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'I need to speak to Robin.'
'Make it quick, Casanova!' Dustin yells after him as he pulls her away to some semblance of privacy. The ground is still shaking intermittently, lightning flashing across the sky every few minutes.
'I can't do this, Robin. You know I'm not-'
'You have made it very clear that being gay is the worst thing you could be, Steve.' she levels him with a terrible look that has him backtracking. She can't think he thinks that.
'No! Not like, for someone else, it's not a bad thing, I just - it's just, I'm not, and-'
'Steve, if there was even a tiny chance it would work why wouldn't you try it?'
'It just... doesn't make any sense. It's like if you and me were supposed to kiss, and - hey maybe that's it, we're like, like, platonic soulmates! Capital P, Robs!' he smacks a hand against her arm desperately.
'You know that's not it. That's not what it comes down to, Steve, we're wasting time! I love you but I am gonna need you to postpone your big gay crisis until after we save the world.'
'I'm not having a gay crisis! I'm straight! I like boobies!'
'You can like boobies and also weird, scrawny, nerd guys.'
'But I. I don't.'
He is trying to put it into words, and he's thinking of his dad calling him queer and Coach calling him a pretty boy and Tommy H using whatever slurs he thinks will hit the hardest whenever he wants the ammo, and he's thinking of how he and Tommy had kissed that one time at the party freshman year and he'd shoved him so hard after, how he'd landed on the concrete and lost his breath and Tommy hadn't spoken to him for three weeks, but Dustin runs up and grabs his wrist and pulls and is complaining at him and the other kids are yelling and he gets pushed in front of the hell version of the boathouse.
Dustin is looking at him expectantly, they all are, and Steve thinks he might be having a heart attack, he's never felt so sincerely like his organs were trying to jump out of his body and he's never felt his heart rate this high, even after running pacers at practice.
‘Do we really think this is gonna work? I mean, true love saving the day, it’s… a little ridiculous. Right?'’
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‘Steve, you’re standing in a hell dimension and we’re talking about killing what is basically a nightmare god.’
Steve sighs and runs his hands through his hair. He really hates this, all of it. They shouldn’t be here, and he shouldn’t be here, and Eddie shouldn’t. They should all be eating cereal on a couch somewhere. He looks out at Lover’s Lake, which has been partially refilled by the sporadically torrential pouring rains but still looks low and weird and off, especially with the way the cracked fault runs into it.
'Just. Can you all stay out here, please.' He says it softly and looks at them all and they're his family, and so many of them are missing, and he doesn’t know how he can fix any of it.
'I don't wanna see that.' Mike is scoffing and El jabs him hard with an elbow and glares so fiercely that if her powers were up to snuff he'd probably be halfway across the backyard by now.
Dustin claps his hand onto Steve's shoulder in that way he has of being weirdly mature sometimes, like he's the older brother, and he says 'I'll be out here for you.'
Steve gulps and opens the moldering door, shuts it behind him even though the boards are barely hanging on and it’s not exactly keeping anything surreptitious.
Eddie is sagged onto an old stool and leaning against the wall, ropes and chains securing him to a beam, and he's shivering. That's the first thing Steve notices. He looks around and finds a ratty drop cloth and steps forward to wrap it around him and Eddie's right arm, just loose enough to drink water when they can bring him some, grabs his wrist.
They're all so in over their heads. Eddie doesn't need to be kept a prisoner, he needs a hospital and stitches and a warm bed, and this fuck of a passenger out of his head.
He's looking at Steve with giant and tired eyes , safe and warm despite it all, not the silverfish shine of a predator, not today. He's still got blood and lake water crusting all over his face and clothes, and he knows he's in pain, but Eddie smiles softly at him anyway, says 'Hey Harrington, draw the short straw?' before he's coughing.
Steve doesn't know what to say. He brushes Eddie's hair back out of his face, tucks it under his bandana again where it came loose, just to keep his face free, maybe keep him breathing clear. He's still just looking at him, looking at his bruises and blood and the way his skin is so pale it looks blue. The hand clinging to his wrist still is scarily weak and feels fragile and cool like glass.
'It's okay.' He knows he's in the Upside Down, the closest thing to bizarro world that probably exists, but to have Eddie comforting him brings nausea to his guts and tears to his eyes, and he thinks as loud as he can that it's not fair, and he hopes if there's some kind of nice deity somewhere, that if it's not demons all the way down, they can hear him. It's not fair.
Eddie's just some fucking guy. He plays weirdo games with all the loner kids so they don't feel so alone and he steals cans of cat food to feed the strays at the trailer park and he makes annoying jokes and talks like he's on stage like all the time. He shouldn't be infected with this shit, he shouldn't be dying, he shouldn't be the tool Vecna was using to put his best friends in the hospital one by one. It's not fucking fair.
He wishes it were him instead. He could bottle it all up for long enough to land at the bottom of the quarry, he thinks, exactly the way they wouldn't let Eddie. Steve could have been sneakier.
'Steve-o, I don't know why you're crying, man, but it's okay. I'm ready to go, this fucking sucks.' he forces out a chuckle that turns into another cough, this one wet enough to have him spitting blood to the side.
'You. You're ready to go.'
'Yeah, let's get a move on, I don't have all day here. I've been trying to tell Dustin that it's gotta be like this but youuu know him.'
Eddie thinks they sent Steve in to kill him.
Regardless of the path his own thoughts were just on, he feels the bile rise to his throat.
'I'm kinda glad they sent you, though. I think you'll get it done, you know? Quick and clean and easy. They don't have to see it at all. And hey, bonus, you're like the prettiest out of all of them, if I have to look at someone while I'm going out it might as well be you.' He squeezes his eyes closed and coughs again but waggles his eyebrows half-heartedly. 'I would fucking love a cigarette though.’
Steve is panting for air and it's like maybe he is the one possessed, actually, he feels like his skin is on fire and his blood feels thick and pounding in his head and his eyes feel drier than they have a right to be when they are steadily streaming tears like this.
'Eddie. I'm not gonna kill you.'
'You sure look like that's the plan, big guy, you've got this real sad look on your face. Like I'm the shittiest puppy at the pound and today's the big day.'
'Shut up. You know that's not even an option.'
Eddie sags as much as the ropes will let him, in relief or disappointment or just exhaustion. The earth beneath them shakes roughly again, enough to cause the lake to splash up at them from the gap in the floorboards. Time is running out.
'Eddie, look at me for a second. I need to say something.'
He stays slouched but raises his eyes enough to look at him through his eyelashes. Eddie doesn’t look him in the eye, but Steve can see they aren't shining silver, so he plows forward before he loses his courage. He brushes aside all of the shitty ideals he has all at once, like taking off a heavy and soaking jacket, and just lets himself ramble.
'I am so glad you're the little shits' story master.'
'Dungeon master.'
Steve waves his hand at the correction and puts both hands firmly on Eddie's shoulders. Eddie tenses again at this, sits up a little straighter but still avoids his eye.
'And I'm real happy you've had our back this whole time. We wouldn't have made it without you.' Eddie scoffs and Steve knows he's thinking about pulling at the machines keeping Max alive, about setting the Henderson house on fire, about putting a knife to Wayne's throat. 'The rest of it wasn't you. You know that, we all know that. No one died. And you protected them, me, us, so much more than any of that, every time you could. This, right now, is you fighting to protect us.' He moves his head down so Eddie has to look at him, and his eyes are just so fucking big and so miserable.
'It's not fair, Eds, that's what I'm trying to say. You should have graduated and gotten a shitty job at the record store and, and-and played shows with your band, and, maybe even gotten big. You should have traveled and eaten too much fancy food and seen the ocean and, and fallen in love.'
'All that was never in the cards, King Steve.'
Steve is shaking his head. He's mad again.
'No, Eddie, it was, it is!'
'Not to be a pessimist but it's kind of hard to play a guitar with, you know…' He lifts his mangled left hand as much as he can, rattles the chains with gnarled and cramped and broken fingers. '...all this.'
'No!' Steve can't help himself, he yells into Eddie's face, must shake him a little, because Eddie's eyes widen and he coughs again. The drop cloth slides off to pool at Steve’s feet.
'You're not exactly convincing me you aren't gonna kill me here, pal.' he groans.
Steve lets Eddie go to pace in front of him. After a dozen or so back-and-forths he starts to open the door, to tell them he thinks he can't do it, but Dustin and Robin are there looking at him, and they're scared, and Mike and El are holding each other and crying a few feet away. He closes the door again and presses his forehead against the soggy wood.
The thing is, the real rub here, is that he does like Eddie, that he's caught himself looking at him like he's beautiful sometimes actually, wondered how soft his hair might be in his hands, even thought about what it would be like to kiss right where his jaw meets his neck, but he hasn't had any time to think since all of this started, so it went into a box on a shelf in his brain with all the other stuff and he figured maybe later, when they got out of this, he could poke at it a little.
He's tugging at his hair, and he can hear his dad's voice plain as if he were standing in front of him, red and spitting because he found a fucking Bowie cassette when he borrowed the Beemer.
'Steve, something's wrong. I don't feel right, man, and I think you should leave. Just like toss me into the lake and get out of here, please. Tell Will he's gotta take over the campaign.' When Steve turns to look at him he smiles bloody, shaky, and Steve can't tell if he's lying or not but it doesn't matter.
'No.' Steve isn't yelling anymore, he's quiet, and Eddie is crying himself, now. Steve can hear his dad's voice in his head still and it's all too much. It's not fair, none of it is.
He walks into Eddie's space, sees his brow furrowed in pain. He smooths his hair out of his face again and presses his thumb against the wrinkles between his eyes, and he just. Breathes. Leans forward and kisses him.
It's so easy to do, actually, and he puts his hands up to cradle Eddie's face and he can feel his fingertips against tangled hair at the base of his neck, a little scratch of patchy stubble brushing against his, can taste salt from tears and blood from both of them, but after a few seconds Eddie kisses him back and it's like his whole body and brain are on fire again.
He presses in firmer and so does Eddie, to the limit of his bindings, and he can feel his right hand touch lightly against his sweater where it can reach, grasp at it, and when Eddie's mouth opens just a little to slot a just a little closer, to press his tongue against his lips, he thinks 'oh'.
It's like sirens and lights and a parade are all running through the boathouse, and it's a stupid cliche and a shitty rom com but it's fucking real, like for a minute they're transported somewhere sweet and nice, maybe those beaches Steve was telling Eddie about, like the warmth on his skin isn't from being dragged against rough ground but from lounging around too much in the sun.
Eddie pulls away and presses his forehead against Steve's shoulder, and Steve puts his arms up to hold him. They're both panting and Eddie's shaking and crying hard enough that Steve feels the moisture spread throughout his sweater, and because he doesn't know what else to do he softly says 'hey' and pets a hand through his gnarled hair. His voice and his breath are quivering.
They stand like that for a few minutes, just existing together with the storm picking up outside, the wind howling, before Eddie slouches in Steve's arms, a sudden dead weight.
'Eds.' He pats lightly at his cheek, adjusts his position so he's holding him up as much as he can to keep the chain from digging into him. 'Hey Eds, Eddie, wake up, man.'
He pushes him away to look at him in the face and his eyes aren't open, but when he lifts a lid they aren't silver, just empty, and he doesn't know what to do. He feels for a pulse and one's there, but it's light, and he can't feel breath coming at all. He needs to lay him on the ground and start compressions, he needs-
'Hey! Hey, hey! Guys I need a hand, pronto, now, Dustin! Robin!'
There's movement everywhere all at once and everyone is there, pulling at straps and cords and lowering Eddie to the damp floor. The whole time Steve is saying 'No, no, no, no, no' like a mantra, but it doesn't help, because by the time he's stretched out on the ground Eddie isn't breathing at all.
Steve lets his body fall into the muscle memory of chest compressions, pushing and pushing and ignoring the snaps and pops that are Eddie's poor already wrecked ribs, and ignoring the strain against his own injuries.
'What happened?' Dustin is crying at his side and yelling over the sound of Steve's counting and the roar of wind and rain outside.
'I dunno, I don't know! It was supposed to work!'
'Was it Vecna? Was he-'
'No, it was Eddie. It was Eddie and he just, he just fell.'
He's so worried he's losing count, worried he isn't keeping time right, but he keeps going, forcing air into his lungs and listening for breath or for a heartbeat, and it's not working, nothing's happening, just the thunder and the shock of lightning flashing with less and less time between and the occasional earthquake, and he knows everyone else is looking at each other and wondering what to do, and Mike says 'we should pull him away, we need to go'.
Steve and Dustin yell 'No!' at the same time but Steve knows, he knows it's been full and precious minutes and every single second is a second too long, and he knows that there's no way they can carry him out like this anyway, and there is a horrible rain picking up outside, the wind blowing it in through the cracks along with the lake, and Steve is so tired. It was all for nothing. And now what, they’d have to leave him again?
Another wave comes up from the lake, this one high enough to drench them all, and as it does Steve is leaning down to breathe air into Eddie's mouth again, plugging his nose, and when the water pulls away Eddie is coughing, just a little bit but he's coughing and coughing means breathing and breathing means alive.