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Steve stood outside the Byers’ house, cigarette in his mouth and an aching in his heart. He hadn’t wanted to do this.
He sighed and put his cigarette out on the wall before stamping it into the ground, and, with slight hesitation, he knocked on the door.
Joyce answered, as she always did. Good old Mrs Byers. She wouldn’t see much of him from now on, Steve suspected.
“Oh- Hi Steve- This is a surprise- What’re you doing here at this time of night?”
Steve suppressed an urge to roll his eyes, it was only 10:30.
“I’m here to see Jonathan.” Steve mumbled, usual confident smile absent from his face.
“Great, he’ll be pleased to see you, come in, come in,” Joyce smiled welcomingly, and Steve headed inside, going straight to Jon’s room. He took a deep breath, and knocked.
Jon opened the door, face lighting up with joy upon seeing Steve, before quickly the joy vanished as he saw that Steve did not have a similar look of happiness upon his face.
“Hey.” Jonathan looked at the floor.
“Hi.” Steve replied.
“What’re you doing here?”
“I need to talk to you about something.” Steve swallowed the lump in his throat.
“Okay.. What’s up?”
“Outside. C’mon.” Steve muttered, concluding the less words he used the better, that way he could keep his voice from breaking more easily.
He walked back outside the Byers’ house, feeling for another cigarette in his pocket. He placed one in his mouth, got out his lighter and lit it.
“Oh.. You’ve… Taken up smoking?” Jonathan inquired, getting a simple nod of the head as an answer. He searched Steve's eyes for a hint of caring, a hint of want, but found none there. Steve was a closed book now.
“I need to talk to you.” Steve repeated, bringing the cigarette away from his lips.
“Yeah.. You said that already..” Jonathan replied, a pit of anxiety in his stomach. He could tell this wouldn’t be a good talk.
Steve paused for a second, taking a long drag from his cigarette, trying to figure out how to say it. He decided to just get to the point plainly.
“It’s over.” Steve closed his eyes to avoid looking at the hurt he was sure would be present in Jon’s.
“What?”
“Our friendship. It’s over.”
“But-”
“Look, we’ve both noticed I’ve been withdrawing from you lately, there’re reasons for that. Mainly because unfortunately I found out you probably don’t like me all that much.” Steve knew that wasn’t true. It was just a lie that his new friends told him to get him away from Jonathan, but Steve wasn’t sure why he was doing this otherwise, so he’d convinced himself that was the case.
“What do you mean?” The look of hurt turned to anger as Steve opened his eyes to look at the other boy again. “Oh. Oh I get it. It’s because I’m not like your new friends. I’m not cool enough for you anymore.”
Immediately Steve tensened, defensive. “No- no, of course not- it’s not my fault you hate me now for whatever reason, I don’t know how long you haven’t liked me but thinking back to how you act around me, it’s been a while. Better to end it now instead of being led on for longer.”
“Led on?- You’re absolutely delusional. You’re being an idiot Steve, you can’t do this.”
“Well I am.”
Steve thought back to all those loving stares, those awkward smiles. He sighed, convincing himself that those were hateful glares, those awkward smiles were because Jon was hiding his dislike.
Nevermind the moments where they were so close to each other that Steve could smell the mentos on Jonathan’s breath. Nevermind all the times they found their hands interlocked, a red flush on both of their faces.
“Don’t- don’t you care about me anymore?” Jonathan asked, sorrow filling his voice.
Steve wanted to yell. He wanted to scream. He wanted to hold onto Jonathan Byers and never let go until the day he died. Of course he cared about Jon. He couldn’t not. But instead he just answered with silence.
“Fine.
Fine.
Just know that when you finally discover that those people are assholes, don’t expect me to be here to clean up your mess. Don’t expect me to let you weep into my arms like I always do. If we’re done, we’re done for good. Got it?” tears were filling Jonathan’s eyes.
“That’s good with me.”
“Y-yeah. Good.” Jonathan immediately went back on his bluff. “ It’s just- they can’t be trusted, okay?” Jon stepped closer to the other boy, holding his hands.
Steve immediately shrugged him off. “They can be more trusted than you. They’re good people.”
“Steve just.. Just give me a chance.” It was clear Jonathan wouldn’t give Steve peace until he was heard out, so Steve looked at him. “What.”
Jonathan hesitated. He hadn’t been expecting Steve to actually hear him out. He took a deep breath.
“Stevie.. I… I think I love you.”
There was a long silence.
Steve’s mind was racing, heart beating faster than the speed of light.
Love. He Loves me.
He shook his head. He didn’t return the feelings- did he? He thought about it. Thought about how happy he got whenever he saw Jon. Thought about how many times they glanced at each other’s lips, wondering if they were as soft as they looked. Thought about how good it felt whenever they were so close that Jon had to wrinkle his nose at the smell of Steve’s cologne, before admitting to loving the smell when he noticed the absence of it a different day.
As the realisation set into place, Steve suddenly felt the smoke of the cigarette irritate him and he started violently coughing. Jonathan immediately started patting his back in an effort to help. Steve threw the cigarette on the ground, stamping it out.
After about 2 minutes of straight coughing, Steve finally calmed down.
“You okay, Steve?” Jon asked.
Steve suddenly felt a hot feeling in his chest. Jonathan Byers, the weird kid, his now ex friend, said he loved him.
Deciding to deny the possibility of the feeling being anything other than anger, Steve yelled at Jonathan. “Get away from me, queer.”
Jon flinched away, heartbroken.
Steve stormed away, trying to ignore the image of that shocked, heartbroken look on Jon’s face that had imprinted into his mind.
And so, it was over.