Chapter Text
"I know, I know, Eds," Steve coos the moment the door shuts, pressing a kiss to the top of the cat's head and stepping further into the house. It’s easier to focus on Eds rather than the swirling pool of emotions gathering in his stomach. Thinking about what the real Eddie Munson thinks of him is like a knife, much harsher than the sweet look little Eddie is giving him now. "So much yelling, 'm sorry for scaring you."
"Did you scare my sweet prince? How dare you!" Robin calls from the living room, spinning around on the couch to glare at him. Steve rolls his eyes, handing off the cat who immediately curls up in her lap. Traitor. It had taken a few weeks of nervous growls and warning bites, but now little Eddie was practically inseparable from Robin.
"No, his namesake did." Steve places his hands on the back of the couch, leaping over it like it might be a hurdle to land beside Robin. Both she and little Eddie give him the same look: annoyance, irritation, disbelief that he had the gall to disturb them. "Showed up yelling about how he deserves an apology."
"Seriously?" Robin asks, hand stopping her petting of Eddie until the cat nips as a signal to continue. "Bastard," she hisses, looking down at the creature, "you and your namesake."
"Don't call my cat a bastard," Steve says, nudging Robin's elbow with his foot as he extends his legs and leans back against the armrest of the couch.
"Seriously, though. Eddie just showed up and demanded an apology?"
"Yep," Steve pops the 'p' and crosses his arms over his chest. There couldn’t be any other explanation for the situation, he refused to believe it. Sure, Eddie had admitted to messing up by the end, but he’d still chosen to throw those specific words at Steve. Even after hearing how damaging that view of him was, Eddie still chose it anyway. It’s all just bullshit, isn’t it?
"That doesn't sound like Eddie," Robin says, raising an eyebrow in his direction. "Is this another moment where I find out how dramatic you are?"
"No," Steve nearly shouts, rolling his eyes at little Eddie's huff of annoyance at his volume. "I'm not dramatic. That's exactly how it happened."
"Steven-"
"My name isn't short for Steven, I've told you-"
"-There is no way it happened like that." Steve wanted to smack her. He also wanted to hug her. Best friends were really confusing sometimes.
"It basically happened like that," Steve corrects himself, leaning forward to pry Eddie off of Robin's lap. The cat lasts for a few seconds on his lap before he slides off, curling up between Steve's hip and arm. "He accused me of making fun of him, which was completely off base, then he stands there and demands an apology from me like I'd done something wrong. And get this, Robs, he was looking at me like he did in school, which, fine but it hurts, you know? Then he sees little Eddie and he completely freaks out, acts like I never to— Oh, shit, Robin. "
"What?"
"I messed up," Steve breathes, the hand not petting the cat moving to swipe through his hair. "I think I forgot to tell Eddie about Eddie."
He meant to, he really did. But from the first moment the name slipped from his mouth, Steve knew it was something big. People didn't just name their pets after people for no reason, not even if they were merely friends. No this was important , and the more Steve thought about confessing to Eddie the more his head swam and his heart raced so hard he thought it might pop free from his chest. So sure, maybe he'd chosen to stop thinking about it .
"Steve! What do you mean?" Robin exclaims, sitting up to show how immersed in the conversation she was.
"Eddie and Eddie Hair-rington haven't met...technically," Steve says, rubbing the back of his neck and wincing against the response he knew he'd get from his friend.
"So you've been talking about little Eddie around big Eddie with literally zero context? Dingus!"
"I didn't mean to!"
"How many times has Eddie thought you called him a fucker? Or a bastard? Or a-"
"I get it!" Steve groans, "Still. I've heard the kids call him so much worse, and he didn't..." He didn't what? Didn't lay into their entire personalities? Their interests? Their whole fucking worth? Reduce all of it down to bullshit, bullshit, bullshit?
"You know what my biggest pet peeve is, Stevie?" Robin asks, voice oddly carrying a light lilt despite the heaviness sinking in Steve's chest.
"People stealing your mouthpiece?"
" Ew, no —but yes," Robin shudders. "No, it's when sweet, darling, stupid men don't get their shit together and kiss."
Best friends were terrible and Steve didn't like them, actually. It wasn't that he'd never thought about kissing Eddie—on the contrary, as time went on it became nearly impossible to have an interaction with the man without the thought crossing his mind—but rather that it was so damn obvious to Robin that he wanted to.
"I don't want to kiss Eddie," Steve tries, "I'm mad at him."
"No, dingus, you're heartbroken ." She says it simply, like the thought should have occurred to him ages ago. It probably should have, of course, but there's no way Steve would ever tell her that. "And it sounds like he is too. So maybe try...oh, I don't know... talking? "
"That's a terrible idea. Plan B."
" Steve, " Robin admonishes, and it reminds him too much of when his middle school teacher used to talk to him in that voice, the kind that says she knows he knows what he did wrong. He does.
"Fine, fine! Next time Eddie shows up at Family Video I'll talk to him." Steve smirks, knowing he's already won. Eddie hadn't been in since the day he said such horrible things to Steve when he left Steve breathless and fighting back shocked tears over realizing how Eddie really thought of him.
"Deal."
Steve Harrington should know never to doubt Robin Buckley.
The second Eddie walks through the double doors of Family Video, Steve's head hits the counter. He tucks it into his folded arms, hoping that might help him disappear. Maybe Eddie miraculously lost his idea of object permanence in the past twenty-four hours?
Eddie hits the little bell to signal he needs help. Robin loudly announces that she's going on her break despite it being only nine in the morning and a mere hour into their shift. Steve feels like he might lurch over the side of a cliff.
"I don't have a lawn mower like the guy in the movie," Eddie says, and Steve still doesn't pick his head up from the counter. "I don't have anything to give you that would make up for this."
"I don't need anything from you," Steve says automatically, lifting his head to reveal a gentle smile on Eddie's face, the man's dark eyes shimmering in spite of the shitty fluorescent lights of the shop. He means it, too. If Eddie really thought so poorly of him, then he didn’t need to hear anything else. They could be fine for the kids, but they didn’t need to force anything. It would ache—and oh, how it would ache—but Steve would get through it. "Everything's fine, Eddie."
"It's not," Eddie corrects, but not in the harsh way he'd thrown the words the previous night. He says it in the way he would remind him that Steve's character is a paladin, or that Ozzy was in Black Sabbath, not Dio. It was the voice Eddie used when he pointed out the obvious in the kindest, most gentle way anyone could so as to spare Steve the embarrassment.
"It is ," Steve insists, "and you know, it's kinda busy in here so—"
"Attention faithful Family Video patrons!" Eddie shouts, climbing up onto the counter and spreading his arms like he had thousands of people watching him instead of the ten or fifteen occupying the building.
"Eddie, c'mon, man, what are you doing?" Steve sighs, cheeks heating up red at all of the eyes staring at the two of them.
"I, Eddie Munson, officially admit that I was wrong. Not all jocks are airheaded and lame," Eddie continues, grinning and winking at one of the women giving him a nasty look. All Steve could do was drop his head into one hand, peering up at the man between his fingers. "Steve Harrington in all his brilliant heroism has shattered the Munson Doctrine forever. That is all, carry on!"
"You really didn't have to do that," Steve says immediately once Eddie hops off the counter into the employee side. "Really."
"Like I said, this was the best I had without a lawn mower."
"You're terrible," Steve responds, though a little smile works its way past the blush on his cheeks.
"I also want to apologize just..." Eddie pauses to glance around the store before looking back at Steve's eyes, then briefly dropping down to look at his lips. Fuck. "Somewhere with less people."
Right, they were still in public. "Right, um...I'm off at 4? Come by the house?"
"I'll be there, Stevie," Eddie promises, stumbling far-less-gracefully back over the counter. Steve laughs because something about Eddie's persistent earnestness makes it impossible to truly stay mad at him forever.
"Okay, listen up, buddy," Steve says seriously once he hears a knock on the door, lifting up Eddie Hair-rington's front paws so he could look him in the eyes. "We've got a new friend coming over, okay? Listen to me really closely. No biting, no scratching, no being a giant chaos monster that feeds off the pain of humans, got it?"
Eddie blinks.
"Glad we understand each other." Steve sets Eddie down, straightening up his own hair before opening the door. "You actually came."
"You thought I wouldn't?" Eddie asks, bouncing on his feet until Steve moves out of the way so he can step into the house.
"I dunno," Steve admits, shrugging once. "You seemed pretty upset before."
"Yeah, I..." Eddie trails off, looking up at the ceiling briefly before refocusing on Steve. "I don't know how to say any of it but-"
"I know I messed up. I should've told you about little Eddie, and I didn't," Steve blurts out, trying to save Eddie at least a bit of explaining. "I should've told you."
"I could've asked," Eddie returns, and yeah he could've. It would've saved a lot of strife, a lot of fucking chest pain, and swiped away tears if he would have just—
"Yeah, you should've," Steve admits quietly.
Eddie steps closer, brown eyes nothing but earnest as he speaks. "I didn't mean any of it. Shit, Steve, I don't know why I said half of what I did, I just thought it'd be better to hurt you before you hurt me worse."
"I wouldn't 've," Steve says, trying to ignore the persistent scratching and tugging he feels on his left pant leg. This was too serious a moment, Eddie's eyes were too soft and too vulnerable, and Steve didn't want it all to end before—
"Is that the hero of the hour?" Eddie beams, bending down to grab at little Eddie before Steve can warn him. Eddie, no, the little shit bites everyone, it takes weeks to get him to warm up to you, and even then—
"He is such a little asshole," Steve hisses, watching as little Eddie immediately snuggles against Eddie's chest, purring delightedly. Steve points to the cat, who's now looking at him with way too much attitude for such a tiny body. "You're a traitor. Remember who gives you tuna, you tiny gremlin."
"I don't know, Stevie, he seems like an innocent sweetheart to me," Eddie teases, eyes on the cat as he pets little Eddie's ears. "Just like his namesake."
"Uh huh," Steve says in a monotone. "I get why you like each other."
"That so?"
"Yeah, you both like torturing me."
"I don't know about that, Steve," Eddie says, stepping closer. His hand stills on little Eddie, moving instead to adjust a piece of stray hair out of Steve's face.
The touch burns in the way it nearly makes Steve gasp, the way it makes him feel like he'd never been alive at all before this moment. He wonders if it was supposed to be like that, or if sometimes he just felt too much too brightly.
"I know I'm giving you a lot of mixed signals, but I really do like you, Steve," Eddie practically whispers.
"You have a lot of making up to do," Steve breathes, chest fluttering at how close Eddie was to him.
"That right?"
"Uh huh," Steve says. "Lots of groveling, cheesy speeches like the stunt you pulled at Video, and definitely bribing little Eddie."
Eddie laughs, a deep sound that rumbles straight through Steve. “I can do that. Little Eds deserves some pampering.”
They would have to talk about it further, the hurt and the missteps, and all the ways this could have been avoided. But for now, Steve allows himself to relish in the feeling of Eddie's lips on his.
That is until a persistent meow causes them to pull apart.