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shrack · 2 years

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the steve situation

Eddie and his friends go to Scoops Ahoy, but Eddie's not expecting Steve to be standing behind the counter.

2.3k words, G — also on ao3

Starcourt mall, if Eddie’s being completely honest, kind of rules. He wouldn’t be caught dead admitting that he actually kind of enjoys it there—but most of that has to do with the neon lights and the fact that the movie theater actually shows all the fucked up horror movies that he’d previously have to travel back to Indianapolis for. It’s also a perfect spot for him and his Corroded Coffin buddies to hang out that isn’t Gareth’s garage or in the woods by Eddie’s trailer, so any night those two are sounding boring, or there’s no Hellfire, the mall is where they go.

He’s not paying any mind. He and his friends have come into this ice cream shop a solid amount of times before, so Eddie doesn’t think to consider this encounter any differently. The girl who’s always helping them out—Robin, who Eddie clocked almost immediately and successfully struck up conversation with back at school—always hooks them up with the senior discount. But as Eddie turns from his conversation, disaster strikes. Because behind the counter, looking as bored as Eddie has ever seen him in the maybe one, two classes they’ve shared over the years, is Steve Harrington.

Now, Eddie has a lot of questions. Mainly: Why the hell is Steve Harrington working at a nautical themed ice cream shop? How is this news to Eddie? And, for fuck’s sake, why him?

Instead of voicing any of these, Eddie spins on a heel and walks right back out the open doorway.

Gareth, who was standing behind him, immediately gets shoulder checked in the process, and yelps, “Hey! What the fuck—“ while Jeff is saying some dumb shit like, “Come on man, what gives?” and Grant is combination laughing and cooing at the whole situation. It’s fucking stupid.

“Just—just shut up!” Eddie snaps, voice going high and raspy when he does. It’s a classic Munson tantrum, hands shaking by either side of his head, eyes squeezed shut so he can hear himself fucking think for a second.

“Classic Munson tantrum,” Grant mutters, elbowing Jeff in the side, Jeff now joined in on the quiet, mocking laughter.

“Just—“ Eddie snaps, standing up straight and tugging on the sides of his vest to straighten himself out. “Give me a second.”

Gareth claps a hand onto Eddie’s shoulder. The motion’s a little awkward, considering that the dude’s shorter than him. “We all know about the Steve Situation, alright, and we get it. But I swear to god if I miss out on my sundae because you can’t get your shit together to talk to that guy—“

“I know I know I know,” Eddie says quickly, cutting Gareth off with a wave of his hand. “Just, Jesus dude I’m gonna see that uniform every time I close my eyes for the next week. I gotta have a plan of attack.”

“The plan of attack is you try to see if Robin’s out back and can come give us our fuckin’ discount.”

“No, dude, come on.” Eddie circles his arm around to pat the small of Gareth’s back and says, “I got this.”

He jerks his head towards the front of the store to signal them to follow his lead, then stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jacket, and sighs.

“Ahoy there. Would you like to set sail on this ocean of flavor with me? I’ll be your captain, I’m Steve Harrington,” Steve announces, deadpan, like Eddie knows they have to do every time someone dares approach their counter.

“Ooh, I like that. Ahoy to you too,” Eddie says, finishing his approach. He can hear one of his idiots snort behind him, but that’s the least of his concerns right now.

Steve lifts up from his slouched position by the register and stands to his full height. Eddie can’t help it—his eyes drift down the front of the uniform. It shouldn’t look good and, in fact, it looks downright ridiculous. “What can I get for you?”

Eddie wets his bottom lip and smiles, drags his eyes back up to meet Steve’s. “I can think of a couple things, if I’m being honest with you Steve.”

Steve’s eyebrows shoot up. They almost touch the stupid little hat. “Ordering for the group, then?”

Right, yeah. Steve is really fucking stupid. Eddie wants to tug on that stupid fucking scarf and kiss him right over this counter. What a sight that would be, huh? “Something like that, yeah.”

Robin decides now is a good moment to emerge from the back room, stopping when she sees Eddie and offering him a quick nod and a smile. “Hey, Munson.”

“Buckley,” Eddie replies, as per, ducking his chin in response.

Steve would make a horrible DM, because he cannot hide a single thing on that pretty face of his. He is confused beyond belief as he looks over his shoulder at Robin and then back at Eddie, and then back at Robin once more for good measure.

“Is Stevie here helping you? Or is he busy doing absolutely nothing again?” she teases, touching the outside of Steve’s arm as she crosses past him and sets up shop in the corner, folding her arms over her chest and leaning against the counter.

“Hey, that’s—“

“He was just about to give us some recommendations, actually,” Eddie cuts in, pursing his lips in a small, coy smile.

Steve looks relieved at the save. Behind Eddie, someone (probably Jeff) nudges the back of his shoe. Right. They have shit to get to eventually.

“So,” Eddie drawls. He stands up and trails one poorly polished finger on top of the display freezer, tracing a small circle before catching Steve’s eye again. Steve is watching his finger, although he snaps his eyes up when he notices Eddie looking. “Pretend I’ve never been here before. What would you recommend, big boy?”

Steve’s head jerks back minutely, and then something must click, because he smirks. “If you’re looking for the full Scoops experience, the U.S.S. Butterscotch is the way to go.”

Eddie hums and points his thumb over his shoulder towards his best approximation at where Gareth might be. “That’s for him. One of those, a chocolate shake for Jeff, a small pistachio waffle cone for Grant because he’s a psychopath who hates fun.”

“Hey!” Grant says, and Eddie shoots him a look over his shoulder. He presses his lips together and nods, and then Eddie turns back to Steve, who looks amused by the whole situation.

“So you have been here,” Steve states, voice a little bit smug.

Eddie shrugs one shoulder and lolls his head towards Robin, giving her a smile. “Only with Robin. I was starting to think she’s the only one who works here.”

Steve chuckles. “Sorry to disappoint.”

“Oh no,” Eddie says, voice dipping low, and Jesus Christ he cannot believe that he’s doing this in front of every prude in this fucking ice cream shop. He grins. “You could never disappoint me.”

Steve scoffs and crosses behind the freezer to slide it open. He reaches up to grab a cup and hesitates, “Cup okay?”

“I prefer it.”

He nods and produces the scooper from the front pocket of his apron. He spins it in his hand and Eddie watches like a man transfixed. Steve asks him another question and he just hums “Uh-huh,” stupidly, busy watching Steve’s entire arm flex as he scoops whatever flavor into the cup. Oh, he’s down bad. This situation has gotten worse.

Steve heads back to the counter and slides the cup across, Eddie following him over and taking the side of it. He’s about to take it and go on his merry way, but Steve produces a spoon from somewhere and sticks it in the top, lingering long enough to catch Eddie’s eye and say, “My favorite. Hope it serves you well.”

It’s Eddie’s turn to be shocked. He nods dumbly and says, “Wh—uh, what do we owe you?”

Steve stands back up and crosses back to the register. He checks them out for only a shake and one small cup, which Eddie pays for without thinking, despite Gareth saying that this trip was supposed to be on him.

“Thanks for sailing through Scoops Ahoy,” Steve says, significantly less bored-sounding than when they first walked in. He leans on his elbow to hold out the receipt for Eddie to take. A small, stupid, undeveloped part of Eddie’s brain hopes that Steve’s number is on it. “If you want it.”

“Yeah. Uh, yep,” Eddie fumbles, taking the receipt and doing his best to make sure their hands don’t touch. He glances down at it, notices the lack of things he was charged for, and looks up. And he swears on his father’s life, Steve winks at him before standing up straight.

Eddie turns to leave, his friends all murmuring excitedly about their ice cream and the movie they’re about to see. He stops right before the exit, though, lifts two fingers to his forehead to salute and calls, “See you around, sailor.”

Steve mimics the salute, and a smile makes its way onto his face in a way that makes Eddie’s stomach start doing complicated stuntwork. He’s then less-than-gracefully pulled out the door by Jeff grabbing his jacket and yanking him back and out the door.

“What just happened?” Eddie asks as soon as they round the corner out of the store, stopping dead in his tracks. He looks down at the cup of ice cream in his hand—he doesn’t even like peanut butter.

“What happened, dude, is that we just paid half price for ice cream!” Grant says excitedly, and then immediately takes an obscene bite out of the top of his ice cream cone like some sort of heathen. It shakes Eddie out of his daze long enough to appreciate how fucking weird his friends are.

Eddie shakes his head, trying to snap himself out of it. He looks back over his shoulder towards the Scoops Ahoy and watches some giggling high school girls that he vaguely recognizes walk in. He points his cup back at it, “Did Steve Harrington just flirt back at me?”

Gareth scoffs around his spoon. “He flirts with anything that has a pulse, you know that.”

“Babes, Gareth, lest I remind you about the Great Rebecca Incident of your sophomore year?”

Gareth kicks the back of Eddie’s knee, making it buckle and forcing Eddie to look away from the front of the store. “Not cool. Who gives a shit anyway?”

“Me!” Eddie snaps, whipping his head back to the store. The same girls leave the store, heads huddled close together, faces significantly less thrilled than when they walked in. “Me gives a shit.”

Inside Scoops Ahoy, Robin’s jaw is hanging open in shock. It has been for the past minute, ever since Eddie and his friends left the store. Steve can see it out of the corner of his eye as he’s trying to count the obscene amount of pennies he just received. He glances at her twice before throwing the pennies into the register and snapping, “What?”

“What the fuck just happened?” she balks, laughing on the last word.

Steve’s brows furrow in confusion and he finally looks at her. She looks bewildered. “What, they just handed me like, forty cents in pennies, I can’t count that fast—“

“No, Steve,” she interrupts. She places her hands on her forehead, and then flaps a hand wildly at the doorway. “You just put frankly the best moves I have ever seen from you in the god awful time that we’ve worked here together on Eddie Munson. And then—and then! Two of the flyers on the cheer team come in and you absolutely cold shoulder them.”

“What?” Steve laughs incredulously, shaking his head and focusing back on the register. “Rob, I think you’re losing it.”

“I’m losing it?” Robin is now pacing back and forth behind Steve in the small sliver of space they have between the soft serve machines and the front counter. “Steve—“

“With Eddie ‘the Freak’ Munson? Come on, Robin, don’t be ridiculous.”

Robin throws both of her hands up in the air and spins in a frantic circle. “I can’t. I cannot handle you Harrington, I know you pride yourself on being able to flirt with every girl that comes through that door you have been absolutely been sucking major shit—“

“Okay, rude—“

“—and I have never once watched you talk to anybody who is not a cute girl that walks through those doors outside of the shit that you are contractually bound to say. And then you have the audacity to say that you were…what? Just being friendly to someone that you just called a freak?”

Steve scoffs and throws the hat onto the counter in order to run both of his hands through his hair. “I’ve changed, you know. Maybe I am just trying to be friendly. I don’t have a lot of friends my age that haven’t actively tried to beat the shit out of me, or are my ex-girlfriend.”

Robin rolls her eyes. “That’s not how you make friends. That’s how you,” she cuts herself off, glances around, and crowds into his side to lower her voice, “that’s how you end up back at Eddie’s trailer.”

“How’d you know he lives in a trailer?” Steve asks. Then, his face drops, and he ducks down to say, “Are you jealous?”

“What? No, no, God no, we’re—“ Robin laughs, waving her hands in a big ‘x’ in front of her, “we’re not each others type. Like, by a mile. But we’ve hung out. He’s a nice enough guy, but not in a million years do I think you two would get along.”

“Well, then, it’s a non-issue,” Steve says, spinning out around Robin’s back and heading to the back room. “One time only. I’m taking my fifteen.”

“Didn’t you already take that?”

Steve opens the windows just enough to stick his middle finger through them. Robin grabs a Sharpie from behind the counter and makes herself a note on the back of her hand to question Eddie when she gets off tonight. Maybe he has more of an answer than Steve’s useless ass does.

#steddie #steddie fanfiction #steddie fic #uhhhh um #steve harrington #eddie munson #tags! bitches hate tags.

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