strangers 1.3k words
inspired by ethel cain's song "strangers" and if you read this it is a requirement that you listen to it. (its linked at the bottom)
idk team I was just listening to this song for the millionth time and needed to get this out, so here's 1.3k words of Eddie experiencing life after death and Steve dealing with grief and guilt I guess
Eddie is a ghost.
He’s made his peace with that.
Some kind of Upside-Down ghost probably. He doesn’t really care.
The people of Hawkins don’t know that. They still believe, still fear that he’s out there somewhere. Everyone that cared about him knows better.
WIthout a proper grave he just kind of… drifts.
Into and out of spaces, he leaves behind no trace save for a soft breeze if someone’s really paying attention.
They usually aren’t.
He’s not really a physical being so much as a feeling. Still in his body but less aware of it than he ever was. He thinks he couldn’t explain it if he wanted to. Couldn’t explain the way that people can’t see him or hear him when he’s there, but later feel like they had, and feel crazy trying to explain it. He’s had to learn his way around his new consciousness in a way that lets him be near the ones he cares about without hurting them. It's an exhausting cycle, to feel out of your mind.
He can see it in the way dread and grief tug at the shoulders of the people he loved. He knows this because the more someone thinks of him, the closer he can get to them.
At first he was at home a lot.
Well, as at home as he could be in this new place they’ve got Wayne in. It’s nowhere Eddie’d ever been when he was living, but Wayne’s there so it's home nonetheless. But as weeks turn into months the closest he can get is just outside the door. He can’t get inside, can’t actually see Wayne anymore. Can’t see the way that loneliness weighs him down. The way he picks himself up every time.
So he lets himself drift to wherever he’s pulled next. A time or two it's been to Jeff’s garage while he’s practicing. Several times he’s gotten to see inside Dustin’s room late at night before the kid falls asleep.
But the place he’s finding himself more and more often, he didn’t recognize at first. He just knew it was a basement somewhere. Drafty, door locked tight, and with nothing but dusty tools to keep him company, he found comfort in knowing that someone was remembering him. Even if only a little. Even if it’s a stranger.
Eddie’s drifted in and out of whatever kind of consciousness he experiences for a while before his surroundings morph and change.
The kitchen of the Harrington house he would recognize anywhere.
He smiles as he takes in the new space and thinks that if he had a human body he’d be sat up on the counter just like he is now.
Steve walks into the kitchen with a furrow in his brow and Eddie takes the time to really look.
This is the first time he’s seen Steve since the last of his air left his lungs and he’s hit with a strange sense of longing.
Can see it in the bags under Steve’s eyes that, even now, say he’s still carrying everything on his own.
He’d always done that.
When Eddie had made that stupid, stupid decision, though he’d be loath to admit it alive, he’d wondered if Steve would've done the same thing.
He thinks they both knew the answer was yes and that that’s the reason Steve still looks like hell even months later.
He looks like hell but he’s still so handsome walking over toward Eddie now.
Eddie knows he can’t see him, doesn’t know he’s there. But he still finds himself longing for the closeness when Steve grabs a glass from the cabinet and leaves the room again.
In an instant Eddie’s back in the basement. Steve’s memory of him gone as quick as it came as Eddie is left with the question that followed him his whole life:
Am I no good?
As he wastes away in the drafty, cold he realizes that he doesn’t feel a pull anywhere else. He decides that seeing Steve once in a while, if only for a short time, is better than being forgotten.
It becomes a routine. Eddie’s hours will turn into days, and he’ll lose track of time. Then he’ll blink and he’s watching Steve stare at himself in the mirror. He looks like he’s been crying and like he’s going to be sick. Eddie wants nothing more than to be able to comfort him. But as quick as they come, they go, and Eddie begins to connect the dots.
Eddie’s memory, like everything else Steve seldom allows himself to feel, gets carried with him always. But he locks them away tight in his heart and only lets them out when he thinks no one is watching. When he thinks he’s allowed to miss Eddie.
So Eddie stays in the basement, stays in Steve’s heart, heavy, guilty, until Steve’s ready to face it again.
One day it catches Steve by surprise.
Eddie can tell because he’s in the middle of putting away groceries when Eddie gets there.
At first Eddie’s confused. But then he sees the milk carton in Steve’s hand with the big MISSING: EDDIE MUNSON and his photo on the side. There’s a sale sticker over his face in what was surely some angry grocer’s last ditch effort to sell milk with the Hawkins devil on the side.
Steve’s frozen just looking at it and honestly Eddie gets it.
After everything that was lost, this may very well be the only physical memory of him that’s left save for a polaroid photo in an evidence locker somewhere.
He’s able to drift close enough to hear the breath Steve lets out before he puts it in the fridge and finishes unpacking his bags.
From that point on Eddie’s no longer in the basement.
He’s able to drift all around Steve’s house and he learns that he can touch things.
He watches Steve’s smile come back when Robin’s over.
He flits his fingers across windchimes when the air is still and watches them take in the music.
He watches Steve crash after long days at work and drags a blanket up over his shoulder.
Sees his confused face when he wakes.
He looks on when Steve pours the milk down the drain and puts the empty carton right back in the fridge.
Even though this makes him sad, he makes a smiley face out of the magnets on the door. Hopes that Steve notices.
He sees him scream out his anger late into the night and wishes that he could touch Steve.
But as time goes on he’s able to witness the way that Steve learns to carry the guilt, but to also try to let himself breathe.
Eddie spends a lot of his time wishing he were alive so that he could tell Steve he’s proud of him. That he could tell him he’s surrounded by people who would help him carry it all if he would just put it down. Wishes he were alive for a lot more reasons than just that.
But the night he gets the closest is when he figures out that he can use the phone in the office to call the one in Steve’s room while he’s away.
He’d learned early on in this afterlife that if he spoke he wouldn’t be heard. But he has a hunch that this might be an Upside-Down loophole.
He’s sitting on the floor across from where Steve’s lying in bed, and he’s watching the stream of tears drip down his pretty, pretty face while he listens to the voicemail.
Hey Stevie.
Called you just to tell you that I made it real far, and that I never blamed you for loving the way that you do while you were torn apart.
I would still wait with you there.
Don’t think about it too hard or you’ll never sleep a wink at night again. Don’t worry about me, Stevie, just know that I loved you.
And I’ll see you when you get here.
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im sorry i have to rant im so fucking pissed
my exams end on 19th and I have to get rid of some books and buy some books which are quite pricy online so I had planned on going to college street on 20th and selling my books and buying the new ones at a cheap price and i was frankly really excited about it because all I get is a one day break to relax bcz i have to start studying for entrances from 21st so all I have is 20th and i wanted to spend it at college street and then get some food and basically have like a solo date kind of thing.
and i was so so excited about it i told my boyfriend about it like 500 times bcz i kept forgetting i've already mentioned it and it was literally on my mind a lott so i kept bringing it up and ik it seems like not a big deal cz i can just sit at home and chill too but i literally do not get to go outside my house. like- the last time i went out was new years eve and after that the only time i've gone out is to school or to give my boards that is it. my mother has some weird like problem wiht me going out like even if i tell her that i just want to go to our terrace for 5 minutes just to get some fresh air she won't even allow that she'll be all suspicious and like sTaNd In ThE bAlCOnY aNd TaKe FrEsH aIr like she herself doesnt leave the house (and blames it on me and my brother ???? when have we ever stopped you bro, she said I HaVe To Be HeRe To KeEp An EyE like im 18 i dont need to be watched 24/7 stop blaming me for choices you put upon yourself) and i just feel so suffocated ALL THE TIME i feel so overstimulated and im so sick of rotting on my bed and i dont want to wait for some birthday party or friends meet up to be able to leave my goddamn house i just wanted to go and have a fun day and get me some books thats it.
anyway so initially the plan was that my mom would go along but something came up so she wanted to postpone it to 21st and i didn't want to bcz i'd already be missing 3 days bcz of my boyfriends birthday, holi and my brothers birthday (all of which are important and i dont want to miss which makes me the villain apparently bcz i should "adjust" and cancel my "parties" instead of trying to stick to my plan bcz that makes me too demanding and selfish apparently) so i suggested that ukw why dont u go do ur thing which came up and i'll go to college street by myself...which is when the solo date idea came which i had really wanted all along but didnt bring up bcz i knew she'd say no but now there's a valid reason for me to go alone so like, its a pretty easy fix i can just go alone but noooo. First of all,
I've been to college street multiple times before so its not like its an unknown area to me
im going by metro which is quite safe
im going when there is stark daylight and i will return home much much before it gets dark and im literally 18
she never lets me go anywhere alone, not even take ubers alone if i want to get back from somewhere my bf has to come drop me everytime and then go backwards to his house which is so so so stupid and i never get to go out alone unless accompanied by family or by a male friend, so obv when i said i'll go to college street alone she refused to let that happen and started screaming about how 'if its so important to go on 20th bcz u dont want to miss a day of studying then cancel ur 'parties' and study then' and i was like no its not about missing a day its just that there's a very easy and logical fix to this problem which is i go alone and its not inconveniencing anyone so why cant i just do that but she will not listen to that bcz im 'adamant' and 'everything has to be according to me' bcz i found a viable solution to the problem. so instead of letting me just go she was literally ready to pay much more money and buy the books online, like.....why cant i just go bro??? (and she keeps telling me im a waste of her money bcz i will amount to nothing in life and my education was a failed investment or wtv so like now why are u wasting more money??? im literally trying to save the money that u 'waste' on me so just let me ???)
anyway i called my dad last night and told him and he was super ok with the idea he said its a good idea that i go alone and that he would speak to her but then today when i asked her if dad spoke to her she said yes, we'll go on 20th and i was like .....we? so apparently she CANCELLED her previously immovable thing for which she wanted me to cancel my 'parties', she cancelled that and agreed to go with me on 20th just so that i dont get to go alone- like ???????????????? what is ur problemmmm
so obv i was super annoyed and i went on a whole ass rant about how i literally struggle to even cross roads bcz i dont know shit about basic travelling bcz all my life ive been in a car and its a running joke with all my guy friends that i 'cannot navigate' and 'dont know any places' and obv??? if im never allowed to go anywhere then how tf will i know the places- the only places i know is bcz recently i've been paying a lot of attention and asking my dad stuff about what roads to take to reach certain places and when i go out with my friends i kind of try and learn a bit but thats it i've only ever gone alone completely alone to two places which is my beauty parlour thats 5 minutes away from my house and one bazaar one time that was 2 bus stops away, thats it. thats my extent of public travelling alone. and now im supposed to go to a whole new STATE for college and i cant even call myself an auto without struggling. and like- is this not a basic life skill??? like ok yeah its not rocket science and i will probably figure it out even if i start later in life but why not now? most of my guy friends literally go everywhere alone, why not me? and my dad agreed with all of this but my mom was just like "you'll be in the hostel only, no need to go out of the campus" like ARE YOU FOR REAL????????? and she's like "if u want to learn skills learn how to cook" like ok yes i will also learn how to cook for sure but i wont have a fucking kitchen in the hostel but somehow cooking is an urgent skill i should learn but going places by myself is unimportant bcz i should just never? leave? the? hostel?
anyway after much screaming and shouting my dad gave up and just cut the call bcz he doesnt want to get into an argument with my mother and my mother was being all suspicious like why do u hAvE tO gO aLoNe AlL oF a SuDdEn even though i literally explained why i want to do this alone but she doesnt think thats valid. so she refuses to let me go and i asked her for one reason why i shouldnt cz usuallt its always "no u have exam what if smthn happens" but now i literally dont even have exam so whats ur excuse now? streets will always be unsafe forever so "what if smthn happens" is not a reason to never let me go out without a man so just gimme one reason and she couldnt give me a single reason she just said "i said no, thats it".
and now she's gone off about how im useless and blah blah and "high maintainance" bcz i want books and "everyone else (some pishi's son) just studies online" and so the whole option of college street is apparently now cancelled and she's trying to set up a whole ass kindle account (half the books i need arent even available as ebooks) just because i wanted to go by myself.
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