#st 4

[spookystarfishzombie]

[strangererotica]

EXPLICIT CONTENT | MINORS DNI

Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: You and Eddie spend some ‘quality time’ together in his van on a stormy afternoon 😘 Includes oral sex (f receiving) face-sitting, masturbation, squirting, unprotected p in v sex

It’s a gorgeous, stormy afternoon in Hawkins. Heavy rainfall drums against the roof of Eddie’s van, trickling down its fogged-up windows. The two of you are wrapped together under a blanket in the back, stripped to your underwear. Eddie’s hands run along your back as you lay over him, his fingers working your bra undone. He succeeds at unhooking it and the bra slides down, the fat of your breasts now pressed against his bare skin. Your breath hitches when your peaked nipples meet the coarse hair on Eddie’s chest. Every part of you seems on fire, sensitive and filled with need. Eddie can feel your arousal, one of his thighs situated between yours, the warmth of your soaked panties wetting his leg…

His breath is warm and moist on your neck, raising goosebumps across your skin. Eddie’s lips suck gently along the base of your throat, traveling down your chest till he’s massaging your breast in his mouth. You keen into his tongue, gliding your nipple against the soft, wet pad. Lightning strikes close by, the rumble of thunder vibrating the backseat under your bodies. Eddie slides his lips off your breast, his eyes wide with mischief. “That was a big one, huh?” he murmurs up at you. Adjusting yourself on top of Eddie, you’re now straddling his bulge instead of his thigh. He groans as you bear down on his stiff cock, the fat outline prominently tenting his boxers. “Yeah, it is a big one,” you respond, using Eddie’s previous words.

He holds you at the waist, rolling his hips upward, grinding you over his bulge. The rain grows stronger along with the wind, whipping against the sides of Eddie’s van. He gently eases you off of him for a second, gazing between your bodies at the soaking mess you’ve made on his boxers. “Jesus Christ,” he marvels, sounding awestruck. “I don’t know if it’s wetter out there, or in here…Fuck I need to taste you…” Eddie guides your hips as you crawl up his body, till your thighs are framing his face. “Atta girl,” he mumbles into your cunt, but his words are obviously muffled by your pussy in his mouth. Eddie’s left hand squeezes at your hip, while his right hand moves to touch himself.

His eyes drift closed, his tongue lapping your cunt through your slippery panties. You sink deeper over Eddie’s face, humping his lips and chin, marking him in your scent. He’s tugging at his cock now, grunting into your wet heat as he fucks himself and you at the same time. Your fingers are locked in Eddie’s hair, his ebony curls damp with sweat. The atmosphere inside the van is extremely warm, prompting you to toss the blanket off your bodies and onto the floor. Eddie’s hand is working himself closer and closer to climax, his mouth sucking your clit through your panties with the same goal. The underwear is completely saturated by this point, a useless barrier between your cunt and Eddie’s mouth. When you come, your orgasm fucking drenches Eddie, the slippery liquid running down his cheeks and neck.

Eddie flips you over, pulling his cock from his boxers and tugging the sopping crotch of your panties aside. Your legs wrap around him instinctively, begging him to fill you up, and he readily obliges. Eddie enters you easily in one thrust, his hands clutching your ankles for leverage as he pumps your cunt full of his release. He lays over you, panting and chuckling into your hair, “fuck sweetheart, m’sorry I came so quick. Y’just squeezed me so good, couldn’t help myself…”

Eddie slides a hand between your bodies to pull his dick out of you, his fingers grazing your clit in the process. A little gasp leaves your body at the contact; Eddie smiles up at you wickedly, that mischievous look in his eyes again. “Aww,” he coos. “Looks like you’ve got one more in there for me, huh princess?”

Before you can respond, Eddie’s already moved backward in the seat, nuzzling your belly on the way down to your pussy. He peels the ruined panties off of you, slathering your legs in your juices as he pulls them off and tosses the soaked fabric to the floor. Eddie rests on his elbows in front of your ass, and burrows his face between your legs.

Your fingers find his hair, tangling in Eddie’s wet mass of curls as he eats you. Heavy rain pummels the roof of Eddie’s van as his tongue bullies its way inside your pussy. It’s almost too much, the way he forces his tongue in and out of you. Eddie isn’t content with licking your clit; he literally has to fuck you with his mouth before he’s satisfied with his work. He knows from experience that you have the strongest orgasms when he pumps his tongue in and out of you like this, rubbing the tip against your g-spot, licking you from the inside out. Your hold tightens in Eddie’s hair, your cunt gripping his tongue as its thrusts continue.

Rutting yourself against his face, your clit bumps Eddie’s nose just as his tongue reaches the deepest place inside you yet. Your climax streaks through you like a bolt of lightning painting the sky, your creamy walls twisting and clenching around Eddie’s tongue. He grins into your cunt as you soak his face again, getting off on the vibrations of your orgasm he can feel through his tongue.

Eddie licks soft stripes up and down your pussy as your orgasm fades, pressing feather-light kisses onto your clit. “Good job, baby,” he says, lifting his head from between your legs. “I knew y’had another one in you…”💋

[scarletsknight]

f*ck me like you’re famous

wc: 3.3k

pairing: eddie x fem!reader

synopsis: the man everyone wants only wants you 

cw: 18+ mdni!!, rockstar!eddie, non canon au, smut, use of marijuana, mentions of alcohol consumption, established relationship, pet names, teasing, eddie's rings (y’all alr know), choking, fingering, oral sex (giving/receiving), orgasm denial, praising, hair pulling, reader has an oral fixation (lowkey), multiple orgasms, mirror sex (not really but kinda), lil bit of possessiveness, overuse of the word fuck, marking, sex while under the influence, unprotected sex, aftercare, fluff?

a/n: this has been sitting in my drafts since my first acc got snipped and just never reposted 😭 but i lowkey wanna get back into writing for this account. pls don’t come for me if i don’t follow through tho life is just fucking crazy rn but i miss this blog and i miss you guys so i’ll try. but until then i hope y’all enjoy this!! 🫶🏽

Eddie wasn't expecting much difference when Corroded Coffin started playing at the Hideout on Fridays instead of Tuesdays. But the crowd more than quadrupled in size, and it seemed to keep growing every week they came back. 

In the middle of one of their songs, Eddie spotted you not too far from the small stage.

You had been fixated on the band's lead guitarist since you got here, barely taking your eyes from him as he expertly moved his fingers over the strings of his instrument. 

This is what Eddie's always wanted; playing for an actual crowd of people and not just five drunks. But now, as he hears the cheers and sees everyone headbanging along to the music, a dream he's had for so long, all he can do is focus on you. 

After their set was over, Eddie was surprisingly quick to start loading their things into his van.

Eddie was getting no help from his bandmates as they were distracted by the group of girls that had come up and started talking to them. One of them even tried flirting with Eddie, but he quickly excuses himself once he finds you again, smoking.

He weaves his way past the people crowding the alleyway behind the bar, walking through clouds of smoke.

With your back turned to him, you didn't see him coming as you were in the middle of a conversation with your friends, passing a joint around. 

Eddie's eyes slowly drank you in as he approached you.

To say you look good would be an understatement. Not that Eddie would ever think otherwise, but it was something about the fitting leather pants you were wearing that he was slowly growing obsessed with. 

You feel two hands on your hips, and your back meets his chest. Eddie snakes his arms around you. 

Resting your head against Eddie's shoulder, you turn your head to face him. 

"My love," you lazily grin at him. 

"Hi, angel," Eddie cupped your jaw and brought your lips to his. He could taste the faint traces of alcohol on your tongue and the smoke your lips still tasted of. 

The friends you arrived with all commended Eddie and his band for their performance before you added onto the praises.

"You guys were fucking amazing," you tell him. 

"You really think so?" he asks. 

You turn your body toward him, wrapping your arms around his neck. 

"Yeah, of course," you nod, "And I could tell your little groupies thought so too," you said. 

Eddie scoffed, "Groupies? I don't have groupies."

"I beg to differ," you say. Eddie follows your eyes, looking at the same girl from earlier, watching you and Eddie, seeming a little mad that someone else has their hands all over him. But you don't give a shit; Eddie was yours first. 

"You jealous?" he teases.

"Never. You're so fucking hot," you tangle your fingers in his hair pulling him closer as if there was any space left between you, "And I don't know, I kinda loved watching everyone go crazy over you, knowing you're gonna fuck my brains out later."

Eddie backed you up against the side of your friend's car, deepening the kiss as he held your face. 

"Keep talking and looking at me like that, I'll take you right here," he threatens, and you laugh. 

Eddie slid his leg between yours, making you hum against his lips, and you felt his thighs come into contact with your core. 

"Eddie," you murmur. From the look in your eyes, he could already tell what you were thinking. 

"Wanna get out of here?" 

"Do you really have to ask?" you smirk.

You bid your friends goodbye, Eddie thanking all of them for coming and letting them know when and where Corroded Coffin is playing next. Walking to his van, hand in hand, Eddie opens the passenger side door for you after you said your byes to the rest of the band. 

Eddie kept one hand on the wheel while the other rested on your thigh. Briefly looking over at you, Eddie feels his chest swell. He watches you roll a joint for him, not wanting to waste any time once you get home, and he couldn't be more in love.

Watching your face twist up in concentration as you wrap the paper around the bud, using the skills he taught you, only made something stir inside Eddie. His hand on your leg started inching higher and higher, firmly squeezing your thigh. 

"Babe, don't start. I'm tryna concentrate," you said, rolling the paper between your fingers. 

"Can't help it when you're the hottest girlfriend on the planet," he grins. 

You glance over at him out of the corner of your eye. "Just shut up and keep your eyes on the road, Munson," you said. 

But Eddie didn't miss the smile that stretched across your face from his words. 

Once Eddie was parked, he hopped out of the van with the freshly rolled joint between his lips, still unlit. He was humming one of Corroded Coffin's songs as he waited for you with his held hand out for you to take as you got out of the van. 

Knowing the whole place was empty, Eddie loudly sang as the two of you slow danced into his trailer. Eddie, dramatically swaying and spinning you around, had giggles spilling from your mouth as you made your way to his room. 

Taking off his shoes and jacket, Eddie swipes a lighter from his desk before sitting at the edge of his bed and sparking the joint. 

Eddie hummed delightedly as thick clouds of smoke entered his lungs. He fell back onto his bed, staring up at his ceiling, taking another drag. 

Having gotten distracted by your boyfriend's immense music collection, not knowing what to put on, you finally make your way over to him. 

Eddie feels the bed sink on either side of his legs as you climb on top of him. He rests one hand on your hip while he smokes with the other. 

You pluck the joint out of his mouth, bringing the filter to your lips and taking a hit for yourself. 

Both his hands are on you now, moving up to your waist. You readjust yourself in his lap, and you hear Eddie sigh. You start subtly dragging your hips against his as you expel the smoke through your nose.

Eddie looked up at you like you were a goddess he was more than ready to worship. 

"God, you're so fucking perfect," Eddie said, "And all mine." 

You would've clenched your thighs together if Eddie's body wasn't between them. You leaned down, grabbing Eddie's jaw and bringing his lips closer to yours. Eddie parted his lips as you blew the smoke into his mouth. 

"And you're mine," you whisper, kissing his face. 

You both sit up, your lips still connected to his. 

"You know that I love you," he stared up at you, his big brown eyes drowning in adoration for you.

"I know," you lean your forehead against his, "I love you too," you tell him before pressing your lips to his.

"Ever since high school. The moment you walked into O'Donnell's class 30 minutes late wearing that goddamn skirt," Eddie slides his hands up your thighs.

You hum into his mouth, kissing him deeply.

"Just promise you won't forget me when you guys become famous," you joke.

"I would never," he says, "You think I'm crazy enough to give this pussy up."

"I hate you," you giggle against his lips.

"Didn't you just say you love me?"

"Yeah, well I change my mind and take it back," you teasingly say, getting out of his lap.

You turn your back to him, but Eddie doesn't let you get too far before he's on his feet too, wrapping his arms around you. Laughs spill from your lips as he holds you against his chest, burying his face into your neck.

"Tell me you love me," he said lowly in your ear, the raspiness of his voice causing slick to pool between your legs.

"No," you said like a moody child.

"Come on, sweetheart, just tell me."

Eddie's fingers found the buttons on your pants, starting to undo them. You wiggle your hips a little assisting Eddie in getting the leather down your legs. He slipped one of his hands between your thighs, stroking your clothed heat.

If Eddie's arm wasn't wrapped around your middle, your knees would've buckled. Between being high and having been incredibly horny for your boyfriend all night, you were extremely sensitive to his touch.

"Let me hear it," he rasps in your ear.

"Eddie," you let your head fall back against his shoulder.

"Mhm?" he hums into your neck.

"I-" the words die on your tongue when he slips his hand into your underwear.

You whimper, feeling the cool metal of his rings against your warm skin. He runs his fingers through your folds, letting your slick coat his digits, purposely neglecting your clit.

"All this for a man you hate?" he scoffs.

You whine, squirming in his arms, trying to move your hips against his hand. But Eddie's strength doesn't allow for it.

"Tell me you love me and I'll give you anything, baby."

You quickly drop the act, falling deeper into this headspace, desperate for Eddie to do anything.

"I love you, Eddie."

"See? That wasn't so hard, now, was it."

He kisses your cheek, starting to rub small circles on your clit. You practically melt against his body, and he falls back onto his bed with you between his legs. You turn your head to capture Eddie's lips in a kiss. At the same time, you're lifting your hips and pulling your underwear off, carelessly letting the piece of fabric hang from your ankle.

Eddie grabs your thighs, keeping them apart. He brings his hand back down to your pussy, lazily playing with your clit.

"Look at you, baby," you follow Eddie's eyes to the mirror by his bed. The sight of you between his legs as he toyed with your clit should've flooded you with embarrassment, but you were already too far gone to care. "So fucking beautiful." he kissed your temple.

"Eds," you start squirming.

"Yeah, sweetheart?"

"Please," you grabbed his wrist, directing his hand where you really needed him.

"So so wet," the tip of his finger teasingly circled your hole before slipping inside you, "And so fucking tight." he then added a second.

You braced yourself with your hands on Eddie's thighs, your nails scratching the denim of his jeans.

"That feel good, baby?"

"Y-Yes. So good."

Eddie pressed his lips to yours as he found a steady rhythm for his fingers. He pushes his tongue into your mouth, and you moan around the wet muscle as he curls his fingers against your soft walls.

"Oh god, Eddie—please," you tell him.

Your legs threatened to close around his hand before he pulled them apart with his other hand. The same hand trails up your body, cupping your boob over your shirt, feeling your perky nipple beneath the material since you opted for no bra tonight. He tweaked the sensitive nub between his fingers, causing you to gasp and your pussy to flutter around his fingers.

"Fuck-m'gonna cum."

"Yeah? you wanna cum all over my fingers, pretty girl?"

"Yes! please please l-"

You let out a broken cry, feeling your orgasm being so abruptly ripped away. You heard Eddie laugh as your hips tried to chase his hand before he left you untouched.

"That's what you get for acting like a brat," he said.

That teasing little fucker.

Turning yourself around to face him, Eddie sees the pout on your face before it's taken over by a smirk.

"I'm sorry, baby," you slowly let your fingers trail down his chest, "let me make it up to you," you fluttered your lashes at him.

Eddie grinned as your hand reached the front of his jeans, palming his semi hard on through his clothes.

He pulled his shirt over his head, flinging it somewhere in the room. You quickly undo his jeans, slipping your hand inside his boxers and beginning to stroke his length.

"Fuck, princess," Eddie groans when you squeeze your fist around him.

You started pulling his jeans off along with his underwear, and Eddie kicked them off his legs the rest of the way. You positioned yourself between his legs, circling your thumb around the tip, smearing the beads of precum all over his cock.

You look up at him through your lashes before you take him into your mouth. You start slow, only sucking on the head, letting the salty precum land on your tongue while you wrap your hand around the base of his cock.

"That's it, sweetheart. Just like that," Eddie sighs, stroking the back of your head as you take more of him into your mouth.

Whether it was your high or just your infatuation with this man, you couldn't get enough of the feeling of Eddie in your mouth. The weight of his cock on your tongue and his breathy moans were enough to have you pressing your thighs together.

You run your tongue along the underside of his cock, coating his length in your saliva. Eddie ran a hand through his hair, brushing his bangs out of his eyes as if he didn't want to miss a thing. Even with tears in your eyes and spit pooling out of the corners of your mouth, Eddie still couldn't take his eyes off you. 

The muscles in Eddie's stomach contracted as he started to roll his hips against your face. You slowly started taking more of him into your mouth, focusing on breathing through your nose as you relax your throat for Eddie. You didn't care about the limits of your gag reflex, taking Eddie's dick deeper down your throat.

Eddie tangled his fingers in your hair, pulling you off him. You whine, not just from the pleasurable pain throbbing from your scalp but the loss of his cock in your mouth.

"Shit, you almost made me cum," he said, shallowly breathing.

"So why didn't you?" you ask, ready to slide him back into your mouth.

Eddie's hold on your hair tightens as he holds you where he wants you.

He smiles as you weakly moan, "Cause as much as I love watching you take me down that pretty little throat of yours, I really need to fuck you."

You moan again, but this time at his words. 

"Please fuck me, Eddie," you didn't care how desperate you sounded. "Please."

"I know, angel, I know."

Once every piece of clothing was discarded, your teeth clashed with his in a heated kiss. He pushed his tongue into your mouth, easily dominating the kiss. Your head met the pillows as Eddie's laid you down. He took his place between your legs, looking down at you. 

Your eyes travel down Eddie's body, studying the ink littered all over his skin like you haven't hundreds of times before.

The muscles in his arm flexed as he pumped his cock in his hand, and you wanted desperately to squeeze your thighs together. 

"How bad do you want it?"

"I want you so fucking badly, Eddie. Been thinking about having you all night. It was hard not thinking about getting up on that stage and letting you have your way with me in front of everyone, so they know who you belong to."

Eddie raises an eyebrow at you before you shrug.

"I told you, not jealous. Maybe just a little possessive."

"That's even hotter," Eddie tells you, "You're mine just as much as I'm yours," you felt his cockhead nudging into your entrance. 

"Yours...Mine," you moan out the word as he slides into you.

You thought the feeling of Eddie inside of you, filling you up, would make you delirious. 

"Fuck, baby, you feel so good."

"Eddie~" 

Eddie started moving slowly, only rocking his hips into yours steadily. 

Eddie knew you as well as the back of his hand. From every movement you make to the noises that spill from your lips, it's like he could tell what you wanted without vocalizing it.

He circled his arms under your legs, your calves resting on his shoulders. 

"Yes—my fucking god, Eddie," you buried your head into the pillows. 

You reach out to him, your nails leaving crescent-shaped indents in his skin as he folds you over, pressing your knees to your chest. Eddie's cock deliciously stretched your walls, feeling him so deep you were sure he was in your guts. 

Eddie dropped your legs from his shoulders to kiss you. He swallowed your moans, sucking your bottom lip between his teeth. 

"You're so fucking wet," he groans against your lips. 

"You feel so good," you whimper. 

Sitting back on his haunches, he spreads your legs wider, mesmerized by the way his cock disappears inside you. 

His cock twitches against your soft walls, seeing you fucked out beneath him. Your tits bounce with every one of his movements. Goosebumps rose on your skin from his rings as he slid his hand up your torso. He didn't miss the chance to tease you, rolling and pinching one of your nipples between his fingers. 

You grab Eddie's wrist, silently telling him what you want as you bring his hand to your neck. Eddie wraps his fingers around your throat, applying pressure to the sides, sure to not crush your windpipe. 

Your eyes rolled back, and Eddie could feel your pussy pulsing around him. Feeling the stainless steel digging into your skin added to the euphoria coursing through your veins. 

Eddie saw the smile etched onto your face as he pounded into you and thought he couldn't be more in love. 

"Shit, angel, I don't know if I'm gonna last any longer."

"Please don't stop. I'm so close."

"You gonna cum for me, sweetheart?"

"Yes...Please, Eddie." 

"I want you to cum with me," Eddie's hand finds its way between you, rubbing uncoordinated circles on your clit. 

All you could do was weakly nod at him. 

The music was barely heard over the sounds of your moans and heavy breaths with the obscene squelching coming from where your bodies connected. You blink your eyes to refocus on the man above you. Eddie's messy hair clung to his forehead and neck from the thin layer of sweat covering his skin. The guitar pick he has on the small chain around his neck dangles above your face, and you slightly tug on it to bring him back down and meet his lips with yours. 

"I fucking love you," you said to Eddie as you came. 

Eddie couldn't hold off any longer, cumming after you said those words to him. His cum painted your walls white, slowly thrusting into you as your pussy milked his cock. 

"Fuck, I love you too," he mumbled into your mouth. 

You lazily made out, the both of you taking your time to come down from your highs. 

Eddie finally moved from between your legs, and you could already feel his cum start to spill out of you.

"Don't move," he tells you. 

"Like I have a choice. Unless you want another addition to the collection of stains."

"Like you aren't responsible for half the stains on this bed."

You gasp dramatically, "And whose fault is that!?"

Eddie laughed, picking up his boxers from the pile of clothes on the floor before leaving the room. He came back shortly with a damp washcloth and took his place back between your legs. 

You saw Eddie lick his lips as he stared at your pussy, messy with his cum. 

"Baby, the sheets," you remind him.

"Right," he snapped out of his thoughts, "It's kinda hot, though," he said with a smirk, wiping your sticky skin. 

"You're so gross," you shake your head. 

"But you love it," he grins.

a/n: feedback is appreciated!! thank you for reading <33

[metalhoops]

Steve’s party trick was appearing sober long past the point of inebriation. 

It was an act he’d perfected through observation. He’d watched his mother down wine like water and waltz into a garden party looking sober as a saint. So when everything went down at the Starcourt Mall, with the drugs and the appearance of another burgeoning concussion-induced migraine fogging the edges of his vision, he’d pushed through with professional tact. 

Steve couldn’t explain how it happened. One moment he was sitting on the kitchen counter, cradling a bag of frozen peas to his bare face, freezer burn nipping at the edges of his consciousness, and the next he was sprawled out on the carpet of a stranger’s house. 

What happened in between, he’d never know. 

Maybe it was for the best. Ignorance was bliss, in Steve’s opinion. His life was so much easier before the Upside Down. He would’ve been a worse person and lived a worse life. Yet his life would’ve been close to normal, not the mercurial mess it’d become.  He wouldn’t have spent the night locked in a secret underground soviet bunker, his face doubling as a punching bag for a man he didn’t know, while monsters roamed about the town. 

The mall had burned down, Steve remembered. After all was said and done, Mrs Byers dropped him and Robin off at their respective homes. Steve insisted he didn’t need to go to the hospital, that he was fine and, more importantly, that his parents were home. When Robin sobered up, she’d realise Steve had lied.

He’d told Robin a lot of things, and after the night in the mall, so had she. She knew Steve’s parents had been out of town for months, but she’d been flying too high to use any of her admittedly brilliant brain to put two and two together. Steve loved Robin. He loved her differently after that night, but he still loved her. He was human. He needed time to lick his wounds and some space. The quiet of the Harrington house had seemed like a blessing, so where the hell was he now?

“Hey, what did you take?” A vaguely familiar voice shook Steve from his stupor. 

He rolled away from the sound, burying his face in the carpet. He cringed as a  spark of pain shot through the veiled numbness that’d inhabited his body since the Russian drugs had hijacked his system. 

“Ouch,” Steve grumbled miserably. 

His head throbbed. One eye was entirely swollen shut. Even if Steve was sober, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to place the boy through his hazy vision. All he could make out were colours, pale skin, dark hair, and darker clothes. 

“I know. I know. You’ve got a real shiner, Harrington. Come on, up,” the boy instructed. 

Steve felt cool skin graze against the nape of his neck, pulling him up into a sitting position. Steve remained boneless, not making the task easy. 

He felt separate from his body, not sure where he ended and the rest of the world began. Once pulled up, he kept falling forward, his face making contact with the dark fabric of the boy’s shirt. The boy was more comfortable than the floor, with less carpet burn and more smooth leather. He smelled of smoke, sweat and an earthy kind of cologne that hadn’t been refreshed in hours.

“Elevator up,” Steve chuckled, laughing too hard for his own good. 

His ribs ached. He felt a laugh shudder through the boy’s body as he pulled Steve back, trying to get a better look at him. He held a finger in front of Steve’s face. 

“Not sure what this is meant to do but I’ve seen it in movies,” the boy commented as he moved his finger right to left, inspecting Steve’s face for something, neither boy was quite sure of. 

“Alright. You’ve gotta know I’m the least likely person to narc on you, Harrington. What did you take? Special K? Some Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds? Were you Chasing the Dragon? Gotta be something stronger than weed, man,” the boy insisted. 

Steve screwed up his nose and moved away from the man. 

“I don’t know what you’re saying,” Steve complained, trying to untangle the string of words the guy had thrown his way. 

Steve staggered to his feet, swaying before propping himself up, leaning against the wall, and feeling the whole thing tilt under his weight. 

“Dude, your walls are broken,” Steve muttered, as his legs gave out and he slid down to the floor. 

“We’re in a trailer, Steve,” the boy pointed out. Steve looked around the place, trying to make shapes from the blurs of colour and light. 

“Oh yeah,” He noted before resting his chin on his knee. 

The boy sat down in front of him, mirroring Steve’s posture, his chin resting on the bare knees of his ripped jeans. 

“Do you know what you took?” He pushed on, this time taking a different approach. 

“No,” Steve admitted, at last, sliding forward. 

The boy’s rings had caught his attention. They were little halos of light. He curiously tugged at his hand, pulling him close to examine the shine. He ran his fingers over the rise and fall of the rings. 

“Okay,” the dark-haired boy breathed, seemingly to himself. 

“I think you need to go to the hospital, dude.” 

“No hospitals,” Steve remarked eloquently as he returned to his previous position, face down on the carpet, taking the boy's hand with him. 

“Yeah well, I’m not so sure I like the idea of you sleeping either, Stevie,” He reasoned, his voice sounding strangled.   

“I’m tired,” Steve rebutted, his eyes sliding shut. 

There the boy was again, taking Steve’s face into his palm and pulling him up. For a moment, the vision in his good eye cleared enough to make out brown eyes painted with concern. 

“Look, I know we hated each other’s guts in high school but I don’t want you to O.D. on my carpet. It’s not good for the ambience,” the boy continued. 

Steve squinted, trying to place the face. Sure, he’d been a jerk in high school, particularly before his senior year, but he didn’t remember hating anyone. Not really. Maybe Jonathan, for a time, but that had passed. 

Munson. Steve’s brain supplied at last. The boy was Eddie Munson. He sold drugs and hung out on the fringes of Steve’s bigger parties back in the peak of his ‘King Steve’ era. 

“You hated me?” Steve asked, hearing the hurt in his voice before he realised what he was feeling. Eddie’s eyes widened in alarm, Steve’s face still in his palm. 

“What? No. I thought you hated me. I mean, you were a jock and I’ve got my whole ‘fuck the man shtick’, so it wasn’t like we ran in the same circles,” Eddie elaborated. 

“Jocks are ‘the man’?” Steve questioned. He’d like to blame the drugs, but he’d probably ask the question sober. 

“No. Yes. Kind of. Jocks are like... the grease for a cog in the wheel of the machine. All mass compliance to societal norms... or whatever.” 

Steve blinked owlishly at Eddie, trying to make a lick of sense out of what he’d said before resigning himself to the fact that he was completely lost. 

“I like Grease. It’s a cool movie,” he settled on, startling another laugh out of Eddie. He gently lowered Steve’s face onto the carpet and sighed. 

“Yeah, it’s a cool movie,” he muttered, leaving Steve for a moment, tossing sheets and a pillow from the sofa to the floor beside him. 

“Look, I’m going to stay up and make sure you don’t choke on your own tongue. You can stay here for the night, but I’m not letting you crash until my uncle gives you the thumbs up, weirdo.” 

Eddie slid a cushion beneath Steve’s head and draped the sheet over him. Steve was bone tired. He wanted nothing more than to sleep, but the pain in his body was growing by the moment and less favourable memories were leaking back into the forefront of his mind. He watched as Eddie placed a tape into the VCR and sat down beside Steve. It took him too long to realise the film was Grease. 

“Who’d you get into a fight with this time?” Eddie asked, seemingly aware of Steve’s sudden restlessness. 

Steve didn’t answer. He didn’t know how to. 

“Were the drugs before or after?” He pushed, searching for something Steve couldn’t work out.

Again, Steve didn’t know how to answer. Once more, Eddie let it slide. 

“You want me to call anyone? A girlfriend... or?” He doesn’t mention Steve’s parents. 

Maybe he was at more parties than Steve remembered, enough to know that the Harringtons being in Hawkins was rarer than a blue moon, less frequent than even Steve would admit to. 

“No,” Steve grumbled, starting to feel the swelling in his lip. 

Eddie nodded and let Steve have his silence. He half paid attention to the flashing lights on the screen, fading in and out of consciousness. Eddie would gently elbow his side each time Steve almost reached sleep. It was a long night, broken only by the opening of a door come sunrise. 

The light was too bright, too sudden. Steve shrunk from it curling into the closest point of dark comfort. Steve realised too late he’d curled himself into a small ball, tucking his face into the familiar darkness provided by Eddie’s crossed legs. 

“What in the Sam Hill have you gotten into, kid?” Steve heard a gruff voice ask in the doorway. Despite his words, the man didn’t sound angry, more amused. 

Steve felt Eddie pull the sheets up to hide his broken face from the light. 

“You know when I was fourteen, and I brought home that stray cat?” Eddie asked. 

Steve heard a door shutting and the scrape of a dining chair sliding against the linoleum. 

“The one that was sick as a dog?” The gruff voice replied. Probably Eddie’s uncle. 

“Same situation,” Eddie spoke.

“You’re telling me you found a kid wanderin’ round the trailer park at night and thought you’d bring him home? You remember what happened to that cat, right?” His uncle asked. 

“He went missing after a week. Then we found him half-kickin’ curled up in the back seat of the Johnsons’ cinder-blocked Austin,” Eddie muttered, stating the words as though it were a conversation Eddie and his uncle had before.  

“And you didn’t leave your room for a week.” 

“Your point, old man?” Eddie remarked.

“My point is, I love you, kid. But sometimes your bleeding heart is more trouble than it’s worth.” 

To Steve’s surprise, the sheet was pulled off his head. The next thing he knew he was face to face with Eddie’s uncle. The man shone a torch in Steve’s eyes, echoing Eddie’s movements, placing a finger in front of his eyes. Eddie watched in silence at Steve’s side. 

“He’s got a pretty bad concussion,” Eddie’s uncle supplied after a beat. 

“He was on something when I found him,” Eddie said. 

Steve was getting sick of people talking about him like he wasn’t there but in the same vein, he wanted to convalesce in peace. Eddie’s uncle shot him a sceptical look.

“Nothing I gave him, promise. He’s not letting me take him to the hospital.” 

“He’s right here,” Steve interjected.

He watched as Eddie’s uncle levelled him under his intense gaze. For the first time since he’d entered the room, he wasn’t seeing symptoms, or a problem Eddie had dropped in his lap but a boy. A kid, in Wayne’s eyes, one that looked worse for wear. It was the goddamn cat all over again. 

“I’m going to get you water and some aspirin. Eds, get some rest. No buts, kid you look like you haven’t slept a wink. Should also be safe enough for you to try to get some shut-eye, boy. I’m not Eddie, you can’t bat your eyes at me and get your way. I’m taking you to the hospital if anything happens, right?” 

Steve looked at the man with narrowly masked surprise before giving him a weak nod. He couldn’t imagine his parents doing the same, not even for one of Steve’s friends, let alone a stranger. 

“Come on, you can sleep in my room,” Eddie uttered, springing to his feet with a joviality that someone who’d gone twenty-four hours without sleep shouldn’t be able to muster. 

Steve blinked, slowly standing and gathering the sheets around himself, acutely aware of how ridiculous he looked. 

“Keep the door open,” Wayne called at their retreating backs. 

That was how Steve spent the summer of ‘85 hauled up and healing at the Munsons’ trailer. A few months later, he’d return the favour. When Eddie went missing, Wayne knew where to look. 

[love-toxin]

Okay but miscommunication trope is only super yummy when there’s a happy ending. Liiiike reader thinking they’re getting kicked out of their relationship in the fruity four, they’re not wanted anymore, maybe even bring replaced (ie with someone like Chrissy), and so every little sarcastic quip or ignoring is seen by them as the others not loving them anymore 🥺. Until one day it all comes crumbling down and I can’t decide with is more angsty, you breaking down telling the others they don’t love you anymore, or you trying to be brave by announcing you’re leaving and the fours hearts just dropping as they try to scramble to convince you to stay and why?! Why are you leaving!?!?! Please! But of course, happy ending when everything’s properly explained and angel is reassured they could never all fall out of love with them ❤️

oh.......miscommunication trope, you say? >:)

(cws: fruity four, gn!angelface, jealousy, post-s4, PTSD, huge miscommunication trope, domestic arguing, you have a tattoo + kinda shitty parents + bad home life, chrissy's a jealousy target, breakups, jopper appearance, you're childhood friends with jonathan, mentions of grief, an almost car crash, very mild head trauma, crying, angst with a happy ending--stick with me angels!)

Sometimes you wish Chrissy would just disappear. Just--poof--and she'd be gone.

It's awful of you to think, but you can't help it. She's just always around, ever since her breakup with Jason she's been by the house much more frequently. You were happy for her at first, because you liked her up until then, and she's always been nice to you. Plus, your partners saved her life back when all that crazy stuff with the Upside Down happened, an event you weren't privy to until after the fact, when you started dating them.

But she's always on Eddie, always chatting him up, always giggling at his attempts to cheer her up, and now she's attracted the attention of your other partners too. They're good friends, and that's good, but....why can you not shake this feeling that there's something more going on? That the arm touches over his jacket and the inside jokes aren't as friendly and harmless as they want you to think?

It's worse than that, though. The honeymoon phase is clearly over--cause all four of them just brush off your concerns, insisting that you're overreacting or just not addressing them at all. So you haven't been piping up when a joke hurts your feelings, and you've bitten your tongue when one of them has to reschedule something you've planned, and it's gotten to the point that they've wondered why you're so quiet all of a sudden. Why would they care? You think with a sour feeling in the back of your throat, rubbing the tattoo on your arm that Eddie gave you and wondering if that was just practice for someone else. You're not oblivious to the way Chrissy is slowly being invited into gatherings and dinners with everyone.....just like you were in the beginning. And after an especially heated fight with both Eddie and Robin, the worst one you've ever gotten into in your entire relationship, he got so pissed off that he just told you not to come to the dinner they had planned, and they'd take someone who actually wanted to go.

That was a couple days ago, and the air in the house has been strained for nobody else but you. You're equally as hurt by Eddie yelling at you as Robin silently going along with it, even though you slammed your bedroom door in her face when she tried to follow you, and waited until Eddie tugged her along to leave before you allowed yourself to cry. You're sick of the feeling that none of them really care for you, that you've been demoted to a piece of furniture in the house, because they've clearly lost interest. And they don't care when your things start disappearing from the house, when the clothes in your closet start dwindling, leaving behind nothing but the ones they've bought for you--no, they'd rather moon over Chrissy fucking Cunningham, and you've just taken all you think your heart can handle.

"I'm going out!" You call into the house from the front door, without any of their four voices responding. When you sigh, turn, and step out to turn the corner of the house, though, you bump right into one of them.

"Oh! Hey, baby." Steve steps back and readjusts the paper bag full of groceries he's got his arm around, keys halfway tucked into his pocket. "Where you off to?"

"Um....just, uh, gonna go visit my parents." You weren't really expecting him to pry, with how in your head you've been lately. But you're not gonna relent just cause one of the people who promised he'd love you forever, yet somehow can't be fucked enough to find the time to even watch a movie with you, asked you a question that remotely shows an ounce of concern.

"Your parents?" He blinks, shifting again to rest the bag on his hip. "You sure?"

That tone is so irritating. You used to love that almost parental sense of duty, the desire of his to know every detail of every problem so he can solve it. But now, you just feel suffocated, even though you're more distant from all of them now than you've ever been. "What, I'm not allowed to see my family?"

"Hey, that's not what I said! hold on," He moves to put the groceries inside, but you wave him off and start walking past him, your tone clearly frustrated as you encourage him to just forget it. But, in a tizzy, Steve hurriedly sets the bag down on the ground and runs to catch up with you, his hand descending on your arm only to be swatted away--but not for long, when he grabs it again and grips it tighter as he turns you to face him. "Jesus, wait! What's the big fuss? Did I do something?"

"Let me go, Steve." You refuse to look him in the eyes, but you can't break his grip. Why can't he just let it go, so it's less painful? "I don't wanna drag this out."

"Drag what out?" Finally, it dawns on him as his eyes dart from the keys clenched in your hand to the windows of your car parked in the driveway, boxes clearly piled up in the trunk and in the backseat that none of them seemed to notice you moving.

".....So that's it? You're breaking up with us?" Steve says it with disbelief, like he's expecting you to say something or anything different. It's almost a little satisfying when you respond in the way he never could have expected, even though he should've by now. Even though it feels bitter on your tongue as soon as it comes up.

"You know what? Yes. That's exactly it." You finally wrench your arm out of his grip, and each of those words sting as they come out, but you won't cry, you refuse to cry in front of Steve today. "I'm leaving tonight, and I'm never coming back to Hawkins again."

"Why?"

"Ask your new girlfriend."

"Who? Wait--Chrissy?" He shakes his head, and what comes out next is more cruel than you wanted to be--but he just won't get it, it won't happen unless you make them realize why they don't want you anymore.

"Wow, the jock has a brain! Well done, Stevie." He grimaces at once, and god, you wish it would all stuff itself back into your throat.

"What the hell is wrong with you? Why are you being such a-"

"I know you're in love with her, Steve! For fuck's sakes, I'm not as stupid as you think I am!" You shout into the broken silence of the front lawn, wishing from the deepest reaches of your heart that this could all just be a horrible nightmare. Not reality. You don't want to be facing those big, soft eyes of Steve staring back at you in shock and pain, so you just turn your head and hope he doesn't see how much you're shaking.

"I get it, okay?! She's prettier than me, and nicer, and she doesn't have my fucking issues--and you guys clearly like her. It's like I don't even exist when she's around." You move aside to gesture towards your car, keys clutched in your hand so they won't fall or get taken from you, because you know Steve is reckless when he's upset. "None of you even noticed I was packing. Nancy fucking helped me put a box in yesterday."

Just then, both your heads turn at the sound of a car approaching--and just in time, you realize it's Eddie, his van's tires crunching the gravel of the long driveway as he pulls up to a stop beside your car. And lo and behold, sitting in the front seat with a smile on her face is her. Chrissy waves to you through the window, and as if your heart isn't in the process of shattering into shards that dig into your lungs, you raise your hand to acknowledge her back. You turn back to look at Steve one last time. Memorizing his face, because you know you won't ever see him again, as you take a few steps backward and hand him your parting words.

"Don't break her heart, Steve. It sucks."

With that, and with nothing but confliction reflecting back at you on his face, you turn on your heels and make your way around your car, bidding Eddie and Chrissy a stiff goodbye as they get out of the van and you get into your car. You reverse, roll back out of the driveway, and shift gears to start puttering down the road. And as soon as the house is out of your rearview mirror, that's when you feel those tears spilling out that won't stop until well after you pass the Leaving Hawkins sign on the side of the road.

A week into your new start in the city, you haven't gotten any more closure than when you left.

Living with your aunt isn't great, but it's something. The apartment is small, and you still haven't found a new job--you did call the Palace to inform them that you were quitting, though, to which you were greeted with nothing but indifference as you left a message on the answering machine. Figures that nobody in that town would miss me, you think, but you can't dwell on it for too long, because then you'll start thinking of them and it'll have you sobbing into your pillow again. Even worse is that you can't even fully express your pain to your family, your aunt, anybody--because they'll all think you're a freak, and it won't be surprising that your "relationship" ended so badly. You don't even really speak to your parents or your family in the first place, so you can't expect them to show you any sympathy. In fact, if they said anything to you, it would probably be that you should be glad it's over so you can live a normal life.

You don't want normal. You want your Robin talking your ear off about something gross for hours, you want Eddie burping into your ear and laughing, you want Nancy falling asleep on top of you and drooling on your chest, and Steve--you want Steve to come over while you're both on your breaks, talking with his mouth full and stealing bits of your lunch while kissing you in between each bite. You want that love back, you want it so badly it hurts, it hurts your heart every time something reminds you of them.

Maybe that's the worst part. That they don't want that anymore, they want someone that can share those memories with of that terrible tragedy, who knows how they feel and relates to those nightmares that wake them up in a cold sweat, who they can compare scars with and laugh with now that it's all over. They want someone scarred but beautiful, someone perfect, and you can never be that way no matter how hard you try. It explains why you haven't gotten a single phone call, or a letter, or anything since you left, and that treatment extends into your second week in Indy and right into the third. But it doesn't get any less painful, even when you get a job at a convenience store around the corner to busy yourself and help with the rent. Nor when you try going on a date or two, just to spend the whole dinner staring off into space as they talk and wondering what the people you loved are doing right now.

While you're behind the counter at work, your thoughts often drift back to that house by Maple Drive. The path around the back that leads into the woods, where Eddie would take you out for a smoke and to watch the stars for awhile--always with a walkie on hand, just in case, as Steve used to say. The pool that often sits empty, and sometimes you'd look out the window to see Nancy lifting up the cover on it to peek underneath, before breathing a visible sigh of relief and briskly walking away. Sometimes even in the middle of the night, creeping out the sliding glass door in her pajamas. And you remember that bed you often shared with Robin, who gets so clingy when she sleeps....and you wonder if she's sharing it with Chrissy now, if the cheerleader you always thought was such a nice girl is occupying the spot you thought would be yours forever.

Your brow furrows as you stock Camels on the shelf behind the counter, sliding each one into the perfect spot but feeling an itch of irritation when they don't line up. Is Eddie holding her right now? Is he coming up behind her every morning, and nuzzling his nose into her cheek as she stirs milk into her coffee? Is Nancy cuddling her and chatting her up about whatever project she has going on right now? Is Steve picking up her bag, and insisting she let her boyfriend hold the heavy stuff while she sits and looks pretty? They probably are. And they're probably much happier doing it with her, than they ever were with you.

Something thuds on the counter behind you, and you sigh without a sound as the gruff voice at your back asks for a pack while you're at it. Your fist squeezes around the box you've got in hand, and when you turn on your heels to toss it on to the tabletop and reach for the scanner, your eyes widen, and so do the ones on the moustached man that's towering in front of you with a petite woman at his side.

"Hop?"

You breathe out the name, trying to regain yourself as quick as you can--you're pretty used to keeping your tears back now, adjusted to having a straight face so nobody will pry or prod for your feelings. The former sheriff of your hometown that you used to duck out of sight from, laughing and hiding your goods with Eddie right behind you, is standing at your counter with a shocked expression, along with Joyce Byers who seems just as surprised to see you here. And with little else you can think of, you clear your throat and try to crack that tense silence.

"Uh...so, you two on vacation, or someth-"

"Are you fucking with me?"

Hopper cuts you off, hands bracing the edge of the counter as he looks you up and down, the two glass bottles of Coke getting shoved aside by him to fall over and roll across the counter as he reaches across the barrier to grab your arm. Without much struggle, because you have no clue what's going on, you allow the older man to yank your wrist up and turn it over, Joyce hurriedly pushing up your sleeve with her gaze pinned to your skin, like she's desperately searching for something that has nothing to do with your confused questions spilling out on top of each other.

When they've finally uncovered that patch of skin they were looking for, the two of them share a look between themselves, before finally looking back up to acknowledge how baffled and worried you are. It isn't until you scan down to see what they found that the pieces start coming together, the black ink of the tattoo Eddie gave you when you first started dating peeking out at you. It's just a thin, mid-sized black circle on your inner forearm, with five points reaching outward like a sun. But the detail of it has always enchanted you, Eddie's diligent stare as he inked it into your skin burned into your mind. You've considered getting it covered since then, but....you can't bring yourself to do it yet.

"I'll call it in," Hopper says cryptically, stepping back and turning away to bring out the walkie from his belt and start mumbling into it. In the meanwhile, you're left with his partner, and the lady you've practically grown up with since she babysat you a long time ago. You often forget that time, when you and Jonathan would run around her backyard with sticks and rocks to try and build your own castle, while his baby brother watched from the stairs and giggled at your antics. You were so young, and so carefree, it seemed....but it was a happy time, one of few before you met those four.

"Honey, you're alright?" Joyce's voice quivers, anxious for the answer, but you nod as soon as her question registers because you hate to see her like this.

"Ye...Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" She circles round the counter, coming right in for a hug that you return without question. The squeeze is tight, like a mother's embrace upon returning home from a long time away, and you instantly feel a pinch of guilt for neglecting to include her in your plan to leave Hawkins. Now that you think about it, you really didn't tell anyone, except....

"-Kid, relax, we're coming there. No, do not get in your car, sit your ass down so you're there when we get back! Jesus," Hop gets more animated as he talks over the channel, and your hug splits as your head swivels towards the sound of a familiar voice through the static. Steve.

"Are they there? Let me talk to them! Please, Hopper, let me hear their voice-"

It's so frantic, desperate. The first time you've heard one of their voices in what feels like your whole life, and you have to struggle not to cave, bringing a shaky hand up over your mouth as you whisper a "What's going on?" to Joyce. And with your ears perked up, you can distinguish the background noise in the transmission--there are three other distinct voices, talking just as fearfully amongst themselves as they also try to get through to Hop. Nancy, Eddie, and Robin, each with as much indignation as Steve, who must be holding the other walkie.

"We're coming down right now, kid. Just try to calm down in the meantime." With that, Hopper shuts the antenna and gestures for you to follow him, the sweet woman at your side holding your arm as you obey him, like she's afraid you'll vanish if she lets go. You're led out of the light of the fluorescent bulbs overhead to Hop's truck parked by the curb--you at least have the sense to fumble with your keys and lock the front door before you leave--you let him open the door and sit yourself in the backseat, and shakily buckle yourself in as they get in front with promises to explain everything. Still struck dumb with shock to the point that it hasn't really registered that you just left work in the middle of your shift.

But you get an idea of what's happening when you turn your head, and catch a glimpse of a scattered stack of papers on the seat beside you out of your peripheral. Tentatively, as Hop starts up the ignition, your fingers brush over one of the nearest pages--and when you lift it up to survey it closer, the two of them notice you and share another sobering look between them. What's staring back at you is undeniably, unmistakably, a missing person's ad. And the picture is one you recognize immediately, because it's yours. Your photo, details of your last sighting, a description of your tattoo, a list of things for people to look out for....

"You really worried everyone back home, kid."

Suddenly, a bitterness rises up inside you, and the paper crumples slightly as you realize what's really happening. "I'm fine. I just...decided to get out of Hawkins."

"Yeah, well, maybe tell your roommates that, first."

"Hop-"

"They didn't care! I told Steve anyways, so what's the big fucking deal?" Even though Joyce flinches at you raising your voice, you can't be quiet right now. Anger is something you've been almost too numb to endure these last few weeks, but now you could just put your fist straight through Hopper's window--they put up such a fuss for what? To drag you back to that shitty inbred town in the sticks, just to make sure they didn't want you in the first place? It's bullshit.

"They sure as shit care!" Hop shouts right back, casting his signature scowl over his shoulder as he drives through semi-empty streets. It's so late, and so dark, it's unlikely there'll even be many pedestrians. "Do you realize how many times Nancy Wheeler has shown up on my doorstep, begging me to go on another search and rescue for you?! They're worried sick!"

"Why?"

There's silence for awhile, very tense silence, before you repeat your question that says much more than just that one word.

"....Because they thought you were gone. They thought you were there."

There. That's what he means--the other world, the Upside Down. The place you've never seen, only heard horror stories about and snatches of descriptions of when you comforted one of them during a night terror. The missing people, the murders, the experiments....they're all so hard to believe, but then again, you can't deny Will's remarkable return from the dead or Barbara Holland's coverup death, both of which you've been close enough to to know that there's no way they're just elaborate lies.

So they were worried you had died. That your disappearance wasn't of your own volition. They're going to be in for an unfortunate surprise, but by the tightly shut locks on Hopper's truck doors, you know there's no getting out of this until he brings you right back to drop you in their laps.

"We came here to look for you. Your mom finally told us you had an aunt in the city." Joyce offers you another piece to the puzzle, but your mind is still stuck on the fact that your ex-partners seemed so desperate over the walkie. They....they wouldn't want you to die, but that doesn't mean they want you. Figures that your parents would make it more difficult for two of the only people that even remotely have any concern for you too, they're probably profiting off all that glorious attention of having a missing child.

"I have a life here, now. I don't want to go back." Lies. You know it's all lies.

"Listen, kid, whatever happened with your friends, I promise it's not worth throwing in the towel. You've gotta see things through." Clearly it's not worth an argument, you'd rather save your energy at this point. You're gonna need plenty to face that hard conversation you know is coming, when you're gonna have to confirm to them directly that you're moving on. No more running away, or hiding from the problem. You have to face it.

"You don't know anything about me, or them."

The already long drive drags on even longer in the silence that follows, and you make a mental note to call your aunt when they get you back to Hawkins, so she doesn't freak out when she comes home to an empty apartment. You can imagine your manager's gonna call and cuss you out before firing you for leaving the store unattended, too, and you groan and let your head hit the seat behind you. Now you're gonna have to find another job, gonna have to explain to your aunt what you did....or maybe she won't even notice your absence, not until someone makes a fuss about it.

Your mind is left racing with so many thoughts and worries that the scenery passes by without note, the moon barely shining any light on the landscape, like it's all one huge plain with little dots for buildings and trees. Like one big hellscape, but it's numb and frozen over with nothing left but a mocking echo of the world that's no longer here. You don't even really recognize your surroundings until a couple hours have passed, and the Welcome To Hawkins sign zips by and has you sitting up in your seat. Just as you pass it, though, you think you see the glimmer of another set of headlights, a rarity on these quiet streets--and then your whole world shifts violently.

"Shit!" Hop curses as he swerves suddenly, and Joyce shrieks as you all nearly careen off the road and into the ditch, your head cracking against the window and bouncing off for you to clutch at it in pain. A groan is all you can get out when he calls back to you, the dizzy feeling making you a little sick, but as you lift your head and the truck rolls to a stop, you spot the culprit of that downright suicidal speed driving that nearly caused a head-on collision.

Your heart is pierced with a deep chill immediately. You'd recognize that van anywhere, and that curly mane of hair as the driver stumbles out his door even moreso. He's not hurt, just dazed--and for the moment, your brain doesn't immediately go to the question of why you should even care. As he stands there in the road, in the dark, Eddie's form is lit up by the headlights still shining without a flicker, but he doesn't flinch even when it must be glaring directly into his eyes, just holds a hand up to block it out. And when they meet yours as you lean over the console to see him, he doesn't wait a second, hurrying around the passenger's side of the truck to fumble for the handle of your door. With a click, and the light above you switching on as a beeping starts to emit from the vehicle, Eddie's suddenly cramming himself into the backseat with you--and there's tears already wetting his cheeks as he grabs you in a hug, gasping in a shaky lungful of breath like he's shocked he's really touching you. Crying and mumbling into your hair, Eddie buckles when you squeeze him back, falling victim to that desire in the deepest part of your soul that just wanted to hold him again.

"I didn't mean it, I didn't mean it baby, I didn't--everything I said, I swear, I was being such a fucking moron-" He starts babbling from nowhere, and his voice itself is a comfort, having not heard it next to your ear for so long that it aches now.

"Eddie-"

"You're mine, okay?! You're my everything!" He cries, burying his face even deeper into your neck and inhaling whatever scent he can get. You're stunned into staying limp, letting his hands grab and squeeze at you wherever they land--his curly hair tickles your cheek and sticks to it, and that sensation alone drags tears up to the surface, only allowing them to spill when you hear him whispering those croaked pleas of "I love you, I love you, I love you" until you're crying right along with him. It's been so long since you heard it, you'd started believing it was never really true.

It takes minutes that feel like hours for you to both calm down enough to look at each other, your face cradled in Eddie's rough hands as he sniffles and murmurs a "You're so beautiful" so innocently sincere, that it instantly makes you wish you had never left. He smiles, and the world that seems so dark grows a little brighter around you. You're not even privy to the looks Joyce and Hopper are giving each other in the front seat, clearly a little surprised at the passion you two share that nobody else has ever seen. But they know. And when Eddie starts pulling you out of your seat with the promise to take you back, Hop only reminds him to drive safely before he allows you two to shut the truck's door and circle round the vehicle with Eddie's arm clinging to your waist. The air hits you, cool and dry, just like it always is in Hawkins. And when he opens your door for you and waits for you to clamber in, before getting in on the other side and fumbling contently with his keys, you're not sure you really know what to expect. He briefly elaborates that he'd gotten worried, and that he's just glad he spotted Hop's truck before he'd sped all the way out of Hawkins and missed you--but it doesn't last, because soon he's grabbing your thigh and sighing out a breath of relief.

"We'll talk about everything when we get home. For now, I just want to hold you." Eddie offers his hand to you, giving it a grateful squeeze when you slip yours into it and interlace your fingers together.

They'll all hate me for real, this time.

That's exactly how the drive goes, Eddie's shoulders relaxed even as he steers with one hand, and navigates while stealing glances over at you with relief written all over his face, and brings your hands up to kiss your knuckles every so often. But he's just one. The other three....your heart sinks as you run over that last conversation you had with Steve, the way you'd ignored Robin completely, and how you pretended everything was absolutely fine with Nancy up until the moment you left. And it somehow dawns on you only then--they thought you were gone, that you had been taken to the Upside Down, and your heart sinks as you watch the trees pass by in clusters while that dread creeps closer down the road that's so familiar.

Not even the comforting warmth of Eddie's hand could drive that thought out of your mind, even less so when he turns and you hit that patch of gravel that leads up the driveway. He'll stop soon, and you'll be facing the music....and when Eddie shifts into park, you sort of float from your seat to the walkway where you threw your feelings back into Steve's face, and up towards the front door that Eddie opens for you before you cross the threshold into the house. It does feel like home, and you don't want to lose it right on the welcome mat, so you blink away any tears that threaten to spill before you quietly follow him into the living room.

Three heads turn to look your way, too inundated in conversation around the coffee table to hear the door opening, but that stops the second their eyes land on you. Steve and Robin are the ones sitting closest to where you stand, but Nancy's the one that makes her way to you first, her lower lip already quivering enough to break into a sob as she crosses the patch of carpet to throw her arms around you. She's strong enough to grip you tight enough to hurt, but too weak to keep herself on her feet, and you end up sinking to the floor with her as your name floods out of her lungs on repeat, getting louder and louder and louder until she's wailing. You could swear the walls rattle with the volume she cries at, completely coming apart in your arms like you've never seen her do before.

"Don't you ever do that to me again!" She shouts, yet her voice is like a child's, wobbling and whiny and so miserably pitiful that it pains you even to listen to it, especially when she's clutching you so close to her body--so afraid that you won't be there when she pulls away, so she refuses to. You don't have any right to cry when she's so distraught, but with your head over her shoulder, the other two watch your lips curve downwards and your eyes screw shut into a flood of tears that won't stop easily.

"I'm sorry, Nancy. I'm okay." You whimper, burying your face into her curls until your lips brush her jawline, and she shudders into each gentle, praiseworthy kiss that you press there. Up until her sobs subside, and she breaths a sigh of relief that you can feel from her chest against yours, each one sinking and rising into each other as you breathe along with her. "I thought you didn't want me anymore."

She shakes her head, and finally pulls herself back to look at you, a fresh wave of tears streaming down her cheeks when she gets a good look at you. Nancy touches your face, thumbs away your own tears--and you know she's not just looking at you, but the girl she lost so long ago, whose smile she sees in yours on those days she misses her the most dearly. "I never wanted you more when I thought you weren't coming back," She whispers back. "How could I not want you? I love you."

The kiss she lays upon your lips is breathtaking, shaking and sweet and just....everything. Everything you missed and craved like air and water and life.

You're already halfway into her embrace when she laughs out that half-hearted joke, walking back with you a couple steps when you throw yourself into it. And she squeezes you so tight, so hard, the kisses a flurry of needy, fluttering touches all over your face until she somehow finds your lips--and when she does, she makes that last one a kiss you won't shake off for days, the feeling tingling your lips even when she pulls away. Still rubbing that spot on your back that she knows is sensitive, Robin grips you in an even harder hug that nearly cracks your spine, and whispers into your ear: "I'm so happy you're here with me." before she kisses you one last time, last one, she swears, fingers crossed behind your back. But then, she takes notice to the man standing just a foot away--and she lets you go to turn you around, her fingertips grazing your arms as you finally face him.

"Yeah, she, uh....she cried, like, every night," Even as Robin says it and breaks the quiet, she herself is rubbing tears from her cheeks, trying to keep that smile going as you stand and Nancy loosens her hold. She moves aside for Eddie to lay his hands on her shoulders from behind, and keep her steady on her feet. "So did Steve. I told you he cries when we watch Princess Bride!"

"I-I....I didn't mean it, Steve. I never...I've never thought you were dumb." Your voice comes out as a whimper, fingers fiddling with each other as you endure that big, brown, wide-eyed stare.

"I know." He breathes, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides. He wants to move, he's antsy, but he won't take another step. "I know, baby."

"Can I hug you?" Steve just nods, but his lip quivers and his features gain that pathetic, sad puppy look, because he was hoping and praying you would say those very words. Your heart soars as he meets your step forward and flings his strong arms tight around your body, crushing you with his huge stature but never loosening up. He instantly brings his hand up to cradle your head against his chest, kissing the crown of it with so much firmness that you know he's reaffirming you're really standing in front of him again.

"I shouldn't have let you leave. I should've slashed your damn tires." He chuckles along with you at the lighthearted crack at breaking the tension, until he chokes up again into a sob. "Nobody could ever replace you. And I swear, I'll never break your heart again."

Steve holds you for a long time, squeezing you and kissing you and brushing strands of hair from your eyes to just look at you, surveying the face of the love he feared he'd never get to cherish again. It's a long time coming, and when he's done, there are three other warm bodies in the room that need attention from the sweet thing they've been killing themselves over these last few weeks.

From there, they catch you up with what had happened in your absence. Steve had walked off to clear his head after you left, and hadn't returned until late in the day--burst through the front door during an unusually quiet dinner and sent them all into a panic, when he realized you really had left and you weren't coming back. The four of them had jumped into action to split up and look for you, Nancy contacted your parents and other family while Steve and Robin tried to find some hint of your whereabouts in the house, cracking open your drawers and notes and realizing how much of your stuff was missing. Meanwhile, Eddie had driven in circles round Hawkins and the outer city limits, trying to find any trace of your car in the dark with the help of passing streetlights.

When those attempts had failed after stretching out into the next day to mid-afternoon, and with your very unhelpful parents insisting they had no idea where you could've gone, that's when your partners had started printing out missing person's flyers and put in an official report with the sheriff's office. And, seemingly having forgotten that you were really the only one who ever checked the voicemail at work, your message tendering your resignation had been errantly erased by your manager--worrying them even further when they questioned him, because if you were really planning on moving away like you said, how could you not tell your employer? It wasn't like you. Their fears had only gotten stronger from there.

The worst had yet to come, though. Because when your car had been found on the side of the road way out in the middle of nowhere, miles and miles away from Hawkins and completely destroyed, the four of them had reached the point of no return. The plates had been torn off, but it was your exact make and model of car, and what were they supposed to believe? That it was just coincidence? That's what Hopper had tried to reassure them with, tried to insist that plenty of cars get found gutted out in the bush, but they couldn't be convinced that it was just some freak happenstance and delude themselves to think that you were fine and dandy somewhere else. The same thing had happened to Max's stepbrother, and they all knew how that had ended.

So started the search parties, the nights spent staying up and studying maps by lamplight, the microwave meals in place of home cooking and sleeping in shifts by the phone, waiting and hoping for some kind of clue to your whereabouts to appear. Finding you had become more important than eating, proper sleep, showering, or attention paid to anything aside from looking towards the horizon to see if you would magically walk back into their lives.

And all that time, you had believed nothing but that they couldn't care less where you were, or what you were doing. When in reality, they could think of nothing but you. That was what had led Eddie to nearly crash into you as you re-entered Hawkins, having been pacing the living room for those long hours after Hop's call until he just couldn't take it anymore--despite the other three trying to stop him, he had dashed out to his van and peeled out of the driveway like a lunatic, just for the slightest chance that he might be there when you needed help. It was so stupid, so reckless, and you'll remember that moment he came rushing around the side of the truck to get to you forever.

Despite them reassuring you about Chrissy, too, when the tears have dried--promising you she's nothing but a friend, and they would have no problems limiting her interaction with all of you from now on--you wave it away, smiling off your stupidity and letting them know that it's fine. You were just being dumb, acting crazy, but you're fine now. And Eddie's eyes narrow at that.

"You're not crazy." He murmurs absentmindedly, and says nothing more until he can slip away from your reunion, and reach the phone in the kitchen. While you're busy dealing with your other partner's crippling absence of affection, he taps his blunt nails into each button, numbly dialing the number he's memorized until the ringing starts and stops.

"Hey, Chris. Angel's back home."

"Oh, that's great! Oh...Eddie, I'm so happy for you. You must be relieved-"

"Yeah. Yeah, I am. Listen, no hard feelings, but....you're my friend, so I'm just gonna be straight. Don't come by the house anymore."

"I--what? Really? I....Eddie, I'm sorry, if I did something to upset you-"

"No, no, nothing you did. Well, not really. But I know how you feel, Chris, and I can't really ignore it anymore." He swallows deeply, and sucks on his teeth as he tries to think of some better way to say it. "I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I don't feel the same. I never have, and I'm sorry if I made you feel like that might change."

"......So that's it?"

"That's it. We can still be friends, but we need space for awhile first, and I'm not gonna ignore you flirting with me anymore. I'm in love and it's not gonna change. Sorry."

"Can we at least talk about it, Eddie? Please? I'd rather talk this out in person."

"No. Bye, Chrissy."

He thuds the phone back on the receiver just a little too hard, and brings his hand up to rub at his neck and try and get the ache out. That didn't feel good, having to confront one of his very few friends with a truth he just wanted to ignore--but the sick feeling he has now can't even compare to how he felt when you were away, and it's an easy decision to make in that regard. He'd take you over her any day. It's a bit of a guilty feeling, but he knows it's the truth even if it hurts Chrissy's feelings, and he's happy even so.

"....Yeah, I missed you real bad, sweetheart. Don't you ever think I wouldn't....or else you are crazy."

"Eddie?" You call out from the living room, and following that sweet voice to its source, he feels himself light up at the sight of you settled back into the couch. Legs tucked up in Robin's lap, halfway into Steve and Nancy's, looking so comfortable and cute as you look up at him. You're where you belong. He's so distracted by the glee and relief of having you home, he didn't even realize how quiet it had been between you all until he came right back from his task. You say nothing more, just hold your arms out to him--and when he gets close enough, you capture him with those pretty eyes of yours, and melt away any ill feeling as you pull him into your chest.

[milevenposting]

Okay. What don't I understand?

[withacapitalp]

Daisies

Read it on ao3 instead

Eddie was never a deep sleeper. Years of living in cars and on couches taught him to always have an ear out. Always be able to wake up in an instant, always be alert, ready to fight whoever might be coming at you. Living with Wayne helped to ease that compulsion a bit, but in general, Eddie was never truly fully relaxed when he slept. Everything that had happened over Spring Break hadn’t helped matters in the slightest. 

So he was awake the second Steve started to choke. 

He was so quick that Steve was still asleep, curled up on his side in the absolutely adorable way that usually made Eddie smile. There was no smile tonight, just an anxious little whimper and a boy frozen in fear, because his partner was choking on nothing and not waking up. 

“Steve?” Eddie whispered, reaching out with a shaking hand and touching Steve’s shoulder. “Baby?” 

Steve continued to gasp, his chest heaving in a strange and awful way as he tried and failed to breathe. Eddie was about to do something more, anything to make him stop, when Steve’s eyes opened. He was the picture of panic for all of two seconds, before he was sitting up, roughly coughing. 

He hacked out a few more harsh sounding noises, before he spat into his open palm, taking a relieved breath as whatever was lodged in his throat came out. Eddie would’ve been relieved too, confused, but okay now that Steve was safe. 

And then he saw what was in Steve’s hand. 

A daisy. Steve had just coughed up a fucking daisy. And, judging by the completely blasé expression he had on his face as he looked down at it, this wasn’t the first time. 

What the fuck?

Eddie had seen Hanahaki before, just once. Some girl in middle school had fallen in love with a dumb jock, a classic move that had felt like a cliche to him at the time. When the jerk rejected her in front of everyone, she had collapsed to her knees in the middle of the cafeteria, spitting out thorny roses till she passed out. 

She lived, but just barely, and had gotten the surgery to remove the roses wrapped around her lungs. By the next week she was happy as a clam, living without a single memory of the incident that had left the rest of the school in total shock. 

Seeing it now gave Eddie the same exact feelings he had all those years ago. A deep sense of discomfort from encroaching on something that incredibly intimate, an odd mix of revulsion and jealousy, and a deep seated wish to be anywhere but where he was at this moment. 

It was even worse now that it was Steve. 

His boyfriend slid out of bed, quietly padding over to the ensuite without even so much as a glance Eddie’s way, leaving behind the flower. Steve didn’t shut the door all the way, so Eddie could hear him cough a few more times. As he did, Eddie picked up the daisy, examining it. 

It was just a regular daisy, white as snow except for a few spots of blood sitting innocently on its petals. Nothing special about it, nothing significant. Apart from the fact that it was Steve’s daisy.  

Steve’s daisy for someone that wasn’t him. 

“Who?” Eddie asked when Steve came back into view looking utterly exhausted. His voice was flat, lacking any of the emotion he usually had. It was like someone had torn his heart out, and now he was just hollow, hollow, hollow. 

Steve hummed in confusion, quirking his head to the side as he leaned his entire body against the doorway, blinking slowly. 

“Who is it?” Eddie clarified, holding up the daisy. Any trace of sleepiness vanished from Steve’s features. He stood up painfully straight, even took a step back, like Eddie had screamed instead of whispered. 

“I’m not mad,” Eddie rushed to say, trying to calm Steve’s quiet panic. He wasn’t mad, his heart was just shattering, falling to pieces on the floor between them. Was that better? “I…I just want to know.” 

He didn’t just want to, he had to. He had to know who had stolen Steve’s heart, or if it had ever been his to claim in the first place. Had Steve had the daisies the entire time? Was he just humoring Eddie anytime he said he loved him? Eddie didn’t want to think that Steve had entered into their relationship out of pity, or some sense of obligation, but any and all confidence Eddie had previously had flew out the window the second that daisy had appeared. 

Were they from Nancy?

“I don’t wanna talk about it,” Steve muttered, avoiding eye contact as he played with a loose thread on his pajama pants. 

He looked oddly vulnerable there, half dressed and making himself smaller than he was, hiding in the doorway instead of curling up in Eddie’s arms where he belonged. On any other night, Eddie would coax him to bed with promises and teasing little jabs that made him both laugh. 

But not tonight. Tonight there were daisies in the bathroom sink and one in Eddie’s hand ruining everything they had built. 

“I deserve to know when my own boyfriend is in love with someone else,” Eddie hissed, harsher than he meant to. There was a bitter taste in his mouth, and fuck, maybe he was mad. Not really at Steve, but at the world. The chaotic black universe that they lived in, whatever awful god lived out in the cosmos that had chosen to damn him specifically. 

Whatever deity existed that loved to give Eddie good things and snatch them away the second he got comfortable. 

“They aren’t- I’m not in love with someone else,” Steve protested weakly, still looking anywhere but at Eddie. 

Eddie scoffed, holding up the daisy between them, pinching it in between his thumb and forefinger like it was something exceptionally disgusting to hold. He had the rabid urge to tear the flower to shreds, destroy it before it could destroy everything they had. 

“It’s not like that,” Steve insisted stubbornly, finally looking up at Eddie with fiery eyes. He went to keep going but the determination disappeared and an odd expression overtook Steve’s features. He braced himself against the door frame, bringing one hand up to his mouth as another bout of coughing overtook him. 

Eddie watched Steve struggle, losing any of the merciless rage that had been rushing through his veins as he watched the love of his life attempt to take a breath. When Steve slid slowly to the floor, Eddie was there, kneeling beside him with a soft hand on his shoulder. 

“What can I do? Do you need me to call someone? You need a hospital, don’t you? This is serious, and you can’t breathe. Should I start doing CPR or the Heimlich or-” Eddie cut himself off with a jolt, biting his tongue to stop any more panicked rambles from escaping. 

He was spending way too much time around Robin. 

Steve shook his head, still coughing. Two more daisies tumbled out into his hand before he dragged a long breath in, letting his head tip back and hit against the jamb. 

“I took my meds,” Steve whispered, his voice ragged and painful sounding, “It’ll clear up. I just have to get out any ones that actually sprouted. It’s not dangerous, it just hurts.”

He said it so plainly, in such a Steve way. Like it didn’t matter at all that it hurt, or that it seemed pretty goddamn scary to choke on daisies on the regular. 

Despite everything that was happening, Eddie let out a soft little incredulous laugh, reaching over and kissing Steve’s forehead. It was probably a strange thing to do, all things considered, but Steve was smiling now, giving Eddie a starry eyed look that made it all inexplicably feel okay. 

“How long have you- why not just get the surgery?” Eddie asked, reaching out and grabbing the hand that wasn’t currently full of daisy blossoms, “It’s way safer-“

“No,” Steve said, soft, but firm. He carefully placed the blooms down next to them, toying with the petals before squeezing Eddie’s fingers and rubbing the column of his throat, his eyes far far away. “I won’t.”

Won’t. Not can’t. Steve would not do it, which meant whoever they were for mattered to him. Hanahaki surgery was one hundred percent- not only did it get rid of the flowers, but the emotions that had caused them in the first place. You never remembered the person who had made them grow. 

Eddie quickly ran through their friends, all of the people in Steve’s life. He could only think of one person who Steve could be in love with, one person who didn’t love him back. At least, not the way Steve probably wanted her to. 

“Nancy,” Eddie stated rather than asked, already knowing the answer. Steve still loving Nancy wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Nancy had made it clear that she didn’t love Steve like that, and they had both moved on. Maybe Steve could still love Eddie part of the way like this, maybe that could be enough. Having a bit of Steve’s heart was better than none at all. 

But Steve shook his head, still fiddling with the petals of his daisies. 

“I told you, it’s not like that,” Steve whispered, looking utterly miserable. He coughed half-heartedly, but no flowers emerged. When Steve was done he sighed, closing his eyes and worrying his lip the way he always did when he was trying to keep his emotions steady. 

Eddie was missing something. Something obvious. It should have been a big glaring neon sign right in front of him with the most basic answer in the world. But try as he might, he still couldn’t see who the daisies would be for if not Nancy. 

Who else could Steve love that didn’t love him back? 

He should stop asking. This wasn’t the time. His boyfriend was in pain in every way, and Steve didn’t need to be interrogated. They had all the time in the world, Eddie needed to just drop it. Steve would tell him, eventually. He always did. Getting secrets from Steve took a long time, but he always gave in at some point. Eddie just had to be patient, and kind, and everything Steve was so good at. 

“Then what’s it like?” Eddie asked anyway, his curiosity overtaking the selfless part of him that was cursing his own name. 

Steve contemplated his answer for a long time, spitting up another daisy before he finally began to speak. 

“When I was in third grade, our teacher had us raise caterpillars into butterflies to teach us about life cycles. Did you ever do that?”

“No,” Eddie immediately replied, confused and slightly irritated by the sudden change of path. What did butterflies have to do with Steve’s love life? 

“We should do it together. It was fun,” Steve said, a wistful little smile on his face as he stared out in the distance, “Everyone got their own glass jar with twigs and leaves and all that, and one little green caterpillar. We could name them whatever we wanted, and Miss Katie would put their name on the jar so we would know who’s was who’s. I named mine Beatrix after the woman who wrote my favorite story.” 

None of this mattered. Was Steve trying to distract him? It wasn’t usually the way he did things, but Eddie had also never expected he was hiding something like this. 

“Wh-“

“Eventually she became a butterfly,” Steve continued, steamrolling past Eddie’s attempt at asking what the hell was going on. He was speaking, and he wouldn’t let himself be interrupted. Eddie settled back, trying to hide how annoyed he was. 

“Beatrix was a monarch. She was so pretty, Eddie, I wanted to keep her forever. But Miss Katie said we had to let them go, or they would die. So we all brought our jars home, to let them free with our parents.” Steve was forced to stop here, another vicious round of choking producing three daisies, all bloodied. He placed them in a row with the other three, all six staring up accusingly at Eddie, like he was the reason they had appeared. 

But he wasn’t. That was the whole problem. 

“I knew exactly what I was going to do. There was this patch of daisies at the end of our garden. My mom had planted them when she and my dad first got married, and they were her favorite flowers. I thought she would like to let Beatrix live there, so we could see her till she flew away.” Steve explained. 

Eddie had seen the daisies before. The garden itself was mostly gone by now, just empty plots of dirt with chicken wire around them, but the daisies were still there. They had lasted almost till November, pretty drops of white that stubbornly bloomed for as long as they could. 

They looked just like the flowers Steve was coughing up. 

A dark pit started to form in Eddie’s stomach as he took in the implications, the dots beginning to form a macabre picture that made him wish he had listened to his better instincts before. He shouldn’t have asked, he shouldn’t have pressed, Steve should have told him this story when he was ready. 

But…maybe this was a blessing in disguise. Maybe Steve would have carried this alone forever. 

“When I got home my parents were already gone. They had something they had to do, I can’t even remember what it was. The sitter was supposed to get there in an hour, but I was by myself. Just me and my butterfly,” Steve cut himself off with a single laugh that sounded more like a gasped out sob, pinching the bridge of his nose. “This is so stupid.”

“No,” Eddie said firmly, holding Steve’s hand in a death grip, reaching out and taking the other one too just for good measure, pulling it away from his face so he couldn’t hurt himself, “it isn’t.” 

Steve gave him a millisecond long smile, instantly going back to the somber mask he was wearing before. 

“I wasn’t supposed to play outside if my parents weren’t home, but why should I listen? They weren’t here. They left again. My mom left again. She never used to leave before that year, but it felt like all she did was leave then. I went outside and over to the daisies, and I sat in front of them, just… just wanting my mama. Wanting her to come back, wanting her here with me, wanting her to love the daisies again like she used to,” Steve said, ducking his head down and lowering his voice till it was almost nothing. 

They both knew he didn’t just mean the daisies, but neither mentioned it. 

“I can still remember it, the first one. I thought I just had to cry, but couldn’t for some reason. Then I realized I already was crying, and there was still that feeling. The one you get when your throat closes, and you can’t breathe because there’s something blocking it up,” Steve untangled from Eddie, reaching up to his throat again. 

Eddie had seen him do it a thousand times. He had thought it was related to the bats, some phantom feeling of a tail still wrapped around his neck trying to strangle him. Even given a million years, Eddie never would have gotten to the truth. 

“I coughed up a flower. A daisy. It looked just like the ones right in front of me. I thought I was dreaming, but then I couldn’t stop coughing. I woke up by myself in the hospital,” Steve said, finishing his story with a whisper and a bitter little smile. 

“Steve,” Eddie breathed, trailing off. He had no idea what to say, how to try and help. He needed to help, needed to do something, but what could Eddie do in the face of over a decade of knowing his love for his mother was unrequited? 

“I love you,” Steve said, still reassuring Eddie, because that was who he was. He cared about everyone so much more than he cared about himself, even when they didn’t deserve it. “These don’t- they’re-“

“I understand,” Eddie replied, cutting Steve off as he reached over and pulled his boyfriend into his arms. Steve went easily, tucking himself against Eddie’s chest as he shook with another round of coughs. “Well I don’t know if I could ever understand, but I love you, and I’m here.” 

The coughs subsided, but Steve’s shoulders continued to shake. Eddie hugged him impossibly closer, laying his cheek on the top of Steve’s head and closing his eyes to block out the image of the daisies. 

“I love you. I love you, and I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”

[daydreamsandcloudnines]

jeezzz

dunno Shawn, you tell me 😒🙃

ST 5, bring my sons home please 🥺🤞

I badly miss madmax too 😩

[cephcel]

happy late pride wooo

[spookystarfishzombie]

[ahoysteviex]

dad!eddie would be so good at bedtime stories. like, we saw him as a DM, those skills 100% translate to story time. those kids could throw anything at him and he'd be able to incorporate it into the story. he'd be so expressive and he'd do voices for all the characters.

at some point, it's basically a mini dnd session and eddie has to set a timer so they don't stay up way past bedtime. eventually he'd make character sheets for the kids and make a whole campaign.

but then if there's ever a night where eddie can't do story time (he has to work late, he's sick, whatever) and steve or billy have to do it, they can't hold a candle to their husband. it's honestly pitiful. the storybooks they have literally have dust on them because the kids never ask for them anymore because eddie just improvs everything and is great at it. so when steve pulls a book out, the kids audibly groan.

i think steve would at least attempt to do silly voices even though they're nothing in comparison to eddie's range. billy wouldn't even try to read anything in character. he'd do narrator voice and that's it, which is why he's always the last pick.

[lovesongzine]

Hello, HellCheer fans! Did you see the message Chrissy and Eddie prepared for you? ❤️ It's still not too late to apply as a cover or social media artist for LoveSong Zine, a digital HellCheer zine.

Applications will remain open until next Sunday (Feb 25).

Learn more about this project and apply as a cover artist and/or social media artist for LoveSong (a digital Hellcheer zine)

[secrettellerssociety]

Vecna being as evil as ever lol. I love him.

[kitmon]

Oh Yeah, That's Right | Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader

Summary: Newly graduated, you and Eddie take a trip to Lover's Lake to celebrate.

Pairing: Eddie Munson (Stranger Things, 2022) x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 9.3k

Tags: smut (18+ only), porn with a lot of plot but I promise it's worth it, drug use (weed), skinny dipping, swimming while intoxicated (don't do this, you will die), sex out in the open, Eddie is kinda a perv but that's just his way of flirting with reader, unprotected sex, Eddie refers to reader as "Pigeon" or "Pidge," it's just a nickname

Author’s Note: I've had this fic in mind since last June and omg I'm so excited to share this! It definitely is a labor of love and something that I wanted to be really good, especially since it is my first smut piece for Eddie (which is wild considering I've loved him for an entire year already) but I am very very proud and I hope that you enjoy it just as much as I do. Also, a big thanks to my bestie @queenimmadolla for beta reading and leaving me the most hilarious notes ever, I love you! And with all that said, enjoy!

The crunch of gravel under your boots is ambient bliss to your ears. Accompanied by the soft ebb and flow of the lake’s tide, the sound of untouched nature; the crickets and the cicadas, the skittering of small paws and the flustered flutter of birds and nocturnal creatures of the night frightened by the stuttering of your breath, taken by the glittering sight of Lover’s Lake at twilight, all glowing with the beams of the moon. Water striders glide across the liquid black mirror, the ripples in the water look like they carry diamonds on the crests of their waves before simmering into smaller crystals that turn fluid and slip between the gaps in the pebbles to return to their home. 

Eddie cuts through the silence of your appreciation with the harsh slam of his door, causing your shoulders to tense and your head to turn to look over the hood at him, his lithe frame strutting towards you as the corner of his lips reach for the dips in his cheeks.

His voice is deep and lilting as he speaks to you, “Told you I knew a spot.”

“Lover’s Lake isn’t a ‘spot,’ anyone over 16 and horny knows about Lover’s Lake,” you retort, eyes remaining unimpressed as he sidles up beside you.

“Well, would you look at that?” He teases as he spreads his arms out and studies himself in front of you.

You giggle, pushing your fingers into his chest and sending him back a step as you ignore him, walking towards the edge of the water. Your boots give way under the clacking stones before you shift your weight, crouching down with your arm around your knees as you pick at what the tide brings in; the forgotten shell homes of gastropods, the algae that grounds itself to the heaviest rocks and sways with the movement of the water like blades of grass in the gusts of April. You submerge your hand into the water and wrap your fingers around the flattest stone you can find, the water teasing the hem of your sweater. 

As Eddie’s heavy, less than subtle steps approach you from behind, you stand with a bit of effort as your unpracticed joints groan, examining the grey, marbled layers of the rock before leaning back and launching it over the water before it plops once, twice, three times before sinking on its fourth splash. Eddie whistles low and your head turns to watch him, all haughty hip-jut and sass-laced hands over sides.

“Not bad, Pidge.” He leans down and doesn’t even study hard before snatching a rock. “Not bad at all,” he mumbles before tossing it with an imperceptible flick of his wrist. The soft-edged stone sails over the water, jumping in six skips, effortlessly beating out your measly three.

“Show off,” you chastise with an unbothered smile as you stock off to where the grit of the shore is lessened by the flatness of the rocks, sitting gracefully before falling to your back to watch the unperturbed night sky glisten with smatterings of light that twinkle and wink down at you. Eddie falls beside you, grunting as he attempts to make himself comfortable over the uneven terrain. You sigh through your nose and turn to look at him.

“Now what?” You question.

He looks down the length of himself, pursing his lips as he takes a minute to inspect the journey from his chest down to his crotch, before turning to meet your eyes, a playful glint in the dark abyss of his own, “Wasn’t kidding when I said I was horny.”

“Not gonna happen,” you smile, matching his mischief as you place your arms behind your head.

He pouts in faux disappointment before brightening again, “Well, darn, then it’s a good thing I brought this to pass the time.” 

He reaches his hand into the denim of his pocket, struggling against the tight fit before brandishing a crumpled joint that had been stuffed away inside. You sit up with him and laugh in your throat as you watch him clumsily try to straighten it back out. The pink muscle of his tongue peeks out past the seam of his lips as he rolls the joint over the meat of his thigh like he’s thinning out pasta. Once it’s decent enough to smoke he brings it to his lips and mumbles out around it, “Would you do me the honor?” 

“Why, of course I could, Sir Dumbass-ington,” you tease with a jaunty shake of your head before reaching into your pocket, digging through your miscellaneous trinkets of gum wrappers, a pocket knife, and chapstick, silver flashing with the white light of the moon once you procure the boxy Zippo. There are vulgar engravings along the side, a relic of your father’s time in Vietnam now used to light Edward’s crinkly joint. You flip open the lighter with a satisfying clink, your faces suddenly shrouded in yellow, carving out the hollows and defining the angles of your faces as you lean it towards him. He dips the end of it into the flame, tutting at it while the stark light draws your attention to the soft slant of his nose, the whetted cut of his cheekbones, the hollow of his cupid's bow all puckered out as he sucks at the cigarette. He huffs in a good breath and, with voice strained, he declares, “Fuck, that’s some good shit,” coughing at the end of it as he hits at his chest.

“Well, don’t go hogging it all,” you laugh, reaching for the jay which he passes to you without complaint. Pinched between soft-tipped fingers, eyes closed, you sip at it and let the warmth of oncoming inebriation roam without restraint, the smooth burn of your throat oddly soothing and a relaxant that tames the tense energy within your muscles. You release it, hiccuping a puff of smoke before pushing it out past your lips where it floats up in waves of nihonga-like wisps, curling and uncurling before being swept up by the breeze where it sprints through the needles of pine trees and over the unbothered surface of the lake.

He watches the way the tendrils float past your puckered lips, puffed out in a sensual ‘o’ before they’re consumed by a stupid grin that pushes against the fat of your cheeks and causes your eyes to squint, all too endearing as the last dregs of smoke seep from where they can through the gaps of your teeth. You giggle as you pass it back to him, trying but uncaring of your failure to hide it behind grunts of fake throat clearing. He smiles at you, your incompetent subtlety comical, childish amusement infectious. 

“What’s so funny?” he asks, eyeing the joint for a moment before bringing it to his lips for another deep hit.

“It’s just,” you cut yourself off with another stunted giggle, “I could be eating mushroom risotto in a clean, crimson booth, sipping on champagne while my good ol’ Papa raises his glass and nods his head at me and says,” you deepen your voice and make your features stony, squaring your shoulders and puffing your chest, “‘we’re so proud of you, sweetie’ before tipping his glass back to three ‘hip, hip, hoo-rah’s.” 

As you finish, you gently take the joint from him, savoring the image of the thick appendages cradling it between deft fingers as you bring it to your mouth and inhale, your shoulders rising with the movement, gathering like a frozen rubber band before slackening as the hashish thaws you free. You simper on the exhale, jolting with a few coughs through your nose as you try to cover your smile with your hand, the other examining the unironed creases in the rolling paper, “Instead, I’m smoking a squished joint in the dark, sitting on warm-ish gravel, with you.”

You bring your legs into you, tying your ankles together with the weight of your palm in your criss-crossed position as he settles the heels of his hands back into the rocks to prop himself up. You move into his space, leaning over him as you tilt your head to reach his level and emphasize your question, “Why is that?”

His lips are barely curled in a tempered smile as he takes his turn with the doobie, rolling his lips in to lick at them before clarifying for you, “‘Cause you love me,” a breath of hemp-tainted air, “duh.”

It’s laced with boyish charm, a sort of supercilious confidence that floats along the shreds of his exhaled fumes, the jab washing over him like dribbles of water gliding down the waxy feathers of a duck’s back, flicking his head and sending the droplets flying like diving hawks back into the water. It’s the kind of breezy personality that only draws you closer, impressed by his ability to pick up on the minute insinuations between each line of dialogue, enough to know that all you could ever want is to be near him.

“Oh yeah.” It's spoken as if you really did need the reminder as you smile that dopey smile, the fuzzy, assuaged feeling of the drug settling into that saturated calm in your chest as you finish with grin-impaired words, “that’s right.”

The roach is all but a barely-there nub anymore, leached at until the brown-grey paper and bud are dispersed in speckles of crumbly ash across the lake-beach. Your muddled mind, though preoccupied with your earlier thought of Eddie’s ringed fingers, registers the minimal amount left and compels you to pick it up between index and thumb. Eddie, just as stoned as you, gives easily, the joint falling into your dainty fingers just the same as you mumble, decisively, “I get the last hit.”

Despite having the joint in your hand, you move forward, one hand bracing you as you lean over his torso. His fingers hover around yours, not protective but seemingly as a product of his dazedness. He watches you, taking in the way your lashes brush the hill of your cheek as you close them, the slow-motion way your plush lips wrap around the paper, your cheeks hollowing as you suck. The embers at the end glow a violent crimson before crumbling to the rocks where they burn out into white ash. You hold the smoke in your mouth, your throat burning with the prolonged presence of the joint’s exhaust as you turn to face Eddie, eyes half lidded and mind running on autopilot. You don’t need to ask, he already understands, parting his lips for you as you close in, tilting your head before releasing the smoke into his mouth. You can feel the heat of his face radiating against your cheeks and lips, the tip of your nose brushing along the side of his own. Your lips are less than a centimeter apart, a hair’s width away from brushing as the smoke curls through the space left between you, catching in Eddie’s mouth. 

Once it all leaves you in a hot exhale, you flick the charred butt into the rocks and turn to flop onto your back, the rubble, though dense, cushions you with rounded edges and eroded stone faces, soft to the touch. You relax beside Eddie who does the same, laying back with his arms cushioning his head, having closed his mouth, exhaling the smoke through his nose like Smaug perched above his mountain of treasures. 

He hums, satisfied and made to feel all warm inside, the gentle sound of your exhale accompanying him before he asks, “Wanna play a game?”

That makes you smile; he couldn’t just enjoy the silence, it had to be filled with banter or grandiose speeches or ‘games’ but you decide to bite, amused by him always. 

“Depends,” you sigh, “what game?”

There’s an impish pause where, through the lapse in conversation, you can hear the smirk playing on his lips. 

“Truth or strip?” He turns his head towards you, and you follow, admiring the way his smile seems so uninhibited, roguish with his insinuation. You know it’s in poor taste to tease but you go on anyway.

“Mm,” you pretend to deliberate, pursing your lips from side to side, before giving in. “Okay.” 

His eyes light up with perverted hope, or more so astonishment at your agreement, mouth morphing from an awed slacken jaw to a lopsided grin. He moves to speak but you’re quick in intercepting him, “What do I get when I win?”

It’s back to astonishment, turning to lean on his forearm and gaze down at you, his eyebrows shooting up as he releases a disbelieving chuckle, “When you win?” 

“Mm-hmm.” Undeterred, you go on, trying on his haughty nature for a change, “What do I get?”

“Well, in the incredibly unlikely occurrence that you do win, I’ll…” 

He trails off, huffing a breath up that rouses his bangs, looking towards the sky for an answer strung somewhere in midnight thread, spelling it out for him behind the stars. He must find one there as he turns, benign grin aimed down at you that scrambles your chest with tender feelings that you force yourself to swallow down with a subtle bob of your throat and the added issue of a suddenly dry mouth.

“I’ll buy you that Cure album you’ve been wanting since August, even though the lead singer is a whiny little—”

You press your thumb over his lips, preventing him from finishing.

“I refuse to allow anymore of this Robert Smith slander,” you protest, removing your hand to tuck it back under your head. “You’re just jealous that he’s so attractive without even having to try,” you swoon.

“Careful,” he rolls his eyes at you, teasing, “don’t want any of that lipstick to ruin that pretty face of makeup you’ve got on.” He says this while trailing his index finger over the contour of your jaw, tickling your skin before you squinch up your face and rub your cheek to your shoulder to shoo him away.

“Ya know,” you roll over with a grunt to prop your head up on your hand while you lie on your side, “there’s something sexy about a man confident enough in his masculinity to wear lipstick.”

“Got any on you right now?” He asks, leaning closer, “Wanna test that theory?” He puckers his lips up and makes towards you. You waste no time in intercepting his tirade with your palm, lips connecting with gravel-roughened skin before you push his face away.

Dismissing the way he falls back to the ground dramatically, arms spread, and tongue lolled out as if your push was enough to seriously injure him, you redirect the conversation back to the initial topic.

“Okay, truth or strip,” you remind, mostly speaking to yourself and ruminating on the raunchiness of the idea, puffing a laugh out your nose as you wonder just what may have influenced it. “Seems like someone’s been taking a few too many trips behind the velvet curtain at Family Video but I’ll humor this,” you point a finger at him, raising your brows and lowering your chin as you eye him, “you’re lucky I’m stoned enough to play along.”

You start to hum out your first question before Eddie halts you, “Woah, woah, woah! We didn’t discuss what I’d be getting if I won.”

“Well, the reason we didn’t bring it up is because that’ll never happen,” you say, cheeky grin pushing against your cheeks as you press your finger to his chest where he glances down only to be met with your pointer finger flicking up against his nose. 

He wrinkles his nose before bringing his hand up to rub at it, sniffing when his thumb swipes at it, going on to insist with a nasally filter.

“Well, since you’re in a pandering mood, indulge me.”

“Okay, fine, I guess we can play pretend for a second,” you say with a minx-ish smile before flopping on your back again with an ‘oomph’ rattling up from your throat, dissolving into a hum as you play with your lips. You pull the puffy bottom one down with the tip of your finger before releasing it, the fat bouncing back into place before you speak.

“If you win, I’ll buy you a new pair of Reeboks.”

“What’s wrong with my Reeboks?” He asks incredulously, looking down the length of his body towards his scuffed, dirt-stained sneakers, the stitching all but frayed and loose, the soles uneven with wear. 

“You’ve needed new shoes since March, God knows what you got up to during spring break that you fucked ‘em up so bad.”

He ignores your suggestion and offers up his own, “That just won’t do, how about, instead...” 

He’s tilting his head to look down the length of your body, not lecherously though that wouldn’t be out of the question for Eddie, but almost as an excuse to hide the bashful tinge in his features.

“You let me take you out on a date? A real date. Not movie night but, like, dinner in that crimson booth you wanted with that fucking mushroom rice or whatever.”

“Risotto,” you correct him with an endeared smile.

“Risotto,” he nods.

The words don’t read as pushy, never pushy. Never entitled or expectant, just gleaming with that curious lift in the eyebrows and a hopeful shimmer in his smile. You mirror a similar girlish crinkle in the corner of your eyes, lips pulled at the edges as you speak, kind and gilded with the softest tone.

“Okay.” It’s so merciful that the vowels get swallowed by the click of the consonants.

Coming to an agreement, you sit up, shuffling a bit to sit with your knees brought up and secured with the linking of your hand over your wrist, Eddie following in the silent shift of bodies rattling grey and brown stones.

You sigh a breath through your nose that untenses your shoulders and relieves the pressure in your head a bit, bringing a lazy twitch of your lips as you ask, “Alright, who goes first?”

He flicks at a pebble on the ground, pouting out his bottom lip in thought as it skips in ‘tick, tick, ticks.’ 

“Rock, paper, scissors?” You nod and offer your fist, settled over the platter of your palm, Eddie doing the same before the barely audible pat of your hand against the other indicates a ‘one, two, three, shoot.’ He settles on rock, your gentle palm hovering in paper. You smile and gently drape it over his curled hand before he says, “Alright, fair and square, go ahead.”

You remove your hand as you tuck both under your bum before continuing in an unsure buzz, “Hmm, okay, the grossest place you’ve ever hooked up.”

He blows out a raspberry that trills his lips. “Easy! the men’s bathroom at The Hideout, second to last stall,” he gives easily, no hesitance, “Gotta try harder than that to win.”

It’s his turn and he squints down at the ground as he thinks before shooting his question, “Alright, most recent porn rental.”

You worry your lip, chewing at the corners and tearing at the chapped skin there. It feels too early to cave and for such an inconsequential question no less, but you know that if Eddie found out about the George Michael lookalike tape hidden between your box spring and your mattress right now, he would never, in a million years, ever let it go, so you figure you can spare a layer in favor of the never-ending humiliation you’d suffer.

You huff as you lean down to begin tugging at the laces of your boots but he tuts, “Shoes don’t count.” 

You scoff, “Since when?”

“We’ll be here forever if every unimportant article of clothing counts!” He explains with his arms spread at his side, dramatics on full display.

“You got a hot date sometime soon?” You counter with a lifted brow.

“Look, I’ll take mine off too so it’s fair,” he concedes, pulling at the laces of his ruined shoes. You sigh before continuing to pull your boots off, tossing them aside. You roll your socks off as well, tucking them inside your shoes so they don’t get lost in the dark.

Your toes flex, curling and extending without being encumbered, taking a moment to embrace the feeling under the pads of your feet, savoring the warmth that emanates from the erosion-softened stones. The rocks have been baked by the rays of the midday sun, cooling now that she’s hidden behind the jagged horizon of pine trees. Your fingers tease the hem of your sweater, ticking over the threads before you grip it and pull it over your head. Your modesty remains intact, though, by the white underlayer you wear. You spit your next question out with hardly any hesitation, “Last thing you masturbated to.”

He blanches under the white light of the moon, lips splitting apart. The momentary surprise on his face is colored by the flushing of his features and the attempted diversion of his throat clearing where he points his finger and eyes you with a look that reads ‘well, just you listen here…’ before it fizzles out as he decides against it. He compresses his lips, shaking his head and sighing as he starts to shrug both his vest and his leather jacket off, laying them over the rocks, the water creeping close to one of the splayed sleeves, teasing the faded and worn-out leather. Your lips curl, impressed for having got to him. 

It goes on like this for 20 minutes, invasive question after invasive question while garments continue to be strewn across the lakeside— belts undone with clinking clasps, buttons popped, shirts tossed to the side— until you’re both dressed only in your underwear. You’d think you’d both have the idea to be embarrassed being so exposed to the other but the both of you find it no different than when you go to the public pool dressed in bikini and swim shorts, though, to be fair, the fabric is much thinner than the nylon of your stringy swimwear and the way his milky skin glows under the celestial curtain of May is much different than when it burns in June. 

It’s Eddie’s turn as soon as he shucks off his black jeans, pale white chest and slender legs displayed with each clumsy wiggle of his feet. After nearly tripping twice over the denim, he grabs the garment and yanks them off from where they’re tangled with his toes, aggressively attempting to chuck them away but, with all his exertion, they flop to the floor with a pitiful ‘plop.’ You snort at his exaggerated display, laughing as he sits back down, leaning over on his elbow like a French muse lazed out on a chaise sofa; sultry, alluring, calling out like a siren with the way he exhibits the entire length of his body unabashedly. His breaths are heavy— that’s what draws your attention back to the present— mixed with his shared laughter as he trains his challenging gaze on you, all suppressed titterings hidden behind loose lips, aiming to get you on the same level as him; one item left. 

“Thought you were clever with that last one, hmm? Alright, what sounds do you make when you’re doing it?”

You laugh a choked, disbelieving noise at the audacity of the question, “You think you’re gonna pull a fast one on me, you perv?”

“Answer the question, why don’t you,” he implores, voice unconcerned with your accusation, that obnoxiously cocksure grin backing you into a corner. 

You narrow your eyes at him, scrunching your nose in petulant defiance before you falter in a histrionic groan of peevishness, rocking back while your legs are crisscross before leaning back forward to tell him, “I’m not gonna give you the satisfaction.”

What’s supposed to be stern becomes watered down with the way a smile is twisting your attempted snarl and Eddie remains just as calm as before, eyes becoming thin with the joy he gets from seeing you like this, all frisky and playfully mad at him. Oh, and half-naked, that makes him very happy.

You sigh, giving in to his hair-brained ploy as you reach back to undo the hook of your bra, fingers gliding over scratchy lace trimming and the creamy texture of the satin as you release the bond. The underwear falls limp over your chest, no longer supported and, as Eddie watches on, eyes vacantly focusing on the expanse of silken flesh beneath your collarbones as his tongue tempts the chapped skin of his lips, you stop yourself from sliding it the rest of the way over your arms. 

“Turn around,” you order, eyes stern.

“What?” He exclaims like someone has just committed a heinous wrong against him. “Come on! It’s just getting good.

“We never said anything about exposing ourselves,” you defend, maintaining your resolve. “Now turn around!” He grumbles but complies, scooting over the gravel until his back is to you and his hands are covering his eyes for good measure. He can hear the way the article flops to the floor as you toss it away, the atmospheric noise of your fidgeting and shifting is euphoric white sound to his ears as he imagines the way your ungainly arms and legs move with your undress. It’s a few more moments of shuffling before silence is restored.

“Okay,” it’s spoken with an underlying quiver, “You can look.”

He turns back to you with some awkward swiveling and finds you with your arms crossed over your chest, your knees brought up for extra coverage as your ankles cross over each other to protect his eyes from your area below. Your face is sheepish, lips twitching in anxious occupation as your eyes focus on your lacquered toenails to keep from finding his own stare.

His face morphs into, what was originally a giddied smile into a sympathetic gaze, features concerned with your sudden timidity. “We don’t have to keep playing, you know?” He tells you, more occupied with your comfort than any boyish fantasy.

“No, no, I’m okay, I swear.” You look up at him wide eyed before shaking your head to convey your fortitude. You straighten your back and take a breath to steady yourself, your once skittish expression softening as you lean closer to him and confide, “I trust you, Eddie.”

He beams at you, touched by your credence in him. “Not to mention, I totally need to smoke you in this game and crush that ego of yours.”

That amorous radiance at the center of his chest is smothered by your taunt and he rolls his eyes as he urges you to continue, “Yeah, yeah, now are you going to ask me a question or are you going to keep being a big sap?”

You giggle with your next query, “Okay, how big are you? Down there?” 

He grins at the question and raises his brows, “Didn’t your mother ever tell you that curiosity killed the cat?”

You match his overdone eye roll before pressing him, “Just answer the question.”

He maintains his Cheshire-ish impression as he thinks on it before admitting, “A bit over six inches. Something like that.”

“Mmm,” you hum, a moderate expression relaxing over your features as you shoot him a level headed grin, “‘something like that?’”

“Don’t believe me?” He challenges, eyebrows shooting up in his bluff.

“Oh, I believe you,” you giggle at the tail end of your words before caving to your levity, laughing through your punchline, “believe that you’re full of shit!”

He acts mock-offended, choking on his words as he scoffs and sputters, placing a hand over his bare chest, “I have just about the right mind to lose on purpose and wipe that so-sure smile off your face.”

“Please do, that record will look absolutely lovely with the rest of my collection.”

“Hmm,” he twists his lips as he eyes you with a squinted stare, “unluckily for you, I’m of the least sound mind right now so the game’s still on, sweetheart.” It’s a dare spoken as he invades your space, so close that you can feel the heat of his words over your cheeks, his eyes darting to your lips with the endearment. Your smug exterior hardly falters as you counter, “And I still plan on winning.”

He leans back, licking the enamel of his canine as he lets his eyes rove over your nearly exposed figure before asking, “Your biggest insecurity.”

Your pleased act falls away at the question as you roll your lips in, scrunching up the side of your face in displeasure before you figure that the vulnerability of the answer is less of an expense than being fully exposed in the dead of night with your best friend.

“Maybe how much I need the attention and validation of others.” It looks like admitting that causes you physical pain as your face is contorted into all sorts of wincing motifs. 

“It’s embarrassing to have to say that out loud,” you whisper into your knees as you lean forward into them, the joints obstructing your lips as you go on. “Especially to you, ‘cause, like, nothing gets to you.”

“Hey, woah,” he stops you in your tracks at the inaccurate perception of him, “Who said nothing ever gets to me?”

You cock your head at him as you send him a look that asks ‘really?’

“C’mon, Pigeon, you know me better than that,” he encourages as he gently knocks your leg with his fist, rocking you with the impact. “That whole standing on tables and dungeon master shit, it’s just a front.”

You bite your lip at the admission, suddenly feeling inadequate with your assumption.

“I mean, yeah, most of it’s like one ear out the other but when it’s something real, that’s the kinda shit that hits deep.”

“You just seem so,” you struggle for the words, twisting your hands about before you find it, “Unbothered.”

“Yeah, well, I just do that to impress you,” he laughs at the ground, watching as his pointer finger twiddles with one of his discarded rings over the lining of his jacket.

You smile at his sudden demureness, leaning forward as best as you can with your legs folded up against you to capture his cheek in your hand and lift his gaze to you. He’s got that sudden starstruck look in his eyes, where they go all big and glassy and his beautifully full lips part as he stares up at you like you’ve emerged from the sky, twinkling in moondust and star particles.

“If you shed a tear once and a while when around me, I’d be even more impressed.” You rub your thumb over the thin, discolored skin under his eye, purple and green from lack of rest. The corner of his mouth ticks up as he moves to look down again at his set of jewelry, lengthy lashes kissing the very tops of his cheeks as a warm hue spottily decorates his skin. The movement displaces your hand before you bring it back around your legs, happy with your effect on him; capable of shutting up the biggest attention whore this side of the Mississippi.   

You disrupt the silence with your next question, “If you knew you were to go to sleep tonight and not wake up in the morning, what’s one thing you’d regret not saying?” 

His eyes glow as they flit up to you, taking away from his fiddling before that same reticent smile takes over and you’ve stupefied him once more. He laughs a breathy sound, a bit embarrassed, before he stands up and clears his throat.

“Alright, you know the deal,” his hands are on his hips, still maintaining that underlying sass, “turn around.” 

A giant grin overhauls your features, “I won?” 

“Yeah, you won.” His stare is soft and enamored as he gazes down at you, looking almost delighted to have lost if it meant he was able to see that precious stretch of your lips over your teeth and the choice twinkle in your eyes. “Now turn around.”

You giggle as you tuck your head into your knees, the sound carrying, though muffled, from where you’re burrowed. You can hear the way he balances from one foot to the other while he extricates himself from his final article of clothing, the rocks under his feet clicking with his distributed weight. You shriek as you feel him shoot his boxers at you, scrambling to toss them off of you while he tells you, “Open your eyes, butthead.”

Your tee-heeing filters off into throaty huffs once you’ve gotten the offending item off before looking back at him and falling into a fit all over again. You roll onto your back once you’ve seen him: both hands cupped over his groin to shield your eyes while he fosters a sheepish look over his face, lips curled in. 

You straighten, eyes squinted and smile beaming as you ask him through a mirth-induced rasp, “Can we get a little spin?” You twirl your finger with your request, leaning back on one arm while the other stays wrapped around your chest. He kisses his teeth, huffing through his nose before obliging you, shuffling on his feet to do a full round. That only serves in starting you up again, the sight of his protectively clenched ass sending you into another frenzy of uncontrolled witch-like cackles. 

“Oh, this is rich,” you sigh, wiping an imaginary tear of gaiety away before you settle back into relative calmness. “Well, now that you’ve been thoroughly humiliated, what now? I’ve still got a buzz going.”

His dismayed pout is replaced by a mischievous grin as he looks out to the dock, not all that far from where you’ve planted yourselves, looking back to you with an expression that nearly worries you with how wickedly no-good it is. Before you can even make out the first syllable of your interrogation, he’s booking it, sprinting along the shoreline, twisting his ankles with the way he slides over the insecure beach front. He’s whooping and hollering, screaming ‘aye, aye, aye, aye’ as his feet clomp over the landing before he jumps off the dock in a gangly flurry of limbs, hitting the surface in a crashing splash that manipulates the water that reaches out for your form, so near the waterside.

You gasp in your throat, hurrying to your feet and chasing after him, tripping once or twice over the rocks before you’re planting yourself at the edge of the dock. Leaning over on your hands and knees, you call for him in a voice that tries to maintain still, “Eddie?”

You give him a moment to reappear, eyes flicking over the water to catch sign of him. He doesn’t respond and an unrelenting tension tightens within your stomach as you grow worried, continuing to scan the water in attempts of deciphering his figure through the murky darkness of the lake. 

“Eddie!”

The water opens in front of you with his reappearance, but you barely have any time to feel relief as he leaps up, the feeling taken over by a looming dread as he grabs you by your biceps and pulls you over the edge. You squeal as you tumble to the water before the sound is swallowed whole once you’ve collided with the surface. It’s dark and near unnavigable and the only way you find the bottom is by flailing your legs, shooting yourself up once your feet are able to catch a boulder. You scramble to the surface, sputtering a choked breath between a brief coughing fit. Through the waterlogged fuzziness of your hearing, you can make out Eddie’s booming laugh. You push your sopping hair out of your eyes to regain your sight, though it’s also distorted by water droplets that cling to your lashes, and lunge at him with angry fists and a peeved growl. He’s too swift for you, though, as he snatches your wrists before they can make impact, but what you can’t do with your body you’ll do with your words.

“You ass! I thought you’d gotten hurt and– and you– urgh!” He’s still snickering at the way your cheeks puff out with your labored breathing and how your dampened hair has turned you into what resembles an unhappily drenched cat, but he tries to damper them at the sight of your flaming temper. 

“I’m sorry,” he attempts to apologize through the laughter, but you have none of it as you try to pull yourself from his hold, grunting as you yank your arms away from him, but he just ensnares you as he wraps his arms around your waist to keep you nearby. He tries to reason with you, his voice falling into a softer, more understanding tone once he acknowledges your distress, “Hey, I’m sorry, I didn't mean to scare you.” 

He’s still smiling, looking down at your tetchy expression while a hand emerges from the water to brush your hair away from your face, petting you before coming back to hold your cheek in his massive hand. You ease with his touch and quit your huffing, though your eyes are still shadowed by the knitting of your brows, darting all across his face, so near and framed by brown, matted strands, made ebony by the lack of light, that stick in tangled swirls across the planes of his face. His bangs drip, disturbing his eyes as he blinks to keep the water out, the droplets landing over his nose and lips.

It’s then that you register the warmth of his hand between your shoulder blades, the heat of his sturdy chest against the plushness of your breasts, nipples pert and skin pebbled from the chill that ran through you from being dunked under. Even further, below that, where you’re still covered by now sopping cotton, you can feel the thick prod of something neat the junction where your vulva meets your thigh and your heart stutters, breath hitching and, suddenly, all you can do is look at Eddie with the same desperate expression he's giving you. His lips are parted, eyes clouded with lust as you take in the clumped length of his eyelashes that flutter with troubling water, the darkness of his brown irises, consumed by want and arousal, the beautiful slope of his nose as it catches the light of the moon, and the glossy plump pink of his lips that draws you closer. It’s all you can do to lean in at the same time he does and press your lips against his and, fuck, if this isn’t what they talk about in John Hughes movies then you don’t know what is. 

It just feels… right. Like the final piece of a puzzle clicking into place or the final cassette needed to complete your favorite artist’s discography sliding against all the others on the shelf, leaving no gaps, slotting so perfectly together. You hum into his mouth, dragging your hands up to wrap around his neck, pulling away, not to exchange any words but to tilt your heads to the other side, deepening the smush of your lips. He can hardly contain his yearning as he does his best to bring himself as close to you as possible, nose digging into the softness of your cheek, teeth clipping the gummy flesh of your lips. His tongue begs your approval as it glides against the seam of your lips and you waste no time in allowing him entry, your muscles meeting in the middle, sliding against each other as you taste the herbal tang of weed on him though you’re unsure if there's any delineation between your taste and his as you suck at his bottom lip.

Eddie detaches from the mess of your kiss, saliva stringing between the two of you before it breaks, falling into the mix of water. He connects to the height of your cheek, placing a romantic kiss there that lasts what feels like forever as you sigh, closing your eyes as you take the wrist of the hand that he uses to hold you like you’re the most precious thing he’s ever been lucky enough to touch. He starts trailing sloppy, open-mouthed kisses down your jaw and neck, nipping at the delicate skin occasionally between his love-pecks, laving his tongue over them when you shiver against him.

“Eddie,” you keen in a needy cry, the syllables soft and aching as he holds you to him tight, never letting you dip below the surface as his fingers dimple your skin with his relentless grip as he grows excited. He separates from where he was lavishing your skin in kisses and soothing licks to mutter, “Fuck, I’ve wanted you for so long.” It sounds lost, like he’s not speaking entirely to you, almost talking to himself, like he can hardly believe he’s got you, right here, wanting him back. 

“Eddie.” You draw his attention as you thread your fingers into his dripping head of hair, begging, “I need you, Eddie.”

“Fuck, I got you, Pidge,” he pacifies, connecting your lips again, murmuring into your mouth, “‘M always gonna take care of you.” 

You cry against him as his hands drift lower to your thighs where he urges you up, hiking your body higher and dragging you against his chest as he carries you, beginning to find purchase on the algae-slick rocks to bring the two of you to shore. He lays you down over his jacket and vest, supporting your head as he rests you there, protecting your back from the gravel, unconcerned with the safety of the treated hide as your more than damp skin connects with the lining and soaks it through. 

He’s clumsy, all adolescent vigor and enthusiasm, swallowing every sound you give him, complimenting every curve of your body with the hollow of his palm, tracing the contours of your figure with the calloused pads of his fingers. You’re no better, dragging him closer by the roots of his mane, scratching along the muscle and bone of his back, breathing wanton noises and arching into the divots of his form. When he leaves your mouth, you breathily whimper, feeling his amused chuckle rumble against the tender skin of your neck as he pays the planes of your body all the attention they could ever hope for. 

He licks the protrusion of your clavicle, kisses the notch between the bones before lifting himself with his arms and takes in the luscious sight of you; skin dewy, gathered droplets glowing pearly like the diamond stars above, lips swollen and spit-shined thanks to him, breasts heaving with the exertion of your lungs. His hand lifts to bring it over your stomach, dragging his thumb from your navel up between the line made by your ribs before he takes your breast into his palm and massages it. His eyes are foggy, unable to focus on anything other than the way the fat and tissue bulge through the gaps in his fingers. He’s brought back by the touch of your fingers ghosting over his cheek and brushing back a clump of hair, tucking it behind his ear. 

His eyes lift to yours, catching sight of your adoring smile made real by the way he worships you, touching you like you’re art. The corners of his lips lift in a sheepish grin, made embarrassed by the way he's been caught.

“So much for looking away.”

That has you throwing your head back, releasing such a sweet peel of laughter that forces Eddie to lay a kiss between the valley of your breasts, chuckling along with you, before taking you by surprise when he latches his mouth to your nipple. It makes your laughter blend with an approving gasp and a resulting groan, your fingers encouraging him with scratches to his scalp, the sensation making him moan over the skin, providing delicious vibrations that have you releasing gorgeous sounds, encouraging you to roll your still-clothed hips against his thick, hot, hard-on. You’re glad he bestows you with enough mercy as to not have you eat your words because he definitely is something like that. 

With a particular flick of your pelvis, the cushy head of his cock catches on your folds through the scratchy material of your underwear and he releases you with a pop, head tipping up as his eyes snap shut and he releases a stuttering breath.

You bring his head down for a kiss, soothing the scrunched nature of his expression before he separates with a huff, burying his head into the crook of your neck while he hugs your body close to him, asking, begging, “I need to be inside you.”

The desperation is enough to have you responding, just as wrecked, “Please, Eddie.”

He untangles himself at your go-ahead, leaning back on his haunches as he takes your legs and admires the way the soaked fabric of your underwear clings to your puffy lips, the white of the material leaving nothing to be imagined. He traces over the hem of the leg opening with his thumb, your coarse hair peeking out and tickling the pad of his finger before he brings it to slide through your folds over the cotton. You jolt and whine as he travels from your seeping hole up to your aching clit, rubbing it in caressing circles before he takes your legs and lifts them, closing them together and placing them over his shoulder so he can drag the garment over the length of your legs. He savors the way it guides his eyes over your perfect skin, all that’s been exposed and what hasn’t before he drags them over your feet, where you kick them off. He chuckles at your fervor before taking the item and tossing it away. He kisses the muscle of your calf, eyes still locked on yours before he takes your legs and spreads them once more. At the sight of your exposed cunt, all glittery and soaked, he releases a low groan, leaning down to lay a kiss just above your thatch of hair.

You arch your lower back to present yourself to him and remind him of what you’ve been begging for, mewling in an insistent, pettish way. He straightens a bit, leaning forward on his left arm as he gathers his ruddy and leaking length into his hand and pumps it once and then twice before rubbing the weeping head through your slick.

“Don’t worry, baby, m’gonna treat you so good,” he assures.

With his promise made, the head of his cock presses into you and you squeak. The sound falls into a satisfied groan, melding with the heavy grunt Eddie releases at the breach. “Shit, you’re so fucking tight," he rushes out, "and damn warm, too, holy shit.”

He leans over you again, elbows supporting his weight, and with his shift, his cock buries deeper within you, making you cry out as he nudges against your sensitive velvet walls, the thick veins catching against your nerves and making your body sing.

Given a moment for both of you to catch your breath, Eddie starts to rock into your wet heat, slow gentle thrusts matching the rhythm of the lake as the incoming waves lick at his knees. They’re yawning and slow, pitching both of your bodies with each snap of his hips against yours. Your arousal coats him and leaks out with each retreat of his hips, your creamy release raveling your mess of hair and squelching with each kiss of your pelvic bones. 

Your noises mingle together in high pitched keens and deep, gravelly groans and curses. You hug him tight, bodies mashed together as your arms hug him from under, nails fighting to keep him close to you as they scrape along his skin and leave glowing irritated markings where they pass while your legs lock at the ankles over his ass to keep his hips from venturing too far from your own. 

His head hangs low above your chest, watching as he exits and enters in and out of you, listening to the wet slap that disappears with the gentle crash and retreat of the waves. His bangs, still clumped with moisture, tease the skin of your breasts, dragging up and down with each of his thrusts, the chill droplets of water that dangle like crystal beads from the ends causing a rash of goosebumps to spread. His breathing is heavy, panting and gulping thick as he moves with you, fucked out on your pussy and the salt of your skin on his tongue when he kisses your chest. You watch as the muscles of his shoulders sway with him, his pale, near translucent skin, speckled with beads of water that you can't help but lean down and lick, kissing, biting every inch of skin you can reach, falling back once he ruts forward and prods at that spot that has your belly tightening and your cunt clamping over him.

“Shit, Eddie,” you gasp, the sound muffled to your own ears, taken over by the chirp of crickets and cooing owls, the croak of sleeping frogs that burrow in muddied soil and fall to rest, their heartbeats slowing with the chill of the earth. The head of his cock keeps tapping against that patch of nerves that has your body shaking and you plead with him, through the way you tighten your legs around his slender hips, to move faster and to hit harder. He understands your subtle request and delivers you firmer, quickened thrusts that have each one of your nerve endings chiming like a silver bell, feeling surrounded by his adoration of you with each kick of his hips that has you ringing in ‘ah, ah, ah’s.

He falls over you, unable to hold himself up anymore while also craving the complete touch of your skin as he winds his arms around your waist and presses his cheek to yours. His hold on you forces you still against him and intensifies the reach of his cock, his dick ramming into you and making your voice jump with each of his pounding thrusts.

The sound of him leaving and then sliding right back home, the clapping of skin on skin is lost to the night while your ramblings of how good he feels and how much you care for him, every word is captured just as every peck against your skin is memorized in a fizzing prickle against your flesh and every sigh and grunt is cataloged in the back of your mind; this is how he sounds, this is the rate of his breathing, this is how he loves.

The thought overwhelms you in a way that excites your senses, suddenly hyper aware of all of the little details: the smell of his cheap cologne invading your nostrils in an intoxicating burn, the feel of his hair, coated in product, made crunchy with hairspray and tickling your cheeks and your lips, the way he fucks into you in the softest, most adoring way. It’s the way he holds you and the way that he protects you, the way that he breaths your name like they’re the most essential set of syllables he’ll ever utter that makes you feel so good that you think you can cry and it’s the prick of your tear ducts and the sniffle caught in your throat that ensures it.

The way he’s moving inside you, you’re tumbling to that glowing end, breathing growing tighter, and Eddie can feel it. He can feel it in the way your skin is hot to the touch despite the late spring temperature and the way your cunt squeezes and chokes his cock every time he drives it back into you.  

“I’m so close,” you whisper into his ear, voice trembling, and he growls, the aggressive noise dissolving into a whimper as he lifts his head to look down at you. His eyes are lidded and the weight of his bottom lip hangs as he readies a strained response that gets caught in his throat.

He notices, then, the streaks along your cheeks, illuminated like liquid silver against your skin and his eyebrows grow taut as he reaches to hold your face and wipe at the water there. “You okay, Pidge?”

His thrusts begin to slow, afraid he may have hurt you, but you refuse to allow that, tightening your legs and securing your arms over his shoulders as you call for him to continue.

“No, no, don’t stop, please.” He returns to his set pace, and you moan for him in a blissed-out haze, turning to kiss his palm over every line, pecking the swirled pads of his fingertips and loving the feel of the grooves against your lips. 

“I’m okay, swear, Eddie," you gasp, head tilting back as you get lost in the heavenly sensation of his cockhead snatching against your walls. "Just feels so good.” You look up at him with sultry eyes that implore him to keep fucking into you and the sight of you all puppy-eyed has his abdomen clenching and his breath catching.

“Fuck,” he chokes.

You whine at the wrecked crack and desperation that laces his voice, reaching your hand up to pull his head down and kiss him, muffling your cries into his mouth as his groans echo within yours. His thrusts grow erratic and unmeasured, and you thrill at his increased speed, breath hitching with the way his thumb travels down your body to rub speedy circles into your clit, each flick causing fireworks to erupt behind your eyelids.

You flinch as you cum, the warmth in your stomach releasing in a white-hot wave of pleasure that has you shaking with the force of it, crying Eddie’s name as it springs like a bound coil finally allowed to relax. With the spasming of your pussy he has to pry himself away from you and pull out, fisting his cock in hurried tugs until he spills all over your stomach, painting your soft skin in streaks of his release.

You hum at the feeling of his warm cum coating you, finding it comforting as you draw him closer, cooing at him and holding his face in your hands as he finishes in stuttering waves before he falls over you, careful not to crush you under his weight. You find the smear of his finish between you not unpleasant and neither does he it seems as he negates it and releases a contented sigh with his head buried into the furnace of your neck, wrapping his arms under you to hug you tight.

You smile at his affection, nuzzling your nose into the side of his head, sighing with him before he admits, slightly slurred, “Fuck, you’re so fucking good.”

His profession has you cradling his head closer and squishing your nose deeper into his forest of hair, smiling like an idiot as you only chuckle in return.

You smile, kissing his head, before murmuring into his locks, “Not so bad yourself.”

You can feel his smile against your neck before he kisses it, and you giggle at his tranquil display of satisfaction.

“But don’t think I’ve forgotten; you still owe me Head on the Door,” you remind while sniffing up the leftover snot in your nose and wiping at your eyes with the heels of your palms. He extricates his face out of his little hovel and looks down at you with that troublesome glimmer in his eyes.

“I mean, may be a little hard, I’ll have to take down the whole door, but I’ll give it a try.”

“Eddie!” You chastise as he barks a booming laugh that has his stomach rumbling against your own. 

“Aw, c’mon, I thought my overpowering sex appeal would wipe that weirdo from your thoughts completely!” He groans in faux disappointment.

You giggle at his theatrics, “Nope, you better count your days because as soon as Robert Smith accepts me as his second wife, your bags are packed.”

He whines as he lays his head beside yours, cheek pressed to the scratchy denim as he moans, “You’re so mean to me.”

You pet his drying hair over his shoulder before pecking a kiss to his mouth, “It’s only ‘cause I love you.”

He hums a brief laugh, “Oh yeah, that’s right.”

[love-toxin]

Bully!stepbro!eddie who flips your skirt, and barges into your room, and moans so annoyingly loudly through the wall

/wrings my hands >:)

(cws: bully!stepbrother!eddie, dc/nc, masturbation, peeping, eddie's a nasty, filthy degenerate <3)

stepbro!Eddie is such a bully he spends his own free time making your life hell. you hate it when he pervs on you, so he does exactly that--spends an hour or two going around your room, and cumming on your things while you're out. he jerks off on your diary so it's sticky when you go to open it, in your panties and your socks so you shriek when you put them on, on your pillow so you'll lay your head down and feel his slimy spunk on your cheek. he jimmies the lock open on the bathroom door to come in while you're showering, whether it's to brush his teeth or take a piss or just so he can sneak in and yank the curtain aside to make you scream in terror and then yell at him to get out. when you're bent over something, he evolves from pretending to air-hump you to actually humping you, his cock disgustingly hard against your backside as you kick at him and whine out that he's gross. he only agrees to drive you to work if you let him put your hand on his crotch the whole way, teasing you by insinuating that he knows you're wet and you wanna give your stepbrother road head, you slut. sometimes, when you've got your headphones on and you're listening to music as you work at your desk--because Eddie would not shut up while he's jerking off next door and distracting you--he sneaks in and rubs his cock raw while he stands right behind you. he intentionally tries to be quiet then, so you don't notice when he cums all over your hair or on your back--and when you do, he'll be smugly grinning to himself in his room as he listens to you shriek, knowing you're gonna be barging in to let him have it for being a gross, filthy pervert of a stepbrother.

[milevenposting]

I've been meaning to tell you something. I missed you.