#eddie has the big feels

[aryanightshade]

IV.

This Episode of Stranger Things is Called: Floor Is Lava

-

{you have four new messages}

“Hey, Eddie. It’s Wayne. Your Uncle Wayne. I was surprised to hear from you. It’s been a while. I, uh, you didn’t leave a number to call back, so I asked around town about you. Heard you’re renting a place from the old sheriff. Thought that was a little funny. You know, with how much you gave me the runaround as youngster. … I hope you’re doing okay, son. If you wanna talk, you know where to find me.”

- - - -

Eddie doesn’t puke from nerves, but it’s a near thing.

It’s Wayne.

Checking in.

It’s an immediate upset to the already delicate emotional equilibrium he’s managed to achieve after freaking out Steve’s porch, and it makes him spin in circles, frothing with panic, like an animal with its leg caught in a steel trap, drawing blood from his own panicked movements.

Wayne.

Wayne found him. After Eddie had made it so goddamned difficult, too. After he gave Wayne a virtual middle finger when he vanished into the night without a word with nothing but big dreams and his own teenage arrogance.

Damn that stubborn old man.

Eddie steps out onto the porch, hovering under palter shelter offered by the eaves from the summer rain, and sucks down cigarette after cigarette until his fingers are frozen and shaking and his pack is empty.

I hope you’re doing okay, son.

Wayne found him. He called.

Down across the yard, the Harrington house is still and lightless. They must be out and about, playing in the water. Eddie flicks his last butt away, watching it spin in lackadaisical circles in a puddle before vanishing between the boards of the porch. Why did Wayne call him back? He doesn’t owe Eddie anything. Anything at all. Eddie was only ever a nuisance, dumped on Wayne’s porch by Indiana CPS when his dad got arrested for his umpteenth DUI or whatever other shit he was involved in that week. Growing up, Eddie spent more time in Wayne’s trailer than not, and those months not being ping-ponged between shitty apartments in Indianapolis were definitely the most stable stretches of his life by a long shot.

Until now.

He sort of owes Wayne a response, doesn’t he?

That being said, Wayne and Eddie are two people astonishingly ill-equipped to have an emotionally probing conversation about anything.

Oddly, Eddie finds his conversation with Steve ratting around the inside of his brain, clattering like loose change in a dryer. About staying here. In Hawkins. About toughing it out. About this being worth it.

He makes toast for El, then a piece for himself, turning the nauseating idea over in his mind. If they stay here, in Hawkins, for longer than a few months, and that’s a big fucking if, then Eddie has to deal with this. He can’t just keep pretending Wayne doesn’t exist.

Eddie knows Wayne cares about him, deep down, under all the tough love and gruffness. He’s not stupid, but a little part of him, the part that’s a total fucking coward always looking for the easy way out, was sort of hoping that maybe Wayne had given up on him completely and they would never have to have this conversation. The whole sorry I disappeared and got a girl pregnant even though I’m a flaming queer and got then got addicted to heroin after she died because I didn’t know how else to get it to stop hurting conversation.

Yeah.

That.

Right.

Eddie shoves the rest of his toast into his mouth. It tastes like glue.

Read on Ao3

[hawkinsbnbg]

Stepbrother Eddie who just wanted to protect his innocent little brother and thought that no one would ever deserve his baby.

He’d chase off Steve’s new boyfriends and return home with bloody knuckles—a result of his wrath—because how dare they lay their dirty hands on Steve?

Every day, when Steve came back from school, he’d check Steve’s pretty cunt to make sure the omega hadn't let some random alphas take his virginity.

If it required him to use his tongue and fingers for a thorough inspection, then no one would be the wiser. And if he knotted Steve’s cute ass once or twice every time before he fell asleep with a purring omega in his arms, then it was a little secret between him and his baby.

In the end, Eddie was the one who took Steve’s virginity because no one could protect his omega better than him.

[lennadanvers]

Hiii, what about Eddie dressing up as a jock for Halloween? Covering up all his tattoos, finding a short brown wig, wearing jeans without any rips and a varsity jacket?

And when people ask about it, he just tells them "monsters are everyday people" or some shit like that.

[jewishrat420]

steve who never learned how to love right.

who knows his mother’s fear of his father the way he knows his father’s right hook in the curve of his hand and the half-moon scars in his palm.

steve who knows how to love the same way he knows cold bath water with no bubbles, as a necessity rather than a luxury. as something he should never bother trying to earn because he was born unworthy.

steve who meets eddie and doesn’t know what to do with the immediate and intense outpouring of love and devotion, who has never been wanted or sought out in such a visceral way. who doesn’t know how to find a way to make it fit in his body when there’s barely enough room within his ribcage for his own heart, aching and perpetually empty.

steve who’d rather leave eddie snapped in two like a fallen tree branch than be the foot that steps on it. who knows it’ll only hurt worse the longer he lets it go on, because he might have his mother’s eyes but it was his own that saw them busted and blue from the calloused knuckles of the hand that looks like his. it’s his own fingers that snap and break as he curls them into his skin, but his fist is unmistakably his father’s.

steve who wouldn’t know the taste of love if it was in the blood he licked from his own palms. if it was in the marrow, deep and pulsing, of the beating thing inside his chest.

x

original post

[1doesnotsimplyhavejust1fandam]

Need an acknowledgement after Buddie goes canon of them having had latent or explicit feelings for each other for years. This isn’t a case of “oh, we were best friends for years and then one day we woke up and were in love.” This is a case of “we’ve been best friends for years, and we’ve been falling in love with each other since the day we met. We just didn’t understand it yet.” We’ve already had Buck’s realization that he’s bisexual, but his arc was chock-full of obliviousness to his attraction to Eddie, his feelings for Eddie, whose attention he actually wants. He still doesn’t really get it, but he gets that he likes men too, at least. Eddie is a whole other ball game. From the Catholic guilt to the toxic masculinity to the childhood emotional neglect to the pressure he keeps putting on himself to perform in relationships. He’s repressed as hell, and he isn’t to “I’m gay” yet, but we see hints of him understanding that how he feels might be a little different (his pause at “follow your heart, not Christopher’s” from Carla, his two talks with Bobby, admitting to performance anxiety on dates to the whole team, his talk with Buck about Marisol being an ex-nun, his acceptance that Ana and a ready-made family was the reason for his panic attack).

We know that the two of them are bad at identifying how they really feel, or at least allowing themselves to feel it. So, it makes way more sense for the show to admit that they’ve had romantic feelings for each other for years, rather than trying to convince the audience that what we’ve been watching these past seven seasons isn’t a product of two characters’ struggles with their identity and relationships. And while I’d be satisfied with a light-hearted snark from Hen or Chim about how they’ve been seeing it for years, I’d be so much happier with a full circle moment of the boys actually fully knowing themselves, acknowledging that they were never just best friends, they just didn’t understand it yet. It would show their series-long growth, as well as being an enormous tip of the hat to the audience. Because we aren’t misinterpreting it. We’re reading the queer-coding directly from the show, yes through subtext of course, but also the literal text. There have been so many moments deserving of acknowledgement in this regard, and I would hate for Buddie to go canon without it being clarified that those moments were exactly as queer and/or romantic as we thought.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Eddie diaz isn’t going to actually move to Texas - oh he’ll probably get close - but he won’t actually go - because it’s running away again - which is what Eddie does when he’s faced with something life changing.

He ran to Shannon to escape his parents (especially his mom)

Then he ran to the army when Shannon got pregnant

Then he ran to the army once again when Chris was diagnosed

Then he ran to LA to escape his parents once more

Then he ran back to Shannon

Then he ran from his grief

He ran from his trauma

Ran from the 118

Ran from his feelings

And now he’s running again - he thinks he’s running towards Chris but he’s actually running away from himself - from joy and freedom - because he thinks it’s the only way to get Chris back - to go back to living under the toxic cloud that is his parents - to go back to being made to feel like a failure (because Helena is going to say I told you so at the first opportunity!)

Eddie is watching Chris and seeing him get the childhood with his parents he never had - one where he was loved and supported and allowed to be a child. Only that’s Eddie’s perspective and Eddie (like Buck) is a flawed narrator of his own life - Chris isn’t actually happy he’s basically getting the same treatment Eddie got from Helen and Ramon - he’s being stiffled - suffocated and he is not being given the right support - the support to work through his trauma and not let it fester.

But Eddie only sees Chris being taught chess by the man who was absent from Eddie’s own childhood, Chris being able to be involved in clubs and tournaments and getting to make friends and be a child.

Eddie doesn’t see that he was already providing all of that for Chris am more - providing him with the love and support and tools to deal with what life throws at him.

Eddie wants in on what he was already doing and doing much better so he’s going to probably go to Texas for a bit and open the dialoge and then reload moving back to Texas just keeps the cycle going (Eddie’s own version of the hamster wheel) and it would reinforce to Chris that running is the answer. That being unhappy is the answer

Ultimately Eddie needs to realise that he can fight to get Chris back without sacrificing all he has been working towards - without sacrificing all the progress he has made. That actually making the first move doesn’t mean abandoning the life he has been building for himself and his son.

Because Chris isn’t actually happy - he’s miserable and he wants his dad - he just isn’t able to admit that yet but they’re going to get to a point where he is - because Eddie has been doing the right things and they will have a conversation in Texas that will bring them both home to LA ;and Buck) and the family they have built.

[nerdy-frog98]

Okay I’ve had several days to think about it, and I’m not upset about Eddie’s cheating storyline anymore.

Nobody asked, but HERE’S why.

Eddie is an incredibly traumatized character. The military experiences (+ his dead friends), losing his wife so suddenly & without closure, and a couple near death experiences will do that to you! Add that to parents trying to take his child away ON TOP OF feeling like he needs to give Christopher a mother at any and all costs…? Maybe a little bit of Catholic guilt sprinkled in there too.

Season 5 was not my favorite for a myriad of reasons, but one thing I did like about it was Eddie’s complete mental breakdown. It felt like a long time coming... BUT. His mental breakdown didn’t even really scratch the surface of his issues, and there are still a lot of things he needs to face before he can truly be at peace. One of those things is Shannon.

The effect that Shannon’s loss had on Eddie has, in my opinion, never been explored properly. We got a little of it in season 3 with the illegal fighting, and then hints of it again when he was with Ana, but it never felt like closure to me. It felt like season 6 tried to give him closure (through Marisol), but it wasn’t satisfying because it was more or less a duller version of what happened with Ana. “Moving on” for his sake, but with no real emotional repercussions. Maybe this is just a personal opinion, but his story has felt like a ticking time bomb to me since the moment he broke up with Ana. His breakdown in s5 wasn’t the real bomb though.

Now imagine being Eddie, a guy with a lot of unresolved guilt and feelings for a woman who died right in front of him. Imagine you see a woman with that dead wife’s exact face. I can honestly say I have no fucking clue what I would do in his position. What he did- erasing Marisol in his first conversation with this lookalike Kim, then later lying to Buck to meet up with Kim- is morally not okay. Sure. Would any of us act in a rational way though?

I’m not meaning to justify cheating, but I do genuinely believe this is one of the only ways that stubborn ass was going to figure out his issues in a way that might actually help him move on. He’s being delusional with Kim, and once the ball drops, I believe there’s a great big breakdown waiting for him on the other end.

People often accuse Eddie of being the most boring of the 118, and I hate that assessment so goddamn much. Eddie is probably one of theee most complex characters (besides Buck) in the entire show. He’s self-destructive, kind, loyal, patient and impatient- he’s a good father and a good friend, and he’s FLAWED. That is why I love him so much.

My initial disappointment with him partially stems from me wanting him to have a singular season of PEACE, which…I realized wasn’t possible without blowing up the bomb first (would’ve preferred to disarm the bomb but I’ll take what I can get).

[homerforsure]

Thinking about how in a parallel universe there’s a version of this season where the Natalia actress was available so Buck got the “move in, move out, you don’t have to force intimacy on a speed run” storyline and Eddie and Marisol break up off screen.

And how, in that universe, there’s a 7.04 from Eddie’s perspective that ends with Tommy taking him home from the hospital and making a comment about Buck and Eddie saying “No, I knew he was jealous that we were hanging out without him. I kept meaning to invite him along but..” “But?” hesitant yet smoldering eye contact. “I didn’t really want to share your attention.”

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

shoutout to Frank, he's gonna fall for / has fallen for the most suspicious puppet in the neighborhood

[thatneoncrisis]

the expendable child character is a narrative parallel to jinx reconciling her relationship with her sister and younger self. like i get not liking expendable child character but she does have an obvious narrative purpose outside of just being cutesy for sillies and then dying for sads. also she had like a cute hair dye montage and stuff man shit was tragic :( maybe im a braindead enjoyer of media trope slop but have you considered that shit was tragic

spoilersssss under da cut

hey have you considered that throwing a character in a show who barely has any personality or any inner world just for them to die because you KNOW theyre a cute kid that people will get attached to is uuuuuh cheap? like i fully understand why she exists, i get the parallels the show isnt subtle, they LITERALLY dye her hair blue and braid it, and she spends half her screen time being the symbol zaun wants jinx to be. how the fuck am i supposed to register her death as tragic when the writing was on the wall the moment she stepped on screen. how am i supposed to get attached to what is essentially a teddy bear filled with C4.

i dont like her bc the show knows how to write kids- violet, powder and mylo bounced off each other and the adults in their lives in such a natural way (excluding the other boy and ekko bc frankly they dont get enough screen time for me to judge them and the first guy was clearly doing double duty as comedic relief/oh wow another dead kid). i do not like child death as blatant manipulation, i do not like pretending that kid was a real and interesting character whos death i should be invested in, i do not like acting like recognizing what a show is doing is the same as them executing it well in any way. i understand CONCEPTUALLY why jinx likes her, omg the baby is just like me fr, they spell it out by having her look at the camera and go wow you remind me of powder who is who i used to be but then bad shit happened but youre cool, but thats not the same as like. building a bond with them, a rapport, shes just kind of this amusing Thing jinx has around and doesnt really care about outside of "kids dying is bad"

finally, do not do that fucking thing where youre like "oh well maybe i just like shitty poopoo tropes but i thought it was pretty good 🥺" how the fuck am i supposed to respond to that. im not like, upset at arcane for fun i like it when stories are told well and get frustrated when the pieces are there and just never connected. i feel like this show has reached a breaking point with how many people it can take from her without it meaning anything after a certain point. half the time its not even her fault it just kind of happens to her in some greek tragedy twist of fate, shes not allowed to have good things and instead of it being like, a conversation about children of war and how unfair shit is dropped on their heads constantly, jinxs motivations and energy is only tangentially related to zauns sovereignty movement.

theyre so like. fixated on her having this overly unserious attitude about everything around her, and i get its a coping thing to distance herself but it RARELY lets up during pivotal moments. its like a story is happening to her rather than her actively contributing- the people would have been taken to stillwater whether she was at the rally or not- sevika would have figured out a way inside that building with or without jinx, they did not escape stillwater thanks to her ingenuity, but because that guy summoned a big ass zombie werewolf who happened to also be her father. the ONLY reason she goes to that building is bc thats where the baby is, i dont think isha as a symbol of the inner child, was inspiring jinx to be a good person, shes just like, a creature of convenience. i guess while im here i can let you guys out or whatever. and what does it mean when that inner child, the living embodiment of whatever goodness and innocence may still exist in jinxs heart, is ripped away from her in a violent explosion exactly the same way as last time? she did the opposite of what vi did last time and the outcome was identical. is history repeating itself, will jinx change? is there any change that can happen that will negate the absolutely comical amount of bad shit that happens to her? this show does not in any way give me the confidence to believe that will happen

basically i think jinxs development thus far is repetitive and gives very little consideration to her as a character rather than an archetype, and isha suffers greatly for it. why show a relationship when you can simply imply it? why make the child any harder for jinx and the audience to project on? why does she need a history, or goals or any interests that arent a giant blue flag that shes powder 2

[littlespoonevan]

i know the joke back in march/april was that tommy was buck's sam and eddie was his nick but actually it would be So much more compelling if tommy was buck's richard and eddie was his chandler because the idea of having children and being a father has always existed on the periphery of buck's identity so if he had to reckon with a partner that didn't want kids it would actually be an interesting conflict that would be in line with buck's characterisation while also allowing the show to tie up all the loose ends about buck and fatherhood from s6 as well as the will and the chris of it all

[distractionpie]

i really want the 8b finale to be Eddie getting his ass in gear re: making moves to bring Christopher home, but barring that, I could also get behind Christopher to upgrading from uber to get his ass on a flight back to LA just to call his dad out for letting half a year pass without fighting for him to come back and yell misguided accusations that Eddie doesn't care and is glad to be rid of him. Of course Eddie said all that stuff about being able to come back at any time but since then he's been all forced supportive cheeriness on calls and not giving any sign that he wants Chris home.

We the audience know it's Eddie's self loathing but Chris is 14 and old enough to do the math on being an unplanned/unwanted pregnancy, and his dad left for the army and then his mom left completely (and then came back but then was gone again anyway). We've seen Chris verbalise the worry that he's part of what makes Eddie sad when Eddie was struggling with his trauma, and then when things semed like they were going good Eddie pulls moves like going after Kim which show that he's not happy with how his life turned out, and it would be easy for teenage Chris to see himself as the biggest part of Eddie's life that he didn't choose and can't get away from. Plus it would be so Helena to let slip a few comments about how Eddie never wanted to be father and ran from it until he couldn't anymore. how it was only his pride that meant he didn't just give Christopher to them like he should have in the first place.

It would be easy for Christopher to start dwelling on those pieces more than the fact Eddie said he could come back anytime, to build up this narrative in his head where maybe it is better for everyone if he's in Texas (even if he misses his dad all the time at the same time as being mad at him) but also he's so mad about it and mad about the percieved dishonesty that he just has to confront Eddie (and in doing so finally force some more mature conversations about their family trauma)

[heartbeetz]

Jazzton if there was like a Who Framed Roger Rabbit thing going on.

Loosely based on this promo image ^

[the-sneep-snoop]

you’ve heard of spider punk now get ready for spider of other musical subculture

[indecisive-dizzy]

Bestie bestie

Regarding your Latter x Eddie ideas, how do you think Eddie would fall for Latter?

This is a toughy, but only bc I don't know how to explain it! Including Frank bc purple and yellow poly <3

Eddie falls in love with Latter the same way he falls in love with Frank, in a way. Of course there's differences, they're different people after all! But what I'm focusing on is: Frank sees Eddie, Latter listens. (not saying Frank doesn't listen to him, trying to be poetic lol)

Latter is genuinely interested in the things Eddie has to say, appreciates and praises how hardworking he is even if he's not there to see it, and encourages his creativity! Even if he's not there in person, Eddie knows Latter cares.

Eddie knows Frank cares through actions. Frank brings him a glass of water, saves him from the beetle, and offers him an umbrella. Frank sees the hard work Latter hears about and acts. While Latter will verbally acknowledge and praise him for it over the phone or in a letter.

Eddie Realizes he's fallen for Latter when he finds himself rereading the suddenly not so subtle love poems and day dreaming. Eddie's not oblivious to love, he knows when he's in love and it hits him like truck! Then like two trucks when he realizes those feelings also apply to Frank!

Latter and Frank fall first, Eddie falls harder twice over <3

Bonus! Pet names Latter calls Eddie <3

My Radiance

Sunshine

My Sweet Summer's Day (very sappy, gets Eddie good)

[yourbestbuddie]

The only thing on my mind is bees.