#gotta keep my place in the angstflayer somehow

[frankenstein-ate-my-left-shoe]

ope.. i got brainrot while driving into work again so here's a rockstar!eddie steddie blurb that goes with this song.

cw for possible refrences to suicidal ideation depending on how you interpret the lyrics (more literal or more metaphorical)

pairing: steddie | word count: 840 | rated: M

The first time Eddie tells Steve he loves him, it’s while they’re awash in the afterglow; Eddie’s still half sprawled over Steve’s bare back with his finger tracing patterns idly over his skin.

“I could trace enough constellations on you to get from here to Mars.” he says as if voicing a thought rather than to Steve.

“Oh yeah?” He snorts.

“Mmhm. And I’d love you from here to there too.”

The steady movement of Steve’s back shudders to a stop, his breath faltering. “Oh yeah?”

A new featherlight touch grazes the skin between his shoulder blades. Eddie’s lips. “From here to Mars, sweetheart.”

Mars becomes a thing between them, and between them alone; “Love you to Mars, Stevie,”, “I love you all the way back home, Eds.” or after some bigot gives either of them grief over their relationship, “Let’s just run away.”, “To where?”, “Hmm. I dunno, maybe Mars?”

So when Eddie has enough of Hawkins, when he does run, and his note is devoid of any reference to their neighboring red planet, it’s crushing.

Steve finds out from Wayne that Eddie and the boys had gone to New York, a two album contract for their band too good of an opportunity to pass up.

He’s jaded and hurt for a long time. Well into Corroded Coffin’s rise to worldwide stardom, and the feeling lasts until a headline in the aisle of the grocery store catches his eye. It screams ‘CORRODED COFFIN’S NORTH AMERICAN TOUR CUT SHORT.”, but there are more: “Frontman Eddie Munson checks in”, and “Eddie Munson: More substance than substance?”.

He and Robin are in Chicago now, running a small bookstore/coffee shop, and Jeff gets in contact with him.

“He’s okay, he’s already doing better. I figured you’d want to know.”

Jeff says it’d been getting worse and worse until Chrissy (who had long been the Robin to Eddie’s Steve, and who’s now his manager) had had enough and sent him off to get help. “He’ll be back sooner than later, I’m sure.”

The next anyone besides Chrissy hears from Eddie, it’s on the radio. A new song from Corroded Coffin’s Eddie Munson that’s nothing like anyone had ever heard from him. 

Steve hears it first when he’s preparing to open one day, that’s part of the reason why it comes as such a surprise. He has never tuned the shop radio to anything other than the mainstream channels, not wanting this exact thing to happen and hear the voice of the man that broke his heart to pieces.

“Up next, a change of pace from the currently still elusive Eddie Munson of Corroded Coffin fame,” the announcer says as the song starts in behind him. Steve freezes at the name. “You heard of this guy? He and that band of his had been making waves in the metal scene for years now; and he’s reportedly been checked out of rehab for a couple months without anyone hearing anything from him. Until now.”

The song starts for real now, the acoustic fading into the background as a voice so unmistakably Eddie, his real southern twang leftover from growing up in Tennessee shining through, breaks through it.

Steve’s so floored at hearing his voice again, that he doesn’t really register the lyrics until Eddie croons out “What if I run away to Mars?”

“Mars.” Steve breathes out.

Eddie is singing about Mars.

Steve had always assumed he was forgotten. That after the years of fame and years without him, that the memories Eddie had of him would be locked away just as tight as Steve’s of Eddie were.

He can’t even continue to think about it because Eddie keeps going, “Would you find me in the stars? Would you miss me in the end, if I run out of oxygen?”

Eddie’s singing on his own, it’s just him and his guitar and his own backup vocals and he sounds so horribly sad.

Eddie’s not okay. Eddie’s not okay! Where is he? Where did he go after getting out of rehab?

Steve whips his phone out of his pocket, leaning heavily on the front counter now for support, and searches frantically for Chrissy’s number.

He’s hoping she hadn’t changed it when Eddie’s voice comes back in over his guitar, “I can't tell which way is home, I've been gone for so long..It's an empty world up here“

Steve freezes again.

He listens to the entire rest of the song there. Phone in hand, thumb hovering over the call button, and heart however many miles away to where Eddie is.

“Three, two, one, I miss you..I'm sorry I got issues” Eddie sings.

Steve finds himself thinking ‘I miss you too’ and ‘It’s okay.’

Eventually, the song ends with Eddie’s voice only. No backup instrumentals, only his voice crooning harmonically with himself 

“Would you miss me in the end if I run out of oxygen? When I run away to Mars..”

He presses the button.

“Steve,” She says in a surprised greeting, “Hi!”

“Where is he?”

star divider is from @saradika

short little part 2 here! | also on AO3

[frankenstein-ate-my-left-shoe]

part 2 to this little piece of brainrot 🤍

pairing: steddie | word count: 1,017 | rated: T

Being this far out from civilization isn’t all that bad, actually, now that he’s used to it.

It was one of the meager handful of places Chrissy suggested he go once he was out. It was here, to his winter home on St. John, or back to Wayne’s.

He didn’t want to go anywhere people already knew him, least of all back to his uncle. Nothing against Wayne, of course, but Eddie didn’t think it fair to show up on the now much older man’s doorstep as even more of a disappointment than when he’d shown back up the first time he didn’t graduate high school. The second time. The time he came back a newly-pardoned murderer (it's a long story).

Wayne didn’t need that from him again. 

He called, of course, damn near twice a day actually, Wayne insisting he make the trip up north and Eddie always shooting him down; “I’m fine now, it’s peaceful here.”, “I’m not going to get into any trouble Wayne, I’m just going to focus on writing, get better, y’know?.”, “Wayne, your truck won’t make it…No, I’m not gonna send a car down for you.. There isn’t even a bus station close by!”

Eventually, he stopped bugging about it, and their calls mostly focused on how to take care of the little place.

It was left to Chrissy by her own Uncle, a rugged geezer named Fritz, and she and Gareth would vacation to the tiny bungalow in the woods of Michigan’s upper peninsula regularly.

It’s got more amenities than any other random spot out here in the middle of the woods, but it’s still heated by wood stove mainly, and it’s only just recently got running water (he still doesn’t know how Chrissy or Gareth ever survived on outhouse alone) so there’s some household fixes he’s had to do while here that Wayne has helped with.

The water heater is tiny and the shower is even smaller, he’s had to chop wood every day to keep up with the nights that turn sharply cold from a mild fall day, he’s used channel locks more than he’d ever even seen a pair of the things in the first two weeks he’d been here but..it’s really grown on him.

He likes the space to breathe, to think, to exist without anything else happening around him. 

Just him, the pine trees, and maybe a bigfoot or two.

That’s also the downside.

There’s internet here, one of the first things Chrissy shelled out for when she got the place, but it’s not great, so majority of the time Eddie spends in his head. And that can be calming and downright terrifying.

He’s thought about so much in so little time that it eventually would need a place to go, and that place was into a notebook…then onto bars… then into his laptop… eventually, he had a whole-ass song. And nothing to do with it.

He’s Eddie Fucking Munson. What in the hell is he supposed to do with a folks-y singer/songwriter song? He can’t release it under the band, he’s not trying to cause a stir with rumors of a solo career when he just solo-y derailed them from the top of the world…

So he sits on it. 

For months.

He didn’t think that’s where this extended vacation was going, but now, post-song, he already feels lighter.

Don’t get him wrong, he still thinks about the subject of the song nearly 24/7, but it’s without the rocks in his stomach…mostly.

That is until the man himself shows up two weeks to the day after he sent Chrissy the song.

He still doesn’t know why he did; after he sent it, he panicked, thinking the lyrics would make her worry and send someone up here to babysit him.

But she didn’t; she asked him if he was okay, called him actually, wanting to hear his voice for herself she said, and whatever she heard must’ve satisfied her.

Eddie himself knew how distraught he still was, even after getting it all out on recording, but it was significantly lessened.

Now, instead of avoiding the thought of his first (and only, let’s be fully fucking honest here) love, he thinks about what he’s up to, if he’s okay, hurts himself with the imagined scenarios he cooked up for what Steve had done after Eddie left with a shitfuck excuse of a note. It’s like he poured his regrets out through song and his brain is now focused on what he would possibly say to him if he ever saw Steve again.

“I’m sorry.” definitely won’t cut it, “I miss you so fucking much.” just isn’t fair, and “I don’t know what I was thinking.” isn’t the truth. 

He knows what he was doing, he was trying to avoid confrontation. Avoid a goodbye. Avoid the inevitable heart wrenching blow he still caused himself..and probably to Steve too.

But now, staring across the small cleared yard of Fritz’s cabin with an armful of freshly-chopped wood tucked under an arm at what must obviously be a figment of his imagination, his mind completely blanks of any and all possible words.

The high, solid, yet somehow still hollow-sounding noise of the logs hitting each other on their way to the ground doesn’t break his shock (though he thinks belatedly that he should’ve made sure his foot was out of their way).

“Steve.” he hears someone say.

“Eddie,” Steve stares back, as if he can’t believe what he’s seeing either. “I heard your song.”

He has that look on his face, the one that usually preludes a steadying pinch to the bridge of his nose to stave off tears. His hand doesn’t raise though, and Eddie can see the shine of the couple that do escape.

So Chrissy had aired the song after all. He wasn’t sure what she or the guys would want to do with it when he sent it, but if this wasn’t a dream, he’d have to thank her.

“You found me.”

“Yeah sweetheart,” Steve breathes out a laugh, “I found you.”

star divider is from @saradika

i also put this on AO3 in my tumblr things collection!

@releasethexbarakat @t-boyeddie @weirdandabsurd42 @weescottishcrowley @stedumpsterfire @hammity-hammer @extra-transitional @autumncrocusandladybug @steddie-island @finntheehumaneater @sageclipse @zerokrox-blog @goodolefashionedloverboi @stevesbipanic

[frankenstein-ate-my-left-shoe]

i was possessed randomly so you all get this 😈 (i gotta keep my place in the angstflayer somehow lmao)

tw for mentions of death, nothing explicit! just talk of passing on/the afterlife

——————————

It was smoother than he thought it’d be, dying.

Passing on.

The moment of death.

It really was just like falling asleep.

He knew it was time; he was old now (decrepit if you ask his grandkids) but it was something he didn’t even realize he was so ready to welcome. Whatever illness he was saddled with the last couple years already fading out of his memory.

Stepping into his new…life? he’s not sure what to expect.

He floats along for a while. In nothing, being nothing, when suddenly, the nothing in front of him starts to solidify.

Instead of nothing, Dustin Henderson is a young man again. He can see his feet walking across pine needles and leaves. over hard-packed dirt and pebbles.

He knows this path, and starts forward confidently.

Skull Rock comes into view through a break in the branches, looming over him and coated in dappled sunlight.

So, he sits down. Settles in to wait for his friends, hoping they are far behind him, when he’s startled by a noise above him.

First, a leather jacket plops down in front of him, followed closely by worn white reeboks, ripped black jeans, a flash of a white shirt. All still wrapped around someone he lost way to fuckin’ soon.

Dustin’s chest and throat constrict, his eyes burn.

The figure turns, their insane brown curls frizz tossed away from his face when he does.

“Hey butthead.” Eddie Munson smiles at him for the first time in 70 years. “You have my vest.”

Dustin looks down at himself. The worn denim vest in question is, indeed, hung over his shoulders. Fitting just a bit bigger than he last remembered.

He huffs out a chuckle, the tears start to fall down his cheeks. “Thought you might want it, asshole.”

He’s crushed into a hug that lasts an eternity, finally pulling away from Eddie after a good eon or so.

Huffing out another laugh when he does, Dustin wipes the tears off his face and says, “Not that I’m not over the fuckin moon to see you, but is.. is he here?”

Eddie grins at him, “Is who here?”

“Henderson!”

Steve.

Steve’s here.

He’s actually fucking here.

“‘Course he is, little man. Been waitin’ for you, ya know.'' Eddie shakes his shoulders, spinning him around and starts to march him back down the path. “Well,” he feels Eddie shrug behind him, “You AND Robin, of course. She’s just real stubborn about leaving, I think.”

They’ve gone maybe four whole steps, when Steve Harrington breaks through the branches in front of them.

“Dustin!” Steve strides forward, wrapping Dustin up in a hug.

He mumbles everything and nothing into the tears that soak the cap atop his head. A good trade for the already soaked spot at the front of that yellow sweater of his.

“You’re here! I missed you so much! It’s too soon… it’s always too soon, but still! Your kids are all so beautiful, your grandkids too! I’m so so sorry I left before I could meet them, Dusty, I wanted to so badly.”

More and more (mostly repeated “You’re here!”s) until he can’t say anymore and falls silent around him for their own eternity.

“I missed you too, Steve.”