wished that she was in Robin’s position instead. 

“You always complain about it.” She said as her blue eyes shot towards Kim, giving her a disbelieving look before she gestured back towards Steve. 

“I think you snapped your hat on too tight.” He mumbled as he shook his head, cheeks slightly pink as he tapped his fingers along the counter. Robin opened her mouth to protest once again, only stopping when a group of girls entered the store.

“All yours, Harrington,” She continued on as she took a step closer to Kim, wagging her eyebrows playfully, “the best part of the job is actually seeing how much he sucks.” She whispered, but not low enough for Steve to miss what she said. He shot her a glare then relaxed his posture, a goofy grin falling upon his lips. 

She felt a sickening feeling washing over her suddenly, as if she had just gotten punched in the gut. She didn’t like this, not one bit. A second later she realized she didn’t have to be worried at all. He stumbled and rambled when he spoke, which she thought was adorable, but the other girls didn’t seem as interested.

“Terrible.” Robin grinned as she watched, looking more than amused as Steve roughly shrugged his shoulders. She could tell that he was trying to brush it off, but something on his features made her wonder if he was defeated. She didn’t like him looking so upset. 

“They just don’t know what they’re missing out on.” She spoke up suddenly, horrifying herself. She could feel the embarrassment trickling down her neck, hoping that he didn’t catch on to what she was suggesting. 

“I guess.” He mumbled as he looked at her for a moment before he turned away once again. She did her best not to sag her shoulders, pretending like she wasn’t completely disappointed. She needed to control her tongue more often. 

The next few hours weren’t too bad, fast at times and slower towards the last hour. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, desperate to sit down in one of the chairs. Her feet were killing her. She glanced down at the work shoes that Susan had purchased for her, deciding that they weren’t nearly as comfortable as her other shoes. 

“What time do we close?” She asked as she finally broke the silence, getting tired of watching people clearing out of the mall. She thought that a nice shower sounded fantastic about now. And something to eat. She was suddenly starving, even her mother’s cooking sounded tasty.

“Fifteen minutes,” Steve huffed as he leaned over the counter, linking his fingers together. She let her eyes linger across the curve of his back for a moment, trying not to focus on how good his ass looked in those shorts, “and then we can go home.” He stated as he looked over his shoulder towards her, quickly making her look back down at her shoes. She could pretend to be doing something until then. 

He wasted no time in locking the door, technically five minutes early, but she wasn’t going to worry about it. Not when Robin was more than happy to go along with it too. And it wasn’t like anyone stopped during that time either. 

“What do you want me to do?” She asked as they began to gather cleaning items, making her eyebrows raise as she glanced around the store. She didn’t feel right in sitting out for this part. She could clean. 

“If you wipe the tables down, I’ll sweep and Robin can mop.” Steve said at last, handing her a rag and a spray bottle. She nodded her head in agreement, deciding that it wasn’t too hard to do. She could live with that. 

“Why do I have to mop?” Robin questioned, eyebrows furrowing together as Kim went ahead and started on the table closest to them. She bit her bottom lip, trying to hide the smile that formed as Steve pressed his hands against his hips. 

“Because I did last night.” He sassed back, making her scoff as they argued back and forth for a few minutes. She was three tables down before he eventually began to sweep up behind her, humming along softly to the music that was playing overhead. She thought that he sounded nice, pretty. 

She held onto her little purse as she followed both of them outside, listening to the little conversations that they traded back and forth. She nodded her head along to most of it, still trying to find the courage to even speak. Then again, she didn’t want either of them to feel like she was forcing herself into their pact either. So she stayed quiet. 

“See you tomorrow!” Robin grinned as she pulled her bike out, then froze, “you’re back tomorrow, right?” She asked as she thought about it for a moment, realizing that she hadn’t asked. 

“Yeah,” she smiled as she quickly nodded her head, feeling a little relieved at how the rest of the day went, “I’m not off again until Thursday.” She admitted as she winced, thinking about how badly her feet would be hurting by then. 

“Same here,” Steve smiled as he looked at her, hair rustling in the summer breeze, “Robin has that day off.” The setting sun cast a nice glow over his features, making his eyes twinkle as he looked at her warmly. 

“So we’ll all be together?” She asked softly, feeling a little relieved about that. At least she wouldn’t have to worry about learning anyone else's name. And they seemed really nice, even though she was a little jealous over how they spoke to one another. 

“Seems like it,” she spoke up again, “we’re better than day shift in case you weren’t aware.” She looked proud as she straddled her bike, making Kim glance out towards the parking lot. So far, no Billy. 

“Totally better.” Steve agreed as her gaze snapped back towards him, heart hammering at the way he ran his fingers through his thick hair. She was too fascinated with him for her own good. 

“See you bright and early then,” Robin smiled as she began to take off on her bike, “Later, dingus!” She shouted with a laugh, riding away as Steve snorted from her response. He stood near her, shaking his head softly. 

She turned away from him, feeling awkward as the wind caught her shirt. She quickly tugged it down, watching as he turned his eyes away quickly.

“Where’s your car?” He asked as he cleared his throat, eyebrows furrowing together as he looked towards the small crowd of cars. She winced, not sure if she wanted to admit that she had no idea how to drive.

“Billy was supposed to pick me up.” She mumbled as she rubbed at her arm, purposely avoiding the way his eyebrows rose on his forehead. She didn’t want him to dislike her even more. 

“Oh.” He breathed out softly as she stood on her tippy-toes, rising to see if the blue Camaro was hidden away somewhere. She grimaced, still not seeing it. 

“The pool must’ve stayed open late.” She replied, knowing that it was a lie. He probably forgot and headed straight to Gina’s, his girlfriend. Not like it was really his problem anyway, but the thought of walking filled her with dread. 

“I can give you a ride.” Steve spoke up, taking her by surprise. She felt her eyes widen as she snapped her head towards him, sure that he was just saying that to be nice.

“Um,” she paused, unsure if she could handle sitting alone in his car, “It’s not that far of a walk.” She stated, even though it would take a fair amount of time. She supposed there was always the bus, but she didn’t know what time it came. 

“Yeah, I think Max would be pissed if she knew I made you walk home alone.” He said with a laugh, making her eyebrows furrow in confusion. 

“You know Max?” She asked, watching as his eyes widened a little bit this time. She watched in awe, catching a hint of green mixed with the brown. 

“She comes in for ice cream a lot,” he shrugged as he shook his head, “it doesn’t matter. Come on, I’m parked over here.” He pointed as he walked, giving her no time to consider his answer before she was scrambling to keep up. 

“Right up front?” She asked with a little smile, thankful that they wouldn’t be walking far. She had a feeling that she’d be going to bed very early tonight. 

“It was my lucky day,” he smiled as he held the door open for her, “how did you like today?” He asked softly as he leaned against the open door, making her stall her movements. She wasn’t sure if she should slide inside, so she stood and spoke to him instead. 

“It doesn’t seem too bad.” She admitted, refusing to admit just how badly her legs ached. She breathed in slowly as his eyes locked onto hers, making her knees feel weak this time. 

“It’s pretty easy work,” he shrugged, “I mean the uniform is awful but other than that.” He stated as he shrugged his shoulders, pink lips curling into a sweet smile. It made her heart hammer roughly in her chest, chills spreading over her skin. She couldn’t believe she was standing this close to him, actually talking to him. 

“It is ridiculous.” She said with a giggle, unable to help herself this time as she watched the way his eyes crinkled with amusement. She breathed in deeply, feeling like her heart was trying to claw through her chest.

“Are you gonna get in?” He asked softly, still smiling in a boyish way. She felt hopeless as she continued to admire his features, breathing in how handsome he was. It took another second to nod her head, forcing her feet to move into the car.

“It looks nice in here,” she complimented as she kept her palms over her knees, enjoying the rush of the AC once he started the car, “feels good.” She added as she tried not to sound too awkward, not wanting to sit in stiff tension either. 

“Thanks,” he smiled as he glanced towards her for a second, then fully looked over his shoulder to reverse out of his spot, “I think she’s a beauty.” He teased, making her giggle all over again. She was sure she sounded annoying, probably too desperate. But she couldn’t help it around him. 

A few seconds later she remembered to give him the address, chewing on her bottom lip as she wondered what he would think about where she lived. It could be worse, but it wasn’t fancy either. And she had heard that he was used to nice things. 

“Can you park here?” She asked him, speaking loud enough that he could hear her over the music. He began to slow down, eyebrows furrowing in confusion as he glanced towards the mailbox on the side of the street. 

“Is this your house?” He asked suddenly, making her shake her head quickly. This had nothing to do with what her house looked like, and everything to do with what her mom would do if she saw him. 

“No,” she blushed as she played with the loose strands of her hair, “but my mom and my stepdad will be furious if they see a guy brought me home.” She admitted sheepishly, thinking about how strict they had been since they’d moved here. It had been rough. 

“They’re stern.” He stated as he put the car in park, making her think about it for a moment. Sometimes it felt like they were a lot more than stern, but she wasn’t going to bring that up now. 

“A little bit,” she agreed as she nodded her head, twisting her hair around her fingers as the knot in her tongue suddenly fell loose, “she’s afraid I’ll get knocked up like she did when she was my age. I mean my mom is. She just worries a lot.” She blurted out for some odd reason, making her wish she could’ve shut up a long time ago. 

“Oh,” he furrowed his eyebrows, eyes a little wide, “I’m sorry to hear that. Don’t worry, I’m like a ninja.” He nodded as he smiled proudly, in a dorky manner. She hated to admit that she was swooning for that too. 

“What do you mean?” She asked softly, smiling along as she turned to face him better. She suddenly didn’t want to leave, even though she knew she had to. He wouldn’t want her to stay here the whole time. 

“They’ll never know I was here,” he added, cheeks slightly flushed, “I can give you a ride tomorrow if you need one.” He offered, making her eyes widen at his suggestion. She wanted to take it up so badly, but she was too worried that something would go wrong. Either between her being awkward or her family. 

“Billy should be able to drop me off again.” She shrugged her shoulders softly, feeling a little awkward suddenly. She didn’t really have money to pay Steve back at the moment either. 

“You don’t have a car?” He asked as he loosely held onto the steering wheel, making her gulp as she thought about the truth. She didn’t have a car because she didn’t need one. At least that’s what Neil told her. 

“I can’t drive.” She whispered shyly, crinkling her nose up as she thought about how badly her driving lessons had been going. She was awful at it. She supposed she would just have to take the bus everywhere, but she could live with that. 

“Alright,” he paused as he dug in the middle console for a moment, smiling triumphantly when he pulled out a napkin and a pen. He scribbled something down for a moment before he passed it to her, making her stomach tighten when she realized it was his number, “in case he can’t, just give me a call. I don’t mind.” He told her, making her feel like she might get sick. She had his number. Steve Harrington’s number. She was sure that she was dreaming. 

“Thanks,” she told him, feeling like she couldn’t remember how to breathe, “I appreciate this.” She added, not sure how she would ever strike up the courage to actually call him. She didn’t want to bother him. 

“See you tomorrow.” He smiled as she opened the car door, her legs feeling like jelly from the nerves that were shooting through her body. She savored one last look of him, excited at the thought of seeing him again. 

“Bye.” She added as she stepped onto the sidewalk, sending him a slow wave as she watched him drive away. She covered her mouth once he was gone, trying to keep from squealing as the giddy feeling filled her intensely. She skipped back towards her house then, suddenly no longer tired. 

Maybe this job wouldn’t be so bad.

[headkiss]

fall right into me

pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader

summary: when something happens to your apartment and you need a place to stay, steve, your best friend, is quick to provide it for you. your prolonged proximity forces you both to realize some things.

word count: 13.6k

warnings: childhood bffs to lovers, absolute idiots in love, mentions of a negative relationship with parents, probably inaccurate descriptions of some things but it’s (say it with me) for the plot!!!

a/n: i know it’s been a LONG time since i’ve posted a long fic so thank u guys for ur patience <3 i had so much fun getting back to it and writing these two, and i hope it’s at least a little bit worth the wait!!! ily :,)

𝜗𝜚

Your shoes are still wet as you dial the first number that comes to mind: Steve’s.

He picks up on the third ring. “Hello?”

“Hey, Steve.”

“Hi,” you can imagine him on the other side of the phone, leaning casually against the wall, an easy smile on his face, “what’s going on?”

You’re not quite sure where to start.

Coming home from work earlier, you’d been excited to shower and change and lay around for the rest of the evening, your book hanging open in your lap and some mindless TV filling the silence.

The day seemed to have other plans for you, though, because as you walked down the stairs to your apartment—one in the basement of a sweet, older couple’s house who just never used the space and converted it—the carpet had made an ugly squelch as soon as you stepped on it.

You looked down at your shoe against the carpet, at the way its color was darker than usual from whatever water had gotten into it. Looking up, you found a complete mess. A piece of the ceiling hanging open right above your bed, water still dripping in steady drops from the gap, your bedding ruined among many other things.

You don’t know how long you stood there, hand over your mouth, eyes flickering over the damage like you were hoping it would vanish, like it was only something you imagined.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t.

The couple who owns the house came down when they heard you shout for them, unsure of what else to do. They’d both gasped when they came down, and began apologizing for something that really wasn’t their fault before one ran up to call whoever it was they needed to call to fix this and the other comforted you with a gentle “we’ll take care of it, sweetie.”

You nodded, eyes still roaming your space that was now uninhabitable.

It’s an old house, something was bound to happen at some point, you only wished it wasn’t so inconvenient for you. A small leak, you could have handled, but the ceiling practically caving in?

Yeah, it was a complete fucking mess.

Hours later, with the damage assessed and set to take a few weeks to fix up, you’re on the phone with the one person you’d known would pick up.

You fill Steve in on what happened, and his first response is a sigh of, “Shit.”

“Yeah, shit,” you agree. “And now I’m gonna have to live with my parents for a while and I don’t know how I’m gonna go back into that house, Steve.”

If you’re being honest, the couple you live with now was kinder to you than your parents were. You suppose that’s one of the many things that you and Steve have bonded over.

“Just come live with me, instead,” he offers without hesitation.

Steve says it like it’s obvious, a no-brainer, and you guess it should be, since you’ve slept over at the Harrington’s house countless times before. Only, this is different because you’d be staying for a while, because you’d be needing his help, which makes you feel all awkward and guilty.

He’s been your absolute best friend for as long as you can remember, and you’re one hundred percent sure you’d offer the same thing if the roles were reversed, but that doesn’t make it any easier for you to accept, not when you’re already frazzled from the events of the day.

“No, Steve, I’m sorry I’m just being dramatic,” you say, twisting the phone’s cord around your finger. “I’ll be fine, really. It’s just a month, or so, and I don’t wanna be in your way or-”

“When have you ever cared about being in my way, angel?” The pet name he’s called you ever since your ninth grade Halloween party slips out naturally, the way it always does. “Besides, this house is too fucking big for me as it is, and you know my parents won’t be around to care, either.”

“I can’t ask you to let me move in, Steve.”

“Well then, it’s a good thing you’re not asking. I’m offering. It’ll be like that one week when we were twelve and you stayed over for spring break, only longer. It’s perfect!”

There’s a small smile ghosting across your face as you recall the memory he’s talking about. A blanket fort in their spacious living room, sleeping bags and pillows piled inside it along with two flashlights.

You can picture the way he looks on the other end of the phone, his hair a bit messy from running his hands through it during the day, one strand rogue against his forehead, his shoulder leaned carelessly against the wall the way it usually is when he stands. Like he can’t be bothered to hold himself up, like there’s constantly a weight on him.

“Are you sure about this, Steve? It’s really okay if you’re not. I swear I’ll be fine.”

“As if I’m letting you spend multiple weeks back in your parent’s house. You’re staying with me, alright?” His voice is insistent, yet kind, letting you know that he’s being honest, that he means it. “We’ll order pizzas and watch shitty romcoms, ‘kay?”

“You can call romcoms shitty all you want, but we both know you get teary at every single one.”

“Don't change the subject, angel. Also, fuck off,” he says, though you can hear the smile in his voice. “So, you’re living with me, yeah?”

You don’t think you could say no to him even if you wanted to.

“Yeah, alright, Steve. Thank you so much.”

“None of that. I know you’d do the same.”

There’s something beautiful about the kind of trust and ease that comes with a friendship as long as yours. One where you’ve watched each other grow up, awkward phases and all, and stuck together the entire way. There’s no questioning whether or not you’d be there for each other if you were in need.

It’s known, felt. Like a fact.

“Now,” he continues, “I’ll pick you up, okay? Ten minutes, tops.”

“Okay.”

“You need me to bring boxes for your stuff?”

“I’m not sure how much is worth keeping. It’s pretty ugly in there.”

Your voice goes small at the end, because the gravity of it all is really sinking in. You’ll have to replace a lot of stuff. Stuff you don’t have money for right now.

But, you haven’t let yourself cry just yet, so you swallow it down.

“I’ll bring some anyway, then. We’ll figure it out, angel, don’t worry.”

“Thanks again, Steve. See you soon.”

“Ten minutes,” he assures you, then the line clicks.

-

True to his word, Steve arrives in under ten minutes, which isn’t surprising considering the size of Hawkins, but feels reassuring all the same.

You’re sitting on the curb in front of the house when Steve’s BMW pulls over on the other side of the road, and you stand just as he climbs out and shuts his door, rounding the car and jogging over to you.

His keys jingle as he tucks them into the pocket of his faded jeans, his opposite hand coming up to squeeze your shoulder, “You okay?”

The warmth of his palm seeps through your work shirt that you’ve yet to change out of, and you let your eyes fall shut just for a second before looking at his face, “Guess so,” you nod. “Maybe ask me again after all of this?”

Steve’s arm winds itself over your shoulders, tugging you into his side and dropping a kiss to the top of your head, simple as an instinct. “I’ve got you. We’ll get through this, angel.”

We’ll, he says. A team.

You reach up and squeeze his hand and nod, guiding him to the side-entrance leading to your basement apartment.

“I hope you didn’t wear your good shoes for this,” you say.

Steve looks down at his feet and shrugs, “Shoes can be replaced.”

He lets you lead the way down the stairs, his footsteps close behind yours. You wince when you look at the damage again, even though you’d seen it minutes ago. You can't bring yourself to look at Steve, to see the reaction on his face, because you think it’ll just make it all more real.

He mouths the word ‘fuck’ while you aren’t looking, then claps his hands once. “Okay, let’s figure out what we can save, yeah? Where do you want me?”

You’re grateful for his gentle guidance at what to do. “Maybe the bathroom? Everything in there should be fine, so it just needs to be packed.”

“‘Kay. I’ll just go grab some boxes from my car,” Steve says. He squeezes your hand once before heading up the stairs. “I’ll be right back.”

You decide to tackle the worst spot first. Though the place is more like a studio, the side that houses your bed and your closet is the most affected, so you head over there and try to tune out the squish of the carpet beneath your feet.

You’re opening the sliding doors to your closet when Steve comes back, dropping a stack of boxes by your feet and running his hand down your arm softly before heading over to the bathroom to pack for you.

Even his presence seems to be making things a little bit easier for you, and each time he finds a small way to touch you or speak to you, to remind you that he’s there, you’re glad for it.

Half of your closet is a gross, wet mess, but some things are salvageable, which you take as a win. Things might be damp, but at least it’s only water, you suppose. A cycle in the dryer and most things will be wearable again.

Your dresses that are hung get the worst of it, soaked and smelly, and you decide that it’d be easier to get a couple new ones than to try and save what’s there.

Steve checks in every now and then, poking his head out of the bathroom’s doorway to look at you and make sure you’re doing alright, giving you a thumbs up when you look over to him.

You’re not sure how you’d be managing this if you were alone, and you’re thankful that you don’t have to.

The next time he checks on you, you’re by your nightstand.

Sitting atop of it is a framed picture of you and Steve from summer camp when you were around ten years old, maybe younger. Only now, the picture’s stained with water and the frame you’d decorated all those years ago at camp is a splotchy mess.

Where yours and Steve’s handwriting used to be, is now a blur from the water seeping into the wooden frame, the marker’s colors muddy. You frown, picking it up and running your thumb over the edge.

Before you can stop yourself, you’re tearing up, frustrated and sad and tired. Memories like this one are the most special to you, the ones that have kept you going for so long, and just like that, the picture that’s sat on your nightstand since being taken is gone, and it fucking sucks.

“Hey, angel?” Steve calls.

When all you do is sniffle and mumble an “mhm?” in response, he sets the box he’d been packing on the bathroom counter and walks over to you.

He comes up behind you, resting his hands on your upper-arms and peering over your shoulder at the ruined picture.

“It was my favorite one,” you say, voice breaking a little. You wipe your tear away as it trails down your cheek, your own fingertips too harsh against your skin.

Although it’s soaked and splotchy now, Steve knows which picture it is. The one where you’ve both got your neon summer camp t-shirts on, the one where his cheeks and nose are completely sunburnt and you’re both grinning up at the camera from your seats on the ground.

Steve’s clutching a stick in his hand for some reason, and you’ve got your fist tangled in the sleeve of his shirt.

It feels like no time and forever has passed since then.

Steve grabs the picture and pries it gently from your hands, setting it back onto the table and turning you around in his grip to face him.

“We can fix it,” he tells you, his brown eyes all soft as his hands come up to cup your face, thumbs swiping your tears away.

“But the frame-”

“We’ll fix it, angel. I’ll find a way, okay? We can pack it in one of the boxes and figure it out.”

“Steve-”

“Look at me,” he urges you when your gaze flickers to the ground. You listen. “This fucking sucks, I know it does, but you’re strong and I’m here, and we can handle this.”

His voice is quiet, but sure. You search his face for any trace of a lie and find none. He really believes what he’s saying, and he really believes in you.

“Thank you for being here.” You take a deep breath and drop your forehead against the collar of his shirt. “I’m sorry for crying. I know it’s kinda stupid. Most of this is replaceable, it’s just-”

“It’s not stupid,” he says, letting his chin rest atop your head. “You’re allowed to cry. Hell, I’d probably be kicking and screaming on the floor like I'm back in the terrible twos.”

You laugh wetly into his shirt.

“Now,” he says, pulling back and putting his hands on his hips, “the quicker we pack, the quicker we go home. I’ll even let you wear a pair of my good fuzzy socks.”

A smile tugs at your mouth. “Deal.”

-

Steve wouldn’t let you do much of the work after that.

Instead, he simply held up items for you to assess from where you’d been leaning against the wall and packed it into a box if it was a ‘yes,’ or tossing it aside dramatically just to try and get you to laugh if it was a ‘no.’

Once things were sorted through and packed, you loaded everything into Steve’s car—which wasn’t a whole bunch, considering how much you had to leave behind.

You’d refused to let Steve carry the boxes all on his own, though he tried, but he still managed to open the doors for you whenever you made it to his car, even when his own hands were full, too.

By the time you were finished, you were drained. It felt like you’d lived multiple days in the one. An eight hour shift opening at the store, then coming home to a wrecked apartment. All you wanted to do was shower and lay down and not get back up.

Steve knows you well enough to be able to tell when it’s time to fill the silence and when it isn’t, and on the drive back to his place, while your head was leaned against his window, he knew to stay quiet and give you a bit of space.

He turned the radio on, but not too loud, letting the songs hum through the speakers. At every stop sign, he reached over and gave your thigh a light squeeze. Reassuring, kind, somehow exactly what you needed at the moment. Nothing more, nothing less.

You were no stranger to the Harrington’s house, having been there countless times since you were little, but it feels more intimidating now, knowing you’ll be staying. You feel silly for being worried, but you are. Asking for help makes you feel like a burden.

Steve, however, doesn’t let you entertain that thought for long, parking in his driveway and jogging around to open the passenger door for you. “Honey, we’re home!”

“Dork,” you say, though you accept his hand and let him tug you up out of the car.

Grabbing the first couple of boxes, Steve leads you inside and upstairs, right to the guest room across the hall from his own bedroom. The closest one to him.

The house has at least two guest rooms, though you suppose with how little Steve's parents are around, you could consider there to be three. Three spare rooms and Steve puts you up in the nearest one possible. It makes your heart squish in your chest, how caring he is. He doesn’t even have to try, really, the goodness in him shows even when he tries to keep it hidden.

It only takes a few trips down to his car and back before all of your boxes are stacked against the wall. You decide you’ll deal with them later.

Steve runs over to his room and grabs a set of pajamas that you’d left there, and hands them to you. “I figured you’d wanna wash up.”

“You calling me smelly, Harrington?”

“Shut up, I think you smell nice. Usually.”

“Hey!”

“I’m teasing, angel.” He ruffles your hair. You swat his hand away. “You know where the bathroom is, and there should be soap and stuff in the shower already. Just yell if you need something, okay?”

You do know where the bathroom is. You have your own toothbrush in a cup by the sink, a set of travel-sized skin care products in the cupboard behind the mirror for whenever you end up staying over.

It’s funny, you’ve always felt more at home here than at your own parents house, and though he hasn’t said it to you, Steve much prefers this house when you’re in it. There’s a warmth that comes with your presence that makes him ache when it’s not around.

You nod, “Thank you again for letting me stay, Steve. I won’t be in the way, promise.”

“I want you in the way. You know you’re always welcome. This is no different.” He shrugs, “Plus, it’ll be nice having you around. Place always feels so empty when it’s just me.”

“Maybe I’ll just stay forever, then,” you say, tone light and joking.

Steve, completely serious, says, “I’d let you.”

There’s a zip that goes through you when he says it, quick as lightning, something you’ve never felt—or noticed, rather—around him. It throws you off just a little.

“Anyways,” Steve cuts your thoughts short, “I’ll let you get settled. Pizza will be waiting for you when you’re done.”

He leaves the room before you can thank him again, his footsteps retreating and heading downstairs.

You’ve been to his house a million times, so you don’t really feel the need to ‘get settled’ but you desperately need a shower so that’s where you go.

You stay in for longer than you need to, letting the too-hot water run down your neck and back.

When you finally do step out of the bathroom, now clad in your pajamas, and head downstairs, Steve’s sitting on the couch in the living room, the romcoms he owns sitting out in front of the TV for you to choose from, your favorite blanket resting on your side of the couch, and pizza boxes on the coffee table just as promised.

It’s the best thing in the world, you think, to have a friend like Steve.

-

You’ve been staying at Steve’s for a couple of days already, and time seems to fly by a little quicker when you’re there, especially when you’re around him.

He’s taken it upon himself to have coffee ready in the pot for you every morning, one of your favorite mugs already next to it on the counter. You’ve cooked breakfasts together (pancakes one day, where you’d done most of the work, or something simple as toast when you both have to get to work), ordered dinners, and Steve comes home from his shifts with a new movie to watch almost every day.

It’s been so nice. Almost perfect, actually.

This morning, the first day where your shifts happen to be at the exact same time, he’d even insisted on driving you to work. It was an easy yes, considering it wasn’t out of his way at all.

After a short stint of working together at the grocery store in ninth grade, and your subsequent firing from the job after a month of constantly distracting each other on the clock, Tim, the grocery manager, took it upon himself to warn Hawkins not to hire the both of you together.

Eventually, you’d taken the closest you could get which resulted in you working at the arcade and Steve next door at Family Video.

You share a parking lot. Steve already drives you to work most days. You like to put up a bit of a fight just to annoy him.

Though you haven’t worked together in years, and he isn’t far away by any means, you miss having Steve around on days like this. Where the arcade is quiet save for the sounds of the games in the background, where you’re simply babysitting the desk and cleaning things multiple times to try and make the hours pass by.

If Steve were with you, he’d make stupid jokes that you don’t wanna laugh at but do, or coerce you into playing the games while on the clock with the change you find whenever you’re cleaning.

He’d probably trash talk you, and bump your hip with his while playing pinball, and be a sore loser, and for some reason you want him around so bad.

You chalk it up to getting used to spending hours and hours with him, every single day, these past couple of days. Staying with him has made you miss him more, you think.

That’s it.

Meanwhile, over at Family Video, Steve isn’t feeling too different from you.

He’s spent the morning stocking shelves, memories popping into his head whenever he’d come across a movie you loved or watched together, while Robin’s been manning the desk.

Then, when his cart was empty and put back into the back room, he sat on the chair behind the front desk, spinning around until Robin stopped him with her foot and asked what he was thinking so hard about.

Steve caught her up on what had happened with your apartment (you’d told him he could tell her, because she’s your friend too and would find out sooner or later) and how you’d ended up staying with him in his house.

She raised her eyebrows and hummed in a way that was automatically suspicious, because Robin isn’t very good at hiding things.

“What?” Steve asks.

“Nothing.” When Steve only gives her a pointed look, Robin continues, “Well… are you sure that’s a good idea?”

Now, Robin is one of Steve’s closest friends, and him one of hers, and she supports him in pretty much everything that he does even when she teases him relentlessly along the way, but she cares about both of you and doesn’t want to see anyone hurt.

She can read Steve better than he can read himself, probably, because to Robin, it’s clear that he feels more than friendly towards you. And he doesn’t even know it.

When they became closer, it was clear to Robin, even before meeting you, just from the way Steve spoke of you, that there was a spot reserved for you in his life that couldn’t be filled by anyone else.

He would say it’s that of ‘best friend’ but Robin would call it something even bigger than that. Still, even though she thinks he’s an absolute dingus, she’s trying to let Steve figure it out for himself.

Clearly, it’s taking fucking forever.

He looks confused at her question, “Why wouldn’t it be a good idea?”

Robin sighs and resists the urge to drop her forehead against the desk and decides on, “You know what they say: become friends with your roommates, don’t become roommates with your friends.”

“Whoever they are, they’re dumb as shit,” Steve says. “She’s been over, slept over, hundreds of times. It’s not any different, just longer.”

“I guess so,” she settles on. “The rules of the world never really seem to apply to you two.”

“That’s because the rules of the world are also dumb as shit.”

“How would you know? It’s not like you’ve ever tried following them.”

“‘Cause I’m a rule breaker, Robs.”

Steve wiggles his eyebrows. Robin shoves the rolling chair he’s sitting on with her foot, sending it into the other side of the desk with a thud.

“Don’t think that smoking weed in your backyard is enough to call yourself a rule breaker, dingus.”

-

That night, your routine was pretty much the same.

Steve was already waiting for you in his car when you left the arcade, a smile spreading onto his face when he saw you making your way across the parking lot to him, your skirt swishing a little with the breeze.

Rather than go straight home, you made a stop at your apartment to talk things over with the couple who owned the home. They’d met with a builder and plumber about getting everything fixed and wanted to walk you through it all.

Steve came with you and held your hand, and both of them cooed at him and pinched his cheeks and called him a cutie before getting to the important stuff.

After going over what had to be done (rip out the carpet, replace it, fix the pipes and make sure no others were at risk, replace the ceiling, and more you couldn’t even remember already), they’d assured you that they would be taking care of it all. Covering the entire cost.

You probably would’ve argued if not for how little money was in your bank account, and how stubborn you knew these people to be. Instead, you’d squeezed them both and thanked them while your eyes grew misty with tears.

Steve’s hand stayed in yours and squeezed when you sniffled.

He knew, because he knew pretty much everything about you, that these people were kinder to you than even your own parents. That, if this had happened at their house, they would’ve found a way to blame you for it.

You feel lucky to have found that kind of parental love elsewhere, sad that you didn’t know exactly what it felt like beforehand.

After giving the couple Steve’s phone number to call in case they needed you and giving them both another hug, you and Steve headed back home.

Home, you call it. Like it’s yours.

Sometimes it feels like it is.

Later, after you and Steve have both showered and had dinner and gotten comfy in your sweats, you’re back in the living room, Steve shows you the movie he’s brought back this time.

“Gremlins?” You ask, smiling and shaking your head.

“Hell yeah, angel. It’s a classic.”

Steve sets everything up, joining you on the couch after pressing ‘play’ on the movie and adjusting the volume with your guidance.

“So, how was work?” Steve asks during the opening credits. The two of you have a hard time being next to each other and not talking. It’s why you get dirty looks whenever you go to the movies.

“Weekdays are so boring, Steve,” you say, letting your head fall against the back of the couch. “You’re so lucky you have Robin to entertain you during the day. I think I dusted like, ten times at least.”

“Robin is a pain in my ass.” He says. He doesn’t really mean it, because even when she is, he’s glad to have her around. A different kind of gladness than he feels with you. “She kept pushing me every time I sat in the rolling chair. There’s probably a dent in the desk.”

“That’s because you were probably hogging the chair, Steve.”

“What the fuck!” Steve’s smiling when he says it, lacking any sort of anger. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”

Your smile mirrors his, the way it always does. It’s contagious, you think, the way his eyes crinkle at the corner.

Shrugging, you say, “I don’t know, I’d wanna push you around on that chair too, I think.”

“You’d spin me too much. I’d get sick all over you and then nobody’s happy.”

“Don’t talk about barf while I’m eating, Harrington.”

You throw a piece of popcorn at him. It bounces off his cheek and lands on his lap, and he doesn’t even flinch. Steve just picks it up and pops it into his mouth.

When the bowl’s empty, you lean forward and set it on the coffee table before sinking back into the couch, Steve's shoulder brushing yours. You let the warmth seep through your clothes and shut your eyes.

It’s a little more than halfway through the movie when Steve realizes you’re asleep. You’d been quiet, sure, but Steve only thought that meant you were paying attention to the movie.

That was, until your head slipped and rested against his shoulder.

He looked down at you, at the hair falling across your forehead (he smoothed it away gently, so it wouldn’t be in your eyes or your mouth), your eyebrows relaxed and free of any worry, your chest rising and falling with steady breaths.

He thinks of how tired you must be, after everything. Your apartment and dealing with the aftermath both emotionally and physically, working long shifts most days to keep your bank account full.

Steve, though he doesn’t let himself look too deep into it, also thinks of how beautiful you are. Now and always.

Not wanting you to get a kink in your neck from the position, Steve decides to rouse you from sleep as gently as possible. He slips a hand under your head to keep it steady and maneuvers himself to kneel in front of you.

“Hey, angel,” he almost whispers, thumb dragging across your cheek. “C’mon, let’s get you to bed.”

Your nose scrunches and you grumble, but after some coaxing, you blink your eyes open and squint at Steve. You blame your half-asleep mind on the way you nuzzle into his palm. “Hmm?”

“You fell asleep.”

“Oh, sorry,” you mumble.

Steve laughs softly. “Don’t be sorry, I just didn’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

The warmth of his hand leaves your cheek as he stands and holds his hands out for you to grab. He pulls you up off the couch and starts leading you towards the stairs.

You knuckle at your eyes on the way, a tiny smile gracing your face at how sweet Steve’s being. As if you haven’t fallen asleep on his couch plenty of times before.

Still sleepy, you stumble a little on the stairs, but Steve catches you easily with an arm around your waist and a small “Careful.”

He leaves his arm there the rest of the way to what’s become your bedroom, guiding you over to the bed and lifting the covers for you.

Tomorrow, you’ll regret not brushing your teeth or washing your face before climbing in bed. But today, you don’t feel like risking not being able to sleep again if you wake yourself up further.

You’re practically asleep again by the time you’re settled with your head on the pillow as Steve tugs the blankets over you.

You’re just awake enough to feel the light press of his lips on your forehead and a soft “Goodnight, angel” against your skin before he leaves the room and shuts the door behind him.

-

On a random Thursday that you and Steve both have off, he convinces you to let him take you to the mall.

“We should go shopping,” he says when you walk into the kitchen. It’s a little later in the morning, having slept in since it’s a day off, the sun slipping through the window in warm beams.

You raise your eyebrows at him. “Like, groceries?”

“No, like shopping shopping. You know, the mall?”

You lean against the kitchen island, the countertop cool on your back where it touches the sliver of skin between your tank top and sleep shorts. Steve has his shoulder against the fridge, his arms crossed over his chest, the sleeves of his t-shirt tight against his muscles. Not that you’re looking.

You squint at him, trying to find his motive on his face. “You literally buy whatever the mannequins are wearing to avoid shopping.”

“That’s what they’re there for!” The sass in his voice has you biting back a smile. “You need new clothes,” he continues, “and I need to get out of this house.”

“We can do something else, Steve,” you say. “I thought you hated shopping.”

“Well, I don’t hate you.” There’s a pause, Steve’s eyes lowering to that sliver of skin above your shorts. He flicks them back to your face quickly, hoping you didn’t notice, because even he’s not sure what compelled his eyes to wander. “Plus, Eddie called me a hermit the other day and I really can’t stand for that, can I?”

“Ohhh,” you ignore the way your skin suddenly feels warm beneath his gaze, “so you need to make a public appearance to prove Eddie wrong?”

“Exactly. We’ll replace some of the things you lost and restore my reputation. Two birds, one stone, right angel?”

So that’s how you’d ended up at the mall. After Starcourt burnt down, the closest place was a couple towns over, and Steve (as always) offered to drive.

He lets you pick the music the entire way, sings along when you hold your water bottle by his mouth like a microphone, even attempts to harmonize with you which just ends in laughter because neither of you sounded that great.

You’re a couple of stores in, and Steve’s been complaint-free so far—which makes sense, since this was his idea, but you’ve caught him side-eyeing some things, so you know he’s got some remarks in his head he just hasn’t said out loud—and follows you around as you browse. You try not to take too long, because you can’t imagine that this is any fun for him.

“How about that one?” Steve asks, pointing at one of the dresses hanging along the store’s wall.

He’d seen your apartment, though that was a bit ago, and he remembered what you’d lost the most of, along with the type of stuff you like. He pays attention like that, in small, quiet ways that you think mean the most.

He knows you. He cares enough to know you.

“Yeah, that’s really pretty, actually,” you admit.

At your approval, Steve grabs one in your size (which he also just happens to know) and adds it to the couple of things he’d already been holding for you. Every time you picked something up, he was quick to snatch it from you, telling you it was ‘too hard to browse with your hands full.’

After making your way through the rest of the store, you decided to head back to try things on, holding out a hand for the stuff Steve’s holding. “You can wait out here, I’ll be quick.”

“Hold on,” he says, holding the hangers out of your reach. “Why do you think I’m here, angel? I wanna help you pick.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes, seriously. Give me a fashion show, yeah?”

“Oh my God,” you mumble, letting him follow you to the fitting rooms.

They’re hidden behind the back wall of the store, a hallway painted bright blue with pink changeroom doors on one side, and white benches along the other.

“Hi there,” an employee with auburn hair greets you both, her smile wide and kind, though you know it’s a practiced one. Customer service smile. “How many you got there, darling?”

“Oh, um,” you turn back towards Steve, who’s counting the hangers in his hand. “Five.”

“Perfect!” The girl takes the key hanging around her neck and unlocks one of the rooms for you. She takes the clothes from Steve and hangs them up inside for you, then turns to the two of you and says, “Your man can have a seat right here. We call them the ‘boyfriend benches.’”

“He’s not my-”

“Thanks,” Steve says, cutting off your correction because for some reason he didn’t want you to correct her.

Did he… like the idea of being your boyfriend?

Fuck. No. He just didn’t want you to have to explain the whole situation in your rambly way. That’s all.

The redhead smiles again, “Holler if you need anything,” she says before walking off.

You stand there for a second, something like confusion on your face. Did it look like you were boyfriend and girlfriend?

“Come on,” Steve says, snapping the both of you out of whatever that was. “Show me what you’ve got.”

“I can't believe you’re making me do this,” you say, walking into the fitting room and shutting the door.

You try on a couple of sweaters first, and Steve feels the fabric both times, making sure that it’s not scratchy on your skin. Then, there’s just some basic t-shirts that aren’t all that exciting, but Steve says they look nice anyway.

Finally, you get to the dress he picked out.

It really was pretty. A midi-length with a ruffled hem and straps that tie into little bows on your shoulders. You don’t always feel good in your clothes. Sometimes you wish you could crawl out of your skin when you look into the mirror, but right now, you don’t hate what you see.

You actually like it.

“Well?” Steve calls softly from the bench.

In response, you open the door and step out so he can see you.

Steve’s seen you in plenty of dresses—hell, you went to prom together—but for some reason this one makes his heart beat just a little bit quicker. Maybe it’s simply the fact that it looks great on you, or the way you’re smiling shyly as he looks you over.

Or, maybe it’s because he’s the one who picked it.

He stands up, spinning his finger in the air in a gesture for you to twirl. You roll your eyes but do it anyway, and he can’t take his eyes off of you. The hallway of fitting rooms isn’t very big, so with both of you in it, you’re standing toe to toe, the gold flecks in the middle of Steve’s eyes and the faint freckles that dot his nose are visible from where you stand.

As if he can’t help it, Steve lifts a finger and dips it beneath the strap on your shoulder. Not moving it or undoing it, just gliding along your skin where it sits.

“You look beautiful,” he says. His voice goes all quiet and soft when he says it, and his eyes widen a tiny bit, like he hadn’t meant it to slip out that way. It sounded… more than friendly. He clears his throat and steps back as much as he can in the small space, his finger leaving your skin. “I have great taste. Clearly.”

You blink at him, then shake yourself out of it as much as you can. “Yeah. Don’t let it get to your head.” You lift the tag where it hangs by your armpit and look at the price. You gasp and swat Steve’s arm. “Steve! Why would you let me walk into a place so expensive?”

You probably should’ve looked at the tag beforehand, but here you are. Steve, shrugging exaggeratedly, says, “I didn’t know!”

“Okay, I’m gonna change before she comes back. We can make a run for it.”

“We’re not stealing.”

“I know, but they look at you all judgemental when you try stuff on and don’t buy something. Trust me.”

You turn and go back into the fitting room to put on your own clothes, taking a look at the dress in the mirror one last time before shaking your head at yourself.

Steve, however, takes the opportunity to leave you and head back out into the store. He finds the dress easily and grabs another one in your size from the rack and heads to the cashier.

He’s just finishing up, bag in hand, when you walk out and meet him at the front of the store.

“For you,” he says, holding out the bag for you to take.

“Steve…” You grab it and look inside. Your chest aches when you see the dress, your heart suddenly too full and your stomach fluttering stupidly. “You didn’t have to do that. I would’ve been fine with something from the Gap.”

“I know that,” he says, a hand lifting to scratch at the back of his neck. It’s a nervous tick of his, and the thought of him being nervous right now makes you melt even more. “I wanted to get it for you. You looked too pretty in it not to have it.”

Your eyes catch his, and again, something passes between you that you don’t think you’ve ever felt before. A fizzle, a spark.

You rock back on your feet, looking down at the ground before meeting his eyes again. They’re so fucking soft it makes you wonder how lucky you have to be to have him in your life. Being your best friend, driving you to work even when he doesn’t have a shift, offering you a place to stay, buying you a dress.

He’s the sweetest boy you’ve ever known.

“Well,” you twist the straps of the bag around your fingers just to keep them busy. “Thank you, Steve. This is really nice.”

His knuckle traces down your arm just once, featherlight. “You’re welcome, angel.”

You don’t buy anything else after that, instead stopping at the food court for fries, stealing from each other’s baskets, smiling and slapping hands away.

It’s the best day you’ve had in a while.

-

You don’t think anything you do will convey just how grateful you are that Steve has been so kind to you. Always, but especially now. Letting you stay with him and refusing to let you pay rent. (“I don’t even pay rent, and I live here all the time.”)

But, this morning, you’ve decided you’re gonna try.

Steve’s favorite meal of the day happens to be breakfast, which is funny, considering he usually eats something as simple as cereal. He’d told you once that it was because, as a kid, breakfast was the most peaceful of meals, his parents too busy getting ready for work or wherever they were going that he’d have the kitchen table to himself.

Lunch was usually spent at school, and Steve was never a fan of school to begin with. Then there was dinner, which his parents (when they were home) still wanted to have all together. They’d ask him questions and make backhanded comments about every single answer he gave. He never won at dinner.

So, breakfast was, and has remained, his favorite.

You made sure to get up early enough to give yourself time to get everything ready before he wakes up. Steve’s usually the one making the coffee in the morning, and you figured the least you could do was give him a break.

Yesterday, while Steve had been at work, you went over to the Wheeler’s and asked Nancy if you could borrow their waffle maker. She’d directed the question to her mother, who went and grabbed it for you and handed it over with a smile. You promised to take good care of it and have it back in a couple of days.

By the time Steve walks into the kitchen, you’ve already made the batter and set out the toppings—berries, maple syrup, whipped cream—like a buffet. However, he just so happens to come in as you’re swearing at the waffle maker.

“Stupid fucking thing,” you mutter, trying to open it.

Steve smiles to himself before saying, “Morning, angel.”

You jump at his voice, not having heard him walk in. When you turn around, your heart beats for a different reason.

Steve’s still only in his pajama pants, plaid and soft, hanging low on his hips. And he’s shirtless, his chest smattered with hair and his skin a little tanned from the sun. He’s got beauty marks all over, like a constellation you could chart, and his abs are just visible beneath the soft of his stomach. A trail of hair leading to the waistband of his pants and disappearing beneath them.

You’ve seen Steve shirtless plenty of times. Swimming and sleeping over in the summer, in high school when you used to go to his practices, but it hits you harder for some reason this time.

The way his hair is still a mess from sleep, his eyes a bit heavy. The way it feels to be greeting him in the kitchen, cooking breakfast. Intimate. Domestic.

You clear your throat and turn back around to pry the waffle maker open, revealing a slightly burnt but otherwise good-looking waffle. “I’m making breakfast. Coffee’s already in the pot, too.”

He walks over, his chest close to your back as he grabs a mug from the cabinet above you before heading over to pour himself a cup. He looks at the spread you’ve prepared, “Waffles, huh? What did I do to deserve all this?”

“Just wanted to do something nice for you,” you say as Steve walks over to lean against the counter next to you, his hip barely touching yours. “To thank you, in a way. For letting me stay and the dress and-”

“How many times do I have to tell you to stop thanking me?” He says, though his voice is soft and still a bit rough from sleep. “I like having you around.”

“So you don’t want the waffles then?”

“Oh, I want the waffles. I just don’t want you to feel like you have to do anything for me. It’s not some debt you’ll owe me, angel.”

“Want you to know I appreciate you is all,” you say, pouring a new scoop of batter into the waffle maker.

Steve, unsure of what exactly possesses him to do so, dips in and presses a kiss to the apple of your cheek, his lips a whisper away from your skin when he says, “I appreciate you, too.”

Then he pulls away and moves to set the table. Like it was natural.

And it was, in a way. How you moved around each other in the kitchen. You leaning out of the way when he needed to reach something you were blocking, him putting a hand on your lower back when he walked behind you so you knew he was there.

Your cheek still tingles from where he’d kissed it when you bring the plate of waffles to the table, your skin somehow even warmer under his gaze, like he’s still remembering exactly how it felt, too.

You sit in the chair beside Steve, not noticing the way he tugs it a bit closer to him with his foot before you sit down. Soon enough, both of you are digging in. Steve’s got more whipped cream on his plate than waffle (you tell him as much) and you’ve got your berries on the side the way you always do.

Neither of you work until later in the day, and it’s nice knowing that you can take your time. Steve tells you about the advice he gave Dustin about how to be ‘cooler’ in school (he’d told him that being cool is completely overrated, he knew from experience, and that being himself is the most important). You’d told him he was going soft with age.

You talk about anything at all. How Keith somehow manages both of your places of work, how he also somehow does both terribly. The way he says ‘if you have time to lean, you have time to clean’ while literally having Cheeto dust on his fingers. Laughing at each other’s impressions of him.

What the new highscores were at the arcade, what people were renting from Family Video.

You wonder what it’ll be like when you have to leave. When you’re living alone again.

Logically, you know you’ll still see Steve frequently, because he’s your favorite person and you can’t remember the last time you went longer than a few days without hanging out. Still, it’ll be different than right now, waking up in the same space and sharing breakfast and brushing your teeth side by side in the mirror.

You’ll miss it, you think.

Trying not to dwell on something that’s still a few weeks away, you take another bite of your waffle. Steve catches your chin and wipes off a bit of whipped cream from the corner of your mouth, then pulling away and sucking it off his thumb.

He goes back to his own plate without a thought. Like touching you just now was an instinct.

Then, he teases you, “These are a little crispy, angel. Maybe you should stick to letting me make breakfast in this household.”

You kick his leg under the table. “That’s a funny way of saying ‘thank you,’ Harrington.”

He kicks you back, much gentler than you’d been. “Thank you.”

“That’s what I thought.”

When you look at him, there’s an easy, boyish smile on his face.

A similar one stretches across your own lips.

-

Steve has had the thought pop up into his head a couple of times, that maybe he should’ve just asked you to live with him before you ever bought that apartment. Because having you around feels the most right things have ever felt in his house.

And though the circumstances of your moving in with him (temporarily, he has to remind himself), were far from ideal, he can’t lie and say that he isn’t glad that you’ve ended up sharing his space.

The room across the hall will always be yours, even when you move back to your place.

He knows that you feel indebted to him for all of it, but if anyone owes the other something, he feels like it’s him. For everything you’ve ever done for him. Sticking around even when he was an asshole in highschool, defending him to his parents whenever you’d cross paths, simply being the kind of friend he needed.

Even when you’re not around, he can picture your face, the way your smile spreads slowly until you’re fucking beaming. Worse, the way you cried into his chest that day at your apartment.

He remembers the crack in your voice when you spoke about that picture frame from summer camp. Though he hasn’t seen you cry since, or even bring it up, he’s decided he wants to fix it. He’d told you he would.

Dustin wound up roped into his plan: find a similar frame, decorate it the exact same way, and scour the photo albums in Steve’s room for his copy of that same picture.

When he was younger, the photo albums pissed him off, because they were purely for show. Pictures of his family that were all fake smiles. Now, he’s glad for them, because at least he has some good memories to look back on. To know it wasn’t always all bad.

Steve probably should’ve thought that one through, because when they looked through his albums, he was on the receiving end of relentless teasing from Dustin. (“Dude, you have an insane boogie in this picture.” “I was four!”)

He hopes it’ll be worth it.

Dustin was the one who found the picture they’d been looking for, and he cheered and waved it in Steve’s face as if they’d been racing.

Now, after driving Dustin back home, decorating the frame the way the two of you did as kids, trying to make his handwriting look like it did back then (which wasn’t too difficult, ‘cause Steve’s writing still isn’t that neat), he’s waiting for you to come downstairs before giving it to you.

He’d picked you up after your shift at the arcade not too long ago, but he knows you like to shower and change as soon as you get home from work, so he’d taken the opportunity to wrap the frame and have it ready for you.

Steve can hear you singing in the shower, and he knows you’re done when it goes quiet. A few minutes later you’re walking down the stairs in a baggy t-shirt and silky sleep shorts.

His eyes, for some reason, linger on your legs for a second.

He stands up, frame in his hand, when you walk over. “I have something for you.”

“Steve! Stop buying me things. Seriously.”

“This thing was free, so you can’t even be mad,” he says, smiling almost sheepishly.

Your eyes search his face, flickering between his own and dipping down to his lips and his nose and back to his eyes. He looks… nervous.

Steve’s never nervous around you.

“Okay,” you say, shuffling on your feet. “What is it?”

“Here,” he hands you the poorly-wrapped frame. “Open it.”

You scrunch your brows at him once, because you have no idea what it could be. It isn’t your birthday, or any sort of holiday at all. With zero guesses, you look down at the light yellow wrapping paper in your hands and slowly tear it open.

What you find makes your eyes grow misty, tears pooling at your lash line but not quite falling.

It’s your favorite picture, the one of you and Steve in those stupid neon shirts with messy hair and dirt on your hands. Only now, it’s not water damaged, and the frame is new, but decorated just like the old one. You run your thumbs over the glass lightly, smiling down at little you and little Steve.

When you look back up at him, he’s already looking at you, his brown eyes all warm, his smile kind but also worried, waiting for your reaction.

Seeing his face springs you into motion, jumping forward and wrapping your arms around his neck tightly with the frame still in your hand. “Thank you,” you say into his skin.

Steve’s arms move to hold you around your waist without a thought. A reflex. They squeeze you close to him, his nose pressed into your damp hair, smelling your shampoo.

“It’s not perfect,” he says. “But I know how much you love that picture, and I wanted to fix it.”

“Steve. Shut up. It is perfect.”

“I’m glad you think so,” he says, his thumbs running back and forth against your back.

You hug for what could’ve been minutes, but neither of you moves to pull away first. You’re not sure if it’s still considered friendly to stand in each other's arms, breathing each other in, for so long, but you don’t care at the moment.

This is probably the nicest thing anyone’s done for you in a long, long time.

When you finally do pull away, you don’t go far. Your arms stay slung over his shoulders, Steve’s hands framing your hips. His thumbs still dragging those sweet patterns against you.

“I’m keeping it forever,” you tell him.

“You sure?” he asks.

“Certain. You’ll always be my best friend, Steve.”

“You’ll always be mine too, angel.”

Then, your eyes both move to each other’s lips, yours flick back up in a second, startled at their wandering.

Steve, however, is a bit transfixed. He looks at the slope of your cupid’s bow, the way your lips are shiny from your lip balm. He thinks it quickly, like a gust of wind that can’t be stopped: I really wanna kiss her right now.

Fuck. He wants to kiss his best friend.

He blinks a few times, clearing his throat and pulling back, letting his hands fall from your waist as yours slide off his shoulders. He misses the feel of your touch immediately, but he’s too freaked out and confused to do anything about it.

“What are you in the mood for tonight?” he asks, cutting off his own thoughts. “I brought back a horror and a comedy. Take your pick.”

“Mmm,” he picks up two tapes from the coffee table and holds them up for you to choose from. “Horror. Unless you’re too scared?”

“You’ll just have to hold my hand, then, won’t you?”

“I guess I will.”

You look back at the picture while Steve puts the movie into the player. You smile at it every time you see it, because you can still see parts of Steve in him now that were in him then.

His eyes, always kind, the way he smiles when he laughs, and about a half hour into the movie, the way he holds your hand and squeezes it when he’s scared.

-

You’re having one of those nights. The kind where sleep seems to be fighting you.

You worked a closing shift at the arcade, which usually lasts until late considering how long you’re open plus all of the cleaning you have to do afterwards. Today was no different, and despite how much later you finish than him at Family Video, Steve waited and drove you home. He hung out in the arcade with you until close, actually.

You’d think that after such a long day, the second your head hit the pillow you’d be out and breathing steadily. Today, that is not the case. You fell asleep for maybe an hour before a nightmare woke you up. You can’t quite remember what happened, only that you’d been yelling for Steve and he wasn’t there.

Groaning quietly, you rub your eyes and toss the blankets away. You stand up and head down to the kitchen in the dark, hand trailing along the walls to make sure you don’t bump into anything.

Just as you’re pouring yourself a glass of water, you hear the shuffle of sleepy footsteps coming into the kitchen.

“Holy shit,” he says, walking over to grab a glass, one hand on his bare chest. “I thought you were a ghost or something just now.”

You shift out of the way to let him get some water just like you did, taking the second that he’s distracted to look at him. His hair a mess, wearing nothing but his boxers. You take a big sip from your glass.

“I feel like I should be offended right now,” you say, “if you think I look like a ghost.”

“Shut up,” he says, dragging out the second word. His voice being rough from sleep makes his words sound much warmer than they are. “My eyes aren’t awake yet. Nothing to do with you, angel.”

You shake your head, though there’s a soft smile on your face the way there always seems to be when you try to be annoyed with Steve. You tilt your head at him, asking, “Couldn’t sleep?”

He shakes his head. “Been tossing and turning. Just can’t get comfortable, then I got pissed ‘cause I couldn’t get comfortable and only made it worse.”

“You would get pissed at that. Probably slapped your pillow like it was at fault.”

He folds his lips inwards and blinks at you. Because he did smack his pillow and call it a dipshit. “Why do you know everything? Spying on me?”

“Hate to say it, but you’re getting predictable, Harrington.” You shrug, then move to put your now empty glass in the dishwasher. “I know you too well.”

He looks at you, your hair falling across your shoulders, your pajama shorts riding up a little as you bend down. The moonlight slipping through the window seems to hit you perfectly. Like a halo.

Fitting, he thinks. You’re his angel, after all.

“Yeah, you do,” he agrees. Then, “What about you? Why’re you up?”

“Nightmare. Been forever since I had one.”

“You okay?” he asks, trailing a knuckle over your shoulder, pushing your hair behind it.

“Yeah,” you say, skin tingling where he’d touched you. “I can't even remember most of it, but now my brain won’t let me sleep.”

Steve wishes he could’ve protected you from whatever haunted you in your sleep. It’s silly, he knows, to think he might be able to ward away anything that hurts you, but he wants to, nonetheless.

He thinks about how comfortable he is whenever you cuddle during movie night. Your head on his shoulder or his chest, his hand on your back or waist.

So, he blurts, “Why don’t you sleep over?”

You furrow your brows at him, “Um, I’ve been sleeping over. A couple of weeks now, actually.”

“No, I mean, like in my room with me,” he says, suddenly shy at the idea. He’s grateful for the darkness, because he can feel his cheeks warming up. “A proper sleepover.”

You’ve done it before. Shared a bed a bunch of times, but for some reason your heart jumps when he says it. Your stomach swirls as you say, maybe a little too quickly, “Okay.”

Steve’s eyes widen like he’s surprised, just for a split second, before a soft smile takes over his face. He holds out a hand for you to take, “C’mon.”

Soon enough, Steve’s lifting his navy bedspread for you, letting you slip into bed next to him. He stays further away at first, letting you settle and lay on your side the way he knows you always do.

You blame sleepiness—or, maybe, the lack thereof—for the way you reach behind you for his arm and tug him closer, draping it over your own waist.

He obliges, of course, his arm securing itself across your stomach, palm spread out and warm against your sleep shirt. His chest is only a breath away from your back, though he keeps his lower half a little more distanced.

His thumb runs circles over your shirt, once, twice, three times before stilling, his forehead pressing to the back of your neck.

“Goodnight, angel,” he says into your hair.

Your hand splays itself on top of his. “Night, Steve.”

And suddenly your eyes grow heavier, and sleep doesn’t feel like much of a battle anymore.

-

You wake up the most rested you’ve felt in a while. There’s warmth surrounding you, but not the uncomfortable kind. The kind that feels safe.

Somehow, you and Steve are even closer than you’d been when you fell asleep. His arm is still around your waist, his other outstretched and tucked beneath your head like a pillow. His chest is flush to your back, and you can feel it expand with every breath he takes.

Most differently of all, however, is the way his hips are snug against the curve of your butt. And you can feel him hard against you.

Your skin feels even warmer than before when you notice.

Steve hasn’t woken up yet, you don’t think, because the faintest snores are getting puffed out against your shoulder where his face is tucked. His hand on your stomach has worked its way beneath your shirt, though, and his fingertips press against your skin, like he’s fighting to keep you close.

As if you’d go anywhere even in your sleep.

His knee is tucked between your legs, and you’re quickly realizing that it’d be pretty impossible to get out of bed without him noticing. You’re completely tangled together, a knot of limbs somehow fitting together just right. Like two puzzle pieces.

In his sleep, Steve’s mouth presses against the back of your shoulder, and only when you involuntarily shiver at the contact, does he stir.

It takes Steve a bit to really wake up, mumbling words that don’t make sense, scrunching his eyes shut even further before blinking them open. He’s met with the sight of you right in front of him. Body curved perfectly against his.

“Steve? You awake?” you ask, checking.

“Mhm,” he hums.

Then, something that has his cheeks flushing pink, he registers the feeling of his boner pressed against your ass. He shuffles them back enough so there’s space between you. “Fuck. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” you say. Because he can’t control the way his body reacts while he’s asleep.

“I didn’t think-” he cuts himself off, because he’s not quite sure how to say I didn’t think about the whole morning wood factor or that I’d fucking plaster myself to you when I suggested a sleepover without sounding stupid. Instead, he just repeats, “I’m sorry.”

You twist yourself around to face him, sheets crumpling and twisting as you move. When you settle back onto the pillow and look at his face, at the redness on his cheeks and the tips of his ears, you squeeze his hand that’s now laying between you.

“It’s okay, really,” you say. “It’s, like, anatomy. You’re human, Steve.”

“I don’t want you to think I invited you to sleep in here for some pervy reason,” he says, scrunching his nose when he says it.

“I don’t think that at all,” you tell him. You squeeze his hand again. “We’ve shared a bed like, a hundred times by now. If anything I’m surprised this hasn’t happened already.”

“Oh my God,” he groans, shutting his eyes and pushing his face into the pillow.

“Steve,” you drag out his name, fighting a giggle at the way he’s acting. He’s got a reputation, after all, and how shy and embarrassed he seems to be doesn’t reflect the things you heard about him in high school. He’s changed a lot since then. “It’s seriously fine. We can pretend it never happened. Promise.”

Steve pulls his face from the pillow, eyes catching yours as his fingers squeeze yours back in appreciation. He lets his eyes wander a bit, at the messy bits of your hair around your face from sleeping, the marks in your cheek from the pillowcase, the way your sleep shirt has fallen off your shoulder.

He feels lucky to get to see you this way, right after you’ve woken up. Vulnerable, unguarded, beautiful.

It’s during this small stretch of silence that you realize how close your faces are now. You’re sharing a pillow, his nose not even an inch from yours. Shift forward the slightest bit, and they’d be touching. Your eyes trail down to his mouth, to the visible patch of chest hair and the freckles that dot his skin. He’s already looking right at you when your eyes flick back upwards.

You know Steve, could tell what he’s feeling just from the look on his face, but this is one you’ve never seen before. At least, not directed at you.

Steve moves first, his eyes a little darker than usual, shifting forward slightly, then looking at you. Daring you to make the next move.

“What if we didn’t forget about it?” he says. Quiet and scratchy.

You don’t have time to think before you move forward a bit, too. Your noses brush. “What would that mean?”

Steve doesn’t answer with words. Rather, he moves forward the final bit and brushes his lips against yours in a question mark of a kiss, giving you time to pull away.

You don’t.

Instead, the hand of yours that isn’t still holding his comes up to the back of his neck, gently encouraging him to do it again. His free hand tightens at your waist as he dips in a second time.

It isn’t as tentative now that you’ve urged him on. His lips meet yours more sure, more firm, but still soft against you. Neither of you cares one bit about morning breath, or about what this might change. As if the morning’s haze slows time, minds still a little sleepy.

You’re simply acting on instinct. And this feels too right to stop.

Soon enough it grows more heated, Steve shifting to hover over you, his elbows pushing into the mattress to hold himself up, his tongue sneaking out to lick against the seam of your lips for permission.

Just as you open up for him, the blaring sound of Steve's alarm cuts you off, pulling back with a gasp. He simply leans up on one arm and slams the snooze button—and you laugh, you laugh, at how hard he hits it—before diving back into you.

You feel hot all over, where one of Steve’s hands has moved to cup your jaw, his thumb running delicately against your face as his mouth moves against yours, practically devouring you. Where the blankets are still over your lower halves, trapping in heat. When he pulls back, looks into your eyes, fucking smiles all dopey and pretty, and then kisses you again.

It’s so good, you’re almost angry at yourself for not kissing him sooner.

You kiss until his alarm goes off again and Steve's forced to pry himself away from you, groaning about being on his ‘last tardy warning’ from Keith.

Still, he takes the time to kiss your forehead on his way out, Family Video vest slung over his shoulder, calling a sweet, “bye, angel,” on his way out. His hair’s still a mess from your fingers, and he doesn’t even seem to mind.

You stay in his bed longer than you probably should, blinking up at the ceiling, fingers pressed against your lips like you’re searching for physical proof that everything was real.

What the fuck just happened?

-

It’s been a couple of weeks, and Steve can’t stop thinking about that kiss. He doesn’t know it, but you can’t stop thinking about it either.

Neither of you have brought it up, and things have faded back to normal as if it had never happened. But you and Steve are both thinking the same things without knowing it. How good and natural and easy it felt, how, every now and then, you think about doing it again.

You talk and joke and watch movies and eat meals together the same way you always have, and it’d be so easy to stay that way, to never kiss again. But then, what if you could stay that way and kiss? Wouldn’t that be something close to perfect?

You lay awake thinking about it every few nights. Because, when you really reflect on your life and how intertwined it is with Steve’s, you realize that you’ve sort of always acted like a couple, minus the kissing and sex aspect. You go on what could easily be classified as dates—the movies, lunch or dinner—you cuddle on the couch almost nightly, and you’ve never shied away from physical touch with one another. Held hands, a palm on your back.

You haven’t brought it up with Steve because you haven’t even come to terms with it yourself. Feelings are so fucking confusing and messy and you’d like to have a better idea of what’s going on in your own head before asking him about his.

Meanwhile, Steve has allowed himself to come to terms with it. He’s in love with you.

He’s pretty sure he has been for a while. Months, maybe even years.

It hadn’t come easily, though. It was nights spent similarly to yours, running through interactions you’ve had and the way he felt that one time in senior year when you went on a date with some guy from your math class. Even then, a part of him felt wrong about it, that pit in his gut.

Then there were his shifts with Robin at Family Video where he’d practically spilled everything just to get her opinion. She looked up and sighed “thank you” before saying that it was nice of him to finally catch on.

Had he really been that obvious? All this time? And had he really been that oblivious to his own feelings?

Steve can’t answer those questions. He can’t say when his love for you changed from platonic to romantic, he just knows that it has and he doesn’t think he’ll ever come back from it.

You’re his best friend in the entire world, the prettiest girl he’s ever seen, and he can’t picture himself loving anyone but you so wholly.

He’s fucking terrified of losing you, but he’s also terrified of never telling you how he feels and testing that what if.

So, like a desperate idiot, he knocks on the door to Eddie’s trailer.

Eddie opens it after a minute and what sounded like him stubbing his toe, “oh, hey Harrington. More weed?”

“No, shut up. I need your help.”

“You,” Eddie points at Steve, then at himself, “need my help for something? Are you ill?”

“Okay,” Steve, dramatic and bitchy as usual, sighs and mutters something about this being a stupid idea and turns to leave.

“Come on,” Eddie laughs, “I’m just joking. What’s up?”

Soon enough, Steve’s sitting on Eddie’s couch, Eddie pacing in front of the coffee table like this is a very serious matter, and telling him pretty much everything. Your kiss, the train of thought it sparked.

“Basically I’m in love with her and I have no clue what to do,” Steve finishes, sinking back into the couch cushions. It squeaks as he shifts.

Eddie pauses, tugging at his bottom lip between his fingers, then looks at Steve and says, “You know I’ve never dated anyone in my life, right?”

Steve groans into his hands, “Why do all of my friends have to be losers with no dating lives.”

Eddie ignores that, because he can tell how affected Steve actually is by all of this. How much he cares. He walks over and sits down on the opposite end of the couch. “Have you ever thought of, I don’t know, telling her how you feel?”

Steve rests his elbows on his knees, leaning forward and letting his head hang for a moment before picking it up. “Of course I have, but I’m fuckin’ scared.”

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

“Um, she could reject me and not feel the same way and everything would be awkward because I ruined it and I’d lose my best friend in the entire world.”

“What if she does feel the same?” Eddie asks.

He’s both yours and Steve’s friend, he’s been around the both of you together. He’s seen the way you look at each other. Eddie might not be an expert, but it’s always looked a lot like love to him. He’s pretty sure the chances of you feeling the same are quite high.

“What do you mean?”

“What if she does feel the same and you never figure it out because you’re too afraid?” Eddie says. “Man, don’t you think that risk is worth taking?”

Steve thinks about it, and as much as he hates to admit it, Eddie’s right. He’d hate to always wonder, to lose out on the chance to really be with you when he knows it could be so good.

You are worth the risk to him.

“When the fuck did you become so wise, Munson?”

“Dunno,” Eddie shrugs. “Wanna smoke?”

Steve laughs, “Yes I do.”

-

With Steve gone at work and you off for the day, there’s been too much room for your thoughts to creep in. Too much silence.

You’ve already been thinking about things so much. Thinking about him so much, that in his absence, your mind seemed to work overtime to fill in the gaps.

You thought about the day he picked you up from your apartment, how quick he was to drop whatever he’d been doing and come over and help you and take you home with him. The day he took you shopping and bought you a dress because he thought you looked pretty in it, the way his fingers fiddled with the strap on your shoulder when you tried it on for him.

The day he gifted you a remade version of your favorite picture from summer camp because he knew how much it meant to you, the way you held on to each other afterwards.

How you’d been waiting for him to get home that night he went to Eddie’s, just to make sure he was okay. How when he came in, he smiled at the sight of you curled on the couch, and he kissed your cheek when he walked by like it was the easiest thing in the world.

Your brain knew he was high, you could smell the weed mingling with his cologne on his clothes when he leaned in close, but your heart didn’t care about that. It thumped in your chest the second he leaned in closer, even worse when his lips touched your cheek.

The realization hits you now like a shock, a quick zip of electricity running through your system. You fucking love him.

Sure, you’ve loved Steve practically your whole life, but this was different. You love him, love him. Like, you want to kiss him when he comes home from work and in the morning. You want him to introduce you as his girlfriend and to be able to call him your boyfriend.

You feel stupid for not realizing it sooner, because looking back on things now, knowing how you feel, you can see it written throughout your entire friendship. Holding hands and kissing foreheads and hands pushing hair away from faces.

For a second, you’re purely happy, because you get to be in love with your best friend and it feels as warm and sweet as sunlight. Then, the fear creeps in, and you’re scared. Scared of losing him, of making things weird, of change and doing the wrong thing.

So scared that you start to panic and pack up some of your things in your bag like you’re running away.

Truthfully, you’re not sure what else to do. You’ve never been in love before, you’ve never known it this way—so kind and unconditional. And your parents sure as hell didn’t set a good example for you. They’d fight, and someone would leave with the slam of a door, and then they’d be back and the cycle would continue.

You’re scared and confused and your instincts are telling you to run away even though the only place you really wanna be is with Steve. In his arms.

You’re stuffing clothes into your bag just to keep your hands busy, breathing hard and fast, when you hear the front door open and close. Steve’s quick to find you, his eyes scanning your room and then looking at you. “What are you doing?”

You feel like you might cry just looking at him. His brown eyes worried but warm as always, his hands stuffed into his pockets like he’s nervous.

“I thought you weren’t supposed to be home until later,” you say, hoping he can’t hear the shake in your voice.

“It was dead, so Keith let me off early. I-” Steve furrows his brows, “are you leaving?”

You nod. “I’ve been in your way long enough.”

“I told you, you’re never in my way.” Steve knows you, and he loves you, and he can tell that there’s something going on. That you’re panicked and trying to get away from whatever it is. He cares too much to let that happen. “I want you to stay.”

You want to stay, too. You just don’t know what comes next, and that unknown, the lack of control, of familiarity, it makes your hands shake.

Your mind doesn’t work the same when you’re afraid.

“Give me one good reason why I should stay, Steve. I’ve been taking up your space for weeks and-”

“Because I love you.” Steve cuts you off. He hadn’t planned on telling you this way, he wanted it to be romantic and perfect but he can’t wait any longer. Especially not when you’re trying to run away. “I’m in love with you. And I want you here.”

You immediately stop in your tracks, blinking up at him like you’re not sure you’d heard him correctly. “You- what?”

“I love you. Romantically. And I think I have for a really long time.”

“You’re not high again, are you?” You ask, your eyes a little misty.

Steve walks over to you and grabs both of your hands in his, making sure you’re looking at him, at the sincerity written all over his face, when he says, “Completely sober. I fucking love you and I want you to keep living with me, because this house doesn’t really feel like home unless you’re in it.”

“What about when my apartment is ready?”

He squeezes your hands. “Stay then, too. Stay forever.”

You look up at him, his hair falling over his forehead, his eyes so honest, a tentative smile on his mouth. The only boy you’ve ever loved.

You feel silly for trying to escape this when this is how it’s turning out. Steve had been brave just now, telling you he loves you and he wants you to stay, so you decide to be brave, too.

It’s easier than you thought it would be to say: “I love you, too, Steve. I feel the same. I only just realized it and freaked out. I’m so scared of losing you, is all.”

“You won’t. Not ever.”

You tip your chin up to kiss him after he says it, because you can. You pour your feelings into it, and Steve returns your kiss as if it’s one he’s known for years. It’s slow, and deep, and sweet, and so full of love you’re practically overflowing with it.

The two of you only pull away when you need a breather. Steve doesn’t go far, resting his forehead against yours.

“So what happens now?” You ask.

“Well, we’ve been acting like a couple for a while, I think, so we stay the same. Mostly. Except now I get to call you my girlfriend-”

“Um, I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to ask me first.”

He lets go of one of your hands and pushes a loose strand of hair behind your ear, his knuckle running lovingly across your cheek. “My angel girl, will you be my girlfriend?”

Your grin is wide and lovesick and cheesy and you don’t care one bit. “Yeah, yes I will. Boyfriend.”

“And, being your boyfriend means I get to do this.”

He kisses you once more. And you don’t ever want to not be kissing him again.

𝜗𝜚

thank you guys so much for reading!!! it would mean a whole bunch if you would consider leaving a comment or a reblog and letting me know what you think!! it helps more than you know <3

[loverofmarsss]

this is undeniably beautiful writing, you did an amazing job at everything. showing how the events of the past affected him emotionally and mentally, the fear of being rejected because of what the events did to him, him finally letting her into the most vulnerable part of him— absolutely beautiful. can't wait to see what you write next.

finally

pairing: steve harrington x reader

summary: in the aftermath of everything, steve comes to one undeniable realisation—he has to let you in. he just hopes you’re ready for what he's about to give.

warnings: 18+ this contains smut, angst (what's new?), scars, crying, body insecurity, arguments, explicit smut, p in v, body worship kinda, it's so sappy guys

a/n: this is so long and was incredibly difficult to write, i swear i was struggling and probably deleted and rewrote each part at least twice. i really hope i did this justice. but buckle up because this is a rollercoaster.

series masterlist

Steve slipped through the front doors of the school before the sun had fully risen, a ghost drifting in silent halls. The echo of his footsteps against the polished floor was unnerving without the usual morning ruckus. Only a couple of bleary-eyed janitors acknowledged his presence with a nod, too occupied to question why he was there so early. 

Truthfully, he hoped they wouldn’t ask—because no explanation would ever sound right. But then again, that was nothing new.

He headed straight for the gym, heart pounding like a trapped animal in his chest. He could feel it throbbing in his ears, overshadowing even the squeak of his trainers on the spotless tiles. Rounding the back corner, he found the small set of showers—an afterthought of a space once used for older students or the occasional sports camp. 

He dropped his bag onto the bench, the sound echoing in the stark emptiness. Then, without hesitation, he tugged the clothes off his body—jumper and joggers, the ones he’d gone to sleep in. He couldn’t even remember how he’d managed to find his other clothes in his scramble to leave your place. His head had been too clouded with shame and panic.

But now, he wanted them off—his mind was already overstimulated, and the added fabric against his skin was only making it worse.

The steady flow of the water was comforting, constant in a life that felt like it was careening off the rails. He stepped under the stream, letting the hot spray pelt his skin. It stung at first, just a little too hot, reminding him that he was still alive—still breathing, still here. He forced his eyes shut, shoulders slumping as steam enveloped him.

He didn’t want to think about anything, yet the images came unbidden. Your face. The look in your eyes when he lost control, when he gripped you hard enough to bruise. It flickered behind his closed lids, bright and aching. 

The memory of that moment—your shock at his exit—slammed into him like a punch. A strangled groan escaped him. He raised his fist to the tiled wall, teeth gritted, so close to just letting go and smashing it. So very close.

No. Don’t. Not again. 

He could almost hear his therapist’s voice.

Nothing good ever comes from hurting yourself.

But what about the hurt he inflicted on you? 

Because—Christ, that was worse. 

Worse than any bruise he could plant on his own flesh. 

Part of him wanted to hurt. He deserved it after laying a hand on you. He couldn't stomach the thought of how those marks would look on your skin now—the shape of them a perfect match to his hand. Proof of his failure to protect, to be gentle. 

He was supposed to be better than this.

He was supposed to be getting better.

The water slowly turned tepid, so he twisted the knob off with a hiss, breath still ragged as steam ghosted around him. His hair dripped in limp strands around his face. 

Only after stopping the shower, he remembered something vital. 

No towel. 

He nearly laughed—a dark, bitter chuckle that caught in his throat. Nothing like standing drip-dry in an abandoned changing room. He hated the feeling of his exposed skin, even on the best of days.

He grabbed the abandoned jumper from the bench, pressing it to his body to wick away the water. The material felt clammy and foreign, but he pushed through, feeling each drop like another reminder of how he never planned anything right anymore.

When he caught sight of himself in the mirror, he grimaced. The reflective surface was warped with condensation, but he could still see the angry marks etched across his torso—the largest slash running from his hip bone to just under his ribs. His stomach clenched at the sight. It didn’t matter how many times he’d seen them; it always felt like the first.

He thought back to who he used to be. Cocky, a little arrogant, but at least he was whole. 

He used to swagger around the high school hallways, grin on his face, chest puffed out like he owned the place. Back then, he was King Steve, the golden boy—girls would practically sigh when he peeled off his shirt at the pool, drawn to his tanned skin and slick confidence. 

He could remember the way their fingertips would graze along his sides, warm and curious, sometimes shy, other times bold. He lived for it—lived for the validation of their longing stares, the flush of their cheeks when they realised they wanted him.

Now, he could barely stand his own reflection. 

The raised scars were ragged lines cutting across the person he once was. Each one told a story of violence, of fights he barely survived. The old Steve had worshiped the feel of someone’s palms sliding over his smooth skin; this Steve was terrified of letting anyone see the mess underneath his clothes. 

He was certain no one would ever touch him like that again—not without flinching. And why wouldn’t they flinch?

You didn’t.

The thought stabbed at his gut. He pictured your reaction when he first showed you the state of his arms—the complete lack of revulsion in your eyes. But those were just his arms. There was no telling how you’d react to the rest of him.

Maybe you’d feel obligated to tell him it didn’t matter—but he knew it would matter. It was too ugly, too raw, too real. His fingers ghosted over the ridges and valleys of ruined flesh, hating every inch of it, mourning the boy who used to be so sure that anyone’s hands on him were a promise of pleasure, not a reminder of pain.

He squeezed his eyes shut, letting a shaky exhale pass through his lips. 

He wished he could go back—so fucking badly. 

Not just to yesterday, but to his younger self, to tell him to run and never look back. That’s what all his friends had done, anyway. Max, Lucas, Nancy, Dustin—they all left the moment they had the chance.

But then again, if he hadn’t stayed, who would have been there to protect them?

He didn’t regret that.

Staying had felt safer, clinging to the familiar. At least he had Robin. But now, all he did was look back on the life he could have lived, replaying the possibilities like a song stuck on repeat.

Back to simpler days when he reveled in stolen kisses behind the bleachers, back when the biggest problem was heartbreak or a lost basketball game. But he couldn’t rewind time. He was stuck here, carrying an inventory of scars on his skin and secrets in his soul, all of them carved by battles he never volunteered for but fought anyway. 

Selfless and stupid. 

So fucking stupid.

Cautiously, he stepped away from the mirror. His boxers slid up over damp thighs, sticking uncomfortably, a reminder of how unprepared he’d been for all of this. As he tugged on his jeans from yesterday, he caught another glimpse of those twisted lines on his hip, and his stomach churned. 

You’ll never look at him the way the others did. 

Especially after this morning.

He couldn’t let that self-hatred bloom right now, not when he still had to make it through the day.

He pulled the shirt over his head, careful not to aggravate the scar tissue. It still stung sometimes, and the shock of cool air against his wet skin made him shiver. One final glance at the mirror, and he felt that hollow ache gnaw at his chest again. 

He looked so far from the King Steve of old—his hair flat, his eyes rimmed, nothing left of that youthful swagger but a faint ghost.

Clenching his jaw, he bent down to pick up his bag. The clothes serving as a flimsy barrier between him and the rest of the world. A world that didn’t know the truth, a world that would never see the depth of his shame. 

He swallowed the lump in his throat, ignoring the pounding guilt that told him he’d never be worthy of touch or tenderness again. With slow, deliberate steps, he turned away from the mirror.

He was fully dressed, but it didn’t matter. Underneath the fabric, he was still raw, still marked, still broken—and no amount of clothing would ever change that. He couldn’t hide in this empty locker room forever. He had to face the day, face the kids, face you—except he wasn’t sure he was ready for that. Not after he’d left you in pieces. 

Get through the day, just get through the day.

The weight of it all made his steps feel leaden. When he emerged from the gym, the halls were still quiet. Everything was tinted in a dull gray that matched the cold ache in his bones. In a few hours, the corridors would be flooded with laughter, questions, and chatter, and bright eyes would turn to him for guidance.

The thought made his stomach churn. 

How could he possibly guide them? 

But there was no time to linger. He had to keep moving—because if he stopped, even for a heartbeat, he’d sink so far that he might never resurface. 

It had happened before. And he had managed to pull himself out once, but there was no telling if he could do it again.

The only thing you felt as you stared at the door was complete numbness.

Your body trembled, each breath catching in your chest as you try to wrap your mind around the fact that Steve just…left. Walked out without even a backward glance in your direction. 

The echo of the door closing still rings in your ears, and you swear you can feel it vibrating through the room, a certainty that he isn’t coming back. 

You’d called out, desperate, begged him not to go, pleaded for him to stay and fix this horrible mess that you had no idea how to navigate. He didn’t so much as hesitate. He saw the hurt in your eyes, registered the tremble in your voice, and still decided to leave you here alone.

And that’s what fucking hurt the most. 

It hits you in waves: confusion, anger, aching in your chest so sharp you think it might just hollow you out from the inside. A mix of emotions tangles in your mind, and you can’t believe this is the same man who’s been so gentle, so sweet, who made you feel seen and wanted. Protected, always. 

The sting of betrayal ignites something bitter—how could this man, the one who’d look at you with such warmth, so casually vanish when you needed him most?

You press a hand to your face, feeling the tears slip between your fingers. In a distant corner of your mind, you register that you’re shaking, your knees threatening to give. The memory of him grabbing you in the throes of that nightmare is still fresh, sharp as a newly opened wound. 

You can practically feel his grip on your wrist, the surge of his panic flooding you as he relived some horror. As frightening as it was, you understood—or at least, you tried to. Night terrors were real; you’d seen enough to know you couldn’t blame him for something he wasn’t even awake to control.

That was all explainable. 

What truly rips you apart inside is that he ran before you could even talk it through. 

You would have endured the pain in your wrist a hundred times over if it meant you didn’t have to deal with this gaping sense of abandonment. You needed him here, not just physically but emotionally—to see the remorse in his eyes, to hear his voice, to feel his arms around you as he promised this would never happen again. 

You wanted him to sit down with you, both of you maybe still trembling from the shock, and figure out how to handle it next time. Because you already know you’re in too deep to pretend you can just walk away. 

If this was going to be part of the reality you shared, then so be it—you’d find ways to cope, to help him. That’s what people do when they care about each other. 

They stay and talk and try to understand.

But he didn’t. He vanished, leaving the sharp tang of fear and heartbreak in his wake. And the one person who can stitch you back together is also the one who tore you apart in the first place. 

Worse, there’s a small voice whispering in your mind that he might not trust you at all, that he doesn’t believe you can handle this darkness—or maybe that he doesn’t want you to see how deep it really goes. It crushes you. If he can’t open up in a moment like this, when you’ve already witnessed him at his most vulnerable, how can you ever feel safe being vulnerable in return?

Your eyes drift again to the door, half-expecting him to change his mind and burst back in, breathless and apologetic. But the knob remains still, the room silent except for your ragged breathing. 

A profound sense of loneliness steals over you. You almost consider marching right out, driving to the school, demanding he talk to you. Let him try to brush you off in front of everyone—let him see you won’t be turned away so easily. 

But common sense, or maybe just the last shred of your pride, holds you back. You know better than to cause a scene, especially around innocent kids who don’t deserve to see two adults unraveling.

At length, you retreat to your bedroom, hands fumbling for clothes that feel safe and soft. You pick a long-sleeved top, something that covers the marks on your arm. The bruises throb with each movement, a physical reminder of everything that happened. Every time you rotate your wrist, the ache spikes, and fresh tears threaten to break free. 

You don’t know which hurts more: the bruises or the empty space where Steve should be, reassuring you that he never meant to cause you pain.

Downstairs, you force yourself into a routine. There’s an order on the desk, scheduled for pickup later today—simple enough to pack, something you can do on autopilot. You line the boxes, arrange the contents, trying to focus on each small task. But your wrist protests every time you bend it, and it’s impossible not to recall the panic in his voice, the wildness in his eyes when he woke.

You push through the discomfort, desperate for a distraction, but all it does is magnify the emptiness in your chest. When the last box is sealed, you exhale a shaky breath and rub your forehead, wishing you could smooth away the swarm of thoughts churning behind it.

You decide you’ll work the shop until the customer comes, feign a smile and some semblance of calm, then close up early. Maybe after that, you can collapse into bed and let yourself cry until your eyes ache more than your arm. Maybe you’ll try to sleep, or maybe you’ll just stare at your phone, hoping Steve will call. 

You hate how much you want him to, but you can’t help it. 

Because despite everything, he’s the only one who can stitch these pieces of you back together in any meaningful way.

You don’t want to think about it, yet it’s all that occupies your mind. He’d been terrified, and that knowledge twists your sympathy and anger together in a knot so tight you feel you might suffocate from it. 

The part of you that cares for him wants to comfort him, hold him until those nightmares fade. The part of you that’s hurt wants to shake him and demand he never, ever do this again. 

You aren’t sure which part is stronger.

You brace yourself for customer service mode, plastering on a polite smile you know won’t reach your eyes. 

And after that, you’ll close up shop and let your thoughts spiral in circles, trying to figure out if there’s a way to mend what’s been broken. 

Because, really, what else can you do?

You can’t go back to pretending everything is fine, not when you have the proof etched into your skin. And you can’t move forward until he decides to talk—if he decides to talk at all.

He hadn’t slept. Not really. 

The night blurred into a half-awake haze where every time he closed his eyes, he saw your face. It was the only thing he had left since you had been dodging his calls. 

He’d told you he would—call that is—or at least, he thought he did. It was all so garbled and panicked, words tumbling out in a half-choked stream as he fled, too ashamed to look at your panic-stricken form for one second longer. 

At first, he wondered if you’d even heard. The confusion in your gaze suggested maybe you hadn’t. 

None of this would have made sense to you anyway.

He could barely comprehend it himself.

When lunchtime came around at school, he tried. He dialed your number on the ancient landline in his classroom, pressing the handset so tightly to his ear that his knuckles turned white. The phone rang on and on, that endless tone droning in his head like an alarm. Then, voicemail. No click of your voice picking up, no hesitant greeting, nothing. 

It was the first sign something was off. You’d always said it was important to answer—it could be a customer, after all. 

He set the phone down slowly. 

Maybe you’re out. 

But that uneasy feeling lodged itself in his chest, refusing to let go. You hardly ever left during your lunch hour. 

He tried again after class ended, his nerves coiled tighter than a spring as he tapped his foot under the desk. Every glance from a passing teacher through the door felt like it burned straight through him—like they all knew he’d done something awful. 

And it showed, too: even the kids had been oddly subdued, their usual energy muted by the forced smile he gave them, the one that never reached his eyes. He wanted to tell them, he wasn’t mad at them. That they didn’t do anything wrong. 

But he did. 

He couldn’t find the words. Not when all he could think about was how he’d scared someone he cared about, even if it was an accident. 

The phone rang and rang again, no answer.

By the time he walked the entire route back to his place, he was ready to crawl out of his skin. He tried once more after he closed his front door behind him, your number already lodged in his mind like a reflex. 

Nothing. 

Not a peep. 

His heart felt like it was in his throat. You always pick up. Especially in the evenings. 

He remembered all those late-night calls, you answering groggy but delighted, telling him he was being stupid for staying up so late. Then you’d laugh, that sweet, half-asleep giggle he’d come to adore, and he’d cling to the sound like a lifeline. 

You’d talk until dawn sometimes, spinning stories, sharing secrets. That memory cut him now like glass—because tonight, there was only silence on the other end. 

And that was the second strike.

When he tried one last time before bed—gripping the handset with both hands to his ear—and still got no answer, the panic set in. 

Hard. 

He could practically hear your voice in his head. But the ring trilled on, eventually sliding into voicemail again. The emptiness felt like a personal betrayal, even though he knew he was the one who’d run from you. 

Maybe you hated him now.

He wouldn’t blame you. 

Or maybe you were hurt and couldn’t bear to speak to him. Neither possibility let him sleep.

But that still didn’t make sense to him. Not answering when you didn’t even know it would be him.

He almost dialed Robin’s number, thumb hovering over the buttons. She’d know what to do—she always did. She’d give him some tough-love pep talk, maybe call you herself. But he pictured the horror on her face when she found out the full extent of what happened, how he’d latched onto you during that nightmare and left you with marks in the shape of his fingers. 

Would she see him differently now? As a threat? A monster? 

He couldn’t stomach that. Couldn’t lose her too. So he didn’t call. He just let the phone drop back on the holder and stared at the ceiling until morning.

The next day only confirmed his worst fears—still no answer. He tried you at every spare moment, hands shaking so badly sometimes he nearly dropped the receiver. 

He told himself he was a coward for doing this over the phone, but the alternative was to walk right up to your shop and risk you slamming the door in his face. He couldn’t decide which would hurt more: your silence over the line or seeing rejection in your eyes. 

But the silence was brutal. It chipped away at him, driving his mind into overdrive with possibilities. That unwavering habit of yours to always answer, to be available, had been so endearing. Now it had morphed into a warning sign.

No answer meant something was wrong.

No answer meant trouble.

No answer meant danger.

The more he thought about it, the more he couldn’t shake it. By afternoon, he was in his car, driving too fast through the quiet neighborhoods of Hawkins, heart rattling in his rib cage like it wanted out. Each stop sign felt like an obstacle, every slow driver a personal torment. A voice in his head whispered that maybe this was all in vain—maybe you wouldn’t even want to see him. 

He had to do something. If you were in trouble, if you were shutting down, he couldn’t just sit at home wracked with guilt. 

He owed you more than that. He could understand that now.

When he finally screeched to a halt in front of your place, he killed the engine in one rough jerk, not caring that the car was crookedly parked. His hand trembled on the door handle as he climbed out, the sight of your shop sending a jolt of dread through him. It wasn’t as bright, as welcoming. The windows seemed dimmer, as though the life had bled from the space. 

Or maybe it’s just you that’s gone dark. 

An icy wave of guilt twisted in his stomach. 

He tried the door, a gentle pull at first that quickly escalated into a desperate yank when it wouldn’t budge. 

Locked. 

You never locked it at this hour, at least not without a sign indicating you’d be back soon. This was abnormal.

Pressing a palm flat against the glass, he peered inside, squinting to see past the faint reflections. That’s when he noticed the state of your desk—papers strewn about, boxes teetering precariously, random books flung as if you’d knocked them over and never bothered to pick them up. 

His heart lurched. You hated mess, took pride in keeping everything tidy. He vividly remembered the meltdown you’d had over a weekend rush, how you’d scurried to reorganise everything within minutes. 

This was not like you.

A flicker of relief sparked when he realised only that corner was in disarray—the rest of the shop looked intact. But the relief was short-lived. This still screamed trouble. If you were leaving things in such a state, you had to be upset, or distracted, or both. 

Shoulders bunched, he thumped on the door, urgency mounting with each second. 

“Hey!” he called, the sound cracking in his throat. He said your name once, then twice, his voice rising in panic when only silence answered.

He remembered every unanswered ring on that phone, every message he’d left that was met with nothing but static. Sanding here, it felt like the universe was doubling down on his punishment, forcing him to relive the helplessness all over again.

“Please,” he said, pressing his brow against the glass. “Listen—I know I messed up, but—”

Suddenly, he saw something move at the edge of his vision. A flash of you, stepping from behind a shelf or the back counter—he couldn’t be sure. Relief slammed through him, leaving him momentarily dizzy. He straightened, heart in his throat, eyes drinking in the sight of you like a lifeline. 

He wanted to weep with gratitude that you were up. You were moving. 

You were alright. 

But the instant he registered your expression, his stomach knotted. 

You looked exhausted—drained in a way that went beyond lack of sleep. You were wearing the clothes you usually reserved for upstairs, they felt so out of place. No shoes, just those thick socks peeking out from beneath your pajama bottoms. An oversized jumper swallowed your frame, sleeves unrolled for once, hanging past your knuckles instead of pushed up like usual.

The relief that hit him was replaced by a heavier dread. He knew why. The sleeves weren’t for comfort—they were for hiding. He didn’t have to see the damage from a few days ago to know it would be worse by now.

You look broken. 

And knowing it was his fault made him wish he could just vanish.

He lifted a hand in a shaky attempt at a wave, lips forming your name in a breathless whisper. The only consolation he had was that you were here, physically okay—at least for now. 

His heart lurched the moment he saw you dart for the stairs.

So this is what it feels like. 

The helplessness of watching someone run when you need them most. 

It gutted him. He wrenched on the handle again, calling your name, more desperate this time. The echoes of what he did—leaving you in exactly the same state—taunted him. His shame rolled over him, drenching him in guilt. 

He called your name again, his voice unsteady, and caught a glimpse of you hesitating on the landing. You turned slowly, wary eyes meeting his, your expression pinched, unreadable and indecisive. You looked torn, as if caught between two instincts, sending him away for good or granting him the same chance you had begged him to give the morning he ran.

He wasn’t running anymore.

“Please,” he rasped, voice cracking around the word, “can you—fuck—can you just open the door? I—I just want to talk.” 

He winced at how needy it sounded, but desperation had stripped him of all pride. You turned fully, glaring at him with an anger he knew too well. 

How dare he ask that of you. 

It was a grim understanding, remembering how you’d wanted him to stay and talk.

He watched you stomp to the door. As your hand closed around the lock, he could see the barely contained fury in the tightness of your jaw. The click sounded thunderous in the still of the shop.

“You want to talk?” You snapped, throwing the door open. “Now, Steve? Really?”

His chest constricted, because you had every right to be furious. 

It didn’t dull the sting of your words, but he owed you this, owed you the chance to say every bit of anger you’d bottled up. He swallowed hard, opening his mouth. 

No explanation came. How could it?

He deserved this. 

Your eyes flicked over him and you gave a mirthless laugh, then turned on your heel and marched back inside. He followed, hands sweaty and shaking, shutting the door behind him in a soft click that felt eerily final. 

“You wanna talk?” You whirled, arms crossed. “Let’s talk.”

He could feel your gaze cutting into him, but it was the exhaustion limning your features that really made his stomach knot. You looked one harsh word away from shattering into pieces. 

He recognised that brand of exhaustion all too well—he wore it often. 

“Look, I—I’m so sorry, angel,” he began, voice trembling. The term of endearment slipped out unthinkingly.

“No.” You inhaled sharply, tearing your gaze from his. “You don’t—you don’t get to call me that, okay?” Your breathing was shaky, tears threatening at the edges of your voice.

He swallowed and nodded, stepping back as if to physically rein himself in. 

This was worse than he thought.

“Alright,” he whispered. “I won’t. But please, let me say sorry. I—I never meant to scare you like that.”

Something flashed in your eyes, a deep, wounded frustration. 

He really didn’t get it.

“Steve,” you said with a weary sigh, “I don’t give a shit about that right now.”

He blinked, thrown. He expected you to rip into him for hurting you, even if it was unintentional. But you pushed on, your voice rising. 

“Are you ever gonna talk to me? Like, actually talk?”

“I—” He stammered. 

Isn’t that what he was doing right now? 

“Of course you’re not,” you said bitterly, eyes flicking to the floor. “I can’t keep doing this.”

“Wait—wait, what?” A spike of alarm hammered in his chest. “I promise, I never meant to lay a hand—”

“Jesus, Steve!” You let out a broken laugh that cracked partway through. “I know that! I know what a fucking nightmare is, alright?”

He stared, stunned, as you raked a hand through your hair, tears brimming.

“I can deal with that,” you pressed on, your voice firm despite the weight of the conversation. “People have them all the time—maybe not to that extent, but at least I can make sense of it.”

You took a deep breath. 

This was it—the question that had been sitting on your tongue for months, the one you had rehearsed a hundred different ways but never had the nerve to say aloud.

“I know something happened to you—you think I haven’t noticed?” You exhaled sharply, a weak attempt to steady yourself before pushing forward. “I see the way you act around me, how you’re always looking over your shoulder, how you barely let me touch you. Don’t you think I’ve put two and two together by now?”

A twisted sense of dread pooled in his stomach. 

So much for keeping everything subtle. 

He’d thought he was being careful, showing you just enough to fly under the radar, but apparently not enough.

“I don’t know the details, not really. But I’ve been patient. I’ve been letting you take your time. And that’s fine. But—God—you need to let me in just a little. Anything. Especially if it could get this bad.”

He opened his mouth, a term of endearment on the tip of his tongue, but he caught himself. 

“I’ve… I’ve never done this before.”

Your eyes filled with pain. 

Is he not even going to try?

“Well, you’re gonna have to figure it out. Because I can’t keep doing this—stumbling around in the dark, watching you shut me out, and getting hurt for trying.”

The fatigue in your voice tore at his heart. He wanted to grab your hands, drag you close, promise that he’d tell you everything if it meant wiping that tortured look off your face. But he knew you needed space to speak, to get it all out.

“You know…I thought about leaving.”

“What?” His eyes widened, the notion shook him. 

Leave Hawkins? Leave him? 

The panic roared in his veins.

“When you left, I was a wreck,” you admitted, tears quivering on your lashes. “I couldn’t do anything right. The order I had to fill? I screwed it up—completely. And the customer tore me a new one, cursing me out in front of everybody. And I stood there, thinking, ‘Why am I doing this? Why am I giving my all to this place when it gives me nothing in return?’”

It was true—you had uprooted everything to move here, determined to start fresh. And for a while, you thought you could. Especially with him. But every time you tried to move forward, you hit a wall. Resistance. Silence. There was only so much you could take.

This lack of communication was breaking you. Only intensified by the last few days. 

“And—I’m not asking for your whole life story,” you said, your voice wavering as you wrapped your arms around yourself instead of reaching for him. He didn’t get that privilege right now. “But it’s like you’re not even trying. Like you don’t want to try. And—and it just—” You swallowed hard, struggling to keep your emotions in check. “It just feels like you don’t trust me.”

His throat constricted at the sight of your tears finally spilling over. He couldn’t hold himself back any longer—he closed the distance in a rush, wrapping his arms around you. You trembled against him, clinging to his shirt as sobs wracked your frame. 

He stroked your hair, pressing apologies into the air around you like whispered confessions, though he wasn’t sure if you could hear them over your own grief. But none of that mattered more than holding you right now, than letting you know he was here. 

He hadn’t even stopped to consider how hard this was for you—how much you had clung to him, relied on him. And maybe that was his fault. He didn’t know how to be your rock, the person you could turn to when everything else felt unsteady. He had shattered that illusion, along with everything you had given him, leaving you with nothing to hold onto.

Then, in a trembling voice, you muttered into his shoulder, something so small he could barely hear it. 

"I just—" You suck in a shaky breath, but it doesn’t help. It doesn’t settle the ache in your chest or stop the way your voice wavers.

"I just feel so fucking stupid—like… like nobody even wants me here anymore."

Oh.

Oh, no. 

Sweetheart, you have no idea how wrong you are.

He holds you tightly as you crumble against his chest, your tears soaking through his shirt even harder than before. Each sob you let out is a blow to his heart; your cries cut deeper than any nightmare he’s ever endured. He scrambles for something to say, something that makes sense—something that won’t come out a tangled mess of incoherent feelings.

“Shhh, that’s not true,” he says softly, his voice steady. “Not true at all. Hey—c’mon breathe with me, yeah? That’s not true—I promise, it’s not—”

He had believed shutting you out would protect you, keep his past locked away where it couldn’t taint anyone else. Instead, all it had done was carve deep wounds in the present.

For a moment, he simply stands there, letting you pour out every emotion. 

He soon comes to a realisation he hates—one he’s been avoiding, hoping he’d have more time to figure it out. But the way you’re clinging to him now, begging for just a shred of honesty, for something real.

He understanfs that the only way to keep you from spiraling further is to open the door he’s kept barred. He needs to give you a glimpse of the shadows lurking behind his eyes, prove that he trusts you enough to share even the smallest fraction of his past.

He has to try.

He inhales shakily. 

Hoping to God this is the right decision. 

“It was…” he begins, voice raw. “It was summer of ‘85.”

He’s started now. 

Something small. Something safe—at least, safer than the rest.

Something true.

Your breathing stills, as if you’re trying to steady yourself. You pull back just enough to meet his gaze, tears still clinging to your lashes. 

“What?” you murmur, confused. But you don’t pull away entirely, you stay close, your fingertips still curled in his shirt.

He nods, exhaling a trembling breath. 

Here goes nothing.

“I—I was working the summer with Rob. At the old mall. First real job since graduation. It’s…where I met her.” 

His eyes flick away for a second, remembering the cramped ice-cream counter, the corny uniform, and how it had felt like the biggest joke in the world back then. But at least it had been something to do, a way to prove he wasn’t just a washed-up high school jock.

You study him, eyes red but full of concern. He can practically feel your pulse racing under his palms, so he drags in another breath and forces himself to continue. 

“It was a crappy gig, honestly. Couldn’t’ve picked something more humiliating if I tried. But hey, it kept me busy—got me out of bed in the morning.” He grimaces, remembering the bright neon of Starcourt, the endless swirl of customers. He presses his lips together, telling himself this is good, that he’s finally doing what you asked. 

Show you something. Let you in.

“Got too close to something we shouldn’t have,” he says finally, voice low. “Way too close. Put our heads where they didn’t belong, and suddenly things were…real. They were really fucking real.” 

He hesitates, haunted by the memory of secret corridors and muffled Russian transmissions. A slight tremor runs through him, and your hand comes up, brushing gently along his side as if trying to soothe the ache. He wonders if you can feel how tense he is, how his heart is pounding. 

Probably.

“It was my fault, really,” he mutters, guilt stabbing at him. “I—uh—I encouraged it. All of us. There were four total—Rob, me, Dustin, Erica. I swear I’ve mentioned ‘em in passing.” He catches the slight nod you give. He’s mentioned Dustin especially, and you’ve always been curious about him. “They ended up moving away after everything. It got too much, and I—I almost lost…all of them.” His voice falters, the words scraping at his throat. “We nearly didn’t make it out in time.”

At the time, he could almost see the humour in it—some twisted, detached part of him had laughed. But, as time passed, the reality of what occurred settled in, sharper than he’d expected.

Being forcibly drugged had blurred the edges of his memory, warping everything into a hazy, disjointed mess. For a while, that had felt like a mercy. But then, piece by piece, the memories began clawing their way back. His doctor called it a trauma response—fragments resurfacing at random, triggered by nothing and everything all at once.

Only they never came back gently. They came in the dead of night, harsh and sudden, a flash of something new, something he hadn’t pieced together before. And with each fragment, the picture became clearer.

He had been closer to dying than he ever let himself believe.

“What do you mean?” you whisper, eyes searching his face. Despite your own heartbreak, you’re looking at him with such compassion it nearly topples the walls he’s built. It’s that look that finally pushes him to give a bit more.

“There was something going on down there,” he whispers. “Something we couldn’t understand—still don’t understand, really. Then the whole place went up in flames. You can read about it in the papers, see how they spun the story.” His eyes squeeze shut, images flashing through his mind: the deafening explosions, the collapsing ceiling. “It was…bad, angel. So fucking bad. I just—” His breath hitches, the memory closing in, “the stuff I saw…I can’t—. sometimes it’s all I see—”

He’s on the verge of unraveling, stuck in the memory of being beaten to a pulp, thinking Robin was gone, not knowing where Dustin and Erica had disappeared to. 

It isn’t even the worst of what he’s been through, but it’s all he can manage right now. The rest stays locked away, too heavy, too unfathomable to put into words. He wishes he could give you more, lay it all out in the open, but even this small piece feels like pulling teeth.

Sharing it feels like exposing a fresh wound to the air. He’s terrified you’ll recoil. But instead, you rest your hand over his heart, fingers spread so you can feel how it thunders in his chest. He wraps you up in his arms again. 

“I’m sorry I can’t… give you more right now,” he says, voice quivering. “I’m so sorry. I—I thought I was better, y’know? I’ve been trying.” There’s a hollow laugh buried under his words, tinged with self-loathing. “I just—it’s hard. I’m working on it, you gotta believe me—I’m gonna work on it, I want—”

Your eyes glisten as you cup his face, thumbs brushing against his cheeks, silencing him immediately. It’s only then he realises tears have slipped past his defenses—he’s crying, and he didn’t even notice. 

“It’s okay,” you whisper, trying to soothe him, nodding to emphasise your words. “You’re okay.”

With tender caution, you lean up and brush your lips against his. It’s brief, but so warm. He kisses you back, just as softly, like he’s afraid you might vanish if he presses too hard.

Pulling away, he’s trembling all over, but there’s a new resolve in his eyes. The weight on his chest feels a fraction lighter. 

“I—I’ll tell you everything someday—everything,” he manages, voice husky with emotion, and he means it. Every ugly memory engraved into his mind, the ones that refused to fade—he would tell you them all. “I swear. Just…not now. I can’t. I’m sorry. I want to, but I—”

You press a gentle finger to his lips. 

This is a start, you are proud of him for this. It’s not a complete story, but it’s enough. You can work with this new information. 

“It’s alright. Really,” you say, voice thick but kind. “Thank you for telling me. I know it’s hard, but you did good, okay? You did really good.”

He’s struck by how your tone is almost parental, like soothing a wounded child. 

Strangely, it doesn’t anger him or make him feel weak—it only fills him with a sense of safety. And so he sags against you, letting your arms envelop him, letting himself be held.

“I really am sorry,” he murmurs. “About running off the other day. I don’t—” He cuts himself off with a shake of his head. “I don’t know what happened. I just…I panicked.”

“It was a shock, and I get it,” you say softly with a nod. “But next time?” You arch a brow. “Please don’t run away from someone who’s trying to help you.”

He can’t help the short laugh that escapes him. There’s something genuine in your tone that loosens the last of the knots in his stomach. 

“No, you’re right,” he admits, bending his head to meet your gaze. “I won’t.”

“Good.” Your lips twitch into a playful smile. “I’m not that scary, am I?”

“I don’t know,” he teases, leaning down, his breath ghosting over your ear. “You have your moments.”

You roll your eyes in mock offense, but before you can pull back, he slips a hand behind your head and leans in, capturing your mouth in another gentle kiss. He loves the way you smile against his lips, the tension around you both lifting like a receding tide. When he finally draws away, there’s a lingering light in your eyes.

“You’re not actually gonna leave… are you?” he asks quietly, trying—and failing—to hide the anxiety that accompanies the question.

“No. I’m not.” You shake your head, offering a smile. “Was just being dramatic.”

He exhales, relief washing over him. Good, he never would have forgiven himself if he had been the catalyst. 

“That’s supposed to be my job,” he counters wryly, and you let out a laugh of your own. 

When his gaze drifts to your scattered desk, his brow furrows. 

“Is that his order right there?” he asks, tipping his head toward the pile of boxes and papers.

With a sigh, you slip out of his embrace and walk over, eyes lingering on the partially emptied contents. 

“Yeah, he took it all out to check it right in front of me,” you explain. “I swear I gave him exactly what he wrote down, but apparently there was a miscommunication.”

He makes a sympathetic noise, stepping up behind you. 

“Want help putting it all back?” he offers, hoping the simple act of assisting you might ease some of the tension that still permeates the air.

“Please,” you say softly, and that single word settles in his chest.

This is what he can do right now—help you, make things right, one careful motion at a time.

You both settle into the couch upstairs, nestling between his legs so your back presses snugly against his chest. His arm curves around your waist, the other hand drifting gently through your hair and brushing along your shoulders in soothing patterns. 

His voice is soft, almost playful, as he rambles about his old job. It reminds you of stories he’s shared in passing, but never in such detail—like he’s finally letting you peek behind the curtain.

“You know, she actually made a whole tally,” he says suddenly, chuckling under his breath.

“A tally?” you repeat, turning slightly so you can glimpse his expression. There’s a hint of self-consciousness around his eyes, but he’s smiling.

“Yeah,” he confirms, voice warm. “Wanted to keep track of how many times I struck out with girls. Really hammered home that I was ‘off my game.’” He air-quotes the last words, rolling his eyes. The self-deprecating smirk on his face makes you giggle.

“Wow,” you breath out. “Did you manage to score a date at all that summer?”

“God, no,” he groans. The memory clearly makes him cringe. “The uniform made sure of that.” 

“Uniform?” you ask, curiosity lighting up your tone.

This is gonna be good.

“I didn’t tell you about that part?” He sighs dramatically, tapping the back of the couch with his free hand. “It was a full-on sailor getup. Hat, shorts—everything.”

“You…dressed as a sailor?” A snort escapes you, and you try to muffle the laugh behind your hand. “Please tell me you still have it.”

“Seriously? No. No I don’t. Think I’ll stick to sweaters, thank you very much.”

You twist around in his lap with a coy grin. 

“Aw, come on. Might be a good look on you.”

He shudders theatrically, pulling you closer until you’re resting against him, torso to torso. 

“Trust me, I looked ridiculous. The last thing I need is to relive that nightmare.”

You laugh and wind your arms around his shoulders. You were joking about his mishap now, that was a good sign. 

“Fine, fine,” you acquiesce. “For the record, I like the way you dress. You have good style.”

He arches an eyebrow, fingers still sweeping through the ends of your hair. 

“You think so?”

“Mhm,” you confirm, a mischievous gleam in your eyes. “Good luck ever getting your shirts back, by the way. I’ve already hidden a few in my room.”

He nods in surrender, before pausing as he recalls something that’s been playing on his mind. 

“Wait—did you take the navy one?”

“Hmm, maybe.” You tilt your head with a sly grin. 

“Unbelievable,” he mutters, though his voice is tinged with amused affection. “I was looking for that last week! Next time, at least give me a heads up.”

You feign contemplation. “I’ll think about it.”

Before he can protest, you lean in and kiss him. It’s soft at first, the way your mouths just brush and part. You can feel the subtle hitch in his breathing as he savours the closeness, smiling against your lips. 

The soft noise you make against his mouth sets his nerves alight, and he inches you closer to him by your waist—like somehow, if he just holds on a little tighter, it’ll anchor him to this moment. Your fingers tangle in his hair, a gentle pressure at his scalp, and he exhales a shaky breath into you, revelling in how you get him to respond so easily.

But then your hands slip lower, down his neck until they settle over his chest. It’s a featherlight touch, nothing that should spook him, yet he tenses anyway, that automatic flinch he hates so much. It’s barely perceptible—he’s skilled at hiding it—but you notice. 

Of course you do. 

You always do.

You pull back, just enough to search his eyes. He reads the hint of disappointment there, though you try to smooth it over with a soft smile. It makes his stomach drop, guilt surging through him. 

Why can’t he do it?

After everything.

Why can’t he just let this happen? 

Frustration burns in his ribs. Even in these moments, when his guard is down, his body still betrays him.

A sigh leaves your lips, and you shift as if you’re about to slide off his lap—ready to give him space and spare him discomfort. But he can’t let that happen, not when his heart is screaming at him for you to stay. 

He grips your hips, halting your retreat, guiding you back into place. You hesitate, blinking at him, confusion filling your features. You don’t push further, though. You just wait, letting him decide what comes next.

His eyes skim every detail of your face, taking in the way your gaze stills, the way your lips part in question. He cups your chin, and the resolution settles in his chest. 

He wants this. 

He wants you, and maybe it’s time he truly showed it—no more half-measures.

“I…” He begins, slow and steady. “I want… you,” voice low with longing.

Your lips curve slightly, if he wants to play, you have no problem humouring him. 

“You can,” you murmur softly, brushing a thumb across his cheek. “You have me.”

He swallows hard, shaking his head. You need to understand his distinction. 

“No. I mean…all of you,” he clarifies, his eyes flicking between yours. “I want all of you… against all of me.”

The confession nearly floors you.

This was big—huge. You could see it in the way he spoke, the look in his eyes, the subtlety behind his words. He was really trying, and that alone was a massive step.

You wanted to tell him not to push himself, that he could take his time. But, god, you wanted him to take this step with you. 

You were practically aching for it.

“You don’t have to,” you whisper, your words were true. “If this is because of today, I’m okay waiting. I don’t want you to rush.”

Don’t want him to do anything out of obligation. 

He exhales, some tension uncoiling in his chest. He hates how scared he is, how part of him is still so damn nervous. But he also knows he’s ready in a way he’s never been before.

“I’m ready,” he insists, voice tinged with a plea. “Please, I… I want this. Want to do this with you.”

You nod—gentle, careful not to draw attention to his vulnerability.

“Okay,” you say quietly, leaning in to press a soft kiss to his mouth. “We can do that.”

Your hands rise to frame his face, your thumbs just grazing the underside of his cheekbones. You kiss him once more, and he feels your acceptance, sweeping away the last thread of doubt. 

He feels safe here. He feels safe with you.

He breathes against your neck, each kiss lingers, heavy with new meaning.

It’s yearning, it’s hesitation—it’s everything at once. Every emotion he can name, and even the ones he can’t, thrumming through him like a live wire. He’s pressed so close—chest to chest, thigh to thigh—that it almost feels like you share the same heartbeat. 

He’s stalling, but you understand. You sense the anxious flutter in his chest, in his movements, the old wounds fueling his wariness. 

You know he needs to be the one to cross that line. 

He needs to be the one to make that final decision. 

At last, he tugs lightly at the hem of your sweatshirt, lifting his gaze to yours in silent question. 

You go first?

You respond with a small, encouraging nod, letting him see your readiness—and your patience. Gently, he helps you sit up on the bed, his hands sliding carefully along your sides, fingertips testing their welcome at every shift of fabric. 

The tenderness in his touch sends a shiver over your skin, and you watch him exhale a slow breath as though reassuring himself this is safe.

Once the garment is off, he lowers you back down with a featherlight press, settling atop of you. His palm finds yours, lacing your fingers together, a tangible tether that seems to keep him grounded. Uncertainty dances across his expression, but he keeps going, letting himself hover in that intoxicating space between caution and desire. 

They say anxiety can heighten pleasure, and right now, he’s drowning in both.

He shifts, adjusting to find a more comfortable position—not just for himself, but for you too. If this was going to be the night he laid everything bare, he needed to get everything else right. 

No distractions. No missteps.

He pushes himself up, using the hand still linked with yours, but the second a sharp yelp escapes your lips, he freezes.

Shit.

Your wrist. 

Your fucking wrist.

Instantly, he recoils, eyes going wide. 

“Fuck—I’m sorry,” he blurts out, his voice shaking with fresh guilt. “I’m—I’m so fucking sorry.”

The weight of it all crashes down on him—the intensity of the moment, the last few days, everything piling on top of him until it’s suffocating. His breath stumbles, his grip loosens, and suddenly, the bed beneath him doesn’t feel so steady anymore.

“I… I can’t do this. I—” He falters, breaking under the strain.

His voice cracks, and you can see it happening—the spiral, the shame rolling over him in waves, dragging him under. But you won’t let him disappear into it.

Not after he’s come so far.

Not after he was so close.

You cup his face in your hands, grounding him, your thumbs brushing gently over his cheeks.

“Steve,” you say firmly, your hands steady as you pull his frantic gaze to yours. “Look at me—hey, look—”

His eyes finally meet yours, wide and scared, like he’s teetering on the edge.

“I trust you,” you say, voice unwavering. “I want this. Okay?”

You soften, letting the urgency slip into something gentler, something he can hold onto.

“Please,” you add, barely above a whisper. Desperate to keep him here, to stop him from retreating into himself. To keep him from running away again.

Your words seem to slice through his panic, and he inhales shakily, forcing himself back.

He can do this.

“Yeah,” he rasps at last, nodding. “Okay. Yeah. I’m… I’m good.” His breath comes in unsteady bursts, the aftermath of an almost-panic detectable in his voice.

For a moment, he just clutches the edge of his sweater, hesitating as if every muscle in his body wants to lock up. You can practically feel the anxiety radiating off him, a pang of sympathy tightens in your chest.

He’s really doing this.

Finally letting you see what he’s kept hidden for so long.

He starts to pull the fabric up, inch by inch, and you swear you feel the tension building inside yourself, mirroring his every move.

Your heart squeezes as you watch him close his eyes, the last of his self-preservation roaring for him to stop. You know exactly how hard it is for him.

It makes you want to reach out, to still his trembling hands. Tell him how well he is doing. But you stay put, giving him the space he needs to do this on his own terms.

Once the material is off, he holds it in a death grip, knuckles bleaching white, and your stomach twists with an ache of empathy.

He’s shaking.

You want to tell him he doesn’t have to be afraid anymore. That scars or not, you’ve chosen him, over and over. But you wait, letting him find his own breath.

When he finally lets the fabric slip from his grasp, you see him glance around, as though searching desperately for a safe place—somewhere to hide the proof that he’s now so utterly exposed.

Your throat tightens, remembering every story he’s told you, every time he’s mentioned wearing hoodies in July, never taking off his shirt by the lake, being careful not to stretch too high in public lest someone catch a glimpse.

How many years has he carried that weight?

He’s kneeling there, half-naked, and the rawness in his eyes makes your heart pound. He looks at you then—uncertain, vulnerable, like he expects you to recoil.

But you don’t. You can’t.

You want him to know that in your eyes, he has never been anything less than beautiful. His scars are part of his story, and you want to learn every chapter if he’ll let you. The corners of your mouth curve into a gentle smile, and you lift one hand, offering it wordlessly. He swallows, then edges closer.

You didn't flinch, after all.

He’s shocked to find himself questioning if he overreacted. From your lack of response, this really was nothing.

The thought is an unsettling, creeping realisation. It’s painful to admit that the words he’s been told so many times might actually be true. That he is—truly—his own worst enemy. 

Maybe, it really was all in his head.

What he feels is grief. He doesn’t know what to do with it, doesn’t know how to hold the weight of the unexpected emotion. He is grieving every lost opportunity, feeling dejected as he is the reason he was held back.

You beckon him closer with a simple lift of your hand. It’s a small gesture, but it speaks volumes.

Come here. He’s not alone in this. 

There’s a shake in his limbs as he crawls over you, and when your hands come up to rest on his shoulders, he exhales, trying to slow the roar of blood in his ears.

“Do they still hurt?” you ask first. Your fingers ghost along one of the longer scars snaking up his side, and he sucks in a breath.

“No,” he manages. His throat feels tight, so he tries a reassuring smile. “They don’t hurt anymore.” 

Not physically, at least. But the reminder of how he got them has always stung somewhere.

Your gaze fills with understanding. 

“Can…can I touch them?”

Can I touch you?

He stiffens, pulse kicking into overdrive. 

“Yeah,” he whispers. “Of course you can.”

Even if he can’t understand why you'd want to.

You surprise him by sliding a hand to his rib cage, fingertips light but deliberate. The sensation makes him tense, then relax. It tickles into a new feeling, one he has yet to feel in an age.

Freedom. 

Like some invisible chain has snapped, letting him feel your touch for what it is.

A sigh escapes him when you guide him down for another kiss, deeper this time, your free hand sneaking up to tangle in his hair. 

There’s an exhilarating rush as he senses just how badly you still want him—how your hips roll against his, hands clinging to his arms, his torso, fingers curling into his marked skin. 

You want this. You still want him. Nothing has changed.

It spreads through him, heating his entire form. You’re pulling him closer, practically begging for more.

It’s euphoric, familiar in a way that sparks memories of his younger self—before the world took a piece out of him. He’d felt invincible back then.  And now, as you arch against him, nails grazing lightly along his spine, it’s like a piece of that bold, fearless boy flickers back to life.

Your pyjama bottoms slip off with his help, soft cotton pooling by the bed. He lingers for a second, mesmerised by the sight of you in nothing but your underwear. 

He’s lucky. So fucking lucky.

A wave of gratitude swells, a fierce need to show you how seen and cherished you are in return.

His mouth travels over your stomach, up your ribs, scattering kisses like he’s leaving a trail of silent thank-yous. He finally shifts higher, he brushes his lips against your chest—hesitant at first, like he’s testing if it’s okay.

Then he grows bolder, his tongue and teeth teasing against sensitive skin, testing, exploring—soaking in every breathy sound you give him like a delicious reward. He pulls back just enough to glance at you, hair falling into his eyes. 

“So pretty,” he murmurs, voice catching in his throat. His fingers find the clasp of your bra, and when he slips it free, he dips his head to kiss and taste at the newly exposed skin. There’s something liberating about the way you curl into him, spurring him on with each gasp. 

“You’re… you’re so fucking stunning,” he breathes, His eyes flick up—just to watch. To take you all in.

“So are you.” You manage to speak, through the dizzying sensation of his mouth.

He huffs a laugh, he doesn't believe that for a second. 

“You don’t have to lie to me, sweetheart.”

You already had him. 

“Not lying,” you say, the sincerity in your flushed face makes his throat constrict.

It wasn’t a lie—he was gorgeous. 

Unfairly so. 

His hair, wild from your hands, framed his face in soft, unruly waves. His lips, plush and kiss-bitten, parted just slightly as he caught his breath. The sharp cut of his brow bone cast the faintest shadows over his dark, wide eyes, pupils blown with pure lust.

The marks on his body were plentiful, scattered like constellations across his skin—but so was his beauty. The slope of his collarbone, the freckle just above his stomach, the way his chest rose and fell in unsteady rhythm. 

“You’re beautiful, Steve Harrington,” you insist, every syllable dripping with conviction.

It sounds so alien to hear the word beautiful tied to his name, but the affection shining in your expression doesn’t waver. A sudden prickle of tears flutters at the corners of his eyes. 

You really meant it.

After you'd seen everything.

“Shit,” he mutters, voice thick, embarrassed at how easily you can unravel him. “I’m supposed to be making you feel good, not getting emotional.”

“You want me to stop?” You smile, leaning up to nip at his jawline. 

“Never,” he whispers, shaking his head, pressing his forehead to yours. 

He never wants you to stop wanting him. 

Your underwear joins the pile on the floor, and then he moves to rid himself of his own jeans. He pauses at the button, a sliver of lingering uncertainty present.

He sees the look on your face—entirely filled with desire—it’s enough to banish the last thread of doubt. He shucks them off, letting them fall, then tugs down whatever’s left until he’s utterly bare before you.

He returns above you, his chest hovering over yours. He kisses along your throat, lips trailing heat as he cups your jaw. His fingers slip lower, skimming across your collarbone, down the curve of your waist, until they reach the soft skin at your inner thigh.

“God, sweetheart…” he murmurs, sinking his teeth gently into the spot where your shoulder meets your neck. “All this for me?” 

Just at the sight of him?

He slides his hand further between your legs, groaning when he feels how soaked you are against his fingertips. 

“Haven’t even touched you properly yet,” he adds, voice rough, thumb circling lazily in a way that draws a quiver out of you.

“Steve,” you plead, your legs fall open wider, begging for more contact.  

It’s all he needs to hear.

“More?” He lowers his mouth to your collarbone, pressing a hot kiss there that makes you shiver. “You want more, baby? I’ll give you anything—just say it.”

“Want you inside me,” you manage, voice catching as your nails scrape lightly across his shoulders. “Please… been wanting for so long.”

Too long.

The words rip a ragged sound from his throat, a groan that vibrates against your skin. His mind swims with the idea of being inside you, everything else fading into white noise, but he resists—barely. 

He’s torn, wanting to give you exactly what you’re begging for, yet desperate to watch you fall apart on his fingers first. His free hand frames your jaw as he pulls back just enough to see your expression.

After everything, he needs you to feel nothing but pleasure tonight.

No pain, no doubt, just this.

Just him.

“I can take it,” you plead, arching your back and pressing your core more firmly into his hand. “Please.”

“I know you can,” he brushes his lips over your cheek, peppering kisses across your face. “I know,” he soothes, stroking deeper, harder, careful but utterly entranced by your every reaction. “Just a little longer, baby. You’re getting there—I can feel it.”

He’s single-minded, pouring everything into his movements—no teasing, no hesitation—just a relentless focus on pulling you apart, on making you soak his hand.

Every whine tells him he’s doing it right. Every breathless whimper is his reward.

Your breath hitches, and your eyes flutter shut as you feel yourself coming close to the edge. He’s watching you intently, drinking in every flicker of bliss on your face. 

It’s enough to unravel whatever composure he has left, but he’s determined to see you through this first. His thumb finds a sweet, sensitive spot inside, coaxing a sudden cry from your lips.

“Let me have it,” he begs as you clench around his fingers. “Then you can have me, alright? I promise. Gonna take such good care of you, angel.”

That final push does it. Your body seizes up, shuddering around his fingers as your climax hits. A breathless moan tears out of your throat, your face tipped back against the pillow. He murmurs your name, transfixed at how you writhe beneath him. 

You cling to his wrist as the waves roll through you, and he eases you through it, pressing reverent kisses to your shoulder, your neck, anywhere he can reach.

He’s never seen anything so beautiful. It’s etched into his mind, this image of you, lips parted in bliss, your chest heaving with each ragged breath.

He barely has time to talk before you tug him into a fierce, urgent kiss, your lips parting under his as the aftershocks of your orgasm still tremble through you. He can feel it in the way your thighs quiver around him and the way you cling to his shoulders, desperately pulling him closer. 

You need him as badly as he needs you.

“Ready now,” you urgently murmured against his mouth. “Need you—now—please.”

It’s almost painful at this point, having him so close. 

“Okay,” he manages, voice husky. His hands slide to your hips, palms nearly trembling from how hard his heart is pounding. “Alright, sweetheart. You have me. Gonna give you what you want, yeah? Waited so long. Been so good for me—” 

You have. In more ways than one, offering him patience and reassurance even when he hardly deserved it. Your fingers curl into his hair, tugging gently, and you say two words that make his stomach twist. 

“Top drawer.”

He fumbles to reach over, pulling it open to find the box of condoms. He tears one packet open with shaking fingers, rolling it on before positioning himself over you again.

A groan spills from his chest as he drags the tip of his cock through your slick, letting himself feel just how soaked you are. His hips jerk involuntarily at the warm, wet pressure, a low rumble building in his throat. 

His past doesn’t exist in this moment—there’s only you, wrapping your legs tight around his waist, urging him closer. The sensation of your ankles locking behind his back sends a jolt of pure desire down his back.

His eyes flick up to yours as he presses in—slow, savouring every fraction of an inch. A tightness gathers at the base of his spine when he feels the snug heat of your pussy welcoming him. You draw a sharp breath, a little gasp that sets him on fire. 

He breathes hard, eyes squeezed shut as he basks in the electric bliss of being fully sheathed inside your walls. Every nerve in his body screams to move—to claim every inch of you and lose himself in the friction—but he holds himself still, chest heaving.

“Need you—” you whisper, voice hoarse. “Need you to move.”

He cups your face with one trembling hand, locking his gaze onto yours, the other hand planted by your head. 

“I will,” he assures you, voice wavering on the edge of control. “I will, I promise—shit, just—gimme a moment, yeah?”

You can feel it—the way he is barely holding on, the way his breath stutters against your skin. This is a lot for him.. 

He just needs a second to process it, to believe it.

Your grip slides up to cradle his head, guiding him to rest against your shoulder. 

“As long as you want,” you promise quietly, but you don't know how much longer you can take. His heart clenches at just how needy you sound for him.

He presses his forehead into your neck, inhaling the lingering scent of your shampoo and skin, before finally drawing back. The sensation of leaving your warm pussy and pressing back in again is everything he’s fantasised about—slow and unhurried, a deliberate, dragging friction that sends sparks dancing across his vision. A guttural moan tears from his throat at how good it feels, how perfectly you fit around him. 

Christ, this was so much more than he ever imagined.

The moment he starts moving again—slowly at first, then steadily building rhythm—it’s like he finally surrenders to everything he’s been holding back.

“Ah—shit,” he exhales, voice thick with need. His eyes flutter shut for a moment, and he grips your hips more firmly. “Feels so good—you—you feel so good.”

Your fingers weave through his hair, nails scraping lightly against his scalp. The action sends sparks skittering down his spine, and he can’t help the low, desperate moan that escapes him. 

He already knows he’s gone, lost in the pleasure, but hearing you—the way you gasp and whimper whenever he thrusts just a bit deeper—only pushes him further.

“Steve,” you murmur, voice trembling with need. You tug at his hair, urging him closer, and he leans over you, chest pressed to yours. The heat of your skin against his feels like the most intoxicating thing in the world.

“Keep doing that,” he pleads. “Just—just like that—” He punctuates the words with a hungry kiss to your throat, then angles his hips in a way that makes you cry out. “So perfect for me. So fucking perfect.”

He’s never felt this drunk on pleasure before—like every stroke, every shift of his body inside yours, is rewiring his brain. It’s all he can do not to lose himself immediately, but he needs to last, needs to give you everything you’ve waited for.

His mouth begins running in a constant string of half-choked praise and filth, fueled by the steady drive of his hips.

“You… oh, baby—look at you,” he gasps, forcing his eyes open to watch your face contort with bliss. “Wanted to see you like this, wanted it so bad. God, you’re—”

A fucking dream.

You whimper again, arching beneath him as he thrusts deeper. Your nails dig into his back, leaving faint crescents that he’ll cherish like badges of honour. 

Maybe if he fucks you good enough, you could leave your own marks, ones that he can look at with pride. 

The sting of pain only sharpens the pleasure as he drops his forehead to yours, breath ragged. 

“You feel—” he mumbles, voice disbelieving, like the words are just flowing out of him. at this point. “Like you were made for me—fuck, can feel you squeezing me—”

His hips stutter, then snap harder, like he’s trying to memorise this, make up for lost time.

“Jesus—so fucking stupid,” he groans, breathless. “Why did it take me this long? Why did I—when you—”

Your moan splinters into a soft sob of ecstasy, and that sound just unravels him further. His confidence surges, stoked by your every reaction. He slides one hand up from your waist to cradle the back of your head, gently tugging so he can devour your mouth. His kiss is open-mouthed, messy, all tongue and desperation.

“You like that?” he asks, voice laced with a giddy awe, as if he can hardly believe he’s the one pulling those sounds from you. “Tell me—tell me how good it feels.” His words spill out before he can check them, he needs to hear if you are as gone as he is.

“Feels… so good,” you manage, broken and breathless. “You’re so—God, Steve—deep.”

He laughs—he fucking laughs. 

Pure, unfiltered bliss bubbles up from his chest, raw and unrestrained.

This moment, you—it’s all he’s ever wanted. 

It’s fucking everything.

“Shit—you’re gonna kill me,” he mutters, burying his face in the crook of your neck. He nips at your skin, pressing kiss after kiss along your throat. 

Now that he’s had a taste of what he’s been missing, he never wants to let it go. Never wants this moment to end.

Your legs tighten around his waist, urging him deeper. There’s no space between you now, just the heated glide of your bodies. Each time he withdraws, he can feel the trembling in your limbs as you cling to him, pulling him right back in. And each time he plunges forward, a fresh surge of desire knots low in his belly.

He changes angle, dipping one shoulder slightly. The new position has him hitting a spot that makes you cry out his name, and he’s undone by it—his pace falters for a moment, overwhelmed by the sudden wave of ecstasy washing through him.

“Christ,” he mutters under his breath, the word breaking apart as he punctuates it with a sharp thrust. His voice is wrecked now, spilling over with pure need as he rambles, barely thinking, just feeling. “All for me, yeah? Fuck—show me. Let me hear you.”

His grip tightens, his movements growing rougher, deeper—chasing your pleasure like it’s the only thing that matters. Like he’ll only believe this is real if he earns it from you, if he can wring it from your body, pull it from your lips.

“Please—don’t stop,” you whimper, needing to take all of him.

His breath stutters, jaw clenched, losing himself in the way you beg for him.

“Not gonna,” His voice is wrecked, thick with heat, his control fraying at the edges. “I’ll give it to you, baby—��

He’d give you everything. 

You nod frantically, hands sliding up to cup his face. Tears of pure bliss gather at the corners of your eyes, and he brushes them away with his thumb. He catches your lips in a sloppy, desperate kiss, tongue dipping into your mouth just as he drives his hips forward again in a relentless rhythm.

He watches your face, the way you bite your lip, your brows knitting as the pleasure builds again. His head spins because he’s the one doing this, bringing you right to the edge. Pride floods him, spurring him to keep going harder, deeper, until his thighs burn.

“Fuck, angel—gonna give you this whenever you want,” he can hardly believe the ragged edge to his own voice, how he’s speaking without filter, entirely guided by the euphoria coursing through him.

“Been so good for me—so fucking patient—” his words break apart with a shuddering gasp. “Not gonna make you wait ever again. You want this? You ask, alright? You fucking ask and it’s yours.”

You chase his mouth with yours, swallowing his words, your hands gripping the nape of his neck. He can’t tell whose breath is louder, whose heartbeat is pounding more fiercely. All he knows is that he’s dangerously close to the point of no return.

“That's it,” he coos, voice unsteady. “Let me see it again—you gonna show me?”

Your only reply is a shattered moan, your body tensing, then unraveling all at once as the pleasure crashes over you. Your walls clench tight around him, dragging a wrecked, guttural groan from his throat.

He thrusts again, pushing you both right to the edge and over, his name spilling from your lips like a prayer. Heat coils tight, then snaps, a white-hot pulse of pleasure ripping through you, leaving you trembling beneath him.

Steve sees stars, fucking galaxies behind his eyelids as he loses himself completely. His hips stutter, his breath breaking against your skin as he buries himself deep, chasing the last aftershocks of your orgasm. He kisses you blindly, desperately, a hot, messy press of lips, as pleasure overtakes him—dragging him under, drowning him in you.

He lingers in the warm aftermath, breath coming in shallow pulses as he slowly, almost reluctantly, pulls away. His stomach lurches unexpectedly, and here’s a moment where he worries the spell might break now that he’s not entwined with you. But the blissed out smile on your face is a balm, telling him everything he needs to know.

He slips out carefully, skin still slick with sweat, and settles beside you on the bed. The rush of air against his torso feels strange—he can’t remember the last time he let himself be this naked in front of anyone. He mostly feels…peaceful.

He turns to you, propping himself up on an elbow. 

“Hey, you with me?” He murmurs, voice a bit hoarse. “Was that…okay? I mean—I tried—” He trails off, cheeks flushing as if he’s embarrassed to be asking.

“Are you really asking me if that was okay?” You tilt your head, amused by his bashfulness.

“I just—” This is so lame, like a kid asking if he did a good job. “It’s been a while for me...” he admits, face reddening. “Wanted to make sure I did everything right.”

A soft laugh escapes your lips, and you reach out to trace a line down his arm. 

“You did more than okay." You punctuate the word by pressing a light kiss to his jaw, feeling him exhale. "You were perfect.”

“Good,” he whispers, eyes fluttering shut. He presses his forehead to yours for a moment, savouring the closeness. “I—I wanted to make you feel good.”

Wanted to prove that he could. 

“Trust me, you did,” you say as you cup his cheek. “I’m probably gonna be thinking about this all day tomorrow.”

“Yeah?” His lips curl into a tentative smile. 

“Absolutely. And the next week, too.”

A boyish grin spreads over his face, some tension easing from his shoulders. He eases off the bed, carefully removing the condom and tying it off, a bit awkward as he stands there stark naked. He holds it, looking around for somewhere to toss it before deciding on the small trash bin near your dresser. 

Once it’s gone, he seems uncertain, his gaze shifting from his discarded clothes to you. He swallows, arms hovering at his sides.

“Um…” He gives a nervous laugh, cheeks stained pink again, unsure of what to do with himself. “I—sorry, I didn’t think this far ahead. Do I just…?”

God, he’s out of practise.

The corner of your mouth quirks up. 

“Here,” you say, rolling onto your side and reaching for the closest thing at hand—his boxer briefs. You toss them to him. “Start with these.”

He catches them with a shy nod, pulling them on quickly. He’s still conscious of his body, but for the first time, he doesn’t feel the urgent need to cover them immediately. When he glances back at you, you’re holding his jumper out, an inviting smile on your face.

“Thanks,” he murmurs, stepping closer to the bed. But then he hesitates. “Actually… um… I—I’m good.”

He’d rather not put it back on if he didn’t have to—this was a workout in itself, both mental and physical. And honestly? He liked the way you were looking at him.

Your gaze lingered, hungry but soft, the way girls used to look at him when he was younger. You liked what you saw. 

“You sure?” you tease, wiggling the material in your hand.

“Yeah,” he says simply. It’s a big thing for him to admit that he’s comfortable remaining bare-chested around you.

“In that case…” You slip the shirt on yourself, pulling it down over your body. It’s long enough to graze the bottom of your hips, and you can feel his eyes lingering on your legs. His warm gaze makes heat flood your cheeks.

“Looks better on you, anyway.” He laughs softly, that sweet, affectionate sound that never fails to tug at your heart. 

Crawling back onto the mattress, you pat the spot beside you, and he settles in, letting you snuggle up close against his side. Your hand drifts lightly over his chest, gliding over both smooth skin and the raised ridges. To you, there was no difference.

The two of you just lie there in comfortable silence for a moment, the only sound present being the soft rustle of sheets. Eventually, you decide to break the hush. 

“So…” you start, voice soft but teasing, a playful glint in your tired eyes. “You’re saying I can have you whenever I want now?”

He huffs out a laugh, shaking his head as he nudges his nose against yours. 

“Within reason, sweetheart,” he smirks, but there’s nothing but warmth behind it.“But yeah,” he murmurs, tracing slow, lazy circles against your skin. “Whenever you want.”

You lift your hand, brushing your fingers over one of his scars, tracing the mark with a gentle touch. He sucks in a breath, but his eyes stay on you.

“Thank you,” you murmur, letting your fingers linger. “I know this wasn’t easy.”

He huffs out a small, self-deprecating laugh, shaking his head. 

“You say that like it’s—I don’t know—like, it’s something groundbreaking.”

“Isn’t it?” You arch a brow. 

He hesitates, then exhales, running a hand through his already-messy hair. 

“I mean… it felt big,” he admits, voice lighter now, like he’s letting himself tease with you instead of retreating inward. “But, y’know… it’s just a shirt, at the end of the day.”

“Just a shirt?”

After everything, his casual dismissal shocks you—but you see it for what it is. 

Progress.

He’s crossed this bridge, left the fear behind. He’s looking forward. This is another obstacle he’s overcome, another weight lifted, he’s not letting it drag him back down.

He smirks, catching your thought process, and shifts beside you. 

“Okay, maybe a little more than that.” Then, he sighs, running a hand through his hair. “Only one other person’s seen me without a shirt in—damn—must be years now.”

That catches your attention. 

“Years?” You blink at him. 

“Yeah. And that was—” He winces slightly. “Well, I was in bad shape at the time, so not exactly a choice.”

Your heart tugs, but you don’t let the moment get too heavy. 

“So what you’re saying is you chose me?”

He groans, dropping his head against the pillow, but he’s smiling now, genuinely. 

“Jesus, you love making me say shit out loud, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” you laugh, nudging him with your knee. “I do.”

He turns to face you more directly, his arm slipping beneath your neck, pulling you in close. 

“Well,” he murmurs, pressing a slow, lingering kiss to your temple. “If I was gonna do this with anyone… I’d want it to be you.” His fingers trace absentmindedly along your spine. "Feels right with you."

Another short silence blossoms, but this time it’s a cosy, intimate one. Eventually, he clears his throat. 

“So…maybe we should think about getting cleaned up?” He rubs at the back of his neck, a hint of bashfulness returning. “I’m kinda sweaty, sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” you respond, pressing a playful kiss to his arm. “You’re not the only one who’s all sticky. A shower sounds nice.”

He shifts, carefully easing off the bed. 

“You wanna come with?” There’s a boyish hope in his voice that makes you grin.

You stretch lazily, savouring the soft slide of his jumper against your skin, your eyes raking over him appreciatively.

“Mm, you go first,” you say, giving him a teasing smirk. “I might need a minute to recover from all that.”

He chuckles, a pink flush creeping up his neck. 

“Right… okay.” He stands up a bit straighter, seemingly buoyed by your banter. “Promise not to use up all the hot water.”

“Good luck,” you joke, arching a brow.

“I’ll try,” he fires back, a spark of mischief in his eyes. Then he leans down, planting a warm kiss on your lips. When he draws back, you catch a glimpse of that smile again. Pure elation.

A gentle hiss of water filters through the door. You can’t help but smile, thinking of how different things feel compared to this morning—so much tenderness in the air, so much more understanding.

Yet a nagging itch persists at the back of your mind.

You walk over to your chest of drawers, hand hovering for a second before pulling open the top. There, tucked under a few random receipts and spare pens, is the little notebook you began after he left you that morning. 

You retrieve it carefully, flipping the worn cover open to the page where you’d scrawled names and details he’d let slip in passing. Fragmented hints you’d gathered as though building a puzzle from mismatched pieces.

Now, after the night you’ve just shared, you have new pages of context to fill in. You let the pen hover above the paper, then jot down the fresh details. Every shaky mention, every half-finished explanation. 

You trust Steve—God, you do. But your anxiety over that horrifying scene a few nights ago weighs heavily on you. 

Never again.

Never want to see him that petrified or feel that helpless.

You pause to reread what you’ve written. A swirl of scribbles, question marks, underlined phrases. 

Starcourt, destroyed in a fire? 

1985.

Summer job.

Got too close.… nearly didn’t make it out?? 

The pen taps lightly on the page as you consider how these clues might fit together.

Your heart twists with guilt. You are unsure if this is a betrayal.

But then you recall the sheer terror in his eyes, the bruises on your own wrist, the way your chest had constricted with helplessness when he ran.

You need answers—not because you doubt him, but because you want to be prepared to care for him better, to protect him if you can.

You push the notebook back beneath the clutter, hiding it away. You straighten your posture, letting a slow exhale chase the tension from your lungs. Reaching for the stray clothes on the side of the bed, you toss them into the hamper. 

You do care about him—deeply. That care drives you now. 

No more blind-siding nightmares.

No more dark corners you’re unprepared for. 

Whatever he’s running from, whatever secrets linger, you’re determined to understand. Because ignorance, you’ve learned, doesn’t save anyone.

And you just hoped this was the safer option.

taglist: @daisy-is-a-writer @chiliwhore @kvroomi @just-lilita @negomi123 @catluver02 @tinythebunni @everythinghasafacee @irrelevantbutembarrassing @almostfullstarfish

[stevesherdaddynowlover]

indifferent [s.h.] 18+

an: heyyyy me again so yeah could not stop thinking about a pathetic steve so here we are!! enjoy and feel free to send suggestions, concepts, or just chat!!

side note i listened to i wanna be yours by arctic monkeys on a loop while writing this so do with thag what you will!

masterlist here!!

summary: you and steve are coworkers and while you try (and fail) to act like he doesn’t exist, he’s a little obsessed with you and would do anything to have your attention

(fem!reader x steve harrington)

warnings: angst, fluff, cursing, public teasing (nothing too crazy), jealous reader, dirty talk, f masturbation, fingering, biting, kissing, spit, handjob MDNI!!!!!

wc: 15.5k

When it came to Steve Harrington, you were indifferent. 

You didn’t fall in with the group of girls who fawned over him like some king, worshiping the ground he walked on and giggling at his attempts at jokes. But you didn’t fall in with the other group either. The ones that hated him, that called him names and rolled their eyes when he walked in the room with a smile on his face. 

So you fell somewhere in the middle. To you Steve Harrington was your coworker, someone you often had to pick up the slack for or cover for when he was running late. You wouldn’t call him a friend but wouldn’t say he was your enemy either. 

The arrangement the two of you had worked well for you. You’d cover for him or save his ass when needed, and in turn he’d leave you alone. Well sometimes he would. You didn’t mind him but sometimes it seemed like he could go on forever and you just…it drove you a little crazy, okay? He was good about leaving you be, making small talk for a little before the both of you quieted down and went about your shift. 

Part of this arrangement was you teasing him until his cheeks burned and his felt fuzzy, but that was neither here nor there. 

But sometimes you think he just couldn’t help it. He’d start going on about something and then it would be 45 minutes later and he’d still be going. You let him do this about once or twice a week. You didn’t mind him or his company, so if it made him happy to ramble on every once in a while you could live with that. He was a yapper and you were quiet. You would hum along to something you’d heard on the way to work and entertain his chit chat for a few minutes but that was really it. 

Did that mean you couldn’t appreciate that he was actually really pretty? Of course not! He had dimples that made him seem boyish and sweet, even when he was being a menace. His hair was perfect, especially after he’d spent the day running his hands through it a million and one times. His lips were pouty and pink and so what if you stared at them when he was droning on about something? A perfect nose that you’d admired the slope of more times than you could count when he was sitting beside you going through returns. 

He was pretty. You wouldn’t deny that. But that was it. No more, no less. It didn’t mean you liked him or wanted him or would fall to your knees for him like half of Hawkins did. Sure, you passed the time at work by teasing him and making him squirm, but it was only because you were bored and he was there, all pretty and willing. 

You were indifferent. 

              ****************************************

Steve liked you. 

If you were in the same room as him he couldn’t help but to watch you. He didn’t know if you saw him and he couldn’t bring himself to care. He’d watch the way you’d tuck your hair behind your ear once every few minutes. He’d watch you scrunch your nose when you were reading and pout your rosy lips when sorting through dvd’s. God you were just so pretty. 

He wanted your attention all the time, he craved it. He knew he looked like a little lovesick puppy the way he followed you around and hoped you’d smile at him or indulge his ramblings every now and then. 

Pathetic. That’s what he was when it came to you. Sometimes you were a little mean to him but he liked it, loved anything you’d give him. He would even show up late on purpose sometimes just to hear you scold him! 

“M’not always gonna be here to cover for you, Harrington. Be a big boy and get to work on time.”

His cheeks would be pink and he’d give you a shy smile, promising this was the last time but you both knew better than to believe that. You didn’t put up with his bullshit, you called him out when he needed it and you didn’t try and act like somebody you weren’t around him. He loved it. 

Like today, you’d barely come in the door before he was on your heels, going on about some party from the weekend before and how it was sooo lame and that he didn’t have any fun. He’s so occupied with his rambling he doesn’t realize you’ve stopped until he slams into your back, hands coming up to grip your shoulders so you don’t both fall over. 

Your hands grip the counter just in time and he expects you to turn around and gripe at him, scolding him like a toddler who’d been on your heels but you don’t. You huff a laugh and playfully shove at his shoulder, shaking your head. 

“Jesus, Harrington. Maybe I need to get you a leash, hm?” 

And maybe Steve likes that a little too much because he can feel the tips of his ears burning and blush working its way up his neck and covering his cheeks in a pink that makes him squirm. 

He watched you quirk an eyebrow at him, a knowing smirk on those lips he’s dreamed about for months and he wonders why he’s not more embarrassed, why his heart is racing and his cock is swelling in his pants. Fuck.

“On second thought, I think maybe you’d like that a little too much.” 

              *************************************

One thing you love about working with Steve is teasing him. You’ve done good to not let him get too close to you, staying neutral when it comes to his antics but you can’t help the giddiness you feel watching him blush and squirm when you’re mean to him. You’ve come to learn he likes when you embarrass him. 

You’re embarrassed to admit it makes you feel a little powerful, a little special when you make him this way. He’s not the big, bad, ‘King Steve’ he was in high school when he’s in front of you, oh no. You think he’s quite pathetic the way he’s practically attached to your hip and you relish in the way he hangs onto every word you give him, especially considering you don’t give him much. 

Like today you’re perched on a stool at the cash register, barely working oscillating fan doing little to cool you down when the ac is shitty, pushing around warm air that makes your thighs stick together and leaves a sheen of sweat on your forehead. You hate the heat, but what you don’t hate is the way Steve’s eyes are glued to your thighs, watching closely every time you readjust or a bead of sweat slides down your leg. 

“Careful, Steve, I won't be happy if you drool on my leg.” That snaps him out of it, shoulders thrown back as he whips his head up to your face and oh yep! There’s those red cheeks you’ve come to like so much. 

He opens his mouth to say something, probably nothing that would make sense but you spare him from trying to explain his wandering eyes, reaching down into your bag to pull out your next bit of entertainment for the day. 

This’ll be good.

Out of the corner of your eye you see him watching you closely and you can’t help the smirk you wear when your fingers find what you were looking for, wrapping around it and pulling it out for Steve to see. You don’t miss the way his lips part or the way he grips the counter in front of you. 

“They’re my favorite,” you wave the cherry blow pop in front of you like you’ve found gold, smirking at the way his eyes follow it through the air, “I only have the one but I can share, I guess.” 

It would be rude of you to not offer him any. You might tease and be mean, but you certainly weren’t rude!

Ripping the wrapper off you waste no time, sticking the sweet treat in your cheek, throwing away the trash and swinging your legs around so you’re face to face with Steve, knees pressed against his as your feet dangle off the stool. 

Maybe you could blame the way you make a show out of it on the lack of customers today. You’ve been here for 4 hours and only a handful of people have come in. Yeah, that’ll do. That’s why you pull it from your mouth with a pop that makes him flinch, lolling your tongue around the candy in a way that makes his eyes glaze over. You can hear him gulp when you hollow your cheeks and close your eyes, pretending like the taste of artificial cherry is what’s making your ears buzz and your heart race. 

Dragging the blow pop from your mouth you gasp, letting your tongue swipe against your bottom lip that you’re sure is shiny with spit. “Oh, where are my manners! Here ya go, Harrington, have a lick.” 

Not giving him a second to react, you surge forward, pushing the sucker against his lips before he has the chance to open, smearing the stickiness and your spit around his mouth and smiling wide at the sight of him, a tint of red around his pouty lips that suits him well. 

“Messy boy, aren’t you?” You swipe your thumb over his lips, collecting some of the mess and you can see the way his tongue peaks out and you know he’s dying to let it touch your thumb. You pull back before he can, popping your thumb in your mouth and humming around it as if it’s the blow pop itself. 

“Told you I could share!” 

You could be indifferent to him and still want to make him melt to his knees for you, right? 

             **************************************

Steve thought about the cherry blow pop incident for weeks. He was surprised he didn’t cum in his pants like a teenager when the spit soaked treat touched his lips or when he watched you suck on your thumb after it swiped across his mouth. 

That was just one example of how you tortured him, how he loved it. He’d had to go home that night and barely made it through the front door before he was pulling his cock out and picturing you on your knees in front of him, teasing him for being a “messy boy.” 

You had no idea. 

This shit would happen, these events that Steve was positive were chemically altering his brain chemistry, and he wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you? You’d do something like that, something so hot it was engraved in his mind forever and then five minutes later it would be as though it never happened. You’d smirk at him, go back to what you were doing and spend the rest of the day ignoring him or giving him one word responses while he begged at your feet for a scrap of attention. 

He really was like a puppy. 

So he was confused, beyond confused on if you were friends, if you wanted him…he just didn’t know what to make of it. He hadn’t seen you act this way with anyone else and it made him feel…special. God he was pathetic. 

The problem with all this was that he wasn’t entirely sure you didn’t hate his guts. I mean yeah, you’d tease and scold him when he was being an idiot and you were mean but never cruel or malicious. But you also never really went out of your way to start a conversation, never really cared to keep one up with him either. You rarely smiled at him, which killed him, because he saw the way you’d laugh at something Robin said or the amusement dancing in your eyes when the kids came in to raise hell. You never let him have it though, and fuck he wishes you would. All he got were teasing smirks and he wasn’t complaining about them, not one bit, but he wanted to see if he could make you all sweet and mushy like everyone else did. 

There’s been a few times he’s caught you staring but you never back down, never look embarrassed to have been watching him and he wonders if you were staring so hard to put a curse on his bloodline or something! He wouldn’t mind if you were, the feel of your eyes on him somewhat satiate the craving he has for you. 

He’s thinking about you again, just like always. In fact he’s so deep in thought, leaned forward letting his chin rest in his palm that for once he doesn’t notice you come up behind him. 

He wishes he would have noticed you because then maybe he could have prepared himself to talk you and then maybe he wouldn’t have fucked everything up the way he did. Maybe it would’ve gone differently and ended without you in tears and him feeling the world's biggest douche bag. 

“Dreamin’ about me, Harrington?” 

“Aren’t I always.” He meant for it to come out teasing—but it didn’t. Now you were staring at him and he was staring out the window, the tips of his ears burning and he wished he could swallow his own tongue. 

“Anyways, any chance you’ll cover my shift this Friday?” 

“Why? Where are you going?” Full on pouting now he finally met your gaze. You never missed a shift, in fact you were the only one that anyone could count on to pick up extra shifts. 

“Who are you, my daddy?” 

His fingers twitched on the counter in front of him and neither of you missed the way his throat bobbed. Jesus Christ you made him crazy. “If you must know, I have a date and Friday is the only day that works.” 

Wait—what? You had a date? With someone who was not him. Based on the way his heart dropped to his ass, he realized he might want far more than just your attention. His throat clogged as he looked at you, waiting as patiently as possible for his answer but fuck a date? You’d never gone on one as long as he’d known you—well that he knew of. 

“But…you don’t go on dates.” 

“And what the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

Oh he was fucked now. He’d opened his big mouth and pissed you off—not in the way he’d liked either. “Well I just, I just meant I’ve never seen anyone ask yo—I didn’t think anyone…or you…I’ve never seen you go on one so I just figured you didn’t.” His foot could not get any further down his throat. He was fucking this up royally, but he was flustered! The pretty girl he liked was going out with someone, god knows who, and his feelings were a little hurt, even if he didn’t have the right! 

“Forget it.” Any amusement you’d held towards him vanished, something else passed over you that he recognized as hurt and then anger. Lots of anger. 

“Wait! M’sorry, I didn’t mean it like tha—”

“No you wait, Harrington. I don’t care what you think or what you think you know, it’s none of your business. I didn’t ask for you to question whether it was possible someone could like me enough to take me out, I asked if you’d cover my shift. Which—by the way—is not a big ask considering I cover your ass at least two times a week! But forget it, asshole, I’m sure my date was a fluke anyways, right?” 

Before he could apologize or even blink you’d stormed away, slamming the break room door behind you. Shit he was an idiot! A huge, massive, blubbering idiot who’d made you more mad than he’d ever seen. His words got all jumbled around you anyways let alone when he was jealous over someone else getting to take you out. 

He’d fucked up big time and was just sure you were cursing his bloodline now. 

                 *********************************

Big, angry tears rolled down your cheeks in the employee bathroom you’d locked yourself in for the last twenty minutes. You were pissed, livid even, but more than that you were hurt. Which was only making you more mad, because why the hell did Steve Harrington have the power to hurt your feelings! He wasn’t anyone to you but a coworker, maybe an acquaintance, and yet here you were crying in the bathroom at work because he…what? Didn’t think you were pretty enough or cool enough or—whatever he fuckin’ thought—to date? 

Okay, sure he didn’t say that exactly, but how else were you supposed to take his blubbering. And yeah, for the most part you were quiet and reserved and didn’t give a fuck what anyone thought, but that didn’t mean you didn’t have feelings for godsake. 

At the end of the day Steve was a guy, a cute guy that you’d admired for his beauty and wouldn’t deny that he was overall sweet and kind, and you were a girl, a girl who apparently was not meant for dates. 

And that hurts your feelings more than you’d care to admit. 

A knock on the door had you wiping at your cheeks furiously, though at this point nothing would be able to hide your red cheeks and swollen eyes. “Who is it?” You cringed at how your voice sounded cracked and whiny. 

“It’s Robin,” Oh thank god. Thank fucking god it wasn’t Steve. “Dingus is out here looking like he’s about to have a meltdown but won’t tell me what’s up, just said you were back here and that I should come check on you.” 

Taking a deep breath you pulled the door open just enough for Robin to slip in, quickly closing it back behind her and trying not to let your bottom lip tremble when she turned to look at you and gasped. You weren’t even a crier! What was going on! 

“Woa—shit I don’t think I’ve ever seen you cry. Are you okay? What happened? Did they get Steve too, he seriously looks two seconds away from curling up on the floor.” Hands immediately covering your face you sigh, willing no more tears to fall until you can get out of here and into your own bed. 

“It’s not, I just—I really don’t wanna talk about it right now, okay? Do you think you could start early and cover the rest of my shift? I promise I’ll make it up to you I just…Rob I just need to go home.” 

“Of course I can, are you crazy? There’s nothing to make up. Go! I’ll tell Harrington you’re not feeling well and he’s stuck with me for the rest of the night,” giving you a reassuring squeeze as you gathered your things you’d grabbed on the way in here you gave her what you hoped came off as a thankful smile, “and when—if—you wanna talk about this, I’m here. Just so you know. I can listen sometimes despite what they all say.” 

You nodded, squeezing her hand and giving yourself one last look in the mirror, grimacing at the utter mess you saw staring back at you. Hiking your bag on your shoulder you fled the safety of the bathroom and all but ran to the door. 

Steve was with a customer, the polite smile he had on his face completely wiped off when he caught a glimpse at your puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks. You didn’t spare him one look, practically running for the door without uttering a word in his direction. 

God he felt like a piece of shit. He doesn’t think he’d ever seen you upset, let alone crying. He’d fucked up bad and didn’t know how to fix it when he’s sure you wouldn’t give him the time of day now. 

He’d have to find a way to make this better, the pit in his stomach growing when he thought of you being upset—hurt—because of him. 

He stood there staring at the door until Robin came up beside him, a concerned look on her face as she studied him. “Did she say what happened?” 

“No, she didn’t. Just said she needed to go home and didn’t want to talk about it. I’ve never seen her so upset though, I’m worried.”

He was thankful she didn’t call him out for his bullshit. It was obvious whatever happened had been between the two of you and he didn’t think he couldn’t take Robin ripping into him right now, even if he deserved it.

“Yeah, me too.” And fuck he was. 

             *************************************

3 days since Steve had made you cry. The more you thought about it, the worse you felt because if you were being honest with yourself, maybe there was a small, teeny tiny part of you that grew fond of Steve. Steve with his goofy smile and bashful grin when he’d tell you stupid jokes. 

It was one thing to be hurt because he’d been a jerk, but now you were dealing with feelings you didn’t want. You’d been hurt because you liked Steve and hearing him say…well you guess he didn’t say much, just stumbled his way through some sentences that all started pretty shitty, your feelings were all twisted up that he viewed you a certain way. 

But instead of thinking too hard about these newfound feelings you had, you chose to ignore it completely. Obviously! You didn’t have the time or energy to worry about what Steve Harrington thought of you, especially when you glance at the clock on your nightstand and shit you’re gonna be late for work! 

This is your first shift in 3 days and your stomach turns because you know you’ll be working with Steve. It also happened to be Friday, the day of your date that you had canceled in a fit of hurt and anger when you got home from your last shift. But based on how that jackass you couldn’t even remember the name of took it, you’d dodged a bullet. 

You’re pulling into Family Video before you know it, dread washing over you and it doesn’t help that the humid summer heat as your bare thighs sticking to your seat, it only adds to your frustration. You make no move to actually get out, but you know you can’t afford to miss a shift or risk this job so you get it over with, pulling yourself out and walking in before you say fuck it and head back home. 

Walking through the front doors you see him immediately, standing behind the counter with worry etched between his brows and a small frown on his face. He looks like a kicked puppy, staring you down as if you’ve wronged him. 

“You’re late.” 

You stiffen, spine straightening at his words and a string of curses are on the tip of your tongue, ready to lash out at him because how dare he. But before you get the chance he’s speaking again, effectively cutting off the tyrade you had going on your head. 

“And that’s fine, totally fine! You’re just never late so I was worried, but then again I know today’s Friday so I wasn’t sure if you’d be showing up at all…I didn’t get the chance to tell you the other day I’d already told Robin I’d cover her shift today but I talked to the boss and if you need to go you can, I can manage one night by myself, I swear!” 

You didn’t answer him, walking past and heading to the break room to hang up your things and try and mentally prepare for what was sure to be the longest shift of your life. The only thing you had going for you was that it was a Friday night, so hopefully you’d be busy and not have time to stress over being stuck with Steve. 

When you come back out he’s standing in the same spot you left him, staring around like a lost little kid waiting for someone to give him direction. Well you won't be doing it tonight. Wordlessly you take a seat on the stool, trying your best to ignore his stare burning into the side of your face. You’d snap at him if you didn’t think you’d have a meltdown. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to go? I know you said tonight was the only night that would work for your date and I swear to you I can handle it. The place’ll still be standing tomorrow.” 

Maybe you should go. You could go home and lay in your bed and wallow some more, eat some ice cream and try and forget the past week had ever happened. But you couldn’t. You needed the money and you certainly weren’t gonna hide from Steve when he’s the one that fucked up. So with all the courage you can muster you turn to him, doing your best to give a blank face so he can’t see the hurt brewing behind your eyes. 

“No, Harrington. I don’t go on dates, remember?” 

            **************************************

Steve watches you turn away from him and fuck, okay he deserved that. He was a major asshole who had spent the last 3 days trying and failing to figure out how to get you to forgive him. 

Then you walk in looking so pretty that for a second he forgets that you’re mad at him, that he had fucked up. But then he sees your eyes and they look sad, detached and that kills him all over again. 

If he thought you might have disliked him before then he had no idea how good he had it! He’d give anything for you to smirk at him, to call him an idiot or to roll your eyes and pretend like you didn’t care when he rambled on, even though he could tell you did care, your eyes always gave you away. 

“Can I please just—”

“No.”

“Please, I’m begging for you to just—”

“No, Steve.” 

“But—”

“Nope.”

“Goddamnit please just let me at least try and explain myself a little bit. I know I don’t deserve it but I hurt you and I never, ever wanted to do that. Please. 5 minutes, honey. Please.” 

He thinks he’s shocked you, eyes widening the tiniest bit before you shrug at him, casting a quick look his way before you turn back around and face away from him. 

“I’m listening.” 

Doing your best to ignore the fact that he just called you honey, he’s never done that, you turn to him and shrug, trying to act indifferent but on the inside you’re dying to know what he has to say. You want to know what he really thinks even though it goes against everything you’ve ever thought or stood for. 

Jesus Christ you were the pathetic one, hoping for the reassurance of King Steve. Highschool you would absolutely kick your ass if she could see you now. 

“I’m not…good at sorting my thoughts, especially around you and the shit I said the other day came out so wrong, so not how I meant it and I just—fuck I’m sorry. I never want you to be sad or hurt because of me…or anything at all,” He didn’t even know how to properly say anything without it coming out that he just liked you so much it made him a fool! “I was not trying to suggest people didn’t want to take you out, that came out all wrong. I’m sure there’s a line of people just waiting for you to give them a chance,” I would know, I’m front and center. “But I was just surprised because I hadn’t ever heard you talk about going on dates so I guess I just assumed…I don’t know. I’m an idiot who was also maybe just a little jealous and fuck it’s not even my business what you do! The point is that I’m sorry, okay? I’m so sorry that I hurt your feelings, it was never my intention.” 

It had been a few minutes with neither of you saying anything, the store empty and only the buzz of the crappy ac could be heard around you as he waited for you to say something, anything. 

“Do you want me to get on my knees and beg for your forgiveness? I’ll do it, I swear. I hate you being upset with me, it fuckin’ sucks.” He couldn’t help it, his skin was crawling the longer you stayed quiet and he thinks he’d do anything to get you to not look so sad. 

He hears a small huff from you and if he was looking he’d have seen it was a small laugh of disbelief. “I may be mean but I’m not cruel, Harrington. I wouldn’t make you get on your knees on this floor.” 

Relief flooded through him and despite the humidity swirling around in the air he swore he felt cooler, lighter than he did before. “Does this mean I’m off your shit list then?” 

Your laugh was loud this time and he felt his chest swell with pride that he had been the one to cause it, even if he hadn’t meant to. 

“What makes you so sure I have a shit list?” 

“Oh come on, you definitely do.” Things felt somewhat normal again and it eased the ache in his chest that had lived there for 3 long days. Maybe this whole thing would make you guys even closer, actually make you friends. 

“Alright, maybe I do. And you’re definitely on it, but not because of what happened,” He found himself smiling at you and if he looked close enough he swore he saw a ghost of a smile on your lips before you wiped it away with the back of your hand, “but about the other day, I…you did hurt my feelings. I know, it’s shocking I have them but every once in a while I’m reminded I’m just like the rest of you, unfortunately. Look, I’ve worked with you a while and you’re sweet, Steve. You’re a good guy and when you were saying those things…I know you didn’t mean it the way it came out, but it made me feel..fuck I hate this shit. It made me feel like you thought I wasn’t good enough or pretty enough or some shit like that and it just…it fucked with me, okay? But I know you’d never be cruel like that so I forgive you. We’ll forget this happened so I don’t have to talk about my feelings anymore and we’ll be good. We are good. Fuck I’ll even admit we’re friends if we can not talk about this ever again.” 

“You think I don’t think you’re pretty or good enough?” That was all his brain could think of. How the fuck could you think that? Had he not been obvious? He all but drooled over you every time you were in his line of sight. 

“Really, Steve? That’s all you got! I just said we were friends. I'd thought you’d be over the moon.” Your eyes were looking everywhere but him and he knew you were trying to deflect. You’d just been vulnerable with him and he should move on but he couldn’t stomach you thinking you weren’t good enough or pretty enough, let alone thinking that he thought those things! 

“Honey, I’d be lucky even if you even gave me a second glance. Good enough? You’re too good for me and every other sorry prick in this town. I fuckin’ swear it. I was caught off guard and jealous. Jealous that someone else had gotten you to give them the time of day!” You looked stunned but he kept going, “And I can give you all the dirty details about how pretty you are. How I spend all day practically getting paid to stare at you, what a job! How I’ve memorized every little detail of your pretty face, how I stare a little too long when you’re bent over in front of me. Or how I think about your cute little mouth wrapped around that blow pop and wish it was my—”

“Steve Harrington!” You’d slapped your palm over his mouth to shut him up and if he wasn’t enjoying how squirmy you suddenly were he’d nip at your palm to make you jump. It was nice seeing you all red faced and hot because of him for a change, even though he loved it when it was the other way around. 

Maybe he’d said too much, let his filter slip a little too far but he wanted—no needed for you to know how perfect you were. Not just to him but to anyone with common sense. 

Pulling your palm away he opened his mouth but you shot him a glare as he did, as if you could sense he was going to do it. He watched as you tucked a stray piece of hair behind your ear and cleared your throat bringing your weary eyes to meet his. 

“Smacking me around now?” He was a little shit, he knew it but he was sure you liked it anyway. 

“You love it.” And shit, you’d got him there. He’d let you do anything you wanted to him with a smile on his face and his heart happy. But just because he’d made you feel better didn’t mean the hurt just went away and he’d do whatever it took to fix it. 

“Caught me,” He threw you a wink that you ignored, rolling your eyes at him, “but seriously, there’s not one thing wrong with you and I’m sorry that I made you feel any different. I’m a dick. I’ll tell you till I’m blue in the face how pretty you are if that’s what it takes.” 

“Oh no, I’ve heard plenty, you perv. Now I know why you’re so quiet when I’m reorganizing the bottom shelves, you’re staring at my ass!” He shrugged at you sheepishly, not being near as embarrassed as he should be for admitting that. 

“But…thank you, Steve. This was just a misunderstanding that you’ve more than cleared up. We’re good, Harrington. I’m good.” And the relief he felt was seen on his face and felt throughout his body. He could’ve used the moment to be sweet, dragging out the conversation but you still looked a little uneasy about opening up to him so he thought it better to go back to territory you were comfortable with, him annoying you. 

“Oh I know we’re good! We’re friends now, remember? Don’t think I’ll ever let you forget it.” 

              *************************************

Things between you and Steve had been…good. 

There was a bit of tension between you, the kind that made your throat dry when you looked at him and your thighs clench when he whispered something in your ear if customers were around and he didn’t want them to hear. Maybe it was from the things he admitted or maybe it was because you were suddenly much more aware of Steve. 

You’d had your talk, if you could call it that, a few weeks ago and the time you’ve spent together since then had been mostly normal. Steve, getting on your nerves, rambling about nothing for as long as you’d let him, looking at you with those pitiful puppy dog eyes when you gave him some attention. You, teasing him relentlessly, even more now than before. Covering for him less, he’d been showing up on time almost every shift you had together. Bending over in front of him more just to hear him curse and see his cheeks flush. 

And maybe kind of developing a crush on him. 

It’s not your fault, it’s his! How were you supposed to resist him after he said he’d be lucky to go out with you, after he told you he’d been jealous someone else was, after he told you how pretty you were and how he thought about your mouth wrapped around his—

Fuck—no, you were not going down that road again. Every time you thought about what he said, how genuine and needy he seemed when he talked about you, your head got all fuzzy and your knees threatened to give out. It was all you could do not to pounce on him the second the words left his mouth. 

So yeah, you had a big fat crush on Steve Harrington. 

He’d also taken your comment about being friends to heart, bringing it up every chance he got and using it as an excuse for the two of you to spend even more time together. You’d walk in Family Video and he’d flash you that smile, opening his arms for a hug you pretended to hate but in reality looked forward to every day. 

“Hello, friend.” 

“As your friend I have to tell you how pretty you look today.” 

“C’mon friend, come to this party with me. It’ll be lame without you.” 

You’d threatened to revoke his “friend” privileges and he’d gasped, clutching his chest dramatically and pretending to stumble to the floor. It took everything in you not to giggle at his antics. You were quickly becoming obsessed with Steve, and even more obsessed with how quick you could get him to turn into a puddle at your feet. 

That was how you find yourself here at the Hawkins public pool with your bag strap digging uncomfortably into your shoulder and sweat dripping down your back, wearing what you’d bet was a grimace as you walked around the scattered chairs looking for Steve. 

One thing that remained constant and strong was the mid summer heat that took your breath away and put you in a less than pleasant mood most of the time. Poor Steve got the brunt of your frustration but he never complained. And that’s why you finally agreed to come to the pool with him, because he was sweet and patient and adorable, even when he was annoying the shit out of you. 

What you didn’t account for was the added heat you’d endure from seeing Steve shirtless before you, arms crossed over his chest and pale pink swim trunks sitting on his hips. 

When did Steve Harrington get chest hair and why was your mouth watering over it? It made him look sexy, older in a way that erased all boyish features you’d come to love. He looked…fuck he looked hot. His hair was slicked back and you knew he’d already gotten in, too impatient to wait for the 10 minutes longer it had taken you to get here. He had a trail of hair on his lower belly that ran down under the band of his swim trunks and you think you might have actually let out a whimper at the sight. 

You took a step toward him and cursed yourself when your legs wobbled a little bit. If he saw it he didn’t say anything, righting yourself quickly and making your way over so you could toss your bag into his waiting arms, trying not to look at the patch of chest hair just inches from your face and failing miserably. 

“My own personal pool boy, a girl could get used to this.” 

It didn’t take long to figure out that the easiest and quickest way to get yourself together was to turn it on him, to make his hands twitch and his stomach clench and to tease him until he was panting like a puppy. 

“At your service, ma’am.” 

Grabbing your arm he tugged you to the chairs he’d saved for the two of you, a cooler sitting between them with the lunch he’d made for the both of you. It makes your heart skip a beat and your tummy flutters. Your sweet Stevie. 

He sat your bag down between the chairs, laying back so his arms were stretched back and crossed behind his head, a twinge in your stomach tightening as you watched him stretch out before you. A fucking Greek god. You needed to even the playing field and you needed to do it now. 

Grabbing the sunscreen from your bag you put on the sweetest smile you could conjure while your body screamed at you to straddle his thighs and kiss him dumb. “Stevie, can you help me out with this?” He nodded without thought, that’s just how kind he was, sitting up to grab the bottle from your hands. 

Before he could make a move to get up you knocked his legs apart, pushing yourself down and back so that you were wedged between his thighs, your back almost completely pressed against his front. 

He cursed behind you, trying to scoot back but your hands dug into his thighs to keep him there, a silent plea. You’re sure if you could see his face he’d look almost pained at the feeling of your skin pressed to his. 

You heard him flip the cap open and squeeze some sunscreen in his hand, neither of you saying anything for a moment before he leaned forward, his lips almost touching the shell of your ear when he spoke, “s’gonna be cold.” You nodded wordlessly and straightened up a little, pushing back further into him. 

“Fuck.” You didn’t mean for it to slip out and hoped you could blame it on the cold lotion hitting your back, but you knew that was a lie. Steve’s big, calloused hands on your shoulders and back had you holding back whines and moans threatening to climb up your throat. Jesus Christ this felt good, too good. 

Any composure you had left flew out the window at his next move and you were quickly falling behind in the one sided game you’d started with him. 

You felt his hands move down lower to where the string of your bikini tied in the back, your thighs clenching hard when he slid them toward the front, following the line of your top and just barely slipping under the cup of your breast to tease the skin there before he was pulling back and going to your shoulders again. 

Holy fuck. 

He tensed behind you when your fingers dug harder into his thighs, but you didn’t even mean to. It was just a knee jerk reaction to his fingers gliding over the underside of your boob for Christ's sake. It wasn’t until you leaned back just a little, totally innocent you were just readjusting, that you felt it. 

Steve was hard. His swimsuit did a shit job of concealing it. And he was pressed up against you so tightly you could feel him throb against your lower back when you gasped. This was your opportunity to one up him, to move ahead a few spaces. 

Head turning to the side just slightly so he was in your peripheral, you needed to make sure he was looking and listening. You spoke as if you weren’t dripping wet yourself, thighs sore from how hard you’d been squeezing them together. 

“Poor baby, touching my shoulders and grazing a pair of tits has you all needy, huh?” 

He whined low in his throat, leaning forward to press his forehead against your back. You could feel little puffs of air against your skin as he tried to compose himself, not that you’d let him. 

“Stop. Don’t be mean.” The words were whispered against your skin and you smiled. 

“Don’t act like you don’t like it when I’m mean. Gets you hard, doesn't it, when I tease you?” You were being mean, so mean, but if the way he subtly tried to buck up against you was indication of how he felt, he loved it. 

You kept going, basking in the feeling of his hands grilling your hips tight and his breathing against your back was getting faster the more you talked. 

“You really are like a puppy. It’s just so fucking cute how whiny you get when you’re like this.” 

Both of you stilled when a whimper slipped out a little too loud and all of a sudden you remembered where you were, a fucking public pool. Steve must have realized too because he pulled back, scooting far enough away that you weren’t touching anymore and you hated how you already missed the feel of his skin on yours. 

Clearing your throat you shuffled over to the other chair, glancing at Steve to see his mouth shut and eyes looking anywhere but you. Maybe you’d gone too far. You opened your mouth to apologize but before you could he was up and tugging you to the edge of the pool, jumping in and practically dragging you in with him. 

The cool water actually did a good job of cooling you down, physically and mentally. When you broke the surface, gasping for air, Steve was already there looking at you. You couldn’t read the look on his face, couldn’t tell if he was upset with you so you bit the bullet. 

“M’sorry if I went too far, Steve. It’s just…you were…the sunscreen—you were making me feel crazy so I wanted to even it up. I shouldn’t have done that though, especially not here. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.” 

For the first time since you came up from the water he broke his stare, opting to look around you before he came closer, pulling you in so no one would hear your conversation. 

“Don’t be sorry, I’m not. I only pulled away because I was seconds from cumming in my shorts like a teenage boy and I was embarrassed.” 

Lips pulling into a smile you covered your mouth and he pouted at you, huffing like a child when he saw you trying not to laugh at him. “No need to be embarrassed, Stevie. You can’t help that you’re a needy little thing.” 

His hand swatted at yours that had come up to pinch his cheeks and you cooed at him to tease him further. “So mean.” He tried to look annoyed but failed and it made your stomach dip at how pretty he looked, drops of water falling off his lashes, lashes you and every girl in Hawkins would kill for. 

“You really are pretty, Harrington.” The tips of his ears burned bright red and he moved toward you instinctively, like he wanted to kiss you. God did you want to kiss him. But you didn’t want to do it in a public place where you wouldn’t be able to make a mess of him after so you pulled back and splashed some water in his face with a giggle. 

“C’mon big boy, let’s swim! I didn't come all this way just to stare at your cute face.” 

Although you wouldn’t mind it. 

          *******************************************

The next few weeks are quiet, work goes by painfully slow when you’re not with Steve and you hate it. Your shifts with Steve are filled with teasing touches and flushed cheeks and very little work. 

You’ve also been spending a good chunk of the time you’re not at work with Steve as well. He somehow almost always convinces you to come over to watch a movie or go with him for a late night ice cream run. You find yourself in his car or playing with his hair while you lay in your bed more often than not. 

And you love it. 

Trying to act like you weren’t obsessed with him was exhausting so you mostly gave it up. You’d smile at him more, laugh at his jokes more freely, and have become much more touchy with him. 

Neither of you could seem to keep your hands off each other if you were in the same room. He always had to have a hand on your hip or one holding your thigh and you couldn’t keep your fingers from rubbing at his neck or slipping through his hair if he was close. 

There hadn’t been a conversation about what was happening, but neither of you seemed to mind. You think that you’d become best friends who were just crazy about each other and that was enough for both of you. 

Until it wasn’t. 

If you were being fair, you knew that technically you and Steve hadn’t officially become exclusive or anything. The two of you probably weren’t even dating, even though you spent all your time together. Cuddling and teasing constantly. 

But you weren’t fair. Everyone who spent any amount of time in a public setting knew that you and Steve were, for lack of a better word, an item. If someone saw you at the grocery store or at the post office, or anywhere, it was a safe bet that Steve was two paces behind you if he wasn’t already at your hip. 

This was common knowledge. Or at least you thought it was. So it’s a surprise, a bad one at that, when you come back from your break with a smile on your face that is quickly wiped away when you see some blonde you went to school with hanging over the counter with her tits pushed at Steve, a devious smile on her face as she bats her eyelashes at him. 

All the blood rushes from your body and you’re not sure you can even keep down the sandwich you’d had for lunch. A sandwich that Steve had made for you, might you add. There’s a horrible twist in your belly and you’ve never felt such rage as you have looking at the way she toys with the collar of his shirt between her fingers and at the way he gives her a small smile and doesn’t pull away. 

You were jealous. So jealous it took the breath right out of you and made your brain go blank. One minute you’re standing there with your skin hot and heart pounding and the next you’re sliding back into your seat beside Steve with a glare so sharp it could cut glass. 

“Need help with anything or are you just gonna keep groping the staff?” If your glare was sharp your words were sharper, serious and stern and directed at the girl who was still touching Steve, your Steve. 

Both the girl and Steve’s eyes widen at your tone. She finally takes a step back and you feel like you can breathe again. You see the way Steve’s staring at you but you don’t look at him, you can’t or you might do something crazy like hit this girl, or even worse, cry. 

Once the initial embarrassment from your words wears off she straightens her back and narrows her eyes in your direction. “I think we had it handled, sweetie. Your coworker here,” You flinch at the way she emphasizes coworker and feel yourself shrink a little, “was just giving me some movie recommendations. But thanks for the offer.” 

“I’ll leave you to it then.” The words taste bitter on your tongue and you want to slap the smirk off her face so bad your palm twitches. Steve is quiet beside you and you can’t even begin to process how that adds to your fury, to the pain that’s bubbling up beneath your skin and threatening to spill out. 

You’ve taken one, maybe two steps away from the counter, ready to go back to the bathroom of shame and cry again over Steve fucking Harrington when a hand on your wrist stops you. 

The same hand, the one that belongs to the boy you’ve become enamored with, tugs you gently back to his side, hand leaving you for just a second so he can wrap his arm around your waist and tug you into his side. Your hips are touching and you feel a wave of relief wash over you, the pain and anger dissolving while his hand grips you tightly against him. 

A sick satisfaction runs through you as you watch the way her jaw clenches and her eyes dim as his arm curls around you. Coworker my ass. Steve clears his throat beside you, catching yours and her attention, “I’m afraid I’m all out of recommendations for you, but maybe my coworker here has some for you.” Before she can even think about speaking you cut her off with a faux pout, “I don’t think I do, sorry!” 

Deciding Steve isn’t worth the battle you’re more than willing to start, what an idiot, she turns around and pretends to look through the new releases for all of five seconds before she’s scurrying out of the store and leaving you both alone again. 

Steve gives one last squeeze to your hip before he moves to sit back down, the reality of your little outburst smacking you in the face. Well, this is awkward. You sit down on your stool, tapping your hands on the counter while you try and gather the courage to look at him. 

You hope he’s not upset with you and if he is well…fuck him! Just because you haven’t said it out loud doesn’t mean he’s not yours. You know for a fact if he caught you flirting with a guy he’d be pissed! All whiny and pouty and pawing at you for attention. So you were justified in being upset, totally and fully justified. 

Now you’ve worked yourself up to tell him off and give him a piece of your mind, and you turn to him to do just that when it all slips away in an instant. Because Steve isn’t upset, no, he’s staring at you with wide, bright eyes and a smirk so big and knowing you curse yourself in your head. 

Oh this is even worse! Now you’ve given him a big head, bigger than he already had! 

“So that was…interesting.” You can hear the amusement in his tone and you roll your eyes. You much prefer him all pathetic and whiny over this…cocky Steve. But really you don’t mind this either. 

“Shut it, Harrington.” You think if you weren’t so obsessed with him you’d have the decency to be even a little embarrassed at how you acted but you aren’t! You practically marked your territory in front of her and you can’t find it in you to care or regret it. 

“You were jealous. Over me! I’ll never shut up about this! I’m taking a spot in the paper for this, alerting the press as we speak!” His bottom lip between his teeth and he looked giddy like it was Christmas morning and he’d gotten the brand new shiny bicycle he’d spent all year wishing for. 

You could have denied it, but what was the point in that? Everyone already knew anyway how you felt, you weren’t exactly subtle about it. Might as well embrace it at this point. 

“And so what if I was? Figure you’re mine anyways, right?” Your cheeks tint the lightest shade of pink as you watch him take in your words, his eyes a little wide and a small shy smile on his lips. 

“I am?” 

God okay, maybe you hadn’t been as obvious as you thought the last months. 

“Well…I thought so. You take up all my time anyways, Harrington, might as well. Plus I like you—well a lot. I’m yours too, ya know. If you want I guess, I don’t know, I thought this was just unspoken between us and now you’re making me nervous!” 

His lips parted in what could either be shock or awe, you weren’t sure. He didn’t look appalled at the idea so that was a good sign, right? 

“I’m sorry I just…sometimes I’m not even sure you like me all that much so I’m just a little shocked but yes! Fuck—yes I’ll be whatever you want.” 

Maybe he was a little dumb or maybe you weren’t as good at showing your feelings as you thought but either way you’d make sure he felt wanted, needed by you. 

“Steve, if I didn’t like you I promise I would not be spending all my time with you. I’m mean sometimes because you like it and I like seeing you all messy and cute. M’kinda obsessed with you, you idiot.”

His grin widened, dimples popping out and your heart sped up at the sight. He was pretty, so pretty and despite how you acted sometimes you felt so lucky that he even wanted to spend any time with you, let alone all of it. Steve Harrington had wiggled his way deep into your heart and your brain and you think your life would be dull without him. 

“I’d ask you to pinch me but I know you’ll make it hurt,” Your hand reached out automatically towards his thigh and he swatted you away with an eye roll, “I’m obsessed with you too, have been for months. Since the first day you started actually. Want you to be my girl, wanna be yours too.” 

Leaning forward you pressed a quick peck to the corner of his mouth and you felt his head turn, trying to catch your lips. He wouldn’t get off the hook that easily, it took no effort to remember how it felt to see that girl's hands all over him. Even if it wasn’t his fault you don’t think he’d mind paying for it anyways. Add on the cocky grin he had earlier when he realized you were jealous and all of a sudden you had big plans for Steve Harrington, plans that made your thighs clench and had you pulsing around nothing. 

You cooed at him, pulling back just in time to see his brows furrowed and a cute little pout working its way on his lips. He had no idea what was coming to him and you couldn’t want to see how sorry he would be. 

“Patience is key, baby.” 

          *****************************************

It was a week later when it all clicked for Steve. 

A week of teasing touches and sneaky glances his way, even when people were looking. You’d leave a kiss on his cheek or the corner of his mouth or on the side of his neck right right under his ear. He was going crazy, body leaning forward subconsciously anytime you were near him. 

You’ve barely let him touch you and at first he was worried but you’d whisper in his ear about “payback” for making you jealous and while he was nervous, now he was just excited. And impatient, wanting and begging for you to just do it already. He couldn’t take much more teasing, his cock had been aching for what felt like forever and no matter how many times he found himself in bed, stroking himself to the thought of you, it wouldn’t ever be enough. 

He thinks you’ve finally decided to put him out of his misery, calling him earlier to ask if you could come over, that you had a special surprise that was just for him. He’d agreed without hesitation, telling you to come over whenever you wanted and that he’d be waiting for you. His parents weren’t around this weekend so he didn’t have to worry about them and he was thanking god for that. 

It had been 4 hours and 37 minutes since you called, not that he’d been counting, when he heard a knock at his door that had him all but jumping over the couch and sprinting for the front door. He practically ripped it open, grinning wide as he took you in with dreamy eyes and his stomach twisted in knots. 

You were wearing a sundress that reached about mid thigh and he had to hold himself upright with the door at the sight of your bare legs, tan and smooth and fuck he just needed to bite at the skin between your thighs. The dress had little strawberries printed all over and he’d bet money that you tasted just as sweet as the fruit. His mouth watered at the sight of your full lips all glossy with whatever you’d put on them and it took everything in him not to lean forward and suck your bottom lip into his mouth. 

He didn’t realize he had been standing there just staring until you cleared your throat, a knowing smirk on your lips as he shook his head to clear him from the daze you’d put him in. “S’pretty, you’re so pretty.” His voice was quiet and he wasn’t sure if he meant for you to hear or if he was just talking to himself. 

“Thank you, handsome. Can I come in or do I need to stand on the porch with you eye-fucking me all night?” He doesn’t think he’d ever get used to your crassness, even though he wasn’t complaining about it. He loved that you spoke your mind, no matter how dirty, and hoped what one day he’d be comfortable doing that too. 

“Right, right, yes come in,” Pulling the door open he stepped to the side so you could come in, knees wobbling when he caught a whiff of your perfume as you passed, “Are you hungry? I can…order something. I don’t have much to cool but maybe I could run to the store real quick?” 

He heard your muffled giggle as you walked through the house in front of him, hips swaying as you walked and he felt his cock twitch in his pants just looking at you. 

“Just hungry for you, Stevie.” 

You were teasing, he knew that, but he wasn’t sure you weren’t serious by the way you eyed him over your shoulder like he was your prey. And fuck did he want to be. He’d crawl around on the floor if you asked. 

By the time he followed your trail and made it through the living room you were at the foot of the stairs, lip between your teeth and hands together behind your back all innocent. You both knew better than to believe that. 

“Can I see your room?” Fuck this was happening. He nodded at you, grabbing your small hand with his and relishing in the way it felt to hold you. He led you up the stairs and was careful not to go too fast, to seem too eager. He knows you’d tease him for being so excited but based on the look in your eyes he thought that maybe you were pretty excited too. 

Pushing his door open he watched as you took in his room, eyes light as you scanned over the posters he’d hung haphazardly, some artwork the kids had drawn for him hanging above his desk. His bed was unmade and he cursed himself, as if you’d care. 

“Looks exactly how I pictured it.” 

“You pictured my room?” 

“Maybe.” 

He stood still, leaning up against the door he’d closed and locked behind him as you made your way around, lifting up papers and magazines, humming quietly to yourself. You must have been a witch or something the way he’d become so entranced with you, following your every move like he wasn’t meant to do anything else.

So when you turn around to face him quickly, he’s startled, eyes shooting up to meet yours like he’d gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar before dinner. 

“Alright then, on the bed.” 

The flurry of questions he has does little to deter him as he scrambles past you and pushes on the bed a little too quickly. He falls forward face first and hears you snicker behind him. He’s not sure where you want him so he hopes he’s right. He scoots back, flush against the wall, the headboard on his left and foot of the bed on his right. 

“You want this, Harrington? I’m not misreading anything, right?” 

He’s shaking his head furiously, eyes wide and mouth closed as he watches for your next move. 

“Oh now you have nothing to say? Months of knowing you and you’re hardly ever quiet. Use your words, big boy.” 

“Y-yes, I want this. Whatever you want.” 

The smile you reward him with makes his chest ache and the blood rush through him so fast he can hear it pounding in his ears. He thinks he wants you looking like that all the time, proud and pleased with him. 

“Good! It’s time for payback then.” 

        **********************************************

You really really hoped your nerves didn’t show on your face as you stood in front of Steve. You don’t think he’d notice even if they did, eyes glazed over as he waited for whatever you had planned. 

Now at this point you were over the whole jealousy thing from last week, really you were! But you played into it a little extra just so you could be mean to him right now. Although with the plans you had, you’d be being mean to him and yourself. 

Wordlessly you reached down, fingers toying with the hem of your dress and you watched as Steve’s eyes tracked the movement, throat bobbing slightly as you lifted it a few inches before letting it drop back down. 

This only lasted for a few minutes before you’d had enough, gripping your dress and almost ripping it over your head and letting it drop to your feet. What you hadn’t mentioned was that you had nothing underneath it, absolutely nothing. 

Steve drank you in, slack jawed with his eyes almost bugging out of his head when he moved from your face to your tits, staring at your already hard nipples that you would blame on the coolness in his room. His eyes moved down further and he groaned, a deep, guttural sound that made your clit throb under his stare. 

Was that some drool leaking down to his chin? 

“Take a picture, it'll last longer.”

“Can I?” You don’t think he even realized the words left his mouth and you fought the urge to laugh at how out of it he seemed already. 

“Not tonight, baby.” 

His hands fisted the sheets below him as the pet name slipped past your lips and you smiled sweetly at him. Pointing to the headboard you directed him with a quiet voice, “I’m gonna sit there,” moving your hand to point toward the foot of his bed he followed your finger eagerly, “and you’re gonna sit there, facing me.” 

He obeyed instantly, shuffling toward where’d you directed him while you climbed onto the bed and and situated yourself against his headboard with your legs stretched out in front of you. 

“Can I have your shirt?” It wasn’t anything special, a plain white t-shirt that hugged him beautifully, but you wanted it all the same. To have his smell surrounding you, covering you in him. He peeled it off so he was left in a pair of jeans that stuck to him in all the right places. Unsure of what to do he tossed it to you and you wasted no time in slipping it over your bare frame, pleased that it bunched at your hips just how you’d hoped.

You could see the disappointment in his face at the extra layer you’d added and you itched to lean forward and pinch his flushed cheeks in adoration. He was just so adorable it made you crazy. With everyone else he was strong and stern, the babysitter and protector and king of Hawkins.

But with you…with you he was soft and sweet, pliable in your hands like putty and you ate up every second of it. 

           ****************************************

Steve thinks he might have gone to heaven, you sitting across from him in nothing but his shirt with your thighs on display. 

His chest feels hot despite the cool air hitting his skin and he thinks if he doesn’t get his hands on you in the next three seconds something horrible might happen. You're giving him that teasing smile that makes his tummy clench and sends excitement zipping down his spine. 

He still can’t believe you like him, that you’re obsessed with him. It’s like a dream come true and he thinks he’s pinched himself at least 17 times in the last week. 

He’s pulled from his thoughts when you call his name softly, head snapping up to meet yours and he feels dizzy all over again from how pretty you look. 

“You’re gonna watch me, okay? No touching me or yourself until I say.” Wait—what? He gives you a nod and tries not to let his disappointment show in his face, and he knows he fails based on the way you smile and shake your head at him. 

But any disappointment he had is gone in a flash when you lean back and spread your legs to give him a glimpse at just how much you like him. He might black out, he’s not sure. You’re glistening for him, a little bit of slick on your thighs and suddenly he’s starved. He audibly groans at the sight of you on display for him. 

“She’s pretty—fuck so pretty.” He’s talking more to himself than you but he sees the way you twitch at him referring to your pussy as “her” and it makes him smile shyly, still not moving his eyes from where you’re dripping on his bed. 

He watches closely as your hand trails down, rubbing over your thighs for just a second before you’re taking two fingers and spreading yourself open for him, both of you too impatient to drag this out too long. Before he can stop himself he’s moving forward, going to his knees and crawling across his bed that feels far too big all of a sudden. He doesn’t realize he’s moved until your legs are closed and one foot is pressed against his bare chest, stopping him from getting any closer. 

One hand is holding him up and the other is holding onto your ankle as he pleads with his eyes for you to let him closer, just a taste, he just needs one little taste. 

“We’ve just started and you’re already breaking the rules?” The faux disappointment in your tone makes him pout, leaning down to press a small kiss against your calf and he hears you chuckle at his attempt at distracting you. 

“M’sorry, baby, you’re just so pretty, she’s so pretty. Let me have a taste, please? I’ll be good after that, I swear. Just one taste, honey.” 

He watches in anticipation, hope is swelling in his chest as you study him and he can see the contemplation in your eyes as you take him in. He’s so close he can smell you and it lights his whole body up, cock so hard pressed up against his jeans he could cry. 

“Hmm, no,” He hears the whine he makes but can’t be bothered to care, “what fun is payback if I give in before I’ve even touched myself! You can be patient, I know you can.” You have much more faith in him than he has in himself, body slumping in defeat before he’s moving back to where you directed him the first time. 

“Can I at least take these jeans off? It hurts, baby.” 

“Fine, but the boxers stay on, sneaky.” It takes him no time before he’s peeling his jeans off, sighing in relief when some of the pressure is released and he feels like he can breathe again. 

Well he can breathe until you’re spreading your legs again, fingers slipping back down to tease at your clit as your eyes stay locked on him. His chest is tightening as he watches you. Watching the way your legs spread wider when you notice him fisting the sheets beside him. Watching the way your head falls back against his headboard when you move down to circle your messy hole, a moan so lewd coming from your mouth he feels a bead of precum drip down his cock. 

Jesus Christ, he couldn’t decide if this was heaven or hell but he’s sure that either way he’d gladly spend an eternity here. 

He’s torn between watching your face or watching your fingers in your cunt, eyes flickering between the two every few seconds so he didn’t miss something important. He remembers how you compare him to a puppy and he’s sure he’s never looked more like one than he does right now. He’s practically panting across from you and you’re the treat that would be making his tail wag—if he had one. 

“Feels so good, Stevie. This is how wet I get just from thinking about you, ya know? Always have me messy and ready for you.” 

“Please let me touch you. Fuck—please, sweetheart. Need it so bad, need you so bad. I’ll be good, I swear. Never make you jealous again. God I swear I’ll do anything.” 

He knew you were getting close, thighs threatening to close on your hand and hips lifting from the bed eagerly. He could see it on your face too—you wanted to deny him, to torture him some more but he could see you giving in. 

“You beg so pretty, Harrington. Fuck, get over here. Now.” 

He didn't need to be told twice, launching himself across the bed and fitting himself between your thighs that had opened a little to accommodate his wide frame. He waited expectantly, and you smiled down at him fondly. 

“You know, you really look like a—”

“A puppy, I know. So can I have my treat then?” 

Nodding at him you swiped your fingers through your folds and held your hand out to him, fingers shiny with you and he opened his mouth quickly. His head moved forward and he took your fingers in his mouth, lapping his tongue around them greedily, determined not to waste a single drop. He hummed around them, eyes closed so he didn't see the way you were staring at him like he’d hung the moon. 

“S’good then?” You sounded breathless above him and he could only nod, not wanting to drop your fingers from his mouth just yet. God, you tasted good. He’d compare you to a nice summer treat but the truth is you’d be perfect for any season, any day. Fuck he’d stay buried between your thighs 24/7 if you’d let him. 

He finally pulled off just enough so that he could speak, “better than a blow pop.” The laugh that pulled from you made his heart warm. It was loud and genuine, shoulders shaking slightly as you grinned at him, teeth on display and everything. 

It was quiet for a few minutes, you pressing your fingers down on his tongue and even though he’d cleaned them up, the taste of you lingered and he would gladly sit here with your fingers in his mouth for hours. 

But you had other plans. 

“Need your fingers, Stevie. They’re bigger than mine and I’m already close from watching you lap at my fingers like a little greedy puppy.” His eyes fell from yours, cheeks red and ears burning as you teased him. 

“Can I use my mouth?” 

“Mhm, not today. I already gave in way too quick, you were just too cute to say no to.” He wants to pout, to protest and beg but he thinks just watching you fall apart on his fingers will be more than enough for him. 

You part your legs further as he slips down to rest his cheek against your inner thigh. His hair tickles the soft, sensitive skin there and you giggle. He moves just enough to press a quick, open mouthed kiss and dreams about the marks he hopes you’ll let him leave there one day. 

With a nod from you he moves his eyes to your cunt, swollen and dripping, and runs his fingers over your clit just to feel your thigh twitch against his cheek. He wraps the hand he’s not using around your thigh, clutching it to him tightly as he eases two of his fingers into you. They slip in easily with no resistance and the feeling of your warm, hot walls snug on his fingers makes him grind his hips down into his bed. 

“Shit—she feels good, hugging my fingers so tight.” Your hips buck up against his hand, urging him in deeper and he smiles against your leg. A groan slips out of him when your hand slips down to rub slow, loose circles on your clit, head rolling back so that all you can see is his eyes peeking up at you. 

He doesn’t think he’s ever seen something so hot in his entire life. He can see the little beads of sweat rolling down your forehead and how you’re panting and whining above him, especially when he curls his fingers upward and finds that spongy spot that has your mouth dropping open and eyes squeezing shut. 

“There it is, yeah? That’s the spot?” You’re nodding quickly, fingers that were circling your clit are now sliding into his hair and gripping it tightly. The burn of it makes him moan against your thigh, the sting of your grip making his eyes roll back into his head almost. 

“D-don’t you dare stop, Harrington. M’close, so so close.” He doesn’t think there is anything that could get him to stop. Not when you’re dripping down his hand and your thighs are shaking like they are. 

The final straw is when he moves his mouth down a couple of inches, teeth scraping against the skin where your thighs almost touch and he bites down, hard enough to leave a mark. He hears the thud of your head knocking against his headboard and the curse that flies out of your mouth as you clench down on him so hard you almost push his fingers out. He works you through it, licking over the mark he just left to soothe the sting and slowing down his fingers once you start to twitch and whine from the feeling. 

It’s not until you're pushing his hand away and letting your legs slump that he takes a peek at you, a lazy smile on your face and hair sticking to your forehead where you’d been sweating. He knows there’s a widening grin on his face as he looks up at you, placing one last kiss before he’s sitting himself up so his legs are under yours and his hands are resting on the tops of your thighs. 

“If that’s what you call payback then remind me to piss you off more often!” 

You roll your eyes, letting your body fall back against his headboard, “Don’t get smart with me now, Harrington. Not when I’m about to make you cum. I would hate to change my mind.” 

His ears perk up and honestly he hadn’t even thought about himself since he’d gotten between your thighs, content with watching you squirm and moan around his fingers. But he wasn’t gonna turn you down, hell no! Just the thought of you anywhere near his cock had him twitching in his boxers. 

He closed his mouth, fingers coming up to mimic zipping a zipper of his lips and tossing the non existent key far behind him. You smirked at him, hand coming close to pat his cheek, almost like you’d pet his head. 

“Good boy, now turn around and take those boxers off, please.” 

          ********************************************

Holy shit. You didn’t think you'd ever cum so hard in your life. You swear you might have actually seen stars for a minute there when he curled his fingers just right. And when he bit you? How the hell did he know you had a thing for biting. 

Keeping him at arm's length had been the hardest thing you’d ever had to do, especially when he was looking at you like you were a five course meal in front of him. He’d practically been salivating at the sight of you and it took everything in you not to give into him immediately. 

But now that you’d cum, all you could think about was him. About finally getting your hand on his cock and listening to the way he’d gasp and whine with your hand around him. Just the thought was enough to send another wave of arousal and need over you, your toes curling and fingers digging into his bed. 

He still hadn’t moved in front of you and you cocked your head at him, trying to figure out why he suddenly had that sad pout on his lips. “What’s the matter?”

His cheeks were red and he looked almost embarrassed as he tried to avoid eye contact with you and you worried you’d done something to upset him. Maybe this wasn’t as good for him, maybe he didn’t like you teasing him? 

“S’just…you haven’t kissed me and I just—I wanna kiss you so bad but I didn’t know if there was a reason you hadn’t or maybe you just didn’t want to or—”

You cut him off, gripping his shoulders and pushing your lips against his that were swollen and slick with spit. He moaned against you, sighing and relaxing in your hold. Fuck—how had you not kissed him yet? 

His tongue swiped against your bottom lip and you heard the little whine he let out when you didn’t let him in, laughing against his lips. He took the opportunity to move closer, hands moving to fist at your hair and you felt lightheaded from how good he felt, how sweet he tasted. 

When you needed to breathe you regretfully pulled back, foreheads touching and noses bumping into one another as you both took big, greedy gulps of air. His eyes almost sparkled as he looked at you, a shy smirk on both your mouths. 

“Better?”

“Perfect.” It was hard to ignore the way your heart thumped against your rib cage like it was trying to fight its way out. He was perfect. Everything about him and the way he carried himself drew you to him like a moth to a flame. Your mind was consumed with all things Steve. 

And while you wanted to be mushy and sweet with him, one glance down between you had your mouth watering and fingers twitching at your sides. There was a dark wet patch on his blue boxers and the outline of his cock was prominent. You think you know why he was so cocky in high school now, he definitely had the goods to back it up. 

“Kiss me whenever you want but if you don’t get your boxers off in the next 5 seconds I might do something crazy.” 

Your words snapped him out of his post kiss haze and you laughed softly as he scrambled off the bed to pull his boxers down his legs and practically kick them across the room. You gulped at the sight of him, of his pretty and thick cock already leaking and shiny for you. You motioned him forward, eyes kind and soft as you spread your legs for him. 

He smiled when you patted the space in front of you and he crawled back between your legs and shuffled so that he was sitting in front of you, his back pressed to your front, the material of his shirt clinging to his sweaty back. Your thighs stretched around his hips but you loved the slight burn it brought you. You laid back and brought him with you so that he was slumped against your chest, your feet hooked over his calves. 

His hands were on either one of your thighs, fingers digging into the soft flesh there while his arms were loose at his sides. You took the opportunity to slip your hands under his arms, hands reaching up to run over his chest, tweaking one of his nipples on your way and watching the way his cock twitched where it was resting against his lower belly. 

Steve looked like a dream, head thrown back on your shoulder, thigh thighs spread open with his pretty cock on display for you. As your hands made their way to his tummy you scratched softly, fingers sliding through the trail that started under his belly button and went down. He must have felt sensitive there because he turned his head to the side, mouth pressed against your neck as he cursed. 

“S’good, so good. Fuck, I swear anything you do feels fuckin’ perfect.” You pressed a quick kiss to his shoulder at his words, feeling the high of them as he spoke. 

Holding your hand out in front of him, palm up toward his face he hummed against you, not sure what you were wanting him to do, but willing to do just about anything if it meant your hand would be on his cock. 

“Spit.” 

All that was heard in the room was his quick intake of air, eyes fluttering as he leaned toward your hand. He looked back at you once, to double check that this was real or for confirmation that you really wanted him to spit in your hand, you’re not sure. But you nodded, throat bobbing as he turned back and spit, watching in awe. 

“Good boy.” 

Any strength he had left was gone at your words, head falling back to its place on your shoulder as you moved your hand down, taking hold of his cock and hearing him hiss at the contact. 

You think this might be the best thing that’s ever happened to you. 

His cock was hot and smooth under your touch, a mix of his spit and precum making it easy to glide your hand over his shaft, letting your thumb catch on the tip and relishing in the way he gasped in your ear. 

“Such a pretty cock for a pretty boy, hmm?” The feeling of his fingers digging into your thighs only spurred you on, hand tight around him as you stroked him quickly, loving the way his tummy would clench and he’d gasp at how slick he was, how good it felt. 

You’d never seen him so needy, so pathetic as he was right now, little whines and pleas against the shell of your ear as you gripped him. He was heavy in your hand and you wondered how he’d feel on your tongue, how he’d taste when he thrusted into your mouth. You’d add that to the list of things you needed to do immediately. 

“M’sorry, sorry fuck—you’re gonna make me cum, m’gonna cum—oh shit.” He was throbbing hard against your palm, breathing even harder against your neck and you cooed at him when his hips started thrusting up in time with your strokes. 

“Without asking? I don’t think so, Stevie. You haven’t even said please!” Your hand slowed and he moved so his hand was wrapped over yours, trying to get you to go faster but you swatted him away, scolding him with a pinch to his hip. 

Taking one look at his face that was still buried in your throat, you could tell he was out of it, so fucked out you weren’t sure he could even form words, let alone beg. But that didn’t stop you from egging him on, slowing down until he was so worked up he was on the verge of tears. 

“Oh fuck—please…baby, honey, please let me cum? I’ve been so good I just..shit I need it. You feel so good, perfect girl. O-oh my god, please. Please please please.” 

He was mumbling, a mix of curses and pleas as he left sloppy, open mouthed kisses against your throat. You think you’d give him anything he wanted right now with how pretty he sounded, all pathetic and fucked out for you. 

“Go ahead, pretty boy. Cum on my hand, yeah? Make a mess of us.” Your hand sped up on his cock, feeling yourself leak into his bed as he twitched against your fingers. You kept going, kept talking as his hips got sloppy and cock was red and begging for release. 

“Don’t know how you’ll ever fit inside me, Stevie. Gonna have to prep me for days I think.” 

“Next time you’ll have to use my mouth, yeah? I hate letting your cum go to waste.” 

“Y’look so pretty like this. My sweet boy thrusting up into my hand, gonna think about this for days.”

He thrusted up one final time, hips stilling and body going tight as his orgasm took over. His cum coated your fist that was still wrapped around him, reaching his belly and even spilling down onto his thighs. He couldn’t even see the way you pouted at how much had been wasted, cursing yourself for not letting him use your mouth. 

Slumped completely against your chest he mumbled something about his legs feeling like jelly and you giggled, cheek resting against his forehead. 

“Soooo, good then?” 

It took all the energy he could muster to squeeze your thigh, head moving to the side a fraction so he could look at you, smiling so big his cheeks had to hurt. “Are you fuckin’ kidding? I think I just saw god for a second.” 

Rolling your eyes and shoving at his shoulders, butterflies danced in your stomach at how pretty he looked. His skin was flushed and glowing, hair a mess where you’d both pulled at it, lips swollen and red from biting and kissing and holding them between his teeth. He looked phenomenal. 

As much as you’d love to stay here wrapped up in him for the rest of your life, your thighs had gone numb from being stretched around his hips and your back ached from sitting back against his headboard for so long. 

Out of the corner of your eye you could see him nodding off on your shoulder, eyes fluttering shut and little puffs of air hitting your skin. You tapped his cheeks with your clean hand, “C’mon, Stevie. Gotta clean us up and then we can go straight to bed.” 

He groaned in protest but leaned up enough so that you could slip from behind him, legs tingling when you stood on them, hobbling to the bathroom on shaky legs and flipping Steve off when you heard him chuckle from behind you. 

“Oh fuck off, Harrington.” 

          ******************************************

When Steve wakes up the next morning it’s slow and sweet, eyes blinking open and a small smile on his lips when he feels you pressed into his side. 

He looks down and tries not to laugh at your mouth hanging open, a little bit of drool on his chest from where your cheek is squished against his skin. Your hair is sticking up in every direction and he can feel your breath on him. It makes his heart grow in his chest, an overwhelming sense of joy and contentment washing over him as he stares down at you. He could get used to this, you attached to his hip and waking up to you in his bed. 

Thinking back to when you barely gave him the time of day, he smiles at your relationship now. How you’re just as needy as him, tugging on his belt loop to pull him to you if he’s not close enough for your liking, pulling his hand to your thigh in his car if he doesn’t do it first. He’s seen you use your foot to pull his chair closer to yours at work countless times, a little smile on his mouth every time. 

There’s a part of him that doesn’t know how he got so lucky. He feels that way all the time but especially when you laugh louder than you mean to, hand coming up to cover your mouth with a bashful smile. He feels it when you're humming along to a song you’d heard on the radio, head moving side to side and hips swaying to the beat in your head. He feels it when you randomly bring his hand up to your mouth, pressing a kiss to his palm and to his fingertips. 

He feels it all the time, really. 

And he loves when you're mean to him, when you tease him about staring at you too long or for getting all bashful when you do something normal like tuck your hair behind your ear or scrunch your nose. He loves that you turn him into mush. 

“Stop staring, you creep.” He’d been so lost in his thoughts he didn’t notice your eyes opening or how’d you had scooted closer to him, one leg coming up to tangle with his, wrapped together tightly. 

“That’s rich coming from you considering I’m gonna have to clean your drool off me.” You gasped, sitting up straight and smacking at this chest, appalled at the notion that you would ever—could ever—drool on him in your sleep. 

“Keep it up, Steve. Remember what happened the last time you pissed me off?”

As if he’d ever forget. Unfortunately for you, the idea of repeating last night, or anything like it, was hardly going to deter him from pressing your buttons in the way that only he knew how to do. Reaching out he tugged you back down to him, tucking you back into his side and pressing a soft kiss to the crown of your head. 

“Don’t tempt me with a good time.” 

[ssweetleaf]

babies.

husband!steve harrington x wife!reader

summary: you finally tell steve that you’re ready for a baby.

includes: SMUT 18+, breeding kink, not really a daddy kink but he refers to himself as daddy lol, mating press, creampie, unprotected p in v

˗ˏˋ ♡ ˎˊ˗

“Hang on— what did you say?”

Steve felt as if he was dreaming, completely delirious, struggling to stay on his feet when his knees started to buckle.

He clutched a quivering palm to his chest, as if in attempt to quell his heart, but nothing could sate the thick thumping that barrelled through his rib cage.

You smiled at him, a small, impish one that made his eyelids flutter and you stepped closer, smoothing your hands along his shoulders before resting upon the thickness of both biceps, squeezing only slightly— just for your benefit, of course.

You knew it was something he’d desperately wanted to hear for a long while, so you spoke slowly, hoping the few words you spoke would register properly.

Because this was real. Such a big step, something that Steve had always dreamt of, but you not quite. It took a good few years for you to succumb to the idea of raising kids; a pretty house and a small wedding— even a few cats roamed around your home, so you knew that something was missing, something you now wanted desperately in your life.

“I want to try for a baby, Steve.” You spoke, watching his doe eyes grow even rounder, little tears threatening to ebb while he felt all melty and gooey, moving forward to shakily cup your cheeks and bring you closer towards him.

Steve nuzzled his nose against yours, sighing out a big breath and sponging a sweet, chaste little kiss to the corner of your mouth.

“I don’t know what to say, honey, I’m—” he shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut, his thumbs lazily circling the apples of your cheeks. “I’m so fucking happy.”

—

So, the two of you fucked like rabbits— for hours and hours, multiple times a day, the mere feeling of his raw length inside you had you creaming around him in minutes, and it was much akin for Steve, the soft, gummy walls of your cunt squeezing around him with no barrier between the two of you.

It felt like heaven.

Steve had insisted that you both have sex as regular as you could, the need to have you pregnant, to make it stick, needed to be quenched, and you nodded along like the doting little wife you were.

“My pretty honey,” he cooed, pressing your knees firmly against your heaving chest, holding you in a mating press whilst he fucked his thick cock into your spasming pussy.

Sweat beaded along his hairline, breathless from his hard thrusts— he had already came inside of you three times that same day, however you knew he wouldn’t let up until he saw those two red lines that told him what he’d wanted to hear.

“Gotta give you my babies, don’t I, hon?” He uttered, moaning breathily into the stuffy air— his full, round balls smacking against your ass with every inward thrust, so full of cum and ready to breed. “Gotta be thorough now, baby— want you nice ‘n’ round.”

He was babbling, words slurring into something almost nonsensical— his pretty lips sponged at any piece of skin he could find, mouthing and suckling with a desperation that shone in his honeyed eyes.

Your pussy practically sucked him in, letting his ruddy tip nudge at the spot so deep inside you, that had you clenching and fluttering.

“Fuck, jus’ wanna be a daddy so bad,” he whined, “and once we have our first, we’ll have another, and another, and another— oh fuck.”

He was fisting the pillow underneath your head, muscles drawn tight, trying so hard to keep his eyes open and not let them flutter closed— trying hard to keep his eyes on you.

“But don’t worry, honey baby,” he sighed with a smile, still thrusting as deep as he could, his thumb moving to rub at your clit. “You’ll still be daddy’s best girl— daddy’s favourite, I’ll make sure of it.”

You whined. He was so filthy, so crude, as soon as his big dick would slip inside of you he’d be gone, so stupid, completely pussy drunk. Silly boy.

“You ready for it, hon?” He cooed, nuzzling his nose into your cheek, “ready for my cum, pretty girl?”

You nodded, uttering a small ‘yes, Stevie’ through a moan and a sigh, clenching hard and quivering around him, ready to cum yourself.

The sheer need to be filled had you delirious.

“Yeah, gonna fill you up— gonna put a sweet baby in that pretty tummy of yours,” he hummed, “that sound good?”

“Sounds s’good, Stevie,” you whined, struggling to keep hold of your legs, your limbs shaky when you tried to keep your knees pressed against you. “Wan’ it so bad, want your cum— want your babies.”

He nodded fervently, hair whipping in every which way, dick throbbing in you hotly, the taut veins pulsing with every inward thrust— so, so close and ready to burst.

“I know ya do, hon— you ready to take it? You ready to take another load, baby?” He whined, squeezing his eyes shut, thrusts turning sloppy and erratic, “I know you’re so full, can barely fit anymore cum inside this poor pussy, huh?”

“Can take it, Stevie,” you spoke, fluttering your lashes, your lips all pouty and pink, “promise.”

And with one, two, three thrusts, he stilled inside of you, so deep, tip kissing your cervix before shooting his thick, pearly ropes of cum inside you, hoping to fill you with his Harrington prodigy, to make all the babies he could wish for.

Steve kept your legs raised, pulling them from your chest to place above his shoulders, keeping your back arched.

“Gotta make sure it takes,” he whispered, stroking at your calf before pressing a little kiss to your ankle. “think this is the one, honey.”

[andvys]

The edges of your soul (I haven't seen yet) ⭐︎ S.H.

⭐︎ Warnings: 18+ mdni! post apocalypse, character death, angst, mean!steve, grumpy!steve x sunshine!reader, blood, wounds -- all the gory stuff, smut in the future chapters, hurt/comfort

⭐︎ Pairing: Grumpy!Steve Harrington x sunshine(fem)!reader

⭐︎ Summary: Everything he once knew, is gone, dead and buried, burned to the ground and turned into ash. All he has known is loss, death and pain, he despised this world, until it brought you to him -- the sunshine he had long forgotten. Light he will follow till the very end.

⭐︎

Prologue ☀︎ When the sun hits, she'll be waiting

Chapter one ☀︎ Welcome and Goodbye

Chapter two ☀︎ Can you see right through me?

Chapter three ☀︎ You’re the greatest thing we’ve lost

Chapter four ☀︎ While I'm alone and blue as can be

Chapter five ☀︎ Watching cityscapes turn to dust

Chapter six ☀︎ The killing time. Unwillingly mine.

Chapter seven ☀︎ Fall back into place. Fall back...

[lqveharrington]

steve harrington - you are in love <3

congrats on 2k!

You Are In Love | S.H.

summary: you and steve have been best friends forever, but overtime, you both realize that there's something more to your friendship than you both thought there was.

pairing: steve harrington x hopper!reader

includes: fluff, minimal usage of Y/N, oblivious idiots, kissing, el and reader are siblings, robin and max play match maker

a/n: cutie patootie stevie! (rules for celebration here!)

Steve Harrington was the type of man girls would go crazy over. From the way he behaved to the way he dressed, they would do anything to get his attention. Luckily for you, he deemed you to be his best friend since childhood. When Tommy and Carol whined about you always hanging around them in high school, Steve would swiftly change the subject. He really only liked hanging out with you anyway.

When you both graduated, something shifted between the two of you. Without the hindrance of Tommy and Carol, you and Steve were free to do whatever you wanted. Whenever you would hang around him, it felt like time would stop. He kept you on your toes despite knowing him for so long.

Weekly dinners around Hawkins during the year would soon become a tradition between the two of you. In your eyes they were friendly dates, but to the kids, you were practically dating. From the whispers as you hung back with him when taking the kids around the mall to the silver necklace he bought you during the summer — they saw something you and Steve couldn't.

They had to do something about it. Fortunately for them, you both made it quite easy.

"Harrington, are you taking me to dinner today or should we reschedule?" You hop onto the counter of Family Video, crossing your legs and smiling brightly at him. "Henderson told me you might have to drive him home after his DND thing or whatever."

"First of all," He started and pulled your legs to the side, sending you a bored look. "I'm at work and you can't bother me." You jokingly pout and follow his movements, watching him restock the bowl of candies at the front. "Secondly, we're still on for dinner. Dustin can get a ride from Munson."

You throw your head back and laugh, "Ah yes, the shared custody of your child."

He rolled his eyes and looked past your head, narrowing his eyes at Max and Eleven. "Why did the girls want to come here again?"

"Uhm, they said they were checking out a new movie that came out." You shrug and slide off the counter. You look in their direction to find them giggling and whispering about something you almost wanted to know about. Almost. "Anyway, don't miss me too much. I'll see you in a few hours, Harrington."

Steve pressed a kiss to the side of your head and pushed a stray piece of hair away from your face. "I'll see you in a bit, Hopper."

You grinned at him and sent him one last wave before rounding up the girls, dragging them back to your car. Before you could even ask them to buckle up, they began hounding you with questions you never expected them to ask. One of the more odd questions sticking out the most.

"Have you ever slept with Steve?" Eleven asked, making you whip around with wide eyes and mouth agape. Her own eyes widened in fear and looked at you with concern. "What?"

Your face flushed a dark red and you began to stutter over your words, unsure of where the question even originated from. "Well, I— No, I haven't but I'm— I'm sorry? What's happening? Do you even know what that means?"

"That you sleep in the same bed as him." She tilted her head and giggled at your red face. "Is that not what that means?"

Max shook her head but found it all amusing, crossing her arms and raising her eyebrows at you. "You seem a little flustered, Hopper. What's up with that?"

"Nothing." You glare at her from your rear view as you pull out of the parking and begin the drive to her house. When Eleven still stared in confusion, you sighed and ran your fingers through your hair. "Yes, I have slept in the same bed as Steve before. And not like that, Mayfield."

"What?"

You shake your head and follow the road down, eyes occasionally flickering up to look at the girls who were still giggling. You didn't understand what they were trying to get at. You've always been able to sleep in the same bed as Steve since an incident years ago, but that was the extent of it all. Sure, you would occasionally sleep in one of his shirts and he would make you breakfast in the mornings, but that was it.

"Have you ever been on a date, Y/N?" Eleven asked again and fiddled with the ends of her sweater, eyes meeting yours in the mirror. "Like the ones me and Mike go on?"

"Uh," You signal and stop at a red light, fingers tapping the steering wheel in an effort to keep your cool. "I have, but it's been a while since I've been on a date."

As you turn, Eleven makes another comment that nearly makes you swerve right off the road. "I thought you and Steve were dating."

You choke on your spit and grip the wheel harder, face redder than Max's hair. Although you knew your sister's words were somewhat innocent, you knew the other girl was behind all the questioning. Steve was nothing but a friend to you. Your best friend. It would be weird to think of him as anything other than that, right?

Since childhood, he was nothing but your best friend. Sometimes you couldn’t help but think what would happen if anything else came out of it, but only in your dreams. When you realized how quiet you were, you silently cursed yourself for staying silent for too long as the girls came to their own conclusion.

"He kisses you a lot." Max drawled and bit back a smirk when your face reddens again, the sight nearly making her laugh once more. "Like more than you study for your exams in college—"

"What will it take for you two to be quiet for the rest of the ride?" You continue to glare at the red-head in the backseat and squint when she opened her mouth. "And your answer will not be money."

Max sighed and looked at Eleven, their eyes meeting and silently communicating with each other. They grinned wickedly and looked over at you, tone overly sweet when they answered your question.

"Admit you're in love with Steve Harrington."

"Oh, Stevie!" Robin grinned widely as she sauntered back in from the break room, leaning back against the counter. She met his confused eyes and tilted her head, still wearing a mischievous grin. "I have a tiny, little question for you."

Steve dug through the boxes underneath the table and waved his hand, barely listening to the girl. "Which is?"

"Could I just — I dunno — take a peek at your wallet?” She asked and pursed her lips to stop from laughing when she saw his incredulous expression peek from underneath the counter. “I just want to make sure my assumptions are right.”

"About what?" Steve sighed in exasperation and ran his fingers through his hair, praying that his hair still looked perfect after how many times he had done it.

"Just give me your stupid wallet." Robin huffed and snatched the leather from his hands. She scrunched her nose at him before opening the wallet, gasping when she found what she was looking for. "Oh my gosh."

Steve creased his brows and looked at the contents of his wallet. There was nothing but cash, his license, cards, and picture he’s had since high school. If Robin was planning on stealing, she picked the wrong day.

"What?"

"You do have a picture of Y/N in your wallet!" Robin all but squealed like a child, causing the customers in the store to look over at the commotion.

Steve sent them a strained smile before grabbing his wallet back from Robin and tucking it away, muttering quiet obscenities to the girl. Robin rolled her eyes, but the smirk that curled her lips overtook her emotions. He knew that some kind of electricity between the two oblivious idiots.

"You like her!" She spoke in a sing-song voice, lightly punching his shoulder. Robin laughed in excitement and shook her head before pausing, turning to look at Steve like a behavioral analyst. "Unless it's something more."

He looked to his left and to his right before raising a brow at her. He would never admit it out loud, but somewhere along the line he fell for you. Hard. From summer car drives to coffee at midnight — you were the one for him. Yet he didn’t want to ruin what the two of you had.

When Steve stayed silent for too long, she started to punch his shoulder in excitement again. It was the silence between asking about love that seemed to trigger everyone today.

"Oh, you're in love! Steve 'the hair' Harrington finally falls in love with his one true love!" She dramatically put a hand to her forehead and leaned back on the counter again. "I thought I would never live to see the day that happens."

He huffed and lightly shoved her, rubbing his hand over his face. "She's my best friend."

"And?" Robin pushed him back and continued to smile, clearly finding his reaction amusing. It wasn’t rare for her to tease him about his dates, but knowing that he was deeply in love with you made it so much more fun. "She clearly likes you too."

"She does?" Steve perked up and rolled his eyes when she winked at him. He flipped her off and pretended to be busy again. “You’re so annoying.”

"Stevie is in love!" She laughed again and sighed softly, tapping her fingers against the counter. "You're going to dinner with her tonight, right?"

He sent her an odd look and nodded, brows furrowing in confusion. "Yeah, what does that—?"

"Confess tonight! I'm sure she loves you too, Harrington." She slammed her palms down onto the counter, once again attracting the customers in the store. Steve sent them another apologetic look before turning his head to glare at the girl. By the end of the day, he swore that they would get a complaint about Robin.

Robin put a hand up to his face when she saw he was going to speak. “And before you back out, the girls and I already made a plan so nothing becomes awkward between the two of you if it fails."

Steve’s eyes widened and pushed her hand out of the way, mind reeling at all the knew information. "Wait what?"

"Nothing!"

After dinner, you both decided to take a walk around the neighborhood. The temperature was perfect and you and Steve had plenty of calories to kill before heading to bed. Besides, you both had unspoken words to say to one another.

"Are you okay? You've been acting strange since you picked me up." You nudged your shoulder with his and tilted your head, eyes worried with concern.

As you walked through the neighborhood, the orange lights from the posts began to flicker on as the sun set in front of you. On instinct, you moved closer to Steve, accommodating to the warmth you were losing. He hid a small smile and pulled you close by the shoulders.

Steve shrugged and kissed the side of your head again. The gears in his head were loudly turning and he wasn’t sure how to make them stop. He met your eyes and smiled softly when you smiled up at him.

"On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate the new diner?" He nudged his head back toward the diner.

You hummed and tapped your chin in thought, snapping your fingers when you figured out how to put it. "A solid six and a half. They threw us a dirty glare for being too loud, but their milkshakes were perfect."

He raised his brows and chuckled softly when you rolled your eyes at him. You were always such a sucker for strawberry milkshakes. "Yeah?"

"Yes, Harrington.” You send him a teasing smile before extending your arm and flashing him your left hand adorned with the wrapping from the straw wrapper. “I even got to make us our paper rings."

You turned to face him properly and grabbed his left hand, lacing them together to show the matching rings. You went to say something else when you found him already staring at you, making your mind instantly blank.

Steve swallowed and squeezed your hand, taking a step closer to you. "Y/N?"

"Yeah?" You murmur and take your own step closer until you were chest to chest.

His gaze dropped to your lips before looking back into your eyes, eyes filled with so much emotion. You gave him a curt nod and let him cup your cheek, shutting your eyes when he leaned in.

Your lips met and for the first time, you really believed time truly stopped. It was just you and him on the sidewalk of Hawkins, Indiana. Your own hands came up to grab the lapels of his denim jacket, deepening the kiss when he pulled you impossibly closer.

When you finally pulled away, your mind was still blanking and the first thing you could say was —

"Oh, my strawberry milkshake." You whisper out before groaning, hiding your face in his shoulder. "Now the thing I say after we first kiss will always be strawberry milkshake!"

Steve kisses the top of your head and gently squeezed your waist. "You're cute."

You scoff before looking up, playing with the buttons on his jacket. "Did Robin put you up to this?"

"Yep." He chuckled and tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, narrowing his eyes at you when he realized what Robin meant. "Did the girls?"

"Yep." You sigh and push up on your toes to give him a quick peck. You tilt your head when he smiles, "We're not going to tell them about this and make them feel bad, right?"

"Of course not.” He laced his hands with yours and began the trek back to his car. "We're only best friends after all."

©lqveharrington - all rights reserved. do not copy, translate or share my work on other media platforms

[luveline]

(𝐢𝐭’𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞) 𝐡𝐞’𝐬 𝐦𝐲 𝐛𝐨𝐲𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝 | 𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐭𝐨𝐧

Steve hears you wrong, thinks he’s your boyfriend, and begins to act accordingly. You try your best to go along with it until you can’t anymore. 3k, fem. requested here ♡ 

cw shy(ish)!reader, misunderstandings, steve being a huge sweetheart, fluff, hurt/comfort, bonus fluff scene 

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

The arcade is loud and brisk this evening, doors thrown open to allow for the constant ebb and flow of younglings, the machine music turned up to account for so many voices. You’re lost in a sea of rainbow flashing lights and the ticklish smell of sugar. Without Steve’s hand behind your shoulder, you’re pretty sure you would’ve gotten lost and trampled half an hour ago. 

A candy necklace pinwheels past your heads like a torpedo, forcing you closer together, your shoulders tight with a flinch. 

“We can leave,” Steve says immediately. He’s weirdly thoughtful. Before he asked you out you had no idea he thought so much about other people, but he’s always thinking about other people. You could argue he thinks a little too much, like you. 

“I wanna see Max.” 

“She has to be here somewhere.” 

That theory proves less and less likely. Steve’s hand falls away from you, tugging through his hair in a marker of stress as you circle the Palace Arcade for the tenth time. “Maybe she quit?” you suggest. 

Steve’s eyebrows pinch together as he gives the arcade another sweep. Max’s rough patch freaked him out, as it freaked you out, because ‘rough patch’ is a kind way to describe it. She could’ve got a whole lot worse; she was suffering, capital S. It’s nice to see her returning to society, but not if she isn’t actually settling in. That’s the whole reason you’re here. 

Steve frowns at you worriedly. 

“Who died?” asks a new voice.

You breathe out a sigh of relief. “Max!” Steve cheers. 

“That’s me,” Max says, looking at you both sceptically. Her ginger hair is pulled into two tight braids either side of her face, her cheeks flushed red. Mascara paints her usually pale lashes a darker brown, and a rosy tinted chapstick shines on her lips. 

“Hey, the uniform looks good on you,” he says affectionately. “You look like a valued member of society.”

“A society in need of better labour laws. I’m pretty sure this is child abuse.” She rolls her eyes. 

“Is it awful?” you ask. 

“It’s fine. Better when your stupid friends aren’t here making themselves sick on candy like they’re nine years old,” she says pointedly to Steve. “Are you going to throw up too? You look–” she grimaces in place of insult. 

“Who’s throwing up?” you ask. 

“Dustin. He’s outside.” 

Steve sighs and gives your shoulder a kind squeeze. “I’ll be right back,” he says, squaring his expression. “Goddamn kids.” 

He sounds like an old man, you think to yourself with a small smile. Disgruntled, he still goes to make sure everyone’s alright. He’s nice, even when that nice is begrudging and tiresome and plain gross sometimes. 

“Why are you smiling at him like that?” Max asks.

You school your impression. “Like what?” 

“Like you like him.” 

You shake your head. “Tell me about work, Max. What’s it like here? Are they giving you your breaks?” 

She drags you over to the counter to sit in the seat waiting behind. She glares at any kid who approaches, but besides that she seems in good spirits. The job isn’t hard, it’s just a job. She’d much rather be at home reading, but wouldn’t everyone? “And I get this sweet uniform,” she says, pointing at the embroidered icon on her shirt pocket. “What’s with you and Steve?” 

“Nothing,” you say, though it’s something. You’re mortified to have been caught having feelings. 

“Looks like something. Are you dating?” 

“I mean, this is a date,” you say, almost whispering as heat floods your face. “But we’re not together.” 

“He was touching you a lot.” 

“Max, he’s really nice. He’s a really nice guy,” you say gently, “and we’re not together, but if he does ask me out eventually, maybe I’ll say yes.” You realise what you’re saying and attempt to backtrack —you do like Steve, but Max doesn’t need to know that. “It’s not like he’s my boyfriend,” you say strangely. 

“Ew,” Max says with a laugh. 

“Not ew,” you correct. You hadn’t meant it in a bad way, it’s— 

“Not ew,” Steve says from behind you, his arm a heavy weight across your shoulder. 

You look wide-eyed up at his face, surprised by his huge beaming smile, an intense loveliness about him as he gives you a half hug. 

“What’s ew about that?” he asks you softly. 

Oh, boy, you think. 

As it turns out, being Steve’s girlfriend is kind of nice, but you aren’t ready.

From that afternoon at the Palace Arcade onward, he treats you like you’re made of gold. And it’s great, he’s so kind, he brings you flowers and takes you out for breakfast, where he pays the tab without any flourishes and talks to you as casually as always. You almost hope he hasn’t got it wrong at all, and that his soft tone a few days ago had been down to a brief overwhelming fondness. You’d get that. You have your moments with him, you’re falling for him, and it’s only a matter of time before you’re desperately in love, you’re sure, but then the waitress asks if you need anything else and he says, “Just a water for my girl,” and you realise you’re not getting off easy. 

Dating is sort of like being good friends; you’d planned to spend the day together anyways. You enjoy his company. It’s clear he’s eager, optioning off the day’s agenda as you return to the car, the bottom of your face hidden in your bouquet. 

“We could go to the movies,” he says, opening the passenger door, his smile seemingly permanent as you climb inside. “No science fiction, I promise.” 

“I kind of like sci-fi.” Petals press fragrant to your top lip.

“Well, we don’t have to go to the Hawk. We could go into the city. I bet they’re playing any movie you wanna see.” He checks that your leg is properly inside the car before he closes the door, jogging around to the driver’s side and practically throwing himself inside. He’s giggling like a kid. “Shit, I’ll see anything you want to.” 

“Steve.” 

“Or we can go do nothing? Until dinner.” 

“Steve,” you say again, thinking you’ll tell him. Nothing good ever comes from dishonesty. 

“What?” he asks. 

His eyes are so brown. Billions of people with brown eyes and you swear you’ve never seen anything like it before, their centres like hot honey, the sweetheart shape to them when he smiles 

You sigh. His smile is contagious, even while your stomach hurts. “Nothing. Let’s go see a movie.” 

“Are you okay?” 

“What?” 

“What do you mean, what? You sounded weird.” 

“I sounded weird?” 

“No!” He winces. “I mean, yeah, you sounded weird for you, like you… I don’t know. Sorry.” 

You feel bad, then. His apology is earnest, his hand resting open on the console for you to take if you could manage the flustering heat of it. 

“I wanna go to the movies,” you say, ‘cos you really do. 

“Alright, good. It’s just, I think my last relationship, I– I didn’t pay enough attention, and I want to do that better this time around. So yeah. Sorry.” 

Oh, Steve, you think. How are you supposed to tell him now? You’re gonna have to pretend to be ready for a relationship with him until you really are, it seems. He doesn’t deserve to have his heart played with twice. 

“Don’t be sorry,” you say gently. “Let’s go watch a movie, okay? I want to go, with you, we’ll watch a shitty daytime flick and then get dinner after. It’ll be fun.” 

You aren’t lying to him about what you want. It’s clear to everybody, Steve and his friends and especially you, that you like him, that you want to be around him and make him laugh. Maybe being his girlfriend won’t even be that different to being his something. 

After all, what’s romantic about seeing a movie? 

“You good?” he asks, half an hour later, your agony prolonged. 

You’re at the back of the movies where the seats have the most leg room, more popcorn and candy than you could ever eat at your feet and a litre cup stuffed into the armrest between you. Steve is tucking his shirt back into his jeans, his head parting the light of the projector and leaving a silhouette in the previews. 

“Steve,” you advise, gesturing for him to lean down out of the way. 

He leans down, further and further, face to face with you with his hands on his hips. A flirtatious teasing makes its way onto his lips. “What?” he asks, amused. 

“You were in the way of the light.” 

“That what it was?”

“Seriously!” you whisper-shout, laughing despite yourself. 

“You’re so cute,” he whispers back. “Want to take your jacket off?” 

Your lips part at his good suggestion. You hold your arm out and start to peel from your jacket, but he takes your sleeve and helps you out of it before folding it and sitting in the seat next to you, your jacket on his thigh. “How’s that, babe?” he asks. 

“It’s good.” 

“Okay, perfect.” He beams at you. He’s always smiling when he’s with you, like you’re the best thing since sliced bread. Like he loves you. “Tell me if you need something, yeah? I know you’re kinda shy.” 

He settles back in his seat with your jacket still in his lap and no indication that he might want to move it. Your knees touch as he relaxes, your knuckles as he puts his arm on the rest between you, a picture of contentedness as the movie begins and the opening credits play. “That’s us,” he says without looking at you. 

Two people walk down the street holding hands as the title of the movie blazes in yellow font with thick red outlines. A Day In Paradise! 

You bite down on a slither of the inside of your lip until it stings. You try to fight it off but the longer you sit there, the more your eyes burn, thinking about Steve and what he deserves and how unfortunate this whole thing is, and yeah, you’re overwhelmed, too. You aren’t ready for so much sweetness all at once. You don’t deserve it, he doesn’t deserve this. 

You force the tears away. The movie goes on and on, the lights low, the chatter of moviegoers and the occasional popcorn crush not nearly loud enough to cover the sound of Steve’s breathing. 

He pushes his hair out of his face. Somebody on screen makes a joke, his hand brushes against yours, and then takes it gently as he laughs. 

You pull your hand away and tip your head down, a frantic tear flicking from your lashes. 

“You okay?” he whispers. 

You try to answer. You whimper instead, a terrible, sorry sound stuck to your throat —you can’t hold it in anymore. It’s too much. 

“I’m sorry,” you mumble tearily, looking up, a tear rolling fast down the bump of your cheek. 

Steve sits still in moderate horror. “Why are you crying?” he whispers.

The thing about Steve that people tend to forget is that, while he takes care of people the best that he can, he’s really young. He doesn’t always know what to do. He stares at you now like you’re a foreign object, hand tucked back into his abdomen. 

A tear drips onto your lip. It tastes salty. “Sorry,” you say. 

“Why?” he asks, dumbfounded.

“I really like you, Steve.” 

He stares at you. “…But?”

“But I–” His frown hurts your heart. “I don’t know if I’m ready for all of this, I never– never had someone like me like this, I don’t know why I’m crying.” You say that last part to yourself rather than him, scrubbing your cheeks with your hands roughly before hiding your face completely. “It’s not you.” 

“I thought…” And of course he did. 

“I know,” you say. “I’m sorry, Steve. I thought it wouldn’t matter but everything’s going so fast.” 

He touches your arm gently. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I thought you wanted this. You– you said I was your boyfriend, to Max? I thought you liked me.” 

“I do like you,” you insist, meeting his eyes. 

“Can I wipe your tears away? They’re everywhere,” he says. You struggle to read his expression, but there’s no resentment or anger there for you. He looks quite serious. 

“Yeah.” 

Steve bends in his seat to wipe your tears off of your face gently. They really are everywhere, on your cheeks, your top lip, your chin, even down the arc of your neck. “I don’t understand,” he says, going back to your cheek for a missed streak, “but you don’t have to be upset. Please. I won’t do anything you don’t want me to do, I promise.” 

“Steve, when I was talking to Max, I said,” —you wince— “that it’s not like you’re my boyfriend. She was asking me about you, and I got all panicky because I like you, but I’m too weird about this stuff, I’m panicking now–”

“Don’t.” His hand lingers on your face, before a sorry flash of dejection passes over him, and he drops your face altogether. 

“I didn’t mean for this to happen. Please believe me.” 

“Of course I believe you.” He grimaces at you, and the heartbreak turns to something more manageable, like he’s brushing himself off. “I’m sorry. For getting the wrong idea.” 

“I like you,” you whisper. Your voice is nearly lost to the rustle of popcorn and drinks. 

“I like you too!” he says loudly. 

A few seats down, somebody turns, an angry whirl of hair and clicky nails. “Can you guys shut up?” 

You and Steve leave your mountain of snacks behind to stand in the theatre hallway, where the winter air is cool on your flushed skin, and the silence is stifling. You lean against a wood feature wall and try to calm down, because he’s the one who should be upset (or maybe he’s not that fussed about you). He stands a half foot away with his arms crossed, looking down at his shoes, though occasionally he glances at you for a split-second and looks away again. 

“You okay?” he asks tightly. 

“I’m sorry.”

He pokes his cheek with his tongue. “So you don’t want to be together?” 

You don’t know. He deserves the truth, even if you barely understand it yourself, and it stings to say. “I do, I like you, but I… I want to take things slowly.” 

He stands there without talking for a while. When he does talk again, he’s laughing, that achy awful sadness he’d worn a far off memory. “You’re this upset because you want us to take things slow?” 

“I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.” 

“You haven’t,” he promises. “That would never hurt my feelings. I knew when I heard it that it was too good to be true.” He scratches the back of his neck. “I guess I gotta earn the title like everybody else does. Is that… cool?” 

You nod vehemently. 

Steve blows a relieved breath of air up his face, his hair ruffling off of his forehead. “I thought I was gonna lose you completely,” he says, smiling. “This is fine. I can work with slow. Slow’s my middle name.”

—♡—

The sun is a blistering heat today. “Can’t believe it’s only spring,” you murmur, eyes covered by the back of your arm. 

A weight sits down on the blanket beside you, the sound of dry grass crushed underfoot. He brings the fresh scent of lemon slices with him, the zest sticking to his hands.

“I think I might melt.” 

“I’d never let that happen,” Steve says, laying down beside you. 

“You can be my parasol.” 

“Your what?” 

“It’s a sun umbrella.” 

“Like this?” he asks, gently laying himself across your front, his face on the slip of your stomach that’s bare, his arms sneaking behind your thighs to hug them as you bring them up. 

You reach down to stroke his hair, taking your fingers through the silky lengths of it, fingernails scratching ever so slightly at his scalp. “Thanks,” you say.

He kisses your naked leg. “You’re welcome, honey.” 

If he’d done that at the beginning of your relationship, you’d have frozen up; not because he would’ve done it differently, not because he wasn't always your handsome sweetheart, but because being comfortable with someone this intimately takes time, and that’s okay. 

“Your face is digging into my hip,” you murmur. 

He shifts back, his ear above your belly button. “Is that better?” 

“That’s perfect.” 

“Are you falling asleep?” he asks softly. 

“No… I’m thinking.” 

“Nothing good ever comes of that.” 

“I have something I want to talk to you about.”

“I love talking to you,” he says. He sounds as though he might fall asleep himself, his tongue heavy in his mouth. 

You stroke his hair away from his face by touch alone. Long, warm minutes pass without conversation. You aren’t scared to tell him how you’re feeling. He’s proved to you over time that he’s someone you’ll always be able to trust, and that whatever you have to say will hold weight. 

“It’s a question.” 

He turns in your hold to face you. You raise your arm, greeted by the image of him sun-kissed and lazing, laid out across you without a care in the world. 

“Don’t tell me then,” he says, rolling his eyes. “Jesus, you’re terrifying.” 

“Would you wanna be my boyfriend?”

He narrows his eyes at you. A myriad of emotions pass between you both, until he’s smiling, and you know he’s sitting up for a kiss seconds before he actually does. He presses his lips to yours carefully. “Baby,” he says as he pulls away, voice as mild as his soft kiss, “I think we’ve passed that point.” 

“I realised I’d never asked you, is all.” 

His hair falls down into his eyes. You tuck it behind his ear. It’s pretty clear now you’re together, even after such a bumpy start. 

“Can I get it in writing this time?” he asks, rubbing the tip of his nose against yours, your eyes fluttering closed in tandem. 

“Give you anything you want if you kiss me,” you murmur. 

His laugh fans over your lips. He cups your cheek, your heart a hummingbird drilling at your ribs as Steve moves in to kiss you properly. Your lips part under the pressure, your head tilting a touch to one side to accommodate him as he searches down for you, melty hot pleasure and nerves that never seem to fade arising as his thumb moves up your cheek, a semi-circle of touch. It promises undulating care whenever you want it. 

You tip your head aside to catch your breath.

“Better late than never,” you joke. 

Steve talks into the soft skin beside your mouth. “You weren’t late, babe. I was early, and I didn’t mind waiting.” 

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

thank u for reading!! pretty please like/reblog or comment if you enjoyed cos it means so much to me and inspires me to write even more!!! but either way i hope u enjoyed❤️❤️❤️

[randomsuggesteduseername]

So you’re telling ME…that after Steve got a job he hated at Scoops Ahoy, his college dream completely unattainable, no future in sight… he went out and bought a pair of blue Adidas Spezials to match his cute little sailor uniform?

that he put in the effort to make sure he’s matching from head to toe? I’m sorry but that’s so cute and completely something he would do…

like, never mind the fact that he absolutely loathes the job and that he’s mostly forced to attend it… he had to make sure he looked good doing it!

….

excuse me while i think about it for a while…

(thank you costume crew for that little detail so i can make up scenarios about Stevie shoe shopping with his uniform in hand, looking for what would match it best)