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#have another set inspired by robin's!!!
edwinas · 2 years
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Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop (2021) Dir. Kyohei Ishiguro | insp
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italiansteebie · 9 months
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for some reason, eddie munson has been hanging out at scoops. scoops ahoy, of all places.
robin isn't sure why he's here, but it seems when he shows up, her rich bitch of a coworker, steve harrington, seems to get real flustered.
how interesting.
she watches from the corner of her eye as steve strikes out with yet another girl, and as eddie scoffs in his direction. it's not harsh, though. more of a fond, knowing look, to which steve meets with his own matching expression.
it seems practices, casual, even. do eddie and steve know each other? outside of boring school hierarchies? are they friends?
the way they're interacting now sure seems like it.
she catches steve's eye, watching as a blush rises to his cheeks, before he ducks his head and wiggles his fingers in some sort of wave at her.
she scoffs and looks back to where eddie was, only to find that he'd moved on already. she pretends not to notice the disappointment on steve's face.
were they actually friends? it seems unlikely but, hey. who is she to judge, the dingus is actually pretty cool sometimes.
---
turns out, the king and the freak were much closer than robin once thought.
and cooler too.
though, that was physically speaking, because about thirty seconds ago, she'd walked in on them in the freezer. luckily, they were only kissing, still, it was a sight she'd never lose.
she power walked back to the break room. "oh my god." she whispered to herself as she sat at the table. "buckley! buck, hey. robin," there was eddie, he looked a bit flustered and the situation fully set in. "hey-"
"robin, you can't-" eddie heaved a breath, "you can't tell anyone, please," his tone was pleading, and his eyes were wide with fear. a concerned part of her wondered where steve was, if he was too ashamed to show his face. no, he wasn't like that.
"it's okay, i- uh. i have a crush on tammy thompson."
"wh- oh. that's great, good. good." eddie breathed. "i gotta go check on stevie." he told her, jerking a thumb towards the walk in.
how steve was still in there was beyond her, that little box was cold.
it was a few minutes before both boys emerged once more, tears frozen to steve's face as he walked out, shaking hands grasping at ring clad fingers.
he was scared. scared of her, robin realized.
"steve-"
"it's okay, robin. eddie told me," he sniffled, hands still shaking. "thanks for being cool about this, my dad would actually kill be if he found out, i- uh. yeah. thanks." he sighed, shoulders finally relaxing, falling away from his ears.
"of course, steve."
"tammy thompson, though?"
"i know, right?" eddie giggled from next to him, still holding steve in a comforting embrace, smiling as steve laughed.
robin scoffed, "what's wrong with tammy?"
"nothing," eddie said casually, while steve decided to forgo pleasantries, "she's a total dud." he scoffed. "she is not!" robin protested, mouth open in amused shock. "glad to see you're back to your bitchy self, sunshine," eddie laughed, watching their antics.
ridiculous.
---
i read @scoops-stevie 's recent post and was ✨inspired✨
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munson-blurbs · 7 months
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Inspired by this TikTok. Thank you to @lesservillain for the idea and to @emsgoodthinkin for brainstorming with me!
Summary: Eddie jumpscares you one too many times, and so you decide to freak him out at work. But who will be more shocked: him, or you?
Warnings: fem!reader, friends-to-lovers, idiots in love, brief description of (fake) gore, joke about throwing up (doesn't actually happen), kissing as a joke (please only kiss w/ consent irl)
WC: 1.3k
It was just a joke. 
A joke that had started when Eddie had barged into your house—the man wouldn’t knock if his life depended on it—and proudly announced, “I got the job!”
The job in question was a haunted house performer at Hawkins’ annual Fall Festival. You’d both been going since you were kids, and his favorite part had always been the haunted house. 
He’d gotten word about his new job in early September. By mid-October, you’re fully sick and tired of his antics. 
“Boo!” he’d yelled as he jumped out from behind the Wheeler’s couch, making you leap out of your seat. 
“Raaahhh!” he’d growled in your ear while you were in the midst of a conversation with Robin, and once your heartbeat returned to normal, you flipped him off. 
His enthusiastic “Gotcha!” during your history quiz was the final straw. You’d yelped, actually shrieked in the middle of class, clapping a hand over your mouth as Mrs. Click glared at you. 
“I’m gonna get you back for that,” you’d hissed once you’d turned in your exam, growing more irritated when he’d just shook his head. 
“You can’t scare me,” he retorted with a smirk, leaning up against a locker. “You’ve never been able to freak me out, and you never will. Don’t even try, little girl.”
Challenge accepted. 
You spend the rest of the week wracking your brain for ideas. What is Eddie Munson afraid of? What will shock him?
The obvious answer is hiding a prized possession and making him think it was stolen or lost. You grin to yourself as you picture him frantically searching for Sweetheart; maybe you could leave a ransom note of sorts. 
But that plan has too many moving pieces, so you scrap it. You’re about to give up entirely when Robin inadvertently gives you an idea. 
“You guys coming to Steve’s party tomorrow?” she asks in between bites of her turkey sandwich. 
“I’m down,” you eagerly agree, itching to have a night out with friends. 
When Robin turns to Eddie, he shakes his head. “Gotta work,” he reminds her, wiggling his fingers to emphasize the spooky nature of his job. 
Robin rolls her eyes. “Fine, okay. Stop by after. I promise we won’t make you play spin the bottle again.”
Eddie’s eyes widen, cheeks redden, and he gets up from the lunch table without another word. 
Bingo. 
The plan is set: on Friday, before Steve’s party, you’ll pay Eddie a visit at the Fall Festival. It’ll be a visit he’ll never forget, you’re sure of that. 
Robin stands with you outside the haunted house, picking at a funnel cake with powdered sugar-coated fingers. “I’ll wait out here,” she promises, “but when you’re done, I wanna hear everything. Especially the look on his face.”
“You got it.” You shoot her a thumb’s up as you jog up to the bored-looking attendant taking tickets. 
You’re in. 
The first room just sets the tone. Eerie organ music pulses through an ancient sound system, and a fog machine creates a steam that prevents you from seeing the floor. Cobwebs hang in the corners of the ceiling, though you’re suspicious that they’re not intentional decorations. 
Eddie’s not in the next room, either; just a woman wearing a blood-spattered wedding dress, wielding a knife and clutching a plastic severed head. She’s screaming something about, “teaching him not to cheat with a bridesmaid,” and looks vaguely annoyed that you’re not quaking with terror. 
You go through three more rooms, getting increasingly irritating with the lack of Eddie in each one. He’s working tonight, so he has to be here—
Loud, stomping footsteps follow you into the dungeon-themed section of the house, and your heart skips a beat as you lay eyes on him. A distorted mask covers his face, but his unruly curls give him away despite the mad scientist costume he’s donning. He holds up a knife and creeps closer, a low growl emanating from his throat. You run until you no longer can, and he easily traps you, the cold metal gate pressing into your back. 
If you’re going to do it, now’s your chance. 
In one swift motion, you turn him so he’s backed up into the gate. A soft, confused “wha—?” leaves his lips as you lift his mask and lean in before you lose your nerve. Your lips press against his; hands on his cheeks as he accepts the way you melt into him.
Why isn’t he pulling away? Why isn’t he laughing and appreciating your prank? Why does it seem like he wants this…like he’s BEEN wanting this?
Fuck. Fuck. 
This isn’t what you were expecting. He’s kissing you back, surprised but hungry, and you’re the one who ends up breaking away. 
Before he can begin to question what’s happening, you dash out of the room. No. No, no, no. Your head spins as you attempt to process the emotions pulsing through your veins. 
It was supposed to be a way of getting him back for his unwavering desire to scare you. Show him what it’s like to be the one on the other side of the joke. Because that’s all it was; a joke. 
So why do you want to kiss him again?
Fresh air hits you like a slap in the face, and once you find Robin, you cling to her like a lifeline. 
“We have to go,” you mumble, dragging her to the exit and refusing to make eye contact. 
“Whoa, what happened?” When you refuse to answer, she sighs but doesn’t relent. “C’mon, did he, like, throw up or something?”
You shake your head. “I think he liked it.”
“Of course he did,” she says with a laugh, “the guy’s in love with you.” She nudges your hip with her own. “Toldja he would lose his shit.”
Your mouth goes dry. “Robs…when I said that I wanted him to ‘freak out,’ what did you think I meant?”
Robin crinkles her nose. “Um, that the Dingus-ette—that’s you—and her doting Dingus were finally going to admit that they have big, stupid crushes on each other?” Her expression falters when you stop in your tracks. “What did you mean?”
“I wanted,” you start, swallowing hard like a gob of peanut butter is stuck to the roof of your mouth, “I wanted to get him back for scaring me. I wanted to freak him out.”
“Mission accomplished.”
She’s no longer looking at you when she speaks, and you follow her gaze to where Eddie’s shuffling over to you. You want to beg her to stay, but she just squeezes your hand in a silent good luck. 
“Hi.” Eddie’s voice is uncharacteristically quiet. “Can we talk?”
You can only nod in response. His mask is atop his mess of curls, and you can see the longing in his eyes. How have you never noticed it before? How did you not notice the need within yourself?
“Actually, I’m lying. I don’t want to talk.” With that, his arms pull you into him, torsos pressed together, and he’s kissing you. It’s like a missing link in a chain you hadn’t realized was broken, and you allow your hands to drape over his shoulders. You can feel him trembling slightly as he deepens the kiss. 
“You okay?” you murmur against his lips. 
“Huh? Oh, yeah,” he answers, ducking his head behind his curtain of hair. “Guess ‘m just a little freaked out that this is really happening.”
A smile twitches at the corners of your mouth, and you lace your fingers with his. 
“Good.”
--
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carolmunson · 1 year
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let's go, don't wait (e.m. x f!reader)
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inspired by this prompt by @edsforehead - it's not exactly the same but i did my best! summary: modern!eddie's been single since 2020 and aside from getting his dick wet after weekend shows at the hideout, he hasn't been going out of his way for love until his friends make him. cw: 18+ for adult themes. alcohol use, swearing, some sexual themes. some discussions of bad parents. eddie had some sad parts of his childhood. all around this is a fluff piece so nothing too bad. (11k) eddie is 32, reader is 30. so older!reader i guess, idk. i already started writing the part two which is almost entirely smut.
Jingle. Click. Creak. “Mmmm.” Eddie knows that groan anywhere, the deep primal urging of a one Gareth Emerson and the giggles of his girlfriend, Tatianna Edwards. They stumble into the apartment, lips attached, hands grabbing and fisting each other’s layers from the cold. 
“Hi guys,” he calls out, his tone was as bored and annoyed as he hoped it would be. His eyes don’t leave the TV, transfixed on the screen while he watches another YouTube compilation of the best guitar solos of all time. He disagrees with most of them, but it’s enough to drone on in the background while he scrolls through his Twitter feed. He’s never even posted. Not once. Not even a picture on his profile. 
“Hi Ed,” Tati chirps, clicking the side table lights on. He can smell her Chloe perfume when she comes to give him a hug hello. Her arms wrap around him from behind the couch, cheeks touching, a few of her butterfly twists falling forward over his shoulder. 
“Did you stay in tonight?” she asks, pressing a glossy smooch to his cheek. “Sure did,” he huffs, arms crossing over hers in a semblance of an embrace. Her gold bracelets are cool against his skin, her gold rings match his silver ones. He thought when Tati entered the picture that he and Gareth would’ve started to drift apart. Instead, Tati became Eddie’s new best friend – Gare really took ‘date the girl version of Eddie’ to heart. They were two peas in a pod. “You should’ve come out, there were a lot of single girls there – you’re a good dancer, you coulda snagged one,” she sounds like a mother trying to set him up. Eddie tilts his head up and looks at her from below, her deep skin shimmering with the glitter fallout from her eye makeup. She always looks pretty with ease, even with her makeup smudged – like she meant to do that. 
“Oh, I’m sure,” he smiles tightly, but the look falls to something soft when Tati lets go and her almond shaped manicured nails rake gently over his scalp through his conditioned curls.  “You can’t just keep picking up girls from shows, dude,” Gareth chides playfully, coming around the couch to sit next to him, “They’re starting to get waaaay too young for you at the bars.”
“Yeah, perv,” Tatianna teases, ruffling his hair before curling up on the recliner closer to the TV.
“Can we please not talk about this again,” Eddie sighs, sinking further into the cushions. He presses on his eyes with the heels of his hands, “You do this every time you guys come back from a date.”
“We gotta get you on Hinge, or something,” Gareth says.
“Tinder at the very least,” Tatianna follows.
“Okay, I’m going to bed,” Eddie grunts when he gets up, a little dizzy at the speed before he finds his footing, “Don’t be too loud tonight.”
“Just trying to help!” Tati calls out, “You deserve to be too loud at night, too!”
Eddie sucks his teeth before he turns the corner to the hallway, disappearing for the night while his friends fell more in love. 
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It feels like they’re disassembling a bomb. Eddie sulks in a seat at the kitchen table while Robin, Steve, Nancy, and Gareth chatter behind him. Jeff and his wife sit across from him with just as much excitement as the group opposite them. Eddie frowns, bangs too long over his eyes, hands sweating onto the back of his banged up stickered phone case.
“I think you should put the picture of the guitar last, it doesn’t have your face in it. I’d swipe past you,” Robin points at the screen in front of him while he tries to make sense of his Hinge profile. 
“Well you’re a whole lesbian Rob, so you’d swipe past me anyway,” Eddie’s clipped words make the group laugh instead of making them back off. His shoulders sink immediately. This was mortifying.
“She’s right though,” Steve pipes up, “They’ll think you’re some weirdo who's obsessed with his guitar if you — well, actually then maybe it’s fine…” 
“Why don’t you—” Jeff starts.
“You’re married and you’ve been with Alycia since 2014. Your opinions are void,” Eddie interrupts with a sigh. 
Jeff lets out a laugh from his broad smile, “Look, I’m just saying. Why don’t you focus on your answers to the questions rather than the pictures? Girls love stuff like that. You’re smart, you’re a good writer.” 
“Babe, they’re not gonna care about his answers if the first picture they see is of an out of focus guitar taken on an iPhone 4S,” Alycia cocks her head at Jeff, “Like, at least be honest with him.” 
“I know you’re squinting in that picture from Jeff’s wedding but maybe you can put that one first,” Nancy points to the screen and then scrolls down a little. It lands on a photo of Jeff and Eddie, both sweating from the night's activities. His dress shirt is unbuttoned half way down his chest, silver chains and tattoos on full display, tie tied around Jeff’s forehead like a makeshift Rambo. 
“Yeah, you look really good in it,” Robin agrees. 
“Wait, wait, wait!” Tati shuffles into the kitchen, “I got in touch with the photographer from the show two weeks ago at Wraith Bar and he’s sending me some pictures.” 
“You can use the six pictures you’re tagged in from the last three years,” Tatianna scolds, “You look like a bum in them.” 
The group frowns and tosses glances at each other, it’s true. The more recent pictures they had of Eddie were far and few between. He was either blinking or off to the side, blurry or ducking out of frame. Every picture where he looks like himself was either from a show or had Chrissy in it, and he deleted all of those three years ago.
“Stop, you look so fine in these,” Tatianna squeals, “The girls are gonna love you.” Everyone but Eddie huddles around Tatianna to scroll through the pictures. Some of him mid shred with sweat pouring down his chest. Some of him screaming into the mic, hair wild and wet around his face. There was one, that he begrudgingly really liked, where his head leaned back into the light with a winning Munson smile. It was when he heard the opening drums to cover ‘The Immigrant Song’ as a gag – but not really a gag ‘cause he loves that song. It gets everyone at the bar pretty excited – even if they only know the song from School of Rock. 
Eventually, Eddie isn’t even holding his phone, it’s being passed between Tati, Steve, and Robin while he dictates his answers to stupid questions. By the time his profile is finished, his head is hidden in his mass of curls, resting his forehead on his forearms at the table. 
“Are we done now?” he asks into the space between his face and the woodgrain. Despite the winter air flowing through the kitchen window, he’s overheated with embarrassment. There are suddenly too many people around, too much talking, too much giggling at his expense. He tilts his head back up and takes a full breath through his nose and out through his mouth – “Oh shit! You matched with someone!” “How? I didn’t even look at anyone yet,” Eddie’s brows furrow while his head slowly comes to center. “Don’t worry about it, dingus,” Robin chides, “Just talk to her.” Eddie takes the phone and looks at her profile. Rachel, 27, Vet tech. She’s pretty, soft eyes, great smile. He swallows thickly before he goes to his ‘Matches’ and types three letters that felt like they took ten years to write: Hey.
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The chats start fast and die faster, some flirty banter here and there before he’s too nervous or quickly bored. His heart squeezes every time he gets a notification, a buzz in his pocket, a reminder of a message. Some girls don’t want a relationship and that’s fine, that’s just not what he’s looking for. Some girls ask the big questions first and he can’t answer right away. Some girls just aren’t his type and he isn’t theirs either. 
The first date he goes on ends with her excusing herself to the bathroom before they even get to order dinner. She doesn’t come back — he’s not even sure what he did. It started off fine, she was pretty with blonde hair and blue eyes. Fun and easy conversation, a voice that sounded like powder puffs and sugar scented perfume. If he blurred his vision a little, she could’ve been Chris. But she wasn’t Chris. 
Maybe that’s why she left. Maybe she got the vibe that he was preoccupied with her looking like his ex. 
Maybe it was because he said, ��You remind me so much of my ex-wife,’ before they got to order dinner. 
His second date wasn’t much better. He was proud of himself for not going for another Chrissy look alike, but it was clear that this new girl was on a hunt for a husband. 
“So are you planning on getting the tattoos removed?” she had asked, pursing her red lips. He was surprised at how well her lipstick stayed on after eating a pasta dish. Whenever he wears makeup for a show, it smudges before the lights come up. 
“Uh, no why?” he asked.
“Just y’know, thinking ahead — family photos and whatever,” she shrugged. His mouth had never run so dry in his life. The chicken alfredo turned in his stomach. 
The third ended up being a quickie in the bar bathroom only for her to leave right after and unmatch him without as much as a ‘Thanks for a good night!’ He at least wanted to be a gentleman about it. 
The fourth fizzled out and neither of them felt the connection. 
The fifth felt weird because they had talked so much on the app that they didn’t have anything left to talk about when they went out for drinks. 
A month had gone by and all he had to show for it was five bad dates and dozens of unanswered chats. Eddie was found sitting in his bed in the dark, only the light on his phone keeping him illuminated while he thumbs through Instagram. Another app that he has for no reason, he never posts, he never shares anything. He just scrolls.
He wonders if Chrissy’s on Hinge. Eddie’s stomach lurches at the thought of coming across her profile. All blonde and blue eyes, all sweet and spunky, all the right answers to her curated questions. Photos of her in the Maldives, in her friend’s weddings, of her in Chicago after she moved. His heart hammers, sweat collects on his bare chest, heating up the chain lying flat against it until it sticks. He quickly swipes out of Instagram to his home screen, a photo of Robin and Steve flipping him off from the stage after a Corroded Show during load out. He holds his thumb on the app until all the apps shake, thumb hovering over the ‘x’ on the corner to delete the Hinge for good. 
What’s another three years of being single? 
“Ed?” he hears Tati on the other side of the door, her soft knock following her voice, “I got Indian and I’m not gonna eat it all. Gare doesn’t want it, you want it?” 
“Yeah, sure,” he hums. She opens the door and sighs at the darkness. He squints as the light pools in from the hallway and sees her lean her shoulder against the door frame.
“Are you in here sulking?” she asks, one brow raising.
“Yeah, Tat, I’m in here sulking,” he groans, laying flat on his mattress, “I like to sulk. Let me sulk.” 
“Don’t sulk,” she puts on a pout and flicks his light on, leaving the containers of rice and chicken saag. He groans when the light stings his eyes, tossing a forearm over his face. 
“What’s wrong?” she asks, her voice falling into kindergarten teacher territory. She never realized her profession would come so handy living with two grown men, “Why’re you being such a baby in here?” 
“I think I’m gonna delete the app,” he murmurs, still hiding under the protection of his tattooed arm. The pressure feels good on his face, releasing the tension starting to brew behind his eyes. He hadn’t eaten since his lunch period at work, the hunger was starting to catch up to him. 
“Don’t delete it,” she shakes her head, crawling onto the end of his bed. She takes her twists out of her jumbo claw clip and readjusts to pull them all back away from her face. Tati eases his phone out of his hand and slides her glasses on, flinging his dead arm off his face to use his Face ID. He whines, face scrunching is disapproval.
“I told you to stop doing that,” Eddie complains, sitting up against his pillows before crawling out of bed to get the food waiting on his dresser, “Do you have any naan or…?” 
“Do I look like a food bank, Munson? Damn,” she tilts her head and he raises his brows in a silent ‘Well, do you?’
She sighs deeply, “Yes, I have extra naan but you can only have it if you don’t delete the app and eat with us in the living room.” 
“Those are two totally different asks, Tati,” Eddie huffs. 
“I don’t make the rules,” she shrugs before starting to laugh, “Actually, I totally do.” 
The phone buzzes in her hand and Tatianna’s grin only widens when she sees the notification, “You have a new like.” 
“Whatever,” he shrugs, face laced with disappointment and frustration, “It’s gonna be another dud. Why bother if there’s no point? Like, this can’t actually be how people meet each other —“ 
Tatianna opens her mouth to protest but Eddie interrupts his own thought before she can speak, “You and Gareth are the anomaly.” 
“What if the sixth time’s a charm? She looks really cute,” She smiles, teeth bright against her smile, cheekbones glistening where her moisturized skin hits the light. 
He rolls his neck and sighs while Tatianna continues to encourage him, “Just try. You owe yourself that. Chrissy wouldn’t—.”
“Fuck Chrissy, Tat,” Eddie’s voice raises slightly, suddenly defensive. His chest burns at the sound of her name, heat rising up through his neck to his face,  “I don’t really give a fuck what Chrissy would and wouldn’t want. ‘Cause if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t have to be on these stupid fucking apps.” 
“Whew, tell me how you really feel Ed,” she says while she stands up off the bed to walk towards him.
“Look, I get you’re still mad about how things went down with Chris. I know you’re still hurting, but you’re denying yourself a chance to start over — just shoot this girl a message. She seems cool,” Tati speaks so gently to him that he soothes instantly. She offers his phone, still open on the new profile — he’s hesitant at first but he takes it from her to look at the screen. 
There you are. You are cute. Your profile is simple: your name, age thirty, your opening tagline ‘idk i’m just out here i guess’. He lets a puff of air out of his nose at the sentiment — ‘Same,’ he thinks. 
“Fine,” he says finally, “I’ll look through her stuff and I’ll message her. Are you happy?” 
“Thrilled,” she smiles, “So thrilled that I’ll even let you have the extra samosa.” 
He follows her out of the room with his phone and food in hand, looking at her fondly when she passes him a tinfoil covered piece of naan in the kitchen, “You’re my best fucking friend, dude.” 
“I thought I was your best friend?” Gareth pouts from the kitchen table, D&D notes littered in front of him. 
Eddie scrunches his nose, tilting his head while he considers, “You’re alright I guess.” 
When the food is done and he’s gotten a proper look at your profile he decides to bite the bullet — fingers shaking while he matches back with you. He doesn’t start with ‘hey’ this time because Robin and Steve said that was boring, so he tries something new: 
wild that you’re just ‘out here’, me too. 
lol, twin behavior. how’s your night?
Eddie’s heart hammers at the response. He’s surprised at the reaction, he hadn’t had that with any of his other chats, normally expecting them to die off after the first ‘Hey, how are you?’ pleasantry. But maybe this could be different, maybe this could be fun. 
scored some indian food from one of my roommates so it’s one of my better nights. 
ooh, i’m so jealous. i have buyers remorse from some baked ziti i ordered. should’ve just made it.
what did you get?
chicken saag, still jealous?
i’m more of a saag paneer girl but consider me over here seething.
Eddie grins into the phone, cheeks hot while he thinks about what to say back. He skims over your profile again, eyes stilling at a photo of you laughing on what looks like a cruise deck. The sun hits you like a golden streak across your eyes. The caption reads ‘the last time i felt a single shred of genuine happiness’, he huffs an airy giggle before going back to the chat. 
you’re funny, did you know that?
um ya, i’m the funniest person i know, actually. 🥰
that's crazy cause i’m the funniest person i know. and since now i know you, it’s looking like we gotta battle for who the funniest is.
Jesus fucking Christ Munson, why can’t you just be normal? Why can you just say ‘lol’ and call it a night? He frets. His leg bounces while he waits for your reply, food rolling in his stomach. The cool metal of his rings is welcomed on his warm cheeks while he leans against his hand on the arm of the couch. The few minutes he waits for the buzz of his phone feel like eternities. But there you are to save him from his embarrassment:
lmao okay. where did you wanna battle?
there’s a bar in the city that i think could host. you around tomornight?
tommorow night* sorry, fuck, i was trying so hard to be smooth with it.
TOMORROW***** FUCK. LET ME LOG OFF FOR ETERNITY REAL QUICK.
yiiiiikes! embarrassing. but this proves you actually might be funnier than me. i’m not a sore loser so i’ll go on a date with you if that’s what you’re asking.
do you drink? it doesn’t have to be a bar.
i do! where did you have in mind?
there’s a spot called little spoon saloon in the city if you’re familiar. sorta cozy.
oh yeah sounds great for a battle 🙄
but yeah i know it, that’s not too far from my place. maybe we’ve seen each other before and never known it. two ships passing in the night~*
does seven work for you? i know it’s a monday, so we can do earlier if you gotta be up early or something.
sevens fine :)
okay :)
:)
:)
see ya tomorrow! Eddie bites his lower lip, breathing steadily through his nose while he sends over his number. Anything to get out of looking at the app for at least another day, anything to spare him from potentially running into Chrissy’s profile despite her being in a different state. It was getting close to the holidays, she could be around at any moment. 
Before he can spiral, his phone buzzes again – this time a text from an unknown number. His grin widens, too caught up in the excitement bubbling in his chest to feel Tatianna’s stare from the recliner. hi, it's me. jsyk if you don't reach out by like, two tomorrow -- i'm considering it a cancellation and i do have a 50% cancellation fee. sorry! 
50%? stop selling yourself so short, kid. but don’t worry, i won’t cancel. no? you’re not scared to battle? i’m never scared of a battle. :) (A lie.) see you tomorrow. 
“What’s got you smiling like that?” Tatianna smiles, cheeks tight from being unable to hide her excitement. “Are you talking to a girrrrrl?” Gareth teases. Eddie let’s out a ‘tssss’ while he stands up and stretches, quirking a brow at his best friend. “Is it a girl? You takin’ her out?” he asks again. “Yeah G, it’s your mom,” he shrugs, “Night y’all.” “Ed,” Tati whines, “Come on.” Pink floats across his cheeks, itching his nose to hide his goofy smile behind his hand. “Yeah, it’s a girl. And yeah, I’m taking her on a date tomorrow,” he groans. Tatianna squeals, shimmying with giddiness while the recliner rocks with her. Eddie’s too caught up in hiding his face, “Ugh, she’s cuuuute, Tati, what am I supposed to do?” 
“Show her what she’s been missing,” Tati shrugs, “Everyone needs an Eddie.” 
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Last night, Eddie fell asleep caught in a memory that became a dream. He’s eight years old at the YMCA, Wayne sitting in the stands watching him – this is maybe two weeks after his dad dropped him off before he got sent to prison. Wayne wanted to make sure his schedule stayed the same as it could, so Saturday swim lessons it was – today was diving off the block. Eddie had been dreading this lesson for a month, knowing that level 2.5 meant you had to at least try. In level two, they had you stand on the block just to get used to it. He could barely breathe for the ten seconds it was up there, tears stinging his eyes while his teacher encouraged him to come closer to the edge. Three of his classmates had already asked if they were allowed to jump off. It looked fun but it was just so high up. What if it hurts? What if he landed the wrong way? He was up soon, standing behind the block with the rest of the kids, shivering from being out of the water. He could dive off the edge of the pool just fine – in fact, his teacher said he was a great diver, especially for an eight year old. So it should be no problem to dive off the block, he just had to do the same thing he always does. Just higher. 
Gareth, before Gareth was his best friend, climbs up the block and puts his feet at the edge of the white plastic and metal. His teacher, Miss Tiffany, tells him to put his arms up and bend his knees and to dive at the whistle. The whistle blows and Gareth leaps – but he doesn’t dive smoothly into the water. 
“BELLY FLOP!” Jason Carver yells from the edge of the pool where all the kids who already dove sat. They start teasing him relentlessly, Miss Tiffany helping him out of the water to inspect his red belly. Tears well up in Gareth’s eyes, his mom leaning over the bannister from the seating area. “Are you okay, baby?” she asks. Gareth burns red with embarrassment, only encouraging the cackling kids to get crueler. 
Miss Tiffany puffs her whistle three times, “If you tease again, you’re not allowed to go to free swim. Do you understand me?” 
The group quiets, slowly kicking their feet in the water. “Alright Eddie, you’re up next!” 
He gulps, climbing up on the block slowly before standing to full height with his eyes closed. He takes a deep breath through his nose and out through his mouth, like his Uncle Wayne taught him to do when he was feeling nervous. When Eddie’s eyes opened, a chill ran through his chest – for some reason the block seemed higher than ever. 
“Ready Freddie?” Miss Tiffany asked, treading water in her red bathing suit. She grinned up at him, knowing that the phrase always made him giggle – but not today. 
“Arms up, knees bent,” she continues. Ed looks down at the water and the room spins, he can hear Jason and the class giggling. Hear the splashes from the kicks of their feet. 
The whistle blows. He doesn’t move. The whistle blows, again. He puts his arms down. “You okay, Eddie? You can do it! You’re a great diver!” she cheers. 
Eddie chews on his lower lip, thinking about the smack of the water when it hit Gareth’s stomach. The laughter. The teasing. The potential of the pain. The whistle blows again. Eddie climbs down off the block, sniffling when he makes it back to the pool deck, “I don’t want to Miss Tiffany.”  
“C’mon Ed, I know you can do it! Do you want me to save you for last?” she asks, her smile still bright and encouraging. Eddie sniffles again, eyes burning with tears while Jason and his friends start to tease him, too. “Swimming sucks,” he bites, stomping towards the boys room, grabbing his ratty towel off one of the benches on the way in. He’s only in the locker room for a few minutes before he hears the door open and Wayne’s apologetic voice talking to Miss Tiffany from the deck floor.
“He’s just goin’ through a lot right now,” Wayne says, his gruff voice rattling off the metal of the room. 
“Eddie?” Tiffany’s voice calls. 
“Come out here, son,” Wayne calls, “Y’know, if your decent.”  
Eddie sniffles back his tears again, shuffling over to the door while Miss Tiffany waits with his Uncle.
“Do you maybe wanna stay a little late today and we can practice diving off the block when class is over?” she offers, “I know it can be scary to do it in front of your classmates, but I want you to pass to level three!” 
“No thanks Miss Tiffany,” he mumbles to the tiles on the floor. 
“That’s okay Eddie, maybe we can try again next week. How’s that sound? I know you can do it,” she says softly. 
“Okay,” he murmurs before turning on his heel and moping back into the locker room. Wayne was waiting by the check in desk when Eddie emerged after changing, his ratty towel slung off his shoulder. 
“You okay?” Wayne asked.
“Yeah, can we just go home?” 
“Sure kid, was gonna stop and get us some lunch if you wanted,” Wayne’s eyes crinkle with his smile, “Wanna go to McDonalds?” 
Eddie returns the smile half heartedly, “Yeah.”
They walk to Wayne’s pick-up hand in hand, despite some parents thinking he’s ‘too old’ to be doing that. He needed the support, and his uncle was never one to make him feel like he didn’t have it. 
“So d’you wanna try again next week? Your starting form was great, buddy,” Wayne asks while Eddie puts his seatbelt on. Eddie considers it. Getting to the edge of the block and making Jason Carver eat his own words. Making him look like a loser for a change. 
But the words ring in his ear ‘BELLY FLOP!’ The relentless teasing if he didn’t do it this week and then messed up next week. He’d be a baby and a joke. 
“I don’t wanna do swimming anymore, Uncle Wayne,” he huffs.
“You sure?” his uncle frowns, putting the car into gear, “You’re really good, Ed. Y’could be on the swim team.” 
“I don’t wanna come back. I quit,” he repeats. He crosses his arms while they pull out of the parking lot, watching the rest of the kids pool out of the doors with smiles on.
Eddie wakes up to his alarm blaring, back in his 32 year old body. He swears that the air of his bedroom smells like chlorine.
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Eddie made sure to text you at 1:59 PM like an asshole. 
still on for tonight? :)
so close to having to pay my cancellation fee. 
but yes, still on for tonight :) 
sorry, work’s been wild today. would’ve texted you sooner!
you’re off the hook…
for now. 😡
He likes your little attitude, he decides. That little hint of sass in your messages keeps him on his toes and it’s not lost on him that this is probably how you flirt. He wonders, selfishly, how easy you are to fluster. You both exchange a few back and forths before he’s finishing up work for the day and heading to Wheeler’s for a campaign chat. 
The texts completely drop off while he gets ready to see you. He takes an extra long time in the shower, using the tiniest squeeze of Tati’s curl cream when he comes out because it makes his hair look good. He scrubs his face raw before shaving, following up with the skin care routine he kept up with, even though Chrissy curated it for him. 
Once dressed, he stepped quietly out to the living room to grab his jacket in the closet and pull out his boots. 
“You used my curl cream, I see,” Tatianna crosses her arms. He blushes. 
“Don’t be mad, I just wanna look good,” he puts on a faux pout, eyes rounding while he slides the leather over arms.
“You look really good,” she smiles, “It’s gonna be great.” 
Eddie shoves his socked feet in his Docs, worn in from years of wear, and looks up at her, “I’m kind of excited.” 
“You should be! I don’t know, I just have a really good feeling about this one,” she smirks, “Text me at some point, let me know how it goes.” 
“It’s a better indicator if he doesn’t text you, Tati,” Gareth says, coming up behind her, “You look sharp, dude.” 
“Sharp?” Eddie rolls his eyes, “What’re you? Eighty?” 
Tatianna clicks on her phone to look at the time, “Can you get the fuck outta here? You’re gonna be late!” 
“I’m going, I’m going!” he laughs, arms up while he grabs his keys from the hook by the door, “Wish me luck, bye!” 
Eddie felt sick. Suddenly feeling like he was standing at the edge of the pool in ‘98.
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When he got his keys in the ignition of his Honda Civic, a text came through immediately. He swallowed tightly, in some way expecting it to be you. In some way, expecting you to be canceling on him. 
Instead, it was Tatianna in the big group chat: 
here, we made a playlist for you
Eddie clicks on the Spotify link and laughs. First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182
First Date - Blink 182 First Date - Blink 182 First Date - Blink 182 First Date - Blink 182
And so on. The music automatically connects, the opening guitar ripping through his speakers. Eddie quickly types up a response on his phone before pulling out into the street. 
very creative, edwards.
someone in this house has to be. ‘In the car, I just can't wait, to pick you up on our very first date. Is it cool if I hold your hand? Is it wrong if I think it's lame to dance?’ He rolls his eyes as Mark and Tom serenade him in the car, laughing at the lyrics. It’d been a while since he’d listened to this album, let alone this song. While he won’t admit it to Gareth or his girlfriend, it was exactly what he needed before he got to the bar. 
‘Do you like my stupid hair? Would you guess that I didn't know what to wear? I'm just scared of what you think, you make me nervous so I really can't eat.’ “Let’s go, don’t wait, this night’s almost over,” he sings along, fingers tapping on his steering wheel while he waits at a red light. He’s on the fourth replay of the song by the time he pulls up. The ignition cuts off the lyrics before the chorus, he takes a big breath before opening the door. Just a couple minutes past seven, but he told you he was running a little late, so you wouldn’t be mad. His phone buzzes to Robin, Steve, and Jeff reacting to the playlist Tati sent. Alicia, Jeff, and Nancy sent him sweet good luck messages. Robin and Steve sent them a picture from a bar they were at, flipping him off. ‘Break a leg, dingus,’ came in her follow up voice memo. Eddie considers making this new picture his phone background. 
He swallows hard when he gets to the door, his bottom lip getting pulled between his teeth in apprehension. He nods to himself, “You got this, Munson.”  Another deep breath, he’s still ten, he’s still afraid to dive off the diving block. What if it hurts? What if he belly flops? 
‘What if you don’t? What if you dive this time?’ He thinks to himself. He opens the door to the bar, his ten year old self puts one foot on the diving block. The chatter of a few conversations at once is disorienting, so is the low light of the bar in comparison to the neon outside. The man at the entrance asks for his ID and he awkwardly fumbles for his wallet as if it’s not obvious he’s been old enough to drink for eleven years. “Here, man,” he says, somehow nervous he’ll get caught with a fake like he’s nineteen again. The security’s light flashes over his birthdate and he passes it back with a short and gruff thank you. Eddie takes a few steps before checking his phone to remind him what you said you’d be wearing.
in a red cut off sweatshirt, jeans that look like dickies – hard to miss! white airforces! i’m here, looking for you if you can’t spot me just approach the most off putting girl at the bar, it’s probably me :) 
He smiles into the light of his phone. You’re are funny. His phone lights up again, another text bubble added to your previous one. Eddie’s heart hammers in his chest when he looks at it, knowing you’re really only moments away. got you a guinness cause that’s what you said you liked on your profile. it looks like battery acid tbh. there’s a couple seats by the end of the bar, i’ll grab them. He looks up from his phone finally to see a blur of red start maneuvering over to the end of the bar. That’s you. Oh shit, that’s you. Oh shit, you’re – fuck. You have a fat fucking ass in those jeans. He swallows again, shaking the horny thoughts out of his head through the tendrils of his hair. Another deep breath through the nose, out of the water to the diving block just to dive again. He walks the length of the bar and hears his name, your voice in real life – not through a voice note or on your profile. “Ed?” 
Eddie catches your eye and his heart sinks and leaps so quickly he thinks he’s going into cardiac arrest. You’re real pretty, even more so when you grin at him from a few feet away. You wave him over and he does his best to walk confidently towards you, taking his jacket off while he does. He doesn’t know it, but the other girls at the bar are looking. He’s all broad shoulders and dark tattoos, two silver chains and understated rings. Full lips and doe eyes. Tatianna never told a lie, he was unmistakably handsome – he just didn’t know what to do with it. You toss your hair when you speak to the bartender from the end of the bar with a bright smile. The man puts two drinks in front of you and you leave cash in their wake. Eddie winces when he sees you pay, but tries to ignore the sting. In a way, it feels like he’s already losing – like he’s playing Sims with Robin and he’s not on track to get a gold reward on date night. You’re hot and you know it, but he can tell it’s like you just found out. Your eyes are flirty no matter what you’re looking at, you’re full bodied and it’s like you know it’s making him salivate. Eddie can’t help but be nervous when he takes a seat next to you, fingers immediately drumming on the bar top in front of him. “Guinness for you,” you say, sliding the pint glass in front of him. “Thanks,” he smiles, “You didn’t have to do that. I asked you out, you’re not supposed to be paying for me.” 
“I know, but – why don’t you get the next one and we’ll call it even?” you offer. He nods while he takes a sip, eyeing the lighter orangey liquid in your glass. “Did you get a cider?” he teases. 
“It’s a grapefruit beer, thank you,” your brows furrow at him while you take a sip. You have a good face, part of him wants to say that but it seems like a weird compliment. ‘Nice face.’ Like, what does that even mean? His tongue feels heavy, he can feel the sweat building under his curly bangs. “Weaksauce,” he laughs, scrunching his nose, “Grapefruit beer? Not for me, toots.” 
“Yeah, because you drink battery acid!” you tease back, “You’re a stout snob, huh?”
“Nah, just never heard of grapefruit beer. I always drink Guinness – or like, Miller light. Never really stray,” he shrugs. 
“You wanna try mine?” you ask, sliding the glass to him. 
“You sure?” he watches you nod and brings the beer to his lips. It’s tart, a little bubbly, hitting his tongue on the off beat from the stout before. It settles and then it’s sweet, he wonders if you’re the same. Eddie smacks his lips, “I don’t hate it.” 
“That’s such a stout snob thing for you to say,” you pull a face, bringing your drink back to sit in front of you. “I’d offer you a sip of mine but I know you don’t like it,” he smiles, “Wouldn’t want to ruin the taste of your dessert beer.” “Fuck off,” you shake your head and smile, taking another sip of your drink. The Guinness in his hand makes him feel less nervous, but not all the way – toeing the line of the end of the diving block but not scared to look down into the water. He can tell you’re nervous too by the way you pick at a hangnail on your thumb absentmindedly, the way you cross and uncross your legs. Eddie’s eyes linger for a moment at the way they spill over each other, squishing flat on the seat of the stool when you keep them uncrossed. He tries to discreetly follow the line of your thighs to your hips, up to your waist before getting ahead of himself and pulling his eyes away. 
“How was your day?” you ask. Not the question he was expecting. “My day?” he asks, brows raised while he tries to recollect anything before getting ready to see you. “Uh, my day was good. Yours?” You fucking dumbass, you couldn’t just spare one detail? She’s gonna think you’re an asshole. “It was fine,” you answer quietly. Your smile fades a little and he feels a panicked chill rush in his chest. “S-sorry, I should’ve elaborated. I sound like such a dick, sorry,” Eddie feels the heat creeping up on his cheeks, a clamminess starting up at his hairline, “I um, I went to work. Came home, went to a friend’s house for a minute and we talked about a campaign we’re putting together next weekend. I had some dinner, and then I started getting ready to see you and um – uh, now I’m here.” “Campaign? Are you a politician or somethin’?” you quirk a brow while you look him over. He feels insecure under your gaze, he hopes you like his tattoos.  
“No, no, it’s for Dungeons and Dragons.” Saying it outloud makes him feel like a loser, even though you don’t react like you think so. 
“Cool,” you smile. 
“Do you like, even know what that is?” Defensive already, waiting for you to make fun of him. Waiting for this to end up another mistake. Waiting to belly flop. 
“Yeah, I know what it is,” you answer quietly again, this time your shoulders, “Have some friends that play.” 
“Oh, cool. Cool,” Eddie nods, chest tightening, toying with his rings while you reach for your drink, “Um, I’m — yeah, sorry if that came off like, dickish. I didn’t mean to—.” 
“No, no, it’s okay,” you shake your head when you say it, almost like it’s rehearsed. Like you’re always ‘okay’-ing something. 
“Sometimes people think it’s weird when I tell them, I dunno,” he shrugs, still looking down at his rings, “If I’m being honest I haven’t been so great at this whole dating thing.” 
You smile again and he looks up in time to see it, his breath hitches. You’re very pretty. 
“If it makes you feel any better, I learned how to play Magic the Gathering twice to impress a boy. Two different ones,” you grimace, scrunching your nose, “Gross right?” 
“Oof, that’s rough,” he jokes, “Magic the Gathering? That’s like, way worse than D&D.”
“Well the difference between you and me, is that I don’t still play,” you bite back, cocking your head while you take another drink. “Didn’t impress those boys after all, huh?” he raises a brow and your mouth falls open in faux offense. 
“You’re so mean,” you gasp.
“Sorry, sweetheart,” he drawls, “Should’ve put that in my profile.” 
“Oh, so you are mean?” you grin. 
“The meanest,” he grins back, teeth straight and shiny. Full lips pulled tight against them, “How was your day?” “I worked,” you shrug, “Not as exciting.” 
“What do you do?” he asks, turning towards you on the stool, leaning one arm on the bar. He relaxes into the seat, legs spreading wide while his free hand runs nervously over his thigh.
“I’m a personal assistant to a jewelry maker,” you let out a half chuckle through your nose, “It sounds fake when I say it out loud. But basically, I just keep her schedule and run errands and keep her shit in order. She’s an older woman and she’s not the most tech savvy in the world — great at what she does though, really eccentric but I feel like you gotta be when you work in the arts like that.” 
“That’s cool,” he says softly, watching you talk, “What kind of jewelry does she make?” 
“Oh you’ll love this, since you like D&D and stuff,” you start, your excitement is infectious, his heart thrums, “She makes fine jewelry for the most part, but also makes anodized chain mail jewelry and wearable pieces for theater and ren fairs on the side. I told you, eccentric.” 
“Oh, so she’s a little alchemist, huh?” he smirks. 
“Kinda, yeah,” you shrug, heat hitting your cheeks while he keeps his gaze on you, “It’s cool to watch the first few times, and then you get bored.” 
“I’m sure it’s the same for people who watch my band,” he laughs. You shake your head, a curve pulling from the corners of your lips while you finish your beer. 
“Alchemist,” you repeat with a playful roll of your eyes, “You’re such a nerd.” 
“What do you do for work?” he notices you fully turn when you ask, your knees toward him. He remembers Steve telling him once that it was always a good sign when they do that. Like Steve knows anything about body language and dating these days, he’s been platonically attached to Robin for years. His little guard dog. 
“I’m a teacher,” he replies, knocking back the remainder of the Guinness in his glass.  
“Hm,” you hum, looking him over suspiciously, “That’s surprising.” 
“I work at a performing arts school,” he rolls his eyes, “It’s 2023, I’m allowed to have tattoos.” “What do you teach?” you squint when you look him over a second time, “Actually, let me guess – drama?” 
“Music theory,” he corrects. 
“Ooh, big brain,” you joke, “That’s cool.” 
“Big brain? I don’t know about that, I just like music,” he shrugs, “It makes sense to me.” “When I was in high school everyone always talked about how hard music theory was – like, all the band kids,” you explain, there’s a sparkle starting to glint in your eye when you talk to him. “You were hanging out with the band kids?” he tosses a sarcastic knowing look before taking his glass in his hands, “And I’m a nerd? I dunno girl, it’s not looking good for you here...” “Even worse, I was dating one,” you grimace back. “Fuuuuck, you were really fighting for your life in 2009 huh?” Eddie laughs low, lower lip tucking in between his teeth to run his tongue over it. 
“2007, 2008 all the way to like, 2016,” you hide your face in one hand and he wishes you wouldn’t. 
“Damn, that’s a long time,” he observes, “You didn’t marry that guy?” 
You lift your head back up, and shake your head, “It was on and off for a long time, he’s not a fan favorite. It’s uh – it’s why I normally don’t date musicians. I almost didn’t match with you ‘cause of your first picture.” 
Fucking Tatianna. 
“Eek, sorry,” Eddie puts his hands up, “Should I go?” “Do you play bass?” you wince.
“I play a lot of instruments,” he chuckles, “I can play the bass. But I’m not like…a bass player, if you know what I mean.” 
“Oh, I know what you mean,” you breathe out a sigh of relief, “Made that mistake more than once.” “What’s your favorite instrument that you play?” you ask, it’s almost girlish. He ponders it while you cross your legs, the toe of your shoe barely brushing the back of his calf but he knows it's there. You rest your chin on your fist while you watch him think about it. His brown eyes glint in the reflection of the light overhead, plush lips parted while he runs his hands over his stubble. “I think I’d have to say…electric guitar? I’ve been playing that the longest,” he hopes you think that’s cool. “Is it the same one that’s in your pictures?” 
“The Warlock?” he asks with a grin, “Yeah, that’s my girl. Best relationship of my life, prob’ly the only lady who talks more than me.” 
“It’s really nice. I like the color.” 
“Thank you,” he says quietly, eyes darting to your knees where they sit between his, “Um, can I get you another drink? Do you want a beer or…?” 
“If I get a real drink will you stop making fun of my beer?” 
“I promise.” He slides off the stool, sad to see your close proximity to him fade away when he stands up. 
“They have food here, right? I’m sort of hungry, if that’s okay,” your voice gets sheepish when you ask. 
“Yeah, that’s okay. Did you eat dinner?” The words fall out of him too fondly. 
“I had like, a huge spinach salad,” you explain, “Might not have been enough.” 
Something tells him to press further before he buys you more liquor, lest this date go to the wayside too quickly, “Did you eat lunch?” 
“I worked through lunch.” 
“Did you eat breakfast?” 
“I had a smoothie,” you confess. 
“Okay, so before I get you a drink, why don’t I get you some chicken fingers or something?” he insists. You’re shy in your smile back to him, nodding along at his advice. Yes, you should eat more before you keep drinking with him. He doesn’t want you to think he’s just trying to get you tipsy, he’s never been that kind of guy – even when he’d bring home girls from the bar. (They’d at least be the same level of totally obliterated as he was.)
He beams back at you when you nod, “Atta girl.” 
He doesn’t notice when your thighs clench. 
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The last chicken finger is eaten, the last fry of the basket he got for you to split crunched through. The conversation had lulled, not because you weren’t interesting – the nerves were getting to him, creeping up like vines along his chest. The look over the diving block at the water, it’s slow waves teasing him to jump. 
“So um,” you began, swallowing your final fry and wiping your hands on a napkin, “Since you’re a teacher, how was school today?” 
Eddie’s so used to this question that his response doesn’t change, always the same quote from the same movie. Forgetting he doesn’t know you like that, his mouth moves quicker than his desire to play things off cool.
“The worst day of my life, what do you think? Gosh!” Eddie sounds more like John Heder in 2004 than John Heder does now – but when he hears himself say it, he’s immediately embarrassed. Eddie opens his mouth to apologize, nervous you won’t understand but instead – you laugh. And what a sound that is for him to hear. 
“Oh, shit. I haven’t watched Napoleon Dynamite in years. Like, not since grade school.” Eddie laughs with you, “Sorry, sorry, that’s like my go-to reaction at home when my roommates ask me that. I should’ve said something more normal like, ‘It was fine. The kids can’t stop trying to take TikTok fancams of me.”
“Roommates? Fancams? You’re so hip, tell me more,” you enthuse. He puts a finger up to stop you at first, locking eyes with the bartender so he can finally order another round of drinks. 
“What kind of real drink do you want?” he asks. 
“Just a marg on the rocks, salt,” you shrug. 
“Psh, I said a real drink,” Eddie teases with a roll of the eyes, but they soften when you go to argue back, “I’m kidding, I’m kidding.” 
His toes inch towards the middle of the diving block.
“You’re cute when you’re mad,” he flirts. Eddie can see the heat hit your cheeks, the creep of a smile slowly curving upwards, you’re embarrassed. Nervous like he is. Maybe this is going just fine. 
When the drinks arrive he slides the margarita towards you and sips his own Jack and Coke slowly through the tiny bar straw. 
“Okay, so. I have two roommates. Gareth, who’s been my best friend since I was nine; and Tatianna who has been my best friend since I was twenty-nine,” he explains. 
“So why aren’t you dating Tatianna?” you challenge. You miss the straw when you reach for it with your mouth, it slides over to the other side of the cup. You try again and miss, cheeks burning while Eddie looks at you continue to fuck up. His eyes glint mischievously while you hold in your frustrated laughter, “Stop looking at me.” 
“It’s fine, I’ll wait while you get your life figured out over there,” he jokes, checking ‘the time’ on his wrist, “Shouldn’t be too long until you finally get it.” 
“You’re so annoying,” you grit out playfully while you capture the straw between your teeth, “Should’ve put that on your profile, too.”
“Anyway,” he continues, “I’m not dating Tatianna because Gare’s going to propose to her when they go on vacation in a few weeks.”
 “Oh! Yeah, that makes sense,” you nod, “Probably not a good idea to date your best friend’s almost wife.” 
“Yeah, definitely not well advised,” he shakes his head, pulling his hair up off of his neck for a minute before dropping it down, “Plus, her last name is Edwards and I dunno…don’t think I could live with myself if I was ‘Eddie Edwards’.”
You laugh again and he hoped you would. It’s a goofy laugh, you don’t try to sound cute when you do it. He knows you must be a loud laugher, if your small ones are any preview to what you could really do. You don’t sound like Chrissy. Her laugh was dainty, feathery. Like how they teach you to giggle in an etiquette class – all soft edges, all smooth lines. 
“You wanna take the girl’s last name?” you raise your brows, “Very forward thinking. Progressive.” 
“I don’t know, something about it’s kinda hot right?” he asks cock of his head, “Plus, my dad sucks so I don’t want to keep repping him by having his last name.” 
“Oh wow, my dad sucks, too,” you reply cheerily, “We have so much in common!” 
“What was it you said before? ‘Twin behavior’?” 
“Twin behavior, yes!” your hands meet both of his knees where he sits across from you, your tone is light and earnest, “You get me.”
Eddie takes in a hitch of breath, desperate to keep his cool when he feels your hands on him. It’s not even sexy but he could shoot straight to the moon if you asked him to. You use his knees as leverage to hop down from your stool, grabbing your drink before nudging him with your hip. 
“If we’re still battling though, there’s an air hockey table in the back room if you wanna play,” you offer. 
“Are you any good?” he wonders, hopping off the stool to follow you to the back. 
“I’m amazing,” you grin, “Actually won seventeen first place trophies in the intergalactic air hockey competition – of course I’m fucking bad at it, that’s why it’s fun to play.” 
Eddie laughs this time, it’s gruff and nicotine soaked. You’re already winning the battle for funniest person – you’re sharp with him and he’s starting to like it. He runs his hand over the side of the air hockey table in the empty back room, more and more pleased that he put this date together on a Monday. He slides a dollar into the machine so it whirs to life, the neon lights flicking on with a stutter. 
“This reminds me of birthday parties when I was a kid,” you muse to yourself, reaching for the hockey disc trapped in your goal, “Can you help me?” 
He nods, hand grazing your back to get you out of the way – you’re warm to the touch. If he was a braver man he would’ve pulled you into him but he’s not, instead squatting down to reach further into the goal where your game piece was. 
“Hm,” he murmurs, reaching further back and barely touching the top of it, “It’s in here, it’s just back there. I can get it, just –” he sucks his teeth like he did the night before, getting to his knees to try. Music plays over head, stuff the new crop of bar goers would consider oldies. You smile at the opening ‘Damn, shawty snappin’...’ of T-Pain’s ‘Buy U A Drank’, but even more surprised when you hear Eddie sing along softly to himself. 
“Snap ya fingers, do yuh step, you can do it all by yourself. Babygirl, what’s your name?” “Not you knowing the lyrics,” you laugh. 
“I was in highschool in 2007 of course, I know the lyrics,” he huffs, standing up, “I think it’s a bust for air hockey.” 
“That’s fine,” you shrug, “We tried.” 
“I know the club, close at three,” he lip syncs to himself before, turning his attention to you, “What’s the chances of you rollin’ with me?” 
You back and forth to each other in time with the lyrics before settling back down in your spot at bar. 
“You even know the Yung Joc part? Damn,” you laugh again, he loves it. 
“Why’re you so surprised? Is it the tattoos?” he asks. 
“Well yeah, you definitely give off a ‘loved Avenged Sevenfold’ in high school vibe,” you scooch your stool closer to his, your knees slotting between his open ones like a perfect puzzle. It’s not enough though, and he’s not sure if it’s himself or the Jack and Coke that encourages him, but he reaches for one of the legs of your stool to pull you closer. 
“Hey,” he says, your faces only a few inches apart. 
“Hey,” you respond. You catch his eyes flick briefly to your lips before they meet yours again. You can see the light smatter of freckles over his nose, long faded from the summer. 
“You’re right, I was really into Avenged Sevenfold when I was in highschool.” 
“I figured. I was into that whole scene thing, back then. All those singers that are mad at their dad’s and like, in retrospect, all hate women I guess,” you realize it as you speak. 
“I probably would’ve thought you were cute,” he guesses. 
“No, you would’ve called me a poser,” you correct, “Don’t lie.” 
He hesitates before nodding, “No, no, you’re right I definitely would’ve called you a poser. Did you like Fall Out Boy and all of that shit?” 
“Don’t shit on the music I liked,” you frown, “That’s not cool.” 
“I’m not, I’m not,” he assures, pulse speeding, “I promise, I’m not. I’m sorry.” You continue talking about music, high school, college, some ins and outs. Nothing too serious. Nothing too intense. But by now, Eddie’s feeling nice and if one thing’s for certain:
He wants to fucking kiss you. Toes at the edge of the diving block, Miss Tiffany’s whistle caught between her teeth. 
“So now that we’re three drinks in, can I ask you a personal question?” you ask, your eyes a little glassy. You’ve confessed that you’re tipsy, but aware, that if you have one more drink you won’t be – so Eddie already paid the tab. 
“What do you wanna know?” he asks.
“Why’re you,” you enunciate, implying he’s something, “On the apps? It’s hard to believe that someone like you would be single. Unless you have like, something deeply wrong with you, but you’ve been all green flags so far.” 
Your hand falls back to his knee and he eyes it before sliding his own hand down his thigh to lace your fingers with his. 
“You want the real story?” he asks, lifting your hand up of his knee to play with your fingers in both of his hands while he talks. His hands are warm and calloused on the fingertips, but the rest are soft. Lacing and unlacing, running his thumb up the lengths of your fingers, tracing your palm. 
“The real story.” 
“You gonna tell me why you’re on the apps after?” 
“Sure,” you nod. You look gentle, at ease. He eases in, too. 
“I got divorced in 2020,” he confesses. It feels like a weight off his chest to tell you, “Married my high school sweetheart, things were great for a long time, but y’know. People grow and – the pandemic was not kind to us.”
“Oh, I’m…I’m sorry to hear that,” you offer softly. 
“It’s okay,” he smiles tightly. “I guess I was both surprised and not surprised at all when she broke up with me. Almost relieved, I guess – that I didn’t have to play the part of her husband anymore. Not that she was a bad wife or anything, she was great she just – I don’t know,” he rambles, “And I don’t know, I just threw myself into work and my friends after. Girls after shows. Was too scared to like – go on dates incase it ended up like my marriage and –” 
He laughs, “My friends were tired of seeing me be so sad, I guess.” 
“You have such a solid support system,” you comment, “You mention your friends, like, every other sentence.” 
A beat. “I like that,” you nod and smile. He can’t get over how you look when you do that. 
“Why’re you on the apps?” he asks, your hand now cradled between the two of his, his fingers grazing your wrist. 
“I’m six months out of a six year long relationship,” you let out a breath through your nose and drop your shoulders a little, “Figured it was time to get back out there – enter my slut era.” 
“Oh yeah, you’re super slutty,” he teases, “That’s actually the first thing I thought when I saw you. ‘She’s in her slut era.’” “God, fuck offfff,” you giggle again. 
“But yeah, I ended it. I figure I should make that clear,” you say, “Just in case that’s like, a red flag for you. But I don’t know, we just weren’t growing in the same directions. Things felt done way before I left and I – I don’t know. I think I was just scared. I took some time for myself and now, here I am.” 
“It’s okay that you ended your relationship, it’s not a red flag,” Eddie’s voice soothes you when he says it, “If you told me you like, cheated on him and then hit him with your car then maybe yeah, I’d be a little concerned. But you’re an adult, you just know what you want better this time around.”
“Yeah,” you agree. Your eyes meet in a silent confirmation. His eyes flick to your lips for a second time before tucking his lower lip between his teeth again. 
BELLY FLOP! 
“You wanna head out? It’s getting a little late,” he offers. 
Your brows raise in surprise, “Uh, sure, yeah.” 
“Not that I don’t like spending time with you,” he assures, letting his fingers linger over your hand while he stands up, not wanting to lose contact just yet, “Just don’t want to keep you out too late.” 
“Oh yes!” you start with an old southern twang, “My daddy’ll be out there with his pistol if I don’t get home ‘fore sundown.”
“You’re funny,” he laughs, letting go over your hand to reach up and squeeze your cheeks affectionately. You both put on your jackets and head outside, both of you wincing in the cold of the winter air. 
“I’d really like to do this again, if you want,” a shy blush reaches his cheeks, meeting the pink from the cold. 
“Yeah, I’d like that,” you’re just as shy in your response, “This was fun. You’re fun.” 
“Thank you,” he flushes deeper, trying to prolong the inevitable. What if he belly flops? What if it hurts? What if the kids make fun of him? 
“I’d offer to drive you home but I’ve had a few,” he says, hand reaching out to fall on your shoulder, “I feel good to drive but like, god forbid anything happens so – I’m happy to get you a car or pay for it for you.” 
“That’s really sweet, thanks. Let me just um,” you pull out your phone to get in Uber with a speed that impresses him, “It’s really not that pricey, I’m close-ish by.” 
“Still,” he says, “Just wanna be a gentleman y’know?” 
“You’re very gentlemanly,” you flirt. Eddie stiffens, nervous, palms clammy. 
“So um, I’ll see you soon?” he asks, opening his arms to give you a hug. 
“Yeah, for sure,” you nod while you let him engulf you. His scent is warm and spicy, mixed with tobacco. You guess either still smokes, or he used to, but he never got up to have a cigarette in the hours you were at the bar. Eddie let’s go and cups your cheek briefly before giving you a gentle but winning smile. His warm brown eyes linger for the last time on your lips, now they’re slightly parted, waiting for him. His toes curl over the edge of the diving block, his knees are bent, arms up over his head...I don’t want to Miss Tiffany. 
Swimming sucks.
“See ya.” 
You quirk your brow for a moment, having expected much more than a hug, “Oh, um…see ya.” 
He walks half way down the street to his car, heart thrumming in his chest in embarrassment. He should’ve just done it. FUCK. He should’ve just kissed you. 
But what if it hurts? What if she leaves? What if you can’t make it to level three? What if they laugh at you? 
He breathes heavily through his nose while tears threaten to well up in his eyes, staining his eyelashes. What if you don’t want to see him again after this? What if you change your mind? He sighs audibly when he turns the key, phone auto connecting to the speakers. He turns up the radio while the car revs to life, pulling on his seatbelt and putting the wheels into gear. He leans back in his seat to pull out of his spot only to see you still waiting for the car outside of the bar. 
Blink-182 blares through his speakers, hitting him straight in the chest.
‘Let’s go, don’t wait, this night’s almost over. Honest, let’s make,this night last forever. Forever. And ever. Let’s make this last forever.’ 
What if he did stay a little later after class? What if he got the chance to move on to level three? 
Fuck it, he thinks. He turns off the ignition, shaking out the sounds of Jason Carver and the kids laughing, the sounds of their feet kicking in the water. Just Miss Tiffany and her whistle. He gets out of the car, determined. You’re still there, head whipping around to see him coming towards you while you bounce on the balls of your feet in the cold. 
Arms up. Knees bent. “Ed? My car’s gonna be here in a sec–” Whistle. His hands reach out to your cold cheeks to pull you in before his full lips capture yours. His eyes flutter close at the contact, feeling your mouth react to his in time. Soft and needy, hydrated. You immediately know how to keep his pace while he separates and goes back in for more. Wet but not messy, passionate but not feverish. The smoothest dive he’d ever done in his life. Your hands escape your pockets, fingers sliding behind his neck to pull him closer, sliding through the nape of his hair. He breaks away for a moment to delicately push your hair out of your face and really look at you before pressing his lips to yours again. You only stop when your Uber beeps from across the street. 
“I wanted to do that all night,” he mumbles sheepishly. 
“I wanted you to do that all night, too,” you giggle, breathless and blushing, “Thank you.” 
“Thank you,” he says, running a hand over his face, “Let me know when you get home, okay?” 
“Okay,” you nod, hurrying across the street as the car honks again,  “Bye!” 
“I’ll put something together for next time!” he calls out. ‘Cause there will be a next time. 
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Tatianna is leaning over the back of the couch with her chin in her hands when Eddie opens the door. Her cheshire cat grin matches his own. 
“So I didn’t hear from you all night,” she starts, her voice syrupy smooth, “So that means it must’ve went really well.” 
Eddie sighs dreamily, kicking off his boots at the entryway and hanging his jacket on one of the hooks by the door. 
“Ooh, you like herrrr! I can tell! Look at your stupid face!” she laughs, pointing at him, bouncing on the cushions. 
“Tati she’s…fuck,” he shakes his head in disbelief while he walks towards her, “There’s either two ways this could go.” 
“Yeah?” she asks, looking up at him, “And those are?” 
“I’m gonna marry her, or she’s gonna absolutely fuckin’ ruin my life.” 
“I like her already,” Tati grins, “Sit down, tell me everything.” 
“Yeah, yeah, give me a sec,” he grumbles, his phone buzzing in his pocket. He plops down onto the couch while Tati grabs two cups of tea from the kitchen that she made especially for the recap of his night. Gareth had been long asleep for an early morning at work tomorrow. 
Eddie takes out his phone, two unread text alerts lingering on his home page. He opens them, smiling stupidly into the screen.
i’m home :) you’re a really good kisser by the way. 
glad you made it home safe. you are too. :) but you started off pretty kissable so, that’s probably why. you’re making me blush over here, stop it. 
Eddie lets out a soft chuckle through his nose, clicking out of your text conversation to go back to his home screen. 
He deletes the apps.
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thecatchat · 4 months
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Ace the bat hound becomes a ghost dog because he's such a good boy and dedicated to justice. Inspired off of this post here.
But, instead of being found out by Danny, it's the batfam's usual mystic contacts, like Constantine, that discover and reunite Ace and the Bats. Constantine muttering about how annoyingly resilient the particular brand of ghost is. From the infinite realms, Ghosts from there are a headache and a half to get rid of but portals, information, and really anything about it is far and few between since no one's been able to get into contact since some fight a couple centuries ago (Dark being sealed away). Justice Leauge Dark promises to let the family know if they hear anything or find any relevant information about the Infinite Realms, but since literally nothing has been heard from them in so long, no one really knows anything off the top of their head about it.
While Ace is technically supposed to be hidden away at home, he ends up sneaking along one day to help deal with Joker after the clown kidnaps Nightwing and/or Robin (Damian). The photos and videos of the event are blurry and smudged, but word of mouth gets around, and soon, the entirety of Gotham is celebrating the return of Bat Hound the Ghost, the very good boy back from the grave.
Meanwhile, things are going great for the family, just having Ace back makes everyone feel just a bit better (because Ace is a full ghost with a core and is helping to filter the currupt ectoplasm called Lazarus Water with physical touch). Jason is over more often and enjoys flopping on the couch with Ace for a quick snooze, Dick is over the moon to fight with Ace by his side again, Damian makes sure Ace is properly introduced to the rest of the animals that live at the mansion, Tim actually falls asleep semi-regularly now after Ace starts bothering him about being awake, and everyone else is reaping the benefits of having a bat trained dog that seems to be able to sniff out when they need a dog to pet.
Then these guys in white show up.
Ace had seemingly been on edge all night and when it was time to turn in for the night and let Signal come out for the day, Ace follows along, not listening to any command to stay home. Some of the others stay ready in the cave but they let Signal and Ace go out with the promise to call the moment something big happens.
Now, up until then, Ace's powers had been tallied up to: intangibility, invisibility, and occasional hovering/heightened jump. Every other exercise responded out as normal dog (except for the whole being dead thing). Maybe slightly higher emotional intelligence, but some dogs are just Like That. Through some tests, they do find that Ace has a new found hatred of Lazarus Water, but they don't find any obvious weakness that isn't a banishment spell which is as worrying as it is a relief.
So when these white suits start shooting using guns that glow the same green as Ace in Signals' vision and the shoots hit? Ace yelps in pain before seemingly barking out some kind of energy ball? And barreling into a wall so hard it cracked from another shot? Every single alarm that Signal can think to trip gets set off.
But not before one of the suits (one of the many suits, they're terrible fighters but there's just so many of them and two of them) takes out something that looks like a thermos and points it at Ace.
Within a second, Ace is gone.
Signal is so shocked he almost gets hit himself by the dozens of shots of energy blasts now aimed at him. He can't get to the white van in time before it speeds off.
----
I'm going to end this part here. I'm going to continue this in the reblogs but I also want people to take a crack at this story themselves! If you're inspired by this please put your thoughts or stories in the reblogs or tags!
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flamingpudding · 8 months
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Ghost Hunting Vigilantes
Ouija Board Prompt Idea Continuation...? Maybe!
Follow up part directly to this: Ghost Hunting Vigilantes #2
A/N: You guys are awesome. Comments and Reblogs gave me so much inspiration I ended typing this down during Lunch Break. Also I just might have wanted to image Tim going all out on the ghost investigation, I blame watching to many TFIL Overnight videos...
You would think that as Ghost King Danny would be able to learn from his mistakes, and he really could learn from his mistakes but for some reasons, this was something he was not learning from as he floated above the vigilantes curious. He wasn't going to mess with them again, Lady Gotham had beat that into his skull at least. Not like he did the first time but apparently the old city spirit was rather protective of her 'knights'.
Still their first meeting had gotten the Ghost King curious. It wasn't just about the matter with the Red Hood Guy, something he had promised Lady Gothom to take care of as compensation once he figured out what was up with him. But these guys seemed to have gotten an interest in ghost communications now.
So a couple weeks later he was floating invisible once again above them watching the RR Teen - by now he had learned that RR stood for Red Robin and he had snickered at the realization that his hero name was also the name of a Dinner - was laying out cat balls all around the room before setting up some other devices.
The Kid, Robin, was sitting cross legged and arms crossed on the ground and looked very grumpy. Danny could hear the kid mutter something about Pit Demons and that they should get rid of them instead of trying to communicate. The kid had yelled that before and Lady Gotham had never explained that in her lectures about how he should treat her 'knights'. What were Pit Demons? Was that a ghost variant his kingly tutors had failed to tell him about? If they were his subjects and tormenting humans he would need to deal with them, before the GIW became aware of them.
The one in blue, Nightwing if he remembered correctly, was laying out the Ouija Board again at the same place it lay last time. Danny noticed that the guy was looking at the board with curious confusion and for a moment the Ghost King wondered if he had left some traces on the board when his own ectoplasm soaked it.
"Think that ghost will appear again?" The girl in purple was also there again and next to her was another girl dressed in darker colors. Spoiler and Orphan according to Tucker and the city spirit.
"It's a Pit Demon. Stop calling it a ghost." Robin cut it glaring heated at them all. Danny muffled a snicker. The poor kid was definitely not very good at handling the ghostly things but by saying the Ghost King was Pit Demon the kid appeared to be braver about the whole situation these vigilantes were 'investigating' and setting themselves up for.
"I am more worried that Replacement got scammed buying all these things." Red Hood huffed as he was turning around and looking at a controller-like thing in his hands. Danny floated closer looking over the tall guy's shoulder. The thing had five LEDs in different colors and EMF Meter was written on it. Huh, was that thing like the Fenton-Finder? Well his parents had to get the idea for their inventions from somewhere.
A high pitched beep resounded in the room and all eyes turned to Red Robin who was finishing up setting a small box with an antenna. Danny recognised this one from online ghost hunting videos Sam has made him watch as a joke, a REM Pod. Oh so all the stuff they laid around the room including the cat balls were options for him to use? That was pretty nice of them considering the first time they were just playing around with a Ouija Board.
"We are all set up and good to start." Red Robin said as he stood up facing the rest of the vigilantes proudly and Danny arched an eyebrow. "We can now investigate if this 'ghost' is a Pit Demon or has anything to do with the Lazarus Pits or Water and what they want here in Gotham! I missed out on getting a sample last time but hopefully they will be willing to give me one this time."
The Lazarus' what now? Danny blinked at the teen stunned. He had only played a joke on them and Lady Gotham had already sorta punished him for it. If getting hit by a ghost club and lectured on knightly etiquette counted as punishment, which in his opinion did. Why were they making such a big deal out of this anyway?
"Don't we need to… like open a veil and introduce ourselves?"
"No."
"Oh come on Baby Bird. We have to be polite."
"Says the fucker who secretly attempted to use the Ouija Board behind our backs." Red Hood grumbled turning on the controller in his hand and nearly dropped it as the LEDs all started to glow and it let out a long drawn out beep. Danny blinked at it, he was still floating around the tall guy's shoulders.
"Fuck! The hell is with that thing?"
"Oh! Oh! The ghost is already here!"
"It is a Pit Demon."
All the vigilantes suddenly looked a lot more on alert, Danny held back a chuckle as he floated away from Red Hood and over to Nightwing. The LEDs went down to two and Danny suppressed a hum in curriousity. Did Red Hood have a signature that thing was picking up on? Was the guy a halfa in the making? He didn't appear to have any of the signs Vlad had told him about once.
"Hey so are you the one we talked to last time?"
Seeing the board as the closest thing to communicate by him, he reached out and moved that wooden piece to YES. The vigilantes looked among themselves and Danny floated over to the kid that started nervously playing with a cat ball that had been placed near him, wondering if he could send out like a calming aura for the kid.
Lady Gotham hadn't needed to hit him that hard, seeing the kid now made the Ghost King feel guilty for scaring the poor boy the way he did. Even if he didn't know what all that Lazarus Stuff was about yet. He mentally noted that down, maybe Clockwork, Pandora or one of the annoying Observants had an idea.
"So are you a Pi-"
"Are you okay?" Nightwing cut in, interrupting the question Red Robin was going to ask and Danny blinked. Huh that was new. It's been a while since anyone aside from his sister and best friends asked him that.
He floated towards the RR teen and he lightly touched the REM Pod's antenna, it let out a different pitched beep than it had before causing the teen that stood by it to jump up and turn around staring at it with wide eyes. "I didn't touch it!"
Spoiler rolled her eyes. "Of course you didn't, Mr. Ghost did."
"The ghost could be a girl for all we know."
"It's 16."
"The voice we heard last time sounded like a male teen though."
"It is a Pit Demon, it most likely lied to us."
Rude, Danny didn't lie. He picked up one of the cat balls, it started instantly lighting up because of the movement, and lightly threw it at the kid that caught the ball on reflex. Wide eyed they all stared at the still blinking ball. "Did…. did the ghost just fucking throw that at Demon Brat?"
"I only ever saw in videos how ghosts lightly touch it to make it blink. I have never seen a ghost throw it like that."
Danny snickered into his hand to muffle it. Robin suddenly dropped the ball like it had burned his hand glaring at nothing as his eyes wandered over the room. "Show yourself Pit Demon!"
He floated over to Nightwing and the Ouija Board again, passing Red Hood who was still holding the EMF Meter that hit all five LEDs for a moment and beeped when he passed by. Making the tall guy jolt and stare down at it. He swiftly moved the wooden piece to NO.
After last time and the beating Lady Gotham gave him with her ghost club, he was not going to show himself. Not even with a little ectoplasm-avatar blob form. Okay maybe he will later on, when he was sure they wouldn't suddenly start attacking it again. He didn't see any of his parents' weapons with them but he wasn't going to risk it. Considering what Red Hood had said earlier, Red Robin might have bought some more stuff he had not shown or laid out yet.
"I demand that you show yourself, Demon!" The kid was pulling out his katana looking ready for a fight.
Now that was rude. Danny was a half ghost. Not a Demon. They were an entirely different species. Sure they were sort of a part of the Infinite Realms but like Ghost are formed from ambient ectoplasm, strong wills and emotions. Demons were like a living breathing species that needed to eat actual food like humans and not entirely made of ectoplasm.
Danny didn't move a single finger to respond to Robin's demand, silently scoffing.
"They are not ghosting us now are they?" Nightwing carefully asked after the silence had dragged on. Red Robin sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I swear if you made them leave, I will not include you the next time we investigate this 'Pit Demon' as you call them."
"Come on guys! We can't give up now. Maybe we can call them back?" Spoiler added, Orphan next to her nodded enthusiastically.
"This thing is still glowing on two LEDs." Red Hood added holding up the EMF Meter for the rest of them to see.
"So it's still around?"
"Probably."
There was more silence and an idea sparked in Danny's head as he suppressed a snicker and carefully floated over to the REM Pod making sure to avoid Red Hood and not alerting the thing in his hand. He crouched by the box, studying it for a little bit and making sure not to touch it to accidentally set it off too soon.
"It's been too quiet. Are you sure it didn't leave?"
"Still on two LEDs."
"This demon is a coward."
"You're not making it better Baby Bird."
"We should have gotten Signal to come too. He probably could have told us for sure if they are still around or not."
"Maybe we should pack up and try another time again?"
"But we didn't even get the ghost's name!"
Taking this as his que to give a sign of 'life' from him again, Danny touched the REM Pods antenna with a certain rhyme in mind. He wasn't hitting the notes correctly but the pitches were different enough from each other that these vigilantes would recognise what he was doing.
They jumped at first at the sudden noise until slowly realization dawned for some of them. The girls started to laugh after a moment and Red Hood also chuckled with the realization. Nightwing didn't look exactly ecstatic but he did seem ready to burst out laughing. Robin looked rather confused and annoyed and Danny wondered if the kid had any meme knowledge while Red Robin groaned but then appeared to smile in good humor.
Once Danny stopped playing with the REM Pod, Red Robin walked over to a table and put the case under it on top. He opened it and placed a raidio looking like thing on the table as well as a camera with a screen on it.
"Now, Mr. Ghost. I know you have a voice we heard before but you seem to appear to prefer not talking to us directly and whatever made you talk last time doesn't seem to be around tonight. So I have a spirit box and a SLS Camera additionally prepared here." Red Robin switched on the 'radio' and it started making white noises filtering through radio channels, he turned back towards the room holding the camera up with the screen facing the teen. The other vigilantes also appeared stunned by how prepared Red Robin was. Danny could only blinked as he realized that Red Robin was pointing it directly at him and for a second he wondered if that thing was actually picking up his movements or if it only picked up static or blurred images like the cameras back at home that were not old film.
"Let's have a talk this way, shall we?"
-Seriously?- Danny muttered making sure he was using ghost speech so they wouldn't hear him only to slap his hands in realization over his mouth as the Spirit box statically repeated his words understandable for them.
Wide eyed he stared at Red Robin who grinned triumphantly at him, he was still invisible at least... right?
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Danny after a reveal gone wrong, is dropped into the DC universe by clockwork to "recover and let loose"
He learned that because this universe is swarming with heros it dosent reeeaaallly need protection
So for the first 2 months danny juat relaxes, using his connection with the ghosts and shades of gothem to get himself a pretty good appartment with a fair amount of free time amd cash
What he wasent expecting was for the ghosts of residential obsessed billionaire bruceie wayne's parents, thomas and martha, to ask him to protect bruce
Danny thinks it over and decided, 'fuck it, how much work could it be, besides i need to protect someone anyway'
.
.
.
Danny was contemplating walking up and punching batman in the face
Turns out the obsessed billionaire, is a parinoid creepy emotionally constipated vigilante
It was 3 weeks into protecting thomas and Martha's "little boy" and danny was already sick of it, and of bruce, the comious amounts of time danny spent knocking out goons was ridiculous, let alone and amount of times he needed to help out the robins
And how the fuck did he raise them, the little one is so violent he could rival the way his parents talked about ghosts
It was after mid afternoon, after danny day job and he's waiting for the sun to go down to keep mr.dark and brooding safe
It was then that another shade plopped itself on his lap, this one specifically had been following him for the last few days
It was 10 minutes later that the little shade gave him an idea, an amazing idea of how to make protecting the dumb fuck that was bruce wayne MUCH more fun, danny looked at the sun and he knew he had time
.
.
.
He got black cargo pants, a black tank top, a labcoat that he dyed toxic green, a white gas mask, one of those belts construction people wear to hold tools and stuff, combat boots, white gloves and a crap ton of scrap metal, househole appliances and a tool box
He spent the next 5 hours constructing little gadgets, remaking the fenton-thermos-model human and preparing for a night out.
.
.
.
Danny was set
In his labcoat was the hand held stuff
:extra tools, retractable boe staff, smoke bombs, mini fire works, trackers
In his cargo pants he had the more heave hitters: the guns he designed, more smoke bonbs, lipstick lazers, wire
But his belt was his favourite: the now human souping thermos, a harly quinn inspired mallet and the ectoplasm grenades,
Tonights going to be fun
.
.
.
Batman saw alot of things, lately things have been too easy, he got hit less, goons attacks hurt less and sometimes his rouge took too long to atrack ofter breaking out of arkham
It had set him on edge
Even his kids said things seemed easer, so he's not paranoid
Tonight however gave him many more questions
During the usual fight with riddler, a kid slightly younger than tim, wearing a gas mask, dropped from the roof like the spawn of satan, dropped smoke bombs, then the sounds of violence accured
when bruce could see again, all the goons were strung up on wire upsidedown
The riddler was tied to a chair which was hanging by one leg over a vat of...something with a smile drawn on his face and his eyes blindfolded
When he looked up the labcoat wearing kid was holding a mallet and a grenade of some kind
:awww dont worry, none of them will die, I'm like you in that sence, i dont kill people...howeverrr messing with them is fair game
Batman tried to stare him down but that made the kid laugh
:aww that wont work B, besides if i wanted to hurt you I'd of done it in the last 3 weeks
So this was why things were easer
With one last laugh the kid dropped the bomb and Lazarus filled Bruce's sights
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grandlinedreams · 5 months
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You’re like the main reason why I’m active again on tumblr. Like, a billion thumbs up for all your really good work.
I had in idea stuck in my head (blame book Instagram) where YN x Law where YN comes back to the polar tang from spending time with Nami and Robin, and they borrowed some books to read. Law doesn’t think anything of it, until he somehow finds out they’re ✨spicy ✨ books.
Waugdjsns pls you guys have been so nice i'm 😭😭😭 but also bookstagram is always two opposites of an extreme with either inspiration galore or just kind of a '...i'm just gonna...leave these people to it' for me but that's okay!! Everyone is entitled to like what they do but anyways!! Of course I can work with that idea though!! I hope this is to your liking 🥺
[Heads up!: implied suggestive book content, a little suggestive in general]
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In terms of people you could hang out with when around the Strawhats, Law is glad you choose to hang around Nami and Robin. Neither seem to attract the same level of chaos as the rest of their crew seems to (neither does Sanji, but there are obvious reasons why Law isn't particularly fond of him) and though he knows you love your crewmates, having familiar faces outside of the Polar Tang seems to keep frustration based squabbles with them at bay.
That being said, you like to test the limits of how long he tolerates your absence before he's reaching out to you via transponder snail. "We do have things to do," he reminds you, and though he does his best not to sound like he's sulking, he can hear the smile in your voice.
"I'll be back before you know it, Captain. Don't worry." He does worry even though he tells himself that he doesn't, tension easing from his muscles once you're back aboard the Polar Tang. This time you have a two bags in hand, ones he eyes with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.
"This is for all of us," you say as you hold up the bag of neatly packed food, "Sanji insisted on sending me back with some new recipes for us to try and said I should let him know what we all think."
"And the other?" Law points and you pull it out of his reach.
"They're books," you say simply, "for me. Nami and Robin had a few recommendations."
And then you're walking past him, conversation apparently finished. He doesn't think much of it after that, would never scold you for wanting to read when he does plenty of it himself, both for studying purposes and not.
It becomes a problem when he realizes that in having new things to occupy your time and attention outside of your job, you've severely curbed time spent with him.
So when you settle yourself on your shared bed with a book in your hand and seemingly no intention to pay attention to him from now until you inevitably go to sleep, he sets his own plan into action.
"Coming to bed on your own for once?" You ask when he settles behind you, long legs bracketing your own as he settles his chin on your head.
"Something like that," he answers, and you turn the page of your book even as his arms wind around you. He frowns when you don't react, now settling his chin on your shoulder. "Is that book more interesting than me?"
This time you reach up, patting his cheek absentmindedly. "Of course not."
It's not the answer that Law wants, far from it ㅡ and so he switches gears, tilting his head to press a soft kiss to the slope of your neck. And then another, and another ㅡ and if you've noticed what he's doing, you do a damn good job of ignoring him.
Until he starts nipping at your skin, little pinches of his teeth to worry small blooms of strawberry pink on your skin. "Did you need something, Law?"
"Your attention," he says simply, lets himself be petulant like a child behind the safety of a closed door. He reaches for your book, tugging it free and angling himself away from you when you swipe at it. "What is in this book that's so interesting?"
"Law, no! Give it back, please." He has half a mind for a moment to simply shut it without a bookmark just to annoy you (it's the teasingly mean streak he's had since childhood days with Lami) but instead, he decides to scan the page you'd been on himself.
Oh. Oh. So that's why you'd been so interested in these books as of late. He turns towards you, raising an eyebrow. "Never would have thought you to be one to read these kinds of things, [Name]."
"Shut up," you hiss, swiping the book back, though your glare is ruined by how red your face is. "I'm a grown adult, I can read what I want."
"Never said you couldn't," Law fires back before he's reaching, pushing you back until you're beneath him. His gaze flicks over his handiwork from earlier, smirk tugging at his lips as mischief shimmers in his eyes. It's rare that he's in one of these kinds of moods, and he plans to take advantage of it. "It's pretty rude of you to tell me to shut up, though. I was going to suggest we try out some of the things in that book of yours."
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queenimmadolla · 1 year
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𝐖𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐓𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐈
(Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader)
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summary: You cancel on your plans to hang out with your crush, Eddie, and your friends when you realize your competition for his affections will also be there. So, naturally, Eddie comes to you.
warnings: misunderstandings, little bit of hurt, little bit of angst, a lot of fluff and a lot of comforting,
a/n: little companion piece to In My Dreams. inspired by Hozier’s song Would That I, my re-watching of grey’s anatomy, my love for Lexie Grey who heavily inspires Reader’s personality in this, and that confession. for creative purposes we’re gonna pretend Halloween 5 came out before 1986, Eddie got held back like twice maximum, and everyone is alive/lives in Hawkins because this is an ideal world. probably won’t be able to post much in the coming weeks so enjoy and let me know what you think (don’t be a jerk)! mistakes will be fixed later.
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You open the sliding door of the shower with a sigh, arm curling around your body at the slight temperature change as you yank the towel off the bathroom counter where you had set it and wrap it around your body, quickly drying off your limbs. Once you’re dry enough, you step out of the shower, towel now wrapped around your body as you grab a clean t-shirt to wrap around your drenched hair.
You swipe the condensation from the steam off the mirror, staring at your bare, disappointed face before the steam fogs it up again.
Your body heaves out another sigh as you prepare to go through your routine in a failed attempt to not think about all the fun your friends are having without you at that very moment.
It wasn’t like they hadn’t invited you, because they had. Heather had come bounding up to you during break on Tuesday to tell you about the group’s plans to hang out on Friday night, go to the mall, head to the movies then grab a bite to eat and probably hang out at someone’s house. You’d agreed immediately, loving nothing more than spending time with your friends. But then you had found out two things that had certainly rained on your parade before it even started:
1.) Roxy Campbell was going. Heather knew how much you two didn’t get along (a dislike that had been mutual since elementary school but had only spiked in animosity in recent years) and had hurriedly explained that it hadn’t been her that extended the invitation to Roxy, which lead you to reason number two.
2.) Chrissy Cunningham would be there. There wasn’t any bad blood between you and Chrissy, far from actually. You didn’t interact with her too much, she was more Heather’s friend than yours (and you sometimes wondered about that, they often cuddled up during big sleepovers, and disappeared at gatherings) but the common factor between Roxy, Chrissy and you was the real problem.
See, you wouldn’t have a problem being in the same place as Roxy on her own, and same goes for Chrissy, but together, they would just be too much for your insecurity, because Eddie was going.
You’d had a crush on Eddie since the fourth grade (he’d been a couple of grades ahead of you at the time, but now he was attainable, or you had thought he was) but it was when Heather had sucked you into their rag tag group consisting of a bunch of social misfits (Steve, Jonathan, Nancy, Argyle, Barb, Robin, Eden, Eddie and a partridge in a pear tree) during junior year that you actually fell in love with him.
He’d been the one you had bonded with the most, you had almost nothing in common—but it didn’t seem to matter because he made you feel like you mattered. He made you feel seen when you thought you were invisible, made you feel heard when you thought no one was listening, and you just. . .you really loved the way he made you feel.
And you were stupid enough to love him. Stupid enough to love his long curls, his smile (the crazed one was a favorite of yours, but it was topped by the shy one he’d always exchange with you when it was just the two of you in your own world—regardless of your friends surrounding you, or when you were in class and you’d turn in your seat to look back at Eddie and he’d already be watching you, he’d give you that same, beautiful smile), the way he’d doodle silly little things all over his hands (and you could go super into depth about your admiration for those hands), how he resembled a Gremlin when he ate, how he couldn’t seem to sit like a normal person in most public settings unless he was mentally exhausted, his dramatics and the stupid faces he’d make, the way he’d bark at Tommy H. when the jerk dared to try and approach Steve or if he was simply annoying Eddie, how much time and effort he put into campaigns, how he never seemed to get mad during the rare campaigns in which the Hellfire Club managed to breeze right through his monsters, mazes, and obstacles. You could go on forever and that was the problem.
Roxy started liking Eddie right around the time you fell in love with him—because she always has to have whatever you want—and Chrissy was the last girl you were aware he’d had a crush on. A crush he’d had since the seventh grade. Given the current strength of your feelings for a crush you’d had for far longer, you didn’t have any hopes that he’d moved on, since you—ya know hadn’t. Roxy didn’t really intimidate you, but if you were sandwiched between the two girls—or worse, if Eddie was, you’d be forced to watch either another girl flirt with him or watch him flirt with another girl. Both of those options sounded terrible to you and you were positive you’d just end up with a stomach ache that had you nearly bedridden like you always did when it came to heartbreak.
After three days of debating, you’d called Heather before you were all supposed to meet up at the mall and had used your mom not letting you go out because you had chores to do as an excuse. Your mom wouldn’t have appreciated being made the villain but they had all seen you looking perfectly fine at school only a couple of hours earlier, meaning you couldn’t play sick, so she’d just have to take one for the team.
Heather had sounded disappointed but understood and told you she’d let the rest of the group know.
Then you proceeded to have a breakdown, you’d cried and cried, crawled into your shower, cried so much and let the reality of not ever being able to love Eddie and be loved by him crash down on you, your chances of being the reason he smiles and feels loved circle the drain before washing away as your body shook with your sobs. At one point you had thought you might suffocate with it all, but you hadn’t. Once the hot water had begun to lower in temperature, you forced yourself to get up and get yourself together. Eddie should be able to be happy with whoever he wanted and if you were really his friend, you would have to be happy for him and stop feeling sorry for yourself.
So, here you were. All alone on a Friday night while the rest of the teenagers in Hawkins got to be, well, teenagers.
You try cheering yourself up by doing a full body shave since you have the time, moisturizing heavily with sweet smelling lotion, shaping your eyebrows, doing a ton of face masks—you may be feeling pathetic but your skin sure wasn’t—and painting your nails and toes. You’d gone with a metallic green this time in an effort to be daring. You even put your earrings back in, just to feel a little less naked.
Once the polish is dry and you have done all the self-care you can think of, you’re left with nothing to do and no one to keep you company. Even your mind is quiet and your thoughts are whispers, if anything. They’re not nice whispers, so you decide to watch a movie. You throw on one of your comfy sweaters and a pair of boy shorts before running downstairs to sort through the rentals your family still has. Normally, you wouldn’t go running out in your underwear regardless of how similar to shorts they appear, but even your parents had plans tonight, Fridays were date night. They’d come home sometime after 2 am, giggling and so in love as they tiptoed—incredibly loudly, somehow—past your room to try and not wake you up while you listened to them trip and stumble down the hall because you couldn’t help but like to listen and imagine it being you and Eddie one day; drunk, in love and without a care in the world because you’d have each other and maybe a slightly sleep deprived teenage daughter.
The movie selections aren’t too vast, most of yours had been returned on Wednesday—WAIT, SCORE!
You admire the VHS cover of The Last Unicorn with a smile before tucking it under your arm and disconnecting the VCR from the TV in the living room. You carry the bulky thing and its wires up to your room, quickly setting it up to your smaller tv and popping the tape in. While the previews play, you pull the soaked t-shirt off your head, your hair is still damp but as you look at yourself in your bedroom mirror, you can’t help but smile. Your face is glowing, you smell amazing, you hair—while still somewhat wet—looks promising to dry and set satisfactory. Hell, the damp look is working for you on its own. With a smile on your face, you feel and look beautiful.
The t-shirt is tossed into your hamper and you dig out a couple of your favorite snacks from your hoarding place under your bed before you settle on top of it, belly down and your comfiest pillow under your chin as the movie begins.
The movie is comforting and provides you a sense of nostalgia, though it hadn’t come out too long ago. You chalk it up to its dated terms and the general setting of it.
You’re completely invested in it, mind filled with nothing but commentary. You’re wondering why the animators made Celaeno the Harpy’s three titties so big and bouncy when the sound of knuckles rapping on your window surprises you. You push yourself up on your arms, craning your head to look even though you have an inkling who it is, the only person to regularly visit you via window pane.
Sure enough, Eddie is grinning at you from the other side, gesturing down to your window locks. You hadn’t been expecting him so you’d left it secured. It was only a little past 8 pm and hang outs nearly went on to 1 am, why wasn’t he with everyone else?
You move your snacks aside and abandon your pillow in favor of climbing off your bed to pause the movie before you make your way over, unlocking and opening the window for him.
“FINALLY!” Eddie grunts out as he tumbles in, rolling a little ways away before he jumps up and stretches his arms out so high he’s almost touching your ceiling. You roll your eyes, a small laugh slipping past your lips as your fondness for the silly boy quickly rises to the surface.
“Oh, quit it, you faker. You weren’t out there that long.”
Eddie scowls at you, eyes narrowed playfully. He won’t bother telling you that he’d been there for ten minutes (after he’d struggled to get on the roof for the same amount of time, Jesus H. Christ, it never got easier scaling your home, but he’d be damned if he stopped doing it, it was romantic and he was in the middle of wooing) watching you in a non-creepy manner, you’d looked so beautiful and peaceful; he hadn’t been able to take his eyes off of you or even consider making you aware of his presence until the overwhelming urge to hold you had taken over. He didn’t know if he’d finally be able to work up the courage to do so but the distance between you, and the physical separation started to give him anxiety so he’d knocked.
“You still took your sweet time getting off your butt to let me in,” Eddie teases as he makes himself comfortable, kicking off his shoes and shrugging off his jacket to hang on your desk chair. He even takes the chain off of his jeans, tucking it into one of the jacket pockets.
“I wasn’t expecting you!” You throw your hands up in defeat after you shut the window again.
Eddie’s grin turns sly, “Did I surprise you, kid?”
Now it’s your turn to narrow your eyes at him, because you know he doesn’t have the audacity to bring this up again. “Do. Not. Start.”
“It’s just pretty interesting for a guy whom you referred to as predictable today, at 10:06 in Mr. Bellow’s class, to surprise you in a manner that is evidently not so predictable.” He’s smug, so very smug as he crosses his arms and smirks.
You groan, though there’s no annoyance to it, in fact—you’re fighting off a smile. If you smile, he wins and that’s what he wants. You can’t give him that, it's the little teasing game you have going on. You will not break.
“You accuse me of holding onto grudges─”
“Because you do.”
“—yet here you are, bringing up something from the past!”
“It happened today!”
“Yeah, earlier today, as in not right now, meaning the past. Besides, I wasn't wrong. You always climb up to my window and you always try to be unexpected, so really, this was very much so an Eddie thing to do and I am—in fact—correct about you being predictable.” You state as you make your way back to your bed, climbing back on top and folding your legs criss cross style.
Eddie stares at you from where he’s standing, amusement clear in those big beautiful, Bambi eyes of his. The smirk is still there, but it’s not so sly or smug anymore, more gentle and you can tell he’s trying to not let it break into a grin but he’s smiling, nonetheless, so you win. And he knows it.
He shakes his head, turning to look at your poster and art covered walls so you can’t see just how big his grin is. When he finally composes himself, his body is relaxed, arms dropping to dangle by his sides as he stalks towards your bed.
“You’re delusional.”
“Am I wrong, though?” You beam up at him and he can’t say no to you, ever.
With a heavy sigh, he drops his weight onto your bed, falling onto his back. Your poor snacks go tumbling but you don’t care, leaning an elbow on your knee as you rest your chin in the palm of your hand while you peer down at him.
“No. What are we watching?”
“You didn’t answer my earlier question.”
“You didn’t ask a question.” You know he knows what you’re referring to.
“I could smother you right now.”
“Mm, but you won’t.”
You drop your hand from your chin to dart forward and tickle his side. Eddie yelps, letting out a loud laugh as he tries to wrangle your hand in his, securing your wrist in his grasp.
“Okay! Okay! Fine, what’s your question?”
“Why aren’t you with everyone else?” You exclaim, in your rush of adrenaline, rather than ask.
Eddie answers like it’s the most simple question in the world, blinking up at you as though the answer should have been obvious to you, “Because you’re not there.”
Your brows furrow, a confused smile crossing your lips and Eddie wants to lean up and kiss the spot between your eyebrows to ease them. You smell so good, too. He just wants to bury his face in your neck, your hair, suffocate himself with you ‘til his lungs refuse oxygen in favor of needing you to breathe.
“I’m hardly the life of the party, Eddie.”
Not when Roxy and Chrissy are around, you think to yourself. If you’re being honest, Chrissy seems more fun than Roxy, and so are you. Anyone is better than Roxy. You can’t help but briefly wonder how Roxy can be friends, acquaintances, whatever, with Chrissy—not that there’s anything wrong with the sweet blonde—but if it was obvious to you that Eddie liked Chrissy, it should have been obvious to Roxy. Roxy loathed you even more than she had before for being friends with Eddie, you figured she’d hate Chrissy since she was the object of his affections.
“You’re spacing’ out on me, kid.” You’re literally shaken from your thoughts when Eddie puts his giant freaking hand on the top of your damp head, giving it a gentle shake. He laughs at your expression when you swat his hand away.
“Sorry, was just thinking about something. Did you say something?”
“I said you’re the life of my party,” Eddie repeats, trying to maintain his cool, despite how fast his heart was racing. He’d do that a lot, drop little hints to see if you picked up on them with hopes you would. Then, he’d have the perfect opportunity to finally tell you how he feels; like how his heart had just about dropped out of his ass when Heather had come on her own and told them you wouldn’t be joining them. He’d been sullen and mostly quiet as they walked through the mall. Steve and Argyle had tried to cheer him up, but it was useless. Chrissy had even tried to strike up a conversation but he couldn’t think about anything but you, so that had dropped pretty fast and he was sure he’d come off as rude, only he couldn’t care right then but he’d apologize next week at school.
Eddie couldn’t even recall what movie they had ended up watching. Even if he had been trying to pay attention, Roxy was constantly trying to talk to him during the movie so he wouldn’t have been able to hear it anyways. The entire time he was trying to think of why you hadn’t shown up. Heather had mentioned something about your mom, but Eddie knew your parents had date nights on Fridays so you were pretty much free to do whatever you wanted. Were you sick? On your period? Suffering? And here he was, albeit not having an even decent time, hanging out with his friends when he could have been comforting you or just with you. He left before the movie hit the halfway point.
“Coolest person I know, kid.”
You smile, sinking back into your shoulders shyly, you may not have been the apple of his eye, but you were still cool in his, “Thanks, Eddie. You’re the coolest person I know, too. Maybe even the best person I know, in general. Don’t tell Robin or Eden I said that.”
Eddie chuckles, still hyper aware of your wrist in his hand, if he plays this right he could just slide it up ‘til he’s palm to palm with you and intertwine your fing─
“The Last Unicorn,” You announce, finally answering his question as you sit up only to lean back into your pillows, pulling your wrist out of his hold just as Eddie had been about to trail his hand higher. You pat the spot next to you as you pull your knees to your chest. “We lost the remote so you’ll have to go press ‘play’.”
“Oh, I’ll have to go press ‘play’, huh?” His amusement is back as he shifts onto his side to face you.
“Mhm,” You nod innocently, placing your finger on the tip of your nose. “Nose goes.”
He stares at you, incredulous, before he reluctantly pushes himself up even though you both know he would have done it regardless.
“That stupid game doesn’t even make sense, if it’s gonna be called ‘Nose Goes’ shouldn’t the first person that touches their nose fucking go?” He grumbles as he presses the button on the VCR before climbing onto the bed, making himself comfy next to you as the movie resumes.
You shush him, eyes fixated on the screen again, on Celaeno, “Look at her boobies.”
Eddie does as you say, guffawing once he notices. He’s more amused with your thought process than he is with the harpy, for obvious reasons. One being that he’s in love with you and how cute you are and the other being that the harpy is far from appealing to look at.
“Wait, does she have three tits?”
“Yeah.”
“Why, though?”
“Because Harpies have three titties, I don’t know, Eddie, I didn’t make the movie.”
“Well, like—does she need the extra one?” He never noticed it before.
“I don’t know, I’m more concerned about how human they look. I get that harpies are kinda supposed to look a little human, but she’s really fugly and not at all human in appearance. They really gave her three human boobs and called it a day. Could have at least given her a human head or some hair but no.”
Eddie’s focused on you, watching you from the corners of his eyes as you rant. One of the things that had broken the awkwardness when you first met was your love of fantasy. You weren’t as obvious about it as he was with his, but he’d seen you reading your copy of The Sword in the Stone after you’d finished a test early, in the English class he shared with you, right before the end of your sophomore year. He’d spent the whole summer wondering about you and he’d been grateful when Heather had been inducted in the group, bringing you with her in the fall. When he failed, he’d been bummed but knowing he got to spend more time with you, learn more about you eased the ache. Falling in love with you had just about healed it completely, and with your encouragement, he was on track to graduate alongside you this year.
When Eddie doesn’t respond, you turn your head to him, raising your brows when you notice his gaze is fixed on you, “You okay, Eddie?”
“Yeah, I’m fine, kid.”
He really is, he’s thinking about all the things he loves about you. How animated you get when you’re excited about something, the way you get all shy when you realize just how excited you’d been, how optimistic you were even when you were having the worst of days—you never lashed out at anyone because of it, how you always put others first (you always claimed to be selfish but the moment you realized you could help someone instead of yourself, you did it), how forgiving you were (Steve had been somewhat of a jerk to you when he was still King Steve but the moment you realized he was genuine in his redemption, you never brought it up and always made sure to mention how he’s grown as a person when someone else brings it up and yeah, Eddie was a little jealous about that). How unapologetically yourself you were, silliness and all (like how you’d gone as Jamie Lloyd in her clown costume with the red nose and mask, from the Halloween movie while everyone else was dressed as provocative as possible for Zoe’s halloween party—and then you’d gone to Tina’s party as an angel with very little covering you up, because you could do both, and Eddie had to spend the entire night hiding an erection). Or how you made the wall flower kids, that Steve and the others sometimes couldn’t see needed attention, feel seen; Lucas, Will and Jane loved it when you came around. They always referred to you and Jonathan as their play parents and yes, Eddie got incredibly jealous with that, too.
And then there was the way you made Eddie feel. Despite his growing friendships, he had still felt a sense of loneliness, still needed his alone time because they overwhelmed him a bit. But not you. You snuck up on him, came into his life so quietly you hadn’t disturbed any of the foundation he’d built around himself to keep the world away, yet still somehow ended up on the same side of the wall with him. When his head got loud, you were there to hush all the thoughts, bringing him a sense of peace. He hardly had to even defend himself to verbal lashings anymore because you were putting whoever it was in their place without even being mean about it, which made him feel like people really were just messing with him to be jerks, like he wasn’t actually a freak. You made him feel like they were the problem, not him. When you looked at him, he felt like you were actually seeing him. Not Eddie ‘The Freak’ Munson, not the frontman to a band everyone thought was going nowhere, not some high school repeat, not some drug dealer, not trailer trash, just Eddie.
God, and the way you said his name! You’d beam, sit up straighter while you flashed him that beautiful smile and Eddie felt like he somehow lit up the room for you, despite you already being the brightest thing in any room.
He’d had crushes before, on Chrissy Cunningham, on Ally Citronni, Tammy Thompson—she talked to him, okay? He was lucky if a girl didn’t walk away giggling with her friends and not in the ‘I just talked to a cute boy’ way and she was a nice girl—even the fucking counselor and yeah, he’d had one on you, had expected it to go away like it had with the others, but it hadn’t. Instead, it blossomed into something so intense he couldn’t eat, he couldn’t fucking sleep, he couldn’t think about anything that wasn’t related to you.
Love on the fucking brain.
He’d even been forced to talk to Wayne about you when Tommy H. had asked you out in an attempt to make Carol jealous during one of their break ups. Even though you’d flat out said no, it had been a reality check for Eddie. Someone could easily just steal you away.  Eddie hadn’t been able to sleep right for a week, and he hadn’t even touched his guitars, prompting an Uncle Wayne intervention, that conversation led him here. And all of the other times he’d tried—failed—to tell you how he felt.
You went back to watching the movie, but not Eddie. He was ready for this, fuck the hints.
“I’m glad I’m not in this movie cause I would have started sprinting, then she’d kil─”
Eddie had placed a finger on the side of your chin, directing your face to his instead of the TV while you had been talking and you hadn’t been able to drag your eyes away from the action on screen but that didn’t stop him from kissing you, lips pressing firmly against yours.
That caught your attention.
Your eyes widen as you realize what’s happening and when it becomes clear Eddie won’t be pulling away, you melt into him, eyelids fluttering shut while you return the kiss with the same amount of fervor. The rest of his hand comes to cradle your jaw, thumb stroking your cheek as he licks at your lips. They part for him almost instantly and he moans at the first taste of you, tongue swiping against yours.
Eddie dominates the kiss and you’re helpless to do anything but respond as he explores your mouth, licking any chance of coherency right off your tongue. His other hand slips around your waist, pulling you flush against him, onto his lap and you can’t quite believe that he’s cradling you like this, as though you were something important to him. You can’t even believe he’s kissing you, let alone this thoroughly!
When Eddie finally—and very reluctantly—pulls away, there’s a string of spittle connecting your lips. You lick it up and Eddie nearly creams his pants right there.
You stare up at him, eyes wide and vulnerable as Eddie leans down to press a kiss to your forehead, thumb still stroking your cheek.
“I love you, kid. I’m in love with you. Messed me up the moment Heather dragged you over to the lunch table and you wouldn’t let go of the seat you’d been sitting on at your old table. Had a feeling it’d be you, I hoped it would.” He confesses, voice gentle and nearly a whisper into the charged air between the two of you.
You want to cry the happiest of tears as you finally confess during a moment you genuinely thought wouldn’t come, not after the circumstances of how the night had started for you, “I love you so much, Eddie. You’re all I think about; I can’t sleep, I-I can’t eat and when I didn’t think you could love me I couldn’t breathe. I love you, I love you so much and I wanted to tell you, I did but I was so scared you wouldn’t love me and I’d ruin it all but I do! I love you.”
Eddie’s on you in an instant, lips insistent against yours and you can’t help the few tears that slip out but Eddie’s quick to wipe them away, trying to convey just how much he loves you with his kisses. When he pulls away again, he rests his forehead against yours.
“I’ve tried to tell you so many times, baby. I just—I fucking suck. That’s it,” the way Eddie says it makes you laugh and he smiles at the sound, leaning forward to press another kiss to your lips. “I fucking suck. I have loved you for so long, and I should have told you a long ass time ago, a fucking year ago. You really are the life of my party—love of my life, actually. You’re it for me, like—fuck.”
He’s quiet for a few moments, but you can be patient now, you’re willing to wait for him forever.
When he speaks again, the playful edge is gone, “I want to marry you.”
Your breath hitches along with your heartbeat and Eddie continues, “Not yet, not while we’re in school, but I’m positive I want to marry you. Hell, if I didn’t think I’d distract the shit out of you, I’d carry you to the courthouse right now—don’t be a smart ass, I know what you’re gonna say and I’m very aware they’re not open right now—but I’d sit there and wait. That’s how sure I am. So when we’re ready, when you’re ready, if you’ll have me, I’m gonna marry you. But for now, would you—I don’t know, wanna be my girlfriend?”
You yank him down for another kiss, multiple before you’re pressing them all over his face and you’re sure he’s smiling, can feel his cheeks pull up when your lips pass over them.
“Yes, yes I want to marry you someday and yes, I want to be your girlfriend. I want you, Eddie, and I’ll take you anyway I can have you.”
Eddie pulls you even further to him, something you didn’t think was possible, as he hugs you, the hand on your cheek traveling up to cradle the back of your head.
You can’t see his face in this position, your face is pretty much pressed into the crook of his neck, but you’re sure he’s crying, can feel the wetness on the side of your forehead.
Your arms wrap around his middle, inching the fabric of his shirt up so your fingers can press into his back. Despite the seriousness of your conversation, Eddie lurches forward into the bed and you squeal as you go with him, back meeting your blankets.
“Eddie!” You’re pinned underneath him, and Eddie has no plans on moving.
“Hm?”
“Get off!”
“You just told me you’ll have me any way you want me and now you want me off of you? I am all for the chase, baby, but you really gotta make up your mind.”
“Ugh,” you groan, admitting defeat as your arms wrap around him once more to hold him and he lets out a content sigh, nose nudging your head. You turn your head in the direction and he presses another sweet kiss to your lips before nuzzling his nose against yours.
“I’m gonna run down the halls on monday and tell everyone you’re my girlfriend.”
“How predictable of you.”
“Kid, I swear to God.”
You and Eddie will have to save The Last Unicorn and the harpy with three boobs for another time, too swept up in each other to pay it any mind.
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hauntlikeaghost0 · 2 years
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horrible timing | e.m.
eddie munson x henderson!reader
summary: it takes literally being dragged through hell for eddie to be brave enough to admit his feelings to you
warnings: swearing. general st angst. basically fluff. eddie may be a bit ooc, this is my first time writing for him.
a/n: this is inspired by the request from @bde-break-down-energy . i tried to get it as close to what you asked for but i haven’t written in a hot minute so i’m a bit rusty. really hope you like it though!
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“this is so stupid. this is so fucking stupid!!” you yell out into the silence of lovers lake, angrily tearing your jacket off your shoulders and throwing it at the panicking boy behind you. nancy had followed a screaming steve into the murky waters just moments ago and robin had instantly followed her. already, the guilt of not selflessly throwing yourself in after them was eating you alive.
“no, no, no, no, no.” eddie mutters behind you, each repetition louder than the last. the boat rocking as he attempts to pace. he’s been on the verge of a breakdown since what occurred in his trailer and this was starting to feel like his last straw. quickly, he puts a firm (but shaking) hand on your shoulder and pulls you to face him. “you are not following them!”
his voice is strained, fear radiating from every part of his existence and for a moment all you can think about is how very far away this eddie is from the slightly unhinged, happy go lucky eddie you had first encountered all that time ago while dropping your brother off to his dnd game. this image almost makes you hesitate.
“i have to!” you shout back. panicking at what could already be happening right below your very feet. “if something happens to them and i didn’t even try to stop it, i couldn’t live with myself, eddie.”
he groans, rolling his eyes. why do you always have to be so stubborn? his mind begins racing, searching for something he could say to make you stay with him right now, to keep you safe. he wishes he could at least hug you, press his lips to yours and savour your presence, but he hasn’t even had the balls to tell you how he feels. he’s standing before a person ready to throw themselves into an unknown alternate dimension to protect their friends and he can’t even tell you he’s had a crush on you ever since he met you, for fear his feelings won’t be reciprocated.
you open your mouth to say something, eyes soft around the edges but face set and determined. his breath hitches in anticipation but all he’s met with is a soft smile before you’re jumping in after your friends.
at the sight your body disappearing into the unknown at the bottom of the lake, eddie’s heart breaks slightly. he’s not good at being heroic, at being brave but the second you’re out of sight he’s already moving towards the side of the boat, taking shallow breaths. he would stupid not to follow you.
as his body hits the cold water, and he forces himself to paddle towards certain danger, he remembers the first time you came to one of his shows. he remembers seeing you in the crowd, how his heart leapt as you bobbed your head along to his songs. he remembers when you sat through the end of his campaign, confusion constantly written on your face but cheering along with everyone else and complimenting his plot. he remembers the hug you gave him after finding him in reefer ricks shed, how you clung to him like you needed him too, like he wasn’t a suspect in a murder case, like he wasn’t even a freak. he would be completely stupid not to follow you.
you let out a yelp as your back collided with solid concrete, groaning and slowly moving to stand. screams echo from ahead of you and before you know it your sprinting towards your friends a measly pocket knife in your hand for protection. the sight of steve’s bleeding bare torso has you grimacing and quickly kneeling down to stick your small blade into the bat-like creature with its tail around his neck. with each monster you and your friends fend of, it seems another one appears and you worry you’re just too outnumbered.
heart hammering in your chest, you push your knife into another creature, yelping as it struggles beneath you. grunts and gasps can be heard from around each of your friends, wild curses pouring from robin. how many times will you be caught in these life or death situations before hawkins finally gets tired of torturing you?
shakily rising to stand, you free your blade from the demobats slimy flesh. head turning wildly as more beasts come into view. for a second the light of hope dims inside you, maybe we won’t make it out this time? maybe this is one supernatural occurance too far? however, lighter fluid is quickly poured over your dying flame as you see a wild head of curly hair storming it’s way towards you.
eddie grips the boats ore in his hand and you take a moment to appreciate how attractive he looks with his hellfire t shirt soaked through, hair disheveled and gaze determined before you have to snap back into action. he instantly begins smacking vecna’s guard dogs down, along with the rest of the group, and soon enough you’ve done enough damage to make a run for it.
nancy takes the lead, everyone on her heals until they reach the shelter of skull rock.
in an instant eddie is by your side, turning you to face him again and scanning his eyes over you intensely, searching for injury. you raise a shaking hand as if to say ‘ta da!’ and mutter out a quiet but resounding. “i’m fine.”
he breathes out a sigh of relief and collapses back to lean against the curve of the rock. “fuck me, i’m so glad you’re not dead.”
you laugh and follow his movements allowing your head to loll to the side and rest on his shoulder. it feels so trivial to grin at the butterflies filling your stomach as he leans his head atop yours, given your situation, but the comfort you find in his presence is enough for you not to care.
it’s hard to pin point when you realised you’d started to fall for eddie. your friendship with him came so unintentionally that having proper feelings for him felt so impossible you must have denied it for ages. maybe it was that one time he smiled at you at one of his gigs, super wide and childlike, like he’d never been happier in his entire life and you almost choked on your drink with how taken aback you were by the feeling flooding your chest. actually, it was definitely then. that when you realised you’d probably die for eddie munson.
a ring clad hand intertwines with yours and squeezes, you look up at him expectantly. he nods towards the rest of the group. “we’re moving again.”
you begin to take a step and feel eddie’s grip loosen slightly. with a pause you shift your hands together again, holding on tightly. “can you just keep hold?” you ask him quietly. “just a little bit longer.”
his heart clenches in his chest and he smiles reassuringly, tilting his head in a slight bow. “as long as you like.”
eddies mind is so thoroughly engrossed in how tender your being with him he hardly has a moment to be surprised at the fact nancy wheeler has guns. when you’d rested your head on his shoulder he’d felt his heart swell. your weight was secure and steady against him. despite him being no hero, no knight in shining armour, you still turned to him to hold you steady, to be your rock. he was proud of that. when you’d asked him to keep hold of your hand he almost cried at how small you seemed, how timid. this big personality he was so used to being surrounded by was exhausted by this battle they were fighting and under any situation he never could deny you. so he just managed to follow along as they plotted their way to nancy’s house, distracted by the security of your hand in his.
when the first earthquake hit you instantly gripped onto eddie, hands grasping his shirt as his armed wrapped around your side and you both fell to the ground, your head in his chest and his elbows in the dirt. it took a few moments for you to look up, instead keeping your eyes screwed shut for a minute your head against eddie as you waited for your chest to stop heaving. since the events of the last few years every sudden movement makes you flinch so you aren’t surprised the earthquake shakes you up a bit. eddie’s hand runs once, twice down your back. “you’re okay.” he tells you. “it’s okay.”
after that he watches you like a hawk. his hand stays firmly in yours, thumb rubbing over the back at random intervals, quick to grab a hold of you and any nearby solid object each time a new earthquake hits. he takes a moment to realise this is the most you’ve ever touched. you’ve been friends for a while but you’d never been close like this. he’d never touched the small of your back before, never felt the curve of your spine, never even wrapped his hand around your bicep. and thought this isn’t the situation he always imagined that happening he would be ungrateful not to appreciate it anyway.
as you finally reach nancy’s house some of the tension loosens in you, though maybe you’d play scared just a little bit longer if it meant eddie would keep holding you in that way. as you step over the threshold you expect to feel relief but feel a sharp shiver crawl up your spine as you see the wheeler’s warm and welcoming house being infested by the upside down.
“are you cold?” eddie’s voice draws your attention for the nightmarish scene. you run a hand down your arm and feel the scattering of goosebumps. you suppose the absolute terror had distracted you from the chill temperature.
“i guess,” you say and then instantly regret your words as you watch eddie begin to shrug off his jacket. you take a step away from him, holding a hand out to refuse his offer but he just knocks it out the way.
“don’t try and fight it.” he says stepping close and laying the warm leather over your shoulders. in any other situation, you might resist a little bit longer but the weight of the jacket is so comforting and as you slowly slide your arms into the slightly too long sleeves, you’re enveloped in eddies scent. it’s cigarettes, a hint of weed and something you assume must be sandalwood.
he pulls on the lapels so it’s tighter over your front and his eyes sparkle beautifully. “looks good on you.”
you only roll your eyes and follow the rest of the group further into the house for fear your blush will grow even brighter. however, you just make it to the bottom of the stairs when you realise eddie is no longer beside you. panic instantly rises in your throat and you turn on your heel quickly. you are forced to pause when you realise he’s still with you, stopped just a few paces behind.
“what’s going on?” you say, anxiety clear in your voice, slowly walking towards him as though something terrible was about to be revealed to you.
“nothing.” he says quickly, rushing to calm you. “nothing to do with this.” he gestures grandly to the hideous sight around him, the silver on his hands glinting in the dim light.
you step closer, pushing him to explain.
he sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose (a tad dramatically). “this is terrible timing.” he says dejectedly and it’s true. this confession had been on the tip of his tongue for about a month now, growing closer and closer to spilling over each time you touched him, each time you looked at him, each time you were near him. and of all those times he chooses now. not that time he almost said it at hellfire club, or at the record store or even on stage at one of his shows. no, he finally grows the balls to tell you whilst searching for weapons to fight of monsters in an alternate dimension. 
he takes a deep breath. “i …. like you.” the words drop from his mouth slowly, like they were completely foreign to him. your brow furrows, does he know you have feelings for him? is he about to reject you? tell you you’re better as friends? you open your mouth to explain but he cuts you off.
“like really, really like you. like lose sleep at night thinking about you and how much i like you.” you feel you’re cheeks heating fast and a smile forms instinctively. “not in a weird way or anything!” he clarifies. “i just think you’re so…” he searches for the word, “so beautiful. and i know your henderson’s sister and that’s kind of weird. but when i look at you i just want to smile and it’s cliche and gross and i kind of hate myself right now but…. but i’m just so, i don’t know, giddy when i’m around you.” he shakes his whole body as though to demonstrate and then abashedly brings a previously shaken hand to the back of his neck, looking up at you from under his lashes. “i don’t know” he sighs. “all i know is that if anything bad happens to one of us today and i hadn’t told you that i’d feel pretty fucking pathetic.”
you laugh. it’s a sharp, short laugh that tore through you. and you can’t tell whether it’s shock, or relief or sheer happiness that elicited the sound but it makes eddie stiffen. you fail to notice. smile so wide your cheeks begin to hurt. his gaze is steady on you, nervously awaiting a reaction.
“i really, really like you too.”
he’s right, as the words fall from your lips with timing does seem incredibly obscene but you’re too happy to care. you step towards him and raise a hand to his cheek, gripping it tenderly.
“god, eddie. i like you so much.”
his whole body seems to relax and that famous smile spreads quickly across his face. that stupidly beautiful smile that made you realise you wanted this boy to be all yours. this beautifully deranged boy.
“you do?”
eddie’s voice is shy and almost completely unfamiliar. you only nod in response, eyes taking in his every feature. now that your reciprocated feelings are clarified you want to do everything you had always imagined; like run your fingers through his hair, play with the rings on his fingers and kiss that pretty smile off his face.
naturally, you go with the latter.
due to the wide smiles on your faces, the first collision of your lips isn’t perfect. it’s a bit too teethy and you keep letting happy giggles slip through. but, after a pause to collect yourself, you press one slow kiss onto his lips, arms over his shoulders. you move to pull back but his hands find your hips and grip them tightly, pulling you back towards him. your knees weaken and your lips meet his once more. you fit together slowly, lips moulding and pulling apart, the trace of his tongue and the nip of his teeth. you have a newfound motive to make it out of this hell hole alive, if being kissed like this by eddie is what awaits on the other side.
when you finally pull apart, he smiles down at your, raising a hand to push a strand of hair behind your ear.
“when we get out of this shit hole, i’m going to take you on the best date of your life.”
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neil-gaiman · 1 year
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Hi Neil! We were talking about Puck of Pook's Hill in one of my seminars, and we were wondering if your Puck in The Sandman was inspired by that book?
Yes and no. Puck of Pook's Hill is hugely influential on me and the way I think about the land and Sussex, and I'm sure it was an influence on Sandman #19.
But my wild Puck is closer to the Robin Goodfellow of the ballad:
From Oberon, in fairy land, The king of ghosts and shadows there, Mad Robin I, at his command, Am sent to view the night-sports here. What revel rout Is kept about, In every corner where I go, I will o'ersee, And merry be, And make good sport, with ho, ho, ho
More swift than lightning can I fly About this airy welkin soon, And, in a minute's space, descry Each thing that's done below the moon. There's not a hag Or ghost shall wag, Or cry, 'ware goblins! where I go; But Robin I Their feats will spy, And send them home with ho, ho, ho!
Whene'er such wanderers I meet, As from their night-sports they trudge home, With counterfeiting voice I greet, And call them on with me to roam: Through woods, through lakes; Through bogs, through brakes; Or else, unseen, with them I go, All in the nick, To play some trick, And frolic it, with ho, ho, ho!
Sometimes I meet them like a man, Sometimes an ox, sometimes a hound; And to a horse I turn me can, To trip and trot about them round. But if to ride My back they stride, More swift than wind away I go, O'er hedge and lands, Through pools and ponds, I hurry, laughing, ho, ho, ho!
When lads and lasses merry be, With possets and with junkets fine; Unseen of all the company, I eat their cakes and sip their wine! And, to make sport, I puff and snort: And out the candles I do blow: The maids I kiss, They shriek—Who's this? I answer nought but ho, ho, ho!
Yet now and then, the maids to please, At midnight I card up their wool; And, while they sleep and take their ease, With wheel to threads their flax I pull. I grind at mill Their malt up still; I dress their hemp; I spin their tow; If any wake, And would me take, I wend me, laughing, ho, ho, ho!
When any need to borrow aught, We lend them what they do require: And, for the use demand we nought; Our own is all we do desire. If to repay They do delay, Abroad amongst them then I go, And night by night, I them affright, With pinchings, dreams, and ho, ho, ho!
When lazy queans have nought to do, But study how to cog and lie: To make debate and mischief too, 'Twixt one another secretly: I mark their gloze, And it disclose To them whom they have wronged so: When I have done, I get me gone, And leave them scolding, ho, ho, ho!
When men do traps and engines set In loop-holes, where the vermin creep, Who from their folds and houses get Their ducks and geese, and lambs and sheep; I spy the gin, And enter in, And seem a vermin taken so; But when they there Approach me near, I leap out laughing, ho, ho, ho!
By wells and rills, in meadows green, We nightly dance our heyday guise; And to our fairy king and queen, We chant our moonlight minstrelsies. When larks 'gin sing, Away we fling; And babes new born steal as we go; And elf in bed We leave in stead, And wend us laughing, ho, ho, ho!
From hag-bred Merlin's time, have I Thus nightly revelled to and fro; And for my pranks men call me by The name of Robin Good-fellow. Fiends, ghosts, and sprites, Who haunt the nights, The hags and goblins do me know; And beldames old My feats have told, So vale, vale; ho, ho, ho!
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superblysubpar · 10 months
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modern!steve harrington x fem!reader
We'll Call It Love Masterlist | song inspiration
4.8k words | 18+ NSFW
Warnings: *This is a prequel to my series "We'll Call It Love" linked above | reader drinks wine and loves olives on her pizza | swearing | SMUT (PIV intercourse -wrapped before tapped /oral - both receiving and performing/dirty talk/ass slapping)
A/N: While this is a prequel to the series, I think it's actually kind of fun to read this after the first two parts and before the third, little easter eggs and what not. I hope you enjoy this and thanks for your patience in waiting for this story! 💛
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“You’re laate,” you sing into your phone, smiling at Argyle across the bar as he motions to your almost empty glass of wine. Spinning on your barstool as you nod and Robin huffs into the phone. 
“I’m so sorry, but Joe was on a terror today and like yes sir god forbid you have raisins in your trail mix and no I did not watch the barista take the temp of your half caf soy bullshit latte because believe it or not I do actually do real work for this company other than wait on your hand and foot and-”
“Robin!” Laughing into the phone and shaking your head. Your own chest hurts from her lack of ending a sentence. “Take a deep breath. I’m just joking, I already ordered the pizza and…” trailing off as she becomes far too quiet on the other end, “You’re not coming at all, are you?”
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Your new friend groans, “I’m so, so, so, sorry. I promise I’m not normally this flakey, but like I cannot afford to lose this job and I have that date tomorrow so if I leave now I may as well go and buy a plot at the cemetery because-”
“Oh my god,” laughing at her dramatic flare, you smile at Argyle as he sets your refilled glass back in front of you. “Stop, you’re fine. I’m more than content to just hang here at the bar. There’s a game tonight, besides, Argyle can keep me company.”
Batting your eyelashes at him, he winks and Robin laughs on the other side of the phone but it quickly turns to another groan. “Please get extra olives on the pizza for me? Dingus hates them and he’s a baby who always gets his way and oh shit,” she whispers into the phone, “Gotta go. Joe is back and asking where his steak is and I forgot to order it. And by forgot I mean he told me he didn’t want steak an hour ago. Please pray for my quick and painless demise. I love you.”
Robin hangs up before you can reply and you slip your phone back into your purse. Leaning onto the counter, you sigh as your chin rests in your palm. “Looks like it’s just you and me tonight, Argyle.”
He tosses a rag over his shoulder and leans against the wall behind him. “Hot date cancel on you?”
Shrugging, he was no stranger to the guys you’d picked up at that very bar in just the few short weeks you’d been coming there. You take a sip of your wine before admitting, “Nah, just Robin. Although, she is very hot.”
He squints, rubbing at his jaw before snapping, “Super talkative lady right? She’s nice, I like her.”
You laugh into your glass as you nod. “That’s the one.” Looking around the fairly quiet bar, you turn back to him with a fake pout on your lips, fluttering your eyelashes dramatically. “Could I persuade you to put the baseball game on?”
He groans, wiping down a glass, “You know Eden’s rule…”
Leaning forward on your elbows, exaggerating your pout as he trails off. He squints before throwing his head back, blowing out a long exhale, “Man, you’re going down with me if she gets mad.”
Snickering into your wine glass because the other owner is quite…particular about the restaurant. Argyle is the exact laid back balance she needs to run the business or she’d never get anyone in the place - there’s a reason it’s named after him. If it were up to Eden, every guest would need to answer a questionnaire about what music taste they have, toppings on pizza, and if they played sports in high school. Any sort of sports paraphernalia on your person would get you on the sidewalk immediately if she had her way. 
Which is why you’ve learned from Argyle that Eden runs the behind the scenes business side of things, and Argyle gets creative freedom on pizzas and drinks, tending to the customers, and earning the tips he rightfully deserves. He was not let loose on decor however. The pizza bar is decked out in nostalgia from the decades, various band’s vinyls covering the walls, black and white photographs of Eden and Argyle in front of their VW Van across the country. Candlesticks with dripping wax and soft lamps lighting the tables, gold and black accented decor, and a strict aesthetic to be met when it came to the music played and what was shown on TV. 
Making a crossing motion over your chest, “I promise your secret is safe with me, nobody in here will be paying attention, anyways.”
He hums, unconvinced, but pops it on. Rolling his eyes at your grin while making a show of muting the TV and putting subtitles on. 
The bar, aside from your seat, is empty, other patrons snuggled into booths behind you. Argyle brings you out your pizza and keeps your cab at a decent level throughout the first several innings, chatting with you as he gets orders done for others. Despite being bummed to not see Robin, you’re a tad excited to have a quiet night to yourself. You enjoy being able to sit at the bar, drink too much wine, eat the kind of pizza you like and-
“Shit.”
A whisper just over your shoulder has you turning, wine glass half suspended to your lips. 
Your eyes greedily take in the man in front of you. From his worn brown leather boots, up dark black jeans that fit him perfectly, to a striped shirt revealing thick chest hair just above the top button. Swallowing harshly when you spot the gold chain nestled there as your gaze climbs higher over the tanned skin of his neck, dotted with freckles and moles. Several pairings of two that lead you to a jaw lined with slight scruff. Your thighs squeeze together on the bar stool when your eyes finally meet his, a hypnotizing and enticing swirl of honey and moss. 
He runs a hand through his disheveled chestnut locks, causal and airy with his tone after he blows his breath out with a nod to your pizza, “I was about to come over here and throw out an incredibly smooth pick up line that I worked on for the last ten minutes,” his thumb hooking over his shoulder to where he must have been before he continues, “But I see you have olives on your pizza. So. Enjoy your horrible dinner choice.”
Your mouth drops open as he slides down two open chairs from you. He smirks into his bottle of beer as he leans back on the stool, eyes on the screen playing the game. 
Hating that you can’t come up with any sort of comeback, you snap your jaw closed and roll your shoulders back, facing the mounted TV screen as well. 
Watching out of the corner of your eye as he leans forward on the bar, eyes dancing across the screen and his fingers twitching on the bottle. His thumbs wear down the paper label as the home team lets two more runs happen. 
Argyle returns with the cardboard pizza box you asked for and he glances at the screen and you lunge forward, finger pointing in his face, “Aha! So you do like baseball!”
He rolls his eyes, shrugging his shoulders, “Yeah, sure, when the Cubs are winning.”
You scoff into your wine glass, “Mm, so never.”
The olive hating man next to you groans, his forehead landing on his arms as his voice is muffled against the bar, “You hate the Cubs too? What is wrong with you?”
Your wine glass hits the bar top a little too harshly and Argyle winces, moving it safely from the edge as you turn to the adorable yet infuriating man next to you, “What is wrong with you?! I was having a perfectly normal night and then you came over here and complained about my dinner and my team preference and-”
“I’m sorry, I saw a pretty girl, alone at a bar, watching baseball and I thought I’d shoot my shot. Excuse me for finding the one girl who not only likes my least favorite food but also hates my team?!”
Rolling your eyes, you narrow them at the TV muttering to Argyle, “Why are the cutest ones always obnoxious?”
Olive man grins, catching his glance out of the corner of your eyes. His tone changes, amusement in it as his perfect teeth gleam in the low light. “You think I’m cute?”
Groaning, you rub at your temple and he keeps going, “Cause, you know, I think you’re still pretty, for what it’s worth. Even if you’re an olive loving Cubs hater.”
He sighs when you turn to face the TV again fully, arms crossing over your chest. Hearing his chair scuff against the dark hardwood beneath it, you’re a little disappointed he gave up so easily. But then, you watch Argyle smile down at the ground as a tapping happens on your shoulder. Rolling your eyes, you practically growl as you turn around to see olive man standing there. “What?”
He extends his hand, leaning on the bar next to you, “Hi, I’m Steve. While I think your choice in pizza toppings is horrendous, I’m willing to look past this fact and your denial of rooting for an excellent baseball team because you’re super cute and I’d love to buy you a drink, maybe walk you home, could even kiss you goodnight.” He smirks as you look down at his hand, and he raises his eyebrows, waiting.
You laugh, because you can’t help it, there’s just something about him. Call it a cosmic connection, who knows. He’s cute, smooth, and able to make you laugh which is saying a lot considering what you’ve been dealt lately. Slipping your hand into his, you try not to focus on how it engulfs yours or how long his fingers are as you introduce yourself. 
“Very nice to meet you. And, great choice, by the way,” hand still holding yours, he leans forward, his mouth hovering just over your lips. Mint and beer hitting you and making you dizzy as he whispers, “The cutest ones are always the best kissers too.”
That’s how you ended up kissing him in your lobby, up the entire flight of stairs, taking a break to push you against the wall, back arching over the railing as his palms pressed flat to the brick on the side of your head. Breaking apart only when the door at the bottom creaks loudly and rudely interrupts you. Steve’s lips stay on you as you bump and fumble your way to your door, hot and quick gasps for breath against your lips as his fingers dig into your hips. Moaning into your mouth as you yank on the back of his hair a little harshly. 
“Keys,” breathing into him, nipping at his top lip as he pushed you into your door. 
Steve nods and you laugh, pushing on his chest so you can focus. Only spurring him on, his lips find purchase on your neck instead. He smirks into your skin at the little yelp you make at the feeling of his teeth grazing under your ear. Thighs growing sticky from his raspy tone as his nose skims over the shell of your ear, following the curve. “Keys?”
Your back arches, neck extending as his fingers fiddle with the hem of your dress. Eyelashes fluttering and mouth parting as his nose and lips drag down your neck. Your fingers dig into his shoulders, as you laugh breathlessly, “Yeah, you know. Those things that…fuck,” Steve’s mouth is back on your ear, nibbling on your earlobe as his knee slots itself between your legs and you sigh. Fingers dragging down his collar and into his chest hair as you continue, “Unlock doors?”
He hums into your jaw, smiling at the way your hips roll, searching for friction on his thigh and he pulls away, hands on either side of your head again. His eyes sparkle in the low light of your hallway, his lips twitching up on one side before he speaks, “So unlock the door. What’re you waiting on?”
You laugh, rolling your eyes as your fingers pull the keys out of your purse slowly. Batting your eyelashes as you try to gain the upperhand again, “What’s the matter, Steve? Growing a little impatient?”
Steve’s eyes narrow playfully, he brushes a finger across your cheek, tracing it down your jaw. Soft and sweet in contrast to the way you were just making out. He leans in, lips hovering over yours as your eyes slowly fall closed, waiting for another kiss. 
That’s when his hands are on your hips again, rocking you over his thigh and you know you’re leaving a damp spot, whining into the air between your lips at his teasing. You aren’t winning this one, and you don’t really care. 
“God, fuck, I-” your brain is actually short circuiting from the way his nose brushes up yours, at the scruff of his jaw on your skin, his eyes darting down to watch the way you use his thigh shamelessly. 
Steve suddenly removes his leg, eyes growing dark at the pout your lips form, at the needy sigh that comes from your chest and huffs out of your nose. He smiles, voice a whisper and a warm breath across your cheek. Throwing your teasing right back at you, “What’s the matter? Growing impatient?”
Rolling your eyes, you spin, quickly unlocking the door and pushing inside. Steve can’t help himself it seems, hands on you immediately again. Keys and purse thrown somewhere to be dealt with later, he pushes you up against the door, his chest to your back as his nose brushes behind your ear. 
Your fingers search for purchase on the wood, back arching into him as he leaves a trail of kisses on your neck to your shoulder, his hand slowly pulling the zipper of your dress down. 
“Be-bedroom?” you gasp out as he spins you to face him, his eyes roaming over your body. His fingers gliding over the band of your underwear and snapping it, making your thighs push together. 
Steve only nods, lips dragging down your chest and stomach as he drops to his knees, “We’ll get there. Just need to taste you right now.”
“Oh, I…oh,” Your head hits back against the door behind you as his nose drags over your clothed slit. 
His fingers pull your underwear down and yours fall into his hair as his tongue licks a long stripe through you. Steve gently pushes your legs apart further, hooking them over his shoulders as his tongue swirls around your clit. Hands holding your ass, he pulls you closer to his mouth forcefully. Moaning into you as his nose glides through you, parting your lips before his mouth returns to them. Your fingers tug in his hair as you glance down at the way he’s devouring you like a man starved. Pleasantly surprised since most guys don’t even offer to go down on you during a hookup, and they definitely don’t find your clit the way Steve found it. 
His tongue prods at your entrance, teasing it before licking back up to your swollen nerves, sucking the sensitive bead between his lips. Your thighs are already shaking around his head, whines falling from you between curses and his name. 
Steve’s fingers slip through you while his tongue works at your clit under the vacuum of his lips. He pushes one finger into your entrance, squeezing at your hip when you whine. Quick to slip a second digit into you, they swirl easily, curling forward in a motion that makes you moan loudly, hand slapping over your mouth. 
He breaks away, only for a second and shakes his head no. Kissing your thigh quickly and tapping his fingers on your waist, “Come on, don’t be shy now. Wanna hear you.”
Mouth back on your clit, fingers pumping into you at a pace that matches the swirl and flick of his tongue, your hand falls back to his hair, pulling yourself closer to his face desperately. Steve nods into you, pace picking up until you’re whining loudly again. Heat radiates through your body until your thighs are squeezing on the side of his head, releasing over his tongue and fingers as your mouth falls open in a gasp, eyes pinching shut. 
Steve takes everything you’re giving him, slowly pulling his mouth and fingers away from you as yours relax in his hair. The sight between your thighs makes your arousal flutter again already. Stomach filling with warmth at the sight of his pink and glossy lips, rosy cheeks and rumpled hair. 
He smirks at you, shaking his head before sighing dramatically. “God, how can someone who tastes so sweet,” he pulls you closer to him again, kissing your thighs before continuing, “Like olives on her pizza?”
Your laugh bursts out of you, head hitting the door again, “Oh my god, shut up.”
Steve’s fingers flex on your hips, lips dragging across the plush skin of your thigh. Eyes glinting with a dare. “Make me.”
Moving to let your legs fall and do just that, he quickly grips you harder, standing. You yelp, grabbing onto his hair, your head almost hitting the ceiling. He lets your body drag down his, torturously slow like a scene straight out of Dirty Dancing, until his hands are under your butt, legs wrapping around him and your faces are close together. He’s grinning widely, tongue licking over the top row of white gleaming at you, breathless as he asks, “Bedroom?” 
You point wordlessly, swallowing at the way his muscles flex around you and the warmth of his fingertips on your spine. Your lips attack his again as he lays you on the bed. Your arms fall around his neck, pulling him to fall across you. The muscles in his forearms dance on either side of your head as he grinds against you. The denim of his jeans a welcomed friction on your sensitive cunt and you gasp into his mouth. 
It’s a flurry of wet lips over hot skin, clothes thrown to places neither of you care to pay attention to. Bodies sliding together, his swollen tip catching on your clit and you bite down on his lip at the feeling, fingers pressing crescent moons into the tight muscles of his shoulder blades. You roll, landing on top of him and working your way down his body. Lips kissing at every freckle and mole you find along his chest and abs. Nose dragging across his hips, you smile when he shivers underneath you. 
Your tongue licks up his length, tracing the curve of the vein, swirling around the tip. Pulling the mushroom head between your lips, Steve’s hips jerk as your tongue flicks at the pre-cum spilling out of him already. His fingers twist in your comforter, a strangled noise from his throat as your head sinks lower, cheeks hollowing as you take him deeper. You glance up under your fluttering lashes to find him looking down at you, wrecked, eyes wild as his tip hits the back of your throat, spit spilling from your lips around him.
“Fuck, fuck. Condom? Do you have a condom?” He gasps, pulling his hips down, his cock falling from your mouth as you nod to your dresser. 
Steve’s quick to slip it on as you straddle him, fingers dragging through his chest hair. He sits up, arms circling your waist and yanking you down closer, pulling a laugh from you. His teeth nip at your neck, voice raspy as he asks, “What do you want? Tell me what you like.”
Taken aback by his question, your hook ups are rarely able to make you laugh, orgasm, and be attentive. He slides between your folds, letting you hover over him and you pull your lip between your teeth as he sucks a bruise under your ear. 
“This is…is good,” you gasp out as he pushes at your entrance. 
Steve nods, guiding you to sink down onto his length, fingers squeezing at your waist as your mouth parts in a gasp, yours gripping at his shoulders. 
You press your face into his neck, whining as you slip further down, taking him fully and you both groan as you circle your hips. 
“Shit, take me so well, honey, that’s it,” Steve’s babbling, hands roaming up your back as his lips kiss over your chest and neck. 
Your hips circle again, slowly lifting yourself up and sinking back down on him. His nose presses into your cheek, breath huffing along your jaw as he whines your name and you flutter around him. The slow drag of his cock along your walls not enough and too much all at once. 
“Steve, I-” your chest is tight, familiar heat growing rapidly in your stomach and he holds you, pushing you down into the mattress, his weight falling on top of you. 
Steve curses softly, pulling out of you and thrusting back in with a force that makes you both gasp around each other’s lips. It’s a dirty glide, sweat slicked bodies grinding together, moans lost in each other’s mouths. The sound of your hips meeting and your arousal filling your room  drown out the way you practically plead his name. Each thrust into you feels like he’s knocking the air from your lungs and filling them at the same time. Coarse hair hitting your clit with each roll of his hips, his lips hover over yours as you throw your head back into the mattress. Your hands cling to his back, nails scratching down it as each powerful thrust shoots you higher and higher. Your eyelids flutter, you’re pretty sure you’re actually losing oxygen, leaving the atmosphere. 
Steve’s name leaves your lips in a strangled gasp and he pants into your parting mouth, “Yeah? Gonna cum for me baby?”
Nodding, babbling nonsense to him, he nips at your bottom lip as your eyes squeeze shut. Your vision fills with stars, heat filling your belly as your walls clench around him as his thrusts only pick up their pace. 
“Yeah?” His tone is mocking now into your lips, you can feel his smile against them. Your eyelids flutter, you’re whimpering, feeling like you’re on another planet, floating aimlessly through space. His thrusts stop suddenly and he sucks on your bottom lip before asking, “How about another one?”
Before you can comprehend the question, he’s pulling out and flipping you. Your stomach somersaults at the way he handles you so easily, almost lazy in how he can manhandle you. His palm rests against your lower back, your cheek pressed into the pillows. Steve groans as your legs spread for him. His hand comes down on the curve of your ass in a slap, not painfully. He cups it as you jolt forward and he curses under his breath. 
He’s not quick about it, letting his tip drag through you and you shiver. Not pushing in until you’re begging him, “Steve, please…”
Who the hell is this guy? How does he have you begging for a third orgasm?
He slips into you, your strangled cry of relief mixing with his moan. 
“Only cause you asked so nicely, pretty girl.”
Your comforter twists in your fists as his thrusts quickly turn to a brutal pace. Steve’s grip on you is bruising as you arch lower for him, spreading as wide as you can, chest heaving into the mattress. Steve’s lips trail down your spine, the cold metal of his chain dragging with them. 
He falls forward, his chest against your back, hips stuttering as his hand reaches around and rubs fast and messy circles into your clit. Your name leaves his lips against your ear as his thrusts try to match the pace of his fingers. 
You’re weightless, body buzzing, vibrating like you’re waiting for take off. Steve’s gasping as shooting stars dance across your closed eyelids. Your walls clench around him, sucking him in and he swears, asking you to cum please. You’re certain the entire galaxy just exploded inside of you as his hips thrust quickly, falter, and slow while your name leaves him in a breathless gasp and your mouth falls open in a silent scream. 
Steve rolls off of you, your chests heaving in tandem as you both stare at your ceiling. 
“That was…” Steve’s hand drags down his cheek, laughing a little. 
“Yeah?” Your lip pulls between your teeth as you try to fight your smile. 
It’s quiet for a second before he clears his throat, voice a whisper, “Yeah.”
Normally, a guy would be out your door by now. They got what they came for, and regardless of if you had a great time, you’re happy to see them go. This feels different, you’re a little hopeful for the first time in awhile. Wondering if you could do all of that again in the very near future. 
“Um…” Steve coughs, voice trailing off as you turn your head. His hand runs through his hair as he squints at your ceiling, lips pursed in thought. Your eyes track the veins and lines of muscle in his arm up to his armpit and shoulder. To the sharp line of his jaw and nose. You feel ridiculous that your thighs already push together from want after all of that. Body heating up with embarrassment, you quickly snap your head back, eyes on your ceiling once more. 
He finally sits up and questions, “Bathroom?”
“Oh. Right. Sorry. Right through there.” You point as you sit up as well. Your fingers cover your lips as you take in the angry red lines from your fingernails that contrast against the tan skin of his back. Head tilting as you watch him stand, smile hiding behind your hand as you watch his butt walk away. 
Steve looks over his shoulder, squinting as his own smile tugs at his lips. He tries to cover himself up and whispers dramatically, “Wow. Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”
“Would if I could,” your laugh escapes you, your grin finally winning as your hand drops and he closes the door. 
Steve finds you dressed in sleep shorts and a band tee, chugging a glass of water in your kitchen a few minutes later. You extend it to him, noticing he’s fully dressed with his shoes in his hand. He takes a sip before setting it down, knuckles tapping on your countertop before blowing out a long breath. 
Your lips twitch as you try to fight the smile that seems to be a permanent feature around him as he looks around frantically, hand rubbing at the back of his neck. 
“Um…I guess…I should…” he trails off, watching you. 
Your arms cross over your chest, barefeet overlapping each other as you nod, “Right, yeah. That was…”
He smirks, nodding as you trail off. “Yeah, it was.”
Steve goes to leave, but spins, licking his lips before rushing out, “Listen. Could we do that again sometime? Maybe I could get your number?”
The cocky and smooth man who you met at the bar, the one who just took you to outer space seems to have disappeared. The blush in his cheeks darkens, lips parted as he seems to hold his breath waiting for your response. 
Nodding, you tuck a piece of hair behind your ear as you try not to grin while acting indifferent. “Sure, yeah.”
An awkward shuffle of him pulling his phone out and you typing your number in before handing it back to him. 
You’re startled when there’s a soft press of his smooth lips against the apple of your cheek. Warm breath hitting your jaw as he whispers, “Have a good night.”
“You…you too.”
Your hand touches where he kissed as he leaves, unsure if you’ve ever been kissed on your cheek like that before. 
Only two minutes later, tucked back in your bed when your phone buzzes. 
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You bite your lip as you pull the comforter up over your chin, typing back for it only to buzz with a response immediately.
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Laughing as you roll onto your stomach, it flips when you inhale the scent of his cologne that clings to your sheets. It takes a minute for him to respond again, your eyelids growing heavy when the phone buzzes finally.
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Huffing into your pillow, the smile that sits there is a welcomed friend as you message him goodnight and save his number in your contacts.  Rocketman seems fitting for an idiot who takes you to outer space three times in one night. 
Even if he does hate olives. 
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WCIL taglist: (I just used the series taglist for this, hope that's okay!)
@boomhauer @loveshotzz @myobmaya @sweetsweetjellybean @pastel-pillows @littlesubbyflower @johnricharddeacy @freezaz123 @selfdeprecatingnerd @big-ope-vibes @manda-panda-monium @hellkaisersangel @yogizzz @soulmatecashton @happytimeunicorns @mandyjo8719 @lunarxeclipse @buckleylips @beckkthewreck @differentdeputyfishpaper @supardupar @micheledawn1975 @imjuststeddietrashatthispoint @sagelittleplace @totally-bogus-timelady @steves-babysitter @fallinginlovewithqueue @aftermidnightwriting @omgshesinsane @pootcullen @definitionwanderlust @nostalgiafool @palmtreesx3x3
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mvltixcc · 2 months
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Girls Like Girls - Robin Buckley X Cheerleader!Reader
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Summary: Robin has a crush on the new girl in town. Y/N is also a new member of the cheer squad, which means Robin sees her all the time at games and other school events. Unfortunately, Robin is put in a tough situation. She's scared to talk to her because the cheerleaders have a reputation of being mean girls and she fears that Y/N may not feel the same. Little does Robin know that Y/N does not appear as she seems. Y/N becomes best friends with Eddie, which seems unlikely at the surface due to different social circles. This leads to rumors of course and word spreads like wildfire here at Hawkins, which then makes Robin's feelings even more confusing. After hanging out with Steve and the gang, Robin starts to see a different side to Y/N. Will they end up together or will they just remain friends?
Word Count: 1.2k
Pinterest board for inspiration
Chapter 1
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“Have you guys seen the new girl around?” A peer in the band circle asked the group as they watched the cheerleaders all huddled together laughing with one another. Some chatter rang about, but Robin had stopped paying attention as she had watched you from afar. She didn’t know exactly how to feel about you. You were a mystery to her. She thought you were beautiful, but she was terrified to talk to you as the cheerleaders were known to be mean to everyone in sight. As Robin became lost in her thoughts, she felt a hard nudge in her side.
“Hello earth to Robin??” Someone asked.
“Ow, what the hell was that for?” Robin proclaimed as she rubbed the harsh spot.
“It’s time to go to our next class, didn’t you hear the bell?” Vickie said pointing to the sound of the bell going off. 
“Oh yeah of course, sorry.” Robin said, walking alongside her friend. 
Vickie started talking about band practice as they walked the halls to their next class. Once again Robin gets lost in her thoughts, spewing ‘yeahs’ and ‘mmhms’ here and there. As they were walking, Robin felt a hard bump in front of her causing her to fall.
“I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you the-” Robin was cut off as she looked to see who she bumped into.
“Are you alright? I’m so sorry, here let me help you!” Y/N exclaimed, helping Robin pick up her books. 
“Uh no no it- it’s okay, I’m alright. I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going. I’m the one that’s sorry!” Robin stammered as she gathered her items. Your hands brushed up against one another as you both went to pick up the last item. Y/N looked up at her and flashed a small smile, making Robin’s cheeks turn a bright strawberry red. 
“Well now look what you did Y/N, such a clutz aren’t we?” Robin looked up to see the town freak, Eddie Munson, looking down at you both chuckling. Y/N stood up and playfully pushed Eddie and giggled. There were rumors about the two of you being an item, but that was all Robin thought it was. Rumors. But maybe it was true after all. Robin’s heart sank as she watched the two of you being playful with one another. Y/N turned back to Robin and gave a small wave goodbye. “I’ll see you guys around, I’m so sorry again!” You said to Robin as she and Eddie headed off to class. “Yeah see ya.” Robin said silently to herself as she watched you two walk off. 
“What was that about?” Vickie chuckled. 
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Robin tried to play it off in hopes that Vickie would drop the subject. 
“You were acting super weird, that's what I’m talking about.” “Look it’s nothing okay, just drop it!” Robin snapped, she hadn’t meant to. Vickie just nodded and sat down. “I’m sorry, I just- it’s nothing and I wish to not talk about it.” Robin apologized as she sat next to her.
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The rest of the morning went by fast and felt like a blur. Robin strolled with her friends to their set table to eat lunch. Robin watched as Y/N and Eddie laughed with one another as she ate her lunch. She felt a harsh bang in her heart as she looked on at the scene from afar. She couldn’t believe that someone like you could be with someone like him. To be clear, Robin never hated Eddie, she didn’t think it was fair how he was treated by everyone. She believes he’s probably a good guy, she just didn’t think this was fair to her. Robin felt envious that Eddie got to be with you. That he got to make you laugh the way you did, she wished it had been her that did that with you instead. As she became lost in those thoughts, she was soon interrupted by a slam on the table in front of her.
“Hey Buckley, how’s it going?” Head cheerleader, Chrissy Cunningham asked sarcastically. The other cheer members look on and  laugh behind her.
“What do you need, Cunningham?” Robin asked with a sigh, dreading what was to come of this unfortunate conversation. A few people had already been watching the scene unfold, as the slam of the table had alerted them. Robin tried her best not to make it worse, she didn’t want the entire lunchroom watching this all go down. 
“Do us all a favor and watch where you walk okay? We don’t need you to injure our star flyer.” The cheerleader spoke with a blunt tone. 
“Look I didn’t mean for it to happen and I already apologized to her. Accidents happen, don't you know?” Robin said as she tried to continue to eat her sandwich. Chrissy grabbed her sandwich and slammed it on the ground, which made the girls beyond her snicker even more. By this point more people were watching. 
“Oh great, here we go.” Robbin muttered under her breath. “Look I-”
“Leave her alone Chrissy! We bumped into each other and it was an accident, that’s it, nothing more!" Robin looked up to see you standing up to the captain of your team. Nobody ever dared to stand up to or defy Chrissy, they always followed her lead and did as they were told. The girls behind her watched in shock, they couldn’t believe what was happening before them. 
“Hmph. Just watch out next time okay?” Chrissy huffed and said before walking away from you both. 
“Are you alright?” Y/N asked, looking at her with soft eyes. 
“Uh yeah I’m- I’m okay, thanks.” Robin said, her cheeks turning a shade of red like before. 
“I’m so sorry about her, she had no right to get involved. If she bothers you again, you just let me know okay?” Y/N said with a soft smile and grabbing her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. Robin nodded to you and before she could say anything, the bell rang once again indicating it was time to head to the next period. 
“Come on Y/N!” Eddie and the rest of the Hellfire club yelled. You turned around and held up a finger, letting them know to give you a moment. “Well I’ll see you later Robin!” You proclaimed with a warm smile, walking over to your friends. Robin felt butterflies from that smile you gave her. This was the most that you had both spoken to one another since you had moved here. Robin began to think that maybe you weren’t so mean and scary like she thought. If she couldn’t be with you like she would like to, then maybe you two could at least be friends.
Next chapter
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fairytalegobang · 1 month
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OFFICIAL Opening DAY
I wanted to clear up some questions and timeline for those not sure if they want to join yet! First, this is a Bang, so Authors will be going first! -That being said we are allowing Artists to submit if they like some inspiration pics to authors who finish early! Second, this theme is fairly open to interpretation; you are not expected or required to do Grimm's Fairy Tales. They may be the most popularly known ones, but that does not make them the only ones. Modern setting is not banned, it just has to feature elements of a Fairy Tale. For the purposes of this Bang, A fairy tale is a story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful beings. Myths, Folklores, and Legends are allowed to be adapted, but anything relating to a current religion people follow or important folkloric figures SHOULD be treated with respect when adapting! So stories relating to the Greek, Roman, and Norse pantheons, for instance, are allowed, as well as folklore figures like Robin Hood or Mulan as examples. Original but on-theme stories are also allowed, as long as they feel and have relevant Fairy Tale aspects.
Third, the timeline! January 13th - Voting/Interest Check Opens February 13th - Sign-Ups Officially Open March 13th - Sign-ups Close for Authors May 30th - Summary Submissions Open (50% work due) June 13th - Summary Submissions Close and Sign-Ups Close for Artists June 15th - Claims Start July 31st - Group Check-in August 13th - Final Check-in (Call for pinch hitters) September 13th - Posting Starts
Posting Will be done to AO3 under a collection set up for the Bang and site of the Artists's choosing to host their work. The artists are expected to be in contact with their Authors to provide a link to their work to link in the fic itself. NEITHER work should be posted publically until September 13th!
Server Rules: •Be Courteous and Respectful to Everyone in the server. •Keep NSFW in the labeled areas. •Keep discussions to their relevant areas. •Do not share anything posted here without permission (This can be disregarded if they themselves utilize a link to another page). •You must be at least 16 years of age to be in this server. BANG Rules: •Do not share art or fic outside of the server-assigned areas besides with your beta privately. •Posting will begin on the 13th of September and be expected to be done (at least a first chapter uploaded the week of) with the rest of the fic to be completed and uploaded on a schedule your artist is comfortable with if their art is to feature at a particular point. •All of your fic should be uploaded no later than October 13th if you want to roll out chapters over a period of time. •Claims will be limited to one fic to artist ratio until a full 24 hours have passed to give everyone available a chance to choose before a second claim can commence. •If you are both an artist and an author, you will be able to participate in the second run of claims (6 hours after), Depending on which time zone is most convenient for the majority of users. •No users under the age of 18 can choose from any fic/art rated Mature+ •Fics are to be at least 3k in length.
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nburkhardt · 7 months
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Inspired by this
Because the movie has wrecked me.
Eddie wakes up and blinks a few times, glancing around and a smile tugs on his lips before resting his head back on the pillow and snuggling into it, closing his eyes; content with being held.
He manages to fall back asleep.
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Steve doesn’t know what happened, they were happy and he was in the middle of saying ‘I love you’ when Eddie stops him with a kiss. That night they fooled around and the next morning, he woke up alone.
No note, no goodbye kiss, nothing.
He doesn’t understand what happened. Their trip was amazing, just the two of them against the world. He really thought they had something, that Eddie cared for him just as he cares for him. That they were on the same page.
Tries calling, tries asking his friends and gets rejected by them too, asks Robin to help and finds out something new about Eddie.
He shuts down sometimes and there’s no knowing when he’ll come back around.
That doesn’t stop him, Steve refuses to let that stop him actually. Mind made up, he gets the only person he knows that can help.
~
“Ed! I’m going out, don’t wait up!”
“Why would I wai-“ Eddie stops, eyes wide and takes in the view in front of him, “Steve”
Steve stands there nearly soaked from the rain, “I’m not sure what I did for you to leave and ignore me.”
He shakes his head, “you didn’t do anything, it’s- you should leave”
“No,” Steve is glaring, moves closer towards him “I thought we were something and then suddenly, the man I love is gone, not answering my calls. Ignoring our friends, ignoring me. I love you, Eddie and I tried telling you too. Tell me what happened, tell me where I went wrong.”
Eddie’s eyes are stinging and he sets his jaw, hoping to keep his face from breaking. Turning around, hoping to put space.
“You- I, it’s not you.”
“That’s a load of shit,” Steve huffs a laugh and moves closer, “I love you, Eddie. Why can’t you let me? Why did I have to go through hoops and trick you into talking to me again? Why spend all that time with me, falling in love just to rip it away with nothing? Am I not enough? Or was it too much? Am I too much?”
His hands are shaking and he feels the tears rolling down his face as he closes them, too afraid to turn around but forces himself anyway. Opening his eyes, Steve’s right there red face and his cheeks are puffy, eyes red with tears. He can’t handle it, knowing that he caused it.
Shaking his head, running a hand over his face before gripping his hair and stepping towards Steve again, “No- no. Steve, it’s- really me. It’s me, i’m- I’m afraid, so afraid of this- whatever this is”
“Whatever this is?”
Eddie nods, taking another step and wanting to reach out but still refusing, “I’ve never had something like this before and when you tried saying it that night, it scared me. So, so I left and shut you out,” taking a deep breath before finally, grabbing hold of Steve’s equally shaking hands.
“Sweetheart, I’m so damn sorry for being a coward, I just, this is scary and my feelings for you scare me”
Steve’s eyes are locked on their hands, “feelings?” It’s a whisper and shaky.
Despite his gaze not being on him, Eddie nods and squeezes Steve’s hands, “yeah, because I love you so damn much, honey. So so damn much that it scares me and I ran, hurting you in the process.”
It’s silent in the trailer besides their shaky breathing and Eddie doesn’t know who moves first, next thing he knows their crashing together into a rough kiss. He does know who pulls away first, it’s Steve and he rests his forehead against his. Eyes closed and lips swollen from the near bruising kiss, “Eddie, baby, I’m afraid too, but I love you so much that I’m pushing forward anyway. I love you and I want you in my life”
He closes his eyes and leans to press their lips together once more in a simple kiss, letting go of his hands only to wrap them around him. Steve quickly wraps his own around him and holds him close, “let me stay, please baby, let me stay. Let me keep you”
All words caught, all Eddie can do is nod against Steve’s shoulder and press a lingering kiss on his shoulder.
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Steve wakes up slowly, blinking the last of sleep away and eyes meet the beautiful view of a kiss shaped bruise forming on Eddie’s naked shoulder, he smiles as he squeezes the wrist in his hand and lets his head fall back on the pillow.
“Good morning, Love.” He hears and realizes that Eddie’s awake too, “can you let go?”
“Should I?”
Eddie doesn’t respond, instead tries wiggling around before Steve finally lets it go and all Eddie does is turn around to wraps his arm around Steve.
“I love you and I don’t want to run away anymore, I love you so damn much”
“I love you so much, Eds”
~
Had thoughts and this came out. Went a little differently than the movie.
Also: just so you know the very start and end take place after the middle. The start is Eddie’s pov of the next morning, he woke up before Steve. The end is Steve’s pov. Hopefully that wasn’t confusing!
Idk where to put the read more soo it’s hiding the tag list instead 😅
@spectrum-spectre @itsfreakingbats @mysticcrownshipper @artiststarme @thereindeerlady @justforthedead89 @ronniescontinuum @freyaforestafay @littlewildflowerkitten @estrellami-1 @gregre369 @zerokrox-blog @bookworm0690 @flustratedcas @carlprocastinator1000 @marvelmwah @solliesolesito @navnae @i-less-than-three-you @grimmfitzz
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emblazons · 4 months
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Note: I am finally posting this (something that has been in my drafts for actual months) because @pinkeoni hurt my feelings talking about Will and Alan Turing). So...you can inavertently thank Robin for this LMAO
I don’t delve much into Stranger Things analysis anymore, but having just watched The Imitation Game, the biopic they made about Alan Turning in 2014—I’m thinking that maybe Will doing his presentation on the man might have an delightful (secondary) parallel to this film’s exploration of him, given Will’s burgeoning queerness + ongoing relationship with normalcy.
Throughout the film, the ongoing theme of "differences bringing about greatness/change" permeates every character, but Turing especially—something that the conversation he has with a character named Joan near the end of the film showcases well:
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In this conversation, Joan is trying to encourage Turing to come out of depression and rely on her, given he is struggling immensely with physical effects of chemical castration—which he obviously resents, but feels is better than giving up the life he has and being “entirely alone” because of his sexuality / desires (sound familiar)?
This ongoing exploration of queerness as tied to greatness and/or otherness is something that is very often explored in Stranger Things as well, primarily with Will—to the point where Will has nearly the exact conversation Alan has with Joan with Jonathan in S2:
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—in addition to us exploring the relationship between a lack of normalcy, queerness and even nerdiness through/by other characters like Robin, Mike & Lucas.
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Now (as we all know), Will’s homosexuality has been forever and inherently linked to his otherness/lack of normalcy—whether with how he was bullied in S1-S2, his struggle to be open with his feelings for Mike in S4, or the million literal / metaphorical things in between, Will has always been encouraged not to conform, but still struggles to self-actualize enough to embrace himself fully…which most of us expect for him come S5.
Basically: the underlying theme of this film for Turning (much like the underlying themes at the heart of ST) revolves around how most people strive for normalcy, despite normalcy being undesirable if you expect to do anything great/interesting. While Turing was a homosexual man, he was also one who struggled greatly with fitting in overall—much like Will, which I think perfectly reflects how the Duffers have set up their S5 resolution + solving Will’s ongoing internal struggle with his romantic feelings for Mike + ongoing dissonance with normalcy.
(sidebar: there are articles exploring the idea of "embracing difference" in this movie that parallel Will's "Being Different." See: Embracing Difference - The Imitation Game)
Both TIG!Turing and Will exist in on the fringes on their respective worlds due to their differences and homosexuality—just as both of them are both most inspired by their (romantic) love for their male best friends....to the point that those relationships define their contributions to the story: Turing with the machine that helped the Allied powers break the Nazi Enigma code, and Will in ways I'm sure we'll be talking about in 2025.
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TL;DR: While Will still has another season to sort through what his love for his best friend means for both his rejection of normalcy and his greatness, it's fairly apparent that (much like Turing) it is the embracing of both difference and homosexuality that leads to greatness—no matter how the world feels about that overall.
(We love it when the gays learn life lessons (and when they win)).
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