#and i added you to the taglist!

[starryeyedjanai]

you and me and a lot of bad decisions

steddie | explicit | 8k | chapter 1: 1994 - i'm only human

read on ao3

written for @thefreakandthehair's summer challenge!

Steve swears he doesn't know how he ends up in these situations.

One minute, he's applying sunscreen to Eddie's back like a good friend, and the next, they've got their hands down each other's pants, breathing harsh breaths and groaning as they get each other off.

It's true that maybe Steve has been a little pent up for a while. He hasn't had much luck dating recently, and working as a guidance counselor is stressful. He's had a tough school year and even after it ended, there was no outlet for him to pour any of his anxious energy into. Robin was still working because "not everyone gets the entire summer off, Steve!"

All of his friends still have to work and he's disillusioned about trying to date someone new after his honestly awful track record.

Last summer, he dated a woman and she was nice and tried to get along with Robin, but Steve knew she didn't understand their relationship, didn't get that she was someone who would always be in Steve's life, regardless of if he has a partner or not. So things got ugly in the end, because she threw out an ultimatum that Steve readily answered - just not in the way she wanted.

So, he's hesitant to try again because most people won't get it, won't get that Steve and Robin are a package deal, do-not-separate, kind of thing.

So between all of his friends still working and not being remotely interested in dating, he's been a little lonely.

He's been cooped up in his apartment being antisocial because this school year has taken so much out of him that he feels like he could sleep for a month.

The one thing he had to look forward to was this vacation.

The sun, his friends, no obligations for an entire week? It sounded like heaven.

And it starts off fine enough. Their hotel is nice, has a nice pool area that opens up to a private beach.

They all get in around the same time, so they make their way to their rooms to drop their stuff off. They're all sharing rooms because it makes more sense to split the cost rather than everyone getting their own room.

He's sharing with Eddie because while he would normally share with Robin, she and Nancy have finally got their shit together and started dating after putting everyone through the misery of watching them awkwardly flirt for years now.

He and Eddie are friends - he thinks. Kind of. After everything, they have so much tying them together that they kind of have to be. They share all the same friends, they live in the same city now and grab drinks together with Robin and Nancy, they spend holidays together with everyone.

While it's true that they're kind of friends, he can admit that he's a little nervous to have so much time alone with Eddie because they just don't normally hang out alone.

He, Eddie, Robin, Nancy, and Jeff were all on the same flight, but Eddie and Jeff took a separate cab to the hotel since there wasn't enough room in the other one. Steve's cab driver was apparently taking the scenic route because he gets to the hotel room and Eddie is already inside, pulling his shirt over his head, getting ready for the pool, it seems.

"Hey, man," Steve says, dragging his suitcase inside. Eddie's already claimed the bed by the window, so Steve drops his sunglasses onto the other bed and grabs the suitcase stand from the closet.

"Hey, man," Eddie parrots back.

Steve opens his suitcase and starts pulling some of his clothes out to put in the drawers.

"Oh, fuck, Steve, tell me you're not one of those people who unpacks on a vacation," Eddie says, watching him open up the empty dresser drawer.

It's rhetorical, Steve knows, but he still answers, "And what's so wrong with that?"

Eddie just shakes his head and says, "You would be the type to make even vacations harder on yourself."

Steve rolls his eyes. "How am I making things harder on myself? What do you do? Just leave your stuff in your suitcase and dig through it everyday to find what you need? How is that easier?"

"It's less work than making sure all your clothes are perfectly folded and in the drawers," he says pointedly.

And- okay. Steve hadn't even realized he was re-folding the shirt in his hands, but he just likes when things are tidy and neat. What's the harm in wanting his stuff to be tidy?

He stuffs the rest of the shirts into the drawer and closes it.

"Are you going to the pool?" he asks, changing the subject.

Eddie grins over at him, gesturing to the swim trunks in his hands. "Very astute, Mr. Harrington."

He drops trou and Steve takes maybe a second too long to look away. He just wasn't expecting to see Eddie's dick so early on in this trip. Not- not that he was expecting to see it at all, you know? Just, he wasn't expecting it.

"Mind if I join you?" he asks, grabbing the trunks from his suitcase. He grabs the rest of his shorts and underwear from the suitcase and puts it in a drawer - he's not going to let Eddie teasing him stop him.

"Sure, the more the merrier. You know what room Nancy and Rob are in?"

"Ah, yep. Or, well, I know they're on the eighth floor, not sure the exact room number. I told them I'd meet them in the lobby before dinner, so that'd give us enough time to unpack and get settled."

He hears Eddie rumble about unpacking on vacation as he steps into the bathroom to change into his trunks. He makes quick work of it before peeking around the bathroom. This hotel is nice, much nicer than last year's disaster. He thinks Robin working at one of the sister properties back in Chicago is probably why they were able to get such a good deal.

He steps out of the bathroom and puts his travel-day clothes back in his suitcase. He rubs sunscreen on his face and shoulders and thinks about calling it a day. He doesn't really need to put it everywhere, right? It's just gonna wash off when they get in the pool anyway.

"Hey, you wanna help me put this on my back before we get down there?" Eddie asks, holding out the sunscreen bottle in his hand.

Eddie doesn't seem to have the same skepticism about putting sunscreen all over, Steve notes as he looks him over - his arms and legs have that sunscreen sheen to them.

He must not say anything for a beat too long because Eddie asks again, impatiently, "Can you get my back or not? Time's ticking, we're wasting daylight."

"Oh, sure, sorry," Steve says, shaking his head, taking the sunscreen from him. He pours some in his hand and steps closer as Eddie turns his back to him.

He looks at the wide expanse of pale skin on his back for a second before he slaps the handful of sunscreen in the center of Eddie's back and Eddie arches away from him for a second.

"That's so cold!" he says as Steve spreads the sunscreen down his back and Steve snorts.

He maybe grabbed a little bit too much because it takes a long while to rub it in. He rubs harder, trying to make the white-cast disappear.

He hears Eddie groan and he pauses. Did he hurt him?

"Sorry," Eddie says when he realizes Steve's frozen behind him. "That just, that felt good."

"This?" Steve asks, digging his palms in harder. He doesn't know why it makes his heart speed up when Eddie hums in agreement.

It's just- it's been a while, since he touched anyone like this. There's so much skin on display, so much pale skin beneath his fingers. He can't help but dig his thumbs in a little as he rubs, turning this into something closer to a massage than spreading sunscreen. The white liquid has all but disappeared, but Steve keeps rubbing, keeps digging his fingertips into the muscles of Eddie's back.

He can't even say how long they stand there, Steve's hands on Eddie, working his thumbs into the muscles there, listening to him sigh and groan at his touch. He rubs up and down on his back and he listens to the little sounds Eddie makes when he hits a good spot and it- fuck. He realizes this is making him hard.

Now the speed of his heart beating makes sense. He's turned on. He's getting hard from putting his hands on Eddie. All this warm skin, the noises he's pulling from him, it's all doing it for him.

"Everything good back there?" Eddie asks, pulling Steve out of his stupor. His hands were frozen on Eddie's back. The air in the hotel room is cool on his skin, but he still feels overheated in the moment.

He realizes he needs to answer, needs Eddie to stay turned around because when he looks down, he's visibly hard in his swim shorts - they're tight, the fabric pulled tight around his cock, leaving very little room for interpretation on what's going on here.

"I'm good, just stay there for a sec?" He takes a couple steps back, his hands falling away from Eddie's skin, leaving him cold in comparison to the way the warmth just seems to be rolling off Eddie's skin.

Of course Eddie doesn't listen. He never listens.

He turns around as Steve is backing up, a thousand thoughts floating through his brain, the number one thought being am I into Eddie?

He swallows hard as Eddie looks at him, sees the moment Eddie notices. His lips curl up, cocky, and he's looking directly at Steve's crotch.

"Oh? Big boy, indeed," he says, and Steve can't even find it in him to roll his eyes because Eddie can't tear his eyes away.

Steve's never shied away from someone looking at him - he likes the attention, likes having eyes on him like this. When Eddie looks back up at his face, Steve sees the hunger there, knows he's wanted.

And he's never been good at making decisions that don't bite him in the ass, so he steps forward, closer to Eddie again.

It's a bad idea, his brain is telling him.

But he's looking at Eddie's mouth and his chest and his tattoos and his goddamned pierced nipples.

Fucking friends is a bad idea, his brain is shouting at him.

But he's stepping closer anyway, feeling the heat seeping from Eddie's skin once more. He wants to touch him. He wants to put his hands on him again. It feels like all the air has rushed out of his lungs, like he can't breathe through the want.

He doesn't know how to make the first move here, where he's so incredibly unprepared for what's about to happen, but luckily he doesn't have to.

Eddie hooks his first two fingers in the waistband of Steve's shorts and pulls him forward, gets their hips aligned, nearly pressing together.

He looks at Eddie's face and realizes how close they are, leaning in towards each other like this.

"Yeah?" Eddie asks and Steve knows he should back away, knows he should laugh it off, make some joke about accidentally getting hard from touching him.

But Eddie's fingers are still dipped into his waistband and Steve is sweating about it. His brain is short circuiting because five minutes ago he was utterly unaware that he was into Eddie like this.

He had no idea that he wanted to feel his skin against his like this, feel the skin of their chests brush.

Eddie's chest is sunscreen-sticky and Steve wants to get stuck to him.

When they're pressed together, flush from chest to waist, Steve feels him, really feels him. He's hard too. Hard from Steve touching him, maybe, or from knowing Steve wants him. Either way, feeling his cock brushing his through only a couple layers of thin fabric is making Steve's scalp prickle like a shiver wants to run it's way down his back.

"Yeah," Steve whispers, shifting his hips forward minutely and biting back the groan that wants to escape.

Their thighs slot together and he takes in a shaky breath. Looks from Eddie's lips to the metal glinting on his chest. He knows it had to have hurt. Did Eddie like it- the hurt?

He knows his face has to be flushed by now. He feels sweaty and red and somehow Eddie's still looking at him like he wants to eat him. It's really doing it for him.

Eddie takes his fingers out of Steve's waistband and Steve doesn't even get a second to mourn the skin to skin contact there because Eddie is cupping Steve's dick through his shorts.

It's such a tease, just Eddie's hand cupping him, no real pressure. Steve pushes himself forward into Eddie's hand.

Eddie lips twitch up again into a smirk, like he's having fun with this, like he likes teasing Steve, getting him a little desperate.

Steve tries to hitch his hips forward again, but Eddie moves his hand back to Steve's hip, herds him backwards until he's backed up against the dresser.

"Is this okay?" Eddie asks, tugging at the waistband. Steve's not exactly sure where this is going, what Eddie wants from him right now, but he nods. If it gets him touched, he wants it.

Eddie grins at him and shoves his hand down into Steve's swim shorts and wraps his hand around Steve's cock. It's suddenly a lot all at once.

Eddie's hand is warm, but his rings are cold to the touch. He's never had someone touch him while wearing rings before. It's not something he's ever had to consider before, whether he's like the feeling.

He does. There's something about the texture difference between the smooth, hard surface of the rings and the softness of Eddie's palm. His fingertips, when he rubs the head of Steve's cock with his thumb, when he wraps his hand around the length of him and strokes, feel rougher than the rest of his hand, callused from years of playing the guitar, Steve guesses.

He drops his head back and groans at the feeling of Eddie stroking him.

The rings are a contrast to Eddie's warm skin, and every stroke is making Steve want to come on them, get them wet with it. It's dizzying, making Steve a little crazy, thinking about coming on Eddie's rings. That's never been a thought that crossed his mind before, but he can't get it out of his head now that it's there.

Eddie strokes him from root to tip, slow and measured, and the only thing Steve can do is sigh about it, bringing his hand up to Eddie's hip.

He looks at where his hand rests on Eddie's hip. Steve's been sunbathing, for lack of anything better to do, recently. His skin is tan and golden and Eddie's skin is so pale in comparison.

This is all so much. And they've barely done anything at all.

"You wanna touch me?" Eddie asks, pulling him out of his thoughts, and Steve nods. He wants to touch him so fucking bad.

He can feel Eddie's breath on his lips, they're so close. He wants to lean in and put his tongue in Eddie's mouth, sloppy and wet the way Eddie's thumb feels on the head of his cock.

He shoves his hand down Eddie's swim shorts instead. They're tight too, like his, so his hand barely has space to move.

But he feels him, gets his hand around him, and he's- he feels big. His cock fills out his grip nicely, it's thick, a good length.

He breathes out a heavy breath as he strokes Eddie's cock. The tip is already wet, pre-come pearling there, getting Steve's hand all sticky when he rubs his palm over it on the next upstroke.

Eddie moans, sharp and sudden, when Steve's thumb catches on the underside of the head of his cock, and then it's like all bets are off. Whatever perceived notion of taking it slow has faded, quickly.

Their hands are moving fast on each other's cocks, grips tightening, like they're in a race to the finish. Like who can hold off the longest?

And Steve still wants to kiss him, almost feels like he has to. He doesn't want to stand here in the middle of their hotel room and touch Eddie, be touched by him, and not know what his mouth feels like against his.

But it feels like it would be a step too far. Like it would snap Eddie out of it, Steve pressing his mouth against his, trying to push this into something it isn't.

Their mouths are close, they're already sharing the same breath, practically. It would be just a hair of a movement that would get their mouths slotted together for real- he wouldn't even have to move much. It still feels too far a space to cross.

Eddie makes the decision not to kiss him even easier when he dips his head to bite at the juncture of Steve's neck.

"Don't leave any marks," he says, breathless. He can't show up to dinner with hickeys on his neck.

"I won't," Eddie says, licking at the spot he bit.

Steve feels close already and it feels too soon. It feels like they just started and Steve is tensing up, ready to come.

Eddie pulls his mouth away from his neck and Steve whines.

"Just," Eddie says, ducking back down to press his mouth quick against his neck again, his breath warm and damp on his skin. He presses a kiss there and it feels more intimate than the situation allows. "We just- I only have two bathing suits and I can't get come on one of them the first fucking day."

Steve nods. Anything, anything- he'll do anything to get Eddie's mouth back on his skin, his hand back on his cock.

He feels like he knows what's coming, and he sucks in a deep breath, at the thought of them pushing their shorts down, at the thought of them rubbing their bare cocks together. He wants it. He wants it more than he's wanted anything in a long time.

He shoves Eddie's shorts down and lets Eddie do the same to him. He looks down and groans. Fuck.

Eddie's cock is red and wet and Steve wants it in his fucking mouth, wants to lap at the wet head, taste his pre-come. He wants Eddie to come in his mouth, wants to roll it around on his tongue.

But Eddie's wrapping a fist around both of them, his hips thrusting forward like he can't stay still and that's good enough. That's more than enough to have Steve riding close to the edge again - feeling Eddie's cock snug against his own in the grip of his hand.

Their foreheads are pressed against each other as they look down at their cocks sliding together in Eddie's fist. It's like he can't look away - it's captivating, the rough slide of them together in Eddie's palm.

He puts one hand on Eddie's neck, the other hand back on Eddie's hip, pulls at him like he can drag him closer even though they're already as close as they can get.

"Fuck. Can't believe the rumors about your dick were true," Eddie whispers, his gaze still glued to their cocks.

"There were rumors about my dick?" Steve asks, switching between looking at their cocks and looking at Eddie looking at their cocks. The feeling swirling in his stomach is so much, and he's so goddamn close.

"Mhm," Eddie hums. "Prettiest dick in Hawkins."

That makes Steve groan, his hand tightening on Eddie's hip.

"Oh yeah?" Eddie asks. "You like being called pretty? Like knowing people are talking about how pretty your dick is?"

He doesn't know why that's what does it for him, but he's coming, just rocking his hips forward, squeezing the hand that's on Eddie's hip until it's probably bruising, and coming all over Eddie's cock. He looks down again, watches it get all over and that makes him twitch even harder. He didn't know that was a thing for him - any of this.

But watching his come get everywhere, all over Eddie's hand and his rings and his cock makes Steve shiver with the sheer amount of possession it strikes in him. He likes his come marking Eddie's skin. He likes Eddie not stopping even for a second, just stroking Steve through it and trying to get himself off with his come-slick hand at the same time.

The sound of Eddie's hand still going, so wet with Steve's come, is obscene in the quiet of the hotel room.

It makes Steve want to get on his knees. He wants to drop down and put his mouth on Eddie, taste his own come on Eddie's cock, lick at it until the taste of salt is gone, keep going until Eddie's filling his mouth with his own salty come.

But he's still catching his breath, still trying to reckon with all of this, when Eddie gasps this perfect little ah sound and comes, getting his fist even slicker. Steve's straddling the edge of overstimulation as Eddie's hand tightens to work himself through it, his grip turning the pleasant aftershocks sharper, meaner.

As Eddie comes down and loosens his grip, Steve brings his hand up to Eddie's chest and touches the metal going through his nipple. It's warm. His skin under Steve's fingertips is so warm. He tugs at it, pulling a groan from Eddie's mouth.

His cock twitches where it lays, still touching Eddie's, still messy with both of their come. It's way too soon to be thinking about more, to be thinking about again, to be seriously considering getting on his knees to clean Eddie up, maybe keep him warm in his mouth until he gets hard again.

He lowers his hand back to Eddie's waist, moves to rest his head on Eddie's shoulder, and closes his eyes.

"Fuck," Steve whispers into the quiet of the room after a minute, only the faint hum of the air conditioning reminding him where they are.

"Mhm," Eddie agrees.

"We just-" Steve cuts himself off, because he still can't quite believe it.

"Mhm," Eddie hums again.

"And it was-"

"It sure was," Eddie says, his clean hand stroking down Steve's back. It's comforting and grounding, having Eddie's still touching him like that, knowing that Eddie's not going anywhere right now.

The room is actually pretty cold, so having Eddie's warm hand running up and down his back is soothing. It makes him shiver just as much as the cool air on his hot skin.

They have to clean up soon or the come will dry uncomfortably in his pubes, but he takes another minute to bask in it. Because in a minute he has to evaluate whatever the fuck just happened. He'll have to look Eddie in the eyes and figure out what the hell this was and how to move forward from it.

He's known Eddie for over eight years now, and nothing like this has ever happened before - Steve's never wanted anything to happen. He had never even considered him an option before.

It's true that they aren't the closest of the bunch - they never really got the chance to get close because Eddie left Hawkins pretty quick after he recovered from the bat bites. He was out in San Francisco and then LA for a couple years, so he and Steve didn't really get the chance to get to know each other.

They'd talk on the phone sometimes to catch up because they were beginning to become friends before he left, before everyone kind of split up. With Steve following Robin to Chicago and Eddie in California, they only ever really saw each other for the holidays at the end of the year, which wasn't exactly enough to foster a deep friendship for them.

It's only recently that Eddie and his band moved out to Chicago, maybe a year or so after Nancy did.

So they've hung out more this past year than they had in the past, but it was still mostly hanging out with their group of friends rather than them hanging out one on one. They'd sometimes go to the bar after work together to de-stress, but unless everyone else was busy, they were rarely alone together.

He thinks he would know if he was secretly into him, is the thing.

He obviously knows Eddie's attractive - the same way he knows his other friends are attractive - but that's never translated into wanting to stick his hands down his pants. Until now.

Something about the ambiance, the liminal space of a hotel room, being all alone with his hands all over Eddie's back- something about that flipped a switch in his brain.

Because standing here, panting into Eddie's shoulder and coming down from an orgasm he was wholly unprepared for, he still wants.

He wants to push Eddie down onto one of the beds in here and grind on him until they come again. He wants to feel Eddie's cock against him again, in him, maybe.

When they pull apart, he doesn't know how they're going to handle this.

There's still so much want running through his body that he's sure Eddie can tell, can see it on his face.

They make their way to the bathroom to clean up and Eddie helps him, dabbing a washcloth across Steve's sticky stomach like it isn't something totally domestic. The warmth in Steve's stomach isn't arousal right now, watching Eddie take care of him like this - it's ooey gooey squishy feelings that Steve is sure didn't exist an hour ago.

He doesn't know how this happened so suddenly, the onset of these feelings, the rubbing off against each other like they've done it before, like they've mastered the art of dry humping against each other until they're desperate with it, breathing heavy against each other's mouths, lips never quite touching.

But Steve lets Eddie clean him up, lets him dab a wet washcloth over the head of his soft cock, lets him tuck him back into his shorts, like this all isn't tugging at his heartstrings, making him feel something he can't quite name yet.

They don't say anything in the bathroom, but when they walk back out into the bedroom, Eddie grabs his sunglasses and asks, "We still goin' to the pool?" kind of like nothing happened between them at all.

Steve blinks at him.

"Yeah, yeah. Uh, lemme grab a towel," he says before grabbing the beach towel he packed.

They walk down to the pool and Steve claims a couple of chairs while Eddie dives straight in.

It's fine.

The way the water glistens off Eddie's skin when he resurfaces makes Steve think about putting his tongue on him to lap up the wetness.

But it's fine.

The way the sunlight glints off Eddie's nipple piercing makes Steve want to touch it, pull at it again, see what noises he can get Eddie to make.

But everything is fine.

The way Eddie looks at him with hooded eyes like he knows exactly what Steve is thinking about makes Steve a little dizzy with the want that washes over him.

But it's probably fine.

Right?

They head back inside after a while of Steve being utterly unable to take his eyes off Eddie in the pool, and Steve knows he's in trouble.

Eddie calls first shower and Steve sits there with his head in his hands for the better part of Eddie's ten minute shower.

How does he get himself into these situations?

He hates not knowing what to expect, wishes he had a manual for what to say and do right after you hook up with your friend.

He doesn't know how to be normal about this the way Eddie seems to be able to. It feels like Eddie is somehow accustomed to hooking up with his friends and Steve doesn't know what to do with that. He doesn't know how to handle any of this.

Does Eddie do this a lot? Does he have friends back home that he hooks up with? Does it just mean nothing to him? The way he's able to just walk it off and appear totally normal is grating at something in Steve. He wishes he could be normal about this.

He's spiraling and he doesn't really know what to do.

When Eddie walks out of the bathroom, Steve tries not to stare, but he's only human. It was bad enough at the pool, but he's sure Eddie is teasing him on purpose now, towel hanging loosely off his hips, water still dripping down his chest, his skin pink and soft looking.

Steve holds back the groan of frustration and slips into the bathroom to shower before they meet the others for dinner.

Unlike Eddie, Steve took his clothes into the bathroom, so he changes in there instead of walking out into the room in just his towel like a harlot.

Robin eyes him suspiciously all throughout dinner, like she can somehow tell he was up to no good, but doesn't know exactly how yet. She always seems to know when something's up with him, but he doesn't think he has the words to say anything about this to her right now, or at all while they're still on vacation. He doesn't even know if he'll have the words when they get back home, because he knows she's going to want to know what's going on with him.

Robin's somehow even more suspicious the next day.

They're late to the lobby the next morning to get breakfast with the others because Eddie slips into Steve's bed as he's swatting at the alarm on the nightstand.

He turns around and Eddie is right there, right up in his space, saying, "You wanna?" and placing a hand on Steve's chest.

And Steve does want to.

So they do.

Steve is still groggy from sleep, but he still pulls Eddie on top of him, he still presses his mouth against Eddie's neck, awake enough to remember to not leave marks there. It's slow and sleepy and he comes in his underwear less than a minute after Eddie does, fingers playing with one of Eddie's nipple rings, his other hand on Eddie's ass, urging him closer, closer, closer.

It's good and Steve still doesn't know how to come to terms with that. How is he supposed to go back to normal after knowing how good it can be with Eddie?

They're late because they spend a few more minutes in bed after they both come, breathing heavily into each other's necks. One of Steve's hands is still on Eddie's nipple, thumbing at the piercing - he's pretty sure that's a thing for Eddie, having it played with. And it definitely is a thing for Steve. He almost wants to go again, wants to put his mouth on Eddie's nipples and grind against him until they're hard again, until they're making even more of a mess.

They're late because after they brush their teeth together in the bathroom, Eddie presses him against the counter and puts his mouth on his neck. He puts his hand on Steve again, circles his fingers around his soft cock and strokes his thumb over it softly, gently. He plays with him for long enough for Steve to start to get hard again.

He's inching his hand down to where he feels Eddie starting to get hard again too. He's curling his fingers around the shape of him, wanting.

They only pull apart because the phone rings - the front desk calling because Robin and the others are tired of waiting for them.

They rush to get changed and they make it downstairs and Steve tries to act normal.

The skin of his neck is sensitive and red from Eddie's facial hair, which is now a whole 'nother thing that Steve can no longer think about without getting turned on apparently. Because now he knows what his mouth feels like against his skin, what the scruff on his face feels like against him.

So Robin knows something is up - either because she and Steve know each other so fucking well, it's obvious to her, or because Steve's not doing anything to try and conceal that he's making what are probably really bad decisions.

On the third day is when she finally says something to him about it and he was right- he just doesn't have the words to say anything about it, mostly because he has no idea what he's doing.

She says something because he's not being normal right now.

Because Eddie refuses to eat his ice cream cone like a normal human being.

He makes eye contact with Steve as he licks his ice cream like he wishes he was licking something else. It makes Steve's cock throb, which is unfortunate considering the entire group is together.

"Why are you looking at him like that?" Robin asks him with wide eyes when Eddie is briefly distracted and talking to Grant.

"Looking at who like what?" Steve asks, cursing the fact that Robin knows him so well, that they share a telepathic bond most days.

And- okay, maybe he wasn't being subtle. He can't help it. Eddie's doing it on purpose, lounging like that, looking like that, all spread out and -

"You're doing it again, dingus." Robin's looking at him with judging eyes when he tears his eyes away.

Steve lets out an exasperated noise. "I'm not looking at anyone like anything, Robbie."

She clenches her jaw and gives him an unimpressed look.

"I'll tell you later? Like when we get home," he says sheepishly, hoping he'll actually be able to. Because right now, he has no idea what he'd even say. We just happened to fall into bed together. Oh, actually, that was after we accidentally jerked each other off. How can he explain that?

Robin looks back and forth between him and Eddie a few times before she nods and says, "Okay, but you're telling me everything. And I mean everything."

Steve doubts she's going to want to hear all of the details of what he's been doing.

This is their last full day here and Steve is maybe having an internal crisis about it. Because he doesn't know what's going to happen once they get home.

He has a feeling he's going to be extremely awkward about it when they get home. He doesn't know if Eddie will want to continue doing whatever it is they're doing or if it'll stop. Because they haven't talked about it at all.

They've just been doing things without talking about it and that isn't really something Steve's dealt with before. Even when he's had hookups in the past, they've established boundaries, called it exactly what it was, and when they were done, that was it. He's never had a week-long extended hookup and he's especially never had one with a friend.

He thinks it's probably going to come and bite him in the ass, not talking about it. Because he's going to get home and all of his friends are going to go back to work and he's going to be left alone to freak out about it, probably.

They spend the last day walking the pier and hanging out on the beach and he tries not to let it show how much he's currently freaking out. He thinks he manages to make it seem like he's a normal human being thinking normal thoughts and not about to spiral.

That night, their last night at the hotel, Eddie pulls a bottle of lube and a couple condoms out of his suitcase and looks at Steve meaningfully.

"You brought lube and condoms?" Steve asks, scrunching his nose up. "Were you planning on fucking someone in our hotel room?"

The thought upsets him more than he wants to admit. He can't imagine coming back to the room and finding Eddie with someone else, someone he sought out and brought back because he wanted to fuck them.

They've had plenty of opportunities to hook up with other people, is the thing, considering they're in San Francisco, and have been going to bars - straight and gay bars - and have been meeting up and hanging out with Eddie and the band's old friends from when they lived out here.

He hadn't thought about it, but now he's thinking about Eddie hooking up with those people he met this week.

It's entirely possible that Eddie could have wanted to take one of them or one of the many people he flirted with back to their room. Why didn't he?

Eddie grins at him and says, "I mean, you never know what could happen on vacation. It's not like I was planning on fucking anyone with you in the room. I mean, probably."

"Only probably? Jesus christ, Eddie," he says, rolling his eyes. He's not going to be jealous about this. He's not. He knows from Eddie's tone that he's joking, mostly.

"I'm kidding. But like I said, anything can happen on vacation, man, as evidenced by everything we've been doing," he says, the first time he's mentioned this thing they've been doing. He lobs the bottle of lube at Steve, badly, but he manages to catch it anyway. "We don't have to use them, by the way. We can keep doing what we've been doing, if you want."

What have they been doing? He wants to ask, wants to know what's going on in Eddie's head, but he also doesn't want to rock the boat. He doesn't know exactly what Eddie thinks is happening, but if he says something, it feels like it would put an end to things early. If this is the last night he has of this, he doesn't want to turn Eddie off by trying to talk about it.

He looks at the condom in Eddie's hand and pauses to think about it. He doesn't think fucking would change anything between them given everything else they've gotten up to this vacation, but he doesn't really want to have to sit on a plane for four and a half hours and be uncomfortable for the entire flight tomorrow.

This is probably the last time they're going to hook up, at least while they're here on vacation so they should make the most of it and make use of the lube at least.

So he says, "I- we shouldn't. Um, there are other things we can do with the lube, though."

Eddie looks at him thoughtfully and drops the condom back in his suitcase. How he even managed to find anything in the explosion currently coming out of his suitcase is a miracle.

"I could fuck your thighs," Eddie says, and a jolt of heat runs through Steve's entire body.

"You could fuck my thighs," he agrees and then goes to grab a towel to lay down on the bed.

The cleaning staff came by while they were gone and remade the beds, so Steve pushes the covers down on his bed and lays the towel there.

He shucks his pants and underwear and pulls his shirt off quickly. Eddie watches him with dark eyes, pulling his own clothes off at the same time.

Steve gets on the bed, turning to lay on his side, facing away from Eddie. He feels Eddie get onto the bed behind him, but he still jolts when he puts a hand on his hip.

Eddie smooths his hand down Steve's side and fits himself along Steve's back.

Steve's already starting to chub up, feeling the hard press of Eddie's body against him. That's another thing he's going to have to reckon with when this vacation is over - Eddie's body is insane.

He never really thought about it before, never really noticed it before. Gone are the days of Eddie being a lanky little beanpole.

With the passing years, he's started going to the gym and his body has more muscle mass than it did before. He's still lanky, but there's muscle there. There's strength and lithe muscles that have had Steve drooling over him for the past week now that he knows just what that strength can do - Eddie lifting him up and placing him on the edge of the desk in their room on the second night here so he could go down on him left Steve feeling shaky and had him blowing his load way too soon.

Feeling Eddie behind him, the press of his half hard cock against his ass, is making Steve kind of regret saying no to getting fucked. It's been a while, and he just knows Eddie would fuck him so right.

He thinks it's the right decision, though - he doesn't know how much more knowledge of how Eddie is as a lover he can take. He doesn't know if he'd be able to survive knowing what Eddie cock feels like inside him, how well he stretches him out, because he knows he would. His cock is wide, fills out Steve's palm so fucking nicely, and feel big when he's taking him in his throat when he's blowing him, so he knows the stretch of it would feel insane.

He feels Eddie press a kiss to his neck before he hears the snick of the bottle of lube opening.

He feels like he should have said something about Eddie having lube this entire time when he saw what was in Eddie's hand a few minutes ago. Because they've been trading spitty hand jobs for days when they could have had the slippery glide of lube on their cocks instead.

Eddie says, "Lift your thigh up for a sec."

So Steve does, feeling a little vulnerable in this position. Maybe they should have done something else or done this a different way, one where he had more control of the situation. Right now, he feels a little bit like he's at Eddie's disposal, like Eddie could do whatever he wanted and Steve would let him.

Eddie reaches between his thighs to coat them in lube before coating his cock. He nudges up closer to Steve, so he's pressed up more firmly against him and Steve lowers his thigh when Eddie's cock slides between his thighs.

Eddie groans, low in his throat when Steve tightens his legs together to give Eddie a nice, tight channel to fuck into. Steve shivers at the sound.

His hand is still coated in lube, so when he reaches around to take Steve's cock in his hand, it's slick and wet with lube, the slide is so nice, exactly the way he does it alone - nice and slick and tight around his dick.

There's a moment of pause where they just breathe together, caught up in it, caught up in the feeling of it.

And then Eddie starts to move.

The drag of him between his thighs is a lot - it's the girth of him pressing against him, nudging up behind his balls on every thrust. He's thick and he feels good between Steve's thighs, would probably feel even better inside him.

He knows it's a little too late to stop and say something like you didn't happen to grab that condom anyway, did you? because he knows Eddie wouldn't - Steve said no, and he knows Eddie would respect that even if he did want to fuck him.

Having Eddie so close to fucking him - the motions are all the same, with Eddie's thrusting against him like he would be if he were really fucking him, his hand wrapped around his dick - but not having him inside him is kind of torture and he's eating his words from before. It might be the smart idea, but fuck if he doesn't want to do the wrong thing right now.

He wants to feel the stretch of him, his hole quivering around him as he bullies his way inside. He wants to feel how deep he'd reach inside him, pressing in slow and measured and considerate like Steve knows he would. He'd want him balls deep, hips pressed flushed against him.

He's gasping at the thought of Eddie inside him, can almost imagine what it would feel like. Eddie's hand around him feels so fucking good - after days of giving each other hand jobs, it's like he knows exactly what Steve likes, how hard to grip him, how and when to play with the head.

The slide of him between his thighs, the feeling of him pressing gentle kisses to his neck, his other arm around Steve like a hug - it's all so much to take in.

He feels wrapped up in him, surrounded by him.

He can feel Eddie's heartbeat against his back with how close and tight they're pressed together.

He comes suddenly in Eddie's hand, gasping, his own hands gripping the pillow beneath him, shuddering through it. Eddie strokes him through it, his slick hand milking the come from him.

It's not the most intense thing he's ever done in the bedroom by far, but this orgasm leaves him feeling wrung out and shaky because Eddie's hand doesn't stop stroking him after he crests through his orgasm, pulling whines from his mouth at the overstimulation.

"Eddie, it's too much," he says, his hand coming down to grab at Eddie's hand still wrapped around him.

"You sure? I could wring another one out of you," he says and Steve's cock leaks at that, still hard, just another glob of come seeping out from the tip. His eyes roll back at the sharp, intense feeling of Eddie's hand being too much on him.

"Fuck, I don't know if I have it in me," he says, voice shaky. Eddie's still hard between his thighs, still thrusting, catching the underside of his sensitive balls every stroke.

Eddie hums in his ear, says, "We'll have to try that another time then," and stops stroking, but keeps his hand on him, cupping him, as he speeds up his hips, chasing his own orgasm.

Steve clamps his thighs together tighter and reaches his arm back to grip Eddie's hair and pull.

Eddie groans, setting his teeth against Steve's shoulder and biting. The edge of pain makes Steve's cock twitch even as it softens in Eddie's hand.

It doesn't take long for Eddie to get there, his come painting the inside of Steve's thighs as he thrusts shallowly and rubs the head of his cock between his thighs.

As they come down, Steve feeling sticky all over somehow, he can't help but think of the way they've come to know each other. He thinks about how intimately they've come to know each other's bodies.

He feels like he knows more about Eddie's body and how to make him come than some people he's actually dated.

He thinks about how Eddie's had his hands and mouth all over Steve, near constantly when they've been alone for this entire week. And how Steve has reciprocated, of course. How his tongue has come to know the shape of Eddie's barbell nipple piercings. How he's come to know the taste of him, the weight of him in his mouth. How exactly he likes his cock to be sucked.

That's not knowledge he should know about someone who's supposed to be a friend, he thinks.

He shouldn't know that Eddie's voice gets gravelly and low when he's about to come. He shouldn't know what Eddie's dirty talk sounds like. He shouldn't know that Eddie still cracks awful jokes even as he's getting his dick sucked.

That all feels like forbidden knowledge, something that he shouldn't be privy to.

But he knows it now. And he isn't sure how he's going to be able to go back to normal once they get home.

taglist (people who've expressed interest in the wip games): @stobinesque @scarcrossdlvrs @cuoredimuschio @steves-strapcollection @patchworkgargoyle @delta-piscium @matchingbatbites @kkpwnall @inairbinad @legitcookie @sidekick-hero @eriquin

#steddie #stranger things #steve x eddie #steveddie #steve harrington #eddie munson #vacation escapades #it's finally here!!! coming in under the wire at 10:55pm on august 31 #the rest will be posted over the next couple of weeks as i finish editing it!! #lemme know if you want to be added to the taglist for the next part

[cassiefromhell]

Unexpected (pt. 6)

Part One Part Five

Fanbase: acotar

Eris x Reader x Azriel

Summary: Eris, freshly mated to you and volatile as ever, has walked in on you and Azriel in a hostile position... what will he think? It's up to you to diffuse the situation.

Word Count: 5.1k

Warnings: fingering, dirty talk, suggestion of oral

A/N: Requests are OPEN! Check my pinned message for details on what I'll write <3 (anything from hc's to drabbles to fully blown fics! ever had a great fic idea but cant write? send em over!!). Thank you so, so much for the notes on this lil series! I read all comments and reblogs.

In the split seconds that follow Eris���s arrival, things go down far too quickly for me to comprehend well. 

As Eris’s expression turns to rage, Azriel realizes the gravity of the situation before I can even react. He releases me from his death grip, gently nudging me away from himself and backing up.

But he was too slow; Eris saw the hold he had me in, and he’s descending on Azriel.

I step forward — honestly, involuntarily, for I did not tell my body to put myself between two very opposing males — and Eris collides with me. “Eris, Eris, love, look at me. Look at me. I’m okay.”

Eris doesn’t even spare me a glance, but he does place a protective hand on my lower back, which means I have his attention. But his whole body is tense and ready to pounce at Azriel.

I continue to soothe him, rubbing circles on his chest. “I’m okay. We were just having a little fun with sparring. Nobody got hurt—”

“That was not sparring,” Eris hisses, eyes narrowing further. “I could hear you down the hall—you were asking him to let you go—”

“You act as if I had her in a chokehold,” Azriel adds, his voice coming from behind me. “She can hold her own — unlike you. I could kill you in an instant.”

His comment causes an immediate growl from Eris, and the red-haired male gently pushes me aside, and then lunges for Azriel.

The movement is too fast for me to react in time, and Eris knocks Azriel to the ground, sending the two sprawling across the floor.

Groaning, I pinch the bridge of my nose, one phrase on loop in my brain: Stupid, aggressive males. Stupid, aggressive males.

I let them brawl for around twenty seconds, wincing when Azriel lands a solid punch to Eris’s nose, but wincing harder when Eris swiftly kicks Azriel’s groin. The sharp cry of pain from that, quite literally, low blow makes me decide that enough is enough.

I stride over to them, then wait until Azriel is on top of their little rolling spree, knowing that he’s more likely to listen to me. When that happens, I speak, my voice demanding and echoing throughout the room. “Enough.”

That word in my signature ‘listen up buckaroo’ tone is enough to make both males pause and look over to me.

“I said, enough. Get off, Azriel, before I drag you by your scruff like a mangy dog — because that’s what you’re both acting like.”

Azriel, with his tail between his legs, gives Eris one last sharp glare before standing, shuffling away.

Eris is on his feet immediately, not looking quite ready to let him go.

“Eris!” I shout, stepping in front of him and grabbing his shoulders. “Look at me. Eris!”

It takes a moment, but he does relent, my first mate’s eyes shifting down to my own. 

“He’s hurting more than I am now. You’ve gotten your petty revenge. Now sit down, and listen,” I scold him, pushing on his shoulders.

Obediently, he sits on the ground. He knows my rage, and he’s learned that a happy mate keeps your life straight.

I whirl, putting my hands on my hips. Azriel is standing there, silent as ever, his shadows angrily swirling. His arms are crossed firmly over his chest, concealing his burnt—and likely now bloodied—hands. His attention is trained on Eris, seeming moderately amused that I have him on the floor like a scolded puppy.

“You too. Sit. Now.”

He too sits, but after more hesitation and a skeptical look towards me. The faint amusement on his features vanishes.

I stride to be standing directly between the two. “I will not tolerate any more anger-fed, impulsive, and frankly violent tendencies between you two. If you’re fighting for me, then do it better — I don’t know, buy me flowers or something. If you’re angry about our whole double-mate predicament, take it out on someone else. Yell at a council member, Eris. Spar with a particularly annoying Illyrian, Azriel. You know what? If you reaaaally need to get out the urge to punch each other’s teeth out, go ahead. But not in my presence. If that’s what you need, then you get a licensed sparring referee to watch you two and make sure no-one dies. But don’t go complaining to me.

“Eris,” I turn to face the male in question, flashing my teeth as I speak. “You will learn to accept that Azriel is also my mate. We’re bound to spend time together, and I understand that we’re freshly mated and you encountered us in an irregular position, but you need to leash your anger towards him.”

I hadn’t planned much of a lecture for Azriel, but a quiet, mocking “leash it, like your hounds” from behind me has me turning to face him once more.

“And Azriel,” I continue, raising my voice an octave. “You will behave. You will watch your mouth. You know better than to egg on a volatile, freshly mated male, especially in front of his female. Do you understand?”

Azriel bites his tongue like he’s refraining from insulting Eris one last time… but he nods.

“Eris. Do you understand?” I ask, crossing my arms.

The red headed male nods, more eagerly than Azriel had.

“Good. Now, both of you up.”

Equally obediently this time, they each rise. 

“Shake hands.”

Eris scowls, giving me a sidelong glance. “Love, you know how I feel about this. I will be civil, but—”

“Don’t make me force you to promise each other eternal pacifism and harmony.”

Eris immediately holds out his hand.

And, thank the Mother, Azriel shakes it.

“Good,” I sigh, running a hand down my face. “Eris, put away my harp. Azriel, I will visit Velaris in four days’ time. I expect you to be here to pick me up.”

Azriel blinks for a moment, then grins. “I’ll be there.”

Eris makes a pouty face, but I manage to brush it off for now. I’m not very good at resisting a clingy Eris, however, so I know that I need to take my leave.

I turn to the exit and leave, slamming the door shut behind me. I have to trust that those two will either talk it out or disperse on their own terms, because I am desperate to get out of the palace after the deadly combination of this encounter and so many days spent in our chambers. Not that I haven’t immensely enjoyed them.

But, honestly, my hips need a break.

An hour later, I sit high up in a tree, deep in the luscious forest surrounding the Autumn Court treehouse-style castle. 

My horse, a disagreeable andalusian mare with a stunning dapple gray coat, is tied to the trunk of a nearby tree. I’m sure she’s happily eating apples or picking the bark off of a stump.

I find these woods incredibly calming. The rustle of leaves, the crunching of pebbles under the hooves of animals — it creates a soothing atmosphere. 

Eris has graciously left me this time on my own. I’m sure he could sense through the bond how upset I was about all of the fighting — I have enough on my plate as it is. However, he won’t be able to stay away for much longer, not with being freshly mated and all.

Right on cue, a soft tugging comes from Eris’s end of the bond. I hesitate, but then match his little tug.

Not thirty seconds later, Eris winnows to a branch above me. First I feel his eyes on me, then hear a soft sigh, and then the shuffling of leaves as he climbs down to my level. He is wordless the whole time, slipping into my branch and sitting behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. He tucks his head against my neck.

Equally silently, I reach back and stroke his hair.

We sit there, straddling this tree branch, for an incalculable period of time. It could have been two minutes, or two hours, I find myself genuinely unsure. 

Eris is the one to break the silence. “I’m sorry for causing you unneeded and unwarranted stress,” he mumbles against my skin. “I love you. So much. And I just want you safe… and happy. Even if that means that you accept Azriel, too.”

Sighing softly, I tilt my head to kiss his forehead. “I love you, too. And I know you do. I accept your apology wholeheartedly.”

He grins against my neck, gently biting my skin. “That’s good, because I wasn’t going to last the night without dragging you back to me by your hair.”

“By my hair?”

“Did I stutter?”

I laugh softly, gently taking his jaw in my hand. I tilt his head up to face me, then give him a long kiss.

Eris leans into it, pulling me closer. When we finally part, he murmurs against my cheek, “Four days, hm?”

“I came up with it on the spot… but yeah. Scores us four more days alone, and then I go to visit Azriel in an environment where you won’t be shooting him glares and scowls and rude little quips—”

“I was not the one making the rude little—”

“Eris.”

“Sorry, love.”

I turn to face him, my legs laying over his. We stare at each other for a very long time, before he smiles and kisses me softly. 

“You know, a lot can be done in four days,” he croons, rubbing my lower back, and then slipping his hand around to my front, over the seam of my trousers.

Whimpering, my head rests against his shoulder. “Eris… As much as I want it, my hips need a break,” I whine, though my body betrays me as heat pools under his touch.

“We don’t need to move your hips at all,” he soothes me, leaving gentle kisses along my neck as he palms me. “Let me take care of you, little flame.”

I open my mouth to, I don’t even know, object? But how could I say no to this, to the delicious sensation his hand is bringing me even through fabric? So instead, I nod, whimpering softly. “Please.”

With Eris and I temporarily gaining a break from the mating frenzy this morning, I had nearly forgotten the intense pull that builds in my abdomen now, the sharp need seeming to stem from my very soul, pulling me towards him — and dampening my underwear.

And so when his hand works its way into my trousers and breaches my folds, I breathe a heavy sigh of relief. Eris tugs me a little closer, so that our bodies are flush against each other, only his hand between us. His touch is gentle right now, thumb dancing circles around my clit and his pinky finger tentatively dipping inside of me. Even the light contact has my heart racing, blood thrumming in my ears.

“So wet for me, already,” he purrs, pushing in his ring finger as well, slowly thrusting in me out. His other hand holds me close as he speaks into my ear. “Such a good girl. My perfect little mate.”

My hips involuntarily buck forward as his thumb presses against that sensitive bundle of nerves, but his other hand grips my thigh tightly.

“Ah,” he growls, shaking his head. “You said your hips needed a break. So keep them still.”

He switches his pinky out for his middle and pointer fingers, slowly thrusting in and out, in and out.

My whimpers shift into moans, and I find myself biting his shoulder to muffle them. His fingers continue to work magic on me — indescribable, fiery magic. And soon, my abdomen begins to tense and flutter, and I murmur a quick, “please.”

“I know, love,” Eris whispers against my ear, quickening his pace. “I’ve got you. Let go.”

With a sharp cry, my release comes. Pleasure and pressure wash over me and up my spine, making me instinctually close my legs around the overstimulation at my apex. Panting, the sensation seems endless, until I manage to float back down to reality, immediately registering Eris’s voice.

“You look so pretty when you cum on my fingers,” he croons, kissing the shell of my ear. “So innocent.”

“Innocent?” I ask, raising a brow. “When I’m orgasmic and moaning, I look innocent?”

Eris grins, sneaking in a few kisses at my pulse point. “It’s hard to explain… but yes.”

I reach down, seizing his wrist and pulling his hand out of my panties. His fingers glisten with my slick, and without hesitation, I bring them into my mouth… and suck.

“Still innocent?” I speak around his fingers, allowing a soft moan to slip from my throat, gagging a little as my lips meet his palm. 

It’s hard to miss the tent that pops up under the fabric over his crotch.

He opens his mouth to speak, but the crunching of footsteps over leaves interrupts our peace.

Eris sighs heavily, retracting his fingers and fixing my trousers for me. I watch his deft fingers button and straighten my pants with lust-filled, hooded eyes, tongue flicking across my lips. He gives me a ‘wait a moment’ look, and then shifts his attention to the ground.

“Can’t you see I’m busy?” He calls down.

My hand reaches for the button of his own slacks, but his fingers capture my wrist without even sparing me a glance.

Damn Fae instincts.

“Apologies, my lord,” a voice calls up — he has quite the regal tone, so perhaps a guard or even a low-ranking, attention-seeking courtier. “But Lord Lucien was looking for you — something about a starry mate matter? He was rather cryptic, my lord.”

Eris groans, leaning his head down to rest on my shoulder. He whispers, “It’s always him. Always.”

It takes me half a second longer to realize what that message means. It’s an Azriel matter. Of course it is. Azriel being my other mate has yet to be exactly… announced… so far, so Eris’s brothers and very few servants or guards know of the situation. It’s no surprise that Lucien is trying to be discreet.

“Tell him I’ll meet with him in just a moment,” Eris calls down, then looks at me and speaks in a hushed tone. “I’m sure he just wants to speak of your departure in four days — I informed him earlier. I’ll meet you in our rooms later.”

“Eris,” I whine, nipping his nose with a graze of my teeth. “Can’t you feel it? The bond is—”

“I know, my love,” he murmurs, capturing my chin between his forefinger and thumb. “And I will make it up to you tonight. I’ll even bring you those smutty little romance books you like and let you recreate a scene with me.”

That satiates me. “Really?” A smile spread across my lips, my posture straightening.

“Yes, really,” he grins, pecking each of my cheeks and then giving me a quick kiss on the lips. “Look forward to that.”

And with that, he leaps from the tree and disappears down the path.

“I’m bringing a hound?”

“Yes.”

“A hound? This is a stake of dominance if I’ve ever seen one.”

“It’s not just any hound,” Eris whines, gesturing to the blonde bitch at my feet, sitting at attention with her ears in the air. “She’s your favorite hound. You love her. You even sneak her extra treats.”

I roll my eyes, kneeling to stroke the dog. She leans into my touch only slightly, but remains at attention, ready to take orders. “Yeah, because look at her. She has the prettiest blue eyes. How could I say no to that face? Hmmmm? How could I say no to this sweet baby?” I nuzzle the hound’s ear, cooing to her. 

When I look back up, Eris is giving me his best puppy dog face. 

“Oh, come now,” I groan, giving his leg a light push. “I’m sure Azriel would not appreciate me bringing Kelpie, whether she’s your dog or mine — she’s still an Autumn Court hound.”

Eris shakes his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “First of all, I’ll never get over you naming a bitch Kelpie. Secondly, I’m sure if you bat your eyelashes and ask nicely, you can bring her,” he raises a brow, “and I want you to please bring her.”

“Why?” I groan, standing once more and bracing my hands on my hips. “So that you know that I’m safe? I am perfectly capable of protecting myself better than a dog can.”

“It’s for my peace of mind,” he begs, stepping forward and tipping my chin up to look at him. “Please, little flame?”

“No.”

“……Please? For me?” Eris juts his bottom lip out, stroking my cheek with his thumb.

The four days left in Autumn have flown by, and Azriel will be here to pick me up any moment. Which perhaps, maybe, has me questioning my resolve on this matter. I know Azriel will let me bring Kelpie, but honestly it might end up feeling like Eris is watching me.

However, the face he’s making…

I groan heavily, eyes shuttering. “I really hate you, you know that?”

I can feel his grin as he kisses me, one hand sneaking around my waist. “That sounds like a concession, because you know you love me.”

Opening my eyes once more, I give his chest a gentle nudge. “I’ll bring the hound. But if I sense any funny business, and I mean any—”

“Yes, yes,” Eris smirks, patting my head, “you’ll have my ass. I know.”

“Damn right she will.”

I whirl around to find Azriel standing there, arms crossed across his leathered chest. 

“Right on time,” I say, with a glance to the clock. “I hope you don’t mind, but I wish to bring a dog from home. Just for comfort, you know?”

Azriel nods, striding to my side and kneeling to stroke the hound’s side. “That won’t be an issue. What’s her name?”

“Kelpie,” I say, patting her head.

Azriel pauses, and glances at Eris. “Did you…”

“She did,” the High Lord responds, gesturing to me. “And I will never understand why.”

“It’s a perfectly capable name!” I huff, crossing my arms. “You males are just too ridiculous to see the creativity in it.”

Azriel stands with a shrug, and then holds his arm out to me. “Are you ready to go?”

I give Eris a small smile as he hands me my bag, and I take it and Kelpie’s collar in one hand, taking Azriel’s arm with the other. Eris and I had said our goodbyes before Azriel had arrived, and before our hound discussion, so there’s no need for that now.

“Yes,” I reply.

And with that, we are enveloped in shadows.

Velaris is a beautiful city, and the place we are staying in is even more beautiful — they call it the House of Wind. 

However, on the topic of wind, I would have appreciated it more at first had someone, anyone, warned me that in winnowing in you have to either fly or drop the last few yards. 

When our winnow ended and I found myself midair and then suddenly in Azriel’s arms, shooting down onto the balcony, I was not pleased. Luckily, the Illyrian had the foresight to grab Kelpie, so she’s fine, but the whole experience was very jarring. 

“I would have appreciated a warning,” I had told him once we landed, holding a hand over my mouth to ease my queasiness.

“I didn’t think you’d be afraid of heights — I’m sorry, it’s so normal to me that I failed to even consider it,” he apologized over and over, placing a protective hand over my lower back.

“I am not afraid of heights, I am afraid of falling.”

That ended the conversation.

Which is why now I sit in the room they prepared for me, resting. Azriel thought it’d be best for me to be able to settle in a little bit before lunch, after which he’ll take me on a formal tour of the city, and then there will be a dinner at a dwelling known as The River House — Rhys has sent me paintings and descriptions of it times before, so that one isn’t new to me. I do still find it a tad bit curious that I was never informed of the existence of the Wind house, but I decided earlier not to ask.

There are a few extra tidbits I’ve learned about the building I sit in now: it can hear you and will do essentially anything you want, and it houses Cassian and a female named Nesta. I’ve been informed in past letters that she’s one of Feyre’s two elder sisters, along with Elain. I’ll be meeting her tonight, at dinner.

One thing I do know is that I like this place. I was told that the House itself arranged my room based on paintings and descriptions of me, and it’s done a fine job. A bookshelf lines an entire wall, filled with literature that, at a glance, seems to be precisely my type. It placed a knife under my pillow and on my nightstand, which is very typical ‘me’ behavior. When I first stepped in, a steaming cup of my favorite tea was placed on a desk, next to a book titled ‘Velaris: Myths and Lore of the City of Starlight.’

The house likes history.

Currently, I sit in a comfortable lounge chair, that book in my lap and tea in hand, reading up on my historical and mythological events.

I’ve been here for around an hour when the door swings open, revealing Azriel.

“Hi,” I say, closing my book. “Come to collect me?”

He gives me a quick once over, nodding. “If you’re feeling up to it.”

“Of course,” I reply, taking the final sip of my tea — but when I shift to put the items on a table, they vanish. “I must admit, that’s a tad unnerving.”

“You get used to it,” Azriel responds with a shrug, extending his arm. “Now, let me show you Velaris.”

“This time, I hope you’ll warn me before plummeting us to a certain doom,” I grin, taking his bicep gently.

He returns my grin with a wry smile of his own. “Only if I feel like it.”

Azriel’s tour of Velaris was exquisite. He showed me each quarter of the city, the squares for creative people, especially the musicians one — where I walked away a happy customer with a new, magic infused, harp cleaning cloth. Azriel carries it for me in a small paper box as we walk along the Sidra to our next destination: dinner.

“I hope you’re not too nervous,” Azriel starts, tensing a little at my side.

I raise a brow, a piece of hair falling over my temple. “Why would I be? I already know Rhys and Mor, and I’ve met Feyre and Cassian.”

He remains rigid, so I slow to a stop, tugging his elbow to turn him towards me. He says nothing, but does make eye contact.

He’s not exactly lying. But I do have the feeling that he’s omitting information. And as a spy, he must be rather good at it.

“What do I need to know, Azriel?”

A pause. The calculations passing through his mind are visible in his eyes, which sets me in an uneasy state. I find myself gripping his arm tightly now.

But the moment has been stretched out in my mind, because not even two seconds later, he replies. “There will be a couple extra people at the dinner. Their names are Gwyn and Emerie — Nesta’s friends.”

“Good. An imbalance leaning the female way is never a bad thing. Offsets you males and your volatile behaviors,” I laugh, my voice ringing through the air with the sound.

I’ve almost forgotten the way that he paused before he told me that. Like he was deciding what, exactly, to tell me.

Almost.

But when I open my mouth to inquire more, I find that we’re already on the gravel path leading up to the river house, so I snap my jaw shut and resolve that going in half-blind will be my fate.

The door swings open, and out comes Mor, who rushes over and sweeps me out of Azriel’s hold, ushering me into the house and buzzing like a bee. “Ah! I’m so glad you’re here — happy to have you back in the Night Court. Is this your first time in Velaris? Oooh, has Az shown you the city? I hope that—”

“Mor—” I cut in, to no avail.

“—he’s given a good tour; he misses all the great places. Did he show you Rita’s? We love that place! I heard you officially mated with Eris — uhm, good for you. What exactly are you doing here anyway? I thought you and the oh-so-mighty High Lord would still be in a little bubble, so I have to wonder— oh, hey, are you hungry? Since we made a—”

“Mor,” I successfully cut in, and she stops, looking over to be with a raised brow. “I’m happy to see you too. And I’m starving. So, lead the way to the food.”

A snort comes from behind me, undoubtedly Azriel. Mor nods and agrees however, placing a hand on my back and shepherding me towards the source of the food smell. 

I know that Cassian has joined Azriel behind me when the sound of wings colliding occurs, followed by hushed whispers.

But I’m distracted rather quickly as I’m led into the dining room, which is full and bustling with people, some that I recognize and some that I don’t.

I immediately spot Rhysand and Feyre, although they’ve spotted me first, judging by the dinner roll that’s hurtling towards my head. The first time I met Rhys, I defended myself by throwing a sandwich at him, so this has sort of become our tradition. My hand snaps out in front of me, catching the bread. I examine it, then take a bite. 

“First of all, are you ever going to get over this joke? Second of all, this is really good bread. Who made this?” I scarf down the food, walking over and taking a seat to Rhys’s left, Feyre already on his right. Azriel quickly takes the seat next to me.

A petite female across the table warily raises her hand. “Oh, I did. I baked the bread,” she explains. Her voice sounds like falling rose petals on a warm autumn day, and gives off the scent of lavender and honey.

“Hi,” I smile to ease her obvious nerves, holding my hand out. I introduce myself, and she shakes my hand.

“Oh, this is Elain, my sister,” Feyre cuts in, gesturing to the brunette across from us. 

“Ah, yes — I’ve heard from the letters.”

“Lovely to meet you, then,” Elain adds, smiling softly. Then her eyes flick to Azriel, her cheeks color, and she looks back to me. “You must be… Azriel’s.. friend? I was told you were visiting.”

My eyebrows draw together, and I glance at Azriel, and then back to Elain. I open my mouth to ask why she’s being so weird about the fact that I’m his mate, but then I realize the way she’s openly biting her cheek and stealing glances at the Illyrian by my side. It’s suddenly abundantly clear; either she has a thing for Azriel, or they have some sort of past.

Don’t let it bother you.

But it does. Just a little. Tiny bit. I shut my mouth, as the table fills in, every seat being filled.

Introductions go around, and I memorize each face and name. It goes: Elain, three females named Gwyneth, Emerie, and Nesta, and then Cassian. On the far end of my side of the table sits Amren, who gives me a slightly frightening grin.

I note that Gwyneth, or as everyone calls her, Gwyn, is charming and witty, paired with a wall-shaking enthusiasm. I quickly learn that she works in the library, so this must be an important form of socialization.

Emerie is nice, as far as I can tell, definitely headstrong and bold. She has an obviously strong form, but I don’t miss the way that her wings seem to sag a little behind her.

I’m halfway through my assessment of Nesta (sharp-tongued, sarcastic, and moderately unapproachable) when a macaron lands on the edge of my plate. I glance over to find Azriel watching me. 

“Oh, thank you,” I murmur, starting to pile food onto my plate. “Sorry, I was a little distracted.”

Azriel leans over, speaking into my ear, his breath tickling my skin and rustling my hair. “You weren’t distracted. You were analyzing.”

“Perhaps,” I shrug, a little smirk curling on my lips.

“I do it too. It’s just easier when you have shadows that are whispering all that you need or want to know,” he murmurs back, then leans away and starts piling food onto his own plate.

Five minutes pass easily of good food and easy conversation… and not one, but two females making eyes at Azriel. 

Elain is the most obvious about it — blushing and batting her eyelashes and aiming to brush her hand against Azriel’s by reaching for a dish at the same time as him. Thank the Mother, Azriel is mainly unaffected. In fact, his end of the bond shows affection for her, but no romantic feelings whatsoever… at least not right now.

Gwyn is the other, but she’s sneaky. More just making jokes and smiling at him than anything else, though I caught her staring at him a couple times.

Am I a little tiny bit uncomfortable? Yes.

But mostly shocked at how bold these females are. After all, his mate is sitting right next to him, right at their table.

I recite to myself: Don’t let it bother you. You and Azriel are hardly anything anyway.

Hardly anything.

“So,” Amren starts, leaning forward to bore her angular silver eyes into me. “Is someone else going to say it, or am I?”

Elain looks over at the female through her lashes, blinking in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

Nesta rolls her eyes, immediately jumping on Amren’s train of thought. But then she points at me, and my heart falters. “This. Her,” Nesta says, smirking. “Why, exactly, is Eris’s mate in Velaris, with Azriel?”

Rhys raises a brow. “You two are so strange. Mor and I have known her for centuries — she’s always welcome to visit.”

Cassian gives Azriel an amused look, like he’s thoroughly enjoying the situation. He raises his wine glass in a ‘good luck’ fashion. But I’m just confused.

All of the people at the table are looking at us, with a range of expressions. Some are questioning, or confused, others looking to us for confirmation on Rhys’s claim.

And then it hits me.

Oh, shit.

They don’t know.

No one here except for Azriel, Cassian, and me knows.

They don’t know that I am Azriel’s mate.

Oh, shit.

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#azriel didnt tell them? lol sucks for you #cassian is very amused #“why is eris's mate here?? hmmm?” is nesta being silly or is cassian a snitch hmm i wonder #comment to be added to taglist #acotar #writing #a court of thorns and roses #fanfiction #eris acotar #eris vanserra #fanfic #a court of mist and fury #a court of silver flames #a court of wings and ruin #eris x reader x azriel #azriel x you #azriel x reader #azriel shadowsinger #azriel acotar #pro eris vanserra #eris vanserra x reader #eris x reader #acotar fanfiction #fem reader #x reader #acotar x reader #unexpected #azriels mate #eris's mate #cassiefromhell

[gutsby]

wedded bliss pt 2 coming soon :-) 🩷🩷

#message me or comment if you wanna be added to the taglist! #love y'all see you soon #nick saban just retired so i may be in mourning for the next 2-3 business days

[qilinkisser]

It's snowing today! So the girls and I are having a cozy day in <33

Reblogs appreciated! S/I (blue pants) uses they/them! F/Os use she/her!

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#ahh my first drawing with my taglist! so many people wanted to be added- thank you all!! #I'm super happy with how this turned out ;w; I just want to have fun parallel play time with them #josie's on a switch in case you can't tell- I wonder what game she's playing! #art 🎨 #josie 🧢 #isabel 🎁 #pj 🩹 #selfship art #selfship #selfshipper #safeship #safeshipping #safeship community #wlw selfship #nblw selfship #poly selfship #f/o x s/i #romantic f/o #lesbian selfship

[bizaar]

Endless Summer ✧

Part 2: She Drives Me Crazy

Cruel Summer Masterlist

First - Next

pairing: eddie munson x afab!reader

warnings: sexual content (18+ minors dni), touch starved!eddie, mentions of drug usage, swearing, bullying, self-deprecation, masturbation (m), oral (m receiving), mentions of slight sexual trauma (nothing serious or icky, just soul-crushing humiliation)

word count: 18.5k

a/n: listen, if there's one thing about me, I'm gonna write eddie a little bit pathetic and a little bit more traumatized than is rightly fair. this chapter should really be called "to all the girls who have treated eddie munson terribly before"

There is absolutely nothing rational about the crush Eddie has on you.  

It’s a wickedly cruel twist of fate to find himself yearning like this, especially for someone like you.   

You, who is so untouchable that he feels like he’s going to burst into flames for so much as looking at you, who is so far removed from his league that you might as well be on another planet.    

It’s really not fair. He’s been through this before, he’s supposed to know better by now, but when has life been anything even remotely close to fair for Eddie?   

It’s driving him more than a little crazy. You’re driving him more than a little crazy, because you’re just about the closest thing to popular as you can get, and he’s a leper – untouchable, same as you, only from the complete opposite end of the spectrum.  

You hang out with cheerleaders and jocks and the arguable social elite of Hawkins High, and Eddie skulks around with his group of loser friends, so far down at the bottom of the food chain that their link is not even attached.   

You’re the day and he’s the night – polar opposites. The way he sees it, you should hate him, just like all your shitty friends do, and he should hate you right back because that’s just the way things are, but against all odds, he doesn’t feel that way.       

Against his better judgement, Eddie likes you. He really, really likes you, which is stupid because he doesn’t even know you, despite what happened that night at Tina Burton’s party last year, despite the way you’d turned big watery eyes up at him, despite all the things you’d said back and forth to each other.   

All the things that haunt him at night that he’s certain you don’t remember.       

He knows he’s just going to end up getting hurt over it, letting himself get so attached to someone so far removed from his orbit. He can already feel the beginnings of that pain, hairline fissures forming cracks over the surface of the calcified muscle in his chest that he’s worked so hard to turn to stone.   

He’s always fine until he sees you, then his mouth goes dry and his hands start to shake, and he feels the ominous prelude to the terrible hurt that lies waiting for him just over the horizon.  

You’re going to break his heart someday, Eddie knows that for certain, and at this point he’s just counting the days until you do.      

Maybe he’ll get over you before that can happen. Maybe something will happen that will cure him of the fever he’s got for you and save him from that impending heartache, but for now, he’s completely and utterly obsessed with you in a totally uncool, irrational, sweaty palms sort of way.      

He’s halfway down the road to loving you without ever having held a real conversation with you, all because you went and committed the unforgivable sin of treating him with the smallest shred of basic human decency.       

If that isn’t the crutch upon which Eddie leans, he doesn’t know what is. All he knows is that ever since that party, he’s been desperate for your attention, starved for it, really, and he doesn’t know what to do about that.       

Except make a fool out of himself in front of half the school population, diverting Carol Perkins’s attention away from you and taking the full brunt of her ire just to try and save you.        

He doesn’t know why he did that – it’s yet another thing he should know better than to do, especially considering the bruise he’s got on his kidneys from the way Tommy Hagan shoved him into a locker later that day and threatened major bodily harm for embarrassing Carol like he did.     

Whatever, she’s a bitch and so is Tommy and they’ve both been that way since Middle School. It was high time somebody knocked her down a peg, and if Eddie was the one who had to do it? So be it, especially if that meant coming to your rescue.       

He would do just about anything for you, except talk to you. He’s not brave enough to do that, because for as obsessed with you as he is, as violently as he craves your attention, you scare the ever-loving shit out of him.     

Still, in the deep blue hours of the early morning, Eddie lies awake imagining all the things he secretly yearns for – all that boyfriend-girlfriend shit. Like holding your hand in a movie theatre, taking you out and giving you a chaste kiss on the forehead at the end of the night, making enough money to afford to buy you flowers and chocolates and jewelry and whatever else your little heart desires.   

Then there are his secret aspirations, the ones that live in the safe space behind his lungs like glittering little jewels, the ones Eddie only entertains when he’s safe and solitary, and really down bad for you. That’s when he starts fantasizing about getting on his knees for you, giving you a ring, marrying you – Christ on a bike, he’s pathetic.    

But he keeps those wishes locked up tight, because he knows the circle you run in, the creatures that swim in your tide pool.    

It’s only a matter of time before you go and get yourself a stupid jock boyfriend and the sky comes crashing down on Eddie’s head. He doesn’t know what he’s going to do when that happens, how he’s supposed to endure it. 

He thinks about it a lot, and it terrifies him.  

How it will be bad enough having to watch you go around with him, whoever he’ll end up being, holding his hand, sitting perched on his lap, falling into his arms and letting him stick his tongue down your throat, but worse than that is how you’ll probably end up getting knocked up and married to the bastard right out of high school.    

Because on top of being a stupid jock with a shining future that promises him collegiate glory in the way of sports scholarships and a good job waiting for him the moment he graduates, he’ll probably be a good Christian boy, too, so he’ll do right by you, come hell or high water – the son of a bitch.   

Worst still is how all that plays directly into the vicious cycle of boys and girls that has existed in this town since time immemorial. In the very likely event that this future comes to pass, you’re almost guaranteed to settle down right here in Hawkins, just like everyone and their mothers and fathers do, and Eddie is just going to have to endure the way that cycle perpetuates itself, because this town is a gravity well in the worst possible way.   

 As likely as you are guaranteed to stay, so is he, and it is a particular brand of quiet doom that keeps him up at night.   

Eddie knows he’s got no prospects, no future, no chance of getting out and finally escaping this place. So, in the event that this terrible future does come to pass, he resigns himself to the fact that he’s just going to have to sit there and continue to watch you live your life in the arms of someone else.       

Eddie would do right by you, if you gave him the chance. He’d work himself to the bone to buy you a house with a fence and a yard and a dog, to put presents under the tree at Christmas and raise your kids right, but that’s not in the cards for him. Thats not the kind of American Dream that is afforded to someone like him.   

That’s what’s going to break his heart in the end, and it’s fucking tragic, really.     

Life would be so much easier if Eddie could just find a way to be a little less himself and a little more the deviant everyone makes him out to be.     

If all he wanted was to get you on your knees and ram his cock down your throat, abuse that pretty little mouth of yours, he could find a way to work with that. He might even manage to coax you out to the van so he can fuck you nasty in the back and be done with all these bullshit feelings.   

Hell, maybe he’ll get lucky, and you’ll come to him.    

He knows what people say about him, after all.   

Word on the street is that Eddie Munson is easy, he’ll trade weed for head – he fell for that exactly one time, and it was a mistake that he is still paying for, all because Tina Burton gave him a forty second blow job for an eighth, and then she went and told all her little friends and suddenly it was open season.  

He’s lost count of how many times a deal has ended with some put-together ASB type balancing their open disdain for him with their horny little fantasies, batting their lashes at him and resting a sleazy hand on his thigh.  

He guesses he was just lucky that the talk of the town was the exchange and not the fact that he came so fast, but it’s cold comfort when everybody is suddenly forgetting their money and offering to pay him in “favors” — really, how do all these rich kids expect him to pay his bills? 

It’s not like you can cash orgasms in at the bank... well, not in this little conservative corner of Indiana, at least. 

The only solace he can take in that is that you’ve never been lumped in with that crowd. He’s never had the pleasure of selling to you, so he’s never had to endure the sick prelude of waiting on you in some parking lot, wondering how this deal is going to play out.  

No, with you he’s doomed to walk around yearning like some kind of lovesick virgin.    

Even now, he’s stuck replaying his most recent interaction with you over and over in his head in an infinite loop, analyzing every minute detail, searching for meaning in the brief moments you’d shared.     

He thinks about what happened in the parking lot that morning the week before, or at least what he can remember of it, considering how he’d spent the minutes leading up to your interaction bogarting Adam’s bong in the back of his van.   

Eddie was high as a fucking kite – higher even – and he didn’t see you coming.      

You caught your Walkman in one hand with an impressive feline grace after you collided – thank God, he could barely afford new brake shoes for the van, let alone even begin to try navigating the waters of replacing something like a cassette player.     

Considering he wasn’t immediately aware of who he’d just crashed into, Eddie set his teeth and braced himself for the incoming volley of verbal abuse that was sure to be hurled his way, and he found himself standing a little more than dumbstruck when it never came.       

Even more so when an apology arrived in its stead.       

“Oh, shit— I’m sorry!”       

The sound of your voice shot him full of holes and sent adrenaline like lightning rocketing down to the tips of his fingers and toes.      

Out of everyone it could have been in this goddamn town, the last person he expected to see was you standing there, thankfully without your ever-present group of horrible friends — still Eddie was not prepared to face you, not as high as he was. He couldn’t muster his armor, snap all his carefully constructed shields into place, and it filled him with a blind, bleary panic.    

Why, oh why did it have to be you?        

Because Hawkins is a small town, made that much smaller when you are so painfully aware of someone that you constantly feel like you’re about to fly apart at the seams.       Then again, he’s not exactly sure why he was so shocked to see it was you, considering it’s hard not to feel like he is tripping over you every time Eddie turns around these days. It would be annoying if it wasn’t so terrifying, never knowing where you are going to pop up next – goddamn pervasive is what you are, like a jump scare waiting for him around every corner, only that never seemed to happen before.    

Before Tina’s party, the most he could say about you is that he’d seen you around. At school, in town, at the arcade and the movies, and that he thought you might have been a year or two behind him. He might have even been able to drum up your name if he really pressed himself to think, but before that night, before you turned those big sad eyes up at him and confessed all your sins, he’d never thought of you as more than just a living accessory to the insufferable unit that is Tommy Hagan and Carol Perkins.      

Now, he can’t seem to make himself think about anything but you.       

And then came the impressive dressing down you’d received over something so blatantly untrue that even Eddie is shocked Carol is stupid enough to believe it.       

People talk, and Tommy Hagan’s trying so hard to convince everyone he doesn’t secretly get his rocks off to Steve Harrington that he’s willing to throw you under the bus to do so. He’s telling people you came on to him at a party last weekend (one which Eddie is only slightly embarrassed to admit that he knows you didn’t attend) and that you got a little too handsy.      

He’s saying you tried to grab his dick, or something vague like that.  

“I woulda let her do it,” Eddie overheard him saying from the back of homeroom, “Only she was too drunk to know what it was she was trying to get her hands on.”    

The group of thickskulled meatheads listening in all erupted into braying donkey laughter after that, and Eddie had to bite his lip to keep from correcting them.  

Not only is that ridiculous, considering Tommy’s obvious proclivity toward his own gender (all the signs are there, even a blind man could see it) but that specific Saturday night which he is referring to, Eddie just so happened to see you shepherding a gaggle of manic cheering boys out from the back of your beat up little green Toyota and across the parking lot into the Palace Arcade.    

He’d been parked in that same lot, perched on the hood of the van and waiting around for a no-show hookup who was already twenty-five minutes late.      

Trust Rick to keep him waiting.    

Normally, Eddie operates on a strict policy that gives his clientele ten minutes of leeway before he hits the breeze. Normally he’s not desperate enough to hang around in a parking lot waiting for someone, but he needed the contraband, because he was expected to bring it to the very party that you skipped out on. The one Tommy Hagan is insisting you attended.    

How tragic it is that he’s got the perfect alibi for you, one he’s not free to go spreading around, because Rick never showed and Eddie elected to wander into the Arcade rather than try to show up at that party empty handed – his occupation is, after all, the only reason he is ever invited to those social gatherings at Tina’s big ugly house. Maybe at first it was out of some kind of misplaced obligation for so summarily ruining his reputation the way she did, but any remorse she feels for spreading that rumor about what he will and won’t trade his stock for has long since evaporated. Anyway, Eddie hates parties, so as far as he figured he wouldn’t be missing anything.      

He had an arguably much better time feeding quarters into the machines and fending off Keith when he came wandering over to watch over his shoulder like a dead eyed zombie while Eddie tried to balance playing Dig-Dug and Dragon’s Lair and keeping a very close eye on you.       

You didn’t go to the party, but neither did Eddie, and he’s not brave enough to defend you from the people who did, because doing so would be admitting that he effectively stalked you around the arcade for the better part of three hours. His friends were happy enough to let him know just how creepy that was, and how maybe he ought to keep that information to himself.      

Eddie agreed, because he doesn’t need that extra layer to his already tarnished reputation – people already think he’s a devil worshiping freak, it would do him no good to add “stalker creep” to his resume.     

Still, despite all the time he’s spent sitting around thinking about you, fantasizing about you, fucking his fist to the image of you that now lives burned into his mind’s eye (two weeks ago he’d had the misfortune of witnessing your skirt blow up walking into class on a particularly gusty day and Eddie swears he’s got a friction burn on his cock from all the time he’s spent jerking off to the memory of it) he never in his wildest dreams expected you to be nice, to give him the time of day.     

It’s part of the reason he’d been so frustrated with his stupid crush on you, because you were supposed to be mean and scary, just like all of your friends.    

There has always been a certain safety in that, in how untouchable you were to him, back when there was not a chance in hell that he’d ever be able to act on any of his feelings toward you, but suddenly none of that was true, and there were pitfalls abound.        

In that moment, stoned out of his mind in the parking lot and staring down at you, he’d somehow slipped behind the veil into a world where he wasn’t some creature to be reviled, where he was a human being with thoughts and feelings and fears and dreams. Somehow, you could see that version of him shining through to the real world, and it was intoxicating like nothing he’d ever experienced, being seen like that.  

Before he knew it, Eddie was on his knees for you.      

He knows he mumbled some sort of slurred apology, something unintelligible to be sure, and he knows you made a joke that took him far too long to get.     

He laughed when it finally hit him, too loud to be appropriate, and all of that knowledge would go on to haunt him later that afternoon when he sat revisiting that moment and everything else that had happened that day.     

He’d made a fool of himself, which was nothing new, but his knees still stung from where the gravel had embedded itself in his flesh through the tear in his jeans while he gathered your books.       

That close, Eddie could smell your perfume, something cloyingly sweet that had lingered in his sinuses all morning, though not unpleasantly so. He could also hear the faint melody of the music blaring from your headphones — you were listening to Magic Man by Heart, which somehow felt extremely appropriate, especially with whatever it was steadily going on between the two of you. 

Come on home girl, he said with a smile, you don’t have to love me yet, let’s get high a while...   

It was almost startling, the window into your life that it opened to him, and he is still not sure why except that it’s just not what he expected from someone in the same social tide pool as Steve Harrington.       

Eddie hadn’t been aware of how he was staring at you until you glanced up at him with your big pretty eyes, the same one’s that have held him in a vice ever since that night …      

Then Carol screeched your name from somewhere across the lot and ruined everything.     

You reacted like you’d been caught smoking or something, and snatched the last of your things up, brushing Eddie’s fingers with yours as you did and sending a bolt of electricity shooting up to his shoulder and exploding in a smattering of sparks across his chest.       

You offered him an apologetic smile that was little more than a horizontal stretch of your lips and promised to see him later in a way that was completely absentminded but still made his knees wobble.       

Oh, now, why’d you have to go and say something like that? All it did was leave him hoping, scanning the sea of faces for you between every break in classes, heart pounding erratically in the fear that he wouldn’t see you, and the fear that he would.       

What did he expect to do if he did? Say hi? Wave to you?       

What if he did and you reacted badly? What if you ignored him? What if you laughed at him?   

The possibilities were infinite and terrifying, and it made the promise that you’d see him again feel all the more dangerous. It left him feeling like he was a kid again, going out day after day and trying in vain to win the affections of the other kids who lived on his block and hated him as a rule.        

It wasn’t until the end of the day that Eddie spied the last of your belongings, overlooked and left behind in your rush to answer Carol’s call. It was a beat-up, dog-eared paperback copy of Dune, tucked in behind the front left tire of the van. Eddie fished it out at the expense of its cover, which, wedged beneath the tire, came tearing off.     

Whoops…  

He flipped through the pages, finding them littered in your loopy handwriting, and it opened yet another window into the elusive creature that you are.          

He fully intended to give it back to you, but he just never seemed to get around to it.       

Seeing you, even just in passing as has been an almost daily occurrence over the past year has started to make his insides go tight and squirmy in a very specific way he hasn’t felt in years.   

Eddie can’t remember the last time he wanted somebody as badly as he wants you.      

Yes, he does.       

Stacey Keats. She was a year older and had done away with his virginity one cruel summer in a fumbling press of bodies that didn’t last long enough to make it through to the end of Queen’s Crazy Little Thing Called Love, which Eddie still can’t hear without cringing bodily.       

At the time, he would have thrown himself into traffic for her, head over heels in love by the time she ushered him out the door that sweaty afternoon with a fond pat on the head and a promise to see him again soon. And it only got worse from there, particularly with the way she’d kept him around and tucked snugly between her legs from June to mid-August. He was half surprised he wasn’t pickled by the end of that summer, more surprised though with how bad he was down for her so fast. He went all the way, flowers and dinner with her parents, he even went and embarrassed himself by telling her he loved her. It wasn’t his fault, not really, because it’s not like Stacey did anything to discourage the snowballing effect of his hormones, easily confused for genuine feelings.      

By the time school came back into session, Eddie was all ego. He waltzed back onto campus that first day, fully convinced that he was a sex god with an older girlfriend – big man on campus – only Stacey evidently didn’t get that memo.       

She looked at him like he had two heads when he approached her at her locker, like she would kill him where he stood for daring to speak to her, standing there among her group of tittering friends, and Eddie learned the hard way that now the summer was over, he had ceased to exist in her sphere.       

Oh, God – huah-fuck! – right there, Eddie – don’t stop, don’t stop! turned into …what the hell are you looking at? in less than seventy-two hours, and it left Eddie feeling like he could curl up and die, right there in the hallway.      

Whether he liked it or not, he was not her boyfriend, he was just some schmuck she’d used to pass the time while her friends were away for the summer. Now that they were back, he’d gone back to being less than the worms in the ground.       

“I thought you said you loved me,” Eddie choked on the words as they slithered out from somewhere deep down in the hollow of his chest, and the harsh, unforgiving laughter that erupted from that group of girls still haunts him sometimes late at night when the trailer park gets a little too quiet.       

That summer with Stacey Keats was a very hard lesson he didn’t expect to have to learn, one that took him a very long time to recover from.  

If there’s one thing Eddie knows, it is that time heals no wounds – distance is the only balm that soothes anything, and it’s the only thing keeping him from drowning in the sea of you.       He’s desperate for you, but not so desperate that he’s about to throw himself down on a spear, so Eddie exiles himself to the slow death of playing your shadow, because the safest way to love you is to do so at arm’s length.  

Still, attention is the high he craves like nothing else, and there is no greater fix than your attention, undivided, unwavering, fixed solely on him, but he doesn’t have any classes with you.  

There are no easy excuses to get you to look at him, so he does the first thing he can think of.       

He does what comes naturally.      

He jumps up on the table, he gets loud and obnoxious and theatrical, he makes a scene and gets in trouble, just like he’d done today.      

He’d been slapped with an in-school detention for it, but it was worth every second he spent under Mrs. O’Donnell’s glare, if only because of the way you’d looked at him, the way you’d smiled. 

Wednesdays are for band practice, and because of Gareth’s drum set, they almost exclusively occur in his garage, in among the holiday decorations and mismatched second-hand furniture they’d cobbled together to create a comfortable hang out spot for themselves.    

It’s there Eddie sits, tucked into the corner of a stained and fraying corduroy couch, finger pads throbbing from their recently concluded practice and brain spinning as he scrambles to understand just how the conversation changed over to him so quickly. One minute they were shooting the shit, talking about all the inane nonsense teen boys could be expected to discuss, and then the conversation strayed to girls, as it naturally does in a room so brimming with unchecked teen hormones. Someone said your name and it made Eddie’s guts seize, caught strangely off guard by the hard shift in conversation topics, as if he isn’t always just sitting around waiting for the topic of you to come up naturally.    

His reaction must have been palpable, as suddenly he was getting a lecture on his love life – or lack thereof.     

“Will you just go talk to her?” Gareth sighs.     

Eddie shakes his head, letting the stinging sensation of his hair striking his face ground him.       

“No, I can’t.”    

His refusal does not sit right with the newest member of his group.      

“Why the fuck not?” He demands.     

It’s strange to be spoken to so directly by someone he’s more or less only just met, but it’s Gareth, so Eddie lets it slide. What’s more, he answers truthfully.     

“Because I’m me.” Eddie begins, gesturing vaguely and fumbling for the words to best express the conundrum that haunts him day in and out, “And she’s—” Untouchable, ethereal, and perhaps most important, off limits.   

“Nice.” Gareth presses, “She’s nice and she’s funny and she’s cool – and she wants her book back, so you might as well just go talk to her.”     

Eddie hangs his head in his hands and grinds out a sound of thick aggravated desperation.     

Of course, you’re all those things, and it would be slightly reassuring to hear all of that confirmed by an inside source if it weren’t for the fact that you were hopelessly and irrevocably out of his league.    

There is the soft whisk of a lighter being flicked over and over somewhere to Eddie’s left as Adam tries and fails to light his nasty, tar caked bong.     

“Quit being a pussy, Man.” He huffs.     

It ignites a fire in the hollow of Eddie’s chest, and he snatches the lighter out of his hand, leveling his bandmate with a hateful look.       

“What am I supposed to do?” He demands, “Just waltz on over and ask her how her day is going? Just say something stupid like, what’s a girl like you doing in a place like this? I’m sure that's exactly what she wants.”    

Gareth hardly lets him finish.     

“Yes, it is! Trust me, Man. I know her, I talk to her basically every day.”     

As if Eddie needs any reminder of that, as if he isn’t already violently jealous of the easy proximity Gareth shares with you by complete and total accident. He suddenly can’t help but picture the way he’d seen the two of you sitting with your heads bowed together when he wandered past Mr. Kapz’s room earlier in the year, taking the long way back to class from the principal’s office in a blatant attempt to try and steal a look at you. Imagine his surprise to find the door wedged open, giving him the perfect vantage to see you and Gareth, snickering over something Eddie was desperate to be included in on — he’s not proud about the way he iced Gareth out over that in the days that followed, but that green eyed monster has a funny little way of making an ass out of people, and Eddie is in no way immune to its clutches. 

In fact, jealousy claws ravenously at his heart thinking about it now, about what should be his moment, passing pipettes back and forth and leaning over beakers and Bunson burners – stealing glances as he pours over textbooks with you, intimate one-on-one study sessions … it makes his ears burn just thinking about everything he’s missing out on, everything he’s sure Gareth is taking for granted. 

Lucky bastard.      

It’s not fair, but it’s just one more thing in a long line of unfairness that has punctuated every beat of Eddie’s natural life since the day he was born. 

“Seriously. You ought to just go and talk to her. I mean, really, what do you have to lose?”    

Everything.      

Eddie grits his teeth to try and bite back the venom pooling on his tongue.    

“Why don’t you go talk to her since you’re such good friends?”    

Gareth pulls a face, like it’s the stupidest thing he’s ever heard.      

“Because I’m not the idiot pining over her.” he says, prodding Eddie in the center of his chest with an accusatory finger.     

He snorts.      

“I’m not pining over her.”     

A loud rumble of dissent washes over the table, startling Eddie.    

“I’m not!” He insists, and it only causes the group to erupt into a fit of booing and hissing.     

They’re quickly talking among themselves, tossing playful handfuls of things at each other and making commentary on what complete and utter bullshit that is.          

“What’s it been, a year since that party?” Jeff starts, “All we ever get from you is oh, woe and misery, she’s so cool and I am but a pathetic loser, however shall my withered heart go on?”    

He clasps his hands and tucks them at his jaw, tilting his head down and batting his eyes to affect the wistfully theatrical look of a maiden asking after her Romeo as he says it, voice jumping up an octave or two.    

Eddie’s face goes hot with righteous indignation, and he opens his mouth to try and say something to defend himself, but the guys are already speaking over him, trading snide comments back and forth at his expense. Something squirms in his midsection as he comes to the sickening realization that this is apparently a widely discussed topic of conversation. It’s one thing to talk about it as a group, but behind his back? He won’t deny that it doesn’t sting a little.     

Before Eddie can make the effort to silence them, Gareth takes it upon himself, shouting something unintelligible, just to try and get a word in and taking his chance when there is a lull in the heated conversation.  

“Look! I wasn’t gonna tell you this—” he starts, “But… she knows, okay?”     

The vagueness of the statement is startling like the clanging of a bell, and suddenly Eddie’s ears are ringing.     

“She–she knows?” He echoes, “She knows.” Eddie’s mind is suddenly crawling with spiders as he tries to balance the question over what that could possibly mean and the knowledge of what he is certain it means.     

If he’s right, he’s going to kill Gareth, right here, right now.     

Eddie sits there, waiting for his friend to elaborate, watching unblinking as the freshman sits fidgeting, pursing his lips and looking anywhere he can, anywhere but directly at Eddie.     

He grits his teeth and braces himself for the answer to a question he already knows.     

“What exactly does she know? Gareth?”     

Flannel clad shoulders jump up to his ears.     

“Obviously that you have her book…” Gareth hums with a flippant shrug, then he grows sheepish, and he drops his tone as the words come tumbling out in a rush, “And … it may or may not have come up that you feel a certain way about her…”     

He might as well have stood up and kicked Eddie in the teeth with the way it hits him. Like getting swamped at the beach, like the rush of the undertow pulling him down to crash against the rocks.     

Eddie is flayed alive as a deafening roar of dissent kicks up from their little huddle.     

He doesn’t hear it though, because he’s too busy feeling his brain melt out of his ears.     

His vision goes spotty and for half a moment he is sure he is about to keel over from the shock of such violent betrayal.       

“YOU TOLD HER?” Eddie shrieks, fisting his hands in his hair and feeling his lungs go flat in his chest.    

He could die. He could literally lay down and die right here on the floor of Gareth’s garage.    

Thankfully, the outrage is a mutual thing.       

“Judas!” Jeff shouts, drowning out whatever curse Adam is busy laying at the junior member of their group’s feet.    

Gareth throws up his hands in a lame attempt at defending himself from the onslaught of vitriol suddenly being hurled his way.     

He has to shout to be heard over the others.     

“She pulled it out of me okay!” He cries, as if that makes it any better.     

Eddie slumps forward, elbows braced on his knees, and scrubs his hands over his face miserably to try and hide the way his cheeks are burning with shame.    

This is the worst thing that’s ever happened to him.       

“Oh, God!” He moans pitifully between his fingers, flinching with every new shock of humiliation that strikes him like bolts to the chest, one right after the other, “How could you do this to me?”    

Gareth is the worst. A thousand curses upon Gareth. Eddie hopes he fucking dies, he hopes something falls out of the sky and crushes him flat, and pitifully, he hopes the same for himself.    

“Explain yourself.” Jeff demands, and when the boy hesitates, he raises his voice, “Now, Gareth!”      

“Okay, okay. Her exact words were: I don’t bite — if he likes me, he should just come and talk to me.”      

A dissenting groan rumbles through the garage as Adam and Jeff exchange disappointed glances. What Gareth did was unforgivable, Eddie is furious, but somehow the feeling is a little more muted than it was a moment ago.    

Because he can’t help but get caught on one tiny little, microscopic detail in your words, parroted from Gareth’s stupid, flapping mouth. A word suddenly materializes in Eddie’s mind and clangs around the planes of his skull, beating his brain into submission as it does.    

Permission.     

He suddenly has permission to approach you.     

Eddie sits in a stunned silence – or at least he thinks he does, the words are tumbling out of his mouth before he even realizes that there is a question forming in his mind.     

“Well, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?!” He shouts.    

And Gareth has evidently had his fill of the abuse being hurled his way.       

“Fucking ask her out!” He fires back.    

The room goes oddly silent as his demand bounces back and forth between the bodies and the walls and the ceiling and the floors.    

The mood shifts, and suddenly Eddie can’t help but notice the way his friends have changed sides. They’re not on his team anymore – what’s more, they’re agreeing with Gareth.    

You know, he’s right, they’re saying. That idea’s not half bad, they’re saying.      

Eddie’s tongue goes fat in his mouth and suddenly his palms are sweating at the mere suggestion of asking you out.     

He’s barely bridged the gap of talking to you, and now suddenly he’s expected to … to what?    

Ask you out.     

Jesus Christ.        

“Sure,” He huffs, feeling his face get hot as his voice cracks, “Sure, I’ll just do that. I’ll just go up to her and ask her out in front of Carol and Tommy and-and-and fucking Steve, right? What could possibly go wrong?”    

“Quit being so dramatic, Man. What are you so afraid of?” Gareth demands, and Eddie’s insides go tight.     

Everything. Everything and anything he can imagine. Breaking the invisible rules very clearly set into place for him and being skinned alive for it. Tarred and feathered and ridden out on a rail, pushed further into the fringes than he already exists and condemned for having the audacity to approach you. Hunted down and killed for the simple act of speaking to someone like you, who by all rights he should not even be allowed to look at, let alone think about the way that he does. In a nice little town like this? Eddie would not put it past them.      

Even if he were brave enough, even if he had the audacity, what is he supposed to even say to you?    

Hi, I’m Eddie. I don’t know if you remember me, but we met at Tina Burton’s party last October, and I’ve been obsessed with you ever since — here’s your book back. D’you want to go to the movies or buy drugs or something? Can I hold your hand or should I just go and deposit myself into the nearest dumpster for your convenience? Great, thanks for your time, I’ll see myself out.      

Somewhere Stacey’s friends are howling with laughter and Eddie is sinking further and further beneath the tide.       

“She’s not like that dude,” Gareth presses, almost as if he’d been privy to Eddie’s inner turmoil, “I swear on my life! She really, really wants you to talk to her…”     

“Oh, fuck off — you know you just ruined my life, right? Do you understand that?” He snaps, slumping back into the fraying couch cushions, arms crossed tight over his chest, grinding his teeth and doing his very best to kill Gareth where he stands, “Jesus fucking Christ – I’m gonna have to change schools after this.”     

Somewhere beside him, Adam snickers.      

“Dude, you’re gonna have to change towns.”      

He shuts up quick when Eddie socks him hard in the shoulder.      

“Alright, fine,” Gareth says, throwing his hands up, “You know what? Fuck it. She’d kill me for telling you this, but she likes you, okay?”    

Jeff and Adam kick up another one of those roaring cries of dissent.      

“Whoa!”     

“Holy shit, just like that?”     

Only once again, Eddie doesn’t hear them. He’s too busy trying to get his bearings again after being knocked off his feet from the impact of the truth bomb Gareth just dropped on him.    

You like him? You like him… he doesn’t understand.   

“... what do you mean she likes me?”    

Gareth pulls a face.    

“What are you, stupid or something?” He scoffs, “I mean she likes you!”   

He keeps saying that, like it’s going to clear things up for him, like he’s speaking plain English and spelling it out for him, which, as far as Eddie can tell, he is, but he still doesn’t understand.   

Maybe he is stupid, but he just can’t seem to make sense of that information. It does not compute.    

Before he can ask after it again, however, Adam shrugs beside him.    

“Actually, I heard about that too.” He says, like it’s the most casual thing in the world.    

Eddie’s heart seizes in his chest and explodes. There are spots and colors dancing across his vision and his head snaps over so quickly he feels something pop in his neck.     

He’s only half surprised when his head doesn’t roll right off of his shoulders, when his eyes don’t pop out of his skull.    

“You what?”     

“There’s a rumor going around.” He says, rolling his eyes and gesturing vaguely, “You know how it is, there’s always a rumor going around.”    

“... that bullshit about the party on Saturday? I already told you guys, I saw her at the arcade–”    

“No, not that one. This one’s new.” Adam says absently, suddenly wrist deep in a can of Pringles as he explains, “Word on the street is she’s into you,”       

Eddie feels himself pulling a face.  

“Who says?”  

Adam shrugs and pops a handful of potato chips into his mouth. 

“Carol Perkins.” he says, chewing noisily.      

It hits him like a fist to the gut.    

“She told you that?” Eddie gasps and feels himself go hot and then cold when Adam’s thick shoulders jump up toward his ears.    

“Well, not exactly. I heard her talking to Tammy Thompson about it in fifth period, apparently that’s what all that noise at lunch was about–”   

It just about breaks his brain with the way it makes perfect sense. Eddie didn’t know what could have happened to turn Carol so fanatically giddy back in the lunchroom when only moments before she’d been trying with every particle of her being to awaken her latent psychic abilities and kill him where he stood. Whatever happened was distressing enough to send you running from the cafeteria, and Eddie had only spent the rest of the afternoon wondering about it, wishing he’d gone after you.  

Of course, with the information that has just come to light, that wish is amplified tenfold.  

Oh, God – why on Earth didn’t he go after you? Especially now that he knows what he knows?    

Then again, he doesn’t really know anything, does he? It’s just a rumor, but it doesn’t make it any less terrible to hear. It’s not the knowledge of what is evidently making its way through the student body like chicken pox that haunts him so much as it is the fact that he almost followed you right out of the lunchroom this afternoon, but he chickened out, like he always does.   

Adam is still going, elaborating on the specificities of his latest foray into eavesdropping on popular girls, who said what and all that good stuff.  

“Wait a minute, wait a minute! This doesn’t make sense.” Eddie says, “This doesn’t make any goddamn sense.”   

Then Gareth huffs out a sigh and braces his hands on his knees before starting again, much slower this time.     

“Think about the way you feel about her.” He says, “You like her, right? You’re crazy about her? You sit around all day imagining doing all that fluffy boyfriend-girlfriend shit with her like holding her hand?”    

It makes him suddenly and painfully shy, and Eddie moves instinctually, snatching a snarled lock of his hair to drag across his face to try and guard against the way he is sure he must be blushing beet red.   

“You don’t have to make it sound so weird…” he mumbles.     

“It’s not weird, Dude. It’s mutual.” Gareth stresses, “I guarantee you she’s sitting around thinking about all that ooey-gooey stuff too, when I tell you she likes you, I mean she was practically vibrating when I told her.”    

Eddie can hardly stand it. He suddenly feels like he’s about to burst.  

“Stop.” He says, “Just… just shut up and give me –” He can’t think, his brain is turning to mush in his skull, “Just gimme a second to think…”     

Gareth does as he’s told, despite the look of stark confusion etched across his face. He sits there and he waits for Eddie to say something, same as everyone else.    

Even Eddie is just sitting there, holding his breath and waiting for his brain to click back over, for the other shoe to drop and for a big stupid shit eating grin to spread across his friend’s face, because he’s fucking with him … right? He’s got to be.     

Only Gareth is still just sitting there, staring back at Eddie and growing more and more nervous the longer he stares at him.    

Eddie looks to Adam for assistance, then, begging him to explain it to him, clear things up where he’s evidently too goddamn stupid to understand. He does this silently, however, because he can’t get the words out around the way his throat is closing up.   

You like him? How can you like him? What’s wrong with you?     

Then, devastatingly, Jeff tilts his head down and pushes his shoulders up.     

“Yeah… I heard something about that too.”    

And that solidifies it. Three for three. Matching slots that send glittering little coins spilling out of the machine and all over Eddie’s feet with a loud DING DING DING!    

Somehow all it does is send a sick feeling bleeding into the pit of his stomach.    

“Jesus Christ!” Eddie’s brain is melting again – you like him, “Why didn’t you tell me? You all knew, and none of you told me…”    

“Well…” Jeff starts, opening his mouth to explain and coming up short. “We were gonna tell you, it’s just…”       

“You were busy, Man.” Adam presses.     

“No I wasn’t,” Eddie insists, violently shaking his head, hard enough that the ends of his hair whip around to sting his face, “No I fucking wasn’t, not when it comes to that. You guys should have told me.”    

“Sure, and get our heads bitten off because you turn into such a fucking weirdo whenever she comes up – we definitely should have told you.” Gareth snorts, oozing sarcasm and glowering at Eddie from where he sits among the fraying cushions, clearly still sore about being dog-piled on. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter, because now you know.” He shrugs, “You like her. She likes you. Circle of life.”         

Sure. Circle of life, not Eddie’s life though. Not his American Dream.     

Before he realizes what he’s doing, he’s on his feet and gathering his things - his jacket, his keys, and the heavy bag of weed sitting untouched in the middle of the table where he had so graciously bestowed it upon his friends at his arrival, free of charge, just because he’s that damn generous.     

He picks things up and drops them again, spins in aimless circles as he remembers something and instantly forgets it as another thing crosses his mind and chases it off. He tries to think, tries to approach this from a rational standpoint, but his brain is pulling in four different directions under the duress of this new information.     

He doesn’t know what to do and he’s panicking a little bit.    

You like him? No, you don’t like him. You can’t, he’s a leper. If you like him that means there’s something wrong with you, and there’s nothing wrong with you – you’re perfect, which means the guys are wrong or they are lying to him.    

More than likely, though, Carol is lying, and it’s a trap. For you or for him, Eddie can’t decide, but he knows for certain that if he takes the bait he’s going to get hurt. Seriously hurt.   

He’s smarter than this, right? He knows how to protect himself from something like this, right? So why the hell is he suddenly considering it? How come his heart is beating so fast in that flighty, hopeful sort of way?    

It’s a trap. You don’t like him… but you do.     

You like him and you want him to talk to you, so much so that you went out of your way to make sure he knows. You want your book back, and he’s got to give it to you because you know he has it and you gave him permission to approach you, but how can he do that without giving you his heart right alongside it? With sharks like Carol and Tina lurking in your waters, how is he supposed to do this?   

He’s not, he decides in an instant.     

Eddie can’t do this. He can’t he can’t he can’t.    

I thought you loved me, he’s still whimpering, eyes wet and brimming, lips and knees wobbling, and Stacey’s friends are laughing at him.     

They’re still laughing.     

Somewhere in the muted rationale of his subconscious, Eddie knows he’s freaking out, and that he’d better get out of here if he wants to keep any shreds of leftover dignity he has. So, he snatches up his keys and his jacket and the bag of weed and Sweetheart and everything else that belongs to him here in Gareth’s garage and struggles to fit all his things in his hands as he turns and bolts for the van.    

Behind him, he can hear Jeff shouting at him, asking him where he’s going, but he’s already slamming the door shut and whipping the van into reverse.    

Music blaring loud enough to rattle the windows, gas pedal pressed to the floor, Eddie drives much too fast for how dark the streets are and how little attention he’s paying to the road. But that’s nothing out of the ordinary. That’s just how he learned to drive.    

The next thing he knows, he’s stumbling up the steps of the trailer and falling through the front door.    

Wayne’s not home, which is good – the last thing he wants to do is have to try and explain why he looks like he’s seen a ghost, which Eddie is sure would be the first and exact words out of his uncle’s mouth if he could see him now.   

Pale, sweating, face pulled tight into a thousand-yard stare.      

Eddie’s brain has completely shut off by now, and for the sake of his own self-preservation, he clicks over into autopilot, going through the motions on complete muscle memory.   

He moves aimlessly about the trailer, throwing his things down, kicking his shoes off, sloughing off his jacket and all his extra layers where he’s suddenly become too hot.  

Strangely, he doesn’t feel like a human being right now, he feels like vapor, like at any moment a stiff breeze is going to blow through the room and send him scattering to every corner of the world… because you like him.    

Eddie tries to remember what normal human activity looks like, what he would naturally do when he comes home like this, despite how completely unnatural it suddenly all feels.   

He makes a mental list and goes down the line: shoes off? Check, stuff stashed? More like thrown haphazardly across his bed, but sure, check.   

Now what … dinner? He’s not hungry. Vapor doesn’t need to eat.   

Homework? Pfft, as if.   

It’s sitting forgotten in his locker, wedged between the sheet metal siding and the tattered paperback scribbled over with your loopy handwriting.   

Eddie’s going hot and cold again, skin prickling with ravenous possibility – you like him, he’s got permission to approach you.     

He blinks, and suddenly he’s in the shower, standing under the tap and letting the water pressure blow his brains out in a desperate attempt to try and make his brain stop buzzing and start working again. He watches the water drip from his lashes down to the swirling tide at his feet and tries and tries and tries to make himself flesh and bone again so that he doesn’t go slipping down the drain.   

He blinks again, once, twice, and then suddenly he’s sitting in the Laz-E boy with his knees up, scratching at the fraying fabric and staring unblinking at the fuzzy pictures moving frantically across the television screen.   

Lucy and Desi are arguing in black and white – the laugh track tells him it’s meant to be comedic, but Eddie’s too busy grinding his teeth together to feel anything but static, because you like him. Because suddenly his future is blown wide and open and there’s a chance for something new… something good, for once.     

Blink, blink, blink.        

“Hello?”   

Eddie’s standing at the telephone, garroting his finger with the cord, and just like that he’s human again, trying to remember how he got here and who he’s talking to on the other line.      

“...Did you mean it?” The words are out before Eddie can settle back into himself completely.     

There is a brief pause as the person on the other end evidently processes the question.    

“Oh, hey Eddie.” Gareth mumbles, voice thick with disuse, “...what time is it?”     

He finds the clock on the wall and stares it in the face, watching the minute hand take a steady turn around the sun.   

3:45. Whoops.    

“It’s late.” Eddie says quickly, vaguely, “Sorry – it couldn’t wait.”   

“...Alright, Man. What was the question?”   

He hardly takes the time to wonder what exactly he’s been doing for the last few hours he’d spent as a cloud of vapor, but the question is burning on his tongue like a hot coal and he can’t help but spit it out.    

“Did you mean what you said? Does she really like me?”   

The long suffering sigh that comes through the phone is ever so faintly tinged with static and makes Eddie’s back teeth buzz.    

“Yes,”   

“And you’re not just bullshitting me.”    

“No. I’m not bullshitting you.” Gareth says, and Eddie wonders if he’s finally going to get around to believing him this time.  

It’s still terrifying, but doing things scared is a skill that Eddie has had in his tool kit since he was very small. He clings to the warmth of its jagged familiarity and forces himself to breathe deep.     

“Okay…” He clears his throat, “Okay. So, um… s-so, what do I do now?”    

“You know what to do.” Gareth insists, “You fuckin’ talk to her, Man.”    

Yeah. He was afraid he was going to say that, but Eddie is a blank slate in desperate need of guidance and nods into the phone, conveniently forgetting that Gareth can’t see him do it.    

“When?” He asks.      

“Tomorrow’s always good.”    

His heart thumps against his ribs and Eddie fails to swallow down the lump forming in his throat.    

“Jesus.” He mumbles, “Isn’t that kind of soon? Shouldn’t I like… make a plan or something?”   

Gareth pauses, like he really has to consider it and the only indicator that Eddie has been holding his breath is when his lungs begin to burn. He tries to breathe out as quietly as he possibly can as Gareth answers him.      

“I don’t know,” He hums, “I guess it depends.”   

“On what?”   

“On whether you’re gonna spend your life sitting around just making plans or if you’re gonna nut up and finally do something about it – she’s not gonna wait around for you forever.”    

Eddie knows that. Of course he knows that, he’s got a goddamn contingency plan for that, but for as often as he sits around entertaining that fantasy, he hates it. 

He hates it with every fibre of his being and Gareth is right, but it doesn’t make it any less worrisome. You like Eddie, sure, but only for now, and only until your stupid imaginary jock boyfriend shows up to sweep you off your feet. He's waiting for you, just over the horizon, waiting impatiently. Who’s to say the sands of time can’t be hurried along if the nice young man decides he’s done waiting for you and decides to come and fetch you himself?   

What’s Eddie supposed to do when that happens?      

He’s not so dull that he doesn’t recognize that there is a very brief window of opportunity open to him here, only a crack, but just enough that if he’s quick he can slip through. It’s dangerous. He’s most definitely going to get burned if he does this, but if he doesn’t, he knows he’s going to spend the rest of his life regretting it. Even if that not-so-distant future comes to pass, even if you do eventually end up in his arms and he manages to whisk you away from all that cloying Suburbia, he’ll regret not having run to you sooner, he’ll regret the life he wasted without you.    

“So, what are you gonna do?”    

“Fuck…” Eddie says through his teeth, letting his head slip forward to hit the wall with a muffled thump.  “...I guess I’m gonna talk to her.”    

“When?”    

“Tomorrow…” Today, technically, but he’s not going to waste time getting caught up on the specificities of daylight hours or just how late he’s calling, “At lunch. If she’s not socked in with all her shitty friends? …I’ll go talk to her.”    

On the other end of the line, Gareth makes a pleased sound in the hollow of his throat, and Eddie makes a mental note to punch him the next time he sees him, just to wipe away the smug look he knows he’s got plastered across his face.      

“Good - just be yourself and she’ll love you.” 

Eddie appreciates the sentiment, despite how blatantly untrue it is.  

“I’m seriously doubt that.” 

“Yeah, of course she will, give her that cool line you said earlier,"  

He doesn’t have to work to remember what line Gareth is talking about – What’s a girl like you doing in a place like this – like he thinks he’s Humphrey Bogart or something.  

“Not a chance in hell.” Eddie bites. 

“What? Why not?” 

“Because it’s stupid.” 

Gareth clicks his tongue.  

“Oh, come on, at least it would be different? Seriously, what’s the worst that can happen?”     

“Public humiliation on a global scale.” Eddie posits, “Gut wrenching shame ... Murder.”    

“Yeah exactly, so no pressure.”     

Eddie makes a thoughtful sound in the hollow of his throat to try and humor his friend, but he suddenly can’t stop thinking about how none of this would be happening if Gareth had just kept his big mouth shut. This is his fault, Eddie is taking a chance at something for the first time in his life, putting himself out there knowing full well that he is probably going to get seriously hurt, and it’s all Gareth’s fault.    

“Listen Gareth.” He starts, “I just want you to know, truly and sincerely from the bottom of my heart, you’re an asshole.”    

He snorts.     

“I know.”    

An hour after Eddie hangs up and drags himself off to bed, Wayne gets home. Eddie lies there, wide awake and staring up at his ceiling, listening to the heavy thumping of his uncle’s footsteps moving through the trailer – into the kitchenette where the whine and thump of the fridge being opened and shut again reveals the lack of food in the house, then down the hall and into the bathroom where there is the hiss of the shower turning on, and a sharp expletive muttered under Wayne’s breath as he discovers that Eddie went and used up all the hot water, trying to force himself back into the shape of something vaguely human.  

Finally, the thump thump thumping footsteps recede down the hall, followed soon by the gentle murmuring of the television being flicked on as Wayne cuts his losses and settles in. Eddie lies awake, knotting his fingers together as he worries about what he’s promised to do in only a few hours time.    

He tries to tell himself he doesn’t have to worry about that right now, because that’s tomorrow’s problem, for now, he’s got all the time in the world, but somehow, he just can’t seem to make it stick. 

Then the rain starts.  

It persists all throughout what is left of the night, thundering down into the tin roofing of the trailer and kicking up the right kind of racket to quickly lull Eddie into a deep and dreamless sleep – it’s what seems like mere moments before Wayne is knocking on his bedroom door, startling him awake and rousing him with the promise of fresh coffee brewing on the stovetop.  

Just like that, it is today, and there begins Eddie’s ticking clock, counting down to the impending doom that awaits him.   

It rains all day with absolutely no sign of stopping and it feels appropriate for the dour mood a night spent lying awake caught in the throes of anxiety has twisted him into – the world mirroring his frame of mind.  

When the time finally comes, and the noon bell rings dismissing the student body for lunch, Eddie nearly drops his lunch pail twice from the titanic outpouring of sweat that has decided to pool in his palms. His heart jumps violently between his throat and his stomach as he makes his way down the hall, dragging his feet like they’ve been set in concrete as he takes the long march toward the cafeteria, staring at the oh-so-tantalizing exit sign, shining above his head like a sickly green beacon.      

He could just leave, he realizes. Feign some kind of sudden onset illness and run for the hills, abandon this insane endeavor, and — and …and and and?      

And what?      

Go home and hide under his covers, condemn himself to a lifetime of regret, jerking off and moping around all because he’s too scared to talk to a pretty girl?      

No way in hell. He’d never live it down.        

Suddenly, a strong hand comes down in a hard clap against his back, ringing out and startling Eddie bad enough to send him leaping damn near out of his skin.      

Visions of authority figures pass through his mind at the speed of light, teachers, principals, cops, Chief Hopper himself, all come to cart him away for some perceived misdemeanor Eddie doesn’t recall committing— perfect, hallelujah.      

“You ready, Man?”      

It’s only Gareth – fucker, this is only happening because of him and his big stupid mouth – and Eddie has to remind himself that he’s the one who has spent the last several months needling him for information about you.      

This is nobody’s fault but his own.     

Still, he resists the urge to double over and brace his hands on his knees.      

“I think I’m gonna be sick.” he huffs.     

Gareth grips him tightly by the shoulder and gives him a good-natured shake.      “That’s the spirit,” He says, then steers Eddie hard to the right down the hall toward the cafeteria “Let’s go.”       

The lunchroom is exceedingly crowded, the day’s dreary weather simultaneously mirroring Eddie’s mood and driving the school’s population to pack themselves indoors in lieu of the typically coveted outdoor seating.      

Eddie takes this as a good sign because maybe it means all your nasty little friends will have descended like flies and he won’t have to submit himself to the slow and terrible death of public humiliation – strange how despite the armor he has amassed over the years, something as simple as talking to someone he’s not meant to interact with drives him to the edge of panic.       

He knows the rules, and he knows how to follow them to avoid mutilation.     

The summer is over, and Stacey’s friends are back…      

The crowd parts as best they can when Eddie appears, like they always do, though it’s a little more difficult for everyone to get out of his way, crammed shoulder to shoulder the way they are.     

In an instant he is granted a clear path to the usual lunch table, where Jeff is already seated, grinning stupidly and gesturing less than discreetly toward your table where – Christ, there you are, sitting alone and quietly pouring over a book.      

Great, so that means he knows about what he and Gareth talked about on the phone last night – this morning – whatever.   

Eddie swallows hard and locks his knees to try and keep them from wobbling as he assesses the situation. He’d given himself one condition in talking to you – that he’d only do it if you weren’t socked in with your shitty friends, and lo and behold there you are… alone.   

Why the fuck are you alone when the cafeteria is standing room only? Without even turning his head, he can clock half a dozen people meandering around looking for seats, so why hasn’t anyone asked to join you?      

Because you’re untouchable, that’s why. In the best, most terrifying possible way.   

You need a personal invitation to join that table, one that is not so readily extended to just anyone and will most certainly never be done for Eddie.      

And he’s just supposed to waltz over to you like he owns the place? The thought makes his legs turn to jelly. 

“Muster thy courage, good sir, and proceed!” Gareth says, giving Eddie a neighborly shove. 

He staggers forward and, thankfully, manages to stay on his feet – the last thing he needs is to go sprawling onto his belly in front of God and everyone he knows. There would be no recovering from that humiliation, and he’s almost sorry it didn’t happen, because it would be the perfect excuse to abandon this endeavor entirely. 

Enough of that, he tells himself, Just cowboy up and get this over with.  

Eddie grits his teeth as he takes a step, and then another, feeling the waters of his courage lap at his ankles like the surf – then, a high, braying laughter jumps up above the monotonous drone of all of his classmates talking at once, and Eddie’s stomach bottoms out. There goes his courage, drawing back with the tide, abandoning him.   

Without a second thought, he walks right past your table and straight for his, planting himself firmly into the seat across from Jeff so that his back is to you.  

The silence that lingers over the table is stupefying and heavy, particularly with the way Jeff is gawping at him.      

“What are you doing?” He starts, followed very quickly by Gareth’s long-suffering sigh.    

“Eddie, come on–” He starts, but he doesn’t let him finish.      

“Shut up shut up shut up – just let me think!” He hisses before forcing himself to take a deep, steadying breath.  

Eddie holds it in his lungs until it burns and then breathes out slowly, noisily.  

It's all his friends can do but stand there, staring helplessly, like he’s completely lost his mind. 

Maybe he has, because here he is, actually doing this.  

“Okay – so she’s alone…” Eddie begins.    

Gareth cuts him off.      

“Not anymore, Tina just sat down.” He says sheepishly.      

The name sends a bolt of fear lancing through his midsection. 

“Tina who–?”     

Eddie just about nearly breaks his neck whipping around to see the dark-haired girl who took it upon herself to arrive in the seven seconds it’s been since he took his eyes off of you — Tina Burton.   

Of course. Of all the people in this goddamn town, Carol, Steve Harrington, even his own goddamn father would have been preferrable to Tina fucking Burton, who stripped his walls down so completely that she only knows what his fucking dick looks like – tastes like, even… Jesus Christ almighty.   

Fuck his stupid fucking life.   

Eddie watches you fold your book closed and carefully tuck it into your bag, offering the girl a weak smile that fades the minute she looks away. He lingers too long, and after a moment, like you could feel him staring at you, your eyes flick up and Eddie jerks back around to face his friends, hands clenched into stressed fists, face burning with anticipation.      

“What are you gonna do?” Jeff asks.     

Eddie shakes his head and wishes people would stop asking him that.     

“I don’t know…” He says, “I need… I just – I need a second to think.”    

Easier said than done with the din of the lunchroom pressing in on him, much louder than it typically ever is. He feels like he’s turning to vapor again, first his fingers and his hands, then his wrists and forearms, all dissipating and wafting up toward the ceiling. Eddie rubs his hands together to try and keep himself solid with a little bit of friction, and he pictures his window of opportunity, swiftly slamming shut.    

He grits his teeth and considers his options here. 

He would very much rather avoid public humiliation if he can manage it, but he doesn’t want to spend his life regretting you, wishing he’d been brave enough, wishing he’d followed you out of the lunchroom, wishing he just fucking talked to you.    

Move or die, something inside of him stresses, and the next thing Eddie knows, he’s got his hands braced on the table and he’s pushing up on creaky, wobbly legs.   

“You got this man.” Gareth says in a way that he imagines is meant to be reassuring, the words settle heavily, one by one in the pit of his stomach as he turns.     

Another deep breath, and then another… one more for good measure, and then Eddie crosses the lunchroom on stiff, stilted legs, fighting the urge to wipe his sweaty, trembling palms down the front of his jeans  

He can see you sitting there, enduring whatever it is Tina is saying to you, but her lips are moving too quickly to make out the words. In no time at all, the need to lipread is quickly discarded as Eddie closes the distance between your tables enough to suddenly hear your conversation.    

“I heard a rumor,” Tina Burton is telling you, her voice lilting in a malicious singsong.  

Uh oh.  

“I’m so sure you did.” You mutter, rolling your eyes and very pointedly not looking at her.   

Your feigned disinterest does nothing to deter the other girl.   

“It’s a good one,” She hums, “Carol told me all about it.”  

You and everyone else, apparently. Eddie thinks, watching you closely for any sign of clairvoyant warning of his approach. He’s nearly there now, only a matter of moments before he bridges the gap and really has to commit to this.  

Tina’s taunting is finally enough to grab your attention. Your head snaps up and your eyes go wide as you regard her with a suspicious look that leaves Eddie feeling like he’s intruding on this moment, that he should turn right back around and go back to his seat.  

“What did she tell you?” You demand, and then suddenly Eddie’s out of time, and he’s standing right there, watching your face twist up into a mask of horror as Tina elaborates.      

“She says you’ve got yourself a little crush–”  

“Hi,” Eddie says and immediately feels himself break into a sweat when Tina’s eyes go bright, and she shows him her teeth in a wicked grin.  

“Speak of the Devil!” She gasps.   

Eddie suppresses a flinch, guts seizing and twisting themselves into a Gordian knot to suddenly be under the bright light of your attention when your head snaps over to him.  

He stares at you, mind suddenly and horrifically blank, and watches helplessly as you stare back at him, wide eyed and mouth falling open in what is perhaps the most appropriate response he could think of.   

That’s more or less how everyone reacts when he approaches them unprompted – he told Gareth you didn’t want him coming up to you like this.  

This is the worst idea he’s ever had in his life.  

He’s wrestling with that urge to bolt again, excuse himself and go back to where he belongs, but Eddie locks his knees and reminds himself that this is where he belongs right now.   

You gave him permission.  

She wants you to talk to her.     

Somehow, with every passing second, that seems a little less true, because you’re just staring at each other, wide eyed and trembling as you both wait for the other to speak.  

Personally, Eddie thinks it should be you, considering you’re the one who apparently wanted to talk to him so bad, but then again, he’s the one who just rocked up to your table and interrupted your conversation, so it probably should be him.  

Some wildly stubborn part of him is refusing to break, however, because he’s done his part. He’s here, isn’t he? You sent for him, and he answered the call, so now it’s your turn to meet him out on this limb. Only you don’t seem to have gotten that memo, so the silence endures.  

It’s incredibly awkward, and after an agonizing moment, even Tina begins to feel it.  

She furrows her brow and gives you an incredulous look when you continue to fail to respond to Eddie’s greeting. She clears her throat, trying to prompt you, and when you just keep sitting there staring back at him, she endeavors to kick start you back into working action – literally kicking you under the table.  

You flinch and the spell is broken in a rush of rapid blinking and a strangled sound ekeing up out of your throat as you endeavor to clear it.  

“Oh – hi!” You stammer, an octave higher than your typical cadence, “Hi!... Hi, E-Eddie… hi. Hi, Eddie.” 

Somehow, it’s worse than the stunned silence, and he feels his stomach bottoming out.    

This is going great, no, really. He’s so glad he did this.  

Tina snorts, and the sound makes the two of you jump in tandem. 

“You’re doing great,” She drawls when you look at her, chin propped up on her hand, batting her eyes at you with an unimpressed, half-lidded gaze.  

Eddie feels his guts seize on your behalf, especially when your face flushes with a deep shade of color, and there he goes turning himself into a shield for you again.   

“Hey,” He bites, before quickly rethinking his tone and beginning again, “...would you mind…? Can-can you give us a minute, Tina?”   

Eddie hates the way her name feels in his mouth, and more than that, he hates the look she gives him to hear him say it.  

Her brows come down over her eyes and her lips twist up maliciously. She can see right through him, and how mortifying a thing it is to be so readily perceived by someone like her.   

“Why?” She asks, stretching the word in a teasing lilt that makes Eddie’s insides go tight.   

The subtext behind the question is so unbearably clear it makes him feel like he could be sick right there on the floor all over his reeboks – why, she asks, when what she really means is, what do you want with her? An accusation, more than a question.  

Eddie can practically feel the color creeping up his neck as he is violently assaulted by memories of Tina’s hair, sticky with product, gripped between his trembling fingers – that haunting sound she made when his hips jerked involuntarily forward and he hit the back of her throat, and even worse, the sound he’d made when she choked and the muscles of her throat constricted on him, ripping him right over the edge before he’d even begun.  

He’s never going to get over the humiliation of that moment, no matter how long he lives.   

Why, God, why did it have to be her?   

Eddie grits his teeth, swallowing that same strangled sound he’d made that terrible day, suddenly lurking on the back of his tongue, and does his best to stay calm, collected – cordial.   

“Just give us a minute, okay?” He pleads, hating himself for it.   

She gives him a hard, condescending look.   

“Oh, Honey,” She stresses, brows tweaking up in faux concern as she makes a point to look at you, then back at him, “Don’t worry. That’s all the time you’re gonna need, anyway.”       

It punches his lungs flat in his chest and Eddie feels something cold land heavily in the pit of his stomach.   

It’s about as much as he could have expected from her – Tina’s always got to have the last word, but to her credit, she braces her hands on the table and stands, giving you one last parting look and winking before she shoulders her bag and saunters off.     

No doubt to go and report back to the rest of the Hawkins Elite, which means he’s suddenly on a ticking clock, and it’s almost enough to make Eddie bolt from there, but he’s once again frozen to the spot.     

Cautiously, Eddie glances back over his shoulder to where his friends sit, watching with rapt attention. They offer enthusiastic thumbs up when they see him looking, and he cringes.    

Eddie clears his throat and you whip back around, still looking just as stunned as you had a moment before.  

“S-so… uh,” He begins, scratching at the back of his neck and realizing much too late that he has absolutely no idea what he plans to say to you – why the fuck didn’t he practice something in all the time he’s spend worrying about this moment? 

Christ on a goddamn bike. 

“Do you… I mean – why don’t you sit down?” You ask, and gesture quickly to the seat across from you.  

Eddie’s heart jumps up into his throat. Suddenly, his palms are sweating, and he feels his knees wobble beneath him.    

Relax relax relax. He tells himself, You’re allowed to do this, you’re right where you’re supposed to be.    

“Yeah, okay,” Eddie says slowly, sliding carefully into the seat across from you.  

Once he’s settled, he braces his hands on his knees before second guessing the motion and – stupidly – extends his hand to you.  

“Hi,” He says again, like a goddamn broken record.  

He can’t help it, it’s the only word that keeps surfacing when he tries to think of something to say to you. 

You stare back at him, blinking as the word lingers between you, and Eddie kicks himself for sounding so goddamn stupid.  

“Hi,” You say slowly, the gentlest hint of a smirk quirking the corners of your lips as you reach across and take his hand, and then, “You already said that.”   

Oh, that’s fantastic. Keep going, Moron, let’s see what else you’ve got in that big empty head of yours.  

“Yeah… yeah, I did. Sorry.”  

You shake your head.  

“You don’t have to be sorry,” You insist kindly, and it throws him for a loop.  

He doesn’t? That’s … odd… because sorry has always been the safest thing to be with people.  

Keep your head down and apologize, no matter what, that’s more or less become Eddie’s motto. It’s how he’s survived so long in a town that hates him on principle, but he supposes this is just another instance of you giving him some kind of permission he’s never had before: he’s allowed to come and talk to you, and he doesn’t have to be sorry for doing so.  

The thought alone is enough to leave him feeling lightheaded in the strangest way.  

“Oh. Right. Okay.” He swallows hard as you shake hands, and Eddie quickly releases you, feeling like his skin is burning from where you touched him.     

He curls his fingers into a fist, trying to trap the sensation there in his palm.     

“So,” You begin, tucking your hands neatly together in front of you on the table and pulling your shoulders up to your ears in a painfully endearing way, “What’s up?” 

“Uh… Gareth.” Eddie says quickly, lamely. 

Your eyes go momentarily bright at the mention of his name, and Eddie tries not to succumb to the misplaced sick feeling it causes in the pit of his stomach. 

He suddenly can’t stop picturing the two of you sitting in Mr. Kapz’s class, with your heads bowed together conspiratorially, whispering back and forth to one another.  

Eddie tells himself he’s not jealous, and he’s not going to let the feeling ruin this, but his throat is going dry, and his mind is going even more blank than it already was. 

“Gareth? What about him.” 

“He, uh, he said you guys were talking and … well actually, what he said was that you said – n-not that he’s telling me about the stuff that you guys talk about in class or anything –” 

You smile as he continues to ramble, nose scrunching up in a way that is entirely too endearing and makes Eddie feel fuzzy and much too warm for all his layers of denim and leather.  

“What did Gareth say?” You ask gently, clearly trying to help him get to his point.  

“He said… well he said that I should come over and say hi. So…” Don’t say it, don’t you dare say it again, “Hi, I guess.” 

Fucking moron. 

You giggle.  

“Hi.”  

It’s like that stiff breeze he’s been waiting on, only miraculously it doesn’t send him scattering to the furthest corners of the Earth. Strangely, it’s almost grounding and Eddie can suddenly feel his courage come rushing back, like a crashing wave of the tide finally returning to shore.  

He smiles, glances down at his hands, clasped together, and knocks his knuckles against the table.  

“He also said I should ask you what a place like this is doing in a girl like you, but that’s – fuck, no! Wait a second, that’s not how that goes.” 

As if the giggling wasn’t bad enough, his titanic fuck up causes you to laugh out loud, and it just about blows his goddamn brains out – Jesus fuck.  

It’s the greatest thing Eddie’s ever heard in his life. Fuck Sabbath and Dio and Metallica and all that noise, his new favorite song is the musical lilt of your laughter.  

It makes his heart seize and throb and suddenly he can feel himself smiling so much wider than before, foolishly, in the goofy way where he knows that goddamn dimple of his must be showing. Eddie’s only cognizant enough to be half embarrassed about that, mostly because he can’t decide if he thinks you’re laughing at him – somehow, he doesn’t think that’s the case.    

Your laughter is the furthest thing from malicious he’s ever heard, and he feels himself go hot, then cold as goosebumps break out across the expanse of his body.    

You’re so pretty, he can hardly stand it, and if he doesn’t hear you laugh again, like, immediately, he’s going to drop dead.     

Eddie breathes out an anxious chuckle to match yours and shakes his head, relishing in the way it causes his hair to fall forward and curtain his blushing features.    

It’s quite a thing to be under the force of your undivided attention – he imagines this is what it must feel like for an ant to wander under a magnifying glass.     

“So, Gareth told me a little something too…” You say once your giggling has finally subsided. 

Eddie’s heart jumps up into his throat and he can’t help but get caught on the way you’re looking at him, so patiently with your arms crossed over the table in front of you. He also can’t help but notice the way it pushes your tits up in that pretty little cardigan you’re wearing, but that’s neither here nor there, despite the way it makes his throat feel like it’s going to close up.  

When he doesn’t answer, you tilt your head forward coquettishly and raise your brows at him. 

“...about my book?” You prompt. 

Oh.  

Eddie can’t decide if he’s relieved about that or not, considering for a moment of blinding terror he was so sure you were about to ask him to confess his feelings for you, but of course that’s not what you would mean. Giving you your book back was the whole point of this, wasn’t it? 

“Right…” Eddie says quickly, shaking his head to try and dislodge any lingering haze of panic, “Yeah, of course. I, uh, I have your book.”     

You light up like a kid on Christmas and clap your hands together theatrically. .    

“You do?” You gasp, feigning amazement. It’s entirely too cute. 

“Yeah, it’s in my locker.” 

“Oh.”   

Oh? What does that mean, oh? Was he supposed to bring it with him? Obviously, based on the way your brow is creasing with disappointment.  

And how he hates to disappoint you, he’s suddenly desperate to rectify his mistake, slap a band aid over the suddenly obvious pitfall he’s blundered into. 

“I mean. It’s not a problem,” Eddie says quickly, pushing up from the table, “I can go get it for you – it’ll take like two seconds if you wanna just sit tight…?”  

You make a dissenting sound in the hollow of your throat that he is entirely helpless to comprehend until you begin scooping your things into your bag, like you’ve suddenly remembered that you have to be somewhere.   

“Actually,” You start, shaking your head, “Now that I think about it, Tina will be back with reinforcements any minute now, so it’s probably better if I go with you.” 

“...wait, really? You wanna go with me?” Eddie stammers, hoping you don’t see him flinch as you stand to meet him and come a little closer into his space than he was rightly prepared for.  

“Yeah, sure.” You say, carefully tucking your chair in and shouldering your bag. “If that’s okay with you?”   

“It’s okay.” Eddie says immediately and perhaps a touch too loud, nodding emphatically, “Yeah, it’s totally okay.”  

You smile, all teeth, eyes scrunching tight, and Eddie’s stomach seizes.  

“Great.” You hum, “Lead the way.”      

It takes Eddie three tries to get his locker open, and when he does, he just about whips himself in the face with the door. He’s never been the type of person concerned about the state of the individual spaces that belong to him. His bedroom, his van, they’re both black holes of mess that he’s never been readily concerned about, and least of all the state of his locker with all its crumpled papers and scribbled graffiti, but suddenly with you standing there, peering into the dark little cubby, he’s kicking himself for not keeping it cleaner or more pleasing to the eye in an aesthetic sort of way.   

He tries to tell himself it’s not that bad, and then you see it.  

“Oh!” You say suddenly, scrunching your nose as you peer at the picture Eddie remembers too late that he has taped to the inside of his locker door – the pinup he’d torn out of a magazine. The model lays stretched over a shag rug with her legs pulled up and her arms splayed over her head, arching her back to push her big fake tits out.   

Eddie feels an electric shock of adrenaline rip through his body as he slaps his hand over the magazine spread with a hard metallic bang. How typical would it be to have this going so well, only to scare you off with the goddamn porn he’s got plastered to the inside of his locker? What the hell is the matter with him? 

Only you’re not scandalized, you’re grinning, eyes bright and teasing.   

“Who is she?” You ask.      

“Nobody.” He chokes, absolutely mortified as he watches you bite your lip.  

“It said January Embers.”  

Eddie opens his mouth to make some sort of an excuse – it's just a joke, oh, where did that come from? Those guys got me again, ha-ha, but somehow he can’t muster the ability to cover for himself, not under the heat of your gaze.  

“Pretend you didn’t see that.” he says, brows pulling down over his eyes. 

You give him a wry look, like you’re trying to decide whether or not to play along before tucking your hands behind your back and pulling your shoulders up to your ears in mock innocence.  

“See what?”  

Oh, good girl.     

The thought is startling and makes Eddie’s face burn more than being caught with a nudie photo taped to the inside of his locker. He clears his throat and keeps his hand pressed firmly to the glossy page as he retrieves your tattered paperback with the other before slamming the door shut tight again, once again hiding his shame.     

“Oh, well, thank you very much, Sir.” You chirp when he passes it to you and Eddie feels the tips of his ears go hot and his jeans get a little tighter.    

Stop it, stop it! Get a hold of yourself, Munson.  

He watches as you turn the book over in your hands with a gentle kind of reverence, not inspecting it, he thinks so much as reacquainting yourself with a treasured thing. It makes his insides go warm and fuzzy, especially with the way your eyes flit up and you catch him staring at you.   

“Gareth said you found it in the parking lot?”  

It’s strange to hear his name spoken, your mutual point of contact, the only reason any of this is happening right now. It stirs something in his chest, not that same jealousy, so much as a selfish aversion to bringing him into this moment.  

This is Eddie’s moment with you, and Gareth has no business intruding in on it, despite all the work he’d done to manufacture it.  

“Yeah…” Eddie says thickly, “I’ve been meaning to give it back to you, but…”   

But I’ve been too scared to come talk to you.  

“Never found the right time?”  

“Exactly.”   

You hum thoughtfully and nod, and Eddie is strangely pleased to have satisfied you with the answer.     

He watches you hug the tattered book to your chest, before leveling him with a suspicious look, peering at him through your lashes in stark contrast to the wry quirk of your lips.   

“So, did you read it?”   

“No,” Eddie lies, suddenly unable to stop thinking about the way he’d spent a long evening laying on his bed flipping through its pages, pouring over all your scribbled little annotations, trying so, so hard to look through the text and into your mind, “Absolutely not.”    Your brows come down over your eyes like you don’t believe him, but your feigned annoyance is betrayed by the shy smile pulling at the corner of your lips. Eddie watches your gaze track sideways, and he instantly feels lesser not to have your eyes upon him, but then your features soften, and you get a far away, wistful look on your face that punches his lungs flat.     

“Hey,” you say softly, “The rain’s stopped…”    

Eddie turns to follow your gaze down the hall to the doors he hadn’t noticed.   

They’re standing open, revealing the cold light filtering down from the break in the clouds and causing the pavement to glisten.   

He thinks back to what you said, about Tina and reinforcements and how it was better that you go with him… you’re better off with him… better off than you would be with your stupid jock boyfriend and the vicious cycle of boys and girls.     

Suddenly, Eddie feels a little braver than is perhaps wise, fueled by the promise of a future he’d never once considered. A chance he was never meant to have.   

Eddie knows he’s going out much further on this limb than is rightly safe, but this is already going so much better than he ever could have hoped, and the high of his winning streak makes him foolish.       

“D’you…? I mean, I wanna show you something… if you’ve got time… that is.” he says, bashfully.      

He tries not to get caught on the subtle way your eyes light up before you check your watch, then you shrug your shoulders and glance back up at him through your lashes in a way that makes him feel sick in the sweetest way.     

“We’ve got twenty minutes before the bell rings,” You hum, “Is it gonna take longer than that?”   

Eddie shakes his head.      

“Have you ever been to the picnic table out in the woods?”  

He second guesses the question the moment it leaves his lips.  

Oh, God, why did he ask you that?  

Eddie holds his breath and waits for you to wrinkle your brow and ask the obvious question – you mean where you deal drugs to all the jocks and cheerleaders? You don’t though, you bite your lip and shake your head, and he blesses you for it, feeling the corners of his mouth twisting up as he smiles at you and grows suddenly shy.    

Eddie drops his gaze to his shoes and gives a lopsided shrug.     

“It’s – uh – it’s real pretty out there, especially after it rains.”   

You’re grinning when he dares to steal a glance up at you, a wide stretch of your lips with a hint of your pearly teeth, and you nod.     

“Show me.”      

He’d thought it was enough simply to extend this interaction as far out to his locker, but now, headed out those doors like they were the threshold to everything he never dared to hope for, Eddie’s won the lottery.   

He’s the luckiest man alive, and he’s painfully aware of the sound of your footsteps, crunching in the wet leaves behind him as you follow him out across campus, headed into the woods. He wonders what people would think if they could see you, what kind of rumors that would kick up in the toxic swirling miasma of high school politics. Eddie imagines all his classmates watching you go with their faces pressed flat against the windows, eyes bugging out on stalks.  

Quick! Somebody save that poor girl before he leads her into the underworld! But it took no coaxing at all for you to follow him out here. You came on your own volition, one willing step after the other, down into the darkened hollow with him.   

It’s not all that dark, actually. As the sun breaks free of the clouds, it streams through the canopy to leave dappled little puddles of silvery light embedded across the forest floor, and you’re sliding onto the bench opposite Eddie with no prompting at all.       

For a few moments of nagging terror, you find yourselves sitting there in another one of those awkward silences, avoiding each other’s gazes and looking around like you’ve only just realized that you’re alone out here, really alone, and you have nothing to talk about.  

It’s briefly terrifying, until you thankfully come to the rescue.  

“You know…” you start, laying your palms flat against the splintered wood tabletop, “This isn’t the first time we’ve… hung out.”    

He levels you with an incredulous look.    

“It’s not?”     

Of course it’s not, but that can’t possibly be what you mean, despite the way you shake your head and wait for him to meet you down the path of your thinking.       

“You don’t remember?”     

Of course he does, but he wants to hear you say it, so he plays dumb and shakes his head.     

Your eyes flit down to your hands and you hum thoughtfully in the hollow of your throat.    

“That’s okay,” you assure him with a lopsided shrug, “It was a while ago. I probably wouldn’t remember me either.”    

It physically pains him, forcing himself to sit there and resist the urge to tell you otherwise. Even if he hadn’t spent the last year caught in the clutches of that night, it would be hard not to remember someone when you’ve lived in the same place with the same people your whole life, it’s only just that you’ve been largely invisible to him until very recently.  

And not even for the obvious reasons like you came back to school after having suddenly developed massive tits over the summer, or got your braces off or something stupid like that – as far as Eddie can tell, you’re just the same as you’ve always been – same hair,  same body, same clothes – you’ve only just miraculously happened to stray into his orbit for the first time, and he’s so goddamn pleased you did.     

“Tina’s party.” You prompt, “Last October–” 

“I remember.” He says, perhaps a little too quickly, and wonders just how much of it you remember.    

That night, the one that haunts his every waking moment – the one that arguably ruined his life, if he was speaking bluntly, getting him so fucked up over you.  

You had no business being at a party like that.  

Eddie knew you’d never smoked from the second someone suggested they pass the blunt around. Probably never even been offered anything like that, judging by the way your eyes bugged out of your skull when the contraband came out. He couldn’t help but feel sorry for you, looking so small and scared standing next to him, but try as he might, Eddie couldn’t save you from the crushing pressure of your peers. One thing almost no one tells you about smoking weed is that it’s worse when you cough – that’s the sort of thing you have to discover for yourself, taking a hit and coughing and choking and spluttering and somehow ending up so much higher than everyone around you, which is exactly what happened to you.  

He found you slumped over against the wall a little while after the game ended, barely conscious and subsequently abandoned by your shit-ass friends.  

Ever the soft-hearted moron he is, he endeavored to take responsibility for you, because he didn’t need that kind of heat if something happened to you while under the influence of something he was pedaling, and you oh so desperately needed his pity.     

So, he made you drink water, and then he dragged you outside for a few deep breaths of fresh air.  

At first, all he was trying to do was keep you upright, holding you pressed against his body like that, but then your brain started working again and you came unglued. You pressed your face into the front of his shirt and wailed about how nobody likes you and he commiserated with an awkward pat to your back that you melted beneath. Eddie remembers the smell of your shampoo when you snuggled up against him, and being so starved for basic human contact, he’d only gone and put his nose in the crown of your head before turning his cheek to rest heavily on you. He held you, and you held him right back, and just like that Eddie felt something healing inside of him, something he didn’t realize was broken until it was put back together.    

You called him nice and nuzzled up against him — he called you Sweet Girl and petted your hair back from your face, and he felt the gentle brush of your lips on the taught columns of his throat when you told him you liked that.     

There he sat, crouched between the trash cans on the side of Tina Burton’s garage, still so fresh off of that humiliating afternoon with her, cuddling with some overly-stoned girl who, up to this very moment, had only lived in Eddie’s fantasies, dredged up to torture him with the memories of someone clinging to him so sweetly and saying such nice things.    

“You were so kind to me,” You say softly, bringing Eddie back to the moment, the here and now where you are a creature of flesh and blood and not something out of his imagination, “… I never got the chance to thank you for, you know… looking after me. Being so nice.” You shrug your shoulders in a way that is almost shy and Eddie feels his heart begin to swell painfully in his chest. “I mean, it’s more than I can say for my friends…”     

And if that isn’t the truest thing anyone has ever said.  

He remembers how they came stalking around the corner and found him there watching over you, and how Carol said something nasty about date-rape that scared the shit out of him.   

Eddie skipped school the entire week following that party in the gut-wrenching fear of that rumor taking root, but thankfully, after he bolted, someone drove the Burton’s Cadillac through the fence and into their pool, and all was mercifully forgotten, including all traces of the moment you’d shared. 

But you’d called him nice, and you’d done it again just now….     

Sweet Girl, he thinks.     

Eddie’s throat is going tight, his palms are going sweaty… he’d throw himself into traffic for you…     

Oh no…     

“Hey… it’s, uh — it was-it was my pleasure.”     

He tries so hard to remind himself that he doesn’t know you — that he didn’t know Stacey Keats and he got his heart broken for it.     

This is not his beautiful house, this is not his beautiful wife, and this most certainly is not his American Dream.  

He doesn’t love you, and he most certainly isn’t suddenly trying to picture what you look like first thing in the morning with a cup of coffee or last thing at night, face scrunched up in a yawn as you say goodnight. He’s not thinking about the way he’d match his tie to your dress for Prom or homecoming or whatever dance he’s certainly not imagining taking you to, he’s not trying to remember the name of that wine Wayne told him he ought to order if he ever takes a girl out to a fancy place like Enzo’s, and he’s definitely, definitely not thinking about getting you out of that nice, soft cardigan of yours… popping the buttons slowly, one by one, teasing you within an inch of your life and holding you at bay while you do everything in your power to try and rub up against him, to steal yourself a little bit of pleasure where he’s oh so tenderly denying you… 

Patience, Sweet Girl, he’d tell you, curling a gentle hand around your throat and holding you there, All good things to those who wait… 

Yeah… Eddie’s definitely not thinking about that… 

He feels his tongue dart out to drag a sheen of moisture over his top lip, and his guts seize when — for the briefest moment — your eyes flick down to watch.     

Did he imagine that? Christ, is he already so far gone for you that he’s hallucinating the possibility of reciprocation?     

It would be so easy to kiss you right now, all he would have to do is lean across the table, or maybe come around to your side of the bench. The thought is intrusive and startling, but when Eddie doesn’t burst into flames for having such an untoward thought about someone like you, he lets himself wonder if you’d let him do it. Probably not, maybe you’re just playing nice, counting the seconds until he offers you weed at a discount or turns you loose so you can go scurrying back to your friends.    

But you’re still here, nothing’s stopping you if you want to leave, and you’re sitting there so pretty, just batting your lashes at him.     

“You’re not what I expected.” He says suddenly, before he even realizes the words were forming on his tongue.   

Your features twist up quizzically.    

“What do you mean?”    

Eddie fumbles for the words, gesturing vaguely as he does.    

“It’s just… you’re so approachable, and — and… nice?”    

You snort out an undainty sound of laughter and he can’t help but laugh right along with you, goofy deep throated giggles bubbling up from inside of him and twisting his face up in what he knows has got to be a big stupid grin. He can’t help it. Sitting there, grinning back at you, Eddie is suddenly convinced he’s in love.       

“Who says I’m not nice?” You ask, tilting forward in a way that Eddie is powerless to help but mirror.     

“Uh, nobody. Nobody says that, it’s just… I mean aren’t you supposed to be popular or something?”     

You scoff.  

“Ah— so, here’s the thing about that — Carol’s the popular one … you know Carol, right?”    

He feels the corner of his mouth twitch as he exercises every bit of willpower he possesses not to react. 

“Sure, I know Carol.” Eddie says slowly, “She’s… fine.”      

“It’s okay, you can say it.” You tell him.  

“She’s awful.”     

And then you go and flip everything he thinks he knows off of the table with one simple gesture, and you nod.  

“Yeah …she’s pretty much the worst.”    

He has absolutely no idea what to think after that, so Eddie makes the diplomatic decision to keep his mouth shut and only offers you a tight-lipped smile when your eyes flit up to regard him.  

Without question, there is understanding there, lying quietly between you – you didn’t ask him why he was inviting you out to the spot where he sells drugs to all your friends, and he doesn’t ask you why you hang out with them in the first place. Suddenly, you’re simpatico in the fact that you don’t understand each other, and neither of you care.   

“Anyway, she’s only popular because of who she hangs out with and I’m just the lucky fella who gets dragged along for the ride.” You say, “I don’t think people really notice if I’m even there half the time – they certainly don’t notice when I’m not.”  

Case and point, that rumor Tommy is touting about what you apparently did at a party you didn’t even attend, and suddenly, Eddie understands how all your shitty little friends could believe it.  

Well, he doesn’t understand, but he supposes it at least makes a little more sense, in a totally vapid, head-assed sort of way.  

“That’s … bizarre.” He says, “So you’re just out here hanging out with the cool kids on complete and total accident?”    

“Pretty much.” You hum, rolling your shoulders and heaving a wistful sigh, “...Anyway, what about you?”   

“What about me?”   

You bite your lip and the way you turn suddenly shy, averting your gaze down to your hands has Eddie’s stomach turning in knots. You like him, you like him, you like him… Eddie has to resist the urge to say it out loud, less a question than an accusation, a point of fact he has no business thrusting upon you.  

“You’re nice too.” You mumble, almost like you’re confirming what he’d just elected not to say to you.  

It leaves him feeling just a little bit winded, because, Christ, you’re gonna give him a big head if you keep talking so sweet like that… and you’re gonna give him a raging hard on if you keep looking at him like that, all shy, glancing up at him through your lashes.  

Maybe he should kiss you. 

Maybe he’s reading the signs wrong, maybe this is one of those lessons he never got around to learning, like that afternoon when Tina Burton put her hand on his thigh and gave him the same look when she suggested she pay for the weed “some other way” but try as he might, Eddie can’t get a sense of any hidden danger here, and he can suddenly hear Gareth posing that ominous question to him over the phone.  

What’s the worst that can happen? 

Then, in the distance, the bell rings bringing with it a bright burst of panic surging through his chest and sending stinging shocks all the way down to his fingers and toes. 

No, not yet, he silently pleads to no one in particular, Five more minutes... please... 

Eddie watches with a sick anxiety as you twist around to stare back through the hollow, back toward where you’d come from, where the school sits waiting for you, and he mourns the impending end of this moment — this perfect, perfect moment, everything he ever hoped it would be.    

More, because he hadn’t been stupid enough to dare to hope it would be this good. For one giddy moment, he briefly entertains the idea of inviting you back to the van, but he stops the thought in his tracks.    

 Invite you back to do what?     

Smoke?     

Fuck?     

Neither, honestly, all he wants is to talk to you some more, but there’s no way he can properly express that, not with his reputation being what it is.     

And even if he tried? What kind of a reaction is that going to get out of you, if you suddenly start to think this was all some convoluted ploy to get into your pants or something? Or worse, if he opens up to you and it turns out you’re just playing nice and very good at faking it.  

But that hasn’t been the case so far. He’d already pushed his luck much further past the breaking point asking you to come out here, and somehow, against all odds, you’re still sitting there.  

You could have bolted the second the bell rang, but you didn’t, and a bigger part of Eddie than he is ready to address is sure that’s got to mean something… that you actually want to be here with him.     

You’re going to be late going back if he keeps you any longer, and that same part of him wishes you wouldn’t go back, that you would stay and linger a little longer in this moment.  

Stay here with him, just for a little while. 

“Well… I should go,” You start, spreading your palms flat across the table, and he feels a sick wave of disappointment wash over him like a fever as he watches you stand, “Chemistry calls,”    

The statement is punctuated with your slow rise from the bench and a goofy, overexaggerated show of jerking your thumbs over your shoulder, just like the way he’d done back in the cafeteria but so much better on you.     

He really does think he might love you and it turns his tongue to a fat, useless thing sitting heavy in his mouth.     

“Do… d’you want me to pass any messages on to Gareth?” You ask suddenly.     

Yes, tell him I could kiss him. That he’s the greatest man to ever walk the face of this Earth, that he’s my goddamn hero.     

“When he asks how it went, tell the smug bastard to mind his own business.”     

You pull a face, features scrunching, brows knitting over your pretty eyes.     

“How it went?” You echo.     

Eddie dismisses the notion with a flippant wave.     

“You’ll know when you know.”    

You snort undaintily and roll your eyes.  

“Okay… I’ll see you later,” you hum, and this time, the promise is hopeful. 

“Sure.” He says, nodding. 

You reward him with another one of those bright smiles, all pearly teeth and crinkled eyes, and then you turn and start out back toward the light.  

Eddie watches you go, feeling his heart thumping solidly in his chest as you reach the end of the hollow and turn to leave him with one last parting glance, a shy wave, and then you’re gone.  

He misses you already. 

“You like me,” he says quietly to himself, testing the words on his lips and feeling a warm satisfaction flood his body when they come out sounding right.  

Eddie lingers a little longer after that, basking in the afterglow of everything that just happened, everything he’s spent so long wishing and hoping for, and wondering too late whether he ought to have followed you, or maybe even walked you to class. It’s probably best that he didn’t, he decides. The scandal of seeing you steal away into the woods together was probably shocking enough for anyone who cared to notice, he can’t imagine what seeing the pair of you walking back together would do.   

He turns his gaze down at the table, to where you’d been sitting only moments ago, and there he sees it.   

A tattered, heavily annotated copy of Dune, missing its front cover.   

Permission. Eddie thinks reverently as he snatches it up and folds it in against his chest.   

He supposes he’ll just have to give it back to you the next time he sees you, and the promise of an impending next time fills him with joy – he’s positively giddy with it, and practically skipping as he makes his way back out of the hollow.  

Christ, he’s such a loser, and he’s down bad for you. 

--

baby taglist: @thrutheburnout, @vintagehellfire,

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson x you #eddie munson imagine #joseph quinn eddie munson #stranger things fic #endless summer fic #cruel summer prequel #if you would like to be added to the taglist please let me know and I will do my best but this lady is still very broken sometimes #the taglist i mean ... not me #sometimes me lmao

[hearts-hunger]

Chapter Three: A Woman Aboard  {Series Masterlist | Series Playlist ♫}

Series Summary: You’ve been called the Jewel of the Bay, a lady born and bred in one of the Royal Navy’s most profitable ports of call. On a fateful summer night, taken aboard the pirate ship Starcatcher, your world is turned upside down. To survive, you must put your faith in the honor among thieves and learn to trust the devotion of a pirate to his most precious treasure.

Pairings: Jake x Reader, Sam x Danny, Josh x Reader | Chapter Word Count: 3k | Warnings: none? allusions to AU-typical violence and innuendo, I suppose

A/N: Pirate Jake is back! Mirador and Josh's pirate birthday pics have reignited the fire of this fic. This one's just a short chapter to get back into the swing of things, but I'm hoping for a longer installment soon. I hope you like it! ♡

You stood with your hands on your hips as Jake left, watching as he scaled the rigging to half-mast with perfect ease. The sheer athleticism of the act astounded you; as nimble as a cat with eight lives spent, Jake climbed until he was perched on the yardarm, one hand gripping the rope as he leaned out to survey his men. He shone in the firelight, bronze and wild and beautiful atop his magnificent ship. You couldn't have torn your gaze off him for all the gold in the world.

One of the pirates jostled you from behind, brushing past you in his hurry to attend to the task of making sail. Skirting out of his way, you noticed with a flash of fear his blood-stained shirt; he joined his companions, many of them fresh from the throes of battle and gritty with gunpowder and blood, some of them laden with ropes of pearls and chains of jewels they’d looted from houses in the bay. You tried to stay out of their way, not least out of concern for your own safety, but there was nowhere on deck that seemed to be free from the frenzy of their work.

“Sapphire!”

You looked up to the deck where Josh stood, one hand on the wheel and the other glinting gold as he beckoned to you. You obeyed, holding your skirts in hand as you hurried up the stairs to his side.

“Funny thing to have a woman aboard,” he said cooly, seemingly unbothered by the hurried work of the crew below. One could even believe him to be calm, gold-bright in the light of the billowing fires from the bay, cannons ringing, curses and orders shouted all around him. 

You smoothed a hand over your skirt, remembering with chagrin that you were out of place, and standing aboard a pirate ship in a state of truly indecent undress, no less. 

“I dare say,” you managed. “It seems no fit place for a lady.”

Josh’s smile wasn’t entirely reassuring. “You’ll find your place, Sapphy. For now, stay here with me to save yourself getting run down by my crew.”

You were relieved to be directed, even if it was by a pirate who was all too keen to whisk you away from your home and your fiancee. You sat primly on a crate at the back of the deck, trying to comport yourself as properly as you could with no shoes, barely any clothes, and your hair unbound about your shoulders. 

The view from the top deck provided ample opportunity to watch the crew at work as they ran about the deck to get the Starcatcher out to sea. The navy gave little chase to the two galleons; some of the ships in Kit’s precious fleet had been set aflame, and the others could not be manned nor sailed quickly enough to keep the Starcatcher or the Indigo Streak from leaving the bay. You marveled at how quickly both ships had come in, gotten what they came for, and left; little over an hour had passed since Jake had rescued you, and they’d gotten their man, their gold, and their revenge on Sapphire Bay and Kit Drake.

Out of the bay, The Starcatcher kept the Streak in its sights as both galleons cut through the waves with unparalleled speed. You watched as the bright fires of your island became smaller and more distant, quickly swallowed by the inky night as the ships sped onwards. Something like despair clutched at you, threatening to swallow you whole; you were well and truly kidnapped, party by your own doing, running from the King’s law and the King’s men to waters unknown. What was to become of you?

Your dismal thoughts were interrupted as Jake all but materialized in front of you, landing gracefully atop the deck.

“Did you swing down from the mast?” you asked, incredulous.

He raised a brow, the telltale rope swinging behind him as he let it go. “Aye. You thought I’d grow wings and fly down from there, did you?”

You flushed. “Hardly. It’s a wonder you haven’t broken your neck doing something like that.”

“He likes to keep his neck safe for pretty bruises from the occasional barmaid,” Josh said, spinning the wheel with a deft hand. “Isn't that true, Jacob?”

Jake frowned. “Hardly.” He looked to you, something daring in his expression. “I’ll teach you to swing from the yard, if you like. I promise I won't let you break your neck either.”

You touched a hand to your throat, feeling to far too exposed in your current state. “No, thank you. I’d be a fool to trust a pirate.”

Jake gave you a wicked grin. “As you say, Sapphy.”

Oh, but the name sounded so different in his voice. You crossed your arms over your chest as if to shield yourself, not knowing what exactly you were shielding yourself from. 

He held out his hand. “Come. Joshua’s had enough lovers leave things in his stateroom for us to find you something more... suitable to wear.”

Your face burned hot, and you declined to take his hand as you stood. “Very well, then.”

You followed him back down the stairs and into the stateroom. Everything inside was as you’d expected from years of imagining a pirate captain’s quarters; gold and red and purple, king’s colors, predominated in fabrics of sensuous velvet and silk. A desk was strewn with maps and quills; opposite it, a tablestood laden with bowls of excotic, expensive fruit and wine. The wide bed in the middle of it all brought images to mind unbidden, and you could only imagine what sort of scandalous acts had unfolded behind the doors of the Starcatcher’s private rooms.

You shivered where you stood, more from cold than anything else. Even off the deck, it was cold out on the open water, and you watched hopefully to see what clothing Jake would produce.

He rummaged in a chest at the foot of the bed, pulling out articles that seemed a motley collection of sailor’s wear and bordello finery. He held up a gaudy red corset for your perusal. 

“For heaven's sake,” you said, averting your gaze, mortified and shocked at such a thing. He grinned.

“Not this, then?” He tossed it back in the chest. “Too bad.”

He nodded towards the sideboard that held dozens of crystal decanters and amber bottles of liquor. “Have a taste of rum, lass, if you’re cold. It’ll keep a fire in your belly.”

You were surprised he’d noticed, and his attentiveness was at once embarrassing and touching. Pouring yourself a very small dose of what you hoped was rum and not some dread pirate poison, you took a sip and felt the fire he’d spoken of.

“There you are, lass,” he said as you sputtered and coughed, a laugh in his voice. “Never had such fine fare, have you?”

“No, I've never had rum before,” you said, trying to be scathing but managing only to sound vaguely weak. “No doubt you have it aplenty.”

He shrugged and pulled a lacy garter out of the chest. “All sailors have a proclivity for anything that makes life more enjoyable, Sapphire.”

No doubt that was true, judging by the articles that had been left behind on the captain’s floor. He finally unearthed a dark blue blouse and brown trousers, and you allowed yourself a breath of relief at something that could be worn with a little dignity.

“Here you are,” he said, handing the clothes to you. “I’ll look with the men to see if there’s any boots that might fit you. Come back out to the deck when you’re ready.”

“Thank you,” you said meekly.

He gave a slight bow. “I’m at your service.”

Alone in the stateroom, you felt for the first time since you’d come aboard that you had a blessed moment away from prying eyes and curious attention. You made quick work of your dress, but there was no way to undo your stays by yourself; resigned to wearing the tight and uncomfortable laces, you dressed quickly in the new clothes and felt a little more sure of yourself, if not nearly as decent as you would have liked. Never in your life had you worn trousers, but they were too big to reveal much of your figure, and with the blouse tucked in they fit well enough. 

Not knowing where else to put them, you placed your discarded skirt and bodice in the chest. You found a colorful scarf to tie your hair back with, wearing it almost like a bandanna, and felt entirely unlike yourself when you stopped to look in the gilded mirror.

“You’re quite a sight,” you sighed to your reflection. You gingerly touched a hand to the angry mark Kit’s signet ring had left, wincing when it stung. The bejeweled Governor’s daughter who’d shown in the mirror at home was nowhere to be seen, replaced by an unkempt, wind-swept young woman who looked as unsteady as she felt. 

Venturing back out to the deck, you found Jake standing by the railing with a pair of boots held causally in hand, a coat draped over his arm.

“I hope I won't see any of your men in stocking feet,” you said, trying for humor. The activity on deck had died down now that the Starcatcher was safely out to sea, but members of the crew still milled about the deck, attending to various tasks.

Jake shook his head. “They’re extra. They’ll likely be too big for you, but I'm sorry to say we’re a bit short on hand-stitched dancing slippers.”

“And you call yourself a pirate,” you said, slipping on the boots and lacing them until they were snug. “Tell your crew to loot them from wherever you’re headed next.”

He gave a doubtful hum as he looked out over the water. The Streak was a few paces ahead, cutting through the waves like a dolphin over the shining, moonlit water. 

“We’re headed to the Cove,” he said when you joined him. “Caravel Cove. It's a safe haven, of sorts. The navy knows where it is, but no King’s man is brave enough to set foot on an island overrun with pirates.”

You’d heard Kit speak of Caravel Cove, heard him disdain its rebellion from the crown, hungry to plunder it and hang every living soul that found safe harbor there, pirate or no. The thought of it sent a shiver down your spine.

“Here,” Jake said, draping the coat over your shoulders. It was soft leather, redolent of gunsmoke and salt air. “In case you didn’t take to the taste of rum.”

You allowed yourself a smile. “It’s kind of you.”

“It’s my pleasure. No use to snatch a lady just to let her catch a chill.”

“Snatch me, did you?” you mused. “I rather think I helped you in your endeavor, pirate.”

“All the same. Did you find your clothes satisfactory?” 

“Very much so,” you said truthfully. “I confess I was loath to wear so little as I arrived in where your men could see me.”

“You needn’t worry about them, lass,” he reminded you. “They’ll treat you with respect. Even if you were only half-dressed.”

His gaze drifted to the scarf in your hair. “That suits you,” he said. “Though the lady who had it first wore it an entirely different way.”

“Fond memories?” you asked, a teasing lilt to your voice.

He chuckled. “From what memories I do have of her, I should say so. Rum and women make for rather blurry recollections.”

It surprised you that you didn’t find him repulsive in his admissions of drink and lovemaking; indeed, to your shame, you found it made him alluring. Had Kit said anything of the sort, and he had, you would have scorned him. Perhaps the bracing sea air was getting to your head.

“What will you do with me when we reach the Cove?” you asked. You didn’t know what you wanted the answer to be; part of you wanted to secure passage home, and the other roused to the idea of adventure such as you’d never dreamed of. Surely there would be plenty to be found at Caravel Cove, if you hadn't gotten your fill on the voyage there.

He considered this, watching your face in the bright, silvery moonlight. 

“I don’t know,” he said truthfully. “Perhaps we’ll find someone to take you back, some lesser known schooner who won’t be blasted from the water before Drake can see you waving your white flag.”

The thought of boarding some other ship hardly appealed to you, especially when the captain could not be expected to give you the same promises as Josh and his twin had. Despite your hesitance to leave earlier, you were overwhelmed for a moment at the thought of an undetermined end to your time aboard a pirate ship. In your wildest dreams you’d never expected to even set foot on one, let alone embark on a long journey aboard one. All of a sudden, you felt the weight of just how alone you were in this strange world, how utterly you would need to trust the word and honor of a man you barely knew.

A shadow of pity crossed Jake’s face. 

“I know you can’t be too keen on the idea,” he said, and his voice was apologetic. “And it’s my fault for not taking you back sooner, or else finding a better place than the ship to keep you safe. I wasn’t thinking, lass. I’m sorry.”

You didn’t say anything for a moment. You looked out over the dark water, drawn to its dark and secret depths, the mysteries and magic it held.

“You might have saved my life,” you said, and it chilled you to know it was true. “I don’t know what Kit would have done to me if you hadn’t stopped him.”

“I’m sorry he hurt you at all,” Jake said, and there was an undercurrent of passion in the sincerity of his tone. “It’s a cowardly, wicked thing to hurt a woman. Especially one you claim to love.”

He spoke truly, and you wished you had the ability or even the desire to defend the man you’d pledged yourself to marry.

“What will you do?” you asked softly. “When you reach the Cove?”

“We’ll have to lie low for a while,” he said. “Give Daniel time to heal.”

“How is he?” you asked, the memory of the bloody first mate coming vividly with a wash of pity and regret. 

Jake shook his head. “I don't know yet. I’ll go over tomorrow and ask after him.”

“How?” you asked curiously. “You won’t anchor somewhere and stop both ships, will you?”

“Nay, lass. I’ll swing over as I did from the yardarm. Perfectly safe if you have your wits about you.”

“Heavens,” you breathed. “You pirates are a different sort, aren’t you?”

He smiled. “I dare say, Sapphy. What sort are you?”

You didn’t know how to answer that. So far all you knew of yourself was a thirst for something beyond your life of parlor games and dinner parties. 

He brushed your hair over your shoulder, and you found the touch intimate and yet entirely safe.

“I suppose you'll have time to figure it out, lass,” he said gently, somehow knowing something of the tumultuous ocean of your heart. “We’ll reach the Cove in four days time, if the weather’s fair.”

“And if it’s not?” you asked.

A look of smug assurance crossed his handsome features. “Still four days, though they’ll be a rough few on stormy seas. Josh and Sam could steer these ships through a hurricane and keep a steady course.”

“I hope to merely take your word for it,” you said, though part of you thrilled at the idea of seeing a masterful sailor best a storm-tossed sea.

Still, despite the call of adventure, you couldn't help a yawn hidden behind your hands.

“Come, lass,” Jake said kindly. “I’ll show you to my quarters. Sleep for a while and get the wind back in your sails.”

You hummed. “Do all pirates talk in seafaring metaphors?”

He chuckled. “All the good ones do.” He held the door open and showed you into a simply furnished room with a view of the sea. “Sit here on the edge of the bed, lass. I’ll get some liniment for that cut of yours.”

You did as he said, though it was more an act of hopping onto the edge of the berth built into the alcove of the window. You brushed a hand over the plain wool blanket. 

“Where do you keep all the treasure you find?” you asked. “It seems like your brother's gotten the lion’s share.”

He took a small tin from a box on his desk. “I have a few things here and there.” He dabbed some of the earthy-scented medicine onto his fingertips, then brushed his fingers gently over the cut on your cheek. “But I don’t entertain as much as my twin, so I don’t need quiet as much finery as he does.” 

You couldn’t help but laugh, feeling a bit fuzzy-headed with exhaustion. “You’re entertaining the daughter of the Governor of Sapphire Bay,” you said. “Has your brother ever managed that?”

“Nay, lass. I suppose that makes me the better pirate.”

“Do you know, I believe it does.” You looked down, bemused, when he knelt before you. “What are you doing?”

“Untying your boots,” he said simply. He unlaced them quickly and set them at the foot of the bed, and you tried to remember the last time a man had treated you with such kindness.

He stood. “Sleep as long as you like. I’ll make myself easily found when you wake.”

You sank gratefully onto his bed, feeling almost like a child when he spread a blanket over you.

“Where will you stay?” you asked drowsily, already half asleep. “I hate to put you out of your own bed.”

“Don't worry your pretty head, lass.” His voice was as gentle and comforting as the steady rock of the ocean. “I’ll be fit and fair with a sailor’s hammock below. Rest now.”

You couldn't have disobeyed, and the last sound was his boots on the plank floor and the closing of the door. The cradle of the waves held you as closely as a mother’s arms, and you sank into a deep and dreamless sleep.

tagging you feral freaks who wanted this so bad the other night: @streamsofstardust @the-starcatcher @gold-mines-melting @runwayblues @spark-my-nature i love y'all <3

#if you want to be added to the taglist shoot me an ask :)) #anywho i hope you like it! #fate of the faithful fic #pirate!jake #pirate jake kiszka #greta van fleet #gvf fanfiction #pirate gvf #pirate!josh #maddie writes stuff! #fotf fic

[librathefangirl]

A Libra NNT Analysis: Meliodas' Demon Secret

Masterlist

Part 1: The Start of a Millennia Long Secret (pre-season 1)

Okay, time to finally get this started. And I want to do that by saying what I've said before, and probably will say again: The Seven Deadly Sins is an anime that needs to be watched (at least) twice. It's like Zaratras says:

Looking back, especially at the earlier seasons, so many things get another meaning when you know the whole story. Meliodas' demon secret is no different. The first time around you get to learn about it along with the characters. The second time around you can see the nuances of it, the symbolism and relation between it and the rest of the story. This is why I wanted to do this analysis series in the first place, to look at the earliest episodes with the perspective of knowing exactly who and what Meliodas is, and see how his demon secret is developed - or rather, how it's revealed. This means that yes, there will be angsty ramblings similar to my previous posts on the subject. I mean how could there not, because a) it's me (and if you know me, you know I love angst), and b) Meliodas really hid who he really was from the people closest to him for so long...

But! Before we get into how Meliodas' secret is revealed I want to take a look at how it was formed. Starting with the why.

Actually, first I'm gonna put a read-more because this got long :) Continue reading for: the reason behind Meliodas' secret, 3,000 years of history, the fall of Danafor, and the Seven Deadly Sins knows... what?

Meliodas' demon secret doesn't actually become a secret until after the end of the First Holy War. Before the end of the war, he has no reason to try to hide it. Everybody already knows what and who he is. For those who don't, well, they soon figure it out. He doesn't hide it; he openly uses his demonic powers and shows himself as a demon, because again, he has no reason not to, and he even admits to being a demon when asked about it. This, to me, is especially noteworthy since this is something we're shown repeatedly that he doesn't do after the end of the war.

After Meliodas and Elizabeth's confrontation with their parents, and the following death and cursing, Meliodas wakes up to a new Britannia. A demon-free Britannia. The war has by then ended, leaving the demons sealed away and the goddesses having lost their physical forms. A new era has started in Britannia. An era where the demons are becoming nothing more than a great evil sealed away by the goddesses. The more years that pass, the more solidified this view becomes. The humans who once had encountered demons, all die or are already dead. By the time of the first season, the demons are just monsters of myth. While there are still some people who know about demons, like Gerheade (who lived through the war) and Elaine, we're also shown that most people don't. They struggle with the idea that such beings even exist, or have a very limited knowledge of demons. We can probably also safely assume that nobody is exactly considering the possibility of a "good" demon. After all, that was already a foreign idea back before they were sealed.

So, given everything we know about this new Britannia and how it came to be, it makes sense why Meliodas would choose to hide the fact that he is a demon. He has no reason to believe anyone would accept this about him. While the world before was also filled with hate and fear towards demons, back then he at least had Elizabeth. And his entire race, even if they did hate him too (but not for being a demon). Now he is all alone, stuck trying (and failing) to protect Elizabeth in a world that doesn't understand demons. People knowing he is a demon would also make it a lot harder for him to live among the humans, which we know he has done repeatedly during in his attempts to keep Elizabeth safe and in his search for a way to break the curse. So, yeah, it's easy to see why Meliodas' demon secret would come to be.

At the same time, I think it's really interesting to point out that while Meliodas does hide that he is a demon and won't even answer the question when directly asked about, he doesn't really lie about it either. He doesn't say he is a demon, but he also doesn't say he isn't a demon or that he is human.

We don't get to see lot of what happens to Meliodas over the 3,000 years between the start of the curse and his arrival in Liones. What we do see is Meliodas, repeatedly, living human lives with Elizabeth's numerous reincarnations. Because of this, the most significant moment we get during those years in regard to his demon secret is the fall of Danafor.

Danafor is an example of a human life we see Meliodas living with Elizabeth, or Liz in this case. From the flashbacks of his times there, provided by the druids' trial, and his interactions with Cain, it's safe to assume that the people of Danafor saw Meliodas as a fellow human - a stupidly overpowerful human perhaps, but a human nonetheless. When Cain learns that Meliodas is in fact Meliodas (and not his son) he is, understandably, shocked. After all, he clearly expected Meliodas to age like a human would and not still look as young. Danafor, or rather the fall of Danafor, marks the beginning of the unraveling of Meliodas' demon secret. This is the first time in who knows how long that Meliodas uses his demonic powers. It's also the first time he's faced with someone who knows who and what he really is (not counting Merlin and Elizabeth with her memories regained) with the appearance of Fraudrin. Even disregarding Fraudrin's future possession of Dreyfus, the events in Danafor (Meliodas' destruction of it and the Coffin of Eternal Darkness) have significant repercussions for Meliodas going forward.

After Danafor, Meliodas life becomes different. Back in Danafor, he was greatly respected as the leader of the Holy Knights. In Liones, he still has respect and status as the captain of the Seven Deadly Sins, but he (along with the other Sins) is also seen as a criminal and sinner. By then, rumors have also spread about what happened in Danafor and Meliodas' part in its destruction. We don't really know for sure what exactly those rumors entailed or how close to the truth they were (they most likely did not involve "demon" or "demonic powers"), they still told a story of Meliodas being the one, not only to destroy Danafor completely, but also kill its citizens.

So, from what we can see, Meliodas' arrival in Liones comes with a new life and a different role. While he is still mostly seen as human, he is also seen as more of a "monster" than before. Both Zaratras and Hendrickson admit to having sense Meliodas' true identity during some of their earliest encounters with him.

That brings us to another interesting thing to look at before I get into analyzing the individual episodes: the extent of Meliodas' demon secret. Meliodas is generally seen as a human, but his secret isn't a complete secret. It's not a situation of nobody knows nothing, as seen above. Of course, how much is known depends on who's perspective we are talking about. So, since it's kind of important for these breakdowns, and it intrigues me to talk about, let's end this part with looking at what the fuck do each of the Seven Deadly Sins actually know about Meliodas in regards to his demon secret?

The most obvious (and also easiest) to start with is Merlin. She is the one who knows the most about Meliodas, seeing as she first met him 3,000 years ago before he even betrayed the demons. To her, there isn't really a "demon secret", only a secret he is keeping from everyone else. Merlin knows Meliodas is a demon. She knows what kind of demon he is and was, his past with the demons and Stigma, even about the curse at the hands of the Demon King and Supreme Deity and what it means for him.

I'm gonna try to do these in order of who knows most, so next up is Gowther, who - well, who the hell knows what he actually knows? But he is the one, next after Merlin, who is the most knowledgeable about Meliodas. Technically, he met Meliodas before even Merlin did, since he was (as his creator's proxy) in the Ten Commandments alongside him. It has also been revealed that the original Gowther was one of Meliodas best friends (Q245, Q&A Corner of chapter 234 in the manga). But Gowther also did erase his own memories prior to season 1, after Nadja's death. Despite this, Gowther is still shown to know more about Meliodas' secret than the others. When the group is first reunited with Gowther, he points out to Meliodas that none of them are of the same race, hinting that he knows Meliodas is not human. Though given his powers, to me at least, it's hard telling exactly how much Gowther knows about Meliodas.

Merlin and Gowther are more or less the only Sins with any real knowledge about Meliodas' secret, but that doesn't mean the others don't know anything. In fact, most of them have gotten some hint prior to the events of season 1, proving that Meliodas' demons secret isn't absolute. Among the remaining Sins, Escanor is the one with the biggest reason, I think, to suspect something. Escanor has, after all, seen Meliodas in his demon form. He might not know exactly what Meliodas is, but he should definitely suspect that Meliodas isn't human. The moment I'm talking about happens during the battle between Escanor and Meliodas, when Meliodas is trying to convince him to join the Seven Deadly Sins. During that battle, Meliodas easily defeats Escanor by releasing his Assault Mode. This means that Escanor saw him with his black eyes and demon mark. Like I said, Escanor probably didn't know what it meant at the time, seeing as he hadn't actually met another demon by then, but at the same time, it stands to reason, that Escanor shouldn't be seeing Meliodas as quite as human as the rest of Liones did.

Now let's talk about Ban. The interesting thing about him is that while, out of the last three Sins, Ban is the one who knows the most about demons, he is also probably the last one who would (willingly) suspect Meliodas of being one - something that he shows later in the first season. Ban's knowledge of the demons comes from him encountering and fighting the Red Demon during its attack on the Fairy King's Forest. This means that his knowledge of the demons as a race is very limited compared to Merlin (though to be fair, most people's knowledge is limited compared to Merlin, especially about demons since, well, very few people seem to know what the demons really are anymore). The Red Demon is also a huge part of Ban's struggles with the idea of Meliodas being one, as he obviously can't let himself put Meliodas equal in any way to the monster who killed Elaine. Still, even if he doesn't want to, Ban has reason to suspect it even before season 1, given what happened with Meliodas' dragon handle. When Ban tried to take the dragon handle, Meliodas cuts him with black flames. This is also the one and only time something has managed to leave a permanent scar on Ban's body since becoming immortal. Both of these indicate, if nothing else, that Meliodas isn't as human as he first appears to be.

Between Diane and King it's a little hard to tell who knows most, because let's face it, neither has much knowledge about Meliodas' secret at this point. Though I would probably have to say Diane does - mostly because I've got an issue with King's knowledge, but more about that later, let's talk about Diane first. Diane doesn't have much knowledge about neither demons nor Meliodas' secret, but, like the others, she has some reason to suspect him not being human. Diane was there and saw Meliodas scar Ban, meaning she saw Meliodas with the black flames just as Ban did. Later, during the events of the Vaizel Fighting Festival, she also admits to having seen "that look" on Meliodas, referring to how he looked while defeating Ban. So, yeah, not much knowing but still some hints.

Now then, last but not least, King. Okay, to be fair, he is one of the Sins with the least knowledge about Meliodas' secret. He also, like Diane, lacks the knowledge of demons in general. He wasn't there during the Red Demon's attack in the Fairy King's Forest and has shown himself to not share Elaine's knowledge about demons, given his reaction to seeing the Red Demon's corpse. He even expresses shock that beings like the Red Demon have actually existed in Britannia. As for Meliodas' secret, when King first meet him in the manga, he literally calls him human. By the time of the first season, King is seemingly still holding this view, later expressing his surprise that Meliodas looks exactly the same despite 10 years having passed.

But I did say I had an issue with King's knowledge, didn't I? Well, unfortunately, I do. It comes with that first meeting between King and Meliodas. As much as I love it, it provides some... inconsistencies, especially in regard to the reveal of Meliodas' demon secret - and since that is what this post is about, it's only fair that we address it. Okay, so here's the thing. King was captured 200 years ago. In the manga page above (first panel, lower left corner) you can even see Helbram's dead body still lying on the ground, proving that it was 200 years ago. Now, Meliodas being there when King is arrested by unnamed knights 200 years before he and Merlin decide to form the Seven Deadly Sins, while a coincidence, is not that unimaginable. But King remembers that moment. He references it to Meliodas in the druids' cave and thinks back to it in the fight against Chandler, which means he clearly remembers the Meliodas 200 years ago as Meliodas and not just some random knight. But then when they are reunited after only 10 years he suddenly thinks it's weird that Meliodas remains unchanged? I just- that is what is happening, right?? Anyway, let's just... drop it for now.

Okay!

So what do we start of with when the fist season begins? Meliodas, who has kept the fact that he is a demon a secret for 3,000 years because Britannia is now "demon-free" and demons are seen as ancient evil monsters; Merlin, who knows everything; Gowther, who knows he is not human; and the rest of the Seven Deadly Sins, who still think of him as human(?). At the same time, the events of Danafor's destruction has set the wheels in motion regarding Meliodas' demon secret finally being revealed to everybody.

Coming soon - Part 2: Cracks in the Mask (season 1 part 1)

---

Taglist: @zorria

#suddenly got very nervous about posting this but here we go #finally got started with this which means i can finally start my rewatch which i have been holding off for the sake of this series #also this actually got longer that i thought it would gonna be interesting to see how the other parts end up #fun fact: this post holds 30 images which is the max amount allowed lol #gonna stop talking in the tags and just post this now... #but let me know if you wanna be added to the taglist for this analysis series #okay wtf is going on with the photos... if you see them one by one that's not how they're supposed to be #a libra nnt analysis #nanatsu no taizai #seven deadly sins #nnt analysis #meliodas' demon secret #meliodas nnt #merlin nnt #gowther nnt #escanor nnt #ban nnt #diane nnt #fairy king harlequin

[smileysuh]

i've just updated my taglists, gotten rid of inactive blogs and such, so if you'd like to be added to my taglists (nct, svt, or nct & svt/general) please shoot me a message and I can add people tonight while I'm working on this :)

#please note #interacting with this post will not guarantee tag list spot #you have to message me with your URL and specify WHICH list you'd like to be added to #the way my taglists work is i tag people on the general/specific lists #then i have an interacted with post list #wherein i scroll through the likes/reblogs of a teaser #everyone who reblogged or commented will be tagged #and in the hundreds of likes i usually get #i prioritize those who i follow (as i always follow back people who are kind in tags and such) #this is how my tag system works :)

[ask-lu-wild]

Be gone sky

#pic #story #checking courage #The Royal Pibling’s Plight #That One Boy that Left Heaven for some Chick #handsome knights #hi I just added pronouns and genders to the links' tags in the taglist #as well as their current ages #remember this is still november 21 in the story #so 2 birthday pepo #if you have any questions about the taglist please send me an ask on author-main

[scrunkalicious]

yappost,,, just call me yappalicious now 😻😻🤭,, kinda a sequel to this post kinda,,, a collectiom of info and hcz, separated by a bit of space depending on whatz related or whatnot,,,

taglist ppl im sacrificing yall 🧍🏻‍♀️

WORD COUNT BC HAVE YOU SEEN THIS THING:

Yall know those "your F/O dancing with you" kinda stuff??? Yeah ok that but backwardz I am dancing with my f/oz like errm

Marly knowz swing dance,,, itz hella fun, and Viktor is kinda insecure abt dancing bc of his leg, limp and cane,, but he rlly wantz to hold n stuff, in the end it takez a lot of prodding from Marly but oh when she finally getz him to dance with her itz sohhnggghbn v gentle and intamate, slow careful steps with Marly not minding if he accidentally gripz her too tightly,, and she givez him the most blessed praise from her afterwardz

tho,, as the yearz pass (more around the part of the show after the timeskip,, act 2 or whatever), it getz increasingly harder for vik to dance as much/easily as he used to,,, it was a bit of a challenge even at the start, but now with him needing a crutch instead of a cane, and with his leg brace and increasing painz,, erm,,, it makez him sad bc he knowz how much fun Marly has with dance but she is assuring him that itz ok,,,,,,, oh man I’m gonna hhhgnbbtgtty (sorry had to get silly for a bit he is dying, bro dropz the line “We’re in uncharted waters now, and I can feel my body eroding” IM GONNA EXPLODE AND SOB ANDAND)

DW IM NOT GONNA END THIS ONE ON A SAD NOTE,,, every now and then they'll do the 'move' "basic" (I couldn't find a video but itz literally actually basic,,, like a default stance lmao,,, just moving legs one kinda small step with armz idk how 2 explain but rlly simple n easy),, which allowz for them to still kinda dance,, and the light movement helpz Vitkor's leg YEA yippee

PDA? No problem!!!!! Showing affect for one another in public is not a problem LMAO,,, there was most DEFINITELY a moment where someone was telling Marly stuff like "you can be with someone better and not someone from the Undercity" n shez all like "OH you don't like my boyfriend??? What if I kissed him on the mouth. In front of you." AND SHE DOES LMAO 🤯

it took viktor a while to ease into the idea of public affection but once he was comfortable with it bro is unstoppable,,,,

professional relationship???? yea ermm theyre kissing in public professionally

yea they are holding handz in public someone stop them (or get the camera)!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The usually outgoing, extroverted, estatic Marly who seems to have way too much energy in public is ever so passive and gentle when in private with Viktor

She handles Viktor very gently, with the most softest of touches and utmost consideration for his body, something that seems like she may not be capable of, with how loudly she presentz herself, she seemz like she may be a rough/rowdy lover, but she is quite the opposite in most situations

The two are very very attentive to one another’s needs. Does Viktor usually need a pillow to prop up his bad leg when cuddling? Expect Marly to pull up with her nicest softest pillowz ever,,, sometimez even onez that she usez personally herself!! Oh, Marly isn’t one to fall asleep easily? Expect to find Viktor laying with her for however long it takez, stroking her hair, pressing soft kisses to her face and whispering sweet nothings to her.

bleehhh Viktor is the little spoon LMAO somehow it still workz despite the height difference,, Marly is holding him so gently,,,

Marly def layz on the couch with Viktor and pullz him over to her,,,, laying his head on her chest while shez snug under him,, he mayyy press a kiss to her neck if hez feeling extra silly,,

ooohhh they love love to kiss eachotherz molez,,, vik has the obvious two on his face, and he actually has one on his neck (found this after analyzing many picz of him),, Marly actually has some, too! She has one on her neck in a similar place as Viktor’s,, and one near her chest area (? Idk anatomy bruh),,, def expanding on this one later bc of reasonz erm,,

Marly WILL beat yo ass if you shit on Viktor for his disability,,

Whether it be babying him and treating him as if he can't do certain thingz,,, or just making fun of him,, she will send you to the MEATGRINDER.

"Sure, he's disabled, but never hindered,"

Lil 5'1/5'2 Marly gon fight you

She knowz how hard he has worked to be where he is now,,,, literally worked his ass off to be at the Academy and SUSTAINED his position. So for him to do all this and then be limited by someone bc they think he can't do certain thingz?? Not on her watch she is sprinting at them full speed to kill them 🧍🏻‍♀️

adding a teensy thing,,, Marly usually doesn’t get too mad easily,, but god forbid she becomez actually mad,,, she doesn’t hold back on wordz so expect to have her hit where insecuritiez lie,, maybe even getting physically violent depending on the situation

they are sooooo supportive of one another they are each other’s cheerleader ong

when Viktor had bad pain dayz, Marly is calling the both of them out of school/work,, spoiling and pampering him a whole bunch yeaagg,,,

Ough and god forbid the days where he feels insecure about his condition,,, when he believes that Marly should be with someone who isn’t “weak” like him,,,,

hes pretty stubborn abt that opinion when ir crosses his mind,,

but expect Marly to show him that she loves HIM. she wouldn’t choose anyone else over her silly scientist,,,

firm but kind words of affirmation from her,,,, the most loving touchez ever,, many kissez for him,,,

when he finally getz what she is saying,, omg itz like falling in love all over again bc wow,,,,

ooohh when marly actually openz up fr and allowz for thingz to be so that she doesn't have to be the only one to carry the burden of her problems?? thatz like viktorz most greatest accomplishment that he achieved ngl

Without her glasses Marly is practically blind,,, everything is all blurry n fuzzy outhghggvhelpme

She can become pretty panicky when she needs to take them off for thingz other than sleep, changing clothes, showering ECT,,, and heavily weary of everything around her when without her spectaclez,,,

But!!! She trustz Viktor enough to have them off,,, bc cuddling with glasses on is uncomfortable and getz the lensez all dirty or whatever,,

She'll have her glasses laid down on a nearby table as they're both on the couch or a bed,,, even though she can't see well she trustz that nothing bad is going to happen,,,

The first few timez she did this she was still pretty anxious,,, but soft wordz and assurance from vik helped with that,,,

they’re both so into giving praise and wordz of affirmation to one another,,,,

thatz the consequencez of paring an observative scientist who WILL spit factz about his partner, and an artist who sees the good in people and admires beauty in everything,,,,,

they both have an incredibly sharp wit and tongue,, though words often come easier to Marly,,

Sometimez one of them will get all blushy and stumble over their wordz during back-n-fourth quipping and they'll both laugh it off,,,

OH they also do petnamez a ton,,,, Marly often callz him “Darling”, “Baby”, “Sweet Boy” and like anything else that gal can think of,,, Viktor callz her “[my] dear”, “sweetheart”, “mahal ko” (translates to ‘my love’ in Tagalog), “My Marly” ectect

YEAH HE LEARNED SOME TAGALOG FOR MARKY N JUMPSCARED HER WITH IT!!, marly kissed him breathless after that just so you know

SIGH,,,, IG I KINDA HAVE TO MENTION JAYCE,,,

Marly toleratez Jayce, taking more of a liking to him when they first met

but when that mf got into politicz and started straining his friendship with vik,,, uhoh errmm this does NOT slide with Marly,,

though there are some momentz where he held her respect (UH SOME ARCANE SPOILERZ IN THE NEXT FEW BULLET POINTZ N SLIGHT TW WARNIN IG)

when Viktor legit just passez out in the lab,, when Marly found him, she called Jayce to help get him to the hospital, and he helped no questions asked,,,

and when uh. when vik was literally about to jump from a building and jayce distracted him. uh yeah Marly actually can’t thank him enough for that,,, Jayce found a small gift drawing from her later that week bc HOLAY MOLAY ERM if blud wasnt there then uhhhhh

and also the fact that he just isn’t mean to vik lmao,, Marly knowz that the two are pretty close and she respectz that

Bruh sometimez they are kindaaa clingy you don't understand bro physical touch is their love language ever

sometimez when Viktor is working in the lab and is like stuck on smth or will be there for a while,,, he'll have marly sit on the ground next to his chair so he can play with her hair or like pet her head while thinking idk man teehee

Or like,, if vik findz Marly on the couch he'll just go and lay on her lap,, claiming that it "helps with body aches"

Ngl they will sleep practically almost anywhere as long as they're with one another,,, hey the lab isn't the best place to go honk mimimimimi honk shoooooo but at least Marly is with Viktor and Viktor is with Marly yk??? Limbs intertwined,, marly holding viktor close with his head against her neck/chest

GOD THEY ARE SO HIGHSCHOOL SWEETHEART CORE (LIZ I GIVE YIU MY LIFE FOR THAT),,, NUZZLING AGAINST ONE ANOTHER AND LEAVING EACH OTHER LIL NOTES N STUFF,,,,

SOME QUESTIONZ FROM MY SILLY @l0v3sickl0s3r TYSM LIZ AGAUIINNN 💜💜

comfort food?

For Marly, either Filipino Adobo, Filipino style spaghetti, or sweetz,,

For Viktor, sweet milk paired with either cookies or a muffin,,,, yeah

what does one do when the other cries/is upset?

Viktor will listen very intently to whatever Marly has to say, and will usually also result to physical comfort, just holding her close. Takes her to a more comfortable place. If the cause of her being upset is a person, expect him to confront said individual soon,,, will spend a ton of time checking on her and making sure she getz better

Marly is quick to provide comforting words, and also provides physical touch, pressing soft kisses to his face as she whispers sweet nothings to him. She’s actually quite worrisome, and almost panicky, but will do all she can to make sure that her lover feels alright

what yankee candle would marly and/or vik be?

idk stuff abt yankee candlez specifically so I’ll just give you scentz 🧍🏻‍♀️

Marly's would have a fruity fragrance,, watermelon mixed with some other things, surprisingly light, as to not give the buyer a headache lmao Viktor’s is a 50/50. The candle may smell like caramel and chocolate,,, or metal and light chemicals bc bro is silly like that

THE TAGLIOST. MY CAPTIVEZ. THE SACRIFICEZ. {{ask to be added/removed lmao}}

@h0t-p1nk-ch33tah-pr1nt @sapphicseal @kiawren annndd liz but i already tagged u with the questionz so yuh

#whoever readz the entire thing getz part of my will #i worked on this for dayz lmao #ask to be added to the taglist itz crayzee #do with this info as you pleabse #ermrmrnrnmrm4 #<3 #scrunkalicious #💜martor💜 #yk what we'll do fandom tagz #marly divata #arcane viktor #self shipper #selfship #self ship #selfshipper #selfship lore #selfship community #self ship community

[boy-wonder-oncologist-fan]

The Robert Sean Leonard cinematic universe

In today's episode of I need to give my screenshots a better use

Tape (2001)

#the people on my taglist are no longer active; so if you want to be added let me know! #robert sean leonard #rsl cinematic universe #rsl #tape 2001 #i haven't done one of this in a while; sorry...

[burningivy]

January Patch

I mentioned way back at the beginning of the month that I was starting a project where I make a patch for each month of the year

and here’s January’s patch!!!

detail shots/design notes/taglist under the cut

so January is named after Janus, the Roman god of gates and transitions, among other things. hence why I went with a gate as one of the major components of the patch. I also, personally, think of January as a time for new beginnings. while the past year may have ended, while the gate is half closed, there’s new opportunities, represented by a ball of glowing light, still waiting

taglist: @acircusfullofdemons

#vic. what? #my art #2024 patches project #textiles #embroidery #let me know if you want to be added to the taglist #I meant to do a progress post #but I started this later than expected #I should be posting the design for feb within the next few days

[ghosttotheparty]

something in the back of my mind

wip/preview no.2 first preview

It’s silent when the door shuts behind Wayne. Except for Eddie’s soft breaths. Steve gazes down at him. It’s getting dark now, the room dim except for the silvery twilight that makes Eddie glow a little. 

“I heard that, you know,” Eddie mumbles, and Steve’s face flushes with heat as he realises what Eddie’s teasing him about. Well actually I have a huge crush on you. Steve tugs his hair a little, watching Eddie smile. 

“Go back to sleep, baby.”

“M’kay.”

Eddie sighs, nuzzling into Steve’s lap, and Steve watches. His heart aches. He’s never felt like this before, almost claustrophobic with it, like he suffocating on his own affection. He wonders if he’s ever actually been in love before. 

He didn’t feel like this with Nancy. It was intense with her, of course, but not like this. He didn’t feel like he was dying a little bit every time he looked at her. It didn’t feel like the world was ending all over again. That’s what it feels like. The end of everything, unavoidable. Like his heart is being ripped straight out of his chest, and Eddie is holding it in the palm of his hand, and Steve is trusting him with it. 

He would let him do anything with it. Squeeze it until it stops beating. Lift it to his mouth and drain it dry.

#im still working on this wip i promise #im at like 16k words rn #comment if you want to be added to the taglist!! #ft vampire!eddie and a frankly bonkers amount of comfort #steddie #steddie fanfic #steddie ficlet #steddie wip #fanfic wip #wip preview #steve harrington #eddie munson #steve harrington fanfic #eddie munson fanfic #something in the back of my mind

[space-writes]

how well would your ocs do against a cockroach tag game

rules: rate your ocs by how well they'd do against a cockroach.

@serenanymph this is a fun tag, sorry it took a lil while to get to it! this is entirely based on Vibes because i have not and do not ever wish to encounter an actual cockroach.

gonna tag @digitalsatyr23 and @halfbit (no pressure!)

Lucian

ooh what’s that OH GOD IT MOVED

equal parts fascinated and frightened

5/10 he’ll probably get it out of the house but he might yell a bit if it flies at his face

Aliyne

immediate stomp, throws the remains out the window

0 tolerance for that shit

"it's just a bug, what are you all making a big deal about?"

10/10, dealt with in a minute tops

Zander

alarmed shrieking and running away

it’s chasing him. somehow it has malicious intent

0/10 he’s getting someone else to deal with it OR using magical overkill

Quest

OH FREE SNACK

grabs it, uses an old infernii trick: use your infernii fire to insta-cook it. get it right you get crunchy fried bug, get it wrong you get charcoal

usually this is for infernal bugs and not. vallorosian cockroaches. nutritional value? debatable.

8/10 bc they’re likely to get charcoal not a snack, but at least the bug is gone?

Leshanna

not quite shrieking but very loud ‘oh no THANK you’

attempts to use magic to trap it, fails, spends a solid hour trying to shoo it out of the house

it re-appears right as she’s trying to go to bed

4/10, she’ll get rid of it eventually but she’ll cry from the stress

Sorrow

this entirely depends on who else is present

he will act like a drama queen about it if Aspiration is there to roll her eyes at him

if he’s on his own though he’ll just like. scoop it up with something and yeet it as far as possible, then go wash his hands

if Vren is there…oh man, i think he’ll absolutely play up how grossed out his is to annoy him. he’s not that bothered. he just wants an excuse to grab Vren and go ‘oh no, it’s terrible, save me little ghost :p’

6/10, points docked for being a little shit about it

Aspiration

picks it up in her bare hands, then uses it to gross out Excellence

Aspiration stop letting it crawl on your arms that is a cockroach

gets told to get rid of it. lies about doing so.

10/10 for handling it, 0/10 for actual getting rid of the problem

Vren

exactly the same as Aliyne. immediate death, no hesitation

10/10 he’s dealt with worse than a bug

but also 0/10 for absolutely no entertainment value whatsoever

Renegade Prince | Valloroth taglist: @cherrybombfangirlwrites @memento-morri-writes @foxboyclit @lawful-evil-novelist @at-thezenith @morganwriteblr @fayeiswriting (ask to be +/-)

#ty for the tag! #tag games #cockroach tag game #c: lucian #c: sorrow #c: vren #c: quest #c: zander #c: aspiration #c: leshanna #c: aliyne #adding the taglist bc i want you all to bully my cast for being bad with bugs #valloroth blogging

[cordeliawhohung]

i've come to the conclusion I don't think anyone actually reads my works/looks through the links on my works before commenting 🙃

#core talks #“add me to the taglist” #homie the link is in the post #but i am literally so tired of pointing that out #also why am i gonna go through the effort of adding you when you didnt even bother to reblog #or like follow me to keep up with it yourself lmfao #ugh sorry just had to rant about that #ill get to the nicer comments and asks when im off work and have more time <3

[poetinprose]

A writeblr (re)introduction + masterpost

Hi, everyone! ^-^ Welcome to my writeblr!

I’ve had this blog for a few years now but a lot has changed since my last introduction + I’ve been pretty inactive for quite a while so I thought it’s more than time for a post like this.

⫸ About me ⫷

✏ My name’s Jay

✏ In my 20′s

✏ Any pronouns are fine but preferably she/they

✏ Favorite genre is fantasy, often in combination with romance but I also dabble in sci-fi/dystopias

✏ I love incorporating science into my fantasy stories and thinking about possible scientific explanations behind magical things and such

✏ I write in German (my native language) but here I post (mostly) in English

✏ I have a shared Wattpad account with a friend who I also write most wips with

✏ Tag game + ask friendly (but sometimes I procrastinate and forget ‘^-^)

⫸ Tenebris ⫷

✧ Genre: High Fantasy

✧ Summary: Kendra, an immortal being from the underworld, is on the Upperworld to undo a big mistake that affects humans’ lives. One day she finds an orphaned and deadly injured baby in a burned down village and despite her disgust towards humans and against every rationality she takes it with her. What she would’ve never imagined is the impact that this human child will have on her life... and her heart.

✧ Links: Wattpad (in German), WIP intro

⫸ Bleeding City ⫷

✧ Genre: Futuristic, fantasy-adjacent, solarpunk

✧ Summary: Vampires have revealed their existence and it turns out that vamprirism is a hereditary disease. That reveal has caused a lot of disturbance so the government has etablished a rule that every vampire has to be assigned at least one human blood donor and are forbidden to feed from others. Noa one day receives a call that she is suited for being a blood donor to a young vampire who's vampirism only recently arose. Besides having to adjust to this change, the young vampire Corin has to deal with the bloody family business which he never wanted to be a part of. And he especially never wanted Noa to be a part of this...

✧ Links: Wattpad (in German), WIP intro (planned)

⫸ Aeternum ⫷

✧ Genre: Urban Fantasy

✧ Summary: By now Thanea has come to terms with her role as an outsider amongst the humans. Because who needs humans when you have mermaids and ghosts for friends? But then Nevras steps into her life and questions everything. Why can she see behind the veil that hides the magical world from human eyes?

What began as a fascinating project for him becomes more and more personal. And how can he tell her that his existence is ruled more by death than by life?

✧ Links: WIP intro

#also let me know if you wanna be added to any taglists #now that I finally wanna start posting about my writing again xD #writeblr #writeblr intro #writeblr introduction #schreiblr #wip: tenebris #wip: bleeding city #my wips #pinned post #writeblr masterpost #fantasy writer #wip: aeternum