#pretend ozzmosis came out before 86

[rebel-walnut]

I recently found a draft of a little Kas!Eddie ish thing I wrote that's mainly exposition but whatever, I was going to expand on it but never did so I guess I'll post it here. Steve POV, ~7650 words.

Anyways, here's Sweet Leaf.

_____

Steve Harrington didn’t know Eddie Munson. They tried to save the world together, failed, he died, and that was that. And yet, there was a surprising amount of guilt that lingered in his chest at the thought of his last words to Steve. “Make him pay,” Eddie had said. And then Dustin was yelling over the walkie, a strangled “They got Eddie,” between muffled sobs. Steve remembers the ringing of his ears at Dustin’s choked cries before the chimes of a clock and a world splitting in two stole his attention away. Dustin knew Eddie better than Steve, maybe that was where the guilt was coming from. That he let one of his best friends cradle someone they thought of as their brother in their arms as the latter bled out. Just another failed attempt at saving someone right out of Steve’s reach. He couldn’t save Barb, he couldn’t save Max, and he couldn’t save Eddie. So he tried to make up for it after the fact and hoped the guilt would eventually stop eating away at him.

He volunteered at the school, rationing out supplies and sorting boxes of donations for families whose homes were destroyed in the ‘earthquake.’ It was good to keep busy, he found himself thinking idly after the third day of volunteering. Gave his hands something to do other than shake, his mind something to do other than replay the four chimes of a clock, and a choked “They got Eddie.” He saw Dustin and the rest of the kids around the school occasionally, the weight of Eddie’s loss and Max’s state evident in the way all of them carried themselves, but mainly in Dustin and Lucas. Lucas spent most of his time in the hospital, Steve driving him when he could and trying to make lighthearted conversation along the way just to distract Lucas for a moment despite it rarely working to get conversation out of him.

The second time he picked Lucas up from the hospital Steve had asked how Max was doing. Lucas simply sat still in the passenger seat before giving a small shake of his head, tears brimming at the corners of his eyes. He had a melancholic ten-yard stare directed out the windshield, blinking heavy before collapsing into Steve’s side with body-wracking sobs that echoed off the windows. He heaved into Steve’s shoulder, Steve turning in his seat to curl an arm around Lucas and tuck his chin on top of his head. Another pang of guilt struck through Steve’s chest with each one of Lucas’s tears that dampened his shirt.

“I miss her so much and it’s all my fault-” Lucas had whispered into the side of Steve’s neck, his words cutting out with a cry just as Steve felt his heart shatter into a million pieces. He held onto Lucas tighter as he whispered back, “None of this is on you. She’ll wake up soon, it’ll all be okay,” his voice cracking on the final word as if calling his bluff. He continued to try to reassure Lucas as he cried into Steve’s shoulder, unsure if the words were landing but feeling the need to try nonetheless. Maybe if he said them enough times it would ring true, just as Steve hoped he could do the same for himself.

Eventually Lucas’s heaves slowed to gentle cries, Steve and Lucas staying latched together sitting in the hospital parking lot with Queen playing softly in the background but neither of them bothering to listen to the words. “It’ll be okay Sinclair, I promise.” Steve’s voice held stronger that time, willing the words into action. Lucas gave a weak cough into Steve’s shoulder before releasing him, brushing away stray tears and straightening in his seat. Steve found the prickling in the corners of his eyes subsided as Lucas stared out the windshield again, this time with a more resolved look to himself. “Fuck Vecna,” Lucas had said with a weak laugh, Steve giving a similar sad laugh in return that both of them could tell was humorless before twisting the key in the ignition, the previous moment decidedly passed. Steve kept the conversation light after that day, although he kept watching for the same forlorn look Lucas wore after picking him up.

If he’s being completely honest with himself -which he usually tries to be- Steve has been looking out for Dustin more than the others, except for maybe Lucas. It’s not that he doesn’t care for the others, he’d die for each and every one of them without a second thought, and has probably come too close for comfort many times. It’s just that he sees himself in both of them, albeit in very different ways, but it’s there nonetheless. He can’t help but notice the tired tension that lingers in Lucas’s shoulders at the mention of Max, the downturn in the edges of his eyes that mimics Dustin’s dry stare that happens more often than not. He tries not to see the way neither of them smile anymore.

In the aftermath of ringing chimes of a bell that haunts them all, Dustin was forged to Steve’s side. He didn’t know which one of them initiated it, but neither of them could stop the fear that shook their fingers, both needing something solid to dig into.

The shriek of “They got Eddie” rang in Steve’s ears on a loop for days, relentlessly loud in his skull the moment it crackled through the walkie. It pounded against the soles of his boots in time as he threw himself out of the Creel house and towards the trailer park where the inevitable was waiting for him.

They got Eddie They got Eddie They got Eddie They got Eddie They got Eddie-

It rattled behind his eyes as his fingers gripped onto the shaggy fabric covering Dustin’s shoulders, pulling him into a crushing grip against Steve’s chest. They got Eddie. A tinny sound rang through his ears and covered the pulsating They got Eddie They got Eddie They got Eddie along with Dustin’s cry-screaming, and whether the ringing was from shock or from head injuries Steve couldn’t be sure. Regardless, it was a welcome distraction from the sight of his mutilated almost-friend-slash-co-parent-slash-armageddon-partner.

Dustin was scrambling at Eddie’s jacket, willing him back to life with half-eaten screams and the warmth of his hands against skin. Everything Steve tried to say got caught in his throat. What could he even say to this? To arguably his best friend and someone who should never have to cradle their dying mentor in their arms at the ripe age of fourteen? So Steve didn’t say anything. Just held Dustin the same as he would hold Lucas in a few days. All desperation and grief, all I’m here for you, and please take comfort in that small fact, and I don’t know how to make this better because it shouldn’t have happened in the first place, and I’m sorry. They could have stayed like that forever, Steve thought. Curled into one another, an endless cycle of grief and comfort while leaning over someone who didn’t deserve what they got. The ground might have shook. It might have torn apart. Steve wouldn’t know. There were more pressing matters, like the guitar pick that was pressed into Dustin’s thumb so hard Steve thought it might break skin. Like how the mingling of tears and blood over cold skin was something Steve didn’t ever want to have to feel again. Like the ache that continuously grew in his chest since the day Barb disappeared from his pool and was sure couldn’t possibly pulse any harder than it was right then, Dustin held close and both of their hands tangled in each other, in Eddie’s sleeves and shirt and hair.

Nancy’s cutting tone over the walkie did nothing to shake him out of his grief-stricken trance, his attention too locked onto the boy in front of him and the corpse of their friend to pay attention to Nancy’s words or bring himself to care. It was the third time that her voice rang out around them, louder and sharper than it was before that Steve snapped back into survival mode.

“STEVE! WE NEED TO GO, NOW!” Nancy barrelled out from behind a few sparse trees and into the clearing, Robin in short tow behind her. Steve had noticed the flash of shock pass over her face before resolving into something cold and unmoving. He knew that expression well, became familiar with it back in ‘83 when this all started. The look that said I have to deal with life threatening problems, and therefore must compartmentalize at least 90 percent of what’s happening around me and will panic about it later. She moved with fervor and intention, stopping next to Eddie’s body and pressing the back of her hand to his cold cheek before whispering a small, “Fuck,” with a light grimace and eyes slightly glassy that if you didn’t know to look for, you would miss.

Robin’s reaction was expectedly harder, a strangled noise not entirely unlike a dying animal pulled from her lungs and her hands flying to cover her mouth the moment she saw them. She was all manic energy, an exact opposite to Nancy’s reaction as she crumpled to the ground beside Nancy and cupped Eddie’s face with her hands. Robin’s words were fast and slurried, mimicking a similar cadence of “No no no, please no,” and “Eddie, no, please,” and “I’m sorry, I’m so fucking sorry,” that Dustin had cried into Steve’s arms when Steve found him earlier.

They sat for a moment or a hundred with everyone holding onto some piece of Eddie. Steve’s tears had dried into his cheeks and Dustin’s hair, Dustin and Robin’s tears still streaming down their faces and dampening Eddie’s shirt where blood hadn’t already. Nancy’s eyes remained glassy, but her stony expression changed into something even harder as the earth shook around them once again. Right. There was still the end of the world to deal with.

They had all collectively looked to Nancy as cracks started shifting in the ground around them, making way for more vines and glowing red substances. Nancy glanced behind them, watching the tree line, before looking back at the group and stating, “Trailer,” clear and concise as always.

Between sniffles, Robin had gathered the strength to move to Dustin’s side, trying to lift him from the ground and remove his grip on Eddie's sleeve. Dustin flinched at the touch, eyes unmoving from Eddie’s own. Steve shuddered with him, feeling a pang in his chest but trying to push him into Robin’s grasp regardless as the cracks around them grew deeper.

“No, nonono, no, we can’t leave him like this, Steve, please!” Dustin’s shrill cries cut through the ringing in Steve’s ears immediately, his own strangled sound escaping him at the boy’s words. Nancy looked at him, eyes sympathetic but saying what they both knew to be true. They couldn’t bring him through. They didn’t have the time.

Steve lifted Dustin to his feet before helping him onto Robin’s back after noticing his limp, Dustin too bereaved to fight it despite his pleas with them to take Eddie. Steve squeezed the back of Dustin’s neck and choked an, ‘I’m sorry,’ into his ear before he told Robin to get to the trailer now, watched her leave with a resolute nod and red-rimmed eyes. Dustin tightened his hold around her neck and sobbed into her shoulder as they turned their back on the scene, Nancy turned instead to face Steve. She looked sympathetic as she tracked his gaze from herself to Eddie, a grieving frown tugging down the corner of her mouth.

“Steve, we can’t-”

“I know,” Steve cut her off with a likely too-sharp tone. He’d apologize for it later. “Get to the trailer, get Dustin and Robin through. I’ll be there in a second.”

Nancy’s sad nod and tight pressed lips said enough as she ran to join the others in the trailer. Once she was gone, Steve let himself sink to his knees next to Eddie again.

“I fucking told you not to be a hero,” He bit out, a weird sort of sad anger behind it. He’ll deal with the anger later in the coming days. The anger of him leaving Dustin, of Dustin having to see him like that at all, of Eddie doing the one thing Steve told him not to do. It’s misplaced anger, he knew. Maybe there was no other way for him to keep Dustin safe. He didn’t care right then. Steve only felt the gnawing empty anger and grief that he knew all of them were holding.

Steve hovered his hand over Eddie’s eyes with trembling fingers before he pressed them to his pale skin and let Eddie’s eyelids slide closed. With a sort of detachment, Steve cradled Eddie’s head in his hands before readjusting it so it laid flat against the ground and curling his hair around his shoulders (it’s softer than he thought even though it’s caked with blood and upside down goop). He straightened Eddie’s legs with a soft touch, and folded his palms over his heart. It felt terribly wrong to leave him here, it was a decision that would likely haunt Steve just as he was haunted by Barbara Holland. And yet, Steve knelt back onto his feet and looked at a man who had been so incredibly alive less than an hour ago. It made him sick.

Steve still doesn’t know why he did this last part, but it felt wrong to leave Eddie with nothing. He leaned forward, pressing the back of his hand to Eddie’s once warm forehead and pushed back the tendrils of hair that poked out from under his bandanna. He brushed his lips over a freckle near the center of Eddie’s forehead in a gentle kiss, let the cold flood over his skin before pulling back and mustering out, “I’m so sorry,” taking his last look at Eddie Munson and turning towards the others already waiting in the right-side up.

At the two-week mark after Eddie’s death, Steve takes Dustin to Eddie’s makeshift grave. It’s a hastily made wooden cross plunged into the ground at the spot where he died in the upside down, with ‘Eddie Munson’ carved across the tee, done by Steve’s pocket knife as cleanly as he could muster (which really wasn’t very clean at all). Dustin had assured him with a tear-muffled voice that Eddie would think the scratchy font was ‘metal.’ They had planted the cross four days after everything, the same day as Eddie’s official funeral that was put on by a bunch of government suits and more of a legal affair than an occasion for mourning.

Steve tries to forget the look on Wayne Munson’s face and the tattered way he stared out into a sea of unknown faces gathering around a cheaply printed photo of Eddie from the yearbook with not even a body to bury, reciting vague statements surrounding Eddie’s death that to the rest of them were clearly a coverup ploy, but to Wayne it was all detached, cold judgement. By that point, Wayne was already moved to another trailer set up by aforementioned government suits due to the damage that was done to his home from the portal and the earthquake.

It was Dustin’s idea -naturally- to have a proper funeral for Eddie. Steve scrounged around for some scrap wood (which was incredibly easy to find given the recent damage done to Hawkins) while Robin had taken Dustin and the rest of the kids to pick out flowers. Steve tried to stay detached as he assembled the cross, needing to be there to comfort the kids more than himself, but he couldn’t help the prickling in his eyes and the ache in his chest as he finished carving out the letters of Eddie’s name. Losing never got any easier.

Dustin, Lucas, and Mike had left a small collection of what looked like ten and twenty sided dice at the base of the cross, along with folded pieces of paper that had what Steve gathered to be character information for their fantasy game on it. Robin arranged the assortment of flowers (astrantias for bravery and strength, purple hyacinths for remorse and sorrow, and white gardenias for family. Steve isn’t sure if Robin made those meanings up or not, but he’ll believe them nonetheless) around the base of the cross with a small tremor in her hands, surrounding the dice and sheets of paper before pressing a gentle kiss to the top of his cross and a murmured sentiment that was too quiet to hear. They stood unmoving around his cross for what could have been an eternity, Steve tucking Dustin and Lucas under his arms with wet eyes and a heavy heart. Shoulders trembled and tears fell. Occasionally a laugh over a memory of Eddie’s outlandish and dramatic behavior. The sun might have set. The moon might have come out. Eddie’s cross stayed unmoving with the rest of them.

Today, it was just Dustin and Steve that visited Eddie’s grave. Lucas was at the hospital again, as he was most of the time, while Mike was in the process of moving like the rest of the Wheelers. Most days it ended up being Steve and Dustin visiting alone anyways. Steve would stand a little ways away from the cross to give Dustin space but close enough for comfort as he told Eddie about all the current news in Hawkins. Dustin would tell Eddie’s grave stories about Will and El, how he would have loved to meet them, how Hopper came back (Steve was still adjusting to that one, but honestly there was too much going on for it to fully shock him) and how they’re both the heroes of Hawkins. With every word, Steve’s chest would ache a little more, and by the end of their visit he’d end up sitting next to Dustin on the ground by Eddie’s cross, an arm thrown around the boy’s shoulder in a touch that both of them needed.

This time as they pulled up to the cross in standard routine, Steve walked with Dustin right up to Eddie’s cross and sat down next to him, abandoning his usual spot by his car. Dustin held a crate of tapes and various items of Eddie’s that Wayne had given him tight to his chest, carefully setting them down in his lap as he sat.

“Hey, Eddie,” Dustin started in his always somber tone that he couldn’t seem to shake these days. None of them could. “I brought some of your tapes and my player, Steve and I thought we could listen to them with you…”

Dustin trails off at the end of his sentence, Steve giving him a small bump of his shoulder and a weak smile. Dustin attempts to return the gesture, then digs through his crate before pulling out a tape that says Black Sabbath: Master of Reality in a swirly purple and green font. Steve idly remembers being compared to a member of the band back in the upside down by a very-much-alive-Eddie that seemed like years ago. Steve tries to remember the expression on Eddie’s face when he called Steve ‘metal.’

Dustin takes the tape out of its case and pops it into the player, cranking up the volume before a track that Steve reads called Sweet Leaf starts blasting through the clearing. He isn’t expecting to like it. He’s expecting loud, blaring drums and screeching guitar. What he isn’t expecting is something low and heady with lyrics that seemingly resemble a love song, and a punchy yet soft guitar riff that Steve can really get behind.

He nudges Dustin with his elbow. “This is metal? Really? There’s a lot less…”

“Screaming?” Dustin supplies with a teasing lilt to his voice and a slight upturn to his mouth. It’s a sight Steve has sorely missed.

“Yeah, screaming. I was expecting to be scared, Henderson.”

“I think he has Slayer in here somewhere if you’d prefer that? Definitely Metallica and Megadeth,” Dustin elbows him in the side a bit too hard for comfort, but he’s fully smiling so Steve can’t argue with that.

“And that’s where the screaming comes in?”

“Sometimes. Still way too hard core and cool for Steve ‘The Hair’ Harrington to be listening to.”

“Since when did you become the authority on metal, you little shit? Last time I checked you were listening to Weird Al so loud your mom had to call me to get you turn it down cause you wouldn’t listen-” Steve lets out a grunt as Dustin tackles him to the ground, covering Steve’s mouth with his hands as if anyone’s around to hear his music taste being slandered. Dustin shrieks as Steve pulls him into a nuggie, screaming about ‘his curls! His beautiful curls!’ Steve pulls back with a laugh as Sweet leaf fades into the next track, starting with a more energetic riff than the last song.

“You know, I think I could like metal,” Steve says to Dustin’s raised eyebrows. “What? Don’t look at me all accusatory! I mean, it’s no Tears for Fears or Springsteen, but it’s alright.”

Dustin stares at him incredulously. “You. Steve Harrington. Wham!’s number one superfan, is suddenly going to be into metal,” Dustin scoffs.

“People are allowed to like different things Henderson, God. I thought I raised you better than that,” Steve ruffles the boy’s hair again despite Dustin’s squawks of protest and his flurry of frantic hands. They dissolve into laughter after another one of Dustin’s cries about his curls.

They finish listening to Master of Reality, and Dustin listens to the first few tracks of Metallica’s Master of Puppets before they load everything back into the beemer, Dustin pressing his fingers to the top of Eddie’s cross then to the guitar pick that hangs off of the tee. His mood returns to its usual melancholic state, but if Steve had to wager a guess, he’d say it’s at least five percent lighter, which counts as a win.

When he pulls up at the Henderson residence, Dustin hesitates in the passenger seat, staring at the crate of tapes in his hands and fiddling with the cut-outs in the plastic. Steve gently claps a hand on his shoulder in something that he hopes is half-comfort half-wake-up-call.

“Henderson, man, you okay?” Dustin furrows his eyebrows before meeting Steve’s concerned stare.

“I’ve already listened to all of them,” His stare is saying more than that, but Steve can’t pinpoint it.

“Okay?”

“I mean- I’ve already listened to all of the tapes in this box. You haven’t,” Dustin’s expression twists even farther into something unreadable before he thrusts the crate into Steve’s hands.

“If you think you’ll like them, you should listen to them. He’d want you to have them. It’s nice to…” Dustin averts his gaze down and rubs at the back of his neck. “…Remember him even if you think you didn’t know him. You did. Know him.”

Dustin gives him a quick once-over like he’ll react poorly to the heartfelt sentiment that is the entirety of Dustin Henderson. Steve’s not sure why he’s worried, or why he thinks Eddie would want Steve of all people to have his metal tapes, but he’s learned not to question Dustin when he gets this way. Instead, Steve pulls Dustin into a crushing hug around the crate and ruffles the back of his hair.

“I’ll listen to them, kid.”

He feels Dustin’s teary smile against his shoulder before pulling away and popping open the door.

“You have to tell me your favourites, because I’ve already made whole lists, Harrington!” Dustin yells as he scurries up the driveway. Steve stares at the jumbled tapes inside the crate for likely a moment too long before grabbing one at random and popping it into the beemer’s player. The case reads ‘Led Zeppelin III,’ and Steve vaguely recognizes the thrumming bass and the screeching of the vocals as the first track kicks into gear. Zeppelin isn’t metal, but he’s not surprised he found it in Eddie’s tapes. Maybe this is how he’ll get fully acquainted with metal- start with rock and see if he makes it past that. Steve cranks up the volume dial on the dashboard and peels out of the Henderson’s with rock’n’roll in his ears and Eddie in a crate in his passenger seat.

Steve decides to make a list. A very methodical mixtape, if you will. He’s not sure why he does it, but Henderson gave him the tapes and it feels wrong to not put them to use. He thumbs through them, pulling out Master of Reality again and popping it into his player. The coughing startles him like it did the first time he listened to the album hours ago with Dustin, but this time he lets the heavy guitar wash over him fully. Flopping down onto his bed, Steve lets his eyes fall shut and if he concentrates hard enough, he swears he can find the scent of leather and weed lingering between every word.

Sweet Leaf is way out of what Steve would consider his taste, is the thing. There’s absolutely no reason for him to find thrumming bass and heavy drums appealing, and yet here he is, listening to metal and finding it interesting for the sake of a dead man. The last thought churns his stomach.

Regardless, he makes a mental note to add Sweet Leaf to the mix.

The next song that gets him, Steve checks the case, is called Orchid. He must have missed it when they visited Eddie, likely too busy bothering Dustin, because Steve swears he will never be able to forget this song for as long as he lives. How a song like this could be considered metal, Steve didn't know. But he also didn’t care because a song as gorgeous as this could be whatever genre it wanted.

It’s light and melancholy all at once. Nothing but gentle yet intricate guitar for maybe a minute or two, soft the entire way through. Steve imagines Eddie learning to play it in the quiet confines of his trailer, gentle hands working along the strings of an acoustic guitar with bold white letters across it (the same guitar now sits in the corner of Dustin’s room) that spell out something about slaying dragons. Eddie’s hair would be fanned out behind him, maybe he would be on his back as he listened to the track over and over, trying to get the rhythm just right. Maybe he took his rings off to play (Steve liked to think he would keep them on. He didn’t know why he would think that) and maybe he would extend the song once he learned it, deciding that only a minute and a half of such a beautiful song was a waste. Maybe as he played only lit by the moonlight streaming through his window he would feel his eyes prickle as Steve’s were now. Maybe he would turn his face into his pillow and mourn the loss of a man’s life cut too short just like the wilting flower of the namesake of the song. Maybe he would yearn for the scent of leather and weed and feel guilty for yearning more than he should.

Maybe he didn’t ever learn the song at all.

The chilly dampness of Steve’s pillow seeps into his cheek. He adds Orchid to the list.

The next tape he pops in is called Ride The Lightning, Metallica. He gets a couple tracks in before the intro to the third song is sending chills down his spine. Eerie chimes ring throughout Steve’s room, echoing off the walls and reverberating in his bones. The ringing is cruel and all too familiar, the sounds of the bell settling deep into his skull and making his fingers tremble. Steve half-expects vines to burst through his floorboards and tangle around his ankles, splitting his room in half and pulling him into the hell realm of thick black poison and people they used to know.

He lunges for the player and ejects the tape as his lungs go into overdrive, back hitting the wall and sliding down towards the floor in a heap, head in his hands. Steve stays on the floor cradling his head until the ringing in his ears is back to a normal amount. When his breathing is considerably more even, he reaches for the case that clattered to the floor in the midst of his panic and reads off the third title. For Whom The Bell Tolls. Figures.

He finishes his list a couple hours and a phone call to Robin later (“Are you sure you’re okay?” “I promise Rob, I’m fine. Just needed to hear your voice.”) after making it through maybe a quarter of the tapes in the box. It goes as follows:

Sweet Leaf - Black Sabbath (He thinks this one is his favourite)

Orchid - Black Sabbath (The most beautiful one on the tape)

Solitude - Black Sabbath (Made him cry)

Master of Puppets - Metallica (He remembers hearing this one distantly in the upside down)

Nothing Else Matters - Metallica (Also made him cry)

See You on the Other Side - Ozzy Osbourne (Just assume all of these made him cry. Metal is emotional, okay?)

Changes - Black Sabbath (Guess what effect this one had on him)

The Trooper - Iron Maiden (He likes this one a little, it’s a bit much. But he’s determined to like it more)

The Number of the Beast - Iron Maiden (Reminds him of Eddie for obvious reasons)

Who Are You? - Black Sabbath (Steve is nothing if not a man who appreciates a good synth riff)

Sabbra Cadabra - Black Sabbath (Who doesn’t love a good love song?)

Immigrant Song - Led Zeppelin (Only fitting to end with the one he first picked himself)

Steve doesn’t include For Whom The Bell Tolls. In fact, he never even finished listening to that album. Fuck Ride The Lightning in particular. That’s what he’s tempted to call the mix, but thinks better of it. Instead, he mindlessly traces out an ‘E’ onto the blank line of the cassette and before he can catch himself, he writes out “Eddie’s mix” across the top. There’s a confused gasp sitting on his lips as he rushes to swipe at it with his thumb before the ink dries. It smudges blue all over the label, but erases the words nonetheless. Steve silently (and confusedly) chides himself for writing it, before hesitating and landing on simply calling the mix ��Sweet Leaf.” The writing is only partially legible over the smear of his previous attempt, but it’ll do. On the backside he quickly scrawls the tracks and timestamps before shutting his newly made tape into his bedside drawer.

Steve piles the rest of the tapes back into the crate (Ride The Lightning finds its rightful place at the very bottom) and tucks them safely into the back of his closet, along with other trinkets and posters that were never allowed on display. Hanging directly above the crate is another item that Eddie shouldn’t have had to part with; his vest. Steve couldn’t bring himself to wash it after everything, even to get the likely-biohazardous-goop out of it. He meant to give it to Dustin or to Wayne, but he couldn’t bring himself to part with it. Having it across the back of his desk chair filled him with a deep guilt every time he caught a glimpse of it, so last week he had moved it into his closet. Still not parting with it, but not being able to stand the sight of it either.

Steve brought his fingers up to the hem of the fabric, feeling the seam along the edge of the denim and the large panel across the back. He tightened his grip when he got to the collar, as if the sheer force would make Eddie materialize into the vest itself. The thought shocked him a little, the sudden contact of the denim burning into his palm. Steve quickly shut the closet door and backed away until his knees buckled on the edge of his bed.

He didn’t know why he felt such a guilt surrounding Eddie, this endless dread and grief. Didn’t know if he was allowed to feel it. Steve hardly knew him. Sure, you get close with people when they’re your dread companions at the end of the world, but he didn’t know if that warranted the comfort that Steve needed to feel so badly after Eddie’s loss. Dustin had it worse. So did Lucas, Mike, Max, the whole goddamn party had been through so much more than Steve could ever put into words.

Steve finds himself thinking that he should give the vest to Dustin as he leans back and feels the burning of his eyes for not the first time today. Maybe then the image of Eddie playing Orchid won’t haunt his dreams.

Steve drives to Eddie’s grave alone the next morning. It’s not one of their usually scheduled visits and Dustin isn’t even with him, so Steve doesn’t know why he feels so compelled to go by himself. He brings his Sweet leaf mix with him and his player, again not sure why he felt the need to, just knew that he did.

The beemer rests in its usual spot on the hill as Steve steps towards Eddie’s cross, the flowers from their last visit just barely wilting in the sun. He gently sets down the player and the tape at the base of the cross, just as they had yesterday with Dustin’s crate of tapes. He settles into an awkward seated position and fiddles with the case of the cassette.

“Um, hi Eddie,” Steve starts as he clears his throat, not quite being able to dispel the air of awkwardness around him. “God, this was a stupid idea,” He mumbles and tugs at the hair around the nape of his neck, clearing his throat again for good measure.

“Look, I’ve been- I’ve been missing you, I guess is the best way to put it. And I-” He stops again, raking a hand through his hair again and tugging hard this time, trying to push down the tears pricking in the corners of his eyes.

“I listened to your music. I made a list, like Henderson said.” Steve lets out a sad chuckle. “He said you’d want me to listen to your tapes, if you can believe it. And I- I did. I listened to some of them.” Steve finds himself involuntarily waiting for a response from the empty cross and feels his heart sink at the gesture.

“You’d probably say something about ‘King Steve finally coming around to real music,’ or I dunno, maybe you’d just be surprised,” He chokes around the words. “I wish I knew you long enough to know for sure what you would have said.”

It feels like a confession as the words leave his lips. He doesn’t know why, doesn’t think he could pinpoint it if he tried. Instead of trying, he reaches for the tape.

“I made a mix of my favourites that I’ve listened to so far, honestly there's a lot of Black Sabbath on there. Maybe I like that Ozzy guy more than I previously thought,” It’s the sad laugh at the end of his sentence that sends a stray tear falling from his eye, and Steve doesn’t bother wiping it away as it trails down his cheek and clings to his jaw. He just presses the play button and ignores it as a second tear falls.

“I called it ‘Sweet Leaf,’ that’s my favourite I think. I didn’t peg you as the type for love songs, even if they’re mostly about drugs,” Steve falls silent after another little morose laugh, content to let the tears dry on his skin and turn the dial just a little bit louder.

You introduced me to my mind

And left me wanting you and your kind

Oh, yeah

Steve lets his eyes fall shut to the sound of the guitar riff he’s become so familiar with, letting one hand fist in the grass beside him and the other tangle around the base of the cross. There’s a small rumbling in his chest that forms in time to the music. He’s not sure if it’s his own crying or the bass.

The rumbling grows steadier still, pulsing from beneath him and in his chest all at once. It becomes all encompassing, growing faster than the heady thrum of the guitar. Steve’s not sure if it’s still coming from himself anymore.

His eyes snap open as another ‘Oh, Yeah!’ rings out around him, pressing his hands deeper into the ground. The earth shakes clumps of dirt free between his fingers, vibrating faster and faster as the song continues. Steve is on his feet in an instant, head whipping around in all directions.

No other signs of earthquake. No other people around. No darkened sky. No sign of the supernatural.

The ground continues to shake beneath Steve’s feet in time to his rising pulse. He drops a hand back to the ground and feels the shaking come to an abrupt stop the moment his fingers make contact with the grass. Steve stays deathly still, willing the ground to stay put. After a few moments, he lets himself breathe a sigh of relief, the sounds of Sweet Leaf still going strong around him.

“What the fuck was that, Eddie,” Steve mumbles to the cross in front of him. He would later regard this as a bad call.

Without the warning this time, a burst of something slimy and fleshy that seems all too familiar to Steve shoves through the ground, tearing up the spot between Steve and the cross. It writhes in the grass in front of him before wrapping around Eddie’s grave tightly enough to splinter the wood. Steve makes an aborted noise somewhere between a scream and a cry at the sight, just in time for another tentacle-like mass to jut upwards from the new portal in the earth. Steve has approximately half a second to scramble backwards as another one emerges and slithers towards him. The edges of the hole they burst through begin to crack at the edges and expand, letting an ominous red glow seep into the grass.

Black goo begins to ooze from the portal as multiple tentacles push their way through it, wrapping around each other and expanding across the field in front of them at an off puttingly languid pace. Steve feels his fingers tremble and forces himself into survival mode, pushing himself back to his feet and ready to get the nail-bat from his trunk.

Even without eyes, the tentacles make him feel watched. He only gets half a step back before the mass of them tower into the sky at jet speed, all of their ends pointed towards Steve.

There’s no time to react.

He feels more than sees the tentacles crash down over his limbs, crushing him back into the ground. They grip around his arms tight enough to bruise, one of them writhing around his neck with slick tension. Steve thinks of being pinned against the walls of the Creel house by the same masses of flesh and dark magic, praying for a miracle that managed to come, and feels no such hope this time. Everything in him sinks as the tentacles grip him tighter and drag him towards the portal they ripped in front of Eddie’s cross. He feels himself go dizzy with the effort to scream around the tightness against his throat, feels the slippery creatures pull him feet first into hell. He tries not to think of the gate at the bottom of lovers lake, tries not to think about how he would have died if Nancy, Robin, and Eddie hadn’t come in after him. Tries not to think about how no one is here for him now.

He makes one last attempt to claw out at Eddie’s cross to give him enough leverage to hang on, but the tentacles are too tight and far too strong. He feels the familiar sucking change of air pressure and the bone chilling slime of the upside down as he’s fully forced through the portal. The tentacles become slightly more slack once Steve is fully back into hell, but even Steve’s jock reflexes couldn’t stop the portal from closing where he once stood. The vines writhe around the hole in the ground, patching it up he realizes, and the sound of Sweet Leaf’s guitar solo is shut out completely.

All that’s left is black goo and stringy red masses that cling together over the spot where Steve was sitting seconds ago. He feels his breathing pick up at the same time that the prickling begins in his fingertips, trembling in the darkened air. The soft ringing that rattles between Steve’s ears is back, but he can’t bring himself to care enough to try and fix it right now. There are bigger problems.

For example, why the fuck was Steve back in the upside down?

The air is oddly still, lacking the screeching of bats and thundering sky that had plagued the place last time he was here. The vines around his feet slithered away from him and hid under trees and goo, disappearing just as fast as they came.

Steve’s chest tightened, ribs aching with the effort of breath from that past thirty seconds. Dropping to his knees, he dug into the goo and vines that remained near his feet, desperation under his nails to open up the portal that sucked him back into his nightmares for seemingly no reason.

“Come on, you motherfucker just let me OUT!” His voice cracked at the end and Steve had to choke down a sob as goo splattered onto his cheek. “Please-”

“Steve.”

Recognition was a funny thing. Currently it was filling his lungs with ice.

Steve froze with one hand beneath the vines he was digging at to turn his head slightly over his shoulder. To where he heard (there’s no way-) the voice.

Under a mass of black and red slithering matter stood a vague shape that Steve didn’t want to recognize. It took a step forward as an arm came up towards Steve’s face. Its fingers extended all the way into claws, stained black at the tips, and swiped the smudge of goo off of Steve’s cheek. Steve’s breath caught in his throat, his trembling fingers stilling at the action. The claw rounded from his cheek to under his chin, pulling up slightly.

Stand, it seemed to command. On unsteady feet, Steve followed the guide of the claw until he was level with the figure. At eye level, he couldn’t help but recognize the figure’s face that stared back at him. Familiar deep eyes (even though the edges were more red tinged than Steve remembered), soft face, and wild hair. Looking down, Steve could make out the vague image of a demon on the figure’s shirt, with Hellfire Club written across the top.

Eddie.

“Eddie, what-” Steve is cut off by Eddie’s hand gripping him hard across both cheeks, clamping over his mouth. He seems only half lucid, eyes flitting between far away stares and then snapping into focus with his eyebrows strewn up.

“Steve,” Eddie whispers, his other hand coming up sharply to cup the back of Steve’s neck, and then quickly moving down to his shoulder, his chest, his arm. His eyes are frantic again, everything searching Steve for something unreachable. “Are you- are you real?”

Steve’s heart breaks. Shatters, actually. Everything in him combusts and falters because he left Eddie down here the entire time and who knows what he’s had to deal with and he just asked Steve if he’s real it’s all his fault it’s all his-

Eddie grips harder on both sides of his neck, snapping Steve back to reality. Steve notices a tentacle sliding over Eddie’s shoulder, working its way towards his neck. It sends a jolt down Steve’s spine as he notices more emerging from over Eddie’s back and slithering down his arms and up the back of his head. Eddie’s nails dig impossibly tighter into Steve.

“Steve, he- he has me,” One of the tentacles slides out from under Eddie’s bandana and across his forehead, sending Steve shuddering backwards but not out of Eddie’s reach. The tentacle continues moving until it reaches the edge of Eddie’s eye, beginning to slide across the whites of his eyes. More appear from under and around his hair, targeting the corners of his eyes until they dig in around the edges. Steve’s stomach drops as the last of Eddie’s eyes are covered in the slippery vines, still moving and writhing into his skin.

Steve tries to pull back out of Eddie’s grasp, but a vine shoots down over his arm and latches around Steve’s shoulder, wet sludge soaking through his shirt and into his skin.

“Eddie, please-”

“He sees me, Steve. He sees you.”

The tentacles around Eddie’s eyes part through the center, revealing nothing but dead milky white. Steve shudders as the trembling chill travels down from the crown of his head. He throws his shoulder back in an attempt to get free, but the vine’s grip stays strong.

“Eddie-” Steve gasps as the vine holding his left shoulder plunges into his skin, searing pain shooting through Steve’s arm. The pain is a burning cold in the back of his mind as he feels his vision black out from the edges. Tentacles reach for his feet once more and Eddie continues to stare at him with blank eyes while the blackness fizzles into the center of Steve’s vision and his mind goes blank save for one thought.

Eddie's alive.

[rebel-walnut]

I SHOULD MENTION: pretend ozzmosis came out pre '86, playing fast and loose with musical timelines here

I recently found a draft of a little Kas!Eddie ish thing I wrote that’s mainly exposition but whatever, I was going to expand on it but never did so I guess I’ll post it here. Steve POV, ~7650 words.

Anyways, here’s Sweet Leaf.

_____

Steve Harrington didn’t know Eddie Munson. They tried to save the world together, failed, he died, and that was that. And yet, there was a surprising amount of guilt that lingered in his chest at the thought of his last words to Steve. “Make him pay,” Eddie had said. And then Dustin was yelling over the walkie, a strangled “They got Eddie,” between muffled sobs. Steve remembers the ringing of his ears at Dustin’s choked cries before the chimes of a clock and a world splitting in two stole his attention away. Dustin knew Eddie better than Steve, maybe that was where the guilt was coming from. That he let one of his best friends cradle someone they thought of as their brother in their arms as the latter bled out. Just another failed attempt at saving someone right out of Steve’s reach. He couldn’t save Barb, he couldn’t save Max, and he couldn’t save Eddie. So he tried to make up for it after the fact and hoped the guilt would eventually stop eating away at him.

He volunteered at the school, rationing out supplies and sorting boxes of donations for families whose homes were destroyed in the ‘earthquake.’ It was good to keep busy, he found himself thinking idly after the third day of volunteering. Gave his hands something to do other than shake, his mind something to do other than replay the four chimes of a clock, and a choked “They got Eddie.” He saw Dustin and the rest of the kids around the school occasionally, the weight of Eddie’s loss and Max’s state evident in the way all of them carried themselves, but mainly in Dustin and Lucas. Lucas spent most of his time in the hospital, Steve driving him when he could and trying to make lighthearted conversation along the way just to distract Lucas for a moment despite it rarely working to get conversation out of him.

Keep reading