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There is exactly one rule to being the babysitter:
You are not the baby.
This means that a) you don’t complain, b) you don’t make a fuss, c) you don’t let yourself get taken advantage of, and d) you don’t cry.
Fairly easy rule to follow, right?
Right?
Steve Harrington thought it was pretty easy, at least. He lived by that rule. Except maybe the complaining part. He may have done that a couple times. The point was, he was a good babysitter. A badass babysitter. He absolutely crushed the sitting of babies.
He was not the baby.
He hadn’t even cried since freshman year of high school.
Yeah, he was good.
Everything was good.
He thought.
He was fucking around with Dustin when it happened, chasing him around Family Video, trying to get back the movie the kid had stolen off a shelf.
When Steve finally tackled him, grabbing the contraband out of his hand and dangling high above his head, out of Dustin’s reach, Dustin reached out and playfully grabbed hold of his throat as though to strangle him. He didn’t squeeze, barely even touched him, but suddenly Steve was struggling to breathe.
He was back in the Upside Down, on the ground, the pressure on his throat increasing, his vision going dark. He was going to die. He was going to die and it wasn’t fair he had so much to live for-
Dustin let go, stepping back with a startled expression. “Dude, you okay?”
“Fine,” Steve tried to say, but no sound came out. He still couldn’t breathe.
He collapsed against the shelves, trying to find air, there had to be air somewhere, Dustin was breathing just fine, but his chest felt too tight, his throat felt like it was constricting.
Oh shit, I’m actually gonna die.
“Steve!” Dustin was in his face, hands held out in a placating gesture, not touching him but close enough to make it claustrophobic. “Shit, man, if I had known that would cause a panic attack-”
Huh? The words didn’t really make sense. Nothing made sense. Why the hell couldn’t he breathe? He couldn’t think.
“Jesus, Steve,” Dustin was actually touching him now, hands on his arms, holding on a little too tightly. “You’re okay. You’re fine. Take a deep breath. You’re okay.”
Steve just stared at him, hoping his offended expression showed. He was not okay, something was very clearly happening to him and Dustin needed to call for help immediately.
Suddenly he could breathe again. He heaved in lungfuls of air, bending over and resting his hands on his knees. His heart was beating much too fast, and he still felt like a weight had been dropped into his chest, and he was trembling, but he was breathing.
Dustin let out a long, relieved sigh. “You scared the shit out of me.”
“ I scared you?” Steve panted.
“Well yeah, you just started freaking out and I didn’t know what to do, you didn’t tell me this was a thing for you and I didn’t want to just do what works for Mike because that might not work for you, and-”
“What the hell are you talking about? What does Mike have to do with this?”
Dustin blinked. “He has panic attacks too. It’s, like, embarrassing for him though, so don’t tell him I told you.”
“Dustin,” Steve straightened up, legs still a little shaky, “I still don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Dustin just stared at him. Then his eyes went wide.
“Ohhh holy shit,” he said. “You haven’t had one before, have you?”
“Had what?”
“A panic attack?”
A panic attack?
He thought he’d heard the term before, maybe. It was probably one of those things that had been mentioned around him that he hadn’t bothered to ask about because it didn’t apply to him.
Except now, apparently, it did.
His further confusion must have been showing, because Dustin sighed and said, “It’s like- it’s this thing that happens. You get scared. For no reason. Or sometimes a reason. You basically just… randomly freak out. You get, like, shaky and stuff. Mike said he thought he was dying the first time he had one.”
Yeah, that was definitely what it had felt like.
So Steve Harrington had just had a panic attack.
And now he needed to figure out what the hell that meant.
He didn’t sleep much that night. He went home after promising Dustin that it wasn’t his fault and that everything was fine, and immediately found his mind unable to shut down.
He was wound much too tight, his leg wouldn’t stop bouncing. He rubbed at it, scratched at it through his jeans, the sensation of his hand moving both calming and frustrating. He couldn’t stay still. His brain kept dragging him back to the panic attack, no matter how hard he tried to distract himself. It bothered him, that this… thing had just hit him out of nowhere and basically taken control. He had been completely helpless.
That wasn’t something that he could afford to have happen again.
Robin came up to him at work in the morning. She stood next to him at the counter, tapping her fingers against the glass surface.
“So, uh,” she said lightly, a little too nonchalant, “Dustin told me what happened yesterday.”
Of course he did. “I’m fine.”
The tapping kept on, both hands churning out competing rhythms. “He said you had a panic attack?”
“That’s what he called it.”
“Is he wrong?”
Steve shrugged, anxious to deflect the question and the conversation as a whole. “I don’t know.”
Tap. Tap tap. Taptaptaptaptaptap.
“Jesus, Robin, can you stop?”
“What?”
He waved his hand in her vague direction. “That. The tapping. Whatever. It’s driving me insane.”
“Sorry,” she tucked her hands into her pockets, looking sheepish and a little taken aback. “I don’t notice I’m doing it. It’s, um, what did the doctor call it. Attention hyper-something. It gets worse when I’m nervous. I move around a lot. Talk too much. It’s like there’s too much in my brain, y’know?”
Actually, he kind of did.
He decided to research it. He gathered as much information as he could find on panic attacks and Robin’s so-called ‘attention hyper-something’, and he sat down with her to look over it all.
‘Just curious’ was the reason he gave her for his newfound interest, when she asked. He hoped it would keep her from asking more questions.
It did not.
“Ok, what is this?” Robin asked after a record ten minutes of silence. “I know you’re not just doing it for me.”
“I told you. I’m curious.”
She gave him a look that said she was one hundred percent not buying his bullshit.
Steve sighed. “Look, I just- I want to make sure there’s nothing wrong with me.”
Robin’s eyebrow raised almost comically high. “ Wrong with you?”
“Yeah.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So you think there’s something wrong with me?”
What? “No, of course not, that’s not-”
“Because that’s what you implied, right there. You realize that.”
Steve shook his head, trying to protest, but Robin steamrolled right over him.
“And, what, you’re better than that? The thought of being in any way different freaks you out so much that you have to find out everything you can in order to erase it? Is that what you think?”
“Forget it,” Steve rose to his feet, sweeping all the materials he’d collected into his back. He left, pushing past Robin, filled with an odd anger that he didn’t understand.
Once again, sleep had trouble finding him. He wanted to apologize to Robin, but a part of him balked at the idea. He hadn’t meant to offend her, he really hadn’t. But at the same time… he had meant it. And he hated that more than anything.
He decided he was going to do something about it.
Somewhere around midnight, Steve cracked open his bedroom window and snuck out into the darkness. It was the same thing he used to do when he would go to see Nancy, but this time when he got in his car he didn’t turn toward the Wheelers’.
He could already hear the music as he pulled into the trailer’s approximation of a driveway. A single guitar, being played way too loudly for any time past ten o’clock.
Does he ever sleep?
Steve had to knock on the door a couple times before he can be heard. He did so with increasingly little patience, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Dammit, why couldn’t he stop moving?
“I didn’t do it!” A familiar voice yelped from inside the trailer as the music cut out, followed by some hasty crashing sounds and finally, approaching footsteps.
“I swear, I have no idea where the music is coming from, I think this place is fucking haunted or someth-”
The door swung open, and the person behind it stopped mid-sentence. “Oh. Hey.”
Eddie had clearly been intending to sleep at some point, dressed in pajama pants and a baggy band t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. His hair was a wild, frizzy mess that badly needed a good taming.
“Does that work?” Steve asked, as a conversation starter.
“What? Oh, the ‘it wasn’t me’ thing?” Eddie grinned. “No. So. What can I do for you, Steve Harrington?”
“I need your help.”
Eddie raised an eyebrow slightly, leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed. He wasn’t wearing his rings, which made his hands seem smaller, somehow, more vulnerable. “It’s a little late to get me to do your homework, but okay, I’ll give it a go.”
Steve sighed. He hadn’t wanted to say it out loud. “Your, uh, professional help.”
A flicker of surprise crossed the other boy’s face, but he hid it quickly behind a dramatic sweep of an arm. “Come on in.”
Steve tucked his hands into his pockets to keep them from fidgeting as he went in, trying to pretend that he wasn’t way out of his depth.
“So, what are you looking for?” Eddie asked, rummaging through a pile of stuff on the kitchen counter. “We’ve got, uh.. Quite a selection.”
Steve shrugged. “I don’t know… I’m just kind of overwhelmed, I guess? I want to just.. Stop for a while. If that makes sense.”
Eddie paused, studying him with those big dark eyes. “You sure?”
“I thought this was, like, a no-questions-asked kinda thing.”
“Normally, yeah,” Eddie said, “but the last time I did a deal like this, it… didn’t end well.”
Oh. Yeah. “I’m not Chrissy.”
Eddie nodded, still not taking his eyes off Steve.
“You’ve got the same look in your eyes, though,” he said quietly after a moment. “That she had. Before-”
“Look, if you don’t have it, you can just say so,” Steve interrupted, a little more harshly than he had intended. “I can just go.”
Eddie bit his lip, contemplating. “I’ve got it,” he admitted, somewhat reluctantly. “But that shit’s dangerous, man.”
Steve was getting tired of people questioning him. “ You’ve done it, right?”
“Yeah, because I’m destructive and have no impulse control. I didn’t really think that was your style.”
“Well, maybe you don’t know me,” Steve snapped. Eddie recoiled as though struck, eyes wide and hurt.
A tense silence fell.
Eddie broke it. “Okay, I’ll just go fuck myself, then. I guess.”
Looking at him, visibly shaken and trying to look tough about it, Steve was suddenly reminded of Jonathan Byers after Steve had broken his camera. That bullied, deflated look, like someone had just taken everything away from him. It made Steve feel a little bit sick.
“Shit, Eddie, I’m sorry,” he said, all the fight going out of him in a rush. “I’ve got a lot going on, I just- I think I had a panic attack a couple days ago? And I might have some sort of- of mental disorder? I’m freaking the fuck out, dude. And I didn’t want it to show.”
Eddie stared at him, then the words sank in and he tilted back against the counter, dropping his face into his palm. “Okay. Fuck. Okay.”
Steve found himself rambling, trying to piece together his fractured train of thought, seeing if it could make some form of sense. “And I came here because- I don’t know. Maybe… Maybe I thought drugs would help, maybe I just thought… I don’t know. I think I kind of thought of you because I’m- a little bit jealous, I guess.”
Eddie blinked. “Wait, what?”
“I mean… yeah.” Steve shrugged, a little embarrassed. “It’s like, you know who you are and you can just… be that. And that’s… It’s pretty damn admirable, man. I could never… I don’t have that. So yeah, sometimes I kinda wish I was you.”
Eddie shifted a bit, uncomfortably. He wrapped his arms around himself, fixing his gaze on the floor. Steve wondered if he’d said something wrong again.
“Well, since we’re being honest,” Eddie mumbled, then raised his voice a little louder. “I tried to kill myself when I was seventeen. They told me I couldn’t graduate and I just… snapped. Slit my wrists with a shitty plastic guitar pick in the boy’s bathroom. Didn’t work. Obviously. Never went that far again, but… You heard me. I’m destructive. I throw shit sometimes. Scream. Broken a couple guitars in my time. Sometimes I just… want to watch something burn. Hurt something. Someone.”
He lifted his chin, trembling a bit. “So yeah, you’re right. I know who I am. Doesn’t mean I want to be him.”
“And you know the stupidest thing?” he went on, laughing a little. “I try to reason it out, come up with something rational, and all I can think is, no one else likes me, so why should I?”
“But that’s- that’s ridiculous,” Steve protested. “You’re not- how other people judge you shouldn’t control how you feel about yourself.”
Eddie snorted. “Look who’s talking. Tell me, Steve, where would you be if you didn’t have Henderson? Wheeler, Robin? Those other kids? If there wasn’t anyone who needed you, who wanted you around. Who made you feel like you were worth something. What the hell would be left of you?”
He tried to envision it, he really did. He tried hard. It just didn’t make sense. He was the goddamn babysitter. He was there because there were people who needed him. If there weren’t, then he would just be… he would be… he would…
“Yeah, we’re not that different,” Eddie finished, catching the look on Steve’s face.
Shit. Shiiiiit. This was too much.
“Maybe, but I can’t just- I can’t be open about that stuff. I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because…” Steve couldn’t believe he was actually going to say this. “They’ll- laugh at me.”
Eddie’s jaw dropped. “Jesus Christ, man. Do you not see how messed up that is? You’ve got trauma coming out of your ass.”
Steve wanted to argue that no, he couldn’t have trauma, he was supposed to be the one who dealt with everyone else’s trauma, but deep down he realized how little sense that made.
“Look,” Eddie scrubbed a hand over his face and through his hair. “I’m a drug dealer, not a therapist. And not gonna lie, I’m exhausted and kind of want to break down right now. So. Who is the person you trust the most? Like, in the world.”
It was barely even a question. “Robin.”
“Okay, perfect. Talk to Robin about this. Work it out. But, like, sleep first. Don’t wake her up. Not everyone is a creature of the night like me.”
“Yeah,” Steve nodded, taking a deep breath. “Yeah, okay. Thanks, Eddie. And uh, you get some sleep too.”
Eddie smiled, just a tiny bit. “No promises.”
He met Robin outside her front door as he usually would to take her to school or work. He wasn’t sure exactly how to start, so he waited until they were both in the car with the doors shut. He didn’t start it.
“We’re gonna be late,” Robin pointed out. “Steve?”
She was still clearly a little pissed at him, but the longer he remained silent the more the annoyance on her face was replaced with concern. “You okay?”
It was just two words, two words that he’d been asked thousands of times and had always been able to bullshit an answer to. And yet it was so much more than that.
“No,” he admitted. “Not really.”
And then he started to cry.
He wasn’t sure how long it lasted, but it felt like too long and not long enough at the same time. He crossed his arms over the steering wheel and buried his face in them, letting his body give in to the heaving, racking sobs.
Distantly he heard Robin go, “oh shit” and make a little uncertain squeaking noise. She patted his hair, rubbed his back, unbuckled her seatbelt and scooted over so she could rest her chin on the back of his head.
It slowed down after a while, Steve’s breathing became more regular and he managed to sit up, wiping his eyes. Robin didn’t say a word.
“I think,” Steve said, once he was able to form real words, “that the way I was raised conditioned me to feel like I was the example, like I was just.. Normal. What normal was supposed to be. My parents didn’t even acknowledge that stuff like this existed. It wasn’t… something that would ever be relevant to me. I must have got it in my head that I was… immune, or something. That I couldn’t be traumatized, couldn’t be affected by anything. And I guess part of me still thinks like that. Part of me probably always will. So when I.. I had that panic attack, and I heard about your attention hyper thing, I just- I thought I would know if I had something like that. Something would- would change. But I guess it couldn’t have, if I’ve always been- like this. So. Yeah. I guess I’ve just… been messed up. And obviously I don’t know how to deal with that.”
There were tears in Robin’s eyes. “Oh, you are so fucking stupid,” she said. “ Such a fucking idiot. Stupid, idiotic stupid idiot.”
“Thanks.”
He was smiling. She was smiling. She leaned back over and hugged him, putting her cheek on his shoulder.
“It’s okay to not be okay, you know,” she told him. “And, I mean, this attention thing, it’s pretty new. Like, in the medical world. I only got diagnosed a couple months ago. Eddie I don’t think has ever been diagnosed. He self medicates or something.”
Steve snorted. “Yeah, I’d believe that.”
“But if you want, we could go get you evaluated soon. At least for that. I can come with you.”
He would like that.
She hugged him for a little longer, then let go, putting her seatbelt back on. “Okay, now we’re really late. Your fault.”
Steve rolled his eyes, turning the key in the ignition.
He took Robin, Nancy, and Eddie for a movie and ice cream after work, because he was feeling grateful for the people in his life. As they were walking back to his car, deep in a discussion about the quality of the movie, Steve noticed that there were bats out, up in the night sky. One swooped down, right between Robin and Eddie, then arced back up and out of sight. Robin watched it fly away, but Eddie stood frozen. He began to shake, chest rising and falling too rapidly.
“Whoa, hey.” Steve jogged back to him, putting a hand on his arm. “Dude. Breathe. You’re okay.”
Eddie squeezed his eyes shut, taking a shuddering breath in. “Bats,” he whispered. “It’s just fucking bats.”
Just bats, yes, but those things in the Upside Down had almost killed him. It was no wonder he was driven to panic by something similar.
Steve squeezed his shoulder. “You’ve got trauma coming out of your ass, man.”
Eddie barked a laugh, distracting him from being afraid. “Fuck you.”
He opened his eyes, took another deep breath, and nodded that he was okay.
“You know, that’s gonna be the first song I write,” he teased. “‘Trauma Out Your Ass’. It’s gonna be a big hit.”
“Yeah, sure, keep telling yourself that,” Steve shot back as he turned to keep walking.
Robin came up next to him, looping her arm through his. “Proud of you,” she said. “I forgot to mention it earlier.”
Before he could reply, Nancy caught up with them. “Oh, Steve, Mike was wondering if you could take him and the boys to some convention thing this weekend? I told him you probably could, but I just wanted to check.”
Steve groaned. “ Always the goddamn babysitter.”
Well, most of the time.
Sometimes he could be the baby.