#(oh!! and since i hate him neil probably dies or fucks off a couple months after billy moves!! don't worry)
Text
One-shot response to @carito-dorito ’s prompt:
Steve meets Billy’s mom at his grave and they bond as they talk about him
It’s sunny and hot in Hawkins, not a cloud in the sky. A beautiful day if there ever was one. Everyone is probably soaking it up, enjoying it while it lasts.
Everyone except Steve, that is.
Steve wishes it was raining, that it was thundering, lightening around him.
Because it's painful, and unfair that the outside world doesn’t match the hollowed out one that’s inside of him.
Why should it be warm and bright and wonderful when something so cold and dark and ugly has made itself at home in his chest?
He doesn't want to feel this way, but he’s resigned. He knows it’s going to hurt, that it’s going to feel like he’s missing a limb.
Because he lost his person.
He lost him, and no one even knew that they’d been together. No one knew that he woke up every morning with a broken heart and cried himself to sleep every night. No one knew that he drove across town every time the pain got to be too much to sit on a patch of new grass and cry.
Well, Max knows. She knows everything. The whole story. The beginning until the end. But he refuses to lean on her, or drag her out here every time he wants to go. It’s the second time this week that he’s here, walking through the cemetery. He’s here so much the caretaker knows him by name now.
No. This is something he does alone.
Like everything else.
When he gets closer to his row, his breath hitches. And for a moment he thinks he’s seeing things, a ghost maybe, or a mirage, because his eyes have zeroed in on a figure standing in front of the headstone, back turned to him. A figure in faded blue jeans and a head full of blonde curly hair.
The same as his.
But no. He knows it’s not him. He's gone. He's been gone for over a month. And they are shorter than he’d been, and upon further inspection, it’s definitely the figure of a woman.
He moves.
He wants to know who this person is, who’s leaving something on his grave. Steve knows everyone that comes here.
Ha. Everyone.
Meaning him and Max.
His dad hasn’t been back since they laid him in the ground, since he stood up in front of everyone and talked about how much he loved him. How proud he was of him. How sorry he was that this happened.
Yeah. Sure. He's sorry.
Maybe sorry that it hadn’t been him that did it.
Steve tries not to think about Neil. When he does, rage consumes him, and he does stupid things. Like keying his truck. Or popping one of the tires. Or trying to punch him in the middle of the supermarket.
It’s just… it's bad.
So he stops thinking about that asshole and focuses again on finding out who this is. He walks until he is standing beside her, and when she turns around it feels like all the air has been sucked out of his lungs.
Because it should be impossible, but Steve is staring into his eyes. And that's his mouth. His golden hair.
This woman…who is standing here alone, crying over his grave… it can't be? But…
“Are you his mom?”
She startles a bit at the sound of his voice, but gives him a calculated look, as if she’s sizing him up.
And God, that is the same too.
“Are you his friend?” She finally asks.
Friend. “Something like that, yeah.”
She nods like she knows what that means, and turns back to the headstone. “He didn’t even tell me.” She says, and her voice is angry, bitter, “Our son… my child, died and he didn't tell me.”
Steve knows she means Neil, and he doesn’t know why she is telling him this, but it doesn’t really matter. He’ll listen. Because this is his mom, and he had loved her. He would have wanted Steve to stay.
So he does.
“He took him from me.” She cries, and furiously wipes tears from her eyes. Steve feels his stomach drop. “Neil didn’t even want him. He just did it to punish me for leaving.” She looks over her shoulder. “He probably never even knew that, did he? That I wasn’t allowed to see him?”
He shakes his head, because he hadn’t. He’d told Steve that she left and didn’t take him. That’s it. “No.”
She makes a sound that he thinks is supposed to be a laugh. “It figures. He probably told him I abandoned him. Made him believe that I didn’t want him, but I do. More than anything. I tried to get him back. I tried so hard, but that bastard blocked me at every turn.”
“The law wasn’t on my side. I was nothing. A waitress living out of a motel. He had a house. A good job Money. It didn’t matter to them that he…” She pauses, “it just didn't matter to them.”
It’s quiet for a moment, and he can hear her sniffling. “I was nothing." She says eventually, "But I loved him. It should have been enough.” Then her legs give out and she’s kneeling, shaky fingers tracing the engraved letters of his name.
“He was almost eighteen. Neil wouldn’t have been able to stop me from seeing him anymore. So I was waiting. I was waiting.” Her shoulders shake and Steve can feel the heat behind his eyes. “And while I was waiting, my baby boy died." She chokes on a sob. ”And I didn’t even know.“
He doesn’t try to stop the tears from falling. His chest feels like it’s breaking open. Feels like he’s losing him all over again, and he places his hand on her shoulder. He wants to say it’s just to comfort her, but it’s not. It’s to anchor him too.
He wants to scream at the sky, the stupid beautiful, clear blue sky, because it shouldn’t be him standing here consoling this beautiful broken woman. She shouldn’t have to have a need to be consoled. She should be smiling and hugging her son, not crying over his grave.
"He was stolen from me. The life we could have had was stolen from us. If Neil would have just…let me have him, maybe he’d still be alive. Maybe he wouldn’t have died thinking…thinking that I didn't… that I didn't love him.”
“He knew.” Steve says softly, crouching down beside her. “He may have thought you left, but he always knew you loved him.”
She just sobs harder and Steve wraps his arms around her, hugs her tightly, holds her like he knows he would have. And shit, his chest aches.
And he keeps holding her until his limbs are numb, until she’s pats his back and pulls away. He sits down right where he is and listens to her taking deep breaths. He takes a few too.
“Was he happy?” She asks when the crying subsides. It sounds more like a plea to Steve’s ears.
“He was when he was with me.” He answers, hoping he’s making the right call by telling her this. He keeps Neil’s bullshit to himself.
She hums, thoughtful. “You loved him didn’t you?”
“Yes.” His throat tightens and his emotions threaten to spill out, because she doesn’t sound angry. Would she have approved of them? There’s only one way to find out. “And he…he never said it, but I could tell that he.. that he loved me too.”
“Only his sister Max knew about us. People here…they …they’re not so open minded. And that was the hardest part. I had to… I had to stand there and pretend that we were nothing to each other. I had to pretend that he didn’t take a part of me with him when he… I had to hold myself together and stuff down the urge to sob because it would have looked strange. It would have tipped off Neil, and I didn’t want to end up decking him at his sons funeral.”
He sighs. “Maybe I should have. Maybe it would have made me feel better. Maybe it would have made everyone feel better. He’s a fucking dick. But you already know that. More than any of us.”
“Yes. I do.”
He rubs at his eyes. “He’s just…he was more upset that Max was at the mall, than finding out…and I was…I was there when it happened. Me and Max. We saw it and we couldn't do anything. We were helpless. And we climbed out of the wreckage of that lobby broken and traumatized, and the only thing he does is yell at her when he finally shows up. What the fuck is wrong with him?”
“A lot.” She replies.
He snorts in agreement before blurting out, “I keyed his truck. After the funeral.”
She looks a little surprised. “You keyed his truck?”
“Yeah. I just. I hate him. Like really really hate him,” God what an understatement. “and it was the easiest passive way to say fuck you.”
“I think I like you-” She stops and tilts her head, “Oh, what’s your name, hun?”
“Steve.”
“I think I like you, Steve. "She extends her hand to him and he takes it. "I’m Amelia.”
Her hand is small in his, “It’s nice to meet you.” He says honestly. “I just wish it was under different circumstances.”
Her mouth turns down and he knows she’s barely holding it together. “Yeah. Me too.”
They sit in a sad yet comfortable silence for a long time, until she abruptly stands up and brushes off her pants.
He shields his eyes from the sun as he looks up at her. “You’re leaving?”
She gives him a slight smile. “You came to be alone with him. I can come back later.”
“At least let me walk you back to your car.”
She agrees so he gets up.
“You staying here in town?” He asks, as they head back to where they’re parked.
She nods, “At least for a couple of days. I’m at the Motel 6 off the highway.”
“Well, I have…Max snuck me some of his stuff.” He tells her. He’s been thinking about this for awhile. He thinks it’s the right thing to do. “You can come look through them if you want? Take something back with you.” He can’t keep them to himself, not anymore, not after meeting her. “And I have pictures. You probably don’t have recent ones, right? You can have some of those too.”
She looks like she’s going to burst out in tears again. “That would be…thank you.”
He swallows the lump in his throat. “He’d want you to have something.”
“You’re a good boy, Steve. I’m glad my son had someone like you here.”
He can’t find the words to respond to that so he just gives her a tight smile and his number before he watching her leave between the iron gates.
Only then does he return.
But he doesn’t sit when he gets there, just stands with the sun beating down on the back of his neck as he stares at the name that shouldn’t be there.
“I met your mom.” He tells the silent granite. “And El was right, Billy.” He blinks back tears. “She’s really pretty.”
#response to prompt#harringrove#post s3#billy still died#angst#steve harrington#billy's mom#neil sucks#i cried writing this#i stg#then i hugged my kids#because shit#heart break central right here#tumblr prompts#all coming back#ten year later fic#tumblr fic
173 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
thereaderinsertlady
Reader Insert Lady
mentalhygiejne
Mentalhygiejne
gorejacques-blog
Shrine of Loserness
viharadarshani
Vihara Darshani