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pretty-batty · 7 months ago

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Loosen Up

Eddie x Original Female Character Pt 3 of Eldath's Priestess 3966 words

Warnings: Suicidal Ideation, Mental Illness. Judy jokes about quitting the game early, if you know what I mean. Tags: First Kiss, Fluff, Stress, guitar struggles, little bit of exposition dump by Steve Harrington. Now on ao3

Summary: Judy reminisces on her and Eddie's first kiss. She encounters the Upside-Down crew and learns a terrible truth.

Notes: I think you're gonna like this one.

Judy’s fingertips sweat against the neck of her electric guitar, vice grip on her pick. Only open strings, the fingerings would come later. Over and over. But never in time, after each round of the same phrase she got more and more frustrated.

Her pick got stuck, one fumble and she is off beat.

“FUCK!” she shouted, tearing off her electric guitar and setting it on her bed as aggressively as she could without damaging the instrument. Her best friend, shirtless, acoustic resting in his lap as he flawlessly finished the phrase, looked up. His sweet gaze landed on her as she sat down on her rug, knees to her chest, face buried in her limbs. “I wanna kill myself.”

“Nooo…” Eddie immediately answered, sighing, “you’re just stressed.” He shifted the instruments around so he could free himself from her bed, resting beside her. His naked shoulder bumping into hers. “Hey…”

She looked up, a soft “hm?” coming from her throat.

“You know what you gotta do?” He smiled, twisting himself to meet her hidden gaze. Shooting to his feet, he stood before her, hands reached out. “We gotta loosen up.”

Judy sighed, fighting back a smile. Her hands grasping his as he helped her to her feet.

Face to face, a foot apart, Eddie pulled her arms back and forth. Left and right, in a sort of simple dance. “Loo-sen up. Loo-sen up. When you’re wigged out you gotta loo-sen up.” He chanted, dipping down slightly to meet Judy’s cool eyes as she forced herself to look at the carpet.

She knew that if she looked up at him, the battle against her own lips would be lost, and she would break out in a smile. It just took one-

A flash of brown, deep and warm.

There it goes.

She locked onto his gaze, lifting her head up to look at him. Her lips pulled up into a soft smile.

He grinned back, teeth sparkling in the dim lamplight. “There she is. My beautiful girl.”

“You can’t” She looked away for a second, shaking her head as her smile widened, “you can’t keep saying stuff like that.”

“Why not? I am beholden to beauty and truth.” He repositioned their hands, fingers lacing together, clutching them to his chest.

“Yeah, a true bohemian. And what do artistes do when they have a friend of the opposite sex?” She smirked, “Flirt mercilessly?”

“If they are beautiful, then we say so. If they are ugly, then we say so.” He brought her knuckles to his lips, fixated on her face as he said, “and if we believe they are the most precious creature, majestic being, divine and golden, we say so.”

A kiss from his plush mouth warmed her knuckles.

Judy’s eyes widened, his breath against her skin sparking heat in the pit of her stomach, spreading to every inch of her body. “Eddie…what?”

“Pbbbbt.” His lips buzzed against her skin, a raspberry covering her fingers in spit.

“EW EDDIE!”

He let her go as she threw herself back, rubbing her hands on her sweatpants as she leaned against her desk. His laugh erupted from his lips, closing the distance between them again. Wrapping his arms around her, trapping her against his chest, loose enough to give her room to toss and writhe.

“Eww, no! You’re gross.” She laughed, squealing and wiggling her hands from their place at her sides, pressing them against his bare chest. Has he always been this warm? She asked herself.

“I’m serious though.” He said, rocking side to side with her. “This is borderline romantic.”

“This?” Judy pressed further, “friends? Friends since childhood? Seen each other naked more times than we should? Popping each other’s back zits? Holding each other’s hair back during a bender?” She shrugged, scoffing, “that’s romance right there.”

Eddie’s smile slightly faded, still fixed on Judy, letting her leave his arms, dropping them to his sides. It was like her words had smacked the joy right out of him. He shuffled back, leaving Judy cold. He blinked once or twice, before returning to the same smile he always had. “Yeah…weird.” He blew it off. “How about that riff, huh? Ready to try again?”

She followed, taking her guitar as he offered it to her. He repositioned himself on her bed, back against the headboard, guitar in his hands, like a shield in front of his aching chest. Judy nervously set her guitar on its stand, crawling into bed and taking her place beside him.

“I’m sorry. That came out wrong.” she said, listening to him gently pluck away. “I don’t think what we are should stop us from…being smitten…with each other.” Stream of consciousness was easier said than done. Usually, she would have prepared a speech. In fact, she had. She had prepared her profession of love for Eddie hundreds of times before. None of them had him half naked in her bed, playing her guitar, after being seemingly jilted by her.

Eddie’s finger slid up the fret, gliding up as if to form a question. His eyes tilted to her, a twinkle of hope.

Judy picked at her fingers, “God…you make me feel…so tingly and warm. And I want to touch you all over.” She refused to look at him, worried she would make a move that would scare him off. “So, when I hold your hair back when you vom, and treat the monster pimples that grow on your shoulders, I’m more than happy because I just get to touch you.” She was met with silence, muttering to herself, “God that sounds weird.”

The whole time, so engrossed in her nails and swirling thoughts, Judy did not notice the acoustic guitar placed at their feet and the pick being set on the nightstand. Eddie’s hands and arms were free. He sat, legs folded under each other, elbows to knees, propping his head up as he continued to gaze at Judy, waiting for her to notice.

“Just…I wanna touch you so bad right now.” She sighed, finally turning to face him, dark eyes shining up at her, fluttering his eyelashes.

“Then do it. Touch me, buttercup.” He said plainly. Judy froze, chest rising and falling as Eddie reached for her hand again, taking it. Slowly, he brought her index finger to the pulse point in his neck. His blood pumped away hard and fast. “Feel that?”

She swallowed audibly, “Mhm.” He further guided her fingers, her fingertips guiding up his stubble and into his hair. Her palm caressing his jaw, he could simply turn his face and press a kiss against the base of her thumb. But he simply paused, waiting for her to make the next move.

Her tongue passed over her bottom lip, gently sucking it between her teeth for a moment, scraping it across before releasing it. A nervous habit. She knew it was gross, even giving her a fat lip a few times during really stressful situations. Her eyes were trained on his lips. His breath was sweet and a bit spicy, cinnamon chewing gum, no lingering nicotine. He hadn’t smoked nor eaten, his teeth were nearly perfect. “Wait…did you brush your teeth before you came here?”

“Yes, I did, in fact, brush my teeth. I do that regularly.”

“No…before you came here, like in the middle of the day? And you didn’t smoke. And you didn’t get a pop or snack.” Her lips parted in a silent gasp, lips curling into a smile. “You’re chewing gum.”

Eddie grinned before licking the gum from his cheek, reaching down to her bedside trashcan, and tilting it, spitting the pink wad into the trash. He turned back to her, “that better?”

In that instant, her lips gently pressed against his, just a gentle sweep and caress before letting go. Her whole body buzzed as she waited for him to respond. And to her relief it took no time at all. His face instantly mashing into hers with the patience of an exited puppy.

Judy landed back on her pillows. Her smile breaking their kiss. Eddie found himself on his side, lips mashed against her cheek. She turned her head, eager to feel his kiss again.

Cold, nothing there, Judy turned to be met with air. She sighed, whispering to herself, “I gotta stop doing that. It only makes me feel worse.” She sat up once again, feet finally on the rug beneath her. “Fuck I gotta take my meds.”

Wayne was at work. Margie was out with her co-workers in a desperate attempt to drink away the pain of losing their students. All that was left was Judy, alone, in her old house. Dressed in her dead brother Joey's clothes for comfort’s sake, she meandered through the hall, turned down the stairs, creeping to the main floor. A buzzing following her to the kitchen. Each light she switched on took 30 seconds to gain its full glow, flickering with all its might. The whole situation filled her with unease.

Her feet slapped across the linoleum as she made her way to the counter. Since her hospital stay at the age of 10, she always had a feeling something was wrong. Not all the time, but enough for it to be a problem. She would get creeped out at random times. Her skin would bristle when she was alone, always on edge, finally breaking into full blown panic attacks in her near teens.

She started on Zoloft after that. And it worked, for a time.

Then kids started going missing. Then she saw her brother die in a dream, only to find his dead body an hour later. While Pittsburgh gave her some relief, her mother’s grief overtook any peace she could have had. Then hell opened up in Hawkins and swallowed her boyfriend whole. Her mental health was never good, manageable, but never optimal.

But this anxiety, this was something else entirely. There was something pressing through the ether. So, she talked to herself, just in case there was someone else with her. Setting a glass on the counter, she opened the fridge and reached for the cold water before pausing.

“Water…oooorrr,” she muttered, opening the freezer to snatch a bottle of vodka, “potato juice wiiiith,” she retrieved a can from the fridge, “sprite?” She set all of the options on the counter, glancing over her shoulder as if to scratch a paranoid itch. Nothing.

The lights flickered again, sending a cascade of chills up her spine.

She drew in a deep breath. While a vodka-sprite would put her to sleep faster, water would allow her to take her antidepressant. “Or I could drink a vodka-sprite and take my antidepressant, have a fucking wild time.”

A slight puff of air knocked a strand of hair over her shoulder. She twisted around on instinct, a short cry leaving her lungs. She was hit with a smell. Marlboro Reds. It sent a pain straight through her temples, causing an ache. Then cinnamon Dentyne.

Eddie.

Bam bam bam.

Three knocks in quick succession jolted her back into reality. She walked briskly to the door, peering over the window to see a helmet of perfectly coiffed hair. Unlocking the door, she opened it to reveal, “Steve Harrington. How can I help you?”

“Would you like to…” he glanced over Judy’s shoulder to the kitchen window, “go find frogs with me?” His cadence was stunted slightly, as if reading from another's lips.

Judy blinked, poking her head out to see only his car parked in her driveway. “Frogs…?” She asked.

“Uh yeah…there are some uh, super cool frogs out tonight. Since it rained and stuff.” Steve continued, “they are attracted to the moisture in the air.”

She felt a creeping up her back again, the buzzing continuing before overpowering the porchlight with a pop, leaving them in darkness. “Yeah, lemme put on a bra.”

Within less than three minutes, Judy had her bag in hand, breasts contained behind fabric and underwire, flip flops smacking across the sidewalk. Her bedroom light flickering in a discernable pattern as Steve pulled out of her driveway.

Lover’s lake was gone, and in her opinion that would have been in poor taste anyway. Steve, instead, took her to the stream to the west of town, which fed into Loch Nora. Parking his BMW on the bank of the small body of water.

“You really keeping with that whole, frog spotting thing, huh?” Judy asked, exiting the car as Steve did.

“Uh…yeah, yeah that was the idea.” He said, still keeping a causal demeanor.

“Honestly, I’m glad you did.” She said, taking off her flip-flops before crawling up the hood of his car, sitting on the roof. She heard him cringe slightly, considering getting down before Steve did the same, kicking off his sneakers and joining her. The car creaked slightly under their joined weight. She pulled out a pack of chewing gum, offering him a piece, “the house was starting to wig me out a bit.”

Steve accepted the offering, unwrapping and popping the stick into his mouth. Judy did the same with hers, stowing away her stash. She chewed and thought.

“When my brother died, I had dreams about him. He would be alive, and I would shake him, like ‘holy shit I thought you were dead’. And he wouldn’t answer that, just changing the subject, go take me to have dinner or something.” She paused, “but that would be it, I’d wake up and he’d be dead. No lingering traces of him in impossible places, no hearing him snort through his deviated septum.”

Steve stayed silent, letting Judy continue to muse and chew. He was a better listener than she had expected.

“So, I thought when Eddie was showing up in my dreams, it was the same thing. We’d cuddle and kiss… But then the dreams started to bleed into reality.” Judy said, folding her arms over her knees, forming a cushion for her face as she hid behind them. “I don’t even have to go to sleep anymore. I can feel him in my room when I walk in, like he’s been waiting for me. I can smell him. I smelled him right before you knocked on my door, Marlboro reds and cinnamon Dentyne gum. I felt his breath past my ear.” She paused, gathering her thoughts, processing her own statement as if she had heard it for the first time. “I know I sound insane. Like certifiable, admit her to a hospital, levels of insane. I know grief does things to you but…this is”

“different?” Steve interjected, “yeah…” He looked to her, hesitating for a moment before deciding that this was the correct choice. “This town is…weird. If I told you what was wrong with it, you’d rethink who the crazy one is.”

“Does this have anything to do with me pulling you, Nancy, Robin, and Dustin from a giant crack in front my boyfriend’s trailer?” She asked. “There must have been a reason, looking like a larping troupe and all.”

He didn’t laugh. His gaze extended past her eyes, empty. She knew that stare too well. Something happened, and she struck a nerve. She quickly attempted to cover her tracks, reaching for his wrist, and holding it, giving a reassuring squeeze.

“What happened, Steve?”

He let out a weary sigh, “I’m not good at this. Henderson is better. But I can give you the rundown. Basically, there was this lab doing crazy experiments, like MK-Ultra experiments, on kids. And this one girl, El or uh Jane, was so powerful she blew a hole through to another dimension, sending this one dude into it and he couldn’t escape. So, he became this all-powerful psychic demon dude, wrinkly, red…really gross.” He raised his hands and arms, slightly waving them, “has these tentacles it’s so weird.”

“Like an octopus?”

“More like fleshy vines. Anyway, in eighty-three, Will Byers goes missing. Turns out, he’s been kidnapped or something. And Barb”

“Holland, yeah Barb Holland. She was one of the kids in the ward with me in seventy-six. Did this guy take them?”

“Pretty much. The kids call it the mindflayer, this hivemind thing. Anyway, the whole time El has escaped…”

Steve continued his narrative. From year to year, Judy was able to align the various Hawkins disasters with the borderline biblical plague shit that came from his mouth. She realized her problems, especially Joey’s death, were miniscule compared to the events that took place right under her feet.

When silence rested between them, Judy finally spoke, posing a question she had never considered before, “did you get sick, when the flu swept Hawkins? You would have been nine.”

“No.”

“Because, that same lab you were talking about, with the kids and the MK-Ultra, made a drug, it was a treatment. Gave it to all the really sick kids. Do you think they did something to it?” She looked at Steve, who sat in thought, brows furrowed. She wasn’t sure if he was actually pondering or if he was humoring her. “I need to know who else. If I could just talk to someone else who got the vaccine…”

He puffed out his cheeks and sighed, getting down off the hood of the car. Judy followed. “I don’t know. But we do have people who can help.”

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

“You were in my house?” Judy was more shocked than insulted. Her aunt sat beside the group of teens, looking almost as guilty as they did. “And you let them stay?”

“Judy, sweetie, if you knew what was going on, you would have too.” Margie’s voice was insistent, but still low and calm. “And I asked Wayne to get some snacks.”

“Sn-snacks?” The young woman continued to pace, the appliances fried beyond repair. “Snacks? The-the fridge is busted, Marge.”

“We have a cooler.” She corrected, “and he’s getting ice too.”

The group of teens remained silent, the single flashlight that remained working flickered.

“What does it want? The flashli- What?” Judy, words stunted and frantic, started to yell at the appliance, “what do you want? I don’t know the boop-boop thing, the-the morse code.”

“He wants you to go to the bedroom,” Lucas said, finally pipping up from the dejected silence the trespassers were in.

“Where the girl, El…in my bedroom. They want me to go in the bedroom with the psychic teen- okay.” She sighed, another graceful whisp of cinnamon gum passing by her nose. Lucas handed her the flashlight. She slowly made her way up the carpeted stairs, turning immediately into her bedroom. Mike Wheeler sat cross-legged across from a young girl with a brown, bobbed haircut. Her nostrils red with dried blood, irritated from constantly wiping it away on her drenched sleeve. She wore Judy’s silk sleep mask over her eyes.

Judy broke the silence, “hope that’s as comfy for you as it is for me.”

“Hm?” El raised it over one eye peeking at her, “yeah it’s really nice.”

“So, you’re talking to…my dead boyfriend?”

“Not dead, he’s just stuck. He made his nest here.”

“In the…Veil of Shadows, the echo of the material plane.” Judy clarified, attempting to prove that she was up to speed, when she was, in fact, way out of her depth.

Dustin looked at her from his position in her desk chair, speaking sympathetically, bordering on condescending, “we just call it the upside-down.”

“Okay, sure, and if, big if, this exists, and you’re talking to something…how do you know it’s Eddie? Not a mimic or some other thing?” She jiggled her leg, “prove it. Make him prove to me it’s him.”

The girl slipped the cover back over her eyes. Mike turned the small radio back on, turning it to an inactive channel. The room filled with audible snow.

Judy’s foot continued to jiggle, only causing her anxiety to worsen. This was impossible. Kids in her house, either complete strangers or mutual acquaintances, all of the things she’d have to replace, the things she had to fix. She was lucky Wayne was here. For all the “Butch Power” her aunt preached, Margie was inept at basic home repair. Now Judy had backup, but the whole situation was yet another headache.

And this thing, if it was Eddie, how does he get back? How did he possibly survive? There was no way in hell he could, and so that led her to this. He was dead, and some weird psychic demon thing was tricking her, tricking everyone, and it would soon ask for the impossible.

It wasn’t him. Just a shadow, a mimic, a cosmic prank. She found herself muttering, “this is bullshit.”

“Yellow flowers…”

Judy stilled.

El repeated, “yellow flowers…small…buttercups.”

Her eyes got hot, a chill running up her spine.

“Buttercup?” El asked.

Judy clenched her jaw to keep herself from a deep, heavy sob, only managing a strangled whimper.

“He needs to hear you, Judy.” Dustin urged.

“Mhm…” She managed. A deep breath, letting out a trembling, “Ed-Eddie.” All the air was sucked out of her, forcing her to gasp and collapse on to the edge of her bed. “Oh God, Eddie…” Her face sank into her palms, sliding beneath her glasses. She removed them, setting them on the bed beside her. Then she melted into her hands. The lights flickered twice, one-two, one-two, one-two. The strange pattern and buzzing caused her frightened whimpers to erupt into full-blown, earth-shattering sobs.

“No, he’s saying ‘no’.” Mike stated, as if trying to calm Judy down.

“Please, Judy, stop crying. It’s upsetting him.” Dustin insisted.

“I’m-!” she ran her face across her hands and fingers, trying to contain herself, rubbing over and over again. Finally, she managed to speak through a tight throat, “I’m upsetting him, for fucksake. With the fucking lightshows and breaking all my electronics.”

The smell of cigarettes and Dentyne hovered right before her, as if squatting down to meet her gaze.

“He’s there, Judy.” El said, pointing at the spot between Judy and herself. Right where the scent resided. “He can hear everything. He wants you to stop crying.”

Judy cupped her hand over her mouth, wiping away any further sorrow, “sorry.” She clenched her eyes closed, forcing the remnants of the tears out. “Oh God, I’m so sorry you guys, I lost it for a second there.” She sniffed, putting her glasses back on. Their attention was drawn downstairs, hearing the front door open. “Wayne’s back, go ahead down. El, you can use the bathroom to clean yourself up, if you’d like.”

“We’re not done. He still wants to talk to you.” The girl insisted.

“And I’d like to do it alone, please.” Judy reached for the flashlight behind her, wiggling it, “we can do yes or no questions.”

With that, and a few more words of thanks, they were out of her room.

Judy returned to her bed, sitting in the center of the mattress, “Okay, one for yes, two for no. That’s what they were doing before, right?”

“Yes.”

“Is it still Eddie?”

“Yes.”

She smiled for a moment, the smell continuing to follow her. But she needed to check, just in case.

“Okay, if you are Eddie, my Eddie, yes or no game. The first time we were intimate, we were both naked.”

“No.”

“Yes or no, the book that brought us together was The Last Unicorn.”

“No.”

“Last one, my vibrator is pink, yes or no.”

“Yes.”

Judy’s smile widened, letting out a laugh, tears leaking from her eyes again.

“No. No. No.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I can’t help it.” She wiped them away with the heel of her palm. “I miss you. This is all insane but at the same time, I’m not insane. Because there are several people who talk to you, see you. God…it’s really you. Oh Eddie, my Eddie.”

WE DID IT MY FRIENDS! EDDIE LIVES!

Thank you for reading! It's time for things to get a-movin'! Tag List: @loserboysandlithium

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