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collectivecloseness · 2 years

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Love Languages: Steve Harrington

A list of Steve Harrington’s love languages, in order of favourite down ~

Acts of service:

Steve is babysitter, mom and dad all in one.

He wants to prove he’s a good friend, and boyfriend, and future husband and father. Never wants to leave you wanting. Anything you need doing, why didn’t you call him earlier? He’s on his way.

Sometimes you tell him though, that he shouldn’t feel like he has to do everything. Not for you, and the kids, and his friends, and the safety of the town, it’s too much on him. He wants to still help, but he appreciates that you don’t want him just for that, and that instead of shutting him out or down, you offer to help with him. Even if it’s something like fixing your car which you have no idea how to do (truthfully Steve is looking over a book on his shelf to make sure he actually remembers things before he helps out) he enjoys letting you help him out.

And reversed, it might be hard to get him to sit down long enough for you to help him, writing his speech asking for a promotion, cooking him dinner, lots of things. He had to learn to be quite independent at a young age. But mostly he’s worried that without helping others out, he’s not worth much to anyone.

But when he starts to get used to the notion of someone doing things just for him, he enjoys those little moments of relaxation. He’d rather it was you rubbing his temples than himself.

Words of affirmation:

He wants to know he’s doing a good enough job, and that you’re happy (and not going to leave him).

He likes to talk about his problems with the upside down because he’s never once felt like he can with the others, as he always had to be brave one. And as everyone knows, boys don’t cry. Well they do now, and he just sobs in pure relief as he is finally able to get it all out, and not do it alone anymore. Soaking your thigh with his tears as your hand has reached under his shirt, scratching his naked back, being careful of any injuries, as you tell him over and over just how amazing he is.

He wants you to know how much he really cares about you, he’s open about that stuff now, confirming with you that he loves you, that you’re perfect, and how much he treasures you. In big speeches as well, even if it’s seemingly at random times. And he’s dead serious during those speeches.

He needs you to know that he’ll always protect you.

Steve has grown so much as a person and he likes your confirmation when you tell him that he really has become a good person, even if you didn’t know him before when he feels like he was a massive douchebag. He likes to have that external reminders that he has grown, he is better, and you add onto that reminder that he should be proud of himself for it.

He also wants to always know what you’re thinking about. He yearns to know what’s going on inside that pretty head. Are they thoughts about him? Are they good? Are they criticisms? Are you okay? Can he help with anything? Talk to him please. He loves hearing your voice! It calms him, and fills him with love so warmly in his chest.

Gift giving:

Likes to buy you flowers, a couple of semi expensive gifts just to see that smile on your face, to know you were happy, and that he made you happy.

Wants to constantly be surprising you with little things to keep you on your toes, he doesn’t like when he thinks things are slowing or feeling less romantic, it worries him, because he doesn’t want you to bore of him. He wants to be fun and spontaneous and to provide for you. Even if sometimes his spontaneity comes off as a little crooked, or forced, but it’s him trying that’s the important factor.

He’s gonna be your spouse after all, he’s gotta prove himself to you. At least he’s sure he does.

Part of it also comes from how he’s grown up, the gentleman buys dinners and jewellery and flowers. But mostly he just loves seeing how happy you get. He literally loves you so much he wants to get you the world.

Probably found something in his parents attic he was 100% sure they wouldn’t care if it was gone, and sold it to buy you a lot of smaller somethings.

Gets excited whenever he sees anything in any store that he thinks you’ll like. Literally grins and places his hands on his knees, bending and squinting at it, before rocking on them for a second. He’s biting his lip in a grin, imagining any multitude of your reactions when he brings it home all bagged up for you at the end of the day. Robin may try pulling him away from store windows, but he always comes back on his own.

Sometimes he goes to shops just to scour blindly for something, any treat to get you when he gets home from work. It makes him happy thinking of you, humming as he gets reminders of your favourite things surrounding him. And the domesticity of strolling around the store, looking at something he can pick out for you, his love, on his way home from work. Even if it’s something smaller like just chocolate, or your favourite drink, he’s happy to come home and have something to chuck at you.

It also lets you know he’s always thinking about you, in his mind.

He’s surprised and always flattered when you buy him something though. Steve doesn’t expect gifts, he doesn’t think he’s good enough to have earned them, or that anyone would think of him spontaneously like that.

He doesn’t think guys get flowers, or chocolates, or personalised gifts that show you know him so well, especially on non special occasions, but he always melts when he gets anything from you, even in those rare times if you thought it was shitty.

You better be careful though, because if you get him something that touches him emotionally, normally something personal, the next day you’re going to be buried alive on the sofa as he shakes out little tokens of affection he just had to grab for you, all over your curled up body.

Bonus, the only time he didn’t care about Eddie stealing, was when he yoinked something Steve had been staring at the entire time in the shop. “Harrington you literally never shut the fuck up about buying this for your girl. And it’s not even that expensive, can’t charge me a felony on that. Go see your wifey. And stop telling me about how awesome this thing is because honestly, a Metallica vinyl has much more value in my books. Plus it wasn’t even that hard to grab.” His friends definitely get annoyed with how obsessed Steve is with the new item he found for you, it’s a mix of being so excited for your reaction and repeating it to himself so he doesn’t forget what he wanted to buy/make, he can’t shut up about it.

Physical touch:

Steve’s still sometimes like a horny teen, cornering you from behind when he lead you to the family video store break room, to kiss your neck and down your chest.

His touch doesn’t always mean he wants sex though, he genuinely just likes touching you, making you smile with his little movements, the feel of you on him. He could just rub his mouth, not even in a kissing way, just nuzzling his face over and over into your shoulder and he’d literally go dizzy. Gets drunk off your scent.

Your scent is comforting to him. It’s his truest version of home. He’s like a scared little child if he wakes in the dark without it; and his parents weren’t exactly ones to tuck him back into bed and kiss the nightmares away. In some ways he almost is like a kid again, gaining an almost trauma response on his worst nights if he wakes up alone, with you not there to lead him hand in hand back to bed, switching the warm lamp on and holding him close. But Steve’s brave, if you’re not home he wants to get over it himself, he put himself back to bed when he was six, he can do it now. But he’ll be very clingy with you the next morning, begging you to stay the night with him.

He likes having a hand on your arm or shoulder in public, or if you hold his hand first he is beaming. It’s not a possessive thing, it’s a support thing, like this is my partner and I’m there for them. Also he’s ready to grab you in case a monster splits the floor in two or something. And just so you know he’s right there with you. Even standing close behind you, just near enough for him to give you reassurances, or for you to extend the same courtesy to him. And again, your warmth and scent are surrounding him, and you’re easy enough to stroke or hold whenever his mind, or body, fathoms of doing so. Casually reminding you of his love and affection for you at all times, even if he can’t say anything because the kids have come to harass him, at least his hand is on your bicep.

Likes laying down with you whenever he has a rest so he can hold you close. Laughing as he snuggles into you, being goofy and vulnerable and stroking every part of your body before just holding you fondly. Probably squeezes a couple of times throughout, just to remind himself that you’re there, and you that he’s there; he’s already hugging you but it’s like an extra hug as an extra reminder of his love for you.

Definitely throws you over his shoulder if you are determined to move because you’ve got to pee, being your own escort to the bathroom before he plops you down, talking to you as he sits with his back to the door, only to wait till the second the tap is turned on to crawl behind you and wrap his arms round your shoulders, smiling into your temple and at your reflection in the bathroom mirror as he kisses your hair, inhaling your smell. Definitely makes a gratuitous sound of content as he sniffs you because it makes you laugh and splash water at him. Not even in a sexual way, just as if your smell makes him so happy and relaxed it’s like a spell.

Please sit on his shoulders in the pool and play wrestle with Eddie and Robin please please please. Wants you to cling onto his back as he wades around with you in the water. Has definitely touched you in the pool as well, obviously only when you two are alone though.

When you’re at home if you’re not sat with him on the couch or in bed, he has his arms wrapped around you and chin tucked into your shoulder or neck, so he can see what you’re doing. Literally gets confused when you mention for the first time that whever you stand up, even if you’re only going to the other side of the room, he’s always following right behind you, like a couple of inches space wise the most, he didn’t even realise he was doing it. You tell him not to stop though. Of course you do reassure that you’re not going to disappear into thin air or abandon him if you walk from the couch to the tv, or worse go into a completely separate room, ugh the dreaded thought, but you also assure him that he is definitely allowed to follow you like a little puppy, he doesn’t have to worry either way. Sometimes when you’re on his lap, playing with his hair as you both watch tv, you’ll just ‘casually’ mention that you were about to go to the kitchen for a snack, because if you’re already on his lap there’s a chance he’s going to not let you out of his arms once and carry you all the way there and all the way back. Cool we’ll go to the kitchen together, you pull the fridge open and take out those blueberries for me please, I’ll make sure not to drop you. Hopefully, he teases.

He’s beaming on the inside when he realises that you touching him has become so normalised to him too! It still makes his brain all happy when you hold his hand to lead him to a new video you wanted an opinion on, or wrapped your arms around his own when he was just giving a stranger directions.

Whenever you grace him with your touch it’s a comforting reminder to him that you really do love him. You want to touch him, you like just so naturally holding him, or getting him to hold you. He craves that confirmation but not in an unhealthy way anymore. It just makes him feel good. Touching you in any way though, makes Steve feel good.

Quality time:

Steve hates having an empty house, he loves you sharing it with him. Even if you don’t officially live with him, you basically do. Steve wants you to casually move in, so you always have each other to come home to. He’s also only told you this, but some nights he gets scared sleeping alone in the big dark house. With you there the scary thoughts of something coming to get him hardly ever even occur to him. It’s family roleplay for real, he can’t wait till the real thing where you have a wedding band on your finger and your first- or sixth- baby in your arm. Not that he wouldn’t be scooping that baby right up.

It may also be the next step for your relationship, even if you’re not sharing a lease, moving in with him still feels so real and normal for Steve. He loves loves loves to talk with you about your future, whether it takes place in that house, or another he’ll buy for you. Hell he’ll even build it for you. White picket fence, a dog, six kids, his dream car, oh what’s that you want the bathroom on the north side too? You got it babe, let him add it to his notebook of example blueprints.

He doesn’t really like being separated from you much, from more of an anxiety and trauma standpoint because what if you get hurt... it is Hawkins after all, and he wouldn’t have been there to be Steve the protector.

Asks you to visit when he’s working, even if he’s not on break, he can still talk to you. Robin likes you so she only bullies Steve about being distracted.

He likes to ask you about your day, and if a day passes and he hasn’t, most likely you just didn’t pick up the phone the only second of the day the poor man had free, he’s worried it was bad and is already thinking of ways to help.

He likes seeing you whenever he is free, likes when you call asking when he’s available. He likes the fact you ask him to spend time with you. Obviously you don’t ask quite like that, not that he’d mind if you did, but when you make plans to see him, just to hang out together; whether you planned something small with him like watching the season finale of that show you were hooked on and playing a board game together, or asking him out on an extravagant date out which fills the entire day with tickets somewhere that cost $100, or just simply asking him for some time between the two of you. It’s something that he’s so happy to do for you.

He likes that you want to spend time with him, but he also likes the fact you don’t feel the need to spend every second with him, like his parents who don’t trust each other. Although Steve would happily spend most of his time with you, not because you two have no trust, but because you just genuinely like each others company that much.

Even if he’s normally working or babysitting the kids, he likes if you’re there with him. Steve doesn’t have a lot of spare time, for moments for just the two of you. He doesn’t particularly mind it, he definitely feels he has to be there for the kids or his friends or work harder towards some goals in life, and doesn’t mind keeping busy vs just watching tv or something. But he’s super snuggly when he does have it, wanting to know everything in your head, or work on something with you like cooking dinner together. If you two can do it together, that’s pretty good in his books.

#sorry for using s1 Steve but the teddy bear kills me n I thought it fit the vibe lol #hope u guys enjoy! <3 #also also just my personal hc’s!#Steve Harrington/reader #Steve Harrington x reader #Steve Harrington headcanons #Steve Harrington #Steve Harrington fluff #hc’s #stranger things

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bearsinpotatosacks · 6 months

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It Must Be Difficult (Dealing with the Concequences of Your Own Actions) - Whumptober2023

People don't change, time does

Summer was nice in Hawkins, she thought, staring at the blue sky. Not California nice, sandy beaches, surfboards and ice cream. It was vibrant green trees against the cloudless sky, hiking in the woods and barbecues in backyards. Also Steve had a pool, which helped.

Black suited a blue sky and emerald trees. So did the church, brown brick with a full garden of flowers out front. Picturesque and manicured. It was a shame it was for a funeral, and not even for anyone good or pretty. Billy didn’t like flowers, or anything that wasn’t his car, himself or heavy metal. Although now she was wondering if he’d even loved himself.

The ceremony had been insufferable. Stuffy air filled the room and not from the heat. There was an arbitrary picture of Billy next to an open casket, they’d cleaned up his body enough that with a suit, his prom suit, it almost wasn’t like he’d been killed by a monster from another dimension that he’d helped to create.

For day 20 of @whumptober . Also on AO3

Words: 3768

She didn’t know why she was doing this at night, it wasn’t like she’d get in trouble, Neil hadn’t involved her in any of the funeral arrangements, even when he made all the wrong decisions. Billy was going to hate it. It wasn’t exactly all to boost Neil’s ego but it mostly was, make him out to be a loving father who’d lost his only son. Not a dad who regularly beat up his own kid for stepping a toe out of line.

“Are you sure about this?” Lucas asked behind her.

The party were on their bikes, they’d been out all day, trying to forget the horrors they’d seen over the past week. She’d have to go home soon, not that she wanted to. Neil was crying, honest to god crying, like she’d never seen. Her mum was frozen in place working automatically as if nothing had changed, but she could see in the way she moved that she was frozen in shock too.

Max felt sick a lot. Guilt, trauma. The idea that she couldn’t tell anyone how he actually died, Neil just had to live with ‘he saved me and my friends from a mall fire’ and how he went on and on about how he’d been stupid to go in there, they all had. He hadn’t quite stepped over to ‘if you hadn’t gone in there, he wouldn’t be dead’ but she could sense it coming. If she thought the house was tense before, then it definitely was now.

“It’s worth a try, right?” She said, posting the invitation into the letter box and getting back on her bike.

Lucas just shrugged, “My mom says you can stay around again if it helps.”

“So did my mom.” Added Will, El was on the back of his bike, staying with Joyce until further notice.

If there was anyone who was sharing her grief right now, it was her. Although her relationship with Hopper had been much better and less complicated, they still lost people to the same fight, still wondered if they could’ve done better, fought better to save them. She tried to tell herself that she would’ve died but that didn’t seem too bad at the moment, with how much her mum and Neil were arguing.

“And mine.” said Mike.

Dustin nodded. It was great to have such supportive friends, sometimes that house felt claustrophobic, but others it was comforting. It was the only place she really had to feel connected to Billy. His things were there, his camaro had been sold off to someone and they were miles away from California, so it was the only place to go if she wanted to remember and grieve without shame. Sometimes she woke up in his bed of all places.

“Thanks guys but I think I’ll go home,”

“As long as you’re sure,” Lucas added.

She nodded. She’d gotten most of Billy’s things after he’d died, all his music and books and random shit filling up the spaces. They weren’t sure what to do with his clothes. That had made her break down, because she could always keep the music, she actually liked some of the heavier stuff he played, and he didn’t have many books. But his clothes were so uniquely him that didn’t know how she could get rid of them, even if they were of no use to her otherwise.

She just nodded and began to cycle away. She couldn’t look back, she knew she couldn’t because they all looked so worried. Worried about her, worried about the fact that she just sent off that invitation, worried about her going home. They didn’t need to worry, she told herself, she could handle herself.

Neil had cried more. Maybe all of those tears he’d saved up and put out as anger had finally come out in waterfalls. Her mum had stayed still, as per usual when it came to Billy, she wasn’t sure if it was some kind of guilt or relief that he was dead that made her so statue-like but something was making her more and more absent recently, even to her.

They’d sang some hymns that Billy would’ve hated. The Priest talked about forgiveness in the kingdom of heaven and how sometimes god worked in mysterious ways. Yeah, he did, psychic powers, other universes and Lovecraftian monsters were a weird way to work. It was something else that Billy would’ve hated.

Half the people in here barely knew him. There was some of Neil’s family that Billy never talked about, his Nana, his Uncle and some cousins. Some of his ‘friends’ that survived Independence day, Tommy and Carol sat at the back looking uncomfortable. Then there was Max and the Party, Steve, Nancy, Jonathan, Joyce, even Robin. She didn’t expect them to come with how Billy treated all of them but they’d all insisted on coming for her. She tried to hide how that almost made her cry, she knew that didn’t matter.

They’d buried the body, threw dirt in and watched him get covered up. Any chance she had to try again and connect were gone. Even though she hated him, there was always a chance they could try again and get closer. Now he was dead, there never would be.

The rest of the crowd had either dispersed or were hanging around their cars. There was a small gathering happening at their house, Max would have to go even if it was all fake and the memories of Neil screaming at Billy and throwing him against walls were everywhere.

Steve came up behind her and sat down on the grass. Billy’s headstone, void of any personal notes, was behind them. The party sat scattered around, keeping their distance but close enough that she knew they were there.

“I didn’t know Billy was Catholic.” He said.

She looked up from where she was pulling up pieces of grass and sprinkling them back down again. “Yeah, I think Neil is, or was, and his mom.”

Her dress was getting scratchy now. The humid summer was making everything awful. It wasn’t just the humidity making her uncomfortable, of course, but it was nice to blame something else for once. Nothing supernatural, just annoying.

“I don’t think she showed, though,” she said. “Either that or I got the wrong address.”

“Who’s that then?” Dustin pointed to the lone woman standing near a tree behind them all.

The party followed his point and stared at the woman with long, fluffy blonde hair and a black pantsuit. They knew who it was by the way she stood, the tense way she held her body. Sunglasses covered her eyes, she wondered if she was crying behind them or just felt ashamed.

She knew they’d noticed her. Her body jolted upwards and she turned to go. But Max wasn’t satisfied with that. If she’d walked out on Billy, left him to become a piece of shit with Neil then she could at least give him some closure, or was it her getting closure?

“Hey, are you Billy’s mom?!” She shouted across the graveyard.

She stopped and nodded, turning around to them. After a moment of hesitation, she came closer and took off her sunglasses. That’s when they could really tell who Billy looked like out of her and Neil. It was the eyes, the clear blue piercing through you, going steely with that gaze. Her nose too, that was the same, the way her skin wrinkled around her eyes, her facial structure. Billy was kind of a spit image of her.

“I was a bit surprised when I got the invitation,” she said, she didn’t talk like Billy though, it was too gentle, too sure of herself. “I mean, Indiana? I bet Billy hated it.”

Max huffed and nodded. She’d hated it too before she met her friends. She didn’t think Billy got that far.

“I was a little scared that Neil knew my address, or I guess I should be comforted that he knew and didn’t do anything.”

“I sent the invitation.” Max spat out. “Neil doesn’t know you’re here, I don’t think.”

She stepped back a bit, gulped and collected herself. Was that a wash of relief or a touch of hurt? If it hadn’t have been for Max seeing her name on Billy's birth certificate, and finding her in the yellow pages, then she wouldn’t have even known her own son died.

“And you are?”

“Max, Max Mayfield, Billy’s-” she looked back at the grave. “Step-sister.”

“Oh, you must have really cared about him, to try and find me for his-” She didn’t say the word. It must be difficult dealing with the consequences of your own actions

“That’s debatable.” Was all she said.

Flashes of when he almost drove into her friends, when he grabbed her arm and left her at the arcade. All the times he gave Lucas shit just because of the colour of his skin. When he barrelled in and hit Steve so hard he almost passed out.

Then the time when he showed her how to drive. When he said ‘fuck this’ at a family reunion and took her to get milkshakes instead, when he let her play that mixed tape labelled ‘M’. She’d never been sure if that had been a mixtape for her or someone else, but she did like it.

“Debatable? How?” She stood in the middle of the group now and seemed to shrink under their watchful eyes. “What was he like, now?”

“A piece of shit.” Steve said, not looking at her.

“What?”

“He almost killed me once when we fought, just kept punching-”

“-he targeted me because of who I am-” Came Lucas.

“-he almost ran us over with his car-” That was Mike.

“-he took his anger out on me for a while,” Max added as a final statement to their bundle of explanations.

Again, Billy’s mum seemed taken aback. This time something broke through her steely gaze and reddened the white’s of her eyes. Was this guilt?

“That doesn’t seem anything like the Billy I knew,” she said.

The one you left behind, Max corrected mentally. Instead she opted for, “Well that’s what happens when a kid’s left with an abusive father and no one else, you get angry and take it out on the closest thing to you, so in his case, literally everyone.”

Her hand covered her mouth. “I thought-”

“That he stopped? No, he definitely didn’t.”

She looked down. Away from them and at her hands. Max did feel sorry for her, she’d wanted to run too, run away from Billy’s abuse and Neil’s manipulation, but she knew that without her for Neil to use as a pawn to hurt Billy, her mum would be next. And she knew that her mum could turn a blind eye far too easily than she thought she should, but she was still her mum, she was still someone stuck underneath an asshole’s thumb and she couldn’t abandon her. She’d seen what that had done to Billy, and she didn’t want her mum chewed up and spat out, angry in a world that didn’t have a clue.

That’s what Billy’s mum had done, though. So while she could understand, it didn’t mean she liked what she’d done.

“Neil didn’t just hate you,” Max said. “He was angry and turned to the next thing he could hurt, Billy, and he got hurt and confused and must have guessed that this is how the Hargroves dealt with their emotions, that this is what love was and this is how the world worked, so when I came into his life, I was the next thing he could hurt.”

She didn’t go any further. Everything about Billy was this confusing, conflicted mess deep inside. She wanted him back because of how bad everything was now, because everything seemed peachy in comparison, she wanted to see if he really meant that sorry and if he would change, get out from under Neil and just be himself away from their shitty home.

But there was that other voice that reminded her of what Billy was like the entire time she’d known him. She didn’t entirely believe that if he’d lived, he would’ve changed. What if he’d only apologised because he’d been dying with a dirty conscience? If he’d have lived, all the evidence suggested that he’d be the same, now even more traumatised by being possessed by some monster he didn’t know anything about. They’d had good moments but they’d been few and far between.

“He hurt you?” Billy’s mum was just looking more and more horrified by the second.

“Not for most of the time we knew each other, for most of it he was a super dickish older brother, distant, cold, uncaring, but that was it, you know? It wasn’t until we moved here, in ‘84, that he really turned on me.”

With a deep breath, she asked, “What happened? It must have been something big for him to turn on you and for you to move to California, right?”

She was smart for connecting the two. It wasn’t exactly hard to figure out. She just hadn’t told anyone the truth, the full truth anyway, of why the Hargrove-Mayfields had moved to Indiana in the first place.

“It was because of your dad, right?” Lucas said. He was the person she’d been the closest to telling, he was a good listener, I guess you had to be when this was your reality, fighting demons.

“Kind of.”

“What do you mean, kind of? That’s what you told us!” Mike added.

“Well people can not tell you things, you know, omit stuff!” She turned to say to him.

Billy’s mum cleared her throat, “Why did you then? Really?”

Max thought back to that night. Her last summer in California. Rays of sunshine, waves crashing on the beach, meeting her friends at the skatepark and occasionally seeing her dad. She would’ve appreciated it more if she’d known it would be her last. Maybe she would’ve done something differently.

“It was the middle of the summer,” She started, everyone now looking at her. Even Billy, she could just tell. “Billy had been more distant than ever, would always be in a rush to get somewhere, anywhere out of the house but never with me. I didn’t care. Any time away from Billy was time well spent in my book, so what if he barely told me when he’d pick me up before speeding off with a wheel spin and speeding fine? It didn’t bother me.”

“Until one day, it was July 11th and I wanted to go to the skatepark, Neil and my mom were at work and he usually got told to do something with me or take me somewhere in the morning but I guessed that that day he just couldn’t be bothered, because he told me to walk and slammed his bedroom door, turned up his music. I was tempted to just steal his car or some of his money as revenge but I ended up calling my dad, we went for milkshakes and he took me to the skatepark instead.”

It was one of the last meaningful times they spent together. All the rest was arguments with her mum, not Neil, never Neil, and letters that got more and more distant.

“And when I got back, Billy wasn’t alone, I didn’t think much of it because it made sense, he wanted to be alone with a girl, big deal, he always wanted to be alone with girls.” She remembered it exactly. While most of her memories of California were terrifyingly fading after the dramatic events of the past year, this one was like a movie seared into her brain. “But he wasn’t with a girl. When I looked through the crack in his door, he was kissing a guy.”

Mumbles of ‘whats’ from her friends rippled. Billy’s mum didn’t budge. She was his mum and probably knew him before he shielded everything below ten plus layers of emotion.

“I was shocked, but didn’t think about what it would mean, I just knew I had ammunition now. So at the dinner table that night, I told Neil that Billy left me on my own to go kissing boys and I spent time with my dad, two things he hated.” She said. “And I expected him to blow up but he didn’t, he told Billy to be a respecting brother and to not do that again.”

“I was disappointed but Billy, he was nothing like I’d seen him before. Still, quiet, wide eyed and terrified. And he was like that for days. Did everything asked of him and more, didn’t make a sound, almost like he was trying to make it so he wouldn’t exist or something. The tension was horrible.”

Tears pricked in her eyes at this part. Like a lot of things lately, all she could think was all the ways she could’ve done things differently, better. Guilt making her throat stick, eyes sting and hands go clammy. She hated it yet was getting used to it all at the same time.

“On that Saturday, though, all the tension came crashing down.”

She wiped her eyes and felt Steve’s hand on her shoulder. Lucas was sitting next to her when she looked to her right. And Billy’s mum’s red stained eyes bore into her back.

“Neil told me and my mom to go to the movies while he and Billy ‘had a talk’. We saw the Karate Kid and got pizza afterwards, I just thought that they were having another fight, they had them all the time, almost every night they were screaming at each other.” She said. “When we got home there was an ambulance outside the house. Billy was being loaded into it and Neil was talking about him getting into a fight with some other kids on a Saturday night.”

She could see the flashing lights now. Hear Neil’s structured panic and the deathly calm underneath. It fooled the paramedics, and the cops, and her too, for a while at least.

“I believed it, Billy got into an argument and got into a fight because he was mad, he did it all the time. But I realised afterwards, seeing his injuries, the fact that they had to glue his skull back together and the bruising on his chest for a few weeks after, that it wasn’t a fight, he and Neil didn’t just have talks. Neil put him in the hospital, Neil decided that there were too many distractions in San Diego and moved us to Hawkins. And Billy blamed me for all of it, so he turned on me.”

This was too much. Seeing her face, being forced to tell her biggest secret because she too felt like this was her fault. Her hands clenched again as she squeezed her eyes shut to fight back tears.

"But if you'd have stayed or taken him with you then Neil wouldn't have treated him like this, so he wouldn't treat me the same, but he did and we never got close and he died protecting me in a-" she took a breath, she couldn’t tell her about the upside down now. "Mall fire before I got the chance to properly talk to him."

She stood up, brushing of Steve and Lucas' comfort. Firey, just like her hair, as she stopped trying to be careful with this woman she'd never known and tell her how it actually was - to an extent.

"So this is all your fault!"

Billy's mum looked taken aback again. She squinted her eyes and tightened her jaw again.

"Why did you invite me, then? If you seem to hate me so much?" She said.

Max looked at Billy's grave. If he was watching this, she'd love to hear what he thought. Although, saying that would probably cause the upside down to make her see ghosts which she didn't want, so she stopped that chain of thought there.

"Because I thought he might like it."

Max turned around. The tears couldn’t be held back now. They flooded her face as she clenched her hands and walked over to Steve's car at the bottom of the bank. Lucas slipped his hand into her’s, stopping her nails from piercing her palms, and smiled.

The rest of the party joined in, all going into their cars but not pulling away as Max found herself alone with Billy’s mum. She didn’t exactly want to leave her alone, she didn’t hate her with her entire heart and soul. It was just the knowledge that if one little thing had gone differently then most of her life would be different. Well, you could say that about anything to be honest, so it didn’t hold much weight.

“There were good times, you know?” She said, not turning around. “When he taught me to drive his car, or took me to the movies instead of making me study.”

“If things were different, he could’ve been the Billy you knew, again, at least a little bit.”

She was silent behind her. Max went to get into Steve’s car, she could see everyone looking through the windows.

“Thank you for sending me that invite.” Was all she said as Max got into the car.

She watched her turn back to Billy’s grave and kneel down, her hand on her mouth. It was weird, this woman who’d missed so much, was grieving more than anyone. Perhaps you could mourn the living after all?

----

If there's one thing that I really appreciated in Stranger Things 4, it was that it showed Max's comflicted feelings, and part of me does know that Vol 2 was solely written by the Duffer Brothers who probably wanted to just make Max hate Billy, but I like to think that she holds both feelings in her heart. Billy was horrible when he was alive but he died before they could've been close, what if he'd gotten a chance to change? And her time before he died seems so much better compared to her life in Season 4 but it's all nostalgia so was it really better? I love it! Also Billy's mum, I basically put all my thoughts on her in here too, she was hurt and ran but she also left her kid behind to become horrible. I tried to foreshadow something for a future Stranger Things fic I've been planning for a while here with Max talking about seeing ghosts because I would love for her to be able to see them as she's died and also is blind so what if she can only see ghosts?

Thanks for reading! @whumptober-archive

#whumptober 2023 #fic #no. 20 #people don't change time does #stranger things #death tw #max mayfield #billy hargrove's mom #lucas sinclair #steve harrington #mike wheeler #will byers #dustin henderson #neil hargrove #billy hargrove #dead billy hargrove #post stranger things 3 #pre stranger things 4 #bear writes

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