#steve harrington has a bad dad
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Part Four: Final Part Four Mean!Eddie Misunderstandings Au
Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Read in full on Ao3
Thank you to everyone that cheered me on @samcoxramblings for your kind words on every post! @flowercrowngods and @barbariansteves for your helpful advice and @zerokrox-blog for your original prompt waaaaay back in February, I'm sorry this took so long but I hope you finally get the comfort you wished for!
***
The kids demand two weeks to prepare for their Hellfire session, insisting that they need this time to debrief Eddie and come up with their game plan, which is fine by Steve.
It also gives him two weeks to decompress from his last interaction with the kid's Dungeon Master, and time to try and untangle exactly how he feels about the whole situation.
It was nice for things to start moving back towards something resembling normal. The kids seemed happier, even going so far as to begin splitting their time between Eddie and Steve once again. Asking for rides to the hobby shop in Indi from their resident metal-head rather than Steve. It was nice to finally have a little bit more time to himself again.
Even Robin, who had previously been steadfast in her Anti-Eddie stance, had suddenly grown rather tight-lipped about the whole thing.
She had even offered to accompany Steve on his errands for the day they scheduled their Hellfire meeting, citing that she was always up for a grocery run and he may need help bringing everything in.
Which, in hindsight, should have been Steve’s first clue that something strange was going on.
“So, you ready?” Robin hums as they walk up and down the canned food aisle of Marsh Market, “you can still back out you know?”
Steve smiles and grabs a box of onion soup mix, he’s fairly certain he has some sour cream at home to make a dip of some sort, much easier than the last snack he tried to prepare for the group.
“Yeah, Robs, I know, I think it should be fine,” he crosses off the soup mix on his list and turns the cart around the empty aisle to head towards the produce section, “the kids are already setting up now so the only thing I need to do is be there,” he shrugs and stops in front of the humming displays.
Steve waits until the misting stops before reaching for a bag of mini carrots and tossing them into the cart.
“Can’t believe you trust Henderson to have a key, I can’t believe you hold us at the same level of trust!” Robin grumbles under her breath as she picks up a granny smith from one of the bins and rubs it on the rolled up sleeves of her navy blazer; it’s just slightly too big for her, most likely stolen from her dad’s closet.
Steve rolls his eyes and continues pushing the cart around the produce area, "careful Birdy, you roll those up anymore you're actually going to turn into Don Johnson".
"I should be so lucky," she snarks back as she catches up to him by the celery.
She tosses the apple back and forth between her hands, nearly dropping it twice before placing the produce into the cart under Steve’s unimpressed gaze.
She starts snapping her fingers and shuffling her feet as they continue walking up and down the aisles, going through their list bit by bit. Steve finds himself watching his friend’s nervous fidgeting with curious eyes, it was just a grocery trip, there shouldn’t be anything to really make her act like this, right?
He takes a quick glance around at some of the employees stocking the aisles, in case Vickie or some other pretty classmate of Robin’s is wandering around.
But, they’re alone.
“Are you sure you don’t need anything else?” Robin asks, as Steve folds up the list and turns the cart towards the check out tills.
She tips the small watch she’s wearing up to her face, her eyes flit back and forth between Steve and the watch as she chews on her bottom lip, which is more than a little odd.
The kids are already at the house and Eddie and the rest of the Hellfire gang won’t be arriving for at least another hour, they have plenty of time?
Robin steps away from the cart and throws her thumb over her shoulder at the chip aisle, “you do realize that you’re going to have like ten teenagers at your house right? You think veggies and dip is enough?”
“I’m ordering pizza later, I think this is fine?” Steve says slowly, gesturing at the cart, confusion and suspicion saturate his words as his eyes narrow at his friend.
“Robin,” Steve murmurs, walking the cart closer towards her, “what's going on?”
“Nothing, why would you --nothing!” She stutters as her freckled face pales slightly.
Steve smirks, Robin is probably the worst liar he’s ever met, and it's always endearing whenever she tries.
The last time she had lied to Steve, it had been about the mascara wand she had dropped onto the passenger seat, staining the leather just slightly, and smearing the black makeup all over the floor covers.
Robin had panicked and insisted that had been there before she had sat down.
Steve had been sitting in the car with her at the time.
He knew a Robin lie when he saw it, but he also knew it wouldn’t take long for her to crack.
“Okay!”
There it is.
“Listen,” Robin hisses sharply, she steps closer until she’s nearly whispering in his ear in the empty chip aisle, “I’m stalling you okay?”
“Probably not something you should be telling the person you’re stalling but okay?” Steve snorts as he leans onto the cart handle, “also, this was the worst place to go to stall us, it's two in the afternoon on a Wednesday, no one else is here”.
“I know!” Robin groans, letting her face fall into her open hands, she slowly lifts her face once more and lets her fingers drag across her forehead and cheeks, pulling at the skin, “I should have said no, I wanted to say no, but they used Will--”
Steve nods, “and you can’t say no to Will, yeah I gotcha”.
The words register after a beat.
“Wait, backup, the kids put you up to this? The unsupervised shitheads in my house right now?”
Robin nods, her blue eyes wide and the barest of smirks still covered by her hands.
“Oh christ,” Steve mutters under his breath, “do I even want to know?”
Robin drops her hands away from her face and scowls for a second before sighing, “I would absolutely love to tell you,” she shakes her head and looks up at the ceiling, “better yet, I’d love to just take you to Indi for the day, forget about this completely, but those God Damn kids know exactly what to say,” she looks at him once more in barely concealed exasperation, “how do they always know what to say?”
“How angry do I need to be, on a scale of like one to ten?”
Robin stares at him consideringly, her eyes scanning his face, “I mean, if I were you, it would be at like, a hundred,” she says eventually, “but since it’s you?”
“Maybe a four”.
Steve nods and drums his hands on the cart handles, blowing out a long slow breath as he makes his decision, “how much more time do they need?”
Robin looks at her watch again and smiles this time, “Well this bought them another five-ish minutes, so maybe another half hour?”
She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a crumpled five dollar bill, “come on, I’ll getcha a coffee or something?”
“Wait, do I even need these snacks? Robin?”
Robin was wrong, this at least warranted a five for the groceries alone.
***
The drive back is uneventful, Steve did end up going though check out, rationalizing that, no matter what, he needed some veggies for the rest of the week so there were worse things he could have spent the money on.
Robin had bought him a coffee from the gas station down the road. There wasn't enough creamer in the world to make that palatable so he leaves it in the cup holder while driving back. Even with a hot chocolate Robin hasn't fared much better.
"Okay, well that's the worst five dollars ever spent," she groans after taking a sip. Robin wrinkles her nose and sets the cup in the other empty holder beside Steve’s before sneaking a quick look at her watch once more, “worth it though,” she says with a small smile.
It slides off her face after a moment when she realizes that they’ve turned down her street, “Steve?”
He looks between her and the road, tilting his head as she touches his elbow gently.
“You can just come over you know, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to and that includes letting people force you to--” Robin snaps her mouth shut with an audible click of her teeth.
She shakes her head and takes her hand back, “sorry, I promised not to say anything”.
Steve pulls over onto the Buckley’s driveway and finally turns to face Robin as much as the driver's seat will allow.
“Still sure about this whole thing only warranting a four?” he asks softly as a bubble of anxiety begins to expand from his stomach and into his chest, as though he’s absorbed her nervous energy over the course of the afternoon.
Robin shrugs, “I don’t know, but,” her blue eyes bounce back and forth between his own, “just don’t let them make you make a decision you’re not ready for,” she chews her lip again, “no one gets to push you around but me”.
Steve laughs as Robin leans out of her seat to give him a quick, but firm, hug before she opens the door and steps outside. As soon as she’s out of the car, Steve wishes he had asked her to stay, to come with him and hold his hand through the unknown. The bereft, hollow feeling from before returns in full force as she walks up to her front door.
She turns around and holds up her thumb and pinky as she lifts her hands to her face, mouthing, ‘Call me later,’ as she waves with her other hand.
She stays outside as Steve slowly reverses, hesitating on the street for just a moment as Robin walks backwards the rest of the way to her door, she moves her hands, motioning for him to get going.
Steve nods once and takes a deep breath as he shifts into drive and heads down the street.
It’s just the kids, he tells himself, how bad can it be?
***
By the time Steve pulls into his driveway, he’s nearly turned around to retrieve Robin and insist that she come with him at least five times. Even now as he pulls the emergency brake for the slight incline of the Harrington driveway, he considers starting the car again and leaving.
The last time he felt this anxious to be home was after graduation, after he’d been rejected from every school he’d applied to and knew there was no getting around that conversation with his dad.
That conversation had ended with the crack in the table, a hastily completed Scoops application, and his parents leaving for three months.
If it hadn’t happened he wouldn’t have met Robin, so at least there had been a silver lining on that occasion.
He’s not sure if there will be one this time.
Steve gets out of the car before opening the back door to grab the paper grocery bag from the store, he leaves the full coffee and hot chocolate cups with a grimace and makes a mental note to throw them out later before locking the car door.
Steve slowly makes his way to the steps, balancing the bag on his hip as he rifles through his pants pocket for his house key.
He looks around the street and spots Eddie’s van parked a few houses down. Great.
Steve knew that Eddie and the others would be showing up around now, even before Robin went ahead and spilled the beans about whatever it was the kids were secretly doing, but he had still hoped for a moment to just breathe before he had to face the inevitable.
Steve takes a deep breath and grabs the door handle, scoffing as it opens immediately. He makes a second mental note to scold Dustin for leaving the door unlocked for just anyone to come in --especially since the rest of Hellfire was already here apparently.
“Hey assholes, the snacks are here,” Steve calls out as he steps over the threshold, tossing his own keys into the dish on the side table.
He kicks the door closed and locks the deadbolt with a roll of his eyes, “and I do include myself with that statement,” he adds under his breath with a smirk.
Steve slides off his shoes and pauses, looking around the foyer.
It’s quiet.
Where there is normally an abundance of yelling and laughter, of the kids arguing amongst themselves, or Eddie’s usual dramatic storytelling, there’s nothing.
Steve walks into the kitchen and puts the bag onto the counter, “guys?” he calls out again, only to be met with silence.
Steve makes his way into the dining room through the swing door and stops in his tracks.
The table is gone.
“What the fuck?” he hears himself whisper as he walks into the middle of the space, nearly into the hanging light in the center of the room --he’d never noticed just how low it was, what with the table that was normally there to stop him from walking directly into it.
“What the fuck?” Steve hisses again, his heart starts to race as he steps around the light and spots the open sliding door to the backyard.
“If you little fuckers decided to move my grandmother’s table when there is a perfectly good patio table out there, I swear to Christ--”
But the kids aren’t outside either.
Eddie freezes as Steve walks around the corner of the house, he’s standing next to the dining table with a piece of sandpaper in his hands.
“Steve,” Eddie squawks in surprise, quickly hiding the sandpaper behind his back, “hey!”
Steve’s not entirely sure just what he’s looking at as he takes another step further into the yard. Eddie’s normally black ripped jeans are covered in a fine layer of dust, his wild curls have been pulled back into a messy ponytail away from his face, and an open container of wood filler sits beside him on the concrete patio.
Steve takes another four steps until he’s close enough to touch the wooden surface, his mouth hanging open as he takes it all in.
The surface of the table has been sanded down in its entirety, removing the beautiful deep cherry varnish, but the crack in the center has been mended, some kind of slightly darker putty has sealed the gaping wound that had marred the surface.
“Can you,” Eddie’s voice shakes, drawing Steve’s attention once more, “can you please say something, I can’t tell if you’re mad or what?”
“You fixed it,” Steve whispers, his eyes fixed on the table, he reaches to run a shaking hand over the surface.
“Careful,” Eddie says softly, grabbing Steve’s hand before it can touch the center with long sure fingers, “that still needs about an hour or so to cure”.
Steve looks from the table to his hand, still cradled in Eddie’s own, before looking up to see two big brown eyes staring into his own.
“I don’t understand,” the words come out in a whisper as Steve swallows around the sudden lump in his throat, “why?”
“Well,” Eddie murmurs as he squeezes Steve’s hand once before threading their fingers together and dragging Steve towards one of the pool loungers in the grass.
Eddie sits down and pulls Steve with him to sit, he feels a deep flush begin to wash over his neck and the tips of his ears, it's impossible to hide in the bright sunlight this time --not that he’d even be able to with Eddie’s firm grip on Steve’s hand.
“Those kids of yours are pretty genius,” Eddie says slowly, deliberately, his gaze never wavering from Steve’s face, “and they love you so fucking much man”.
Eddie clears his throat and rubs his thumb over Steve’s knuckles, “and there seems to be some confusion about how I actually feel about you, so allow me to uh, lay it all on the,” he gestures with his free hand towards the dining table and smirks, “well you know”.
Steve feels his heart leaping out of his chest, he can’t sit here, listen to this, he’s heard it before, it isn’t real.
Steve moves to stand up from the lounger but Eddie is faster as he manages to grab Steve’s other hand, holding him in place.
“Eddie--”
“You said no one had ever bothered before,” Eddie barrels on, speaking so quickly that Steve hardly understands at first. He squeezes Steve’s hands lightly again, the skin warmed metal from Eddie’s rings press into the palms of Steve’s hands.
“No one’s ever tried to fix it, have they?” Eddie breathes out as his eyes flit back and forth, searching Steve’s own, “would you let me try?”
For a moment, Steve lets himself just sit with the words.
Lets himself indulge in the soft, almost reverent way that Eddie asks. He lets the warmth of Eddie’s hands tether him to something resembling hope.
Before he shakes his head.
“You don’t know what you’re saying Eddie,” Steve growls, but the words lack any true bite.
“I know exactly what I’m saying,” Eddie insists, he gets up from beside Steve and kneels in the grass in front of him, “but I don’t think you do, I think we’ve been talking past each recently Steve, and it took speaking to a bunch of people --way smarter than me, to realize it. So here it is--”
“Don’t,” Steve shouts at the same time that Eddie whispers, “I like you,” and for a moment neither moves.
Steve slowly takes his hands out of Eddie's now slack grip.
He lowers one hand down to the edge of the pool lounger, gripping it so harshly that his knuckles slowly fade to white, while the other he brings up to cover Eddie’s mouth.
“Don’t say something you can’t take back,” Steve says softly.
Eddie just stares for a beat, his forehead pinched in a terrible frown, before he reaches up to cup Steve’s cheek and gently removes the hand covering his mouth. He smiles softly and lets his thumb gently run over the crest of Steve’s cheekbone.
“Good thing I don’t want to take it back,” Eddie insists, he slides the hand on Steve’s cheek down to hold his chin firmly between two fingers.
“Steve,” Eddie lifts himself up so he’s balancing on the balls of his feet, just high enough that they are at eye level now, “I spent a very long time holding onto things that weren’t even remotely true, and they made me act like an asshole, I can’t tell you how sorry I am for that sweetheart”.
“What if you change your mind, what if I--”
“Steve, what the fuck could you do at this point that would shock me?" Eddie says with a derisive laugh, he lets go of Steve's face to press his hand briefly to his own chest.
"I’m a drug dealing, satan worshiping, murderer who almost ate it in another dimension from killer demon bats".
Eddie grins as he peppers his speech with air quotes but the edges of it are jagged, and the good humour doesn't quite reach his eyes.
Steve breathes out sharply through his nose and shakes his head, “I get angry sometimes, I say things I don't mean, I…"
He sees himself surrounded by ceramic shards again, crying as he sweeps up his own mess, and shudders.
It's enough for Eddie to nod, and shuffle closer still.
"Pot," Eddie says softly as he pokes Steve in the sternum with this pointer finger and then brings it around to point at his own face, "kettle".
Steve chews his bottom lip as his thoughts swirl together and fly apart, disjointed and frenetic, "I just," he swallows around a harsh lump that begins to form in his throat, "I don't want you to think that I'm something that I'm not”.
Steve closes his eyes, missing the way that Eddie freezes at the words, but he can’t stop now --he has to get this all out or he’ll never be able to.
"That I've changed, that I'm this thing you've built up, for your sake, because let me tell you, it's pretty heartbreaking when everything you hoped was real turns out to be all in your head".
Steve opens his eyes as Eddie makes a sound like he’s been punched in the gut.
He’s still kneeling in front of Steve, even closer now, almost close enough that Steve can count the light dusting of freckles on his nose, and it feels like his heart will burst at any moment.
Fuck it.
"I've been halfway in love with you since you woke up from the hospital," Steve blurts out, “only to find out that you didn't feel even remotely the same about me, this whole time,” he breathes in shallowly as Eddie pales.
"I don't think I could take it if that happened again Eds,” Steve continues as he drops his gaze to his knees, “I think it would crush me".
"That's why I don't want you to say something you can't take--"
The words die on his lips as Eddie grabs his face and kisses him.
It’s harsh and clumsy, their teeth clack as Eddie loses his balance, pushing himself into Steve. They fall over the lounger, Steve’s shoulders and lower back hit the metal frame hard, forcing a muffled groan out as Eddie falls on top of him with his own faint, ‘oof’.
Eddie tries to raise himself up by his hands before falling even further as one of his hands slips through the rubber slats of the chair and he crashes into Steve's stomach.
Eddie babbles a string of incomprehensible apologies as he frees his trapped hand and manages to gently straddle Steve. Eddie hovers over him and lifts his hands to cup Steve's face.
“Shit baby, are you okay? Fuck, that’s not how I wanted that to go at all, I’m so shit at this”.
“Can we, can you get off and then we can get off the stupid chair?” Steve wheezes as he tries to catch his breath and shift his weight away from the metal still pressed into his back, “lets go inside, we can..talk about this”.
Eddie curses under his breath, his expression nervous, and moves his legs off of Steve and the chair before holding a hand out to help Steve to his feet.
Steve rubs his back as he leads the pair back inside through the sliding glass door, not daring to turn around and face Eddie.
He feels his own mortified flush spread across his chest and neck and winces; this is probably the most he’s blushed in years all in the span of a single afternoon.
He kissed me, he kissed me, he kissed me, plays on a seemingly endless loop in Steve’s head as he walks into the house, he can’t help the wide smile that blooms over his face --despite the other, darker thought that whispers in his ear, be careful, be careful, be careful.
Steve takes them through the empty dining room and into the living room before dropping onto the couch with another low groan. He looks up as he realizes that Eddie is no longer beside him.
Eddie stands in the entryway to the living room, he’s holding a thick handful of hair over his mouth and watching Steve carefully.
“Can’t talk with you all the way over there,” Steve huffs.
He tries for a smile but the effect is lost as Eddie continues to stand and stare at him, looking as though he could bolt from the house at any moment.
“Please come here Eds,” Steve tries again, his voice small. He takes a deep breath, if Eddie can be brave so can you, he thinks as he holds out his hand.
Eddie hesitates for just a moment more, his eyes flick beyond Steve to the hallway linked to the foyer and back, it’s so quick Steve nearly misses it.
Still, he keeps his hand steady, holding it aloft.
Eventually Eddie takes a tentative step, then another, slowly moving forward until his fingers brush Steve’s own. He takes a seat next to Steve on the plush gray couch but doesn’t relax as Steve turns his body to face him. Eddie tenses even further as Steve gives his hand a gentle squeeze.
He opens his mouth to start but Eddie beats him to it.
“I’m so sorry Steve,” Eddie whispers, his voice strained and thin as he takes his hand back, “I just fucking attacked you? Jesus, I," he cuts himself off, whatever he had been about to say trapped behind the teeth that dig into his bottom lip.
"I mean," Steve mumbles, hating the hunched line of Eddie's shoulders, "I tell you I've been in love with you for months and you kiss me, that makes sense to me?"
"Stop doing that," Eddie bites out as he stands up, slapping his hands on his knees to launch himself away from the couch.
He paces the living room, not looking at Steve and getting progressively more agitated as he walks.
"I apologize and then you turn it around on yourself, why do you do that? Just let me apologize!"
Eddie halts suddenly as he straightens and faces Steve, it's as though a lightbulb has blinked on in the ether as Eddie speaks his next words slowly and carefully, "stop letting me off the hook Steve, be honest with me".
"I have been honest with you," Steve tries but Eddie shakes his head.
"Nope, you've told me some of your stuff today, but not why you keep downplaying everything, why you're not just telling me you're upset, it's like you're censoring the stuff you think I don't want to hear, come on”.
"My stuff," Steve mutters under his breath as a hot flicker of irritation licks at his ribcage.
"Yes," Eddie says, throwing his hands into his hair in frustration.
"Everybody censors themselves Eddie, you think I tell the kids everything? That I've told Robin everything?"
At this Eddie blanches, surprise etched over his forehead as his eyebrows climb into his wispy bangs.
"But Robin--"
"Knows enough, but not everything,"Steve scoffs as he crosses his arms over his stomach, "and she doesn't need to".
Robin may know his parents are hardly around, she may have formed her own opinions, assumptions about what she thinks is going on; but Steve has gotten very good at hiding these things -especially over the years.
Pulling out the King Steve persona, make them laugh, make them mad, watch this hand while the other pulls the wool over their eyes.
"Then tell me," Eddie says softly, but there is a challenge to his words.
He shifts his stance slightly, putting more weight on his left leg as he cocks his hip out to the side, "shock me Harrington".
Steve shifts on the couch, feeling pinned under Eddie's gaze, before swiping a tired hand over his face and dropping it into his lap.
"That crack in the table happened just before I graduated," Steve says softly, his head tipped down so the words tumble into his knees.
He ignores the sharp intake of breath from Eddie, not daring to look up as he continues, "my uh, my dad opened the rejection letter from Vincennes, that one had just been delivered that morning I think".
Steve breathes out slowly and picks at a hangnail on his left thumb, he hasn't ever spoken about this to anyone, he's never really managed to talk about his home life growing up without side stepping things.
There had been moments where Steve thinks Tommy and Carol might have had their suspicions, but they never asked and Steve wasn't in a position to talk about it.
"I think that was at the beginning of June, so, so his logical conclusion was to uh, go looking for the other letters, the ones I must have received already".
Steve barks out a laugh, but the sound rings out hollow in the large living room, he startles slightly as the couch dips down next to him as Eddie sits, close enough that his knees are brushing Steve's own.
He doesn't say anything, but it's enough for Steve to breathe out and keep going.
"And he found them, my dad, in the shoebox I kept in the back of my closet".
"I don't know why I had even kept them," Steve shakes his head, "I should have thrown them away".
Steve absently traces a faint white line across his temple, staring past his knees into the patterns of the ornate area rug, "I got home from school and he had the letters waiting for me".
"He laid them all out on the dining table," Steve sweeps his hands out, setting the scene in his head, "like you see in those detective movies right? He just needed some string to connect them all to me".
Steve shivers and closes his eyes, the words still echoing fresh in his mind, the hot spittle that hit his face as his father cornered him against the wall still makes him flinch if he thinks about it too hard.
"He asked when I was planning to tell him about the rejections, and I couldn't give him an answer," he reaches up and pinches his nose, just once, blinking a few times as he wills away the gathering moisture.
"I didn't raise you to be this way Steven, like some fucking ungrateful coward --look at me when I'm God Damn talking to you!" Richard seethes as he slams the flat of his palm into the center of the table, his Harvard class ring splitting the wood as it connects with a loud crack.
Richard doesn't look down, his hand slides to one of the letters, snatching it from the surface as he steps around the table, towards Steve, in three sure strides. He backs his son towards the wall, looming over Steve as he shoves the paper into his face in one hand while the other grips the collar of Steve's T-Shirt.
"What will people think, huh, our only son didn't get into college, Hagan got in for chrissakes," his dad shakes him once, forcing Steve's head to connect with the wall, "what am I supposed to tell people Steven, what are we going to tell your poor mother?"
"I thought that Wheeler girl was supposed to be smart, tutor you or something," Richard scoffs as he finally lets go of Steve's shirt collar, "or did she finally come to her senses?"
Steve sneers before he can stop himself, "I didn't think you were even around enough to see that dad--"
The blow comes swiftly, catching him across the temple, his father's class ring comes out to play once again as a hot burst of pain blooms across the entire left side of his face from the backhand.
"Don't you ever speak to me that way again, you want to be a big man Steven? Just see what happens".
Steve blinks once, coming back to himself, "my dad, um, he has a problem with anger, with uh, expressing it I guess".
"But that isn't what this is about," Steve whispers, and this time he can't keep the wobble from his voice as he speaks.
"I'm afraid, I'm just like him, that I could do what he did if I got upset enough, and you," he breathes out sharply but the sounds more like a sob than anything else, "you want me to be honest?"
Steve finally lifts his eyes up to meet Eddie's own. Eddie, who looks as though he wants to melt into the floor, his shoulders tense and his own eyes seem suspiciously shiny as they stare back at Steve.
"Why couldn't you be honest with me, huh?" Steve whispers, "from the beginning?"
A tear breaks the surface, tracing down Steve's cheek. He manages to catch it roughly with the back of his hand before reaching up to press the heels of both his hands into his eyes --as though the pressure could stop the building deluge he knows is inevitable.
"I was so angry with you when you told me that you hadn't meant what you said in the Upside Down," Steve manages to speak through the tightening of his throat as he drops his hands back down into his lap, "that I smashed a plate in my kitchen after you left, I don't, I don't know what happened".
His breath quickens suddenly and every other word comes out as a gasp, "but it's like my worst fucking fears h-have come true and I don't, I don't know what to do, I don't, I--"
"Oh sweetheart," Eddie says softly as he reaches for Steve, pulling him into his arms with gentle fingers, "oh, I gotcha".
Steve lets himself be moved, for his head to be tipped into the crook of Eddie's neck and his body tucked into Eddie's chest.
Steve tries to slow down his breathing, to stop the shuddering of his chest as he fights the tears.
"It's okay," Eddie tries but Steve shakes his head.
"It's not," he bites out, the words taper off into a whine, "it's not--"
"Okay, you're right, it's not," Eddie says so softly Steve nearly misses it.
"I'm so, so, sorry Steve," Eddie murmurs into Steve's hair, holding him tighter as Steve finally gives in and lets himself cry.
He's not sure how long they sit for, eventually Steve feels a steady hand card through his hair while the other strokes down his arms, he feels the tension in his shoulders begin to melt away and the tears slow to a gentle trickle.
"I'm an idiot," Eddie huffs out, the breath flutters Steve's hair, making him twitch at the sensation.
Steve reaches up and wipes at his face with tired hands. The skin feels warm to the touch and puffy around his eyes and his nose which refuses to stop running, he must look like an absolute sight right now, he thinks to himself with a grimace.
"You're not an idiot," he manages to croak, but Eddie's already shaking his head sharply, turning himself to look at Steve.
"Oh believe me, I've fucked up before, pretty spectacularly, but this takes the goddamn cake sweetheart".
"And you're right," Eddie says slowly, carefully, "I shouldn't be harping on about you hiding how you feel when I'm the reason why we're in this mess".
Eddie chews his bottom lip, worrying it between his teeth before pulling away from Steve entirely as he reaches up to cup Steve's face between his hands.
"I'm sorry for not being honest with you Stevie, and I will spend every day trying to make it up to you if you let me?"
Steve looks at Eddie, really looks at him.
He takes in the drooped curve of his shoulders, the subtle pink of the tip of his nose and the glassy sheen in his brown eyes. The way his chest has stopped rising and he drops his hands away from Steve the longer he openly stares at the metal-head, the way Eddie anxiously spins and spins and spins the rings on his hands the longer he waits.
It’s an easy decision to reach out and place his own hand on Eddies own, to halt the frantic movements with a gentle squeeze.
“So,” Steve says, grinning as Eddie finally looks up at him once more, "on a scale of helping to chauffeur the kids to finishing fixing the table, what kind of making it up to me are we talking about?"
The smile Eddie gives him is nearly blinding as he launches himself at Steve, gathering him up in his arms. His hair smells like sawdust and there's the barest hint of some kind of cologne that Steve can't place.
Eddie leans back into the couch cushions, laughingly wetly and taking Steve with him. The sound makes his chest ache as Steve realizes just how much he’s missed Eddie’s laughter. He buries his face in Eddie's neck as they cuddle into one another, letting themselves sit with nothing but the sound of the occasional car driving down the street outside or the humming of grasshoppers through the screen door to the backyard.
"For what it's worth," Eddie huffs, breaking the quiet, a hint of dimples revealing themselves as he smiles, "I've never met the guy, but from the sounds of it, you are the farthest thing from being like 'Ol Dick Harrington".
Steve says nothing but feels something in his chest finally unclench for the first time in weeks.
"Besides, there's nothing like a good plate smash every now and again Stevie," Eddie hums as he runs his thumb over the crest of Steve's cheekbone again.
"That's what Robin said," Steve mumbles, as he leans further into Eddie with a smile, "she came over that night, after".
"A wise and terrifying woman," Eddie says sagely, "who I hope to never piss off again".
He stops suddenly and looks up at Steve, a nervous pinch to his brow as he plays with a loose curl hanging in front of his face, "I'm glad you guys have each other," Eddie says slowly, letting his thumb stroke Steve's hand absently, "that you have people in your corner and--”
Eddie swallows, his eyes darting back and forth between Steve's eyes as he finally seems to steel himself.
"I hope you'll let me be one of those people".
This nervous, quiet Eddie, is so strange to take in, but then again Steve's also never been on the receiving end of so many apologies all at once, it's just shy of being overwhelming at this point.
"Oh come off it Eddie," Steve huffs with a roll of his eyes, "you had me the moment I saw that fucking table outside and you tried to hide the sandpaper behind your back --real smooth by the way".
The way Eddie stares at him in surprise and that same look of awe from before, tells Steve that was the right thing to say.
Eddie barks out a wet laugh and squeezes him tighter, tipping his face to nuzzle Steve's ear, "I missed you teasing me".
"That was the worst part about all of this," he shudders once and drops his head to Steve's shoulder, "I thought I lost my friend, but I have you back".
"Yeah, you have me Eds," Steve says softly.
Steve rests against Eddie, uncaring that the position is growing more uncomfortable as the arm tucked closest to the metal-head falls asleep. Eddie holds him with such gentle reverence that Steve feels as though he may just burst from happiness at any moment.
Everything he's wanted for months, has finally fallen into place.
It's quiet for another moment. Steve plays with one of Eddie's hands, running his fingers over the calluses from playing guitar and the eclectic rings decorating his knuckles.
Eddie clears his throat after a beat, swallowing once, “so uh, earlier….that wasn’t exactly how I pictured our first kiss you know?"
Steve feels a small grin slowly bloom, he's not quite facing Eddie the way they're sitting, so he can play coy a little longer.
“You’ve pictured it huh?”
Eddie snorts “Oh yeah, you have no idea, there’s usually more tongue involved and less chipped teeth”.
Steve nods, letting them sit for a moment longer, letting himself be chased for once.
Eddie pulls back slightly, leaving his arms loosely wrapped around Steve, “think we could uh, try again?”
“Will you mean it as much as you did the first time?” Steve says with a smile as he rubs his lip with his thumb and flushed cheeks.
“You liked that huh, always knew you were a freak like me Harrington,” Eddie barks out, his eyes shining with mirth as he leans closer to run the tip of his nose down Steve's before nuzzling them together, "wanna make some good memories in this house Stevie?"
“Only if you’re with me Eds,” Steve whispers against Eddie’s lips as he slowly leans in.
Steve’s heart races, anticipation flooding his veins and filling his chest with a giddy realization that he finally, finally, gets to have this.
That he knows Eddie finally, finally, feels the same way.
He’ll call Robin later, let her know about Hellfire’s plan, the apology, and maybe even the truth about everything he’d kept hidden away for so long. The old hurts soothed and the lid of the box in his mind permanently open now, the lid wrenched off its hinges so as to never close again. Maybe he could let people in, to let them know him.
For now, Steve lets himself be lowered onto the couch, lets Eddie's hands roam freely, over Steve's shoulders, his neck --letting his fingers gently brush the long scar from the Demobat tail, before lifting one hand to cup his cheek while the other climbs into Steve hair, threading his fingers through it and giving the locks an experimental tug.
Steve's hands make their way up Eddie's back, under his shirt, tracing over the raised scars on his sides. Eddie shoots Steve a wicked grin, his eyes crinkle at the sides as he lets his weight gently fall over Steve, catching himself with his hands on the couch cushions on either side of Steve's face, effectively caging him in.
Eddie moves slowly, deliberately, it's not nearly as brutal as the first time but Eddie kisses like a wildman starved, licking into Steve's mouth and grazing his bottom lip with harsh teeth.
It feels like Steve is being consumed, slowly, carefully.
It's overwhelming in the best way. The feeling of his soft lips against Steve’s own, the harsh stubble that rubs against Steve’s chin. The smell of weed, and sawdust, and cologne invades his nose.
Eddie pulls back briefly before leaning down again to place a soft kiss against Steve’s lips.
“How's that for a second kiss?” he asks with a raised eyebrow and a wide smirk pulling at his slightly puffy lips.
Steve scoffs and tugs at Eddie’s shirt collar, “I dunno, maybe we need to check again?”
Eddie’s laughter rings out loud and long in the Harrington living room, as he leans down again and hugs Steve tightly.
For the first time in a long time, Steve feels himself relax.
He lets the weight of Eddie press him into the cushions and releases a long contented breath, the Harrington house, finally feeling warmer than it has in a long time.
I hope you all enjoyed this as much as I enjoyed working on it! This was the first fic of this length that I was still actively writing as I was updating that I've actually completed and I'm pretty damn happy about that! I was so worried about abandoning this guy and I'm glad I was able to finish it, hopefully it has come to a satisfying conclusion <3
Taglist: @zerokrox-blog @samcoxramblings @thosemessyvibes @liketheocean @vampireinthesun @themostunoriginalpersonever @merricatty @hyperfixationgoddess @hippieg1rl420 @mysticcrownshipper @estrellami-1 @clumsiluni @messrs-weasley @the-obsessed-nerdist
#platonic stobin#mean!eddie wip#finally finished this big boy#eddie munson has a bad dad#protective wayne munson#the party#will byers can and will weaponize those eyes of his#I broke my promise about how long this would take#angst with a happy ending#steddie#getting together#afewproblems writes#afewproblemswrites#steve harrington has a bad dad#implied referenced child abuse both verbal and physical#its only a small section but its not great#hurt steve harrington#slaps steves chest 'this boy can hold so much trauma'
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Southern Nights
(steddie, some depictions of blood, gore, and talk of death, just over 8k words)
chapter one: an aching feeling that you can't get rid of
“The road is longer than it is hard. With no one to guide you, and no one to hold. No best foot forward to sway the odds. Just a voice inside you, and a stone to throw.”
-Ethel Cain and Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, “God’s Country”
Steve’s thighs were going numb from sitting in the car for so long, so any kind of stop was greatly welcomed. Hell, he practically flung himself out of the stuffy car the second it was stopped, being extra careful not to slam the door in his haste.
Georgia was much hotter than Indiana. He had only been here once before, on a trip down to visit his grandma before she died, but that had only been for a day. Now he was supposed to live here. Five-Hundred-and-eighty-two miles away from his best friend, and five-hundred-and-eighty-two-miles away from the reason that this was all happening.
His parents hadn’t told him why they were moving, but he knew. They wanted to get as far away from the rumors about their son being queer as they possibly could, which meant a quick (and as he had only learned on the car ride over, permanent) trip down to his mother’s childhood home—one that he had heard her curse and slander thousands of times growing up, but one that she now had a kind of faux-eagerness to visit, trying to play into the lie they were feeding him.
There was a reason his mother had quit trying to become an actress when she was younger. She wasn’t very good at faking things, and she hadn’t gotten any better as she had aged. Her smile was tight and forced as she gingerly stepped out of the car, making a show of putting her hands on her hips as she glanced at Steve, sighing. “I missed this.”
“Sure you did,” he muttered, giving her a strained smile of his own, nothing but doubt evident in his voice. He wasn’t allowed to be rude, but he could sass them all he wanted—for the rest of time, actually, if it came to that, he was quite good at it.
“It’s been a while since I’ve been back here, you know,” she said matter-of-factly, walking past him to get to the door to the rest-stop, her heels clicking against the worn, cracked pavement.
Steve nodded, glancing back at the car where his father was still sitting, his head leaned against the back of the head-rest, eyes closed, probably reveling in the quiet that had been so scarce as of late. Steve had made sure that his Walkman’s volume was at its highest so that they could hear the music playing even when he had his headphones on. They didn’t tell him to turn it down, even though it annoyed them. They knew he was upset.
He followed after his mother, grabbing onto her arm lightly when she tripped over a crack. “I know, ma, it’s probably hard to visit here if you’re off in Paris all the time,” he said gently, patting her shoulder.
She nodded, her eyes kept down. He didn't want to be mad at her, because this was all his fathers idea and she just had to play along. This was hard for her, too, but he was still upset. She didn’t say anything to convince Richard otherwise—but it’s not like anything she said would have helped. “Let’s get inside, hm? It’s hot out here, your makeup will run.”
She stayed silent, her eyes glued to the ground in front of her feet. Steve sighed, his head ducked down near her shoulder. “Ma?”
His mother’s head snapped up, flinching when she noticed how close he was. He dropped his hand from her shoulder, stepping back. “Let’s go inside. Dad’s waiting.”
Adelina nodded and took in a shuddering breath. She was holding together a lot worse than Steve was, which wasn’t a surprise. It took her a moment, and a gentle nudge from Steve, but she kept walking, her son trailing behind her as they entered the building.
It was small, run-down with peeling wallpaper, a couple rows of shelves with half-crushed bags of chips and pretzels, a few freezers with flat sodas and warm water bottles. “Restrooms are over in the corner, I think,” Steve whispered to his mom, pointing off to a darker area of the room with a short hall and a couple of doors with worn down signs. “I’m gonna make a call, get some chips.”
Adelina nodded, a slight stumble in her step as she walked off. Steve pitied his mother, the poor thing–her whole life uprooted and moved back to a place that everyone knew she hated. Maybe seeing how miserable she was here would change his dad’s mind and he would take them someplace closer to Indiana, where he could still see Robin.
This was all Tommy’s fault. Every fucking bit of it. But Steve didn’t want to think about Tommy anymore.
He turned to face the counter. The clerk looked less than friendly, scribbling away in some notebook, her stare bored and her cheeks flushed. She was pretty, a short blonde braid down her back, a too-big flannel rolled up at her elbows. Steve ran a hand through his hair, sighing before heading over.
“Hey,” he said lightly, leaning against the front of the counter. The girl didn’t look up. He could see freckles dusted across the bridge of her nose now that he was closer. Her eyes were a gray-green. “Could I, uh–use the phone over there?” he tried again, ducking his head and motioning to the phone on the wall near the back door.
“Nope,” she said, still not looking up from what she was writing. It took everything in Steve not to look over her arm and see what was on the pages. He didn’t look.
“I need to make a call,” He tried again, moving slightly and shifting his hand more towards her arm so as to get her attention, his voice softer and more pleading. Being pathetic always worked to get him what he wanted.
“And I said no, I'm not allowed to let people use the phone unless it’s an emergency,” She said, looking up, her voice slow as if he was dumb. “Sorry, sweetheart.”
“It is an emergency, I need to call my sister,” he lied, faux-sadness seeping into his tone. “She’s little and alone, I need to make sure she’s okay before we keep driving.”
The girl didn’t bother him with too many questions, didn’t ask why his (not real) little sister was being left alone, only sighed and shook her head slightly, rolling her eyes. “Fine. Two minutes.”
Steve grinned, nodding and pushing off of the counter. Robin answered in only a few rings, her voice choked with a half-sob, “Steve–”
“Hey, hey, Jeez,” Steve whispered, his voice quiet. He didn’t want the clerk to overhear, but then again she really didn’t seem to care. “Don’t just assume it’s me, Bobbie.”
“Are you okay?” She asked breathlessly, panic in her voice. “You haven’t been answering my calls!”
“We haven’t gotten to the house, yet, babe,” He leaned more against the wall. “You’re calling an empty house.”
“Well, the phone answered the last time I called but all I heard was wet -choking sounds and I got worried.”
“Okay, Jesus, well—“ he huffed, shaking his head slightly, his fingers tugging at the hair on the back of his neck. Robin heard things all the time, but it didn’ make the eerie feeling in his gut go away. “It’s an old house, Robs, been empty for a long time. It was probably just some people fucking with you when they heard the phone ring, yeah? Relax.”
Robin didn’t sound relaxed when she spoke again, but she sounded better than before, her voice less shaky. “Thought you died or something.”
“I’m alright, babe,” he whispered, sighing.
“If you get to live in a haunted house without me I’m going to kill you,” she whispered back, her voice still a bit choked.
“I know,” he murmured. “It’s not haunted, just old. Can’t have fun with ghosts without you, don’t worry.”
“And don’t die in it, either, I don’t want to move to Georgia just to see you because you’re dead,” she threatened.
“I won’t die,” he said firmly, his eyebrows pressed together. “Promise.”
It was a strange promise to make, and one that virtually meant nothing, but Robin seemed satisfied. “Okay. But you could—“
Steve’s head snaps over to the side when he hears the click of heels, whatever Robin was saying dying away before it could reach his ears. His mother rounds the corner, the skin around her eyes blotchy and red, but she instantly straightens up and wipes her cheeks when she sees him looking, giving a shaky smile.
“I gotta go, Bobbie,” Steve interrupts whatever she was saying about EMFs. “Promise I’ll call you tonight once all of the unpacking is taken care of, okay?”
He heard Robin sigh. He knew where she was sitting, curled up in the beanbag by her room, leaning against the wall with all of her Madonna and Elvira posters–probably wrinkling them, her fingers twirled around the cord and her knees pulled to her chest. There were probably books covering her floor again, even though he had helped her clean it just a few hours before they left two days ago because she never remembered on her own.
“Okay,” she whispered, her voice small and quiet–fragile.
Fuck, he missed her already.
“Hey,” he said softly, pushing off of the wall. “I love you, okay? I’ll call you tonight, go and clean the papers off of your bed.”
Robin giggled, and it sounded wet, nasally. “Love you too–and stop being right about things, that’s my job.”
“So there are papers on your floor, huh?” He prodded, grinning.
“I’m hanging up!” She shrieked, and Steve flinched away from the phone slightly.
“Okay, Bobbin, bye.”
The dial tone beeped and he sighed, running his hand through his hair to make sure it was fixed before going back over to his mom, forgetting about the snacks. They’d be at the house soon, anyways.
Adelina smiled, thin and watery and not at all happy, rubbing her hand against Steve’s shoulder briefly before placing her hands on her hips. “I’m just–so sentimental, baby, I'll be okay soon.”
“I know you will,” Steve said, nodding once before trudging off, waving goodbye to the clerk who didn’t look up from her writing.
He wasn’t prepared to be back in the summer heat, squinting through the brightness, the crunch of his shoes and the clicking off his mother’s heels on the pavement all too much. She always complained to him about how uncomfortable they were (to him, not Richard), he didn’t know why she wore them all the time, they were the only pair she had.
He opened the door to the blue BMW–his car, because his dad insisted on driving this one down through the heat instead of having a mover take it like he did with the other car–and slipped inside, reveling in the air conditioner and dreading getting out again, even if it meant he had to be locked in a car with his dad for the rest of time.
“Jesus,” His dad breathed when Adelina finally trudged her way to the passenger door, slipping inside and taking a deep breath.
“Richard,” Steve’s mother chided, the only thing she said for the rest of the ride.
Everyone was quiet–mourning the loss of something, because they all didn’t want to be there–stuck together, miserable together. Steve wished they would go back to Paris soon so that he would at least have the house to himself. Then he could sit and call Robin all day without his dad telling him to stop bothering ‘that poor girl’. He never liked Robin, always saying it was unhealthy how attached they were on the few days that he was home, that he shouldn’t be hanging out with a dyke, and that he should hang out more with the Hagan’s boy.
Now he wanted Steve to hang out with anyone but Tommy. Steve wished they had never kissed–even though it felt like more than just kissing with how touchy Tommy was, but it wasn’t like Steve had been complaining when it had happened–and that he had listened to Robin and hadn’t pathetically begged Tommy to come over because he didn’t want to be alone.
The rest of the car ride went by in a blur, green trees rolling past and the blue smudges of the ocean against the fogged up window from his breath. Careless Whisper playing through his headphones just made him miss Robin even more. It was the song that she liked to dance to with him, made him play it all the time whenever she would come over. She would have liked seeing the ocean here. It was pretty.
His new house wasn’t at the coast, but it was within walking distance–through a little swampy area, his mom had said, an always-flooded graveyard and a stream that no one went by because of all the old deer carcasses that kept showing up without warning. She hadn’t given much detail to that, but then again, no one knew what was killing them.
“Oh,” Steve’s mother breathed, her shoulders slumping slightly as soon as the house came into view. It was more ruined than Steve remembered it–old and tall, chipping stone and rusted iron railings up the steps to the front door. Some of the windows were cracked, and there were vines moss up the walls.
He wanted an excuse not to have to go in, but saying ‘this house makes me feel like I want to die’ would do nothing to deter his father. He sighed and turned off his Walkman, slipping off his headphones and stuffing them all back into his backpack.
His mother got out and sighed what Steve assumed was supposed to sound nostalgic, but sounded almost like a whimper. “Isn’t it just…”
“Falling apart?” Steve recommended, raising his eyebrows.
His dad sighed, shaking his head as he got out of the car, smoothing down the jacket of his suit. “Steven.”
“What?” He muttered, looking away from his mother’s shaking hands.
“You and your mother go and unpack what we have in the car, I need to drive up and make sure everything is all set in the office.”
“You’re leaving?” Binaca said quickly, turning. “I–can’t I go with you, the movers will be here in an hour–”
“I told you to stay here and unpack,” Richard said sternly, his expression challenging Steve and his mother. Try and argue with me again. See what happens.
Adelina straightened up, nodding, her breath catching deep in her throat as she watched her husband unpack the few bags they had from the trunk. Steve wanted to throw his father in the supposed river outback, but he picked up the bags from the patchy grass instead.
His mother stood watching the car drive away, and then for a while after, her gaze focused on something that he couldn’t make out. He knew that something happened to her in this house–there had to be a reason that she had left, and why she was this upset about coming back.
Steve left her there as he walked over to the house. The inside was more homey, less falling-apart but still worn and tattered in the corners. Everything looked well loved. There was one stair step that was more worn, lighter and scratched away over time, with a little chipped paw print painted in green on the side. Steve didn’t know what it meant. There was so much history in this house that it made him feel sick—little porcelain birds that each had a story, crosses with writing painted into the sides that he couldn’t understand, and a jacket draped over the dining room chair nearest the kitchen, collecting dust.
Steve set down the bag with his clothes on the table, going over to it. It was brown and leather, kind of faded and scratched. His fingers came away gray when he touched it. The inside was sewn with a flower print, red roses on dirty white lined cloth, no longer soft from years of wear.
“Steve, bambolotto,” Adelina said, stepping through the door and into the kitchen. Steve watched as she looked around at the faded floral wallpaper and the dark brown wooden panels. Her eyes fell onto one of the many framed photos that were cluttered on the far wall–ones of little girls in long white dresses, all black and white.
Adelina sniffed and wiped her eyes with her free hand, her husband’s bag of clothes at her feet. “Right,” She started again, sighing, watching as Steve set the jacket back over the chair, picking up his bag. “There’s a room in the attic, that’s yours, carissima.”
“The Attic?” Steve asked, frowning. They drove all this way down and he got the room in the attic?
“Yes, Steve, the attic,” His mother said, a bit more firm this time, her eyes watering. “You go and set up, I'm going to go and sit out back for a while.”
Steve nodded, huffing and going to find his dingy attic room. He glanced over at her quickly when she gasped as he set foot on the stairs.
“Don’t step on the middle one,” She said quickly, her eyes wide, and she looked so on edge that Steve didn’t question it, skipping over the worn step with the paw print and continuing up the stairs.
There was a door down the hallway at the top of the stairs, with another, steeper set behind them, flowers painted on the handrails. Steve kept his hands off so that they wouldn’t chip. He had now resigned himself to his fate, but he was going to be nice about it.
At least he might have a good view if he had to be in the—
Oh.
The attic room wasn’t tattered at all. There were photos and odds and ends on the wall, a couple skulls mounted above the window and some…hanging bones in the corner that he wasn’t going to touch in case they were cursed. The bed was small with a metal frame and a pretty pink and white flower quilt that had seen some better days.
The dresser in the corner was green and yellow with white foxes painted on the drawers. He opened it to put his clothes in and found a dead bird, dropping the bag with a gag and cringing away.
“Oh, ew,” He muttered, picking it up by the foot and going over to the window. The latch was hard to undo with one hand, but he got it after a minute, shoving at the glass with his shoulder until it opened, tossing the bird out onto the grass. It fell the story down and hit the ground with a sickening thwap!, and Steve held back another gag as he backed up, leaving the slightly cracked window open to let the room air out, since most things were covered in a thin layer of dust.
“What the hell is wrong with this place,” He breathed, eyeing the hanging bones and the corner as he slowly opened the drawer again before putting his clothes away, trying to busy himself with sorting before the movers came and he could help them. They hadn’t brought a lot with them, seeing as they hadn’t really had much in their old house to begin with–it has been mostly empty since his parents had barely been there for a few days before they left for their work trips, his mother only going along to make sure Richard didn’t try and stick his dick into everything that moved–but his father insisted on hiring movers anyways to take the few boxes that would have fit in the car with them.
It didn’t take long for his clothes to be put away, since he didn’t really have many clothes already–a few polos and some jeans and a couple loose t-shirts here and there. If he had free time he could call Robin, but if he called her this close to the last call she’d expect frequent calls all the time, and his parents would probably have things around the house to keep him busy.
But on the other hand…Robin…
He called Robin.
“Did the ghosts kill you yet?” Was the first thing she asked, the cord scratching on the other end like she was spinning back and forth in her desk chair.
“How do you always know it’s me?” He muttered, sitting down on the bed, but it was a bit uncomfortable since the old phone on the wall couldn’t quite reach that far. “And no, Bobby, I am very much still alive.”
“Oh, good. Have you seen any ghosts yet? Anything weird?”
“No,” he rolled his eyes. “Ghosts aren’t real though.”
“Do you even know who you’re saying that to, Steven?”
“Don’t call me Steven,” he whispered, standing up and leaning against the wall.
“Sorry—but I love ghosts. How could you do this to me?”
“I’m not preventing you from liking ghosts, babe, you can still like them without me.”
“But we were supposed to go on ghost hunts together when we were older!” She whined, and he could hear the pout in her voice through the phone.
“We were?” He muttered, his eyebrows pressed together. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“Well, I shouldn’t have had to, you should have just known,” She muttered back.
“But won’t it be more fun if I don’t believe it? To contradict what you say?”
There was a long pause. “Do you even know what contradict means?”
Steve frowned. “Yeah, I do.”
“That’s a big word for you, Stevie,” she teased, and he knew she was joking but his shoulders still slumped.
“I know big words,” he defended, his voice more quiet. “I’m not stupid. Please don’t start thinking I’m stupid…”
Maybe this would be better than Hawkins. Maybe his reputation this time could be better, too. Back home, everyone thought he was pretty, but also a fucking idiot. ‘Jesus it’s like he doesn’t listen unless you’re talking about sports,’ Carol was fond of muttering, rolling her eyes and making his shoulders shrink in like they always did when he got upset. He always tried his best to listen, but when she talked about her romance novels it was hard to follow along with all of the names and who had sex with who.
Things just slipped his mind, especially the important things, it seemed. He only really knew three things about Carol, even though they had been best friends for years:
She kept a hairdryer in her purse and used to let him borrow it after rounds when he was still on the swim team
She liked fancy french perfumes but they discontinued her favorite one so she only used it when she was trying to hook up with someone during the many times her and Tommy had broken up
She liked girls,too, but if Steve told anyone she would “strangle him with the hair dryer cord”
“Oh, no, Steve—“ She said quickly, her tone dropping the teasing. “You’re not stupid, I was just joking.”
“I know,” Steve said dismissively, hating that his insecurities were making Robin feel bad. “I know, I'm sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” She whispered, and Steve really wanted to touch her right now. It felt weird to be so far away from the one person who he knew actually cared about him. Sure, there were plenty of people in Hawkins who liked him, but no one he knew was missing him right now except Robin. And maybe Carol. He’d have to ask Robin to find out her new number so he could call her, since he hadn’t seen Carol since she moved to the next town over. She switched highschools and didn’t even bother to tell him she was moving.
Maybe that was why Tommy kissed him. He didn’t even know if Carol knew about the kiss, but he hoped she wouldn’t hate him for it. Sure, he had asked Tommy to come over, and he hadn’t told Tommy to stop when Tommy had slid his hand up his thigh while they were watching the movie, or when Tommy had pulled Steve into his lap and kissed down his neck, his hands up Steve’s shirt. Steve had kissed him back, but he thought that Tommy and Carol had broken up–that it was fine because Tommy didn’t have a girlfriend anymore, and because Tommy and Carol both kissed other people when they were “taking a break” all the time.
But later that night Tommy had said “my girlfriend”. Because she was never just “Carol” to him, she was “my girlfriend”. Steve told him to get the fuck out of the house after that.
And then he was here. In Georgia, in the attic, standing silently and listening to the silent line where his best friend was on the other end.
Steve?” Robin whispered, her voice hesitant and unsure.
“Hm?” he hummed back, his fingers drifting over the wood of the fox-dresser.
“You’re not mad, are you?”
“No, Bobby, I’m not mad,” He muttered, sighing and tugging at the phone cord. “Just tired, babe, that’s–”
His head snapped towards the door when he heard a wet sounding cough and a thud. His brows furrowed and his finger tightened on the phone cord. “What the fuck?”
“What?” Robin said quickly, sounding panicked. “What happened?”
“Nothing, nothing, I just–” He glanced towards the door again when the noise happened again. “I gotta go, unpacking and stuff, okay?”
“Okay,” Robin said, sighing. “Call me tomorrow?”
“Will do, birdie, love you.”
“Love you too.”
The line went dead and he shoved the phone back into the holder hurriedly, running over to the stairs. “Ma?” He called, being careful not to trip down the steep steps out of the attic. He really hoped she wasn’t choking, because that’s what the noise sounded like.
“Mamma?” He tried again, leaning over the railing and trying to see into the kitchen once he got to the second set of stairs to where she had left the screen door to the back porch open. “Stai bene?”
There was no answer again.
“Shit,” He cursed, practically running down the rest of the stairs. “Mammina?”
He ran through the kitchen and pushed open the screen door. “Ma?”
His mom was curled up in a white rocking chair, her long brown hair–wavy from being in a braid all last night–falling down her shoulders. Her shoes were thrown in the grass in front of the rotting porch steps, the top one caved in. There was moss and lichen across the planks, cracks and holes, and it all creaked when Steve walked over to her, kneeling down next to the chair.
“Ma,” He whispered, placing a hesitant hand on her knee. “Are you okay?”
His mom just sighed, turning to look at him, shiny tear-streaks down her face. “Sì,” she whispered back, shifting in the chair and reaching over to push some hair out of his face. “I’m okay, baby.”
Steve sighed, nodding and standing up. The wood creaked dangerously underneath him, but it stayed still. Steve made to leave, give him mom some space to deal with her emotions in peace, but her hand slid down and circled his wrist. “Why?”
“Hm?” He looked down at her fingers, shaking and cold against his skin, even though it was so fucking hot outside.
“You were worried,” She explained, her grip softening to let him go. “Why?”
“I heard, like,” He trailed off, waving his hand absently in confusion. “Choking sounds somewhere, wanted to make sure it wasn’t you dying or something.”
“You could hear me out here?” She said, sounding a little panicked.
Steve felt confusion seep into his skin before it shed off. He took in her tears streaked face, cheeks flushed again and shaking hands. She was worried that he had heard her crying.
It wasn’t the first time he had seen his mom cry, but that had been when his grandma had died and they had to come out here for the funeral. That was a good thing to cry over, she had said to him. She kept telling him that this–being upset over moving–was stupid and that she just needed to adjust to the change and get over it. Steve didn’t think it was stupid to cry over, but he didn’t say that, just took her hand from where it was hanging limply at the side of the chair and squeezed it gently, his voice quiet. “No, no. I couldn’t hear you, mamma, I just had the window open to air out the attic and I wanted to be sure it wasn’t you. I couldn’t hear you, It’s okay.”
Adelina sighed, nodding, her thumb brushing against Steve’s palm as she relaxed back into the chair, her eyes closed.
“Mamma?” Steve whispered, tracing his hand up her arm to rest on her shoulder.
She didn’t answer. The rocking chair stilled.
Steve picked up the high heels from the grass, skipping the most rotten step and placing them at his mother’s feet. He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, patting her knee lightly before going back inside, closing the screen door as quietly as he could.
He needed a shower. And a nap. And maybe for Richard to come back so that he could check out the town without worrying about his mom being alone in the house.
He went back up the stairs, turning to the bathroom which was just next to the door leading up to his bedroom. THe bathroom was small, with one of those claw-foot bathtubs that was supposed to be white but wasn’t anymore, a shower curtain dipping into it, hiding the inside. It was big, big enough for four people to sit comfortably, he thought.
It made Steve uneasy. He never kept the shower curtain open in Hawkins, not after those horrible fucking nightmares about vines and that man with burned red skin and claws. There was some perfume on the sink counter: a pink flower bottle that read “EAU DE TOILETTE”.
Maybe he’d mail that to Carol. It wasn’t the kind she wore on occasion, but the bottle was from Paris. He slipped off his shirt, folding it and placing it on the toilet seat before pulling back the shower curtain and–
Steve screamed, falling backwards, his back hitting the sharp corner of the sink. There was a boy in the bathtub, curled up and coughing, his long curly brown hair swaying slightly around his shoulders like it was underwater. His face was a ghostly pale, his hands shaking.
Steve gasped at nearly the same time the man did, shooting up and making to leave for the bathroom before he heard the man gag again. He stopped with his hand on the doorknob. He couldn’t just leave this person here to suffocate.
He looked back at the boy, whining in the back of the throat as he ran a hand down his face before slipping into the bathtub with the boy and helping him move onto his knees, leaning over near where the drain was. Always the fucking hero. God, this was going to get him killed one day. Maybe in a few minutes when this intruder stopped dying.
“Jesus, man, breathe,” Steve muttered, patting the man harshly on the back. All of his former training as a lifeguard suddenly left him in this moment of panic.
The guy hacked again, choking out a garbled, “Ri–Ri…ver…”
Steve frowned, his hand stilling, but going back to its original movement when the man gagged again. “River?”
The guy nodded, gasping and trying to sit up, but Steve kept him bent over. Water spilled out of the guy’s mouth and into the drain, black and murky and gross.
“Fuck, what happened?” Steve asked, panicked, holding the guy’s long curly hair out of his face as he spat up more of the black liquid. It felt weird in his fingers, cold and not-really there, soaking wet just like the rest of him.
“Jus’ go,” The boy muttered, shaking his head.
Steve shook his head, too, frowning. “I’m not just leaving you–”
The boy cut him off with another cough. “Go,” He snapped, coughing up more goo.
Steve stood, startled at the forcefulness of the man’s voice. He scrambled out of the bathtub, his back stinging with white-hot pain as he moved to the door. “The river?” He asked slowly, turning back around.
The man nodded, one arm wrapped tightly around his stomach and the other bracing himself against the edge of the bathtub, black dribbling down his chin.
“Jesus, fuck, okay,” Steve breathed, grabbing his shirt and slipping out of the door, calling over his shoulder, “If you die in here while i’m gone, that’s on you.”
He slipped his shirt on, ignoring the obvious feeling of a bruise forming on his back when his shoulders flexed. He ran down the stairs again, a death grip on the rail that grated on his palm. He felt bad for leaving that poor boy there, even if he was intruding and had probably broken in–maybe while Steve was outside with his mom?–the thought of the shit he kept spitting out made him want to throw up. He stepped around a dusty metal bowl on the ground next to the door, running down the porch steps and ignoring his mom as she asked where he was going.
He could see the river a few seconds after moving around trees and ducking under vines, his sneakers wet from the damp moss.
There was a boy in the river—the same boy from the bathtub—lying limp on the side, his arm twisted and tangled in a root. He had blood coming from his mouth, but he was unmoving, the red mixing with the murky black water as it watched over his mouth. His hair was dirty, matted, and if Steve didn’t know any better he would have thought that the swaying of his other arm in the water was him moving, trying to keep his head from going fully under.
He stepped forward, wet soaking the knees of his jeans as he kneeled in the wet moss, disentangling the boy from the tree root that popped above the ground, trapping his arm. The body let out a whimper and Steve froze, grabbing onto the boy’s arm before he could float further away.
“It’s okay,” He whispered to the corpse, dragging him back onto the muddy earth. It felt stupid to soothe someone who was dead, but he didn’t seem all that dead, even though he wasn’t breathing and his hands were cold. “I’ve got you now, you’re safe.”
The body didn’t make any more noise as Steve looked around, his eyes landing on the old shed. The boy’s wet hair was cold against Steve’s shoulder as he carried him, pushing the creaking wood door open with his hip and leaning the boy up against the corner. The wood was rotten like the porch, damp smelling with little beetles crawling in and out of the holes and knots.
Steve brushed some hair out of the boy’s face, his fingers tracing over his cheeks. The boy choked again and Steve flinched back, startled. The black goo he saw in the bath trickled out of his mouth and Steve helped him lean over again so that he could cough it all out. He didn’t like how the boy whimpered, his eyebrows pressed together, so lifelike for a corpse.
“Hurts,” the corpse whispered, and Steve made himself still, sucking in a breath.
“I know, but you’ll be okay,” he said back, his fingers untangling some of the bloody and gross curls on the back of the boy’s neck. “You’ll be alright.”
Steve didn’t know why he was so calm, but he didn’t want to panic and worry the corpse, even though a corpse shouldn’t be allowed to be worried. There wasn’t really anything to be worried about when you were dead.
“You’ll be alright,” Steve whispered again, rubbing his hand up and down the corpse’s back, trying to help him calm down even though he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. “I–you’re okay now, right? I can go and check on you inside?”
The corpse fell still, slumping forward, his cold, damp forehead hitting the rotting wood floor. Steve leaned him back against the wall, standing up slowly. His hands were shaking, and he could feel his breath stuttering already.
He wasn’t going to cry he wasn’t going to cry he wasn’t—
Fuck.
When he got back, the boy twisted his arms, trying to get his shirt off, his hair dripping water down his pale, scarred chest. Steve watched as he stood up on his tip-toes to get a better look in the mirror above the sink, his face contorting in a sob as he bent over, his spine pressing up against the thin, pale skin of his back. There were red lines between each bump, thin and scarred, one bleeding down towards the waistline of his wet jeans.
Steve stared, his cheeks flushing. He wanted to reach out and trace the ridges of the boy's spine, feel his waxy skin under his fingers–the way it bumped and dipped, his skin feeling not-all-there…
Steve shook his head, frowning. Normal thoughts, fuck, think normal thoughts–
“Are you okay?” Steve whispered, watching the blood make a mark along the boy’s pale skin as it soaked into his Levi’s.
“Fuck,” the boy moaned, dropping his head back, exposing his neck which was also scarred, but not as much as his chest. Steve felt his face flushed as he took a hesitant step closer.
“I can breathe, holy shit,” the boy muttered, rubbing at his throat, sounding almost in awe, which was immediately followed by a sob as his legs gave out, his hands covering his mouth as he all but collapsed on the tile floor.
Steve decided that all of the ‘who are you and how the fuck did you get into my bathtub’ questions could wait until later. “Okay, Jesus—“
Steve reached forward quickly, grabbing the boy and easing him onto the ground, his hands on the guy’s shoulders. “Hey, hey—“
The boy’s eyes were big, brown—looking down at his knees as he ran his hands quickly through his hair, which looked more dry than it had a few moments ago. “Holy fuck,” he sobbed, dropping his head down.
“What’s your name?” Steve asked, turning the boy slightly to look at his back, trying to wipe some of the blood away before pressing his hand to the cut to try and stop it from bleeding.
The boy winced, dropping his head onto Steve’s shoulder, and Steve tried very hard to stay still, his jaw set. “Eddie.”
“Eddie? Okay, Eddie—wanna tell me what happened back here?” He pressed a bit harder to try and stop the bleeding and could feel the boy’s face twist up against the skin of his neck, a whimper slipping out.
“I don’t know, I was—I was helping Evelyn get rid of those deer and then I was…cold,” Eddie whispered. “And then I was wet and I was choking a-and then–but I’m not anymore–”
“Slow down, Jesus,” Steve whispered, patting the boy’s back as he coughed up the black goo, which ran down his chin and landed just in front of Steve’s knee. “Fuck, what is that?”
“Dunno,” Eddie whispered back, shrugging as he cleared his throat and ran a hand over the scar on his throat. “I just…I can’t go back outside.”
There was a sense of urgency in the boy’s tone as he looked up at Steve pleadingly. “I can’t—if…if Jason is still there he’ll…”
“Who the fuck is Jason?” Steve muttered, his eyebrows pressed together as he kept his hand on the boy’s spine when he stood, blood flowing from under his finger in a steady stream. There was blood in the bathtub, too, on the tile floor and on his jeans. On his shoes. His arm.
Eddie looked down, wiping his eyes and reaching behind him to push Steve’s hand away. “He…I don’t want to tell you. Maybe I can haunt him, though, if I’m not stuck here.”
“Haunt?” Steve asked incredulously, wiping the blood off of his hands and onto his already ruined jeans. “What do you mean haunt?”
“Like a ghost,” Eddie whispered, wiggling his fingers and then wincing. “Wooo…”
Steve sighed, shaking his head and running a hand down his face, which only smeared blood. “There were two of you.” He said calmly,clenching his hands into fists to try and stop them from shaking. They shook anyway. “Why were there two of you, Eddie?”
“Woooo…” Eddie repeated, wiggling his fingers again, an apologetic smile on his face before he winced again, and Steve grabbed him before he could tip over, his eyes wide.
“You’re a ghost?”
Eddie shrugged. “Something like that. I think.”
“Jesus fucking christ,” Steve whimpered, running a hand through his hair, not even caring about the blood that was getting in it. “Holy fuck—“
“Hey—,” Eddie tried to get in, his expression softening, but Steve shook his head. The panic he had been pushing away was finally catching up to him. He felt like he was going to throw up, saliva filling his mouth as he gagged, bracing himself on the sink counter.
“It’s okay,” Eddie whispered, placing a hand on Steve’s shoulder, and it went through his skin, which made Steve feel even worse. “Shit, sorry, I’m still not used to the touching stuff.”
He placed his hand in Steve’s shoulder and it stayed, but Steve was really beginning to realize how fucked all of this was—why Eddie’s skin really didn’t feel right, why he looked kind of hazy, why there had been two of him—god, why had there been two of him—
“There you go,” Eddie murmured sympathetically as Steve took a deep breath, the hand unmoving on his shoulder, and Steve wanted it off, wanted this feeling to go away, but he didn’t say anything. “It’s okay…just breathe for a second, don’t try to talk, alright?”
Steve reluctantly snapped his jaw shut from where he had opened his mouth, with a bit more force than he wanted to. He felt warm in the heat of the bathroom, but he was fucking cold. He flinched when Eddie’s fingers shifted slightly, absentmindedly, tried to play it off, but Eddie must have noticed because the hand slipped off with a sigh.
“Sorry, man, I just…sorry,” Eddie muttered, his hair looking just a bit more dry, but still wet around him, sticking to his face.
“I feel like I’m gonna be sick,” Steve whispered shakily. He wanted his mom, but he didn’t think she’d understand why he was so upset, and that would just make her worried.
“I can go,” Eddie offered, wringing his hands out awkwardly. “I mean, I can’t…leave the property but I could go and hang out in the basement for a bit if you need some space?”
“Why can’t you leave?” Steve muttered, his head tipped back as he tried to breathe again. “You know what, I don’t care, just go, okay?”
Eddie nodded, looking down, and Steve reached around to feel at the spot where his back had hit the counter, hissing. It felt better when he kept his hand on it after a moment, though. “Yeah, I’ll…I’ll go.”
Steve nodded back, closing his eyes and sinking to the floor, rubbing his hands up and down his thighs as he sucked in a shaking breath, shaking his head. He was okay. It wasn’t like his entire world just got flipped fucking upside down, because now there was a ghost in his house, and a body in the shed, and blood covering the bathroom floor.
Right. Blood. He should—he should clean that. He stood, grabbing a towel from the sink and wiped down the edge of the tub, running the shower to help it wash away. He wiped the floor next, and then the sink counter, biting back tears as he tossed the towel into the sink huffing. Fuck showering, he didn’t want to be in the bathroom at all anymore, not after what just happened.
He went into the hall, surprised he didn’t find a trail of blood down the stairs from how much Eddie was still bleeding.
The leather jacket was gone from the dining room when Steve got downstairs, sitting down on the floor in front of one of the kitchen cabinets, the green paint chipping.
The screen door clicked open and his mother padded in, looking exhausted, her heels in her hand and her makeup smudged. She shot him an odd glance as she grabbed a cup from the cabinet, and filled it with water from the sink. She let the cup overflow as white sediment collected at the bottom, her lip quivering as she dumped out the glass and set it on the counter. “Hey, baby?”
“Hmm?” Steve hummed, trying to keep the shake out of his own voice as he stood, his hand cupped at her elbow. “What?”
She hesitated, looking him over.
“Mamma?” He prompted gently, rubbing his thumb in a circle, trying to focus on how real her skin felt.
“Nothing,” she whispered, shaking her head, but she looked like she wanted to say more. She kissed his forehead, having to stand up on her toes now that she wasn’t in her heels anymore. “Are you okay?”
Steve scoffed, looking away, but his breath was still shaky. He rolled his eyes, dropping his hand. “I’m okay, ma. Don’t worry.”
“I am going to worry, you’re all shaky,” she murmured, lightly poking him in the ribs before her hand smoothed up and down his side. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m tired,” Steve lied through his teeth, shaking his head and letting her pull him into a hug, feeling heavy when she swayed him back and forth, her feet rocking, her heels forgotten next to them.
“I’m tired, too,” she confessed quietly, like it was something she wasn’t supposed to say, and Steve fit a hand on the back of her neck, his nose pressed to the top of her head. He hated how she thought she couldn’t tell him these things. How he was just supposed to believe her when she said she was fine each time, because she was his mom.
He stayed quiet, nodding, and trying to ignore the way he heard the muffled sound of the basement stairs creaking, his eyes screwed shut. “It’ll be okay. We’ll be okay.”
Adelina nodded, a hand coming to rub up his back, pausing when he winced. “Steven?” She muttered, her tone worried, and fuck, she never called him his full name.
“I’m okay,” he lied again, bending down to hide his face in her neck, pull her closer and hoped she wouldn’t push, because he didn’t want to talk about it. “I’m okay.”
He needed to stop telling her that.
“I was thinking of heading up to church,” Adelina muttered, pulling away, and Steve wished she would stay—not leave him alone in this fucking house with Eddie, but he nodded.
“I’m staying here, I don’t—“ he breathed out a sigh, shrugging. He hated church more than he hated ghosts. “I’ll just stay.”
“Alright,” his mother said, grabbing her high heels and wiping her eyes. “There shouldn’t be any services right now, I just…need to speak to Dan. Take my mind off of things.”
Steve paused, looking her over as she fidgeted with her dress. She looked embarrassed and he wanted to know why, but he knew she wouldn’t tell him.
“He’s—he’s an old friend, carissima,” she explained quickly. “It’s nothing, just…wanted to catch up, see how he’s been doing in the…years I’ve been away.”
Steve nodded, “Mhm,” as he took the glass and filled it up with the now clear water. “I don’t need an explanation, ma.” He turned, kissing her on the cheek. “I’ll tell dad you’re visiting one of your lady friends if he gets back before you.”
He passed the water to his mom, who sipped it and muttered. “One of my lady friends?”
Steve nodded, leaning back against the counter. “Yeah,” he smiled, a thin and weak thing, but a smile nonetheless, nudging his shoulder against his. “Go, you don’t wanna keep Dan waiting.”
Adelina rolled her eyes, but she pushed off of the counter and walked upstairs to fix her makeup.
comments and reblogs are appreciated! they help cheer me up and motivate me to write more if i know that you guys are enjoying this nonsense hehe
the taglist for this will always be open, but i am in the midst of a writing break (a very short one) so it might take me a while to post the net chapter of this <3
(divider by florietas)
#i already have a bunch of this written so i thought since i'm taking a kind of short break from writing#i would post some pre-written stuff so that y'all still have stuff to read#i'm on a laptop right now so i'll post this on ao3 when i can log into it again#i don't remember my password haha i never use stuff on this laptop#it's old#also i don't speak italian#but i looked up italian pet names and found ones i liked so sorry if they're horribly wrong#i'm tired#steddie#steddie fanfic#steddie angst#steddie hurt/comfort#steve x eddie#finn writes#steddie fic#stranger things#eddie munson#steve harrington#my fic#steve harrington has a bad dad#steve harrington fanfic#steve harrington fanfiction#eddie munson fanfic#eddie munson fanfiction#long fic#my post
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Teen Dad AU
Part 2!!
Starting the tag list with: @mugloversonly @jackiemonroe5512 @thestarslittleking @jonesen4coffee @virginlemontea @blackpanzy @littlebluejane @paintsplatteredandimperfect @astrid-nomically-steddie @maferisa-7 @phantomrose17 @child-of-cthuhlu @sofadofax @thoughtfulbreadpolice @fandomnerd103 @artemisiscursed @croatoan-like-its-hot @silenzioperso @myownworstenemyyy @feral-possums-in-the-bog @mente-sindescanso @mrslectermoriarty @y4r3luv @a-couchpotato @aknelimdoogladania @she-collects-smut
…
Thursday came in a false sense of security.
Steve woke up to the gentle sun in his face, the breeze of an open window in his hair, and his son’s chubby baby fingers wrapped around his hand.
Steve grinned sleepily at Louie and laughed when baby Louie smiled so wide back at him that his paci fell out.
Steve held Louie close while preparing a small breakfast of eggs and toast, then continued to hold him while making his bottle and setting out a few cheese puffs for him teethe on.
Steve made sure Louie ate first, helping him hold the bottle and then laughing at the pure mess he makes with the cheese puffs. Then Steve himself ate. Clean up was quick enough witch a wet rag and a speedy wipe-down.
Later on, just as Steve was thinking about preparing lunch, the front doors opened.
“Shit. Shit shit shit SHIT.” Steve angrily whispered to himself. Little Louie stared at him from where he was propped on the couch, not a thought behind his wide eyes. Though he obviously knew something was wrong with his dad.
Steve was quick to buckle Louie into his car seat, bundling him up with a blanket and giving him his bear.
“Stephan? Are you in the living room? Come grab our bags, please,” Cynthia Harrington called from down the hall.
There was no getting out of this. No way of getting Louie to the car without his parents seeing. But he’s sure they already knew of the baby, or suspected something. Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln were nosy motherfuckers set on ruining Steve’s life.
Steve sighed and looked at Louie. He knelt in front of the car seat and rubbed a hand gently on his son’s face. Louie grabbed his finger and smiled around his paci.
Steve wanted to cry.
“Stephan! Your mother called you so answer her!” Richard Harrington yelled. Steve heard the wind outside pick up aggressively and cursed the mornings sunshine.
“Coming!”
Steve padded into the hallway where his parents were taking off their jackets. Cynthia and Richard were picture-perfect— or they would’ve been. If it weren’t for the pressed line of his mother’s mouth and the hard line of his father’s jaw. Steve knew what was coming before they did.
“Stephan, the bags.” Were his mothers first words to him. Not “Hi, son, how have you been?” Not “Sorry we’ve been gone for nearly 8 months.” Not “How are you feelings after that concussion from last November? We’re terribly sorry we couldn’t stop work to simply call and make sure you were ok.”
No. None of that. Instead he was demanded around like a fucking dog.
“Um. Actually, I had to talk to you both. If you don’t mind—“
“Save it. Take the bags upstairs and meet us in the living room,” Richard stated harshly.
Steve flinched. He hated himself for flinching. But they couldn’t go in the living room. Not while Louie was still in there.
“Actually, dad— it’s very important and I just really need to talk to you guys—“
“Stephan!”
Steve winced at the pitchy tone of his mother.
“Please, I promise— It’ll be worth your time, just— just give a minute, please.” He was begging now. He hated begging.
Richard had grown tired of Steve’s fumbling for words and shoved past him. Steve knocked into the wall with the harshness.
“Stephan, you will listen to your mother and take the bags upstairs and meet us—“
“Dad, wait—“
Richard stopped in the doorway to the living room, whatever insult or command he was going to throw Steve’s way dying on his tongue.
“Stephan. Why, in the Lord’s name, is there a baby’s car seat in my living room?”
His tone was calm. Steve knew better than to think he was actually anything other than furious.
“Thats— that’s what I needed to speak to you about. Please, I—“
Steve should’ve anticipated the slap.
But he didn’t. And his head snapped to the side with the force that left him seeing stars.
Steve didn’t stay long enough to listen to his dad yelling slurs or his mom crying. He simply grabbed Louie’s car seat, picked up his shoes by the door, and left.
.
Steve had been driving for near three hours before he pulled over. He’d circled the entirety of town before finally pulling into a small dirt path by the quarry. Belatedly he realized someone was crying.
He hurried to get out of the car, rounding to the back and sliding into the backseat to sit next to Louie’s car seat. But Louie wasn’t crying, he was sound asleep.
Steve realized he was crying.
He startled when a broken sob tore itself out of his throat. He hurried out of the car and dragged himself the few yards to the edge of the quarry.
He sat down and let the rain pelt him from all angles. His face stung. Steve knew the slap would bruise phenomenally in the morning. It’d probably affect his tips at work.
He swung his feet idly on the edge, belatedly realizing he wasn’t wearing his shoes or even socks for that matter. His heels where starting to bleed from each time he rammed them into the rocks on the edge of the cliff.
Steve doesn’t know how long he sat there in the rain. He snapped back to reality when a particularly loud burst of thunder rumbled in his gut. He went back to the car.
Louie was still sound asleep. Steve figured he himself should most likely sleep as well. He didn’t know when he’d be able to get a place for them, but he’d already been saving up.
He curled up in the back seat next to baby Louie. He didn’t bother with a blanket, and he knew he’d get a cold with his clothes still being wet, but he deemed it fine.
Steve’s sleep was fitful and restless. Filled with slurs and yelling and running from monsters that shouldn’t exist.
.
It was a week before he finally got a place.
Not that long, sure. But it was a week of pure dread and exhaustion and nightmares.
The trailer he was looking at was located near the edge of Forest Hills. It was two bedroom one bathroom and had a small living room (with no ceiling light) and a kitchen (that barely had any wiggle room). But it was his.
He’d been at work when he got the call— as that was where he told the landlord to call. Mason— the line cook— called him back.
“Hey Steve-o! That landlord guys on the phone!”
Steve jumped so hard he nearly spilled the waters he was carrying.
“Be right there, Mace!”
Steve was quick to get the waters to the table 7 and take their orders for the night before he rushed back. He tossed his notepad at Mason and snatched the phone.
“Hi, Mr. Gardison!” he greeted cheerily.
“Stephen, hi. So…”
And Steve was given the trailer.
He was vibrating with excitement by the end of his call. When Steve returned the phone to its holder he was picked up from the ground in a bear hug. He laughed and hugged Mason back.
“You got the place!” Mason cheered.
“I got the place!” Steve laughed.
The rest of his day went swimmingly. He would be able to officially move into the trailer on Friday— which was fine by him. Two days of waiting was nothing.
Steve was given congratulations from a few of the regulars. Mr. Jinkins gave him a good slap on the shoulder while Miss. Gladson pulled him into a hug. They tipped him an extra 5 dollars each before they left.
At the end of his Wednesday shift, Steve gave out hugs to most of his coworkers. Mason, Allya, and his boss Michelle got hugs while George and Gwen got high fives. Steve left feeling light on his feet with a to-go bag for dinner.
Thursday was filled with the lunch rush. Steve had to take his break early to check on baby Louie in the back. He felt bad turning George’s manager office into a daycare but George assured him it was fine.
“Hey honey,” Steve’s cooed at the baby in his arms. “How are you doing, huh love? You’ve been cooped up for so long I know.”
Louie gripped his baby hands into the front of Steve’s apron. He was back in the kitchens today, Allya taking his place up front waitressing.
Steve hopped around and lightly bounced Louie against his chest, humming quietly and gently.
Louie whined and continued to cry.
“I know Louie, I know. You hungry? Hang on baby.”
Steve made sure Louie was fed and burped and laid him done for a nap. He only had an hour of his shift left.
Thursday finished off normally and Steve left with his usual dinner. He drove out to the quarry and parked before sitting in the backseat with Louie to eat.
Eventually he took Louie out of the car and sat with him on the rocky ground of the quarry. Steve held Louie close in his lap, letting the baby play with his hands and fingers and babble about nothing and everything.
Steve occasionally answered with little gums of encouragement, but for the most part he let baby Louie talk to himself. He was lost in thought, daydreaming about the trailer and how they got to move in tomorrow.
Before Steve knew it Louie had fallen asleep and he himself was on the verge. He got them both settled in the backseat once more and allowed himself to drift off.
…
We’re finally, maybe, getting somewhere lol. Tag list is open to everyone still, feel free to ask for a place!! We’ll get into some of Steve’s school life in the next part hopefully 🤞
Part 3:
#stranger things#steve harrington#little louie harrington :)#teen dad steve harringon#teen dad au#i don’t remember what else I’m supposed to tag#uh#eventual steddie#eddie x steve#steve x eddie#steddie#steve harrington is a damn good dad#steve harrington has bad parents#steve harrington needs a better family#steve harrington needs a hug#everyone wants to give him a hug#I’ve run out of things to tag
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Every time someone makes Steve say he doesn't need kids of his own because he has the party a small part of me dies
#stop denying this mans dream just because you dont personally like it!!!!#having kids of your own is not the same as babysitting kids slightly younger than you!!!#the party has their own siblings and parents!!!#he is not their dad!!!#give him babies of his own!!!#he wants to be a dad and have a big family and thats not a bad thing!#its a good dream!#im emo about this and im not sorry#steve harrington#momo.txt
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Headcanon that Steve's Dad and Uncle Wayne were in high school together and Mr Harrington was essentially an even more of an asshole season 1 Steve. So when Wayne hears Eddie complain about Steve in highschool he's not exactly suprised. But when he finally meets Steve, who incidentally showed up in the middle of the night, cut on his forehead and a fresh shiner, being held close by his nephew with silent tears, he thinks maybe he was wrong and Steve was just another target like he was.
#uncle wayne#steve harrington#eddie munson#stranger things#good uncle wayne#steve harrington has bad parents#mr harrington#his dads an asshole#stranger things s4#st4#steddie#stranger things season 4#stranger things headcanons
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You Gotta Let It Out Soon
slight tw: verbal abuse and attempted assault. Overall, it's just Steve's dad being a terrible father.
Please be kind to yourself if you choose to read this.
Title from "Daddy Issues" by the Neighborhood (Seemed fitting)
Steve was late.
Dustin is going to give him so much shit.
He didn’t mean to take a nap, honest.
He had to lay down because he felt a headache coming on, and he really didn’t want to deal with it.
Were his eyes closed? Yes.
Did he feel himself nodding off? Well… yeah.
But that’s not the point! He didn’t mean to.
He rushes down the stairs, his keys in his mouth as he awkwardly hops on one foot getting on one shoe before doing the same with the other one. It wasn’t until he looked up that he found he was being watched.
He stands up straight, taking his keys and shoving them in his pocket, keeping a tight grip on them.
“Dad…”
“Steven.”
“W-what are — When did-”
“For God’s sake Steven, stop being an idiot and finish your sentence.” His dad was already done with him.
“What are you doing here?” That’s a safe question.
“It’s my house, Steven. Why wouldn’t I be here?”
Steve shrugs, “You haven’t been here for months. Haven’t seen you since February, it's November now. ”
His dad scoffs, rolling his eyes, “I’m a very-”
“Very busy man, yeah.” Steve finishes that same lame excuse his dad gives him every time, “You mentioned that once or twice.”
“Don’t talk back to me Steven.” His voice went stern, “You have the nerve to act out when the house isn’t even cleaned and the fridge is empty. How are you living Steve, like a goddamn barn animal?”
His dad may have a point, the house could use some cleaning, and he definitely needed to go to the store, but honestly, he wasn’t expecting him to be home.
“My bad, I’ve been busy.”
“Do not make excuses Steven-”
“I’m not making excuses!” He talks over his dad, “I work 10-hour shifts and when I’m not working, I’m helping some of the kids I look after.”
“Like a babysitter?” The tone of his dad’s voice is condescending.
“Yeah, like a babysitter, sure.”
“You’re a grown man, Steven. You can’t even take care of yourself.”
“Well, I did though, didn’t I?” Steve crosses his arms, shrugging, “You and Mom weren’t around. Took good care of myself then.”
“Your Mother and I were around enough.”
Steve can’t help but laugh, “Seriously? You’re serious right now?”
“Stop laughing Steven! We are your parents. We raised you to be better.”
Now that caught his attention. “You raised me? Seriously?”
“Of course we did. We gave you a roof over your head and kept you fed-” His dad kept listing things, but Steve just heard white noise.
“You didn’t raise me.” Steve mutters, keeping his eyes down. His father stopped, clearly hearing him.
“Say that again?” He was clearly taunting Steve, and Steve fell for it.
“You didn’t raise me.”
“Steven Richard Harrington, do not talk to your father like that.” Steve cringes at his full name. Especially his middle name. A reminder he’ll always be connected to his father, even without his last name.
“I did though you left when-”
“I did not ‘leave’ Steven. I had work to do, and it was important.”
“More important than your son?”
“You were old enough to take care of yourself.”
“I was NINE!” He screams, a tear falling down his cheek as he points his finger at his father, “You left me to fend for myself when I was nine!”
“Oh boo-hoo, grow up Steven-”
“I have!” He screams again, finally letting out all his pent-up anger, “And you would have noticed if you were around. But you weren’t.”
He gets into his father’s face, “While you were off screwing every woman you laid eyes on and mom was drowning her sorrows at the hotel bar about her pathetic excuse of a husband, I was here. Growing up. I taught myself how to use the stove and how to buy groceries. I taught myself how to fix things around the house. I even taught myself how to drive. You did none of that.”
“I have paid for this life you are living. This house! That car! Those tutors, even though they were useless.” His dad runs a frustrated hand through his hair. It physically makes Steve ill. “God, I raised an insolent, unappreciative son.”
“You didn’t fucking raise me!” He yells, his throat already getting raw from the explosion of emotions.
His father stopped, staring daggers at Steve.
He senses it before it happens. He sees the anger on his father’s face and just knows. As his father’s hand flies up to slap him, he catches it. His nails digging into his father’s wrist, his knuckles turning white. The shock on his father’s face makes him smile.
He leans in close, taunting him, “You can’t fucking hurt me, I have fought worse things than you, and I have always won.”
Steve knows he has to look crazy, he can see it in his dad’s eyes. He’s scared of Steve. Good.
He shoves his father’s arm down to his side and walks by, heading up the stairs. He’s done and he means it. He grabs his duffle bag and shoves a bunch of his clothes and toiletries into it. He grabs his unused backpack and takes down all the pictures everyone hung up, carefully putting them in his bag. He grabs some other miscellaneous items that mean the world to him: like the rock Eddie gave him because it was pretty, the walkie Dustin gave him so he would always know everyone was safe, the little notes Robin would write on post-it notes and slap onto his wall. He took all of it.
With his backpack on and his duffle thrown over his shoulder he grabs his keys from his pocket and goes back downstairs. He sees that his father moved to the living room, so he tries to sneak out quietly.
Of course the Gods didn’t think he deserved a break.
“Where do you think you are going, Steven.”
Steve’s shoulders drop, and he turns to his dad.
“I’m leaving.”
“If you leave this house, I’ll-”
“You’ll what?” He challenges. “No, seriously. What will you do?”
His dad looks him straight in the eyes, “I’ll sell this house, and you’ll be on the street. Your mother and I will never come back to Hawkins.”
“Good fucking riddance.”
Steve opens the door and walks out, he knows his dad is yelling at him. Probably calling him all sorts of names, but he was done.
He throws his bags into the passenger seat, gets in his Beemer and drives off. His shoulders relax as he watches the Harrington house get small in his rearview mirror.
---
Steve didn’t have a plan when he left. Just knew he had to leave.
He continued to drive aimlessly around Hawkins before pulling into a familiar trailer park. He parks next to the van and gets out, jumping the stairs and knocking, rather impatiently, at the door.
He hears Eddie mumbling to himself, most likely annoyed he had to get out of bed, before the door swings open.
“Stevie!” Eddie’s once annoyed face instantly lit up, but slowly it fell, “What happened?”
“Huh?” Steve can feel the lump in his throat, and he feels the tears on his cheeks. Shit, how long had he been crying. “Shit.” He furiously wipes away his tears.
Eddie ushers him inside and moves him to the couch. He envelops Steve in his arms, letting him rest his head on his chest, hearing the rhythmic beating of his heart.
“Sweetheart, what happened?” Eddie coos.
Steve cries again as he explains what went down with his dad. Eddie comforts him the whole time, letting Steve take his time. When he was done, Eddie was furious.
“He kicked you out!” He softly yells.
“Technically no, I left.”
“But he just allowed you! And he almost hit you!”
“But he didn’t. I just was… overreacting or something.” He shrugs it off, but he knows Eddie won’t.
“Stevie, look at me.” Steve does what he is told and was a little shocked as Eddie gently took his face in his hands. “No parent should ever, ever hit you or even attempt to hit you.”
Steve slowly nods, “Yeah, but-”
“No buts. Steve, you can’t keep sticking up for your dad. He’s an asshole. You know it. I know it. Most of fucking Hawkins knows it. Why do you still protect him?”
“He’s my dad, Eds.” He says like that's an explanation. And it is, in some ways, but not the way Eddie is looking for. “We had good times, before the bad. Before he left. And I know he’s capable of that good. He has to be.” He feels himself choking up again, “He was a good dad.”
Eddie pulls him into his chest, letting Steve cry it out.
Steve sometimes forgets that there was good within his dad. That he actually had good memories with him. But that was before the Harrington business picked up.
His dad would take him to play catch in the yard. And shoot hoops with him. As a family they would go on drives and on picnics. They’d watch movies and listen to music and dance around. When Steve had a nightmare his dad would come in and read him stories as he fell asleep. They would get up early and make breakfast for his mom in bed on Mother’s Day, softly laughing as they brought up waffles and coffee for her. There was a time his dad would go to his little league games and cheer him on as loud as possible.
But then his business picked up, and it was like all those good times disappeared.
“Stevie, I’m sorry. I know he’s your dad-”
“You’re right though,” He croaks, “He’s a terrible father now. He’s a completely different man now than he was then. It’s- it’s just… hard to let go.”
Eddie nods, running his fingers through Steve’s hair. “I know, baby. I know.”
They stay on the couch, Eddie comforting him until Wayne gets home. Eddie briefly explains what happened with Steve’s dad.
“You stay here as long as you need to, boy. You got that? This is your home now. And you're safe here.”
Steve nods, another round of tears falling down his face as Wayne hugs him tightly.
Steve slowly puts his stuff around the trailer, not too much though. Just hangs his clothes with Eddie’s and puts his toothbrush in the holder.
He finally feels like he’s in a home.
And when he and Eddie drive past the Harrington house and see a “For Sale” sign in front, it feels like weight has been lifted off his shoulders.
#steve harrington#steve harrington's dad is a bad dad#downright terrible#steve harrington has daddy issues#steve does not have a good relationship with his father#established steddie#steddie#eddie munson#steve x eddie#eddie x steve#stranger things#wayne munson being the best man alive#i love wayne munson#seriously 10/10#wayne munson supremacy#okay i am done#drops this and runs away peaking through a bush
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Hopper slowly becoming a father figure to Steve over the years holds such a special place in my heart. I’m a sucker for Hop detaining Steve for underage drinking when he’s 14, and then again when he’s 15, and then slowly coming to the realization that the reason the Harrington’s don’t answer the phone to come pick up their son is because they’re not home to do so. Hopper who slowly starts to love Steve like his own, Hopper who’s worried sick about him when he finds him at the quarry one night despite Steve’s futile attempts at claiming he just needed air. Hopper who, though he hates that Steve is even involved in the upside down, is thankful that it brought them together again. Hopper who lets Steve move in after Vecna because his parents sold the house and kicked him out. Hopper who receives adoption papers one Christmas from Steve, and if there isn’t a dry eye in the room when it’s gifted? Well, who’s gonna know
#stranger things#steve harrington#jim hopper#steve harrington angst#steve harrington has bad parents#hopper is dad
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i want to see wayne and hopper interact
hopper, who knows about steve’s father and the bruises steve hides, who sees the way steve flinches when he raises a hand, who knows that it’s worse when his parents are home than when they’re away. hopper, who went through a lot of the same trauma steve did (thrust into a parental role, fighting monsters- both human and nonhuman- and getting captured & tortured by russians).
and wayne munson, who’s heard a lot of things about richard harrington, how he’s a heartless bastard and an extreme perfectionist. wayne, who knows the signs of abuse (because of eddie’s dad) and recognizes them in the harrington boy his nephew keeps bringing over. wayne, a war veteran who is intimately familiar with ptsd and flashbacks, recognizing those in a 19 year old boy, a kid, who has too many scars and a haunted look in his eyes.
i want these two to meet at some kind of gathering with the kids & co at steve’s house. i want them to sit in a comfortable silence, sipping beer and watching the people around them. i want them to notice steve freeze up at the sound of a car pulling into the driveway, watch the blood drain from his face as he stumbles inside to the front door. i want them to glance at each other and, without a moment of hesitation, silently agree to follow him.
i want richard harrington to open his door and see two men- the chief of police and another man he doesn’t recognize- eyeing him with matching looks of righteous fury, his son trembling behind them.
i want steve to have these two people he considers father figures stand up for him and protect him from the man that tarnished his idea of fatherhood in the first place.
#stranger things#implied abuse cw#steve harrington#jim hopper#wayne munson#steve harringtons dad#hopper stranger things#steve harrington has bad parents#steve harrington has scars#mini fic#steve harrington whump#chief hopper
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The Lie Becomes the Truth (Part 1) - A Steddie Fic
The thing is...Steve didn't lie to his parents. If there was one thing about the panic inducing shit storm he could hold onto, it was that.
Steve didn't lie.
The beautiful, weathered, smooth, terrifying, slippery sea-glass words that unexpectedly ebbed from his throat were as truthful as the blood pumping through his veins.
Lost in the overwhelming hazy-daze his parents often left him in when they were bombarding him with lectures, criticisms, and instructions, Steve just open his mouth, and the words softly, silkingly slid out.
"I'm in love with Eddie Munson."
This stopped both of his parents cold in their tracks.
(His parents had been talking at Steve about possibly setting up an apprenticeship at a local law firm, and talking about how an associate's niece would make a nice addition to the family, like she was a Tiffany lamp instead of a potential daughter in law. Before that it was Steve's "poor choice" of flowers he planted in the flower beds. "Lavender and mums look plain and poor, Steven. You should have replanted the snap dragons and daffodils.")
His mother looked flabbergasted. His father?
Fuming.
"Would you like to run that by me again, Steven?"
And...yeah. Yeah! He didn't mean to say it, but he *did* want to say it again. He wanted to yell it on top of the roof. He wanted it tattooed on his skin. He wanted to whisper it over and over again in Eddie's ear.
He had faced down demogorgons, demodogs, demobats, fucking Vecna, his kids in danger, concussions, fucking Russians, Max's driving, drunk Nancy Wheeler, and a pale Eddie Munson with no heartbeat.
If he could face those terrifying things and come through, he could face these practical strangers and their suitcases in the foyer.
Squaring his shoulders and putting on the Steve Harrington swagger, he stated it again. "Yeah, I'm in love with Eddie Munson."
His mom blinked.
"But isn't he a guy?"
Okay, so apparently two truths were to be said that day.
"Yeah. I like guys too, Mom."
And that is when his father yelled.
...
A numb, shocked Steve was driving aimlessly towards the Henderson's house. Robin was out of town visiting Nana Buckley. Eddie...he just couldn't go to Eddie's. Not yet. He needed Dustin to help him parse out what the fuck just happened to him.
Apparently, the Harrington's didn't care one bit that their son was bisexual. He could like and date men all he liked, as long as he gave them grandchildren to take Christmas card pictures with.
It didn't matter that Eddie had been accused and cleared of murder. "Any publicity is good publicity, Steven. It is all in how you spin it."
No. Steve's parents threw him out...because Eddie was "trailer trash".
His father threw the contents of his closet at him. "No son of mine is going to date someone from Forest Hills!"
His mother fretted. "What will our friends think?"
Also...somehow, Steve went from the lazy, single, screw up son that couldn't get into college, to the lazy, screw up son that was *engaged* to Eddie Munson.
That came about when his horrified mother held up a particular skull ring that had been on his night stand.
"W-what is this?!"
When he was in the hospital, Eddie had grasped Steve's hand and shakily slipped the ring onto his finger. "Hey, Stevie? Hold onto this for me, would ya?"
Of course, he had said. Eddie had smiled before he passed out on the gurney.
That had been a couple of months ago. Eddie had never asked for it back. Steve didn't wear it...in public. While most people take off their jewelry for bed, Steve would put the ring *on*.
Steve had been honest, again. He shrugged.
"It's Eddie's."
His mother wailed. "He gave you a ring, and it isn't even gold?!?"
So, yeah. Steve was now kicked out because he was engaged to a poor man that lives in a trailer.
Steve had told the truth, but it somehow became a life changing lie.
What was he going to do? And what was he going to say to Eddie?
---
Link to Part 2
#steddie#steve harrington#eddie munson#luna is a writer#dustin’s dads#dustin henderson#steve harrington has bad parents
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ok but imagine billy staying over at steve’s and steve’s parents come home early from one of their trips one night and they’re arguing about something
you know, voices very much raised, accusations being thrown around, the whole shebang
and billy just bolts up, knuckles white where he’s gripping onto the bedsheets and suddenly he’s six again
six years old and his dad is yelling at his mom, his mom is yelling back and he’s in the middle of it
but then steve’s arms are around him, pulling him into his lap, tucking his head into his chest
and he’s safe
he’s still out of it, can still hear the voices, still has tears running down his face but he can feel steve, can smell steve, and he knows no one’s going to hurt him in this moment, knows that much
knows he’s safe with steve
#billy hargrove#steve harrington#harringrove#my words#idk i was thinking abt neil’s ‘you were with him again weren’t you’#and steve saying that his mom doesn’t trust his dad#not the parallels#shoutout to steve’s parents shitty marriage#really helps with the dynamic here#why do all the st parents hate each other and cheat on each other what is that about#anyway#steve being a good boyfriend#billy feeling comforted by steve#it’s all i want#it’s what they deserve tbh#billy comforts steve afterwards it’s ok#no but actually waking up to shouting has to be one of the worst things#ik billy would have a bad time with it#steve: i need to be needed#billy: hi#steve: perfect
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Every so often, I find myself thinking of the kind of story that Billy could have had if it had been Neil who got flayed in S3, instead of Billy.
If it was Neil who went off to work one day, and came back Wrong... not because he came back mean, but because he came back too nice. Too calm, missing all the sneers and casual insults that are usually thrown Billy's way whenever they're in the same room; strangely unconcerned with Billy's life but too concerned with whatever Max and that new friend of hers are up to, instead of offloading "responsibility" for his step-daughter's every move to Billy under threat of violence if he doesn't make her stick to Neil's rules.
And Billy is the only one who notices just how wrong this all is.
Max listens to him about as well as she ever does - which is to say: not at all - when he tries to bring up Neil's behavior with her (admittedly, he probably brings it up with his usual amount of grace and tact, which is to say: also none). It's not like Billy can tell the cops that his dad is acting weird by being too nice, if he was even the sort of person who went to cops to solve his problems. He hasn't exactly cultivated the kind of friendships where they talk about his relationship with his shitty dad, either, so he's exhausted his extremely short list of people who might understand as soon as Max storms off in her usual cloud of pissy, righteous teenage anger at his inability to talk to her without being a dick right off the bat.
And like, he's not even entirely sure why he's bothering to try and understand this new leaf Neil's turned over? Shouldn't it be a good thing that his dad is mostly just ignoring him, that Neil's finally taking a bit of responsibility for the kid whose mom he decided to marry and play happy little family with in the first place?
It's just... it's weird, is all.
It's weird, and it grates at him, and he can't help but drag himself into this mess, looking for trouble even when it doesn't find him first as his dad likes - liked - to say whenever Billy got caught up in the consequences of his own poor decision making.
So long story short, Billy goes from the one always being watched to the one always watching his dad, discovers his dad may or may not be starting some kind of cult with all his (white, male, because the man's definitely got plenty of bigotry that Vecna's perfectly happy to play along with, as long as he gets his army somehow) coworkers, discovers that actually it may be a literal fucking Satan cult or some shit when some of those coworkers and/or his dad start bleeding black (and maybe he catches sight of that new friend of Max's displaying what are definitely magic fucking powers), and winds up stumbling into the midst of the Upside Down plot all on his lonesome just as things are coming to a climax with the melted-people-spidermonster at the brand new mall, of all places.
And maybe Billy's been doing some of his own rather difficult and unpleasant personal introspection and character growth, in between spying on his dad and discovering that his sister and her nerdy little friends know way too much about magic and monsters, but still can't seem to notice just how fucking weird her own step-dad is acting until he goes straight-up feral at their little magic friend, said magical friend shoves him through a brick wall with her brain, and he escapes without so much as a broken bone so far as Billy can tell from his vantage point, hidden what is suddenly looking like a much less safe distance away from whatever-the-fuck-that-was than he'd originally thought.
The point is, Billy's done some thinking of his own. Some growing as a person, even, one might say.
So by the time he follows his dad to the mall, he still honestly has no clue what the hell is going on, but he knows his dad has always been a bastard, and he knows that little magic kid his dad is dragging towards a horror movie spider monster the size of their house might be the only one who can save this stupid nonsense town full of monsters and cornfields and bullshit and maybe, possibly, a few people who don't deserve to die horribly in some insane alien monster apocolypse.
In this universe, instead of El making a last minute, desperate attempt to reach out to Billy with empathy before the Mind Flayer feeds her to the monster, it's Billy who steps in out of nowhere to distract his dad from this random little girl the monster seems to want so badly but isn't gonna get.
Because Neil's been acting weird. He's been ignoring his fuckup of a son, paying too much attention to Max and hasn't even called Billy a delinquent or an irresponsible fuckup or a faggot in nearly a week, and apparently he's possessed by a monster that might literally be from hell.
But Max seemed to think Neil was still somewhere in there when he went crazy on her little magic friend, and maybe she couldn't reach him, but Billy's spent half his life learning just how to push his dad's buttons and get Neil's attention lazer-focused on himself.
Pissing off Neil Hargrove is an artform that Billy's long since perfected.
It feels good to be doing it on purpose because he's trying to stand in front of someone else to keep them safe, for the first time since his mom left and he started thinking he had to care about himself first, since no one else was going to. Doesn't even feel afraid when he tells his dad loud enough for the peanut gallery to overhear that he was right all those years, he raised a filthy fucking faggot who likes dick instead of pussy, that he doesn't give a shit about respect and responsibility if those things are supposed to turn him into a Man like the one that Neil Hargrove's always been.
Billy's always been a disappointment to his father.
Somehow, that fact doesn't sting like it used to.
Now he's got proof his dad hates him enough to shake off a shadow monster from another world just to beat on his own kid, and Billy?
Billy meets his dad's rage with a fucking smile.
For once, his dad's hits don't hurt more than the ache of the physical bruises they'll leave behind, don't come packed with that extra kick of guilt and shame and longing for a dad who loves him. For once, he makes himself get back up, bloody teeth bared with all the feral hatred and rage fostered from years of living in fear of his own father, and he hits back at the man who was already a monster long before he ever got possessed by one from another world.
Billy was never gonna be the kind of son his father wanted, but it's on his own terms now. Because Billy's never gonna be the kind of man his father was, either.
And step one of being a better kind of person is making sure this stupid fucking town and his annoying bitch of a step-sister and all the other weird little nerds and annoying classmates she seems to hang out with and all the other blissfully ignorant hicks sensibly enjoying the 4th of July fair instead of fighting eldritch horrors in the mall, actually survive to see July 5th...
Even if that means fist fighting his dad in the mall while a little magic girl takes advantage of Neil's distraction to take on a melted flesh monster in the background of this brand new form of fucked up mess his life has somehow become.
#st#billy hargrove#neil hargrove#one of these people was already a monster#and one of them was a messed up kid with a lot of bad reactions to a lot of ongoing trauma#and some screwed up world views that he deserved a chance to grow up and learn better than#and anyway i'm probably not going to write this fanfic#because i already have too many wips higher up on my priority list to finish#but this story that could have been has lived rent free in my head for a while#and i figured i'd finally at least share it here#gay billy hargrove#he's definitely got a crush on steve#even if he leaves *that* part out of his Distracting Dad speech#because he definitely noticed steve was there too#(because of course he was)#(in retrospect#monster shit is probably what was happening last time he encountered steve harrington under extremely sketchy circumstances too)
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I think Steve needs a secret creative hobby that he springs on the group, surprising everyone.
Sometimes, it can be a little depressing to believe that everyone you love sees you as this one guy, this dumb jock. Intellectually, he knows that the kids and Robin, Nance, and Eddie don't think he's stupid, but that doesn't make the feeling go away.
What if his mom had put him in a ballroom dancing class when he was younger? From age 7 to 12, he took dancing through an independent studio with the other rich kids. It started with ballroom, which continued into swing-dancing. He loved it.
And Steve was good.
He was fluid and graceful, an absolute natural the instructor would remark to his mother when she would come to pick him up. In fact, they were picking kids to participate in the upcoming tournament for the youth category, and Steve was a perfect candidate, the instructor said.
That was until his dad made the executive decision to pull Steve out and force him into sports after catching Steve dancing with his mom in the kitchen. Watching his son twirling around with Susan Harrington, a small indulgent smile on her face, was the final straw for Richard.
"No son of mine is going to prance around like that, like a little fairy," he snarled as he dragged Steve away from the kitchen, his firm white-knuckle grip holding Steve's small arm as they made their way up the stairs to his room.
Steve tried not to make a sound as he covered his ears to the yelling match taking place in room below him.
Steve ended up in little league the next day.
Steve still practiced though, on his own.
It wasn't as though he hadn't made friends in that class, kids who kept on with it.
He missed it, he missed them. He missed how he felt when dancing.
It was freeing.
Carla Neilson taught him the new steps, things she continued to learn while Steve played baseball, basketball, and eventually made the swim team in highschool.
Swimming would probably be the closest he would get to that feeling of gliding along the floor, that grace and fluidity never really leaving him.
He had been a decent player at one time because of his quick feet, but that was before Billy Hargrove rolled into town. Steve never quite learned how to plant his feet because dancing always kept him moving, Hargrove seemed to enjoy pointing out how truly 'fairy-like' he was as he made his way across the court. Those words, the same words his father had hissed at him, all those years ago left him cold and hurt.
He stops dancing after that.
It's not until years later, after Vecna, after Billy dies and his Father disowns him, after he kisses Eddie for the first time and he finally feels like he can breath again that the group finds out.
It's at a party. Everyone of age is a little tipsy or faded at this point in the evening and playing a question game, the kids roll their eyes at their older friends antics and stick to the Nintendo across the living room of Steve and Eddie's apartment.
The question of, 'What is your hidden talent,' comes up and everyone takes their turn.
Robin recites the alphabet backwards, not blinking or pausing the entire way which everyone applauds for once she's finished.
Nancy does a quick handstand and takes three steps backward before dropping her legs back to the ground, she curtsies with a sly smile and laughs as she sits next to Robin again who is staring at Nancy like shes never seen her before.
Eddie thinks for a moment before lifting his hand to his mouth and blows out an impressively loud whistle that prompts Mike to tell them all off for being loud.
Jonathan blows a giant smoke ring while Argyle moonwalks around the living room, earning the pair of them a chorus of woops and applause.
Everyone turns to Steve once Argyle drops back to his seat next to Jonathan, "Alright brochacho you're up man," he says with a hazy smile.
Steve thinks for a moment, looking around at everyone, all of these people who love him, and makes a decision.
"Uh, yeah okay, I've got one," he says slowly before standing up from the loveseat he's sharing with Eddie, "but I'll need a volunteer and some music".
"Oh my God," Robin stage whispers to Nancy, "is he going to do magic right now? Steven Harrington can you do magic??"
Steve snorts and rolls his eyes, "I think I found my volunteer," he holds out his hand for Robin to take as Eddie stands up to turn on their second-hand record player they got from Uncle Wayne as a house warming.
"Uh, one of mine Eds," Steve says with a slight shake to his voice, "something with a beat".
"Oh shit," Robin chokes out as Steve tugs her close. She nearly stumbles, but his arms hold her up.
Eddie smirks like it's a challenge and pulls out Whitney Houston, earning a smile from Jonathan and a small, 'really?' from Nancy.
Argyle laughs, "Heck Yeah man, Whitney rocks dude, turn that shit up!"
Steve smiles and takes a deep breath, his heart is racing but he doesn't care in this moment, he looks at Eddie who is grinning at him, a slightly curious look on his face.
And it's like riding a bike, he leads Robin across the small space twirling and dipping her as she squeals and tries to follow.
Steve probably could have picked a slightly less clumsy volunteer, but he loves Robin and showing her, showing them all, this part of himself after hiding it for so long just means the world to him.
He keeps his own feet fast, keeping the beat but moving Robin where she needs to be as they glide over the carpet, he spins her out and then back into his arms as the song ends, they are both breathing heavily by the time the last note rings out and Robin can't contain her hands from smacking into Steve's chest as she yells, "Who the fuck are you! Dingus how could you hide this!"
Steve blushes as Eddie comes up behind him to hook his head over his shoulder as his arms come up to wrap around Steve's waist.
"Fancy footwork dude," Argyle says nodding at Jonathan who is looking at Steve with fascination.
"When did you learn to dance?" Nancy asks, her voice soft and kind, as though she knows exactly how big this is for him.
"I will accept the fact that you did not pick me to dance just now if I can be your partner next time," Eddie says into Steve's ear, letting his teeth graze the lobe slightly making Steve shiver and laugh.
El and Max refuse to let him sit down for the rest of the night, insisting that he do that spinning move with each of them until all of the kids demand a turn.
Even Mike.
And he loves them all, happy to have finally shared this piece of himself with all of them. His heart is full.
#stranger things#steve harrington#steddie#eddie munson#the party#steve harrington is a dancer#let steve have hobbies#this turned out way longer than i meant it to#fanfiction#steve x eddie#stranger things season 4#head canon#steddie drabble#steve harrinton has a bad dad#soft steve harrington#found family is the best family#this is so soft
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im in a "steve has a good mum" mood so here are some random but positive-ish headcanons i have about her
ive got one where she's australian literally just because
she comes from a big family who didnt approve of her choice in husband so she hasnt spoken to them in years (a regret on her part, but she's stubborn and proud)
she had steve out of wedlock so her parents dont speak to her but she visits her sister a lot
she's an only child who married into the harrington family for the name
she's an extravagant socialite, maybe a model or a small-time actress
she's respected in town bc she's super involved in the community
she loves steve but resents what his father turned him into so she avoids him through his teen years (a regret)
she loves steve but doesnt know how to be a mother, she genuinely thinks she does enough by giving him freedom and money
she loves steve, he was her best friend when he was a kid bc her husband was always working and even if she lost him for a bit during the king steve years shes proud of who he grows into
she follows her husband around to stop him from cheating bc she doesnt want him to tear their family apart
she kind of a mix of joyce byers and karen wheeler
she's a mean girl at heart which is where steve gets it from and they gossip in the kitchen
she acts dumb on purpose so that people let their guard down around her (she does this to her husband as well)
she's the actual brains in the family
if she found out steve was bi she'd be scared for him and would run interference so his dad wouldnt find out if he had a boy over
she comes back to hawkins as soon as she hears about starcourt
she heads back when she hears about the murders in hawkins bc steve isnt answering the fucking phone and she gets there right after the earthquakes
she's french
she's italian
she has a nickname for steve that has nothing to do with his name and he either finds it sweet or deeply embarrassing
#while i do also have negative headcanons about jer#and i love a good 'steve has bad parents fic'#i also love the idea of him getting along with his mum#all hes ever really said about her is that she went with his dad to a conference to stop him from cheating#and he put her on his resume bc shes respected#and yeah he barely mentions her but maybe she just never comes up!#maybe steve had to convince her not to go pay neil hargrove a visit after billy knocked him out#maybe she showed up at the mall in her pyjamas with shaking hands#or maybe she took a taxi from the airport a few days later and hovered over steve for a week#i just like to think about him having a good parent sometimes#even if i do like the yummy angst potential in him having two shitty ones lmao#i can have both#im bisexual and i contain multitudes#steve harrington#steve harrington headcanons#steve harringtons mother#stranger things headcanons
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Teen Dad AU
Tag list: @live0rdive @y4r3luv @jonesn4coffee @sofadofax @jackiemonroe5512 @sensationalsunburst @scarlet-malfoy @l393ndjean @asspirin-s @fandomz-brainrot
Tag list is open until I finish this series so feel free to ask to be added!!
.
Steve Harrington had a son.
An actual son.
And his name was Louie.
And little Louie Harrington was Steve’s pride and joy.
But there was a problem. Steve was 17. 17 years old and with a son.
It’s fine.
Martha Timbley was the mothers name. “Was” because after she gave birth and dropped Louie off with an extensive apology, her parents packed everything up and took her to New York.
So Martha Timbley was the mother, until she had to leave.
Then Nancy might’ve been, but she met Louie after they had already broken up. Nancy was content with simply knowing about Louie’s existence. Steve wouldn’t hold it against her, really.
Louie was Steve’s pride and joy, as said before, and he loved to talk about him to people.
Except Steve is 17. And the only friends he has are a bunch of 8th graders and his ex girlfriend and her new boyfriend. 99% of which don’t even know about Louie’s existence.
So Steve didn’t get to talk about Louie as much as he’d like.
Speaking of the baby Harrington, there was a soft cry from Steve’s bedroom. Steve, who had been in the bathroom getting ready for a shower, rushed in to pick up a now crying baby Louie.
“Hey hey hey, it’s alright baby it’s alright. What’s the matter honey? You hungry? I bet you are, huh?”
Steve loved talking to Louie. Which makes him sound pathetic. Louie’s only 6 months old at this point in time. And for him to be Steve’s favorite person to talk to?
That’s just kind of sad.
But the point still stands.
Steve carried Louie carefully downstairs and into the kitchen. Steve never put Louie down while making the bottle, gently bouncing on his feet and rocking back and forth.
The bottle was easy enough to make. Steve took it into the living room and sat on the couch with Louie in his arms. Little Louie drank the bottle right up to the delight of Steve. His big brown eyes stared right at him while his little baby hands curled around his ears. Steve chuckled quietly.
Little Louie had Steve’s eyes, much to his delight. But he had a mix of his and Martha’s hair, curly and mostly brown with blond highlights— like Steve’s— but had a ginger tint to it that reflected Martha’s firey curls.
Louie finished the bottle and Steve burped him gently. It was nearing only 5 PM on that Tuesday in August of 1984, but Steve felt himself growing tired and worn with exhaustion. Louie was a sucker to put to sleep and to keep asleep, often waking in the night with screams and cries and needing to be held in order to fall to sleep.
Which was fine with Steve. Well— the holding part. He didn’t really like the screaming and crying part but that was to be expected with babies of Louie’s age.
Steve liked holding baby Louie during the night. But he often feared that he’d roll over and crush the boy. So, Steve let Louie sleep on the bed with him while surrounded by pillows at all times.
It was around 6 PM now on that fine Tuesday. Steve finally plated up a small dinner for himself of pasta. He let Louie gnaw on a couple of noodles while Steve rocked him gently.
It was nearing 7 when Steve finally out Louie down for the first time in nearly 3 hours. Louie wasn’t asleep, not quite yet. But Steve tucked him in and surrounded him in pillows as if he was.
Steve turned the radio on and turned it down real low. He let the soft tunes of some country song lull little Louie to sleep.
Louie fell asleep clutching a small bear Martha gave him. Steve was upset that she couldn’t be in Louie’s life. Even if there wasn’t anything between the two of them Louie deserved to know his mother cared. Steve sighed.
As much as he wanted to collapse on his side of the bed, he refrained.
Instead, Steve pulled out a duffel bag from under his bed and set to work. His parents would be expected home in two days, and he already knew what the outcome would be.
They’d enjoyed their trip to where-ever-the-fuck for the past 7 months, they’d made sure Steve knew how much they didn’t miss him over the phone when they asked about the house and neighbors more than him.
But that’s fine. It’s whatever. Steve didn’t need their approval. He’d stopped caring about it after sophomore year; when he’d won his first game with the winning shot and they hadn’t bothered to say anything outside of “you should be doing that all the time”.
So really? Fuck them.
But they were currently Steve’s only means of housing.
So he’s kind of fucked.
But he packed the duffle bag nice and tight. He packed the bag with his clothes and a blanket and moved to pull out a suitcase he still had from his first (and last) trip with his parents when he was 9.
Into the suitcase went most of Louie’s stuff; clothes, toys, extra bottles that weren’t going to be needed until Thursday. And then he packed one of the smaller pockets with his important things; birth certificates and the papers showing that his car was in fact his.
He already had a diaper bag with the rest of Louie’s stuff. He kept it packed all the time for when he could convince Nancy to babysit for him. Like tomorrow.
Tomorrow, Steve would have work from 9 in the morning to 5 in the afternoon. Not ideal but he needs the hours. Nancy would be over by 8:30 with a promise of watching Louie.
Steve doesn’t know how Nancy hasn’t clued anyone in on Louie’s existence. But as much as he wanted to question it he didn’t fancy pushing his luck.
With the bags packed he set them aside by his door. He’d put them in the car tomorrow when he left for work. But for now, he all but collapsed on his bed. He had the vague feeling of Louie wrapping his little hands around his finger before he officially passed out.
…
First part is officially out!! I’m working on my s3 steddie part 4 behind the scenes but that should be out soon as well. Expect part 2 of this sometime in the following week.
Second Part:
#stranger things#steve harrington#eddie munson#nancy wheeler#teen dad steve harringon#he’s an amazing dad#little louie has life cut out for him#nancy isn’t too bad in this#she’s like a resigned vodka aunt in the beginning but she works on it#you’ll get more plot in the next part I promise#eventual steddie#eddie munson x steve harrington
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Currently having sooo many feelings about Steve wanting to be a dad
How he wants a big family who loves each other unconditionally because he was a lonely, neglected kid whos parents' love was very conditional
#he wants to be a dad sooooo bad#will love his kids with all of his heart#he deserves it#getting out of hawkins and travelling america with a large family who loves each other so much theyre all willing to live in a winnebago#is a very cute very fitting dream#yes the '6 nuggets' comment was a reference to the party#but that doesnt mean his dream means any less#ive seen a lot of fics where everyone gets to fufil their dream#except steve#he doesnt get to travel or his multiple kids#because he “has the party”#and its like.... he is not their parent#he is a jackass older brothrt figure who deserves a life of his own#let him have his own kids!! he wants them!!#Steve harrington#momo.txt
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Steve pays for Netflix. Everyone else just uses his.
Nancy is probably the only one who pays for her own.
Steve encourages everyone to use his accounts bc he isn’t even the one paying for them. His parents are.
Eddie makes full use of this and has his profile set up to be as outrageously gay as possible in order to piss off Steve’s parents.
Steve loves every minute of it.
#eddie munson#nancy wheeler#steve harrington#stranger things#steddie#steve knows his parents won’t do shit bc it would look bad to cut him off#the whole ‘gay son’ thing has been used for business clout so many times#steve’s dad being held up as the pinnacle of inclusivity bc his son is gay#steve’s told him multiple times that actually he’s bi#but no one listens
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