#hosted by the steddie big bang of course!

[cldhead]

delayed piece for @disjointed-art for a first date themed steddie art exchange!

[kofi]

[abstractnaturaldisaster]

Turn the Record on and Wonder What Went Wrong (Preview)

Steve and Eddie circled each other after the final battle with Vecna. Steve was confronting a part of himself he had packed away so far in the back of his mind he’d never intended to revisit. Eddie was grappling with the fact that Steve had at best ignored him and his friends in high school and at worst cheered as the other jocks played hunt the freak with Eddie and his Hellfire cohort. Nancy breaking up with Jonathon didn’t help Eddie’s confidence in his new friendship with Steve either. Everything felt so fragile. Every touch felt like it was a statement of intent and neither Steve nor Eddie were quite ready to figure out what that meant. Eddie put his pent up energy into his music, churning out new songs for Corroded Coffin to try out during their upgraded Friday night gig at the Hideout. Turned out that being wanted for murder really upped your metal street cred.

Steve still worked at Family Video with Robin while they were both figuring out what their futures would look like. Nancy had surprisingly stayed in Hawkins after the final battle because she was able to get a differed start date from Emerson. The “earthquake” in Hawkins had made national news and Emerson seemed particularly understanding of Nancy’s request. Steve wondered if Dr. Owens and the feds had something to do with it. Nancy fit into Steve and Robin’s friendship with unexpected ease and the three of them often passed the long summer days at Steve’s house enjoying the AC Steve’s parents still paid for out of guilt they had left their only son to deal with the fall out of the Hawkins disaster alone. They would listen to old records Steve’s parents had left at the suburban mansion and put on aggressive false mid-atlantic accents while pretending to host fancy shindigs for important clients. Eddie and the rest of the party would join them often but no one else had slotted into Steve and Robin’s codependency as easily as Nancy. 

It wasn’t that Eddie didn’t like hanging out with Steve and Robin and Nancy, it was that the Steve and Nancy of it all made Eddie’s skin itch. He didn’t know how to explain it without breaking the delicate tension between him and Steve. Eddie wrote about it instead. He wrote songs about boys with brown eyes and NPCs that were always just a little aloof and above whatever adventure the party was on. Thankfully the Corroded Coffin boys didn’t call him on any of it and let him work through the Steve Harrington problem via power chords and ballads. At some point, Eddie had written enough songs that the band was ready to send out a demo to labels to see if they caught any interest. On a whim, Eddie threw one of his ballads onto the end of the album. A song about a boy who was just out of reach.

Everything was everything But baby it's the last show Everything could be everything But it's time to say goodbye so Get your last fix, and your last hit Grab your old girl with her new tricks Honey, yeah, it's no surprise That I got lost in your brown eyes

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Spoilers for the fic ahead!!

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So I should absolutely be working on my big bang story but this idea came to me and I had to start it. I was listening to You and I by Lady Gaga and I had this sudden vision of Steve buying the Hideout. I also thought about Eddie making it big and coming back to Hawkins for Wayne’s wedding to Claudia (I low key ship this so hard). Of course Steve would be hosting the wedding at the Hideout. So then I was thinking about other Lady Gaga songs that were Steddie-coded and Brown Eyes seemed like such an obvious one. I also might use this story to write some background Will / Gareth because I am becoming invested in that pairing, lol. Please sound off in the comments about what you’d like to see in this universe!