#i need to work on the next chapter of my steddie fic

[thathopelessromantic]

i need to be able to project my thoughts onto a word document so i can write and cross stitch at the same time

[laundrybiscuits]

The first chapter of purify our misfit ways is now up on AO3, encompassing almost all the content posted to tumblr.

I’ve edited and expanded it a bit more heavily than usual, because I wrote a lot of the first draft while exhausted and miserably sipping an overpriced smoothie while killing six hours in my least favorite airport. Still sort of trying to figure out what I’m doing with this fic, so I may go back and edit it further, but I think it’s hit some kind of minimum threshold of acceptability and I basically wanted to overwrite the tumblr draft.

[stevethehairington]

besties i want you all to know that i have been thinking about a steddie aquamarine au for D A Y S now

[xiaq]

I know this is going to mean very little to the majority of y'all, but I closed 4 deals in the last 24 hours putting me well over the Q1 number I needed to get a nice bonus and prompting my boss to say some lovely things to me/to our team about me.

B, Deacon, and I are going to celebrate with a sushi + reading picnic in the park tomorrow. I'm feeling very valued (and tired! lol), but we leave for our honeymoon in 2 weeks and I have promised B that my work laptop will stay at home and after the Q1 I've had, I'm not even feeling that guilty about taking some time off.

(on Sunday I'll try to get the next chapter in my Steddie fic finished! If you've been waiting for that, thanks for your patience.)

[superblysubpar]

Happy Sunday Rec night! Maybe this is the week I finally get on top of my shit and catch up on reading and post these every week instead of waiting months to make these long ass ones? Who knows. Tune in next Sunday to find out.

Please reblog and share why you love your favorite writer's work! They can't read your thoughts from a simple like. If you can't reblog or comment, consider sending a sweet anon message in support, it could really make someone's day and it will also encourage your favorite writer(s) to keep writing the work you love!💛

Find previous recs on @superbreblogger my fic rec blog or on my pinned post under "critic's choice"

Happy reading and have a great week!

Steve Harrington

untitled mutual masturbation with AIRWIY Steve by @loveshotzz - smut

untitled facial with Steve by @roanniom - smut

untitled father's day with stobin by @shares-a-vest - fluffy angst

melancholy by @rustedhearts - angst

chocolate by @upsidedownwithsteve - smut

untitled sneaking around with Colors Steve by @loveshotzz - smut

untitled kissing all of Steve's moles and freckles by @hungharrington - fluff

Bad For Business: The Bonus Level by @upsidedownwithsteve- smut

untitled romance books by @cherrychilli - smut

steve's reactions to crisis by @hawkins83 - angst

underwear by @upsidedownwithsteve - smut

birthday by @upsidedownwithsteve - smut

untitled birthday with AIRWIY Steve by @loveshotzz - smut

Wake Up Slow by @carolmunson - fluff

untitled giving steve a hickey by @loveshotzz - smut

Melt With You (Pt 1 to My Name's Elvira) by @loveshotzz - fluff

untitled trying new postition with AIRWIY Steve by @loveshotzz - smut

Love Sucks 1: The Beginning by @upsidedownwithsteve

Love Sucks 2: The Interrogation by @upsidedownwithsteve

surrounded by your embrace by @stevebabey - fluff

Love Sucks 3: The Hunt by @upsidedownwithsteve

Petrichor by @rosewaterandivy - smut

chapter one: ticket to anywhere by @abibliophobiaa - this series will contain angst, fluff, and smut

Hell To Pay - The Prologue: The Warmth of Your Doorway by @rosewaterandivy - this series may contain angst, fluff, smut

anxious to run into you imagine AIRWIY Steve by @carolmunson - fluff

Eddie Munson

Torn: Song 1. Scar Tissue by @sweetsweetjellybean - this series will contain angst, fluff, and smut

untitled checking for ticks by @familyvideostevie - smut

A Need by @courtingchaos - smut

Torn: Song 2. Sour Girl by @sweetsweetjellybean - this series will contain angst, fluff, and smut

untitled birthday smut with whatta man eddie by @loveshotzz - smut

Untitled No. 1 by @courtingchaos - smut

untitled healing with eddie by @carolmunson - angst

early morning snow by @chechelia - fluff

eddie's bed headcanons by @deadboyfriendd - fluff

untitled pregnancy cravings by @chechelia - fluff

Torn: Song 3: Disarm by @sweetsweetjellybean - this series will contain angst, fluff, and smut

eddie guitar pick imagine by @starlightsearches - fluffy smut

untitled sound tech eddie by @carolmunson - fluff

untitled bard!renfaire!eddie iamgine by @carolmunson - fluff

Steddie, Stobin, and Everything Stranger Things:

public by @upsidedownwithsteve - smut (steddie x reader)

kinktober, day 7 - somnophilia by @aphrogeneias - smut (tech steve x reader, but a hint of eddie listening so here she goes)

The V Card by @palmtreesx3 - *this series dives into Steve AND Robin with their friendship as well as chapters focused on their love lives/partners separately - this series will contain angst, fluff, and smut

Aphrodisiac by @palmtreesx3 *see above note

Lubrication by @palmtreesx3 *see above note

untitled emmy was in a mood and we all died by @upsidedownwithsteve - smut (steddie x reader)

Series I'm Currently Reading & Recommend:

Talking In Your Sleep by @abibliophobiaa - ongoing

Orange Colored Sky by @carolmunson - ongoing

Let's Go, Don't Wait by @carolmunson - ongoing

Get Off by @palmtreesx3 - ongoing

My Name's Elvira, But You Can Call Me Tonight - by @loveshotzz - completed

Torn - by @sweetsweetjellybean - ongoing

Right Where You Left Me - by @abibliophobiaa - ongoing

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is:  Pricklywhicket/@messessentialist ! Prickleywhicket has four fics published to AO3 -- All in the Steddie tag!

Our anonymous nominator recommends the following works by pricklywhicket:

so let's sneak in from the cheap seats, honey

it's supposed to be fun (turning twenty-one)

start by pulling him out of the fire

"Sadie is so super talented in the way she describes literally everything. She is so good at writing and it's a shame that she's flown under the radar because she's not the quickest at putting things out there." -- Anonymous

Below the cut, Pricklywhicket answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

Why do any of us write anything? Because we want the story to exist in the world, and it doesn’t yet, so we gotta hike up our pants and do it ourselves!

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

Hurt/Comfort. I’m always a sucker for the blorbos taking care of one another, in whatever form that takes. This has always been true, across a truly astronomical number of fandoms I’ve found myself dabbling in over the years.

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

…actually, probably hurt/comfort! I just need to get those little dudes some validation and unconditional positive regard, okay?

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

I’m sure I won’t be the first one to say this, but: I HAVE TO PICK ONE????? Okay, alright. I can do this. I’m gonna say…Sanctuary by SpicedSage.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

I’ve only written canon or canon-adjacent fic so far, so I’m eager to work on something that’s completely AU. I think there’s a unique challenge to keeping characters recognizable as themselves in a world that might not have all the same contexts that made them into that person.

What is your writing process like?

I would love to say it’s super organized and well-planned, but the truth is it’s mostly about routine and responsibility. I set aside time to do it every day, even if I can only tap out a few sentences. I’m not very strict about writing in a straight line - I can stop a scene if it’s giving me trouble, write a note about what I think happens in some [brackets], and move on to something that I have more fully fleshed-out ideas for. Sometimes writing the next scene helps you know more about what needs to happen in the current one. 

Do you have any writing quirks?

I'm sure my betas would say yes 🙃 I tend to write a lot of dialogue - a lot of my revision process is going back through and realizing I have two pages of a conversation with no indication of what’s physically happening in the world around the speakers.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

Definitely when I’m finished. Prior to my ‘23 bang fic, I had never written anything chaptered. I knew going in that I could NOT start posting if it wasn’t finished, because I’ve been burned too many times by abandoned works. I didn’t want to do that to people reading my fic, and the best way to avoid it is to finish before you post.

Which fic are you most proud of?

Easily start by pulling him out of the fire. The biggest, most ambitious thing I’ve ever attempted - I still kind of can’t believe I wrote 85k.

How did you get the idea for start by pulling him out of the fire?

Like most terrible ideas, it was spawned in a fandom discord chat. We were discussing the tendency of Steddie fics to centralize the party at Steve’s house, because his parents are never there anyway. And then someone mentioned what if the parents came home and found their house occupied, and someone else mentioned Wayne being there, and it just sort of…spiraled out from there.

When writing start by pulling him out of the fire, what was something you didn’t expect?

I had no idea, going in, that I was going to write a comprehensive history of the Wayne and Eddie Munson relationship. I started writing it where I did to give some background on Wayne’s existing distaste for the elder Harrington, and then I just…kept writing. Over the course of a month or two I wrote 20k of WayneAndEddie that I had no idea was in me - it just kept coming.

What inspired it's supposed to be fun (turning twenty-one)?

@wynnyfryd. It was a gift for her birthday. We were talking about our mutual love of Letterkenny, and she mentioned that the episode was her favorite and wouldn’t it be funny if someone wrote… and the rest is history.

What was your favorite part to write from it's supposed to be fun (turning twenty-one)?

I had an unreasonable amount of fun with that one in general. But I think my favorite part was Eddie polling the party about what Steve means to them all. It was fun to sort of put myself in each character’s shoes and think about how they would answer. Plus y’know, any excuse to unironically love on Steve Harrington.

How do/did you feel writing so let's sneak in from the cheap seats, honey?

I believe my exact words upon deciding to write it were “jingles miserably to a blank google doc.” This was a classic case of saying “god I wish there was a fic where—” and having friends tell me that it was now my responsibility to write it. I’m glad I did, though. I love that story, and it proved to me that I could write sex and publish it and not burst into flames. I also just really, really love summer storms. And Wayne’s use of the singular ‘herpe.’

What was the most difficult part of writing so let's sneak in from the cheap seats honey?

Getting over the fear of publishing something E-rated. It was just something I hadn’t done, and I had a lot of anxiety that people were not going to respond well to it. I made three people individually review the sex scenes before I even asked anyone to beta the full fic. Of course I was worried for nothing, the reception for that fic was super lovely and gave me the confidence boost I needed to attempt start by pulling him out of the fire!

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

This is like asking me to pick a favorite child. I’ll say this: most of my favorite lines in start by pulling him out of the fire were taken directly from conversations @wormdebut and I had about the fic. She’s my number one cheerleader and sounding board, and sometimes she’s so goddamn funny that I just have to include it. You have her to thank, for instance, for Steve quite literally dropping his croissant when he first sees Eddie in glasses.

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

I have a couple of irons in the fire, but nothing I’m ready to share just yet! I’ve been taking a breather from writing (blame baldur’s gate 3, okay) but my WIPs are still very much IP. Stay tuned!

Outside of these questions, Is there anything YOU would like to add?

Not that I can think of!

Thank you to our author, Pricklywhicket, and our anonymous nominator! See more of pricklywhicket's works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!

[paperbackribs]

Witch Steve

(working title)

next: Chapter 2: The Aftermath

So 👉👈 You were all so encouraging that I was inspired to write 14 chapters of Witch Steve. This will eventually be going up on Ao3, but while I'm finishing it up and re-editing I'll post the start of it all on Tumblr. Chapter content: steddie to come, platonic stobin, ~2K words.

Edit/Update: This is a 15 chapter fic. Ao3 here.

Chapter 1 The Sacrifice

Robin fiddles with the vodka bottle full of gasoline in her hands, “…in the face of the world ending, the stakes of my love life feel spectacularly low.”

She sighs, stuffing one of their rags into the mouth of the clear glass and completing their next Molotov cocktail. Steve watches the resignation on her face and thinks that if anyone deserves to have a moment of love and joy in the face of the world ending, it’s Robin.

It’s all of them, he reflects, looking out onto the grassy clearing.

The forest of trees behind Lucas and Erica reminds him of where they will be taking their battle to shortly. Vecna waiting in the Upside Down like a venomous spider in his web. Manipulating the troubled emotions and frightening visions of his victims, ready to break them in more than one way for his selfish desires.

Exuberant laughter draws his eyes over Nancy tailoring her weapon to Dustin as he dodges Eddie’s outstretched hands. Fondness rises within Steve like the warmth of rising bread. The fading sun frames the two boys as Eddie speaks earnestly into Dustin’s grinning face, the bond between them obvious even from here.

“Maybe it’s not the time for romance,” he admits, pensive as he watches Eddie tackle Dustin to the ground with a cackle. “But isn't love the most important thing when it is the end of the world.”

Robin knocks her knees amicably against his and he knows that this is her way of saying she loves him. He smiles back at her; he loves her too. He says it silently because he does, more than he can say at this moment. The words heavy and stuck at the back of his throat.

He wishes she could have had her moment with Vickie before they face the coming danger. The fragility of their situation leaves him with a disturbing feeling of unease churning in his gut.

It’s the fear of losing Robin that further feeds into Steve’s increasing sense of foreboding, making his teeth clench and nails dig into his palms. He has to Know, Steve decides; he needs to make sure there is hope for a later where love and romance can be indulged.

In the heart of the quiet afternoon, Steve allows the sounds of the boys roughhousing and Erica’s sharp, but not unkind, words to become muffled. While he relaxes his fists and Robin fades from his sight, Steve unfurls his uncanny gift to see into the murky depths of their futures. He hears a soft, haunting melody reaching out to him through the ethereal and a glimmering sheen covers his vision.

Like a weaver of fate, he gently unravels the white threads of destiny that intertwine around the lives of those he cherishes. Even Eddie, new to the party but just as entrenched in their fight, running scared; yet Steve thinks, just as courageously meeting the more experienced members toe to toe.

And it is only Eddie’s fate that gleams a terrible ox-blood red, a twisted tapestry of the future revealing a grim reality. Steve’s unease deepens as he Sees two roads diverging before Eddie, each leading to vastly different destinies.

One road, he is unsurprised to find, is golden bright and brilliant, full of joy, love, and friendship. This Eddie would be the guiding light for those he loves and who will love him just as fiercely as he holds them to his heart.

Steve swallows over the hard knot in his throat at the thought of all the beauty that is stolen if Eddie loses that path: because the other is shrouded in a terrible darkness.

If Eddie chooses this road, a jagged tear will be torn through the tapestry of too many lives. An unravelling thread that leads to the frayed fabric of its survivors in a way that Steve thinks the self-deprecating Eddie would never suspect.

Aside from family, only one other person knows Steve’s truth. Keeps his secret close to her breast, alongside twin confessions on a bathroom floor. Robin haltingly refusing Steve’s advances to favour Tammy Thompson and Steve blurting out that he comes from a long line of Witches. Taught at his nana’s knee and made to understand that this is something just as private to him as Robin understands her sexuality to be to her.

He watches Dustin’s wide smile, still innocent amongst a grim collection of dark moments, and Knows that this will be a turning point for his young friend. One in which Dustin lives a life spirited and mirthful or another irrecoverable scarred and linked to a critical event of grief and regret. A shiver runs down Steve’s spine and he decides he can’t stand idly by, watching as Eddie teeters on the precipice of these two divergent paths.

Drawing from long lessons of heritage and the power he and his kind hold, Steve decides on a potent action that will allow him to weave a new pattern.

---

Scarlet lightning roars in the darkness behind Eddie and Dustin as the boys wait for Steve, Robin and Nancy to depart and attack Vecna. The trailer behind the boys is tightly wrapped in the sinister vines of the Upside Down and the smell of sulphur rains down with the grey ash that coats the world in a bitter blanket. Steve watches the ghostly flakes drift onto the cloud of Eddie’s bound-back hair, and he knows that this is the moment that he readied for.

Steve reaches out to Eddie with his uncanny gift — a glass sphere, like a marble, is cradled innocently at the centre of his hand. It is as big as an apricot pit and strangely swirls with warm browns and flecks of gold, like the gentle play of sunlight flickering through to a forest floor. Steve holds his open palm out to Eddie, his hazel eyes filled with a heartfelt entreaty.

"Eddie," he asks softly, "take the marble and swallow it. Please, trust me."

Even in the short time that Steve has known Eddie, he gets that the other guy isn’t known for his impulse control. Despite this, he’s still somewhat surprised when Eddie, with no hesitation, takes the marble and swallows it down. Doe-eyed pools of warm brown look up at him through dark bangs.

“I do,” Eddie shrugs with a mysterious smile.

“What was that” Dustin shrieks, the faux military tags he had insisted on wearing jingling in agitation.

Robin stays silent behind him; Steve knows she’s holding her questions for later, having cottoned onto that he was up to something mystical when he’d hidden in the RV for a while. Only clasping his arm briefly in support when he had walked past, sweating and still pale.

Nancy though is just as surprised as Dustin and looks on at them suspiciously.

Eddie knocks an arm lightly into Dustin’s side, “I don’t know, but it tastes like hot chocolate. Warm,” he chuckles softly, “even comforting.” He turns questioning eyes back to Steve, “but, yeah, what was that?”

Steve feels how tight his smile is. “A little insurance.”

He talks to both of them, trying to instil them to obey by the force of his words alone. Knows that Dustin can be a stubborn little shit. “Just… if this goes south, I mean, at all. You abort.” But his focus turns, inevitably, to Eddie. “Don’t be a hero, man. Okay?”

A flash of emotion crosses Eddie’s face too quickly for Steve to understand before he slings an arm around Dustin’s skinny shoulders. “Of course, look at us. We are not heroes.” Under his hoodie and headband, Dustin grimaces in agreement.

The deep feeling of foreboding in his gut is untouched by their reassurance, but Steve doesn’t bother to unravel his Sight again. He’s done what he can and now he follows the girls to battle Vecna and maybe free them all from this nightmare once and for damn good.

As they travel through the dark forest, neither girl notices the small glowing pulse that Steve presses to each of them. The marks fade softly before the other can notice it. Transported by a light brush over Nancy’s tight shoulders and a firm squeeze of Robin’s sweaty hand in his.

The attack against Vecna is fierce but the three of them have never struck more certain or true. Steve with his axe, Robin and her cocktails, and Nancy with the shorn-off shotgun. Their attacks land every time and between their physical assault and Max’s diversion, something must go right because the world shudders once, then twice, but stays steady before Vecna screams harshly and his pale, grotesque body falls broken to floor. His web of terror finally shattered.

The rest of the decrepit house, vines and all, quickly catch from the blazing gasoline and the three stumble after each other, racing to the still-rancid outdoor air. But it’s air free of Vecna and that makes it all the sweeter.

With a whoop, Robin jumps into Steve’s waiting arms and breathlessly he swings her in joy. Resting his forehead on hers, he knows she can see every nuance of his relief, sensing him finally releasing the suffocating fear of the Upside Down. “This is it, Robin. I can feel it.” Steve exclaims.

Robin’s blue eyes, which sometimes can be so cynical for a person this young, gleam in belief. Belief in Steve and that he can See the truth of it all. She wraps her hands around his shoulders and is shaking in a combination of comfort and ebbing adrenalin. “Thank god,” she breathes.

“Let’s hope so,” Nancy interrupts. But she’s looking on at them with a small smile.

Steve knows it will take a long time for her to believe that it is true. And she doesn’t have the benefit of Steve’s Knowing as they do. But she’ll get there, he thinks. Much like it will take them all time to heal, they will. And the kids will bounce back, he thinks with faith. They’ve been made to be too resilient for children their age but he’s grateful for it, nonetheless.

It’s at the thought of Dustin that Steve remembers Eddie and those two paths he had seen; he urges the girls on, back to the uncanny version of the trailer park. Impatience sparking through to his fingertips.

They’ve not quite reached it yet when Steve hears the haunting cries of anguish that echo through the empty forest and roads of the Upside Down.

Dustin is hunched over the still-warm but devastatingly motionless body of his beloved Dungeon Master and friend. Bright red blood spills everywhere, coating Dustin's hands and across his face where he has smeared a hand over his cheeks. Eyes filled with tears and pain, Dustin looks up at Steve and cries out that the older boy had tried to save him.

“He said he didn’t run, Steve. But he did. He did. He ran to the demo-bats and they— they—"

Dustin starts hiccupping between tears and short, frantic breaths. He grabs at Eddie’s camouflage jacket, shaking the body as if it will jolt the older boy awake.

“Eddie!” Dustin cries. His voice, often bigger and louder than his short body would seem, breaks through the empty quiet of the Upside Down. No more swarming bats or jagged bolts of red lightning to distract from the palpable sense of grief saturating into their tired bodies. The only cruel answer is the flakes of ash gathering over Eddie’s unresponsive body like this terrible world is already trying to bury him away.

Steve’s heart is breaking, he feels the crack of it cleanly through his chest and in the thickening at the back of his throat and burning behind his eyes. But he is not powerless; this is exactly what he prepared for.

With a firm, yet gentle hand, Steve unlocks Dustin’s stiff fingers and shifts him into Nancy’s waiting embrace. She tries to turn him in her arms, but Dustin refuses to look away.

Nancy must think that Steve is going to quietly close the lids over Eddie’s blank eyes, which should be bright and expressive; eyes that were full of mischief just hours ago. Or that Steve will try to pick up the body and take it back with them, impossible as it seems in the moment, to think of carrying a heavy and limp weight vertically and against gravity where climbing through the Upside Down gates, with only their own bodies to support them, had been hard enough.

He’s not going to do any of those things, Steve thinks fiercely. He won’t need to.

With an unwavering determination, Steve drops to his knees and pushes his left hand down, through and deep into the realm of the mystical, until he finds an answering beat, a corresponding warmth. He pulls, straining with every ounce of physical and spiritual strength he possesses. A pearlescent light suddenly pushes out from Steve's link to Eddie, it pours unendingly into the dark landscape before pulsing sharply. The ethereal cuts precisely through the unclean atmosphere before rapidly shrinking back into the connection between the two boys.

Steve's own spirit is being drained, a live wire shooting up his arm and threading through every vein of his body in a white, blinding heat. But Steve knows that it is in this critical moment where he could lose his own body and soul, where the world hangs in the balance between life and death, that something miraculous can happen.

And it does.

Eddie draws a shuddering breath and his eyelids flutter open. His chest starts to rise even as his gaze looks unsteadily out into the living world once more.

“Steve?” he whispers hoarsely.

“I’ve got you, Eddie,” Steve murmurs, checking that the wounds are healing under the slick blood. His left arm is numb, but he uses the shaking right to examine Eddie’s torso where jagged gashes are rapidly closing over.

“It’s all right, we’ll get you help, you’re gonna be okay."

“No, Steve, your eyes…” Eddie lifts a shaking finger to touch Steve’s face, leaving a red fingerprint behind to mark Steve with the very essence of his mortal life.

Steve knows what he must see since this has worked. Because reality is not the same as when Eddie had closed his eyes for seemingly the last time. As Eddie returned from the brink of death, Steve now sees the world through one rich hazel eye, while the other will remain forever white and sightless, an eerie testament to the price paid to mend the shattered threads of destiny.

If you liked anything, please consider leaving a comment over on Ao3 :-) It would make my day!

Taglist

My taglist is always open so let me know if you want to be added. Likewise, if you want to be removed let me know too. :) If I've missed you, definitely let me know because it's an accident!

@a-gae-af-racoon

@a-lovely-craziness

@aly-reads-alot

@bookworm0690

@cinnamon-mushroomabomination

@everyrandomthing

@goodolefashionedloverboi

@hallucinatedjosten

@ilikeititspretty

@just-a-tiny-void

@ledleaf

@littlewildflowerkitten

@lostonceandneverfound

@manda-panda-monium

@matchingbatbites

@nburkhardt

@newtstabber

@obliosworld

@oliver-sykes

@probablyscreamingintothevoid

@rajumat

@scoops-stevie

@spectrum-spectre

@tartarusknight

@whackyrach

[rogueddie]

Canon Divergence Steddie Fics

Important: READ THE TAGS! Also, leave a comment and kudos! These fics are amazing and I love them and I hope y'all do too 🧭

save it for a rainy day

Unoriginal_Username

In which Steve Harrington has to walk home in a torrential downpour, and happens to find Eddie Munson without an umbrella.

Words : 5,166 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : General Audiences

AO3 : x

Haunting

AnnetheCatDetective

Steve gets dragged to a haunted house… little does he know he's about to be a whole other kind of haunted.

Words : 8,890 Chapters : 3/3 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

I think I like them too

melonalemonade

Eddie was expecting to feel the sharp knuckles of a hand colliding with his jaw any second but the only thing colliding was a pair of soft lips … with his own.

Words : 2,035 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

off the beaten path

pukner

Post season 3, Steve manages to figure out that he's bisexual, despite his best efforts to repress it, comes out to Robin and Jonathan Byers of all people, and figures himself out. Also, there's a cute guy who might be actually insane running the kids' dnd club and he's got his eye on him. And his bandana.

Too bad Eddie Munson hasn't had a similar revelation. He's still under the impression that he's a straight man obsessing over Steve Harrington for normal, extremely heterosexual reasons.

Words : 34,208 Chapters : 6/6 Rating : Explicit

AO3 : x

you make it feel like christmas

oceanwaves23

Steve somehow ends up celebrating the Christmas of 1985 with Max and Eddie 'the Freak' Munson and it just might be his favorite Christmas yet.

Words : 9,122 Chapters : 3/3 Rating : Mature

AO3 : x

I wave goodbye to the end of beginning

LittleMissKnowItAll

Steve and Eddie properly meet for the first time in the middle of Family Video, somewhere during the summer of '85.

It's the start of a friendship, maybe even the start of something more.

Words : 19,814 Chapters : 2/2 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

kickstart my heart

inspectorabed

Eddie sighs and leans back in his chair. The plastic groans in protest under the weight of him. “You know, what sucks about all of this is that now I have to re-examine my biases. If Steve Harrington is actually, deep down, a decent guy, that means any of those asshole preps might be hiding a secret heart of gold. I mean, who’s next, Jason Carver?”

This makes Ant laugh rather hysterically. Eddie can’t tell if he’s doing it for dramatic effect or if he really thinks Eddie is that funny. “Okay, maybe not,” he concedes. “But you get my point.”

Words : 14,236 Chapters : 2/2 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

it's his party (and i'll fall if i want to)

formosus_iniquis

"Steve?" She nods, but even death couldn't stop him now,

"Harrington? Steve Harrington? King Steve? Steve "the Hair" Harrington? Steve "Big House, No Parents" Harrington? Steve "Sex God" Harrington?"

"I am certain you made at least those last two up. Yes, Steve "Lady Killer" Harrington invited me to his party."

"Are we about to be Carrie'd?"

Words : 25,411 Chapters : 2/2 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

I'm Beginning to Understand, There's No Mystery to This Man

senoritablack

Four times Eddie thinks Steve Harrington’s fucking with him, plus one time he accepts the compliment. Alternatively, the one where Steve’s been blatant since freshman year and Eddie’s really thick.

Words : 5,428 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

don't you know you might find a better place to stay

Anonymous

Eddie works the night shift at Hawkin's local grocery store. Somehow, Steve can't stop coming.

Words : 6,780 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

King Steve Buys Weed

StepfordSnarker

When Steve promises to get Robin high over the weekend, and his usual weed guy goes out of town, he needs to find a replacement. Eddie's grungy, and nerdy, and weird, but he'll have to do.

Words : 4,488 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : Mature

AO3 : x

undue

meglimeg

Steve and Eddie knew each long before Vecna, before Hellfire, before the Upside Down.

Words : 6,301 Chapters : 1/1 Rating : Teen And Up Audiences

AO3 : x

The Enormous Upside to Losing Everything

Stressed_Depressed_Lemonzest

Steve gets his heart broken in two and promptly trips over Eddie Munson. Then that school freak Steve usually wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole offers him weed to forget his troubles.

Words : 35,886 Chapters : 5/5 Rating : Mature

AO3 : x

[acasualcrossfade]

Sink or Swim

Here's my fic for the Steddie Summer Exchange! :D

☀️ @steddiesummerexchange for @writer-in-theory ☀️

Stranger Things | Steddie | Rating: E | Words: 14976

Established Steddie, Scoops Ahoy! Eddie Munson, Lifeguard! Steve, Platonic Stobin, Eddie Munson and the Party

Chapters: 2/2

Read on Ao3

Notes: Thank you to the wonderful @sidekick-hero for your beta work on this! ❤️

Summary: After defeating Vecna, everyone begins to solidify their summer plans. There’s college plans for Nancy and Jonathan, and Robin gets promoted to Store Manager at Family Video. Steve remains wary about their defeat against Vecna, which stunts his own summer plans and future. When he’s urged to apply for the open lifeguarding position, his life and relationship with Eddie fall into place in ways he didn’t imagine.

☀️ Sneak peek below! ☀️

When Steve entered his house after his shift at Family Video with Robin, he noticed the pile of shoes at the door first. Steve slipped off his sneakers and tossed them to the growing pile as Robin’s shoe thunked into the pile. Her purple chucks landed next to Max’s red pair, and Steve placed his sneakers near Dustin’s sandals. His gaze shifted to the black boots in the corner. Eddie was home.

“We made it through another shift, dingus,” she smiled. She still had on her Family Video vest and the new MANAGER pin shone in the evening light. “And I almost forgot it’s Hellfire: P.E. night.” She leaned against the wall to tug off her sneakers. Hellfire: Party Edition was a special campaign between Eddie and the kids and it was the only campaign they ran as one of the Party members as DM. 

“Congrats to us. It feels like time stands still when I’m there,” Steve said dryly. He wondered if she felt as drained as he did. Family Video was the one functional hang-out spot in town, and with its influx of business and need for organization, Keith hired a freckle-face kid who was better at shelving than Steve was. 

In what felt like punishment, Keith banished Steve to the back room to sort old rewinds. Steve was pretty sure they were Keith’s movie collection that he wanted labeled and put in alphabetical order. 

“You could check with Hopper again,” Robin reminded him. “He’s probably got a list of other available jobs. Or knows someone who’s looking for an extra set of hands.”

“I know, I just…I feel like I should find one on my own.” 

Steve trusted Hopper, it still felt odd asking for something he already had. 

Besides, he did inquire about open jobs around town a few weeks ago, and Hopper referred him to the pool to be a lifeguard. The pool was far from his first choice, but the one thing about it was it wasn’t the dusty back room of Family Video. Sitting in the sun sounded better than becoming besties with the dust bunnies. Still, apprehension filled his chest at the thought of being shirtless in front of the people of Hawkins. His back and side were healed from the bat bites, but he was left with scars scattered across his torso, the worst of them at his sides. Most days Steve barely wanted to look at himself in the mirror. 

Keep reading on Ao3!

[dangerous-disposition]

i could be honest, i could be human [Steddie WIP snippet]

THIS FIC IS NOW COMPLETE

Read it on my writing blog @gerrystamour (see pinned post) or on AO3

Here is a snippet of a fic I'm working on that is kind of a "5 times Eddie asks Steve who hurt him + 1 time he actually does something about it" and takes place over the course of the show and into post-S4 territory. When it's done it'll be 6 chapters and will be rated E. Mostly I need eyes that aren't mine to see it.

Steve Harrington did not feel sorry for himself.

Sorry? Absolutely. For himself? No.

He felt sorry for how he treated Nancy, for what he said to Jonathan, how he let Tommy make a mess of the Hawk’s sign. But not for himself, even if he couldn’t blink without wincing and something smarted when he moved his jaw. Even if his knuckles ached and a molar was wiggling a bit too much for his comfort. The way Steve figured it, all together that was roughly only half of what he deserved.

Getting the shit beat out of him for being an idiot wasn’t necessarily unfamiliar to him, though the low-grade agony in his face was.

With a heavy sigh, Steve dipped the rag into the bucket of pink, soapy water and returned to scrubbing the red spray paint off the Hawk’s sign. It was slow-going, and the sun was setting, but he had just a bit of the last letter to clean, and then he would be done. He would be free to go home and figure out his next move.

He didn’t have any more friends, what with his fight with Tommy and Carol, and he was pretty sure he didn’t have a girlfriend anymore. Not after his stunning display of class and conflict resolution.

“Well, well, well,” came a sarcastic, yet excited voice from below. “If it isn’t the King of Hawkins High himself, Steve Harrington.”

Steve groaned, the title bringing a sour taste to his mouth. Some king he supposedly was. He didn’t even recognize the voice, but that didn’t say much; Steve probably wouldn’t recognize the voices of most of the kids he went to school with because he was exactly that sort of asshole.

“Didn’t know you could actually do honest work,” the person continued, and the comment stung a bit, even if it was a fair assumption. “Though is it honest work if you made the mess in the first place?”

“Look man, I get it—” Steve started as he looked down, deliberately angling his face to hide the bruising, and abruptly froze.

Beaming gleefully up at Steve was the Freak. Something-Munson. His first name was escaping Steve, and not for any reason that was good or defensible.

Steve knew him by appearance and reputation alone, and he was pretty sure he could count the facts he knew about him on one hand. He dressed weird, had long hair, listened to shitty music, had an even shittier van, and dealt drugs. He had seen Tommy meet with him before they went to parties enough times to know at least that much. In the end, Steve had almost exclusively only heard him referred to as either the Freak or simply Munson.

“You were saying, Harrington?” Munson urged; his grin was broad but mean.

“What do you want, Munson?” Steve asked instead, returning to his chore.

“Heard from a little birdy that you were reduced to janitorial work. Obviously, I had to see that for myself before I would believe it,” he replied easily, and Steve scoffed.

“You came all the way out here just to watch me clean a sign? I’m honoured,” Steve muttered darkly.

“Don’t flatter yourself. I was already in the neighbourhood,” Munson said, and Steve heard the unmistakable sound of a lighter being flicked. When Steve glanced back down, Munson was leaning against the light post and taking a long drag from a cigarette.

“C’mon, man,” Steve practically whined as he scrubbed the last of the graffiti off the sign. He was done his chore and he really didn’t want to deal with Munson’s smug face when he climbed down and revealed his bruised face. “I know I’ve been a douchebag—”

“Been? You’ve been a douchebag? As in past-tense?” Munson asked with a loud, bitter laugh. Steve could hear the eyeroll in Munson’s voice when he added, “I don’t think you get to decide when you aren’t a douchebag anymore, Harrington.”

Steve was at a loss with that, wracking his brain for a single time he was ever rude or mean to Munson. The thing was, Steve was never deliberately mean to people, his fight earlier with Jonathan notwithstanding; he just didn’t care, or tried to seem like he didn’t, as if he was above caring. For fuck’s sake, Steve couldn’t even remember Munson’s first name.

Tommy and Carol were the mean ones, and he did nothing try to stop them. How many times, unbeknown to Steve, had Tommy harassed Munson and his friends? Or how many times had Steve just tuned it out?

“Fine! I know I am a douchebag, but don’t you think this is kinda childish?” Steve grumbled, crossing his arms over the top of the ladder and dropping his forehead onto them.

“Oh, it definitely is,” Munson agreed happily, and Steve shouted when the whole ladder shook. Munson had kicked it lightly, just enough to rock it but not so much that it actually fell over. “Gonna stay up there forever, Harrington?”

“Not forever,” Steve replied, shrugging. “Just until you get bored and leave.”

“Then you’ll be up there forever,” Munson sing-songed. “C’mon, Harrington. I don’t bite, promise.”

Steve felt his face heat, his chest and stomach fluttering with an emotion he couldn’t place immediately. Shame? Humiliation? He stopped inspecting those thoughts too closely and climbed down.

When Steve was back on solid ground, he turned to face Munson and stood up straight. He was taller than Steve by just a bit, but it was enough that he had to look up slightly to meet his eyes.

“Oh, Harrington,” Munson laughed—no, practically crooned, his eyes wide and bright as he reached up to touch the bruising. “Who did this to you?” he asked, his tone downright giddy.

READ THE COMPLETED FIC ON AO3

[ilovecupcakesandtea]

Chapter two My master list

Title: Chapter one

Word Count: 1356

Archive Warnings: Smut in future chapters. Slight angst. Alcohol misuse.

Rating: E

Pairing(s): Eddie Munson/Steve Harrington Robin Buckley/Chrissy Cunningham

Character(s): Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley, Chrissy Cunningham, Benny, Uncle Wayne & The Party

Tags: Smut. Angst. Steddie. Buckingham. Steve Harrington. Eddie Munson. Robin Buckley. Chrissy Cunningham. Band AU. TW Alcohol use.

Summary (optional): Two different styles of music, two boys that really don't like each other. What could possibly go wrong?

Beta Reader: Thank you so much to my beautiful beta readers @slippy-slip @ladydarklord & @dontwasteyourchances

Art link and credit: Art is by the wonderfully talented @pink-luna-moth (as is the banner)

Fic link and credit: Ao3 Link

AN: First off thank you to Alex for the art and being just amazing to work alongside. Thank you to Slip for dragging me back from the edge so many times over this. I really am so excited to have this out here!!

I wrote this for the @strangerthingsreversebigbang event and had a lot of fun doing so!!

Divider links: reblog and music notes

The scent of gardenia flooding her senses was the first indication that someone was sitting next to her. If she had been more awake she would have realised it was a scent familiar to her – not in a creepy way, as she has to point out to Steve on a regular basis. The smell of gardenia and other floral scents was something that Robin associated with one person, and one person only. Chrissy Cunningham. Robin's long-term crush, the first person she ever really noticed she had a crush on, Chrissy Cunningham, who was actually talking to Robin, who was probably just sitting staring at her.

“Hi, sorry, I didn’t catch anything you said” Robin apologised, holding up her headphones to show why.

“I just asked if I could sit here” Chrissy giggled, pointing at the seat next to Robin. 

“Yeah, yeah, sure, I mean I’m not saving it for anyone obviously, and I can’t stop you from sitting where you want, so yeah the seat’s yours if you want to sit there” Robin rambled, ending with an audible snap of her teeth as she stopped herself from rambling any further. 

“Thanks, I’m a good seat mate, I have snacks” Chrissy grinned, pulling some pretzels and some red vines out of her bag. 

“What are you listening to?” Chrissy asked, nodding towards Robin's headphones. 

“Oh errmm, it's The Clash” Robin smiled sheepishly. 

“I love them! Stumbled across them ages ago and really enjoyed them” Chrissy declared. 

“No way!” Robin exclaimed in reply.

This couldn't be happening. Robin didn't need any more reason to have a crush on this girl. Now she had good taste in music too! 

“Yeah! Not the normal kind of thing I listen to, but there's something about them” Chrissy giggled. 

“Want to listen with me?” Robin asked, offering an earbud towards the other girl. 

All kinds of things ran through her head. Was Chrissy this chatty with everyone? Was she staring at the cheerleader? Did everyone else think it was weird them being sat together? 

“So what else do you listen to?” Chrissy questioned, breaking Robin out of her spiralling thoughts. 

“Oh, I listen to a lot of Ramones, Misfits, The Damned, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, Agnostic Front, The Vandals, Pennywise. Punk mostly, I mean you could probably tell that from the bands” she blushed. “What about you?” 

“A lot of Metallica, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, some Ozzy, Children of Bodom, System of a Down, and Evanescence. Metal mostly, if you couldn't tell” Chrissy winked and then giggled. 

The rest of the journey to the game consisted of eating the pretzels and red vines, Chrissy insisting if Robin didn't eat them with her then she would be sick as she was cheering, and sharing music suggestions via 2 iPods and a shared set of headphones. 

The game was in full swing and Robin knew she should be paying a lot more attention than she was but she couldn't. She was certain Chrissy kept looking back at her, every time Robin caught her eye she got a shy smile back and then Chrissy would look away. 

On the way back home Chrissy sat next to Robin without asking and the girls fell back into their previous conversation regarding music and different genres and any overlaps they have in them. 

“I had fun, we should do it again sometime” Chrissy blushed as they both stepped off the bus back at Hawkins High. 

“Yeah, yeah, me too. Definitely, like I definitely had fun and we should definitely do it again” Robin rambled. 

“Maybe at the movies after school on Monday?” Chrissy asked, clearly nervous. 

“Yes. Absolutely” Robin squeaked. 

“Come along Buckley, I don't want to be here any longer than I have to be!” The sound of Steve Harrington, her best friend and ride home, came from across the parking lot. 

“I'd better go,” Robin laughed. “Bye,” she waved, walking backward before turning round and heading towards Steve, luckily without falling on her ass.

“We don't have to discuss it tonight but I 100% just saved you from a Robin ramble. Everything ok?” Steve asked as soon as Robin was in the car. 

“Yeah, it's ok, thanks for saving me,” Robin smiled.

The next morning, after a long night overthinking everything that Chrissy and Robin herself had said, Robin spoke up.

“So I sat next to Chrissy Cunningham on the way to the game yesterday and we talked about music all the way there. Then she actually chose to sit next to me on the way back and we talked all the way back as well. And then when we got off the bus she said we should do it again sometime. What does that even mean Steve?! Did she have a good time talking to me and so really wants to do it again or was it more of a being polite thing? Plus I think she kept looking at me during the game so yeah, what does it mean?! Oh yeah, and I may have agreed to go to the movies with her after school tomorrow” Robin rambled at a mile a minute to Steve who just stood there with his coffee to his lips waiting for her to finish. 

Taking a sip Steve contemplated his next words. He couldn't give Robin false hope but he had heard rumours about Chrissy and a couple of girls from the cheer squad so maybe Chrissy did want to take Robin on a date. 

“So, Chrissy Cunningham, who's a well-known metalhead, listened to your punk, asked you to the movies and you still don't know if she wants to take you on a date or not,” Steve asked, cocking an eyebrow. 

“Maybe she was just being nice!” Robin exclaimed, throwing her hands up. 

“I’ll talk to her at school tomorrow, ok?” Steve ushered Robin out of the kitchen and they both got ready for the day they had planned.

It wasn’t until between 3rd and 4th period the following day that Steve managed to speak to Chrissy. He caught her pretending to put things in her locker and trying to take sneaky glances at Robin.

“She’s really pretty isn't she?” Steve whispered, sliding up beside Chrissy and pretending to check his bag for something. 

“Yeah, she is” Chrissy replied softly before blushing and looking at Steve wide-eyed, “I didn't mean it like that, just that she’s objectively pretty, nothing else.”  

“Secrets safe with a fellow friend Cunningham” Steve chuckles “Have fun at the movies later,” he said before winking and walking away. 

“I’m telling you now, it's a date. She wants to date you. Sit in those back seats and ignore the movie” Steve laughed as he dodged a soggy chip thrown at him by Robin, as he told her about the interaction he’d had with Chrissy earlier in the day. 

“You know it’s not that simple Stevie, it’s not safe. As far as we know she’s straight and as far as she thinks I’m straight too. I can’t just tell her I'm not. What if it gets out? My parents don’t even know Steve.” Robin sighed. 

“Birdie she was literally looking at you and agreed when I said you’re pretty. I’ve heard the stories about her and the cheer squad as well. Either way, she’s a safe person to tell, I’m certain of it.” Steve reassured, squeezing her arm lovingly. 

“Maybe” Robin responded, smiling at him sadly. 

Steve knew it wasn't as easy as he made out to her. He was destined to explore his sexuality in dark corners and dingy bathrooms, maybe a cheap hotel if he was lucky. But the chances are he would settle down with a wife and a kid or two, maybe he'd tell his wife he too liked men or maybe he wouldn't. But he was certain he would do anything to help his soulmate find her girl. 

“Anyway, what's this about the cheer squad?” Robin asked suddenly, as though her brain had finally caught up to what he'd said. 

“Oh Robin, see if Chrissy will tell you” He smirked back at her before he continued to eat his salad.

[laundrybiscuits]

(come alive in the neon light tag)

He does eventually say some of what he’s been thinking about to Robin, because he can’t not. It feels too much like keeping secrets from her, and they don’t do that. 

But he still doesn’t want to hurt her, so he just ends up blurting out, “I can’t figure out how to date Eddie,” while they’re watching Murder, She Wrote. 

“Isn’t that supposed to be your whole thing?” Robin’s not really paying attention, he can tell. 

“With girls, yeah! But it’s not like I can pull my usual moves on Eddie. How do you date someone without other people knowing?”

“Hm,” she says, tapping her chin. “If Steve Harrington is the only one who knows he’s on a date, is it a date? Very philosophical.”

“I’m serious, Robin!”

She groans into the throw pillow she’s been hugging. “I don’t know, Steve! It’s not like I have any relevant experience!”

“Right, but, how would you do it? If you had a girlfriend?”

“I don’t know! I haven’t thought that far in advance, because at this rate, I’m going to die alone with a hundred cats.”

Steve tips his head back against the couch cushions, staring at the ceiling. “I just didn’t think this was gonna be—I mean, it’s not like I don’t know how to have a girlfriend.”

The throw pillow whacks him in the face. “Steve! Listen to me! Eddie is not going to be your girlfriend, do you understand? You can’t just have, like, a girlfriend-shaped space in your life and put Eddie in it. He’d let you, because he’s as much of an idiot as you are, but it’ll fuck you both up. I’m serious.”

“You think he’d let me?” says Steve. 

Robin just looks at him. 

Steve sighs. “I know it’s not…I know it’s a long shot, okay? It’s just, it’s Eddie. So.”

“So,” Robin echoes. She looks kinda sad, almost. Tired. She's curled up on herself at the end of the couch.

“Sorry I’ve been, uh, talking about this stuff so much,” Steve says. 

Robin leans over to bump his shoulder with hers. “Dingus. You’re in crisis or whatever. Talk about it as much as you want.”

“What? I’m not in crisis.” Steve thinks he would know if he was in crisis. Everything’s going pretty much great for him, actually. 

“Okay, well. Steve,” she says. She’s looking down and picking a little at a hangnail. “Don’t take this the wrong way. But. Now that you know a little more about what this kind of thing involves, like, firsthand…are you sure you want to keep trying to make this happen?”

It’s so close to what he’s been carefully not thinking about that he almost falls in love with her all over again. But—

“Yeah,” he says. His mouth is dry. “I really, really do. It’s. Rob, it’s Eddie.”

“I know,” she sighs.

[katyawriteswhump]

the power of love part 8 (steddie, stobin, steve whump fic)

Steve has a habit of surviving near death experiences then getting sick for no reason. And Eddie and those fatal bat bites? After an impossible feat of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation from Steve, he’s mysteriously fixed. So, Eddie’s back to being banished, this time with Steve and Robin in tow. Eddie’s healing, but Steve isn’t… and life gets even more confusing, when Eddie develops feelings for Steve, which aren’t entirely unrequited.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

(also on AO3 here where it's still in need of love, if anybody is feeling kind *sobs* ;))

Chapter Eight

Eddie POV continued

“You kissed? And now you can’t wake him?” Robin perches beside Steve on the bunk then rounds on Eddie—genuinely baring her teeth. “I shouldn’t leave you alone with him. It’s like you’re cursing him or something.”

“Woah! Are you accusing me of satanist shit now?” Eddie stops pacing the floorboards, claws his hair.

“Steve? Steve! Oh God, please!” She gently pats him, sinks her face into a hand. “Sorry, Eddie. It’s just… totally unexplainable.” She looks up sharply. “That’s exactly what we should be looking for, right?”

“The unexplainable?” Robin nods. “I should be dead. Steve should be bright and breezy—”

“—and it’s not anything to do with the Upside Down.”

Eddie hums uneasily. Should he share the new theory he’s got brewing? “I dunno. It blows to be a cynic, but—"

“Come on, Eddie! There are so many other possible explanations. If the Upside Down is real, who knows what else is? You’re a maestro of the D and D underworld—work with me here.”

They bounce ideas off each other, including that Steve might’ve succumbed to bad beer. Neither of them buy that one.

“Maybe Steve has some sort of regenerative power,” she says, “like Doctor Who. And you’re leeching it out of him, or something.”

Eddie hoots: “It’s my fault again?”

“No! Look, I sometimes get kinda papa grizzly where Steve is concerned, which is odd, because otherwise, I have almost zero protective instinct. We can’t deny the pattern, though—last time you two got mouth to mouth, he performed miracles and then went downhill fast. This time, uh…”

“I slurped the life out of him again?” Eddie sinks down on the opposite bunk. He thinks back to the kiss, which had been so mind-blowingly awesome. Until it wasn’t. Time to test his number one sucks-balls-squared theory of the day.

He slowly peels his shirt—or, rather, Steve’s now extremely grubby t-shirt—off over his head.

“Ew! Save it for the boys, Munson.”

He runs his palm across his midriff, glances over his shoulder, then hurries closer to the window for better light. Holy shit. “I was still covered in scars yesterday. Even earlier today, there was too much pink among the ink. Now there’s diddly-squat.”

 “So, Steve is still healing you?”

Eddie scrunches the shirt and hurls it across the room. “Yeah, and at this rate, my payback’s gonna kill him! We’ve been so fixated on Steve—what if I’m somehow a font of crappy juju? The big bad wolf the whole world believes I am, after all.”

“No.” Robin strokes Steve’s arm. Eddie’s dying to be close to him, too. Shit, he doesn’t dare! “It’s the water. It gives him some kind of power, and he’s passing it on to you. I mean, it doesn’t explain everything, but…”

Eddie retrieves his shirt, grabs her lifeline and clings to it. “It’s as good an explanation as any.”

“Ooooh!” She turns super-excited. “Perhaps there are fairies in Lover’s Lake? Water nymphs? Or aliens landed there! I’m still mightily suspicious about those clouds and the choppers, because—”

“This is getting absurd, Robin.” She sneers at him, shrugs anyhow. “Look, if we buy the lake theory, what can we do about it? It’s not like we can drag him there. We left the car practically in the next county, and he’s too sick.”

“I could fetch water and bring it back here?”

“Given my recent form, I think it’s best for you to stay with him. Eddie the Banished will don his armour and head once more into the breach.”

“Shakespeare? You listened in English Lit?”

Eddie puffs out his chest, conjuring a bravado he so doesn’t feel. “Still gonna be my year, Buckley.”

His armour is chiefly the shelter of the forest, during several hours of tedious trek. He cycles the last part of his journey, pulling his bandana over his face. When he makes radio contact with Dustin, however, his journey feels more than worth it.

Eddie arranges a meet with the Wheelers at Skull Rock. At least, he believes he does. Dustin communicates in one of his more baffling codes. Eddie is blown away, therefore, when he spots his fave lil’ dude approaching their liaison spot. Dustin defiantly wears his Hellfire Club t-shirt, despite everything.

Dustin throws down his crutches. Eddie rushes forward and flings his arms around him.

“Eddie! You son-of-a-bitch! You scared me so much!”

“Yeeeah, I was pretty scared myself.” Eddie hugs him tight, squeezes his eyes tighter. Tears leak anyhow. “But I’m alive and…” He pulls back, drinks up the sight of Dustin, who sniffs and rubs his red face. “God, it’s good to see you.”

Somebody clears their throat. Eddie jumps a good two inches in the air.

“Hey.” Nancy Wheeler stands a few yards off, offering a sheepish wave, which Eddie returns.

It’s not really surprising she’s there. Someone had to give Dustin a ride, and help him limp through the woods. Sitting beneath the rock, the three of them discuss possible explanations for wtf is going on with Steve.

“Okay, let me get my head around this,” she says. “You think Steve derives some sort of regenerative power from Lover’s Lake? And he’s sick? Right now?” She frets her lip. “I should go to him.”

“Uuuuuh, no need. We’re coping all right.” Eddie almost laughs out loud at how badly he doesn’t want her anywhere near Steve. He’d never in his wildest dreams have believed he would go toe-to-toe as a love rival with Nancy Wheeler.

She shakes her head. “There’s gotta be a connection with the Upside Down. This is bad. Really bad.”

“Not necessarily,” says Dustin. “I like Eddie’s hypothesis. There’s no logical reason why all the supernatural shit in this town, let alone this world, is evil.”

“It was Robin’s hypothesis,” admits Eddie.

“Whatever,” says Dustin. “If a bad alternate dimension can bleed into ours, maybe a good dimension can too.”

“I suppose,” said Nancy. Eddie nearly agrees with her, but can’t quite be that gracious. “Either way, if that lake fixes Steve somehow, we need to act quick.”

Nancy heads off to collect lake water. Once she’s gone, Eddie feels able to share his other Steve-related issue: “Didn’t want to divulge this in front of Wheeler, but… Uh, Steve and I got mouth-to-mouth again.”

“You had to perform CPR on him? I had no idea you knew—”

“There’s other reasons that lips meet.” Eddie puckers his lips and crosses his eyes, totally silly. 

Dustin stares at him, his mouth hanging open. “Oh!”

“Yeah. Theeeeen… he basically passed out.”

“Whut?”

“Look, don’t ask me to explain it! I mean, I like him. I really like him. Equally implausible, I think he likes me, but…” Aargh! His feelings for Steve are more tortuous than pleasurable right now. What’s more, the distance between them makes armouring his heart a teeny-weeny bit easier. 

“But?” Dustin bobs up and down on his butt.

“If I’m making him sicker, I should make myself scarce. I still wonder if I’m the bad apple here. Flayed… or whatever. It would neatly continue the sordid tale that is my life. Plus, if Hopper’s back, I bet he can get Steve off the hook for aiding and abetting, or whatever. Steve can go home, get the help he needs.”

“Hopper’s got his own problems, dude.” Dustin scratches his head beneath his baseball cap, kinda nervy. “There’s this army colonel in town, O’Sullivan, who’s pretty much Vecna levels of evil. He knows about Brenner and Hawkins Lab, and… Long story, cut short. He’s out to kill Eleven.”

“You gotta be shitting me!”

“That was my line when I found out. Hopper and El are hiding out, waiting for a safe opportunity to get outta Dodge. The band of the banished gets bigger every day.”

“Well, this exile should return to being a solo act. Steve and I absolutely would not work in the real world.”

“Huh?” Dustin wrinkles his nose. “You’re different—that’s what makes it fun. Even Suzie and I don’t like all the same music, for example. She’s got a real downer on Debbie Gibson.”

“Then maybe I should date Suzie,” mumbles Eddie, avoiding Dustin’s scrutiny. “In reality, Steve and I are from different planets. I’ve seen his house—his folks are loaded.”

“You can’t hold Steve’s parents against him. They’re literally never there for him. His Dad travels tons, and they stopped taking him with him when he was, like, eleven, because…” Dustin’s jaw drops again.

“Because what?” prompts Eddie. 

“Steve stopped travelling with his parents because he started getting sick every time.”

“So, he got travel sick. So do tons of kids. So what?”

“I honestly don’t know! But it supports your theories concerning his proximity to the lake. Sort of.” Dustin whacks his cap against the rock. “Jesus-mother-effing-son-of-a-bitch! I am literally dying to return to a world where I can trust the laws of science.”

Steve POV

1979

Getting himself up in the morning, getting himself to the school bus-stop alone—that only sucked.

It was the emptiness of the night that freaked him out.

Steve stayed up too late, of course he did. He was nearly twelve years old, with nobody to tell him what to do. He ate sweets and watched grown-up television, which got boring pretty fast. When he finally plucked up the courage to go to bed, he’d huddle under the covers, muffling his ears. It never drowned out that horrible, screaming quiet.

Who knew silence could be so loud?

He missed his mom, and it hurt, too. Knowing she chose to leave him behind. 

He’d hated travelling, because in the last year, he’d always got ill. Like, not just travel sick, but fevers and chills and headaches and stomach cramps, always “ruining” his father’s trips. 

Inevitably, his dad decreed that he must stay behind, and the first couple of times, his mom stayed home with him. Then she’d told him his father needed her more. What did that even mean? Steve really, really needed her, simply to be there. Somewhere in the house.

She wasn’t. 

The hours would stretch on, while he was too scared to close his eyes, until…

The monsters barged out of the closet, rioting through his nightmares. Then THEY arrived, with their smooth, smiling face and whirlpool eyes. That wordlessly singing voice, trickling through the waters, reassuring him everything would be all right…

In the morning, shuffling to the bus-stop, he remembered them. Clearer than the monsters, even. Oh man, he could be so childish and unhip sometimes.

“Steve? Steve! Please wake up! You’ve been asleep for hours.”

A groan escapes him, and then: “Momma?” Somehow, he knows it’s not her. “Dad?”

He opens his eyes. 

Oh shit. 

No, that’s not where his life is now. He’s sure as hell not eleven-years-old! Robin looks faintly amused, and also like she wants to thump him: “Gonna give you a pass on that this once, Steve, then go bleach my brain.”

Part 9

...

tags: @estrellami-1 @kal-ology (thank you, thank you, thank you!) If anybody else would like to be tagged on this fic or any of my writing, please let me know :) Reblogs, comments and likes also very much appreciated :) Thank you for reading so far :)

(also part of my steve whump fic series on AO3)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 10 Part 11

[just-my-latest-hyperfixation]

WIP Weekend

Weekly WIP update

I've mainly been focussing on my Steddie Big Bang fic this week, wrapping up chapter 2 and re-reading what I have so far. I've been suffering from bitchy brain syndrome all week with regard to this project, thinking everything I wrote was crap, but I guess that's mainly due to being unable to share my ideas. Revising what I've already written has actually helped a little, because I do quite like how it's coming together. I'll prepare my summary and excerpt next, then go back to working on chapter 3 of The King's Gift.

8 out of 29 prompts from my 1k follower celebration are filled, with a new one hopefully dropping over the weekend.

Send me an emoji and I'll write and share three sentences from that project. (Steddie Big Bang snippets will be blurred, as I'm not allowed to disclose anything yet.)

🏰The King's Gift

❓Steddie Big Bang fic 2024

🥳1k follower celebration ficlets

Snippet from 🥳

(CW nudity, explicit sexual content)

Eddie thought he knew what pain was. 

He was chomped on by a flock of feral demon bats while fully conscious. He wouldn’t wish that experience on his worst enemy, and trust him, he has a lot of enemies, what with half the town still convinced he’s a devil-worshiping, cheerleader-murdering psychopath. 

Eddie also thought he knew humiliation. 

Hell, he needed help peeing in those first few weeks in the hospital. His dick has been touched by more people than he is comfortable admitting - and isn’t that something for a chronically bitchless, triple-senior D&D nerd?

Point is, if anyone had asked before today, Eddie would’ve boldly claimed there was nothing in the pain and humiliation department strong enough to make him even bat an eyelash. 

Turns out he was wrong. 

“Fuuuck,” he whines, hands white-knuckling the bedsheets. His head, heavy from craning his neck, thuds back into the pillow. “What the hell is taking so long? Take it off, take it off, take it-” 

“I’m trying, okay?” Steve snaps. He has stopped laughing, which … okay, Eddie appreciates he’s taking this seriously, but he absolutely does not like that brow furrow. That's Steve Harrington's trademark ‘we're royally fucked but I'm gonna keep it together to not freak anyone out’ brow furrow. “The damn knot won't come loose.” 

He tugs at said knot as if to demonstrate, and Eddie almost jerks off the bed as a jolt of pain zaps from the base of his cock all the way up his spine. 

“Jesus fuck, be careful!” he barks, but Steve stays unimpressed. 

“Hold still,” he scolds, voice deep and stern. One large hand grips Eddie’s knee and pushes his thighs further apart. It's very close to how Eddie envisioned this going, and his cock gives a treacherous little twitch. “Don't know why you thought this was a good idea.” 

“I told you,” Eddie hisses through another bout of pain. “It was supposed to be a surprise. I wanted to do something special for our anniversary.” 

Steve gives him a look. 

“So you put a bow around your dick.”

[steviewashere]

If you followed me from my Indulgence and Discovery fic on AO3, I'd like to let you know there is a new chapter up!

It's not an entirely kinky chapter, all things considered with previous chapters, but it's my offering for taking a like five month hiatus from that fic. So, apologies if it isn't everything you're hoping it would be, but it's what I feel comfortable with at the moment with getting back into the swing of things.

There's a snippet below the cut. This is a weight gain kink steddie fic, so if you are not into that or are not intrigued by it—don't read. If you read it and end up not liking it, keep that to yourself because I genuinely don't care about negative opinions. <3

🔞MINORS DNI (I FUCKING FORGOT THIS BETTER LATE THAN NEVER)🔞

SNIPPET:

——— “Open your eyes for me, sweet thing.” He does, looking into Eddie’s deep eyes. Glazed. Dilated pupils. Loving. “Got you a Coke. Gonna give it to you, but you gotta keep your head raised for me, alright? I’ll keep my hand under your head, but I don’t want you to fall back and choke.”

“Okay,” Steve whispers, “I trust you.”

Eddie smiles, no teeth, but it’s beautiful and shiny all the same. “I know you do, baby boy. Open up for me, Stevie. Let me quench you.”

He parts his lips, just enough that the cold metal edge of the can rests on his bottom lip. And at the first careful tip back, he takes a steady sip. It’s lukewarm, but still that same sweetness he’s used to. The Coke is bubbling in his mouth, carbonation working down his throat. Cheeks puffing with the pull of his soda. Then, Eddie brings it away. Without words, they exchange the soda back and forth. Sip and then he breathes and Eddie brings it back, sip and breathe and back, sip and—

It’s already gone after a couple minutes. His belly tight and warm, sloshing with the soda.

He breaks away from the can with a gasp, eyes glazed and blurry as he looks to Eddie. Cock spilling pre-come onto his underbelly. He’s tender and warm. Lax and comfortable. “Good job,” Eddie praises, “you’re doing so good. Listening to me. Taking what I give to you. What do you need next?”

“Kiss?” He softly requests, puppy eyes pleading. Eddie obliges him, dipping in slow and gentle. His lips move tenderly against Steve’s, tongue licking at the salty grease from his lips, tasting the soda remnants still inside his mouth. And Steve tastes back, the bit of sugary donut still stuck between Eddie’s teeth, his morning breath, a cup of coffee he must’ve had while he readied the food. Sappily, Steve thinks Eddie tastes like home. Like comfort.

———

[steddieunderdogfics]

This week’s writer spotlight feature is:  @stevestark ! With fourteen Stranger Things fics and twelve in the Steve/Eddie tag, their charming works make waves in the fandom!

Our anonymous nominator recommends the following works by @stevestark:

they told me all of my cages were mental (so I got wasted like all my potential)

i think your house is haunted (your dad is always mad)

i was hitting my marks ('cause i can do it with a broken heart)

Eddie and Robin's Very Real Heterosexual Adventure

it’s hard to be at a party when I feel like an open wound (it’s hard to be anywhere these days when all I want is you)

Whether their fics are under 5k or over 10k, their world-building is so good! they have a way of making our boys feel so natural and the progression of the relationship always feels realistic. they were one of my favorites back in 2022 when s4 dropped, and they've made a sudden return to the fandom this year with new stories that are just as good if not better than what they had written back then! I'm always so excited to see they've posted something new, no matter if it's a new chapter or a whole new story. -- anonymous

Below the cut,  @stevestark answered some questions about their writing process and some of their recommended work!

Why do you write Steddie?

After watching ST4 Vol. 1 I was obsessed. Steve Harrington was one of literally two characters I loved from the very first time I “met” them (the other being Jim Hopper, which is why he tends to feature heavily in my works as the resident Dad) but I had never really been into any ships for him up to that point. The immediate chemistry he had with Eddie Munson though? Woof. I knew I had to write them, and it honestly was like I blinked and had suddenly churned out multiple fics. I stopped writing in general around the end of 2022, but when I got fired from my job in April, I got bored and reread my own works, which drew me right back in, especially because I had already written about 10,000 words of they told me all of my cages were mental (so I got wasted like all my potential) but had yet to finish it. I wanted to read the ending so badly myself that I simply picked it back up, and then next thing I knew I was writing more and more.

What’s your favorite trope to READ?

There’s so many. I’m always a sucker for some good old fashioned Hurt/Comfort or Angst With a Happy Ending, but I think my all time favorite has to be Enemies to Friends to Lovers.

What’s your favorite trope to WRITE?

Definitely Angst With a Happy Ending. I don’t think I really know how to write anything that’s just straight fluff or even straight smut. There has to be some angst in there, and I’m not really one for an unhappy ending. I’ll maybe do ambiguous, but I was raised on Nora Ephron and Nancy Meyers ⸺ we’re happy ending girlies.

What’s your favorite Steddie fic?

The One In Which A Time Loop Is Fucking Exhasuting. by badpancake on AO3. I think about that shit daily. Every part of it is absolute perfection, and I'm in love with it.

Is there a trope you’re excited to explore in a future work but haven’t yet?

Fittingly with the last question, time travel! I have a title for a time travel fix-it already, I just need to let it ferment a little in my mind so I can figure out how to do it in a way that feels at least somewhat unique.

What is your writing process like?

Step 1: Put Taylor Swift’s folklore on repeat. Step 2: Open GDoc. Step 3: Stare at GDoc. Step 4: Start writing the first thing that pops into my head and hope it comes out coherent in the end. Step 5: Publish and then immediately reread my work after it’s already live, and pray I only find minor mistakes that I can quickly fix before anyone else reads the fic and spots them.

Do you have any writing quirks?

I always have the title before I even know what the fic will be! 99% of my fic titles are Taylor Swift lyrics, and it’s usually a process of me hearing a specific phrase and thinking “This is so Steddie coded.” After that, I begin the above process, and hope I do the lyrics justice, because I tend to choose the ones that are the most poetic to me personally.

Do you prefer posting when you’ve finished writing or on a schedule?

Definitely when I finish writing. I’ve tried holding myself to a schedule before with multichaptered fic in other fandoms, and it just never works out the way I want it to. I actually have an ongoing Steddie WIP that I haven’t touched since April, because I’m waiting for the next chapter to come to me fully before I start writing it, and I do kind of regret posting it as a WIP in the first place. I feel much more accomplished when I can just push the whole work out at once, i.e. my season 2 rewrite where Eleven is found and taken in by Eddie and Wayne, which I had debated posting as a multichaptered fic as I wrote chunks of it at a time. I talked myself out of it though, and despite the fact that it took me weeks to finish, once I got there it was so satisfying to hit that publish button.

Which fic are you most proud of?

Definitely i was hitting my marks ('cause i can do it with a broken heart). There’s a whole entire 58 track playlist to go along with it that I carefully researched and curated before writing even a single word of the story, broken down into specifically themed mixtapes in a GDoc; it's linked at the end of the fic, with a breakdown of which mixtape each set of songs belongs to, and it is my absolute pride and joy.

How did you get the idea for they told me all of my cages were mental (so I got wasted like all my potential)?

I had a passing thought one day about the fact that Steve seemed to just tangentially know who Eddie was by the time we met him in canon, and wondered what it would be like if he had actually sort of known him, and what that would look like. Then I thought about the legend of King Steve, and the fact that he probably did know Eddie, if only as a dealer, and the whole thing sort of wrote itself after that.

When writing they told me all of my cages were mental (so I got wasted like all my potential), what was something you didn’t expect?

Definitely how long it ended up being! The plot was truly just a passing thought, and I honestly believed I would write little vignettes of the two of them getting to know each other at parties over the years, but what actually transpired was some deep character work and a true slow-build to anything substantial between Steve and Eddie.

What inspired i think your house is haunted (your dad is always mad)?

Honestly the title itself! Sometimes, when I pick a Taylor Swift lyric and decide it would be a pretty fic title, that’s where the inspiration ends. With this one, I thought about the fanon (and somewhat canon) belief that Steve’s parents are assholes who don’t really love their son, and even though I’ve known the lyrics to folklore backwards and forwards since the album dropped in 2020, for some reason that line hit extra hard in April of this year, and all I could think about was how badly Steve Harrington wants to be loved and wanted, and I just started writing and didn’t stop until I was satisfied.

What was your favorite part to write from Eddie and Robin's Very Real Heterosexual Adventure?

The entire thing. I’m not just saying that, either. Sometimes, such a good idea falls into my lap that I actually do a proper outline, and with this one, I fully had little sketches going on and everything. I meticulously planned every date they would go on, and I knew exactly how it would end. Though, if I had to isolate any single part that was the most fun to write, it would be the last few lines. Just pure chaos. It makes me laugh every time.

How do/did you feel writing i was hitting my marks ('cause i can do it with a broken heart)?

That was one of my favorites to write, and it flowed out so easily; I had just finished rewatching all of ST, start to finish, for the first time since right before ST4 Vol. 1 dropped. And the only thing I could think about after finishing was that even though it made sense for Max to be cursed, it would have made infinitely more sense for it to be Steve. All we ever see in canon of Steve Harrington is his insecurity and feeling that he’s never enough for anyone; season 1, he thinks Nancy is cheating on him with Jonathan, and they try to keep him out of the Upside Down stuff. Season 2, Nancy actually leaves him for Jonathan, and tells him that he ⸺ and his love, and loving him ⸺ is bullshit. Season 3 is literally the story of how King Steve became a nobody who never wins a fight and falls in love with people who will never love him back. Even season 4 ⸺ when Dustin comes rushing into Family Video to try to track down Eddie somehow? Steve’s immediate reaction is “Oh, your new best friend Eddie who you think is cooler than me because he plays your nerdy game.” He’s never not a mess of insecurity and self-loathing, and nobody around him ever really does anything to rectify that feeling for him, so he’d be perfect Vecna bait. And the whole thing started with the playlist, really, because I had this idea that Steve is a vibes guy for music, rather than a style or genre guy, and then it was just a matter of writing around the mixtapes I’d mapped out. Which, naturally, led to breaking my own goddamn heart writing what I think it feels like inside his head, because I was  ⸺ and still very much am ⸺ that person in the friend group. Never the first pick, always an afterthought, the one people always think is fine but never bother to actually check if they are. So, I guess, it felt cathartic to get it all out somehow, but it was also just so deeply sad, because that feeling never really goes away completely, and I hated doing that to Steve.

What was the most difficult part of writing it’s hard to be at a party when I feel like an open wound (it’s hard to be anywhere these days when all I want is you)?

Probably just the physical aspect of shotgunning, honestly, and also trying to accurately describe the high. Weed doesn’t do anything for me mentally, and I don’t like what it does for me physically ⸺ to the point that I actually wonder if I have a mild allergy to it ⸺ so it’s not really something I can pull from personal experience in regards to describing it, which made it more difficult than I was prepared for.

Do you have a favorite scene and/or line from any of your fics?

Definitely the opening bit of there’s something about you in the moonlight (but your eyes go so well with the day). Both the Eddie intro and the Steve intro. It was just so fun to tap into that feeling of being a kid and getting hit with the lightning bolt of why people have crushes, but I especially have a lot of love and fondness for the way I described Steve’s desire to find his perfect match, and how it’s not rooted in sex like people thought of King Steve, but in his desire to find someone he’d have fun with forever.

Do you have any upcoming projects or fics you’d like to share/promote?

I’m currently working on a multichaptered fic where Eddie lives, but leaves Hawkins the very night he’s released from the hospital without telling anyone; he does stay in contact though, and he and Steve end up falling in love through letters and phone calls, until, eventually, Eddie realizes that he ran away from the one thing that made him feel the most alive. At last edit, which was yesterday, it’s at 15 chapters and 18,000 words, and I’ve only just gotten to the point where Eddie and Steve are playing phone-tag. Also, if anyone is interested in a non-Steddie but still relatively Eddie-centric fic, I rewrote the entire season 2 canon in are we out of the woods? (are we in the clear yet?) and I am currently working on a season 3 rewrite, which will be followed by a season 4 rewrite, wherein Steddie will become canon. It’s definitely for the long-haulers, but I think it’ll be worth it. Actually, despite being non-shippy so far, it’s probably my favorite thing I’ve ever written. There’s just something about Wayne Munson as the world’s best dad that does it for me, and, as we’ve seen in canon, Eddie is surprisingly really good with kids. I like to think that he’d have been an excellent brother, and I got to explore that with him and Wayne deciding Eleven was theirs.

Thank you to our author, @stevestark, and our nominator! See more of @stevestark works featured on our page throughout the day!

Writer’s Spotlight is every Wednesday! Want to nominate an author? You can nominate them here!