Work Text:
“Bullshit.”
“Scouts honor.”
“You were never in the scouts.”
“Well what else am I supposed to swear on?”
Lucy rolled her eyes, holding back a smile. She had been doing it all night and was starting to get good at it.
It was late. Their movie had ended and Lucy had dared to take Eddie up on his suggestion to just walk for a while. It wasn’t an unusual request. They did it all the time, but spending so much time alone with him was proving treacherous.
Her little crush hadn’t faded since the end of the semester and they were almost to July. It felt like it was getting worse.
She thought some distance would do her some good, but Eddie had called her out of the blue and she couldn’t think of a good excuse not to. They were still friends. She couldn’t avoid him forever. A movie seemed innocent enough; dark, limited talking, safe. She had even managed to pay attention to what was on screen for most of it. Even still, his occasional commentary in her ear drove her to distraction. She honestly couldn’t remember anything of what they had just seen by the time they walked out.
If she had any sense she would have made up some excuse about work in the morning, but then he smiled and she knew she’d do just about anything he asked.
He kept the conversation going for the first stretch and eventually Lucy was able to relax enough to answer back. Nothing had changed. Eddie was still Eddie. She just had to remind herself of that and not get herself into a tizzy over a laugh or a look.
They had even managed to move past the subject of the movie to, of all things, Shakespeare. Somewhere in their rambles Lucy grumbled about wishing she could rent an apartment for three months to do summer stock in a big city or even just Shakespeare in the park. This prompted Eddie to make a rather bold claim pertaining to Mercutio and Queen Mab.
“Why would you even try to memorize the Queen Mab speech?” Lucy protested.
He shrugged. “It’s cool. I mean the rest of the play is gooey, lovey dovey shlock, but all the Mercutio stuff is awesome. Besides, I needed the extra credit.”
“So you just up and performed in front of the entire class for a couple extra points?”
He scoffed. “Please, if I did that my reputation would never recover. Mr. Kennedy just let me do it at lunch.”
Lucy’s lips pressed into a line. Mr. Kennedy was known for being one of the more reasonable teachers at Hawkins. She could see him offering to let Eddie perform privately if he felt like Eddie was otherwise putting in the effort. Still, she couldn’t help feeling like he was pulling her leg.
Eddie caught her skeptical expression. “You don’t believe me.”
“I just don’t see it,” she admitted.
He nodded, his brows creasing in deep thought. It only took him a moment to come to a decision. “Okay.”
He took two long strides ahead before jumping up on a bench in front of an empty store front. He cleared his throat, placing a hand over his heart.
“I, Edward Munson, shall perform Shakespeare’s Queen Mab for the judgment and viewing pleasure of this illustrious audience,” he announced in the most obnoxious British accent he could muster as he gestured to the non-existent crowd.
Lucy let out a laugh, which only encouraged him.
“Now I shall require some audience participation,” he said, peering down at her with a scrupulous eye, “assuming the audience has the play memorized as well.”
“We do,” she assured.
“Excellent,” he grinned, dropping the accent while he was at it. “Now, let me see, how does it start?“ He tapped his chin. "Romeo says, ‘I dreampt a dream tonight’. Mercutio, 'And so did I’.”
Lucy smiled. “Well, what was yours?”
Eddie grinned and something else seemed to shift inside him, like the turning of a dial. She’d seen it a handful of times when a campaign took on a particularly dramatic turn. A sudden tremble of anticipation shot through her.
“That dreamers often lie,” he answered.
“In bed asleep while they do dream things true,” she replied.
“O,” he crouched down, meeting her straight in the eye, “then I see Queen Mab hath been with you.”
He leaned in, his eyes glimmering with an unbalanced glee. “She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes, in shape no bigger than an agate-stone,” he raised his finger waving it in front of her eyes, “on the fore-finger of an alderman, drawn with a team of little atomies, athwart men’s noses as they lie asleep.”
Ever so slowly he began to rise, his hands and arms animating every line.
“Her wagon-spokes made of long spiders’ legs, the cover of the wings of grasshoppers, the traces of the smallest spider’s web, the collars of the moonshine’s watery beams, her whip of cricket’s bone, the lash of film, her wagoner a small grey-coated gnat, not so big as a round little worm Prick’d from the lazy finger of a maid; her chariot is an empty hazel-nut, made by the joiner squirrel or old grub, time out o’ mind the fairies’ coachmakers. And in this state she gallops night by night through lovers’ brains, and then they dream of love.”
He drawled out the final word mockingly as he once again turned his attention toward her, sinking down to her level.
“O'er courtiers’ knees, that dream on court'sies straight,” he continued, pointing to her knees. “O'er lawyers’ fingers, who straight dream on fees,” he took her hand, pinching the ends of her fingers. “O'er ladies ’ lips, who straight on kisses dream,” he brushed her lips, or, at least, came close enough the air of his movements tickled her skin.
Lucy could feel her cheeks heat at the gesture. She thought he might stop to comment, but he didn’t break his stride as his expression kept up that half crazed smile.
“Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues, because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are.” He straightened up, waving his hand in front of his nose as if offended by the smell.
“Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier’s nose,” he went on, now using his own body as demonstration. “And then dreams he of smelling out a suit; and sometime comes she with a tithe-pig’s tail, tickling a parson’s nose as a’ lies asleep, then dreams, he of another benefice: sometime she driveth o'er a soldier’s neck, and then dreams he of cutting foreign throats.”
He clutched his neck and Lucy felt something else change. Still in character, but the glee was gone, replaced with a menace that made her spine straighten.
“Of breaches,” he continued, “ambuscadoes, Spanish blades, of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon Drums in his ear,” he slammed his hand behind him making the glass of the storefront vibrate, “at which he starts and wakes, and being thus frighted swears a prayer or two and sleeps again.”
His eyes widened, his body like a live wire as if about the fall of the edge.
“This is that very Mab, that plats the manes of horses in the night, and bakes the elflocks in foul sluttish hairs, which once untangled, much misfortune bodes,” he shouted. “This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs, That presses them and learns them first to bear, making them women of good carriage: This is she—”
“Peace, peace,” Lucy interjected, grabbing his hand. She didn’t know how she remembered the line, but was grateful she did. It would all feel a waste if she didn’t. “Mercutio, peace. Thou talk'st of nothing.”
“True,” he admitted, as if suddenly allowed to breathe again. He jumped down from the bench, never letting go of her hand as he looked down into her eyes. “I talk of dreams, which are the children of an idle brain, begot of nothing but vain fantasy, which is as thin of substance as the air, and more inconstant than the wind, who woos, even now the frozen bosom of the north, and, being angered, puffs away from thence, turning his side to the dew-dropping South.”
A silence fell then, not that Lucy notice for the thundering of her heart in her ears. She felt like her whole body was shaking. He really needed to stop looking at her like that.
Suddenly he looked away and up to the ceiling.
“I think it’s Benvolio after that,” he said, speculatively.
“Yeah,” Lucy said, breathlessly. “I think you’re right.”
Eddie looked back down. Mercutio was gone and he was back to his usual teasing self. “Good?”
“Good?” she repeated. “Eddie, that was…holy shit!”
She covered her mouth with her hands in some vain attempt to hide her smile and surely obvious blush.
She could say a lot of things to say about his impromptu performance; amazing, transcendent, mind blowing, but the one she kept coming back to was hot. It was very, very hot. She couldn’t for the life of her explain why, but it was just about the sexiest thing she’d ever seen him do.
This was worse than when he ran lines with her for As You Like It. New rule going forward, never let Eddie Munson perform Shakespeare. It was bad for her health.
It didn’t help that he was grinning at her now with the most adorably proud expression.
“Think I earned that extra credit then?” he teased.
“I think you deserve a full ride to Julliard.”
He laughed. She couldn’t be sure, but she could have sworn his cheeks were slightly pink.
“Seriously, that was incredible,” she continued. “Why haven’t you auditioned before? You would be amazing.”
He waved her off. “Oh c’mon Henderson, you know the rules. Seniors take priority. If I join now they’d have to commit to a one man show. Wouldn’t be fair to the rest of you.”
“You should still give it a shot,” she insisted. “I think you’d fit right in.”
“Yeah?”
Lucy felt her stomach flip. The look in those beautiful brown eyes was so soft it made her melt. This was why she had been avoiding him. All it took was one innocent look and she was a goner. How did people handle this?
“Yeah,” she said, glancing away. “I mean, unless you’re still worried about your reputation.”
He snorted, wrapping his arm around her shoulders as he pushed them both forward.
“How about this, after you’ve made your spectacular Broadway debut and if I’m not busy performing at The Garden, drop me a line. I’d be happy to do a reading.”
She nodded along. “You’ll be my first call.”
They continued on like that for a little while, speaking of dreams as if they would someday be reality. Lucy hoped they would and that maybe, someday, she’d be able to tell Eddie exactly how he fit into hers.