Steve startles awake, disoriented and filled with a slight bout of panic — as always when he takes a nap that turns into five hours of deep sleep and catapults him right into the next dimension for a while there.
Heart racing, he blinks his dark bedroom into existence, and it takes him a while to realise where he is and what woke him up.
And then the landline phone on his nightstand rings again, and he exhales deeply before reaching for it with clumsy, sluggish movements.
“‘Ello?”
“Steve,” comes Eddie’s sing-song voice from the other end, washing over Steve in a soothing way that leaves him falling back into the pillows. He clutches the phone to his ear as he closes his eyes, the smile already forming at how happy Eddie sounds. He rarely sings Steve’s name like that. He should do it more often.
“Hi there.” His voice sounds like shit. Like he just took a — Jesus Christ, has it really been four hours? Well. He sounds exactly like someone who took a four-hour nap after a shit day at work would sound like.
There’s fumbling on the other end, but it stops suddenly. “Did I wake you? Shit man, I thought it was past nap time.”
“I don’t have nap time,” Steve grumbles, actually pouting at Eddie’s words and realising only a second too late how ridiculous he sounds.
“Sure, man, whatever you say. We all know you’re actually just a life-sized toddler.”
Steve sputters, sitting up against his headboard as he gradually wakes up. “Hey! Also, I don’t think you actually understand what life-sized means.”
“Yes, I do.”
Steve shakes his head at this ridiculous, ridiculous man. “What exactly do you think a non-life-sized toddler looks like, Eduardissimo?”
“Like Dustin.”
The answer is so quick and deadpan, Steve cannot contain the laugh that bursts out of him, waking him up quicker and gentler than anything else in the world could have, and he revels in the sound of Eddie joining him. He must look so smug right now, and so damn proud of himself. Steve wants to see him. Wants to kiss that smile right from his lips and replace it with something a lot more genuine.
“You’re an asshole,” he says instead, pulling his blanket further around him as he lifts his knees to sit more comfortably.
Eddie hums, still teasing somehow with just that noise, and Steve just can’t stop smiling. “You like me so much, Harrington.”
“Hmm,” he mirrors Eddie’s hum, but even he can hear the smile on his face. “Jury’s still out on that one, actually.”
“Any tendencies yet on the verdict?”
“Nope, they can’t decide.”
Eddie snorts at that, and Steve has no idea how that can sound so sweet. But it does. He buries his smile in his knees for a bit, the blanket hot around his burning cheeks. He’s hopeless.
“Well, let me know as soon as they do, yeah?”
“Will do,” he laughs, ruining all his attempts to sound solemn. “So what’s up? Why’d you call?”
“Oh!” And suddenly it’s like a switch has been flipped and Eddie doesn’t sound teasing and smug anymore, but instead just fucking giddy! “I have a bed now!”
Steve smiles at it. At that voice, that tone, that infectious emotion. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah!” More fumbling on the other end, and Steve can only imagine that Eddie is rolling around in his newly acquired bed.
Who’s the life-sized toddler now, hm?
“No more sleeping on the floor for this Munson boy, nuh-uh, my good sir! We are in possession of a bed now. A wooden bed, no fancy headboard or anything, just…”
“Just a bed,” Steve says, feeling like he’s about to burst into a million little particles of fondness and affection and the never-ending need to kiss Eddie. To hold him. To touch him in any way he can. “That’s great, Edsie.”
“It is, Stevesie.”
“Man, I hate you so much,” Steve squints at the ceiling and laughs, actually kicking his feet, the minute breeze providing a little relief for the heat in his face.
And Eddie has no business to sound so smug when he says, “Yeah, you do.”
A pause then, and it feels loaded even through the phone. Steve clutches it closer to his face, hoping stupidly that Eddie can feel it.
“You should come hate me in my new bed.”
Steve’s breath hitches, and his brain shuts off for a hot second there. Before he can overthink this, he decides to just… play along. And listen to what his heart has been telling him for months now.
“Oh yeah?” he asks, breathless still, but his whole body tingles with just these two words. With the possibility they bring. The offer that they are. The question. The everything that’s stored in them.
“Yeah,” Eddie says, and he sounds just as breathless. “I mean, if— If you want to?”
“I do.” Steve swallows. “Right, uh— Right now?”
“Whenever.” And it sounds more like an As soon as possible.
“Okay,” Steve breathes, scrambling out of bed as quickly as possible, pulling off his shirt with the phone still pressed to his ear, letting out an embarrassing noise as it gets tangled in a mess of cord and fabric. He scrambles to free it, almost dropping it in the process. “I’ll be there in thirty.”
“To come look at my new bed?”
“Sure.”
On the other end, Eddie laughs again, but he still sounds just as breathless as Steve does. Just as excited. As fragile. Just as many fucking things.
“Alright,” Eddie murmurs, though Steve can still hear the smile. “I’ll see you then.”
And then he hangs up before either of them can get lost in their own heads about this sudden certainty of change. Steve is grateful for the steady noise of the dial tone reminding him that this is happening. But that nothing has to happen.
It’s a nice bed, he finds hours later, fingers combing through Eddie’s hair who’s cuddling him half asleep. It’s the best fucking bed he’s ever seen, if only because it led to this.
🤍 permanent tag list gang: @skiddit @inklessletter @aringofsalt @hellion-child @stobin-cryptid @hotluncheddie @gutterflower77 @auroraplume @steddieonbigboy @n0-1-important @stevesjockstrap @brainvines @puppy-steve @izzy2210 @itsall-taken @mangoinacan13 @madigoround @pukner @i-amthepizzaman @swimmingbirdrunningrock @hammity-hammer @stevesbipanic @bitchysunflower @estrellami-1 (lmk if you want on or off)
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This season is about depression. But WHY is The Big Guy depressed?
Let's take a look at the clues Mr. Brennan "Anti-Capitalist" Mulligan has laid out for us 🔍
The Big Guy aka Elias Hodge, works for a "retro-futurist conglomerate" as a "mento-technological" researcher
There's a Prohibition on oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin -- citizens are only allowed cortisol & adrenaline (hormones that're released when someone is under a lot of stress)
This Prohibition will (allegedly) be lifted once Elias receives recognition from his bosses
All Elias's pleasures and non-work related urges have been driven underground to the red light district -- so he's not allowing himself to focus on anything that isn't work
The Fix is basically a hitman working for the District Attorney, Mark Bition (Ambition) to eliminate any urge that has the potential to distract Elias from his work
More on the above point: District Attorneys are prosecuters, ie, are the ones responsible for punishing those who go against the state. So this further emphasizes that Elias is very strictly policing himself in order to succeed at work
Conrad Schintz (Conscience) is a tiny kid who has trouble making himself heard and doesn't have a lot of power
Speaking of kids -- all of Elias's childhood interests have also been driven underground, this time being kept under the care of Ms. Loathing. This, plus the line about "not deserving pleasure", hints that Elias is potentially struggling with self-loathing as well (also Loathing's line about "focusing on me is not going to do anything but make me stronger")
CONCLUSION:
All this paints a picture of someone who is driven by logic and ambition, to the detriment of his emotional well-being. Elias seems to feel that his only value comes from what he is able to produce for his superiors, and this causes him to suppress any part of himself that doesn't make him a more productive worker. This has led to him becoming extremely isolated and lonely as a result
We can also guess that the work Elias is doing doesn't align with his values, and that he needs to keep his conscience as quiet as possible in order to do it. Even worse, we now see that he's thinking about killing his conscience outright
This season is about the psychological toll being a cog in the machine takes on a person, and I cannot WAIT to see where we go next
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Low energy Devotional Acts for when you don’t have a lot of energy (or time, or money, etc.) pt. 1
⚡️Zeus⚡️
-listen to storm or rain soundscapes
-watch the weather or check the weather on your phone or in the newspaper
-watch storm chasing videos
-watch documentaries or videos about various monarchies and/or kings
-watch videos about Crete! His mother hid Him there in a cave to keep Him safe from his father! And there’s all sorts of travel videos and such about it! If military history is your thing you could also learn about the Battle of Crete which took place in ww2!
-listen to devotional playlists for Him I have one up on Spotify but I know there’s some others there as well!
-cloud gaze
-watch nature docs about any of His sacred animals! The eagle, bulls, etc.
⚔️Ares⚔️
-watch war movies or war related shows (my favorite is Band of Brothers which I have on dvd)
-watch war related documentaries
-watch combat sports like boxing, wrestling, etc.
-do a Wikipedia rabbit hole search about various weapons and/or combat styles from any era or a YouTube deep dive whichever works for you
-if able find and attend a reenactment my town does a little civil war thing a few times a year that I occasionally go to you learn about what life as a soldier was like and what training was like and all that it’s very interesting
-watch a video about Thebes! Ares is said to have played a role in its founding!
-learn about birds of prey!
-listen to a devotional playlist for Him
-adding to this with: listening to video game soundtracks from fighting/combat games, or listening to war soundscapes
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