Chapter Text
They’re quick to get him out of there—there being Hawkins, and they being some morally ambiguous shadow group that every member of the motley Vecna crew seems to have a different definition of. Like, he’s pretty sure there are Russians involved, but also the US government’s got something to do with it, and also there are (were?) some evil scientists, but also some good scientists, and he’s not really clear which side of that divide Wheeler’s scary little girlfriend stands on, but somehow she’s involved, too. And her dad is (was?) the ringleader? But the heretofore dead-or-AWOL Chief Hopper’s also her dad? Apparently?
It’s a lot to take in. Maybe it would’ve all been easier to swallow if Eddie hadn’t been fresh off of learning about the eldritch nega-Hawkins next door—along with its resident inside-out maniac. Or if said maniac hadn’t crumpled two people like soda cans right in front of him. Or if he hadn’t spent the better part of a week hiding from a whole town ready to rip him apart—or if he’d slept more than twenty minutes through the whole ordeal.
But he doesn’t have the juice left to process all that, so he doesn’t. And when a dude in a suit walks into the hospital room where Eddie’s spent the last two days getting poked and stitched and pumped full of antibiotics and beige-tasting Jell-O, he doesn’t process that either.
And when this caricature of a secret service agent tells him and his Uncle Wayne that they’re being moved out of Hawkins, that it’s all being taken care of, that they’ll be under observation, that this is all for their own safety, Eddie doesn’t have a single godfearing thought about it.
Well, he has one.
“Hellfire?” He mutters, woozy. Uncle Wayne puts one of his big dry hands on Eddie’s shoulder. Either he or the agent says something—Eddie’s not sure. Morphine heavies his lids and makes everything sound like an echo, far away.
“My friends,” he says, then closes his eyes.
***
The sour taste of duct tape sticks to Eddie’s teeth as he smooths the Judas Priest poster against the wall. There’s a tear along the left side and a suspiciously bloodlike smear near the bottom, but Eddie doesn’t care—it’s one of the few things that’d survived the trailer, and it makes the boxy room he’d been sleeping in for the last two months feel less like a bedroom and more like his.
A lot of their stuff’d been deemed “too contaminated” to keep—mostly Wayne’s things, Eddie recalls, with no small amount of guilt. His uncle’s mug collection, for instance. Everything in the kitchen and living room, almost all of their furniture. The scant photos of family members that predated Eddie: a black-and-white shot of a wiry dog, a severe-looking woman and a young Wayne missing his two front teeth. Their new spot came with some basic furnishings—a couch, beds, a dining table and chairs, even a new(ish) TV in the living room—but Eddie found himself missing their lumpy old couch. The trailer’s dark, familiar carpet.
Eddie’s room had been farther away from the portal—less demo-dust on the walls—so he got to keep his posters, his clothes, most of his books. His Dungeons and Dragons materials. Not his guitar. Eddie swallows. The…people, the They, they’d burned anything he’d taken with him to the Upside Down. They’d done it while he was in the hospital, too doped out to protest or even know. It stings—that was his baby, his love—but he supposes as far as guitar-deaths go, absolutely fucking shredding “Master of Puppets” in the proverbial bowels of hell’s just about as metal as it comes.
Now, Eddie claps his hands together and steps back, squinting. The walls are sparse, but at least they’re not bare. He’s got a new mattress for the first time in his life—it’s wrapped in a set of stiff gray sheets they’d grabbed at the K-Mart their first night here. There’s a squat bookshelf buckling under the weight of his books in the corner, and a lamp glows dimly on an upside down cardboard box nearby.
It’s not much, he thinks. The thought ends there.
Eddie should probably be embarrassed that it’s taken him this long to do it—to unpack his meager belongings—but he’s not. He tugs at a bandana pinned to the wall, slides the pad of his finger along the lamp’s hot shade. Part of him’s still not sure this is real. Part of him thinks he did die in the Upside Down, that this—the aftermath, the real world—is all some fucked up purgatorio, that maybe in facing down a horde of demobats so a smartass, gold-hearted fifteen year old wouldn’t have to, he’d canceled out all the mostly-shit stuff he’d done before that and landed himself in the afterlife’s equivalent of an apartment complex in the afterlife’s equivalent of the Indianapolis metro.
So when Dustin had called a week ago, Eddie’d done his best to sound cool. Settled. Like he’d spent the days since Hawkins doing more than just reading, sleeping, smoking, and feeling sorry for himself.
“The club’s taken a vote.” Dustin had that insufferably declarative tone on, the one Eddie both hated and adored. “We all agree—once school's out, we’ll come up to Indianapolis every Saturday if you’ll DM one more campaign.”
“That so? I don’t recall being asked to cast my vote,” Eddie’d said. “Pretty fucked up democracy you’re running here, Henderson.”
Dustin’s scoff made Eddie’s cheeks hurt. “Like you wouldn’t piss your pants to see us again!” When Eddie just hmmed, the kid went quiet for a moment. Then his voice got so soft and young it nearly took a bite out of Eddie, right out of his chewed up gut: “Do you…not want to see us?”
Red sky. Cold hands. Metal tang behind his teeth. I’m—I’m gonna look after them—
“Kill the waterworks, kid,” Eddie’d said, even though he was the one sucking back sudden tears. “You can come. Probably. Let me check with my uncle first.”
He knew Wayne wouldn’t mind—his uncle was a quiet man, but not a cold one. He’d been watching Eddie with sad, tired eyes ever since the hospital. Every night, he’d pick up dinner on the way home from his shift at the hardware store—fast food, usually, a luxury he could afford now that They were paying their rent—and watch Eddie eat it. He tried to be subtle about it, but Eddie noticed. Wayne only seemed to relax once he’d gotten through at least half a burger.
It made Eddie’s shoulders itch.
“Course you can have your friends over,” Wayne had said when he’d asked. Eddie appreciated how casually he’d shaped the word friends . “Hell. Have ‘em stay the night.”
Eddie saw him hide a smile behind his Whopper. He’d buried his own in a fistful of fries.
And so: now he’s digging through his last two boxes, looking for his favorite dice—he’s sure he kept them, he’d made a point of tucking them in a sock and tossing that in with his miniatures—all in preparation to play pretend with a bunch of kids he’d fought the devil with not too long ago.
And he remembers he’s alive. Believes it.
***
Eddie hadn’t thought to ask how Henderson et al. would be getting to Indianapolis, so when Saturday afternoon comes and there’s a knock at the door, he’s more than a little surprised to find Steve Harrington on the other side of it.
“Dork delivery,” Steve drawls. There’s noise behind him—a snort, a what, an offended hey—and Steve smirks a little, steps aside.
Teenagers pour past him—a veritable typhoon of them. Okay, well, maybe not that many, but Eddie’d thought the club meant Dustin, Mike, and Lucas, maybe their little friend Will he’d heard so much about. By his count, there are no fewer than seven gangly bodies squawking around him, shedding backpacks and shoes like feathers: Dustin, Mike, Lucas, and Will, yeah, but also Max, scowling around an eyepatch, the psychic—El?—and the indomitable youngest Sinclar, voice sharp and steely above the din.
“You…brought reinforcements,” Eddie says.
Dustin breaks off whatever argument he’d been having with Mike and Erica—the nexus of the squawking, the squawk-nexus, so to speak—and seems to remember where they are, why they’re there. He slams into Eddie with enough force to remind him he has ribs. Recently broken ones.
“Jesus Henderson,” he croaks.
“Sorry,” Dustin says quickly. He beams up at Eddie unapologetically. “But yeah. Reinforcements! Plus Max. She doesn’t want to play.”
“I don’t want to play,” Max echoes.
“But she wanted to come.”
“Lucas made me come.”
Lucas—somehow already in Eddie’s kitchen, when did that happen—yells, “You asked to join!”
“No,” Max says, teeth clenched, “I asked if you were really gonna ditch me every weekend to play your stupid game.”
“No, you said—”
“I know what I said, Lucas—”
“Hello, Eddie.”
Eddie blinks. It’s Mike’s girlfriend. Her hair’s grown a bit, and she’s wearing a polite smile. “Hi,” he says. “...El, right?”
“Yes,” she says, gives him an endearingly sincere curtsy. “Thank you for having us in your home.” After a moment, she adds, “Thank you for a lot of things.”
“Uh,” Eddie says, a little overwhelmed. “Pleasure’s all mine.” El nods and heads towards the growing crowd in the kitchen.
There’s a tired sigh behind him. Steve’s leaning in the doorway, arms crossed, “Never have kids,” he says.
“I’m gonna need a bigger dungeon,” Eddie mutters. At Steve’s strange look, he adds, “In the campaign. Henderson didn’t tell me he’d be bringing a goddamn cavalry. Little shit.” He shakes his head. “And you! Color me gobsmacked. You gonna play, Harrington?”
“Oh no, not me,” Steve says, holding his hands up. “I’m just the chauffeur.”
Eddie blinks rapidly. “You drove them all the way here to just—what, watch?”
Steve shrugs. “Not like I had anything better to do.” He looks away, scratching at the corner of his mouth.
There’s an odd layer around the words that Eddie almost recognizes—flat, frank, a little too casual. It reminds him of the tone he’d used to tell Gareth and Jeff he’d flunked senior year. Again.
He feels, suddenly, and with a bizarre conviction, that it doesn’t suit Steve Harrington at all.
“Well, get in here, Harrington,” he says, waving Steve in from where he’s still hovering in the doorway. Steve looks a little surprised, doesn’t move until Eddie jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “Someone’s gotta help me wrangle these goddamn animals.”
*
It takes them a good hour to get things started—Eddie has to set the stage, and they have to divvy up snacks, and Lucas forgot his character sheet so he has to make another, to his sister’s immense irritation—but once they’re in it, they’re in it. Side chatter dies. Magic flows. Hours roll by like creekwater, steady and fresh.
It’s easy for Eddie to lose himself in the narrative. He’s a little rusty at first—hell, he hasn’t spoken to anyone other than his uncle in months, much less guided a ragtag group of adventures through an imaginary gauntlet of tricks and villains—but the rhythms come back quick. It feels like pulling his beaten-up winter boots out of the closet after a long, grueling summer. It’s warm, it’s familiar, it fits.
He’s grateful for Will; the kid’s a legendary roleplayer, sharp and practical, and he balances out Dustin and Mike, who so often overthink Eddie’s (admittedly pretty sinister) puzzles. El, the poor girl, tries to befriend every NPC they meet, but can’t roll charisma for shit. Max ends up functionally playing for Lucas—at first she’s just rolling his dice, because you do it weird, but by hour three she’s got thoughts about what they should do with the Baron’s nephew.
Steve watches from the couch. It puts Eddie on edge at first, almost makes him want to turn around and tell him to just get over here, but something stops him. Something skittish, spacious. Yeah, they’d gone through some truly wild shit together, they’d stared into the abyss and the abyss stared back, but he still doesn’t know much about the guy—the real guy. Not the dickhead from high school, all smarm and charm, but the one who’d walked with him in the Upside Down, who radiated everything’s going to be okay energy, even with the world on the edge of complete destruction.
It feels weird. And Eddie’s doesn’t usually shy from weird, but this weird’s different from his usual flavor—less counterculture freakazoid and more I don’t want to look at this, not straight on. So he doesn’t. And it’s not like Steve’s just staring at the walls—he’s snorting at Dustin’s bad puns, helping Max heckle Lucas. When the gang’s facing down a murder of Kenku bandits, he even tosses a few combat suggestions—all of which Erica shuts down, brutally.
“If you want to play, you get your ass over here and play. Otherwise? Hush up. No backseat drivers.”
“I am literally the driver in this room,” Steve protests. “You were in my backseat.”
“Shut it,” Erica shoots back. The badly hidden grin withers on Eddie’s face when she fixes her hard eyes back on him. “I use uncanny dodge.”
It goes on like this for a while. Around seven, they order pizza. At eight, Wayne walks through the door and a chorus of hi Mr. Munsons rises from the table.
“Kids,” Wayne says, nodding. He lingers briefly, beer in hand, looking like he wants to ask a question. Instead, he says, voice gruff, “If everyone’s up by noon, I’ll make breakfast.”
They play for another hour—until Eddie starts to hear something that sounds suspiciously like a snore coming from Steve's side of the couch. When he slaps his hands against his thighs, he politely ignores the startled grunt that follows.
“You’ve fared well so far, travelers,” he sneers at the group, “but know this! You’re never far from the clutches of evil. Sleep, rest, dream, but know that I—Eddie Munson—have much, much more in store for you.”
Mike audibly gulps.
“AKA, it’s bedtime. Girls in the guest room, boys out here in the living room. Harrington—” Eddie leans back in his chair, tipping his head backwards at the unlikely babysitter, “—you’re bunking with me. Hope you don’t mind the floor.”
“Floor’s fine,” Steve mumbles, trying (and failing) to surreptitiously rub at his eyes. Eddie gives him an upside down wink.
*
Once the kids are settled—which takes about an hour longer than Eddie expects and requires Steve putting his hands on his hips and bringing out his Serious Voice, which Eddie finds both terrifying and oddly endearing—Eddie ushers Steve into his room.
“Welcome,” he says, spinning, “to my incredibly adequate sleeping quarters.”
“Nice,” Steve says. “I like the…room-ness. Of it.” He gestures vaguely, a rolled-up sleeping bag tucked against his hip.
“It’s the pinnacle of rooms. Room a la mode.”
Steve purses his lips, taps a finger against his jaw. “Doesn’t that mean…with ice cream? Or something?”
“You need something to sleep in?” Eddie asks, veering the conversation because he thinks Steve might be technically right. “I’ve got this Zeppelin shirt you’d look metal as hell in.”
“Nah, I’m good,” Steve says, rolling out the sleeping bag. “I’d take a pillow though.”
Eddie grabs one from his bed, tosses it over to Steve. He's glad he has one to spare—he only had one pillow in the trailer.
They change with their backs to each other—or least, Eddie does. He’s not sure where Harrington’s looking, but he hopes it isn’t at the gnarly scars curling around his torso—even Eddie tries to avoid looking at them. Some pale and shining, others red, raised, angry. He yanks on a soft gray tee as quickly as he can.
He feels a twinge of guilt climbing into his bed as Steve wiggles into his sleeping bag. But what is he going to do? Ask if Harrington wants to bunk up? A different part of him—smaller but older, a part that remembers the halls of Hawkins high—likes it. Being comfortable while King Steve isn’t.
The room fills with a mild silence. Eddie stares at his ceiling. Imagines a dark hole in the middle of it.
“Pretty cool to see you in your element out there.” Steve says, sudden but soft. It still makes Eddie jump a little.
“Yeah?” Eddie glances at the Steve-shape on his floor. “You sat through all that like a real champ, Harrington.”
He hears a puff of breath, a rustle. “I’m serious, man. I kinda get it. I mean, I don’t get it, like, the initiative and dice and shit. But I get why they all wanted to come see you.”
Eddie’s mouth twitches. “My big-city mansion? Fridge full of imported grapes?”
“Definitely that,” Steve snorts. “And you’re cool. Cooler than I thought. You know, back then.”
“Back when kings were kings and freaks were freaks,” Eddie mutters, more to himself than to Steve. He hears more rustling, feels his skin prickle—realizes Steve’s probably rolled over and is looking at him. Eddie keeps his gaze fixed at the ceiling.
“I was a dick in school,” Steve says, flat. “Total, Grade-A dick.”
Eddie’s fingers find a loose thread in his sheet. He hadn’t been fishing for this—he’s a little uncomfortable that it’s happening, frankly. He still doesn’t look at Steve.
“And I’m sor—”
Eddie cuts him off. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Apologize, man.” He rolls the thread between his pointer finger and thumb. “Bygones, etcetera.”
“Well,” Steve says, a little loud. “I am. Sorry. I don’t know.” He makes a frustrated sound. “You nearly die a couple times and it makes you think about all the dumb shit you’ve done.” His voice goes a little quieter. “How people remember you.”
“I…get that,” Eddie says. “Actually, I really do.” He lets out a short, unamused laugh. “Thought a lot about that when I was hiding at Rick’s with the whole town gunning for my blood.”
The silence returns. It’s heavier now. Eddie wants to throw it off like a sheet.
“For what it’s worth,” he says, words happening without his brain’s permission, “I think everyone in our immediate vicinity would have…mostly good things to say at your funeral.”
Steve’s quiet for a moment. A long moment. Then he says, “...yeah?” and for such a small sound, it takes up so much space. It’s another shade of Steve—not the high school version, not the bad ass version, but a third one, armorless and frank. It tweaks something in Eddie’s chest.
“Oh yeah,” he says, rolling on his side so he can see Steve—and nearly swallows his tongue when he sees Steve staring right back. His eyes are huge. “They’d run out of room on your tombstone. Steve Harrington, badass, bat-thrashing babysitter.”
Steve’s eyebrows twitch, and his face cracks into a smile. “Shut up.”
“Steve Harrington,” Eddie prods, “Hirsute hero of Hawkins.”
“Shut up, dude.”
“Steve Harrington, selfless mother of seven.”
“Eddie Munson,” Steve says, flopping onto his back. His ears are pink, even in the dark. “Died as he lived, running his goddamn mouth.”
***
Eddie does eventually get out of the apartment.
He starts going on walks. He's never been much for excessive sunlight and he’s got some lingering anxieties about being seen, even though all that’s a couple hundred miles away now—but his skin’s nearly translucent after spending so much time inside, and Wayne worries.
So he walks. He figures out there’s a gas station nearby—takes note of that. The area they’re in is mostly residential, but after a good half hour he starts to see shops, a couple diners. One broadcasts a 24 hour breakfast menu, which Eddie studiously tucks away into the ‘vital information’ file in his brain.
On his fourth outing, Eddie spots something new: a music shop. Well, the shop itself isn’t new—it looks kinda run down, if he’s being honest. The windows are cloudy, the OPEN sign bleached with time. Still, he perks up when he spots it, jogs across the street to get a closer look.
There’s a brassy jingle when he walks into the store. It’s just one big room cramped with rows of records and tapes, and the walls are a chaos of posters. There’s music playing, but Eddie’s surprised to realize he doesn’t recognize it. The carpet’s so worn down it’s practically flat under his feet. It smells a little dusty, but also like dark, dark coffee—he spots a surprisingly modern-looking percolator behind the counter. He likes it.
“In or out,” a rough voice says.
Eddie jumps. A woman—older, maybe in her forties—stands up from below the counter. She’s tanned and tough-looking, her eyelids heavily shadowed in blue. The look she’s giving Eddie is both bored and annoyed, and Eddie shuffles all the way in, shutting the door behind him.
“Hi,” he says. “Nice shop.”
“I know,” the woman says. “It’s mine.”
“Cool, sick,” Eddie says, nodding, tucking his thumbs into his pockets. “I, uh, just moved here.”
The woman arches a thin eyebrow.
“Mind if I have a little look-see?” Eddie says, jutting his chin at the cluttered aisles.
“Long as you do a little buying at the end of it.” Her look is pointed.
“You got any Iron Maiden?”
“Back corner,” the woman says, then, evidently satisfied that Eddie’s a customer and not just a reprobate looking for free air conditioning, squats back down behind the counter.
She’s got more than Iron Maiden, turns out—Eddie finds a lot of good shit. A bunch of his tapes had gotten wrecked in the scrabble to break Nancy out of her Vecna trance back in his trailer, and he’s been eager to replace them. He has to keep reminding himself he can replace them, and not just by hiding them in his pockets. Between Wayne’s job and whatever money the government’s still slipping them to keep them hush-hush about the Hawkins hellhole, Eddie gets an allowance now, an actual allowance.
It’s not as much as he made selling percs to preps in the parking lot, and he’ll have to figure something else out eventually—but for now, he’s content to freeload.
Still, though—he glances at the sizable stack of cassettes he’s building, precarious on the edge of the shelf. He might be going a little hard, here.
“Can I set some of these aside?” Eddie asks. “I can’t—I, uh, can only afford to grab a few today.”
The woman pops back up from under the counter. “Sure,” she says, less annoyed now. “Bring ‘em over here.”
Eddie approaches. He sets two tall stacks of tapes in front of the woman; she makes no effort to hide her scrutiny. Eddie feels a rare surge of self-consciousness.
“Hm,” the woman says. “I’m Mara.”
“Huh?”
The woman—Mara—laughs. It rattles a little, a smoker’s laugh, but Eddie likes it. “I’m Mara, kid.” She pulls the first two tapes off the stack and starts jabbing at her cash register. “You got decent taste.”
***
Steve shows up the next weekend, kid-caravan in tow. El pushes a blue gift bag at him when she walks in—Eddie’s hands come up automatically, receiving the bag with confusion.
“To keep your house warm,” she chirps, then follows the others into the living room. Mike lingers briefly behind, whispers to Eddie, “She means housewarming. It’s a housewarming gift. She just learned about those.”
“Oh,” Eddie says. He looks in the bag. It’s a toaster. There’s a note pinned to the box: Very good for Eggos. From, El. It makes something rise in Eddie’s throat and—alarmingly—his eyes. He turns sharply towards the kitchen, blinking fast.
The game goes a little slower this time—true to his nature, Eddie’d spent the last week beefing up his baddies, complicating his puzzles, trying to make a campaign worthy of a big party. The group puts up a hard fight against a pack of enchanted wolves. They miss the opportunity to unveil the barkeep’s true identity, which will absolutely bite them in the ass later. Mike’s Paladin fails an athletics check and falls down a well that’s not a well at all.
The atmosphere’s tense, but not heavy. It’s exhilarating. Dustin’s perched on the edge of his seat most of the evening; Will’s pizza goes cold before he remembers to take a bite. Even Steve gets into it, leaning forward on the couch so he can count dice over the kids’ hunched shoulders. Eddie watches it all from behind his DM screen, fingers steepled.
For the first time in a long time, the before-times don’t feel so far away. He can almost forget that he’s not the same person he was in the spring. He can almost forget his scars.
“Alright, my little chickadees,” Eddie says when it’s nearing ten o’clock. “That’s a wrap. My uncle gets home in half an hour and I don’t want you chirping all night and keeping him up. Bedtime!”
He’s met with less resistance than he expects—everyone’s been biting back yawns for the better part of an hour—except Will, who looks devastated. Eddie’s beginning to think the guy would play through the night if he’d let him.
They separate into their groups—girls in the guest room, boys in the living room, Steve following Eddie to his room again. This time Eddie doesn’t feel so strange about the company.
“New poster?” Steve asks, nodding at a print taped up near Eddie’s bed.
Eddie glances up from where he’d been digging in his closet. “Hm? Oh, yeah. Black Sabbath. That’s from their first album. Not my favorite, but the album cover’s sick.”
Eddie watches Steve squint. “...that the guy who ate a bat?”
Eddie chuckles. “Yeah, Ozzy—”
“—Osborne! Ozzy Osbourne,” Steve finishes. Eddie laughs again.
“My my, Harrginton. Full of surprises, aren’t you?”
“Oh, come on,” Steve says, one hand on his hip, the other turned up in an offended shrug. “I’m not an idiot. I listen. I remember things.”
“No, yeah, of course,” Eddie says, pulling a pair of sweats out of a pile on the floor of his closet. There’s a short silence while they both change, but it’s long enough for the mood to shift. For Eddie to remember the last time they’d covered this subject, for all the slick, nervy details to slip back in.
The viscous trees. The sweat and grime on their scalps. The plummeting feeling in Eddie’s stomach.
“Do you have dreams about it?” Eddie asks. He doesn’t turn around, keeps staring into his closet. “About there?”
“I do,” Steve says. That’s when Eddie turns, sees Steve looking at him but not at him—he’s looking in Eddie’s direction but seeing something past him, something much farther away.
“...me too,” Eddie says, quietly. He hasn’t told Wayne about the dreams. He hasn’t told anyone. He sits on the edge of his bed, leans on his knees. “All of the time, actually. About the bats. My fucked-up trailer. And Chr—” his throat seizes. He has to swallow. “And Chrissy, sometimes. But usually it’s just me. Alone.”
“I’m never alone,” Steve says, and it’s nearly a whisper. Eddie’s about to tell him that’s a sort of a fucked up thing to brag about, but then Steve continues, “Everyone’s always there, dying. Nance, Robin, the kids, you.”
There are a lot of things Eddie could say, should say. Instead, he says, “Me?”
Steve lets out a short, hollow laugh. “Yeah, man. You.” He’s still standing in the middle of Eddie’s room, arms straight by his sides now. His fists are clenched tight. “You know, when we found you? I didn’t think you were breathing. Nancy said you were. But I couldn’t see it. Couldn’t feel it. When I carried you—”
“You carried me?”
“Oh, what, did you think Henderson fucking did it?”
“I…” Eddie says, “I guess I never thought about it.”
Steve lets out a breath and abruptly sits, crossing his legs on the sleeping back he'd laid out. “Well, I carried you. I carried you even though I fully thought you were—that I was carrying a corpse.”
The tension’s ramped up high in the room, and it makes Eddie’s skin feel too tight for his bones. He’s looking at yet another Steve, not the one from last weekend, fuzzy at the edges, but one with a hard outline. Angry. But that anger’s not pointed it at anything—not at Vecna or the Upside Down or the fucked up adults that let them face that shit alone—no, it’s all spinning around in Steve’s head, caught inside his body.
Eddie wants to throw open his windows and crawl out, or smoke a dozen cigarettes, or—and this is what he ends up going for—say something stupid.
“Sounds pretty fucking metal, dude.”
He’s worried for a moment that it’s the wrong move, that it’s too stupid, because Steve looks up at him sharply—but the crease in his brow isn’t angry, it’s bewildered, even a little amused.
“You’re a lunatic,” Steve says, shaking his head. “A heavy lunatic.”
Eddie feels his shoulders relax—he hadn’t known he’d been tensing them—and puts on a snarky smile. “I may look dainty, but I've got a big appetite, Harrington. I eat as many eggs as any good ol’ American boy.”
“I’m sure,” Steve says, wrinkling his nose. “I just…I’m sorry you got hurt.”
“Wasn’t your fault,” Eddie says, shrugging.
“Still.”
“Bygones, etcetera.” He pulls his feet up on his bed now, toes cold.
Steve’s quiet, then he reaches his arms high over his head and lets out a stretch-groan. Eddie guesses they’re done talking now, so he slides himself under his covers, even though he doesn’t feel tired at all. He hears Steve getting similarly situated.
“Hey,” Steve says suddenly. “Thanks for doing this. For the kids. I think they needed it.”
“Yeah,” Eddie says. He doesn’t mention how much he needed it, too.
And even though it feels better now, even though the silence between them feels something like comfortable, he’s compelled to disrupt it. “Thanks,” he says, “for getting me out of hell.”
***
The next weekend, Max, El, and Erica aren’t there. Apparently Hopper had been less than pleased to find out his daughter’s Saturday sleepovers weren’t happening at Max’s place, as he’d been told, but an entire city away with a bunch of teenage boys the next room over.
Max, according to Lucas, had stayed behind “as a show of solidarity.”
Erica, also according to Lucas, had stayed behind because she didn’t want to be “the only girl in a car full of boys who smell like they don’t wipe their asses.”
(“I wipe!” Lucas cries. “We all wipe!”)
Eddie, a little annoyed that no one had bothered to tell him about their diminished numbers ahead of time, sucks his teeth. “I won’t lie, gremlins. S’gonna be a tough session if you’re down that many.”
Will groans. Mike and Lucas glance at each other, perhaps commiserating over their decisions to mix business (dungeon crawling) with pleasure (girlfriends). Dustin looks like the demobats are back and crowding the windows.
Eddie’s just about ready to tell them to suck it up and sit down when he feels a clap on his shoulder. He turns—Steve’s standing next to him, face serious.
“Alright, coach,” Steve says. “Sub me in.”
Now Dustin’s face looks less like oh no demobats and more like wait why are all of the demobats turning into flying bananas. “For real?”
“Yeah,” Steve says, shrugging. “I’ve sat through two of these little,” he waves a hand, “sessions so far, I get the gist.”
“Do you?” Eddie says. He’s aware he sounds a little mean, but that’s not why he asks—he’s just shocked.
“Pfft. Yeah, man. Seduce the bartender, kill the monster. I’m practically a pro at that sort of stuff.”
Eddie feels a baffled smile spreading across his face. He’s not sure why this delights him so much, but it does.
“Alright, kids,” he says, still watching Steve. “Get the babysitter a character sheet.”
*
They manage fairly well. Eddie does end up toning it down a bit—otherwise they would’ve lost half the party in a particularly nasty fey encounter. Steve, though he needs frequent reminders about modifiers and is evidently dead set on not understanding initiative and combat order, does seem to get the gist. He seduces a bartender. He kills a monster. He also tries to peek around Eddie’s screen more than once; the third time Eddie slaps his arm and Steve jumps, yelps what the hell, and stutters something about looking for dice. Regardless, his cobbled-together fighter (who he names Steve Two) makes it to the end of the session along with the rest of the party.
“That,” Steve says, once they’ve called it quits and the kids are stifling yawns, “was by far the dorkiest thing I’ve ever done.”
“But you liked it,” says Dustin, eyes small and sparkling.
“It…wasn’t the worst way to spend a Saturday,” Steve admits, carefully. Then he narrows his eyes at the younger boys, leaning forward. “And if any of you breathes a word of this back home, I’ll stick my foot so far up your asses you’ll taste shit.”
The mischievous glimmer vanishes from Dustin’s eyes. “Rude,” he mutters.
Later, while the kids jostle for sink space in the bathroom and Eddie clears the table, he watches Steve. He’s quiet, won’t look Eddie in the eye. He’s fidgeting with a D20.
“You should take the guest room this time, Harrington,” Eddie says. The guy’s gotta be tired of sleeping on his floor.
Steve looks up, clenches the die in his fist. “Actually,” he says. “D’you—are you tired?”
Eddie considers. “Intellectually? Yes. Your children wear me out.” Steve rolls his eyes. “But physically? No, not really. Why?”
“I, uh,” Steve starts, sounding almost…meek? “brought some beers, thought maybe we could have a couple? Stay up? Hang out?”
“Hang out,” Eddie repeats flatly. Steve’s knee stops. He can tell it’s a bristle even before Steve’s eyes flash up at him—quick, but obvious. “Wait, sorry, that sounded shitty. Sure, man.”
Steve looks like he wants to say something but he doesn’t. He also doesn’t move to retrieve said beers. The energy feels weird as fuck and Eddie rushes to unpack it.
“Sorry,” he says again. “I just—it’s been a long time since someone wanted to hang out with me.” At Steve’s snort, he adds, “Someone who isn’t an actual child.”
Steve’s laugh is a little dry, but it’s genuine. “I can relate,” he says. “Unfortunately.”
*
The beer’s bad, but it’s not the worst Eddie’s ever had. He turns on the TV, partially thinking they might find a movie to watch, but mostly just wanting the vague shapes and muffled sounds to combat the awkward silence sure to fill the sparse den.
He used to be great at talking—couldn’t get enough of it, frankly—but he’s out of practice now. Sure, he talks with Wayne a little bit, and he’s talked a bit with Mara at that music shop he found, but some days? Eddie doesn’t say a single word.
He keeps thinking it’ll change one day, that he’ll wake up and his brain won’t feel so foggy, that his voice will be hot and fearless in his throat. Like it used to be.
But who’d be around to listen?
“So, Harrington,” he says, twisting on the couch so his back’s against the armrest, his arm draped across the back. “Aside from ferrying teens to and from fairyland, what do you get up to in merry old Hawkins?”
“Uh, honestly? Not much,” Steve says, and Eddie’s a little surprised how easily he admits it. “It’s weird there, you know? I mean, I guess you do. But it’s a different kind of weird now.”
Eddie takes a thoughtful pull from his can. “Elaborate.”
Steve tells him how normal it is, how forced. How readily everyone seems to swallow the stories about earthquakes and natural phenomena, even when the facts don’t line up. Eddie presses back a smile—he’s made similar speeches spurning normality while marching down cafeteria tables.
But then Steve mentions how strange it is to drive past the wrecked downtown. The buckled streets and sinkholes. How none of the streetlamps work over there anymore, and it’s so dark when he’s on his way to the grocery store.
“Like, I’m supposed to buy some stupid cereal and smile at the cashier like we weren’t all this close to the end of the world?” The can creaks in his hands.“I don’t know, man. I’ve fucked with the Upside Down before, but I always shook it off.” He sighs. “Having a harder time with this one.”
Without thinking, Eddie glances briefly at Steve’s throat. He’s not sure if the darkness there is a shadow from the dim light of the TV, or something else. Marks that linger.
“What did you do last time?” He asks. “You know, to shake it off.”
Steve looks up at the ceiling, expression thoughtful. “Worked. Dated. I dunno, stupid stuff.”
“Weren’t you working at the Family Video before all hell broke loose?”
“Yeah,” Steve says, “but guess what? It fell into the center of the earth. So now I’m jobless.”
“And dateless?” The question jumps out from an untraceable part of him. He almost wants to bite his tongue.
Steve laughs. “So dateless.”
Eddie’s brain does a little electrical jolt that he should probably steer away from, but he doesn’t. Instead, he mock-gasps. “Hawkins’s most eligible bachelor? Single?”
“I know, right? Unemployed, hangs out with kids, has nightmares about everyone dying. I’m a total package.” Steve lets out a long breath. “It’s just…harder to talk to people. Now.”
“I hear you,” Eddie says. “Aside from my uncle, I barely talk to anyone now. Except the gremlins. And you.”
Steve’s leaning on his knees, his beer dangling between them. He plucks the tab with his thumb. “It’s nice that you can talk to your uncle. Wayne. He seems like a cool guy.”
“He is,” Eddie says, sincere. “What about your folks?”
“Pretty sure my dad hates me. My mom—I don’t know, she’s nice. But she does whatever my dad tells her to.” The beer tab snaps off. “They wanted me to be a certain way. And I’m not. So now they don’t want me around at all.” Steve stares at his feet. “Should probably move out or something.”
And do what?
Eddie hears it, even though Steve doesn’t say it. He’s asked himself the same question. Some days he humors having a future—getting a job, maybe even going to community college.
And then? He doesn’t have an answer.
So instead, he takes long sip of beer. He finishes it. He slams it down on the coffee table (a little louder than he should considering there’s a room of teens sleeping nearby). Steve jumps.
“Fuck ‘em!” Eddie says. Feels a familiar spark in his throat, the beginnings of his old enthusiasm. “Fuck ‘em. You’re a good dude, Steve Harrington. I said it once, I’ll say it again.”
Steve laughs, but it’s weak.
“Hey, I’m a good fucking judge of character,” Eddie insists. “If I say you’re good, you’re good. You’ll figure something out.”
Steve looks at him, then—sideways, still leaning over his knees, his hair flopped and splotched with television light. That feeling in Eddie’s throat cinches, flutters.
“Thanks, Munson,” Steve says, his smile so soft. “You’re a good dude, too.”
They do watch a bit of the movie, then. Steve says it reminds him of something he and Robin watched at work, but he can’t remember the name. They talk about their favorites; Eddie waxes poetic about The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Steve seems shocked that Eddie hasn’t seen Beverly Hills Cop. They come together beautifully on Blade Runner, though.
Wayne comes home around midnight. When he hears the door, Steve makes to grab at the empty cans on the coffee table, but Eddie stretches his leg across the couch, nudges him with his foot. It’s cool, he mouths.
“Boys,” Wayne says, nodding at them both. “Don’t mind me.”
“Nah, we should hit the hay,” Eddie says—as if on cue, Steve’s mouth widens in a huge yawn. Eddie digs his toe into Steve’s thigh again. “Can’t have you falling asleep at the wheel tomorrow. Precious cargo.”
“I wouldn’t,” Steve says, looking both serious and sleepy.
Eddie notices Wayne—noticing something. It makes Eddie draw his foot in, stand abruptly from the couch.
*
Later, when Steve’s snoring on his floor, Eddie realizes he maybe should’ve offered him the couch. Wonders why it hadn’t even occurred to him.
*
And the next morning, when he’s shutting the door behind everyone, when Steve blusters back in, when he shoves a pocket-warmed D20 at him, the one he’d been futzing with last night, when he says almost stole this and gives him a fucking salute before chasing after the others, Eddie realizes something else.
Fuck.