#oh yeah they’re on Weather Top but no sentence of me mentioning that worked bc my languages were misbehaving

[flowercrowngods]

The grass is warm and soft beneath him as Steve gazes up at the stars shining down on him in those constellations he knows so well. It’s a crisp and clear night, a light breeze chasing away the last remnants of the midsummer heat, and Steve is smiling up at the moonless sky. Beside him, Eddie has his eyes closed and Steve is pretty sure he’s asleep, but Steve has never minded being alone with the stars.

They know him. They know all his secrets. 

They know how he longs to reach for Eddie’s hand where it’s lying between them, palm up and so very inviting. They know of his yearning heartbeat and how it is reduced to flutters when Eddie is around with that beaming smile of his. 

The stars know Steve Harrington better than he knows even himself, but they keep it a secret among the universe, shared only on moonless, cloudless nights. Like this one, with Eddie here beside him. 

“Did you know you always smile when you see the stars?” 

Eddie’s voice is too soft to really startle him, but Steve's heartbeat picks up anyway. He couldn’t fight the smile even if he tried. 

“Do I?” 

Eddie nods, the grass rustling beneath his head, and Steve looks over to see Eddie’s eyes still closed. It’s what makes him keep looking. The stars won’t tell.

“Yeah,” he breathes and Steve’s eyes fall down to his lips. “Makes me think like you’re in on some cosmic secret sometimes, Stevie. You one of them?” 

“One of what?” Steve whispers back, his hand inching closer to Eddie’s. Not to touch. Just to make sure that in another universe, another Steve will take that hand. 

Eddie smiles as if he knows, as if he feels that other universe inside his chest, but he doesn’t reach out. “The stars. A fallen one, maybe.”

Steve huffs out a breath and tears his eyes away from Eddie to look back up again. “I’m not a fallen star, Eddie.” 

“Hmm,” he hums, and Steve wants to wrap himself up in it. Curl on his side and rest his head on Eddie’s chest, ask him to hum for the rest of their lives, or so long as the stars will cover them. “Tell me about the stars, then? And why they make you smile.” 

Steve swallows and searches the sky for answers. He could. He shouldn’t, maybe. But he wants to. Right now, with Eddie’s eyes closed, their hands almost touching, their smiles refusing to leave, and the stars above them glowing and twinkling so kindly, Steve wants to tell him. 

This is it.

But if he closes his eyes, this can be just like any other night Steve has spent telling the stars about him. Only this time, Eddie is here to listen. 

“It’s because they know,” he whispers, heart beating in his throat now, choking off the words.

“They know?” Eddie prompts after a while, just as quiet, just as trembling. 

And now Steve reaches out with his pinkie and hooks it over Eddie’s pointer and middle fingers. “They know,” he repeats. “About you.” 

Slowly, achingly slowly, Steve caresses Eddie’s fingers with his own until their hands lie on top of each other, slotting together perfectly. He hears a hitched breath and wonders, fears, aches, for all but a moment. Until Eddie’s thumb comes up to draw tentative patterns on Steve’s palm. Until Eddie is moving closer to rest his head against Steve’s, never once letting go of his hand.

“What about me?” he whispers, and Steve finally opens his eyes, shifting until their foreheads are touching, and looking down at their joined hands. 

“Just that… I really, really like you.” 

Another hum, and this time Steve can feel it making its way through his body. It makes him shiver even on a warm night like this. Makes him yearn for more.

“And that’s making you smile?” 

He’s helpless. Now that he started talking, now that he took Eddie’s hand, now that they’re sharing the same breath, Steve is so, so helpless. But he’s not scared anymore.

“Yes.”

Eddie’s free hand comes up to rest on his cheek. Not to pull him in for a kiss like Steve thinks for a second, but just to hold him. Maybe in another universe they’re kissing. In this one, Eddie is cradling him like he’s something precious. It feels even more intimate.

“You’re doing nothing to convince me that you’re not a fallen fucking star, though, Stevie.” 

Steve laughs softly, sounding almost giddy to his own ears, and lifts his hand into Eddie’s hair. 

His tone shifts when he continues. “I’m not even entirely sure you’re real right now.” 

Along with Eddie's tone there was a shift in the very fabric of the universe that leaves Steve breathless. He swallows and angles his face closer to Eddie’s, feeling brave because Eddie is still here, still talking like that, and maybe, maybe… 

“I’m real, Eds,” he breathes. 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” And it feels like he’s saying more than that. So much more. “Are you?” 

Eddie nods again, bringing his face even closer until their noses are touching and he breathes a tiny, “Very,” against Steve’s lips. 

And then, covered by the kindest glow of the stars above them, Steve claims Eddie’s lips in the softest, slowest, most genuine kiss. 

for @withacapitalp in the hopes that you'll have a kind and gentle day, or something to come to that could feel like a hug 🤍