#but I’m also not totally against Nancy wanting to be on her own for a while

[chirpsythismorning]

The way fans on the st sub are almost all in agreement Nancy ending up with neither Jon nor Steve wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, and how they can even come up with a sleuth of reasons as to why, honestly pretty valid and fair reasons, but then are absolutely gobsmacked when fans merely speculate something along those lines for El is, quite something.

[ymaohoh]

'Dating Chrissy' - Hellcheer Fic - Oneshot

'It seemed that word had traveled to all the bachelors of Hawkins High that the Queen Bee herself was open to dating (and her bonehead ex was safely out of the picture). So it fell to the brave and brightest knights to try for her hand.' Chrissy's single and Nancy encourages her to try dating. Eddie's not so thrilled. Eventual happy ending and post-Vecna. Also on Archive.

Eddie cupped his hands together and yelled… “Cunningham! C’mere. You’re a goddamn genius!”

The entire hallway seemed to freeze and then turn as one to peer at the head cheerleader who was trying (and failing) not to giggle. She was scooping out books from her locker with a very bemused looking Robin Buckley waiting beside her. Both of them were well used to Eddie’s dramatics. 

Chrissy grinned. “Yeah? No duh, Munson. Tell me something I don’t know.” 

Eddie was beaming from ear to ear as he strode towards her, weaving round the surprised students like he didn’t even notice or care about the stares. That Eddie Munson and Chrissy Cunningham were friends was old news by now and so were the rumors about devil worship and black magic and so forth. No, for some explicable reason Chrissy seemed to enjoy The Freak’s company and their peers moved onto the next boiling pot of hot gossip. 

They didn’t know that the perfect and angelic looking Chrissy was a glorified freak at heart too.

(and boy how she’d squealed when Eddie first pointed it out, after stumbling across her trying to headbang - adorably - to his mix tape. She’d swatted his arm and said ‘Eddie!’ in such a breathy happy voice that it became a badge of honor now. Big bad scary Eddie had softened like cookie dough at the mere sight). 

More importantly perhaps, the other students at Hawkins High didn’t know about spring break or how the pair teamed up with other loveable misfits (‘The Party,’ Henderson dubbed them) to save the world like freakin’ superheroes. 

Chrissy had nearly died that evening in Eddie’s trailer and that was a decent enough ice breaker, all things considered. Ever since then they’d sort of been thrown together - the loser junkie and Queen Bee - and it turned out they made an excellent duo. Chrissy brought the brains and the brawn, and Eddie had a smart mouth and wheels. 

That kind of thing formed friendships, you know? As did carrying around the secret of Vecna all these weeks later because it was supposed to be kept totally hush hush. 

Annoyingly the government suits thanked them all most profusely and patched up their wounds - but their thanks didn’t extend to canceling finals or handing out honorary diplomas. Which meant the older kids still had to knuckle down and study. 

So all in all, things were looking pretty swell for Eddie right now. 

He presented his latest Math test like it was the holy grail itself, spun from solid gold. 

“B plus, baby, which means…drumroll please, Buckley…” he grinned as Robin dutifully taped her knuckles against the locker. “...I’ve passed O'Donnell’s class! The school’s gonna have no choice but let me graduate in green this summer, so long as I keep my head down and play nice. This dumbass you see before you is going to finally graduate. I fucking knew 1986 was going to be my year!” 

Chrissy gave a loud whoop and bounced on the tips of her sneakers. She looked like she wanted to launch into a whole new cheer routine just for him. 

“Eddie! That’s amazing news! I’m so proud of you!”

Eddie laughed and swung his arms around her waist before picking her up and spinning them around in circles. Chrissy giggled against his chest and didn’t seem to mind even though they were causing a small spectacle (Eddie didn’t give a shit but Chrissy could sometimes get blushy and pink if people paid her too much attention). In the distance, somewhere, Eddie heard Robin offer her own congratulations and pat him on the back. 

“Knew you could do it, Eddie!” Chrissy was saying. "I just knew it."

He set her down and jammed the test safely into his backpack. He couldn’t wait to show it to Wayne. Though his uncle never scolded him for his piss poor efforts with school before, he held out hope Eddie might someday find the motivation to straighten up and apply himself. 

(the government did fork out a tidy sum of cash in exchange for their silence and Wayne right away set up a college fund for Eddie (while he lay unconscious, being sewn back together like Frankenstein's monster). There was enough left over for Eddie to buy a brand new van and amp for his guitar which cheered him up). 

Maybe Eddie would actually get to use that fund now. 

“Nah, it’s all down to you, sweetness. Couldn’t have done it without your expert tutorage. Gonna buy you some candy or a big bunch of flowers to say thanks. What’s your poison? Roses? Want some wildflowers, Chriss? Or what about…what are they called? Chrysanthemums, like your name. I’ll fill your bedroom with them.” 

When she first offered her help, he’d not been optimistic honestly. A dumbass is a dumbass, right? But hell, Chrissy was a wonderful study buddy and again they proved they made an excellent team. He thought about all those late nights together studying old test papers, the cute revision cards she made with her pink and purple gel pens, the study timetable she decorated with stickers. Turns out Eddie’s a sucker for a gold shiny star sticker...especially when Chrissy herself pressed it to the tip of his nose.

O'Donnell should seriously take notes.

Chrissy swiped her hand against his arm playfully and gave it a squeeze. “Eddie, you’re sweet, but you don’t need to do that. You worked really hard and earned this fair and square. We talked about it... the answers were already there in your brain - just whizzing around like bats. You just needed help focusing and writing it all down.”

“We should celebrate!” Robin suddenly interjected. Eddie and Chrissy both seemed to jump, as though they’d forgotten she was a part of the conversation. “This definitely feels like something we should celebrate with cliche party hats and balloons. How about Saturday night at Steve’s place? We’ve got the night off work and I know his calendar... he’s got like zero plans.”

The bell rang so Chrissy shouldered her heavy backpack and they began to walk towards the lunch hall. 

Feeling a bit guilty for leaving her out, Eddie flashed Robin a huge grin and said that sounded great. They began to talk about logistics, invites, playlists, and Robin promised to bring along a pack of her dad's fancy imported beers if Eddie swore not to play any Black Sabbath. 

“As long as you don’t force me in the pool again, I’m sweet, ‘cause these glorious curls can’t handle it. And I’m not playing strip poker with you again because you clearly cheated last time and Steve nearly had a stroke,” Eddie chuckled. He noticed Chrissy was a bit quiet and gently bumped her shoulder. “How about it, Cunningham? Party this weekend at Harrington’s mansion? It’s time I finally showed you how to hangbang like a true rockstar.” 

Chrissy bit her lower lip. 

On hindsight Eddie should’ve known that things were going just too well for him. He was due a cosmic kick between the legs.

Chrissy began to speak and three things happened to Eddie all at once. His legs forgot how to function so he missed a step, his stomach heaved like he was going to seriously throw up, and it felt like some devilish spirit had just tipped an ice cold bucket of water over his head. It wasn't pretty.

“I…I’ll be there, Eddie, of course…but I might be a little late,” she said slowly. “I’ve got a…well… a date. You know Andrew from English class, Robin? Well he asked me if I wanted to see that new horror film this Saturday and I kinda' said yes. It’ll be rude to rearrange last minute, but it’s an early showing so maybe I can ask him to drop me off at Steve’s place after? You think he’ll mind?”

Eddie was vaguely aware of Robin saying something like oh wow. That’ll be fun, Chrissy. I’m sure Andrew won’t mind dropping you off afterwards. I thought you hated horror films or did he suggest it so he could play the ‘oh she’s scared so I’ll hold her hand’ move? Guys are seriously stupid. Is this your first date since…you know…?

Chrissy nodded.

“Since Jason? Yeah. I know it’s only been a month... but Nancy knows Andrew from the school newspaper and says he’s a real great guy. She thinks I should…what did she call it? ‘Put myself out there’…and try dating again. I got with Jason when we were freshman, you know, and it all happened so fast. He gave me his letterman jacket and we went out for milkshakes …and then we were suddenly boyfriend and girlfriend. He’s the only guy I’ve seriously dated…which I guess sets a pretty low bar,”  she added with a blush. 

It hardly needed saying but none of Chrissy’s new friends liked her stick-up-the-ass ex-boyfriend Jason Carver. Since the first day he’d been an absolute boor about Chrissy helping the party fight Vecna and threw his weight around when he felt ignored or sidelined (which he usually was). 

Chrissy admitted they’d been on the rocks for ages and his speech at the pep rally was when she knew for certain it was truly over. She’d just…outgrown him. 

And now she was talking about dating again. 

Eddie noticed that her hand closest to him was twitching and she was gnawing at her lip so hard it was in danger of being chewed right off. He suddenly felt like the world’s biggest jackass when she clearly needed a friend right now. 

Sighing inwardly, he took a deep breath. He tried to look supportive just like Robin. “You know what? I think that sounds great.”

Chrissy and Robin both looked up at him.

Chrissy’s baby blue eyes seemed to widen. “Oh Eddie, I’m being so selfish. If you want me to cancel, of course I will. It’s amazing news and I do want to celebrate with you. Honestly…do you want me to take a rain check?”

“No no, it’s fine. I’ll see you afterwards anyway, right? We can hang out then. You should go on the date, Chriss. Honestly.” 

“...Really?”

“Abso-fucking-lutely. It’ll be good for you to…put yourself out there. Nancy's right.”

“Oh. Okay…if you’re sure."

“Totally sure. Fly your freaky flag, Cunningham.”

He even pumped his fist into the air for good measure.

Chrissy smiled and then excused herself to go to the bathroom. 

Eddie and Robin waited outside and Robin peered across at him. She was wearing such a painfully exasperated expression that Eddie couldn’t ignore it…though it would serve her right if he did. He sighed and ran a hand through his messy hair before speaking, knowing full well where this conversation was heading. 

He’d had similar awkward chats with Nancy and Steve and Dustin which usually resulted in a lot of eye rolling (and name calling). 

“You look like an owl.”

“I’m just flabbergasted, Munson. Truly flabbergasted.” 

“Right…go ahead and spit it out before you explode.” 

“The wonderfully beautiful and amazing Chrissy Cunningham, who is honestly too good for the likes of any of us really, just asked if you were sure she should date…and you responded with…and I quote… let your ‘freaky flag fly���. You know that was the exact moment in chick flicks where the romantic hero finally admits their true feelings, and they both swoon and kiss face. It was the perfect setup…”

“Buckley…I swear to god...” 

“You’ve been making gooey eyes at Chrissy since day one, Munson, and now she’s ditched dickhead Carver and ready to move on…and you give her your blessing? Really? You’re seriously okay with the idea of her dating Andrew and holding hands and smooching and…”

“Okay…okay…hush!” 

The hallway was pretty busy and although Robin was using her inside voice, Eddie was still nervous about being overheard especially with her throwing around words like swoon and smooch. And also yeah…he wasn’t totally over the moon with picturing Chrissy doing any of that stuff with whoever the hell this Andrew was. 

“What exactly am I supposed to say?” he shrugged. He crossed his arms like a shield.

"You could start with being honest."

“Fine...here's the shitty truth. Did I think that maybe there was something between me and Chriss when everything went down with Vecna? Sure, yeah. I’d freak out when she flirted back or hugged me…but clearly I was wrong or misread things, and she only sees me as a friend. Which is fine, by the way, being her friend is a fucking honor.”

Robin was shaking her head. “Dude, it wasn’t nothing. We all noticed it.”

“Yeah? Look, it doesn’t matter either way. Deep down I knew how this fantasy would play out and I’ve got no expectations. This is reality. She’s going to a good college after summer and she’s so smart she’ll ace it and have this amazing perfect life…and my dumbass will only hold her back. I know how goddamn beautiful and amazing Chrissy is, okay? She’s a fucking angel. But I’m…me… and like you just said, she’s so far out of my league it’s like we’re a different species; she’s some lovely elf and I’m this cave goblin. I get it. In the real world…me and her just don’t make sense. I know it. She knows it. You know it.” 

Shit. He hadn't meant to let it all come pouring out at once. Clearly he'd been bottling up more teenage angst than he knew.

Robin was looking at him now with something akin to surprise and sympathy. She was evidently not expecting this outpour of brutal honesty from him. Sarcasm and jokes maybe, or him telling her to go to hell, but not whatever this was. For all her wise cracks and joking, Robin was annoyingly perceptive.

“Big words for a fantasy nerd. She’s your fairy muse, the princess at the end of the quest. You think you can really let her go?” she asked after a pause. 

“If this really was a dumb movie and I admitted all this stuff…you know what would happen? A big fat nothing. She’d blush and say ‘sorry, Eddie’ and be so crazy kind when she let me down. No swooning or…riding off into the sunset or whatever. Sorry to disappoint.” 

“So what if she has a good time with Andrew? What if they hit it off and sparks fly. You’d be fine seeing that?” 

“Fuck no but I’m still not going to say anything.” 

“But…” 

Eddie cleared his throat. “Look...I wasn’t lying to her. It would be good for her to date someone other than that prick Jason. After everything we’ve been through…she fucking deserves to be happy, you know? Let her be a kid and have some damn fun.”

He’d been so proud when she mustered the confidence to finally dump Jason, and when she stood up to her crappy asshole parents too. She was grabbing life by the horns and who was he to throw a spanner in the works because of feelings? 

Robin sighed. She looked like a deflated balloon.

“You’re a good guy, Eddie,” she said. “But this is going to end in heartbreak.” 

“I’ll handle it. Just stitch me right back up again, right? What’s a few more scars…”

**

‘Let her have some damn fun.’

He didn’t feel so benevolent when Saturday finally rolled around. 

Eddie arrived at Steve’s that afternoon trying to keep upbeat (the freshmen were coming so they decided to start the celebrations early so they could make their curfews and still have time to par-tay). He found plenty of other things to think about... and Robin came through with the promise of fancy booze as a well done gift.

Steve started up the BBQ and bought some beers and wine coolers with strict instructions to the younger party members they were only allowed one (though Lucas definitely swiped more). He was wearing a jazzy orange apron and still somehow managed to look effortlessly cool flipping burgers. He’d clapped Eddie on the back when he arrived and murmured something about third time’s the charm but he sounded genuinely pleased for him. He seemed fine with them commandeering his home for the evening (or was just used to it by now). 

Nancy had brought along party hats and balloons and streamers (again as promised. They looked like something from a kid’s birthday party and Eddie beamed - especially when she strong-armed Jonathan into wearing a pointy hat). 

They decorated everything tastefully at first, but after some wine coolers Nancy and Robin became more confident with their artistic abilities and the garden soon turned into a mess of white and red streamers and balloons.

Chuckling, Eddie settled back onto one of the pool loungers and cracked open the lid of his fancy beer feeling pretty good. Steve passed him a burger with all the trimmings and Max put Kate Bush on the stereo. 

(Dustin had heard about the gold stickers from Chrissy and brought along a sheet as a gag gift. Eddie was now sporting a star on either cheek. Jeff had them stuck all over his face. They were currently paying a silent game of who could pin the most on Steve without him noticing.)

It was chaos and Eddie loved it. They were all such weirdos.

They talked about everything and nothing for a while when he noticed Lucas and Max holding hands. They were dating again and it seemed to be going well. 

But seeing that made him think about Chrissy who was at that exact moment in time (he checked Nancy’s watch to be sure) sitting in a dark movie theater with her date, watching a scary film. Chrissy was terrible with horror films - she’d had to hide behind his hands when Will put on Friday the 13th - so it was a cunning move on Andrew’s part if he wanted an excuse to get close to her. Plenty of chances to hold her hand, tuck her close to his side, maybe even wrap his arm around her shoulders if he was feeling brave. 

Was she holding his hand right now? Were they sharing a soda with just one straw? 

He didn’t know Andrew nor did he want to give Robin the satisfaction of asking. Was he another Carver with big shoulders and perfect smooth blond hair? 

Eddie seriously needed a joint and Jonathan joined him down the street to smoke. It helped a bit.  

It was nearly 8pm when he finally heard a car pull up and the passenger door slam shut. They all looked round as Chrissy opened the side gate and stepped through to the garden. It was getting dark (though Steve had rigged up some electric lights), and they were still hanging out in the garden drinking and playing silly games. 

Chrissy gave them all a big wave and smiled brightly. She was thankfully alone. 

They beckoned her over (Nancy rushed up to give her a hug) and Eddie noticed no one asked where she’d been which meant they all knew about the date. He noticed Dustin and Steve glancing at him to gauge his reaction. 

Chrissy snagged a wine cooler from the icebox and plopped down in the spare spot beside Eddie. She wasn’t dressed up exactly but she’d made a noticeable effort to style her hair and put on a blue sundress that Eddie had once said was pretty. She was wearing a new perfume too. 

“Hey guys. What’s with all the streamers? Steve, why do you have stickers all over your ass?” She giggled. 

“Goddamn it.” 

“We like to party in style, Cunningham,” Eddie smiled in greeting. Jonathan had two party hats on his head now and was putting on some Dio. Finally. Jeff and Gareth let out a cheer. “Drink up, you’ve got some catching up to do. Wheeler was just explaining why there’s no bouncy castle.” 

Nancy spluttered something about not being kids anymore which was Robin’s cue to then suggest strip poker which everyone shut down. Steve offered to play normal poker and she accepted it grudgingly. 

The freshmen were ready to head off anyway and Robin went to the kitchen for more beers. 

“I still don’t know how to play,” Chrissy whispered to him. 

“Stick with me kid, you can be on my team,” he said conspiringly. “Only don’t blurt out what cards we have like last time, ‘kay?” 

Chrissy grinned and she nudged her leg against his. “Sorry I’m late. I’m really proud of you for today, Eddie. Now we can graduate together!” 

Eddie nudged her back. 

He very deliberately didn’t ask about her evening nor did she bring it up either, though Nancy apparently cornered her later on for a full breakdown. Eddie had just decided that he was at peace with things and didn’t need to know any details (the date was over, right? And she seemed happy to be here with him) when he walked in on Nancy and Robin discussing it in the kitchen while fetching ice. 

Nancy noticed him right away and raised her voice so that he could hear too. 

“...she said Andrew took himself way too seriously. Said it was like being with Jason all over again. Apparently he kept going on about all the writing awards he’d won and it came off as serious bragging, and he’s got his whole life planned out where he’s going to be this famous writer. You know Chrissy, she’s way too polite to shut that shit down, but she’s after fun, right? Who needs all that heavy stuff on a first date? She said it was like being interviewed for a job.” 

“Ugh. Way too much male ego,” Robin cringed. “Guess there’s not gonna be a date two for Andrew?”

“I doubt it, but she said it’s not put her off dating. Let’s hope the next guy shows her a better time.” 

Nancy was very pointedly looking at him now. 

He rolled his eyes and went back through to the other room where they were still playing poker. Robin was winning but Eddie and Chrissy were coming a close second (all Eddie’s doing - Chrissy, bless her, couldn’t bluff at all). Jonathan was staring at his cards as though he could magically change them with mere force of will...though maybe he was too stoned to see clearly.  

Eddie sat down on his seat and took a very large gulp of his fancy beer. 

Chrissy was leaning across the table to look at their cards and kept whispering questions in his ear, so he wrapped an arm around her waist and tugged her over so she could perch on his lap instead. Her perfume smelled like strawberries and vanilla and he took a deep breath. 

“Sit tight and buckle in, sweetness. We’re gonna win.” 

(they didn’t, but they were having too much fun to care)

**

Though poor Andrew didn’t get another date, Chrissy soon found herself another one. It seemed that word had traveled to all the bachelors of Hawkins High that the Queen Bee herself was open to dating (and her bonehead ex was safely out of the picture). So it fell to the brave and brightest knights to try for her hand.

This time it was a guy from the Photography club. Jonathan gave him the all clear when Chrissy probed. 

“He’s called James,” Chrissy revealed at lunch. She was picking at her sandwich. “He was very sweet actually - he wrote me a little note saying how he’d always had a soft spot for me from afar. We’re going to park up by the lake and go for a hike this weekend.”

Lover’s Lake. 

“A hike on a first date?” Nancy raised an eyebrow. “It’s not exactly traditional…”

Jonathan shrugged beside her. “I think it’s nice. Plenty of time and space to talk in private and get to know each other. He’s a quiet guy.” 

He promised to take Nancy on a hike and she softened like melted butter. 

“I think he’s going to bring his camera actually - he said he would show me how it works and then maybe we could develop the photos together too.” 

“All alone in the darkroom,” Robin sniggered. “This James seems to have it all figured out, I’m half impressed. What are you gonna wear, Chriss?” 

“Oh! I guess my workout gear? Or would that be too casual? Maybe I should wear some shorts? I can’t exactly wear a dress if we’re hiking.” 

“Wear those tiny black shorts you’ve got. That’ll give him something to photograph.” 

Chrissy blushed to the very roots of her hair but Eddie noticed she didn’t say no. 

Eddie kept silent throughout and focused on his own lunch. 

Unlike Andrew, Eddie actually knew James and had even sold him weed before. James was very different from Jason's all-American vibe; tall, dark hair (that always looked perfectly tousled), and a serious (but sensitive) expression on his face. He could often be found with a camera slung around his neck wearing the kind of shabby clothes girls seemed to feel were cool and artistic. 

Eddie sat behind him in class Friday afternoon and tried hard not to glare daggers into his back. Was he thinking about the weekend instead of whatever war the teacher was droning on about? He would be. 

To Eddie’s utter dismay James actually turned around when the bell went and gave Eddie a tight smile. 

“Hey Munson, you know Chrissy Cunningham, right? You’re friends?” 

“Sure.” 

“Well I’m taking her out this weekend, maybe she told you? But I’m kind of freaking out a bit…I mean…it’s her, you know? I thought maybe I should buy some flowers and surprise her? Do you know what she likes?”

A diabolical part of Eddie wanted to mess with him but he managed to keep his cool. This was for Chrissy, after all, and he wanted her to have a nice time.

“Get her Chrysanthemums,” he said, getting to his feet. “And make her laugh, alright?” 

That whole weekend Eddie tried to keep busy. He cleaned his entire bedroom, gave the kitchen a scrub, even mowed the patch of grass out front. Wayne didn’t say a word though he pressed a hand to Eddie’s forehead to make sure he wasn’t feeling sick. Eddie tried to practice his guitar but found his concentration was all over the place. 

He thought seriously about taking a long drive (maybe towards Reefer Rick’s and a certain lake nearby) but tossed the idea aside. 

When he got to school Monday, he wanted to just head to class and forget all about the weekend - though at the same time he desperately wanted to hear every detail too. It had been a gloriously sunny weekend (perfect for stomping around nature) and the lake had probably looked picture perfect. Did they have fun? Joke? Did Chrissy wear those tiny black shorts that cupped her ass so perfectly? Most importantly… did Chrissy have a nice time?

It was Jonathan who finally took pity on him. They were sharing a smoke out in the woods before lunch period. 

“Go on…hit me with it,” Eddie breathed out long and hard. 

Best to get a heads up now before lunch with everyone’s curious eyes flickering to him to assess his reaction. 

Jonathan watched him carefully as he spoke. 

“...Chrissy called Nance up last night on the phone. Said the hike was nice but really awkward. Apparently James turned up with roses which she hates and barely said a word the whole time. She figured it was just nerves and tried hard to fill in the blanks - you know how nice she can be - but he wouldn’t take the hint.”

“Ah…”

That Jonathan was saying that, when he was a pretty awkward guy himself, must have meant it was truly bad. 

“I guess you and Nancy won’t have to share the darkroom.”

Jonathan coughed and blushed but rather tellingly didn’t say a word. 

Eddie couldn’t help but feel pleased that it was a dud even though Chrissy looked pretty disappointed when she spoke about it at lunch. She told them how beautiful the lake was but no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t coax much out of James which was frankly bizarre because even Mr Wheeler had warmed up to Chrissy. If she was a D&D character she would have critically high charisma stats.  

Eddie noticed that after Chrissy finished talking she didn’t touch her lunch. Her fingers tore up the sandwich into little scraps while their friends tore into James, oblivious. 

He could almost see the cogs of her brain turning. Hear the anxious little thoughts gnawing away at her confidence. 

Screw that. 

So of course Eddie interrupted and started talking about the time Jeff got so high at Rick’s place that he jumped into the lake fully clothed, forgetting that he couldn’t in fact swim. It had taken both Grant and Eddie to fish him out because he wanted to stay in and make friends with the ‘fishes’. He mimed it out at the lunch table, hamming it up to the max, and making Jeff’s blazed expression even more cartoonish. Jeff himself sat at the table and laughed along with the others at the performance, taking it in his stride. 

Eddie watched as Chrissy picked up her lunch and began to eat. She sniggered along with everyone else when Eddie pretended to be Jeff falling asleep in the bathtub (when they finally dragged him back to the house to hose down). 

She even munched on the chocolate muffin he threw at her. 

He felt his chest relax.

**

Chrissy was a popular girl and so the date offers naturally kept coming, and Chrissy bravely didn’t let the last attempts put her off. She wanted to try dating and reasoned surely the next one would be better? 

And it was. 

This time it was with another jock from the basketball team who Lucas was friendly with. He was called Christopher and apparently didn’t care about stepping on Jason’s toes one bit if it meant landing a date with Chrissy. Even Eddie had to admire the bold move. 

(and yes Chrissy laughed when Dustin pointed out the inevitable dilemma should someone call out ‘Chris/Chriss!')

Christopher was a jock but Lucas promised Chrissy he was one of the good ones and she accepted his offer to go to the town fair that weekend. Christopher had the typical athletes frame and swagger, but the smile he gave Chrissy by her locker seemed sincere. 

Eddie didn’t even need to get the lowdown from Lucas that Monday because he went to the fair himself along with the others. He was having a pretty good evening eating cotton candy and scaring Steve in the Haunted House, when he spied Chrissy and Christopher lining up for the ferris wheel. 

Keen to be a gent, Christopher was maintaining a decent amount of distance between them but when it was their turn to step on the ride, Christopher placed a hand on her lower back to help her up and they sat snuggly together in the small car. There was something intimate about the way their bodies were pushed together and they whispered back and forth. 

He saw Chrissy tip her head back in laughter and felt a knot in his stomach. Eddie really fucking tried not to stare. He truly did. 

That Monday Chrissy told them the date went well and Christopher had walked her home after, even impressing the dragon that was her mother when she spotted his letterman jacket. That bothered Eddie more than anything else, honestly, especially when he glanced down at his ripped jeans and scuffed boots. Her mom was such a damn cliche. 

Eddie had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. 

“...But I’m not sure there’s going to be a date two,” Chrissy said, nonchalantly sipping her water. “We both like sports but we don’t have much else in common, and I don’t know how I feel about dating another athlete…no offense Lucas...but it’s a lot of pressure. Plus the smug look on my mom’s face kinda turned me off. The last thing I want is for her to think I’m trying to crawl back into her good books by dating someone like Jason.” 

“But it went well?” Nancy pressed. “You had fun?”

Chrissy smiled. “Yeah I did…I think we can chalk that up to one successful date so far.” 

**

Then came David from the swim team. He had a BMW but was more interested in looking at his reflection than looking at her. 

Then came Joshua from band. Chrissy called him sweet but way too handsy. 

(Eddie felt his jaw clench, what did she mean by handsy? He was saved by Nancy who offered to find her guns…hard to say if she was serious or not)

Annnnnnd then along came John. 

John picked up weekend shifts at Family Video and asked her if she wanted to grab a milkshake after school. He seemed confident and cool and Steve told her he was saving up to take a year off before college and do some enlightened soul searching. Chrissy and Nancy made impressed ‘oooo’ noises when Steve explained that meant backpacking around Asia.

“I’ve never thought about traveling,” Chrissy said. “I think I’d like to, you know. California, Paris, maybe Rome? Wouldn’t that be so romantic? Or maybe go to England and see all the castles and lakes. I don’t wanna’ be stuck in the midwest forever.”

So they went out and had milkshakes. It was all so cute and twee. He knew Chrissy would probably pick strawberry, her favorite. 

The next morning Robin pounced on him as soon as he parked up his van. 

“So Chrissy rang me last night after John dropped her home on his motorcycle,” she greeted. 

“Be still my beating heart. How punk rock.” 

“The date went seriously well, Eddie. Chrissy’s made up. She was gushing about how interesting he was and how dreamy his eyes were. She reckons they’re the same colour as the sky...”

“Don’t you think it’s a bit early in the day for kicking a man when he’s down?” he grumbled, slamming the car door with more force than was strictly necessary. 

“They kissed.”

Honestly, that alone felt like a fucking bullet to Eddie’s chest and his face might’ve betrayed this for a fraction of a second before he pulled on his best DM mask. Instead he pulled out a cigarette and lit it. He tried to look as cool as a cucumber though his thoughts were racing. Maybe it was only a polite peck on the cheek and Robin was just winding him up? Goddamn, had she worn her bubblegum lipgloss? Were tongues involved?

“And you’re telling me that delightful piece of gossip because…?” 

“Because she had a nice time! For all we know there could be a date two,” Robin explained, exasperated. “This is getting out of hand now, Munson.”

“Who Chrissy dates or… kisses…is none of my business, Buckley. I told you, there’s nothing between me and Chrissy. We’re just friends.”

“Look, I saw you at the fair looking fucking devastated when you saw her cuddling with that Christopher guy. What if she sees John again and this time they do more than kiss…what if they have sex?”

“Buckley!”

“What? You gunna’ be fine hearing all about that?”

“...it’s not…” he groaned. “I can’t have this conversation. Seriously.” 

He tried walking away but she clung onto his arm. 

“Eddie.”

Eddie looked back and was struck by how serious Robin looked.

His voice cracked a little as he said, “...they really kissed? She said that?”

“Yeah.”

Eddie groaned and rubbed a hand over his eyes. The idea of Chrissy doing that did bother him. It bothered him more than he could’ve ever imagined. He knew he had no right to feel jealous but it crept over him like a wave. Everything he’d said to Robin before all this dating mess was still true - he still believed Chrissy was out of his league, that she deserved better - but hell, he hadn’t even tried. He’d given up at the first hurdle and she was slipping away. He was such a damn coward. 

He thought about the last few weeks, about how desperately he wanted to be the one to take her out for milkshakes and hold her hand on the carnival rides. More than that…he wanted to be the guy to make her giggle and smile and feel happy.

But...didn't he do that?

Something twisted in his chest and he suddenly realized he was that guy. Had been all along. Didn’t she light up like a star whenever he hugged her or clowned around just to cheer her up?

She always looked at him like he was the only other person in the world. They were the perfect team, totally in sync.

Chrissy was his goddamn dream girl.

What the fuck was he doing?

“I don’t believe for one minute you’ve given up on her…” Robin said. 

Eddie sighed. “I’m such an idiot.” 

“Yep.”

“Is it too late, d’you think? Is she into John?”

“She’s into you more. Always has been.”

“What if…”

What if she didn’t feel that way anymore? What if she wanted to date John and go traveling? He had a motorbike and all Eddie had was a beat up van. What if? What if? What if?

Robin picked up on his panic and she offered him a shaky smile.

“Let me give you a piece of advice, loser to loser. If you want a chance with Chrissy Cunningham you’d better step the fuck up and ask her out now, because honestly? I think you’d be really perfect together. She’s been looking for you all this time, bonehead.”

Eddie huffed a laugh into the collar of his jacket and knew he was blushing. 

He clapped Robin on the shoulder. She was a pretty good friend, even if she was annoying as shit. 

“Now go get your princess!”

**

Eddie didn’t go to Chrissy right away. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it right. He didn’t want to be one of the other guys who casually held her back after class or slipped a note in her locker asking if she wanted a date. He was Eddie. Her Eddie. 

And Eddie’s pesky brain had a tendency to go into overdrive. 

So that weekend he drove like a wildcat to the ‘nice side’ of Hawkins. He didn’t dare knock at her front door wearing a suit and tie as he was pretty certain her mom would call the cops. Instead he parked his shitty van down the street and approached by foot. Her home looked exactly like a showhouse from the cover of Better Homes and Gardens magazine; pristine, tidy, unnerving. Even the grass was mowed in perfect lines. 

It was a reflection of Chrissy from before. Like ivy, it threatened to strangle her. 

Eddie would rather take his crappy trailer anyday. 

(so would Chrissy. She said she felt more at home in the Munson homestead than she ever had at her childhood home. It kind of sucked that she felt that way…even though it made Eddie’s stomach twist into knots). 

It started to rain (obviously) as he approached the house and carefully climbed the trellis. 

The rain made the wood slippery. It wasn’t the first time he'd scaled the side of her house, but it was the first time he’d done so carrying a heavy rucksack over his shoulder. He hoped the trellis would hold the weight okay. It would be just his luck to come crashing down into Mr Cunningham’s award winning rose bushes and alert the entire neighborhood. 

He knocked smartly at her window. 

“Eddie!” Chrissy hurriedly opened the window. Her expression was one of total shock. “What are you doing, you weirdo? You’re totally soaked!”

She was wearing a fluffy pink bathrobe and slippers. She looked as sweet as cotton candy. 

She was tugging him inside and he landed on the carpet with a soft thump. They waited for a second to see if the noise would summon her demon of a mother, but all remained quiet. She grinned at him like they were co-conspirators of a jewel heist. 

“What are you doing here?” she asked again.

She’d clearly just stepped out the shower. A neatly ironed outfit was spread out on the bed behind her and she had the radio on. He vaguely recognised the preppy tones of Cyndi Lauper.

“Clearly just dropping by to see you, Cunningham. Thought that was obvious.” 

Chrissy wrinkled her perfect nose and he had the irresistible urge to bite it. “And you didn’t want to use the door because…?”

She offered him a towel to dry off with and he took it gratefully. His teeth were chattering…from the cold and nerves. Eddie didn’t get nervous often but Chrissy always had this effect on him.  

“I’m making a grand gesture.”

“Okay…”

Only then did he open the rucksack. Chrissy watched him silently as he brought out a (crumpled) bouquet of orange and yellow flowers. Then a checked blanket. Then some cutlery and a Tupperware box. Then a few other items to really set the scene. He'd always had a good eye for detail.

He sank to his knees and spread it all out on her bedroom floor. "You're gonna' have to imagine the carpet is grass and there's a babbling brook somewhere."

"It's a picnic. Why are we having a picnic, Eddie?" she knelt down beside him on the blanket. "You made peanut butter and jelly!"

Her favorite snack. She used to have it as a kid before her mom got so fussy and it reminded her of her grandma. He used his lighter to light a candle and placed it carefully between them.

He took a deep breath. It was now or never…

“Are you going to see John again?”

She was clearly not expecting that. She blinked. “I…He mentioned something about meeting up again, yes.” 

“Chriss. Do me a favor?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t.”

He watched as her lovely blue eyes widened in surprise. 

“What do you…”

“Go out with me.”

His heart missed a beat.

“Eddie…?”

“Go on a date with me. We can do whatever you want… a hike or a dinner or movie. Whatever. Just as long as it’s with me. I’ll be real honest… I meant it before when I said you deserve some fun…but it’s been crazy watching you go off on these dates and come back each time goddamn bored or disappointed. You deserve fun, Cunningham… and I’m it. I’m the fun. Come out with me and let me show you a hella' good time.”

He wanted so badly to hide behind the curtain of his hair, but held steady. He’d been practicing that speech for hours - trying so hard to make it sound light and funny - instead of spilling all the lovey dovey stuff that he truly felt. Maybe one day he’d get a chance to say all of that...but... baby steps. 

“What do you say, Chriss?”

And then Chrissy was grinning from ear to ear. She began to giggle which turned into a laugh which turned into happy tears. If he could bottle that fucking amazing smile he would. He found himself grinning back.

“What took you so long, Munson?” she beamed. “I’ve been waiting forever for you.”

They should engrave that on his headstone. No words would ever sound sweeter.

She slipped her hand into his.

“So that’s a yes? You gonna date me?”

“I’m gonna date you,” Chrissy agreed. “I’m gonna date you so hard.”

[livingfast04]

Monster Au? - Part 2

part one II part three I’ll post a snort snippet of Part three when I get ready to post this on ao3, or I might post this as just a tumblr thing. I’m not sure yet, I have kind of an idea of what I want. but also not really. However I also don’t want to conflict with “An Untuned Piano” (which if you haven’t read before you should totally go and do that-) and this was just a little break for my messy brain.  TW for Vomit- and a little body horror- (this hardly scrapes the surface of the terrible, terrible ideas I have. My poor little Hurt No Comfort Brain is mean)  ---

Steve hated how much he identified with the creature, with Frankenstein’s Monster. It made his skin prickle, that was his threshold for, for relating to a character. A creature whose creator turned on him- a creature that kills every person who had the capability to love him, and then himself.

Even now, tucked against the couch watching his friends pile together, touching in some way. Steve felt sick to his stomach, knotted and messy. He wasn’t sure what to think. His belly ached, and he wasn’t even sure if it was rebelling food he couldn’t process or if he felt like an outsider in his own space.

After everything, after 83’, after the Junkyard, and the Tunnels- the Demo-dogs, after Russians and the mall. 

After Vecna. 

Of the kids getting attached to Eddie, Eddie who is a vampire- Eddie who only lived because of that fact. Came out of the bats almost completely unscarred, unscratched- with a mouthful of blood, and fear in his eyes. 

Steve envied that, the quick healing, the way Eddie bounced back faster than any of them really, right next to Max and her single broken arm. The wolf sleeping in her bones pushing her further than Vecna could even dare to go.

Now they push into Steve’s space, into his house with little care for what Steve thinks. It’s their space, pack space, coven space. And Steve shouldn’t care because he’s human. Not wolf like Robin and Hopper, not Born-Witch like the Byers-Hopper Clan, not Made Witch like the Wheeler Siblings, not Dragon as the Sinclar siblings are, not Gremlin like Dustin or even remotely close to being a Vampire like Eddie- not, not- 

Steve was human, and it was just his house, and it shouldn’t matter if they want to stay in it for hours. It shouldn’t matter if Steve said no, if Steve didn’t want them there. It was their space now. He should enjoy having people in his house after being alone for so long- but the way they treat it, as if Steve’s the interloper.

It was driving him nuts. 

He couldn’t keep anything down, processed foods he wasn’t supposed to eat filled the tables- foods that Joyce cooked, or Hopper when he made breakfast. It was twisting around in his head, curling his stomach and turning it over.

It was his space, and he couldn’t mark it as his own. No, scratch that it was his father’s space. 

Why Hopper had no sway over him, why every forceful remark from Nancy stung. Steve wasn’t a part of whatever kind of pack had collected in his living room. He wasn’t allowed to be, not until he had his Father’s permission, or they recognized him as a part of it. 

And they hadn’t.

They probably never would. Not with the way they all seemed to dislike that Steve was even around half the time. But it’s fine, it’s okay. His skin crawls, all the perfect edges, the ones that he shapes, molds, covers up how bad the scars around his neck actually look, about how his stomach isn’t fully healed. His skin is struggling to stitch itself back together with the lack of proper care. 

Steve’s missing chunks, muscle, skin, fat- his body moves and changes. There’s limits, and caring for himself as he’s supposed to is hard when he’s supposed to wear human skin. He’s not supposed to wear it for one- he can’t heal like this. 

So all imperfections are covered, hidden away. Bites his tongue and hopes he can keep down whatever processed meal he’s eaten. Avoid Eddie’s imploring Vampire snitching gaze every time he tears a stitch. 

His stomach knotted painfully another time. And Steve was on his feet, don’t panic, don’t panic, don’t panic- It wasn’t discomfort this time, not with the saliva pooled on his tongue. He stumbled slightly, bile rising in his throat. His head spun as he stood, and his knees threatened to buckle-

---

Eddie watched with sharp eyes as Steve stood from his place on the couch, part of him wanted to coo, call out the other to join the pile. Curl around him and remind everyone that Steve was Eddie’s.

He worked his jaw as the younger boy shuffled out of the living room and down the hallway to the bathroom. Eddie’s sharper ears heard the sink turn on almost as soon as The door shut, which was unusual. Eddie twitched, disturbing Dustin who was sprawled across him.

Under the sound of water running was the sound of retching. Eddie’s face screwed up in sympathy. Oh damn, how long had Steve sat there feeling bad? How did Eddie not notice? Over everything, all the little things. With the way anxiety made Steve’s pulse beat far to fast- 

Eddie tapped Dustin’s side “Up.”

Dustin grumbled, a long drawn out why, as he wiggled around for a moment, but ultimately flopped off Eddie. Right on to Mike who let out a groan at the sudden impact to his ribs. Eddie ruffled his curls, pushing the boy's head around a little bit.

“Going to go check on Harrington.” Interrupting bonding time, the displeasure was loud in the air, but Eddie could hear Steve’s heart kick, thumping anxiously. And he couldn’t just leave it. Not with the way he’d watched the boy slightly stumble before all but bolting for the open bathroom door.

Not with how in tune he had accidentally become of the human. “He’s just in the bathroom-“ Nancy’s voice was rough, half asleep from where she was tucked between Robin and Jonathan. Eddie looked over the gathered group with raised eyebrows. He knows that some of them probably could hear Steve over the water running.

Eddie snorted, a little bit of a bitter sound. “Yeah Puking.” That startled Robin who jerked up right. Her ears weren’t completely useless like this, but there was a small chance that she wasn’t used to recognizing Steve as much anymore. The human had pulled back some from the group, Robin had been almost inconsolable for over two weeks over it. 

That she couldn’t recognize his footsteps, or his breathing patterns. That Steve was hardly around outside of work anymore, and it was devastating. They’d been bonded, they were bonded, a pair. Eddie had been sympathetic, but he remembers asking if she’d even talked to Steve about it.

Nancy had been more vocal in her displeasure for Steve’s actions. Eddie wanted to ask them if they knew that Steve smelled like blood, and healing. As if there wasn’t a clotting heavy smell of skin stitching itself back together. Maybe Steve was retreating because he was hurting, and uncomfortable. 

That the smell of blood wasn’t going away and it was making Eddie anxious.

“I’ve got him, Buckley. Lay back down.” Eddie moved around the pile of sleepy bodies, eyeing the adults in the kitchen as he passed, and then paused in front of the bathroom door. His feet quiet on the floor.

He tapped softly on the door, knocking his knuckles just slightly against the wood. The Retching hadn’t stopped, if anything the closer Eddie got he could hear just how painful it sounded. The smell of blood was underlying, and it set him on fire. That wasn’t right. It wasn’t. “Harrington? You alright?” The toilet flushed, not quite covering the gag that Steve made. Eddie knocked on the door again, leaning against the door frame.

“‘M fine, Ed’ie,” he didn’t sound fine. Eddie hummed under his breath.

“You don’t sound fine.” There was a pause, the water hadn’t stopped running, and Eddie was starting to get nervous. Steve’s pulse was jackrabbiting hard. “Can I come in?” He pressed his palm against the doorknob, the metal was frigid. Steve was quiet, and then Eddie hears another gag- and then what sounds like dry heaving. 

Fuck, okay- that’s, “I’m coming in Harrington.” Eddie pushes open the door, not locked- which is good, he really doesn’t want to break a door. The light isn’t even turned on, and it takes his eyes a minute to understand the difference. He steps fully into the space and shuts the door behind him.

Steve is hunched over the toilet, legs curled uncomfortably. “Go away Munson.” Eddie reaches out to turn the sink off, the handle squeaks. Before sinking down to sit on the small bathroom floor next to the other.

The smell of blood was thicker now that he was sharing the space. Eddie worked his jaw, pricking his lips slightly with his teeth. “Steve.” His voice is hard, and it draws wet hazel eyes to his face, they dart around slightly, before falling back to look at the toilet. “Are you bleeding?” Yes, Eddie knew this, could all but taste it, and it was making his skin crawl because it was wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

Steve’s whole form shuttered, curling tighter around the toilet. He retches again, and doesn’t respond. The bathroom didn’t smell like healing, and the blood that comes with it. It smelled like distress, vomit, and blood.

Eddie reached out to touch Steve’s shoulder, his body curled away from the outstretched touch. His creature hissed low in his belly, angry at the rejection, Steve was his. God he hated imprinting on Humans.

But this didn’t feel like flinching away from Eddie because he was well, Eddie. But rather a curl away because he was uncomfortable and touch wouldn’t help. So Eddie pulled back. He could hear Steve’s heart jackrabbit, the anxiety heavy in the air. “What can I do to help?” 

“Go away.” Eddie blinked, well fuck you to then. He huffed, standing up, offense now filling his chest.

“You are literally vomiting in your toilet- and you want me to just leave?” Eddie lowered his eyebrows, looking at Steve’s shaking form with something close to a glare. Steve didn’t even bother to look up. 

“I didn’t ask for your help, just go back- to, to the living room, and the pile of people who don’t live in my fucking house.” Eddie jolted, echoed into the porcelain and muffled as it was, there was almost a growl to the tone, low and sharp. Maybe Steve was spending too much time around them. Eddie hissed, mind realizing Steve was claiming their space-

He jerked up to stand, “Fine then, suffer by yourself. And it’s your house, but it’s our space.” 

Steve’s body was shaking harder as Eddie turned to leave, hands curled around the toilet seat, holding onto it. “Fuck off Munson.”

Eddie slammed the door behind him. Chest heaving, his whole body giving a hard shake, trying to rid himself of the smell of blood. He wandered back into the living room, flopped down in his spot, and curled around Dustin. “Eddie?” 

Robin’s voice was hesitant, he lifted his face slightly to look at her, “You okay?” Was Steve okay? She was anxious, that was telling from the way she was clinging to Max who had burrowed into her side. 

“Fine.” He bites it out, the word feels too sharp, but he was hot, and angry. 

He can hear Steve leaves the bathroom maybe 20 minutes later, and he goes upstairs instead of coming back to the living room. Maybe it’s for the better.

---

[likecastle]

Femslash February - rusted hinges

Thank you to @marbledswissroll, who sent the prompt “rusted hinges.” (And, yes, for the record, what you sent definitely count as prompts!)

I’m accepting Ronance prompts all month for Femslash February. I have a few more prompts in my inbox, but I’ve still need a few more to get me through the end of the month, so please send them my way! Anon asks are totally fine, and you’re welcome to send more than one prompt. Don’t be shy! You can find previous prompts I’ve filled here.

“It could be worse,” Robin says, leaning on the door just to hear it squeak again. The paint is coated so heavily over the rusted hinges that she’s actually sort of impressed the door moves at all, let alone enough to make such a piercing noise.

“It could be better,” Nancy counters.

Robin shrugs. “So we’ll get some WD40.”

“No,” Nancy corrects, “the super will get some WD40, and also fix the leaky tap in the bathroom, and do something about that noise the radiator’s making.”

Robin rolls her eyes, but she’s smiling despite herself. “Fine, we’ll call the super in the morning and you can give him an itemized list, OK?” She moves away from the door and goes to wrap her arms around Nancy’s waist, dropping her chin onto Nancy’s shoulder. “But let’s just try to relax tonight, yeah?”

Nancy huffs out a sigh, but Robin can feel her relaxing into her embrace. “It’s our first place together,” she says, almost ruefully. “I just want everything to be perfect.”

“It is,” Robin assures her, pressing a kiss to the side of Nancy’s throat.

At the touch of Robin’s lips, Nancy leans back against her, settling in closer. “You know the sound of that water dripping is going to keep you up all night.”

It’s true. Even now, Robin can’t quite ignore the tap-tap of water from down the hall. But Robin isn’t in the mood for practicalities, and she refuses to be in a bad mood tonight. She rocks Nancy gently against her, swaying side to side, and slides her hands down to Nancy’s hips. “I guess you’ll just have to tire me out so I sleep through it, then.”

Nancy laughs, and Robin can feel it against her, like there’s no separation between Nancy’s joy and her own. “Is that so?”

“I mean,” Robin drawls, “far be it from me to tell you what to do, but I’m pretty sure it’s, like, a rite of passage in a new apartment. Can’t go skipping any move-in traditions. You want everything to be perfect in our new place, don’t you?”

“I thought it already was,” Nancy says archly, but Robin can hear the smile in her voice.

“You’re right,” Robin concedes. “This place will always be perfect as long as I’m here with you.” She drops one more kiss on Nancy’s throat before straightening up and letting her go. “Guess that means we can get back to unpacking.”

She takes one step toward the pile of boxes stacked up in the corner before Nancy grabs her wrist. “Where do you think you’re going?” she asks, pulling Robin back in. “I thought we were going to break in that bed.”

“Well,” Robin says, letting Nancy walk her backwards toward the mattress that still sitting on the floor next to the unassembled bedframe, “if you insist.”

[asirensrage]

Title: The First Step Rating: T POV: Steve Harrington Warnings: Swearing. Self-deprecation. Summary: Takes place in Chapter 46 of Tammy Thompson Takes on the Upside Down. Steve debates with himself outside Kate's home as he thinks about her.

Notes: oh hey, it's the first look at Steve's pov...and how he feels about Kate. Dedicated to @residentdormouse because I say so.

“This is stupid.” He says it to himself. The car is silent in return. “It’s a bad idea.” He’s not asking for a response but he thinks better out loud. “I shouldn’t be here. I mean, what did I expect? Her to just be waiting? She’s going to think I’m a total creep.” He sighs and rests his head on the steering wheel.  “I’m an idiot.”

He is. He’s been avoiding Kate. He just…he didn’t know how to talk to her now, how to interact with her. Ever since prom when they danced and actually had fun. He’s never had someone be playful back and join in like she did. Nancy used to just smile and laugh a bit and tell him he was an idiot. He groans again. Then Tommy got into his head with Tammy and how she used to be obsessed with him and he just…got into his own head. 

So he avoided her. Can’t say something stupid if he doesn’t see her…but he missed handing her coffee and seeing her eyes light up and talking to her knowing no matter how boring or dumb it was, she was really and truly listening. He’s never had someone have that steadfast belief that he’ll figure things out. 

Everyone says he’s an idiot and he’s beginning to think they’re right. Kate’s the only one he can talk to about the monsters in this town. She’s the only one he really wants to talk to…about anything. 

He groans and taps his head against the wheel. 

“I’m an idiot,” he says again to himself. “What was I going to say? I heard you and Robin talking about not being able to sleep? I can’t sleep too? Like she’s going to want to talk to me now. I fucked up.” He waves a hand like he’s talking to someone else. “I fucked up and now I’m sitting outside her house like some weirdo stalker waiting to see if she comes out so what? I can say sorry? I can ask if she has nightmares too? That’s a great idea. Way to break the ice. Hey Kate, got nightmares? Me too? Want to hang?” He runs a hand through his hair. “I just want to…I don’t know. Say sorry? Tell her I miss her?” 

He leans his head back against the seat. He does miss her. Kate showed up like a windstorm in his life. Even if they didn’t talk before the tunnel thing, it was hard not to notice her. He always tried not to look at Tammy, especially when he could feel her stare boring into him, but Kate just attracted attention. She wasn’t afraid to call anyone out on their bullshit, even herself and he…liked that. He liked that she apologized. So sure, he was nervous when he saw her with Dustin but he was also so fucking grateful not to go down into those tunnels alone with a bunch of asshole kids. Everything after that was just…simple. 

He doesn’t have many friends. Not anymore. Kate never seemed like she cared about the rumours or who he used to be, only who he was. And he fucked it up because they danced at prom and suddenly it wasn’t like dancing with a friend but he thought about kissing her and how she actually felt in his arms as they hammed it up and he completely forgot he even had a date until they were walking back to that table and he wasn’t sitting next to her. 

“Okay, okay, okay,” he says. “It doesn’t matter. I just have to say sorry…and find a way to explain why I’m outside of her house without admitting I was listening to them. Friends don’t do that, right? Are we even friends?” he waves his hand again. “Why would she want to be my friend? Especially after this. I was an asshole and–”

He jumps out of his skin as someone knocks on his window. He was so wrapped up in his thoughts, he wasn’t even paying attention. He looks over and lets out a breath he didn’t even realize he was holding at the sight of Kate on the other side. She looks tired and amused. Amused is good. He can work with amused. 

Steve rolls down the window. “Uh, hi.” 

“Are you stalking me?” she grins and he ignores the way his heartbeat picks up. God, she’s pretty. How did he never see it before? 

“What? No!” he says as soon as he registers what she asked. 

“Relax,” she rolls her eyes. “I’m just teasing. What are you doing here?” 

Steve swallows tightly, silently prays he doesn’t fuck this up and tries to explain. Somehow, it works. 

taglist: @raith-way @arrthurpendragon @zeleniafic @jvstjewels @veetlegeuse @chickensarentcheap @nejires-hado @residentdormouse @endless-oc-creations  @stanshollaand @wordspin-shares @chrissymunson

st tag: @happinessinthedarkesttimes

[heavencasteel420]

Can you do director’s commentary on Nancy’s letter drafts to Jonathan? 🥹 The one where she pretends she got Barb back killed me

Thank you for the ask! I'm so glad you liked the Barb letter; it was a late addition and I'm very fond of it myself.

(Some discussion of suicide and Billy being gross below the cut, not beyond what appears in the fic.)

Okay, so first of all, the Regular Letter:

Dear Jonathan,

I hope that you're doing well. I thought I would write to you to ask how things are going in Indianapolis. I know we didn’t really talk when you were still in Hawkins, but I was thinking about you the other day and wanted to see how you were.

What’s it like living in a city? I know it’s just Indianapolis, but I bet the record stores are better. I remember you liked all that art rock stuff. It’s probably nice to be in a place with more kinds of people, too. It gets a little boring around here.

Things are about the same for me. School is going well, even though I’m about to tear my hair out over chemistry. I’m still going out with Steve Harrington. You are probably making a face now and thinking “Ugh, Steve Harrington.”He’s actually matured a lot, though. And maybe you’re actually wondering why he’d go out with dorky Nancy Wheeler. Well, I haven’t matured a lot. I guess I’m about the same.

Do you remember Barb Holland, my best friend? There hasn’t been any news since you moved away. I don’t think she would’ve gone to Indianapolis, but could you keep an eye out for her?

Mom and Dad and Mike and Holly are all doing well. I hope you are, too.

Sincerely,

Nancy

Nancy's being so normal right now! She's very carefully trying not to brush up against any of the things about Jonathan's life that might be hard or weird or bad, which is difficult because all she has to go on is that he lives in Indianapolis with his dad and not in a mental hospital. (She remembers his taste in music, though!) She's sharing totally benign news about her own life

...and yet she's already getting a little weird with it. She brings up Jonathan's presumed dislike of Steve when (a) that's not something he ever shared with her and (b) it's not really a lighthearted topic, given that Jonathan's reason for disliking Steve is his obvious disdain for the Byers family. (I did have a draft where she says "ugh, Steve Harrington" in the letter she sends to Jonathan, and Jonathan's like "yes, Nancy, that's exactly how I said it, because I'm actually a Valley Girl now, how did you know?")

Her self-loathing also creeps in, albeit in a mild way. Her reasons for feeling not good enough for Steve are way sadder than her initial insecurity over him being cooler and slightly older, but she's still acting like Nice Girl Nancy in this letter so she reverts to that. And of course she asks about Barb.

(She crumpled up this letter and put it in the wastebasket because she thought it sounded too stupid.)

Now...the Mean Letter.

Dear Jonathan,

How are you doing? It doesn’t matter, because I’m about to make it worse, just like I always do. Maybe you remember the day I came up to you in the hallway and said I was sorry about Will. Maybe you don’t, because too many horrible things happened afterwards and there’s no reason you’d remember one wimpy girl offering her pathetic condolences. Either way, that’s maybe the last nice thing I ever did, and it wasn’t much.

Nancy's mostly being mean to herself here, but this would also be a super-fucked-up letter to send to Jonathan. She's just so angry at herself that she's indulging this fantasy of being horrible to other people, too.

Why am I writing to you, then, when I never talked to you when it might have actually helped? Well, hear me out: I was drinking in your old house with a bunch of kids who used to make fun of you for being weird and poor. That’s what people do in your old house now: drink and stare at the evidence of your mom losing her mind, like a bunch of ghouls. Tommy Hagan was one of them. Remember how he used to say you’d murdered Will? He feels kind of bad about it since you tried to kill yourself. Anyway, I drank too much bourbon and hallucinated your brother’s ghost. Just thought I’d let you know, in case you were nostalgic for the worst three months of your life. God, I hope they were the worst.

She's more actively ashamed of hanging out in his old house now (although, being Nancy, she's eventually going to be like "well, I did find Will's ghost, though!"). She's also recognizing that, even if she wrote it in a nice way, bringing up this false hope has the potential to be incredibly cruel.

What else is new? I let Billy Hargrove (you don’t know him, he moved here after you went away, but he’s an asshole) touch my boobs at a party, even though I’ve been going out with Steve Harrington for a year. I know Steve was always rude and snotty to you, but, trust me, I’m way worse than he is. I think Barb would hate the person I am now. Maybe she already knew I would turn out like this, and that’s why she left.

Her self-loathing is sharper and more specific here. She's not just hateful; Barb would hate her, and she caused Barb's disappearance by being awful. This is, of course, pretty nonsensical, given that (a) Barb couldn't predict the future and (b) if Barb could see what Nancy was going through, she would recognize that her drinking and her brittleness and her apathy are the result of losing her. She would be very sad!

I almost hope that’s true. If she left because she hated me, that would mean that she decided to leave, instead of being taken away. That would mean maybe she’s okay.

Anger is easier for Nancy to deal with than the grief underneath it, but the grief still works its way into the letter. She's probably a little drunk when she writes this.

I could probably get sued or even arrested for writing this letter. Recklessly using the U.S. Postal Service to inflict emotional distress or something. Maybe you can tell your dad to stop trying to sue the quarry and set his sights on Queen Bitch Nancy Wheeler instead.

I don’t know why I’m saying all of this to you. You don’t deserve it.

Sincerely yours,

Nancy

Again, this would be a fucked-up thing to say if she ever sent the letter, regardless of Jonathan's feelings about his dad. She scribbles over and tears up this letter, partly because she's horrified by it and partly because she really doesn't want Karen to find it. Karen totally goes through her stuff.

And the Barb Letter!

Dear Jonathan,

I know it’s probably weird to get a letter from me. We only really knew each other through Mike and Will, but you were always nice to them even when they (almost always Mike, let’s be honest) made me want to tear my hair out. I’m really sorry about everything that happened, and I should have written sooner. In my defense, a lot of things have been going on.

This is the only letter where Nancy really talks about Mike, who is mentioned throughout the non-letter parts of the chapter as being depressed and withdrawn. She's both concerned about and detached from his suffering; it doesn't occur to her to reach out to him herself. It's only in the fantasy letter than she can really acknowledge him.

When you left Hawkins, I was still going out with Steve Harrington and my best friend Barb was still missing. Neither of those things are true anymore. Steve was actually a good boyfriend. I know he wasn’t always great in other ways, but he really tried to be there for me when Barb was gone. I wasn’t a very good girlfriend. I was just sad all the time and picked fights with his friends. Not that it’s hard to get into fights with Tommy and Carol, but mostly I hated them for not being Barb.

After she came home, there wasn’t really any reason for us to keep dating. I just wanted to spend time with Barb and he didn’t feel like he had to look after me. He’s with Chrissy Cunningham now. You probably remember her—she was always really sweet and cute, and she made the cheerleading squad sophomore year. She’s good at it, too. Anyway, I’m really happy for her and Steve.

Deep down, Nancy knows what she wants and needs to let Steve go, at least as a boyfriend, but that's excruciatingly hard when she cares about him and he's her only friend...except for maybe Tommy and Carol, whom she assumes would stop hanging out with her if she broke up with Steve. And she does have some positive feelings towards them, too.

Chrissy, of course, has her own problems, but to Nancy she's an avatar of Ideal Teenage Girlhood.

Barb really did run away. She took a bus way out West, to some little town in Nevada. She worked as a waitress and lived in a dirty house with a bunch of other girls. She says it was exciting sometimes, and the desert was beautiful, but mostly it was just hard and lonely. She wanted to come home pretty soon after she left, but she couldn’t face everyone after scaring them so badly. It was only after some asshole stole all her money that she called home.

Nancy has, without realizing it, constructed a Desert Hearts scenario for Barb in her head. She's going to hold onto that lesbian dream even though she is only barely aware that Barb might've been gay.

I was mad at her for maybe five seconds after I found out, because I’d worried something worse had happened, but I couldn’t stay that way. I was too happy to have her back. Besides, she was going through a lot of things I never knew about. I won’t go too much into it because it’s her private business, but she felt really alone and some of that was because of how I acted. She thought I was going to ditch her for Steve and his friends. I don’t think I would have. I love her too much. But I can understand why she thought so. I think some people can be good no matter what happens or who they’re with, but I’m not one of them. I didn’t like who I was with Steve and his friends, and it wasn’t even their fault. It was me.

Nancy's kind of overcorrecting here. Obviously she was not immune to peer pressure as a high school sophomore, but as we see in canon this is a function of youth and circumstances, not an essential wishy-washiness in her soul. This is the girl who, at a crucial popularity-making moment, offered her condolences to Jonathan when the people she was with clearly thought it was weird and unnecessary.

I wish I’d talked to you in between coming up to you at the bulletin board that day and writing this letter. I knew things were bad, that your mom wasn’t working or even leaving the house anymore, and you always looked so tired in school. My mom was worried about you both. I didn’t feel like I could do anything to help, because I was so messed up myself, but maybe it would’ve made a difference. Which is maybe why I’m writing now. I have no idea how things are for you in Indianapolis. I don’t expect you to write back to me and tell me. But, if you want to write me, I’d like to hear from you. Mike would probably also like to hear how you’re doing. He misses Will, too.

Yours truly,

Nancy

She's not being totally fair to herself here, either. Even Karen, an adult with some resources who cared about the Byers family and recognized there was a problem, couldn't figure out what to do on her own. But the instinct for noticing and connecting is a good one.

The Final Letter!

Dear Jonathan,

I’ve tried to write this letter a bunch of times, but I don’t think there’s any getting around the fact that I’m doing something weird. We never really talked before, except in passing. It wasn’t because I had bad feelings towards you. Our lives just seemed so different. You always seemed like a miniature adult, looking after your brother and working to pay the bills, while I was reading Seventeen with Barb and fantasizing about marrying Mikhail Baryshnikov.

This is a pretty blunt thing to say, that she noticed his life was hard and she found that alienating. She's getting farther and farther away from writing the letter the way she would to a real person; this is a note in a bottle, a message beamed into space.

Also, I strongly believe in younger Nancy's crush on ballet dancer and Soviet defector Mikhail Baryshnikov. My mom is almost an exact contemporary of Nancy's, and that was her junior high crush.

I almost didn’t come up to you at the bulletin board that day, because what could I say to you? My biggest problem was trying to date Steve Harrington without hurting Barb’s feelings or strangling his friends. Isn’t it strange that I thought that, and the very next day my own best friend disappeared and no one seemed to know what to say to me? Barb’s parents are the only other people I know who would understand, and of course it’s worse for them, but they’re so optimistic that she’ll come back that I feel like the worst person in the world around them. Because I think she’s dead. Maybe you remember me screaming in the hallway about it, after I broke my own hand. I don’t do crazy stuff like that anymore, but I still believe what I said. I can almost believe that Barb would run away, that something was making her so unhappy that she couldn’t stay in Hawkins and for some reason she couldn’t tell me what it was, but I can’t believe she would leave me and her parents without letting us know she was safe. She was responsible. She loved her parents. She loved me.

Nancy and Steve aren't regularly having dinner with the Hollands in this universe, because Nancy doesn't feel a special responsibility due to knowing the truth. They're still in town, though, and holding on to the hope that Barb is alive. This is part of why Nancy doesn't say anything to Jonathan about Will's voice; she knows how cruel hope can be.

She's a little more clear-headed here, though. No matter how bad she feels about her last moments with Barb, intellectually she recognizes that they probably weren't enough to drive Barb away and that something is off.

I feel like I moved to another country after she disappeared. Everyone else I know is still in America and I’m in Kiribati. Do you feel that way, too, or is it different because you’re in a new place? I’m not trying to say our situations are exactly the same, but I think you might understand what I’m feeling more than anyone in Hawkins. Why didn’t I talk to you before? I saw you, drifting through the halls like a ghost, and I felt bad.

She's not consistently keeping in mind that he might read this letter. She's expressing compassion here, but she's also calling him a ghost, which is pretty messed-up.

I don’t really understand why I did anything back then, honestly. Did you know I poured pig blood all over Officer Callahan’s car last May? (His personal car, not his cop car—I wasn’t that stupid.) He acted like a pig the first time I talked to him and Officer Powell about Barb disappearing, making it all about how I had sex with Steve Harrington that night. He did that in front of my mom, and he looked really pleased with himself for embarrassing me. Like he was knocking me down a peg for thinking I had something important to tell the police, and that was way more important to him than the fact that Barb was in danger. I guess I was still stewing about it months later, because I got drunk and bitched about it to Carol—you remember Carol Perkins? Big hair, bigger mouth?—and she said I should do something about it. So she and Tommy Hagan helped me get some pig’s blood and dump it all over his car the very next week. I think that’s why I’m still friends with them. They’re assholes sometimes, but it wasn’t easy to get all that pig’s blood.

Nancy "Fuck Tha Police" Wheeler, everyone. Powell and Callahan are mostly comic figures in the show, but their behavior when they're questioning Nancy in front of her mom in S1 is so incredibly gross, especially Callahan's.

Carol and Nancy might not get along, but she's not gonna let some sleazy cop insult her sort-of friend! Tommy was like "oh, this fucks, actually" about it.

This is another instance where Nancy is being super-frank, in a way she might not be if she really expected an answer from Jonathan.

Steve—I’m still going out with Steve Harrington—thought we took it a little too far. He’s nicer than me, and he was worried about me getting in trouble. I did, of course. Callahan didn’t press charges, but my parents had to pay for repairs. Dad was so confused. He actually asked if I wanted people to think I was a Manson Girl. Mom made me go see a psychiatrist, who was almost as disgusting as Callahan. I didn’t even know a woman could be that gross. All she wanted to do was talk about why I had sex with Steve when we hadn’t been going out that long. Like wanting to have sex with a good-looking guy made me a nympho and that was the real problem. I don’t know if you’ve seen a psychiatrist, but, if you have, I hope it was actually helpful and not a stupid, humiliating waste of time.

Nancy kind of gets off the hook for being a nice white middle-class girl, plus all of Hawkins knows why she's Like That. Karen's intentions are good, but Ted's indifference is a powerful force, especially when the first psychiatrist is bad.

She's sort of acknowledging some uncomfortable facts about Jonathan's life now, and maybe kind of fishing for info.

Mom stopped making me go pretty soon, at least, since I’d calmed down and Dad kept pestering her about the bill. I still do messed-up stuff, but I’m sneakier about it. I drink a lot. Bourbon is my favorite. I also let this really sleazy new senior, Billy Hargrove, put his hand on my boob at a party this Halloween. It wasn’t a surprise or anything. He gave me more than enough time to say “I have a boyfriend” or move away. I wanted to let him, because he was looking at me like I was something gross he’d stepped in, and that was how I felt.

Billy makes a move on Nancy mostly because she's Steve's girlfriend and he feels the need to knock Steve down a peg so Billy can be the Big Man on Campus. (This may also be a way to channel his own attraction to Steve—either way, it’s not very nice to Nancy.) But he’s also intrigued by how much she hates it. Also, this isn’t a case where Nancy freezes up, but that could have very well been what was happening so Billy is doing something kind of shitty.

You probably don’t want to hear any of this. I would understand if you threw this letter in the garbage. Even if you do, I want to let you know I’m glad you’re alive. That was the only good thing to come out of this whole mess.

Love,

Nancy

Nancy lashes out and distances herself a lot in this fic, but she has a lot of kindness in her heart and she really means this, partly just because Jonathan is a fellow human being and partly because she’s holding onto the idea that someone got out of Hawkins and was able to be happy. This is also pretty blunt of her—she’s acknowledging the suicide attempt—but in this case her directness is actually pretty necessary. He hasn’t heard this much, if ever, between Joyce not knowing he tried to kill himself and Lonnie refusing to acknowledge (to him, anyway) that the attempt was serious.

[schrijverr]

A Behind the Scenes of: Corroded Coffin Pt. 3

Jonathan is out, so Eddie gives insight into the Europe tour he went on with Corroded Coffin in '94 (can be read as a standalone).

Pt. 1 & Pt. 2

On AO3.

Ships: Steddie

Warnings: minor homophobia mention

~~~~~~~~~~

The video opens not to Jonathan in his living room, but to Eddie on his own couch. He grins into the camera and happily says: “Bet y’all didn’t see this one coming.”

“Jonny-boy was a little idiot, who went out and did a photoshoot in the rain for four hours without a coat, so now he’s miserable in bed, getting homemade soup spoon fed to him by Argyle, so truly his life isn’t the worst. Anyway, he’s really invested in this project and he didn’t want to miss an upload, so I offered to make a video and that’s what we’re doing,” Eddie explains.

“I’m gonna talk about the Corroded Coffin Europe tour of ‘94 with my lovely baby, Stevie, here as the peanut gallery,” Eddie introduces.

“Hi,” Steve speaks up, his audio not the best, since Eddie only has one mic.

“We wanted to stay true to Jonathan vibes in these videos,” Eddie winks at the camera, before grabbing his own copy of the book and announcing: “Let’s get into it, people.”

He flips it open, then has to flip a little more, before he finds the right page. He lets out a little ah-ha when he does, then looks up and says: “First one is Corroded Coffin in London, which is embarrassing for me right out of the gate.”

The photo that comes on screen is of Eddie and Jeff glued to the window of a pod of a Ferris wheel. The two are boggled by the view, but Chris next to them isn’t so much. He is too busy lighting a cigarette to watch the view.

“When I gave Nancy this photo, I was completely convinced this was the London Eye, told her that with full confidence,” Eddie explains. “Now, Nancy is a lot smarter than me, because she googled it to check and the London Eye was built in 1998, which is definitely later than ‘94 which is when this was taken. So, uhm, I was talking out of my ass and this is just a random Ferris wheel. Still very cool, but not the same.”

“Me and Jeff had never been out of the state, but Gar had been in Canada once and Chris the fucker had family in England, so he’d already been. As you can see, he was a little less impressed with the view than the rest of us,” Eddie says.

“The next photo is Legal Weed and taken in the Netherlands, shout out,” Eddie grins.

The photo is taken in a hotel room. All of them have joints because weed has been legal in the Netherlands since 1976. Gareth is holding a joint in one hand as he sits cross legged on the bed, stuffing his face with chips with the other. Jeff watching the ring he blew with a lazy smirk as he reclines against the pillows. Eddie is lying with his head off the side of the bed as he takes a drag of his joint.

“This was the only stop on our tour we were allowed to smoke. Our manager would have killed us if we got arrested while abroad,” Eddie pouts.

“I would have come killed you too, Eds,” Steve calls out from behind the camera.

“You wouldn't have come to bail me out?” Eddie asks, pout deepening, though he looks amused too, dimples showing slightly.

“No, of course, I would,” Steve answers, sounding offended. “I would have broken you out if need be. I just also would have had to kill you for being an idiot.”

“Well, ain’t I glad I didn’t get arrested,” Eddie laughs and winks. Then he focuses back on the photo and says: “Getting high with the guys is always fun. We work great under influence, but it also helps us unwind too. Great for between shows.”

“Jeff is totally showing off by the way. He only learned to blow a ring like that in ‘92,” Eddie points out. “I taught him that. And Gareth is totally stealing my chips too. The mooch.”

“The next one is Gareth the Manneken Pis and is taken in Belgian of Gareth being an idiot,” Eddie introduces, his accent throwing the pronunciation of the name off a little.

Gareth the Manneken Piss is of Gareth imitating Manneken Pis as Eddie and Chris loose their shit next to him. A few tourists around them are mean mugging the group.

“Isn’t there one of you doing the exact same on the next page?” Steve asks.

“We’re not talking about that right now, baby,” Eddie says, flushing red. Before he shakes it off and says: “You know what? I’m taking it back. Me and Gar were very correct for our Manneken Pis impersonation. He is an icon and I love him.”

“He’s just a silly little guy, you know. They dress him up holidays with little outfits and have myths about him being a war hero, that’s just iconic,” Eddie defends himself. “I’ve read his Wikipedia page a lot, okay.”

“He has,” Steve confirms from behind the camera. “We went to Brussel on a trip once just to see him in one of his outfits.”

“And it was magical,” Eddie tells the audience definitively.

“It was,” Steve agrees with bemused fondness.

“So, shout out to Gar for being very correct,” Eddie laughs. “Next one is taken by me and is called DnD on the Road.”

The photo is taken from the head of the table, the edge of the DM screen visible. Chris, Gareth and Jeff around a table on the tour bus as the countryside passes them by outside. The three are discussing their next move with grave seriousness.

“We’re all big DnD fans. We made the DnD club at our high school together way back when. I’ve been DMing for these guys since ‘82. We never stopped even on the road,” Eddie recalls fondly. “Our manager loved us for that, because we never broke anything in our hotels, just played our nerdy little game. We still do.”

“The next one is Castle Hill, which is in Budapest if I’m not mistaken. They have this amazing architecture,” Eddie says.

The photo is of Jeff and Eddie from behind. Eddie is practically on Jeff’s back so he can see the Castle Hill of Budapest. It’s a cozy sweet moment, even if the two look slightly ridiculous. They’re in bright colored shirts and cargo shorts, the best disguise they could have found.

Eddie grimaces slightly, before he admits: “Those outfits are my biggest shame.”

“Oi, that’s my shirt,” Steve exclaims.

“Yeah,” Eddie grins. “I love you, baby, but you know our fashion doesn’t mesh.”

“You like stealing my shirts,” Steve pouts.

“I do, I do,” Eddie quickly assures him. “I just don’t like people knowing I like stealing your shirts. I have a bad boy image to maintain, you know.”

“Your image has been ruined ten times over, everyone knows you’re too nice,” Steve rolls his eyes.

Eddie pauses for a second, then makes a ‘fair enough’-face, as he shrugs: “You’re probably right, sweetheart. And you clothes made a great disguise. Somehow no one ever thinks the normie next to them is from Corroded Coffin.”

“Why would they?” Steve laughs. “You guys looked ridiculous.”

“Hey!” Eddie exclaims, but he’s laughing too.

After they calmed down, Steve asks: “Why are you hanging of Jeff anyway?” He already knows the answer, but he has also been keeping Eddie on track for over three decades.

“I was so tired,” Eddie whines as an answer. “Being a tourist is a little fun, but it’s so much walking and I am not athletic, Stevie, not at all. And my beautiful, strong, jock husband wasn’t there to carry me, so I had to lean on Jeff. I love Jeff, but he doesn’t have nice shoulders like you do.”

You can hear Steve giggling in the background as Eddie finishes his lament. Despite his dramatics, Eddie sends a little glance over to Steve, looking proud of the reaction he got.

“Last one on the page is Post-Show Smoke Break,” Eddie moves on after dropping his theatrics again.

That one is taken behind a venue. Chris, Eddie and Gareth are all in costume with their coats over it, hair sweat slicked. Chris and Gareth are smoking while Eddie sulkily sucks on a lollipop.

“Now this one was just rude. They always were,” Eddie complains. “We quit smoking together at the start of the year – well, not Chris, but the rest of us. Gar was already smoking a month later and Jeff started again on tour. They’d all smoke and I was trying so hard, so I had to stand there like a dumbass with my lollipop.”

“I’m glad you didn’t start again,” Steve says softly.

Immediately the indignation melts of Eddie as he gives Steve a smitten smile. He replies: “I’m glad too, sweetheart.” Then he breaks the moment with a joke: “I can even walk up the stairs without being winded nowadays. A true win.”

Steve snorts: “How did any of you survive those shows?”

“Adrenaline and youth, baby,” Eddie winks. “Also shout out to our costume makers, we looked both ridiculous and epic in the best ways.”

“Ridiculous and epic is kind of your brand,” Steve informs him.

“Should I name my autobiography that?” Eddie asks, looking serious.

“Since when are you writing an autobiography?” Steve asks in return.

“I’m not,” Eddie shrugs casually.

“God, you’re ridiculous,” Steve sighs, sounding incredibly fond as he does so.

“But you love me anyway?” Eddie makes big pleading eyes as he asks.

“Of course I love you.”

“I love you too, Stevie,” Eddie grins in return, then happily flips the page, grin widening as he says: “Okay, so I have no excuse for this whole page. I just missed my baby and I needed to call him, because he couldn't come with me, but he had to experience this with me.”

“Are you at the page with all the photos of you calling me?” Steve asks.

“Jup,” Eddie replies, popping the p. “I think I’m just going through them real quick, saying why I was calling you. Think that’s smart?”

“Sounds good to me.”

“Okay, first up Calling Steve from London,” Eddie reads.

The photo that appears is of Eddie in a red phone booth, behind him is the Big Ben. He has sunglasses on and a hat in which he is hiding his hair along with bright tourist-y clothes. He is smiling excitedly.

“I had seen the Big Ben and the phone booths like they have in the movies. Of course I had to tell Stevie about it. He has also never seen it, so I had to report to the best of my ability, no better way to do that then when right there,” Eddie shrugs. “Next up Calling Steve from Dublin.”

It’s of Eddie on the phone in a pub. There is a beer in his hand and behind him is a bar of people drinking and laughing. They had managed to sneak out and not be recognized, since a folk band is playing and drew a different crowd than they do.

“Well, I told him we were gonna try and sneak out, I had to tell him it was successful, you know. Plus, I missed him. Being among a lot of people that aren’t him, always makes me miss him. I wanted to hear his voice,” Eddie says.

“Ahww, baby,” Steve coos as Eddie blushes and hides behind his hair. Steve says: “I love you, Eddie,” and Eddie grins shyly from behind his hair.

“Love you too, darling,” Eddie tells him, dropping hair as he twirls it around his finger. After a beat, he clears his throat and says: “Next one is Calling Steve from Amsterdam.”

Calling Steve from Amsterdam is of Eddie in an airport as he happily talks into the phone. Behind him are Chris and Jeff glaring at the paparazzi that is being held back by security, while Eddie is oblivious.

Sheepishly Eddie admits: “Someone just told me weed was legal in the Netherlands, so I had to tell Steve about it. Also, I always call when we land to say I’m safe, though I must admit that the timing could have been better here.”

“Now the next one, I have already defended myself about,” Eddie introduces. “It’s Calling Steve from Brussels.”

This is the photo of Eddie imitating Manneken Pis even if the person on the other side of the phone can’t see him. He is at a payphone again in disguise as he talks excitedly on the phone.

“I was calling Steve, because I had just met Manneken Pis AKA one of the greatest statues in human history. Of course, I had to tell Steve about that. Here I was telling him about Gareth impersonating the statue. I gesture when I talk,” Eddie shrugs.

“It’s cute,” Steve assures him.

“Thank you, baby,” Eddie grins, before he moves on: “Now the next one is Calling Steve from Paris, which is more subdued. Very artistic, shout out to Gar.”

The photo is of Eddie in a hotel room. He is sitting in the windowsill, leaning against it as he looks over the Paris skyline while chewing on a toothpick. He looks a bit melancholic and wistful as he listens to what is being said to him over the phone.

“Ever tour has a point where the excitement of being on the road dies down and the homesickness overpowers it,” Eddie says softly, looking down at the photo. “I called Steve nightly. He was telling me about how they’d gone to the club and Robs had met a girl.”

“That was the night she met Rose, really?” Steve asks, sounding surprised.

“Sure is,” Eddie nods. “You were so excited about it and you were rambling away and I was just hit by how much I missed you and how much I wanted to be home. To root for Robin, help her pick out an outfit, give her a pep talk, listen to you two go over the wooing plan you made with her. It just sounded so much better than being out there.”

Eddie clears his throat, then plasters on a smile as he jokes: “But as you can see, I did not abandon the tour midway through, I stayed like a good little boy. Just a hazard of the job and I bounce back easily, don’t worry. I don’t have the attention span to keep one mood for too long.”

“Now, next up is Calling Steve from the Road, which Jeff took while we’re on a potty break while driving to Madrid,” Eddie says.

It’s of Eddie at a gas station somewhere in the middle of nowhere, calling from a payphone with the tour bus behind him. The Corroded Coffin logo is splashed across it and a group in the background is pointing at him, but he seems oblivious as he happily talks into the phone.

“For those wondering, yes, I did get recognized shortly after. They were very nice, I told them I was talking to my sweetheart and they were very understanding about it. My manager nearly tore my head off about it, but it was worth it,” Eddie grins. “I signed a few shirts and they let me be to go bug the other guys. Hope they’re doing well.”

“I remember that, you suck at Spanish,” Steve speaks up, “but it was very cute to see you try. Robin had to come over to feed you lines to say to them.”

“And I am very grateful to her for that,” Eddie replies with a smile. Then he goes on: “Alrighty, next one is Calling Steve from Rome.”

Calling Steve from Rome is of Eddie next to the Spanish Steps while on the phone in disguise. A fair of sorts is going on on at the square in the background that Eddie points to, despite not being seen. There is a lollipop in the hand he’s gesturing with, while Chris leans against the wall next to him as he smokes.

“We found this by pure luck, so I had to call Steve to tell him and ask what he wanted as a souvenir or if Robs would like anything,” Eddie explains. “Robin loves markets.”

“She does. She and Rose got a stand next Saturday, did she tell you?” Steve asks.

“Yeah, she’s been telling anyone, who is willing to listen,” Eddie answers with a fond eyeroll.

“She’s excited about it. Their tomatoes have been doing great this year,” Steve says.

“And they’re delicious, I don’t know how she does it. I killed that cactus she got for my birthday and that thing was fake,” Eddie exclaims.

“Knocking it off the dresser and stepping on it, is bad for any object, Eds,” Steve informs him with a little bit of amused judgment.

“Fair enough,” Eddie grins. “Now what’s next? Ah, yes, Calling Steve from Athens.”

The photograph is of Eddie with big eyes as he watches the Acropolis. However, despite his awe, there is a payphone tucked between his shoulder and ear. He is describing the sight to the person on the other side.

“Okay, context, I’ve been a little ancient Greece nerd since I was 8 years old,” Eddie confesses. “I love that shit. I built whole homebrew worlds and campaigns of of it and I did actually reading about it, I hate reading. Seeing it in person was amazing and like life shattering, I couldn’t do that without Steve right there.”

“You were all stammering on the phone,” Steve recalls sounding very much in love. “It was very cute.”

“I managed to get myself together and give a kickass description,” Eddie pouts, though his dimples are showing despite his huffiness.

“It was very kickass,” Steve assures him.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Eddie smiles, then he mutters: “I still use that description.” He blinks, then continues: “The next one is Calling Steve from Berlin.”

In the photo you can see Eddie in Berlin. The wall had only fallen a little over three years ago and many remnants are still upright. Eddie is in front of one of those, calling home, as the graffiti behind him asks to be reunited with loved ones, being allowed to go home. Eddie himself looks a little anguished yet relieved as he hears the other person talk over the phone.

“God, it’s hard to describe being there, especially so recently after the fall,” Eddie sighs. “It this combination of a place of mourning and a place of desperate hope that makes you want to check up on everyone I know. I called Stevie first of course, but I also called the other twerps. Jeff called his mom too.”

Eddie’s quiet for a beat, then he says: “But you know, we were all fine. We all made it out just fine,” he is going for his normal cheer, but those who know, can hear the layer in his voice, that ‘thank god, we did’.

“The next one is a little less sad, luckily. They’re in the order of how we traveled, but we have multiple of every location. Jonathan picked the photos to put in and he sure picked ones that make your emotions jojo. Very much like it is on tour” Eddie laughs. “So, onto Calling Steve from Budapest.”

Calling Steve from Budapest is of Eddie in full stage makeup, having big dramatic eyeliner around his eyes and his hair teased to all hell. He is in a leather vest that is hanging open to reveal a mesh shirt through which all his scars and tattoos can be seen, leather pants and high boots with straps and buckles. He looks like he is about to step on the stage, but he is still on the phone, twirling the telephone cord with a shy grin. Gareth in a leather harness is facepalming behind him.

“How do you manage to be cute and hot at the same time?” Steve asks, bordering on complaining.

“Ahw, babe, you think I’m hot and cute?” Eddie replies, batting his lashes.

“Of course, I do,” Steve says, you can’t see him, but you just know he’s rolling his eyes. “I’ve been with you for 31 years by now, bit rude if I didn’t think so.”

Eddie’s joking batting lashes look turns into genuine heart eyes as he coos: “Stevie, I’m gonna have to make out with you now,” as he gets up from the couch.

There is a cut and Eddie is sitting on the couch again, happy grin stretching across his face. He continues on like nothing had happened, saying: “I was calling Steve to tell him Chris accidentally misspelled his own name when signing the wall. It was hilarious and had to be shared and then it kind of spiraled, because I like talking to my baby.”

“Next up is another sad one,” Eddie warns. “Calling Steve from Copenhagen.”

The photo is of of a hotel room, out of the window one can see the colorful houses of Copenhagen, however, the cheery atmosphere does not reach the room. Eddie is on the bed, while on the phone, crying. Chris is next to him on the bed, an arm wrapped around him, so Eddie can get comfort by burrowing into his side. Jeff is sitting on the other side of Eddie, handing him a sweater that belongs to Steve.

“Like I said before, sometimes the missing becomes worse and I had a nightmare and all I wanted was to cuddle up with my baby and I couldn’t. It was all a bit too much,” Eddie explains quietly. “I am glad for the guys. They’ve always been there for me.”

“As that photo indicated, I was glad to go home, even if it was pretty cool to go on tour in Europe,” Eddie says. “You can see my enthusiasm in the last one, which is Calling Steve from Stockholm.”

The last photo is of Eddie calling from another airport. This time they haven’t been spotted. He is dressed in sweatpants and his own merch with messy hair. His face is split in two as he talks.

“I was calling him to tell him I was about to board the plane home,” Eddie says, softly grinning. “I was so excited to see him, you have no idea. God, I missed you so much. I love doing tours, but I love it more when I get to see you.”

“Ahww, you’re so cute,” Steve squealed lovingly.

“Look who’s talking,” Eddie smiles back, eyes crinkling in the process.

Then he flips the page as if to check, scanning over it to see what’s on it. His eyes get stuck on it for a second, before he grins: “Let’s add the reunion photo to this as well: Back from Europe.”

The photo is of Eddie hanging off Steve koala style, bags still around their feet, the rest of the band coming up behind them and Robin steadying Steve, so he doesn’t fall over from the sudden weight.

“I always jump Steve when I get home,” Eddie grins. “Well, used to, neither of our bones are strong enough for that now. Getting old rocks, but it has it’s lesser moments.”

“I could still catch you,” Steve pouts.

“Of course, you can, sweetheart,” Eddie smiles at him. “But let’s not test it, just in case. You’ve had enough hits to the head to last you a lifetime, plus Robs would totally murder me if you had but a bruise on you after a stint like that. Which it totally hypocritical, because she has no issue enlisting your help when putting on the Christmas decorations.”

“That’s because, she needs me to hold the ladder, not climb it, Eds,” Steve points out, fond grin obvious in his voice.

“Still,” Eddie pouts. Then he focuses back on the photo and says: “Steve couldn’t come pick me up from the airport, because our label was afraid of paps catching us – total dick move by the way – so that’s why our dramatic reunion is happening in our little hallway.”

Eddie looks a little sad as he says it and Steve softly says: “I still liked our reunions anyway, baby.”

“I know,” Eddie replies, flashing a small smile. “Just- It’s always gonna feel like we missed out on things because of it anyway, you know.”

“I do,” Steve agrees quietly.

The two are silent for a second, then Eddie smiles again and signs off: “Now, I watched Jon do these, so I’m gonna try and do his dorky sign off, so let’s go. That was a behind the scenes of the Corroded Coffin Europe tour, hope that was interesting. Bye!”

[thestobingirlie]

ty for saying the thing about how steve said it was a bad plan and no one listened. it irritates me sm lol, esp bc he has serious injuries and they were all just like "that sounds like a you problem." steve is their best fighter (esp in s4 - literally the only one able to kill a demobat on his own [nancy and robin had to work together to manage and eddie just batted them away]) and got hurt (when he's never gotten hurt by one of the upside down monsters before) but somehow they're immune to this? makes total sense. also about saying that nancy is not the best group leader. ppl act like she is bc she's smart and ""badass"" but most of her personality would work against her being a good leader tbh, esp in survival situations imo. like i've seen so many fics start having characters (esp eddie for some reason?) say that nancy is their leader and even that she's the one they would want by them during a fight when 1) nancy being their actual leader was robin lying lol and also when she was de facto leader they all failed and 2) nancy is a long-range fighter and not even a successful one, what help would she be in a fight? esp bc nancy's not even good at lying/getting them out of dangerous situations - she just has plot armor, robin is the one who's good at that.

steve saying it was a bad plan and that plan failing miserably doesn’t fit into the narrative of steve being an irredeemable idiot, so it just gets ignored.

yeah, one of their best fighters got eaten, and is still walking around with chunks of his stomach missing, but who cares about those bats! i’m sure with the power of friendship and music, they can be defeated!

and yeah, nancy, much as i love her, just isn’t really a good leader. she’s not great at listening to people and considering their opinion, she’s hard-headed, and often can’t be swayed once she’s made a decision. she’s good with a gun, but shouldn’t be the one calling the shots. like you said, her plan in s4 got two people killed, and even in s3 when she called the shots, she and jonathan got fired.

honestly, if nancy just started shooting people, i’d totally want her by my side, but if i’m up against a monster from the upside down, i’m gonna want el, hopper or steve.

[wibble-wobbegong]

@elekinetic sorry i need to do this in one big thing or else im gonna lose track of my thoughts 🙏

ok so i’ll admit it’s been a bit since i rewatched so my memory may be fuzzy but from my knowledge the wheelers always seem to have a strict set of values that they (generally) refuse to deviate from even if other wants pull them in the direction of deviation. with karen and nancy, they both clearly show they want to be with other people but they wont cheat. karen holds her family in high priority and, although she doesn’t have the best mothering skills, she always makes an effort to put her family first and be there for them where she can. in her world, the biggest danger often manifests itself as conformity and she opens her arms to nancy and mike and encourages them to be closer to themselves in some ways.

karen encourages nancy to be a strong woman and she gives mike the opportunity to open up to her. she is no perfect mother, but a lot of the reinforcing of social norma and expectations onto mike are done through ted rather than karen, but karen’s dedication to her family prevents her from fully stopping ted by leaving him. she gets frustrated with him and his remarks towards mike in s1 and s4 and is there to hold him at the end of those same seasons. she holds family very highly which direct her actions in trying to foster her children and not let them completely disconnect from herself or their father by breaking apart that marriage. she’s there when she’s aware how deeply something is wrong, but we do see situations where she doesn’t reach out first. it’s like she’s not quite sure how to do what she knows is right but she does make an effort towards it

nancy has her own principles she holds highly. she believes in her right to equal treatment and has a dedication to the truth, hence that constant hunt for it. i think those things guide her in not cheating on steve even when it’s made clear she’s rather be with jonathan. she doesn’t hold the same values as karen, but she holds them just as strongly and wont let herself deviate from them much (although im not an expert on nancy this is kinda what ive picked up)

mike’s moral rigidity needs no explanation i think. his moral pillars are laid out within the first few episodes and he tries hard to stick to them to the best of his abilities.

i feel like we can use mike’s past dedication to his beliefs alongside it being a constant theme with the wheelers to see that mike very likely would never cheat in el until he was absolutely certain they werent dating and she didnt want that from him. it may not even be explicit, like how st ancy originally broke up, but he wouldnt proceed if he wasnt confident it wouldnt hurt el i dont think much how like nancy was willing to hide parts of herself for steve’s sake and the only reason those parts of her feelings came to light were bc she was drunk as shit

also, i’m strictly talking canon!! i have zero problems with it being explored in fics and have read a few myself bc i cannot deny that the juice is JUICY. i think it should totally be explored in fictional works and it doesnt even have to be respectful or pay homage to all this stuff im talking about, it can be as messy or situational as an author wants and i’ll eat it up. i’m just an analytical nerd who likes to take hypotheticals and really pin them against canon possibilities and how a character would interact with that situation in canon lmao

its always “would will let mike kiss him if he was still dating el” and never “the entire reason mike is with el is bc he wants her to be happy even at the expense of his own suffering so he would never do anything he thinks would hurt her even in secret and we know this bc the other wheelers have a history of wanting someone else and still not cheating and, although mike is different from his family in many ways, the wheelers are incredibly caring and morally rigid people and that extends to mike”

[justmeinadaze]

Playing the Game Part 6 (Steve X Plus Size Reader) 

Warnings: Dom/Daddy Steve and all that that implies (I regret nothing!) Reader doesn't really Brat in this one. You two will run in a jerk from Steves passed and he will be an asshole.

Word Count: 2715

“I don’t think it’s a good idea.” Steve folded his arms from his place on the couch. 

“Uh oh. Be careful, Robin. Steve has his pouty look on.” You whisper loudly next to her. He narrows his eyes playfully at you, shaking his head. 

“Come on, Stevie. You won’t be alone. We’ll all be there with you.” Robin smiled at him from her place on the floor in Steve apartment. 

You had all met at his place to hang out and share a few drinks. When Nancy arrived, she announced that the high school was putting together a little gathering for any alumni that wanted to attend. The younger kids had zero interest in going but you and Robin were excited at the idea of seeing the school again. You understood why for Steve that sounded awful but even Eddie said he would make an appearance just to piss off as many people as he could. 

“Didn’t we just see all these people a few months ago at the Halloween party?” Steve asks feeling more and more like he was about to lose this battle.

You stand up and flop down on the sofa next to him. He uncrosses his arms and pulls your legs closer to him. “Baby, if you don’t want to go that’s completely fine.”

“Yeah, but I know you want to go and I don’t want you to go alone.”

“I won’t be alone. I’ll be with our friends.”

He purses his lips as he lets out a deep sigh from his nose. You hop off the couch and grab his hand, dragging him out onto his patio. “Ok, what’s running through your mind, Steve?”

His fingers reach forward grazing your own as his gaze shifts to the floor. “I feel bad.”

You reach up and move his head up to meet your face. “Why do you feel bad?”

He exhales as he lets go. “If I go, I feel like it’s a reminder of who I was and if we go together than that’s going to be a reminder to us both which will hurt you. Then if I decide I don’t want to go then I feel like I’m abandoning you to face those people alone which, again, is a good reminder of how it was in high school.”

“Baby, you didn’t abandon me in school. We just… didn’t meet or talk or whatever. Steve, you’re still so hard on yourself. We’ve talked about this a lot. This man here is a new man, a good man. Fuck the past. Just show them who you are now like you did with me.”

He grins as he leans down to kiss your lips. “Thank you, baby girl.”

Your own smile grows as you leap into his arms, wrapping your legs around him. “You’re very welcome, Daddy.”

#########################

“Honey, you look good! Calm down. It’s ok.” Steve was fidgeting with his casual suit he decided to wear. He DID look really good. He chose his black jacket and slacks with a light blue button up shirt underneath. His black leather shoes were gleaming in the light. You also decided on a more informal attire, wearing a black jumper dress with a short sleeved white shirt underneath. Your black flats clacked against the floor as you and Steve headed towards your friends. 

Robin seemed just as jumpy as Steve but for a totally different reason.  “Do you think Vickie might come tonight? It’s been so long since I’ve seen her.”

You loop your arm around Steve’s waist as puts his own across your shoulders pulling you to his side. “I hope so. I still think she had a crush on you.”

She grabs your cheeks and kisses your forehead. “Oh, my little motivation pill. I love you so much.”

“Well, howdy there, beautiful people.” Eddie saunters in dressed in his usual heavy metal garb. You gesture at his clothes. 

“Weren’t even going to try, were you?”

He grabs his heart. “Princess, it’s like you don’t know me at all. Of course not.”

After Nancy and Johnathan arrive, you all make your way towards the gym. A good amount of people actually showed up and everyone was already mingling out on the makeshift dance floor. Steve’s eyes never rest in one place. He’s constantly on the lookout but for what he isn’t sure. 

Robin gestures towards your old high school friend group. “Let’s go say hi.”

“Oh, I will later. I’m just going to stay here for a bit.”

“You can go.” Steve looks down at you with a smile. “Seriously. I’ll be fine.” He gently pushes you away from him as you and Robin head towards your friends. 

Once again Steve finds himself alone at a table at an event, bored and drinking spiked punch. Everyone else had left to go catch up with the other alumni from their classes. He watches you talk with a slight smile on his face. Seeing you like this always makes his heart skip a beat. His mind starts to drift slightly as he wonders what WOULD school had been like if he had been with you then?

He knows you would have been front and center at all of his sporting events, filling up the empty seat left by his parents. He would have joined you to your clubs and nerdy conventions. He would have been so confused but you would have definitely explained thing to him in a way that made sense and even if it didn’t who cares?! He’d be with you. He would have taken you on dates to the movies, fancy dinners, and school dances. You would have made love to him at Lover’s Lake then after you two would hold each other and just talk about the future. God, why hadn’t he paid more attention back then?

“Holy shit. Steve Harrington?” A loud, familiar voice brings Steve back to his present hell. His old friend Tommy Hagan pulls out a chair next to him and he cringes when the boy pats him aggressively on the back. 

“Hey Tommy. How’s it going?”

“Never better, man. Never better. Carol and I got married and popped out a few kids. I’m a manager at my dad’s office so making some good money.” Steve nods his head, taking another sip from his cup. “Yeah, dude. So how have you been? I heard about Rebecca. I’m sorry.”

“It’s no big deal. I mean, I met my current girlfriend that I’m really into so…” His eyes flash in your direction and Tommy turns to look. 

“Y/N Y/L/N? Are you serious?” He chuckles to himself. 

Steve’s eyes narrow. “What’s so funny?” 

“No, nothing. I guess you’re no longer on your A game, huh, Stevie boy?”

Steve’s jaw tightens as he lets out a small sarcastic laugh. “I know I haven’t seen you in a long time, Thomas, so I don’t know who you think you’re talking to but I’m going to give you this one and only warning.”

Tommy stands up straight, no longer amused and Steve quickly stands up as well. “Oh? And what warning would that be?”

“Steve? Everything ok?” You ask coming up from the side of them. 

“I guess it’s easy to let your woman fight your battles for you when she’s bigger than a fucking house.”

Steve steps forward but you sidestep in front of him facing Tommy. “Speaking of houses, I heard a rumor your dad is about to lose his gigantic mansion. How is the business by the way? My understanding is no one wanted to work for a company that’s in the red so your daddy had to hire you as a last resort.” You blink obnoxiously in his direction. 

Tommy shakes his head as he huffs air out of his nose and stomps off. Steve’s arms wrap around your stomach as he leans in and rests his head on your shoulder. 

“You ok?” You ask him as you rub your hands over his. 

“Yeah, I’m ok. Are you?”

“Pffft, please. I never would have made it through school without knowing how to handle a few Tommy Hagans.” You smile as you turn around and grab his hand. “Come on, Harrington. Let’s go take a look around.”

######################

“God, everything feels so weird now that we aren’t kids anymore.” He says as you both peak into rooms and roam through hallways. You stop suddenly pulling him back. “What is it?”

You reach for the handle and open the door of a classroom. “Do you recognize this room?”

“Um, it’s a…”, he looks around at the literary quotes hanging on the wall and notices some books in a cabinet in the back corner. “An English room?”

“Very good, Harrington.” You grin as you make your way towards one of the desks. 

“Wait a minute. Isn’t this Ms. Wick’s Freshman English classroom?” Your grin grows as you watch him start to remember. “Wow! I sat right here.” He walks towards a desk near the back of the class. His own smile faulters when he looks over at you. 

“And I sat right here.”

The same row, one chair ahead of him.  

“I remember the first time I ever saw you; you walked in dripping with sweat. Her class for you was right after gym. I assumed anyway. Every afternoon you would slink by me and I would hear you throw your body in to the desk. Sometimes before Ms. Wick came in you would let out this obnoxious sigh.” You laugh at the memory. 

Steve suddenly walks past you towards the teacher’s desk, rummaging around in the drawers. He pulls out a sheet of paper and two pens, lightly jogging back to where you were. He guides you in your old desk and positions you so you’re facing the front of the room. 

You hear him scoot into a desk and write something down on the paper. After a few seconds, there’s a light tap on your shoulder. You turn your neck and see Steve’s hand holding out a folded piece of paper. When you open it, you bite your bottom lip to contain your giggle. 

Do you like me? Yes No Maybe

You open the pen, making a few marks as you fold it up and reach your arm back to give it to him. 

Do you like me? Yes No Maybe

Do you like me, Steve Harrington?

This time he threw it back over your shoulder and it landed in front you on the desk. 

I love you, Baby Girl.

After you write on his note, you get up, placing it on his desk in front of him. He glanced up at you before opening it fully. 

I love you to. 

You cup his face in both your hands as you lean down to kiss his lips. Steve wraps you in his arms pulling you closer to him making you giggle.

“I love the enthusiasm, Daddy but I am not going to fit on this desk. You and I will fall over and die.”

He chuckles as his lips roam down your neck. “One of the best ways to go out.”

“Where would you take the girls? When you got frisky during school hours?”

Steve leans back from you, a wicked grin spreading across his face. He gets up grabbing your hand as he drags you out of the classroom down the hallway. When he finally turns into a room, you quickly read the sign before he pulls you through the door, Girl’s Bathroom.

You laugh at him as his lips collide with yours, pushing you back against the tile wall. 

“Really, Steve Harrington? The GIRLS bathroom?”, you ask between his aggressive open mouth kisses. You purr as his hips grind against yours, his hands on your ass bringing you closer to his clothed groin. 

“Yeah, I’m a gentleman.”, he answers cheekily. He undoes his belt and reaches into his pants to pull out his cock, pumping it a few times in his hand. You hike up your jumper and pull down your panties to your ankle as you lift your leg around his waist. Steve grabs your thigh eagerly as leans into you, the tip of his dick grazing your center. 

You moan and lick your lips before you speak again. “You know Daddy, I’m starting to think you have a thing with bathrooms.”

He smiles down at you as he slowly pushes himself into your entrance. Steve leans forward as he begins pumping into you slowly. “No, little one. I just have a thing for you.”

You grip his neck, clinging to him as he thrust his cock into you harder making you cry out. You bite into his shoulder trying to stifle the volume of your moans so no one hears. You hear him grunt into your ear and your turn your neck towards the beautiful sound. 

“Say it. I want to hear you say it to me.” 

You pull his hair moving his head back so his eyes are on yours. “What do you need to hear, Daddy? Hm?”

His hand drops your thigh as both palms roughly come to your cheeks. “Tell me you love me.”

“I love you.”

He shakes his head and delivers a particularly hard thrust that border between pleasure and pain. “Tell me you love me.”

You search his eyes, still seeing the dominant daddy shining through but there’s a small glint of Harrington hiding behind him. The Steve Harrington who had been hurt by his parents, previous friends, girlfriends, and even life itself. 

“I love you, Steve.”

He releases your face, gripping your leg once more, and increases his pace as he rests his forehead against the nook between your shoulder and neck. 

The coil that had been steadily winding in your belly snapped and you wrapped your arms around his neck as he fucked you through it chasing his own climax. You pulled your head back gently leaning on his own as you whispered adoration against his parted lips. 

“Please Daddy. Cum for me, baby. I love you so much. I want to feel your cum inside of me, please.” His mouth connected with yours as his hips sputtered and he released his seed deep inside your aching pussy. 

Steve pulled himself out of you and let go of your thigh but he didn’t let you go. When he removed his lips from your now swollen ones, his face hovered in front of your own with his eyes squeezed shut.

“Steve? You okay?” He doesn’t answer immediately, making you nervous. “Honey, look at me. Do I need to call an ambulance?” You let out an anxious chuckle. Tenderly you run your hand over his cheek. “What’s going on, baby? Talk to me.”

He runs his tongue over his lips and finally his eyes open, meeting yours. “I’m okay. I’m just…really fucking happy.” He smiles wide showing off his beautiful teeth as he kisses your forehead, letting his mouth linger there before pulling away. “I love you to.” He runs his palms over your hair smoothing it down before shuffling into one of the stalls and grabbing some toilet paper. 

“I know this isn’t the best but”, he reaches down and cleans between your legs. You flinch slightly at the feeling of the rough high school cheap paper. “I’m really sorry.”

“It’s ok. Did any of your other girls complain back then?” He gives you an awkward side glance. “What?”

“Um, I never actually had sex IN the girl’s bathroom.” You bite you lip, trying to hide your grin. “Hey, hey now. You said take you to where I took girls when I felt frisky not where we had sex. That would be in the Harrington home or my car. I never actually did it on campus.”

He bends down and pulls up your panties before grabbing his own pants. A thought hits him suddenly while he’s buckling his belt. “Wait. Did you ever…?”

“Did I ever what, Harrington?” You narrow your eyes playfully knowing exactly what he’s asking.

“Oooh you bad girl!”

“See that’s your biggest problem. You keep underestimating me.” You toss him a sly wink as you casually saunter out of the bathroom.

[sunflowerharrington]

🧸 LISTEN UP FELLOW EDDIE MUNSON SLUTS, I HAVE TO SHARE SOMETHING

it’s nothing much, just a little smut before bed lmfao. inspired by my chats with @myobmaya (sorry not sorry for @/ing you babes)

@friendly-neighborhood-ghoul @sympathyforher @gods-favorite-asthmatic @taecube @wzrlds @eddiebillysteve @quickiesgirl @eddies-bat dm comment or ask in my inbox to be added or taken off my taglist for updates on my future ST fics!

ps this is not the dom!dm!eddie smut i was talking about, that’ll be out after my steve etl smut

Neighbours Know My Name - EM

eddie catches you walking out of ms o’donnell’s class and asks you to meet him in the forest at lunch to talk. you’re sitting with your friends at lunch and before you know it it’s time to get back to work, completely forgetting about eddie. and he’s like super mad, like as mad as i was when max and eds died, because you accidentally bailed on him.

after work when you’re on your way to your car he stops you, not saying a word for a while. then he leans down and kisses you, soft, slow and sweet. he’d calmly ask you why you bailed on him and wouldn’t believe you when you say you totally forgot.

and then a switch flicks in his mind.

“oh so you’re lying to me now too?” and now he’s got you pressed against the door of the driver’s side of your car.

he totally spits in your mouth at some point if you’re into that (even if you’re not he does it anyway and if any drips out of your mouth he smacks your ass, hard) maybe pulling your hair to get you to look him in the eye… you know, the usual. and getting you to call him master, he fucking eats that shit up and it makes his ego skyrocket.

“i was gonna just kiss you,” he says, pulling you against him, opening the door to the backseat. “but now I’m gonna fuck you until the only word you can remember is my name. and then you’ll never forget about me again…”

smacks your ass again when you call him eddie instead of master but he doesn’t correct you, he waits for you to correct yourself.

fucks you so dumb you can’t even remember your own name. the only words leaving your lips being a mix of “please” “eddie” “daddy” “sir” and “master”

he goes fucking feral when you call him sir and/or master

doesn’t pull out. “if you wanna keep calling me daddy like a little fucking slut, i’ll make you a mommy, you got that you little bitch?”

um yeah… this one time he’s so angry that he can’t even stop the disgustingly hot words from escaping his plush lips…

the kids complain about the noise later that night coming from his bedroom in the trailer while they’re all having a sleepover to keep safe from the vecnabus:

el asks about the happy screams. max interrupts her before she can ask if it’s the same thing billy used to do with girls, and steve. erica asks too many questions and calls you two “disgusting nerds, but it’s not as bad as what i found under lucas’ bed”. lucas is begging erica to shut the fuck up, later agreeing with her. will couldn’t really care less, he’s just happy for you and steve. dustin is in the bathroom throwing up because apparently his dad isn’t allowed to find somebody that isn’t steve. mike agrees with will because he obviously does because he’s in luuuuuurve.

steve wishes it was him who got to ruin you, as do robin and nancy. argyle has no idea what’s going on and jonathan’s still trying to figure out why joyce had to go see the britanicas so he’s not focussed on what happened with you and eddie. murray will be proud when he gets home. joyce and hop will be too until hop finds out your door was only open two inches (THREE INCH MINIMUM), and joyce will also make sure you two are doing it safely. you’re not because eddie wants to fuck a baby into you but shhh don’t tell joyce she’ll freak the fuck out (but then she’ll also be happy). wayne will ask why you guys hadn’t fucked sooner and billy will be smiling down at you two from heaven, proud of his little bitches (you guys all used to have threesomes but more on that later)(steve joined in sometimes)

and the neighbours knock around complaining about the noise but y’all just blame it on the wind.

even better if you’re the local vicar / priest’s daughter 👀🥵😩

that’s it, i’m done. i’m too far gone. i’m such a slut for munson it’s not even funny. it’s 2am and i need to sleep but i CAN’T

[princessamericachavez]

Okay but I’m obsessed with Eddie Manson and how, while he is a character clearly created to subvert expectations (both in and out of the show), he too is a character whose expectations are being consistently subverted. 

Like, this whole ride from ep 1 to ep 7 is a constant wake-up for him. Because for all that Eddie is a person who clearly hates and mocks other’s prejudices against him —and uses them to his own advantage and as a defense mechanism— he turns out to be a fairly prejudiced character himself...

The obvious one is Chrissy, of course, and how he expected her to be scary and mean and she just turned out to be sweet and nice... or with Erica, belittling her when she wants to join the party only to be shown up by her, she knows her shit, she’s here to play and won’t apologize for it. And both times Eddie quickly relents, because we are shown he’s a character who isn’t stuck on his prejudices. When proven wrong, he accepts it and shifts his perception accordingly. 

BUT ALSO

The way his expectations of himself have changed. How he told Steve that these past few days he discovered he’s “the kind of guy that runs away” instead of a hero and he was so self-depreciating about it... I think that idea is going to change too by the end of this season. He will get his chance to shine (shredding scene, anyone??)

But also, okay, so this boy —this kid— is terrified out of his mind and on the run and assuming that no one will ever believe him and that they will hunt him down and crucify him... instead he finds that the kids he took under his wing in school are actually the ones having his back??

And then there’s Steve and Nancy, right? Because who do this kids go to in a moment of crisis? Steve “poster boy” Harrington. And not only that (as far as Eddie is concerned, that probably tracks with Dustin’s hero worship) but Steve answers to the call like the goddam Paladin he is, showing up to protect everyone with a fucking wooden oar, poking stuff around like a mama bear because “the people in this room have nearly died a hundred times” and he’s the one putting himself in the front line again and again. 

Okay but from Eddie’s perspective? All this guys came to his aid, defying the law and doing everything in this power to protect him, just because Dustin vouched for him. He has to be so confused. 

So Eddie Manson, who fancies himself the edgiest mf in this boring little town, discovers these bullied, lonely, weird, passionate children have been fighting monsters on the regular, so often in fact that they aren’t even faced by it... they assume it’s up to them to respond and fight back. Eddie Manson, who fancies himself the edgiest mf in this boring little cursed town, discovering Nancy “fucking class president” Wheeler owns guns to protect herself and her loved ones against interdimensional monsters. Eddie Manson realizing that Steve Harrington is always taking charge, jumping in when Eddie himself wouldn’t dare, volunteering in order to protect others —and not just that, but he gets to see how the others love him in return and jump in after him. And he himself says so: if these ladies are willing to go after Steve, it must mean something. And the way he talks to Steve in the Upside Down, he is clearly accepting he was wrong and opening up because —as i said— he is a character who learns and changes. 

Also, how hilarious is it that when Dustin described Steve as a “total badass” Eddie probably coined it to his worship and assumed it meant Steve was so cool or so good at sports or so good with girls... and then he got to see Steve go fucking feral on the upside down and probably went “oh” because he realized Dustin must have been referring to this all along (and if he blushes a little and later sounds a little awkward and tong-tied around Steve, he won’t admit it). 

I guess it’s too be expected, with Eddie playing the “newcommer” role this season, just like Max and Robin were playing catch-up in seasons 2 and 3 respectively, but I guess I particularly love it coming from a character who is clearly so aware of other people’s misconceptions and yet... and yet! 

[polymusepotion]

nancy.

she took an oath. strangely, in everything that he’s said, in every horrible truth he’s just laid bare before her, that is the one thought that manages to surface clearest. she took an oath. many didn’t take it seriously. they’re just words. the kind of thing everyone mutters before they solidify their new position and title. but she meant them. she practiced them. murmured them to herself a hundred times in the shower to ensure that she felt every word. that it flowed. she meant it. do no harm. it didn’t matter who someone was when they crossed her path in the emergency room. it didn’t matter why they were there, what they’d done to get there, who they’d been before. it didn’t matter. her job — her oath — had always been to save them.

i need you to let him.

she’s suspected, for awhile, that whatever it was that landed him here was far from something that allowed his hands to stay clean. a mob enforcer, maybe. or some government asset. she wasn’t far off, and the truth isn’t nearly as startling as it should have been. it’s those final words that really hit. that pull the air from her lungs in a thin wisp, make her eyelids flutter as she feels her throat close, tears burn, entire body seizing up on itself as one word nearly tumbles from between her lips. no. no. i need you to let him. no.

but she swallows the protest. she took an oath, but she also knows that this transcends it. they’re not in the hospital. she’s not even sure she’s technically a licensed doctor anymore. and this might be the only way for them to survive. she took an oath, but she’s also learned how to steel herself away from the pain of her job. the loss. she knows how to shut down. she’s good at it. too good at it. back at the hospital, she had a reputation for being icy. detached. she can do this.

still, nancy’s hand shakes as he lifts it, fingertips trailing from his forehead, down his temple, along the curve of his jaw before she lets her hand slip to the back of his neck, pulling herself up so that she can kiss him. his lips taste salty, and she can’t quite pinpoint the moment she started crying but she can feel the tears slipping down her cheeks as she inhales sharply against his mouth.  ❝ i love you. ❞  she needs him to know that. she wishes she had the time to explain to him that those aren’t words she gives freely. it’s been a problem, before. with other boyfriends. girlfriends. but not with him, never with him.

she can’t quite manage to voice the words that signal her agreement to the plan. she doesn’t want to. but she also knows better than to argue. instead, nancy nods. throat tightening, pulling away from him and trying to steel herself up as best as she can. they have to survive. she’s good at surviving. she’s just never had to consider the cost of her own survival when it comes to potentially losing someone else she loves.

❝ i want a beach wedding, ❞  she murmurs, blue eyes cutting back up to his. her head nods once, as if this is a totally acceptable thing to be putting on the table right now.  ❝ you and me. your sister. mine. my dad. our dogs, ❞  her voice catches, but nancy presses on.  ❝ i want a beach wedding. ❞  her hand takes his, thumb smoothing over the band on his finger. it might be fake. this whole thing, their whole life that’s been built around a lie. but there’s a small amount of solace in knowing that if she dies today, she’ll die being his. her head ducks, lips brushing over his knuckles, a brief exhale before she swallows down the emotion, coaxes herself back into some semblance of control.  ❝ i won’t leave you in there. i’ll play along. i can play along. — but i’m not letting him take you. ❞

sebastian nods once. it’s the best he’s going to get, he knows, but it’s good enough for now. pocketing his phone, he moves toward the garage door, their packed belongings slung over his shoulder, rubbing against his bandaged chest, her hand in his. he reaches for the keys hanging on the hooks where they keep them and he pauses. a low curse leaves his lips as, instead of reaching for the set of keys that go to their suv -- the same care they’d used to get groceries and had somehow been returned to them -- he reaches for another set. a set of keys he hasn’t seen in months. an audi key. ruby’s first dog tag from when she was a puppy. an apple tag so, he he lost them in a fight, he could find them. he pulls his mobile back from his pocket. though the phones were already similar, he realizes now this isn’t the government-issued phone. this is his old phone. the one he used before he left. quickly, seb returns his phone and his fingers close around the small key ring and he leads nancy through the door to the garage and presses the button for the door. there, in the third car spot, is his matte black audi. it still has his european tags. the wheel still on the wrong side of the car to be in this country. if it were anyone but james who had demanded his presence, he would insist on checking for a bomb on the car.

then again... james doesn’t take to being betrayed. maybe he should check. he turns to look at nancy. “step back inside and close the door. i need to look some things over. then we’ll get going.” he kisses her cheek and waits for her to step back. “on our drive, i want to hear more about this wedding. i’ll need it for a distraction.” he winks as if this were any other day. as soon as the door is closed, he goes to the car and drops down to the floor, looking beneath it. around it. finding an app on his phone he’s installed to scan for such things. if there were a bomb he set off, her being just inside wouldn’t keep her from harm. but the slight barrier should be enough to at least protect her from the worst of the damage.

undercarriage checked, he then opens each door and checks under the seat. scanning. scanning. boot. bonnet. everything comes up clear. and this little gift from moriarty has given him another idea. one that will be a risk, but sebastian has never been one to just roll over and show his belly. finally satisfied, he tosses their luggage in the backseat and jogs back to the door to get nancy. he smiles at her when he sees her again and offers his hand to take her to the car, escorting her to what would be, for her, the driver’s seat. then he climbs in the other behind the wheel. “let me get out of the neighborhood, then we’ll talk more, yeah?” 

out on the road, seb once again curses under his breath when he sees brenda in her yard placing colorful pumpkins along her drive. their windows are too dark for her to see them, but she must notice nancy through the windscreen. she waves wildly and jogs to them as seb slows the vehicle. “blake! ryan! oh my! why is this car backwards? and why have those people been going in and out of your home? you... what happened?” she asks as she finally seems to register the cuts and bruises. the blood they haven’t had the chance to wash out of their hair.

seb flashes her a weary smile. “the security company still came. good. i’d hoped they would even though we weren’t there. we were in a car accident, unfortunately. both of us are okay, just a little tired from it all. this is a loaner. can you believe they had this beauty as a rental?” his hands caress the steering wheel as if he’s in heaven.

she frowns. blinks. looks at nancy. blinks again. it’s clear she has a million questions, but sebastian shifts the joystick out of neutral and back into first, trying to give her the hint they need to go, but brenda’s eyes snag on the bag in their backseat. “are you going somewhere?” she demands.

“yes,” seb admits. “it’s why we had the system installed. we’ll be out of town for a while. i’m taking my beautiful wife to hawaii for a couple weeks. it was always the plan, but after the wreck, we both need to relax in the sunshine.” autumn in colorado was grey and dreary. “and we’re going to miss our flight if we delay much longer. we’ll see you, brenda.” he waved, then didn’t give her the chance to say anything else before he rolled his window up and drove off down the road.

“is it ridiculous i think i might almost miss her?” he asks. though it’s not brenda. it’s this life. here. with nancy. with another sigh, he touches the screen on the console and dials a number. the contact listing showing up only as m.

“basher,” james purrs. “did you find your gift? i know you’ve missed it.”

“i did. thank you.” seb’s voice is a combination between surrender, acceptance, and appreciation. the look on his face is one of distaste. hatred. stubborn determination to survive. “but you had to know, now that i have it, i’m not just going to leave it behind. blake-- nancy and i will drive to new york and get on a freighter ship that can haul my car back over the ocean with us. it means we won’t be there tomorrow. but we’re coming all the same. i’m sure you’ve installed something to ensure we follow through.” he stumbled over her name on purpose to try to put the impression of more distance between them. he’s also certain of his last comment. jim has likely hidden a tag or some tracking chip somewhere in the car, knowing seb would probably check for only explosives if he checked for anything. the car will be tracked.

moriarty lets out a long, suffering sigh. “fine. make your plans, basher. i know that’s why you want the extra time. it won’t change anything.”

“i’m sure you’re right,” sebastian admits. “you already know you’ve said what you need to to get me there. but you couldn’t honestly expect me to fly coach.”

jim chuckles. “glad to see you’re still the same man. looking forward to what comes next.”

the line goes dead and the silence stretches. sebastian exhales a long, low sigh. “we’ll stop at a supermarket and get you a burner phone. do you have your family’s number’s memorized? i think it’s time you finally get to talk to them.”

@ofthclight

nancy.

she took an oath. strangely, in everything that he’s said, in every horrible truth he’s just laid bare before her, that is the one thought that manages to surface clearest. she took an oath. many didn’t take it seriously. they’re just words. the kind of thing everyone mutters before they solidify their new position and title. but she meant them. she practiced them. murmured them to herself a hundred times in the shower to ensure that she felt every word. that it flowed. she meant it. do no harm. it didn’t matter who someone was when they crossed her path in the emergency room. it didn’t matter why they were there, what they’d done to get there, who they’d been before. it didn’t matter. her job — her oath — had always been to save them.

i need you to let him.

she’s suspected, for awhile, that whatever it was that landed him here was far from something that allowed his hands to stay clean. a mob enforcer, maybe. or some government asset. she wasn’t far off, and the truth isn’t nearly as startling as it should have been. it’s those final words that really hit. that pull the air from her lungs in a thin wisp, make her eyelids flutter as she feels her throat close, tears burn, entire body seizing up on itself as one word nearly tumbles from between her lips. no. no. i need you to let him. no.

but she swallows the protest. she took an oath, but she also knows that this transcends it. they’re not in the hospital. she’s not even sure she’s technically a licensed doctor anymore. and this might be the only way for them to survive. she took an oath, but she’s also learned how to steel herself away from the pain of her job. the loss. she knows how to shut down. she’s good at it. too good at it. back at the hospital, she had a reputation for being icy. detached. she can do this.

still, nancy’s hand shakes as he lifts it, fingertips trailing from his forehead, down his temple, along the curve of his jaw before she lets her hand slip to the back of his neck, pulling herself up so that she can kiss him. his lips taste salty, and she can’t quite pinpoint the moment she started crying but she can feel the tears slipping down her cheeks as she inhales sharply against his mouth.  ❝ i love you. ❞  she needs him to know that. she wishes she had the time to explain to him that those aren’t words she gives freely. it’s been a problem, before. with other boyfriends. girlfriends. but not with him, never with him.

she can’t quite manage to voice the words that signal her agreement to the plan. she doesn’t want to. but she also knows better than to argue. instead, nancy nods. throat tightening, pulling away from him and trying to steel herself up as best as she can. they have to survive. she’s good at surviving. she’s just never had to consider the cost of her own survival when it comes to potentially losing someone else she loves.

❝ i want a beach wedding, ❞  she murmurs, blue eyes cutting back up to his. her head nods once, as if this is a totally acceptable thing to be putting on the table right now.  ❝ you and me. your sister. mine. my dad. our dogs, ❞  her voice catches, but nancy presses on.  ❝ i want a beach wedding. ❞  her hand takes his, thumb smoothing over the band on his finger. it might be fake. this whole thing, their whole life that’s been built around a lie. but there’s a small amount of solace in knowing that if she dies today, she’ll die being his. her head ducks, lips brushing over his knuckles, a brief exhale before she swallows down the emotion, coaxes herself back into some semblance of control.  ❝ i won’t leave you in there. i’ll play along. i can play along. — but i’m not letting him take you. ❞

sebastian nods once. it’s the best he’s going to get, he knows, but it’s good enough for now. pocketing his phone, he moves toward the garage door, their packed belongings slung over his shoulder, rubbing against his bandaged chest, her hand in his. he reaches for the keys hanging on the hooks where they keep them and he pauses. a low curse leaves his lips as, instead of reaching for the set of keys that go to their suv -- the same care they’d used to get groceries and had somehow been returned to them -- he reaches for another set. a set of keys he hasn’t seen in months. an audi key. ruby’s first dog tag from when she was a puppy. an apple tag so, he he lost them in a fight, he could find them. he pulls his mobile back from his pocket. though the phones were already similar, he realizes now this isn’t the government-issued phone. this is his old phone. the one he used before he left. quickly, seb returns his phone and his fingers close around the small key ring and he leads nancy through the door to the garage and presses the button for the door. there, in the third car spot, is his matte black audi. it still has his european tags. the wheel still on the wrong side of the car to be in this country. if it were anyone but james who had demanded his presence, he would insist on checking for a bomb on the car.

then again... james doesn’t take to being betrayed. maybe he should check. he turns to look at nancy. “step back inside and close the door. i need to look some things over. then we’ll get going.” he kisses her cheek and waits for her to step back. “on our drive, i want to hear more about this wedding. i’ll need it for a distraction.” he winks as if this were any other day. as soon as the door is closed, he goes to the car and drops down to the floor, looking beneath it. around it. finding an app on his phone he’s installed to scan for such things. if there were a bomb he set off, her being just inside wouldn’t keep her from harm. but the slight barrier should be enough to at least protect her from the worst of the damage.

undercarriage checked, he then opens each door and checks under the seat. scanning. scanning. boot. bonnet. everything comes up clear. and this little gift from moriarty has given him another idea. one that will be a risk, but sebastian has never been one to just roll over and show his belly. finally satisfied, he tosses their luggage in the backseat and jogs back to the door to get nancy. he smiles at her when he sees her again and offers his hand to take her to the car, escorting her to what would be, for her, the driver’s seat. then he climbs in the other behind the wheel. “let me get out of the neighborhood, then we’ll talk more, yeah?” 

out on the road, seb once again curses under his breath when he sees brenda in her yard placing colorful pumpkins along her drive. their windows are too dark for her to see them, but she must notice nancy through the windscreen. she waves wildly and jogs to them as seb slows the vehicle. “blake! ryan! oh my! why is this car backwards? and why have those people been going in and out of your home? you... what happened?” she asks as she finally seems to register the cuts and bruises. the blood they haven’t had the chance to wash out of their hair.

seb flashes her a weary smile. “the security company still came. good. i’d hoped they would even though we weren’t there. we were in a car accident, unfortunately. both of us are okay, just a little tired from it all. this is a loaner. can you believe they had this beauty as a rental?” his hands caress the steering wheel as if he’s in heaven.

she frowns. blinks. looks at nancy. blinks again. it’s clear she has a million questions, but sebastian shifts the joystick out of neutral and back into first, trying to give her the hint they need to go, but brenda’s eyes snag on the bag in their backseat. “are you going somewhere?” she demands.

“yes,” seb admits. “it’s why we had the system installed. we’ll be out of town for a while. i’m taking my beautiful wife to hawaii for a couple weeks. it was always the plan, but after the wreck, we both need to relax in the sunshine.” autumn in colorado was grey and dreary. “and we’re going to miss our flight if we delay much longer. we’ll see you, brenda.” he waved, then didn’t give her the chance to say anything else before he rolled his window up and drove off down the road.

“is it ridiculous i think i might almost miss her?” he asks. though it’s not brenda. it’s this life. here. with nancy. with another sigh, he touches the screen on the console and dials a number. the contact listing showing up only as m.

“basher,” james purrs. “did you find your gift? i know you’ve missed it.”

“i did. thank you.” seb’s voice is a combination between surrender, acceptance, and appreciation. the look on his face is one of distaste. hatred. stubborn determination to survive. “but you had to know, now that i have it, i’m not just going to leave it behind. blake-- nancy and i will drive to new york and get on a freighter ship that can haul my car back over the ocean with us. it means we won’t be there tomorrow. but we’re coming all the same. i’m sure you’ve installed something to ensure we follow through.” he stumbled over her name on purpose to try to put the impression of more distance between them. he’s also certain of his last comment. jim has likely hidden a tag or some tracking chip somewhere in the car, knowing seb would probably check for only explosives if he checked for anything. the car will be tracked.

moriarty lets out a long, suffering sigh. “fine. make your plans, basher. i know that’s why you want the extra time. it won’t change anything.”

“i’m sure you’re right,” sebastian admits. “you already know you’ve said what you need to to get me there. but you couldn’t honestly expect me to fly coach.”

jim chuckles. “glad to see you’re still the same man. looking forward to what comes next.”

the line goes dead and the silence stretches. sebastian exhales a long, low sigh. “we’ll stop at a supermarket and get you a burner phone. do you have your family’s number’s memorized? i think it’s time you finally get to talk to them.”

@ofthclight

[that-thing-that-feeling]

I think the anon ask where you talk about Eddie participating in the hierarchy within his own subculture and Jonathan not quite being in a position to partake in it (nor does he wish to) is really interesting!

If I’m interpreting this right, it’s like there’s two different ideas of playing out (high school level) nonconformity here:

Eddie’s version is a more active form, like saying screw the mainstream conformity, I’m making my own rules, and then gets some sort of power back that he otherwise wouldn’t have in a “typical” high school hierarchy

Jonathan’s version is a more passive form, like less outright confrontational, he doesn’t seek to significantly redefine anything—instead it seems like he just doesn’t really participate mostly, if at all?

Also as a side-note to Eddie being ‘the biggest outcast,’ at least pre-witch hunt: I would like to add that it’s implied Eddie’s band has been around since Eddie was in middle school, if his talk with Chrissy in the woods was anything to go by. So I would assume he’s had a little group he’s found kinship with for a while, not too unlike Mike, Will, Lucas, and Dustin

I think in their own ways they both say screw mainstream conformity, but then right, Jonathan has used it to separate himself from everyone (or at least also uses this as a excuse of why he’s separate from everyone, but he’s also this very introverted character who has been shown to be very independent and into activities like photography that are more solo). I still think it’s a bit weird there was never really an arts group of potential friends (like not theater, not band), the alt music kids or visual arts kids, for him bc usually high schools have that. But if he had ever belonged had a group of friends like that, or idk was a photographer on the school paper or yearbook, he never would have tried to control it, much less bully anyone in it, or be extroverted in it, or put himself at top of a hierarchy. There’s always been a sense of Jonathan truly not fitting in at Hawkins, wanting to be apart from it and not letting anyone in, and always idk dreaming of what came next. He has of course been in a relationship with Nancy that made him open up more with her, and now has his first friend in Argyle.

Then with Eddie, yeah in that cafeteria and DnD scene, it just struck me how much he’s both very much an extrovert but also has created a little group that has a hierarchy, as you well put it. And he’s at the top of that hierarchy. And while he criticizes the forced conformity of other groups (from jocks, to science people, to partiers, to band), he likes to be King of his own little group and keep a hierarchy in it and have his group conform to him. Which imo sorta just replicates what he says he’s against? Anyway, what it weirdly does for such a supposed outsider, is it gives him traits more in common with the other ST male teens people have been drawn to. The fandom has tended to like certain “alpha” traits with the male teens, whether extroversion, hierarchy making, confrontation, the ability to intimidate or take control, etc. Granted I do think Eddie is more complicated than that, it’s just the people who were claiming he’s just a total outcast before the witch hunt are wrong imo, like he enacts the hierarchies he says he doesn’t like, and I wonder if that’s actually a reason the fandom has been drawn to him.

Jonathan meanwhile doesn’t enact those hierarchies, is introverted and interior, and is an outcast in the fandom so I was wondering if those things were related. It’s also just true he’s been underwritten and people have gravitated towards characters given bigger or more showy moments.

[please-buckme]

A Broken Heart.

Chapter 1

Lee Bodecker x fem!reader

Chapter warnings: slight mentions of sex, 18+,hitting, sad shit, break up, heart break, angst, cursing

Chapter Summary: reader and Lee breakup.

Masterlist

Series Masterlist

Chapter 2 //Chapter 3

The world felt as if it were shattering around you, crumbling beneath your feet like the rapture was upon you. Honestly, if the world did come to an end right now you’d be elated. At least you wouldn’t have to deal with your broken heart anymore.

You sat against a wall in your room, wallowing in your own self petty. It’d be three days since Lee Bodecker had broken things off with you. He had said that you were hurting his campaign, that he still loved you but needed a woman of power to help him become sheriff of this godforsaken town.

Lee had taken you out in the same field he took you to every time y’all made love. He kissed you so passionately, held you so closely. If you weren’t so caught up in the way his hands felt against your bare skin, you would’ve noticed how distraught he was the entire time he made love to you. It was his way of saying goodbye before he actually said goodbye. After he’d broken up with you, you felt disgusting and violated.

You’d never felt like that with Lee. He was your deputy and sinner in disguise. He was your rock and your soft place to fall. When the tears finally fill, the most empty feeling you’d ever felt emerged in your gut. One day you thought you were gonna be Mrs. Lee Bodecker. You daydreamed constantly of your wedding day and sharing a bed with the man you loved for the rest of your life ‘til you were old and gray. To know now that dream will always remain a dream.. that’s what hurt the most.

After Lee drove you home, you sat in your room for three days straight, not even coming out for supper. Your momma tried to convince you to eat and it worked once on the second day, until you threw up right after.

She didn’t understand. She’d never been in love, not really. Not love like you and Lee had. People told y’all all the time how rare and beautiful your love for one another was and you agreed. Just looking back on those memories made you sick. You listened in awe of how beautiful your love was not knowing Lee would only break your heart days later.

Today was Sunday, the lord's day, and usually you never wanted to go to church, but today you really didn’t want to go. The whole town, including Lee and his new arm candy, would be there. It’s the first time you’d be seeing Lee since he dropped you off. It was too soon, especially since you knew he’d already moved on.

As you sat with your head between your knees, your momma barged through your bedroom door.

“Jesus, girl. Why aren’t you up and ready to go? Church starts in an hour and you aren’t gonna make me late again.” She stomped over to your closet and shuffled through your dresses.

“Momma.. I- I’m not ready. I can’t see… him with her. I just ain’t ready for that kinda humiliation.” You sighed, trying to reason with your Bible-thumpin momma.

“Oh, no. You’ve embarrassed me enough this week. Disappearin’ for three whole days over a boy? You’re pathetic. You know, back in my day, we didn’t get to sit around and sulk the days away. No. We had to carry on like everything was fine and that’s what you’re gonna do. Now, get dressed.” She threw you a dress, one of your favorites actually. It was a teal blue, babydoll dress that you usually saved for special occasions, but you weren’t feeling very special at the moment and now you were just pissed off.

You stood and came face-to-face with your momma, “I’m not going. You have no idea how I feel. You can’t. You’ve never felt love the way we had it, Momma. No one ever loved you or me the way I love Lee. You couldn’t possib-“

Just then you felt a sharp sting against your cheek as your momma slapped you across the face.

“Not. Another. Word. You will be dressed and waitin for me at the car in ten minutes. No poutin’ and no sulkin’ in the pews. I don’t wanna hear another word about that boy.” She turned to exit your room but turned around to give you one last dig to the heart, “And, honey, a man in love would never have done what he did to you. Remember that next time you wanna preach to me about love.” With that she left your room. Your cheek still stung from the unexpected hit to the face. Your momma was cruel but she’d never hit you before.

The slap, in a way, was kind of refreshing. For a split second you’d totally forgotten about Lee. Only for a second, though. His crystal blue eyes and cheshire lips never leave your thoughts completely. You shook your head in defeat, trying to erase him from your mind. It didn’t work, but you took a deep breath and began getting ready.

//

The church parking lot was full when you and your momma pulled in. Rickety old trucks to brand spankin new, brightly colored cars littered the dusty lot. You spotted Lee’s car immediately, thankfully he was already inside.

The whole town came to this church, which wasn’t that many people. Nevertheless, everybody knew everybody and, even if you didn’t care, everybody knew everybody’s dirty laundry. Old Man Karl got pulled over last week for a DUI, Nancy from the library cheated on her husband with his brother and.. oh yeah, Lee Bodecker dumped his long time girlfriend for the mayor's daughter.

Lee and yours breakup was the talk of the town. You were the fresh, new gossip in this boring as hell town and there’s nothing you could do about it.

You couldn’t get two steps into the church without being bombarded by women you didn’t want to know but also knew too much about, asking if you were alright and that they’d pray for you on this ‘beautiful, glorious Sunday morning’. Yeah, same shit different day, different person.

One woman stayed to chat with your momma, so you went to find your seat. Your usual spot was next to Lee and naturally that’s where you headed, only to be greeted by Lee and His new girlfriend, Laura-Jean Mancon. She was one of those girls who’d been pretty her whole life. Blind hair, blue eyes and a huge rack. Everybody thought she’d go into modeling or start an acting career but she never did. Instead, she stayed and was now going to marry Lee. In your eyes, that’s the best path she could’ve taken. You’d take her place any day.

“Mornin’ Y/n.” Lee cleared his throat, unable to make eye contact with you.

“L-“ You went to say his name but found you couldn’t. It was only one syllable, only three letters and it pained you to even think about, let alone say aloud. You cleared your throat, “Laura-Jean, nice to see you again.”

Laura-Jean said nothing in return. She just hummed, waiting for you to talk away.

“I guess I’ll go.. find me a new seat.” You took a deep breath when you felt the tears welling up in your eyes, again. Lee stared straight forward the whole time you stood there, too cowardly to even look you in the eyes. Some Sheriff he’ll be.

You scanned the crowd of people and found your momma in the front row, of course. You made your way up the aisle and took your seat next to her. The chorus sang their hems and the preacher clapped his way in on the last versus.

“How are we doin’ on this fine Sunday mornin’?” he drawled to the crowd. He got an assortment of greetings in return.

“I said ‘HOW ARE WE DOIN ON THIS BRIGHT N’ SHINY SUNDIE MORNIN’?’.”

“GOOD” the people shouted in return. You could hear Laura-Jean giggling over something but you wouldn’t dare look back. Lee always made church bearable, making wise cracks at the preaches expense.

“Now, today I’d like to talk a little bit about love. Of course, we’re always talkin’ about love when it comes to our lord and savor, Jesus Christ. But just for a moment, it ain’t about him. No. This mornin’ I’m preachin’ to you about young love.”

Here we go.

“It comes and goes so fast, but when you have it, it’s one of the most beautiful things this world can offer you.. especially when you put a little Jesus in it.” The church laughed. You knew where this was going. Your stomach churned as you sunk down into the pew.

“I’d like to ask the newly engaged folks in the crowd to come and join me up here. You know who you are, soon to be Mr. and Mrs. Lee Bodecker.”

Your heart felt as if it were going to explode, a tear escaped through your lashes and you quickly wiped it away.

They walked up hand in hand, smiling for cheek to cheek. How could he be so happy, so calm after only being broken up for less than a week? Did he ever love you? Really love you. Like you loved him. Obviously not because you could never, in good conscience do this to him. You couldn’t stand on a stage wrapped arm in arm with another man while Lee sat, just as you were now, devastated and totally distraught.

“So tell us,” the preach beamed. “When’s the big day.”

Lee looked at you with a pained expression as Laura-Jean answered the preach.

“May 21st”

Your breathing heavies at the reply. Turning to your momma you whispered, “Momma, that’s in two weeks.”

“I know that. Now, hush.” She side eyed you with a full smile still pressed to her lips. Even your own mother didn’t seem to care about your feelings. You sat there, listening to Laura-Jean go on and on about their ‘big day’. Tears streamed down your face and you let them. You’d given up on trying to hide how hurt you really felt. When you looked up, Lee stared straight at you. He wasn’t crying but his pain ridden face told you everything. One look at him and you couldn’t breathe anymore. You stood abruptly, all eyes were on you and Laura-Jean had stopped talking.

“I- excuse me.” You said before booking it out the back door. Lee hollered out, asking you to wait. It was too late. You were half way out the door and couldn’t stand to be in that room for another second.

Your feet stomped against the grave, dust clouding up in your wake as you made your way to the road.

“Y/n!” Lee called out after you.

“Go away. I have nothing to say to you, L- fuck.” You cursed, trying desperately to get away from him.

“I said wait, goddammit.” He growled, capturing your bicep in his large hand.

“Let go of me!” You whined sounding out of breath.

“Not until you listened to what I have to say.”

“What, Lee? What could you possibly have to say?”

“I- I.. dammit. I know I put you in a tough position but-“

“A tough position?” You repeated.

“Let me finish.” He sighed and released your arm from his grasp, “I know I hurt you. I can’t even begin to tell you how sorry I am, but, doll, this is it. This is my only chance at becoming Sheriff. You know how hard I’ve worked to get here and you’ve always been so supportive of my dream. I- I just thought.. out of everyone you would understand.”

Your skin burned as you imagined smoke blowing from your ears. Did he really just say that? That you should understand the break up and go on with your life like nothing happened like he is? You stood there frozen, breathing heavier and heavier as your brain tried to come up with a coherent response while trying to also remain a lady.

“I- I still love you. You know that, right?” He asked, bringing a hand to your cheek and wiping a stray tear away.

You flinched at his burning touch and slapped his hand away, “Don’t touch me. Don’t you ever touch me again. I don’t love you anymore. I can’t love you. Shit… seeing you was the best part of my day and now I can’t even look at you without feeling like my heart is being ripped out of my chest. I can’t even say your name anymore. Everything about you, now, fills me with so much pain and dread. So if that’s what your love is, keep it. I don’t want it anymore.”

“Doll,” A tear ran down his cheek, you now being the one who’s breaking his heart. “I never meant to hurt you. I swear.” He sniffles.

“Well, you did. I’m in so much pain.” You sobbed, “I’m in so much pain and I have no one to go to because you were my person. You have left me completely empty and utterly alone.”

“Y/n, I-“

“Save it, Bodecker. I’m done talking to you.”

Lee didn’t chase after you this time. He let the tears stream down his face as he watched you walk away. He was just as heartbroken as you but couldn’t show it., not when he was so close to winning this election. He wiped his face with the back of his hand and headed back towards the church. He knew you just needed time and that he’d still see you around town.

Seeing you today took his breath away. You wore your favorite dress that he bought you for your birthday so long ago. You didn’t have on any makeup, which he loved. You were so naturally beautiful and he did still love you with every piece of his shattered heart. He’d eventually come up with a plan to get you back, but for now he would respect your space.

//

Once you’d gotten home and shut the door, you couldn’t help but scream at the top of your lungs. Hoping for some sort of release from all this heartache you felt. Telling him you couldn’t love him was the hardest thing you ever had to do. You sat on the floor in the same position you were in before you left; head between your knees and sobbing like a baby.

There was no escaping him in this town. There was church and the grocery store and the diner you worked at part time. He was everywhere. He’d come in every morning you worked to have coffee with you. He had been a part of every little thing you do in your daily routine for as long as you can remember.

There was never a time you weren’t together. It was always just you and him. He was the one who held you when you were sad, but where was he now when you needed him most?

To you, there was only one way to fix this; get the hell out of here. Completely leave town and start anew somewhere else. You have an aunt that lives right outside of town. You can stay there until it doesn’t hurt anymore.

Wiping the tears from your eyes, you got up. Your aunt agreed to the plan and said you could stay with her for as long as you needed when you called her. You packed a small duffle bag and waited for her to pick you up.

When she did finally pull up out front, you hopped in the car and she drove off, leaving the dusty ole town you called home for so long. You took in a deep breath as you drove towards your new life. No Lee, no momma, no worries.

Dividers by: @firefly-in-darkness

Taglist: @haydens-moles , @c00lkidvibes , @tcc-gizmachine , @buckysm3talarm , @gogolucky13 , @cryptidcasanova , @heavenlyseb , @writersbuck , @teddy-bearbaby , @bbmommy0902 , @sweetllamaparadise , @thereblogcrusader , @aleemendoza2425-blog , @frostbytebaby , @jessyballet , @emotionallyandphysicallydone , @sarge-barnes-sir , @generalbagelcookieslime

(Dm me to be added to taglist)

[steviespanties]

I have a whore knee thought but I’m afraid to write it myself so I thought I’d send it here, if it catches your fancy. Love your work!

Omega!Steve always had a hard time getting turned on when he was with other alphas. His body just wasn’t into it, but with Billy he’s always ridiculously wet and ready. Everything about his alpha—Billy’s scent, his command, his fervor—keeps Steve loose and pliant.

sdfGHJ I LOVEE it!!!!!!!😍💗💗💗😳 Thank you for sharing this with me, it’s *chefs kiss* amazing!! (1,5k words. omegaverse smut, obviously. vague descriptions of unsatisfying drunk - but consensual- sex. pants being ruined. something something fated pairs. sorry for the lack of editing!!)

So, Steve’s a horny guy, okay? Always has been and has never made a secret of it. His friends know. Most of the school knows. Sure, he’ll pretend for his parents that he’s a good ol’ Christian boy who goes to church every Sunday and totally doesn’t sneak out to parties to get dicked down by eager alphas any other day of the week. It’s just also always been frustrating. 

His selection in Hawkins leaves much to be desired, with smug alphas who think just having a knot makes them God’s gift to humanity and simply whipping their dicks out will get Steve gushing wet immediately. They’re lucky his libido overrules his endless disappointment. No time spent on working him up, alcohol dulling his senses to make the ache he feels less uncomfortable. It’s not bad. It’s not really good, either. 

There’s an itch underneath his skin, a formless desire for more that never takes shape no matter how often he tries. He’s a spring coiled tight and no matter who he lets between his legs, he can’t bring himself to unwind. He lets fucking Brody from the baseball team plow him into the guest bed at a post-game party and even the tiny sparks of pleasure brushing his insides can’t make his back muscles unclench or his hole more wet. There’s just pathetic grunts coming from above him. The sting of a hand slapping against his asscheek and a huffed “make some noise, will ya?”

Yeah, no. He gets up instead. Ignores Brody’s halfhearted protests as he tugs up his pants and throws him an icy glare that makes the guy sputter and shut up. Pathetic.

It takes time, he thinks. Time to get him loose and trusting. Effort, too, to make him want to bow his back and present himself. Steve hates to sound like his mom, but when he jerks off later that night with a hand around his dick and three fingers in his wet hole, imagining a formless someone to sweep in and fill him up, he thinks ‘there’s just no quality alphas in this town’.

And then Billy Hargrove rolls into Hawkins, stinking of cigarette smoke, fucking Aqua Net and perfume and underneath it all? Jesus fucking Christ. A cloud of pheromones so strong and fragrant, it makes Steve drool a little just from catching a whiff of it in the hallways. They haven’t even talked yet and he already feels a hook in him. Right next to that itch. Closer than ever before to scratching it. He wants, more than he has ever wanted before, to get this guy’s scent on his skin. Wants to drip with the guy’s come.  And, to his massive surprise, underneath that raging storm of pure instinctual lust, there’s simply interest. He feels like a dog with his ears perked up and his snout in the wind. He’s on the chase.

If Steve has learned one thing, though, is that if he really, desperately wants something, he has to pursue it carefully. And nothing is more of a siren-song to alphas than an interested, yet reserved omega. So he’s not among the welcoming committee of fawning followers at Billy’s heels. He counts on them to fill the guy in on all the gossip. Walks by close enough in the hallway to get a whiff of Steve walking by. Feels those ocean blue eyes burning holes into the back of his head by the end of the day, just like he anticipated. Of course, it blows in his face within hours.

He’s not even properly buzzed at Tina’s Halloween party, too busy to keep Nancy away from getting shitfaced while they wait for Jonathan to pick her up. He swallows his frustration. This was supposed to be his opportunity to leave a lasting impression and instead he’s stuck babysitting his ex because she can’t hold her liquor.

And then he sees him. He takes one look at Billy Hargrove and even from across the room, clearly stalking towards him through a crowd of dancing people Steve can tell: The guy is trouble. 

In his periphery, he registers Jonathan swooping in and dragging Nancy off. Registers the cheers of people around them. Hears through the pulsing music “Harrington, right?” and his mouth says “Steve, actually.”

Hargrove leans forward. Close. Closer. Right into his space, stinking of beer and smoke and that irresistible hook underneath that pulls Steve’s body over a precipice he knows he’s crossed when he watches Billy’s pupils blow up and his chest move in the most unsubtle scenting he’s ever seen.

A heavy arm wraps around Steve’s shoulder and with a decisive pull, he’s flush against the warm, firm side of- “Billy,” is purred into his ear. Breath on his sensitive skin that makes him shudder and warmth pool in his belly. His arm winds around Billy’s waist and he realizes in that moment that any resemblance of a plan has flown out of the window. He’s putty.

“I’ve already heard so much about you,” Billy grins. There’s a wild edge to his smile. A mischievous spark in his voice and eyes that sinks the hook even deeper. Steve can’t help but smile back.

“Of course you have.” As they talk, Billy steers him through a room filled with eyes glued to their every move. It’s a familiar feeling- being the center of attention, even when people desperately try to play it cool. Letting the curiosity and jealousy pearl off his skin like drops of water, an entire audience to Steve being felt up and led around and held close throughout the evening with no resistance from him.

He’s just hungry. Watches Billy drink beer from a can and lick his lips with a pink tongue. Feels Billy’s hands firmly grip his hips as they dance and his eyes on Steve’s as he tucks a loose strand of hair behind his ear. It’s impossible to escape Billy’s scent, growing stronger the more he sweats. Becoming overwhelming when he tucks that strand of hair behind Steve’s ear for him and brushes his scent gland in such a deliberately soft motion it makes that pool of warmth in Steve’s belly transform into molten heat and a shocking pulse of slick. Right in his pants.

Billy’s eyes are wide, expression stunned. This isn’t how it normally goes, Steve wants to tell him through his embarrassment. Breathes more of Billy in and hears “Let’s get out of here” instead of a leer or an insult.

Steve knows he’s easy, okay? He’s been searching for someone in this town to make it worth his while and it’s been a disappointing search so far. So even when Billy pushes him into the backseat of his car, tugs his pants down and peels Steve’s soaked briefs off his legs, he still wonders if this will be a fluke. Right up until Billy’s heavy body covers him and their lips and tongues meet in a slick, delicious glide and his hole pulses slick right onto the car seat.

Before he can even settle into pure mortification, there’s that purr again. “Holy shit,” Billy says. Wondering. Delighted. A gloved hand glides over Steve’s skin. Up the inside of his thigh, to his hole where he’s more sensitive and swollen and wet than he’s ever been before for an alpha. Steve gasps. “Open your legs,” he’s told. And he does. Gets an appreciative “Just like that” in return that makes his arms break out into goosebumps.

Maybe it doesn’t take time at all, he thinks dazedly as he watches Billy pull off his gloves and glide a finger into his pulsing hole with such confidence and ease, it makes Steve moan immediately. Maybe all it takes is an alpha with a California tan and a wicked laugh that makes Steve want to smile along. The kinda guy who drags him around a party and never lets him go, who can’t stop petting Steve’s side and his hair.

And maybe, he thinks deliriously as sweat rolls down his back and the slick glide of Billy’s cock has turned into loud squelching on every powerful thrust that makes Steve gush onto the seats, maybe it does take trust. Because Billy looks at him. He scents Steve like he can’t help it, leans down to steal breathless kisses between moans like he needs every bit of contact just as desperately as Steve does.

‘He has freckles,’ Steve thinks incoherently as his dick twitches in Billy’s grip. Once, twice. Another time, right as Billy’s knot catches, locks them together in perfect pressure and everything falls apart in white-hot pleasure that spills over Steve’s body and out of him in ropes of come over his belly.  Billy bends forward when he comes. Like he can’t get close enough even when they’re locked together, a twitching, moaning weight on top of Steve’s fucked out body.

They bask in the afterglow for a long time. Steve pets Billy’s head, curls turned soft from a night of constant movement and sweat. There’s no need to get off this ride. Not when that itch has finally been scratched and one look at Billy’s blissed out face tells him that the hook he’s felt under his own skin has worked itself under Billy’s as well.