Chapter Text
“Hey, I’ll be back in two hours to pick you up,” Jonathan said to Will as he got out of the car at the arcade.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll get Steve to take us home, he’s already picking up Dustin. Bye!” Will waved and bolted into the arcade.
Steve, picking up his brother. Jonathan blinked hard. The Harringtons and the Hendersons didn’t live too far from them, and it made less work for him, even if it was slightly concerning.
Will got home exactly two hours and ten minutes later. Jonathan heard him open the front door and immediately bolted out to the living room, hoping to catch a glimpse of if it was actually Steve that brought him. And it was. There was Harrington, sitting in his driveway in his stupid BMW, waiting to make sure Will got inside safe like a concerned parent would. And then the unthinkable happened, Steve got out of his car and walked to the door, smiling all the way.
“Hey,” he said as he got within speaking range. Jonathan just nodded at him. “I’m glad that Will’s doing better. The other kids were getting worried about him.”
“Me too.” Jonathan breathed a small sigh of relief that Steve only wanted to talk about Will. “I worry that he’s isolating himself sometimes,” he admitted.
“Taking after you?” Steve immediately slapped his hand over his mouth once he realized what he said. But before he could say anything else Jonathan just scoffed.
“I’m trying to be better about that now.”
Steve swallowed, still anxious about what had slipped out.
“Hey, thanks for bringing him home,” Jonathan said before the silence got too awkward.
“It’s no trouble man, like I told Nancy, I’m a damn good babysitter. Give me a call if you need me to take him anywhere again, okay? I know you and your mom get real busy sometimes and if you’re concerned about him isolating himself he needs the other kids as much as he can get them. You have my phone number?” Steve stared at him, waiting for a response.
“Oh, uh, I can look it up if I need it. Thanks, Harrington.”
“No problem, Byers. Well, see ya ‘round.” With that Steve walked back to his car and drove off, not even waiting for a goodbye back.
“What the hell just happened?” Jonathan muttered to himself as he walked back into the house.
~
“Hey, Nance?”
“What’s up?”
“Steve took Will home from the arcade the other day. Says he told you he was a ‘Damn good babysitter’ or something.” He makes air quotes around what Steve said as if he doesn’t quite believe him.
“Oh yeah, he’s been hanging out with the middle schoolers more. Picks up Mike sometimes. I think my mom even asked him to babysit Holly for her last week when we were out at the movies.”
“Huh. I never expected him to be the type to be the babysitter.”
“Oh, I totally saw it coming. Especially now that he doesn’t talk to Tommy H. or Carol anymore. He’s always been super protective of people, but you’d never know it because he doesn’t have siblings.”
“Really? He doesn’t talk to them anymore? Who does he talk to then?” He hadn’t seen them together in the last couple of weeks, and thinking about it he hadn’t really seen much of Steve at all.
“I honestly don’t know. I don’t see him very often at school anymore, and when I do he’s usually by himself. I kinda feel bad about it sometimes when I do see him. He looks lonely.”
“Yeah,” Jonathan thinks for a minute, “he kinda does.”
“We’re having lunch with him tomorrow.” Nancy decided abruptly. “There’s no reason that the two of you shouldn’t be friends.” The bell rings before he can get a word in about it, but honestly, he doesn’t care that much. Maybe it would be good for him to try to be friends with Steve.
~
“There you are!” Nancy exclaimed when they’d finally found Steve. It had taken them a good ten minutes of looking to find him, hidden away in the corner of the lunchroom.
Steve stared at them as they stood there, his mouth slightly open as if he wanted to say something but didn’t know what it was.
Jonathan cleared his throat. “Can we sit with you?”
Steve’s face lit up. “Oh, uh, yeah!” He scrambled to clear some of his things from the small table to make room for them. Neither asked why he was sitting by himself at that moment, but the air was thick with the unasked question.
And then Nancy started babbling. Asked Steve about his classes, commenting on how downhill the quality of the cafeteria food had gone, asking after the kids, really just talking to fill space. Jonathan was grateful for it. He had never been the best conversationalist and her voice was soothing.
“I don’t know how you put up with them,” Jonathan muttered at some point when they were talking about the kids.
“Oh they’re not so bad,” Steve laughed, “except for Mike,” Nancy made a face at that and Steve raised his hands in surrender “he and El are like, attached at the hip and it’s incredibly annoying.”
That made Jonathan laugh. “Will will not shut up about how annoying that is either. It’s always ‘Mike wouldn’t talk to me today', ‘Mike’s ignoring me for her’ and all that.”
“Oh you both know you’re right, my brother’s a real pain,” Nancy laughed at them.
“Maybe,” Steve looked out into the distance as if to see who was watching. “but he kind of reminds me of myself at his age. Just wanting to be there for everyone all the time but doing a shit job of it?” A sadness crept into Steve’s eyes that Jonathan had never seen before. “It’s nice to think I’m doing a better job now, but I know I’m not.” He paused and looked at Nancy. “I was a shit boyfriend.”
Nancy's eyes blew wide at the statement, but she said nothing.
Steve continued. “And Jonathan,” he turned his gaze “I’m sorry. I was an asshole to you. But God things have changed, with all the…” He glanced around again to make sure that nobody was paying attention to them “monster fighting and terrifying encounters… it’s really making me rethink some things.”
Jonathan gaped at him. Steve looks so guilty about how he treated him, and Jonathan honestly thought that it was water under the bridge.
“You,” He begins, but the bell rings, and Steve bolts from his seat.
“See you guys later!” And with that, he’s gone.
Jonathan looks at Nancy, who’s scrunching her face up in her signature thinking look.
“We have to do something.”
~
Something. Jonathan’s mind had been repeating the word over and over again for days, and now he was pacing over it.
Jonathan wasn’t ever very good at making friends. He had never been. Friendly gestures weren’t made towards him, except by Nancy.
“God, this is so stupid. He hates me! We literally got in a fight last year!” Jonathan ran his hands through his hair in frustration as he paced. This wouldn’t be nearly as hard if Steve didn’t hate him, but Jonathan was convinced that he did. Why would anyone even want to be friends with him? “I’m a total loser!” Jonathan was beginning to spiral when the phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hey!” It was Nancy. “You and me and Steve are going to the movies. Does tomorrow work for you?”
“Yeah, that’s fine. I'll see you at school tomorrow?”
“Of course! And by the way, you’ve gotta be the one to ask him.”
“What?”
“Ask Steve. To the movies.”
“But Nance,”
She cut him off. “No buts, I’ll see you tomorrow!” She said, hanging up on him.
Well, that solved that problem, but there was still the actual going to the movies with Steve thing to deal with, not to mention the inviting of Steve to go with them.
~
Nancy was standing at his locker the next morning when Jonathan got to school.
“Have you asked him yet?”
“When would I have done that? You thought I was going to call him?”
“Yes!”
“Oh yeah, I’m just gonna call him up, be all, hey Stevie, wanna see a movie with me and my girlfriend tomorrow?“
Nancy swatted at him. “No, but you actually think you’re gonna be able to ask him to his face?”
Nancy wasn’t wrong. Nancy was rarely wrong and he loved that about her.
“Well I have to now, don’t I?” She nodded. Jonathan rolled his eyes. “Fine. I’ll ask him at lunch.”
She gave him a look. “I really will? Okay?”
“Okay. I’ll see you later, I’ve got to get to class.” Nancy hurried off, brushing past Steve on her way.
“What’s that look for?” Steve asked when he reached him.
“What look?” Was he making a look? Why was Steve asking him about it? Jonathan’s face scrunched up even more.
Steve gave a singular laugh before scrunching his face in a way very similar to Jonathan. “You look like you’re hoping Nancy trips as she walks away. Like this.” He motions to his own ridiculous expression.
Jonathan laughed at that because it was pretty close to the truth.
“What’d she do this time?” Steve said with a small smirk still on his face.
Jonathan sighed “She gets so determined sometimes when she gets an idea in her head, and it’s exasperating. She always tries to get me in on it.”
“Oh, I’m well aware of how determined Nancy Wheeler can be. What’s she trying to get you to do?”
He blinked at Steve, who sounded so genuinely interested in what was going on in his life. He shook his head as if to shake himself out of his thoughts. “She’s trying to get me to ask you to come to the movies with us tonight.”
“Huh, what’s it? A Thursday?” Jonathan nodded. “Sure, I’m free. What time?”
“Oh, I don’t know, we’ll have to ask her.” He was not expecting to have this happen when it did, and he was totally unprepared for the question, even if it was obvious and logical.
“No worries, just let me know later. I’ll see you tonight, gotta get to class.” Steve winked at him as he walked off, confident as ever.
Jonathan had to do a double take. Steve Harrington had just winked at him. And he was going to be late for class. Shit, class. Jonathan took off immediately to biology.