Archive of Our Own

The early August sun was searing into the back of Steve’s neck and his arms were already turning pink and splotchy from sun burn. Sweat dripped from his hairline down the side of his face, which he quickly dabbed off with the back of his hand before wiping it across his jeans. Someone near him smelled worse than he thought someone could ever smell, but that’s what 95 degree weather with almost 100% humidity would do. 

Everyone around him in the crowd was struggling with the heat but the excitement that buzzed through the air had an electricity that was almost more palpable than any weariness was. An outdoor venue smack dab in the middle of summer might not have been the smartest idea. 

If you had told Steve four years ago that he would have rushed to buy tickets to see Guns n’ Roses in Indianapolis on the last leg of their 1988 American tour, he would have promptly laughed in your face. High school Steve, the King with the hair and the perfect girl and the popularity, wouldn’t have been caught dead at a show like this. 

He wouldn’t have pushed to be close to the barricade to get the best views like he was now, wouldn’t have donned a worn out t-shirt he bought at one of their previous shows and not put any products in his hair. He wouldn’t have even been at a Guns n’ Roses show. 

But a lot had changed since 1984. Steve wasn’t a king anymore; he was a guy who worked at a video store while taking classes at the community college who hung out with high schoolers to pass the time. He had seen things that he never could have even imagined, fought monsters from a different dimension, killed and bled and nearly died just to do it all over again the next time a big bad tried to take over Hawkins. 

The biggest change from high school, though, came from who he hung out with. Sure, he had the kids but the old Steve would have never been best friends with the self proclaimed “freaks”. He would have never given Robin Buckley the time of day only to end up being closer to her than anyone in the world. He would have never spent almost every day with Eddie Munson before he decided to up and leave Hawkins without any way to contact him. He would have never thought he’d be so upset that he couldn’t talk to someone he considered so close to him. 

Steve and Eddie blended together over the summer after the whole Vecna-murdering-traumatized-teens thing. Steve was there for Eddie when he couldn’t sleep without seeing mangled bodies and holes in the ceiling, demobats circling around him in a hoard. Eddie was a reprieve for Steve when the silence of an empty house and broken dreams of getting out of his small town got to be too much. 

The days got colder, the holidays came and went, and the two became closer and closer as the weeks went on. You would be hard pressed to see one without the other. They became this unexpected duo that seemed to just get each other when everything was stacked against them. They listened to music and watched movies and lounged around and smoked and drank and acted like they hadn’t seen the world fall apart around them. Playing pretend was easier than any realities they could be a part of. 

The year went by quickly, both Steve and Eddie healing from all the bites they had suffered in the Upside Down before getting back to normal life. Well, the closest thing to normal life they could get anyway. Steve spent his days working at the Family Video with Robin where Dustin and Eddie crashed more often than not, strolling through the aisles or causing a ruckus at the counter. 

The summer of ‘87 was how Steve found Guns n’ Roses, so even if he was still hurt about Eddie up and leaving without a reason 2 months later, at least he still had that. 

JULY 27, 1987

“Oh come on dude, you’re really gonna tell me you don’t know Guns n’ Roses?!” Eddie all but yelled good naturedly, a broad smile on his face that made his eyes crinkle around the edges. A dimple appeared on the side of cheek that Steve had never really noticed before. It was cute.

Steve shifted in his seat on the lumpy coach in Eddie’s trailer, hackles raised in preparation to defend himself, pressed his shoulders back to appear more secure. “Sorry I don’t know every single one of your little bands, Munson. No one told me I had to be up to date with all the rock bands in the world to keep hanging out with you.” 

He could see Eddie’s face soften but he kept a smaller smile on his face. “Paradise City?” He questioned and continued once he saw the blank stare that Steve was giving back to him. “Sweet Child o' Mine? Welcome to the Jungle? None of those ring a bell?” 

Neither of them spoke, staring at each other like that would magically make Steve know one the songs or that Eddie would yield and drop the topic. Instead, he grinned again and snapped his fingers before storming into his room without another word.

“Come on man, you know I don’t like when you get that look. You’re up to something,” Steve said and followed Eddie’s path to his room, pausing to lean on the door frame with his arms crossed and watch him dig through seemingly all of his belongings without even reacting to Steve being there. “Not sure how you could find anything in this pigsty but sure, continue your search.” 

Eddie popped up suddenly, tape in hand and wild look in his eyes. “This, my friend. This is your rock awakening.” He stuck his tongue out as he pushed past Steve in the doorway, ignoring the small shout of 'hey!' that came from it, and made his way to the stereo system at the front of the trailer. Eddie immediately pressed the rewind button to get to the beginning of the cassette and turned to look back at Steve. 

“Prepare to have your mind thoroughly and completely blown, Harrington.”

PRESENT DAY

Feedback rang out over the speaker system as the opening band took the stage and started plugging into the amps. The drummer looked the part, wild hair and even wilder eyes without a shirt covering his pink-tinged shoulders, smiling as he got his drum set sorted. The bassist and one of the guitarists were laughing together in the middle of the stage as they tightened the straps on their instruments and chugged beers. Another guitarist was off to the side of the stage, hunched over, tuning his guitar with his back turned to the crowd and puffs of smoke drifting into the air above his head. 

The crowd was getting restless. Seeing activity on stage brought the energy up and had people pushing, trying to get closer to the front. Steve planted his feet firmly where he stood and braced himself against the wave of shoving, sweaty bare arms touching his own causing him to grimace at the feeling. He pushed back against a few people while keeping his eyes on the stage, watched as the lone guitarist made his way off to the backstage area, his long curly hair flowing behind him. If Steve didn’t know any better, he would think it was Slash himself, but there was no top hat in sight.

The stage lights came on in an instant and the drummer immediately started to bang out a fast rhythm as the other band members made their way back to the stage. A bass line caught on to the drums followed by the backing guitar. The beat was good, had the crowd cheering and pushing even closer to get up to the front. A guitar riff came out over top of all the other instruments and Steve froze in place, the smile on his face disappearing. 

He knew that riff. He had heard it enough times over the summer of ‘86 to know it as soon as it started. Hell, Steve was there when it was written. 

MAY 13, 1986

They’re sitting in Steve’s garage with a freshly smoked joint on the work bench behind the folding chairs they’re lounging in. Steve is throwing an old baseball in the air and catching it most of the time and Eddie is plucking away on his guitar, the silence between them comfortable and welcome. 

It was one of the bad days. A day where Steve hadn’t slept and Eddie had felt like his skin was strung too tight across his bones and the very snap of a branch in the woods had both of them reaching for the most weapon-like item in sight. The weed helped calm things down, the company helped even more. 

His band practice had just ended and Steve barely had enough time to walk through the door from his shift at Family Video before he heard the screech of the van tires pulling into his driveway. 

They both knew what to expect on those days; Eddie would pull a joint or three out of his jacket pocket and Steve would line the door to the kitchen with a towel at the bottom to stop the smell from getting inside. Steve would grab the beers and Eddie would take down the chairs and they’d both sigh in relief once the first hit was taken. 

It was normally Eddie who would talk first, unable to keep thoughts in his head for longer than a minute before needing everyone to know what was on his mind. Steve would laugh and turn to face him, send back a good-natured jab and slap his hand against Eddie’s upper arm. It wasn’t much, but it was solidarity, and sometimes that was all they could ask for. 

“That sounds nice,” Steve said quietly, eyes still trained on the ceiling from where he was watching the ball he had previously been tossing. Eddie gave a noncommittal grunt. Steve turned in his chair slightly to look at his friend’s face. “I mean it, man. It’s really good.”

The blush that rose high on his cheeks was worth any compliment he could give, Steve thought to himself, watching as it spread to the tips of his ears. 

“I dunno, it’s just something I've been playing around with.” Eddie plucked away at the chords again, hummed a few bars with it. “It’ll sound better when it’s amped up, you know?” He hit a note, then another, before going back and trying again with a different note following. 

“Yikes, not that one,” Steve said as Eddie tried the combo again. “The first one was better.” 

Eddie chuckled, played the original chords along with the starting combo, glanced at Steve. “That better, princess?” He smirked at him before playing it again and again as if trying to get his fingers to memorize the exact positions. 

“Much better. My ears thank you,” Steve grinned back at him. He stood up and grabbed two more beers for them, tossing one to Eddie. His eyes zeroed in on the patch of skin that appeared when Eddie’s t-shirt was pulled up as he caught the can, saw the harsh lines of demobat bites that littered the area, the broken lines of ink where tattoos had previously been. It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.

Something Eddie played then felt right, perfect with the song  and just out of the ordinary enough to be just what the melody needed. It felt kismet.

“Play that again,” Steve said, not entirely sure why he felt so breathless.

PRESENT DAY

“Indianapolis, how are we fucking feeling?!” 

The guitarist had run out from the side of the stage, wide smile on his face, strumming the riff over and over on his cherry red electric guitar as he spoke to the crowd. Eddie fucking Munson. 

Steve noticed 3 things all at once: 1. His hair had gotten even longer than it was when he left, the curls bigger and higher with a folded black bandana running across his forehead. 2. The black Metallica t-shirt that Steve gave him years ago had been cut on the sides to remove the sleeves, exposing his torso and hinting at new tattoos. 3. He looked good.

Eddie’s confidence was apparent; he had always had this air about him but now? It was all consuming. The way he leaned into the mic to talk to the crowd, cocky smile across his face, leather pants snug across his long legs that wasn’t leaving much to the imagination. He shook his head and some of his curls were swept over his shoulder in the process.

Shit.

“We’re Corroded Coffin and we’re gonna play a few songs for you tonight. If you like what you hear, check out Paulie at our merch table and grab a copy of our newest EP.” Eddie waved off stage to what Steve could only assume was said Paulie but he couldn’t bring himself to look at anything other than the man on the stage. Someone he thought he would never see again.

SEPTEMBER 27, 1987

“What do you mean, you’re just… leaving?! Up and running away?” Steve had yelled, watching Eddie pull open his van door with a force he should have expected with how angry he was. He turned around quickly, hair billowing over his shoulder to scoff in Steve’s face.

“Didn’t you know that’s what I fucking do best, Steve-O?” The smile on Eddie’s face was anything but sincere, a snarl turning up the corners of his mouth to match the manic look in his eyes. “Running away, per usual!” He lifted his arms up as if to gesture at the intricacies of his life and then slapped them back down against his thighs. “The town fuck up, the queer, the freak! Off to find himself in whatever place will fucking take him!”

Steve rolled his eyes and took a few steps towards Eddie, going to hug him or slap him or pull on his jacket like a child to keep him from leaving. “Oh, don’t give me that bullshit, man,” he said with exasperation. 

He glanced into the back of the van, saw a few boxes and bags packed to the brim with things he recognized from the trailer. He softened when he saw the Metallica shirt he had gifted Eddie laying on the top of one of the open bags. Wondered why it made his heart pound and snap in two at the same time.

The September air had a chill to it that had Steve crossing his arms over his chest to keep out the breeze. He took in a deep breath, spared a glance at Eddie’s face and felt his own face fall, his eyes finding the dirt of his driveway under his feet easier to look at than his best friend. Steve brought his eyes back up to Eddie, tried to school his features. “Just…”

Eddie stiffened. Clenched his jaw and tilted his head and looked at Steve expectantly, breathing heavily through his nose looking more like a spooked animal than he had seen in a long time. He paused long enough that the air felt electric in a different way than it ever had before. “...Just what?”

Steve didn’t know how to find the words he wanted to say. What he wanted to do was wrap his arms around Eddie and convince him through that alone that he needed him to stay. It didn’t matter if Eddie liked boys, it didn’t matter that people thought they relied on each other too much, none of it mattered.

“Don’t leave me here alone, man.”

Steve couldn’t bring himself to admit to anyone that he was scared. He was 21 years old and couldn’t get into college and worked in a video store and he felt trapped in Hawkins and now his best friend was leaving. Eddie was a safe house. He was proof that Steve wasn’t alone, that not everyone has to go off to some big school to prove their self worth. 

And now he was leaving. And Steve would be alone.

PRESENT DAY

Eddie was magnetic. His voice pierced through the loud sounds of the music and he ran around like he owned the stage. The first song was hypnotizing, the familiar chords worming their way into Steve’s brain and bringing back memories of summer days come and gone. The second song had just as much energy and even more grit, Eddie spitting the words into the mic with a conviction that had Steve thinking he’d follow Eddie to whatever ends of whatever planets he wanted him to. Their third song was a classic party song, had the crowd jumping and rowdy, fists flying in the air talking about damning the man and living your own life. 

The band stopped after that to take a break, drink some water in the sweltering heat, readjust their neck straps and tight pants. Eddie lit a cigarette for the bassist and gave it to him with a cheeky wink to follow that had Steve’s stomach turning in ways he hadn’t felt since high school.

“Thank you, everyone, this is ahh-” Eddie lit his own cigarette and took a long drag before leaving it hanging out of the side of his mouth, smiling as wide as he could without letting it fall. “This is a fucking dream come true for us!” He cackled away from the mic and clapped his hands once, loudly, before turning back to the crowd.

Steve was truly, remarkably, utterly, entirely fucked. He found himself pushing through people, trying to get even closer to the barricade as possible, watching as Eddie charmed both the crowd and his band members with his standard wit but toned down in a way that was new to Steve. 

“We’re from just down the road in Hicksville, dear old Hawkins, Indiana-” there were a few broken off cheers and Steve considered chorusing along with them but then thought better of it when he saw Eddie perk up, eyebrows reaching the bandana on his forehead. “Hell yeah! Go Tigers, I guess.” He paused and barked out a laugh. “I hated high school though, all 6 years of it, so… maybe more like, Eat Shit Tigers!”

He allowed himself to laugh at that, a sharp sound that was punched out of his chest and had the middle aged balding man next to him looking at him with disdain.  Steve gave him a smile and looked for another way to get closer to the front, stopping behind a gaggle of girls that he knew were here for reasons other than the music. 

“Anyway, you have a great show ahead of you so thanks for letting us rock while they got their sorry asses ready to melt your faces off! This is our last song.”

To Steve’s surprise, the crowd seemed bummed that Corroded Coffin would be wrapping up and he allowed pride to bloom in his chest. Eddie’s eyes got wide, a sincere smile crossing his face when he noticed, too. 

“This one’s called ‘Freak and The King’, let’s fucking go!”

The drums picked up before Eddie could even finish and a heavy, slow bass line followed along with it and Steve found that he couldn’t breathe. His heart had doubled in time, a pit in his stomach exploding with nerves and happiness and something else he couldn’t put his finger on. It had never felt more important to get to the front. He pushed his way through the girls while the guitar started a steady rhythm and Eddie vocalized into the mic. He had to be as close as humanly possible. 

SEPTEMBER 15, 1987

“You know,” Eddie said, high as a fucking kite on Steve’s floor with Led Zeppelin playing in the background. “There’s nothing sexier sometimes than a good guitar riff.” He laughed to himself, played air guitar along with Jimmy Page, Robert Plant crooning about needing a whole lot of love in the background. “Like, listen-”

Eddie stood up, stumbled over to where Steve laid on his bed, finishing off the last of the second joint they had for the night, planted himself on his knees on the side of the bed. 

“Yes, Eddie. I’ve heard this-”

“Shh!” Eddie zipped his lips at him quickly, pressed a finger to his closed mouth and nodded his head along with the rhythm, eyes wide and boring into Steve’s. Plant was still in the background, his vocalizations turning more into moans the longer the song went on before the music crescendoed and went back to the original tempo. 

“Man, it’s just too fucking good!” Eddie exclaimed, letting his head fall back and picking his air guitar back up. 

Steve was too high for this. The pale expanse of Eddie’s neck was on display, his Adam’s apple prominent and moving as he swallowed around his cottonmouth. He was still sitting on his knees, spread out and bouncing along with the beat. This wasn’t the first time and it sure as hell wasn’t going to be the last time that Steve wondered what Eddie’s skin would feel like under his lips, what color it would turn after he sucked bruises along his jawline, if his stubble would hurt or if it would be a welcomed scratch.

He took in a sharp breath through his nose to attempt to ground himself, focused on how the air filled his lungs and held it there until it hurt. Closed his eyes so he wouldn’t have to see how goddamn hot his best friend was, but it was all he could see behind his eyelids. He shook himself back to reality as the music dropped out for a second time.

“Way down inside,” Eddie sang, voice an octave lower than the original with an air microphone in front of his mouth and Steve couldn’t look away if he tried. 

“Woman, you need,” his hips moved from side to side along with the drum beats and Steve had to grip his comforter in his hands to keep from doing anything stupid.

“Love!” Eddie finished out before bringing his hand down to start on the air drums. He had that wide smile on his face that Steve adored, his eyes warm and bright, dimple out and present, and he couldn’t help but smile back. Eddie fell down face first next to where Steve was laying and then flipped over onto his back.

“See, what’d I tell you? Sometimes there’s nothing sexier, man.” Eddie flipped his head on the pillow to look at Steve and raised his eyebrows before jumping off the bed with zero coordination. 

Steve couldn’t move. He couldn’t think. He stared at his ceiling and tried counting to 100, having to restart a few times when he lost track, kept his comforter balled up in his fists. 

“Hello, Earth to Steve?” A hand waved in front of his face and he looked over to see Eddie’s face still smiling but softer, concerned. “You good dude?”

No, he thought to himself, I’m not good. All I want to do is see what you feel like under me and I don’t know how that can ever happen without scaring you off.

Instead, what he says is, “He sounded really hot in the background. The uhh, moaning.” Steve spared a glance at Eddie’s face and saw that the smile was gone, replaced with confusion. “It was like, it was the buildup, right? Then he got off? It was hot.”

Eddie was silent, his face a blank stare as he picked up a cigarette to light, blowing the smoke out the open window. He chuckled to himself, under his breath, turned to Steve with a look he couldn’t put a name to. 

“Don’t fucking do that, man.”

Steve recoiled as if he had been punched, furrowed his brows and sat up straight on the bed. “Do what? I thought we were talking about the music that you wanted to put on by the way-”

“Not that, and you fucking know it.” Eddie took another drag, held it in for a long time, ran a hand through his hair before looking back up at Steve. “You don’t need to fucking… I don’t know, patronize me?”

And now Steve was officially lost. “Patronize you? This is your fucking shit man, how do I have any sort of upper hand here?” He was floundering, he could feel it. Felt his hands trying to find purchase in the air before grabbing at his hair, leaving it sticking up in a way he could only assume was unattractive. 

Eddie laughed again with zero humor in it before leveling his gaze with Steve’s. “Just because I’m the fucking queer doesn’t mean you can make fun of me for-”

“Woah, woah dude!” Steve back peddled, standing up from the bed so fast that he got lightheaded walking over to where Eddie stood. “Where the fuck did that come from?! I was being serious, it was hot-”

Eddie turned away and went to grab for his bag on the floor, started packing whatever things of his he could see laying around Steve’s room. He panicked, he didn’t know what to do to get him to stop, to listen. Steve grabbed his wrist that was outstretched to grab his lighter off the desk.

“Eddie.” Steve didn’t leave any room for him to do anything but listen to him, his tone firm and unwavering. “That is not what I was doing.” He took a deep breath, pulled Eddie the slightest bit towards him so they were face-to-face. “I meant it. I was agreeing with you and your music theory bullshit about it being sexy. I would never, never, make fun of you for anything but especially that.” 

They locked eyes in a way that Steve would never forget as long as he lived. It wasn’t something they talked about often. Eddie had come out casually to Steve early on into their friendship and that was the end of it, really. No long winded discussion, no late night talks about their types, it just faded to the background as stored information that Steve kept in the Eddie file in his brain. 

“Now, are we good?” Steve asked, his hands moving up to Eddie’s shoulders as if trying to keep him in place. Eddie hesitated, glanced to the side of Steve’s head before looking back, rolled his eyes and smirked.

“Yeah, we’re good, Harrington.”

PRESENT DAY

It was a good song, great even. The members worked all together to put on this obscenely long song that had no ending point in sight and by the time Eddie broke off to grab another sip of water, Steve had finally made his way to the very front end of the barricade. He was shoved between a girl on his left with an impressive mohawk and a guy on his right that made him feel short with how teased his hair was. 

After yet another change in tempo, Eddie walked back over to the mic that was now almost directly in front of Steve. From here, he could see how he rolled his hips to the hearty bass of the drums, the way his stomach was still scarred over from the bites, the way water dripped off some of the ends of his curls as if he had splashed some from his bottle onto his face. 

If Steve thought Eddie was a good performer before, this would take the fucking cake.

He had total control of the stage, the crowd, his band mates. It was both nothing and exactly like how it was in Hawkins; this loudmouth kid with a bravado that couldn’t be shaken unless you knew the right place to look. This Eddie knew what he was doing and it wasn’t fake. This Eddie had everyone in the palm of his hand to do with as he pleased, a dungeon master to the end. 

The song was sexy, anyone could tell that. The beat was simple and effective, slow enough to use in the bedroom but still loud enough that it could be mistaken as just a good old fashioned rock song. It had Steve feeling a different kind of heat than the Indiana sun; a heat that warmed him from the inside and left a heaviness in its wake.

"The King of the Freaks, and a freak of a king,” Eddie wailed over the mic, his guitar carrying a solo over the melody. “Won’t you come and freak me, Your Majesty?” He stuck his tongue out and laughed wildy, rushing to the front of the stage to touch the hands of the people closest at the front.

The girls behind Steve screamed in response but his tongue felt like lead in his mouth. He could do nothing, say nothing, other than gawk at this guy he used to know and listen to him sing a song that had to be about him. It had to be. Subtlety had never exactly been Eddie’s strongest of suits. 

“Will you, oh won’t you,” Steve watched as Eddie jumped around the stage before ending back at the mic stand, a smile bright on his face. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back while strumming away on his guitar just like the night they listened to Zeppelin. “Don’t let me deceive you as a-”

It would be cliche, Steve thought, for time to have actually slowed down when they made eye contact for the first time in over a year. And yet knowing that it was cheesy, it didn’t stop it from happening.

Eddie’s smile faltered, his head tipping the side like a dog hearing a whistle, and suddenly there was nothing else there. All Steve could see was Eddie. He watched as he tripped over his own feet for a second before snapping back to reality, ripping his eyes away from Steve to saunter over to the other corner of the stage. 

By the time it felt like he could breathe again, Eddie was back, right in front of him. He looked out into the crowd but kept looking back to Steve, his stage persona firmly in place, all charisma and charm. Honestly, Steve didn’t know what he was expecting but cool and composed like nothing had happened was not it. 

The music came to a head, drums loud and bass line booming as Eddie ripped into a guitar solo. He stood at the side of the stage, leg perched on an amp next to him as he strummed away, the crowd cheering wildly and jumping around. Eddie looked up and scanned the crowd, his own excitement clear on his face before locking eyes with Steve. 

He made his way to the other side of the stage, eyes never straying off of Steve before he broke eye contact to connect with the crowd on the side. The solo became increasingly harder as it went on and Steve was entranced by how quickly Eddie’s fingers moved, the chipped black fingernail polish and rings adorning his fingers adding to how impressive it looked. 

Once he was back to the center of the stage, Steve knew he was in trouble. Eddie stopped right in front of him and smirked in that way that was so intentional before dropping to his knees and leaning back, head falling behind him as he shook out his curls. Being this close, Steve could see how fast his fingers were moving but that wasn’t what he was focusing on. Instead, all he could look at was the tattoo on his lower hip, covering some of the scarring from the bat bites. 

JUNE 24, 1986

It was one of the bad nights. Steve and Eddie had gone to bed a while ago, but he wasn’t actually able to fall asleep peacefully. He tossed and turned in his bed before falling asleep sometime around 3am only to be stuck in a loop of endless nightmares. Images of bats and broken bodies and finding his friend laying near lifeless on the ground before carrying him through the gate. Saw his friends floating off the ground with their bones snapping one by one. 

He heard a creak in the hallway, small enough that it could be excused as the house settling but not to Steve. The sound woke him abruptly and he had his nail bat in hand almost just as quickly, reaching under his bed to grab the handle. He spun it in his hand once, twice, in warm up before planting his feet firmly and readied himself for an intruder. 

With his sleep-addled brain, it took him a second to remember that Eddie was even in the house. Eddie, who didn’t have a bat with him, who wouldn’t know where to get a weapon when he needed it. A fresh wave of panic went over Steve, fearing the worst. He needed to get to Eddie and make sure he was safe. 

Without a second thought, he threw open his bedroom door and turned to head towards the guest room down the hall. What he didn’t expect was for there to be a figure in the hallway. One that screamed exactly like Eddie.

“Steve! Dude what the fuck are you doing?” Eddie was panting, holding a hand to his chest and looked at the other man, bat held high above his head. 

He looked past Eddie to the other end of the hallway, looking for what, he wasn’t sure. “I heard a noise.” 

It was simple enough of an answer but the look of concern that flashed across Eddie’s face made Steve feel stupid, childish. 

“It was just me, man,” Eddie has his arms out in front of him like he was afraid of scaring him, showing that he was unarmed. He took small steps towards Steve who was breathing heavily through his nose. “I just got up to go to the bathroom.” 

Eddie reached him and placed his hand over Steve’s where it was wrapped tightly around the wooden handle. “We’re safe, dude, I promise.” His big brown eyes bore into Steve’s, his other arm reaching up to place firmly on his bicep. 

The two walked back silently to Steve’s room where Eddie was able to coax the bat away from him and get him back into bed. He swung the bat around a couple of times before setting it down next to the night stand. 

“God, I feel like an idiot,” Steve whispered into the quiet of his room, running a hand down his face. His bones felt heavy. He pulled his legs up and into his chest, resting his face against his knees. “Can’t even hear a noise in my own goddamn house without turning into a lunatic.” Eddie came to the side of the bed and sat on the corner. 

“I don’t know how to tell you this, but you’ve recently been through quite a bit of shit that would have anyone reaching for a bat for the things that go bump in the night.” Eddie looked over at the bat and turned back to Steve. “The nails are a cool addition to it. Think they sell that at War Zone?” He grinned. 

Steve chuckled, turned onto his side and pillowed his head on his hands. “That is actually a Jonathan Byers special. Back when we first fought these things.” Eddie tilted his head to the side, looked at him for long enough that Steve started to get antsy. “What?” 

Eddie shook his head, rubbed a hand at the back of his neck. “I feel like I'm barely making it through after one time with all this interdimensional shit. You’ve had to deal with all this, what, four times? You’re a fucking superhero.” He paused, turned his head, and all Steve could focus on was how nice he looked in the moonlight. Eddie looked back at Steve, his eyes soft and smile even softer. He looked almost nervous. “I’m so glad I got to actually know you, Steve Harrington.”

PRESENT DAY

The nails on the baseball bat of Eddie’s tattoo were dripping blood, a pool of it layered over what Steve knew would be some of the worst scarring and as soon as he saw it, his world came crashing down. 

This wasn’t normal codependency. This wasn’t buddies who had a falling out after being so tightly wound around each other that they didn’t know where one person ended and the other began. This wasn't even platonic anymore. This was something much deeper than just two guys who fought through stuff together. 

“Come on King, your castle or mine? This freak’s stuck to you with ties that bind,” Eddie had stood up, solo over, yelling back into the mic. The music was at a breaking point and Steve knew it had to be close to over. Eddie rolled his head and cocked out his hip, looking down at Steve with a look that held him firmly in place. 

“I’ll make you feel like a King, beg you nice from my knees. Cause what’s a freak to a king if not eager to please?” 

Any air left in Steve’s lungs was punched out by the smirk on Eddie’s face.

“Thank you, Indianapolis!” 

The final chord played and the crowd went wild, Eddie and his bandmates stopping to bow a few times before heading offstage. Steve was furious, confused, elated, too many things for the body to feel all at once. He watched Eddie walk off the stage without so much of a final glance at him.

He saw Eddie run a hand through his hair roughly off stage as he angrily yelled something before he was hidden by a wall and Steve wanted nothing more than to figure out a way to get backstage. He looked around, took in the set crew coming onto the stage to get things ready for Guns n’ Roses and saw the drummer from Corroded Coffin making his way to the merch booth. It was now or never.

Steve pushed his way along the barricade, apologizing to everyone he passed for being in their way, grumbling back profanities when they were sent his way. Being out of the crowd was a relief because it meant there was at least a bit of a breeze to help beat the heat. The drummer and Paulie the merch guy were still talking by the time he made his way up to the booth and they both looked up at him as soon as he got there.

“What can I get for you, man?” Paulie asked, arm outstretched to the various shirts, patches and tapes they were selling. Nothing too extravagant but it all had potential.

Steve scratched at the back of his neck, looking back sheepishly. “Hi, uhh, I’m-”

“Steve Harrington,” the drummer cut him off, the smile he wore on stage gone without a trace, replaced now with a frown. “Wouldn’t have ever expected to see you here.”

“Yeah, well,” Steve chuckled, gesturing to the fairgrounds around him, “who wouldn’t want to be under the burning sun right now?” He was aiming for casual and missed it by a mile, the answer sounding forced and painfully awkward. “I’m sorry, do I know you?”

The drummer laughed, harsh and fast which caused Paulie to look between the two of them with a wary eye. “No, no I guess you wouldn’t know me. We only went to school together for 9 years but I wouldn't expect you to remember little old me.”

Steve balked and tried his hardest to rack his brain to find a name to attach to the face. The other man must have caught on, laughed again only this time a little less harsh and took pity on him. “Gareth Richardson, man. I used to live over on Douglas. Ring any bells?” 

The only bell it rang was from the night that Tommy convinced him to drive him around so they could throw eggs at people’s mailboxes and he knew they went down Douglas but he wasn’t going to bring that up. He had changed. He had. “Sorry, man,” Steve started, shaking his head in apology. “I was kind of stuck in my own world back then.”

Gareth gave him a look that even Steve knew meant ‘no shit’ and turned to walk back to the stage area. 

“Wait I was just-” Steve reached his arm out to Gareth wanting to stop him but not going as far as to actually touch him. He gave Steve a blank, unamused stare. “I was hoping I could talk to Eddie.”

Steve didn’t know what Eddie had told them about their friendship. He assumed he had been brought up at least in passing after spending nearly every day together for over a year, especially considering that there would be days Eddie would get to practice late after spending the day bothering Steve at work. 

He watched Gareth pause and contemplate, narrowing his eyes at Steve before sighing and turning, heading back to the stage. “I’ll let him know you’re here but no promises. Enjoy the show, Harrington.” 

It had gotten late enough that the sun was close to setting, casting the fairgrounds in an orange glow, a welcome reprieve from the blazing sunshine from earlier. Steve grabbed a cassette off the merch table to look at and moved out of the way of the people who were coming to look at everything Corroded Coffin had to offer. 

The tape had art on the front of it with a skeleton playing guitar in what looked like a version of the Upside Down and it made Steve chuckle. He flipped it over, read over the tracklist to see that “Freak and The King” was track number 4 and made a mental note to buy it after talking to Eddie. 

After what felt like hours of waiting with his stomach in knots and only so many things to distract himself from chickening out and going back to see the show, Eddie was walking towards him. His shoulders were pressed back and he had a smile on his face that Steve didn’t remember ever seeing before. It looked forced, his eyes big and wide with his cheeks wrinkling up from the sheer force of the smile. It was out of place for what Steve was used to.

“Steve, man! Hey!” Eddie said too loud and wrapped his arm around Steve’s shoulder to pull him in for a side hug. It felt too normal for everything that had happened in the past year. Steve pulled away from him and put a little distance between them, met Eddie’s strange smile with a frown of his own. 

"'Hey’ ? That’s what you’re gonna open with?” He scoffed, put his hands on his hips in the way that Dustin made fun of him for because it made him look like Mrs. Wheeler. “You fucking disappear for a goddamn year with no way to contact you and you say ‘hey’ like I saw you a week ago?”

Eddie’s eyes got impossibly wider and his smile faltered for a second before he took in a shaky breath. “Let’s go watch the show, man-” He went to pull Steve towards the stage by his wrist but he shrugged himself out of Eddie’s hold quickly enough.

“The show? I couldn’t care less about the fucking show, man.” The term of affection was dripping in sarcasm and Steve was trying his hardest to not make a scene. This wasn’t what he imagined when he thought of them meeting back up. He didn’t have a concrete picture of what it would be, but it wasn’t this. “We need to talk.”

Eddie bit at his lip and looked anywhere but at Steve, pulled his hand up to his mouth to bite at the nail before breathing sharply through his nose and resuming his confident stance from earlier. “And we will, but for now,” he grabbed Steve’s wrist again, stroked at the skin for a second and looked at where he held onto him. “Let’s go watch a rock show.” 

Something about the way Eddie was looking at him convinced him to follow along, the anger welling up inside of him being pushed to the side to feel even just a morsel of happiness to be with his friend once again. As they made their way to the side of the stage, Eddie turned back to Steve and gave him a blinding smile, this one perfect and real, that turned his knees to jelly. 

“We get to watch from back here, how cool is that?!” Eddie pushed him by his shoulders to where he could see the stagehands finishing up as they were getting everything put together and could look out at the crowd that he was previously in. When Steve stopped to look at Eddie, really look at him, he could swear he saw stars in his eyes. This was his dream and he had made it. Pride bubbled up in Steve’s stomach and he let out a giddy laugh. They could have a much needed conversation later, but for now, he was going to stand next to his friend and try to not worry about anything. 

The lights dimmed and the crowd went nuts, shouts and claps and whistles louder than Steve would have ever imagined. He joined along in cheering with everyone else and Eddie started along with him. From the other side of the stage, the members of Guns n’ Roses came out one by one and made their way to their respective spots on stage.

The concert was everything Steve could have wanted. He had already seen them at the beginning of their tour so knew what the setlist would be and just how good of a show it would be but watching it from backstage was an experience he would never forget. With every new song starting, he’d perk up and sing along, Eddie right by his side, head banging with the band and jumping until he was out of breath. 

It was fully dark by the time the band was wrapping up, stars shining brightly above them even with the light pollution from the nearby city. Steve knew that they had saved his favorite song for last but it didn’t stop him from the breathless anticipation of the first notes blaring out through the speakers. Once the riff started, he felt a warm pressure against the back of his hand. Glancing down, he saw the back of Eddie’s hand pressing against his.

AUGUST 10, 1987

“I don’t know whether I’m surprised or not that ‘Sweet Child o' Mine’ is your favorite song,” Eddie said. They had taken Eddie’s van out to Lover’s Lake (just to chill, Eddie promised, filling Steve with a disappointment he didn’t know what to do with) and were sitting on the roof with the windows rolled down, Appetite for Destruction playing softly in the summer air along with the faint chirp of frogs and crickets. He had a cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth and cracked open a beer, handing it Steve before opening his own.

Steve snorted. “And I don’t know if I should take offense to that or not.” He took a sip from his beer, trying to get all the foam from the top of the can before taking a larger swig. 

“It’s not a bad thing, Harrington,” Eddie said, full of conviction in the way that only he could pull off without sounding cheesy. “It’s a good song. It just seems… I dunno, fitting in a way.” He paused to take a drag of his cigarette before blowing it in the opposite direction of Steve. “It’s easily their sweetest song so-”

“Wait,” Steve turned to look at him with his whole body, leaning onto one elbow. “You calling me sweet, Munson?” 

Eddie grinned in a way that had Steve’s breath catching in his chest. He took a sip of his beer probably too quickly in an attempt to make the feeling go away and took note of how Eddie’s eyes seemed to watch the movement of his throat. 

“Again, not a bad thing, Stevie.” His eyes dropped before looking back up at Steve, his answer genuine. It wasn’t common to have conversations not dripped in sarcasm and hidden behind jokes. Sure, they talked all the time but things never felt so serious. It happened once in a blue moon that a conversation they had was open and sincere; this was one of them. 

It made something bloom inside Steve that he knew but didn’t want to put a name on. Something big and scary that was easier to ignore than facing it head on. In the quiet hours of the night like this, everything felt safe yet fragile, the air around them feeling like a comforting blanket and he didn’t want to mess that up. He didn’t want to lose Eddie, not over something that he didn’t have to.

Steve turned back around and laid on the roof, staring up at the stars. He hummed along to a few bars before actively singing along a little bit under his breath. Eddie was still, the only sound coming from him was his cigarette softly sizzling as he took in a small drag. He hadn’t taken his eyes off Steve. 

“Steve.”

The song was coming to an end and he turned his head to look at Eddie. His eyes were big and he was biting at the inside of his cheek and Steve just knew that something was going to happen, he could feel it in his bones. The air was charged as they both stared at each other, Steve silently willing Eddie to just do something or say anything and-

The beginning of ‘You’re Crazy’ blasting through the speakers shook them both out of whatever that was, causing Eddie to almost fall off the roof, effectively ruining the moment. Steve jumped into protection mode as he reached out a hand to steady him and wrapped it around his upper arm, Eddie giggling from almost falling. 

“Jesus, Munson! Gonna give me a heart attack.” After Eddie was definitely not going anywhere, Steve flopped back down on the roof and let his arm cover his eyes while trying to will his heart to slow down after everything that had just happened. As he laid there, he felt fingers wrap around his wrist and slowly lift his arm from his face. 

“I’m fine, Mom,” Eddie started in his usual joking tone, signature grin overtaking his face. He took a second, letting Steve catch his breath. “Are you?”

It probably wasn’t meant as anything other than genuine concern, Steve thought. He knew he looked a mess, hair probably going in a million different ways after lunging after Eddie to keep him from falling off the roof. He knew his eyes were probably too wide and his breath was coming in too fast but Steve knew what it was like to think he’d lost Eddie before. He sure as Hell didn’t want to feel it again. 

“Yeah,” he said after a bit, “Yeah, I'm fine.”

PRESENT DAY

The show ended with just as much energy as they had started with and Steve was feeling the post-concert high. He had a smile on his face that didn’t want to leave as he followed Eddie back to wherever they had all their gear stored and helped pick up their things to bring back to their cars without question. 

Eddie was unreadable. On the one hand, he seemed as keyed up as Steve felt and he was a ball of energy that could have only come from being on the stage. On the other hand, it was a nervous energy that Steve knew came from wanting to avoid actually talking to him about anything serious. The band got everything loaded in and Eddie saw his band mates off, a silent agreement between he and Steve that they’d have to hang back together to figure things out. 

Steve watched as Gareth gave Eddie a tight hug, pulled him close and whispered into his ear before patting him soundly on the shoulder. Eddie had laughed quietly and turned back to Steve with a genuine smile on his face which distracted Steve from seeing the daggers Gareth was sending his way. The other members drove off in their respective vehicles and left Steve and Eddie alone in the dirt parking lot. 

With the taillights of the others gone and out of sight, Eddie shuffled his feet and faced Steve, whatever bravado he was sporting earlier had vanished. Now, Steve was left with Eddie looking small and nervous and he hated it. 

“So,” he started, not trusting his own voice to speak much louder than right above a whisper but he had to make Eddie think that everything was okay. He didn’t want to scare him away. “I’m thinking we go get some take-out and a 12 pack.” He smiled when Eddie looked up with a more open expression than he was wearing not even a minute earlier. “We can just sit and-”

“Catch up?” 

Steve nodded and noticed that Eddie was fiddling with one of the rings on his hand. He couldn’t tell if it was nerves or if it was just from habit. “I have a room over at The Omni downtown if we uh-” He cut himself off when he saw how wide Eddie’s eyes got when he mentioned his hotel room, even if it was only for a split second before he schooled his features. 

“We can sit in the parking lot and chill in your van, nothing fancy. I just don’t want to leave the Beemer parked here overnight.” Steve hoped he played that off casually enough to where Eddie wouldn’t be able to tell that he was just as nervous. 

It was strange to be so wound up around someone that you had literally put your life in the hands of. Even if they didn’t have the longest of histories, they had an intense one, one that managed to consume every part of Steve’s current psyche and he wanted, needed, to repair whatever was wrong. 

Steve pointed to where his car was parked on the other side of the lot and grabbed his key out of his back pocket. “Follow behind me and I’ll get us there.”

Eddie smirked and opened the van door. “Always trying to be the leader, huh, Harrington?” 

“Yeah, yeah. I just know we wouldn’t get there if I left it up to your incredible driving.”

SEPTEMBER 3, 1987

“Watch the road, you idiot!” Steve shouted, hand grabbing the handle above him and pressing his foot through the imaginary brake pedal on the passenger side floor board. Eddie was laughing wildly and Queen was blaring through the speakers as it was one of the only cassette tapes they could agree upon when driving. The windows were down, letting the early September breeze roll in and make bird nests out of their hair, the sunshine keeping them comfortably warm. 

They were on their way to Indianapolis for a weekend away as a late 21st birthday treat to himself. Steve was able to get them a couple of hotel rooms in the big city and they were allowing themselves to have pure, unadulterated fun for once. No kids to babysit, no parents to keep happy, no wandering eyes thinking a certain someone had sacrificed their children to Satan. 

But Steve was really starting to regret letting Eddie drive his car.

“Harrington, careful. Keep talking like that and I might start to think you care about my safety.” Eddie turned to look at Steve in the passenger seat with a wide grin before drumming on the steering wheel to the beat of the song. 

“Your safety, my safety, my car’s safety. Yeah, I care about all of that, actually.” He ran a hand through his hair and slumped down against the seat, keeping his hand over his eyes as he sighed.

“Maybe if I don’t look, I’ll magically open my eyes and we’ll be parked at the hotel with not a scratch on the car and I’ll live to see another day where I don’t let anyone else drive because apparently I’m the only one who was able to pass my driving test.” 

He heard one of his favorite sounds, Eddie full-body laughing, and took his hand off his eyes to glare at him. “Yeah, laugh it up now, Munson, but just know you’re gonna be paying for my extensive hospital bills after this road trip is over.”

“Steve, I don’t know if you’ve noticed but we actually haven’t gotten into any accidents.”

He huffed and crossed his arms over his chest while continuing to pout at Eddie. “My therapy bills then cause I’m sure to need them after all this.”

Eddie reached out to ruffle Steve’s hair, causing him to pout even more before turning the music down so they could actually talk to one another without screaming over Freddie Mercury. “So what’s our plan for tonight, Your Majesty?”

“Well,” Steve started around a sigh as he readjusted in his seat and pulled at the seatbelt that was starting to dig into his neck uncomfortably. “We have tonight, all day tomorrow and the next day before we need to head out. I say we take it easy tonight, watch a movie or something and then get to exploring tomorrow.” 

Eddie nodded in agreement, his fingers keeping a beat on the steering wheel. “We talking Pay-Per-View?” Steve hummed as a yes, watching the way the sunlight bounced off of the rings on Eddie’s fingers. “We talking a movie or a movie?” And with that Steve’s trance was broken. 

“Hate to break it to you but I don’t think we’d be able to find a movie like that to agree on.” 

“Oh, but Stevie,” Eddie began in a way that made Steve not want to know how his sentence was going to end. “How would you know until you’ve tried?”

Heat flashed through Steve’s veins, his face burning up instantly and his stomach twisting in knots. It was a joke. It was a joke, right? Eddie wasn’t actually suggesting… anything, right? Images of them together popped up behind his eyes before he could stop them. 

He saw them picking some raunchy movie and laying down on a bed together, nervous and shy, before one of them, probably Steve, slid a hand down into his pants. Eddie would then go to help, because what’s a hand to a friend in need, and it would be hot and messy and nothing like Steve ever thought he wanted but this was Eddie and how could it be wrong if it was Eddie?

The thought made Steve’s breath catch in his throat and he coughed on air, not playing this off smoothly at all. Eddie patted him on his back as he chuckled as if he was clueless to the things that Steve was thinking about and had thought about before and the things he wanted-

“Chill dude, it was just a joke.” 

Eddie’s hand was like fire when it stayed on Steve’s back rubbing soothing circles into his spine while he caught his breath. He swatted him away before he could think anything of it, just needing his hand off of him, and he saw the hurt flash on Eddie’s face before he schooled it behind a grin. 

“Besides, if we both have our own rooms it’s not like we can’t choose our own, uhh, movies later anyway.” Eddie laughed this weird, half disjointed laugh and looked back at the road, his fingers still drumming along to the music. 

Great, now Steve had to think about Eddie on the other side of a wall from him getting off on hotel-grade porn when he could be with him instead. Peachy. 

PRESENT DAY

The drive back to The Omni was shorter than Steve thought it would be. His mind was running a thousand miles a minute and he couldn’t focus at all on actually driving back. He wouldn’t have been surprised if he ran a stop sign or two but at least he knew Eddie of all people couldn’t knock him for that. 

He pulled into a spot off the side of the building. Eddie was right behind him and there were plenty of open spots near him for the van. He flipped down his visor to take in his appearance in the dimly lit mirror.

“You can do this,” Steve whispered to himself, raking his hands through the longer hair on the top of his head and brushing the dirt dust off his face where it had mixed in with the sweat from the day. “You’ve fought literal monsters, Harrington. Talking to him is a cakewalk.” He took in a deep breath and let it out quickly. “But monsters weren’t able to rip your heart in half so maybe they’re the lesser evil here.”

Eddie’s headlights pulling into the spot next to him startled him and had him flipping the visor back up. Steve shook his head to let his hair fall more naturally before getting out of the car and shoving his hands into his back pockets, leaning against the side closest to the van. Eddie jumped out of the driver’s side and made his way towards him with that same weird smile Steve had first seen him with. 

“So, we ordering pizza?” Eddie started and went to open the back door of his van to show a cooler intermixed with guitars and amps. He sat on the edge of the van floor and leaned back to pull the cooler closer to him. “I have plenty of beer for us. No need for, uhh, a run.”

He hated this. This wasn’t right. Eddie used to be so comfortable around Steve and now for whatever reason, things felt more tense than they ever had been. At least when Steve was school royalty and Eddie was a freak, they knew their place. They knew what to expect out of each other. 

But now this? This tension and awkwardness left Steve confused. He didn’t know where to go from there. It was like he needed to apologize to him but he had no idea what for. Something was obviously bothering Eddie but thinking all the way back to when he decided to leave, Steve had no earthly clue what he could have done wrong. 

“Yeah, pizza’s good. You still like black olives with pepperoni or are you more of a pizza snob now that you’re apparently some big time rockstar?” Steve said it with the intention of being funny but by the look on Eddie’s face and the way he scoffed, it seemed like it was taken as anything but. “What? What’s that look for?”

Eddie paused. He pulled a Busch out of the cooler and popped it open, handing it to Steve before getting his own. “Nothing. Olives are fine.”

“No,” It felt like he was pulling teeth. “There was clearly a look, man.” Steve felt his jaw tense up and his eyebrow furrow as he looked at him. Eddie shook his head and took a sip while trying his best to keep his face neutral. It did nothing but make Steve feel like he was going to explode. “Will you just fucking talk to me?”

“Are we at least gonna order the pizza before you grill me like it’s 20 Questions or-”

“Woah, grill you?” And there it was. The breaking point. 

Steve had to laugh, he had to. If wanting to know what his friend had been up to for a year after no contact, that was considered grilling? Eddie used to be someone that Steve knew all the ins and outs of. They lived in each other's pockets continuously for so long that breaking everything off felt like he lost a life line. 

Every joke he heard, every tale of a terrible customer, every nightmare and awkward moment, Eddie heard them all for a year. He was who Steve turned for every little thought that passed through his head and when Eddie left, it was a grief like he had never felt before. 

He wasn’t there to hear Steve’s lames jokes before anyone else. He wasn’t there to listen to him vent about how awful work could be. He wasn’t there when Steve needed someone to grab the fucking bat full of nails out of his hands when he heard a bump in the night. Eddie wasn’t there.

The air between them was heavy. Steve could tell that Eddie had things to say and Steve knew he had some less than kind words of his own to dish out. And yet there Eddie sat, one hand clenched tightly around a can of Budweiser and lighting a cigarette with the other as his eyes burned holes into the pavement.

Steve had to laugh. “That’s fucking rich, you know that?” It was hollow, both the words and the scoff that he let out. “You just up and fucking leave and act like I can’t ask a single question, which was a joke, by the way. In case you don’t remember that I can make those.”

He saw Eddie flinch and a part of him felt accomplished. Good, he thought, he should feel a bit shitty. Steve walked over and took the cigarette out of his hand, ignoring the squawk of surprise Eddie let out. 

“You can do one of two things right now, Munson,” Steve took a harsh drag of the cigarette and held it in while giving Eddie a look so steady that it could only be rivaled by his own mother. “One, you can punch me in the face like you so clearly want to do.” Eddie started to interject, standing up from the edge of the van. “No, I’m not finished! Or two, you can just tell me what the fuck is going on, man.” 

Steve walked the few steps back over to where Eddie had been and promptly sat down. He leveled the other man with another Harrington Stare and slapped his hand down hard next to him, encouraging his friend to sit back down. Steve flicked the ash off the cherry of the cigarette quickly before offering it back out to Eddie, who accepted it with a frown.

“You just left,” Steve started when it was apparent Eddie wouldn’t be the one baring his soul first, “Hawkins, the gang, me.” He let a burst of air out of his lungs that could be mistaken for a laugh but they both knew it wasn’t. “And like, I know we had our fair share of issues but I thought-” 

He cut himself off when he felt his blood starting to boil, a desperation trying to claw its way out of Steve’s chest just like on the day Eddie had left in the first place. Steve shook his head and took a steadying breath before turning his whole body to look at his friend. 

“I thought we were close enough that you could tell me what was going on. I didn’t… I don’t, know what I did to make you push me away like that.” Steve dropped his head back to look up at the sky that was completely devoid of stars, a self-deprecating smile on his face. “Cause it must have been something bad, right? Bad enough to make you leave?”

His heart was fluttering in his chest and it felt like it would fall out of his body if the conversation went on much longer. The silence that Eddie was giving him was suffocating him the longer it went on and Steve could do nothing but sit there and continue rambling, trying to give him an in to talk somewhere.

“Please, man, just tell me-”

Eddie stood up suddenly, hand tight in his hair, and began pacing. “It’s not going to change anything, though, Steve. If I tell you what I’m thinking, why I ran away yet again.” He puffed at the cigarette a few times before looking at Steve with a practiced blank stare. The only thing tipping Steve off that he wasn’t comfortable was his hand picking at a spare thread from his shirt. “Even if we could go back to a year, hell two years ago, nothing would change.”

Steve scoffed, smirked while looking at shoes scuffing against the pavement. “So it is me then?”

He saw out of his periphery that Eddie stopped pacing abruptly and made an effort to walk towards Steve only to stop halfway. 

“You didn’t do anything, Steve.” Eddie’s voice was small when he spoke, small in a way that Steve only heard when he was waking the other up from nightmares or when he lost yet another job because of protestors outside of wherever he was working. “I promise, it isn’t you-”

“No? Cause I’m really trying to figure out how I’m not the problem when you can’t even talk to me or hell, even look at me like you used to.” 

Steve stood up then, facing Eddie and crowding into his space, setting his beer on the hood of his own car. Eddie took in a shuddering breath but pushed his shoulders back anyway, trying to seem like he was holding his own when Steve could see he was actually shrinking away. They had always been close to the same height but the few centimeters he had on Eddie were really showing as they stood almost nose to nose. 

“The offer still stands, Munson,” Steve breathed out, close enough to one another that his whisper was heard loud and clear. “Either you tell me what’s going on or you lay one right here,” He said as he pushed his fingers into his cheek, “because I can’t take this from you anymore.” 

The two stood there for what felt like an eternity but was clearly only a few seconds. Crickets were chirping, car horns loud and intrusive, the parking lot lamp was flickering above them, but neither of them made a move. 

It felt surreal to see Eddie break when Steve was still standing so close to him. He could see as whatever wall was holding him back broke when he felt Eddie’s hand on his cheek. Steve braced himself for the stinging impact of the punch that would follow but didn’t have enough time to process what he would actually feel. 

Eddie’s lips on his, soft but a bit chapped, was not what Steve expected. 

The kiss was over as soon as it had started, not long enough to close his eyes or know what was happening until he felt more than saw Eddie pull away. 

“Well, go on, Harrington. Tell me again how badly you want to know why I left.” Eddie took a few steps backwards, turning on his heel to chug more of his beer. He wiped at his mouth with the back of his palm before offering Steve a sarcastic smile. 

He’d be stupid to say he didn’t know that whatever they had was less than platonic. Steve knew from his own butterflies and desire to be close to Eddie at all times and the way that his eyes always found themselves looking at Eddie that there was… something else there. He thought back on how his palms would get sweaty and his stomach would feel caught in his throat, thought about the way Eddie would shrink in on himself when Steve would talk to Robin about girls. 

“There it is, my big secret!” Eddie threw his arms up and laughed wildly.

It all made sense now. It all clicked into place. Steve felt like he could finally take a breath of fresh air and like the fog in his brain had magically vanished. Eddie liked him.

Steve giggled. 

Eddie’s head whipped around to look at Steve, panic obvious on his face, his eyes wide and open. Shit, that wasn’t the look he ever wanted to see on the other man’s face. Steve went to take a few steps towards Eddie who immediately took a few of his own backwards. 

“Is that it?” Steve said, a ridiculous grin still on his face. “All these dramatics cause you wanted to kiss me?” Eddie sputtered for a minute before shaking his head as if to clear a mirage from in front of him.

“Umm... yes?” It was said as a question, not an answer. The laugh he let out sounded more like disbelief than anything and his face was wrinkled in confusion. 

Steve laughed, loud and brash, and wrapped his arms around his stomach. “Eddie, dude, you’ve had me thinking for months that I was garbage and now you’re gonna tell me that it is, in fact, quite the opposite of that?”  He took in the look on Eddie’s face and laughed even harder. This was all too difficult to fully comprehend. “Oh man, that’s too good.”

Eddie’s voice was strained when he spoke, just a hint too high pitched. “I don’t know how this is funny?” Steve watched as he pulled a lock of hair in front of his face to hide and it made his heart burst into a million pieces. His laughing died down and he paused for a moment just to look at the man in front of him. 

He was scared. Where there was relief spreading through Steve, cooling and calming down the rage he had felt for so long, he knew it wasn’t the same for Eddie. Whatever he was thinking was big enough that he felt the only thing he could do was run away instead of talking to Steve. 

“Eddie,” Steve said while reaching out his hand and motioning for him to come closer. “I’m not laughing at you, man, I promise.” He ran a hand through his hair and hoped his face was showing just how elated he actually was. “Come sit down.”

“You’re not going to punch me, are you?”

“Jesus, Munson, no.” Steve sat on the edge of the van and put his hands up in a vague motion of surrender. 

“Okay,” Eddie walked carefully over to the van, his eyes never leaving Steve’s face. “You just look a little manic right now and I’m not trying to die yet.” 

Steve laughed again at that, heart fluttering at the way that Eddie’s lips quirked up a bit at the sound. The van buckled a little under both of their weights when Eddie sat on the edge next to Steve and they twisted to look at each other. Steve’s knee was digging into the meat of one of Eddie’s thighs and the heat coming off of him was a welcome comfort. 

“So you like me.” Steve phrased it as a statement, not a question and watched as Eddie’s eyes seemed to get impossibly larger. He pulled his bottom lip into his mouth and bit his teeth into the flesh before nodding jerkily. Eddie looked down at his hands sitting in his lap and started fidgeting with his rings. 

“Like an obscene amount if I’m being honest.” 

If it were physically possible, Steve would have sworn that his heart grew three sizes larger at hearing Eddie’s confession. He couldn’t help the smile that overtook his face and he sat up straighter as he tried to take in a deep breath. 

“Good, that's… good to know.” Steve let out another breathy giggle after a pause. He couldn’t believe that this was an actual conversation that they were having. 

He had hid away from his feelings for so long, let his mind ignore all the times that he felt a magnetic draw to Eddie or any time his limbs felt electric where Eddie had touched them. Steve was so used to pushing down anything that wasn’t right or perfect in the eyes of his father that for once, it felt nice to just feel unabashedly. 

“I know I should have told you or something,” Eddie started, his gaze still focused on his hands in his lap. “I just-” he broke off with a sigh. “God, Steve, you have no idea how terrifying you are.” 

Steve held his breath so he could let Eddie talk without being tempted to interrupt him. He had wanted him to explain himself and now that he was, he wasn’t going to break that. 

“You were always hot, you know? In school, walking around like you fucking owned everything.” Eddie chuckled, low and quick before taking in a shaky breath and looking up at the starless sky. “I couldn’t fucking stand you. And then you had to go and turn out to be a nice guy.” 

Eddie sniffed and ran a hand down his face, shaking his head. He pulled out his crumpled pack of cigarettes and lit one quickly. “Dustin would talk about how great you were and it fucking ruined me. This crush I had on you went from being ‘oh, he’s really good looking but he’s still an asshole’ to a full blown infatuation. You and your stupid hair and perfect smile and heart of goddamn gold.” 

Steve felt the blush starting high on his cheeks, felt his pulse quickening on the side of his neck. It was surreal seeing Eddie be this open and serious without an ounce of joking in his tone. 

“Then with everything with Vecna, you were my hero, Steve. Pulled my ass out of the Upside Down and patched me up without any hesitation. How was I supposed to not fall for that?” Eddie shook his head and took a drag from the cigarette, making sure to blow the smoke away from Steve’s face just like old times. “God, and you in my battle jacket? That is not an image I’m going to forget any time soon.” 

Eddie turned to Steve with a smirk on his face and he quirked his eyebrows up suggestively. Steve scoffed and smiled back, a shy almost nervous grin, turning his head to look at Eddie. 

“Is that so?”

“Oh yeah,” Eddie started with a slow nod, pursing his lips and closing his eyes as if tasting a delicious meal for the first time. He tapped his fingers against his temple. “It’s locked up here for a rainy day.”

Steve looked down to see that Eddie had finally stopped fidgeting with his rings and wanted nothing more than to see what his fingers felt like in between his own. 

So he did.

With one hand, Steve pried open Eddie’s fingers and slid his own between them, feeling the way his rings pressed against the sensitive skin of his fingers. Eddie’s palm was warm against his own, one part from nerves and the other from the muggy August air. Steve let his thumb run smoothly against the outside of Eddie’s own, cataloging the sharp intake of breath from him in his mind. 

“Steve.” Eddie said quietly, breathlessly. He hummed in response, staring at the way his hand fit in Eddie’s and memorizing how nice it felt. “I’m trying really hard not to freak out right now.” 

He brought his gaze up, locked eyes with the other man and let out the breath he didn’t know he was holding. “I know. Thank you, for telling me all that, I mean.” Steve leaned over and grabbed Eddie’s cigarette for the second time that night and puffed on it for a few seconds. “Is this okay?”

Eddie swallowed and looked like he was trying to evaluate everything that was going on. Steve felt his hand flex in his before holding on even tighter and steeling his expression. “Well, that depends on what ‘this’ means.” 

Steve hummed again, thought about it for a second. 

What was ‘this’? It was a good question, a great one even. Steve didn’t know if he had an answer that wasn’t completely mundane and could accurately sum up what he was feeling. The only thing he knew was that his hand fit in Eddie’s and that was enough for him. 

“I like you too, you know.” 

It was as simple as that in Steve’s eyes. He had come to terms with liking both boys and girls a long time ago and while he might not have ever acted upon it before, being with Eddie felt right. 

Eddie was silent, his beautiful brown eyes big and shining and his bottom lip was pulled in with his teeth again. Steve felt his hand twitch underneath his own and squeezed it back in response. 

“This isn’t a joke, right?” Eddie finally said quietly, his voice low and rumbling. 

“I know I used to be an asshole but I wouldn't joke about this. You have to know that.” Steve brought his other hand up, pushed it against the side of Eddie’s cheek and felt the stubble underneath his palm. “I mean it, Munson.”

Eddie looked like he melted under Steve’s hand and closed his eyes, pressing his face further into his palm. “Okay,” he responded with a small smile pulling at his lips. 

If they could, Steve would have sat there all night with Eddie in his hands but they were in public and romantic or not, they couldn’t stay in the parking lot. Steve moved his hand from his cheek to wrap in the hair at the nape of Eddie’s neck before letting go, standing and pulling the other man up by their connected hands. 

“Let me grab my stuff out of the car and we can go upstairs?” Steve asked, letting their hands swing around for a second. Eddie’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline fast enough to force a cackle out of Steve.

“My my, Harrington, are you propositioning me?” Eddie crowded into Steve’s personal space, pushing him back against Steve’s BMW with enough force that it almost knocked the air out of him. 

“If you’re objecting, then no, I’m not.”

Eddie’s eyes looked like they were sparkling. “And if I'm not objecting?”

Steve pursed his lips and brought his hand up to his chin as if he was pondering the infinite depths of the universe before cracking a grin and pushing Eddie back. He opened the trunk and pulled out his duffle bag, turning to look at Eddie with his hands perched on his hips. 

“Then grab the cooler.” He walked back to where Eddie was standing, looking at him with that cheesy smile on his face, the one that made his dimple show and his eyes crinkle and made Steve’s heart flutter. “And follow me.”

DECEMBER 22, 1986

Steve awoke abruptly to knocking at his window. Without a single light on in his room, it took his eyes some time to adjust to the darkness, his hand grappling for his bat and knocking over his side table lamp in the process. 

“Shit,” he muttered as he rolled out of bed to flick on his overhead light and get his bat firmly in his hands. Once the light was on and he was able to see outside, he saw none other than Eddie Munson sitting on the part of the roof that jutted out next to his window. The closer Steve got to his window, the better he could see Eddie’s condition. He dropped the bat on the floor and scrambled to get the window open so the other man could slide in.

“What the hell happened?!” Steve pulled Eddie into a standing position so he could get a better look at his face that was covered in bruises and gashes, blood dried and cracking on his split lip. 

Eddie didn’t waste any time in pleasantries or small talk, just started pacing around the floor while wringing his hands together.

“Fucking basketball team, man! You’d think after my name was cleared they’d leave me alone, but no. I’m still free game whenever they need a punching bag.” He turned to Steve, wild eyed with his hair going everywhere and Steve took in just how rough he looked. His knuckles were open and bleeding with a large cut going across one of his fingers where Steve assumed a ring had cut him. 

“They tried to go for the kids, man, and I just couldn’t let them-”

Steve jolted at that, thought of Mike, Lucas, Dustin, Erica sitting around the Hellfire table dealing with yet another fight that they should have never been a part of. “They’re okay, right?” he said, cutting Eddie off, anger burning hot under his skin. 

Eddie nodded his head quickly before letting out a sigh. “Yeah, of course. I wouldn’t let them touch a hair on their pretty little heads. Besides, Erica started giving them a piece of her mind and made at least one of them run away.” 

He stopped pacing and took in a deep breath while closing his eyes as if he was trying to reboot his system. Steve could tell he was rattled, more than usual. Eddie opened his eyes and looked at Steve with a fresh confusion on his face. 

“...You’re naked.”

Steve balked and brought his arms down to cover the front of his boxers. “Well dude, you kinda woke me up. And I’m not naked, I’m wearing boxers!” 

Eddie paused. He looked over Steve for long enough for a blush to start creeping up his bare chest before looking back at Steve’s face. His eyes were big and wide and Steve had to force himself to look away. “It’s snowing outside and you wore nothing to bed?”

“It’s snowing?” Steve asked as he made his way to his dresser, pulling out an old swim team shirt and throwing it on. He pressed his face up to the window next to his desk and saw that it was in fact snowing. “Wait, this is all irrelevant. Are you okay? Your face is a bit…” 

“You trying to tell me I’m not pretty?” Eddie pouted and then winced immediately as his lip pulled at the cut there.

“You’re gorgeous,” he said with a roll of his eyes, trying not to let it show that he didn’t mean it entirely sarcastically. “Wait here, I’m going to go get you an ice pack for your eye.”

Steve made his way downstairs and collected the items he thought he would need: an ice pack, a bowl with warm water, a towel, the first aid kit that he hoped was stocked after last Spring. Being away from Eddie was needed distance; seeing how beaten up he was and the why he was beaten up was doing funny things to Steve’s stomach. He needed a second away to breathe. 

Once he was back in his room, the first thing he saw was Eddie sitting on his floor while gingerly trying to pull off his rings, his face contorted in pain as he twisted the metal around. 

“Woah, dude, hang on. Let’s try to get your hand cleaned up first before you go ripping off more skin.” Steve placed everything on the floor before sitting down in front of Eddie so their kneecaps were slightly touching. He dipped the towel into the bowl of water and started dabbing at the cuts on his knuckles. 

“Thank you, by the way,” Steve said softly, breaking through the silence in the room. “For taking care of the munchkins.”

Eddie snorted and then hissed under his breath as Steve pressed the fabric into a particularly sensitive spot. “No need to thank me, man. I care about the losers.” He flexed his hand and Steve watched as the muscles moved under his skin. “I’m not gonna let some douchebag jocks pick on them.” 

Steve wrung the towel off in the bowl of water before moving up to focus on the gash across Eddie’s cheekbone, swiping at the blood that had dried around it. “Sorry,” he muttered as Eddie recoiled. 

Eddie hummed and closed his eyes, letting out a shaky breath and slumping over a bit. “What do I do, Harrington?” he asked quietly, so quietly that Steve had to ask him to repeat what he had said to even catch it. “I just-” 

He shook his head to clear his thoughts causing Steve’s hand to slip off his cheek. Steve huffed and brought his other hand to hold onto Eddie’s chin gently. “Hold still,” he said, pressing down with his thumb to prove the hold he had on Eddie. 

With wide eyes, Eddie’s tongue darted out to lick at the cut on his lip and Steve couldn’t help but watch the movement. He felt a tug low in his gut and flicked his eyes back up to look into Eddie’s. “You, uhh… you asked a question?” 

“Right,” Eddie blinked rapidly a few times before answering, “yeah.” He let out this weird half laugh that sounded more like a punch to the stomach which puffed up the bangs on his forehead. “I don’t know what to do, Steve. It’s like, how can I keep them safe all the time when I feel like I have to watch my back everywhere I go?”

Steve knew how he felt. After their first encounter with the demogorgon, Steve caught himself looking in every corner, down every alley, in any open rooms just to make sure there wasn’t one of those things lurking in the darkness. It had only been a few months since Eddie had even found out about all the craziness that Hawkins had to offer so he wasn’t surprised that he was on edge. 

“Look, I’m not going to tell you it goes away, but it’ll get better.” Steve brought the rag back up to Eddie’s face to pat at the cut on his cheek. “It took me a good year to not jump every time I heard someone knocking on my door. But if the problem is those assholes and not monsters then you let me know and I’ll take care of them.” 

He may have a shitty track record with fights but no one, no one, messed with his friends. Their little group was closer to him than anyone else, his own blood relatives included, so he would do everything in his power to make sure they were taken care of. Even if it was jocks or monsters or the nightmares that won’t let up. 

Steve opened the first aid kit and pulled out the roll of athletic tape, ripping off a piece with his teeth to place over the worst cut on his cheek to keep it in place. He moved onto Eddie’s hands, placing antiseptic on his knuckles and using a bit of water to help loosen where the rings were stuck. Carefully, he pulled the rings off one by one, noticing how callused the pads of his fingers were once he got to the ends. 

When he looked back up from his handy work, he noticed Eddie staring at him with a light in his eyes that he had never seen before. 

“Can I help you?” he asked after a few seconds, a small grin on his face. 

“Sorry, it’s just-” Eddie started and turned his head away while a smile of his own overcame his face. “You’re actually a really nice guy, aren’t you, Harrington?”

Now it was Steve’s turn to look away, a blush rising up the sides of his neck. He brought a hand up to scratch at the back of his head. “I dunno, dude.” He chuckled before turning back to Eddie. “Does it make me an asshole if I say I’m trying to be?”

Eddie grinned, big and wide with his eyes crinkling. “No, man. I don’t think so.” 

Steve stood up suddenly and stretched out his back that was sore from sitting on the ground for so long. He glanced out the window to see that the snow had picked up in the time it took for Eddie to get patched back together. 

“Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I don’t think you’ll be going back to the trailer tonight.” Steve went to his dresser and pulled out a pair of old sweatpants and a sweatshirt while Eddie scrambled over to look out the window. 

“Shit,” he said under his breath. Eddie turned around and took notice of the clothes Steve was holding out. “Are those for me?” 

“No, they’re for my invisible friend that’s been here the whole time.” He said sarcastically. “Yes, they’re for you, idiot.” 

“What, are we gonna have a sleepover? Want to braid my hair and gossip about boys?” Eddie said but still took the clothes in Steve’s outstretched hand. 

Steve sighed and put his hands on his hips. “The guest room is taken right now. My Aunt Kathy is in town for Christmas so you’ll have to bunk here with me.” Eddie’s face fell and it made Steve’s stomach twist in an unpleasant way. “I’ll sleep on the floor…?”

Eddie’s mouth dropped open but he closed it quickly while shaking his head. “No way, I’m not gonna kick you out of your bed, dude.” 

“Good, that was a stupid idea anyway. It is way too cold to sleep on the ground anyway. Oh!” Steve broke off and grabbed at his hair, walking back to the door that led to the hallway. “I’ll be right back, one second.”

As quietly as he could, Steve made his way down the stairs to the Christmas tree in the living room. He crouched down and looked for a very specific bag that he had put under the tree earlier in the week. Finding the black gift bag was easy enough so he grabbed it and made his way back to his room. 

“This was supposed to be for a few days from now, but I guess there’s no harm in you getting it today.” Steve shut the door behind him and looked up to see Eddie in just Steve’s old basketball sweatpants. They were a little baggy and Eddie had tied the waist low on his hips just to keep them up. “I have good timing,” Steve finally said which caused Eddie to crack out a laugh.

“Pervy,” he said as he reached for the bag in Steve’s hand. He held it in front of him and looked back to Steve who was grinning like the cat who got the cream. “You got me a gift?” 

“Duh, it’s Christmas.” Steve said it so matter-of-factly and with such authority that Eddie wouldn’t have been able to question him any further. “Open it!”

Eddie chuckled again and pulled at the wrapping paper that was sticking up from the bag. “Okay, geez, impatient much?” 

The smile that broke out of Eddie’s face was worth how long it took Steve to drive around trying to find a store that sold the type of band shirts Eddie liked. 

“It’s Metallica!” Steve said with a flourish of his hands and motioned for Eddie to put it on. “This is why it was good timing, dude. You can try it on!” 

Eddie put the shirt on as fast as he could, careful to miss the bandage on his face, and looked down at the artwork on the shirt. “This is the ‘Master of Puppets’ album,” was all he could croak out, looking at Steve with the same glint in his eyes as before. 

“Yeah and do you know how long it took me find this fucking shirt, dude? I’ve been looking for months but since the album is so new-”

Steve was cut off with a bone crushing hug, Eddie’s arms wrapping around his waist and air knocked out of him from the force of it. He brought his hands up to return the embrace and felt Eddie's face bury into his neck ever so slightly. The two stayed like that, wrapped up in one another, swaying from side to side for longer than Steve had ever hugged anyone before. He pulled his head back with a choked off laugh and looked at Eddie.

“I take it you like it?” And if he felt proud of himself for his gift giving skills, he was trying his hardest not to show it.

“Steve,” Eddie answered, big brown eyes shining in the harsh overhead light of Steve’s room. “This is perfect. Thank you.” 

“You’re most welcome,” he said with a pat to Eddie’s shoulder. Steve made his way back over to his bed and curled into the spot he had been in previously. “Now do me a favor? Shut off the light and let me go back to bed. I’m beat.” 

Eddie stood off to the side of the bed for a second, fiddling with the hem of his new shirt before flicking the light switch and crawling into bed next to the other man. The two laid in silence, side by side on their backs, for a while and Steve could have sworn Eddie had fallen asleep now that the adrenaline from the fight had worn off. 

“Steve?” 

His voice was soft and cut through the air like a knife. He felt Eddie shift on the bed and turned over to lay on his side only to see that the other man was already mirroring his position. 

“Thanks for, y’know... everything.” Eddie’s voice was a whisper in the darkness of the room, the moonlight streaming in off the snow being the only light in the room. He saw a small smile on Eddie’s face and gave him one back. He couldn’t help but think that he never wanted the morning to come and for Eddie to have to leave.

“Any time, man.”

PRESENT DAY

The hotel room was nice, bigger than most standard rooms with a balcony that looked out over the garden terrace courtyard on the ground floor. The two men walked in and Steve immediately flicked on the bedside lamp before dropping his bag next to the King size bed. Eddie walked around the room with wide eyes, opening the balcony doors to look at the city around them. 

“I’m uhh,” Steve said, causing Eddie to turn around to look at him as he leaned against the balcony railing. “I’m just gonna get a quick shower.” 

Eddie tilted his head to the side and quirked an eyebrow, smirk apparent on his face. 

“Is that an invitation?” 

Steve choked and turned beet red, sputtered for a minute before finding his voice. “Eventually, yeah,” and he was very proud of himself for not letting his voice crack as he said it. Eddie’s smirk turned into a wide grin and his nose scrunched up at the hint of possible future endeavors. “But for now, I promise I’ll be fast.”

He picked up a fresh change of boxers, a new t-shirt from his duffle and grabbed the separate bag of toiletries. Steve turned the water as hot as it could go and stripped out of the dirty clothes from the day, feeling instantly relieved. He stepped into the shower once the water was up to temperature and took the shortest shower of his life. 

As he scrubbed at his skin with the hotel bar of soap, he thought back to everything that had happened. The song, the burning eye contact, the kiss. He couldn’t help but giggle to himself. It felt too good to be true, like the other shoe was bound to drop the second he got out of the bathroom. 

Good things didn’t happen to Steve. He barely made it out of high school and left with a GPA that couldn’t even get him into Tech. His dating life was less than superb and his best friends were years younger than him. He had no relationship with his parents and was stuck in a less than great job cause it was the only one he could get. Not to mention the trauma that came with fighting monsters from another dimension.

This? Happiness? It didn’t come to Steve often. He was going to soak it up as best he could before something eventually happened and ruined it all. 

After he towel dried off, he wiped the steam from the mirror and took in his appearance. His skin was slightly sunkissed, his freckles showing up clearly on the bridge of his nose. He hadn’t planned on styling his hair, Eddie had seen him plenty of times with his hair in far worse conditions, but he still tossed it around trying to get it to do something. 

He brushed his teeth, dabbed on a bit of cologne and put his new boxers on along with the shirt he had brought into the bathroom. He looked at himself through the mirror and took a deep breath. 

“You’ve got this, Harrington.”

Opening the door to see Eddie right there was not what he was expecting. Being pulled out of the bathroom with a hand around his waist and being pressed against the wall next to them was also not what he was expecting. 

“Finally,” Eddie muttered against his lips, one hand around Steve’s waist and the other curling around his cheek. Steve let out a hum of surprise and brought his hands up to thread through Eddie’s hair.

This, Steve thought, I’ve definitely got this.

Steve took in a deep breath through his nose as he pushed closer into Eddie, their chests and hips bumping together. He felt the fingers on his hip dig in deeper and quickly began to regret only wearing boxers. Steve let his tongue dart out and press against Eddie’s lips for a beat before tilting his head for a better angle. 

He untangled his hands from Eddie’s hair and looped his fingers into the front of waistband on the leather pants he had somehow shimmied himself into. With a tug, he pressed his hips even more firmly against Eddie’s and arched his back off the wall, hearing a responsive sound from the other man. 

Eddie pulled back briefly to put a bruising kiss on Steve’s jawline and started to stumble backwards before connecting their lips again. Steve felt them hit the edge of the desk near the entryway and moved his hands to the backs of Eddie’s thighs, picking him up quickly to set him on the desktop. Eddie shuffled for a second before breaking from the kiss to swipe everything off the desk. It clattered to the floor and he didn’t even spare the decency to look sheepish about the loud bang it made. 

“Shut up,” he said to either Steve or the pens still rolling around on the floor before hauling Steve back in by the back of his neck. 

Making out with Eddie was going to become Steve’s newest favorite activity. They were both so passionate, tongues exploring each other's mouths, fingers pressing hard into each other's skin, breathless and messy and somehow perfect. 

Eddie’s legs wrapped around Steve’s waist, pulling him in and letting their hips roll against each other and yeah, he was really starting to regret the boxers now. Steve brought one hand back into Eddie’s hair and pulled ever so slightly to maneuver his head how he wanted it. The moan that vibrated through him was, quite possibly, the best thing that Steve had ever heard. 

He could have stayed there for hours, days, years and not have had enough of the man underneath him. They moved together in a way that felt natural, practiced. Sure, Steve had only kissed one other man in his life, some no name at a bar a year ago when he had drummed up the courage to go into the city alone, but even he knew that there was no going back from this. 

Steve broke the kiss and pulled again at Eddie’s hair to tilt his head back, appreciating the glossy look in his eyes and the flush on the tips of his cheeks. 

“Hair pulling? Really? Steve whispered, leaning down to put a lingering kiss against his lips before pulling back the tiniest bit. He watched the blush intensify and pressed his lips against the heated skin. Eddie hummed and tightened his thighs around Steve’s hips, moving his hands to go under the other man’s shirt and scratch at the trail of hair on his stomach. 

“And what about it?” he answered with a smirk, tilting his head up as far as it could go to start sucking at the skin on Steve’s jaw. 

“Shit,” he whined, bringing his other hand to toss the bandana headband off of Eddie’s forehead, taking the time to run his fingers down the hair at the crown of his head. He felt Eddie grin against his skin, tongue flicking out to lap at the spot he had been messing with. The teeth afterwards were a surprise that Steve hadn’t expected, causing him to buck his hips forward into Eddie’s. “Oh, fuck.”

He was being too loud, he knew he was. The balcony door was still open and hotel walls were thin but he didn't have the brain power to care about it at all. 

Eddie’s hands made their way up Steve’s chest, taking time to flick a finger over his nipples before wrapping them around his back, feeling the muscles contort under his hands. He had switched to a part lower down on his neck and Steve just knew he would have marks all over him by the time he checked out the next morning. 

“God, your mouth,” Steve groaned out as he pressed Eddie’s head even closer to him with a hand on the back of his head. Eddie answered with a bite followed by his slick tongue that had Steve slamming his hand onto the wall behind them. “Jesus.”

Eddie pulled back to look at his handiwork, his hands moving south to rest just above the curve of Steve’s ass. “Are you always this loud or am I just spectacularly good at this?” 

Steve rolled his eyes and pulled on Eddie’s hair again, hard enough to have him closing his eyes, mouth opening in a silent sigh. 

“Cocky bastard,” he replied before surging forward and kissing him, Eddie’s lips slick and swollen after attacking Steve's neck. 

The hands on the small of Steve’s back started inching down even further, pulling him impossibly closer into Eddie’s hips. Steve rolled his hips, his cock half-hard from just a little foreplay. He didn’t have time to be embarrassed, though, as he felt Eddie’s next to his in the same condition. He moved his hands down to the hem of Eddie’s shirt and tugged, breaking the kiss to toss it somewhere behind him. 

With the little bit of space between them, Steve looked at Eddie’s flushed face, his eyes half-lidded, his curls poofed up at the top of his head from being tugged on. It was a good look, a great look. It made Steve bend down to slowly capture his lips once again, watching as Eddie’s closed just before he pressed his lips to his. 

Steve pulled back again which caused Eddie to pout his lower lip jutting out and his eyes becoming impossibly doe-like. 

“You make it hard to stop kissing you when you look like that,” Steve said, his voice low and desperate. Eddie smirked.

“Then how about you don’t stop kissing me? Problem solved. A win for all parties involved.”

Steve sighed and pulled Eddie to him, arms circling around his back and pressed his face into the top of Eddie’s head. He felt the other man’s head rest in the crook of his neck and then felt the just there pressure of feather light kisses in the places he was sure were hickeys. 

“Do we need to talk about this?” Steve’s voice was muffled as he spoke into Eddie’s hair, one hand running up and down his spine and the other resting at the base of his neck. Eddie snorted out a laugh and let his legs tighten around Steve once again. 

“Have I ever told you how good you smell?” 

“Hey,” Steve said, lifting his head up to kiss his head before promptly laying it back down. “Don’t change the subject.”

Eddie’s tongue came out and placed a soft kitten-like lick to Steve’s skin. “I’m serious. It’s one of the things I missed most about being in Hawkins. I saved up for months to buy that cologne you wear at some fancy shop and they tried to kick me out cause they thought I was shoplifting.” He inhaled deeply, nose pressed to the crease in Steve’s neck and the breath he let out ticked. Steve twitched and Eddie took it as his cue to pull back and press a quick kiss to his lips. 

“Really? You went through all that just to get some shitty Calvin Klein cologne?”

Eddie hummed. “If it makes you feel better, Gareth ragged on me for weeks for smelling like a prep. I didn’t mind it, though. I dunno, it made me feel… close to you.”

Steve’s mind went blank. Sure, they had been making out like the world was ending and it was the last thing they would ever do, but having the verbal confirmation that this wasn’t just in Steve’s head was something he didn’t realize he needed. 

He pulled the other man’s head back once more and pressed his lips firmly to Eddie’s, hungry and needy. Steve’s hand slipped down to wrap around the backs of his thighs and he picked up Eddie, who quickly locked his heels behind his back to keep from slipping. Eddie’s hands wound around Steve’s neck and tangled in his hair as they swapped heavy kisses. 

“Steve!” Eddie shouted as he was deposited on the bed, not even realizing that Steve had walked them over to the other side of the room. Steve quieted him with another kiss. 

“Your song,” Steve said as he crowded into Eddie’s space, causing the other man to crawl backward to the head of the bed. “It was about me, right?” 

Eddie cackled, loud and bright. “Give him an award, ladies and gentlemen! He figured it out all on his own.” 

“So was it true?” He placed a kiss to the side of Eddie’s mouth and began to trail kisses down his neck to his collarbone before going back up. His mouth hovered over Eddie’s for a few breaths before he spoke again. “You’ll beg on your knees for me?”

He felt and heard Eddie’s breath hitch in his chest, his hands going to Steve’s biceps and digging into the muscle there. 

“Jesus, Steve.” 

Now it was Steve’s turn to smirk. He leant down and captured Eddie’s lips in a searing kiss, their hips slotting together and legs intertwining. Steve rolled his hips with each kiss he gave Eddie and the two of them found a rhythm that was starting to drive him crazy. The man underneath him was making these little sounds low in his throat and pulling at the hem of Steve’s shirt. 

“This needs to come off,” Eddie muttered against his lips, “like, now.” 

Steve pulled back and stared at Eddie, took in how his hair was splayed out across the pillows, his naked chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath. He brought his legs to straddle over Eddie’s, their cocks rubbing against one other, causing a hiss of relief from each of the men.

“That doesn’t sound like begging to me,” he teased. Eddie gave him a look that was both unimpressed but oh so desperate and who was Steve to not give him what he wanted? He brought his hands to the back of the shirt and pulled it over his head, pride swelling in his chest as Eddie let out a low whistle. 

“You been working out, Harrington?” he asked. Eddie sat up and pressed his face into Steve’s chest with a deep breath, his hands exploring the sides of the newly exposed torso. He kissed over the scars he could reach, made sure to kiss each freckle he could find, licked over Steve’s nipples to turn them into hard peaks. 

Steve turned to putty under Eddie’s hands and mouth. He had his hands tangled back in his hair, moving his head this way and that as Eddie’s lips touched every part of skin he could find. 

A bite to his nipple had him crying out, deep and guttural. “Shit, that’s so good, baby,” Steve said as the other man licked over where his teeth marks were still in the flesh. With a tug to his hair, Steve pulled Eddie off of him to connect their lips once more. 

“If you keep this up, I don’t know if I’ll be able to control myself,” Steve whispered against his lips before moving down across his cheek to his jaw, lips finding Eddie’s earlobe and pulling it into his mouth. 

“Yeah,” Eddie said breathlessly, his hips rocking up into Steve’s in a slow but obvious rhythm. “That’s kind of the point here.” 

Steve groaned against Eddie’s ear and pushed him back to lay on the plush bedding underneath them. “You’re gonna be the death of me,” he said with a wolfish grin before claiming his lips once more. 

They rolled against each other swapping heated kisses for Steve didn’t know how long. He could have died peacefully wrapped up in Eddie’s arms and not have had a care in the world. It felt new and exciting, rubbing against each other like high schoolers and exploring each other for the first time. It was perfect bliss. 

Until the shrill ringing of the phone ruined it. 

Steve broke away from Eddie with a sigh. “Ignore it,” he said as he planted his lips on Eddie’s neck, taking his time now to mark up his neck. They already had matching bat scars so what was matching hickeys? Eventually, the phone stopped and Steve thanked whatever God that was listening so he could focus on the task at hand.

Eddie’s hands found themselves going everywhere from Steve’s hair to trailing down his back, confident fingers even dipping under the waistband of his boxers to knead at the flesh of Steve’s ass. It had Steve gasping against his neck, grinding his cock even more steadily on Eddie’s, reveling in the feeling. 

“God, I wanna fuck you so badly.” 

They hadn’t talked about it. How far they were going to go, who was going to do what, anything. But Steve knew if he didn’t say it out loud, if he didn't put the thought into the universe, that he would explode. He felt Eddie’s fingers dig firmly into his ass, a whisper of ‘fuck yes’ that was breathed out against his ear, and took that as all the answer he needed. 

Then the phone rang again. 

He huffed in frustration, his head falling into the crook of Eddie’s neck as the other man laughed, pulling his hands out of Steve’s boxers to swat at his ass. 

“You better answer it so we can get this show on the road, dude.” 

Steve pulled a face, his eyebrows furrowed and mouth curled into a frown. “Don’t call me ‘dude’ when you just had your hands on my ass.” That caused Eddie to laugh even louder this time as Steve leaned over to the side table to grab the phone. 

“Yeah?” he answered gruffly. 

“Mr. Harrington, this is Damion at the front desk.” 

Steve sighed and ran a hand down his face. Eddie, the little shit, started to trail his hands over Steve’s thighs, fingers feather light as they dropped onto his inner thighs. He let his fingers crawl under the fabric there and Steve almost felt like he was struck by lightning as they made their way upwards. 

“Uhh,” he said, trying very hard not to moan into the phone. “Okay, hi?”

He pulled the receiver away from his face and put a hand over his mouth as Eddie connected his mouth back over one of Steve’s nipples. 

“We’ve had a few complaints regarding noise coming from your room, sir.” 

Steve took the hand off his mouth to smack at Eddie’s shoulder as he latched his lips onto Steve’s neck once more. 

“Yeah, umm, I tripped earlier.” He paused as Eddie got to a particularly sensitive spot. He took in a shaking breath and brought his hand back to weave through Eddie’s hair, pulling him off and giving him a stern look that anyone knew would mean to knock it off. “Sorry, I hit the desk and a couple of things fell.” 

There was a pause on the other end that Steve knew meant that Damion wasn’t buying any of that, but eventually he heard a sniff on the other end as the agent composed himself. 

“I see, sir. Sorry for the inconvenience. For the comfort of our other guests, however, if you could please try to keep the noise to a minimum.” 

It took everything in Steve to not laugh out loud. He currently had hands pulling at his boxers and pressing into tender areas while having the apparent master of hickeys hard at work on his neck. His cock was throbbing and he as having a hard time catching breath and he was talking on the phone to stranger about keeping the sex noises down. It was all very comical.

“Yeah, sure bud.” Steve went to hang up the phone and wasn’t able to get it on the receiver in time for Damion to not have heard Eddie burst out laughing. 

“Did we get in trouble?” He asked with a grin on his face. Steve pushed him off and back onto the bed underneath them. 

“All cause of your fucking mouth, I swear to God,” Steve answered as he went to throw his legs off of Eddie and onto the side of the bed. The second he went to stand, he felt arms creep around his bare waist and lips pressed to the back of his neck. 

“And where do you think you’re going?” Eddie asked, his hands playing with the hair leading down to the top of Steve’s boxers. “I’m not finished with you.”

Steve tilted his head back to find Eddie’s lips once more and grabbed at the hands on his stomach. He peeled Eddie’s hands off and stood up with a quickness. 

“I need to go get something out of my bag and you-” he put his hands on his hips and took the opportunity to really take in just how attractive Eddie was. His hair was a mess, lips red and puffy with a flush on his chest, leather pants somehow still in pristine shape and showing off how hard his cock was. “You need to get out of those godforsaken pants cause I know I won’t be able to peel them off of you.” 

Eddie grinned and his eyes were bright as he stood up off the bed, his fingers toying with the string that laced the pants on his hips. Steve stood where he was, a few steps away from the bathroom, and stopped to watch as Eddie slowly undid one of the strings. 

“Steve,” Eddie said, looking up at him from under his eyelashes, “if you wanna watch me take these off, you have approximately 10 seconds to grab whatever you need before I get started without you.” 

He didn’t need anymore convincing than that and he scrambled to the bathroom. He heard Eddie count, “10, 9…” and his hands searched through his toiletry bag on a mission. Tubes of things fell out and Steve didn’t even care to pick them, grabbing a condom and the travel sized bottle of lube before rushing back to the bedroom. 

“... and 1.” Eddie said with a smirk, his head tilted to the side enticingly. With a wink, he pulled the last of the string laces apart from each other and began to wiggle the pants down. Steve walked forward, hands depositing the items onto the bed and reached his hands out to place them on top of Eddie’s. 

Eddie ghosted his lips over Steve’s. “I thought you said you couldn’t help me out of these?” He asked in a whisper. Steve shuddered and placed his hands firmly on the tops of Eddie’s now exposed thighs. 

“I lied.” 

He looked down, seeing the dark patch of hair that trailed down from Eddie’s stomach and couldn’t help but get butterflies in his stomach at the idea of what would come next. 

“Of course you didn’t wear anything under them,” Steve said breathlessly, the skin under his hands warm and soft as he moved them to rest on the plush sides of Eddie’s hips. “Christ, Munson.”

He tried to connect his lips back to Eddie’s only to find the other man bending down further, getting the pants to his knees before huffing in frustration. His cock was hard and flushed red, curving up into the hairs on his stomach and Steve had never felt as turned on as he was now. 

“As sexy as this is,” Eddie started, standing back at full height, “I actually am going to have to sit down to get these off.” 

It was such a drastic change in speed and Steve barked out a laugh, followed by one from Eddie. He had never had this before; sure, he had fucked plenty of people over the years but it never felt this natural. They meshed together so seamlessly and were able to joke and poke fun and be themselves, something Steve had never thought would be possible. 

Eddie stumbled backward and sat on the bed to start peeling off the fabric from his calves. “If I had known this is how the night would be ending, I wouldn’t have worn the stupid things to begin with.” Eddie huffed and blew a piece of hair out of his face. 

“Well, I personally am very happy that I got to see you in them,” Steve said as he bent down to help pull the last pant leg off, leaving Eddie naked on the stark white bedding. He could see the nerves starting to set in on the other man’s face and took the opportunity to press a soft kiss to the side of Eddie’s calf. 

“Sweet talker,” Eddie said, a blush on his cheeks. Steve crowded into his space and kissed his lips, soft and closed mouthed to press him back against the pillows. “Steve?”

They came apart at Eddie’s question and Steve bracketed his head with his arms, looking down at him. “Yeah?”

Eddie bit at his lip quickly before tilting his head. “Are you-” he broke off and took in a deep breath. “You’re good with all this?”

Steve brought one hand to pet though Eddie’s hair, trying to soften his expression and calm his heartbeat down. “Yes,” he whispered, placing a kiss on Eddie's cheek, feeling how warm the skin was under his lips. “It’s actually kind of embarrassing just how good with this I am.” 

He took in a sharp breath and leaned up to look into Eddie’s eyes. “I think it took me a little longer to figure it out, but you have no idea how badly I want to be here. Be with you.” He stroked a hand down the side of Eddie’s face, left it cupping the side of his cheek, reveled in the way Eddie closed his eyes at the sensation. 

“Seeing you today, felt like a dream come true. I thought you were gone, Eddie. I thought I wouldn’t get to see you again and poof, there you were in those fucking pants on stage and it felt like… I dunno. It felt like a wake up call.”

He watched Eddie’s eyes go big at that, a smile so sweet spreading onto his face that Steve had to know how it tasted. 

“I’m all in, Eds,” Steve said with sincerity. “With you, I mean. You won’t be able to shake me off again, asshole.” 

Eddie wrapped his arms around Steve’s neck and pulled him down to press kiss after kiss to Steve’s face, both of them giggling like schoolgirls. 

“God, you’re such a fucking charmer, aren’t you?” 

His hands found their way back to Steve’s boxers, snapping the elastic against his back before putting his hands under the fabric to feel his ass again. Steve shifted to sit up slightly and pull at his boxers. Eddie’s eyes were laser focused on Steve’s and he couldn’t help but stare back as he got the elastic over his hips. 

Steve was humble, he was. He knew there had to be bigger dicks out there but he also was realistic. His cock was nice, good length and width without any sort of pronounced curve. He hadn’t had any complaints about it before so he wasn’t necessarily surprised when Eddie’s eyes went wide. 

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Eddie said with exasperation as Steve sat up to pull the boxers down his legs, tossing them to end up somewhere on the floor. “You really are just textbook perfect, aren’t you?” 

Eddie brought his hand up to touch gently at the tip of Steve’s cock, pulling back slowly to watch the strand of precum connected to his middle finger. Steve hissed through his teeth at the touch and subconsciously rocked his hips forward to chase the feeling. 

With his big Bambi eyes locked on Steve’s, Eddie brought his hand up to his mouth, his tongue darting out to lick at the tip of his finger a few times before pausing and putting the digit fully in his mouth. His cheeks hollowed as he sucked on his own finger and Steve’s mind imploded on itself. 

“Fuck,” he groaned, his mouth open and slack as he watched Eddie continue to push the finger in and out of his mouth. Steve’s hand came to the front of Eddie’s throat as he leant down to push his tongue in Eddie’s mouth alongside his finger.

Eddie let out a moan of his own, taking out his finger and kissing Steve fully. His hands found their favorite place once more and pulled Steve in close by his ass. Now that they both were stripped completely, their cocks rubbing together was euphoric. 

With a shove, Eddie flipped them over so he could straddle Steve’s hips, grabbing hold of his wrists and pinning them to the pillows underneath his head. Steve’s chest stretched and his back arched off the bed at the pull. Their lips met once more before Eddie broke off and started kissing his way down Steve’s body. 

“You gonna keep your hands there, sweetheart?” Eddie asked once he saw that Steve had yet to move his arms down, cocking his eyebrow and pressing a lingering kiss just under Steve’s belly button. 

Steve floundered, not even realizing that he had grabbed onto the slats of the headboard. Eddie chuckled as he saw the other man fight against where to put his hands and flipped his hair over his shoulder as he resumed kissing over Steve’s stomach. 

“We’re gonna have to explore that later,” Eddie muttered into the soft flesh where Steve’s leg met his torso. After a few moments of nothing, Eddie looked up yet again and rolled his eyes. “Steve, please pull my hair. I’m giving you explicit permission to.” 

That he could do. He unclenched his fists from the wood headboard to bring his hands down to the pillowy curls. One hand pushed back the bangs from Eddie’s forehead and the other wrapped around the back of his head to grab at the hair at the nape of his neck. 

With a cheeky wink that had Steve rolling his eyes, Eddie brought his mouth to where he needed it most. His tongue licked up from the base to tip on the underside of his cock and Steve could have sworn he blacked out for a second. 

“Oh, shit,” Steve said breathlessly as Eddie wrapped his lips around the tip before moving his head down. His mouth was hot, almost too hot, and Steve had to will himself to not buck up into the welcoming heat. Eddie pulled off and spit slowly onto his cock. The eye contact was too much for Steve and he had to close his eyes to sear the image of Eddie sucking his cock into his brain. 

He felt a pinch on his thigh and peeked an eye open to see Eddie hovering just over the tip. “Eyes on me, Stevie.” 

He lowered himself back down Steve’s cock and Steve had to force himself not to close his eyes at just how good it felt. He had had blowjobs before but nothing, nothing, compared to Eddie on his elbows and knees, back arched just so as he bobbed over him. 

Steve pulled Eddie’s hair, doubling over on himself at the vibrating moan it earned him and released his hold almost immediately. Eddie pulled off with a wet slurp and took Steve in his hand, pumping him slowly enough to keep him just close enough to the edge. 

“What was that, Steve?” He pressed a kiss to the tip of his cock and pulled away just as quickly, keeping his hand in a steady rhythm. “I already told you I like having my hair-”

Without wasting a second, Steve pushed a hand back into Eddie’s hair at his hairline and pulled it back, loving how his eyes fluttered closed at the feeling. 

“If you moan again on my dick, I’m going to come way too quickly.” 

It was said matter of factly and Eddie let a sloppy smile come across his face. “Okay, okay, I get it. No more hair pulling.” He brought his mouth back to Steve’s cock and let another line of spit fall onto the tip before taking him into his mouth. 

“Goddamnit,” Steve said low and deep, his hand finding the back of Eddie’s head again, careful not to twist the strands of hair into his fingers. He pushed lightly at Eddie’s head, encouraging him to keep going only to have Eddie pop off him once more. 

“Later though, right? You’ll pull my hair later?”

Steve chuckled and maneuvered Eddie’s head back down onto his cock again. “Sure, later.” 

Eddie worked with vigor, sucking hard and wrapping his tongue around him when he could. He didn’t try to take Steve down his throat, and he didn’t blame Eddie for that at all. He knew sometimes his size could be intimidating. Eddie did however take the time to pay attention to Steve’s balls, sucking them into his mouth as he pumped at his cock with a hand loosely fisted around him. 

At one point, Steve looked down and saw that Eddie had a hand on himself, jerking at the same pace as he was bobbing on Steve’s cock. It was one of the hottest things he had ever seen, bringing him too close to the edge that he knew he would finish too soon. 

He held Eddie down for a beat before pulling him off by a hand on his cheek. Ignoring the whine it brought out of Eddie, he smoothed his hand over the mess of spit that had collected on his chin before pulling Eddie up for a kiss that was just as messy.

“Why’d you stop me?” he asked with a pout, his hand finding its way back to wrap around Steve’s cock. Steve swatted at Eddie’s shoulder.

“Because I don’t want to come yet,” he answered with an incredulous look on his face. He flung his arm to the side to grab the condom and lube he had thrown on the bed earlier. With a flourish, he brought the condom up to wave in front of Eddie’s face. 

“Oh, fuck yes,” Eddie said and scrambled to a sitting position, his cock flushed to a point of looking painful. He was sitting back on his heels as he made grabby hands at Steve who looked at him with confusion. He rolled his eyes. “The lube, Steve.” 

The bottle was tossed to him and instead of catching it, it hit Eddie’s chest and fell to the bed in front of him. 

“Nice catch,” Steve said with a chuckle. Eddie glared at him and flicked the bottle open, dribbling the lube onto his fingers. 

“You’re the athlete between us, darling.”

Steve watched with a furrowed brow as Eddie rubbed the lube between his fingertips before reaching behind himself. “Hey, what are you-”

“I got impatient,” Eddie cut him off with a shaky breath, his knees pressed into the bed underneath him in a wide straddle to push a finger inside himself. 

His eyes rolled back into his head slightly and his mouth dropped open, chest puffing up with the massive gulps of air he was taking in. Steve sat up fully against the headboard, hand coming down to stroke at himself lazily. 

There had been a lot of things that night alone that Steve thought would be the hottest thing he had seen. Eddie’s face as he pulled on his hair, the way he looked so innocent with his wide eyes as his mouth mapped over Steve’s chest, bobbing over his cock. 

This took the top prize. 

“Shit,” he said on a groan, Eddie steadily working his hips in a rhythm over his finger. His skin was so pale that his whole body was flushed, his eyes half-lidded, tongue running over his bottom lip before pulling it with his teeth. 

“Steve…” Eddie whispered back. His head fell forward with a sigh and then he rolled it to the side, his hair falling over his shoulders in a way that made him look like a goddamn supermodel. 

“Yeah, baby?”

With his hand working over his cock, he was trying so hard to not pull Eddie down and finish fingering him open because he was enjoying the show so much more. 

“Feels so good, Steve.” Eddie let out a broken chuckle as he paused his movements to add an extra finger in himself. Steve watched with full attention as Eddie’s eyes widened suddenly and he took in a shaking breath, releasing it with a moan. “Steve,” he whined once again, starting to move his hips once more. 

And fuck, if Steve thought he looked hot earlier, there was no way he would ever be able to scrub the desperate call of his name out of his brain. 

Eddie fell forward, bracing himself with his other hand, and pressed his cheek into the bed. His ass was high in the air now and Steve had a full view of just what exactly he was doing to himself. 

With every push of his fingers, his hips went back to meet them. Eddie was letting out these little sounds constantly intermixed with expletives or Steve’s name. Steve had to force himself to pull his hand off of his cock because he could surely come from that visual alone. 

He shuffled himself onto his knees to crawl over to Eddie. “Doing so good, baby,” Steve muttered with his lips pressed to Eddie’s back. He pulled away to stroke his hand over the plump swell of Eddie’s ass before bringing his hand to the other side and pulling him apart even further.

“Fuck,” Eddie groaned, low and rumbling in his chest. 

Steve kissed Eddie’s ass cheek before grabbing the bottle of lube and pouring a little bit onto his own finger. He dragged it around the underside of where Eddie was opening himself before teasing it against Eddie’s fingers. 

“Can I help?” Steve whispered, loving the way it made Eddie shiver in response. 

“Please, please Steve-” His voice was getting breathier and more desperate as the time went on. If he asked anything in that voice, Steve didn’t think he’d ever be able to tell him no. 

The air around them was hot and muggy, their bare skin sweaty and sticky where it was touching each other. As Steve pushed his finger in alongside Eddie’s, he could have sworn the room got hotter by 100 degrees. 

Eddie keened, his back arching and hand curling into the comforter before reaching behind him blindly to find Steve’s thigh. His fingers dug into the muscle there in a way to ground himself and Steve just about stopped breathing. 

“Shit, Eddie.” Steve’s finger was enveloped in a heat he wasn’t fully expecting, soft and pulling him in. He draped himself over Eddie’s back and pushed his hair to the side so he could place kiss after kiss on his shoulder. 

Their hands moved in tandem with one another. Steve breathing out little encouragements into Eddie’s ear and the other man answered with moans and curse words. He sat up a bit, looked at Eddie laid out on the bed with his legs spread wide and brought his free hand to tangle in his hair once more. 

Eddie’s mouth quirked up at the feeling, cracking an eye open to see Steve lording over him. 

“Do it,” he said firmly. Steve didn’t need to be told twice and he pulled roughly. Eddie’s eyes fluttered shut once more, mouth open in a moan and his fingers sped up in his ass. “So good, so good, so good.”

If they kept this up, Steve didn’t know if they’d make it much further. He kept his hand on Eddie’s head, pressing it into the bed as he pulled his finger out, causing Eddie to whine. He laid over Eddie’s back once again to get his mouth down next to his ear. 

“You ready?” he asked, and Eddie responded by closing his eyes and pulling his fingers out. He stretched and looked almost cat-like before sitting up to pull Steve in for a kiss. The two fell back onto the pillows together, tongues hot in each other’s mouths, legs twisting together. 

Steve rolled over to lay on top of Eddie who wrapped his legs around his waist. Their hips rocked together a few times before Steve broke off to start rolling the condom on. He reached behind him to get the bottle of lube and poured a line onto his cock, trying not to take too long spreading it around on his sensitive cock. 

He grabbed one of Eddie’s legs and pushed it towards his chest, leant down to steal one more kiss before dragging the head of his cock against his hole. 

Slowly but surely, he pushed in, pausing anytime he saw the slightest of winces on Eddie’s face. Steve kept his mouth hovering just right over his, giving him small, sweet kisses. Eddie had his arms wrapped around Steve’s neck and let one hand play with the hairs at the nape of his neck. 

“Holy fuck, Steve,” he breathed out with his eyes big and wide before they rolled shut, eyebrows almost into his hairline. “Oh my god.” 

“I know, me too.” Steve chuckled a little breathlessly and paused once their hips were flush. He licked back into Eddie’s mouth, still not yet tired of the taste of cigarettes and beer and Eddie that he found there. 

He felt a subtle roll of hips against his own and looked down to see that Eddie was definitely moving against him. Steve smirked and rocked his hips to meet Eddie’s, relishing in the way his eyes shot open. 

“Fuck, Steve,” he said again, the hand tangled in Steve’s hair tightening its grip. 

Steve pulled out slightly, the slide wet and perfect. He pushed further down to connect their lips again, tongue licking into Eddie's mouth in tandem with his shallow thrusts. He kept one hand on the back of Eddie’s thigh, pressing it to his chest, the other hand braced near the side of his head. 

“You feel so good, babe,” Steve breathed out, his thrusts starting to get deeper and harder. Eddie’s bottom lip was stuck between his teeth and Steve knew that there would be little indents of his teeth when he stopped. 

Eddie grinned, showing off his dimples and making his eyes get all crinkly. “Thank you,” he said before surging up to capture Steve’s lips with his own once more. 

“Wow, pretty and humble, who would have thought?” Steve said with a roll of his eyes. He increased the speed of his thrusts and watched as another smile spread across Eddie’s face. 

“You think I’m pretty, Stevie?”

Steve brought his hand up to brush away some hair stuck to Eddie’s forehead and trailed his fingers down the side of his face. 

“I think you’re beautiful.”

It was probably a bit too sappy, a bit too serious and Steve would have thought it was cheesy if he wasn’t already falling scarily hard for the man underneath him. Eddie’s eyes softened, his smile sweeter than before and he placed his hand over Steve’s.

“Look who’s talking,” Eddie said without a hint of sarcasm. He pulled Steve’s face down to meet his and pressed a messy kiss to his cheek. “Calling me beautiful when we all know who the real looker is here.” 

With the way that Eddie was spread out underneath him, Steve was able to spot the tattoo low on his stomach of his bat full of bloody nails. He brushed his fingers against the ink, Eddie sucking in a breath at the contact.

"You got this tattooed," he said, his thumb continuously running over the skin. 

"It's very metal," Eddie breathed out and tangled his fingers with Steve's. "Plus, you know, I'm kind of obsessed with the guy who wields it."

Steve responded with a particularly hard thrust and shoved his tongue into Eddie's open mouth. He didn't know what else to say that could possibly show just how much he loved it.

You're mine, Steve's brain supplied for him. Mine.

Eddie’s leg wrapped around the dip underneath Steve’s ass to pull him closer, heel of his foot digging into the swell of an asscheek. It spurred Steve on, his hips grinding as close to Eddie as he could. 

He must have a sweet spot because suddenly, all of Eddie’s limbs tighten at once. The hand that was threaded through Steve’s hair pulled him down, the heel pressing into his ass dug in deeper, the fingers wrapped around his own squeezed tightly, and Eddie let out a moan that was sure to ring in Steve’s ears for a long time. 

“Right there, oh my fucking God,” Eddie breathed out, his voice breaking off with each thrust. “Steve, don’t you fucking stop.” 

His eyes were rolling back into his head and his jaw was slack and Steve took a mental picture to hold onto because that? He could paint that image a thousand times and it would never do it justice. 

Eddie’s hole tightened sporadically around Steve’s cock, making his hips stutter and punching a groan out of him. 

It all felt right. Being here with Eddie underneath him, squirming and making sounds that he never thought he’d get to hear, feeling his heart beating just as fast as his, seeing the pure bliss on his face. He could fuck a hundred, hell, a million people and never get as close to perfection as he was now. 

“Eddie,” he choked out. He pressed a sloppy kiss to his cheek and then let his face fall into the other man’s neck. “Babe, I’m close. I’m-”

He felt Eddie’s hole flutter around him and he moaned, loud and open in Eddie’s ear. He felt hands petting his hair and brushing over his back, lips pressing softly to the side of his head. 

“I know, sweetheart,” Eddie whispered. “I’ve got you, come on.” 

Steve had enough brain power to snake a hand between them to wrap around Eddie’s cock, hard and weeping on his stomach. Eddie took in a sharp breath through his nose at the contact and released it through a hiss between his teeth.

“Oh, so not fair,” he said, groaning at the pressure around him. They were both breathing hard against one another at this point, wrapped fully around each other, Steve’s hips bucking into Eddie fast and deep. Eddie was chanting out ‘yes, yes, yes’ under his breath, which just made Steve’s hand speed up. 

Steve was reaching his limit. Every fiber of his being felt like it was on fire and Eddie’s little sounds weren’t making it any easier to not finish. He pulled his head up to meet Eddie in a searing kiss as he pounded his hips into him a few more times.

“Fuck,” Steve moaned, his hips stuttering as he came. His grip on Eddie turned fast and hard, the heavy breaths from the man underneath showing that he was not too far behind. 

He felt like he was floating, his eyes locked on Eddie’s unfocused gaze, working his hips through the last of his orgasm to help get Eddie there. Steve felt the other man tense up and just like that, he was coming over his hand. His mouth was open and his eyes were screwed shut as he panted, his chest heaving. 

Steve kept his hand around Eddie’s cock until the other man started batting at it with a hum of disapproval. “Quit it,” he whined, his voice slow like molasses. 

He pulled his hand away and flung it to the side, already tempted to get up and find a tissue but preferring to stay right where he was. Eddie’s eyes cracked open, an exhausted smirk on his lips. He brought his arms up to wrap around Steve’s neck, pulling the other man down to kiss him slow and syrupy sweet. 

Steve pulled out of Eddie as gently as he could, kissing the line on his forehead when Eddie's eyebrows pulled together at the uncomfortable feeling. "Sorry," he muttered against his forehead. He reached down himself to take off the condom, tying a knot in the top and holding it in his hand that was covered in Eddie's release. He's deal with that later. Right now, all he wanted to do was cuddle up with the boy who had tilted his world on its axis.

They kissed softly for a few minutes, basking in the afterglow and trying to get use of their limbs again. Steve had his clean hand petting at Eddie’s hair with their legs tangled together.

“Mmm, Eddie,” Steve hummed as he tried to break off their kisses only to be dragged back down by the arms around his neck. “Baby, I gotta go get a towel or something.” 

Eddie huffed against his lips before flinging his arms down dramatically and sighing. “Fine, but make it quick. I want to cuddle.” 

Steve snorted and pressed a final kiss to the side of Eddie’s mouth, rolling over to stand up. “Such a drama queen,” he said jokingly. The bathroom was so close that he barely had finished his sentence by the time he had fished a hand towel off the rack and tossed the used condom into the small trashcan under the sink. 

He turned the corner while he wiped his hand, careful not to trip over the pens and coasters that were scattered on the floor from the desk, to a sight that would take his breath away. 

Eddie was curled on his side, one leg drawn up and his head resting in his hand. The smile on his face was one of bliss and made his face look soft around the edges. His hair was wild and his cheeks were still flushed and Steve didn’t know what to do with his stammering heart. 

Eddie reached his arm out when he saw that Steve was back and pulled him down to the bed. He then proceeded to do his best koala impression and wrap himself firmly around Steve, making sure to have every part of them touching. 

They were both sweaty, skin sticky and hot, so it wasn’t the most comfortable but Steve couldn’t find it in him to mind. The night air had cooled immensely and the breeze coming in from the open balcony door was a welcome reprieve. 

Steve leaned back so he could look at Eddie’s face, taking the time to trace his fingers over his closed eyelids, his nose, his lips. He tucked his hair behind his ear and brushed his sweaty bangs from his forehead. Eddie’s eyes fluttered open at the touches and made sure to kiss at the pads of Steve’s fingertips as they trailed over his lips. 

“Hey,” Steve said softly, the silence in the room now deafening. Eddie hummed. “So that was…”

He didn’t know how to finish the sentence. It felt too small to say it was great but it felt too big to say that he never wanted to be anywhere other than right here ever again. Steve knew that this was a step in the right direction but it didn’t stop him from feeling nervous at what the morning would bring. 

Were they together? Was this a one time thing? He didn’t think it was. He knew that Eddie liked him, knew he liked him back, knew that it was a serious thing. But they didn’t exactly talk about it. They didn’t put a label on anything. It felt like the gears were turning in his head but weren’t clicking into place. 

“Earth to Steve,” Eddie whispered back with a smile. He waved a hand in his face and pushed his finger into Steve’s forehead. “I can practically hear you thinking.” Eddie bit at his lip and tilted his head, suddenly looking every bit as nervous as Steve felt. 

“Sorry, just,” Steve shook his head and ran his fingers through Eddie’s hair as if it was a way to calm them both down. “That was okay, right?” 

Eddie’s mouth curled up into a grin. “Are you looking for a performance review? 10 out of 10, spectacular, Earth shattering. You’ve ruined me for men forever.” 

Steve forced himself to chuckle, eyes falling down to where his hand was curled in a lock of Eddie’s hair. “Thanks, but I meant… Like, we’re okay?” He took in a shaking breath and laid his head in the crook of Eddie’s neck to hide. 

“Oh,” Eddie said eventually. His hands came up to rub soothing patterns on Steve’s bare back, leaving goosebumps in their wake. “Steve.” He got a grunt in response. “Stevie, look at me.” He twisted his head as Eddie pulled back the slightest bit so they could make eye contact. 

“I’m going to say this once, so you better listen.” Eddie’s foot trailed up Steve’s calf before settling to wrap his leg around his knee. “I’ve been wanting to do that for 5 years. There is no question in my mind that kissing you in the parking lot was the best decision I could have made.” 

Steve snorted and rolled his eyes. “Now who’s the sweet talker?” 

Eddie rolled over and caged Steve in with his arms with his face hovering over the other man’s. He leant down and placed a feather light kiss to his lips. 

“I’m serious, Steve. Absolutely no regrets. In fact,” he slotted a knee between Steve’s legs and let his hips drop gingerly to press their spent cocks together. “I can’t wait for round two.” 

Steve felt a blush creep up his neck, flushing his cheeks. “Yeah, that’s gonna have to wait until the morning.”

A light chuckle escaped Eddie at that and he curled himself against Steve’s side, his leg coming up to drape over his thighs and head resting on his shoulder. His hand started to play in the hair on his chest and Steve drew lazy shapes on Eddie’s upper arm. 

“So who’s getting up to close the door?” Eddie asked after a beat of silence, hearing the low laugh that rumbled out of Steve’s chest. “Not me, that’s for damn sure. You’re too comfy of a pillow for me to want to move.” 

“We’re 6 floors up,” Steve said and pressed a kiss onto the top of Eddie’s head. “No one’s dumb enough to scale the building just for that. I say we leave it open.” 

Eddie tilted his head back and caught Steve’s lips with his own. “You know, logically, that’s really not the smartest plan, what with our track record and all.” He snuggled his head down against Steve’s chest once more and closed his eyes. 

Steve looked down at Eddie, felt his heart beat loud enough that the other man could probably hear it, pictured waking up with him warm against his side and not worrying about anything else in the world. 

“I’m willing to take that chance if you are.” 

The smile on Eddie’s face, lazy and subtle and perfect, was answer enough. 

“I’m all in, Harrington.”