#and Steve fights Billy and tells him to protect the kids

[steviesbicrisis]

Season 2 rewrite that I think will be super cool: what if Eddie was a part of Kali's gang?

Maybe Eddie used to live in another state with his dad and when the police came to arrest him, Eddie doesn't wait for child services, he never finds out about his uncle, he just runs away.

He meets the gang and he likes what he sees: a bunch of outcasts, freaks, who want to take revenge on the people who hurt them. Eddie is full of anger, just like them, and he wants to make his father pay for what he has done to him and his mother.

But then, as he follows them in their avenging missions, something feels wrong. Despite all the anger in his bones, he can't bring himself to enjoy hurting others. He decides to stay on the sidelines, has no other place to go, no family, and doesn't want to turn his back on the first people who accepted him, even with their debatable moral compass.

When Jane arrives, Eddie, much like Kali, sees something of himself in her. When they go on her first mission, he decides to join them, much to everyone's surprise. And when Jane spares the man who she was supposed to kill, Eddie knows for certain she's just like him.

Jane doesn't belong with Kali, Eddie doesn't belong with Kali. But Jane has some people, friends, she told Eddie about, that are the closest thing to a family that she ever had.

The cops arrive at their hiding place, they're jumping on the van, but Jane doesn't. Eddie looks at the cops coming close, then at Jane, then at Kali, then he jumps out the van and follows her.

He wants to meet these friends who are worth fighting for.

[acowardinmordor]

Steve has powers, specifically of a Doesn’t Stay Dead variety. He knows theirs a limit on how many times he can come back. Let’s go with eight. Aka he has nine lives. He knows there’s a cap, and he has some kind of mark on his body that counts down. He lost one as a kid, doing something like riding his bike too fast, and crashing over a hill. Nothing nefarious, just a bad accident.

He drinks himself unconscious freshman year, and wakes up in vomit, missing a marker.

He survives the demogorgon.

Billy kills him though. So does the Russian beating.

The kids realize after Starcourt that Steve really was killed by the Russians, but don’t realize there’s a cap. It makes them feel safer if they think that Steve will always be there for him.

He doesn’t tell them that he died twice. The only reason he knows about the second is because he woke up the next day missing one of the marks. He never went to the hospital, so doesn’t know why or how, just that he’s used six of his eight chances.

Definitely drowns getting dragged through watergate, and barely revived before the others reached him. Only one left.

Eddie survives, barely. Steve learned his lesson from Starcourt and goes to the hospital, takes the antibiotics. Takes it easy, tells himself that it’s all over. So it’s fine. And he still has one spare.

Gets close with Eddie as they recover and wait on the Feds. And Eddie loves stories, knows fairytales and immediately declares that this infinite life glitch is fake. There’s no way it’s Infinite. He assumes that Steve doesn’t know that, and isn’t going to tell him. They get close enough that Eddie sees the marks on the back of Steve’s neck, sees seven faded, sees one left. He freaks out for a while. Tries to talk to Robin about it, but even she doesn’t know, and he doesn’t know how to tell her this secret that doesn’t belong to him.

Steddie is not quite together, but everyone knows it’s an any day now thing. That’s when Vecna comes back.

Steve goes down protecting the kids. But he gets up a moment later. It’s the first time they ever saw it happen, and it cements Steve as the coolest dude ever. He’s invincible.

Something something, they have a plan that needs someone to take on a very dangerous bait role. Obviously, to the kids, Steve is the only possible choice. And since it doesn’t matter, Steve wouldn’t let anyone else do it anyway, there’s no reason to tell them. Either he’ll survive or he won’t.

Eddie though? Not having it. Informs the group that he’s going with Steve. No one likes this plan. Eddie has vivid, vicious scars from last time. Steve can come back to life. It’s just stupid for Eddie to risk himself.

They’re both self sacrificing idiots, and when shit goes down, they’re both determined that THEY will be the one to die and save the other.

Luckily, they cancel each other out. Neither dies during the fight, and the others find them fast enough to get them to the hospital. It’s not until Eddie wakes up from the surgical anasthesia, and frantically asks about Steve that the secret comes out. He’s drugged out of his mind, and rambles his fears and the marks and how he knows that Steve won’t survive another one.

Unluckily, the kids and Robin were clustered around Eddie’s bed - around the bed of the guy they thought was at risk of dying and staying dead, because they knew Steve would be okay no matter what - and they hear all of it.

So it’s a horrible thing as they look at the other bed in the room, at Steve, still not awake, still critical, and have to grapple with that fear, even as they try to count, and learn all the times and ways that Steve has died before. Praying that it won’t happen again

[steddieas-shegoes]

Eddie had heard plenty of stories about Steve losing fights.

He had the concussions to prove it.

But what Eddie saw with his own two eyes was far more impressive than whatever version of Steve had let Jonathan Byers and Billy Hargrove win.

He’d seen how quick he was to defend the kids, defend Nancy and Robin, even defend Eddie when he barely knew him. He’d thrown himself head first into the mix, nail bat in hand or not.

So when Eddie asked about it, Steve shrugged it off.

“Everyone loses fights.”

Sure, everyone does. But he’s seen Steve win against literal alternate dimension monsters.

No way a human teenage boy or two could be harder to beat.

But he let it go. If Steve insisted on it being a couple of genuine losses, so be it.

But Eddie doesn’t let things go. Especially not when it comes to Steve.

“I guess I just don’t understand how you lost to Jonathan. I mean had he ever even been in a fight before?”

“No. But neither had I.”

“But you should’ve won that fight with no effort. No offense to Jonathan, but he’s scrawny and doesn’t even punch right.”

“I don’t know. Why are you so hung up on this?”

Well, because this wasn’t simple. Eddie could tell Steve was hiding something, he just didn’t know what.

“I guess because no one else ever asked you.”

Steve stared at him, probably trying to figure out how to avoid answering.

“No one seems to ever ask you about you.”

Steve looked down at the floor.

“They don’t need to.”

“You deserve to have people care. So I’m gonna care for now and then I’m gonna have a chat with your idiot kids about relational reciprocity.”

“What?”

“They have to show they care about you as much as you care about them. That’s kind of the deal with friendship.”

“Oh.”

Oh? Did Steve genuinely not know that?

Jesus Christ.

“So?”

“I think I just wasn’t good at fighting.”

“Nah. That’s not it.”

Eddie could see Steve thinking.

When he finally spoke, he wasn’t making eye contact. Eddie reached his hand out towards his face, cupping his chin and lifting his face so he had to look at him.

“Try again, Stevie.”

Steve took in a shaky breath.

“I wasn’t good at fighting for me.”

Eddie nodded. “Why’s that?”

“Just didn’t seem like I deserved to win. I deserved the hits I got.”

“Why?”

“Because I was awful. I said shitty things or did shitty things. Or with Billy, I knew I had to let him take it out on me and I guess I thought I deserved it. I dunno.”

“Mm.”

He released Steve’s chin, watching as his head dropped back down and he seemed to curl in on himself.

Eddie couldn’t allow that to happen.

So he pulled Steve into his lap, smirking to himself just a little when he let out a yelp of surprise at the manhandling.

“So all this time, you’ve put your body and mind and future on the line for everyone else without a second thought, but when you had to protect yourself and only yourself, it’s not worth the effort? Am I understanding correctly?”

Steve didn’t respond, but then again, Eddie hadn’t really expected him to. He was too busy hiding his face in Eddie’s chest.

“That’s what I thought. So who taught you that you’re not worth fighting for? Who told you that anything you’ve done wrong should be considered a debt owed to whoever wanted to raise their fists? Who made you believe that your mistakes could only be absolved if you let them get punched out of you?”

Steve was crying; He could feel the cold wetness seeping through his shirt.

“You tell me who it was and I’ll make sure they know how it feels to lose a fight.”

“Just me.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

He let Steve sit with the words for a few minutes before speaking again.

“You did some not great things as a teenager, as many teenagers tend to do. Have you seen the way Mike talks to people? He’s a shithead. But do you think he deserves to get concussed from a punch to the temple?”

Steve shook his head.

“Dustin gets an attitude anytime we don’t immediately bend to his will and calls us names all the time. Do you think he deserves to get a plate smashed over his head?”

“Of course not.”

Steve’s voice was quiet.

“You have more than made up for any mistakes you may have made in the past, even without the punches being thrown at you. If I have to tell you that you deserve to be treated with kindness and respect every day, then I fucking will. Hear me?”

“Hear you.”

Steve was staring at Eddie, tears still silently and rapidly falling down his cheeks.

Eddie wiped them away and gave him a small smile.

“You have no idea how special you are. But that’s gonna change.”

“Okay.”

Eddie placed a kiss on his forehead before he wrangled him against his chest again, moving his legs so he could relax completely.

“Just relax, okay? I got you. You’re worth protecting.” Eddie sighed softly. “You’re worth everything.”

[voidpacifist]

I have a new brainworm about steve harrington that I need (NEED!!) to share

imagine this for me: it's 1983. nothing eventful happens, at least in the supernatural sense. steve and nancy still date, he still drops his terrible friends when he realizes they're not gonna support him if it doesn't fit their agenda, he still accidentally becomes close to a bunch of seventh graders when nance asks him if he can babysit--

(not that he'd ever say no to her, but it's not what he envisioned the summer of '84 to be like, okay?)

--and overall, things are relatively normal for him. his parents continue to be absent, but they still get excited for him when they learn he has a girlfriend or won a new award at the end of the school year for something sporty or what have you. they're not bad people, they just don't know how to be good parents. and they're always, always away.

but the thing about 1983, is that his final interaction with tommy before he "broke up" their friendship by dating someone kind and sweet and "perfect" like nancy, was him getting absolutely wailed on. enough that he went to the hospital with a severe concussion and some damage to his optic nerve. the doctors told him he already has something going on with his vision to begin with, probably a genetic disease passed down from one of his folks, that increase his chances of going blind earlier in life. meaning, if push came to shove, his vision could go entirely if he got into any more scruples with ex-friends or people who just generally disliked him.

and then lucas sinclair asks him for dating advice, because he likes max mayfield, the new girl in his class, and ultimately it lands steve being the chauffeur for their first date just days after halloween in 1984. by now, he and nancy have broken up — they weren't emotionally available in the ways they needed to be with one another, and steve knows his dream of the future is different from her own. this time, there's no speech about bullshit or faking it. they simply both know that their expiration is upon them and call it quits.

(it still hurts, but he told lucas to shoot his shot, because if there's anything he's learned by dating nancy wheeler, it's that projecting his heartbreak and hurt onto others is a gateway to toxicity in the water; and by god he is not sabotaging this kids emotional maturity, okay? okay)

so he takes the kids to bennys burgers, because lucas insists it's "cool enough" for this girl, and he doesn't want to overdo it by going somewhere too fancy. but when steve returns to pick them up, there's a hiccup in the plan.

billy, maxs step-brother and steve's most recent bother at school, is there, gearing up to try and scare lucas off, or do something worse. steve, anointed babysitter and generally protective friend, steps in without hesitation. the fight that results makes the local news. steve lands in the hospital again.

his vision doesn't go completely, but it goes enough. enough that he can't drive, enough that he'll have to find large print books or simply relearn to read altogether in braille. enough that he's advised to get a cane or a guide dog. enough that, when all is said and done, his old life has been completely upended.

jonathan--

(the same jonathan who has now swept nancy off her feet the way steve used to)

--surprisingly, is the one who ends up getting close to steve after this. he tells steve about what it was like when will was found after being missing for a week, about how he knows it isn't the same, but that he relates to the feeling of oh god, everythings different and nothing I used to have is coming back. he doesn't divulge on the details, but steve knows he's serious about understanding the feeling.

even more surprising is nancy, who commands him every day that god dammit steve, your life is not coming back unless you take it back yourself and then reassures him in the same breath that he's not weak for needing help doing so.

and then the kids join in too. and steve harrington isnt a king anymore of anything, but he's the king of his own life, he's the king of himself. he starts going back to school even when he feels embarrassed to be there, like he's an imposter or ill equipped. he starts going to public places just to meet poorly concealed whispers with something friendly and witty in return. he starts taking his power back in a way that never needs to hurt anyone, that never needs to hurt himself.

he also discovers he loves bright colors — neons and pinks and reds especially. he takes a trip with nancy and barb one day to indy on some sort of girls trip (they've long since made up since the first house party, and barb latches onto steve as a best friend shockingly fast in the wake of his and tommy's split), and it's there that he meets someone punk for the first time. he develops a fixation on the colored hair, the leather and spikes and denim with safety pins in it. he badgers the girls about teaching him how to wear eyeliner.

it's his gateway into punk style, which is then a further path into the subculture itself, into colored laces and battle vests and the politics and social aspects. steve takes to it like a fish to water.

the name steve harrington used to mean something entirely different. even though he calls his parents every day since the incident, even though they've been back to see him multiple times, even though they've tried to be present in their strange, semi-absent way, they still haven't seen him since his transformation from local jock to local punk.

needless to say, he spends a lot more time educating them about his "waywardness" and a lot less time actually excitedly telling them about the next color of his hair. but the harringtons aren't unaware — they can see how while this may be a creative way for steve to begin expressing and discovering himself, it's also an armor. no one really wants to fuck with someone who will trip you with his cane if you're being an asshole, someone who wears a lot of spikes and other sharp objects on their body for fun.

so they let it be. and they stay a little longer, this time.

this shift doesn't go unnoticed by the local gossips, but it also doesn't go unnoticed by the "freaks and geeks" at school. he develops, quite by accident, a reputation that rivals that of the king of freaks at hawkins. eddie munson wears the title proudly, clings to it with every antic and every quip that feeds into the rumors about him. but he respects what it took for steve to get here.

so he invites him along to a hellfire session. which turns into two. which turns into steve becoming a party member, which turns into him excitedly telling the kids he babysits that he gets it now, that yes, they can absolutely host their games at his house as long as they have rides back home.

but as he and eddie get closer as friends, eddie notices that as well as steve has done accepting himself as he is, he still misses the things he used to do without thinking much about needing sight to do it. contact sports and movies and other very visually inclined things. and listen, eddie's happy that steve has renounced the toxic social scene of jockdom, he really is, but he also recognizes a guy who misses pieces of his old life.

(he finds himself missing his old life, the life before wayne, all the time, just for the parts that didn't hurt him)

so eddie, much to steves surprise, suggests he try joining the swim team for the final quarter of his senior year. and hey, fuck it, what can it hurt? he's already a nerd now as well as a punk as well as disabled — he can go for one more oddball, not-quite-jock occupation. the coach has several stipulations, all of which steve takes in stride.

he's granted a tryout. he doesn't make it on.

eddie, in his wildest nightmares, doesn't touch sports. he's already athletic in other regards, naturally good at sprinting and lifting heavy things from taking equipment to and from band practice. he doesn't think he actually needs sports, but he's willing to go with steve to lake jordan to keep practicing. he's seen how stubborn harrington is, and he's not about to stop it.

eventually, they do these laps across the lake and back (it's a pretty small lake) just to get high once they're done. and fuck, if steve can swim the length of the lake, he can get a job at the new starcourt mall. and he does. he's there at scoops ahoy the bare minimum of hours they're required to give him to technically say he's employed, but at least he has work. his friends visit him there after their own jobs are done for the day, and eddie consistently shows up just to bug him.

robin, his coworker, is impressed and startled by this version of steve. she'd say she doesn't trust it, but there's nothing to trust really, about the shock of bright green hair or the way his eyes aren't actually that focused looking, or about the way he casually tells stories about getting high and swimming the length of lake jordan. not to mention, the chemistry he can't physically or metaphorically see between him and eddie is laughable to her, and entirely too obvious.

she ends up with one bad trip from the wrong dealer, and steve stays with her through the comedown, and she realizes she would probably die for him, because he sits there and listens to her buzzed ramble about tammy thompson and his bagel crumbs and other dumb shit from when he was still in high school. he's the first person she's ever come out to, and she's the first person he's ever thought could be a soulmate, the kind he'd never give his body but would marry in a heartbeat if she asked him.

he tells her about billy. she tells him about her mother. they tell each other a lot of secrets, more than he's ever told jonathan and nancy, or barb, or even eddie.

and then their workplace gets set on fire from a gas leak after hours. they pack up and go to family video, because they're a package deal. it's barb being on the crew that convinces keith to let steve take the job, and he has a new shtick joking about being a blind guy who likes movies.

then eddie probably takes him to one or two or maybe five. then they maybe make out after one of their swims. then steve starts going to eddies shows at the hideout, starts going with him damn near everywhere, and this was the kind of companionship he needed from the get go but didn't have. the kind where they support each other's interests without changing themselves for it, the kind where there is love born from fierce and unwavering friendship, the kind where loyalty is unquestionable but agreeing all the time is optional. and god.

steve harrington has been blind for a year. and he wears metal in his face and color in his hair. and he and his friends gather for movies just for the enjoyment of it. and he swims the lakes of hawkins with his boyfriend. and he plays dungeons and dragons with the kids who haven't let go of him just yet. and his parents aren't who he needs them to be yet, but they're trying. everyones trying. and eveyrone is enough.

and he's enough, at the end of the day.

[ihni]

Bro, my first thought was that this would be HORRIBLE for Billy and Steve because the second Billy shoulder-checked Steve during basketball they would've hit the ground in front of EVERYONE. But then like. I thought more about it and it got worse.

Because Billy would kinda know that his soulmate is gonna be a guy, right. And he'd be doing everything he could to prevent anyone from ever finding out, so

He's been getting into massive arguments with Neil his whole life, every time his dad tries to get him into sports. When he's a kid his dad accuses him of being a pussy for shying away from really engaging with the team, never wanting to make contact with anyone, thinking that Billy's afraid of getting hurt while playing. Billy tries to push back as much as he can, he hates not being able to do anything to prove his dad wrong because he can't tell him the TRUTH, and he gets too angry to come up with a convincing lie.

He gets so paranoid about physical contact that he develops a reputation for beating the shit out of guys who so much as bump into him in the hallway at school. It happens a couple times. Some kid in his class will brush past him, not realizing who he is, and it scares him so much he lashes out.

Once he gets a little older he starts dating (girls) as much as possible. It's for his safety, he tells himself, and ignores the part where he just misses being touched so much he'll settle for whatever he can get. Which is not as much as he'd like, considering most of the girls his age are fucking terrified of him. (Moving to Indiana doesn't help much, he might have the advantage of being a relative unknown, but there's fewer girls who are willing to cozy up with a guy who isn't their soulmate.)

In short. Touch-starved Billy

And that fight at the Byers would go soooo differently....As in it probably would not happen at all, because up until this point they have not touched at all, and have barely interacted because they don't have basketball together and Billy's just been obsessed with Steve from a distance.

Then like. He shows up and Steve is being weird and Billy wants to touch him for all kinds of reasons, but he's also firmly against touching him for just as many. He's wound up and stressed and he can't lash out like he wants to, so he just ignores Steve and walks right into the Byers' house to take it out on the kids. He doesn't have the same hangups about pushing Max around, or Lucas. He knows neither of them could be his soulmate, so they're fair game.

But he's barely said two words to Max before Steve (who in this scenario has NOT been shoved to the ground and kicked, so was right behind Billy as he walked into the house) grabs his shoulder to get his attention, and they both hit the floor.

Which would be so interesting because it's technically the same result as the fight, both of them passed out (thought Max doesn't get to stand up to Billy), so the plot could continue as normal from there, except. Like. The kids are freaking out for entirely different reasons, Max is swearing them all to secrecy and worrying about what Billy's gonna do when he wakes up, and half of them are yelling about how much this does not matter right now because there's monsters to set on fire. Dustin's having a mild crisis about getting advice about girls a couple hours ago from a guy who might be gay now?? There's a debate about whether they should bring Steve with them after Max steals Billy's keys. Mike is uncomfortable with the idea and won't admit why. Dustin gets pissed at him. Lucas tries to breeze past the whole weird soulmate thing and focus on the fact that they'll need all the help they can get if they're gonna do this.

They do still bring him along, and leave Billy behind.

I feel like it would be so interesting for Steve to be trying to concentrate on fighting monsters and protecting the kids but there's this weird new soulmate bond thing distracting him, and he's so incredibly confused by it because it's with BILLY.

Meanwhile Billy wakes up alone in the Byers' house, and has a panic attack when he realizes what happened. His first instinct is to just get in his car and leave town because now this group of shithead kids know his secret and Neil was ALREADY pissed at him for losing Max, this is just gonna make things so much worse and he doesn't know how to deal with any of it. Except his car is GONE, and he has no idea where anyone is or why they took the Camaro. All he does know is that he can't go home right now, and he has nowhere else to go, but he just wants to run SOMEWHERE.

He'd end up avoiding Steve for as long as he can, and quite possibly just would not return home either. I feel like it would be incredibly awkward when Steve drives the kids back to the Byers' and Billy's sitting on the porch, chain-smoking and all hunched over like he's trying not to puke. No one knows what to say for a long moment, and then Billy just shoves past everyone, flees to his car, and drives off alone. I can see him trying to live out of his car for a good couple weeks, completely shutting everyone out, until Steve tracks him down and they actually talk.

(also side note, once they work their shit out and are actually settled into a relationship, Billy would be just. The clingiest. He spent so long avoiding touching people and now that he's allowing himself to he cannot get enough. He WILL be wrapped around Steve at all times.)

First of all, I love you. Just want to get that out of the way. Thank you for blessing my inbox thusly.

Second of all, this hits like half of all my buttons. Touch-starved, posing, secretly gay Billy who's hiding his fear behind a mask of anger? SIGN ME THE FUCK UP.

You got the kids' reactions exactly right, I could picture them so clearly in my mind. And Steve too, fighting monsters while trying to understand this new soul bond (which, how would that show? How would it feel and affect them?), and Billy freaking out and just ... "step one: need car. step two: who the fuck knows" and living out of his car because he's too afraid to go home. What would Neil do? Would he find out about it or would he just be angry that Billy ... left, and didn't come back? How does the soul bond affect Billy and Steve when it is new and they are avoiding each other, is that why Billy doesn't leave Hawkins? I suppose Billy would eventually have to go home since he's underage, how would that go? AAA SO MANY QUESTIONS, MY BRAIN IS ALIGHT WITH DELIGHT

In short; I'd like to order 80K of this please. Future clinginess on the side (to be enjoyed as a dessert <3)

Also thank you for this.

[tartarusknight]

The Fallen King and the King of the Freaks | Part 1

Ao3 Link | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16

Steve didn't have the heart to tell the kids about how Billy didn't back off after Max's threat. Not when they seemed to look up to him for some reason. So, instead, he stayed out of Billy's way as much as he could. But it seemed like the man was hunting him down. It got to the point that Steve dropped basketball.

Steve got used to being slammed into lockers and taunts from the people he used to friends with. So what if he wasn't top dog anymore? So what if he didn't have any friends his own age? So what if Nancy dumped him (ripped his heart out and stomped on it with bullshit)? So what if Billy left bruises on his body with well time jabs and kicks? Steve was an adult he could handle this...

However, as he was shoved into the janitors closet and hearing the lock click behind him, he thought maybe it was getting worse. He slammed his shoulder to the door but it didn't budge and he heard Billy's stupid laughter outside. "Enjoy your alone time, princess," Billy taunted.

Steve slid to the ground and tried not to panic. He wasn't going to freak out just because it's dark and he doesn't have anything to protect himself. He really wasn't going to. He wasn't that much of a loser that he was scared of the dark.

Then he started to cry. He normally was a silent crier, but normally, he wasn't struggling to breathe. He curled around himself and tried not to think of creatures with mouths that took up their entire head and opened like flower petals. Really, he was trying. But Steve just couldn't focus.

There was a soft voice outside the door that shook him from his isolation. "Hey man, you alright?" A dude questioned, and Steve tried to focus so he could answer. "Imma pick the lock, just gimme a minute. I've got ya," the voice was smooth, and Steve squeezed his eyes shut. He didn't really want to be seen at the moment, but he wanted out more.

The door clicked, and Steve crawled back so it could open. Eddie Munson was crouched there, a few things in his hands that he probably used to pick the lock. The known drug dealer looked frozen in shock at the sight of Steve, and Steve basically plowed into him to get out of the room quickly.

His brain was fried, and he really wanted to cling to Munson and let the calm voice focus him. Instead, he backed off and pressed his back to the wall, hanging his head between his thighs. "Thanks," he mumbled and hid his tear stained face from the other.

"Uh, it's um, not a problem... Usually, I'm helping others after you pick on them, though," Eddie's voice wasn't as soft as it had been. It made Steve wince and curl up tighter on himself. Of course, Munson would hate him...

"Never shoved anyone in janitor closets before," he said instead.

"Ahh, lockers then."

Steve shook his head, "You could really hurt someone doing that. What if no one found them? Or if they passed out or something?" He pointed out and finally looked up at the other boy. Eddie was just staring at him like he's never seen Steve before. "I never wanted to hurt anyone," Steve breathed out, but it came out more snappish than he meant it to.

"Right... so how come King Steve was shoved into the closet?" Eddie questioned and Steve looked away from him. "Did you sleep with someone's girl-"

"Jesus man, I get it! You hate me but can you fucking stop? Not everything that happens to me is my fault, okay?" Steve snapped, and Eddie flinched back. "Fuck, stop acting like I'll hurt you, Jesus. Billy's just an asshole who needs a punching bag, okay? And he learned that he can take he down, okay?" He gestured to the slowly healing bruises on his face.

Eddie was staring at him, "why you?"

Steve scoffed, "cause he can't take it out on his sister anymore? Cause he's an asshole with mommy issues? Or maybe just because he knows I won't fight back! I don't know, I'm not in his brain! I don't know what he thinks when he trips me in the hallway or throws a ball at my head in the gym!"

Eddie blinks and gets up to his feet, but then he holds out his hand in offering. "Come on, man." Steve takes it and lets Eddie pull him to his feet. He's still a little shaky, but he manages to stay on his feet. "I've been known to adopt lost sheep," he's guided away towards the exit and he's so shocked he doesn't fight it.

"Thought you hated me," He points out.

Eddie laughs, "eh, you can just buy me dinner." Eddie pauses for a moment, but Steve is already nodding. It makes Eddie grin, and he throws an arm around his shoulder. "Welcome to the land of the outcasts. Here I'm the king." He gestures to the group of people smoking by one of the picnic benches outside.

"You'll lose a few cool-dude points if you're seen with us," Eddie smiles like it's funny but Steve just feels bad. These were the people he never stood up for. These were the people he never looked at, just ignored.

Steve smiles and looks at Eddie, "you inviting me into the Munson cult?"

Eddie's grin goes sharp, "You gotta earn that. I'm offering you a starting point."

Steve thinks about how lonely he's been and how kind Eddie's voice had been. "So, how do I climb up the ladder? My only skills are giving rides, basketball, and hair."

"Don't forget the Harrington charm," Eddie grins and it's kinder. "Show us yourself, and we'll see from there." He whispers before turning to the group of people.

"Gentlemen, we have a traveler from the halls of royalty! He's come to bless us with his presence!" Eddie's voice is filled with so much emotion. Steve almost misses the way the group tenses up.

Steve might have a while to go before they trust them. But he thinks maybe it could be worth it. Especially as Eddie looks back at him with a smile that makes Steve's stomach flip. "Uh, hey," he smiles awkwardly, wiggling his fingers in greeting.

[stevie-petey]

I have a blurb idea!! When Jonathan, Nancy , Joyce and will get back from the cabin and the kids fill everyone in on what happened while they were gone. Dustin would absolutely reenact Steve and Billy fighting and bug and Billy fighting. You can't tell me Dustin and the kids would be kinda proud that bug held her own against Billy for the most part. Jonathan hearing about bug protecting Steve from Billy and Steve protecting bug in the tunnels. Would Jonathan feel a little upset that bug doesn't need him to protect her anymore, that is Steve's job now?

i absolutely love this one omg yes i adore doing scenes with just steve n jon their friendship makes me <333

enjoy !

"wheres bug?"

steve and the kids are sweeping the floors, quiet and tired as the events from tonight finally settle upon them. when they hear jonathans question, they all stop what theyre doing. a dark look passes over steves bloodied and bruise face, a sight that only makes the ice within jonathans throat constrict tighter.

will is asleep in jonathans arms, and when no one answers his question his panic overwhelms him and he feels his grip on will lessen. "steve, wheres y/n?"

steve steps forward, understanding jonathans fear more than anyone else in this room. "shes okay, i promise."

"but where is she?"

"in your room, asleep. she... shes had a rough night." steve looks away, ashamed that he couldnt protect you.

"she got her ass kicked." dustin says blunty.

jonathans head spins. "what?"

joyce and nancy now walk in and quickly notice your absence. their own worry begins to rise. when mike sees nancy, he runs up to her and starts rattling off question after question about el, will, if she wants to see him, dustin, and lucas reenact you and steve fighting billy.

"you guys fought billy?" nancy exclaims, now stepping towards steve as well. she misses the way jonathans hands shake as he struggles to hold his brother. hes terrified. if you fought billy, why arent you here right now to brag about how you won? did he hurt you? did jonathan send you back to the hospital again?

its joyce who sees her sons panic. she gently grabs will from her oldest and kisses his cheek. her voice is low so that no one else hears. while steve understands jonathans fear for your safety, joyce understands his love for you. "shes strong. she'll be okay."

they leave and dustin and the boys jump into their reenactment of the fight. mike pretends to be billy while dustin is you and lucas is steve. they jump on one another, scream and throw plates, and when dustin jumps onto mikes back as he has lucas on the ground, something in jonathans stomach twists.

"y/n totally saved steves ass!" dustin whoops as he rides around mikes back.

nancy and jonathan look over to steve, who has been quiet the entire time, and when he catches their eye he lets out a soft chuckle and shrugs. "she did. seems we cant stop saving each other."

jonathan frowns, about to ask what he means by that, but then mike starts choking dustin and dustin pretends to faint and once again his head spins.

"did billy..." nancy turns to steve, terrified as well. she places a hand against her own neck, stroking at the skin tenderly. she cant imagine what youve gone through tonight, and jonathan just shakes his head.

"he did." steves voice is hard.

dustin now pretends to stab mike, who crumples to the floor. "and then she stabbed the creep!"

"y/n held her own," mike admits, impressed.

"shes my hero," steve quips, though his heart isnt entirely in it. his heart is in the next room, where it lays besides you in jonathans bed as you sleep.

lucas, who is still on the floor as he pretends to be a knocked out steve, holds a finger up. "didnt you then save her in the tunnels?"

"you took her to the tunnels?" jonathan faces steve feels an anger that was once so familiar to him now rise. after everything you went through tonight, why would steve allow you to further push yourself?

the teen sighs. he understands jonathans anger, but theres so much that he will never understand when it comes to you and steve. the debt you owe one another, the trust that is there to always have each others back, no questions asked. "we both know theres no stopping her when shes made up her mind. all i could do was make sure she was safe."

"which he did." dustin adds, sending jonathan a pointed look.

he deflates, now suddenly embarrassed for his outburst. he knows steve is right. when it comes to the ones you love, theres no stopping you. sometimes hes afraid youll die protecting everyone else.

the thought is an unpleasant one, and jonathan castes it out of his head. what matters now is that youre only a room away from him, asleep and safe and alive. you will have new scars, new bruises and wounds to heal, but youre alive, and he'll be right next to you once more. jonathan may not have been there tonight, and he might not ever be the one to protect you again, but he knows he will always be by your side as you recover and heal and move on.

hes been by your side he was he twelve and the only thing that scared you was the creaking of floorboards.

now hes seventeen and you fear much more than shadows.

youre not jonathans anymore to protect, not really, but you will always be his to watch over. he'll always be there to walk you home, and he knows youll always do the same for him. youll always remind each other of who you are, where you belong. lines and strings and all.

"so, you really saved y/n's life again?" jonathan asks steve, silently extending this admission as a peace offering.

steve shrugs once more, his face flushed. he feels the shift again, he can see the olive branch that jonathan presents him, and steve never thought he would get here. to be worthy of this, to have your safety in his hands and jonathans acceptance. "i owed her."

jonathan laughs, and steve finally understands why the boy is your closest friend. jonathan byers is a lot of things, but hes loyal above all else, and steve knows that he he understands you better than anyone else with such few words.

nancy takes mike home, steve offers to drive dustin and lucas, and slowly the house empties. as steve exits the door, he lingers for a second, before he takes a deep breath. "hey, jonathan."

he turns. "yeah?"

"go see her, she could really use you right now... she'll always need you."

jonathan smiles. "thank you."

they both know that hes thanking steve for so much more than encouraging him to go to you.

neither of them acknowledge it again. they dont need to.

[passivenovember]

Night Shift (for @catharrington )

--

The first thing he sees when he comes to is Max. 

She’s crying in her sleep, the liquid timbre of it slipping loosely in time with a heart monitor, somewhere to the left, fading in and out of view as the steady drip of morphine fights to drag Billy under.

He realizes, that. The heart monitor is his. He’s plugged into it and he hurts. More than Neil. More than anything.

What’s left of his mind is liquified, sloshing around in a body strapped to a bed. It turns the memory of Maxine over in his hands like a rubber duck in an ocean of guilt.

She’s alive. Billy made sure of it, so. She’s alright. She’s okay–

It aches to breathe, burns so bad that his vision blacks out and Billy thinks, eyes glued to the grounding shock of red hair on his sister’s head, that he’s too young to die. 

–

The first time Billy’s strong enough to crash awake and stay there, he wishes for death. 

Fuck being too young. 

Everything burns, and then he’s gasping around a pain unlike any he’s ever felt as warm amber light filters through his eyelashes. He’s bleeding, from the very center of his chest, watercolor seeping through a cloth. He watches red bloom, bloom, bloom over white gauze and thinks. He should call for help. 

But then someone snuffles, deep in sleep and Billy flinches toward the sound, teeth on edge. 

Maxine looks like she hasn’t moved or showered or eaten in days, and Billy grunts. Her angry, cave-man big brother even knocking on death’s door. He tries to sit but something else escapes him, a fucking. Whine. 

More blood.

He’s crying. He doesn't know when he starts crying, but he’s fighting to get to Max, he’s wading through shit and fire and and then someone says, “Don’t move, Hargrove, you’ll rip yourself open again.”

Steve Harrington looks like he went three rounds with a meat grinder. Like someone tried to kill him. Like Billy–

“Shh, it’s alright,” Steve’s fingers are soft, through the searing pain, gentle as butterfly wings on the caps of Billy’s shoulders. “Lay back,” Steve tells him, blue and black and purple, like spilled paint, “Lay down, okay?”

Billy gets lost in the fat bulge of Steve’s bottom lip. Thinks. 

He probably did that to Steve. Everything’s fuzzy, he doesn’t remember anything but he remembers wanting. Steve. Everyone dead. Everyone and then himself. 

He didn’t think everyone included Steve Harrington.

“It’s alright,” Steve cards those soft, sweet fingers through Billy’s hair. “Lay down,” He says, “Rest.”

Billy does.

–

The next time he wakes it’s because Maxine is throwing a temper tantrum. 

Billy would know the sound of her voice in death. The shrill, ear-splitting soprano of Max’s screams could yank him out of hell and catapult his body through the lid of his coffin, startled lips gathering earth between his gums until he’s awake, again. 

Alive.

A man in a white lab coat tells Max to calm down. 

She spits, instead, phlegmy and gross and just like Billy taught her, in the Doc’s face, “You’re not moving him.”

It’s half-way unintelligible. Billy squints, like there’s sunlight streaming bright and relentless from his sister’s throat and he’ll go blind if he doesn’t protect himself. 

“Kid,” The Doctor says, “He’s not awake. He’s not getting any better–”

“If you take him to Chicago I’ll kill myself,” Maxine declares. Stubborn bitch. “If you take him, I’ll. I’ll chain myself to the bottom of the helicopter. I’ll stop eating. I’ll starve myself–”

She will. She’s a man of her word, the fuckin’ loser. 

“A hunger strike?” The Doc frowns, regretful. “You can try, kid. Won’t bring your brother back.”

Billy smirks. Almost. It hurts and his head splits open and across the room, on his feet and ready to restrain Billy’s very own red-headed tornado from punching a hole through the Doctor’s sternum, Steve Harrington watches Billy. 

His face looks normal now. 

Almost. 

He’s yellowing, sort of, like an old photograph, but. He’s beautiful. 

Billy’s chest aches. 

“--His entire life is here,” Maxine says, voice wobbling dangerously. Billy knows she’s about two seconds from decapitating this Doctor with her bare hands, “His family. I’m his family, you’re not just going to take him away from–”

“--Kid–”

“--Don’t call me kid, you fucking asshole,” Max says, “Don’t–”

“--If we can’t get him somewhere he’ll wake up, he’ll die.” The Doctor says. Not a teensy bit regretful.

Billy doesn’t exactly blame him. 

But you’d think a bomb has gone off. You’d think society’s on the brink of collapse, by the way Maxine goes shocked still, and then.

She moves. 

Or, She tries to move, screaming and screaming as Steve holds her back, never once taking his eyes off of Billy. “Max,” Steve says. His lip’s not bulging anymore. 

Maxine wails against the Doctor, anyway, her tiny fists not packing much force because the fucker just looks sad, about it. For her. Max will break her thumb, doing that. 

Billy tries to call her a dumb fucker and fails.

Tries to sit up and fails.  

“Max,” Steve tells her, putting himself in front of the Doc, “Look.”

Her eyes are blue, like his.

Somehow Billy forgot about that while he was treading water in the sea of everything else. Billy and Max stare at each other for ten long, breathless seconds. 

And.

All Billy can think is that he should’ve stayed dead. He should’ve followed his mother’s voice into the pits of hell, like she wanted him to, he should’ve stopped fighting and in that stretch of breathless anticipation, he knows. 

Maxine is going to open her mouth and tell him that he fucked it up. Again. Die, she’s thinking. If you’re not going to do it, I’ll kill you myself.

Max blinks and then she opens her mouth. Makes a terrible noise. It’s the worst fuckin’ thing Billy’s ever heard, and turns out he was right, her fists don’t pack much force but she knocks him one across the jaw, anyway. Maybe an accident, but then again. Maybe not.

“You fucking asshole,” She says, scratching and clawing until Steve Harrinton grabs her around the chest in a barrel hug, lifting her off the hospital bed like she weighs nothing. 

It’s alright, Billy wants to say, I deserve it. It’s the least of what I deserve. And besides. It’s the only place on Billy’s entire body that isn’t screaming in pain, so. 

Small victories.

“Let me go,” Max shouts, but Steve doesn’t. He holds her tight, watching Billy. 

The Doctor stares, too, like he’s witnessing a miracle. Like he isn’t sure what to make of all this. Like he’s going to run screaming into the halls and take all the credit even though he was ready to ship a corpse off to Chicago this morning.

Immediately, Billy hates him. 

Max elbows Steve Harrington in the gut. He drops to the floor, groaning, and Billy has the nerve to feel proud as his sister climbs over the lip of the bed with a fire in her eyes, unlike anything Billy’s ever seen, and.

He was standing at the mouth of hell, once. 

Billy notes, distantly, that he shouldn’t have worried so much about her. Shouldn’t have risen from the dead to make sure she’d be, not. Alright, but. Something. Maxine can take care of herself and Billy never should’e doubted it. She’s gearing up to take care of him, now, let the trash out to roost, but.

But.

Maxine collapses on top of him, instead. Billy thinks, distantly, that she might be trying to suffocate him because she’s laying flat across his oxygen tube. 

But. 

She’s crying. Her body shakes hard enough to rumble the bed and the linoleum floor and the entire building beneath that. It hurts. Billy wants to lift his arms and hold her to him, but he can’t. He can’t feel his arms, he can’t–

“I’m sorry,” Maxine says, clutching at his neck, “I’m so sorry, Billy.”

Steve Harrington and the Doctor are gone before Billy thinks to ask about the hole in his chest. When the door slams shut behind them, Maxine sits up and O2 hisses through the plastic around his nose. 

Billy can breathe, again.

–

“What did it feel like?”

Billy’s grateful that his room has a window. The trees have been good to him.

Maxine knocks her sneaker into the hospital bed, shooting pain up Billy’s left side. He ignores it, biting against the fleshy patch of his cheek until blood drips on his tongue. “Billy.”

Billy shakes his head.

Steve Harrington stands watching, backlit with bright September skies. He’s been perched under the window for hours with his arms across his chest, holding vitriol in the birdcage of his ribs, just. Watching. Billy and Max together.

“Dipshit,” Max says, “I know you can hear me. You’re mute, not deaf,” Max kicks him, ignoring his wince of pain, “What the fuck happened to you while you were–”

“Max,” Steve tells her, coming to life, “He can’t talk.”

Or think, Or move. 

“I know.”

“You’re stressing him out.”

“How the fuck do you know, Harrington?”

Billy smirks, a little, watching the roll of Steve’s neck muscles. Irritated, like Billy. Like a brother. “Look at him,” Steve says, “He’s begging me with those big blue eyes, Harrington, she’s stressing me out, make her stop.”

Billy wants to smile. He tries to, but.

“I can’t stress him out,” Maxine says, kicking at him again. “He’s not even doing anything.”

It’s lighthearted. As bright as things can be when Billy’s still on a respirator, but he knows she’s pissed. Out of everything, he knows that. The shape of Maxine’s rage. 

“Jesus Christ, Mayfield,” Steve exhales, exhausted, and every tree branch outside the window moves with him. “You have to give him time.”

Maxine kicks the bed again, hard and insistent until Billy has to look at her otherwise his lungs will explode with the pain. He doesn’t want to. He manages, anyway, and. Maxine deflates. A wilted red balloon.

She’s crying. Suddenly. 

He frowns at her, like. What, shitbird? 

Max seems to hear him. “What happened to you?”

Blue eyes, blue like his. Their anger falls the same way, like a sledgehammer against tempered glass. Pain spiderwebs out from him, varicose veins devouring all the light and warmth from the room with guilt.

Max’s face wrinkles, a raisin in the September glow, and Billy forces air through his lips. I’m sorry, he wants to say, I’m sorry I can’t put words to it right now. I’m sorry I can’t make sense of it for you. I’m sorry you have to carry it on your shoulders like a backpack full of algebra homework. I’m sorry–

Her fingers are cold when they curl into the palm of Billy’s hand. He’s sorry this is happening to them. To her, so.

“See,” Harrington says, “You stop flapping your gums for five seconds and he’ll give you what you want.”

Billy rolls his eyes and holds her fingers tightly, trying to press every syllable into Max’s thundering pulse. Billy hopes she understands, knows she does, and when he turns back to the window Steve Harrington is there. 

Watching Billy with pink cheeks, a pink nose. Not sepia at all anymore. 

Healed. 

–

“We have to change your linens,” The nurse says. 

Billy doesn’t know what a fucking linen is. He wrinkles his nose, waiting for Maxine or Steve Harrington to jump in and gather context clues, but they’re useless. Basically wallpaper, anytime the nurses come in. 

He’s never seen two storybook heroes more squeamish at the sight of blood or the sound of discomfort.

The nurse raises her eyebrows at them, already pissed off. “Bedsheets,” She says. “We need to change them so he doesn’t get sores.”

“Sores?” Maxine says, finally serving as Billy’s voice box.

“Yes, he hasn’t learned to walk yet–”

“--What if he never learns to walk again?” Max wonders, “Will he get sores from laying around all the time–”

“--He’ll learn,” The nurse says, done deal. She’s a bitch. Billy’s favorite, so.

He knows right away that it’s going to hurt. Makes a noise like a fork caught in a garbage disposal, completely involuntary, and his backup helper snaps out of it. “How do we change his bedsheets?” Steve asks. Which. 

Douses Billy in cold water. 

He would rather die than let Steve see that. And he has. He almost stayed dead, too, and now–

“Little girl,” The nurse says to Maxine, “Wait in the hall.”

“No way,” Max says, crossing her arms, “No fucking way I’m leaving you in here with my brother, alone–”

“--I’m here–” Steve says.

“--Little girl, do you want to watch your brother thrash in agony and wet himself?”

The nurse waits, her eyebrows disappearing into her hairline while Max comes to terms with losing the bitch-off in a hospital room, of all places.

“No ma’am,” Maxine says finally.

“Perfect. do as I say.”

Max nods, pinning Billy with a flat stare. “I’ll be right back, okay?”

He nods.

The second the door shuts behind her, the nurse tears the blanket from Billy’s legs, “You hold him still while I jimmy the sheet out from under him.”

Steve Harrington looks nervous. Comical. “Isn’t there another nurse who can help–”

Billy’s torso lights on fire when the nurse yanks on his bed sheet and one of the elastic corners snaps around his foot like a claw. She’s not gentle but she’s fast. The linen drags him into a sea of pain, Billy’s arms move independent of the rest of his body, yanking the I.V. out of his arm, and he’s embarrassed but he can’t stop. 

Humiliated when the nurse says, “Lay still, sweetheart,” Like his chest isn’t a gaping wound. “You’ll just make it worse for yourself.” 

Billy screams as best he can. Thrashes. Tries to center himself in the reality that Steve Harrington is watching him, nervously shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Billy’s asshole nurse shouts, “Come hold him down, alright?”

Harrington has the nerve to look terrified.

“Alright,” Steve says. “Okay. Yeah.” His jaw squares with determination and then he’s leaning over Billy, palms white-hot and stubborn against Billy’s shoulder caps. 

He smells good, like pine needles.

“Hey,” Steve says, smiling softly, “You’re alright–”

Billy’s nurse yanks the sheets out from under him, jostling Billy up and back down again on the lumpy fucking horrible mattress.

He must scream. 

It must be awful, because Steve rubs his palms up and down, up and down, trying to soothe him, “There we go, Malibu, doing so fuckin’ fantastic,” He says, “Just a little bit longer, right nurse?”

Malibu.

Malibumalibumalibu–

“We still have to sit him up to put the new sheet on the bed,” Billy’s nurse says, just to spite him.

He won’t survive it. He’s being torn apart. Billy thrashes in Steve’s hold. Can’t take it. Won’t–

“Hey. Look at me, Hargrove.”

Billy. Gets lost in the expression on Steve’s face. It reminds him of the court, of a time when Billy wasn’t this pathetic, whimpering mess of torn skin and bones. 

Steve rubs his thumbs, gently, over Billy’s jawline, “I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here with you, yeah?”

Billy nods, blinking against tears. 

“Good,” Steve says. He turns to the nurse, “Alright, when do we–”

Billy bends at the waist, sitting heavily in Steve’s arms. 

And.

Death smells like pine. Feels like warm hands, rubbing circles into his back.

–

He lives.

–

It’s like the flood gates open. Steve touches Billy whenever he wants, after that, and when Billy goes into surgery to replace the tattered skin on his ribcage, Steve’s there.

Holding Billy’s hand when he falls asleep. Holding Billy’s hand when he wakes up.

–

Eventually, Steve starts talking.

He brings up high school, which has disappeared into the rear-view of where they are now. Rivalries and broken plates and bloody knuckles don’t matter, anymore, in retro-spect. 

Maybe they never did.

Steve helps him learn to use his vocal cords, again. He waits with patient, sparkling brown eyes, stubbornly insisting Billy can answer small questions.

When it finally happens, Steve calls him a hero.

They share stories, dreams, pudding cups and cold lasagna from the hospital cafeteria. 

Steve Harrington is funny. 

Billy never gave the possibility much thought. Steve’s earnest and loyal and beautiful, but Billy never considered that Steve would say and do things that make Billy laugh so hard his stitches nearly pop. 

The hospital staff hate Steve as much as they adore him, and when Billy learns to sit again, Steve Harrington is right there, holding Billy’s hand. Rubbing circles into his wrist that Billy senses like lightning in the heartland. 

Steve. Has tears clinging to his lashes, looks like he’s never been more proud of anything in all his life, and Billy thinks. He could be worth something, again. Someday.

Worth Steve.

–

“I’m so fucking proud of you,” Steve says that night, when they’re alone, in the dark. “You’re not what I thought you’d be, you’re. Billy; you’re amazing.”

Billy can talk, again. He thinks he should say something, but the words won’t come.

–

Maxine has to go home at the end of the day. That’s the deal. 

The hospital Billy’s staying in may know about monsters and dimensional tears but they still make preteens go home to sleep in their own bed once their brothers are out of the woods. It’s the worst part of Billy’s recovery. The dark.

Max fights it, tooth and nail. They both do. 

Round and round she goes with the Doc. She’s his sister. She can’t leave him alone because she doesn’t want to leave him alone, blah-blah-blah, and. 

Maxine screams and cries so much that, eventually, Owens and his goons make an exception. Steve Harrington volunteers to serve as Billy’s discount little sister because he doesn’t have school or a job or a girlfriend. No one to miss his body like Billy does, so.

He's always at the hospital. 

Not much changes, in retrospect, because Steve was there on that first afternoon and he’s there always, day and night and back again, Billy blinks and then suddenly he can’t remember a time when Steve Harrington wasn’t two feet away from him, complaining about whatever cassette tape Max brings from home that week. 

Steve’s only ever gone for an hour at a time. He disappears in the early morning to go home and shower, change his clothes, and then he’s back, again, to keep Max’s cot warm for her while she’s playing Only Child.

Neil never comes to the hospital. Like Billy said. Small victories.

–

Will Byers is the first to notice that Billy’s a faggot.

Well.

He’s not the first but he’s definitely the most gentle. 

Billy clocks that about him the first time someone knocks on his hospital door and he has to do a double take because Maxine is doing her calculus homework on the cot next to him, and Steve’s the one that pulls himself away from Billy’s dinner long enough to swallow a hunk of cold lasagna to open the door.

Everyone in the entire world who cares about him is already here, but Will Byers leads a group of doe-eyed, worried looking people behind him, all bundled up in winter coats because it’s February. Somehow. 

Billy slept through most of 1985 so he’s shocked when Little Boy Byers is tall enough that his mom looks like a munchkin when she bullies her way into the room. Joyce, Billy thinks she’s called. 

Mrs. Byers introduces herself while she drapes a blanket over the foot of Billy’s hospital bed and scolds Steve Harrington for picking at Billy’s dinner. Freak Byers stands next to his brother looking high and uncomfortable.

Mostly high.

“Waa?” Steve demands, Bambi through and through with a roll sticking out of his mouth, “But. Joyce, Billy said–”

“It’s alright, Mrs. Byers,” Billy tells her, wary when the Chief of Police lumbers over to clap a huge, concerned paw onto Max’s shoulder, “I don’t like the hospital food, anyway–”

“You have to eat, honey,” Joyce says.

Honey. 

Honey feels like Malibu but tastes so, so different.

When Bill doesn’t say anything, Mrs. Byers nods. “I’ll bring you something. And. It’s Joyce.”

“No, that’s alright,” Billy tries to sit, wincing when his chest bandage tugs at the tender, curling pieces of raw across his pecks. Steve leans forward with the lip of a putting cup in his mouth and helps him settle against the pillows, hands warm where they stay, sleeping against his stomach. 

Like he’s worried Billy might stand up and run away.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mrs. Byers says, piling another blanket onto the foot of Billy’s bed, “If you’re going to get out of here, you need your strength. You need your food,” Mrs. Byers says, yanking the pudding cup from Steve’s teeth.

She tosses it to him and Steve grabs it from the air.

“Alright, open up, hero,” Steve tears it pop tab loose with his teeth and feeds it to Billy, one spoon full at a time. A little gets on Billy’s nose and Steve uses his thumb to wipe it away, lingering.

“Your nose,” Steve says quietly, voice thick with vanilla, “You’ve got a cute nose. Like a goddamn rabbit.”

Billy smiles. They smile at each other, big and dumb like always, only.

Across the room, Little Boy Byers watches them. 

Billy thinks he might catch on fire.

–

“I want to take you out of here,” Steve says in the dark. 

It’s late. So late the sky has started to turn silver. 

Steve’s thumb rubs circles into Billy’s wrist, where they’re stuck like paper dolls. It’s the only way Billy can sleep, but. He’s awake, streaming with consciousness when Steve says, “You have to get strong. You have to get better, for me.”

Billy. Feels the press of lips against his hand. Thinks.

He’d crawl if he had to.

Wherever Steve wanted to go, he’d crawl.

–

He learns to walk. Has to get out of here, someday.

—

Steve Harrington asks what Billy’s going to do when he gets out of here. 

Doesn’t know that Billy was awake, that night.

Doesn’t realize–

Billy just got the clear to ditch his oxygen tube and it’s got them both giddy. Smiling at each other and the Doc when he says, “Almost home free, son.”

It’s the closest Billy’s felt to joy in longer than he can remember. Steve’s laugh soothes a part of Billy that’s been aching since before the monster made a home inside of him, and the question fills him with an unfamiliar kind of hope.

Steve’s eyes sparkle when he says it. “What are you doing after this?” Like they’re finishing up an afternoon of basketball practice and Steve’s been trying to work up the nerve to ask Billy. Not on a date, but. Something. 

Billy feels naked without his oxygen tube. Exposed. “What do you mean?”

“When you’re strong enough to go home,” Steve says, sinking lower onto Maxine’s cot. She’s at school, and they’re both graduated, so. Steve takes up residence in the daytime, eating Billy’s hospital food and listening to him read whatever books Max leaves behind. 

Usually, they sit close together, thighs pressed close together, but.

Not today.

Billy without an oxygen tube is unstoppable. Free. He almost misses it. Thinks. Can’t be worth it if Steve’s not holding him together.

“I dunno. Maybe I’ll go back to California.”

“Can’t do that,” Steve says, like. Done deal.

“Why not?”

“Because,” Steve says, searching for the words. His nose scrunches like it does when he’s deep in thought and Billy fills in the blanks for him. You can’t leave because we’re friends now, Ghost Steve says, even though they’ll never admit it. You can’t leave because I want to play basketball with you, again, even though Billy’s still about an inch from blowing a fuse when his legs pick up speed. You can’t leave because. 

I love you.

Steve hums, still searching for the words. Billy sits on his hospital bed and waits for him to sort through, heart pounding, until Steve grins at him. “You can’t leave because I need a roommate, Malibu.” Steve decides.

It’s a relief and it’s not. It’s death. 

Billy’s dying. “What?”

“My parents never use the house,” Steve tells him, sitting forward so his elbows leave little indents on his thighs. Billy’s always thinking about Steve’s thighs. “I have a million empty rooms. Empty beds.”

“Plural,” Billy teases.

“Yeah. I was born with a silver fuckin’ spoon in my mouth, sue me.”

“I’m not a charity case.”

“You’re not a charity case,” Steve says, grinning, “You’re my roommate.”

Billy imagines it, as those brown eyes pin him to the hospital bed. Steve Harrington in his space, or Billy in his, always. Forever. 

Billy shrugs. Nothing hurts so much he can’t breathe, anymore. Not in the physical sense. “I can’t.”

“Why not? Better offer?”

“No. I’m an invalid.”

“So am I,” Steve says, “Mentally.”

“You’re not, you’re–” Perfect. Billy ignores Steve’s eyes as the go soft and gooey, cookies fresh from the oven. “I can’t make you take care of me.”

“I want to,” Steve says loudly. Stubborn like Billy. Like Max. “I like taking care of you–”

“We weren’t friends before.”

“That doesn’t matter, I didn’t know you before.”

Billy smirks, “And you know me now?”

“Yeah,” Steve pokes at him with one cold index finger and leaves it there, “Yeah, I. C’mon. Move in with me. Let take you out of here.”

–

In the middle of night sometime just after May Day, 1986, Steve Harrington has a nightmare. Maybe he was always having them.

Billy wakes slowly and then all at once, surprised that the pain doesn’t knock him out cold, anymore. Apparently. Steve is a shaking meld of blanket on the cot next to the hospital bed. Billy can just make out the pad of Steve’s foot where it vibrates, toes flexing the cotton expanse of his sock like he’s climbing something, in never-never land.

Billy lies awake and counts the steady beep-beep-beep of his heart monitor, too afraid to get up because Steve’s monsters might eat his head and crawl out of the mass of him, plopping wet and slimy onto the hospital floor.

But.

Steve thrashes violently, and Billy can’t take it anymore.

“Harrington—”

Steve huddles away from the sound of Billy’s voice and it’s a war, not to take it personally, to harness his bravery and toss his blanket to the side, to shuffle off of his lumpy and uncomfortable mattress and stand over the cot, thinking he’s not afraid of me. We’re friends now. Steve–

“Steve,” Billy tries again, teeth clenched against the sound Harrington makes in the throes of his nightmare. Like he’s being chased. Hunted. He twists under the blanket, and the dull, eerie light from Billy’s health monitor catches the sweat on Steve’s forehead, and. The fuckin’ look on his face–

“Please,” Billy says thickly, “Please, Harrington, wake up–” 

Steve jolts, ripped out of dreaming by Billy’s hand on his shoulder. The usual calm, sugary warmth of his eyes has disappeared and he zero’s in on Billy, face contorted with rage and fear. 

Steve swings wildly, shoving until Billy falls back onto the hospital bed. Harrington watches the fall, coming back to himself just as the air knocks loose from Billy’s lungs.

He hurts, again. Like last summer. Like he always has, the beautiful boy in front of him flashing like lightning, and. 

For just a moment. Looks like Billy’s father.

“Billy,” Steve says, cheeks dripping with emotion, “Billy, I’m so–”

Billy flinches away from him on impulse, and.

Steve cracks. Breaks. Before Billy can tell him that it’s okay, it was accident, Billy’s stronger than he used to be–

Harrington bolts from the room, door slamming shut behind him.

–

Freak Byers starts driving Max to the hospital.

–

Billy can’t say he’s surprised when the only people who come to see him are his sister and her stupid little friends, riding their bikes to spend all day at the hospital when the weather is nice enough. 

They’re loud and annoying but Billy likes them. Will, at least. 

Steve vanishes, so.

It hurts and it doesn’t. They were on to something good, before that night, something Billy wants with the same intensity that he needs air and water. He’s grateful, in a way, that the possibility of roommates has died before it ever began. 

Less he can fuck up. Less that can make him bleed.

Bygones. All that.

–

On July 20th, a year after death, Billy moves into Joyce Byers’ house because he has nowhere else to go.

It’s as simple as Will Byers helping Billy into the clothes he brings from Jonathan’s closet, clutching Billy’s elbow until Joyce’s tiny brown car swings into view. “Let’s go home,” Will says.

So they do.

Steve never comes to visit.

–

Two months after moving into the Byers’, his Camaro appears in the driveway good as fuckin’ new. On the windshield they’ve taped a check for five hundred thousand dollars and a note that says, sorry for your loss.

Billy watched a monster tear his only friend in half, dozens of people in half, and all of them were carted around in this fuckin’ car like lambs to the slaughter. 

He had to learn to walk again.

It’s good to know what their lives are worth, Billy guesses. What Big Brother is willing do to keep him quiet.

–

“I saw you, once,” Will says, not long after Billy settles onto the couch. 

The Byers’ place smells like pancakes and cigarettes all the time and it’s fuckin’ weird. Joyce is trying to quit for Billy and so is Hopper even though they don’t know that Freak Byers rolls joints for him, and the whole thing is huge and uncomfortable. Like how kids hide things from their parents to protect them.

Billy’s starts to think of the living room as his. 

All that time he hid on Cherry Lane in that fuckin’ room and all it takes is the soft care of Joyce Byers and a beer from Jim Hopper and Billy’s home. The safest he’s ever felt even though he’s out in the open and vulnerable to Will Byers’ soft declarations. Eleven’s wide, staring eyes.

Billy looks up from the book he was reading, startled, “Huh?”

Will fidgets in the doorway, dressed and ready for the first day of school. Billy resists the urge to snap at him, spit it the fuck out. Will’s not tough like Maxine. He’d melt, probably. Keel over, and. Billy likes the kid. 

Sue him. 

So he waits, fiddling with the worn edge of his library book, until Will exhales everything all at once. “I saw Steve Harrington feed you pudding at the hospital that day, when you were just learning to talk and walk again–”

The book falls shut.

“--He said you were cute. That you have a nose like a rabbit. And. I was just wondering,” Will says, choking on his words, “I was just thinking. That.”

“Don’t think about it,” Billy says. “Steve and I–”

“--I just–”

“Will,” He says softly. Thinks he should probably be afraid. Hopper’s in the kitchen. Joyce is at work, and. She won’t be able to stop him if Hop gets the wrong idea about Billy. Or the right one. 

But.

He knows he’s safe. In the pit of his stomach, curling like warmth through his bones, Billy knows it.

They’re safe, here.

Will shakes his head. Afraid of other things, himself maybe, so. He shakes his whole body. “Billy, I think I might. I might be–”

“I’m driving you to school,” Billy stands up, his blanket falling to the ground. 

–

It’s hot enough now that Billy’s arms stick to the leather in the Camaro. 

He doesn’t let anyone ride with him, but not for the reasons he used to pull out of his ass pre-’85. Now it’s wrapped in bodies, the skin of dozens and dozens of people who will never make it home because–

Will is silent most of the way, fingers white-knuckle on his knee caps.

Billy loosens his hands on the wheel and it feels like his knuckles are breaking. He itches for a cigarette. Plays Eagles instead. Waits for the other shoe to drop.

They’re parked in front of the high school, watching the excitement of everyone’s first day, when Will says, “I think I like boys,” and. 

His voice cracks under a pressure unlike anything Billy’s ever heard.

He gets it. And he doesn’t. 

In his own life it was never news. Neil let him know what was happening right away. Three letters thrown back at him, sharp enough to leave scars in their wake.

This is supposed to be news, for Will Byers. The end of the world. Billy’s supposed to look over at the kid and call him a faggot, tell him he’s an abomination, fuckin’. Whatever. He won’t, though. Pot calling the kettle, right?

Billy watches hundreds of teenagers on their path toward a higher education. “Me too,” He says. Life goes on.

Will turns to him, shocked. “You do?”

Billy’s closet is glass. Always was. “Thought you saw me and Steve.”

“I didn’t know Steve likes–”

“He doesn’t,” Billy replies, not. Swallowing. His throat might click with unshed tears. Break and split open, so. “He’s just. Good. A good person, to me.”

“I understand,” Will tells him, “My friend, Mike, is. He’s like that, too. Not like us.”

Us. 

Billy breaks for him. Didn’t think he was capable of it, but. 

He breaks, anyway.

–

In November, Billy opens the door to his bedroom and Steve Harrington is sitting on the couch right where Billy sets his pillow every night. He jumps to his feet, hands balled at his sides as if caught. Guilty of something else, and all Billy can think about is burning his hand-me-down pillow and sleepin’ with his nose pressed to the place Harrington was sat, watching the front door.

“Billy–”

“I’ve been calling all day,” Maxine says, steamrolling him. She grins at Billy, planted firmly in Hopper’s chair. Queen of the castle. 

Neil doesn’t like them to see each other, so. 

Billy’s chest expands like a springtime rose at the sound of her voice. He doesn’t take his eyes off of Steve, “I don’t sit around waiting for you to call me, Max, I’m not glued to the phone.”

Steve flushes red. Spilled paint.

“You should be, it’s the only way I can ever get a hold of you,” Steve’s bright yellow sweater is eclipsed by red when Max pulls Billy into a hug, crushing him. “How are you?”

He doesn’t take his eyes off of Steve, “I’m fine.”

“Good, is Will home?”

Billy looks at her, then. “I thought you were here to see me?”

“No. We’re starting a new campaign and you happen to live here, now, I figured,” Maxine pinches him, “Two birds one stone.”

“Great, thanks,” Billy rolls his eyes, padding toward the kitchen, “He’s probably over at the Wheeler’s. Did you check there?”

“No,” Max says, “Steve–”

“Fuck Steve,” Billy says, not caring. Caring so, so much. “They’ll be back soon. If the station wagon’s gone that means Joyce went to grab him.”

Max hovers in the doorway, frowning when Billy digs through the refrigerator for a beer. 

Her eyes are blue like his, judgmental like his. “You’re not supposed to drink that shit,” Max tells him, wrinkling her nose.

Billy cracks the pop top. “And you’re not supposed to play DND on a school night.”

“Things are different, now.”

They watch each other, silent, until the front door swings open and a hundred teenagers swarm the living room. Max hugs him once, right around the middle, before following their voices to Will's room. The door slams shut and all the fuckin’ racket gives way to muffled silence.

Different.

Things are different now.

Billy leans against the sink and sips his beer. Waits for Joyce or Freak Byers to round the corner into the kitchen until he remembers that they’ve both got work tonight and Hop’s at the cabin.

Joyce does that. Carts teenagers around in between shifts at the general store because she’s a good mom. Good person. 

Steve Harrington appears, arms crossed over his chest. “Fuck Steve, huh?”

Billy’s heart thunders in his chest. It’s been months, and. 

He shrugs.

The air rushes from Steve’s lungs. “Don’t have to be an asshole about it.”

“That’s just what I am,” Billy says, “An asshole.”

“Maybe.”

Billy holds his can out, “Want a beer?”

Steve stares at him. Then the slick rim of the can. Then at Billy. “No.”

“Suit yourself,” Billy says. “Where’ve you been?”

“Playing chauffeur, I guess.”

“Couldn’t stop to say hi in between shifts?”

Steve flushes. “Billy–”

“You never came to see me again,” Billy says, “You disappeared. I made it out of the hospital and–”

“I shoved you, Billy.”

“It was a nightmare.”

“Right. Exactly,” Steve shakes his head, like. It doesn’t matter. But the thing is, Billy knows shoving with intent. He knows men who plot to draw blood, and he knows monsters and Steve, just. 

Isn’t that.

He is an asshole, though. “Maxine couldn’t ride her bike over?” 

And Steve folds like a house of cards. “C’mon, you know Neil doesn’t let her ride that thing around, especially when it’s cold like this.”

“I know Neil. He was my dad.”

Steve looks ready for a fight. Poised to run at any second. 

Billy’s never been more exhausted in his entire life. “Glad you can be her big brother, now.”

“Billy–”

“No, they’re some huge fuckin’ shoes to fill. I’m dead, anyway.”

“You’re not dead–”

Billy tosses the can into Joyce’s recycling bin. It clatters and causes a scene and Billy wants to take it back. Steve deflates like a balloon. “Shouldn't you rinse that before you throw it away?”

“Yeah well. I make a shitty roommate.”

Steve watches, spooked, as Billy shoves past him and disappears.

–

Christmas 1986 and January, 1987 come and go. 

Joyce gets him a sweater. 

Billy wonders if he’ll ever feel alive again.

–

In April, he starts to miss the sea. 

Conscious enough to think of home.

–

“I think–”

Max stares at him, a cigarette pinched between two fingers. 

“--I think I want to see California.”

She cut her hair over spring break so it twists, too lazy to be called a curl, under the determined jut over her chin. It’s what girls are doing, in 1987. Cutting all their hair off. Max looks older, all of a sudden, and Billy doesn’t know when he missed it. 

She hands him the cigarette because he’s comin’ up on two years post recovery and, dramatics aside, he could shave a couple years off the impending decades. The smoke burns through his lungs pleasantly, paints the sky purple when he lets it go. 

“You want to see California,” Max repeats, staring out across the quarry as the words settle on her tongue, “Like–”

“--I think I could stand a change of scenery.”

She takes the cigarette from him. “That’s not a change, you’ve lived there for most of your life.”

“I’m not looking for LBC, I want–”

“--Mountains?”

Billy thinks about it. Really, he wants two-thousand miles between him and everything, but. “Yeah,” he says, because it’s simple. Low stakes. “Mountains could be good, like. A cure.”

“Like tuberculosis victims?”

“Sure. Claws aren’t that different.”

Maxine snorts. They smoke for an eternity in silence, basking in the sunset, and Billy thinks she’s on board. She’s okay with it, because she’s older now, but then she throws the lit cherry at him and it scathes his jaw. Sears him to the bone. 

“Ow, Maxine, what the fuck–”

“You’re pathetic,” She says, full of venom.

“Probably.”

“Why are you always running away?” Max slides off the car hood and gets in his face, and Billy.

Two years ago he would’ve–

He can’t think that way anymore. 

“Max–”

“So, what? You save everyone and become the hero and fuckin’. Sulk around for two years like a dickbag and now you want to run away? Just when everyone’s starting to love–”

“No one fuckin’ loves me,” Billy says. A non answer. Tastes like a lie, but. It’s the truth. He clears his throat. “I don’t want to run away.”

Max shoves him, “I love you. Asshole.”

“I know. Love you too.”

“Don’t I count?”

Billy grabs her hand, “Of course you do, dipshit. The most.” Maxine’s crying for real, now. Billy hates it so fuckin’ much. 

“Can I come?”

“Your a minor,” Billy supplies. Regrets it more than anything that he’s got to leave her behind, but. “Don’t worry. Not about anything, alright? Steve’ll–”

Max shoves him again, “This is about Steve Harrington, isn’t it?”

“No.” Billy lies.

“Steve’s going to–”

“--He’s not gonna do anything,” Billy snarls, “He’s not. We haven’t spoken in months.”

“He always asks about you,” Max says simply, and. 

Billy’s got a flat tire. It lets all the air out of the sky. It shouldn’t matter, shouldn’t put his brakes on, but. 

He blinks. “Okay.”

“You’re so fucking stupid,” Max says. “He’s not going to let you leave, Billy. Not without–”

“--He doesn’t get a say, in this.”

Maxine stares at him, eyes polished like Riverstone. “Are you going to say goodbye to him? At least?” 

“No.”

“Alright,” Max says. She shoves him again, “Dumbass. I hate you. I hate you so much–”

Billy hugs her. 

Loves her, just. So much his chest aches and burns like he’s back in the hospital, day one, July 20th, 1985, and. 

He thinks.

Worries about how many people he knows he can’t say goodbye to.

–

Will takes it the hardest. June just makes the pain turn raspberry on his cheeks and Billy hates to see him cry, so. He isn’t surprised when Little William locks himself in his bedroom to make shit easier on the both of them.

Freak Byers hugs Billy, slips a joint in his pocket, ruffles his hair.

Hopper gives him a beer. The last they’ll share in all the world. Maxine tells him to call. El tells him to write, and.

Joyce Byers slips a sheet of paper in his glove compartment. 

It sits funny, in retrospect. He took his hush-money and ran off to the sea and she left him something to remember her by, and that’s death. Burial. It’s her fault and it’s not. It’s the thing that breaks the dam. The last straw and suddenly the weight of everything is too much. 

Really, it starts before that. With the rumble of truck tires into the cracked driveway of a new home, thousands of miles from the sea. It begins with the pier, months before that. A boy with beautiful brown eyes that could only ever raise suspicion in Neil’s gut because he was right about this. Everything. Billy. 

Truthfully, it starts with a phone call and a shitty, half-baked apology from a woman Billy would never see again. 

He isn’t smart enough to keep track, though. 

So he almost dies and then doesn’t, and decides pretty quickly that it's Joyce. It starts and ends with summer air licking at the tender, still-healing pink of a hole punched through his chest 630 days ago. It begins with the glove box, and a note that’s gotta weigh less than an ounce.

It starts with Joyce Fuckin’ Byers.

Billy figures maybe Hop did the dirty work for her. That he took a rolled-down window as an invitation, once Billy caved on the beer he was always offering and let it spill that he was leaving so they thought. Now is the time for action. Hop slipped the thing in between Billy’s vehicle registration and insurance proof when he wasn’t looking. He played his part.

The paper is definitely from Joyce, though. 

He’s seen her handwriting, before, all over the fuckin’ place, swooping, swirling cursive that reminds her to get milk the next time she’s at Melvalds. Billy’s seen it pinned to the fridge in sappy, sweet-sick notes that she leaves for Hop and Freak Byers and Byers’ little brother, telling them to eat something while she’s gone, to remember to take out the trash, fuckin’. Whatever.

Point is, Billy knows it was her. And when he finally digs it out of the glove box, when he runs into it looking for an old pack of smokes somewhere outside of Nebraska, it’s folded in half three times and stamped with his name and feels like an attack.

Billy. 

Only, Joyce calls him William when it’s something heavy and important, so. William. Might as well be, as far as Billy’s concerned. 

Billy, she starts. Good a place as any, sparking a fuse she isn’t equipped to monitor. He doesn’t deserve shared beers and hidden notes.

Billy, Joyce says, with all the weight of William. I know that you’re having a hard time adjusting. I should’ve checked on you but I wasn’t sure what to say and now you’re gone. I wasn’t always the best mother to my own kids, and sometimes old habits die hard. I know you’ve had a hard life, even though you never talk about it, and I know all of this shit must hurt like hell, but you have to know that I’m proud of you for everything. Making it out of the hospital in one piece. Especially that–

His palms sweat, smearing the page when he flattens it against the wheel, smoothing its surface in the moonlight so he can read it, and can’t, because Hop insisted they have one more beer before Billy took off for the coast, and now–

We should’ve checked on you before. That’s all I want to say. You’re a good kid, Billy. You pretend not to be, but you are, and seeing you with Hop, how he loves you like a son…I’m here for you. We all are. I’ve included a list of phone numbers you can call any time. We’re here to help–

Phone numbers for both Wheeler kids. And Lucas Sinclair. And Dustin Henderson. And the Byers’ place. 

Call anytime, Joyce says. 

Anyone. Anytime.

Seeing you with Hop, how he loves you like a son–

Billy sniffs and chokes on a sudden, violent wave of emotion. Joyce Byers doesn’t know what the fuck she’s talking about.

–

He should’ve said goodbye to the one person that came second to mattering the most.

It eats at him, tearing away chunks of his flesh with small, sharp teeth. He moves into his new apartment by the sea and thinks about drowning himself in it.

–

A month after landing in California things are different.

Worse.

–

He tries not to think about Steve Harrington, who he hasn’t spoken to since that cold, shitty night in November when they shed each other’s apologies like old winter coats.

Everyone else came to say goodbye, but. 

Not Steve. Should be a clear enough answer that what they had was nothing but that doesn’t matter to Billy. Could never matter. Steve’s memory comes up like gray water in the bathroom sink. Not there one day, and then. 

There.

Sits like a ghost in the corner in the same outfit he wore the last time Billy saw him, delivering Maxine to a brand new campaign. Soft yellow sweater like swallowing canyons in the morning light.

“You look like shit,” Billy tells him. The Doctors said it could happen, off and on, for the rest of his life. Seeing the dead and the left behind, it’s the cruel result of playing bitch to an interdimensional monster. Taking a claw through the chest and surviving an IV drip of internal bleeding that still acts up when Billy takes a fist to the head.

It never happened, when he was in Hawkins, but. 

That’s just Bill’s luck. It’s a punishment. He’s in hell. No two ways about it, because.

Ghost Steve Harrington shrugs his yellow shoulders and everything looks��worse, here. Drab. Billy thinks California wasn’t made for gray weather but since it’s November, the sea foam has scrubbed the color from everything until only acid remains.

Ghost Steve’s sweater looks brown in Billy’s bedroom. 

Billy gets used to him, more or less. Ghost Steve never says anything, but he watches Billy fall into bed every night and his eyes spell judgment. Why don’t you unpack these boxes? Why haven’t you used any of that green to buy a half-decent setup? Why don’t you call Joyce, you know she worries–

Once, Billy throws a pillow at Ghost Steve Harrington’s head. “Go away, already.”

Billy wonders if the real Steve, alive Steve, is as pretty as his memory makes out for him. 

He is. Always was.

Billy hates himself. “You’re not real, you know. You’re alive. Most of you is alive, back in Hawkins.”

Ghost Steve just smiles at him, slow and terrible as if to say I’m dead here and so are you. 

It fucking sucks. Billy tugs the blanket over his head and ignores Steve Harrington the Ghost. He ignores everything until it starts coming up like sludge in the bathroom sink.

–

Billy writes a letter to the only person in the world who understands what it feels like to harbor shit for a man who never once noticed him, until they had each other’s blood under their nails. 

So.

As soon as the landline is installed, Billy breaks his rule and scribbles the number down, addressing the envelope to Little William Byers, Who Can Always Hold His Water.

415. 667. 8224. For Emergencies only.

From, Big William Hargrove. 

Will can be trusted. Billy worries about him and it’s a roiling, sore-spot weakness. He’s terrified that Will’s made up his mind to never speak to Billy again.

He sends the letter, anyway. 

–

Billy starts seeing other people, too. In his house. On the street. 

Ghost Steve Harrington isn’t too thrilled with all the extra company, but the only other memory in the world brave enough to stand in his bedroom used to tuck him into his He-Man pajamas at night, so. Nothing Martha Hargrove hasn’t seen before. 

Billy starts to wonder if he’s going crazy.

Heather’s got dominion over the bathroom. Looks exactly like the last time Billy saw her, in that dumb-fucker Lifeguard uniform, except her arm is gone. Torn away. Little bits of her blood get on Billy’s cheek when she turns from her reflection in the mirror, eyes brimming with vitriol and lost potential as if to say, you fed me to that thing. We were friends, Billy, I was your only friend–

“You’re not real,” Billy tells her. Pisses in the toilet bowl, as if to prove his point. 

Heather’s not real. 

None of it’s real. 

–

A week before Thanksgiving Billy calls to tell Joyce he’s suffocating. To tell her that he misses Freak Byers and his little brother so much that Billy can’t breathe sometimes, and it’s Joyce’s fuckin’ fault. She’s a bitch, and Hop’s a loser, and he misses them both so much that he’s packed and unpacked and repacked his apartment four times because California doesn’t feel like home anymore. 

He misses the couch. He wants the dead to stay buried. He wants to go home.

So Billy drinks a bottle of schnapps and calls to say that Joyce can go fuck herself hard, Billy hates her for turning him into this, but Steve Harrington answers the phone.

It’s two o’clock in the morning Hawkins time, so Billy hangs up.

Steve calls back immediately, “Everyone’s asleep,” He says, voice rough with unuse. “Make it quick.”

Billy’s killed himself thinking about Steve, like this. Fresh from sleep. Warm. “Uh,” He says intelligently, “Sorry.”

“Who is this?”

He wonders if Ghost Steve is still in the bedroom, or if he went back to Hawkins. Floating on the clouds. “This is, uh. This is Billy.”

“Billy Hargrove?” Like he didn’t spend months in Billy’s hospital room. Didn’t cry when Billy learned to walk again.

“Yes.”

“Hi,” Steve says, soft. 

So warm and fleece-lined with emotion that Billy wants to curl up inside of it and never, ever leave. Something ruffles as Steve shifts his weight, waking up a little bit. “Hold on, Bill, let me–”

“No,” Billy says, “She’s asleep. You don’t need to wake her up.”

“You called.”

“I know.”

“She won’t want to miss you, you never call.”

“I know, alright? I just. I don’t want to wake her up,” Billy says, swallowing against the threat of tears. He hates Joyce but he doesn’t want to make anything worse than he already has by just. Living.

“Are you serious?” Steve snorts like Billy’s the most ridiculous, stupid fucker on the planet. “You called at two o’clock in the morning and you don’t want to wake her up?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“That’s so weird.”

Billy sniffs, exhausted, “Who asked you?”

“Nobody,” Steve tells him easily, “No one, I just think–”

“Why the fuck do you care enough to think about it or me or Joyce?” Billy snaps. The receiver groans a little in his fist, “It’s not any of your business–”

“--You know I care about you, Billy.”

“Do I?” Billy sips at his bottle, angry enough to see red, “You say shit in the dark. When you’re tired. When–”

“Hey, dickshit, you woke me up.”

“It’s not dickshit, it’s dip shit–”

“--Okay–”

“Fuckin’ Einstein.”

Steve doesn’t hang up. Billy considers it, seething until he takes another swig, and then Steve asks, “Are you alright?” 

The world comes to a sudden, screeching halt. The tender pink and still-healing parts of himself inflate with vulnerability, which only makes him angry. “I’m fine.”

“Really?”

“Yes, asshole.” 

“You’re drunk and it’s two in the morning–”

“--It’s only midnight where I am–”

“--Well, people who are actually fine don’t drink schnapps at midnight on a fuckin’ Tuesday.”

Billy freezes, back going ram-rod straight against the drywall. “How. How’d you know–”

“Only schnapps gets you slurring like that,” Steve says. Then, catching himself, “I mean ‘you,’ as in. The royal you.”

They partied in high school. Never together, but near. Billy–

It feels like a lie. He lets it go.

“I don’t know what schnapps does to you, as in. Billy Hargrove.”

I miss the way you say my name, Billy doesn’t tell him. He tosses the bottle back, swallowing fire as it bubbles up the lining of his throat. “Kay, well. Tell Joyce I called.”

“You could call back tomorrow and tell her yourself.”

“No,” Billy says, fiddling with the hole in his jeans. 

“Why not?”

“Because it’s none of your fucking business, Harrington, that’s why.”

“She worries about you,” Steve says, fully awake now. Sitting, probably. 

Billy tries not to get caught up in the mental image of Steve Harrington with bed-head and pillow lines on his cheeks and blankets pooling around his hips. 

Fails. 

Steve says, “Joyce loves–”

“--Why are you sleeping at her house?” Billy demands. Remembering himself. Remembering that the couch used to be his, before he ran away. 

“I get nightmares,” Steve says. Billy knows that. Billy knows– 

“Bullshit,” He’s angry about it. What tore them apart. “What’s there to be afraid of, anymore?”

“I saw you get punched through the chest,” Steve says, “On July Fourth. I was up there in the rafters, and I just. Saw. Does something to a nineteen year old, you know?”

He was there after, too. Until he wasn’t.

Billy’s palms grow wet and clammy against the bottle.

He has the sudden and familiar urge to apologize. Sorry Steve had to see that. Sorry the image of it meant nothing, in the long run. Nickels and dimes. He lived and, really, what was the trauma for?

Billy opens his mouth, chin wobbling and–

“Is that why you. The hospital. Why you–”

“Shit, it’s late,” Steve yawns. “I’ll tell her you called.”

“Sure,” Billy says, scrubbing the wet on his cheeks. “Thanks. Appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

–

Max sends him letters. Another thing he caves into, later on.

For Emergencies only. 

From, Billy Hargrove. 

She writes immediately. The envelopes are always crinkled by fingertips and nails, the ink always smudged with tears and grief. He has to imagine that they get that way, dilapidated because a journey across six states can’t be easy on them.

He can’t imagine Max crying as she writes to him. Can’t imagine her crying at all. 

He thinks about her in that house, sometimes. 

He hopes. Prays. The guilt swallows him whole.

– 

Billy develops a system for determining if the person he’s talking to is real. 

“You’re a beach bum,” The guy says. All tanned skin and small, curved lips. No black sludge leaks from his eyes, so. 

Real. Things have gotten worse on the coast.

Billy stares up at him from the sand, counting the seconds. He doesn’t have a towel. Joyce tried to get him to take some, one, but Billy is the spitting image of his father. Old habits die hard, so. He’s got minerals seeping through the holes in his pants and his hands feel grimy, covered in sea stuff for his pride.

“I see you here,” The guy says, “Every day.”

“Sure.”

“Ain’t you got a job, man?”

Billy turns his attention back to the waves. The foam.

“Guess not,” The guy shifts his weight, blocking dull gray sunlight. “You from around here?”

“LBC, originally,” Billy says, surprising himself. He pulls his knees to his chest with a burst of salty, stinging wind off the shore. Somewhere, about a mile into the deep past Manila landing, something massive is rotting in the waves. Feeding the ecosystem. Circle of life, and all that.

The guy nods, “What brings you to Arcata?”

“Just moved back from the midwest.”

“Mm, Chicago?”

“No, Indiana.” Billy says, not in the mood for conversation.

“Got used to small and shitty, then?”

Billy laughs, surprising himself. It's the first noise he’s made in weeks with a person who’s not caught in a ten-second delay over his landline. Feels okay. Weird. “Yeah,” Billy determines, “I like that Arcata’s on the bay and not wide open. Out there, you know?” Billy gestures to the ocean with his sleeve cuff.

Can’t see the other side of it. Landlocked or not.

The guy seems to understand. He watches the shoreline for a long while and then he says, “What’s in Indiana?”

Monsters. My sister. Shadows. “Nothing,” Billy says. “That’s why I’m on the beach.”

“Nothing here either, amigo,” The guy says, grinning slow and easy, “Looks like you traded shit for shit.”

“Alright. Thanks.”

“I’m Argyle,” Argyle says. 

“Billy,” He lifts his hand toward the sky for a shake, just like his daddy taught him. 

Argyle just nods at him, chewing on the inside of his cheek. Billy’s palm falls, dejected, to the sand. 

They watch the shoreline. They watch a seagull try and swallow a crab and then laugh when its throat is nearly torn open from the inside. It’s good to laugh. Weird. Dark thing to find humor in.

“I own a surf place,” Argyle says when the seagull takes flight. “Ever heard of it?”

There are a million out here. “Sure.”

“Not really a surf place, in the conventional sense. I do longboards too. And Mary Jane. Pizza, for Miss Mary’s lovers.”

Billy nods, pulling his knees close again, watching sand tumble from the grip of his leg hair. 

Argyle sparks something that looks like a cigarette and smells like a joint. “You need a job?”

“What kinda job is it?”

“Selling surf supplies. Longboards and weed and pizza–”

“Is that legal?”

“Not yet. Legalize gluten,” Argyle says, with a triumphant fist.

Billy shrugs so Argyle shrugs, casting shadows. Teasing. “If you ain’t got a job, how’d you afford to leave LBC for Indiana, and then bum-fuck for Arcata?”

“Big Brother hush-money,” Billy says, serious as a heart attack but Argyle laughs, and like. 

The skies, fuckin’. Break. Open and pour. 

It’s the best thing Billy’s ever heard. The timbre of it licks at the pink, still-healing skin on Billy’s chest through his jumper. Argyle’s lilting, chaotic beat lights him up and magically casts itself out of Billy’s lungs until they’re laughing at each other. Laughing together. 

It’s weird. Good.

“You’re a bizarre fuckin’ guy, beach bum.”

Billy shrugs, again, self-conscious. “Where’s your shop?”

Argyle points over Billy’s shoulder at a small, driftwood shack he hadn’t noticed today, or yesterday, or last week. The sign looks brand new. Says, Surfer Boy Pizza, In bright, shining letters.

“That’s her,” Argyle says, in love.

Billy stares at the shoreline. “That’s a dump.”

“Hey, I’ve had to hoard money from the Government. We’re not all as lucky as you,” Argyle grins, slow and easy, “You want the job or not? Could use a little silence in the shop. The other guy I work with, Eddie, he’ll talk your fuckin’ ear off about nothing if you give him the chance. Look to me like you won’t give anyone a chance.”

Billy feels like he’s been doused in cold water. 

He rocks back and forth, breathing in and out until the feeling passes, “Maybe,” He says. The best he can do. A non-answer. A remedy.

“Alright, well. Stop in sometime, if you get bored staring at the ocean,” Argyle grins at him, beaming itself onto Billy’s face until they’re mirror images. “Freak.”

–

Billy watches a lot of T.V. 

His living room is cast in a permanent silver hue, painting his hair gray and his lips purple. All that money rotting in his bank account and he’s only pitched together enough to buy a standard television box, and a place for her to sit, and a place for him to sit. 

His apartment is functional, like a prison. His kitchen is made of one bowl, one cup, one spoon (because he can saw into things with its blunt edge, should anything ever come to that), and a hot plate. He doesn’t have a skillet or a soup pot or anything so the shit is practically useless.

He eats dollar tacos from the hut. 

He starves. 

He drinks enough water and beer to send fluid leaking from his pores, and he watches T.V. 

Always. Blue.

This close to Christmas, all three stations are swamped with targeted Ads. Can’t go half a beer without enduring another fuckin’ commercial, selling sneakers and Atari game consoles and brand new VW station wagons. 

Billy chugs another PBR and thinks he could buy a hundred VW station wagons, thanks to Big Brother. He could buy a private plane, and an eight-bedroom house on the coast, and if he ever runs out of green there’ll be more where that came from. That’s the perk of getting possessed by a monster, so. 

Billy finds a scrap of newspaper border and jots down the number that flashes across the screen. Thinks, he could probably visit VW tomorrow. Could pay for the entire thing in cash. Could pack a bag and drive back to the Midwest–

Hallway through an ad for hair plugs, the phone starts to ring. Billy ignores the shrill ding of the bell until it stops. Starts up again. Stops. Starts.

Eventually he yanks his telephone off the hook, swallowing a mouthful of beer. “What.”

“That’s not how you’re supposed to answer the phone.”

Billy pulls away, staring at the receiver. “Who is this?”

“Steve.”

“Steve Harrington?” Billy asks, a mockery of their first phone call. Like Steve didn’t take care of him in the hospital. Wasn’t there when Billy learned to walk again. When Steve doesn’t say anything back, Billy swallows. “It’s two o’clock in the morning.”

“You were kind enough to call at two my time, thought I’d return the favor.”

His stomach swoops, low and dangerous. “That was weeks ago, now.”

“You never called Joyce.”

“So?”

“So, I promised I’d do a wellness check.” 

Billy mutes the T.V., his arms breaking out in goose pimples with Steve’s next inhale. Feeling warm breath against his cheek from two thousand miles away. 

“Well. I’m alive.”

“Barely. Tell Joyce that.” Steve Harrington exhales into the phone. Billy imagines cigarette smoke and fire. 

Wishes it could burn him to the ground. “Look, I appreciate you reaching out or whatever, looking me up in the phone book so I can apologize to Joyce for being the shittiest of all her adopted children–”

“--I didn’t look for you in the phone book–”

Billy’s mouth dries up, tacky and uncomfortable. 

“--No one could look for you in the phone book. Way you run your life, you don’t exist, Hargrove.”

Billy stands. His knees crack. “How’d you get this number?” Sounds like a shitty, drunken cop in a shitty, dark thriller/drama about his shitty, shitty life.

“I asked Joyce.” Steve says easily. The hero.

“Where did she get this number?”

“From Max.”

Billy’s stomach swoops. “That’s bullshit. Max knows my address, not my phone number.”

“Maybe Joyce got it from someone else, maybe she didn’t, maybe she found it on a crumpled piece of paper that was thrown into the trash,” Steve says, “Does it really matter?”

“Yes. You had no right to do that,” Billy says, voice shaking. He wonders if Will threw his note away. If he’s angry. “None of you have any right to do this to me–”

“Totally,” Steve says, “Your sister has no right to know where you are. Joyce, who put a roof over your head for a year after you left the hospital, is supposed to stop worrying and missing you because you want it. Screwed that we care about you, the asshole who saved the town and all our lives and the fuckin’ world, on top of that.” 

We. 

Screwed that we care about you.

Billy’s stomach is full of rocks, roiling and knocking into one another. They throw him off balance and send river water pulsing up his throat. He’s drowning, he–

“You can’t save everyone and then disappear.”

Billy swallows. “I didn’t.”

“You didn’t even say goodbye, Billy.”

“Neither did you,” Billy says, furious. “Before that. At the hospital–”

“I don’t want to hurt you, okay? I. When I pushed–”

“Stop,” Billy says, “Please. Stop.”

“Sure,” Steve Harrington scoffs, full of rage. “My bad. Forgot you can’t accept that you’re a regular fuckin’ hometown hero and I’m a piece of shit.”

Billy hates this. He left Hawkins, to. To get away from this, and. He ran.

Might as well admit that, now.

Billy must make a noise, must fall apart, because. Steve’s stubble scrapes against the phone. “Billy. Look, I–”

“What do you want?” Billy’s voice shakes. Sounds weak. 

Harrington doesn’t seem to hear. “I just called to check on you.”

“Feels more like you’re beating me over the head with a rock.”

“Funny,” Steve says, “Cain and Abel, right?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Not really,” Steve tells him. An awkward silence yawns between them, stretching on until Billy thinks the call must’ve dropped, and then; “I didn’t call to check on you.”

Billy snorts. “And after all the steam you put into that speech?” He’s grateful that they’re even, now. Neither looking down their nose at the other. Liars and crooks, two of a kind. “Jesus Christ, what will Joyce say?” 

“I haven’t slept in two days. I’ve tried everything, but. I keep thinking about Starcourt.”

It takes the air out of Billy’s lungs. 

“I can’t stop thinking about you,” Steve mumbles. Soft enough that Billy isn’t sure he heard it right, but then, “Billy. I just. I needed to hear your voice. Are you okay?”

Billy can’t say anything back. He’s learning to speak, again, he can’t walk, he’s on the brink of death–

“Malibu? You there?”

Not a damn thing can be funny, anymore. “I’m sorry, Steve.”

“It’s alright.”

“If I hadn’t been at Starcourt, you’d be asleep right now.”

Steve snorts, “Don’t be stupid.”

“It’s true,” Billy mutters, sick, “In a roundabout way, if I hadn’t been on the road that night, if that. Thing had never crawled inside of me–”

“If that hadn’t happened we wouldn’t be together now,” Steve says. 

The weight of the world, on their shoulders.

Billy cracks. “I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for. You. Hargrove, you’re the only person left who doesn’t have to apologize,” Steve Harrington breathes deeply, into the receiver, and Billy swallows it. Fills his own lungs to taste cigarette smoke. “I called because I knew you’d be up. I just. Knew you would be. Cain and Abel, right?”

“Brothers’ keeper,” Billy says. The television screen flickers. The world is blue, and Billy is. Cast in its light.

“Can you sit with me? Just until I fall asleep.” Steve sounds like he’s drowning.

Billy can’t help but to jump in and save him.

–

Surfer Boy Pizza is even uglier on the inside. 

Argyle wasn’t kidding about the surf supplies plus description. From the moment the door shuts behind him, Billy’s at a loss trying to figure out what anyone would stop in here to buy since it seems like the kind of place people are exiled to.

The air is stale. Beach salt and sweat permeate the air as the result of a broken cooling unit, leaking onto the ground that hasn’t been scrubbed clean in months.

“Hello?” Billy asks, barely above a mumble, “Anyone home?”

“Back here!”

Billy tugs his flannel closer, cherry-picking his way through piles of useless shit and garbage. Surfer Boy’s walls are messy with knickknacks and shitty wire shelves pushed haphazardly against white and red checkered tile. Piles of fishing nets, lead-bellied life preservers, and vintage scuba gear mark the landing of the main desk, which has to be a repurposed McDonald’s check-out counter.

Behind it, covered in swirling, snaking tattoos, a man stares at him. 

He’s cute. His fist turns white around a water-spotted glass jar that says, Eddie’s Homemade Fishing Bait. The H has been drawn to look like the devil. 

“Uh,” The guy says smartly. 

“I’m Billy,” He puts his hand out but the guy doesn’t take it, he just stares. Stares and Stares.

“Okay. I’m here to see Argyle,” Billy points to the jar, “I’m guessing you’re Eddie?”

“I’m Eddie,” He says, cheeks turning bright pink. 

Great.

“Okay, uh,” Billy fiddles with the cuffs of his flannel. “I sit on the beach, sometimes.”

“Every day,” Eddie tells him, still not moving, “I see you out there sometimes.”

“Every day, uh. Yeah. Is Argyle–”

“Are you here for a job?” Eddie asks, tacking his jar behind a sign that says the exact same thing. Eddie’s Homemade Fishing Bait, like maybe he’ll lose one or the other if he doesn’t keep track. “If you’re sniffing around for a job–”

“--Look, man, Argyle asked me to come and work for him.”

“Right, yeah, but I’m his partner,” Eddie says, scrubbing his hands on his jeans. “I’m his silent partner. Do you know anything about crabbing?”

Billy frowns, “Crabbing? I thought this was a surf shack.”

“And a fishing place, we sell longboards, too. Contraband t-shirts, homemade banana bread and vintage earrings, bait–”

“--And weed–”

Eddie jumps over the counter, slapping a damp, smelly hand over Billy’s mouth, “Dude, what the fuck? That’s private. That’s a private–”

Billy shoves him off, chest heaving like he’s just been chased. He’s been caught.

Eddie tracks him, eyes wide and afraid. Big eyes. Brown. Pretty.

“Don’t touch me.” Billy says, moving away.

“Sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Your fingers taste like fishing bait,” Billy spits, scrubbing his own hand over his mouth. 

“Sorry, I was making–”

“--Sure–”

“--Weed brownies,” Eddie says, wagging his eyebrows. 

“Weed brownies,” Billy repeats, tasting fish on his tongue. “Why the fuck do they taste like pond scum?”

“That’s my special ingredient,” Eddie says, and. He cackles. High and bright and frightening, like a man brandishing a knife who knows something Billy doesn’t. 

It’s strange.

It startles a laugh out of Billy, anyway. Weird and good but terrifying. Argyle in another font, scribbled in the shape of swirling tattoos and pretty brown eyes. 

Eddie watches him. 

“What?” Billy says. He rubs a palm over his face, suddenly self-conscious.

“Nothing,” When Billy stares at him, wide-eyed and confused, Eddie grins. “When you laugh, you’re just. You’re beautiful. Know that?”

Billy scoffs, “You’re a fuckin’ weirdo.” He says, but his stomach swoops. The Bastard.

“Yeah. When can you start?”

–

“I got a job,” Billy says, instead of hello when Steve calls on Friday. It’s warm, for late January, California finally giving up her quest toward the unfamiliar.

Steve chuckles. “Got a job as, what, a government spy?” 

“No.”

“Supermodel, then. Undercover CIA ops, government supermodel–”

“--Like Nixon?”

“No, what the fuck? Have you seen yourself in the mirror, Malibu? You’re more JFK,” Steve says, sleepy and warm.

“I’m working at a surf place,” Billy tells him. It’s no fun to make Harrington guess when he sounds a minute from sleep.

“No shit? Didn’t know you surfed.”

“Used to,” Billy says, grinning when Steve makes a low, impressed noise. “Don’t get excited, I stopped when Neil moved us to corncob hell.”

“Maybe you’ll get back into it. Being around that stuff all the time, y’know.”

“Maybe,” Billy says. His belly flutters with possibility. He’s strong enough to run now. Hopeful enough to work. “It’s more than just surf stuff, actually. We do fishing bait, and crabbing and long boards–”

“--They sell hand blown Christmas ornaments too?” 

“Probably,” Billy can hear the smile in Steve’s voice, dawning over his perfect pink lips. “High people love interior design.”

“What’s high got to do with it?”

“We sell Miss Mary.”

“Criminal,” Steve says, “I leave you alone for two minutes–”

“Eight months,” Billy tells him. A pin drops. “Not that I’ve been counting.”

Billy prepares himself for something, though he can’t put a finger on what’s got him ready to pace the fuckin’ floor, geared up for the deafening click! Of Harrington’s receiver as it hits the cradle. 

They’ve never hung up on each other, but. Then again, they’ve never held a conversation this long either. Usually Steve just calls so he can fall asleep to the sounds of Billy swishing beer around in a can, pissing into the toilet bowl, blowing his nose when the weather’s cold enough.

But.

There’s a first time for everything. 

“Has it been that long?” Steve wonders, surprising him. 

“Yeah,” Billy says. Lying, because it’s more than that. Two Novembers and a New year, a cut and dry four-hundred days trying to acclimate to all of the rot they’ve been dealt. But who’s counting? 

“When do you start your new job?”

“Sunday,”

“Got the whole weekend to, fuckin’. Skinny dip, rollerblade on the pier, and hike in the mountains.”

“I don’t live in the mountains.”

“Huh. Maxine said–”

“Jesus. Girl runs her fuckin’ mouth too much.”

“She’s just excited,” Steve tells him. Sounds like a big brother, a proud mom. “She talks all the time about joining you out there.”

“She’d hate it.”

Steve snorts. “Kid was born for the ocean. Like you, you know? Your eyes.” When Bilyl doesn’t say anything back, Steve yawns. “I’m sure you’ve got your reasons. Bay Watch not her scene anymore?”

Billy shrugs, “Not as beachy, where I am. LBC was quintessential California.”

“Where are you?” Steve asks, voice full of wonder. “Hold on, lemme get a pen and paper–”

“Not falling for that, Harrington.”

“Why not?” Steve demands, pouting. “I’m not gonna show up at your apartment door one day, y’know–”

“You might. With your pen and fuckin’ paper.”

“You’re right, I might,” Steve sing-songs, “I was able to bully your phone number out of the Byers’.”

“Hah!” Billy says, leaning forward. His beer’s almost gone so it doesn’t slosh when he jabs an accusatory finger at Steve from two thousand miles away, “I knew Will was the one who gave you my phone number. Little shit.”

“It’s not his fault, I wasn’t eating or sleeping, after you left, so. Joyce took pity on me.”

Billy almost cracks with the weight of his heart battering against his ribs. “Joyce?”

“She. Gave it to me.”

Billy swallows, throat clicking with emotion. “She had it the whole time?”

“They all did. Do, I guess,” Steve tells him. Then, after a beat, “You’re not mad, are you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Please don’t change your fuckin’ number because of this.”

“Dunno. Might,” Billy lifts the can to his lips, sad to find it empty. “Should probably move, too, before Maxine tells everyone where my apartment is and you’re all pissed to find that the beach here sucks and we can’t even climb a fuckin’ mountain.”

Steve laughs. “But the other stuff?”

“Totally,” Billy says. He stands, pulling the phone as far as it will go until he gets his hand around the refrigerator door.

Steve lights a cigarette, inhaling sweetly into the phone. “Why didn’t you move to the mountains, anyway?”

“Room and board is expensive up there.”

“Didn’t the government shell out some money for your trouble?”

“Yeah,” Billy says, “Not enough.”

“We could combine our shit,” Steve says suddenly, “Y’know. Merge our assets and get someplace real nice.”

Billy drops his beer can. It gushes over kitchen linoleum like an unleashed tidal wave and he swears, stooping to mop it up with a dish rag. “Shit—”

“--Did I say something–”

“--No it’s. Nothing more stupid than the shit you usually say,” Billy tells him. Because. Combine our shit and merge our assets feels like something else. Grows teeth to chew and lips to say remember what tore you apart?

“Billy? You there?”

“I’m here,” Billy says. He dumps the dishrag into the sink, throat drier than it’s ever been in his life. 

He clears it. 

Says, “You want me to be your roommate,” and the words taste like lead. Burn like poison. 

“I want you to be my roommate,” Steve admits. 

It’s dark, through the kitchen window. Arcata sleeps and dreams outward, in every direction, and it makes Billy brave. Stupid. 

“Alright,” He says, playing along.

“Done deal,” Steve says, grinning, “Pack your bag, baby. I’m coming to get you.”

Billy’s heart swells, ignorant to the pain that will come in the morning when he comes to. “You work at Family Video, now?” Can’t. Stand the pressure of the moment.

“Yeah,” Steve says, “The mall burned down, so. Not a ton of other options unless I want to work at the General Store.”

“And you’re gonna come get me on a Disk Jockey’s salary?” Billy leans forward, fingers scrambling for his pack of smokes. “You could open your own ice cream parlor.”

“I don’t have–that’s not what I want to do with my life.”

“Really? Being a lifeguard is what I want to do with mine.” Billy quips. Steve laughs suddenly, smooth as marmalade on fresh toast. Warm. Billy wants to make him do it again. “Rescuing screaming brats from themselves as they run around the edge of the pool and stub their toes and crack chins on wet cement–”

“--Jesus Christ–”

“--Sunburns,” Billy admits. “The lis goes on.”

“That’s bullshit,” Steve says, ruffling the couch face as he sits straighter. “The chicks never shut up about you, that summer. You tanned.”

“Yeah, over my burns.”

“Is that even possible?”

Billy exhales a cloud of pale purple smoke, basking in the light from the television. “Sure, if you know the right elixir of sunscreen, tanning oil, and bomb-pops. Anything’s possible.”

“Another load of bullshit,” Steve tsks lightly, “Y’know, I was held prisoner in that fuckin’ sailor uniform all summer and I never saw you come through. Not once.” He says. Regretful, like it’s a goddamn shame Steve never got to see him in his slutty little shorts.

“Yeah,” Billy grumbles, “Never saw me once and now I’m damaged goods.”

“You’re Clark Kent,” Steve tells him, “You’ve got, like. Superhero good looks.”

Billy chuckles, “Thought I was a CIA Government Plant, Spy–”

“You’re beautiful,” Steve says suddenly. 

Billy stalls. The air escapes from his tires and he’s, fuckin’. Trapped. Stranded in this endless, horrible moment where all the shit he never thinks about lathers like soap suds, tasting bitter on the back of his tongue.

“Needa get your eyes checked, Bambi Boy.”

“Eyes are fine,” Steve grumbles. “How’d you get a bomb pop if you never–”

“--Max would get them for me.”

“Oh! Makes sense, I guess. She was always pink-cheeked and pissed off. Buying two of whatever she wanted that day. Guess I always assumed it was for Sinclair and not–”

“--Her bull-dog brother?”

“Her lifeguard,” Silence yawns again but doesn’t get to settle as Steve lights his cigarette. “Why’d you never come in yourself? Why send the kid?”

“You really gotta ask that?” Billy demands, grinning, “C’mon. Wouldn’t be caught dead in an ice cream parlor before work, pretty boy.”

“Not even for a bomb pop?”

“Not a chance,” Billy says easily, not. Wanting to tell the truth. 

Steve seems to understand, anyway. “I lied.”

“--Yeah?”

“I saw you around. That summer, before. Everything,” Steve says. He’s out there alone, making these swooping declarations, and he always has been, if Billy thinks back on it. If he’s honest with himself, so. 

“I was carryin’ a torch for you, before that summer,” Billy says. Figures. He probably owes Steve the truth after. Everything. 

Harrington sucks in a breath, “Billy–”

“I was scared. Always was.” Steve doesn’t say anything so Billy exhales everything, “Look, you don’t. It’s not–”

“--I didn’t know,” Steve says thickly. “I had a feeling, maybe, sometimes, but. Billy, if I had known–”

“--Then, what, you would’ve dumped your girlfriend sooner? Sucked me off after basketball practice?”

“Maybe.”

Billy’s vision blacks out for a second. Like a hard reset to make room for this new information. Whole machine’s fucked so they’ve gotta restructure, figure something else out. 

It’s whiplash. 

“I wound't have let you,” Billy’s skin is pink and tender, at his core. Not for monsters, for once. “My dad, and. Everything. I wasn’t a good guy, Steve.”

“Neither was I.”

“No, you don’t get it. I deserved what I got, Steve. Everything I did to my sister, and. To all those people–”

“--That wasn’t you.”

“Maybe,” Billy spits, “The shit in the summertime was fueled by a monster, but. Before? Steve, I–”

“--You’ve only ever been around monsters,” Harrington tells him. It sits for a moment, on Billy’s sternum. Weight. Eventually, Steve clears his throat, “I know more than I probably should, but. Max and I have talked.”

“Yeah, she fuckin’. She told me, right before I left Hawkins. Said that you ask about me. All the time.”

“You’re interesting,” Steve says, like, “Even before Starcourt I was interested in you. Understanding you.”

“There was nothing to understand. You didn’t know me, before–”

“Yeah, but I know you now,” Steve tells him. Because it’s enough. In his world, good’s always going to win out in the end, “And, like. I’m just thinking if there are monsters and Russians under the mall and little girls who can throw shit with their minds, it just. Doesn’t matter. I’m thinking it shouldn’t fuckin’ matter that I didn’t know you before you almost died because I was there for the bad shit. I saw you, Billy. I know you taught yourself to walk again, and I know you make me laugh, and I know that I can’t sleep unless I hear your voice, and I know that they night I pushed you down I ruined something. Good.”

Billy scrubs at his cheek. I comes away wet. 

“I’m serious about combining our shit,” Steve tells him, “Merging our assets, or whatever.”

“No you’re not. You haven’t really thought about it–”

“Fuck you, baby, all I do is sit here and fuckin. Think.” 

About you. All I fuckin’ do is sit here and think about you, Billy fills in the blanks for him. Figures, they shouldn’t have to spell everything out after everything they’ve barely lived through–

Billy clears his throat. It scrapes and burns. “What about Hawkins?”

“What about it.”

“I dunno, wouldn’t. Everyone miss you? Max and that curly haired, freaky little boy genius, and–”

“--I can’t sleep without you, Billy,” Steve says. Sounds like he’s drowning, like that first night, when he said– “Everything that’s happened, and it’s like. We’re just animals, you know? Caught up in trying to stand on two feet and we get so fuckin’ consumed by the specifics of everything. What you had to do to survive, the shit I don’t know about, the kids, the mosnters, just. Everything.” 

Speeches. Billy had to sit through so many speeches, when he wouldn’t fuckin’ die already, and. 

Never thought he’d want to listen. 

Never thought Steve–

“All I know is I want to be with you, Billy.”

Outside the window, the sky is turning silver. 

“Let me be with you. Any way I can.”

–

It’s nice to be around people who don’t know where Billy came from. To the boys at the Surf Ship, he is a ghost, born in some long ego era. 

Whoever he was before doesn’t matter.

Argyle and Eddie bring him back to life.

–

Neil Hargrove tries to kill him.

Just after Valentine’s Day, just after we’re animals, let me be with you, all i know is I want to be with you–

Maxine calls to tell Billy that Neil shot himself. 

Yeah. Calls, like. The telephone. Billy can’t find it in himself to be angry about that, because he’s missed her and then she says, something happened.

She says, Dad ate a bullet for his first meal of 1988. And then she says, Your dad. Neil did, like Billy would ever forget. Would ever need reminding. Then she says, he didn’t survive.  

Billy. 

He’s got all sorts of fucked up feelings about it, right away. He folds in half three times until he’s on the floor, marking the way his legs throw shadows on the carpet, large enough to cast doubt over everything Billy thought was true.

He cries. 

Neil is dead and Billy cries, already forgetting the sound of his voice.

–

At two o’clock in the morning the phone rings, again.

His neck hurts from laying on the carpet. The frayed edges of Maxine’s notebook paper plant like tiny, insignificant seeds. They catch and take hold and Billy thinks, distantly, that he should do something before grief roots itself in the apartment, where it was never really allowed to before.

The phone stops ringing. Starts. Stops. 

Another letter has taken control of his life, and that makes him angry. He cries about it, and the phone starts to ring again.

Billy holds the receiver to his face, watching the note flutter when he says, “My dad died.”

“I know,” Steve tells him. “I meant to call sooner. I’m sorry I didn’t call sooner.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”

“I wanted Max to be the one to tell you. And she doesn’t have your landline–”

“--I know you gave it to her,” Billy says. Thinks, if Maxine had sent him a goddamn letter through the fuckin’ mail to tell him the last monster is dead, he would’ve lost what’s left of his marbles, he would’ve–

“--Neil ate a bullet,” Billy says. He sounds like himself, but. He doesn’t. Steve holds his breath on the other end of the line, so Billy says, “I’ve never seen someone get shot, before. I’ve seen them get ripped apart.”

“Billy–”

“I shouldn’t have left,” He tells the ceiling. 

Steve goes quiet. It’s terrible, not hearing the cigarette smoke leave his lungs, not sensing his laugh where it blooms and grows like springtime flowers. They don’t deserve this. They’ve never deserved any of this, but. Who fuckin’ cares.

“You had to get out of here,” Steve tells him. The real Steve, alive and unwell in Hawkins, Indiana. “Billy, this place is–”

“Neil’s dead.”

“Maybe he deserved it.”

“And maybe I should be there for Maxine, for once,” Billy says. Aches to see her. Burns to hold her close. 

Steve snorts, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“I just. I think that if anyone here was supposed to die–”

“--Stop–”

“--There’s a hole in my chest,” Billy admits. He can feel it, sometimes, rising like tree bark to scrape and tear at the air around him. A monster aiming to carve a place on him.

It’s so late. It’s so goddamn early–

“I’ll patch it up,” Steve says valiantly. The hero. The prince. 

Everything’s so easy for him. Simple.

“Maybe you’re right,” Billy says after a minute. After catching his breath.

“Maybe I’m right about what?”

“None of it matters,” Billy tells him. “Nothing matters so much that I can’t just. Tell you–”

But that’s a half-truth, funny in retrospect. Because almost three years ago, Billy died. Nearly. And he never expected that anything would matter to him ever again, but things happen all the time that have nothing to do with anything. That’s the beauty. They help him live. Will and Joyce and Freak Byers and Maxine and–

“Steve. I,” Billy swallows, throat clicking, “I lo–”

“--I want to see you,” Steve says in a rush, “Just. Tell me where you are. I can be there in a few days.”

“That’s crazy.”

“Maybe but that’s what I want. You. I want you–”

“You’re insane,” Billy scrambles, trying to grasp whatever excuses keep eluding him. “Like you don’t already know my address. Like Max didn’t fuckin’ tell you.”

“You’re right. I still need you to say the word, though,” Steve sounds like he’s moving, on the other end of the line. Bouncing on the balls of his feet in anticipation. “I’m serious. Tell me you want me and I’ll leave right now. If I drive through the night I can be there in a day.”

Billy’s heart soars, emotion flapping like wings in his chest. 

But.

“You can’t leave Maxine. Not with all this shit happening in Hawkins with Neil, and–”

“I’ll bring her with me,” Steve says, “We can take turns driving.”

Tears slide down Billy’s cheeks, full of hope. “She’s a bitch in the car."

"So am I, I only want to listen to Wham."

"She's only got a permit. What if a cop–”

“--We’ll go on a high-speed chase. I’ll get to you sooner.” Harrington says. 

Billy exhales a laugh. 

Thinks about the years spent wondering what he deserves. What he wants. Never imagining the line between them would whittle away and disappear until their weight could kiss like reunited lovers. 

Thinks of death and life. Of Max.

"Y'know, I usually sit on the beach, first thing. Watch the sunrise."

Steve hums. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Billy scrubs away the tears on his face, shuddering as more slide to take up their mantle. “Got something to write with?”

–

The answering machine gets him. 

"Argyle," Billy says, standing over his kitchen sink. "You're not in. Uh. I just wanted to let you know that Steve's coming to town. Steve Harrington. He's on his way and I don't know what this means, I sorta feel like I'm drowning a little bit, but. In a good way. A really good way."

Billy rinses his stomach bile, watching as it swirls and disappears. 

"I don't think I'm going back to Hawkins, but. I also don't know if I'm staying here. My dad died, and Steve's brining my sister to see me, 'cause. I have a sister, I think I told you about her, and. I have a Steve. You know about him, so."

Billy swallows, wondering how many fuckin' goodbyes he will have to live through. 

What he will have to live through, now until forever. 

"Just," Billy says, voice cracking, "Thank you. For talking to me on the beach that day, and asking me to come work for you, and just. You brought me back to life. That's it. Maybe I'll see you tomorrow. Maybe I won't, but. Give Eddie a punch goodbye, for me. See ya around." Billy sucks a mouthful of air, scrubbing at his eyes, "This is Billy, by the way."

--

Billy's grateful Arcata has a shoreline. The ocean has been good to him, his first true sanctuary. Makes him think of the trees back home, in Hawkins. Has him wondering if it's okay, now that home is a person. People.

It's warm, for February. 

He watches the sunrise with a lump in his throat, knowing that any minute a car will pull into the lot behind him and love will walk back into his life. Maybe it never left. Maybe it's not something he's ever had to work for. 

He counts the minutes. He adjusts his blanket, the very same one Joyce draped over his hospital bed all those months ago, and then a car approaches. Two doors open and shut, one right after the other, and then.

Dawn breaks, driving a knife through the dark.

[munsonshire]

Steve Harrington as your boyfriend

Pairing: Steve x reader (gender neutral)

Masterlist

He will drive you everywhere, you got your own personal driver.

He knows the best places to organize dates and takes you there.

Loves to take you to see the sunset or sunrise

He lets you play with his hair once you've gained enough trust, he's very personal with his hair and won't let anyone tough it except for those people that he really trusts. Will eventually let you style it.

If you two worked together at Scoops he'd be the happiest man ever

Movie night dates where Robin is also invited and maybe some of the kids sneak in too.

He did invent Skull Rock, I mean, he KNEW where it was which equals to him going there often and probably making out with a lot of people there too sooooo you'll go to make out there too.

If anyone bullies you or insults you or similar then he will fight that person for you, usually losing the fight but its the thought that matters.

Gives the most obvious hickeys, always in places that he knows you can't hide well so that they're visible.

Will come up to you and wrap his arms around you at any chance that he gets, usually lifting you in the air too (like he did to Nance in S2)

Very touchy, and loves physical touch.

Gives forehead kisses all the time.

Always supports you, he's not the kind of guy to forbid you from wearing certain clothes or going to certain places, no, all he will tell you is to be careful.

Tries his best at comforting you when you're sad

Cuddling is a must, if it was for him then you'd be cuddling all day

Has this habit of biting you just for fun (especially when you're cuddling)

Pushes you gently against a wall to make out

Makes stupid little jokes that make you laugh

Very protective over you when at parties, especially if Billy is there.

He's the kind of boyfriend that would never forgive himself if he forgot your birthday (might make a separate hc where he does...)

If you say something weird or get caught up on your words, basically say something unintelligible he will say something along the lines of "sorry honey, I don't speak Simlish" (let's pretend that the sims do exist in the 80s for a min okay?) he never says it with bad intention or anything.

You sometimes have to remind him to take some alone time, he's always driving the kids everywhere and ends up exhausted.

Sometimes, usually during get-togethers he will come up to you, cover your eyes with his hands, and ask "Guess who?" even though you already know

[solarmorrigan]

Under My Skin - Stranger Things - steddie

[Ao3]

In spite of the extensive skincare regimen that Steve will not admit to having, the fight with Jonathan Byers leaves its marks.

The cut on his lip heals no problem, and the bridge of his nose is left without much more than a faint line, easily dismissed. The split on his left cheekbone, though – that one sticks. It probably doesn’t help that he’d never sought proper medical attention after that fight, had never had any of the cuts or bruises properly seen to (he’d been considering going to a doctor once he finished cleaning up his mess, but then an interdimensional monster had dropped out of the ceiling of the Byers’ living room and Steve had kind of forgotten everything else).

It's not the world’s worst scar, just a little starburst of shiny skin stuck in just on the far side of the apple of his cheek, but it’s enough to make Steve frown whenever he catches it in the mirror. His looks are his best asset, he’s always been told; hell, aside from athletics, he’s been informed that his looks are pretty much his only asset, so it really won’t do to be messing them up.

He takes to wearing sunglasses whenever he can. They don’t really hide the scar, but they direct attention away from it, and he realizes quickly that the sunglasses also tend to lessen the number of headaches he gets (lights have been brighter since he got his clock cleaned, and they’re likelier to trigger a nasty pain right behind his eyes, and Steve thinks now and then that he probably really should’ve been to see a doctor, because he’s pretty sure he’d had a concussion). This works for a little bit, but Nancy keeps telling him to take them off, that they look silly.

Steve doesn’t want to tell her that they help with the headaches he hasn’t even told her he’s been getting (he doesn’t want her to worry, or to see him as any less) and he definitely doesn’t want to draw attention to the fact he’s sensitive about a little scar (nor does he particularly want to remind Nancy of how he got it in the first place), so he stops wearing them.

After all, Nancy’s opinion has become devastatingly important to him (and it remains so, long after it should).

Billy Hargrove does a far more thorough job of wrecking Steve’s shit than Jonathan had.

Steve’s last coherent thought before he succumbs to pain and then darkness is that he’s going to die here, and that he’s fucking failed to protect the kids.

(His first coherent thought upon waking, incidentally, is that he apparently hasn’t died, but that the kids are going to fucking kill him.)

When all is said and done, he doesn’t see a doctor this time, either (why start now?), just spends a few days throwing up and swaying dizzily any time he tries to move while under the watchful eye of Hopper and Eleven in their cabin in the middle of goddamn nowhere, before he’s deemed healthy enough to go home.

(Steve might fudge the truth a bit and insinuate to Hopper that his parents are definitely home and that they will definitely make sure he doesn’t slip into a coma in his sleep, but he thinks Hopper and Eleven deserve to spend some bonding time together that doesn’t involve Steve and his head trauma.)

Someone (he suspects the joint effort of Dustin and Max) had done their best to close Steve’s wounds with colorful cartoon bandages they’d dug out of the Byers’ medicine cabinet, but in the end, it doesn’t seem to have done much. The cut on his forehead had been short but deep, but it fades into something that doesn’t look like too much more than a dramatic pockmark. The gash on his jaw, though—which, he can’t say for sure, but he thinks was caused by the broken porcelain of the plate Dustin says Billy had hit him with—that one is noticeable.

Even after it heals, it looks pink and raw and stands out as it curls up over the sharp edge of his jaw, a glaring flaw on his face and a glaring reminder of his failure to look after the people he’d promised to keep safe.

He tries not to think about it—tries really, really hard—but Dustin inevitably catches him poking at it while looking in the mirror of his sun visor.

“You just make it redder when you mess with it,” Dustin says.

Steve snatches his hand away. “I do not.”

“Okay, but you do. You should just leave it alone. It’ll fade eventually.” Dustin shrugs. “But in the meantime, it looks, like… kinda badass.”

Steve turns to face Dustin, one brow raised in patent disbelief. Dustin tosses his hands up in defense.

“I mean, yeah, you got it getting your ass kicked, but it looks pretty cool. You could make up any story about it!” he says. “Besides, chicks dig cool scars, right?”

Chewing the inside of his cheek for a moment, Steve manages a smile (a real one, even) for the kid. “’course they do, Henderson.”

Steve tries making up various cool stories about the scar, but he’s never been the most creative, and when people ask about it—and they do, inevitably, because even after it fades, it’s still noticeable, and people are nosy bastards—he just brushes them off by saying it was a stupid accident with a broken plate.

Close enough.

It hasn’t even been a year since his last encounter with someone’s fists when Steve becomes acquainted with a particular brand of Russian hospitality.

The ugly j-hook of a cut that his interrogators leave under his lip is small potatoes compared to… literally everything else that happens that night (and for having been, y’know, technically tortured and all, Steve figures he got off pretty lightly; sure, his headaches have grown worse, and his hearing and vision are a little fuzzier on one side than the other, and he’s having a little trouble remembering fine details sometimes, but aesthetically speaking – yeah, he got off pretty easy). Still, in quieter moments, Steve can’t help but run his fingers over the texture of the scar and ruminate.

He can’t say he regrets how he got it, not when he’d at least been able to keep most of the heat off of everyone else, but he regrets that they’d gotten into that situation at all. He should have done better than to let it happen, he should have come up with a better solution to getting them out of there, he should have fought harder, he should have, he should have, he should have.

Besides that, combined with all the other marks Steve has been collecting over the last couple of years, he’s pretty sure the scar on his lip tips the scale from “badass” to “unpleasant to look at,” with regards to his face. He certainly doesn’t like looking at it.

He tries expressing this to Robin one evening, driving home after the closing shift at the video store, when the sky is dark and close, and the streetlights make everything seem softer– safer.

“Oh my god, you are not unpleasant to look at, you insecure dingus,” Robin insists, reaching over and giving him a shove, ignoring his protest that he is driving right now. “The scars make you look… rakish.”

“That’s not a word,” Steve says.

“It is so.”

“It is not. Don’t make shit up just to make me feel better.”

“I’m not! It means, like, sorta disreputable, but also dashing. Like a gentleman robber or something,” Robin says.

Steve shoots her a look before turning back to the road. “You’ve been reading too many of those romance books they sell at the checkout.”

“I am super offended you think I read those. That’s rude,” Robin says, but she sounds like she’s trying not to laugh.

“Anyway, I’m not saying that I’m unpleasant to look at as, like, a whole, it’s just… they don’t add up to an inviting picture.” Steve shrugs.

Robin reaches over the center console again, but this time she just pats his arm. “I promise your face is still perfectly inviting, Steve.”

He knows she’s not trying to be dismissive, he just can’t properly articulate why he’s so bothered, so he just doesn’t bring it up again.

He successfully doesn’t bring it up again for nearly a year, until after the deep scrapes from getting dragged across the dry lakebed and the cuts and bites from the demobats have put the final nail in the coffin of whatever physical appeal he’d probably had left. Steve can definitely say goodbye to swimming at public pools ever again, but keeping his shirt on isn’t going to do much for the ugly laceration that damned bat’s tail left around his throat.

It doesn’t heal pretty, and Steve would have said given up on the dating scene—on the prospect of a relationship—entirely if it hadn’t been for Eddie.

Eddie, who, in spite of Steve’s many obvious physical flaws (not just the scars, but the symptoms that accompany getting a certain number of knocks to the head, which, by virtue of simply being around all the goddamn time, Eddie has been privy to), seems to be completely into him.

And Steve’s not going to question it, the way Eddie always wants to be in his space, the way Eddie never seems to tire of him, all the ways he invites Steve’s touch, the way he seems to have room for all the affection Steve wants to give him – Steve just wishes he’d cool it with the pet names.

Some of them aren’t too bad (things like sweetheart and baby are standards that Steve finds he doesn’t mind at all) and some are so ridiculous that he can’t really hate them (he won’t pretend to understand Eddie’s obsession with fantasy books, but if he likes calling Steve sweet things in fucking Elvish or whatever the hell it is, Steve isn’t going to make him feel bad for it), but there’s one that never fails to rub him the wrong way.

“Good morning, pretty boy,” Eddie murmurs into the scant space between them, leaning up to press a kiss directly to the scar that runs over Steve’s jaw.

Steve goes tense, but does his best not to flinch. “Can you not?” he grumbles, shifting against the pillows. “It’s too early for that shit.”

“Too early to say good morning to my boyfriend?” Eddie asks, dark eyes sparkling in the morning light. “Because if I wait too long to do that, it’s gonna turn into good afternoon.”

Steve rolls his eyes. “Too early to be calling me that.”

“What, pretty boy?” Eddie’s grin grows as Steve squirms a little. “But you are. Even covered in pillow creases and drool.”

Self-consciously, Steve reaches up to swipe at the corners of his mouth, and Eddie snickers.

“Sorry, sweetheart, but even this early in the morning, you’re still pretty.”

“Eddie…”

“But if you’d prefer something else, I could go with beautiful,” Eddie says, pressing another kiss to the corner of Steve’s mouth.

“Eddie.”

“Or handsome.” Eddie pecks a kiss to Steve’s cheek, just below the starburst scar, and Steve presses a firm hand to his chest, stopping short of shoving him away.

“Eddie, stop,” Steve grits out.

And Eddie does.

He stops and he pulls back a bit, looking entirely confused and more than a little worried. “Steve, what’s wrong?”

With a huff, Steve rolls so he’s not facing Eddie’s wide-eyed bewilderment. “Look, I don’t know if you think you’re only teasing, or if you’re trying to make me feel better, or what, but can you just stop?”

“Hey.” Eddie’s hand is gentle but very assuredly present on Steve’s shoulder. “Give me a little more to work with here, what the hell am I doing?”

“Calling me shit like that. Pretty. Handsome,” Steve spits out. “Whatever. It’s – you don’t have to keep saying it.”

There is a long, heavy moment of silence.

“Do you seriously think you’re not?” Eddie finally says, incredulous.

Twisting back around, Steve sneers at Eddie. “You cannot possibly have failed to notice that my face is kinda fucked up, Eddie.”

“Your face is perfect,” Eddie blurts, and Steve resists the irritable urge to shove at him again.

“My face is covered in scars, jackass.”

“So? Those are, like, surface-level imperfections. Literally skin-deep! Structurally speaking, your face is definitely perfect.”

When Steve moves to roll away from Eddie again, Eddie pounces, straddling Steve’s hips and using all his weight to keep him where he is. “No, no, I’m definitely right about this,” Eddie insists. “Besides this square jawed shit you have going on, your eyes are gorgeous.” He reaches up, cupping Steve’s cheeks and brushing his thumbs gently beneath Steve’s eyes. “And your smile is probably my favorite thing to look at.” Eddie lets his hands drift down to Steve’s jaw, then trail further, to his neck, his shoulders, his chest. “And the rest of you? I mean, are you kidding me with this?”

Steve is very much not kidding Eddie with this, but he can’t quite bring himself to say as much. His throat has gone tight for some reason; he’s been living with all these marks for years, so he’s not entirely sure why he’s getting choked up now.

“You don’t really think the scars make you ugly, do you?” Eddie asks softly, and Steve can only nod. “Steve… sweetheart, come on. I mean, look, I’m not gonna lie to you and say they’re not noticeable – and yeah, one or two even stand out, but they don’t take away at all. They add to the picture. I swear I am not fucking with you on this, you’re beautiful.”

Finally, Steve finds his voice. “They’re ugly because of what they stand for. It’s all my fucking failure carved into my fucking face.”

Eddie’s expression does something weird, getting stuck somewhere between anger and sadness. “That’s what you think they are?”

“Every time–” Steve’s voice grinds to a stop for a moment, but he pushes on. “Every time I’m supposed to be looking out for people, protecting them, they still get hurt. I get the shit kicked out of me and it isn’t even worth anything and–”

“You can’t take that all on yourself. You can’t,” Eddie breaks in. “You got all of these scars looking out for the people you love. Looking out for us. And I hate that you had to get them, but I gotta say – I love what they stand for.”

Steve doesn’t have a chance to get another word in before Eddie is leaning down and pressing a kiss to Steve’s throat. Steve flinches, just a little, because the skin there is sensitive now, but Eddie keeps it light – so soft it’s nearly reverent.

“This one was me, and Buckley, and big Wheeler,” Eddie murmurs, sitting up a little so he can brush his hands down the spiderweb scars on Steve’s sides. “And so were these. And I also kinda like ‘em because they match mine, if I’m being honest.”

One short sob of a laugh comes out of Steve at that, and he reaches up to run his fingers over the places on Eddie’s sides where the demobats had gotten a few good bites in before Vecna had been destroyed. Eddie smiles, then leans back down and kisses the scar that hooks under Steve’s lip.

“Buckley again, and Henderson, and Sinclair the younger,” he says. “I was terrified just listening to that story, but you– you kept their attention on you and off of everyone else.”

“I…”

Eddie doesn’t wait for Steve to find his words. Instead, he presses his lips to the gash on Steve’s jaw, where he’d started that morning. “Sinclair the elder. Red.” He moves up and kisses the smaller gouge in Steve’s forehead. “Henderson again. Small Wheeler. Standing up to a bigoted piece of shit who took his issues out on kids.”

You make it sound so much more heroic than it really was, Steve wants to say, but Eddie’s already moved on to the faded line on the bridge of his nose, and then to the little starburst scar on his cheek.

“You can’t possibly love that one,” Steve manages. “I didn’t get that one saving anyone, I got it for being a shithead.”

“Are you kidding? This one’s my favorite. This one was the eye-opener.” Eddie kisses the scar again. “This one saved you.”

If asked, Steve would say with a reasonable amount of confidence that he’s pretty thick-skinned. Harsh words don’t trip him up. Rough treatment might knock him down, but he’ll always get up, and he’ll come back for more as many times as he’s able. Steve can take a hit.

He can take many, many hits.

But it’s softness—the gentleness of Eddie’s hands and his mouth and his words—that finally manages to break him.

(“You’re even pretty when you cry,” Eddie says later, falsely aggrieved. “That’s not even fair!”

This time Eddie is definitely teasing him—nobody looks pretty when they cry—but Steve finds he doesn’t mind as much. It doesn’t seem as important, just at the moment. Instead of denying it, Steve simply sighs, “It’s a gift.”

Eddie snorts and presses a kiss to Steve’s cheek, where he’s scarred, and blotchy, and sticky with tears, but also entirely loved.)

[nailbatss]

"Lie to Me"

This is another entry for @harringrovesummerbingo !!

Square & Prompt: A3 - “Lie to Me”

Rating: Angsty

Word Count: 3.1k

Major Tags: Harringrove (obviously), angst, like the most hurtful piece I’ve probably written, blood, mentions of wounds, confession of feelings, aaaangst, character death

Summary: When things go wrong in the Starcourt Mall, who’s going to be there for you when things all go wrong? Billy doesn’t have anyone, or so he thinks. That is, until things go wrong for him to find out.

Who can you count on when things go south? Who’s going to be there for you to patch your wounds when you get in a huge fight?

If you were to ask Steve, he would easily say this group of weirdos that he pulled together last minute.

If you ask Billy, he’d answer nobody. He couldn’t count on his friends back in California, they’ve probably long forgotten him. Tommy H and Carol weren’t even his close friends either. They were groupies looking for the next hottest commodity, him. 

What happens when you lose that fight?

Steve would answer he gets drugged by the Russians and forced to tell the truth about something he doesn’t even want to spill out. He was pretty sure his head would be raging about that one. It was already bad enough he got the shit beaten out of him by Hargrove and he hated him for that, but he understood his panic about Max. That part he could forgive, now his comment about Lucas? Absolutely not.

That was his kid. He wasn’t going to play around when it came to his kids. Hell, Billy couldn’t blame him for protecting his little sister. In fact, nobody could actually. He realized he lost his connection to her the moment she decided to drug him and knock him out in that abandoned house.

He lost everything.

Billy wasn’t the type to sulk about, in fact, he was going to do the exact opposite. He was going to pretend like none of this shit bothered him.

That’s why he almost had a thing with Mrs. Wheeler. Yeah, he doesn’t like to think about that. It was only for show anyway since he felt sick the moment she started to reciprocate and pretend to think about leaving her husband to be with him.

God, what was he thinking?

That night when he was driving to the motel, he was actually going to break it off. He wasn’t going to continue flirting with her since someone else had caught his eye. He had it bad for Harrington; that he wasn’t proud to admit, but it was something.

He’d stopped flirting with girls, stopped trying to pick them up, and instead, he started to lay it thick on the brunette boy. Though he was older, Billy took that as a challenge to keep doing it. He liked pushing the envelope and seeing how much he could get away with.

Crash. Squealing of brakes. Smashing of glass.

After he had wrecked by the old mill, Billy pulled himself out of his car for now to investigate what the hell had happened. Rubbing the back of his head, his sharp blue eyes scanned the area, searching for any sign of what could have made him crash. Raising his brow, Billy knew it was better not to ask who was there in the darkness. Huffing to himself, he shook his head and turned around to return to his car. 

Fwoop. Snatch!

“What the hell?!” He exclaimed as something wrapped around his ankles, pulling him back towards that abandoned factory. “Hey! What the fuck, let go of me!” He roared as he tried to kick whatever had its hold on him off of him. “LET! GO!”

His heart was racing with something he was very familiar with, fear. His screams were contained within the walls of the steelworks, his hands gripping everything in his path to try and hold himself off. His cries of anguish weren’t heard by anyone and he was sure this was how he died. Someone had him and they weren’t going to let go anytime soon.

A single tear slid down his cheek as he whispered an apology into the darkness.

“I’m sorry Steve… I’m sorry Max…”

That was all before he was dragged into the darkness.

~*~

“What are you doing out here, amigo?” He confidently strides up to Steve, playing coy for a moment. He noticed a figure in the window as soon as they started talking. Now wasn’t the time to draw attention there yet.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Steve retorts and puts his hands on his hips. Bitchy, he liked that in the man.

“My thirteen year old sister goes missing, all day. Then I find her out here with you, in a stranger’s house, and you lie to me about it.” Billy’s face contorts with an almost angered expression.

“She’s not with me, man.” Steve scoffed.

Suddenly, Billy gestures with his lit cigarette towards a window, seeing a familiar figure in the dim lighting of the house.

“Then who’s that?”

“Oh shit.”

The air was knocked out of Steve’s lungs as he hit the ground. Billy tossed his finished cigarette into the woods somewhere and he exhaled the smoke.

“I told you to plant your feet, pretty boy.” 

Then he swaggered on into the house, the door closing behind him.

Stars danced on the edge of Steve’s vision as he was once again knocked down. He couldn’t lose. Not this time.

So he pushed himself to his feet and chased after him.

~*~

Dark. Everything was so dark. Billy began to wonder what happened as he recalled that sudden memory. Was this all Steve’s plan? Did his little group of freaks crash his car and do this to him?

No, they weren’t smart enough for that.

Well, maybe the curly-haired one, that kid was freakishly smart from what Max told him.

Either way, he didn’t like this.

“Hello?” He called out as he stumbled through the dark, attempting to find a light source, anything like that.

“This isn’t funny.”

“You mean you do not like this game?” A growling voice questioned him.

There was a chill in his bones. Something didn’t feel right here.

“What the fuck? No, I don’t like this! Let me go!”

“Oh, but we cannot. We have work to do, William.” 

Yeah, Billy most definitely did not like that.

“What do you mean?” His heart rate picked up, obviously frightened by the voice and how it knew his name. His real name. Not the nickname he went by.

“You and I have work to do. These people, this place, it did not give you anything. I will make things right, you will see. Everything will be perfect.”

“Stop speaking in fucking riddles! Tell me what you want from me!”

A deep chuckle rang out, making the ends of his hair stick up on his neck. Something was deeply wrong here and he didn’t know how to go about fixing it.

“We will start by fixing your relationships with your family. Your sister will thank you for this.” 

“Leave Max out of this!”

He was met by silence, then suddenly, he was left alone it felt like.

The darkness quickly gave way to a window opening, which he seemed to realize was his body. He watched as his hands lifted up, his ring glinting in the pale sunlight as it crept through the boarded up windows.

“Oh shit.”

That wasn’t him moving anything. 

That thing was moving him.

And he had no idea where it was headed.

~*~

Hissing, the creature hated the fireworks as they hit his body, and Billy stood still, watching it all happen from inside. He was screaming for himself to wake up, to not harm anyone else. He was tired of seeing the destruction that befell his hands. He had already sacrificed Heather and her family to this thing. Now, he had to watch as it was after that girl Max was friends with.El, he seemed to recall. 

Before he knew it, his body was turning, heading towards the girl as she was on the ground. He was wrestling with her in an attempt to pick her up. Her leg was damaged and she was a prime target for that creature who was made up of their townspeople, the people who had lived in this town and he had made fun of. Soon, the monster slammed him away from the window, his body slamming into the floor. He picked himself up and he decided to sit on the nearest surface, a perfect mockup of his bed. 

He hoisted himself up, sitting down on the not so plush surface to wait. Tears were falling down his face at this point. Nobody could save him, not even himself. This creature had caused mass destruction and the town was fearful. He didn’t know if anyone was left. Or if anything was left for that matter. All there seemed to be was this stupid mall. 

Billy balled himself up and he let the tears flow, apologies flowing from his lips.

~*~

Basketball. He was good at that.

His father had found out that he wasn’t actually into girls. He screamed at him and berated his son, throwing punches left and right, beating the hell out of him to “teach him a lesson”. Blood poured from his nose, bruises were blossoming underneath his t-shirt. Neil wasn’t stupid enough to leave marks were people could see them.

That’s what made getting away with it so easy. Neil didn’t have to worry about Billy snitching to anyone because that would mean he loses the roof over his head, he loses the food that’s on the table, and he loses access to the one person who treated him like a son. 

He took beatings for Max too. She was too young to go through that.

He wasn’t going to lay a finger on her.

This one was particularly bad. He sat on his bed and wiped his nose, wheezing from the beating he took. Hearing a soft knock at the door, he didn’t even move. He knew that was Max from the pattern of her knocks. He didn’t have the strength to tell her to piss off. He could actually use the company.

“‘Min.” He muttered.

Max must have understood, or she was coming in anyway, that was a choice too. Lifting his head, Billy acknowledged her with a nod. A soft gasp escaped her as she took in the sight before her. Neil hadn’t been so careful this time and really let Billy have it. His nose was busted, his lip was too, and his eye was swelling shut. There was no way he could write that off as an accident.

The red-haired girl approached him with a first aid kit. It broke his heart knowing she had to know how to fix him up. Kneeling on the floor in front of him, Max opened the kit and immediately began tending to his wounds.

“How d’ya know how to-”

“Fix you? I’ve bandaged you up a few times.. You know, Mom showed me how to do this.” She answered with a soft scoff. “He beat the hell out of you, huh?”

“I’ll fuckin say.” Billy muttered and winced as she put a cotton ball on his forehead. It was soaked with hydrogen peroxide to clean out the wound. Damn, she’d be a good nurse if she wanted to be.

“You shouldn’t have to do this.” He said quietly, so quietly that Max almost didn’t hear him.

“What kind of sister would I be if I didn’t? After all, you took that one for me, didn’t you?”

“No… I deserved it.”

“Why?” Max questioned as she paused wiping the wound to bandage it.

“He found out I don’t play for the same team.” Billy answered somberly.

“What does that-” Max paused to process what he said, “Oh…”

“Yeah, oh.”

“I’m sorry.. I’m so sorry.” Max whispered.

“Why are you sorry? You didn’t do this to me.”

“Because you didn’t deserve it.” 

Billy’s bottom lip nearly trembled from hearing how heartbroken she sounded. After she closed the kit and stood to leave, his arms snaked around her and pulled her in for a hug. Leaning his forehead against her stomach, he swear he didn’t feel the tears start racing until she hugged him back.

One day they’d get out of there. One day he wouldn’t have to hide who he is.

~*~

“You ever think about what it would be like to get out of here?” Billy questioned one night. 

He and Steve were at the Harrington residence and smoking outside by the pool. It was a warm enough night and the pool had been cleaned since Barb’s death. He wasn’t about to let some bad juju come back while he was trying to have a good night.

Steve exhaled his smoke. “I do, yeah… Other times, I feel-” He paused to think of the word he was looking for.

“Trapped?” Billy finished.

“Yeah, yeah, trapped. That’s it.” He took another drag from his cigarette.

“You never did tell me why you called so suddenly. And what happened to you?” Steve asked as he turned his attention towards the blonde.

“My dad found out something I was hiding from him and he didn’t take it too well.”

“Shit, dude, I’m sorry.” Steve’s expression softened and his brows furrowed in worry. “Don’t hit me for this. But why did he hurt you? Like what exactly did he find out?”

Billy chuckled softly, ironically even.

“Neil Hargrove doesn’t like the fact that his son likes dick, not pussy.”

“O-Oh.” Steve coughed and he tried to recover from what he had just heard.

“Right on, good for you dude.” Steve flushed with a brilliant shade of red. “How’d you find that out?”

“I tried sleeping around, nothing ever felt… right. Not until I met someone.” He shrugged. “Not like I’m going to pursue anything with him though.”

“Why’s that?”

“I think he plays for the opposite team. He likes chicks too much.” Billy shrugs.

“Well, how do you know?” Steve questioned, sitting shoulder to shoulder with him now.

Billy took that moment to look at him. “I don’t know, Harrington, do you like dudes?”

Steve’s eyebrows furrowed inquisitively. “I- why are you asking m- oh.”

It was silent between the two of them for a while until Billy stood up. “That was stupid, forget it.” 

Before the blonde could completely walk away, Steve stood up quickly and caught his wrist.

“Hey, I never said I didn’t like dudes.” Steve smiled softly.

“You also didn’t answer my question. Just let me go, we’ll forget about it.” Billy tried to yank his hand away.

But that was before Steve caught his jaw, pulling him in for a searing kiss. 

His eyes widened before he melted into the kiss. The boys pulled away for air a moment or so later. Their eyes met; blue met brown in a clash of colors, all their feelings being unsaid, but lingering in the air. It was obvious they had a connection.

One that Billy wasn’t going to let go now that he had it.

"Be mine?"

"Fuck yeah, pretty boy. M'all yours."

~*~

The next time Billy lifted his head, he saw her standing there. That weird girl, El, her name was. He could see the 011 tattooed on her wrist. How she had one so young, he’d never know, but she was a badass in his eyes for it.

“It is time to go now.”

“Go? Go where?” He questioned. “And how are you here?”

“Go home.” El smiled. “I came to find you.”

“You mean?”

“Yes, out of here.” She extended her hand, wanting him to take it, so she could bring him home. “Back to the others, to Max, to Steve.” 

A blush creeped along his cheeks. Yeah, he wanted to go home, back to Steve, and where he felt the most comfortable. 

“Okay.” He placed his hand in hers, standing to his feet, “Take me home.”

Whoosh!

After opening his eyes, Billy’s met those concerned brown ones all over again. He was laying on top of her and keeping her pinned beneath his body. Suddenly, he felt sick, so he stood up and faced towards the loud screeching noise. The Mindflayer was extending its tentacles towards the two of them. He figured since he had been sacrificing her to it, that’s why it was creeping so slowly.

He grit his teeth together and reached out, basically pushing the tentacle’s arm away. He screamed, “Don’t touch her!”

Steve watched on with agony as Billy was doing that. “Billy stop!” His heart was pounding. Robin grabbed his hand and pulled him back. “Stop! You’re only going to get yourself killed!”

“He’s going to get himself killed! Rob let go!” He panicked and he looked at her. “Please.”

“No, Steve, I’m sorry. I can’t lose you.” Robin pleaded.

He managed to turn back, only to watch as that other tentacle impaled Billy right through the stomach. His scream erupted through the mall as he shoved the thing away from him, obviously taking back his authority.

“Fuck you! I’m not letting anyone else run my life for me!” He growled, desperately trying not to choke on his own blood. 

The next tentacle went right through his chest, making him fall to his knees. Before he could completely collapse, he felt someone cradle his head and pull him into their lap.

Cloudy blue eyes met those deep pools of chocolate.

His smile was tinted with blood, his own blood. “H-Hey pretty boy. F-fancy meeting you here.” He coughed.

“You promised me… You promised!” Steve sobbed softly.

“I-I know I did.” Billy wheezed again, staring up at him. Picking up his hand, he gently placed it on Steve’s cheek.

“Need you to do me f-favor.”

“A-Anything! I’ll do anything!” Steve sniffled.

“Lie to me, pretty boy.”

“W-What?” Steve was confused.

“Lie to me. Tell me we-we’re going to make it. T-Tell me about our lives after this.” Billy requested softly and his gaze seemed slightly far off.

“We’re going to get the hell out of here. A-And we’re, we’re going to get married. I don’t give a shit if it’s legal or not.” Steve sniffled. “I-I want a house on the beach with you. I-I want about two or three kids.” He wiped his tears away. “We’ll get a dog.”

“W-What kind of dog?” Billy wheezed.

“A golden retriever, o-or a lab. And you’ll be a mechanic to fix cars, I’ll be a teacher. We’ll just be happy, I don’t give a damn how, but we will.” Steve sniffled.

“S-Sounds good. M’tired, p-pretty boy.” Billy’s eyes were slowly shutting.

Steve knew he was losing this battle. He wasn’t going to be able to fight anymore. After all, he spent his whole life fighting. Billy had been through it all.

“Go ahead, baby, you go ahead and rest, okay?” Steve choked out.

“M’kay. L-Love you, S-Steve.”

“I-I love you too, Billy.” He stroked his cheek, getting the curls out of his face.

The gesture made Billy smile slightly before his eyes fully shut, slipping off into that peaceful warmth that he felt. His hand fell into Steve’s waiting one and a sob rang out from Steve’s chest. 

His beautiful California boy was gone. With him, Steve’s heart.

[piratefishmama]

God. I just wanna know what Dustin could’ve told the Hellfire boys about Steve ya know. Like how could he have talked their ears off about him being a badass without bringing up his upside down related heroics? I mean did he tell them that Steve Harrington repeatedly saved his life but that he couldn’t go into details because it was classified information? Did they all roll their eyes at his obvious dramatics and overflowing imagination and tried to humor him?? And now Eddie tries to recall everything Dustin had said, everything he had dismissed and takes a moment to really understand the implications.

Eddie Munson would love to be able to say that he’d believe just about anything. He was an open minded kind of guy, nerdy, loved the fantasy genre, believed in aliens because it made sense for aliens to exist since the universe was just so infinitely big, and it’d be just so very stupid to think that Earth was the only little marble to hold sentient life among it all.

Believed in big foot purely because it’d be fucking hilarious if the guy actually existed but was just like. A really big hairy nudist that liked to terrorize locals. He’d seen a few bears in his time, not the grizzly kind either.

He loved his cryptids, Nessie and all her lake lookalikes was one of his favourites, just this really big water dinosaur thing that was actually probably just a whales dick breaching the water in all those photos, but whatever. It was funny to believe that it could be, even if his belief stemmed mostly from the idea that he could loudly declare with his whole chest that he believed in them to watch gleefully as people tried to convince him they weren’t real.

Harmless mischief really.

He would love to be able to say he believed just about anything.

Anything, he’d believe anything, anything except for whatever the fuck his new little sheep kept spouting about one infamous Steve “The Hair” Harrington after Eddie made the foolish mistake of innocently asking why Steve Harrington’s unmistakable Beemer was parked outside on the curb a little too loudly, mostly to himself.

“He drives us home.” Mike had answered the rhetorical question as he shrugged his bag over his shoulder, offering no further explanation.

“He does what now?” Eddie had to press for more, then it was Dustin who did the oversharing. And it was Dustin who never stopped sharing.

It was like he’d opened pandoras goddamn box only instead of all the worlds suffering it only contained Dustin’s endless gushing stream of stories that the others just politely ignored since Dustin only ever aimed them at him. So yeah, the analogy fit, it was still mostly suffering.

Steve took on a whole pack of wild ravenous dogs to protect them once, not demon dogs, Dustin was careful with that, but dogs that cornered them in the junkyard while Dustin had been trying to find the one that ate his poor cat for some such reason or another.

He’d embellished a little of course, the dogs totally had rabies, Steve was basically a hero who put his life on the line to protect them all. Eddie just scoffed in disbelief, as if Steve would risk putting a single hair atop his glorious head in danger, no sir.

Not even for a bunch of kids.

Then there was the Billy thing, may the douchecanoe rest in peace, Lucas even piped up there, mentioned that Steve had gotten his ass handed to him sure, but it was entirely to keep Billy away from him. Steve had put himself between monsters and those kids multiple times that night. Eddie could… sort of believe that one.

Steve was a douchebag sure, but he had turned up around that time with a real fucked up face like he’d gone toe to toe with a brick wall a few times and nobody really knew why.

The Steve had won a fight against a Russian soldier story was a fun one. Dustin wouldn’t elaborate on that one, said it was hush hush, it’d just kind of come out that one while Dustin was adamantly declaring Steve’s badassery, much to Eddie’s own adamant disbelief, but Dustin had quickly changed the subject anyway, not that Eddie was going to pry for more information on a made up story.

Usually he’d love to watch a lie spiral out of control until the edges inevitably frayed and it all fell apart.

But listening to one of his favourite little sheep go on and on and on and on about Steeeeeeeve Harrington, about how badass he was, about how cool he was, about how he looked after them, about how he took them to the arcade, and kept them safe from all kinds of dumb shit, about how he gave him advice that got him his girlfriend (Eddie hadn’t believed she was real at first either until Mike and Lucas had in unison piped up that actually, she was.) that Steve had been cool enough to drive him to the snowball and help him get ready, that he was basically like a big brother he didn’t know he’d needed, or an extra mother.

It was exhausting, and annoying as shit listening to him try and convince him to talk to Steve, get to know him, maybe make friends because “you’d both get along so well! I’m telling you I’m RIGHT about this, trust me! Why does nobody ever trust me? You trust me right?”

"Pfft, sure thing, shrimp." Nope.

Whatever, it wasn’t like he’d ever have to talk to Steve.

Until he does. Until he sees a sweaty, damp, dirty, and bleeding Steve "WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK" Harrington bite a demon bats tentacle tail off. Until he sees him splat that same bat into the floor over and over again until it's brains are nothing but a smear, and then watches as that same bat is then torn in half by pure brute strength and wow all those conversations come rushing back to Eddie like a tidal wave all at once that he can only look upon in somewhat flush-faced awe because,

"Holy shit. You really are a badass." Stupid Dustin, always right about shit.

[gracegrove]

Elf au Harringrove (mostly Billy tho)

Where the plot is mostly the same as Elf except,

Billy grows up in the North Pole not believing that he's a cotton-headed-ninny-muggins but rather an exceptionally genetically gifted elf who is by far taller than all the other elves. He excels at winter sports and is a menace at ice hockey and polar bear polo. He is not talented with toy making but why would someone such as himself want to waste time on Litebrites and Mr. Potato Heads? No, Billy wanted more than an elf's life. He is often in trouble for racing the reindeer, swapping spit (and other things) with other elves, and passing out in the stables hiccuping with an empty bottle of maple bourbon from Santa's personal stores.

One day while sobering up in a pile of hay, Billy overhears the stable elves complain that Billy's behavior is human and no elf would act this way. Why did they ever take in a human? Billy then has an identity crisis.

Billy finds out from his adopted elf parent, that as an infant he was in a car accident in which his mother was driving. She died in the crash and Billy was taken to an orphanage. No one at the time came to claim him. Billy's name was known because he was found with a blanket that had his name embroidered on it. However, Santa knows who Billy's father is.

Santa tells Billy that his father is Neil Hargrove, a New York City police sergeant with a wife and daughter who live in Queens. Santa says that Neil is a good man who has been on his Nice List since 1973. Billy cannot believe it.

Blaming Neil for abandoning his mother to die and not claiming him at the orphanage, Billy sets out for New York City with the goal of putting Neil Hargrove back on the Naughty List.

Billy puts his plan in motion by going to Neil's precinct on his first day in NYC (still dressed as an elf) and introduces himself to Neil with the most vulgar Christmasgram complete with ass shaking. Neil arrests Billy and has his lieutenant, Hopper run fingerprints and DNA on this guy because he's gotta have priors for prostitution or distribution or something. No way that kid was telling the truth, even if he somehow knew his late girlfriend's name. The DNA comes back a familial match. Father and son.

What is he going to do? Hopper suggests taking Billy home and Billy musters his most innocent smile in agreement. As Billy worms his way into Neil's life he learns that his parents had a fight the night his mother died and that Neil and his new wife fight sometimes too. This fuels Billy's mission, as he decides to tail Neil during his day to catch Neil messing up.

After meeting Steve and growing closer with Neil's daughter, Maxine, Billy begins to realize that his efforts to put Neil on the Naughty List aren't worth it. He will never forget what happened to his mother and how it affected his life, but seeking out revenge will not fulfill him. Billy realizes that Neil does not need any help getting back in the Naughty List and that he should put his efforts into protecting the new relationships that he has found.

Elf au extras

The pennies from heaven montage but Billy style:

Billy sneaks into a peep show, kicks his feet up, and enjoys himself with a Christmas themed striptease. “Santa was sooooo elfing wrong… this is better (than peeking at presents early)”.

Goes into the WORLD'S BEST CUP OF COFFEE cafe to try it. He silently takes a sip. Says with a straight face, “This is gumdroppings.” [Insert elf equivalent of cussword to mean shit] Then he walks out of the cafe without paying.

A teenager on the street offers Billy a CD copy of their ‘demo’. Billy takes it because it looks like a shiny Christmas bauble, but doesn't pay for it.

Billy gets asked by a family from Des Moines if they can get their picture taken with him. He says no but gives in when their little girl starts crying.

Billy acts like he's cool but goes round and round in the carousel door until he can't walk straight and falls back out onto the sidewalk.

Billy farehops the subway.

Billy has done at least five different things without paying that the cops are now chasing him like a cartoon character and the only way he loses them is by blending in with the Christmas decor at the department store…. Where he meets Steve.

[ladykailitha]

Telling It Like It Is Part 1

This one will be updated differently in smaller parts as we have now gotten to the point where my stories are much, MUCH longer. But I won’t be tagging. My ADHD would freak out. Masterlist or read it here on AO3

*

Jonathan slipped out back with a six pack of beers, thrilled that Steve was alone for the first time in weeks. He sat down next to Steve on the lounge chair and handed him a beer.

Steve popped lid off both their beers and took a sip. “Thanks, man.”

Jonathan nodded and they drank in silence for a bit.

“They aren’t tearing up my house, are they?” Steve asked, jerking his thumb behind them.

“Nah,” Jonathan said with a grin. “I made sure to put Eddie on guard duty. Those kids will behave for him.”

Steve nodded. Eddie and Jonathan being here was one of the reasons he went outside for a smoke. He could trust them to keep the chaos to a minimum.

He down the rest of the beer and popped open another one.

“Look, you know I don’t like you,” Jonathan began. Steve let out a chuckle. “But I respect the hell out you and that a good place to be.”

“Same,” Steve said. “I don’t think I could ever like you after...well everything I guess. But I trust you. And that’s important to me.”

“Nice to see us on the same page,” Jonathan agreed. “This will make what I have to say easier. On both of us, I think.”

Steve looked down the six pack. “That why you brought the beer?”

Jonathan laughed. “A bit.” He rubbed his hand on his jeans. “Listen close, because if you tell anyone about this conversation I will deny it and pull out all the pictures from middle school and turn them into fliers.”

Steve laughed. “Whatever say, man. No one is going to believe me anyway.”

Jonathan cocked his head. “Fair. But you need to hear this from me and not anyone else, because you won’t believe it from anyone else.”

Steve frowned. “What?”

“Now, I wasn’t there for any of these moments, but I’ve heard it from them,” he said, taking a deep breath. “Bullshit, douche, and douchebag. Sound familiar?”

Steve flinched with every word. He nodded and then pinched his nose and rubbed it.

“From what I gather only Eddie apologized?” Jonathan pressed.

Again he nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

“So take it from me, Steve,” Jonathan said. “You weren’t ever any of those things.”

“But I–” Steve said.

Jonathan cut him off. “You were a scared kid with abandonment issues who followed the first people who said that they liked you.”

“But–”

“And just like with your fucking parents, their love was conditional, wasn’t it?” Jonathan pressed. “Because I sure the hell didn’t see them around after your so-called fall from grace.”

“I left them,” Steve said weakly.

“You want to know why?” he asked.

“I take it you’re going to tell me anyway,” Steve murmured.

“Because deep down, Steve, you were always a good person.” Jonathan finished his beer and wiped his mouth. “I think your very presence kept them in check because they got worse. You were always the first in line to apologize when you thought you’d done something wrong. And yeah, protecting those kids wasn’t an option, it was something you had to do as the oldest of the bunch, but you stuck around. You think Tommy or Billy would have?”

Steve shook his head. He knew that they wouldn’t have. “I made myself useful because I didn’t have anyone else.”

Jonathan stared at him. “Holy shit, dude. This is way worse than I thought.”

Steve reared back his head in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“You think those kids, Eddie, Robin, Nancy, you think they are only still around because of the fancy house and nice car?”

Steve hung his head, but that was answer enough for him.

“Dude, I couldn’t say for sure about anyone else,” he said, shaking his head. “But my mom, Claudia Henderson, and Wayne Munson have been fighting for months who gets to adopt you when your parents finally disown you.”

Steve raised his head slowly. “Why?”

“Because they see you take care of their kids as if they are your own, and you deserve better than the Harrington name.”

Steve thought about it. “Oh. I’m wanted?”

It took everything Jonathan had not to cry. He barely held it together with Will, and now Steve Harrington. And no way in hell was he going to shed a tear for this dude.

“Yeah, you are,” he said. He stood up and gave Steve’s shoulder a squeeze. “Just think about what I said, okay?”

Steve looked up. “Yeah. Yeah, I will. Thanks.”

Jonathan nodded and went back inside.

Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Epilogue

[rustboxstarr]

Animal Sex, Animal Sex?

Pairings: Eddie Munson X Girlfriend Reader,

Warnings: SMUT!!!! P I V sex, Protected! (Wrap it before you tap it) Rough sex, jealousy, Billy being ex boyfriend, talk of sex obvi, squirting, domestic fighting, probably more that i cant think of

Summary: Based off of Ross and Rachel in episode 18 of season 2!

Important to know before reading:

Nancy and Eddie are siblings (Monica and Ross)

You and Nancy are room mates (Rachel and Monica)

For once in his life Steve is not the ladies man hehe

Wordcount: 2.2 k

Masterlist

“Robin's got another job, right?” Steve asked Nancy as he rested his arm around her shoulders, her nestled into his torso on the brown comfy couch of the coffee shop.

“Great set tonight, Robin” you told her as she got off the small stage and placed her guitar next to an armchair which she then sank down in.

“I know.” Robin grimaced smugly.

“Well, we should probably get going.” Eddie tapped your thigh. 

“We should too. I've got work at 8 in the morning.” Steve smiled at his girlfriend. 

“You know how we always stay at your apartment?” Nancy got his attention. “I thought tonight we'd stay at my place.” she suggested as she gave him a little bit of a pout. 

“I don't know.” Steve pretended to think. “I don't have my jammies.” he joked.

Nancy giggled a little “Well maybe you don't need them.” she said suggestively.

Eddie rolled his eyes and threw his hand out in the air “My baby sister, ladies and gentlemen.”

Nancy turned towards her older brother “Shut up. I'm happy.”

“Oh, this is so nice!” Robin exclaimed. “I have to make a speech.” she stated as she rose from her chair.

She cleared her throat, holding an imaginary wineglass to the group “ I just wanna’ say that of all the guys that Nancy has been with, and that is a lot” she laughed and gave you and Eddie a wide eyed look. Nancy froze and closed her eyes. She turned awkwardly towards Steve to check his expression. 

“I like you the best.” she smiled childishly. 

Instead Steve politely gave her an “Awww Thank you, Robin” he breathed lightly “That's very sweet.”

As the group put their coats on to head out into the chilly autumn weather Steve leaned down towards Nancy.

“You hear that?” he grinned. “She likes me best” he shrugged into his jacket “And apparently, there have been a lot.” he dramatized with wide eyes and a suspicious look. 

Nancy chuckled, “Not a lot” she tried to cover “Robin's kidding” she waved her hand “Robin's crazy.” she deadpanned her boyfriend slightly. 

You chuckled to Eddie “Robin's dead” you smirked at him, earning a small laugh from your tall boyfriend. 

“Well, it wasn't that many guys.” Nancy continued the conversation you and Eddie had witnessed the couple having all the way up the street and in the stairwell. 

“If you consider how many guys there actually are…” she sighed “...it's a very small percentage.”

“Hey It's not that big a deal” Steve said as he dropped his coat on a chair.  “I was just curious.” 

“Good night.” Eddie called as he led you to your room with his hand on the small of your back. 

“Good night, Steve… Good luck, Nance.” you smiled devilishly. 

You heard the couple talking as you entered your room and adjusted the door to almost closed but still a small sliver peeking. Both of you slipped your shoes off and excess clothing while listening in. 

“Before I tell you” you heard Nancy start  “you tell me how many women you've been with.” you shot Eddie a look, it was very amusing to listen to. 

“Two.” Steve stated. 

Eddie took a step towards you, slinking his hands around your waist and holding you to him.

“Two? Two?” Nancy asked, shocked. Both you and Eddie couldn't help but grin at each other, the whole thing was very funny. 

“How is that possible? I mean…” Nancy seemed to think for a second “have you seen you?”

“I mean, what can I say?” 

“I dated Olivia for almost three years, so from sophomore to senior year” he paused “Now you. That's two.” he stated plainly. 

“Two it is.” 

“Okayy time for bed.” she said quickly. “I'm gonna brush my teeth.” you heard her scurry towards the bathroom. 

“Woah woah, wait a minute now!” Steve's heavier footsteps followed. 

“Come on, it's your turn.” he complained as you heard what must have been the bathroom door shut. 

“Oh, come on!” he sighed exasperated. “You know, I don't need the

actual number. Just a ballpark.”

The door opened again “It is definitely less than a ballpark” she said before the door shut again. 

Steves footsteps were heard making their way to the bedroom 

You sighed and sat down on the bed “I am so glad I'm not Nancy right now.” you chuckled. 

“Tell me about it.” Eddie answered as he slank behind you on the bed, leaning on his right hand. 

“Sooo what's your magic number?” he asked, resting his head on your shoulder. 

You scrunched your face up slightly, you were not that keen on landing in Nancy's situation. 

“Come on” Eddis pressed “you know everyone I've been with. All.. both of them.”

You sighed and turned slightly to face him. “Well, there's you.” you started. 

“Better not be doing these in order.” Eddie joked. 

“Billy Dreskin” you began counting “Pete Carny.”

Eddie hummed hearing the name of one of the old classmates who transferred out of state two years ago. 

“Keith” you simply said his name, knowing Eddie had heard all about the video store clerk.  

“Aaand Billy” you mentioned your most recent boyfriend, the one who had broken up with you when sensing you had feelings for Eddie, he had been right but the breakup was still pretty messy.

“Oh, yes, the weenie from Turinie.” Eddie rolled his eyes.

“Babeee, are you jealous of Billy?” you mocked him a little. 

Eddie made a slight noise. “ Oh come on I'm so much happier with you than I ever was with him.” you smiled as you hugged him tightly. 

“Really?” he asked, looking for some slight assurance. 

“Oh, please!” your heart warmed at your slightly insecure boyfriend, he was so adorable. “That Paolo thing was barely a relationship.” you continued. Earning a soft kiss on your shoulder. 

“All it really was, was just meaningless, animal sex.” 

Eddie froze, looking awkwardly dead in the eyes. 

You drew back slightly “Okay, you know, that sounded so much better in my head.”

Eddie sat up. “Animal sex?” he asked, slightly deflated. “Ugh I don't know why I said that” you groaned. 

“Animal sex?” he asked again, quite baffled. 

“No baby listen, I didnt even love him, I love you!” you pleated exasperated. 

 Eddie stood up and fiddled with a small black teddy bear that rested on your bookshelf. 

“Was he better than me?” he asked, glancing towards you. 

You groaned loudly and threw yourself back onto the bed, “Well! was he?”

“Eddie, please listen to me” you sprung up off the bed. 

Circling the bed to the opposite side of eddie you continued talking “You are so much better for me than Billy ever was”

You crawled onto the bed “I mean you care about me, you're loving,

you make me laugh.” you pulled at his arm, turning him to face you. 

“ Oh hey If I make you laugh, here's an idea.” he snapped his fingers.

“Why don't you invite Billyover to have a little romp in the sack...and I'll stand in the corner and tell knock-knock jokes!” he exclaimed.

You threw yourself  off the bed again “Stop! God!” you complained. Desperately you waved your arms against your body pleading with him “ Eddie what we have is special!” you almost shouted in desperation.“All Billy and I ever had was-”

"Animal sex animal sex?” Eddie interrupted. 

You groaned, pulling your fingers through your hair and ruffing it up. 

“So what are you saying?” Eddie turned towards you. “I mean you’re saying that there's nothing between us "animal" at all?” he pressed. “There's not even, like, um, a little animal?Not even, like.. like chipmunk sex?” he squaked.

“Ok Eddie” you stepped up onto the bed, trudging over to him “Try to hear me” you grasped onto his shoulders. “Okay?I'm not gonna lie to you, okay it was good with Billy” 

“Knock-knock” Eddie interjected

“But!” you pointed your finger at him  “What you and I have

is so much better” you told him exhaustedly. “We, we have tenderness, we have intimacy, we connect!” you gestured between your two bodies “You know? I swear. This, this is the best ... I have ever had.” you looked down at him.

Eddie stared into your eyes, searching your face. “Until now.” he caught you off guard by quickly grasping onto the backs of your thighs, picking you up and throwing you onto the bed. 

You squealed as Eddie climbed on top of you, instantly connecting his lips to yours, desperately kissing you. Pushing his pelvis hard against your core as you wrapped your legs around his waist. 

Your hands desperately searched foe the hem of his shirt, once you found it you pulled at it, forcing it up his back. 

Eddie quickly sat up ripping his shirt over his head and watching as you awkwardly sat up, crunching your stomach and lifting both the hoodie and crop top over your head. 

Eddie leaned back down instantly connecting his hands to your clothed boobs, harshly kidding the plump skin, sucking dark hickies over your chest. 

“Condom?” Eddie asked. 

“Bedside table” you pointed flimsily. 

Eddie quickly forced himself off the bed rooting through your drawer as you adjusted yourself to lie on the bed with your head by the pillows. As he fumbled with opening the box and then the wrapper you unbuttoned and slipped your jeans off your legs. 

Eddie finally got the condom free of the line of others and threw it onto the bed. being very quick to remove his pants he hurried with ripping the condom wrapper open with his teeth and rolling it over his cock. 

You washed excitedly as Eddie lightly stroked his cock. “Bra” he stated, you realized you were still wearing the dark green bra unclasped the back, ripping it off and throwing it somewhere in the room.

Eddie climbed onto the bed and adjusted himself on top of you. “Uh.. foreplay?” he asked awkwardly as the tip of his cock brushed the opening of your cunt. “No, no were good, please just, put it in” you begged. 

Eddie chuckled and pushed himself inside. “Geez, we should fight more often, you're dripping” he grinned as he began thrusting at an acceptably slow pace. 

“Shut up and go faster” Eddie moved his hips back and forth drilling into you at a furious pace. You let out a loud moan as you slipped your hands around his torso, grasping onto his skin with both hands. 

“Fuck” Eddie groaned as he rested his forarms on either side of your head, his finger tangling in your sprawled out hair. 

“Oh fuck Eddie! Yes! omg!” you moaned loudly as the headboard began hitting the wall from Eddie's constant thrusting. 

“Fuck fuck FUCK!” you continued. you could never really shut up during dex, but Eddie loved it. 

“Yes! Yes! Yes! just like that” Eddie went even faster, his whole body straightening, muscles working as hard as they could. 

“Fuck im about to cum, damn it” Eddie slowed a little. 

“Just continue, please omg!” you pushed on his lower back till he started back up again. 

“YES! Fuck” you closed your eyes as your pupils rolled back in your head. 

Your mouth flew open. “Shit shit shit!” you squealed as you felt the familiar feeling of having to pee. 

“Fuck! Eddie, I'm about to squirt, don't stop!” you screamed. Eddie's eyes grew wide as he felt and heard you soaking his abdomen with the clear liquid. 

“Fuck im really gonna cum now!” Eddie alerted you. 

“Just one more minute!” 

“Fuck I can't control it!” he shouted as he thrusted as fast as he could into you, spurts of cum shot out of you, soaking the bed, yourself and your boyfriend. 

Eddie felt the milky liquid flow out of him as he groaned loudly. “Ahhh fuckkk” he groaned exhaustedly. he slowed his pace as your body gave out, if you hadnt been on a mattress you would have fallen down from your collapse, instead you just lay there completely fucked out in a pool of cum as Eddie lay on top of you, his head in the crook of your neck, trying to catch his breath. 

He let out a loud breath as his eyes shut from exhaustion. You lay under him, your legs spread and your hands above your head, breathing rapidly. 

“Holy fuck” was all you could muster. 

“Sorry I came so fast” Eddie whispered in your ear “That was the best I've ever had” you stated quietly. Eddie chuckled with pride. 

“Having fun yet!” you heard a knock at the wall followed by Steve's voice. “Shut up man!” Eddie shouted back. 

“I'm getting you back for this! I just had to hear my brother having full blown sex!” Nancy shouted “Oh god i'll never be the same!”

you both laughed at her. 

After 20 minutes or so of lying in the pool with Eddie still inside you, you both got up, eddie slipped his boxers back on as you ran and got towels in just his t shirt, you quickly dried yourselves off, soaked up some of the cum on the bed and changed the sheets, lots of towels covering the damp patch for a quick fix. 

You threw yourself on the bed, exhausted. “Nope, I need a shower” you sat back up, eddie beside you. 

“Bath?” he asked with a heartwarming smile. “YES!” you said excited. 

[tartarusknight]

So supernatural au for Stranger things. Well, it's a more unnatural version. Still with the Upside Down, just a different version!

Season 1--->

The Wheelers were human, and Nancy was shown how to protect herself at a young age. But she befriends a banshee Barbara Holland and keeps to herself for the most part. But she falls for Steve Harrington, who was a siren. People warn her away, tell her that it's just because he's spelling her to love him.

Barb is the most protective. So she goes with Nancy to Steve's. Even though she's been feeling off since the youngest of the Byers pack went missing. And when she goes up with Steve, she swears she can hear Barb's scream.

Afterward, Nancy talks to Jonathan Byers from the Byers' pack, and they go looking for their friends/family. Only when they go looking, Nancy finds a weird portal. When she goes in, she's sees a creature she doesn't know. Before Jonathan's able to get her out there, it bites her.

And that night, she feels her body change. Jonathan is with her as Demagorgan's bite changes Nancy. The small scars form on her face, letting her face open up. Her nails are able to lengthen into talons. Jonathan walks her through dealing with the transformations, and Nancy develops a close bond to him.

And after everything goes down, she joins the Byers' pack. But other than that, nothing changes.

Season 2 --->

The next year, as the demodogs start acting up, Nancy, who's already struggling with Barb's death, snaps under it all. She yells at Steve and blames him for using his sirens call on her. How they couldn't really be in love and that it was all just bullshit. She goes to Jonathan, and it all stays the same.

Steve is stopped by Dustin Henderson, a young satyr. The boy had been trying to take care of a young creature, and it had escaped. Steve agreed and grabbed the trusty nail bat he had gotten from Jonathan.

They still go to the junk yard. Steve still protects them. Lucas, the young Gorgon and Max, the young Harpy. Before they head back to the Byers with the rest of the group.

And when Hopper, the human chief of police sees the young fae girl whom he had taken in, a new version of hell breaks loose. Steve, thankfully, is left in charge of the kids since a siren wasn't known for fighting (no matter how much Steve proved that he was strong).

And when Billy, the argogant werewolf, shows up, Steve protects them. He is doing his best, but Max still saves his ass. But he's brought into the younger kids' party/pack after that. Afterward, they headed into the tunnels, and Dustin was able to speak softly to Dart in his satyr speak.

Season 3--->

Has Steve with a witch Robin at Scoops. With Dustin pulling them into the Russian conspiracy. Then Erica joins as well later on. It has Steve trying to use his siren song on the Russians, but since Steve hadn't used a drip of it since Nancy, it comes out wrong and doesn't work. Robin is able to heal him a little, but without her herbs and books, she's trapped as well.

Little Gorgon Erica saves them by turning the doctor to stone, and Dustin gets them out.

Season --->

Eddie Munson is a known vampire. His dad had been one before he went feral from accidentally taking to much blood from his wife and killed himself in his greif.

That made Eddie half vampire, the other half human. But when Chrissy the sweet merfolk die in his living room, Eddie is quick to be blamed. He goes into hiding and is relieved when Dustin finds him.

And Steve, who had sworn off dating in fear of never being able to be with someone who truly loves him, falls for Eddie. And well, with Vampires' ability to charm others as well, he can't be charmed, and they can trust that they love each other for who they are.

That's it. That's my idea... all I got. Thoughts????

Steve - Siren

Nancy - Were-Demogorgan

Mike - human

Byers - Werewolves

Barb - Banshee

Sinclairs - Gorgon (think Medusa)

Dustin - Satyr or Cyclops

Max - Harpy

Billy - Werewolf

Eddie - Vampire

Robin - Witch

El - Fae who was experimented on and made more powerful.

Hopper - human

Jason - Minotaur

Chrissy - Merfolk