#talk to me and keep me sane

[hinamie]

all i have left

[unclewaynemunson]

Pt2 to this post

'Is something wrong?' Nancy asks, not long after the two of them have taken their familiar spots on the hood of Steve's car. They're basking in what might be the last warm sunlight of the year, looking out over the quarry, at a safe distance from the edge.

It's become a tradition the two of them share, ever since they reconnected back in March. It calms them both, to just sit here and take in the view, no one around but each other. Nancy is one of the few people Steve can share a comfortable silence with: sometimes they sit here quietly for what feels like hours, side by side, listening to music or to nothing but the birds singing around them. But they also have their best conversations here: it's the place where Nancy entrusted him she wanted to break up with Jonathan; it's the place where they talked about their shared past and decided they would always love each other as friends; it's the place where they finally talked about Barbara in a way they couldn't when they were younger. It's where Nancy talked about the ghosts still haunting her and Steve talked about how lonely he sometimes felt.

Steve huffs. 'How did you guess?'

'When you frown, you always do it with your whole face,' Nancy notes. 'So it's hard to miss, really.'

Steve glances at her side profile. There's a serenity to her features that's still relatively new. It means she's healing, slowly learning how to be happy again. It means she stopped waiting for the end of the world and started believing in a real future again. It makes Steve proud of how far they both have come.

'I had a fight with Eddie,' he confesses. 'And with Dustin, I guess.'

'What happened?'

He sighs. 'It's complicated.'

'Wanna tell me about it?'

The look in her eyes is kind and inviting. Steve hesitates. He wants to, but he doesn't know if he can. It's a risk. It's scary.

But he can't imagine Nancy Wheeler ever being careless with his secrets. He can't imagine her judging him, can't imagine her being as small-minded as most people in this town.

He was planning on telling her anyway, because things had been going so well with Eddie lately and – no, he shouldn't think about that right now. But maybe it would actually be nice to talk about it with Nancy.

'So, um...' His throat feels tight and his hands are sweaty. 'I recently discovered some things about myself. I-' The words get stuck somewhere on the way to his mouth, and he clears his throat.

Nancy doesn't push, but only gives him an encouraging nod, waiting for him to find his voice again.

'I found out I like boys,' he finally manages to confess. 'And I need you to know that – that that doesn't mean that what I felt for you wasn't real. It was. I loved you, and now I fell in love with a boy. And-'

'Steve.' Nancy's hand suddenly covers his, causing him to finally jerk his head away from the view over the quarry, to focus on her face again instead.

Her eyes are wide, and she squeezes his hand.

'You don't have to explain yourself to me,' she tells him. 'We're good. But thank you for telling me. For trusting me with this.'

Steve heaves out a relieved sigh, and Nancy smiles; it's that genuine kind of smile which reveals all kinds of dimples and soft lines across her face.

'We might be more similar than you thought,' she tells him, a faint blush spreading over her cheeks.

'Really?' Her words make his breath catch in his throat. He squints at her, trying to see her in this new light. 'Are you saying what I think you're saying?'

She shrugs. 'I don't know. I'm not sure yet,' she admits. 'Still figuring things out.'

'Take your time, there's no rush,' he tells her. 'But...' He bumps his shoulder against hers. 'When you're done figuring it out, talk to me, okay?'

She nods. 'Okay.'

For a while, it's quiet between the two of them. Some kind of raptor circles high above them in the sky. They both follow it with their eyes until it disappears among the tree tops west of the quarry.

'Is it Eddie?'

Steve blinks dumbly a couple of times.

'Wha- what?'

'The guy you were talking about. The one you fell in love with. It's Eddie, isn't it?'

'Jesus, Wheeler, what kind of sorceress are you?' Steve exclaims.

Nancy laughs again. 'You're not being as subtle as you think,' she tells him. 'The two of you have been hooking up for a while now, haven't you?'

Steve huffs dramatically. 'This is unfair. You know everything; I can't even tell you my own secrets anymore!'

'So what happened?' Nancy asks. 'You said you had a fight with him?'

'It's fucking stupid,' he sighs. 'Dustin was getting way too excited about the fact that I was gonna be hanging out with you, so I told him I was seeing someone. Next thing I knew, he was telling Eddie all about how I was seeing a girl.' He waves his hands around to make annoyed air quotations. 'I wanted to tell Eddie it was a misunderstanding, but Dustin was there, so I couldn't out us just like that, and he looked so betrayed and heartbroken... He didn't wanna listen to me.'

Steve sighs; he still can't manage to forget that look in Eddie's eyes when Dustin delivered the big news. 'I wish I would've talked about what I felt for him earlier. I should've been honest when I had the chance, y'know. But I was afraid he wouldn't wanna label what we had, that he wouldn't feel the same way – and now we're in this whole mess. God, he must hate me right now, Nance.'

To his surprise, Nancy gives him an unexpected slap against his arm.

'Ouch, what the hell was that for?!'

'What are you even doing here with me, Steve? You should've gone after him, tell him how you feel!'

'I tried, obviously, but he didn't wanna listen to me!'

'So make him listen! You're in love with him, he obviously feels the same way about you, and you let him leave to wallow in a broken heart he doesn't even need to have!' She rolls her eyes and slides off the car, adding something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like an exasperated 'Boys!' before she pulls Steve off the car as well. 'C'mon, time to get your ass over to the trailer park. Right. Now,' she says through gritted teeth. And, well, Steve knows better than to argue with a determined - and truthfully quite terrifying - Nancy Wheeler.

Read the last part here Taglist: @withacapitalp @ultimatedreamer104 @irregular-child @jcmadgirl @estrellami-1 @myguiltyartpleasure @hallucinatedjosten @jaybren @thew1ldblueyonder @melodymeddler @alycatavatar @zoeweee @lolawonsstuff @fairy-princette @saramelaniemoon @phirex22 @krazyperson @xxsky-shockxx (I only put people on this list who explicitly asked to be tagged. That's really no problem, I love to do that so dw about asking, but I got a lot of relatively vague reactions to the previous post that i'm not gonna dissect and interpret, bc I don't wanna clog anyone's notes unwanted. So just to be clear: i consider it a huge compliment if anyone asks for a tag but please do it clearly if you do!)

[noodles-and-tea]

I keep alternating between your tiktok and tumblr just to ensure I don’t miss any of your Merlín art!!

Awww 🥹🥹🥹🥹

[promisedastoria]

[darkshrimpemotions]

"WWDITS is queerbaiting because I don't see a monogamous gay couple hitting all the relationship milestones I expect out of romance!"

IT ISN'T FOR YOU.

I have had it up to here, here being roughly fifty feet above my fucking head, with any queer representation that doesn't conform to monogamous alloromantic allosexual depictions that follow standards for romance that originated in cisheteronormative media being called queerbaiting.

I have had it up to here with my orientation feeling deeply, beautifully seen and tenderly treated by a piece of media only to have a bunch of my supposed community members completely discount that media because it's not depicting their specific queer experience.

I have had it up to here with the biphobia and bi erasure, the discounting of polyamorous relationship dynamics as invalid or less valuable, the tendency of allo gay fans to treat any representation that doesn't cater to them specifically as if it's bad, or nonexistent, or pandering to cishet people.

Newsflash, that's just the same shit I've heard y'all say about my actual sexuality all my life. Shut the fuck up actually.

If WWDITS doesn't speak to you, fine. Maybe it wasn't fucking for you. Maybe go watch any other piece of queer media instead. I know there's not enough, but of what exists, 99% of it is for you. This was for me, and I will not let you write it off as queerbaiting because of that any more than I'd let you write me off as not queer enough for not being like you.

[sorrelpaws]

>be me >make a friend >hang out with him >he gets hurts due to hanging out with me >mfw my only friend might die because of me

[lazybakerart]

NO GOODBYES ONLY SEE YOU SOON

for @weird-an !! HAPPY BIRTHDAY! here's a lil drawing of argyle and billy, where Things are still new and hawkins is some place neither of them have ever heard of. you're a wonderful friend an and you mean the world to me!! thank you for being you!! <3!!

++ close up!

[ironicsoap]

you are expendable, you are not expected to return

[sundrownsthehouse]

please i am begging you to listen to what i found I'M CRYING

[spookythesillyfella]

iz thiz anything ?

[autistic-katara]

u guys won’t believe how normal i acted yesterday when one of the kids i volunteer with was making miraculous references during part of a game

[ariseastrae]

Watching Dandadan be like

"Oh! this episode has a really nice messa- and they're naked again..."

(Light-hearted Post)

[brainfilehasstoppedworking]

when ur son died in a killing game and u have to survive being one of the hit list targets but ur just a chill guy (im sorry)

His son is dead but he chillin' in Towa's Science Memorial Hall

[bogkeep]

so i watched the new arcane eps this weekend right. and there's this super classy cat lady who shows up for like a minute or so in one episode right. and her voice is so good and bewitching and also sounded really, really familiar so i instantly went on the hunt for Whomst may that be. imdb did not have the information yet (she is there now!), and search engine gave me nothing for 'arcane lest', so i had to fight netflix into actually playing the credits for me on the full screen and i had to stand right in front of the tv to read the teeny tiny letters. anyway lest is voiced by transgender actress eve lindley. and i could swear i had heard her name somewhere before and it took me over a full day to figure out that she's been a guest on the you're wrong about podcast. SO NOW I KNOW

[murdleandmarot]

Sometimes you have to make shitty little OCxCanon comics to keep yourself sane

Sorry @mysticalcats I stole ur oc (foxglove)

[yourplaceinaugust]

making non tumblr user friends was a mistake bc i was ranting about symbrock to my friend and ended it by saying "the third movie needs to be rated r so they can fuck" and my friends only response was "what the fuck"