Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He falls

and falls

and keeps falling.

Something pushes him out of a dark and strange dream. Would he want to stay if he had the choice? No, I don’t think so. It was so cold, and dark, and sad. Who would want to stay there?

…then go…

There’s a strange warmth and a shove. Haunting images of the dream sear one last desperate picture in his mind—a world coloured by the deepest blue, a threadbare blanket, tears on the face of a friend—before they’re nothing, all of it left behind when he opens his eyes to a blinding world of white.

Beep. Beep.

So weird. Just a moment ago he was weightless. Now he can feel his body and the weight of the world again. Inch by inch he turns his head towards the noise. A phantom noose aches dully around his neck. There’s a monitor next to him that’s lit up with lines and numbers. He’s in the hospital, and he’s alive.

Right?

If he was dead then surely it would be more peaceful than this. Maybe he would feel nothing again.

Is that what happened? Did he die?

Beyond the pieces of the dream there’s nothing. His memories hide like cockroaches, scuttling away now that the light is flipped on. What can he remember?

His name. Steve Harrington. That’s a good start. He lives in Hawkins, Indiana. He’s a high school senior and his girlfriend’s name is Nancy. He can remember himself, his childhood, and his parents. Just not how he ended up here.

Oh, god. Was he at a party? His parents are going to murder him and toss his body in the woods.

What the hell happened?

The door on the far side of the room opens with a soft click. A woman with a round, friendly face pokes her head in. “Good to see you’re awake, Mr. Harrington. Doctor Morrison will be in to see you shortly.”

Shortly? What does that mean? His eyes wander around the room. There’s no clock in here. He can only listen to the rhythmic beeping of the monitor and wait. It nearly lulls him back to sleep before the door opens again. The doctor checks the monitor and stands at the end of his bed, looking down over the top of his glasses.

“Finally awake, are we? It’s about time. Do you remember how you got here, Mr. Harrington?”

“I…no.” Steve’s words come out in a rough croak, scratching their way from his throat.

“What’s the last thing you do remember?”

“I was…”

—a rushing of air, the passing of universes dancing beyond his fingertips, streaks of brilliant color the kind he’s never seen before, it would all be so beautiful if his heart wasn’t going crazy, and panic wasn’t filling his throat. Something is wrong, so wrong, somebody help me! Please—

“...did I fall?”

The doctor’s stern look makes Steve nervous. “You were driving but it wouldn’t be unusual if you thought you were falling. The brain can have a myriad of reactions during traumatic events.”

“What? You mean…I crashed?” Deep in his gut that knowledge doesn’t sit right. Wouldn’t he at least remember driving?

“You did. You can thank your guardian angel—your injuries should’ve been much worse. We don’t know why you’ve been unconscious for three days.”

Friday October 19th, 1984.

Steve is sitting on the bed and staring at nothing when the door opens. That familiar sharp click of heels on tile makes his stomach feel full of wriggling worms. He doesn’t look up. She hates that. If you can’t look me in the eye when I’m talking to you, young man—

He’s drowning in a gray sweat suit that’s as soft as a pillow and he rolls the wristband between his fingers. The nurse told him he gets to keep it. Will it shrink enough in the dryer that he could wear it running? Or maybe he’ll keep it for pajamas. Or maybe he’ll just wear it whenever he feels like this.

But he doesn’t want to feel like this again.

He doesn’t even know if there’s a word for it, but it’s like he’s from outer space. Strange and weird and alien.

“Get up, Steve,” his mom says. “It’s time to go.”

The nurse makes him sit in the wheelchair. Something about hospital policy. There’s nothing wrong with his legs but whatever. He doesn’t argue.

All the way to the front entrance his mom’s shoes click behind him like a ticking bomb. The car is the final step where he gets blown to bits. Steve’s pulse climbs higher and higher. Is it healthy to be this anxious after waking up from a coma?

Her door slams shut. She turns the key and the engine of her BMW jumps to life. Steve stares at his hands. He’s heard of people reading fortunes by the lines on their palms. What would his lines say?

When they’re idling at the first red light, she finally speaks.

“Look at you.”

Three little words. She never gets loud like his dad. Instead she chooses words that keep him up at night, wondering if all the bad things she thinks about him are true.

A dozen thoughts scramble through his mind. I don’t understand—it was an accident—I don’t know what happened—why can’t you be glad I’m okay?

That’s the one that hurts the most.

What would someone else’s mom say? What would Mrs. Wheeler say? He pictures her with a smile, drawing him into a warm hug. Oh, honey, we heard about your accident and we’re so glad you’re alright. If you need anything just let us know. Anything. A blanket, a hug, or a house filled with the mouth-watering smell of casserole in the oven. (His mom doesn’t cook anymore. Only the housekeeper does.) Soft, warm clothes and a kiss on the forehead. It’s been a long time since his mom was anything like that.

“Do you have any idea what people in this town are saying right now?”

It’s never a good idea to say anything when she’s angry like this, but he’s desperate to state his case. He bites his lip.

“No? I suppose there isn’t enough room for anything but yourself in that head of yours, least of all enough to remember that the council elections are coming up.”

“I didn’t forget.” Damn it.

She laughs softly, unkindly. “Oh, he speaks. And yet I still don’t hear an apology.”

“It was an accident.”

“Of course it was, everyone knows that. The only mystery they’re talking about is what you were on. So what was it, hm? Pot? Cocaine? Acid?”

“I wasn’t on anything!” Steve wouldn’t go driving around if he was fucked up. He doesn’t think so anyway.

“What else would make you crash your car on the side of a straight empty road? Unless Mrs. Granby was right? She called my office to express her deepest sympathies. Did you know her eldest grandson in Michigan tried to kill himself a few months ago? Thankfully, he’s getting help—”

Steve tears his eyes away from the world passing outside the window. Oh god, is that what the people out there are thinking? The thought makes him nauseous. “I didn’t—it wasn’t that. And I wasn’t on drugs.”

“I know that, Steve. Of course they screened you at the hospital, but that isn’t the point.” She pulls into the driveway and looks at him with a face carved from stone. “The point is that the truth doesn’t matter when the stories people invent are always far more interesting.”

Steve locks the door as soon as he gets to his room. Shaky breath in, shaky breath out. Again, and again, and again.

It feels like a century has passed since he’s been here, not three days. The housekeeper doesn’t clean in his room so everything is the way he left it. Messy bed and stray clothes across the shag rug. A pencil tucked into the middle of Macbeth on his desk beside a rough draft of his Indiana State application essay. It’s comforting. It’s jarring.

A muffled bang comes from downstairs. His mom is probably going back to work. More damage control now that he’s out of his coma. Maybe she’ll even be on the evening news. What will she say? We’re so grateful to have him home, and my husband and I would like to thank everyone in the community for their generous support during this difficult time. Something like that. He’s watched her on the news before, and he always wonders if everyone else sees the same person he does.

What will they see now? The mother of a drug addict, or the mother of a suicidal kid? Or both? Neither is true, except…

No, Steve wouldn’t, but he was upset. He remembers that much. Upset doesn’t even come close to what he felt. It felt like the world was ending, and he was blindsided by a grief so strong it crushed him. There was no warning and no cause, and he can still feel it now hiding in his bones like he was born with it. It doesn’t make sense.

But he didn’t want to kill himself. He would remember that.

Right?

Steve collapses onto the tangled blankets of his bed and buries his face in his pillow. Damn it, why can’t he remember what happened? It’s like snatches of a dream—crushing darkness and desperate faces and the overwhelming feeling that he failed. Nothing matters now, because it’s all over. Steve tries to remember, and tries not to cry, and lies on the bed for hours watching the light in his room fade away.

Every breath is made of darkness. Here, in this place of slithering vines and the stench of decay, only things from nightmares exist. There’s an orange glow pulsing across the ground. A broken seam between worlds, its edges made from a black, writhing mass. Through the seam he can see a sliver of starry night sky. That’s where he should be. Not here in this hellish place.

The world is ending.

Someone says his name.

A strange heat tingles beneath his feet through the soles of his boots. There’s a bright spot in the ground that wasn’t there before. Was it? It grows wider, blooming out into a glowing white circle. Another one appears near his heel, then another one ahead of him. All around him glittering orbs of light burst from the dirt. Mushrooms. He wants to touch one but he can’t lean down with his arms so heavy.

Someone says his name out loud this time.

“Steve, let’s go.”

The world has just begun.

A bang on his bedroom door startles Steve awake.

“Steve! Your girlfriend is on the phone, pick it up!”

He rubs his eyes. He thinks the blurry numbers on the clock read 9:12. Shit. He picks up the receiver. “H’lo?”

Nancy’s worried voice fills his ear. “Steve, why didn’t you call?”

“‘M sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry, I mean how are you? Were you asleep? I just figured you’d call, I’ve been so worried, and then I saw your mom on the news. Should I…do you want me to come over?”

God, he’d love to see her, but it doesn’t feel right. How weird is that? It doesn’t feel right? But it doesn’t. He’s too battered to let something as beautiful as her eyes see him right now, and he doesn’t want to make her miserable with whatever pity party he’s having.

“No, not now. Maybe tomorrow?”

“Are you sure?”

No. “Yeah, I wouldn’t be good company. And my mom is already pissed at me, so…”

When he first got the phone in his room he worried his mother would spy on his calls. At some point he realized she doesn’t care enough about what he does to spy. At least, he thinks bitterly, until it hurts her reputation. Even knowing this sometimes he still leaves things unsaid. And she hates you. It doesn’t make sense but his mother ticks in ways he’ll never understand. Maybe he should stop trying to.

“She’s mad at you right now?” Nancy ignores the words he doesn’t say. She knows, they both know, but they don’t talk about it.

“Yeah, about the car,” he lies. It might not even be a lie but it’s the easiest answer.

“About the—? Oh, Steve.” She sighs, and he hates the heavy sound of it. “Is that why you didn’t call?”

“I—no, I just…” He twists the cord around his fingers. Part of him wants to tell her about the weird sadness but mostly he just wants to pretend everything is fine. Besides, he doesn’t think she could say anything to help. “I was tired. Is that weird? I’ve been asleep for three days.”

“Being in a coma isn’t exactly sleeping, Steve.”

“I guess.”

“Okay, well, I’ll—oh, shoot!”

“What?”

“We were supposed to have dinner with Barb’s parents tomorrow.” She adds quickly, “It’s fine, I’ll ask if we can move it to next Friday. I’m sure they’ll understand.”

Of course they will. They know about his accident, just like everyone else.

“Okay,” Steve says.

“Goodnight. See you tomorrow.”

“Yeah. I love you.”

Her reply comes a second slower than it should, and it’s barely louder than the squeak of a mouse. It’s always the same.

“Love you too.”

The phone rings, and Nancy’s fingers stop moving through his hair.

“Damn it,” Steve mutters into her sweater. He was just starting to feel kind of normal again, curled up against her with the pleasant weight of her mom’s chicken casserole in his stomach.

“Is that your dad?” she asks.

“Probably.”

His mom warned him this was coming.

“I still can’t believe he didn’t come back.”

Steve can. Business was always first for his dad. He once overheard his dad ask his mom if Steve was really his because Steve is nearly the polar opposite of both of them. Unambitious, no drive. Steve was awake for hours that night.

“It was an important trip,” he says numbly. How bad would it be if he doesn’t pick up? But it’s either now over the phone or later in person when his dad comes home.

He picks up.

“Steve.”

“Dad.”

“Your behavior is getting out of hand. I hope your joyride was worth all the damage you’ve done to the Harrington name in that town, and right before your mother’s re-election—”

Don’t listen, Steve tells himself. It’s not fair.

He’s usually pretty good at tuning his dad out—years of practice—but it doesn’t work this time. He nearly dies in a car accident and he gets the same reaction as when he’s caught with beer or pot. A damn disgrace. Beyond disappointed. Selfish brat. Then his dad mentions the car and he can’t help asking.

“What happened to it?”

“What, your mother didn’t tell you? It’s junk, you totalled it. And you can forget about getting another one handed to you, you little shit. You need to smarten up and realize that your actions have consequences—”

“What about school?”

“Figure it out, Steve, you’re almost eighteen. By the time I was your age—”

Steve holds the phone away. He hung up on his dad once before and he doesn’t want a repeat of that experience anytime soon. When he finally hears the click and the dial tone, he puts the phone down.

“That sounded awful,” Nancy says. She squeezes his shoulder. “Are you okay?”

There’s a brand new determination swirling in Steve’s gut. Just this once he agrees with his dad. He doesn’t want to rely on the old man forever.

“Yeah. I’m okay.”

He watches the two girls leave, dressed in frilly button-ups and poofy skirts that he never knew Nancy owned. They look so different now, part of a world he doesn't belong to. True academics. And he's still stuck on Earth in his same old world keeping an eye on the kids. Always the babysitter. He had to be left behind again by Nancy and her brilliant ideas. He loves the little shits, and he's good at taking care of them, but it stings that she didn't think he was good enough for this. Doesn't look smart enough. Doesn't sound smart enough. Will never be smart enough.

And then he isn't.

He isn't smart enough when he kneels in front of the redheaded girl and her eyes are rolling back into her head, and he doesn't know what to do. He can't wake her up, wake up, please, wake up! He doesn't know how to save her, god if anyone would please, please tell me how to save her—!

Wake up, please wake UP—

"MAX!"

Steve jolts awake from the sound of his own voice ringing in his ears. The dream is already fading but he can still see her in his mind—a girl with red hair shining in the sun, sitting in a graveyard. He can count on one hand the number of girls he knows with red hair and none of them are named Max.

And one of them died last year.

Steve takes a deep breath and rubs his eyes. It was just a dream, just a stupid dream. It doesn’t mean shit even if it was really weird. But he can’t fall back to sleep no matter how hard he tries. He rolls from side to side and when his alarm buzzes he slaps the snooze button. Then again. And for the third time.

Steve walks into Mrs. Cooper’s English class catastrophically late. Her pained smile says it all. The only thing saving his ass from detention is the fact that he’s coming back from being in the hospital.

“Welcome back, Mr. Harrington. Have a seat.”

Everyone watches Steve walk across the room towards the last open seat. It makes his skin crawl like he’s covered in ants. He looks at his sneakers instead and pretends he can’t hear the whispering. He relaxes a little when Mrs. Cooper starts talking again, but then she leaves the room to get their homework from the office, and sure enough—

“Hey, Harrington. Saw your mommy crying on TV the other night,” Tommy says. A bunch of the guys snicker.

Steve flips him off. That’s such bullshit. His mom never cries. Not for real, and definitely not for pity votes. He keeps digging through his backpack but Macbeth is nowhere to be found. Damn it. He knew he was forgetting something as he ran out the door and hopped on his bike.

“She wasn’t crying,” Lisa says, like she’s trying to reassure him. He wants to tell her he doesn’t give a shit, but his throat is thick and dry. Jesus, he needs water.

“What was it like?” Jenna asks, turning in her seat to face Steve.

From two seats away, Nick asks, “Did you really swerve to avoid a kid on the road?”

“Bullshit,” Petey on the other side of the room calls. “Where did you hear that?”

“Channel 10, dude.”

“Nah, he just can’t drive.”

“I can drive,” he snaps. His hands are sweaty, and he picks up his pen and puts it down. Picks it up again. He needs to work on this damn paper. Maybe when Mrs. Cooper gets back he can see if she has an extra copy of Macbeth.

“Obviously not.”

“Or maybe,” Tommy says, “little Stevie was doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing. That’s what I heard.” Steve doesn’t need to look to know that ugly smirk is on his face. He can hear it. “So high the tree looked like a girl and he just had to hit it.”

A bunch of people laugh.

Dave says, “Does Wheeler know?”

Steve folds his arms across his stomach but it doesn’t stop the jittery feeling. It feels like his skin is absorbing the laughter in the room and keeping it alive in his veins. They used to be his friends.

“Is it true that—”

Oh, fucking hell, please don’t finish that sentence, please don’t—

“Hey, dickheads!” A voice behind Steve says. “Some of us are trying to finish this shit so we can pass, would you shut up?”

Tommy laughs like he's an animal with its prey surrounded. “You’re going to need a miracle for that, freak.”

“Yeah, you gonna help me write this essay? Didn’t think so. Man, you talk way too fucking much.”

“Go fuck yourself you trailer park piece of shit.”

“Oh, like I haven’t heard that before. Go on, give it another shot. With some imagination this time.”

The door opens. The room falls into silence. Mrs. Cooper hands out stacks of paper to pass down the rows, and when the last two sheets come to Steve he hopes his sweaty hands don’t wrinkle the paper. He twists in his seat and looks right into the eyes of Eddie Munson.

Regret stabs Steve through the chest. Fuck. A hundred thoughts storm through his head, each one at odds with each other. He knows Eddie. He doesn't know Eddie. Eddie isn't here. Eddie is right in front of him. Eddie is the end. Eddie is the beginning. Eddie is the reason. Eddie is the aftermath. Eddie is fine. Eddie isn't safe. Eddie is home. Eddie doesn't belong. Eddie is—Eddie is—Eddie is—

Plucking the sheet of paper from Steve’s hand. "Thanks," he says.

Steve faces the front again. Back to the safety of the blank page in front of him. He takes a deep breath. What the hell was that?

Something nudges at his shoulder. There’s Macbeth, held in a hand decorated with chunky silver rings. “You can borrow mine,” Eddie whispers. “If you need it.”

“Don’t you need it?” Steve can’t quite look at Eddie’s face.

“I have my notes.” Eddie shuffles stuff around his desk. “Somewhere, I think. It’s fine, just take it.”

“Thanks.”

Steve takes the book. It's well worn from years of abuse by seniors who couldn't care any less about old Bill, all softened corners and bent pages and cracked spine. He flips open the cover. Inside there's a guitar drawn in black pen, shaped like two diamonds joined together with curving devil horns at the top of its body. Then he notices the ripped edge of a piece of paper peeking out from the middle of the book. In scrawling letters, the note reads:

ignore those assholes

He turns around again. Looks at Eddie fully this time. “Thanks,” he says again.

Eddie’s chin is propped in his hand. Only the corner of his smile is visible.

Steve doesn’t know him. Not really, no matter what mixed signals his brain is sending, but he’s heard all the gossip. People say Eddie is a freak—he worships the devil, he kills animals and lights things on fire, his family is made of criminals and he didn’t fall far from the tree. Last year Steve believed it all. He knew every rumor, the funny, the crazy, and the ugly.

Now he only believes three things—Eddie Munson has nerve, he’s thoughtful, and whatever apocalypse Steve’s brain is convinced has happened, Eddie is somehow a part of it.

"Do you have a lot to catch up on?" Nancy asks him at lunch in between bites of her apple.

"I missed a math test and I'm behind on my English essay." Steve watches her eat so he doesn't have to think about all the people in the cafeteria watching him. They used to eat in his car when the weather was nice, and he misses that now more than ever.

"If you want to study with me I'll be in the library after class today."

"Yeah. Maybe."

Something is different between them. Steve noticed it yesterday when she came over, and now he can feel it again. Has she noticed? Or is it just him? It's like he's trying to fit into an old pair of jeans that he's grown out of. He never noticed anything before the accident but now it's all he can see. She used to bloom under his attention. Now she rarely opens up. They were never perfect but they've had a lot of good times, and now those times seem so far away in his memory.

But that's not fair. The anniversary of her best friend's death is coming up. Of course she's quieter.

Steve looks around the cafeteria. There are two girls coming down the aisle between the rows of tables, but only one of them catches his eye. She's dressed in a plaid shirt and overalls, and she's carrying an instrument case in one hand and her lunch bag in the other. She's cute but that's not what makes Steve stare and feel like he can't breathe, he'll never breathe again until she's in his arms and he knows she's alright, no matter how much she hates to be hugged, and—

“...and I’m trying to save up for my license, but chores only go so far, you know?” The girl is telling her friend.

“I heard there’s a new mall coming next year, my dad said they’ve started building already,” her friend says.

“Yeah, I guess if I don't find anything sooner…”

They pass Steve's table and find a spot at the back of the cafeteria, and Steve only pulls his eyes away when Nancy says, "Wow. I can't believe you're checking out other girls right in front of me."

"I'm not, she just seems familiar. The girl with the instrument. Is she in your year?"

"Yeah, I think her name is—"

He knows before she says it. Robin. First Eddie, now her. People he doesn't know but somehow he feels like he does. He never saw the face of the girl in his dream walking beside Nancy, but her hair was exactly the same color.

"Robin." Nancy's eyes drift to the far end of the table. Jonathan is walking by. He looks at her and slows but he doesn't stop, and she looks back down to her apple again.

"Did you eat lunch with him?" Steve asks.

Nancy frowns. "What?"

"Thought he was going to come over for a minute."

She rolls her eyes. She doesn't do that a lot. "Steve, relax, he's just a friend."

"It's fine, I'm not saying anything." Steve shrugs. It's hard to act casual when it seems like everything in his life is changing. It used to be so easy. Something would happen and Cool King Steve would let everyone know that he didn't care. "If you did, I'm just glad you didn't eat alone. That’s all."

There's a voice in the back of his mind that he's never heard before telling him they were never meant to be. And he's starting to believe it.

After his last class Steve hops on his bike and tries to ignore the looks from the seniors hanging around Dylan Waters’ car. He misses his Beamer like a lost limb, but it’s not so bad if he pretends he’s a kid again as he rides around town to avoid going home. He always wanted to grow up faster than he could. Now he’d give anything to be twelve again.

He rides through the main drag and pauses outside Family Video to read a bright red sign in the window. Hiring Now! He doesn’t even think before he’s off his bike and pulling the door open. He’s never had a job before, not even a newspaper route, so it’s about damn time. This is exactly what he needs.

There’s a skinny kid behind the counter with glasses half the size of his face, and he frowns when Steve walks in.

“Uh, hi.” Steve’s palms feel clammy. “I saw the sign and I… want to apply?”

“Oh, you want one of these?” The kid pulls out a sheet of paper from under the counter. “You can get on your knees and suck my dick, Harrington.”

“Uh.” Steve wasn’t expecting that. He looks at the nametag clipped to the kid’s vest. Tim. Does he know any Tim’s? “Excuse me?”

Tim scowls. “Of course you don’t remember. Gym, sophomore year. You and your stupid friends were such assholes to me and Keith—”

Steve sighs. Of course the first place he tries there’s someone who knew him at his worst. But if he wants his old reputation to stop following him like a plague then he has to start somewhere.

“Listen, man. I’m sorry for whatever I did, okay? I don’t do that shit anymore.”

Tim gives him a long, doubtful look.

“Forget it, keep your forms.”

He’s halfway to the door when Tim says, “What would you even recommend to anyone? Rocky?” with a derisive snort.

“Hey, don’t knock Stallone,” Steve says, but this is obviously a test so he adds, “but maybe The Apartment?”

That’s not what he meant to say at all. The Apartment? He doesn’t remember watching any movie called The Apartment. He figured Ghostbusters would be nerdy enough for this kid.

Tim stares at him.

“Children of Paradise?” What the hell is he saying?

A door at the back of the store opens and Tim straightens, casting a nervous glance over his shoulder. He shoves the form at Steve. “Fine, take it.”

Steve is halfway out the door when he thinks about that girl, Robin, and the snatch of her conversation he overheard at lunch. He turns back and says, “Give me another one.”

Tim rolls his eyes and slaps another form on the counter. “Go away.”

Steve fights his grin until he’s back on his bike. It’s such a small victory but he feels better now than he did when he woke up this morning. Now all he has to do is figure out a way to give Robin the form—maybe he can slip it into her locker—and then maybe he’ll be one step closer to figuring out why he feels like he needs her in his life.

A fat drop of water bursts across the back of his hand and the sky opens up. Steve rides as fast as he can but he’s soaked by the time he gets home. He dries off and sits at his desk to get to work. Between the job application, homework, and his college applications, he has enough to keep him busy until almost midnight when he finally crawls into bed and falls asleep to the sound of thunder rippling across the sky. Boom.

Boom

Boom

Boom

He’s tucked in tight, cramped, legs touching someone else’s skin in the back of the car, hot and sticky summer night.

Should be outside, at the fair, having fun, no no no, he’s here in the car. Pain exploding in his face, broken nose? Check later. Time to run now, not run, drive. DRIVE FASTER!

BOOM

BOOM

BOOM

He squeezes her hand and she squeezes back, sweaty fingers, warm rings. Stares at the gargantuan shadow chasing them down the road.

BOOM

BOOM

BOOM

Steve bolts awake. 3:17 am. His heart is hammering like he’s about to die.

Nightmares aren’t new to him, but it’s been months since he’s had one about that night in Jonathan’s house. And the monster in this one was different. Bigger. Worse. Even now that he’s awake it won’t leave him alone. He’s on edge, staring hard at the dark corners of his room.

He needs to run.

He throws on the hospital sweatshirt and tiptoes downstairs in his socks. He takes his sneakers to the lounge door by the pool instead of going out the front so he doesn’t risk waking his mom.

The sky is black but the rain has stopped, leaving everything shining wet in the glow of the moon. Steve should be scared of the dark. He knows what can lurk unseen, biding time in the shadows, but he’s always loved running at night. Maybe that means he’s as dumb as everyone thinks he is. He jogs around the block, and his footsteps seem loud enough to wake the entire world.

He doesn’t remember most of the dream. Just that one terrifying moment and the suffocating feeling of something wanting him dead. Wanting everyone and everything in this world dead.

Chapter Text

Eddie Munson stares at the book in Steve's hand. "That's not mine," he says. "Mine was rough, dude. Like it went to war, and came back with tattoos and found out that its wife was cheating on it, you know? That's not my Bill."

Steve snorts a laugh. "No, but yours is..."

He pulls it out of his bag. Eddie left English yesterday before he could give it back and now it looks ten times worse. He did his best to dry out the pages after he got home, but now they're warped and wrinkled and exploding from between the covers.

“Oh.” Eddie doesn’t look pissed. Actually, he looks like he might laugh. “Did you drop it in the tub? There are better things to do in the tub than homework.”

Steve chuckles. He hopes his face isn’t red. “It rained on my way home.” And like an idiot, he forgot he shoved it in the outside pocket of his bag. “I bike now,” he adds lamely.

Talking to Eddie about a ruined book makes the night Steve had seem so far away. Even after his run, he couldn’t fall back to sleep, and the nightmare haunted his mind as he got ready for school this morning. With just a couple jokes, Eddie did what he couldn’t and pushed it to the back of his mind. He didn’t know Eddie was funny, but why would he? When people talk about him, they never say anything good.

“You don’t have to give me yours, it’s fine.” Eddie blows a giant blue bubble with his gum, and grins at Mrs. Cooper after it pops. She doesn’t bother reminding him about the classroom rules.

“I feel bad, just take it,” Steve insists. And if Mrs. Cooper makes him pay to replace it, then it’s better him than Eddie. “Your drawing was really good,” he adds. “Feel like I stole the Mona Lisa and left it out in the rain.”

Eddie looks surprised and he can’t hide his pleased grin. “The Mona Lisa? Damn, Harrington, that’s high praise for a little doodle.”

Steve shrugs awkwardly. He was so disappointed when he saw that the ink lines of the guitar had bled across the page, and he still doesn’t know why. “Is it red?” he asks.

“Is what red?”

“Your guitar, is it red? I feel like I’ve seen it before.”

“Uh, yeah. It is. It kind of has this flame pattern…” Eddie frowns and scratches absently at his jaw. “Did you see us play at the school concert last year?”

Steve avoids those like the plague. “Oh, yeah, I think so,” he lies. Maybe it’s just like the way he knew the names of those movies yesterday. No reason for it, he just knows.

“Wow, Steve Harrington is a fan?” Eddie smirks. “I didn’t expect that. You want an autograph before we make it big?”

Mrs. Cooper’s voice cuts across the classroom. “Alright, turn to page 52, everyone. Today we’ll be discussing symbolism and the role of fate.”

After her lecture when he’s working on his essay, Steve feels a tap at his shoulder. He takes a slip of paper from Eddie’s hand. On it there’s a new and improved drawing of the guitar, this time with the flame pattern drawn in red pen. Eddie’s name is scrawled in the corner. Your new Mona Lisa.

After school and his first basketball practice since coming back, Steve bikes to Family Video. Tim isn’t behind the counter today—thank god. Instead there’s a middle aged man whose name tag reads Manager.

“How can I help you, son?” the man asks.

“I wanted to submit this.”

The man takes his application. After a quick glance at the page, his face lights up in recognition. “Ah, you must be Donna Harrington’s son! I was so sorry to hear about your accident.” He sounds sincere enough. If he’s been listening to any of the town gossip, Steve can’t tell.

“Thank you.” Steve subtly wipes his hand against his jeans and holds it out, thinking about all the times he’s seen his father charm potential business partners. If his dad can fake it, so can he. He puts on a beaming smile. “Steve Harrington.”

The manager shakes his hand. “Frank Gibbons. I imagine you're trying to spread your wings, eh? You going into business with your old man?”

Steve’s brain trips over the question. That was always the plan before, but now… “Maybe, but I want to get some different experience first.” Gibbons looks like he’s expecting more, so he adds, “And I know it’ll help my college applications.”

“No doubt about that. Your parents must be proud.”

Steve smiles tightly and nods. He doesn’t trust anything he might blurt out in response to that.

“Well, let’s see.” He reads over Steve’s application. It feels painstakingly slow to Steve, even though it’s probably only a couple minutes. There’s a girl in the family section with a lollipop in her mouth, and Steve watches her flip over every tape she can reach before Gibbons is finished.

Finally Gibbons says, “If you can do weekends and you can start this Saturday then you’re hired.”

This time Steve’s smile is real. “I’ll be here on Saturday.”

“Harrington!”

Coach Ritter waves Steve over to the benches in gym class. They’re only five minutes into warm up laps, and he hasn’t even broken a sweat yet. Ms. Kelley is standing beside Coach, holding a planner in her hands, and she gives him a warm smile.

“Hi Steve, can we talk outside? This won’t take long.”

“Sure,” Steve says. He makes the mistake of glancing back as he follows her into the hallway. Most of the class is watching him. It’s quieter out here, but he can still hear the muffled squeaking of shoes on the gym floor.

“You missed your college session while you were in the hospital,” Ms. Kelley says.

“Oh, crap. Sorry.”

“It’s alright, you’re one of the few students with a reasonable excuse.” She flips open her planner. “When is your free period today?”

Steve sighs. He doesn’t even care how loud it is. “Is this optional?” He might’ve asked her that when he booked the first appointment.

“Definitely not, and I’d rather not take you out of class when you’ve already missed a week.”

Steve looks at the gym door, and she laughs like she can read his mind. “You can miss two minutes of gym,” she says. “So?”

Steve thinks about lying, but she probably already knows. “It’s last period,” he says.

She barely glances at her book. “Perfect, I can squeeze you in. Come to my office at 2:30. And don’t forget, or I’ll be hunting you down tomorrow.”

Ms. Kelley is an evil, evil woman.

“Alright, I think you’ve got a solid plan. You probably won’t be ready for the early application deadline next Wednesday, but you still have lots of time as long as you stay focused.” Ms. Kelley glances up from her notebook. “What? What’s with the face?”

“Nothing.”

“Steve. I hate to say it but I honestly can’t tell if you care about your applications. With most kids, I can tell one way or the other.”

“I care, really.” He’s mostly been listening to her and giving short answers, but he does care. “I just don’t think my grades are good enough.”

She looks down at his record again. “I won’t lie to you, they’re not amazing, but you’ve done a lot of extracurriculars and that could definitely impress the right people. And you still have this year to get them up. You could always apply again next year.”

And go to college a year later than everyone else? Steve hates that idea. He used to think there was no point in going to college. His future was laid out in a position at his dad's company with benefits packages and corporate ladders to climb year after year. He used to think it was set in stone, but now for the first time he can see a life outside of his dad's shadow and college is the first step. Hell, if he just gets accepted to one school he would be proud of himself.

“Don’t give up because of that, okay? You might surprise yourself.”

“Yeah, sure.” Steve reaches for his backpack.

“Ah, ah, not so fast.”

Damn.

“College talk is done but I’m not finished with you yet.” Ms. Kelley closes her notebook and moves his reports to the side. She folds her hands on top of her desk. Having her full attention is nerve-racking. “How are you doing?”

Fuck. Of course she wants to talk about the accident. He should’ve seen that coming. “Fine,” he says.

She waits. The only sound in her office is the clock ticking on the wall. He could’ve been home by now.

“That’s it?” She finally asks. “Fine? Everything is the same?”

No. Nothing is the same, even if everything should be. He doesn’t know why he feels so sideways, so off balance. He shrugs.

“Is there anything you want to talk about?” Something about her voice changes, like she really wants to ask a different question.

The anger that’s been burning under Steve’s skin since he came back—fueled by every whisper and look and question and joke—finally explodes. “I’m not suicidal!” he snaps.

“Steve.” That’s all she says, and her voice is stern.

Steve deflates instantly. “Sorry.”

The last bell of the day rings. The noise in the hallway rises, and he hears crowds of people laughing and talking as they walk past the closed office door. Free to go home.

“Can I go?”

“Hmm…no.”

“You’re really going to hold me hostage?”

That brings a slight smile to her face before she looks serious again. “Of course not. But before I let you go, I want you to listen to me very carefully. In this room you can say anything you want. That is a gift I give to every student. You can tell me absolutely anything and it will stay between us. If you decide everything isn’t fine, I want you to come and talk to me. I know it’s not easy but trust me, it helps.”

She looks so honest and open. Steve can’t help trusting her. “Okay,” he agrees.

Ms. Kelley leans back in her chair and studies him for a moment. “Alright,” she finally says. “Go home.”

In a bathroom stall, with his head full of cotton and blurring lights and the words from Alex P. Keaton on the screen—something about kissing his own mother?—ringing in his ears, he looks at her. This girl he never would’ve liked—not his type in a million years, and don’t you think you should be past such primitive social constructs, Steve? Yes, Dustin, you’re probably right, but that’s not what he said, was it? No, he was stuck and now he’s unstuck and he really, really likes her, and—

She tells him that it’s never going to happen, and why, and he’s disappointed at first, he would never lie about that, but he’s okay with it, okay with her, and he would never try to change her because then she wouldn’t be her, and he wants her to always be herself—

And then she laughs, and he laughs, and they both laugh and he doesn’t know who started it but he’s glad they’re laughing together and he hopes it never ends…

Steve floats awake before his alarm goes off with a smile on his face. That was such a good dream, so different from the other ones he’s had. Maybe it’s a good sign.

His good mood stays all the way to school. He says hi to Eddie in English and realizes a second too late that it’s not something he normally does. He never talked to Eddie before this week but now he wants to. Something about Eddie makes all those curious thoughts buzz around in his brain, and he wants to know why.

Eddie doesn’t give him a weird look but it’s probably because he’s still half asleep. “You’re way too happy for Shakespeare first thing in the morning.”

“Am I?”

“Yeah, it’s totally suspicious. You slip a little something extra in your cornflakes?”

Steve looks down.

“Oh, shit. Sorry. I didn’t mean that. Don’t listen to me. I don’t believe what people are saying, if it makes you feel any better. And hey, I would know, right?”

That startles a laugh out of Steve. He’s right. If Steve was on drugs he would be buying them from Eddie. Now if only the rest of the town could be convinced. “No special cornflakes. Just slept well.”

“How the hell do you manage that? Seriously, tell me. I sleep like I’m possessed. Three a.m. and I’m talking in latin, my head’s spinning around…”

Steve grins at the joke. He shrugs. “I don’t know. Finally got lucky, I guess. I’ve been having weird dreams since the accident. Bad dreams, but this one was pretty good.” He meets Eddie’s eyes for a second and looks away. “I don’t know why I’m telling you this shit.”

They barely know each other, there’s no way Eddie cares. But he’s looking at Steve like he’s curious, and Steve gets that feeling again. He knows Eddie. He doesn’t know Eddie. He knows Eddie.

“I do,” Eddie says seriously. “I have one of those faces, you know? So I’ve been told.”

“Yeah? Who told you that?”

Eddie leans across his desk with a grin. “The voices in my head.”

After school Steve goes to swim practice. The team doesn't say much to him in the locker room, except for Jay, who says, "Glad you're back, dude." It's one of the nicest things anyone has said to him all week. Steve is the first one to dive, and he steps up to the board and waits for Coach Ritter to blow the whistle.

Three.

Two.

One.

Steve flies through the air—

—and breaks into the surface of a pitch black sea.

What the hell?

It’s so cold and dark—no, wait. There’s a glow in the water coming from behind him. He swims down, down, down. The glow comes from a tear in the sea floor, dull orange like the mouth of a volcano. He stretches his hand towards it.

It’s gone. His fingers are touching the pool floor. The water is bright and clean and clear. He’s losing his damn mind.

Steve comes up and swims to the side of the pool. It’s fine, it was just—

Just what? He’s not asleep, and that wasn’t a dream.

“Harrington, what the hell was that? You know the drill, come on.” Coach Ritter is on the bench, his clipboard on his knee and a timer in his hand.

“I know, I’m sorry, I just…got a little dizzy.”

“If you’re going to be sick, get the hell out of my pool.”

“I’m fine.”

Coach Ritter eyes him warily, but he lets Steve stay. His next dive, and the third one, and all of their drills afterwards are miraculously normal, but he feels sluggish in the water. The pool seems ten times bigger than it should be. It doesn’t make sense, he shouldn’t feel this rusty after being gone for less than a week.

After practice, Coach Ritter pulls Steve aside while the rest of the team heads into the locker room. “I think it’s too soon for you to be back at it, kid,” he says.

Steve’s heart drops. “What? No, I’m fine—” He needs to practice, he needs to compete this year and win, or he might as well kiss college goodbye.

Coach holds up his hand. “Hey, it’s not just swim. Your performance in basketball isn’t what it should be either.”

“I’m fine,” Steve insists, “I just need to get back into it.”

“For your sake, I sure hope so.” Coach grimaces. “I know you’re recovering, but I’ll kick you off if it’s best for the teams. Get your game up by the first match so I don’t have to.”

Down, down, down he’s pulled through the water, a vice grip around his ankle that he can’t shake off no matter how hard he tries. Panic, lungs burning, water rushing around his head, then—

Out of the water, he can breathe, thank god, but the thing still isn’t letting go.

“No, no, no—!”

It pulls and pulls, dragging him over the rocky, unforgiving ground and shredding the skin of his back. He flails out, tries to grab onto something, anything, but the thing pulling him is too strong, far too strong.

A screech—whoosh of air—something hurtling into him—winding around his neck—razor blades piercing his skin, over and over and over—

He screams.

Steve wakes up with a scream dying in his throat. His tee shirt is soaked like he really was swimming. He pulls it off and touches his stomach gingerly. There’s no bite marks, or blood. His skin is smooth.

Of course it is, what the hell was he expecting? It was just a dream. But every claw and tooth that punctured his skin felt so real. He flops back onto the damp sheets and wonders if he’s doomed to have these nightmares for the rest of his life.

“Maybe you could come over and help me tonight?” Steve asks. It’s finally Friday, and the weather is nice, and maybe if they went on a date or just talked or something he could fix the distance between them.

Nancy bites her lip and looks at the essay in his hands. “We have our dinner tonight, Steve.”

Shit. Steve forgot about that. Going to the Hollands place with her is the last thing he wants to do but he’d be a real asshole if he backed out now. They’ve been over for dinner twice before and the only good part is Mrs. Holland’s casserole. The rest of the evening is always filled with guilt and awkward conversation. He doesn’t know how Nancy does it. The last time they went was in June on Barbara’s birthday, and after they left he asked her if she thought it was good for either of them. Nancy slammed the car door and didn’t talk to him for a week.

“It’s fine,” she says. “You don’t have to come. Just work on your applications.”

Steve slings his bag over his shoulder and watches students filtering in across the parking lot. It would be so easy to agree but he doesn’t want to break his promise.

“No, I’ll come with you.”

It’s too early in the morning to wonder what she’s thinking. Steve bites his tongue on the I love you that wants to slip out. When did he start doing that?

The revving of an engine splinters his thoughts. A sports car pulls into the lot and the passenger door flings open before the tail lights are even off. A girl storms out. She flips a middle finger at the driver, her mane of ginger hair shining in the autumn sunlight, and she—

floats in the air, helpless, arms out, out of reach

—slams the door, stalking off towards Hawkins Middle.

Holy shit. That’s the girl from his dream. Max. Is this real? Can Nancy see her walking away?

“He must be a new senior,” Nancy comments.

The driver is dressed in denim and motorcycle boots, and when he walks past them towards the school’s front door Steve feels a phantom ache in his gut like he’s just been punched.

He knows them.

But he’s never seen either one of them before.

He’s definitely losing his mind.

All through math class the redheaded girl and the new guy stick in the back of Steve's mind. Which sucks because he's already a week behind and math is his worst subject. When he gets to gym, the new guy struts into the locker room like he owns the place. Coach Ritter introduces him as Billy, and somehow that makes sense. Like of course his name is Billy. What else would it be? Billy pulls off his shirt for basketball and plays the entire game with a smirk on his face, and damn it he’s actually good. Steve hates him already. He probably would've hated the guy anyway even if he didn't have some weird psychic impression of him.

Is that what this is? He’s psychic now? But he’s not like that girl with the superpowers that Nancy told him about. He’s not special.

Dinner with the Hollands is the same as last time. Steve’s jokes don’t land. Guilty memories rush in. It’s even more awkward and painful than last time. Every time he’s here, he remembers that he’s the one who knew Barbara the least. After dinner, Nancy drives him home in her mom’s car.

“It’s weird being on this side, you know? I’m supposed to drive you home and I can’t even do that anymore.”

“It’s okay, Steve.” She’s lost in thought, her thumb absently rubbing the steering wheel. The engine is idling away. That’s as good a sign as any that she isn’t going to come inside and stay for a while. Not that he would expect her to. His house is probably the last place she wants to be. “Thanks for coming,” she says.

“Hey, of course.”

He leans over the console and kisses her cheek. She doesn't flinch but she doesn't have much of a reaction either and he stops the sigh that wants to escape. By now he knows that there isn't much he can do when she's like this, withdrawn in her grief for her best friend, but it usually doesn't stop him from trying.

"Goodnight," he says, and at the very least she says it back, even if it's impossibly quiet. "Drive safe, okay?"

"I will."

Steve pulls the handle and gets out of the car, and watches her drive away from the front steps. In his room he goes for his records. He should work on his applications but he won’t get anything done in a mood like this. As he flips through the records, he glances up to the window and his eyes catch on the pool.

He used to love swimming at night, feeling the warm water and the cool night air on his skin at the same time, but he never went out once at night all summer. When he looks into the darkness surrounding the glowing water all he thinks about is the picture Nancy showed him last year. It was a delicate patchwork thanks to him, carefully taped together, but even in its sorry state the image was clear. Barbara, sitting on the diving board, with an unholy creature standing behind her.

With the anniversary of the day she went missing looming near, he feels that invisible enemy coming back again. Guilt. He can't fight it with his bare hands, can't stick it in the face with a bat full of nails. It’ll always haunt them. He hoped it would get better over time but he doesn't know if it has.

Steve looks away from the window and back down to his records. He pulls out a familiar white cover, and sets The Hurting on the player to spin.

Chapter Text

Frank ends the tour at the back of the store in front of the Adult section. He reaches inside the curtain to flick a switch, and the neon sign above the doorway lights up. “Last rule,” he says sternly. “Do not let any kids sneak in here. And believe me, they’ll try.”

“No kids, got it,” Steve says. He glances at Robin beside him. When he walked in this morning to see her standing at the counter getting a vest from Frank, he could barely keep the grin off his face. His plan worked. And sure, he felt like a total creep trying to figure out which locker was hers so he could anonymously slip her the application form, but it was worth it. Or at least, he hopes it will be. She didn’t look happy when she saw who she’d be working with, but all Steve has to do is not live up to his old reputation.

Robin nods. “No kids.”

Frank claps his hands together. “Great! Let’s open up, shall we?”

The morning passes quietly, and at noon Frank sends him and Robin to the break room for lunch. He must think they’re friends, despite the fact that they’ve barely spoken to each other. The only noise in the break room comes from the humming of the old fridge and the crunching as they eat, and Steve hates it. He thinks about the dream he had—laughing on the floor with her, how much he loved her, how much she trusted him—and he wants that for real. How does he get there?

“So,” Steve breaks the silence. “What instrument do you play?”

Robin frowns and gives him a wary look. “The trumpet.”

“Cool. That’s cool.” Steve half wishes the fridge would fall on top of him and put him out of his misery. He’s never had to actually try to make friends before. People hung around because of his name, or his looks, or his family’s money. Never because of who he really is. “So, uh—”

Robin rolls her eyes. “You don’t have to talk to me because we exist in the same room, you know,” she says snidely. “It didn’t stop you from ignoring me last year. Why are you even here anyway? Aren’t your parents rich?”

“Last year?” Steve asks. What the hell is she talking about?

Robin looks at him like he’s an idiot. “I was in your class, genius.”

Shit. What? Is he just remembering her from a class they had together? No, no way. That wouldn’t explain why it feels like they should be best friends, that wouldn’t explain the dreams about her.

“Which class?” Steve asks.

She looks unimpressed. “World History.”

Steve winces. “I don’t remember that class at all.”

“Obviously. King Steve has no time for us peasants.”

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that, so he doesn’t say anything. He thinks of his mom’s words. No room in that head for anyone but yourself.

After lunch, Frank leaves them on their own and retreats into his office. Steve asks Robin for help twice when he can’t remember something, and again when he doesn’t even need it so that maybe she’ll feel comfortable asking him for help in return. This might be harder than he thought it would be, but he’s not giving up yet. This could be a fresh start. Not a first impression—he blew that before he knew it mattered—but a better one. Steve doesn’t know how or why, but he knows that she’s important.

The next few days take on a strange new normal. Steve keeps having weird dreams. He doesn’t always wake up with a heart attack feeling like he’s going to die, but they’re always bizarre. Conversations that don’t make sense, with people that don’t make sense. Walking down an absurdly long tunnel. Making Molotov cocktails. Something about Russians. More tunnels—why so many tunnels? What the hell does it all mean?

Steve gets used to them, like he gets used to being heckled in gym class by guys who used to be his friends. He talks to Eddie in English, and says hi if he shows up to biology. It’s never a sure thing, and on the days he doesn’t come Steve always notices his empty seat at the back of the room. At lunch, he sits with Nancy and the table between them feels a thousand miles wide. He works on his applications during his free period even though he’s definitely not making the early deadline. On Wednesday he’s in the library with Nancy after class and he watches the clock tick tick tick to four o’clock, and that’s it. Early deadline gone. Soon he’ll start hearing his classmates talk about acceptance letters, and he’s sitting here struggling to finish one essay.

Steve realizes that Nancy’s seat is empty. He finds her across the library, staring at someone with a faraway look on her face.

“I can’t keep doing this,” she tells him after he pulls her into a study room.

“What are you talking about?” Steve’s heart plummets to his gut. He knows what’s coming, what this is about. In some ways maybe he expected it, because she must have noticed all the cracks in their relationship too. But is he ready? That voice in the back of his mind whispers again. We’re just not meant to be.

“Barb,” she stresses, and Steve lets out the breath in his lungs. God, he’s such an awful, awful person.

They’ve had this conversation before. Maybe we should tell her parents…You know we can’t do that…I know… Every time Steve thinks his guilt is coming from somewhere different than Nancy’s. Wanting to move on, not wanting to blame himself for something that was completely beyond their control, no matter what Nancy thinks. How could you possibly have known a creature from another dimension was going to attack her, huh? He said that the last time they had this talk, and maybe he deserved the slap he got for it.

“Let’s just…go to Tina’s stupid party tonight, wear our stupid costumes and be stupid teenagers, okay? Can we do that?” Steve pleads.

They both have different worries right now but standing in the study room, his hands on her shoulders while she has her arms crossed, Steve feels like he’s the only one trying. He shoves his hands into his pockets and the space between them seems to grow wider.

She nods reluctantly. “Okay.”

“I’ll meet you there at eight,” Steve says. “I’m gonna head home.”

Steve walks to Tina’s house in the evening. The party has already started and the music is blasting out of the house. Nancy is waiting for him, standing on the curb in her Lana costume, and Steve gets the strangest feeling. Like he’s seen her here before, in that costume, on that curb, looking like she’d rather be anywhere else.

He shakes it off and takes her hand. “Come on, let’s dance.”

They push through the crowd inside to get drinks, and the music is so loud it rings in Steve’s ears. They dance and drink, and he tries to take his own advice and be a stupid teenager having fun, but that weird feeling gets stronger every time Nancy scoops her cup into the punch bowl.

Tommy finds him when he’s in the kitchen getting another drink, and of course he’s dressed like one of the evil karate kids. Billy comes up behind him, and he’s not even in costume. Unless he’s dressed up as an arrogant bastard.

“We’ve got ourselves a new keg king, Harrington,” Tommy says.

“Yeah, eat it, Harrington!” Lewis says, spitting right in his face.

Last year Steve might’ve cared. “Yeah? You want a trophy?”

Billy gives him that same piercing stare he does in class. He smirks around his cigarette, cool and slow like he’s made up his mind about something, and stalks off.

“You’d never beat his record,” Tommy sneers. “I bet you wouldn’t even beat your old record now, bitch.”

How the hell were they friends for so long? Steve takes a swig from his cup, and he’s half tempted to dump it on Tommy’s head, but he’ll piss off soon enough. In a room filled with alcohol and girls, Steve is the least exciting thing.

Tommy shakes his head and disappears back into the crowd.

Steve goes back to dancing with Nancy, and when ‘Girls on Film’ starts blasting from the speakers she stumbles to the punch bowl again, nearly knocking a bunch of empty beer bottles off the counter.

Steve grabs her wrist. “No, no, no, you’ve had enough.”

“Screw you!”

“Stop, put it down—”

Jesus, did he walk into the room backwards? The feeling is so strong now, like he’s swimming in it. Deja vu—that’s what it’s called. He’s arguing with Nancy in the middle of a crowded party, and an image of that bright red drink all over her white shirt fills his mind. I’ve done this before.

Nancy makes a frustrated noise and flings the cup forward.

Cold punch splashes into Steve’s clothes, and ice cubes scatter across the floor. Great. Now it looks like he’s just pissed blood. “Thanks a lot, Nance,” he mutters.

She doesn’t look sorry at all. “This is your fault,” she slurs. “You…you wanted—this is what you wanted—! You want a drink, you. There. You have a drink.”

“Jesus, seriously? I never said get—”

“You—you’re such bullshit! You say one thing and then you say no—you just—why d’you keep pretending? Like, like everything is fine and we’re happy and in love and—”

Steve’s pulse pounds in his ears and his stomach turns to lead.

Pretending. Like we’re in love.

She doesn’t love him. Maybe she never did. She never says it unless he says it first. Isn’t that enough proof? Never mind all of their rocky moments, never mind the way she looks at Jonathan and lies about it, never mind how long he waited before she said yes again last year—

We were never meant to be.

It’s a cold comfort, a little grain of truth buried in his mind. He doesn’t know where it comes from, or if he’s grateful for it, or if he wants to take that little voice and set it on fire.

“Like—like we didn’t—like Barb wasn’t our fault?”

“What are you talking about?” Steve says through gritted teeth. He’s suddenly aware that someone stopped the music and everyone is watching them. The entire senior year is watching his relationship crumble like it’s a damn soap opera. “Barb went missing—”

“You’re bullshit.” She shoves his chest, and her angry eyes scald him. “Partying,” she spits. “Sure, partying, we’re partying…it’s bullshit…” She falters and catches herself on the counter. “I wish,” she mumbles, “...wish you were Jonathan.”

Everyone around them gasps.

Fury thunders through Steve’s veins, and all the air in his lungs rushes out like he’s been kicked in the chest.

Fuck this.

And fuck her.

The crowd parts for Steve like he’s a pariah. He heads for the bathroom, his feet moving on autopilot. He can’t breathe, he needs to be alone, he needs to be somewhere no one can see him, just for a minute, he just needs to fall apart for a minute—

Steve shoves the bathroom door open. Eddie is there, sitting on the toilet cover counting bills while Petey McDonald in his mime costume snorts something off the counter.

Eddie looks up. He’s not in costume but there’s a pair of red devil horns sticking out of his hair. “You get in a fight with the Kool-Aid guy?”

Steve doesn’t laugh. He must be a mess—angry and drunk and covered in punch and ready to cry. He keeps his eyes away from the mirror. “Can I…?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Eddie says. He shoves Petey into the hallway but he’s slower to leave, pausing in the doorway. “I’ll be outside, if you…If you want to come outside.”

Steve nods numbly. The door closes with a gentle click. He cleans the punch out of his shirt and takes deep breaths. Maybe he had a feeling this was coming, but he didn’t expect this. He might as well have stood naked in the room for how much everyone saw, and all so she could tell him how she really feels. How long has she wished she was with Jonathan instead? The entire year? Fuck.

We were never meant to be.

There’s a knock on the door. “Hey, come on!” a girl whines. It sounds like Carrie-Ann. “I need to go!”

Steve wipes a few stray tears off his face and blows past her. He goes out to the patio, and the fresh air is a relief from the sweaty stink of people dancing inside. Eddie isn’t here so he goes through the gate to the front yard and finally sees him, leaning against a car that isn’t his with a cigarette in his mouth. He offers one to Steve.

Steve looks at it, and wishes it was a joint instead. Despite what half of Hawkins seems to think, he doesn't get high often. It's been months. He had trouble sleeping after that night at Jonathan's, and the weed he still had from Tommy helped until his dad caught him. He never dared to bring any more home after that. Now he only does it at parties like this, and fuck it. Screw his parents, and screw Hawkins. Why can’t he be a stupid teenager and get fucked up like everyone else here? He needs it after that.

Steve clears his throat and hopes he doesn’t sound like he’s been crying. “You got any joints?”

Eddie frowns. “I thought you didn’t…”

“Sometimes,” Steve says, “but nothing else, you know? I kinda wish I did right now.”

Eddie pulls out a bag from his jacket pocket with a few rolled joints. “That bad, huh? I heard people talking on my way out.”

“Yeah.” Steve gets his wallet out and counts his change. “How much?”

Eddie shakes his head and holds one out. “On the house. For your woman woes.”

“Thanks.” Steve hates being pitied but a free joint is a free joint. He lights it with Eddie’s lighter and takes the first hit.

“So it’s over?” Eddie asks. “You and Wheeler? You don’t have to talk about it but if you want to, it’s cool. Anything you say under the influence is safe with me. Scout’s honor.”

“You were a boy scout?” Steve asks doubtfully.

“Fuck no. But I dumpster dived once, does that count? I think it should, I was a boy and I was scouting. I should be an honorary member.”

“Why not?” Steve takes another puff. Nancy’s words might sting for a while, but at least right now his anger is starting to fade. She was finally being honest, even if he didn’t want to hear it. He knew they were falling apart. “Deja vu,” he mutters.

Eddie breathes out a stream of smoke. “What?”

“Me and Nancy. I had this weird feeling when I got here that something bad was going to happen. Then it did.”

“What, you can see the future?” Eddie pretends to bow. “All hail Wizard Steve.”

“Shut up. Not like that. It just felt like it was coming.” A shriek of laughter makes Steve look at the group still gathered around the keg. Someone is carrying a zombie cheerleader on his shoulders. Teenagers being stupid, not a care in the world.

“She was right about one thing,” he says. “I guess I was pretending everything was okay.”

“Why?”

Steve is losing focus. He looks at Eddie, and Eddie frowns at him, and he doesn’t understand the question. “Why…what?”

“Why didn’t you break up with her before?”

“I…it’s complicated.”

The end of Eddie’s cigarette burns bright orange as he takes another drag. “It can’t be that complicated. You’re either happy with her or you’re not.”

“I had to try,” Steve insists. Why is that so crazy? Is it crazy? Doesn’t everyone just pretend that things are okay?

“No, you don’t,” Eddie says simply. “Hey, free advice—if it’s not working, you can just give up.”

“Screw you, man, you don’t know. Like, last year, and the accident—”

“What does your accident have to do with it?”

Steve nods. “Exactly.”

Eddie stares at him like he’s one of Ms. O’Donnell’s equations. “...What?”

Steve hums along to the music booming from the house. “I love this song.”

Eddie shakes his head. He gives up trying to figure Steve out, which is good, because Steve doesn’t even know what he’s talking about. “You like Bon Jovi?”

“I like whatever’s on the radio.” Steve leans back on the hood of the car. It’s really kicking in now and the high greets him like an old friend. This is fantastic. He lets out a giggle.

“Good?”

“Fuck, yeah. I should do this more often. Last time was…fireworks…fireworks, oh! Fourth of July. See, Mom? I’m a good boy.”

“This is going to be fun,” Eddie says with a grin.

“Want some?”

Eddie gives the joint a long look. “No. I’m good.”

God, the night sky is just so beautiful. The moon is all glowy and the stars are all twinkly, and Steve should look up more often. He stretches his hand towards the stars and tries to grab them. Maybe he can keep them in his pockets and take them home, then put them on his ceiling so he never feels lonely again.

Steve gasps and slaps Eddie’s shoulder. “Hey, that star just winked at me!”

Eddie chuckles. “That’s your sign, dude. Go for it. Ask it out, you’re a free man now.”

“Huh. What do you think, baby?” Steve says to the sky. “Can I take you out?” The star of his affections refuses to twinkle again. “Eddie, she said no. Now what?”

“Date her sister,” Eddie says wisely.

Steve laughs. The stars stay in their sky, cold and unblinking. “Nah, they don’t like me.”

“Then I guess you’ll have to find someone closer.”

“Hmm. No more girls. Girls are from another planet. Should just date guys.” The thought of kissing someone like Tommy fills his head. “Ugh, no.” If he’s not dating girls, and he’s not dating guys, who’s left? “Maybe the monster,” he muses.

“...the what?”

Steve drags his eyes away from those cruel stars to find Eddie staring at him. “You know. The monster.”

“The one that lives under your bed? Are you still scared of the dark, Harrington?”

“Not under my bed, silly.” Steve giggles. “In Jonathan’s ceiling.”

Eddie gawks at him. The cigarette falls from his fingers and lands on the hood of the car. He flicks it to the ground and lights another one. “You’re so high,” he mutters.

“It’s truuuue.”

“You saw a monster in… Jonathan Byers’ ceiling?”

“Mhm. Was so scary. Like. So scary. But if I don’t die—boom! We could be soooo happy, right? It could suck dick—”

Eddie coughs around his cigarette.

"It had a face, like—" Steve snaps his fingers open and closed in Eddie's face. Eddie knocks his hand away. "Like a flower. A tulip." He giggles again. "No, wait, it had so many teeth. Never mind. And I hit it with a bat. Public enemy of monsters everywhere." He laughs again. He can’t help it, the look on Eddie’s face is so funny.

The joint disappears from Steve's hand. He was holding it, right? Did he drop it? No, Eddie has it.

“Hey, that’s mine.”

“Yeah, I think it’s laced, dude. Quick question, what does purple taste like? You might be tripping on acid.”

“‘M not tripping,” Steve mumbles.

Billy appears. Steve didn’t even see him coming. It’s like he sprung up from the ground. Pop! Like a mushroom. He giggles.

“What good is a dealer you have to go looking for?” Billy looks like a drowned rat, but Tina doesn’t have a pool in her backyard so either someone shoved him into a tub or it's just a disgusting mix of sweat and beer.

Eddie glares at him. “Do you think I’d be out here if I still had shit to sell?”

“You don’t have anything left?”

“No, get fucked.”

With one last hard look between them, Billy walks away.

“He’s not very smart, is he,” Steve says. In his outside voice.

“I think he heard that,” Eddie says.

Halfway back to the house, Billy turns around. “Say that to my face, Harrington!”

“Dumbass!”

Billy flips him off.

“I can do that too!” Steve holds up his finger. Then he mumbles at Eddie, “Am I holding up the right one?”

Eddie laughs for hours. It seems like hours. It’s such a delicious sound Steve wishes he could eat it. What would it taste like? Bubblegum. Or candy. Something sweet. Eddie’s always eating something sweet.

“Would you get off the car, man?” A very sour, very familiar voice says.

Steve’s world goes spinny for a second as Eddie pulls him up, and he stumbles against Eddie when he’s on his feet again. Jonathan is standing on the curb, holding a completely wasted Nancy up with his arm around her waist.

“Oh, shit, sorry J-man, forgot this was yours,” Steve says. He watches Jonathan shove all of Nancy’s spaghetti limbs into the backseat and close the door. “Good luck with her.”

Jonathan walks around the front of the car. “What are you talking about,” he mutters.

“Maybe if you’re a really really really good boy she’ll tell you that she loves you. And mean it.”

Eddie hisses. “Ouch.”

Jonathan glares at him over the top of the open car door. He opens his mouth, then shakes his head and ducks inside. He drives away.

Steve slumps to the curb. Seeing Jonathan with his arms around Nancy sobers him a little. He remembers last year, sneaking up to her window to see them in her room. Jonathan was always gentle with her. So gentle, like feathers coming down around her shoulders. Soft, gentle boy. Is he like that? Is he gentle enough? Or is it something else? They just seem to get each other. Will he find that too someday? It was never going to be Nancy.

Eddie sits on the curb beside him. “You’re a very soft boy and you’ll find someone else,” he says quietly, and oh. Steve mumbled all of that out loud. Oops.

Eddie offers him the joint, now stubbed out. “Here, keep it for later.” Steve shakes his head so he shoves it back into his pocket.

Steve looks at Eddie’s boots, stretched out onto the pavement in front of him. They’re cracked and scuffed like he’s been wearing them for years. His jeans are the same, ripped and patched and ripped again. Steve looks and keeps looking, from his rings to his vest to the tips of the devil horns in his hair. He can still feel that strange tugging in his mind when he looks at Eddie. That whirling wonder between all the things Eddie isn’t and all the things he is, but right now…Right now he’s the only thing that makes sense. Leaning back, hands in the grass, eyes closed with his face tilted to the sky, he looks like he belongs here. At this party, in this moment. Next to Steve.

“You look right.”

Eddie looks over at him. “What?”

“You know sometimes things look really out of place but you don’t, like you…you should stay in this, just, here or wherever, but I don’t think you should leave and I think maybe one day you might not look in place or feel in place or something will make you out of place and then you should just ignore whatever that thing is and say no, to hell with that, I’m…this is my place, or—”

Eddie raises his eyebrows. “Wow. I didn’t know you were a poet.”

“What?”

“Do you have any idea what you just said?”

“Um. No.”

Steve loses track of time. Lying back on the grass, listening to the music booming out of the house, everything feels easy. So what if that star rejected him? He can try again. He can do what Eddie said—find someone within reach who could treasure the love he has to give.

Eddie—sweet, wonderful, psychic Eddie—disappears into the house and comes back out with two giant bags of chips, a pack of Oreos and two cold beers. It tastes like a gourmet meal. After a while, he asks, “Are you gonna be okay?”

“Mhm. Think so.” He’s still a little drunk and high but he doesn’t think it’ll hurt too much when he wakes up in the morning. He hopes it doesn’t.

“Good. I wouldn’t want you running around trying to fuck monsters and getting your dick bitten off.”

Steve laughs so hard he starts coughing. “At least you know what monsters are about, you know?”

“Not really, no,” he says, but he’s smiling anyway. He looks down at the empty beer bottle in his hands and he scratches at the edge of the label.

“No monsters in your life? Lucky bastard.”

“Apparently.”

A couple stumbles down the street with their hands all over each other, and Steve is pretty damn sure the girl is Cassie King, one of the most popular girls in senior year. Eddie is watching them too.

“What about girls? You got a girlfriend?” Steve asks. He hasn’t heard of any girls who dated Eddie, but he didn’t know many of the seniors last year, the people Eddie was supposed to graduate with. Does he even like girls? There was a rumor that—

Eddie’s face whips toward him. He looks furious. “What the fuck kind of question is that? Of course I like girls.”

Oh, fuck. Steve did the thing again. Where his thought accidentally makes it out of his mouth. “I didn’t mean to say that,” he mumbles.

Eddie laughs but it’s bitter and uglier than his bubblegum laughter from before. “You hear all the shit people say about you and you still believe rumors?” He stands up and no, no, he can’t leave, it’s not safe for him and damn it, they could’ve been friends, real friends—

“Eddie, wait, I’m sorry—”

He’s going back inside.

Fuck.

Fuck!

Is pissing people off Steve’s natural talent? He must look pathetic right now, but at least everyone outside is drunk or high and not paying him any attention. He wants to go inside and find Eddie but he can’t stomach the thought of going back into a house full of sweaty drunk teens. He wallows in the yard until he narrowly avoids being puked on by Big Brent, and then he goes home to get as far from the smell of vomit as possible. He doesn’t look back at Tina’s house, hoping to see a head of curly hair wearing a pair of devil horns one last time. He really fucked up this time.

Steve comes home to a dark house. He crawls on top of his bed and falls asleep in his lame, punch-stained costume.

He carries the body all the way back to the trailer. He doesn’t let Dustin help, doesn’t want him to feel the weight of his dead friend in his arms. He can’t do much to soothe Dustin’s grief but he can do this little bit, if it helps at all.

Carefully, slowly, he moves through the narrow hallway, stepping over vines as thick as anacondas. The girls have already pulled the mattress back into his room, and Steve lays him down. Straightens his arms and legs. Dustin gently puts his guitar on him, and Steve pulls the blanket over his body. It’s as close to a burial as they have the time or the means to give him right now. It’s leagues less than what he deserves.

Dustin cries the entire time. He’s clutching a guitar pick necklace in his fist.

Steve pulls him into a hug and says into his curls, “I’m sorry. I wish things had gone differently.”

“We need to go,” Nancy says quietly. “Check on Max.”

Steve swallows back another wave of grief. Check on Max, like the gates haven’t already broken open, like they don’t already know they’ve lost her. Dustin cries harder at the sound of her name. One dead friend wasn’t enough—the world just had to give them two.

Dustin takes a deep breath, pulls out of Steve’s arms, and nods. He’s the last one out of the room. Steve watches him close the door, and he whispers into the darkness, “You’re my hero, Eddie. Rest in peace.”

Steve wakes up, sober and scared, and bursts into tears. It was so real, too real, even more vivid than all the other dreams. So real he can still feel the weight of the body in his arms.

Eddie’s body.

Eddie’s dead body.

He carried Eddie’s dead body in his arms.

Eddie is going to die.

Chapter Text

That was the worst dream Steve has ever had. Even worse than dreams of monsters and flashing Christmas lights. He can handle those. He can handle waking up in a cold sweat with his heart racing and jumping at shadows in the dark, but he never wants to wake up the way he did last night ever again. It felt like a bad omen. He never would’ve called himself superstitious before last year, but everything is different now.

The dream was so cold and blue, like it happened at the bottom of the ocean, and Steve’s heart is still broken from the way Dustin cried. There shouldn’t be anything but a goofy grin on his face. Steve barely knows the kid but he knows that. He looked older in the dream—they all did. Dustin, Nancy, and Robin. Eddie did too, his face pale and frozen in the darkness.

But he was still too young to die.

“Heads up!”

A dodgeball smacks Steve in the face.

Coach Ritter shakes his head. Half of the class is missing, and the half that showed up might as well not be playing, Steve included.

“Alright,” Coach sighs. “Push-ups, all of you. Let’s go!”

Eddie doesn’t show up to English. It’s not weird with so many seniors sick but it feels like there’s a ghost sitting behind Steve for the entire class. Eddie is fine. Probably. Jesus, the guy isn’t going to die because he had a bad dream. Steve needs to get a grip.

He only stops thinking about Eddie when Nancy drags him outside at lunch, and he realizes she doesn’t remember a damn thing about last night. Fuck. He doesn’t want to do this again.

“Seriously?” Steve demands.

“What?” Nancy crosses her arms tight across her chest to fight off the chill. “I remember dancing and…spilling some punch. You got mad at me because I was drunk…and then you took me home.”

“Oh, spilling? No, you threw your drink at me. And Jonathan took you home. No car, remember?”

Her frown deepens. "I don’t understand. What happened?”

“It’s pretty simple, Nance, you were just telling it like it is,” he says bitterly. “This is bullshit, I’m bullshit, and you wish I was Jonathan.”

She sucks in a sharp breath and her eyes go wide as she looks down.

“Yeah. You said that out loud.” They both made that mistake last night, saying something that should’ve stayed in their heads. She might not remember it but she still knows how she feels. It’s still real, and Steve is still the fool who stuck around too long for a girl who doesn’t love him.

“I don’t get you,” he says. “You’ll go hunt monsters but you can’t tell me how you feel until you’re drunk? Is it really that scary?” But maybe it does make sense. There are no consequences for hurting a monster, no guilt that sticks around after it’s over.

“I…” Nancy struggles for words and Steve doesn’t feel bad for letting her. She always seems to know what to do, what to say, what she needs, until it comes to things like this. Even in his dreams she’s always confident. The differences between them are as clear as glass now. It was never going to work out. They were never really a match.

“I don’t want…to hurt you…”

It’s way too late for that. “You already did,” Steve reminds her. “In front of everyone. So.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers.

There’s nothing left to say. That’s it, they’re over. And it hurts, but not like salt in an open wound. It feels more like pressing on an old bruise. They were always going to end up this way, and somehow he knew that.

“Just so you know, I never pretended to love you.” Steve leaves her standing in the cold.

I’m sorry.

He has his own apology to make, but that’s not the only reason he decides to go to Eddie’s place after swim practice. He’s being dumb and paranoid, but the dream rattled his nerves. What if something happened to Eddie after the party? What if he didn’t make it home? There’s only one way Steve can put his mind at ease. And if Eddie doesn’t want to talk to him then at least Steve will know he’s okay. No matter what, it can’t go any worse than the time he tried to bury the hatchet with Jonathan and ended up fighting a monster. Eddie won’t have monsters coming out of his ceiling.

Hopefully.

It shouldn’t be hard to figure out where Eddie lives—there are only two trailer parks in Hawkins—but as soon as Steve hops on his bike he knows where to go. Forest Hills. He guides the bike by instinct until he pulls up to a trailer that looks like every other trailer in the park. Somehow, he’s sure this is the right place. He leans his bike against the side and knocks on the door.

The door swings outward and Steve steps back before he’s smacked in the face.

“Can I help you?” A haggard-looking man asks. He has a ratty blanket around his shoulders.

The exact same blanket Steve pulled over Eddie’s body in his dream. Same pattern, same colour, same hole in the corner.

Steve’s chest goes tight. If the blanket is real, what does that mean for the rest of the dream? Shit, shit, shit— “I’m looking for Eddie Munson?”

The man’s eyes narrow. “Who are you?”

“I’m Steve. I’m in two of his classes.”

“Why are you looking for him?”

“I just want to talk to him.” Under the man’s scrutiny Steve feels like he’s ten years old. “I owe him an apology.”

“Well, you’re shit out of luck then. He’s not home.”

A heaviness sinks through Steve and lands in his stomach. Great, now he’s even more worried. He almost asks the man if he’s seen Eddie today but he still looks suspicious of Steve. “Do you know when he’ll be back?” he asks instead.

“Nope.”

“Can you tell him I came by? And I’m sorry for what I said yesterday.”

The man pulls the blanket tighter around himself. “Sure thing, kid. That it?”

"Yeah. Thanks." Steve gets back on his bike and goes home. He doesn't ride around town even though he wants to, because that would be ridiculous. He doesn't need to go hunting for Eddie. He's fine. He'll be at school tomorrow.

Maybe.

“While I’m glad that you asked to speak to me, I’d be happier if you actually spoke to me.”

Steve rubs his eyes and looks at Ms. Kelley’s expectant face. It’s too early for this but it’s his own fault. This was the only time she had left for the week and once he made up his mind to go see her he didn’t want to put it off anymore.

“Sorry,” he says. “I just don’t know where to start.” What the hell does he tell her first? How he feels like he’s losing his mind, or that he knows things he shouldn’t know, or that he broke up with someone he used to be so crazy about, or that he can’t make new friends, or—?

She taps her pen against her notebook. “Hm. How about something simple? If you could change only one thing about today, what would it be?”

“Eddie wouldn’t hate me.” Of course the first thing that pops into his mind is Eddie. Steve’s been thinking about the dream and the party constantly.

“Eddie Munson? Are you two friends?”

“Definitely not now,” Steve mutters. “Before…maybe. I don’t know.” They probably could’ve been, if Steve hadn’t been so stupid. He eyes the tip of Ms. Kelley’s pen hovering dangerously close to her paper. “Can you not take notes?”

“No problem.” She shoves the notebook to the messier side of her desk. “So what happened with Eddie?”

“We were at Tina’s party and I said something really stupid and pissed him off.”

“Don’t feel too bad, it happens to all of us. Have you talked to him about it?”

Steve shakes his head. “He wasn’t here yesterday and he wasn’t home.”

“Well, hopefully you get the chance today. I’m glad you want to make things right, most people would want to sweep it under the rug and pretend they did nothing wrong. Do you want to be friends with him?”

“Yeah, I do.” Steve started talking to him because of the curiosity that’s plagued him since the accident, but now he just wants to talk to Eddie. He’s so different from what Steve assumed based on what people say, but when is gossip ever right? You hear all the shit people say about you and you still believe rumors? Eddie was right, but listening to everything people say is such a hard habit to break when he’s been doing it for so long.

“He’s the only person at school I can talk to,” Steve says. “Especially since me and Nancy broke up.”

“When did that happen?”

“Yesterday. Officially. But we had a fight at the party.”

Ms. Kelley gives him a sympathetic smile. "You had a rough Halloween."

“Yeah, tell me about it,” he mutters.

"How do you feel about the break-up?"

“It’s…fine. It was coming.” His anger at Nancy burned so hot and died so fast. Eddie was right about that, too. Steve could’ve ended things sooner, but he chose to be blind. He chose to pretend, and he only realized what he was doing after the accident. He doesn’t know if it would’ve hurt more or less if he broke up with her sooner, but it would’ve saved him from his own lies that he told himself when she said love you too. She’s shy, she’s nervous, she’s not used to it, she doesn’t want anyone to hear.

No. She just didn’t mean it.

“I should’ve broken up with her sooner.”

“It’s always easier to say what we should’ve done after things have happened,” Ms. Kelley says. “If she was here now, what would you say to her?”

“Nothing,” Steve says. It’s all said and done.

“To me, it sounds like you’re ready to move forward.”

“Yeah, I think I—” A yawn interrupts his words. “Sorry.”

Ms. Kelley tilts her head and gives him a concerned look. “Are you sleeping okay? You do look pretty tired. More than the last time I saw you.”

Steve wants to say he’s fine, but he squashes the urge down. He asked to see her—there’s no point in lying. “No, not since the accident.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Steve shifts in his chair, feeling an echo of guilt at the way he snapped at her during their last meeting. “You’re not going to tell my parents anything I say, right?”

“Not unless you ask me to,” she assures him. “Have you talked to them about it?”

“No.” Even if they weren’t mad about the accident and the car and their damaged reputations, and even if his mom wasn’t busy with her re-election campaign, Steve still wouldn’t. At some point he stopped telling them anything personal because they don’t care. “Mom’s busy and dad’s away.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. They should be your biggest supporters right now, but you can talk to me about it.”

Steve runs a hand through his hair. He talks more to the photo of a puppy on her desk than to her. “It’s not really the accident, just everything that’s happened after. I don’t remember it. I just remember being upset and then boom, I’m waking up in the hospital. Now everything is weird.”

“Weird how?” she asks.

Steve looks away from the puppy and up at her face. She’s waiting patiently, her hands folded on top of her desk. “You’re going to think I’m crazy.”

“Trust me, I won’t. I’ve been doing this for a long time, I’ve heard all sorts of things.”

But she has no idea what Steve’s been through.

He forces the words out. “I get this, I don’t know, this feeling? That something happened. Something big, something important, and I can’t remember it. I…I have weird dreams—nightmares—about people I don’t know. And I think I hallucinated. At swim practice last week I thought I was at the bottom of Lover’s Lake.” He looks down and rubs his clammy palms against his jeans. “I don’t feel…like myself.”

Steve has to hand it to her—she’s got a damn good poker face. She doesn’t look confused or concerned or surprised, just thoughtful. "And all of this started after the accident?" she asks.

"From the day I woke up.”

"Have you talked to your doctor?"

Steve sighs and shakes his head. “At the hospital they said they couldn’t find anything wrong. They did a whole bunch of tests.”

She purses her lips. "I’m not a neurologist, Steve. I suggest you see your doctor. Maybe you need more time to recover, even if everything seemed okay at first."

"Do you think it might just go away?"

"Maybe. Brains are incredibly complex and there's still a lot we don't know about them."

Steve knows she’s right. He should see Doctor Morrison again. He doesn’t want to be stuck with this feeling that he’s missing something for the rest of his life. “Is it possible to get memories back?” he wonders.

Ms. Kelley leans back in her chair as she thinks. “I believe so. Memories can be triggered, especially by smells. They can also come back if you’re in a similar emotional state to when they were created. I think there are some studies that used meditation and hypnosis to try and—”

“Hypnosis? Like when people do what someone tells them to do at fairs and stuff?”

She smiles. “Stage hypnosis is mostly fake, but the theory is grounded in real science that’s been around for decades. There are a lot of things you could try, but I think your best bet is to see your doctor first and in the meantime keep a journal.”

Steve almost laughs, but he doesn’t. She looks serious. “You want me to start a diary?”

“Whatever you want to call it. Writing down your dreams and thoughts might jog your memory, or even get rid of the feeling altogether.”

It seems like it’s worth a shot when she says that, even if he despises writing. “Okay,” he agrees.

The warning bell for first period buzzes through the office. Steve picks up his bag.

“Before you go, let’s book another appointment. It sounds like you have a lot on your mind.” Ms. Kelley flips open her planner. “I’m booked next week for what looks like the entire senior year, unless you want Friday after class.”

“I can’t, we have our first basketball game.”

She glances at a copy of his schedule. “How about the thirteenth on your free period? It’ll be after lunch.”

“Sure.”

She writes his name down. “Okay, great, now go get that English grade up. And good luck with Eddie.”

Eddie isn’t in his seat when Steve walks in, but first period English is usually a toss up—sometimes he’s the first one in the room, amped up on caffeine or sugar (or both), or he walks in twenty minutes late like he just rolled out of bed. Steve eyes the clock as Mrs. Cooper begins her lecture. Eddie has to be okay, because if something happened to him the whole school would be talking about it.

It’s almost nine when the door opens. Eddie walks in and Steve’s whole body relaxes. He didn’t realize how tense he was or that his leg was bouncing until it stopped.

“Late again, Mr. Munson, you know what that means,” Mrs. Cooper scolds.

“Sure thing, Coops,” Eddie says. He walks around the back of the class and Steve catches his eye as he sits down. He doesn’t look mad, but that doesn’t mean anything.

When Mrs. Cooper is finally done talking, Steve turns around in his chair. “Hey. I’m sorry for what I said at the party. You were right, I was dumb, and I know people just talk crap all the time.”

Eddie shakes his head. “It’s fine, you were fucked up—”

“No, it’s not fine, I messed up and I hurt you, and I didn’t mean to, I’m just an idiot.”

Eddie’s face softens. “Stop, you’re not an idiot. You’re…” For a moment he looks incredibly guilty, and he looks down at his desk.

“What? I’m what?” Steve asks.

“I feel kind of bad. I used to think you were some spoiled rich douche everyone was always talking about. Harrington this, Harrington that…”

Steve winces. “I was like that.”

“I don’t think that now. My uncle told me you came over, you really seem like you give a shit.”

“I do.”

Eddie frowns and he looks at the pen he’s twirling around his fingers. “Why?”

“...Why? Why do I care that I upset you?”

Because I want to be your friend. Because I want to save your life. Because there’s just something about you.

Eddie leans back in his seat and looks across the room. The bell is about to ring, and everyone else is packing up. “Most people don’t.”

Fuck them for treating Eddie like dirt. “I don’t want to be like them,” Steve insists. “I’m trying to do better. Be better. Make better friends.” He hopes that didn’t sound as desperate to Eddie as he thought it did.

Eddie’s eyes are almost black under the classroom lights as he looks at Steve. A slow grin creeps onto his face, and it’s such a relief to see after his anger at the party and his lifeless face in Steve’s dream. “Oh shit, is this getting serious? I can make you a friendship bracelet.”

Steve thinks he’s joking, and he wonders what a friendship bracelet from Eddie would even look like. He can’t imagine wearing jewelry like Eddie’s in a million years. “Please tell me you’re joking.”

Eddie just laughs.

• Walking through a really dark place
• Russians
• Nancy and Robin leave me with a bunch of kids, redhead girl floats????
• Running driving away from giant monster thing
• Walking down a long tunnel with Robin, Dustin, and…Erica?
• Talk to Robin, weird sailor outfit
• Underground tunnels?
• Talking to Nancy in old creepy house
• Swimming in lovers lake, attacked by bats
• Eddie dies

Steve stares at the last two words on his list.

Now that they’re on paper and not stuck in his head driving him crazy, the dreams seem like pieces of a deranged puzzle. And he’s damn sure they have something to do with the Upside Down. Or at least some of them. A giant monster, demon bats, and a floating girl? They’re too weird to not be.

Max, he remembers. That’s her name. He was devastated when he thought she was dead, and it had something to do with gates. Maybe all of the dreams are connected to the Upside Down. Nancy went there. How did she describe it?

"It was dark, and there was like pollen or something floating in the air, and everything was sticky," she'd said quietly. They were in the hospital waiting room after Will was found. "That's where it lives."

“And…it took Barbara?” he asked. He was so ashamed. He’d been so dumb and jealous and had no idea what she or Jonathan were going through.

Nancy nodded numbly. “The girl they were talking about? She has some sort of…I don’t know…abilities. She could find them in the Upside Down just by floating around in the kiddie pool. It was honestly kind of creepy.” She looked at her hands folded in her lap. “She said Barb was…gone.”

Steve looks out the window. The pool is like a beacon in the inky darkness of the backyard. She could find them just by floating in the pool. And Ms. Kelley said meditation and hypnosis might trigger memories…

No. That’s a stupid idea. He’s not a psychic girl.

Steve writes all the things Ms. Kelley mentioned in his notebook. Same emotions, smells, meditation, hypnosis, journalling. He looks out the window again. Would it really hurt to try? What’s the worst that could happen—he feels stupid for a few minutes when it doesn’t work? And it won’t, but the idea won’t leave his brain and he doesn’t know what else to write.

Fuck it.

Steve changes into his swim trunks, grabs a towel, and heads outside to the pool. He shivers in the autumn chill, but the pool heater is on and the water is nice and warm. He wades down the steps and drags a few pool noodles in to help him float. His heart is already starting to race at the thought of closing his eyes on the dark tree line. Barbara sat right there on the diving board with a blood-thirsty monster right behind her.

Fucking hell, Harrington, you’re not scared of the dark. The monster is gone.

Steve takes a deep breath. He looks at the trees one last time then leans back and closes his eyes.

The world goes deathly silent.

He tries to relax and think about nothing.

Is it working?

Stop it. Don’t think.

What is he even doing?

Trying to remember. Trying to find what he’s missing. The accident. The dreams.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

Everything is fine.

An unnatural warmth spreads down Steve’s spine. Somehow it’s warmer than the water, but it doesn’t burn. Like a hand running down his back.

He’s not alone.

What? Of course he’s alone. No one knows he’s out here, and if someone else was in the pool he would’ve heard an echo of their movement with his ears underwater. He can’t hear anything but the hum of the heater.

No. I’m not alone.

Fuck, this really was a stupid idea. Is someone watching him? Is it something from the Upside Down? Or someone psychic like Eleven? Should he get out? He should get out. But he’s too scared to move.

A calm feeling surrounds Steve like a blanket, and his panic fades away. Everything is fine. A shiver dances across his scalp, like something is touching his hair, and an image of his mother fills his mind.

She changes into Nancy’s mom. Then Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins.

What the hell? Maybe he's really losing it this time.

His mother stands in a dark, nothing place. She turns into Nancy’s mom. Then Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins. His mom. Mrs. Wheeler. Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins. His mom. Mrs. Wheeler. Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins. His mom.

There’s something in Steve’s head showing him every woman he knows. No, not every woman, every mother.

The image changes.

Steve. Tiny. Giggling in the cupboard under the laundry room sink. Footsteps walk by. They walk by again. Then the cupboard doors open. “I found you!”

That…was real. A memory he had long forgotten. His mom used to play hide and seek with him when he was little, years before she ever got involved in the town politics. And when he thought of a new spot and it took her too long to find him, he’d run out and jump into her arms and demand ice cream. She caved every time.

The picture in his mind changes again.

An underwater-coloured place. Hopeless. Floating bits of white. Steve is walking. Older. Tired. Eyes sad. Carrying a body.

Steve gasps. He splashes out of the pool as fast as he can and wraps the towel tight around his body.

He’s alone. There’s nothing in the water. Nothing lurking in the trees. Nothing lurking in his head.

Chapter Text

Steve is starting to think he's not crazy.

It's dangerous—crazy people never think they're crazy, right?—but there are too many coincidences to ignore. He dreamed of that girl and she's real. He dreamed of Eddie covered in a blanket that he actually owns, with a guitar he actually plays. And whatever happened last night wasn't his imagination. He’s sure of it. Something or someone was showing him things in his mind.

He thinks about it all morning as he re-shelves tapes at work. Mothers. Hide and seek. Himself, carrying Eddie's body. Just like his dream, but it wasn't from his own eyes. It was like something was watching him. Mothers, hide and seek, and himself. Was it saying that it found him? Was it looking for him? Does it know about his dreams? Or maybe it gives him the dreams? He has too many questions, and no one to ask for answers. Unless he's brave enough to try again.

Steve reaches for the next tape in the bin. Psycho. He sighs. Sure, he knows it's from all of the Halloween movie rentals being returned, but it also might be the universe laughing at him. Anything is possible.

The bell over the door rings. A woman comes into the store, trailed by a girl Steve has definitely seen at school before. She looks around, and her face lights up when she sees Robin behind the counter.

"Hi, Robin!"

Robin drops the tape she's checking into the system. "Hi, Chrissy."

Chrissy? She must be Chrissy Cunningham. He’s heard people talk about her, and he’s seen her at games and rallies with the cheerleaders, but he never put the face to the name. Her body lifted up into the air and she just, like, hung there. In the air. And her bones...her bones started to snap.

A cold shiver runs down Steve’s spine. What the fuck? Why the hell did he think that? And why did it almost sound like…Eddie?

Chrissy leans over the counter. “I didn’t know you worked here.”

“I just started last weekend,” Robin tells her. She’s tapping her fingers on the counter. “Still got the training wheels on, sort of, but do you—what are you looking for? Obviously you’re looking for a movie, but I mean, anything specific? I can find it. Whatever you’re looking for. If you are looking for something. Or do you need a—?”

“Chrissy, how about Footloose?” The woman calls from the drama shelf. Even from here, Steve can tell she’s leaving tapes in all the wrong spots. “I know how much you love that one. Or maybe something more mature? Richard Gere? He’s quite handsome.”

Chrissy’s shoulders slump. "I've seen Footloose five times, mom,” she calls back. “Actually,” she says to Robin, “I’m looking for The Clairvoyant? My friend said it was good but I don't know if she brought it back yet. Can you check?"

Steve grabs it from the thriller aisle. He just put it back an hour ago. “I got it, Rob,” he says, and brings it to the counter.

“Thanks!” Chrissy says. “Oh, you’re Steve Harrington, right? I’m Chrissy.”

“Yeah, that’s me. Are you two friends?”

Chrissy nods. “Robin and I sit together in math.”

“Yup,” Robin says. Is she blushing? “Ms. O’Donnell and her alphabetic seating.”

Steve knows the joys of that all too well since he’s stuck next to Tommy for the entire term, but at least it’s working out for someone.

“I’ll be right back, I have to get my mom’s card.” Chrissy goes to find her mom in the romance aisle, her hair swishing with each bouncy step, and for a moment Robin watches her weave around the shelves. Then she glares at Steve.

“Did you call me Rob?”

“What? Oh. I didn’t mean—”

“Yeah, don’t—”

“I won’t.”

“—call me that.”

“Sorry.” He didn’t even think about it, it just slipped out. He heard the nickname in a dream, just like everything else he knows about her. Steve points to the last bin of returns. “Are you done with those? I’ll put them back.”

Robin finishes checking in the last few tapes and passes him the bin. Chrissy comes back and reluctantly puts Clairvoyant on the top.

“Thanks,” she says, “but I guess you’ll have to put it back.” She shakes her head and a bitter look crosses her face. “She says it’s not for ‘proper young ladies.’”

“No offense to your mom, but that’s totally ridiculous,” Steve says.

Chrissy glances over her shoulder to make sure her mom is still on the other side of the store. “That’s just how she is.”

“Maybe we can...” Steve shuffles through the bin. Most of the movies are horrors or thrillers, but at the bottom of the pile he finds a few that aren’t. Star Wars, Robin Hood, and…Lovesick—perfect. He swaps the covers and gives The Clairvoyant back to Chrissy, now disguised as a romance.

Chrissy’s blue eyes go wide. She looks between him and Robin nervously. "Are you sure? I don't want you to get in trouble."

“If you bring it back tomorrow I bet no one will notice,” Steve says. Besides, it’s only his second weekend. Mistakes are bound to happen, right?

It’s worth it for Chrissy’s bright grin. “I can do that.”

“You could get in trouble for that,” Robin says mildly after Chrissy and her mom leave. A devious look crosses her face—oh shit. She could tell Frank and get him fired so she doesn’t have to work with him, and she’s probably realizing the exact same thing. Steve would do it if he hated someone that much.

“Don’t tell Frank,” he pleads. He hides the mismatched tape under the counter with a quick glance at the closed office door. Losing his first job after only two weeks would suck, but losing this chance to know her would suck even more.

“My silence can be bought,” she says loftily.

“Are you kidding me? You want to blackmail me for trying to cheer her up?”

Robin frowns. “You weren’t flirting with her?”

"What? No. I just thought she'd appreciate it." It definitely had nothing to do with Steve’s lingering guilt about the terrifying words that came to his mind when he saw her, because that would be crazy (and he’s not crazy).

Chrissy is true to her word. She brings the tape back on Sunday and thanks Steve about a million times. She waves as she heads out the door. “See you tomorrow, Robin!”

Robin spills a handful of someone’s change across the counter. “Sorry—uh, bye Chrissy!”

Steve bites his lip. He wants to say something so badly but he already made that mistake once this week, and he doesn’t want to ruin his chance with Robin like he almost did with Eddie. But in his dream…

She told him she’s a lesbian.

Steve can't remember the exact words. It's hazy and weird like all dreams after waking up, but he remembers feeling the oh moment of clarity. He was disappointed because he liked her so much and then finally he was thankful. She trusted him enough to tell him and that meant more than anything. It flipped his world inside out to know someone like her but in the end he knew he'd do anything for her, do anything to be worthy of her trust.

And if she really is, that’ll be just another reason to believe the dreams mean something.

"You won't believe me."

"Try us."

With every word out of the guy's mouth, Steve's dread rises like cold water through his body. Not again, not again, please not again, but begging whatever gods there are to believe in won't stop it. It's back, crawling into his life like a roach that just won't die. The guy's face is half hidden in shadow and his voice is barely more than a whisper eaten by the darkness as he delivers the blow.

"She came to me at lunch, said she wanted to buy so I met her behind the school, by that old picnic table in the woods. I don't...I don't know if that matters. But anyway. She seemed really stressed out, real jumpy, you know? At first I thought she was just nervous because it was her first time buying weed, but then she said she wanted something stronger so after the game I took her to my place. Gotta keep the hard stuff at home, so. I went to my room to grab it and when I came back out she was just...standing there. I said her name but she couldn't hear me. Or she couldn't talk. I don't know. Then her body lifted up into the air and she just, like, hung there. In the air. And her bones...her bones started to snap. Her eyes...it was like something was inside her head, pulling. I didn't know what to do so...I ran."

Steve wants to tell him it's okay, he did what any sane person would do. Hell, they should all be running right now. But his tongue is thick and he's frozen with that old fight or flight energy, and shit. Maybe he's next. Maybe they're all next on the menu. They don't know anything, they could all die tomorrow—

Steve jerks awake in a cold sweat. He can’t breathe. The darkness in the room is suffocating, and he fumbles to turn on the lamp beside his bed. The warm glow floods the room, and he relaxes. Another night, another nightmare. At least Eddie didn’t die this time.

Steve opens the drawer and pulls out his notebook and pen to add this dream to the list. Eddie telling a ghost story about Chrissy Cunningham (floating like Max?). He drops them back into the drawer and wipes his hands down his face. He’s so damn tired of these dreams.

Monday is a special kind of hell. Not only is it Monday, but the gossip has started fresh again, this time about his breakup with Nancy. Tommy elbows him in math and says something about Nancy being into perverts. Steve doesn’t respond. At least no one’s asking if he’s suicidal anymore.

Steve doesn't go to the cafeteria at lunch. He'll have no one to sit with and the last thing he wants is for everyone to stare at him while he eats alone. God, he's so pathetic. He wishes he could sit with Eddie, but Eddie eats with his friends and barging in on their group would make him feel worse.

Instead he wanders outside. It's too cold for most people except for the group of smokers in front of the school. Steve walks around the building, and when he sees the crop of trees with their leaves turned sunset red, he remembers what Eddie said in his dream. He follows a beaten path through the woods and comes to a rotting picnic table. This is where Eddie does his deals. Or at least the one he did with Chrissy in his story, and that was probably the least believable part of it. She definitely doesn't seem like the type to be buying drugs.

There's no one here now so Steve drops his bag and sits on the table. He pulls out his cigarettes and wedges his lighter out of his pocket to light up. He stays outside for all of lunch, and when he hears the bell ring distantly he heads back inside.

Biology is his last class of the day, and it’s quiet up until there’s a shatter of glass at the back of the room. Steve looks over his shoulder and so does everyone else.

“Could you be any more of an idiot?” Dylan Waters gives Eddie a disgusted look. There’s a pool of blue staining solution on the floor between their chairs.

Eddie flips him off. “That was your fault, asshole.”

“I’ll put you both in detention if you can’t work together,” Mr. Jamison says. He’s already out of his desk, grabbing the cleaning supplies from the cupboard.

“Can I switch seats, Mr. Jamison?” Dylan whines. “He’ll ruin my work! No wonder he couldn’t graduate—”

Eddie doesn’t just roll his eyes, he rolls his entire head in annoyance. If sitting beside Dylan Waters is the reason he doesn’t show up to biology half the time, Steve can’t blame him.

“Yes, fine,” Mr. Jamison says wearily as he mops the floor. “Can I get a volunteer to switch seats with Mr. Waters?”

Steve isn’t surprised that no one raises their hand. He’s probably the only person in the room who wants to, but he waits a few seconds so he doesn’t look too eager. Dylan glares at his best friend Gary, and Gary shakes his head. Of course. Dylan wants to sit beside Cassie King, but he definitely isn’t the one who left with Cassie on Halloween.

Steve raises his hand. “I don’t mind.” Watching the hope die on Dylan’s face is one of the best parts of his day.

"There you go, Mr. Waters," Mr. Jamison says. "You can sit beside Sarah."

Steve gathers his books and says a prayer in his head for his grade. Without Sarah explaining all the tricky things to him he's going to have a hell of a time hanging onto his C grade. Selfishly, he hopes she's not as nice to Dylan.

But now he gets to sit beside Eddie.

Eddie leans close with his hands on his heart as soon as Steve sits down. “My savior,” he says dramatically.

Steve shoves him away and starts preparing the next slide. “Shut up. I couldn’t let Dylan get what he wanted,” he says, like that’s the reason he volunteered. Eddie can probably see right through him. “He wanted Gary’s spot so he could spend the whole period flirting with Cassie. He’s been in love with her since, like, third grade or something.”

“Ohhh. Yeah, he does seem to drool in that direction a lot. Poor Cassie.” Eddie hands him a blank slide from the box. “Are you good at this shit?”

“Making slides? Sure. This class? …Not really.”

“Still probably better than me,” Eddie mutters. “I’m lucky if I get a D minus.”

“Maybe I can help?” Steve offers. “I can’t make any promises, but we could study together. If you want.”

Eddie gives him a small, appreciative smile. “I hope my grades aren’t contagious.”

They work through the rest of the assignment. Eddie whizzes through drawing the cells and neurons but he gets stuck on the questions. He writes and erases and writes again and rubs his forehead, leaving a smudge of graphite on his temple. Steve tells him it’s there, and he wipes it away. By the last ten minutes of class, he’s slumped over his desk.

Steve pokes his arm with the end of his pencil. “Come on, you’re almost done.”

“Nugh. Hey, do me a favor? If I start decaying in this desk from boredom, will you put me out of my misery? You can still say something at my funeral, it's cool. And make sure my grave says ‘here lies Eddie Munson, the best guitar player in the history of Hawkins.’"

An image of Eddie dead with his guitar on his body invades Steve's mind. They couldn’t give him a funeral, or a proper grave. No, no, no, don’t think about it. He flips his assignment over and starts doodling on the back. “How would I know if that’s true?”

Eddie lifts his head off his arms and props it in his hand. “I thought you saw us play?”

“I don’t remember the concert that well,” Steve lies. Now he knows the only place he’s seen Eddie’s guitar is in his nightmares.

“Then you should come to the Hideout tomorrow night and bear witness.” Eddie says bear witness in a lofty, English accent. “Eight o’clock.”

If anyone else asked Steve to go to a rock show, he’d tell them to take a hike. It’s not his kind of music, even if he enjoys that Bon Jovi song on the radio, but he’s starting to think Eddie could get him to try anything. “Yeah, maybe I’ll check it out. What’s your band’s name?”

“Wow, you really don’t remember. Corroded Coffin."

Steve snorts. "Corroded Coffin? Seriously?"

Eddie grins. "We were thirteen and we thought it was cool. Then it stuck. Thank god we chose that, Jeff wanted the name to be Nuclear Flesh."

Steve laughs. A few people look his way so he quiets down, but Eddie doesn’t notice the looks.

“It’s okay, you can laugh. I told him—” Eddie’s eyes fall to Steve’s page, and he frowns. “What is that? I won’t lie, it’s very Georgia O’Keefe from this angle.”

"What?" Steve looks at his paper. He started off drawing more neurons, but then he drew a long oval with viney lines coming from the sides, almost like neuron tails. If he was as good at drawing as Eddie is, it might look more like what it's supposed to be—a glowing rupture between worlds. A broken seam—an orange glow—black, writhing edges—

“She painted flowers that look like…” Eddie leans closer and whispers, “It looks like a pussy.”

“No, it—” Steve squints at the mass of pencil lines. Well, maybe…

"But if you saw one that looked like that I don't know how you survived. Or did you? Should we hold a funeral for your—?"

Steve rolls his eyes. “It’s not that.”

“Then what is it?”

“I saw it in a dream.” And in the pool during swim practice, but he leaves that part out. “It was glowing orange.”

“Oh,” Eddie says, like that explains anything. "So it was a glowing eldritch pussy—"

“Shut up.” Steve looks around the room, but no one is looking at them now. Everyone is finished their work and talking to their friends. “I don’t know what that means.”

“What, eldritch? It’s like, uh, supernatural. Weird.” Eddie puts his pencil to the drawing and starts coloring in some of the lines. “No wonder you can’t sleep. Are all your nightmares about weird eldritch…things?”

“They’re—” Steve stops. He shouldn’t be telling Eddie any of this. If they found out that he’s told anyone about the Upside Down, even indirectly… He shakes his head.

“Aw, come on, they can’t be any weirder than mine. Let me think…sliding down a water slide and into the mouth of a giant kraken...riding into battle against tree zombies...oh! I had one where I was eating dinner with a bunch of fictional characters and then I looked down and I was naked the entire time.” Eddie gives him a big-eyed, expectant look, and god damn it. He really does make Steve want to talk.

“I had one about this girl—”

Eddie gasps. “No way, Steve Harrington dreaming about girls? You’re right, that is weird.”

“Shut up, it wasn’t like that.”

“How was it not like that?”

This is really Steve’s life now—sitting in biology being teased by Eddie Munson. It’s almost weirder than the dreams. “She was just a kid and she was sitting in a graveyard. I was trying to wake her up and she couldn’t.”

Eddie looks intrigued. “Alright, I’ll give you a point, that’s pretty creepy. But it’s not as weird as mine.”

“I saw her in real life after.”

Eddie stops drawing on Steve’s paper and his face turns serious. Shit. Any minute now he’s going to call Steve crazy. “Are you saying…you saw it happen? You actually saw her in a graveyard?”

“No, no, not the graveyard, just the girl,” Steve says. That doesn’t make it any less weird.

“Maybe you saw her around town before the dream.”

“Maybe,” Steve says. It could be possible—he has no idea what day they arrived in Hawkins—but if he remembered her face enough to dream about her, then wouldn’t he remember seeing her around town?

Eddie’s eyes narrow and he leans closer to Steve. “Wait a minute. You said you had a bad feeling before the Halloween party.”

“Did I?”

“You did! Maybe you’re psychic, you freak. Or, wait—a divination wizard!”

No one has ever called Steve a freak before. No one would dare. But coming from Eddie it feels like a welcoming, not an insult. It feels kind of good, like it's just them against the world.

"Is that from Dungeons and Dragons?" Steve asks.

Eddie’s jaw drops. “You know D&D? Whoa, whoa, wait…do you play? Holy shit.”

"I don't play, I’ve just heard of it." From where, exactly? Steve has no idea.

Eddie looks delighted. “You have to come to Hellfire on Friday. Fuck, man, Steve Harrington at Hellfire? I think the guys’ heads would explode.”

And hang out with you and Eddie the Freak Munson? No, thanks.

The feeling of him and Eddie against the world fades. Of course it wouldn't be just the two of them. Eddie's friends would be there, and Steve wouldn't fit in. Not that it matters because he can't go anyway. "I can't. We have our first basketball game of the season."

It sucks to watch Eddie try and hide his disappointment, so Steve adds, “They’re not always on Fridays.”

A small smile comes back to his face. “Maybe another time, then.”

Steve misses the door to the Hideout twice before finally seeing the sign. It’s tucked between a pizza place and a dress shop, and the glass is covered with notices—performance schedules and local club info and ads for musicians. Corroded Coffin is scrawled beside Tuesday at 8:00 pm.

Steve’s sneakers stick to the floor as he walks down the long hallway and into the bar. The band is setting up on the stage tucked into the corner of the room, and the guy behind the microphone says something over his shoulder that makes the rest of the group look at Steve. Eddie hops down from the stage and crosses the room with a bright grin.

“You’re here,” he says. He looks like a real rockstar. The bandana that’s usually hanging from his pocket is tied around his head, and he’s shinier than usual with extra jewelry. His eyes seem darker—he must be wearing makeup—and he’s shirtless under his denim vest, and oh. He has tattoos.

“You invited me,” Steve reminds him.

“I know.” Eddie shoves his hands in his pockets. “I didn’t really think you were interested.”

“I’m interested.” More than Steve ever thought he would be. He slides some change over the bar to pay for his Coke. “Like you said, I’m here to bear witness.”

“Well, shit. Now I’m going to be nervous.”

“What, because I’m here?”

Eddie shrugs. Steve has never thought of him as shy before, but that’s what he thinks now. Eddie looks shy, but also pleased that he’s here, and that alone makes it worth the bike ride across town.

“I didn’t know you had tattoos.” Steve doesn’t know anyone with tattoos except Charlie on the basketball team, and he only got one after Steve and the team dared him to last year. It was his girlfriend’s initials, and they broke up three weeks later.

“Yeah, too bad I can’t just rip off my shirt at school and show them off,” Eddie says with a smirk.

“When did you get them?”

Eddie lifts the flap of his vest and points to a spider inked on his chest. “I popped my cherry with her on my sixteenth birthday. And then I was hooked and got five more.” Eddie points to each of them. “Demon guy, puppet man, bats, and wyvern.”

“What the hell is a wyvern?” Steve looks closer at the ink on the back of his arm. It looks like it’s about to jump right off Eddie’s skin and attack. If Steve is ever going to get a tattoo he’d never get anything like that, but it looks good on Eddie. They all look good on him. Fit for a rockstar.

“It’s kind of like a dragon but with a hawk’s head. Badass, right?”

“That’s only five. You said five more. I have a D in math but I can count.”

A devilish look crosses Eddie’s face. “It’s a snake, but you’re going to have to use your imagination for that one—”

The lead singer’s voice booms across the room as he talks into the microphone. “She’s getting cold, Eddie.” He’s pointing to the side where a familiar guitar with a flame pattern sits in its stand. The last time Steve saw it was in his nightmare. “How could you treat her like this?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming.”

Steve starts to follow him towards the stage but Eddie stops him with a gentle touch to his chest. “Whoa, whoa, no, don’t sit near the front, trust me. Unless you want your ears falling off.”

Steve looks from Eddie’s hand to the few people on the other side of the room. They must be regulars. “Oh. Right. Good luck.”

“I hope you enjoy it.” For a moment it looks like Eddie is going to say something else, but then he bites his lip and goes to rejoin the band.

The lights dim and two spotlights above the stage light up as Steve finds a seat. The lead singer doesn’t introduce them—he doesn’t need to if the same five people show up each week—and they start playing.

Eddie plays like he was born with a guitar in his hands.

All of the guys look confident, but Eddie looks natural. Effortless. He plays with his whole body, moving with the beat and grinning the entire time. His hands fly like mad during his solo and when the singer starts up again there’s a proud smile on his face. He mouths the words as the singer screams them.

“Call me on the hotline, baby!”

They go right into the next song, and then another one, and another one. Steve enjoys the slower songs, but the part he likes the most is seeing Eddie on stage. Watching him play is like watching him come to life. He’s electric, and every inch of him seems to glow in the spotlight. The stage is his.

After six songs, the band bows. The regulars behind Steve start clapping and he joins in. “Thanks, gents,” the singer says. “See you next week.”

Eddie puts his guitar on the stand and the band comes down from the stage. The spotlights vanish and the regular lights turn on again. Eddie talks to the bartender for a few minutes, then he comes to Steve’s table with his own glass of Coke.

“So? What’d you think?”

“Um.” Steve feels like Eddie’s electric energy is infecting him. His thoughts are all over the place. “It was great. I mean, I don’t know much about rock music but you sounded like you knew what you were doing.”

“Really? I totally fucked up in Princess of the Dawn.”

“I didn’t notice,” Steve says honestly.

“You’re just saying that.”

“No, I actually didn’t. You were great.”

Eddie has that same shy but pleased look from earlier, and he might be blushing but the light is too low for Steve to be sure. Eddie takes a swig from his glass and wipes his mouth. “I started thinking, you know? You can’t do that when you’re playing music.”

“You can’t think?”

Eddie shakes his head. “It’s a baaaad idea. Like, if I think too much, I’ll mess up. I just have to let my hands play and trust that I practiced enough. Does that make sense?”

“I think I get it,” Steve says. “It’s like when I’m playing basketball. I don’t think too hard, I just go.”

“Yeah, exactly. Do you…play any instruments? Or is that a dumb question?”

Steve gives him a look like really? Me?

“What? I don’t want to assume just because you’re a jock that you don’t. You could be a secretly gifted flutist for all I know.”

Steve snorts a laugh. His dad never wanted him to have any music lessons outside of school, let alone for something as girly as a flute. “Definitely not. The last time I played anything was like fifth grade. You know, this thing?” He mimes tapping in the air like his fingers are drumsticks. “I forget what it’s called.”

“Oh! Um…” Eddie snaps his fingers and his face scrunches as he thinks. “A xylophone?”

“Yeah, that. I can play that. Probably.”

Eddie grins. “We should get you on stage. Oh my god, could you imagine ‘Hotline’ on a xylophone?”

“That was the first song, right?”

“Yup. Call me on the hotline, baby!” he sings, because of course he can sing, too. And better than the lead singer, at least in Steve’s opinion. Maybe the other guy is a good singer for this kind of music, but Steve could listen to Eddie’s voice all day.

“That’s Black Sabbath. Or, like, new Black Sabbath. They haven’t been the same since Ozzy left—I know you don't know who that is—but did you like it? It’s not one of my favorite songs but it’s kind of fun.”

“Yeah, it was fun,” Steve agrees. He liked it up until the end when the singer was mostly screaming rather than singing. He’ll just have to get used to it. “Who picks the songs?”

“We each get a pick—Jeff picked that one—and then we vote on one or two more,” Eddie says.

“So who picked Queen?” Steve wasn’t expecting to hear anything he recognized, but the familiar start of ‘You’re My Best Friend,’ the last song they played, put a smile on his face.

Eddie points a thumb towards the bartender. “We gotta keep John happy. If John wants Queen, we’re playing Queen, and John wants Queen every single week. But it works out, he gives us free food. Oh, yeah, I was gonna ask—do you want to split some wings?”

“Sure,” Steve says.

“Good, because I’ve already ordered them and—” he looks around, and there’s a waitress coming towards their table with a tray— “yeah, I think that’s ours.”

Ours. Steve doesn’t know why, but he likes the sound of that. Like yesterday, when he got that feeling of the two of them against the world.

The waitress puts a giant plate of wings and a basket of fries on the table between them.

“Thanks, Cath,” Eddie says.

“No problem, kiddo. You guys are sounding better every week, you know.”

“Does that mean extra pie?” Eddie asks sweetly, batting his eyes at her.

She laughs and bumps him gently on the head with her now empty tray. “Dream on, kid.”

“How long have you been playing here?” Steve asks after she leaves.

“Oh, since…sophomore year? Yeah, sophomore year. We did a Christmas thing and then they let us come back even though we totally sucked. I know why, though.” Eddie leans across the table and lowers his voice. “Cathy thinks Gareth is adorable. Don’t tell John.”

Eddie’s band mates are sitting together a few tables away, and they keep glancing over at Steve. “Who’s Gareth?” Steve asks.

Eddie looks over his shoulder and they all turn back to their food. “The one in the red shirt. Our drummer.”

Steve nibbles on a few fries. “I think your friends think it’s weird that I’m here.”

“It is weird, but I’m glad you came.” Eddie fiddles with his napkin, rolling the corner between his fingers. It seems like he’s going to say something else, but he takes another drink of his Coke instead.

“Can I come next week?” Steve asks. He hopes Eddie wants him to, but he won’t show up unless he knows for sure.

Eddie presses his lips together to fight back a smile. Even in the low light, his eyes seem to shine. “Hell yeah, you can.” He holds a fry in front of his mouth in the shape of a smile. What a goofball.

After they finish eating and after Eddie gets his slice of pie from Cathy, the face of his watch lights up green. Steve checks his own watch. It’s ten o’clock. He didn’t know it was so late, it feels like they’ve only been talking for five minutes. Eddie gets his guitar and his bag from the stage and comes back to their table.

“I have to get going, my uncle needs the van.” Eddie takes off his vest. His tattoos are on full display for a moment before he pulls a long sleeved shirt on. Then he pulls on his leather jacket, and the vest goes back on top. “Do you want a ride?”

Yes. “No, it’s cool, I have my bike.”

“You can toss it in the back, come on.” Eddie waves goodbye to his band and leads Steve outside. They shove the bike in the back of the van, and Eddie buckles his guitar into the backseat like a baby. When he turns the key in the ignition, the wailing of a guitar plays from the radio.

“You can change the station,” he says.

Steve turns the volume down but he doesn’t change the channel. It’s obviously the right move—Eddie starts tapping the steering wheel and singing under his breath as he drives, taking the turns where Steve tells him to.

Steve wishes the night didn’t have to end, and now that he’s going home he knows why. When he’s with Eddie, he doesn’t think about anything else. He doesn’t think about his nightmares, or monsters, or the Upside Down, or mysterious things in his head. He just thinks about Eddie, and how he really is a freak but not for the reasons people think. He’s a freak because he dips his fries in soda (and convinced Steve to try it—never again). He’s a freak because his thumbs can bend too far backwards. He's a freak because he's proud of all the things that make him different. The more Steve hangs out with him, the more he wonders why he spent so long trying to be liked by everyone else.

Eddie pulls up to the end of Steve’s driveway and helps him take the bike out.

“Thanks for the ride,” Steve says.

“No problem,” Eddie says easily. He closes the back doors and gives the van a fond pat on the window.

“See you tomorrow.”

“You definitely might not miss me.” Eddie gives him a two finger salute and disappears around the side of the van. The door slams and then he’s taking off down the street into darkness. The van drifts through a stop sign, turns a corner, and then it’s gone. And Steve wishes he was still inside.

Steve walks the bike up the driveway and leaves it in the carport. Every step to his room is like a step back towards reality, back to the eldritch nightmares waiting for him as soon as he closes his eyes.

Chapter Text

Between school, brutal basketball practices, and hours of homework, Steve finishes his application for Indiana State. It’s one in the morning on game day when he’s done putting the package together. He stares at the smudge of ink under the school’s address and hopes whoever opens it won’t notice. There’s so much of himself inside this envelope. Everything he’s worth laid out for a stranger to judge. In the morning before gym class, Steve gives his application to the office clerks to mail out. Good luck, he wishes himself. Now he can focus on the game tonight.

“Are you nervous?” Eddie asks him in English. He’s wearing his Hellfire Club shirt, and Steve looks at the demon’s red face and thinks about the tattoos hiding underneath. He’s been thinking about Eddie all week. Eddie in class and Eddie on Tuesday night are like two different people—it’s fascinating. Steve feels like he’s in on a secret, knowing this other side of Eddie exists, and it’s a damn shame that most people have no idea how talented and funny and energetic Eddie is, but he’s not going to tell anyone. This secret is precious.

“A little,” Steve admits. The real answer is more like I’m sweating buckets. He hasn’t forgotten what Coach Ritter said, and he can’t fuck up tonight. “I haven’t been on my game since the accident.”

“Well, if you get tired of playing with balls you can always ditch and come to Hellfire,” Eddie jokes. His grin is as contagious as it always is. “Seriously, though. Good luck.”

Too bad it doesn’t help. They lose by four points, but at least it’s not Steve’s fault. He’ll live to see another game, but judging by the direction of Coach’s glare Dylan might not.

Steve is the last one to leave the locker room. A couple of his teammates are chatting in the hallway but most of them are gone. They didn’t win so no one wants to stick around and celebrate. Steve heads into the darkness of the parking lot to get his bike and he sees Eddie’s van still in the lot. He figured Hellfire would be over by now.

Steve goes back inside and wanders into the dark hallways, and the hair on the back of his neck prickles until he finds an open door with light and voices spilling out.

Eddie is in the middle of the room. Even with his back to the door, Steve can see he’s lit up with that same electric energy he had on Tuesday night. He’s out of his seat with his arms spread wide above the table, cackling madly while the rest of the group is loudly upset about something. This room must be storage for the drama department—colored spotlights shine on the table and Eddie’s chair looks like it was made for a king.

Steve is glad they don’t notice him. Maybe Eddie was serious about his invitation, but now that he’s here he doesn’t want to interrupt. He doesn’t play games like this, he doesn’t belong here. He should go home and work on his next application. He’ll see Eddie on Monday. But he stays outside the door, and he keeps watching Eddie. He doesn’t want to look away.

Footsteps in the hallway jolt him into action. He darts away from the door before Eddie can turn and see him, and he walks past the janitor who’s heading for the same door.

“Time to pack up, boys,” Steve hears the janitor say. “And make sure you unplug those lights this time.”

Outside, Steve gets his bike from the rack, swings his leg over, and hesitates. He looks at the school’s front door, lit by a single light. He wants to wait for Eddie, but he doesn’t want to explain what he’s still doing here almost twenty minutes after the game ended. He’s being dumb. Go home.

His mom is sitting on the couch in the great room when he gets home, which is weird. She’s been working late at the office almost every night this week. She’s still in her suit, and she’s popping open a bottle of her favorite wine.

“You’re just getting home?” she says. She doesn’t sound angry but he can never tell with her.

Steve checks his watch. It’s almost seven thirty. “I had a basketball game.” He stopped bringing home tickets for his parents in freshman year. They never asked for any, and he stopped wanting them to come.

She pours out a glass almost full to the brim. “How did it go?”

“It was fine.”

She puts the bottle on the coffee table and sighs. “Your father is coming home tonight. The deal fell through.”

Steve hears the words she doesn’t say loud and clear. Don’t even breathe in his direction.

For the whole weekend, Steve walks on eggshells at home. When he gets home from work he takes a deep breath, unlocks the door, and darts up to his room as fast as possible. He doesn’t talk to his dad until they eat dinner together on Sunday night. Steve can’t remember the last time they had dinner as a family.

“You need a haircut,” his dad says. “Hannah could mop the floor with that nest.”

“I’ll get one,” Steve lies. He’s sitting in the middle of the long dining table, drinking Coke out of a wine glass, and his parents are at opposite ends. They’re like separate islands with oceans of space between them.

“Have you been staying out of trouble?”

“Yes.”

“He has a job now,” his mom says.

“You knew?” Steve never told her, and she never asked where he goes on the weekends. Most of the time she’s busy on the weekends too, and he figured she doesn’t pay enough attention to notice.

“Of course I knew, Steve, I’ve known Frank for years.” So she knew because she was listening to people in town again, but she never bothered to talk to Steve.

“Is that where you were today? You have a job?” His dad laughs. There’s nothing nice about it.

A hot flush rolls through Steve and his hands tighten around the silverware. “What’s so funny about that?” He’ll always be like this. No matter what Steve does, nothing will ever be enough.

“It’s about damn time. I bet you thought you could have it easy and live off your old man forever, right?”

“No.”

“Bullshit,” his dad spits. “Some hard work ought to keep you in line.”

Steve wants to get up, leave the table, storm upstairs and slam the door, but he doesn’t. That would mean letting his dad win. Instead he finishes his food in silence. Maybe this is why they don’t eat together anymore.

Eddie doesn't come to English on Monday. Steve wishes he was here—the class feels so boring without him—but he doesn't worry until he gets to biology and Eddie's still not here. He hasn't missed biology in a week (since Steve became his lab partner, and he hopes it's not a coincidence) and Steve feels that jittery anxiety bubbling up again.

Mr. Jamison tsks at Eddie’s empty spot when he hands out their practice tests.

“Can I take one for Eddie?” Steve asks.

“Suit yourself.” Mr. Jamison gives him another one.

After basketball practice, Steve bikes to the trailer park and knocks on their trailer door. The van is parked on the gravel driveway, so he hopes that means Eddie is home.

Eddie’s uncle opens the door with a steaming mug in his hand. “Sorry, kid, I don’t think he’s taking visitors. I’ll tell him you stopped by.” He starts to pull the door closed but Steve grabs it.

“Wait, I brought him some homework.” Steve pulls it out of his bag. He’s such an idiot. Of course Eddie is home and safe, he’s probably just sick. Steve should’ve brought something to cheer him up, chicken soup or candy or something. Instead he’s here with homework.

“Who is it?” Eddie’s soft voice comes from further inside.

“It’s your friend Steve.”

Eddie appears behind his uncle. “Hey.” He’s drowning in a giant black sweater with the hood pulled up. His skin is paler than normal in the gray autumn daylight, but his eyes and nose are pink. Maybe he’s just been sneezing non-stop, or maybe he’s been…crying.

Eddie’s uncle squeezes his shoulder and turns back inside. “Don’t let the cold air in.”

“Yeah, you can come in,” Eddie says. He pulls Steve inside with a gentle hand on his wrist. “Did it rain? Your hair is wet,” he says as he locks the door.

“Oh. No. I just had practice.” Steve looks around the trailer. It feels like a home the way his house never does. There’s a large mug collection proudly on display above the couch where Eddie’s uncle is drinking his tea and turning on the tv. There’s a little bit of mess everywhere—papers on the counter, magnets cluttering the fridge door, and a pile of shoes on the ground beside him. His eyes drift up to the expanse of empty ceiling. He saw a web of vines across the floor in his dream, but he never saw the ceiling. There’s something missing.

“What? Is there a spider?” Eddie asks. “We get tons, trust me.”

“No, no spider.” Steve feels inside out. He looks at Eddie and thinks he shouldn’t be here. But Eddie lives here. It’s not safe. This is his home. This is his grave. “Are you okay?”

Eddie looks surprised. “Were you…worried about me? Is that why you’re here?”

Steve’s face goes warm, and he looks at the scuffs on his shoes. “I—you haven’t missed bio in a while. I brought your practice test for tomorrow, so…”

“Shit, I forgot about that.” Eddie rubs his eyes and pushes the hood down. His hair is a mess. “Thanks.”

That’s it, homework delivery is done. Eddie is fine, and all of Steve’s worry should be gone, but Eddie is obviously not fine. He looks so different from the way he did in Hellfire on Friday night. He looks sad, more than sad, and Steve wants to help and he doesn't know how and he's dying to pull Eddie into his arms. Closer, closer—he needs—I want—

Steve squeezes the straps of his bag so his hands don’t do something stupid like reach out for Eddie, because what the fuck. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“You don’t have to go. Come on, you said you’d study with me.” Eddie shakes the practice test. “If you don’t do this with me it’s not getting done.”

“You’re not contagious, are you?”

“What? No, I’m—” Eddie shakes his head. “I’m not sick,” he says quietly.

Steve’s curiosity gets the better of him. “What’s wrong? Sorry. You don’t have to tell me.”

“I don’t even know if I can explain it. I just think too much sometimes.” Eddie wipes a hand over his face. He looks like he could sleep for a week. “Do you ever wish you could turn your brain off?”

“Um…I don’t think so.”

“You’re lucky then. Come on.”

Eddie leads him to the tiny kitchen table. It’s barely big enough for two. He clears off papers and dishes, and they sit down to work. Well, Eddie works. Steve stares at the paper and tries to understand the questions, but he can feel Eddie’s knee brush against his own as it bounces under the table. Eddie isn’t wearing his rings, but even without them Steve ends up looking at his hands. They’re always moving. If he isn’t writing, then he’s shaking the pencil while he curls the corner of the paper with his other hand.

Focus. Steve writes the answer to another question, and he’s pretty sure it’s wrong.

Eddie drops his pencil. “God, this is just…too many words. ‘What are the two ions critical to a neuron’s ability to pass electrical signals?’ What does that even mean? I don’t fucking remember what an ion is. Is it the same as a molecule?”

“Peanut butter and bananas,” Steve says.

Eddie blinks at him. “What? Are you hungry? We don’t have any bananas but if you want a hit of peanut butter, I won’t judge. I’ll get you a spoon.”

“No, the question. The ions. Peanut butter—salt. And bananas—potassium. That’s the pump thing, the sodium-potassium pump.”

Eddie looks at his page. “Oh. Ohhhh. Right. I might actually remember that. I thought you said you weren’t good at bio?”

Steve shrugs. “I’m not, I just remember Mr. Jamison saying that. I guess my neurons were firing that day.”

Eddie’s smile isn’t as bright as it should be, but it’s better than nothing at all. “What question are you on?”

Steve looks down. “Um, six.” Pathetic.

“You’re still on the first page? Am I distracting you?”

“No.”

Eddie bites his lip. “Are you sure?”

Steve meets his eyes for just a second, but looking at Eddie feels like looking at lightning. He looks down again. There’s electricity stuck in his veins. Are these questions even written in English?

“I’m sure,” he says. “I just have a lot on my mind.” And right now all of it is Eddie. Eddie is too quiet, and Eddie should never be quiet, and he wants Eddie to be okay, and he wants to be closer, and he wants to reach across the table and—and the table is too small, too big, and oh my god, finish these fucking questions—

“Okay,” Eddie says. He sounds like he doesn’t believe Steve.

The Happy Days rerun on the tv finishes, and Eddie’s uncle wanders into the kitchen to start frying up some eggs and bacon. The sounds of sizzling and the spatula scraping the pan and the kettle boiling actually help Steve focus better, and he catches up to Eddie on the second page. Eddie’s uncle brings over a small plate with an egg sandwich and two mugs of tea to their table, then he takes his own food to the couch.

Eddie blows gently on the tea and takes a sip. “What?”

Damn it, he’s looking again. “Nothing.” Steve picks up his own tea. “It’s stupid, I just wouldn’t picture you drinking tea.”

“See?” Eddie twists in his seat to look at his uncle. “He agrees with me. Rockstars don’t drink tea.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Shut up and drink it, Ed.”

Eddie’s smile is brighter this time, so much closer to normal. “Uncle Wayne is trying to stop me from guzzling gallons of coffee everyday.”

“Is it working?” Steve asks.

“Not a damn bit,” Wayne grumbles.

After they split the sandwich and finish answering the questions, they mark each other’s with the answer key at the back of the textbook, and yeah, they’re both going to fail. Steve stares at Eddie’s handwriting on his page in messy scratches of red pen. If he can’t concentrate working with Eddie now, how is he supposed to focus sitting beside him during the test? Maybe he’s just tired. It’s been a long day, and he’s exhausted, and it’s nearly dark outside. Or maybe…maybe what?

"Thanks for coming over," Eddie says at the door. His eyes seem deep enough to fall into. "You—it really cheered me up."

Steve nods. "Good." He can feel that itch again, the itch to walk right into Eddie and hold him. It fills every corner and curve of his body. He has to leave before he does something stupid. He reaches for the door handle, but Eddie puts a hand on his shoulder. "Yeah? What?"

Eddie looks nervous, and then he moves and—

He hugs Steve.

Steve is electrified. Everything lights up with bells and whistles and blinding colors like his body is one of those carnival games, and he's just hit the jackpot. Eddie is warm against him and his arms are strong and Steve is frozen. Wait, yeah, he should definitely be hugging Eddie back, and he's going to, he wants to, he starts to, but what if he can’t let go?

Eddie pulls back. He's looking at the floor. "I—is it okay?"

Steve runs a hand through his now dry hair. "Fine, yeah. Whatever you need. It's cool."

Eddie smiles that tiny, pleased smile. "Cool."

"Cool," Steve says again. "See you tomorrow." He digs his nails into his palms and heads out. What is wrong with him? What the hell was that? The gravel crunching under his feet as he walks away sounds like it's laughing at him.

"Steve?" Eddie is poking his head around the door, pointing towards—

Oh, shit. His bike. He forgot about his damn bike.

"Isn't that yours?"

"Yeah, thanks." Steve knows he's blushing. Thank god it's too dark for Eddie to see. He grabs his bike and walks the stupid thing home.

Steve stands under the pulse of scalding water until his fingertips start to wrinkle. The burn doesn’t clear his head the way he hoped it would, the way it normally does. If he’s being honest with himself—and there’s no point in lying, it never works out for him—he can only think of one word to describe how he feels.

Stained.

Stained by the way Eddie looked at him. Stained by the feelings in his body when he was in Eddie’s arms.

He can close his eyes and picture Eddie perfectly—the fall of his messy curls, his pale skin, the darkness of his eyes, the way he looked in the late daylight streaming through the window while they worked, the way he’d bite his lips as he thought about a question and left them flushed and red. Closer, closer, closer. Steve wanted to be closer, and then Eddie read his mind, and now he wants more. If Eddie was here—

What, in the shower with him?

—he’d still want to be closer.

Fuck.

FUCK.

FUCK!

Steve shoves his face under the hot spray and scrubs the hell out of his skin again. His heart is racing.

Maybe at first it was that curious feeling. The nightmares, the missing feeling of something, some place where Eddie was, some way Eddie should be in his life.

But not anymore.

He knows this feeling.

Cherry red lips and long eyelashes, tight jeans and tiny waists, sweet smells and big smiles, always brunette. He always liked brunette girls.

Girls. He likes girls.

He can’t—

He can’t be—

He can’t breathe.

Chapter Text

Steve hates when his dad is right, and this was always something Tom Harrington was afraid of.

Having a fag for a son.

Do you want him to be a sissy boy? No, no piano lessons, none of that shit. He needs to be in baseball after school. Do the other boys his age have music lessons? Of course not. He needs to toughen up. Is that what you want, Donna? A fag in our house?

Did his dad know? Could he somehow sense it years ago? If only his parents could read his mind now. Steve knows exactly what they would say. Disgusting. Dirty. Faggot.

Maybe every girl Steve has ever liked was just a fluke. Maybe this is who he really is, and he was too stupid to know it. Blind to his own feelings. Pretending to be just like everyone else. How does he know what's real? Maybe, along with everything else that's happening to him, he really is just going crazy.

Fuck. He told Nancy he never pretended to love her.

What if he did?

A sharp clap startles Steve out of his thoughts. Across from him behind her desk, Ms. Kelley is half out of her chair with a worried look on her face.

“Sorry,” he says. He squeezes his hands into fists against his jeans. “Lost in thought. What was the question?”

She settles back into her seat. “Forget the question. You’re so far away. What’s going on?”

Steve doesn’t say anything. There’s no way he can tell her about this, she’d probably kick him out of the office.

“Is it about your parents?” she asks.

“I wish,” Steve mumbles. That would be so much easier.

“Steve, whatever you’re going through, you don’t have to do it alone. I’m here to help you in whatever way I can.”

She always uses his first name. All of his other teachers are so formal, Mr. Harrington or just Harrington. He hates it. It makes him think of his dad every time. Ms. Kelley says his name and he trusts her. He trusts that she cares.

But the thought of telling someone makes him feel like he’s going to throw up.

Steve covers his face with his hands and breathes into the darkness. He squeezes his eyes closed, and his lashes are wet. It’s like every damn part of him is trying to hold tight, trying to keep this secret buried in darkness. “I can’t,” he says, and it’s muffled into his skin but she still understands.

“You can,” she insists. “You can tell me anything, Steve. I promise. Would it help if I turn around?”

“I don’t know…maybe.”

Ms. Kelley turns her chair around and sits facing the wall. It really shouldn’t make a difference but the nervous thunder of his heart begins to calm down. He grabs a tissue from the box on her desk and wipes his eyes and nose. The ticking of the clock is the only noise in her office. She waits patiently.

He takes a deep breath and ignores the way his lungs hitch at the end. “I…I think I like a guy.”

Shit. Too much. She said anything but this is just too much. She’s never going to look at him the same way again, she’s going to turn around and look at him and know he’s a queer and tell his parents—

“And you feel like it’s the end of the world, right?”

She’s not kicking him out. She’s still sitting there, and even though he can’t see her face he can hear the kindness and sympathy in her voice. He wants to cry all over again, this time with relief.

“A little bit,” he confesses in a whisper. “I just don’t get it. I mean I-I’ve been with girls, and I was in love with Nancy, I’m sure I was, and I’ve never—” Steve runs a hand through his hair and tugs on a fistful. “I don’t know what’s happening to me!”

“Steve,” she says gently. She turns her head to the side. “Having feelings for another boy doesn’t necessarily make you gay.”

“But…I want to kiss him,” he mumbles. His face goes hot. Thank god she can’t see him. “Doesn’t that make me a queer?” He thought about it enough last night, there's just no denying it. He wants to touch Eddie. He wants to kiss Eddie. He's a fucking fag.

“I’m not trying to tell you that your feelings aren’t real,” she says. “What I mean is that they can be just as real for this boy as they were for the girls you’ve dated. You can like both. It's called bisexuality. It doesn't surprise me that you haven't heard of it in a town like ours."

Steve stares at the side of her face. All of his panic and fear starts melting away, just like that. He couldn’t sleep last night and here she is with a solution that sounds so simple. Maybe it is. “So, if you like boys and girls, you’re…bisexual?”

“Yes, exactly. Bisexual people are attracted to both.”

"Like...all the time? Or does it change?" Is that what's happening? He liked girls, and now he's going to like guys...and maybe someday he'll go back to liking girls? The idea of flipping between the two like a light switch is terrifying. What does that mean for his feelings for Eddie? Will they just go away someday when he stops liking boys?

“Unfortunately, I can’t answer that for you since I don’t know what it’s like,” Ms. Kelley says over her shoulder. “But what I would encourage you to do is let yourself feel what you’re feeling. It’s not wrong, and it’s not something you should be ashamed of.”

Steve looks down at his hands in his lap. “I don’t think anyone else would say that.”

“No one else knows what it’s like to be you, Steve,” she says firmly. She twists in her seat so she can look at him fully. “I know it’s scary, but self-discovery is always a good thing. At least I think so. Maybe this isn’t the end of the world for you, but the beginning of a new one.”

She gives him a warm, comforting smile, and maybe she’s right. Maybe everything will be okay. “I’m glad you told me,” she says. “You have a lot of courage.”

Steve doesn't feel very courageous when he hesitates outside the door of the Hideout. He's already late and he told Eddie after biology that he would be here. After seeing him so down yesterday there's no way he's going to break that promise. In class everything was haywire inside Steve just sitting next to Eddie, but at least they were doing their test so he didn’t have to talk. He's definitely getting an F on that one—he left it half blank.

If he thinks about his feelings like Ms. Kelley told him to, he doesn't hate them. He doesn’t like to imagine what anyone would say if they knew, but if he can keep it to himself, get used to it, get over it, he might be okay. Even if he is...bisexual...no one needs to know.

Steve opens the door. He goes down the sticky-floored hallway, orders a Coke, and sits at the same table as last week. It would all be the same except for how he feels, and he really should've seen it coming with the way he felt watching Eddie on stage.

He can tell the second Eddie sees him. He finishes a solo with his hand flying over his guitar, he glances up, and a radiant smile lights up his face even brighter than the spotlights. Steve's heart tumbles around his chest like it's drunk.

After they finish playing, Eddie orders food at the bar then comes to Steve's table. "You missed one of my favorites," he accuses. "I thought maybe you changed your mind."

"Sorry," Steve says. He fiddles with his drink, turning it around and watching a drop of condensation slide down the glass. "Our game in Allandale ended late and then I had to bike here."

"From Allandale?" Eddie looks so worried, and it's cute. He's cute. This is weird, but the weird newness of thinking about another guy this way doesn't make it any easier.

"No, no, we get dropped off at school," Steve reassures him. “What did you order?”

“Nachos. Enough for you if you want some.”

“I’m starving.” Steve almost cries when Cathy brings the biggest plate of nachos he’s ever seen in his life to their table. They devour it in five minutes, and after she brings their desserts, Steve slides his over to Eddie. “For you.”

Instead of the smile Steve is hoping for, Eddie frowns at the two pieces of pie in front of him and scratches his jaw. “Why…is this because of yesterday? You don’t have to feel bad for me, it just happens sometimes.”

“What, you don’t want it?”

“Not if it’s pity pie,” Eddie says stubbornly.

Steve barely stops himself from rolling his eyes. “It’s not pity pie, you jackass. If you don’t want it…” He reaches across the table and Eddie smacks his hand away with the hint of a grin on his lips. “That’s what I thought.”

If anything the reason is way worse than pity. Steve is selfish. He wants to make Eddie smile, wants to be the only person who can make him smile the way he does. The way his eyes light up, the dimples on his cheeks, the curve of his lips—he’s so addictive.

A flash of guilt squeezes Steve's chest too tight. No matter what Ms. Kelley said, he shouldn't be thinking about Eddie like this. It's so wrong—but it's just a crush. Everyone gets crushes. It'll never go away if he lets himself think like this. But how is he supposed to stop his head from spinning when he sees all the dark ink on Eddie's skin? How does he stop wanting to touch? Steve downs the last of his Coke to distract himself. It's mostly melted ice now.

“Do you want to hang out at my place?” Eddie asks after he gets his shirt and jacket on. “You’d have to bike home after but I thought I might have a smoke. I can play you the songs you missed…”

Steve freezes. Alone, with Eddie, and high? Bad idea, bad idea, bad idea—that’s just asking for trouble, and isn’t it funny? The last time he was high with Eddie he accused him of being queer. Look at him now. Way to go, Steve.

“I-I’m kind of tired, sorry,” Steve says. It sounds like a pathetic excuse, but Eddie doesn’t look too put out. Thank god. He’s weak, and it wouldn’t take much arguing from Eddie to make him change his mind. One pleading look with his big dark eyes and he’d probably have to scrape a puddle of Steve off the floor.

“Nah, it’s cool, you’re right, you had basketball and stuff,” Eddie says. “Come on, I’ll drive you home.”

Through the window in the door to the guidance office, Steve can see Ms. Kelley at her desk eating lunch. He raps his knuckles on the door and pokes his head in. “You wanted to see me?”

She puts her fork down and waves him in. “Yes, come in, shut the door. Don’t worry, this won’t take long.” She rifles through her desk drawer for a moment, then she pulls out a plain folder and hands it to him. “I dug up what I could. I even went into the city to see what I could find. I’m afraid it’s not much, but I hope it might help you.”

Steve opens the folder. She was really being modest when she said it’s not much. There are pamphlets, copies of articles, handwritten notes, cut out clippings of newspapers, and they all have one thing in common. Bisexual. The word is in every title.

Oh. She went through all this trouble just to help him. Steve swallows past the lump in his throat. “Thank you.”

She smiles. “You’re welcome. If you want to talk some more, you know what to do.”

Steve feels the folder burning a hole through his bag as he leaves her office. No one knows it’s there, he reminds himself. No one but him. He starts walking towards his locker to put it away, but then he changes his mind and goes outside. Across the track field, through the trees, and then he comes to the lonely picnic table. He sits on the table and pulls out the folder.

One by one he reads, starting with the short notes that Ms. Kelley copied by hand. One of them is an ad for a bisexual men’s group and the other is a statement of support for bisexuals copied from a magazine. He reads about something called the Kinsey scale, then a few opinion articles, then he gets to a first hand account from a bisexual woman that knocks the air from his lungs. Change a few words and he could’ve written it himself.

Memories flood his mind. Watching certain movies over and over and not thinking about why. Copying how other guys acted in the locker rooms until it finally felt natural. Oh. Maybe it isn’t normal to be scared someone would call him a fag every time he changes for gym class. He didn’t want to hang out alone with any of his guy friends when he was thirteen because it made him feel squirmy and strange, and he didn’t know why. He was too scared to ask Tommy if he knew the feeling. He’s looked at guys and thought he was jealous, he thought he wanted to look like them. No, he just liked to look.

Holy shit. He never knew what the puzzle was supposed to look like, but the pieces were always there. He’s not broken, or stupid, or losing his mind, he’s just—

Bisexual.

“Bisexual,” he whispers to the trees. The wind rustles gently, and a few fire red leaves fly off branches and join the carpet on the forest floor. Out here in the cold with no one around, it feels like time has stopped just for him. Waiting for him to be ready.

Will he ever be ready? The pieces of himself have shifted so much, and now he needs to clean up after the quake. Rebuild his house.

Steve picks up the ad for the men’s group again. Chicago. There’s a whole group of people just like him in the world, and they’re not even that far. Maybe when he buys a new car he can go there. Until then, there’s someone closer he can talk to.

Robin.

He thinks about his dream. Smiling at her in a bathroom stall and finally understanding. If that part of his dream is right then she could understand what he’s going through. He might just have to take that chance.

“Steve?”

His whole body jumps. Fuck, fuck, fuck—he didn’t hear the footsteps coming behind him. He scrambles to put everything back in the folder and shoves it into his bag. He steps down from the table and keeps his head down as he walks past Eddie. “Sorry, didn’t mean to steal your spot. I’ll see you in bio.”

“Whoa, whoa, wait—”

There's a tug on Steve's bag and he jerks to a stop. Eddie walks up beside him, crunching leaves under his boots with every step, and he's already too close for how raw Steve feels right now. Half of him wants to throw himself at Eddie and feel all of those electric things he felt when Eddie hugged him on Monday, and the other half of him wants to go home, curl up in a ball in his blankets, and be alone for as long as possible.

So instead he's frozen, staring at the dead leaves on the ground.

“What’s up? You okay?”

Steve folds his arms across his chest and shrugs. “I’m fine.” What would Eddie think if he knew the truth? Maybe he’d laugh at Steve. Maybe Steve deserves to be laughed at.

“Why are you out here all by yourself?”

If that doesn’t make him sound like the most pathetic person on the planet, Steve doesn’t know what would. “I just needed to think,” he says, as casually and non-pathetically as he can.

It’s not enough to make Eddie give up his interrogation. “What, every day since last week?” he asks.

Since last week? Oh. Shit. Steve hopes he isn’t blushing.

“Yeah, I noticed you haven’t been in the caf at lunch lately,” Eddie says pointedly. He lets go of the backpack and moves in front of Steve, and now he’s blocking the patch of leaves Steve was staring at. “Is this…what you do? You sit alone out here at lunch? Do you eat?” Steve hates how sad he sounds. He shouldn’t be sad for anyone, especially not Steve.

“I eat,” Steve lies. He feels brave enough to look at Eddie for a moment, and he gets one glimpse and no, no, no look away, because his nerves are lighting up again and he wants to kiss Eddie so fucking badly. It’s not fair that he has lips that look like that.

“You don’t have to pretend you’re okay, you know,” Eddie says softly. “Not with me. You saw me on Monday, I’m not okay all the time. And I’m not going to tell anyone.”

“I know.” Steve trusts him completely. Eddie is nothing like his old friends, the ones he had to worry about who he told things to, because Carol’s a blabbermouth, and Tommy will tell Carol, and Tina can’t take anything seriously, and Nick gives terrible advice, and they were all so judgmental…

“So what’s going on?” Eddie gives him a playful poke to the stomach. “Talk to me.”

Steve takes a deep breath and lets it out slow. “It’s just…something scary I have to deal with.”

“Like your scary dreams?” Eddie asks.

“No. A different kind of scary.”

“Can I help you make it less scary? I can be your teddy bear.”

Steve’s stomach twists with guilt. Eddie wouldn’t joke like that if he knew how Steve feels, what he really wants. If he knew the truth, he’d be long gone. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

“I think you need that friendship bracelet after all,” Eddie says. “Did your old friends, like…not give a shit? Ever?”

Steve thinks about Tommy and Carol. They were his best friends for years, and even though he thinks they probably cared in their own way, they were never good at showing it. Most of the time they spent together was just about having fun. They didn’t talk like this.

“Not like you,” Steve says honestly. And that’s exactly why he can’t fuck this up. Eddie is the best friend he’s ever had, the kind of friend he never thought he’d have, and he can’t lose this already. He needs to get over this crush.

The warning bell for the end of lunch rings in the distance. Reality crashes back to Steve—he was out here stressing and somehow Eddie showed up. Maybe he’s the psychic one.

“Were you meeting someone for a deal?” Steve asks.

Eddie gives him a weird look. “No, I just came out to have a smoke.”

Steve glances back at the picnic table and imagines Chrissy Cunningham buying weed from Eddie. It’s just so bizarre. “Oh. I thought you did your deals here.”

“Maybe a few, but this is one of my favorite spots. I don’t like telling people about it.” Eddie tilts his head and looks at Steve with narrowed eyes. “How did you know about this spot? And why do you think I do deals here?”

“I heard someone talking about it,” Steve lies. Technically it’s not a lie, but he can’t exactly say you told me in a dream. “We should get to class.”

Steve starts walking, but again Eddie pulls on his bag to stop him. His suspicion is gone, and now there's a sneaky smile on his face. "Do you want to play hooky? I'll bet you ten whole dollars I can kick your ass at bowling."

“Ten bucks? Someone’s cocky,” Steve says. As tempting as it is, and Eddie sure seems to know how to tempt him, it’s not worth the risk. “I can’t. Mrs. Nelson works at the alley.”

“So?”

“Mrs. Nelson is friends with my mom, and if my mom finds out I’m skipping class…” And with someone like Eddie?

“Aww, is itty bitty baby Steve scared of his mum?” Eddie teases, and Steve doesn’t mind being made fun of if it means he gets to see that smile.

“No, I’m scared of my dad,” he admits. His mom would definitely tell him, and if his dad got any ideas about him and Eddie—even if it was just that they’re friends—he’d be in a whole new dimension of trouble. “So I’m going to biology. You coming, or what?”

“Ew. Fine. You’re a terrible influence.”

Steve laughs, and it’s too loud for the quiet of the forest but he doesn’t care. He shoves Eddie, and Eddie shoves him back, and every step Steve takes back to school feels lighter than the last.

When the bell rings at the end of biology, Eddie tucks something into Steve’s jacket pocket before he goes to his next class. “See you later,” he says.

After Steve gets to the library and claims a table to try and study on his free period, he pulls it out. It’s a bundle of paper, and he unfolds it carefully. There’s a drawing of a teddy bear lying on its side with its head propped on its arm, and a comic book style speech bubble above it.

emergency teddy bear services: 317-587-1164 (ask for eddie, wayne is more of a grizzly).

Steve doesn’t time it, but he probably grins like a lunatic for at least ten minutes. His cheeks hurt, god damn it. Eddie is some kind of magic.

Steve’s heart breaks for all of them, but especially for Max. He never had to worry about impending death when he was her age. He worried about basketball tryouts and kissing girls and book reports. He can’t imagine saying goodbye to his friends and packing up a lifetime of things to say in a letter. He’d never be able to do it—he was never good at writing.

He wishes he had friends like them when he was younger, but he has them now and that’s enough. He’s going to protect them, he’s going to keep them, he has to. And the first step is wrapping his head around this damn story until Nancy comes back with her brilliant plan. He looks down at the paper again.

THE WEEKLY WATCHER

VICTOR CREEL CLAIMS:

ANCIENT DEMON KILLED FAMILY

Chapter Text

Steve flies awake. Holy shit holy shit holy shit—he flicks the lamp on, and rips open the drawer of the nightstand to grab his notebook and pen.

• Weekly watcher, Creel, ancient demon

He stares at the words with a spark of excitement zipping through his veins. Finally, finally, after dozens of nightmares and weeks of terrible sleep, there’s something he can touch. An actual clue. If this article is real—and so many things in his dreams are, why not this?—it could be the key to figuring out what they mean.

And Max.

• Max knew she was going to die, writing letters

How did she know? It had to be something from the Upside Down that killed her, since it had something to do with the gates. Oh god, what if she was killed by that giant spidery monster he dreamed about? Jesus Christ, she must’ve been terrified. But how did they know it was coming? There was no warning when the monster attacked Will and Barbara last year.

Maybe they knew something because of the article? Max was wearing the same blue jacket that he saw before, and in that earlier dream Nancy and Robin went somewhere.

Steve flips to a new page. On the left side he writes, waiting for Nancy and Robin with Dustin, Lucas, and Max in Nancy’s basement, she had a plan. On the right side he writes, Nancy and Robin leave and we’re at the graveyard. It almost…makes sense. They connect. And somewhere in the middle, this article was important.

Steve rubs his tired eyes and massages his temples. This is too much thinking first thing in the morning. He’s done more thinking lately than he ever has before in all of his school years combined. Or at least that’s how it feels. But if he can unravel it all then it’ll be worth it.

Beep beep! Beep beep! Beep beep!

Steve slaps his alarm clock off. For the first time in his life he wants to go to the library, but it’ll have to wait.

He brings the notebook to school. He thinks about Max and Chrissy after he’s smacked out of dodgeball, and he thinks about Nancy and Robin while he’s working through math problems. In English, he takes out the notebook when he’s supposed to be listening to Mrs. Cooper’s lecture.

• Max didn’t die in the graveyard because we knew she was dead when Eddie died
• Chrissy floated in the air but there was no monster in Eddie’s story
• Did Chrissy know she was going to die too?
• Why did we go to the graveyard?
• Where was Mike and Will and Jonathan?

Steve wishes he could reach into the brain of his dream-self and just know what the fuck this all means instead of having to puzzle shit out. There are too many pieces, too many details. He really doesn’t know if he can do this alone.

His train of thought derails when he feels something at the back of his head. Barely there, but it’s enough to make him freeze in his seat. Maybe it’s that thing that was in his mind on that night in the pool. He waits for that strange warmth to trickle down his spine, but it doesn’t come. It happens again, stronger, like a tickle through his hair, and it’s definitely not in his mind. He looks over his shoulder.

Eddie is holding a pen inches from Steve’s face. He drops his hand and his eyes go wide like a kid trying to fake innocence.

Steve raises his eyebrows and whispers, “Can I help you?”

“Boo,” Eddie whispers back. There’s a hint of a smile dancing around the edges of his lips, and Steve lets himself look for just a moment before he turns around again.

He’s not going to think about it too hard. Eddie is his best friend, and his best friend is…playing with his hair. That’s it. He’s probably just bored. Whatever the reason is, at least he’s not acting like Steve is made of glass after yesterday. He’s not tiptoeing around Steve or looking at him with pity. He’s just being Eddie.

When the bell finally sets them free for lunch, Eddie follows Steve through the crowded hallway like a shadow instead of going to the cafeteria to meet his friends.

“Aren’t you going to the caf?” Steve asks as he spins the dial on his locker.

“Are you?” Eddie says. He leans against the wall of lockers with his arms crossed over his Hellfire shirt, and he watches Steve and only Steve, despite all the other people passing by.

Steve opens his locker. Usually at this point he’d wait until the hallway is empty then go outside, and now Eddie knows that. Maybe it was dumb to hope he wouldn’t bring it up. “I don’t need a babysitter,” he says.

“I don’t know what you’ve heard about me but I would never sit on babies,” Eddie says. He puts his hand on his chest like he’s been shot. “And I’m hurt that you would think that about me. I thought we were friends.”

Steve shakes his head even as the smile threatens to take over. “Seriously, I’m fine. I brought lunch. You can go eat with your friends.” He sees a flash of movement in the corner of his eye and then smack! on the side of his head. “Ow,” he says, more out of surprise than actual pain. Eddie hit him.

“Dude, quit being a dumbass.” He gives Steve a look like I’m waiting.

“Yeah, yeah, fine.” Giving up is the easiest choice Steve can make. It’s not like spending time with Eddie is a chore—he’s really only arguing for the sake of his pride. Eddie knows that. Eddie can see right through him.

Steve finishes swapping his textbooks, but Eddie grabs his locker door before he can close it. He peers inside. “Wait, I need a pen. You got one hiding in here?”

Steve’s heart stutters at how close he is, close enough to smell his cologne. It’s deep and woodsy, like a forest after a rainfall, and there’s a hint of cigarette smoke underneath, and he’s got a broken beer bottle at his neck, he can feel the sharp tip touching his skin, smell a barely-there trace of cologne, see scared angry eyes in the dark. The guy is like a wild animal, a wild spooked animal hiding from the shadows while hiding in the shadows himself—

“You smell good.”

Fucking hell. Steve is going to throw himself off the ends of the earth. He did not just say that, what the fuck fuck fuck—

Wait, Ms. Kelley was right. Memories can be triggered, especially by smells. Maybe all of the answers really are locked in his head, and he needs the right triggers to set them free.

He glances at Eddie nervously. There’s a grin on his face as blinding as the sun, and Steve feels a blistering heat on his cheeks.

“You’re…” Eddie starts.

Shit. Now Eddie’s going to accuse him of being gay, maybe just as a joke, and Steve wants to kick himself. He was supposed to be careful. “What?” He hopes Eddie doesn’t hear the panic in his voice.

Eddie shakes his head. His sweet smile doesn’t disappear. “Nothing. Never mind. What was I looking for?”

Steve only remembers when he looks away from Eddie and back into his locker. “Um. A pen. Don’t you have one in your pocket?”

“Oh, that’s not a pen.”

Laughter bursts out of Steve. He laughs and laughs until he’s gasping for air and his legs feel like they’re made of water. He melts down the locker doors with tears leaking from his eyes, and when he looks up Eddie looks so god damn proud of himself. He checks his front pocket and pulls out a pen.

“Huh,” he says, and that one word makes Steve laugh himself breathless all over again. It shouldn’t be this funny but it must be Eddie’s magic again, making him laugh so easily even with all the other shit happening in his life.

“You are psychic,” Eddie says with wide-eyed wonder.

Steve takes a deep breath and wipes his eyes. “I saw you put it there.”

“Yeah, I don’t remember doing that.” He uncaps the pen, and he pauses with the tip over the back of his hand. “What was I…?”

“No idea.”

“You’re helpful,” he mutters.

Steve laughs again.

“Oh, right.” He scribbles something on his skin and shoves the pen back in his pocket. “So, are you getting off the floor anytime soon or are you a worm now?”

“Shut up,” Steve says without any bite. “This is your fault.”

Eddie slides down and lands next to Steve, stretching his long legs out across the tiles. The hallway is empty now, and except for any teachers who might walk by it means they’re practically alone.

“Then this shall be the Harrington Munson luncheon location,” Eddie declares in a ridiculous English accent, throwing his arms out wide in front of Steve.

“You’re such a dork.”

Eddie scoffs. “How dare you? I’m very cool, and I’ve got the tattoos to prove it. Do you?”

“No,” Steve admits.

“Ha.” Eddie pokes him on the cheek. “I win. Dork me? Dork you, dude.”

God, he’s so touch-y. It’s driving Steve nuts. It’s like some invisible dam broke after Eddie hugged him on Monday and now he’s not holding back. Poking Steve, shoving him, playing with his hair. There’s barely an inch of space between them right now. Steve isn’t getting his hopes up—that would be dumb—but he can’t help wishing that Eddie never stops.

Eddie’s face turns sly. “I can pop your cherry if you want.”

Steve chokes on nothing. “You what?”

Now it’s Eddie’s turn to laugh hysterically, and he leans into Steve, laughing right next to his ear. That laugh alone is probably half the reason Steve feels the way he does. “Your tattoo cherry,” he gets out. “You know, give you your first.”

“No way.” Steve can’t imagine ink on his skin like Eddie’s, but he can imagine Eddie close to his body, focussed on Steve’s skin, fingers pressing him gently. That part is easy. And the idea of Eddie leaving a permanent mark on him…he’s going to have to think about that later. “Wait, did you do those yourself?”

“No, god no, that would be a nightmare. But I know how, I could give you something small.” Eddie walks two ringed fingers down the top of Steve’s thigh to his knee, and Steve finally notices what he wrote on the back of his hand. “Come on, let me poke you, I’m—”

“Why did you write down my locker combo?”

“So I don’t forget it.” Eddie doesn’t say obviously, but Steve hears it anyway. Obviously, I need to remember your locker combination. Obviously, it’s very important.

“But why…?”

“Hey, relax,” Eddie says with a straight face. “I’m not going to put any eldritch horrors in there.”

“Oh, thank god, I was terrified,” Steve says flatly. Eddie will never fully appreciate the irony of his promise. One monster was enough for a lifetime, but Steve has a sinking feeling the Upside Down isn’t done with him yet.

He pulls out his lunch and starts to eat, but the idea of Eddie leaving things in his locker like a not-so-secret admirer is stuck in his brain. He’s so screwed. He thinks too much around Eddie. He thinks too little. He’s pretty much turning into a girl—hearts in his eyes and a boy on his mind. The illusion of privacy in the empty hallway only makes it worse. He imagines kissing Eddie the way any other couple would kiss in the hallways.

Stop it.

He needs to get over this crush before it gets even worse. Eddie would be all too easy to love.

The end of lunch comes too soon. When the bell buzzes through the hallway, cutting through their conversation, Eddie gets up and bows. “Thank you for dining with me, Sir Steve. I should like to request a second luncheon, scheduled for Monday, November 19th. Please inform me of your availability at your earliest convenience.”

Steve flings a grape at him, and it hits him right on the demon of his Hellfire shirt. “I accept your invitation, you dork.” He stands up and slings his bag over his shoulder. Students are flooding the hallway, going to class or making last minute trips to their lockers, and he needs to go to the library to get a good table. “I’ll see you in bio.”

“You might,” Eddie says mysteriously. “If you’re lucky. I don’t make those kinds of promises.”

“What, you’d leave me all on my own? I thought we were friends.”

Eddie snickers. “Gotta keep you on your toes.”

Steve tries not to watch him walk away but it’s a lost cause. After his free period and history class, he walks into last period biology and Eddie is there. Just like Steve thought he would be.

Steve steps down off the bus into the darkness of the school parking lot and breathes in the cool evening air. He looks for Eddie’s van but it’s not in the lot, so Hellfire must be over.

Dylan and Kenny and the rest of the guys head towards their cars, talking loudly about meeting at Joe’s Pizza to celebrate their win over Grosmount. Once upon a time Steve would’ve been invited. Once upon a time he would’ve cared if he wasn’t. He checks his watch, tilting his wrist towards the glow of the bus’s headlights. He might make it to the library before it closes.

“Harrington!” Coach Ritter calls. He’s the last one off the bus, and he hops down from the steps and claps Steve on the shoulder. “Great game tonight, son. Great game. I’m proud of you.”

Steve can’t hold back his grin. “Thanks, Coach.” He worried that having so much on his mind would mess up his game, but if anything basketball is the distraction he needs. He lost himself in the game and didn’t worry about anything else, just like Eddie and his music.

“I think we have a chance at making it to the finals, don’t you?” Coach asks as he pulls his gloves out of his pockets.

“Yeah, I think we do.”

They both look over when Dylan’s car peals out of the parking lot, windows down and rowdy voices streaming out into the night.

“Listen,” Coach starts, “I know they’re giving you a rough time, but keep your head up, okay? You’ve really bounced back.” Coach gives him a rare smile. “No pun intended.”

It’s nice to know that all of Steve’s effort is appreciated by someone. He’s been working so hard—in basketball and swim, doing homework, writing college applications, working on the weekends, trying to accept his feelings, trying to figure out his dreams—and balancing it all is exhausting.

“Have a good weekend, Coach,” he says.

“You too, kid.”

Steve pulls his bike from the rack and hops on. The cold wind whips his face as he rides, knocking away his drowsiness from almost falling asleep on the bus. Even with the cold, it’s peaceful. Just him and the clicking of the gears and the thick storm clouds above him, glowing with hellish red lightning. There are flecks of white floating in the air, and he prays to whatever god is listening that he doesn’t inhale that shit. That’s the last thing he needs to worry about right now. He breathes hard as he pedals, and even with the flashlight shining from Eddie’s bike it’s so damn dark until the sky lights up again. Dustin better be right about this.

Steve blinks. The world goes back to normal. He pulls the bike to a stop to catch his breath.

He hallucinated again, and it felt so real. For a fraction of a moment, he was in the Upside Down. Everything weird started after his accident, but maybe that’s just a coincidence. Maybe the accident didn’t cause anything, it was the other way around. He could’ve had a hallucination just like that while he was driving and drove right off the road. Either way, the sooner he can figure this all out, the better.

He keeps riding to the library, and he goes inside right up to the librarian’s desk. “Do you have records of the Weekly Watcher?”

She blinks wearily at him over the tops of her glasses. “I believe so. That’ll be in the basement archives, in the microform catalogue.” She disappears into the office and comes back a minute later with a key. “We’re closing in twenty minutes,” she warns.

“I’ll be fast,” Steve promises. He takes the key, unlocks the door and goes down into the musty basement. He finds the section labelled Microform Archive and he opens the W drawer. There are a few rolls inside and he pulls one out. The Weekly Watcher. He takes it to the reader, and his excitement from this morning buzzes back to life.

Steve scrolls past some headlines that are literally out of this world, and he’s seen a monster from another dimension. Elvis Cloned by Aliens? He almost starts reading the article before he stops himself. Creel, he’s looking for Creel. The headlines scroll by, and scroll by, and there’s nothing, and it starts to feel like a massive waste of time, and then—

Bingo. Holy shit.

VICTOR CREEL CLAIMS: ANCIENT DEMON KILLED FAMILY

The Murder That Shocked a Small Community. Was It a Triple Homicide or Demonic Ritual?

‘Roane county prosecutors successfully argued that Victor Creel, 40, is a cold-blooded murderer responsible for the brutal slayings of his beautiful wife Virginia, 36, and their two innocent children, Alice, 15, and little Henry, 12.

‘But even now from behind bars at Pennhurst Mental Hospital, Victor insists that he is innocent. According to several insiders, Victor believes his house was haunted by an ancient "demon." He maintains that this vengeful demon terrorized his family, reaching a bloody climax on that tragic night in March…’

Steve reads the article, and then reads it again slower. Of course it was too much to hope that this would make everything make sense, but there has to be a clue in here somewhere.

A crazy guy kills his family but claims that a demon haunting his home is the real killer. It’s got to have something to do with the Upside Down, or else why was it so important? So maybe Victor Creel isn’t crazy. Maybe he saw something from the Upside Down in—Steve checks the date again—March 1959? Is that possible? Did the Upside Down exist in the fifties? And if it did, were there psychic dimension-gate-opening kids in the fifties like Eleven?

‘Alice, 15, and little Henry, 12.’ Maybe one of them? No. Yes. Maybe one of them opened a gate and a monster came through?

‘Night after night, a horrible stench would precede the discovery of a dead animal on the property. One evening, the daughter Alice found a rotting possum in her duvet cover, with no idea how it could have gotten there. Another such spine-tingling event occurred when the bathtub began to spout not water but insects. Their healthy lawn turned black overnight.’

No, it doesn’t make sense. Flesh-hungry monsters don’t haunt people. It does sound like a ghost story, if any of it is true. Ghost story…he wrote that in his notebook. When Eddie was talking about Chrissy, it sounded like he was telling a ghost story.

Wait. He might have two puzzle pieces that fit.

Steve scans the article frantically. There was something about—there.

‘The attempted exorcism angered the demon, which then killed Creel’s family, removing their eyes.’

Eyes.

‘Her eyes…it was like something was inside her head, pulling.’

Maybe they died the same way. Creel’s family and Chrissy. Attacked by the same ghost? Are there even ghosts in the Upside Down? People have definitely died there. He laid Eddie’s body on the bed, lifeless, no time for a funeral, no time for a proper grave.

Steve thinks about the dreams again. Waiting for Nancy and Robin with a plan and then they left. The answer has to be in his head somewhere. He squeezes his eyes shut.

Nancy and Robin walk away and then the kids and Max and they’re waiting in a graveyard and then Max and screaming and he’s shaking her shoulders and she’s not waking up and Dustin crash lands on the ground, tapes spilling from his arms, and he pants, “Robin said if she listens—no time to explain! WHAT’S HER FAVOURITE SONG?”

He needs to think like Nancy. Where would she have gone? Nancy, who wants to work for the school paper next year, who always wanted to tell Barbara’s parents the truth, who doesn’t let anything slip passed her. She went somewhere she didn’t think he could help, somewhere they had to dress to impress. If this story was so important, where would she go?

‘Now, our source inside the mental hospital where Creel is serving out his life sentence have gotten the exclusive scoop from Creel himself, including grizzly details never before reported, and Creel's theory as to why his life was so conveniently spared.’

She went to talk to him.

She went to Pennhurst.

Holy shit. That’s the answer, he can feel it.

And that’s exactly what he needs to do.

Steve stares at the phone for twenty minutes before picking it up. He listens to the dial tone, and his hand hovers over the buttons, but he can’t do it. He has the number memorized after calling so many times, but he hasn’t talked to Nancy since they broke up and he doesn’t want to now. He should. He should call, get her help, tell her what’s going on. But he can’t. Nancy probably doesn’t want to talk to him either, and he doesn’t want her to think he’s trying to get back together.

He puts the phone down.

What would he tell her? I have dreams about you and Robin and Eddie and I don’t know what they mean and I want to go to Pennhurst? She might not think he’s crazy, but she’ll think he’s desperate.

Steve rummages through the drawer of his nightstand and finds the note with the teddy bear on it, and he’s dialing the number before he can think twice about it.

Click! “Munsons,” Wayne’s gruff voice drawls.

“Can I talk to Eddie? It’s Steve.”

“Hang on.” There’s a clatter, and a few seconds of silence, and then—

“Hey.” Eddie sounds warm and fond and surprised, and it’s like a cherry on top of the day Steve’s had.

“Hi.”

“Wow, you sound happy. Does that mean you won?”

“Won? Oh, the game, yeah. We won. But that’s not really why.”

Eddie hums. “Are you going to tell me what’s up or am I supposed to guess?”

Steve rolls back onto his bed and stretches out across the comforter. “I can’t really explain it, I’m just…figuring things out. Slowly.”

“That’s so vague, dude. Is this about your scary shit? You can tell me about it, I promise I’m a good listener when I’m not at school trying to learn boring crap. Do you want me to come over? I can come over. Teddy bear services are still on the table.”

Steve grins at the eagerness in Eddie’s voice. It’s not just wishful thinking, he can hear it as clear as day. “What does that mean?”

“Whatever you want it to mean,” Eddie says easily.

“Does it mean I can ask you for a favor?”

“You sure can. What kind of favor?”

“I, uh, I need a ride somewhere. I was thinking tomorrow.” That’s a lot to ask on short notice, so he sweetens the deal. “I’ll give you gas money and buy you dinner after as a thank you.”

“Free dinner? Anywhere?”

“Anywhere you want,” Steve says.

“Sold. Wait, let me check if my uncle needs the van tomorrow.” There’s a few seconds of muffled voices, and then Eddie says, “Okay, we’re good. Where do you need to go?”

Steve fiddles with the phone cord. That was the easy part, but at least he’s not asking Eddie in person. He’s not sure if he’d be able to get the words out. “Um…Pennhurst.”

There’s nothing but radio silence over the line.

“Eddie?”

“Penn—the asylum?” Eddie chokes out. “Is this a one-way trip?”

“Very funny. But no. I’m doing…research.”

“Research,” Eddie echoes. “You want me to take you to an insane asylum on a Saturday night to do research.”

Steve should’ve sucked it up and called Nancy. “Look, I know it sounds crazy, and you think I’m crazy, but I could really use your help. I have reasons.”

“What reasons?”

“I found an article about one of the patients and I want to talk to them,” Steve says carefully. Hopefully that’s enough for Eddie. “Like an interview. You don’t have to come in with me—”

“No way in hell am I letting you go into an asylum by yourself. I’ve seen horror movies. And Scooby Doo.”

Steve snorts. “You know it’s not abandoned, right? There are non-crazy people there, too.”

“You sure about that?”

“Yeah, I already called them to find out their visiting hours.”

“You’re really serious about this.”

“Yeah, I am” Steve says. “Is it still a yes?”

Eddie sighs the longest, most melodramatic sigh Steve’s ever heard, and he can’t help laughing at it. He’s too excited to care if Eddie thinks he’s crazy. He’s going to say yes. That’s all Steve needs.

“Yes, it’s still a yes. You’re so mysterious, you know that? I’m intrigued against my own will. Steve Harrington wants to visit an asylum on a Saturday night. Does this make me Fred because I’ve got the Mystery Machine? Or are you Fred? Never mind, I’m Shaggy. Should I bring snacks?” The pitch of Eddie’s voice changes, and he sounds just like Shaggy when he says, “Like, zoinks, Scoob, this better be a damn good dinner!”

“Can you do Scooby? Please?”

“Oh my god,” Eddie mutters, but he does it anyway. “Ruh roh, we’re out of Scooby snacks, Shaggy!”

Steve laughs and laughs, and he wishes he could see Eddie. He wonders if Eddie looks as proud of himself right now as he did at lunch for making Steve laugh so much.

“So, what’s the plan?” Eddie asks after Steve catches his breath.

“Can you pick me up at Family Video at six?”

“Why Family Video?”

“Because I work there.”

“Oh. I didn’t know you had a job. Oh shit, this is perfect. Can you waive my late fees?”

“Are you trying to get me fired?” Steve asks.

“Just knock a few dollars off and see what happens.”

“No.”

Eddie laughs. “Alright, fine. I’ll pick you up at six tomorrow.”

When he says it like that, it almost sounds like they’re going on a date. Which reminds Steve— “Oh, can you wear something nice?”

“Nice?” Eddie says doubtfully. “How nice are we talking here?”

“Like…job interview nice?”

“Job inter—!? Steve. I live in a trailer. I sell drugs.”

Steve instantly feels like an idiot. If he’d thought about it for two seconds, he would’ve realized Eddie probably doesn’t own a sport coat. “Alright, alright, I get it, I’ll…I’m sure I’ve got something that can fit you.”

“You’re gonna…? Okay. Yeah, sure.” He sounds a little out of breath.

“Okay,” Steve says.

“Yeah,” Eddie says.

Steve doesn’t want to hang up, and by the sound of it neither does Eddie. The silence stretches, and Steve wonders if it’s too late to take him up on his offer to come over, but his mom is home, he has to get up early tomorrow, and just the idea of Eddie in his room makes his head spin. He yawns, and that’s as good a sign as any that he's making the best choice.

“Grandpa,” Eddies teases. “It’s not even ten yet.”

“I’ve had a long day.”

“It’s okay, go take your dentures out and get your jammies on.”

“Shut up,” Steve laughs.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” Eddie says, with the smile so clear in his voice.

“Eddie?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you,” Steve says sincerely. He’s so glad Eddie said yes—he really doesn’t want to do this alone. Eddie can’t know the truth, but he doesn’t need to know to come with him to Pennhurst. Steve isn’t dragging him into anything dangerous there.

Eddie makes a noise, a soft breath of a laugh like he doesn’t know what to say. “…You’re welcome.”

Steve forces himself to say goodnight and hang up the phone. He gets ready for bed, and when he goes to the window to close the blinds, he looks across the darkness of the backyard. He was too scared to try and communicate with the thing in his head, and now even if he wanted to try again he can’t. His dad closed the pool on the weekend for the winter, and the only other pool he could use would be at school under Coach Ritter’s supervision.

Maybe he doesn’t need the pool. Maybe he just has to be relaxed. Open. Patient. He’s safe in his room, he doesn’t need to worry about monsters, and now that he knows something wants to communicate with him, maybe it’ll be easier. It’s worth a shot. He’s getting closer to understanding his dreams, and this thing has to be connected somehow.

Steve turns out the lamp. He lies on the shag rug in the pitch black and closes his eyes. He spreads out his arms and legs as if he was floating in the pool and takes a deep breath. He’s open. He’s calm. He doesn’t feel like an idiot.

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

Again, and again, and again.

He focuses on his pulse, letting the rhythm of his heart take the stage. He doesn’t know how to meditate properly, if there is such a thing, so this is as good as it’s going to get.

Talk to me. Who are you? What are you?

He waits. His head is silent.

Please. Who are you? What do you want?

He doesn’t feel that warmth melting down his spine like hot honey, and he doesn’t feel that blanket of calmness around him like he did before.

He doesn’t feel anything this time.

Chapter Text

Steve has waited all morning for a chance like this. Family Video is finally free of the morning rush of customers, Frank is doing paperwork in his office, the phones aren’t ringing off the hook—this is the best chance he’s going to get, but worms are wriggling in his gut and his throat feels like a desert no matter how much water he drinks. He could fuck this up in so many ways and make Robin hate him for good, but he needs to try.

She’s sitting on her stool slumped over the counter with her head resting on her hand, the perfect picture of boredom.

“Can I…can we talk about something?”

She doesn’t even look at him. “What could you possibly want to talk to me about?”

Steve imagined a dozen different ways to start this conversation, and now he can’t remember any of them. He wipes his sweaty palms on his jeans. “Uh…girls?”

That gets her attention. She straightens up and looks at him like he’s lost his mind. Maybe he has. “Girls?”

A tidal wave of doubt nearly makes him give up. What if he’s wrong? If he’s wrong, and he tells her about his feelings for Eddie, she could tell the whole school. The whole town.

But his dreams haven’t led him wrong yet.

“Exactly how desperate are you for someone to talk to?” she asks. “On a scale of one to ten, are you at an eleven right now? Should I call someone?”

Steve fiddles with a loose thread near the bottom of his hideous green vest. The last button is hanging on for dear life and he’s half tempted to just rip it off. He can do this—he has to do this—and for fuck’s sake he fought a monster. Nothing could ever be as scary as that. “I need to talk to you,” he says. “Just you.”

Robin frowns and folds her arms across her chest. “Why?” she asks. She looks deeply suspicious.

“I get it, okay? You think I’m a douche, you don’t like me, I never noticed you last year. Fine. But if you give me a chance I think we could be friends. I…I think we—”

“It was you, wasn’t it?”

Steve’s train of thought tumbles off the rails. “...what? What was me?”

Robin stands and starts pacing around inside the cash counter. “I’ve been wondering and wondering and Hannah said she didn’t put it there and then you were here but I thought no way. Why the hell would Steve Harrington put that application in my locker? It doesn’t make any sense, you never talked to me once last year—”

Shit. Steve was hoping she wouldn’t figure it out this soon. Maybe he would’ve told her at some point, but only if they did become friends. Only when he had her trust.

She stops pacing and stares at him, reading the answer all over his face. “It was you.”

“Yeah.” Steve stands up and ignores the ache in his chest when she takes a step back. “Robin, I—”

“You’re a freak,” she spits. “Are you stalking me or something?” She groans and tilts her face to the ceiling. “What did I do to deserve this?”

“I’m not stalking you, I just—” missed you, even if I don’t know why “—I need to ask you something.” He takes a deep breath. There’s no way around it, he just has to spit it out. “Do you like girls?”

Her eyes explode and her face turns a violent shade of red. “What the HELL is wrong with you? That’s disgusting, I’m not like that—!”

“Robin, I’m not—”

“Are you trying to start rumors about me or some shit? Do you hate me or something?” She’s breathing hard and her eyes are furious, but somewhere in the rising pitch of her voice she sounds like she might be…scared. “Are you just—?”

“No, Robin, please, I’m not asking to be an asshole, I—”

The door of Frank’s office squeaks open and he pokes his head out. “Is everything alright out here?”

“We’re fine,” Steve says, because Robin isn’t going to say anything. She turns away from Steve and her hands clench into fists at her sides.

Frank hesitates. He looks between Steve and Robin, looks around the empty store, and retreats back into his office. The second his door clicks closed, Steve tries again. He can fix this, he can, he just needs to tell her the truth.

“Robin—”

“Go screw yourself.”

Steve held her hand, back to back, laughed with her, cried with her, stuck, tied up, sick in a bathroom, had a crush on her, accepted her, loved her because she was the world to him.

‘You have a lot of courage.’ Ms. Kelley told him that, and she didn’t even know half of what he’s been through. He fought a monster with a bat full of nails and a single prayer that he’d live to see another day. He can tell Robin the truth, and face whatever might happen if he’s wrong.

“I’m asking you because I want someone to talk to. Because…I like a guy.”

Her whole body tenses like a bolt of lightning shot down her spine, and her head snaps up. She’s frozen, and the longer she doesn’t say anything, the faster Steve’s pulse climbs. He feels sick to his stomach. He needs her to say something, say anything so he knows he didn’t just make a giant mistake.

“Robin?” he whispers.

She turns around slowly, inch by inch. Her face is slack with shock. Everything she thought about him must’ve just crumbled to pieces in her mind. “Y-you…” she says shakily. “You’re…gay?” Her last word comes out in a whisper.

Steve shakes his head. “I do like girls but I…I like guys, too. Apparently. It’s called…being bisexual?” He tries to sound confident but it still comes out sounding like a question. This is the second time he’s told someone, but the first time he’s had a word to explain it. It’s so new. The word feels so strange on his tongue, sounds so strange in his thoughts.

“David Bowie is bisexual,” she says dazedly.

“Really?”

“That’s what I read.” Robin wipes a hand down her face then meets his eyes. “You swear you’re not messing with me?”

“I’m not messing with you,” he promises.

“...holy crap.” She looks down at her hands and twists one of her rings back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Then she nods. “I…yeah. I like girls. But I’m not bisexual.”

Every ounce of fear leaves Steve’s body in a rush. He feels boneless, feather-light, ready to fly off on the high of relief. His dreams were right again. “That’s okay. That’s fantastic.”

A frown creases between her eyes. “But…how did you know?” she asks.

An unstoppable grin pulls at Steve’s face. “You like Chrissy.”

Robin splutters. Her face turns red again, but this time it’s not because she’s angry. “I—she’s—it’s—she’s hot!”

Steve laughs. “Yeah, she is.”

She wanders back to her seat and slumps onto it. “Steve Harrington…wow. So that’s why you did this? But…how did you know before we started working together?”

Weird psychic dreams?

“I-I heard some juniors talking—”

Her eyes go wide and panicked. Steve hates that he has to lie to her, almost as much as he hates himself for lying to Eddie about why they’re going to Pennhurst tonight. It seems like all he does these days is lie.

“—but they were just messing around. Talking shit about, uh, the band and stuff, but I thought I’d take the chance and get to know you.”

It sounds like such bullshit to Steve but she’s too worried about any rumors going around about her to notice. The worst sort of silver lining he wishes he didn’t need.

“I don’t have anyone else to talk to. Besides Ms. Kelley.”

That shocks her out of her worry, and her jaw drops. “You told the guidance counselor you like boys?”

Steve shrugs awkwardly and ignores the heat that rises to his face. “I wasn’t planning on it, it kinda just came out. She was really nice. She gave me stuff to read.”

Robin shudders. “I can’t imagine telling anyone at school.” She looks down at her lap and picks at a fraying hole in her jeans. “I’ve never told anyone before, although I tried to kiss Hannah Fleming when we were like ten so she might remember.” Her mouth twists. “But I can’t imagine her telling anyone. She’s nice, like, actually nice.”

Steve drags his stool next to hers and sits down. “Hey, don’t worry about it. They were just joking and I haven’t heard anything else since then. You’re fine.”

She whips her hand out and grabs Steve’s arm, and her nails dig into his skin. “You can’t tell anyone.”

“I won’t,” he promises.

“I’d retaliate,” she warns.

“Yeah, I’d expect that.”

“I’m serious. I’ll tell people I saw you blowing Big Brent behind the track field.”

“Ugh.” Steve doesn't think anyone would believe that, but the idea of it is enough to make him nauseous. It’s worth it though, because the anxiety on Robin’s face disappears and she laughs and laughs, and it’s the first time she’s ever really smiled at him. He wants to take a picture, put her in a frame and hang onto the moment.

She lets go of his arm and looks at the crescent moons she left on his skin. “Sorry.”

Steve rubs his thumb over the deep red marks. "It's okay. Can I ask…how did you know?"

She looks faintly amused, as if she’s remembering a funny moment from years ago. “In a way, it was kind of because of you."

"What do you mean?"

She looks down at her hands in her lap and picks off the black polish on her nails as she talks. "Last year, in Click's class. That's when I knew. Like, officially. Done deal, I’m the big old L word. I kind of always felt different from the other girls but I didn't understand why, even after I tried to kiss Hannah. But Tammy Thompson wouldn't stop staring at you and I just...didn't get it. You left bagel crumbs from your breakfast all over the floor, and you asked dumb questions, and you were a total douchebag. But that didn't matter to Tammy. It didn't matter to so many girls. I felt like I was the only girl who could keep her head on when you were in the room, and I was obsessed with you trying to figure out why. I tried so hard to see what they saw, and I couldn't. I just couldn't. Then I realized how much I wanted Tammy to look at me.”

“Okay, ouch, but…I’m glad I could help,” Steve jokes, and her lips quirk in a wry smile. “You’re right though, I was a total douche. Maybe if I hadn’t spent so much time trying to be cool and popular I would’ve known this sooner.”

“So you really didn’t know before you started liking this guy?”

“No idea,” he says. “It hit me like a fucking truck.”

Robin throws her head back and laughs, and she catches herself with a hand on his shoulder when she leans back a little too far. Steve holds onto her arm until she’s balanced again.

“When I look back now, a lot of things make sense, you know? Lots of little things I never paid attention to.”

“Yeah,” she agrees. “I know exactly what you mean.”

It’s hard to believe Steve was ever so scared now. Ms. Kelley helped him understand himself, but talking to Robin makes him feel normal. She makes him feel like he’s known he was bisexual for years, even though it’s been less than a week. And maybe they’re not real friends just yet, but with a trust like this between them, he knows they’ll get there. And then he won’t have to rely on the memory of a dream to feel like he knows someone inside and out.

“So…” Robin has a mischievous look on her face. “If Big Brent isn’t your type then who is? Wait, is it that new senior?”

Steve cringes so hard that he thinks his face might get stuck scrunched in disgust. He might actually throw up. “Billy Hargrove? That guy’s a giant asshole.”

“You could still think he’s hot,” she reasons.

“No. No way.” And fine, Billy…isn’t ugly. Steve can admit that to himself now, but he can’t imagine any dimension where he’d ever want to date Billy. He’d rather fight a demogorgon again.

“Come on, you know I like Chrissy. Fair is fair.” She shoves his shoulder hard enough that he nearly falls off his stool. “You said you wanted to talk, dingus. So talk. Who’s the guy?”

“It’s, um…it’s Eddie. Eddie Munson.”

She gasps, her eyebrows shooting up her forehead. “No way.”

“Do you know him?”

“I think the whole school knows who he is. Doesn’t he sell drugs to all the rich seniors?”

“I don’t know,” Steve says. Another lie, but this one isn’t so painful. “I don’t do drugs.”

Robin doesn’t believe him anyway. She snorts. “Sure, party boy. I can’t believe that’s who you have the hots for.”

Steve crosses his arms. “He’s not like what people say, okay? He’s nice, he’s funny.”

“This is his second time doing senior year, right?”

“He’s not stupid,” Steve snaps. Maybe this was a mistake after all. “You don’t know him like I do, alright? None of my old friends really cared about me, but he does. He’s the only one who treated me like a person after I came back from the hospital."

Robin is quiet. Steve rips the stupid loose button off his vest—he doesn’t need it anyway. The room seems louder but it’s just his pulse pounding in his ears. He shouldn’t have snapped at her but he can’t regret defending Eddie. He’ll always have to fight his reputation, and if Steve can make it a little easier, change just one person’s mind, then he will.

The silence is broken when the bell over the door rings, and old man Humphrey enters the store at a snail’s pace, leaning heavily on his cane. Now their customer-free time is gone until after he picks a movie to watch with his granddaughter.

“I’ll be the eyes this time,” Robin says bravely and she slides off her stool. It’s really Steve’s turn to follow the old man around the store and read the descriptions off the back of the tapes for him.

Steve reaches out and takes her wrist. “I’m sorry, Robin.”

“No, no, you’re right. I don’t know Eddie. Maybe—you know, after the Hump leaves—you could tell me more?” She looks sincere. Steve couldn’t say no even if he wanted to, but that doesn’t mean he has to be the only one spilling his guts.

“Only if you tell me about Chrissy,” he bargains.

She rolls her eyes, but there’s a small smile creeping onto her face. “Deal.”

Steve’s heart skips a beat when he finally sees a familiar figure outside the glass of Family Video. Eddie holds the door open for Mrs. Rowland as she leaves with a dramatic sweep of his arm, then he comes in and right up to the counter in front of Steve. There’s a wide smile already on his face, and it’s so contagious it’s infecting Steve already.

“Hey.”

It’s only been a day since they’ve seen each other, but something in Steve feels like they’ve been apart for weeks. “You’re early,” he says.

Eddie looks at his watch. His face turns sheepish, which makes no sense until he says, “I, uh…I was scared I’d be late so I got my uncle to be my timekeeper. He took my watch after I got back from band practice and covered all the clocks. He can be a damn good drill sergeant.”

“How was practice?” Steve asks.

“It was good. I picked a song I really hope you like.” Eddie’s smile shifts to a look of panic. “You’re coming on Tuesday, right? You better be.”

“Yeah, I’ll be there.” There’s no way he’d miss it, especially after all Eddie is doing to help him. Steve watches Eddie’s panic fade and the easy smile comes back, and then the cash register rings behind him, and he remembers why Eddie is here. “Since you’re early, you might as well get changed now. Come on.”

Steve leads Eddie into the back of the store and grabs the clothes from the break room. He was so careful this morning, rolling them up in his backpack for the ride to work and hanging them on the coat rack as soon as he clocked in so they wouldn’t wrinkle. “You can use the staff washroom.”

Eddie takes the clothes and gives him a two finger salute before disappearing into the washroom.

Steve walks back to the checkout. Robin has finished cashing out the dad with his two young kids and she’s waiting for him, sitting on her stool with a shit-eating grin on her face.

“I think I should make popcorn,” she says. “This is better than a movie.”

“Shut up.”

“I can’t believe I get to watch Steve Harrington get all flustered by a boy. I love my life.”

“Shut. Up.” Steve looks around. The only customer in the store is old Mrs. Merrill in the romance section, but she can’t hear anyone unless they’re shouting at her from a foot away.

“But why won’t you tell me where you’re going?” Robin whines. “You told me everything else. You waxed on about how the sun shines out of his ass and how sexy he looks when he fondles his guitar—”

Steve flushes and he glances down the hall to the back rooms. “I did not say that.”

“You meant it. I could tell. And now you’re practically going on a date—”

“It’s not a date!”

“—and you won’t tell me where?” Robin leans against the counter beside him. “Steve,” she says, and he looks at her lined blue eyes. “Steve Harrington. I was under the impression that as two non-heterosexual people in this stupid town we have an understanding, and henceforth we will be sharing gay happenings with each other—”

Steve laughs at that, and she smiles but doesn’t give up.

“—and now you’re holding out on me. What gives?”

Steve shrugs helplessly. “I don’t know what to tell you, it’s not a date.” And he’s not ready to see the look on her face if he tells her he’s taking Eddie to an insane asylum.

“Then why is he playing dress up in your clothes?”

“We have people to impress.”

Her expression turns calculating, but she can’t come up with anything and she starts looking more and more frustrated.

Steve takes pity on her. “I’ll tell you about it tomorrow, alright? I promise.”

Her eyes narrow and she crosses her arms. “Fine.”

Steve bumps his shoulder into hers gently, and it takes every ounce of self-control he can muster not to squeeze her into a hug when she bumps back. After everything they’ve told each other, they’re so much closer to becoming the kind of friends he sees in his dreams, the kind who would do anything for each other.

“You realize he has, like, no ass.”

“What?”

She looks at him seriously. “There’s nothing going on back there.”

Steve did not think he’d end his shift defending Eddie’s ass, but here he is. “He does, he just…doesn’t have very flattering pants.”

No ass, she mouths, shaking her head.

“Why are you looking at it?”

“I was sizing him up for you.”

“Thank you,” Steve says sarcastically.

“You’re welcome.”

“I like him for more than his ass, you know.” Steve loves being able to talk to Robin about this, but it's too easy to believe he has a chance when she believes it too. He needs to bring his soaring hopes back down to reality. “Not that it matters.”

“Oh, come on,” Robin says, rolling her eyes. “Did you not see that absolutely gigantic smile on his face when he came in? That thing was radioactive, Harrington.”

“But you can’t see Chrissy’s?” Steve fires back.

She shuts her mouth so fast he can hear her teeth click together. Yeah, they can both play that game.

“She didn’t come in today,” Steve adds. “I guess we’ll see her tomorrow, huh?”

“See who tomorrow?” Eddie’s voice comes from behind them.

They both turn around, and all the breath in Steve’s lungs seizes. Oh, he’s an idiot. He needs to rethink his entire dumbass plan because now Eddie’s in his clothes and he won’t be able to look away the entire night. He’s doomed. He wants to see Eddie in all of his clothes, in none of his clothes, in his room, in his bed. Damn it. The blazer Steve brought him is a little too loose around the shoulders and Eddie’s still wearing his own belt, but he looks…

“Wow—I, uh, you look great,” Steve manages. “Really good. Yeah.”

“Yeah, you wear Steve’s clothes pretty well,” Robin says. Steve elbows her and doesn’t even try to hide it. “What? Maybe he should keep them.”

“This is Robin,” Steve tells Eddie. “Ignore her.”

“Rude.”

Eddie looks confused, and there’s something vaguely apprehensive on his face as he looks at Robin. He puts his pile of folded clothes and his winter jacket on the counter in front of Steve. “Should I tie my hair back?”

“Let’s see?” Steve says.

Eddie holds his hair behind his neck to show him, but Steve can’t focus on anything else besides the line of his jaw and the pale skin of his throat. Steve was not prepared for this. He was not prepared for Eddie to look this god damn amazing.

“Um…”

“Tie it back,” Robin decides.

“I wasn’t asking you,” Eddie tells her coolly.

Robin blinks, and her stunned face is a mirror of Steve’s surprise. Where the hell did that come from? She looks at Steve, and he can tell in the tilt of her head and her raised eyebrows exactly what she’s thinking—weren’t you just telling me that he’s actually nice?

Eddie lets go of his hair and shoves his hands in his pockets. An awkward silence falls.

And Steve doesn’t get it. He’s seen the way Eddie feels a lot of different things—frustrated, elated, angry, sad, playful, excited—but he’s never once seen Eddie be downright rude for no reason.

“Okayyy…” Steve checks his watch and says to Robin, “If Frank asks, tell him I’m in the bathroom.”

“Boooo, you’re not allowed to leave early.” She mimes something with her hands.

“What are you doing?”

“Throwing my invisible popcorn at you.”

“I’m never taking you to the movies,” Steve says. He hooks Eddie by the arm and tugs him towards the back of the store. “Come on.”

Steve grabs a pot of hair grease and a comb from his bag in the break room, then he shoves Eddie back into the bathroom and shuts the door. “That wasn’t very nice,” he says as he unscrews the lid and warms up a bit of grease between his fingers.

Eddie faces the sink and puts his hands on the edge. He doesn’t look up into the cracked mirror. “Sorry,” he says, in the quietest voice Steve’s ever heard from him, and he really doesn’t have a voice that’s made to be quiet. It’s so bizarre—he seemed fine when he came in.

“Don’t say sorry to me, man, say sorry to her.”

Eddie nods stiffly.

Steve hates how quiet he is, and he hates that he doesn’t know how to fix it. He reaches for Eddie’s hair but Eddie ducks away.

“I hate having stuff in my hair.”

“It’s only a little bit. Please?”

Eddie leans back towards him slowly. “Fine.”

Steve starts massaging the grease through Eddie's soft hair. He works his way from the top to the ends, making sure to be gentle enough so Eddie doesn't regret letting him do this. It's mostly just an excuse to touch his hair; there's only enough grease on Steve's hands to make his hair look slightly less dry, but at least Eddie seems to enjoy it. The tension in his shoulders lessens and after a minute his eyes slip closed.

“Are you alright?” Steve asks.

Eddie’s chest lifts and falls as he takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I’m fine. Sorry, I’m just getting hungry, I guess.”

“Did you bring your Scooby snacks, Shag?”

That brings the ghost of a smile to Eddie’s lips. “No, I forgot.”

“We can grab a couple chocolate bars from the corner store before we go. Turn that way.”

Eddie turns away so Steve can work at the back of his hair. “No, it’s okay,” he says.

“Yeah? You’ll be okay until we get back?”

"Yeah, I'll be fine," Eddie says. Steve believes him—he sounds almost back to normal now, that strange quiet in his voice nearly gone. “So, who are we going to see at Pennhurst?”

“Victor Creel.” Steve picks up the comb and starts working it through Eddie’s hair, careful not to tug too hard.

“Victor Creel? That name sounds familiar.” Eddie rests his hand on the sink and taps a finger against the porcelain. His hand looks so empty without his jewelry; the only thing he’s still wearing is a small gold ring on his pinky finger.

“Really? He’s been locked up since before we were born.”

“What did he do?”

“Uh, he killed his wife and kids and took out their eyes—”

“Jesus,” Eddie mutters. “Father of the year.”

“—supposedly,” Steve finishes. He reaches over Eddie’s shoulder with his hand out. “Hair tie?”

Eddie pulls one off his wrist and presses it into Steve’s palm. “He’s locked up, isn’t he? What’s ‘supposedly’ for?”

“That’s why I want to talk to him. He said his house was haunted by an evil demon.” Steve puts the comb down and ties Eddie’s hair into a ponytail. “Look at me.”

Eddie turns back around and meets Steve’s eyes, and for a breathless moment Steve forgets what he’s doing, what they’re talking about, what they’re getting ready for.

“You believe in that kind of stuff?” Eddie asks, spurring Steve’s brain back into action. “Ghosts and demons and shit?”

Steve combs through Eddie’s bangs and fixes a few stray hairs around the sides of his face. “Yeah, I do.”

Eddie lets out a little breath of a laugh and shakes his head.

“What?”

“Nothing, it’s just…everyday you get more interesting.”

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that. It doesn’t help that they’re only a foot apart in this tiny washroom with the door closed, and Eddie is still looking at him. He puts the comb in his back pocket and closes the lid on the hair grease to have a reason to look away.

“Do you…do you believe that kind of stuff?”

“Not really. I like the idea of it, you know? It makes good stories. Like, magic and creatures and spells and witchcraft and whatever, but I don’t really believe it.”

If only he knew what Steve has seen. “Not even ghosts?” Steve asks.

Eddie shrugs and looks into the cracked mirror. “Ghosts? Maybe. But not demons. I know people say I worship the devil and I was born in a cult, but I wasn’t, and I don’t.”

“Maybe Victor Creel can make a believer out of you.”

“I think you can make me a believer,” Eddie says.

The volume on Steve’s heartbeat turns up to one hundred, and he can feel the pulse of his blood through every inch of his body, all the way to his fingertips. Eddie probably didn’t mean for that to sound so…so intense, and Steve knows he’s being stupid, but all he can do is watch as Eddie inspects his hair, totally unaware of the reaction he caused.

Steve swallows. He needs water, he needs air, he needs to get out of this bathroom before he does something totally dumb. “Okay? You look good.”

“Yeah. They don’t call you The Hair for nothing,” Eddie teases.

“No one calls me that anymore.” Steve nudges Eddie towards the door. “Go, I need to change.”

After Eddie heads back to the front of the store, Steve grabs the clothes he brought for himself from the coat rack and changes in the bathroom. He fixes his own hair and eyes his reflection in the mirror. It’s sinking in now—this is happening. He’s going to Pennhurst. And maybe his whole plan is a shot in the dark but no matter what happens it won’t be a waste of time, because he’ll be with Eddie.

They spend most of the drive in an easy kind of quiet. The radio is on but it’s not loud, and Eddie hums along as he drives. The overhead light in the van is busted, so Steve uses a flashlight to check the county map he has open on his lap. When he’s not looking at the map he’s looking at Eddie instead. He likes the way Eddie looks when his face glows in the headlights of the occasional car passing the other way. He likes the way Eddie taps the wheel to the beat of the music, and the way he lights up and bounces his head when a song he likes comes on. Steve wants to memorize everything about him.

“What’s our next turn?” Eddie asks, not taking his eyes off the dark road ahead.

“Right at 26.”

A shiver passes through Steve when he finally sees it. The asylum looms ahead at the end of a long driveway, nearly black against the deep autumn night with its windows lit up like watchful eyes. Spotlights across the grounds shine onto the building and trees, and even in the darkness it looks prestigious. If Steve didn’t know what it was, he might’ve thought it was some sort of private school. He definitely made the right choice with their clothes.

“Why’d you stop?” he asks.

“Wasn’t me, the car’s frightened,” Eddie jokes, but he sounds a bit too serious. He squeezes the wheel tight. “Are you sure about this? The place looks so…”

“Unwelcoming?” Steve suggests.

“Yeah, exactly.”

Maybe in the daytime it wouldn’t be so bad, but in the night it looks like somewhere they have no right to be, somewhere they shouldn’t even want to be. It’s in the shadows, in the shapes of the wicked tree branches and the darkness of the road and the eerie spots of light floating in a sea of night.

“We’ll be fine,” Steve says, to convince Eddie as much as himself. “The worst they can do is say no and kick us out.”

“Right.” Eddie presses the gas and rolls the van up the driveway and into the parking lot. He turns the key, pulls it out, takes a deep breath and opens his door. Steve grabs his notebook and pen and follows his lead.

They cross the pavement to where there’s a sign staked in the ground with a light shining onto it. Main Entrance. Steve pulls the door open. His hands are sweaty and the notebook in his other hand is crumpling in his grip. He walks into a reception area that’s lit by a few lamps. There are three chairs on the left side, and a woman sitting behind a desk to the right. She looks at them.

“Are you boys lost? There’s a payphone down the hall if you need to call someone.”

Time to shine.

Steve steels his nerves and walks up to her desk. He puts on his friendliest smile. “No, ma’am, we’re not lost. We work for the school newspaper at Hawkins High, and I know it’s late and this is a lot to ask, but we were hoping to talk to Victor Creel for a history piece—”

The woman laughs once, a sharp sound that echoes in the otherwise empty hall. “You want to talk to one of our maximum security patients? Do you have a notice of approval from the board?”

Shit. Is that what Nancy and Robin did? Steve feels a gentle kick to his ankle and Eddie gives him a pointed look.

“You requested it, didn’t you?”

“Uh, yes. I did,” Steve lies. “I haven’t gotten a reply but I’m not ready to give up.”

The receptionist doesn’t look sympathetic at all. “Then you will simply have to wait. Have a good evening.” She looks back down at her paperwork. Dismissed.

But Steve did not come all the way out here—and drag Eddie all the way out here—just to be turned away in the first five minutes. He knew this wasn’t going to be simple, but he can do this. He can charm his way into things and out of things just like his parents. He’s going to get her vote. He’s going to make her a deal she can’t refuse.

“Ma’am.” Steve looks at her name tag. “Margaret. If you think I’m going to sit around and wait for a bunch of people to take two high school students seriously, you can think again.”

She puts her pen down and glares at him. “Young man, there are strict procedures that must be followed—”

“And I’d love to follow them. Really, I would. But if I waited around and didn’t take a chance, I won’t make it where I want to go.” Steve plants his hands on the edge of her desk and looks her straight in the eyes. “Harvard, Margaret, just like my dad. They have the best journalism program in the country and to get there I need your help. What other student can say that they’ve interviewed a man like Creel?”

Margaret takes off her glasses and pinches the bridge of her nose. “I’m sorry, I can’t help you.”

Think like Mom. Think like Dad. Think like Nancy. What would they say? What would they try if they knew they had next to no chance?

Before he can come up with an answer, Eddie reaches forward and picks up a small, framed photo on Margaret’s desk.

“Is this your son, Margaret?” he asks.

“I—yes, it is.”

“What does he want to be when he grows up?” Eddie says in a conspiratorial tone, “Do you have a future president at home?”

Her voice softens just a little as she looks at the photo. “An astronaut. He wants to go to the moon.”

Eddie puts the picture in her hand. “And would you come home after a long day at work and look that little boy in the eyes and say, ‘Sorry, son, you’re never going to be an astronaut because only very lucky people get to achieve anything and the rest of us have to sit down, shut up, and slave away at a desk for someone else for the rest of our sorry lives, so kiss that dream goodbye sweetie and aim for something a little more down to Earth. How about a cashier? Doesn’t that sound exciting? Or a car salesman, buddy, doesn’t that sound like fun?’ What do you think your son would say to that? My guess starts with ‘n’ and ends with ‘o’.”

Margaret looks almost as stunned as Steve feels. Okay, alright, maybe Eddie is two steps ahead of him. Maybe he’s onto something.

Steve picks up where Eddie left off before she can get a word out. “We have nothing going for us, Marge. We live in the middle of nowhere and we don’t have rich parents. We need scholarships and you know what would make us stand out among a sea of applications from every other damn high school in the country? An interview with Victor Creel.”

“Do you know any other high schoolers who would be here on a Saturday night?” Eddie adds, and he gives Steve a look. “We could’ve been at the bowling alley, having fun.”

Another time, I promise, Steve thinks, hoping that somehow Eddie can read his mind. “But we’re here, Margaret, and we’re not leaving.”

Margaret sighs. “Your academic goals are admirable but it’s just not my decision to make. I’m sorry.” She sounds like she means it this time.

“I understand, Margaret. You’re just doing your job.” Steve says. He steps back from her desk and lets his shoulders hang low like it’s the end of the world for him. He rubs a hand over his face, and beside him Eddie is following his lead in looking as miserable as possible. He crosses his arms and shuffles his feet.

“All that work, man,” Eddie says quietly, but still loud enough for Margaret to hear. He’s a better actor than Steve could’ve imagined. “All those hours in the library.”

“Yeah, I know.” Steve gives it a few more seconds, then turns back to Margaret. One last try. “Are you sure there’s no one who can help us?”

His hope rises with every beat of his heart as he watches her face. She opens her mouth, closes it, looks down, and her eyes flick to the picture of her son. She checks her watch, her mouth twists as she thinks, and then—

She’s standing up.

She’s standing up.

“Wait here.” She walks down the hall and turns a corner. The second she disappears, Steve grabs Eddie’s shoulders and shakes him back and forth.

“Are you kidding me? That was great!”

Eddie pushes Steve’s hands away. “Whoa, stop. Don’t get too excited, she could be getting security.”

“No way, she totally bought it. How did you come up with that?”

Eddie shrugs, like it wasn’t a big deal. “I was in the drama club, I can improv a little.”

“Oh.” Steve doesn’t know why he’s surprised. Eddie is good at all that kind of creative stuff, all the kinds of things that Steve sucks at. “Not anymore?”

“They wouldn’t let me stay after my grades sank too much.”

“That’s such crap. I bet you were the best one there.”

The way Eddie smiles is like a light bulb warming up, the barest hint of a glow that gets brighter and brighter until it’s too blinding to look at. His cheeks are pink and he reaches a hand up behind his ear like he’s going to fiddle with his hair before he remembers that it’s tied back.

“I thought you were nervous,” Steve says.

“I was. I am. But I want to help you.”

Steve might have to kiss him. Right here, right now, because he can’t hold back anymore. How he could ever resist is the biggest mystery he’ll never solve, because the need is burning through his body like a wildfire and he can’t think of anything he’s ever wanted more.

“What?” Eddie whispers.

He reaches for Eddie’s hand—

Click, click, click, click.

—and pulls back. Steve looks over his shoulder. Margaret is coming back down the hallway, her heels echoing with each step.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Steve says instead.

Eddie doesn’t look away until Margaret is right behind them. She goes behind her desk and pulls something out of a drawer. “Your names?”

“Steve.”

“Eddie.”

She writes their names and hands over two visitor name tag stickers. “Follow me.”

Steve reads the signs on each door they pass to bring his focus back to the reason they’re here. He can’t afford to be distracted when the plan is actually working. Laundry, Sanitation, Medical Supply, Records Unit A. He doesn’t see anyone else until they turn and there’s a nurse rolling a man in a wheelchair down the hall. They stop between an unoccupied desk and a door that says Warden. Margaret knocks twice, then pushes the door open and gestures them inside.

There’s no turning back now.

Steve gives her an honest smile. “Thanks, Margaret. We owe you big time.” He enters the office with Eddie right behind him.

There’s a man sitting behind a grand wooden desk that’s just like the one Steve’s mom has in her home office. He looks exactly how Steve would picture a college professor to look—balding, bow tie, tweed suit, and a face that looks like he hasn’t smiled in years. The name plaque on the desk reads Anthony Hatch, Managing Director. He’s the man at the top, the one person who could grant Steve his wish.

“Have a seat, boys.”

They sit in the scuffed wooden chairs in front of Hatch’s desk. Compared to everything else in the office, the guest chairs are the only things not in pristine condition.

“Margaret was quite swayed by your plea,” Hatch says. “You want to talk to Victor Creel?”

“Yes, sir,” Steve says, and Eddie echoes his words.

Hatch leans forward and folds his hands together on top of his desk. He looks between them with shrewd eyes. “Why?”

Steve clears his throat. “We’re writing a history piece for our school newspaper and we want to go to college for journalism. The chance to interview Victor Creel would really help us stand out, and—”

“I imagine it would,” Hatch cuts in. “But there is a protocol for visiting a patient like Victor. You have to put in a formal request with the board.”

“We did,” Steve says quickly. “They probably threw it right in the trash. No one is going to take two high school students seriously. Except, we hope you do.”

And we’re already here, Steve realizes. They’re already in the office. Hatch could’ve easily turned them away with a single no when Margaret asked him, but instead he said yes. He invited them in. He’s curious, and if he’s curious then maybe he’s willing to bend the rules.

Hatch leans back in his chair with a thoughtful look on his face. “You are quite determined.”

“Yes, sir,” Steve says. His confidence is growing, but he’s seen his dad charm enough potential business partners to know he can’t get too cocky yet. “We’ve been doing our research and this is one of Hawkins’ most interesting stories.”

Maybe not as interesting as an alternate dimension, but still interesting.

“Does he still think he’s innocent?” Eddie asks.

“Oh, yes,” Hatch says. “If you catch him in the right mood he’ll tell anyone who might be gullible enough to believe him. Although he’s not very fond of reporters.” He gives them a thin, condescending smile. “Then again, you’re not real reporters, are you.”

“We could be,” Eddie says with an edge in his voice. He shoots Steve a quick look but it’s too fast for Steve to read. It doesn’t matter. He’s not worried, and he wants to know what Eddie is going to say. “Let’s face it, Mr. Hatch—”

“It’s doctor,” Hatch corrects with narrowed eyes.

“Anthony,” Eddie says. “No one cares what we write in the school paper. No one cares if we can write about which team won the game, or what the cafeteria is serving next week, or who did an epic guitar solo at the school concert. A ten year old could write about that crap. You’re an educated man, you tell me—would Harvard care? Probably not, right? That’s nothing to be proud of. But an interview with Victor Creel? Now that is something we can be proud of.”

The room goes quiet. Steve doesn’t move, he barely breathes. He can tell Hatch is thinking and there’s no way Steve could add anything better to Eddie’s argument. It was perfect—he’s incredible—and now they have to wait. It’s crazy to think there’s a whole town of people who believe he’s an idiot because he can’t pass a few classes. They don’t know him. They don’t know anything he’s capable of. But Steve does.

What feels like a lifetime later, Hatch finally says, “Indeed.” He tidies his desk and puts a few pens in a tray before checking his watch. “Perhaps Victor would be willing to indulge a couple of curious students. He hasn’t had visitors in quite some time.”

Holy fuck. Holy fuck. Is this really happening? Steve looks at Eddie, and Eddie looks back with wide eyes.

“Ten minutes won’t hurt,” Hatch continues. “And I’ll be with you the entire time if you boys get scared.”

“Ten minutes,” Steve breathes. “That would be great.” He doesn’t even care how patronizing Hatch sounds, as if they’re just children. Somehow his wild, barely thought out plan is working.

No, not somehow, it’s not some mysterious god granting his wishes. It’s Eddie. If Eddie wasn’t here, this might not be happening at all.

Hatch stands up and tucks his chair into his desk. “Let’s go see if he’s in a chatty mood, gentlemen. Follow me.”

With every step he takes towards the madman, Steve’s anxiety grows. What if he’s not ready? What if he doesn’t ask the right questions? What if Victor really is just a crazy old man? Nancy should be the one doing this. Nancy did do this, somewhere in his mind, and now he has to follow her footsteps. He has to be ready. There’s no other choice.

As they walk behind Hatch, Steve catches Eddie’s eye. Eddie is biting his lip, and he’s still wide-eyed like he can’t believe this is happening either. Steve squeezes Eddie’s wrist through the sleeve of his own blazer. He hopes it tells Eddie everything he can’t say right now—thank you, you’re the best, don’t be scared. Eddie’s mouth twitches but he doesn’t smile.

Hatch leads them down a wooden staircase into a dimly lit alcove, and at the bottom in front of a single door there’s a security guard.

“I’m bringing a couple of students in to meet Victor,” Hatch tells him. “Please inform them of the rules.”

The guard’s steely gaze flickers to Steve and then to Eddie. He unhooks a ring of keys from his belt and turns around to unlock the door. Secure Psychiatric Unit: Restricted Access. “Do not touch him. Do not give him anything. Stand five feet away from the bars at all times. Understand?”

“Yes,” they both say.

Steve follows Hatch and the guard inside with Eddie behind him. It looks like a prison, with a steel gate and a row of cells beyond, and it’s colder. Darker. There are no windows, just little pockets of light from sconces hanging on the walls of the hallway. If the patients down here weren’t already mad, they’d probably go mad just being locked up like this.

The guard unlocks the gate and slides it open with a loud clang! It’s almost louder than the thunder of Steve’s pulse. Hatch leads them in calmly—he must be used to it, used to being surrounded by the insane, but Steve feels jumpy as they walk past each cell. He’s almost too scared to look into them, but his curiosity is stronger. One patient ignores them as he mutters to himself but the next man watches them from where he’s crouched in the corner of his cell like some sort of animal. A wooden chair sits across from each cell, and all of them are covered in a thick layer of dust. They get no company but themselves.

“The five foot rule is mostly for your comfort,” Hatch tells them over his shoulder. “A few of our patients have urinated on visitors in the past.” He comes to a stop in front of the very last cell. “However Victor is relatively civil. Aren’t you, Victor?”

In the glow of a single bulb hanging over the cell, a man with a tangled mane of gray hair sits at a desk facing the back wall. Victor Creel. The man who shocked Hawkins all those years ago. The man who could have answers that Steve needs, even if he doesn’t know it.

“You have a couple of visitors, Victor,” Hatch says. “Curious kids. I believe they want to hear about your demon.”

Steve swallows his nerves down. “Yes, we do. I’m Steve and this is Eddie, and we’re from Hawkins. We read about what happened to your family in The Weekly Watcher but I have some questions.”

The man doesn’t speak. He doesn’t move. He’s more of a statue than a man, a carving of a broken soul. The only sign of life is a faint scratching noise coming from inside the cell.

Steve hopes to hell he can get Creel in a chatty mood. If he can’t get the man to talk then all of their effort is wasted, and there’s no way Hatch will give them a second chance. This is his one shot.

Steve flips open his notebook and takes one last glance at all of his questions for Creel. He has so many, but he can’t ask the most important one—was the demon that killed your family possibly a monster or ghost from another dimension? He’ll have to weave together the answers of other questions to figure it out. He flips to a blank page and pulls out his pen.

“Victor, could you tell me about your kids? Alice and Henry? I want to know what they were like.” And if one of them possibly could’ve been special. Special like Eleven.

The scratching noise stops, and a long silence follows Steve’s question. Then, out from the depths of the cell…

“My children?”

The voice of Victor Creel sounds like it’s been dragged over burning coals and left somewhere to die years ago. “My sweet children…the world thinks I despised them…”

Steve’s heart jumps in his throat. Creel’s talking, but he can’t let the man stop. Focus. What would Nancy say? “But you tried to save them from a monster. I bet no other parents could say that.” Although Steve can think of one single mother who fits the bill.

To Steve’s surprise, Creel laughs hoarsely at that. It’s not a contagious kind of laughter, but the laugh of a man who has nothing left to live for. “If there were any, they’d be right over there. Down here with me.” His voice turns sad. “Everything I did was for my children. And after all of it, I tried to join them.”

Creel turns in his chair, and Steve sucks in a sharp breath when he sees the man’s face. He has no eyes. There are only mounds of scarred flesh where his eyes should be.

“My apologies, boys, I should’ve warned you,” Hatch says. He doesn’t sound sorry at all. Part of Steve thinks he must like it—using tortured people to shock visitors. All at once, Steve feels overwhelmingly sad for all of the people forced to call Pennhurst home.

“If you find yourself too frightened—”

“We’re not scared,” Eddie tells Hatch. He taps Steve’s arm. “I can take notes for you, if you want,” he says quietly. He really deserves a five course meal for all of this, and more. As much as Steve can give him.

“Thanks.” Steve hands him the open notebook and his pen, then he looks at the cell again.

Victor Creel is standing now, closer to the bars with his arms wrapped around himself. If it wasn’t for his missing eyes and his plain white hospital clothes, he could be any old man that Steve might pass on the street. Those are the things that make him look mad. “How old are you, boy?” he asks.

“Seventeen,” Steve answers.

“Not even a man yet. Nowhere near a father. I wouldn’t expect a boy like you to understand.”

“I want to have kids. Someday.”

“Whatever you do, don’t bring them to Hawkins.”

Something about the ominous words, or the darkness in Creel’s voice, sends a shiver down Steve’s spine. He already knows what kinds of horrors Hawkins can hide, but to hear it from someone else, from someone who’s life was blown apart by its madness, makes it all feel real again.

Creel twists his hands together, and when he speaks again his voice is quieter. So quiet Steve has to break the five foot rule and move closer to hear him.

“That’s what my Virginia and I did, and we paid dearly for that mistake. With our lives, and theirs.”

“So you moved here for your kids?”

“Yes. Mostly for Henry.” Victor’s voice takes on a faraway tone and his face tilts up, as if he’s watching a memory play inside his mind. “Alice was as happy as a clam anywhere she went, but Henry…well, he was a sensitive child. Quiet, and shy. We thought a change would be good for him, and after Virginia’s great-uncle passed we had the means to make it so. But even in our magnificent new home, I could see he felt something was wrong…”

A sensitive child. Maybe there’s something to Steve’s theory after all, but he needs to know more. “How did it start?”

“Do you know what a dead rabbit smells like, boy? Or a dead chicken? A dead dog? That’s how it started. With the rotting stench of animal flesh. We had one month of peace in that house and then it began on a Sunday morning. Virginia was making breakfast—her favorite peach porridge—and when she opened the window that ungodly smell came in.”

Victor’s face twists in distaste, as if he can still smell it under his nose now. “After we found the third one, we told the police. The chief blamed it on a wild cat. But this…this was no wild cat. It was an evil neither animal nor human. It was a spawn of Satan. A demon. And it was even closer than I realized.”

“What made you think it was a demon?” Steve asks.

“It wasn’t just outside the house, boy. It was inside the house. Alice found a dead possum in her bed. Virginia found a dead cat in the laundry room.”

“Did you see the demon?” Steve presses. “Or anything else…weird?”

Victor faces Steve—if he had eyes, they would be staring at Steve right now. “Why are you so interested, boy?”

“I—because…I believe you,” Steve trips over his words, careful of Eddie and Hatch behind him. “I believe demons can exist.”

“Then believe me when I say this: I didn’t need to see it, I could feel it.” Victor sits heavily on the end of his cot. “We never saw the demon, no. But we began to have encounters that it conjured up. Nightmares. Waking, living nightmares. It took pleasure in tormenting us. Even poor, innocent Alice. It wasn’t long before I began to have encounters of my own.”

“Did Henry have these encounters too?”

“Henry…” Victor says brokenly. “My brave boy. I could tell he was frightened but he never told us about his. He spent a lot of time in his room, trying to hide from the demon. He could feel it, just as I could. Hiding, nesting, somewhere in the shadows of our home. It had cursed our town. It had cursed our home. It had cursed us.”

Sounds like the Upside Down. Steve wonders what Victor Creel would make of the story of a boy who was stolen into another dimension by a monster, and a girl who opened its gate with her mind. If he was alone and had more time, maybe he could find out.

“What happened during the exorcism?” he asks instead.

Victor puts his head in his hands and scratches his fingers through his matted gray hair. Steve feels guilty for making the man remember, but then again, he’s locked up in here with nothing to do but remember. He probably relives the nightmare all the time. Every day, every night, never-ending.

“I called the local priest to come and help us. He blessed our home, each and every room from the cellar to the attic. He asked the Lord to free us from this curse. Virginia didn’t think it would work but she was as desperate as I was to rid our home of the evil.”

Victor looks up, and Steve can’t tear his eyes away from the ropes of angry scars over the mangled flesh of his eyes. “I finally felt at peace again…for a few hours. That very same evening I knew what a fool I’d been. We didn’t drive it from our home. We only made it furious.”

BOOM!

Steve jumps at the sound. For a split second he thinks Creel’s demon is down here with them, but then he hears footsteps rushing down the stairs. A frantic nurse hurries through the main door.

“Doctor Hatch! Doctor Hatch!”

Hatch closes his eyes briefly like he’s summoning his patience. “I’m with visitors, Wendy, please—”

“It’s Ramona,” the nurse says desperately. “She’s attacked Alex again!”

“Oh, Ramona,” Hatch mutters angrily under his breath. “Will you boys be alright here by yourself for a few minutes? I’ll be back shortly. Officer Davidson can help you if you need anything.”

“We’ll be fine,” Steve says. He feels light-headed at his luck. Hatch is leaving, and he could talk to Creel alone if he just asks Eddie to walk far enough away so he can’t hear. He looks at Eddie behind him, long enough for Eddie to notice and frown at him.

What? he mouths.

Steve can’t do it. The guard watching them from the end of the hall might get suspicious, but it’s more than that. He can’t ask Eddie to go away when he’s the reason Steve made it in here.

He turns back to Creel. “Please tell me what happened that night. I’m sorry to ask, but I need to know everything. Every detail. Anything you remember, especially about Henry.” He worries that Creel might get suspicious again, but he doesn’t. He talks. Maybe because he’s been alone with his nightmare for too long, or maybe because someone is willing to believe him.

“We were eating dinner. My wife was wearing the set of pearls I’d given her for our very first anniversary. They were her favorite. Sweet little flowers on her ears.” Creel sounds almost happy as he reminisces about his wife, but it doesn’t last long. “The radio turned on by itself. It was the demon, it had done this trick before. The television, the lights, the radio. On, and off, and on, and off. I got up to turn it off, and that’s when it took her. My sweet Virginia, right in front of the children.”

Victor whimpers and turns his head to the side as if shying away from the memory playing in his mind. “Her bones…they broke—” he snaps his fingers, and the sound echoes like the crack of a whip through his cell “—just like that. Holes,” he says, tapping the flesh where his eyes once were, and dragging the tips of his fingers down his cheek. “And blood.”

And her bones...her bones started to snap. Her eyes...it was like something was inside her head, pulling.

“I tried to get the children out, to save them, but…I was back to France. Back in the war. It was a memory.” Victor wraps his arms tight around himself as if to warm himself against a sudden chill. “I thought German soldiers were inside. I ordered its shelling…but I was so very wrong. The demon was taunting me, and I was sure it would take me, just as it took my Virginia.”

Victor stands up again. He stretches a hand out in front of him as if to touch some invisible thing only he can sense. “But then…I heard another voice. At first I believed it was an angel. I followed her…only to find myself in a nightmare far worse. While I was gone, the demon took my children.”

“What did you see?” Steve asks in a whisper. He realizes he drifted closer as Victor was telling his story, and now he’s less than a foot away from the bars.

Victor’s face contorts with grief. His is the kind of grief that will never truly heal as long as he has no answers for what happened. “Alice,” he says, gesturing towards the ground in front of him, “suffered the same fate as my Virginia. Henry—I almost had hope for my boy. His body wasn’t broken but he was bleeding.” Victor lifts his hand and touches two fingers to his mustache. “His brain…they told me his brain was broken beyond repair. He slipped into a coma, and a week later he died.”

Creel slams his fists into his scarred eye sockets. “I wanted to join them,” he moans miserably. “Hatch wouldn’t let me.”

It’s a true nightmare, and it sounds like the ghost story of what happened to Chrissy. But there’s only one way to be sure.

“Victor?” Steve inches closer, and touches the bars of his cage. “When Virginia—when the demon took her…did she float in the air?”

Victor surges towards Steve and grabs the bars in front of Steve’s face. “How did you know that?” he demands, spittle flying from his lips. “I never told anyone that. How did you know?”

Steve flinches back and fights the urge to take off running down the hall. He’s safe, he’s on the other side of Victor’s cage—and thank god for that. What if the bars weren’t holding him back? What would he do for answers after so many years without any?

“I—I…”

Victor slams a hand against the bars. “Why are you here, boy? Hatch is gone—tell me the truth!”

“You boys alright down there?” The guard calls from down the hall.

“We’re fine!” Steve says, but it doesn’t matter. The guard is already heading towards them. They’re out of time.

“Tell me what you know!” Victor cries out desperately, pressing his face between the bars. “Tell me!”

“I don’t know anything!”

“LIAR!” Victor roars.

“What the fuck, Steve?” Eddie whispers behind him. He looks shocked, the notebook hanging forgotten in his hand.

“Do you work for the Devil? Are you trying to summon him? To finish me off? TELL ME!” Victor reaches out between the bars and finds Steve’s arm. “Please,” he begs, “it can be our little secret, I won’t tell Hatch why you’re here, just tell me what you know!”

“HEY!” The guard shouts. He’s halfway to them, and he starts running. “GET BACK, VICTOR!”

But the madman doesn’t let go. He yanks Steve closer to the bars with a surprising strength. “All evil must have a home, boy,” he growls darkly. “Careful it doesn’t come into your own.”

Steve pulls his arm free and stumbles as far away from the madman as he can get, stumbling right back into Eddie. Eddie grabs him before they fall to the ground, and his fingers dig into Steve’s arm.

“Steve, what the hell—?”

BANG! The guard whacks his baton against the bars of Victor’s cell, and the madman draws away, hiding his face and curling onto his cot like a sorry animal. Then the guard’s glare pierces through Steve.

“I think it’s time for you boys to leave.”

Chapter Text

“I extended a courtesy to you both out of good will and you betrayed it by upsetting my patient—one of the most dangerous patients in this hospital. You should be ashamed of yourselves. You will never return to my facility again unless you want to be arrested for trespassing. Now get out!”

Steve doesn’t give a shit about Hatch’s threat. He doesn’t care about the door slamming in his face or that he’s not allowed to come back. He doesn’t want to anyway. None of that matters. All he can think about is the boy sitting silently beside him.

He never should’ve brought Eddie.

His plan was complete and utter crap but he never imagined any consequences. He never thought it could end so badly except if he had to come home empty-handed when it failed. But it didn't fail. He got what he wanted and now he might lose his best friend for it.

Steve feels like cement was poured down his throat, locking every inch of his body into a statue. His grip on the seatbelt is as tight as if it’s a lifeline, but they’re not moving. They haven’t left the parking lot. The van isn’t even on.

“Why aren’t you talking?” Eddie says slowly. There’s a simmering anger in his voice and leather creaks as his hands tighten around the steering wheel. “You should be telling me what the actual fuck that was all about.”

“I…I can’t,” Steve says quietly, desperately, still not ready to look at Eddie. He can’t think of a lie that Eddie might believe, but maybe that’s because he’d rather be banished to the Upside Down than lie to Eddie anymore.

“Oh. Right. So you’re just leaving me in the dark for fun?”

“Eddie—”

“No. Nope. No way. I helped you swindle your way in there and now you want me to just forget about it? Like knowing things you shouldn’t know about a psycho murderer makes total sense? They just kicked us out, Steve! We got kicked out of an insane asylum!”

Steve bites back a wave of dread. This is so much worse than when they fought on Halloween, and it was his fault then, too. They weren’t even friends but now he knows exactly what he’s going to lose.

At last he looks at Eddie. Even in the near darkness he can see the stone cold set of Eddie’s face. “I want to tell you the truth but you’ll think I’m crazy.”

“Steve, this is crazy!” Eddie jabs his hand towards the building beyond the windshield. It’s darker now that visiting hours are over, and its shadow looms over them like a curse they can’t escape. “We’re already at fucking crazy town—!”

“And I don’t want you to leave me here!”

He didn’t mean to say that, but as soon as the words slip out Steve realizes how true they are. The gnawing fear lives in the back of his mind, a deep and poisoning what if? What if he tells the truth and Eddie marches him right back inside? And says keep him, he belongs here with the rest of the crazies. Just the idea of it makes his eyes water but he doesn’t cry. He squeezes his eyes shut.

Eddie sighs. When he speaks again the anger in his voice is easing up. “I’m not going to leave you here. Do you really think I’d do that?” His hand touches Steve’s arm and he squeezes gently through the sleeve of Steve’s coat. Steve opens his eyes and sees the gold ring on his pinky finger glowing pale in the faint moonlight streaming into the van. “What I’m saying is I’m already here. I knew where we were going and I still said yes. Crazy doesn’t bother me, okay? I mean, have you met me? I love weird shit. But I did all of this for you and you can’t even tell me why? I thought we were friends now.”

Steve puts his hand over Eddie’s and holds his fingers tight. His skin is freezing but the touch still sparks a flame in Steve’s chest. “We are friends. You’re my best friend. I don’t want to lose you because you think I’m insane.”

“You won’t,” Eddie insists. “Whatever it is, I won’t run away screaming. I promise. I’m not that old bat Mrs. Granby or your mom or your dad or whoever, okay? I’m open-minded. Lay it on me.”

Steve wants to tell him everything. He imagines it for a moment. Telling Eddie about the Upside Down, and the monster with the flower face, and the girl with super powers who defeated it, and everything that really happened last year when the rest of Hawkins thought a boy got lost in the woods. This isn’t a game, Nancy. You know we can’t do that. If they found out that we told anyone they could put us in jail, they could destroy our lives, our families…they can do anything they want. Just think about what you’re saying.

He can’t tell Eddie. It’s too dangerous for both of them.

But maybe, if he’s careful…he can still tell Eddie about his dreams. He already told Eddie about his dream of Max in the graveyard, and Eddie didn’t freak out. He called Steve a divination wizard. Maybe he is open-minded. Maybe he could believe Steve about that much.

Steve twists in his seat to face Eddie. He lowers their hands between them but he doesn’t let go. “Do you remember that I said I’ve been having weird dreams?”

“Yeah…?” Eddie says hesitantly. “The girl in the graveyard and the eldritch pussy?”

“Yeah. Those ones.” Steve wishes he could skip this part and jump forward in time to after the words are out and he knows how Eddie will react, but he can’t. He forces the words out anyway. “I had a dream that I was reading an article about Victor Creel. I saw the headline, and I saw that it was from The Weekly Watcher, and I found it at the library yesterday. It’s a real article. I never saw it before, I’ve never even heard of Victor Creel before that dream. And I had a dream about a girl who floated in the air, and her bones snapped and her eyes were sucked back into her head. Just like Victor told us. It’s like they’re…connected. They mean something.”

The van is heavy with silence. Their little world—in the middle of nowhere surrounded by nothing but darkness and an insane asylum—is made of a quiet so thick Steve might choke on it. He waits for the guillotine to sever his neck but the one good sign is that Eddie hasn’t let go of his hand. That’s enough for Steve to hold onto his hope when it wants to wither and die at the long look Eddie is giving him.

“You’re serious about this?” he finally asks. “You’re actually having psychic dreams or something?”

Steve rubs his thumb over the ring on Eddie’s pinky but it does nothing to calm the racing of his heart. It’s too much to look at him, like the black of Eddie’s eyes might swallow him in shadow if he looks for too long. “You said I could make you a believer.”

Eddie lets out a sharp, quick breath. In some other world maybe it could’ve been a laugh, but here Steve doesn’t know. “Are you fucking with me?”

“No, Eddie, I swear I’m not. I know how this sounds, okay? Trust me, I know I sound insane, but this is the truth.” Only half of it, whispers a traitorous voice in Steve’s mind.

“Well…between you and Creel’s demon…I think I was right.”

That concrete feeling vanishes inside Steve. It’s a good thing he’s already sitting down otherwise he’d be falling to his knees right now. “You believe me?”

“I want to, okay? I…I’m trying to.”

“That’s enough, oh my god Eddie, that’s enough.” Steve dives closer and wraps his arms around Eddie. The hug is awkward over the middle console between their seats but it feels just as head-spinning heart-racing as the first time Eddie hugged him.

“Thank you,” he whispers into Eddie’s shoulder. He doesn’t deserve Eddie at all but he has a greedy heart. He’ll take whatever Eddie is giving, and keep him close as long as possible.

“I get best friend privileges, okay?” Eddie says, a lightness returning to his voice. “If you ever have dreams about mysteriously important numbers, let me know. I’ll buy a lottery ticket.”

Steve forces himself to lean back and he misses Eddie’s arms around him the second they’re gone. “Deal. Thanks for helping me get in there. I never would’ve got in without you.”

“Nah, you would’ve,” Eddie says. Steve can see the hint of a smile on his face in the low light, but more than that he can hear it in Eddie’s voice. “You make a great Fred, you know that? Keep it up with this kind of research and everyone’s going to think you’re a meddling teenager soon.”

“That means I should be driving the Mystery Machine.”

“Oh, hell no.” Eddie turns the key in the ignition and the engine jumps to life. “Let’s get the fuck out of here. You owe me dinner and I’m dying for some good pizza.” He puts the van into gear but he doesn’t step on the gas. He’s looking at Steve, waiting. “Okay?”

Steve isn’t sure if Eddie’s asking if he’s okay, or if he’s good with pizza for dinner, or both. The weight of the question makes him think it’s not about pizza, but either way the answer is the same. It’s going to be okay, they’re going to be okay. “Yeah. Okay.”

Eddie drives out of the parking lot and starts them down the long dark road back to Hawkins. Steve watches the asylum disappear in the side view mirror, its haunting presence fading into the night sky as they drive away. Good riddance.

Joe’s Pizza is the place to be on Saturday nights. The restaurant is alive with people and noise and the mouth-watering aroma of garlic and cheese and tomatoes. Families crowd around tables with babies wailing in high chairs, kids play at the arcade games in the corner, and a few juniors Steve recognizes from school linger around the jukebox. They’re lucky enough to grab a booth left by a family who was heading out as they walked in, and Steve places their order at the counter then slides into the bench across from Eddie.

“Can I ask you something? About your dreams?” Eddie already has his coat off, and he shrugs out of Steve’s blazer and pulls the tie out of his hair. He was quiet for most of the drive. Steve could tell he was thinking because he didn’t even sing along to the radio.

“Yeah, shoot.” Hopefully Steve can give him an honest answer.

“What do you think they mean? Like, if you had to guess.”

Steve pretends to think as he unbuttons his cuffs and rolls his sleeves up. He knows they have something to do with the Upside Down but he can’t tell Eddie that. “Maybe that something bad is going to happen? That’s what I thought after I woke up in the hospital, that something bad happened.”

“The crash?” Eddie wonders.

“No, not the crash. Something bigger. I don’t know.”

Eddie takes one of the coloring sheets and the box of crayons meant for kids from the stand at the end of the table and starts filling the image with colour. It’s a slice of pizza, and he’s using electric blue for the spots of pepperoni. “Have you told anyone else about your dreams?”

“It was hard enough telling you,” Steve points out. He takes the brown crayon and fills in the pizza crust. The back of his hand brushes against Eddie’s more than once as they colour in the picture. “I told Ms. Kelley that I’ve been feeling off and having weird dreams, but I never told her what they were about.”

“Off? Off how? Like your deja vu thing?”

“No, not that.” Steve pauses with his crayon. He glances around to make sure that no one is listening, but everyone else in the restaurant is too busy enjoying themselves to care about eavesdropping on him. He doesn’t bother warning Eddie that it's going to sound crazy—it seems like nothing can scare him away. “I feel like I’m me…but I’m also not me. You know when you’re trying on clothes that you used to wear and you still think you can fit into them, but then you get one leg or one arm in and oh shit, it’s too small? I feel like that…but with my whole body.”

Eddie leans closer over the table, and his eyes are glued to Steve. “That’s so weird. And all of this started after your accident, right? What did Ms. Kelley say?”

“She told me to go back to the doctor, and I did. They didn’t find anything. You know what’s really weird? I didn’t have a scratch on me after the accident, I just couldn’t wake up.”

“And now you’re having dreams about murders from the fifties.”

Steve shrugs helplessly. Even though he knows more than Eddie thinks he does, this part of it all is still a complete mystery. What happened when he crashed? Why did he end up in a coma without a single bruise on his body? He might never know for the rest of his life.

Eddie taps the back of Steve’s hand with the tip of his crayon. “I have a theory,” he says.

“Really?”

“Yeah. If the demon is real—and I’m still on the fence—but if it is, maybe when you were in a coma it possessed you and now you’re a sleeper agent, and he’s going to make you do all of his evil bidding someday. You’ll be like…Evil Shadow Steve.”

“Jesus, I hope not,” Steve mutters.

A smirk lights up Eddie’s face. He’s obviously joking but if this is what Steve gets—if this is Eddie wanting and trying to believe—then he’ll take it. “We should put you in a bath of holy water and see what happens.”

“So, like…a baptism?”

Realization dawns on Eddie’s face and his mouth falls open. “Oh. I forgot that was a thing they actually do. Fuck yeah, let’s get you baptized. You might need it.”

Steve snorts and starts coloring the picture again. “What do we do? Just go to the church and ask for one?”

Eddie taps on the table. “Hello? Yes, hi. I’d like to order an extra large baptism please? Can I get extra holy water? Yeah, the holier the better, thanks. Can I take it to go? No?”

Steve cracks up with laughter at Eddie’s little skit, and even with his watery eyes he can still see Eddie’s triumphant smile. He writes on the back of the coloring sheet, rips the note away, folds it into a tiny square and flicks it across the table to Steve.

“Put that in your pocket,” he instructs Steve.

“What, I can’t look at it?”

“Yeah, later. After you get home.”

Steve ignores his burning curiosity and does as Eddie asks. “Okay.”

The server arrives at their booth with a full tray and starts unloading everything onto the table—a pitcher of Coke, a basket of garlic bread, a bowl of salad, plates, cups, cutlery. “The pizza will be out in a few minutes,” she says before disappearing back to the kitchen.

Eddie stares across the table. “What’s all this?”

“Food.” Steve sinks his teeth into a piece of garlic bread. “Mmm, so good.” He never realized how hungry he was until they got here.

“Yeah, no shit, but I thought we were just getting pizza.”

“Uh, no, we’re getting dinner. Just because you picked pizza doesn’t mean you don’t get the whole package.” Steve points at the food on the table. “Dinner includes drinks, appetizer, and side with the pizza. And save room for dessert, too.”

That gets Eddie’s attention. “Dessert?”

“Yeah, you haven’t tried the dessert pizza?”

His face lights up like a kid on their birthday. “Dessert pizza? That must be new.” His excitement vanishes and he looks at Steve with narrowed eyes. “I know what this is.”

Panic shoots through Steve. “What?” He offered Eddie dinner, he’s just sticking to his word. It’s just dinner.

“You’re trying to stuff me like a turkey and eat me for Thanksgiving.”

Steve laughs a little too loud with relief and slides the bread basket over to Eddie’s side. “So what if I am, Munson? You gonna say no?”

Eddie takes a piece.

The server brings their pizza right as they’re finishing up the last of the garlic bread. Eddie chose Hawaiian, because of course he wants a pizza with something sweet on it. Somehow that’s the most Eddie option on the menu. When Steve takes the first bite of his meat lover’s pizza, he knows Eddie had the right idea with his choice of dinner. Sitting in a booth with him and eating something as simple as a delicious piece of pizza makes Steve feel normal again. Like he’s coming back to reality after what happened at the asylum. The dreams and the crazy old man and the demon and Hatch are all so far away, fading further from his mind with every bite he takes.

After Steve finishes his second slice, Eddie stretches across the table and shoves a piece of Hawaiian in his face. “Try it.”

Steve leans away like it’s poisonous. “Fruit doesn’t belong on pizza, dude.”

“Tell your tomatoes to fuck off then. That’s a fruit.”

“Tomatoes aren’t sweet.”

Eddie shoves it closer until it touches Steve’s mouth. “Ah, you had your mouth on it, it’s yours.”

“Fine.” Steve takes it from his hand and eats a tentative bite. “It’s…not bad.”

Eddie gives him a knowing look. “You like it. Admit it.”

“Yeah, whatever, I like it.”

“Did you see that coming, psychic boy?”

“Well, well, well,” says an all too familiar voice, and every ounce of happiness in Steve’s body flees at the sound. He looks over his shoulder and sees Tommy coming up to their table with Carol under his arm. He didn't see them come in, so they must've been here already, sitting in the back corner. She’s chewing on a piece of gum, and Tommy is wearing that same ugly smirk that he always has on his face.

“Look who it is,” Tommy says. “First he gets dumped in front of the whole senior year and now he’s hanging out with the scum of Hawkins. How the mighty have fallen.”

Eddie’s face hardens and he flips Tommy off.

“The scum of Hawkins?” Steve echoes, and a hot wave of anger rushes through him. He doesn’t give a shit what Tommy thinks about him anymore but there’s no fucking way he’ll let him insult Eddie and ruin their night. “What the hell is wrong with you? You sure you’re not thinking about yourself again, asshole?”

“Aw, you know you used to have it so much better, babe,” Carol says with a fake pout. She reaches out and pets Steve’s hair.

He slaps her hand away. “Seriously, just piss off.”

But Tommy doesn’t move. There’s something calculating behind his eyes as he looks between Steve and Eddie, and his smirk grows wider. “Hang on, hang on…is this a fucking date? Holy shit.”

Steve goes cold all the way to his toes as Carol cackles. He rolls his eyes to hide the panic bubbling in his gut, but he doesn’t look at them or at Eddie. They know him too well. They know exactly what he looks like when he likes someone, and even though Tommy is probably just joking to rile him up, if they look too closely they might see the truth.

“Fuck off, we’re not on a date,” Eddie snarls. “I’m not surprised you don’t understand friendship, I don’t see anyone lining up to hang out with you.”

Tommy ignores the jab. “So if you’re not on a date then why are you all dressed up?”

Shit. Steve’s rib cage shrinks in his chest, and it’s getting harder to breathe. He forgot about the clothes they’re wearing, and the last thing he’s going to do is tell Tommy they were at an asylum. Fuck, what if Tommy recognizes the clothes Eddie is wearing?

Tommy looks victorious like he just caught them red-handed. He looks right at Steve. “Do you dress up for dinner with all your little freak friends?”

“Jesus Christ, man, we’re not—”

“We were at Notre Dame, asshole,” Eddie snaps. “Getting a tour.” If looks could kill then Tommy should be a smoldering pile of ash from the heat of his glare.

Steve breathes again. He could kiss Eddie for his quick thinking alone. He’s saved their asses more than once tonight.

Carol scoffs and folds her arms across her chest. “You? College?”

Tommy snickers. “You think we’re going to believe that? The repeat senior is finally putting on his big boy pants and going to college, is he? You’re going to have to sell the trailer for that. Or, wait—is your boyfriend paying? Are you two gonna run away and be queer little freaks—?”

“Go to hell, Tommy.” Steve wishes he’d beaten the shit out of Tommy last year when he had the perfect chance, but he can make this a new opportunity. If Tommy won’t leave on his own then maybe Steve will drag him outside and prove that he could’ve won that fight.

Eddie’s knuckles turn white as his fist tightens around his knife. “You don’t know shit about me,” he says dangerously.

Tommy plants his hand on the edge of their table and leans over Eddie. “I know that you’re a fag,” he sneers. He spits on Eddie’s plate and his half-eaten slice of pizza, then he looks at Steve. “You better watch out, Harrington. I hear it’s contagious.”

Steve is out of the booth and grabbing Tommy by the collar before he even thinks about moving. “You’re really fucking desperate, huh? I get it. You miss me and you wish I was lonely and miserable without you guys, but I’m not. My life is better without you, and you look like an attention whore right now so you should just go.”

And it’s true. The jukebox has stopped and the three juniors are staring at them and whispering to each other, and everyone sitting at the tables near theirs is watching them. From the kitchen a man calls out, “Knock it off, boys.”

Steve shoves Tommy away. “Yeah, Tommy. Knock it the fuck off.”

Tommy glowers at him, his lip twisted with anger. Carol steps between them.

“Let’s go,” she tells Tommy, and she doesn’t look at Steve. For a moment he thinks Tommy might try to punch him instead, right here in the middle of the restaurant, but he doesn’t. He takes Carol’s hand and they leave.

Dancing in the Dark starts playing from the jukebox, and all of the tension in Steve’s muscles dissolves instantly at the familiar beat. He takes a deep breath. “What a dick,” he mutters.

Eddie doesn’t respond. He’s staring down at his ruined plate with that same stony look on his face. Steve puts a hand on his shoulder, and he flinches.

“You okay? We can leave.”

Eddie shakes his head.

“Sure?”

“I’m fine.”

“I’m sorry about him. Here, I’ll get you a new plate.”

Steve takes it to the kitchen and comes back with a clean plate. At least the rest of Eddie’s pizza was safe from Tommy in its box at the other end of the table. They start eating again, but there’s an uncomfortable quiet at their table now. Even with Bruce Springsteen playing, and even though they’re surrounded by people enjoying themselves, the good mood from before Tommy and Carol showed up is gone. Trying to get it back seems like a Herculean task but Steve is nothing if not willing to try.

He puts his pizza down and wipes a napkin over his mouth. “Hey. Tommy is a gigantic asshole. I’m pretty sure it’s written in his DNA or whatever. Don’t listen to anything he says.”

“I know, I’m not,” Eddie says, but if he’s expecting Steve to believe that then he’s not as good of a liar as he thinks he is. Nothing has changed but he seems smaller somehow, like his shoulders are drawn in a bit too tight, and a deep ache grows in Steve’s chest. He must be used to hearing all the same old insults and rumors by now, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hurt him anymore.

“Does it bug you?” Steve asks quietly. “What he said, that it looks like we’re…on a date?” Maybe it’s a dangerous question, maybe it comes too close to giving all of his feelings away, but he doesn’t take it back.

“Not really,” Eddie says without looking at him. He fiddles with his napkin, balling it up and stretching it back out. “I know he was just trying to piss us off. Why? Does it…bother you?”

In his gut Steve knows that it does, but only because he wishes it was true. “No, of course not. You’re right, he was just trying to piss us off. But we probably should’ve changed before we sat down.”

Eddie looks down at his borrowed shirt. “Yeah.” He leans back against the worn leather seat and eats another bite of his pizza. “It’s hard to believe you were friends with them.”

Steve thinks the same thing every time he sees them. He used to miss them sometimes, rarely, when he remembered the fun they had, but now that he can see them from a distance he knows he’s better on the other side. They haven’t changed a bit and he’s changed so much. They’ll never fit together the way they used to.

“I was just like them,” he says, but it’s a pointless confession. Eddie already knows that.

“But what happened?” Eddie asks. “Or did you just wake up one day and see the light?”

“No. Nancy happened.”

“They didn’t like her?”

“Oh, they hated her guts, but…it wasn’t that. She was the first person I ever fell in love with and it made me think about a lot of things differently.”

When Steve fell for her it was like a waterfall.

He was floating downstream, living his life like the rest of the cool guys. Another girl, another notch on his belt. At first he thought Nancy would be the same. She was cute and smart, and he thought they’d go on a date or two, sleep together, and that would be it.

He never saw the drop coming. He didn’t think it was even possible. Falling in love in high school? That was for movies and girls’ fantasies. When it happened his whole world changed.

“I thought about who I was, and what people really thought about me, and I guess I wanted to be…worthy of her. Tommy and Carol just liked the jerk I was before all of that.”

Eddie tilts his head and gives him a skeptical look. “Are we talking about the same Nancy Wheeler who got drunk and told everyone she wished she was dating Jonathan Byers instead of you?”

Steve winces. “Yeah, not her finest moment.” It’s been long enough now that Steve can almost see the humor in it, how the way their relationship ended made no sense and yet made perfect sense. Just as weird as the rest of their lives.

“I don’t get it. What was so special about her?”

Steve wonders how to put it into words. Even besides the fact that she hunts monsters in her free time, she’s not like any other girl he dated. “You have to understand something. The people I was friends with, the popular crowd…it’s like there’s some contest to be the person who cares the least. You know—fuck school, fuck my parents, fuck that, fuck you. I was winning for a long time but it wasn’t really me, and I’d look at Tommy and Carol and I felt like I couldn’t talk to them about anything important. I don’t know, maybe they honestly didn’t care, but I wasn’t happy. Not really.”

“And then Nancy came along?”

“She was like fresh air. She cared so much, about her grades, about her family, about other people.” Steve remembers watching her walk up to Jonathan at school to offer her sympathy after Will went missing, something Steve wasn’t willing to do. Something he knew that if he did, Tommy and Carol would’ve mocked him endlessly for it. “She wasn’t afraid to care. I think that’s what made me fall in love.”

Eddie looks down and starts fiddling with his napkin again. “Would you get back together with her? If she wanted to?”

“No way,” Steve says instantly. “You were right, what you said on Halloween. Sometimes you have to let things end. It’s like a forest fire, you know? After it all burns down you can start over.” And learn new things about yourself.

He never would’ve known that he could like guys if he stayed with Nancy, but he doesn’t think he would’ve known without her either. If he stayed the same asshole that he was he never would’ve figured it out. She was like a spark in his life, burning off the influence of everyone else and showing him he could just be himself. Whoever that was. Whoever that will be.

“What about you?” Steve asks. Maybe this is the worst place to ask, maybe it’s the best place, but he asks anyway. “Have you ever been in love?”

“Yeah, right now,” Eddie says. He kisses the slice of Hawaiian in his hand. “I’m head over heels for this pizza.”

Steve kicks his foot gently under the table. “Seriously. It’s your turn to spill your guts.”

Eddie finishes off his slice and takes a swig of his Coke. Steve thinks he’s going to change the subject but then he finally says, “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I’ve liked a lot of girls but I’ve only dated, like…three.” Bitterness creeps into his voice. “And nothing lasted because they didn’t want to be seen with one of the freaks. So I guess I kind of gave up on that.”

“You don’t deserve that,” Steve says quietly. “You know that, right?”

Eddie shrugs. His face is carefully blank as he watches a family passing by their booth on the way to the door.

“You deserve someone who wants to treat you like the hottest shit in town.” And Steve just described himself. He hopes Eddie doesn’t notice.

Eddie scoffs. “You think I’m going to find that in Hawkins?”

“You never know. Here, let me check my magic crystal ball.” Steve curves his hands together as if he’s holding an invisible ball between them, and he bangs them down on the table. “Oops, it’s heavy. Oh, mystic crystals, show me Eddie’s future…”

That sweet, slow smile starts lighting up Eddie’s face again. Unstoppable, undeniable, and it sends Steve’s pulse into overdrive. He looks back down to his pretend crystal ball.

“...uh huh, uh huh, okay, I’m seeing good things…oh, I think you’re going to get some action…okay, a lot of action—whoa!” Steve tosses his hands like he’s chucking the ball out the window after seeing something x-rated, and across the table Eddie is in tears with laughter. That’s better. So much better. He’s the most beautiful when his cheeks are pink and his grin is bright and his eyes are shining with happiness.

Eddie reaches across the table with greedy hands and grabs a piece of Steve’s pizza before Steve can stop him. Not that he would—he’d do anything to keep that joy on Eddie’s face—but he’s not going to let Eddie get away with it that easy.

“Hey, I bought you an entire pizza and now you’re stealing mine?”

“I gave you a piece.”

“You practically shoved that down my throat.”

“But sharing is caring, Steve.”

“Yeah, it is, and I’m sharing by buying you dinner…”

Steve doesn’t want to say goodnight. He wants to invite Eddie inside and keep him for a little bit longer but the light above his front porch is shining like a beacon in the darkness, so someone is home. Probably his mom. He looks down at his bike. It’s the only thing between him and Eddie as they stand at the end of the driveway under the moonlight and the pale gold of a nearby streetlight.

“Thank you for everything,” Steve says. For the ride, for helping him see Victor Creel, for listening to the unbelievable, but especially for all of the laughter.

“Thanks for dinner.” Eddie fidgets with the bike, leaning it back and forth between them with one hand on the seat and the other on the handlebar. “Can we do this again? Not the asylum crap obviously, and let’s avoid your old friends next time…”

“So just dinner?” Steve asks, and he bites his tongue before he can add like a date? His heart is tripping over its beat, going back and forth like the bike. He could kiss Eddie right now. He almost did at the asylum, and that sudden burst of confidence took him by surprise. He doesn’t feel it now.

“It doesn’t have to be dinner,” Eddie says. “It can be whatever.”

“We should go bowling. You know, since you think you can beat me.”

“I know I can, Harrington,” Eddie says with a teasing smile.

“Keep dreaming, Munson.” Steve holds his box of leftover pizza under one arm and takes the bike handle, and Eddie lets go. “I’ll see you on Monday.” It doesn’t feel like enough. It isn’t enough, but anything more would be too much.

“Steve?”

“Yeah?”

There’s enough light to see Eddie’s face, but not enough to read the look in his eyes, somehow darker than the darkness outside as he looks at Steve. He bites his lip. “I…I’m still wearing your clothes.”

“Oh. Yeah. Um…I think Robin was right.”

“You…you want me to keep them?”

Shit. Too much, too obvious. He needs to be more careful and actually think before he says anything like that. “You know, just…if you like them,” he says as casually as he can. “I think they fit you better anyways.”

“I like them,” Eddie says instantly.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” Eddie echoes. “Do you need a hand?”

“No, I got it, thanks.”

“Alright, so…yeah. Goodnight.”

Steve rolls his bike up the driveway and leaves it in the carport beside his dad’s old jeep. When he’s on the front step he looks over his shoulder. Eddie is still there, and he waves. Steve waves back. He unlocks the door and goes inside, then drops everything and runs upstairs with his shoes on. He goes into the first empty guest suite and leaves the light off so he can peek out the window.

Eddie is closing the back doors of the van slowly. Instead of disappearing around the side and driving away, he leans against the door with his face pressed into the window.

Something magnetic stirs inside Steve, begging him to run outside back to Eddie. He could do it, he still has his shoes on. Maybe Eddie would want that. Maybe Robin was right about more than just the clothes, and Steve isn’t the only one wishing for something.

Eddie leans away from the van. He rubs his hands down his face then disappears around the side. The rear lights turn on, and then the van is gone.

Steve remembers the note in his pocket and he digs it out. He flicks on a lamp to read it, and he wants to cry at the words written in chunky blue crayon.

I like making you laugh :)

No one has ever told him that before. None of his friends, none of the girls he dated, not Nancy. No one.

I can be your teddy bear. I think you can make me a believer. I did all of this for you. I like making you laugh. Steve wouldn’t say all of those things to someone who was just a friend. He’s gotten pretty good at squashing down the hope when it rears its head inside of him, but maybe he shouldn’t. Maybe he should let it breathe, let it see. Let it grow and spread and fill him up. It’s not wrong, and it’s not something to be ashamed of. Maybe in the world he and Robin live in, Eddie could be there.

Chapter Text

“Okay, let me get this straight. You asked him to take you to an insane asylum?”

Steve fiddles with the candy rack he’s refilling instead of looking at Robin’s face. “Uh…yeah.”

He knew when he walked into work this morning that he would have to lie to her again but he told her as much as he could about his evening with Eddie. She thinks he dragged Eddie to Pennhurst for a college application project and she doesn’t know anything about the argument they had or his dreams, but otherwise he told her everything. And it was almost fun, like when he gossipped with his old friends about who slept with who, but now the tone of her voice makes him nervous.

“Which he did. Willingly. Wearing your clothes—”

“Yup.”

“—and then you took him out for dinner—”

“It was just pizza,” Steve says. But it wasn’t, was it? By his own words to Eddie last night, it was as close to a five course meal at Enzo’s as Steve could get.

“—he gave you a note that said he likes making you laugh, and you let him keep your clothes?” Robin finishes. Steve finally feels brave enough to look at her, and she’s staring at him with her hands on her hips. It’s a bad sign when girls do that.

“Yeah. Pretty much.”

Her mouth moves but no words come out. Steve refills the rack of Raisinets and Goobers then cuts open the next box while she struggles for words. He broke her. She probably thinks he’s a psychopath for taking Eddie to Pennhurst. Maybe he should’ve told her they went to Notre Dame, and then she wouldn’t look like her soul abandoned her body to fly off to another dimension.

She heaves a huge sigh and rubs her fingers over her temples like she’s trying to ward off a headache. “Do you need your eyes checked? How the hell do you still think he’s not into you?”

Oh. Oh, thank god.

Steve tosses a Dubble Bubble at her head. “I never said that.”

She flinches when the wrapped gum hits her forehead but she doesn’t catch it. She doesn’t even try. She has that soul-has-left-the-building look on her face again. “Wait, what? So you do think he’s into you?”

Steve picks up the gum and rolls it between his fingers. It makes him think of Eddie, how he always chews gum in Mrs. Cooper’s class, and Steve has to stop himself from laughing at her stern face every time he hears that pop! behind him.

“I think he might be, yeah.”

And the thing is, Steve is good at this. He’s good at flirting and romance. He can tell if a girl is interested with just a look and a smile, but it’s going to take a whole lot more than that for him to be confident with Eddie. If Nancy was a waterfall then Eddie is a rip current pulling him under, pulling him so far out of his comfort zone that he doesn’t know which way is up or down or left or right. He has to tally up every moment in his mind, everything Eddie has said and done, every note, every smile, every laugh at Steve’s dumb jokes, and if it ever feels like enough then maybe he’ll ask Eddie out on a date. A real one.

But then he imagines saying the words to Eddie’s face and his nerves buzz like he’s eaten static.

“Might be?” Robin repeats incredulously. “You’re still not sure? Do you remember when he saw lucky little me who gets to work with Steve Harrington and got all bitchy? When was that? Oh yeah—just yesterday. That boy was jealous.”

“Oh.” That makes sense. A lot more sense than Eddie’s excuse that he was just hungry. I wasn’t asking you. “Holy shit, I think you’re right.”

Robin scoffs. She pushes one of the candy bins aside so she can sit on the counter, right in Steve’s way. “Of course I’m right, dingus. I have working eyeballs.”

“Oh, what a load of crap. If you had working eyeballs you’d see Chrissy shoving her boobies in your face every weekend.”

Robin smacks his arm with a pack of Runts. “Ew, gross. Don’t say boobies. Ever. Again. What are you talking about?”

“You seriously don’t notice? What are you looking at—her eyes? She comes in and leans over the counter like—” Steve imitates the way she does it, hands on the edge of the counter, chest pushed forward, neck tilted just so. “It’s kind of slutty.”

Robin’s mouth drops open and she kicks his leg hard. “She’s not a slut!”

“Ow,” Steve hisses. He hobbles out of her range. “I’m not saying she is, just that most girls don’t wear tops that low to Family Video. A family establishment.”

“Maybe she’s trying to get your attention.”

“I wasn’t even behind the counter! Robin, I’m telling you—she wants you to look at her boobies.”

Robin sighs. She takes the lid off the Dubble Bubble bin and shoves a few handfuls of gum from the restock box inside. “You don’t get it, okay? You have no idea how lucky you are.”

“What, because I like girls too?” Steve says. He knows he’s lucky for that. He couldn’t imagine being gay in a town like this, where people like the person he used to be are everywhere.

But Robin shakes her head. “No, you’re lucky because the first guy you’ve ever liked likes you back. Do you know how many girls I’ve liked? Full blown crushes, but also just, oh I wonder what it would be like to kiss that girl. But it doesn’t matter, because I’ll never have the chance. I always have to tell myself that. I’m so used to denial it’s like I don’t know how to do anything else!” Her eyes are filled with a quiet desperation as she looks at him like he could give her all the answers. “How do I stop?”

Steve wishes he could give her the confidence he has with girls. “I get what you’re saying but just think about it. You said she always smiles at you in class and wants to hang out, and she comes in every weekend and hangs on your arm for like an hour. It’s not rocket science, Rob.” He uses the nickname on purpose, and he has to stop himself from smiling when she doesn’t tell him off about it.

“God, it feels like it sometimes,” she mutters.

They both need an extra boost of confidence, but if they can’t find it then maybe a kick in the ass will work instead. Steve wasn’t confident when he had his first kiss at a party in sixth grade, but he did it because he made a bet with Dylan B to see who could kiss a girl first.

That could work. After all, this is just another first.

“How about a bet?” Steve challenges. “Twenty bucks says I'll tell Eddie before you tell Chrissy.”

She perks up. There’s a fire in her eyes as she thinks about it, but then she shakes her head. “Twenty’s too much. Ten.”

“Fifteen,” Steve counters. “Come on, it’s gotta be worth the fight. And let’s have a deadline so we don’t chicken out. End of the month?” It’s the eighteenth today, so that gives them two weeks.

“What happens if neither of us make the deadline?”

Steve thinks of the perfect answer instantly. He sits at the computer and opens the customer database, and types M-U-N-S-O-N. Two accounts show up, one for Eddie and one for Wayne, but they both have the same phone number that Steve half-remembered. He grabs the notepad next to the register and writes it down.

Robin leans over his shoulder. “What are you doing?”

Steve gives her the note. “This is insurance.” He returns to the main screen and types C-U-N-N-I-N-G-H-A-M. An account appears with the first name Laura, and it’s the one because Steve recognizes some of the latest rentals, and oh. The current rental is… “The Apartment?”

“I recommended that to her,” Robin says.

“You’ve seen it?”

“Yeah, only like a hundred times. It’s one of my favorite movies.”

Steve wants to laugh. He’d given up on ever figuring out why he knew the name of that movie, and now the answer falls into his lap when he doesn’t expect it.

Robin looks at the note in her hand. “Okay, I get it. If you don’t tell him by the end of the month, then I get to tell him.” Her face turns wicked. “God, that would be fun.”

“Exactly.” Steve writes down Chrissy’s number and slips it into his pocket. “And I would get to tell Chrissy. So do we have a deal, Buckley?” He holds out his hand, and after one last moment of deliberation, she shakes it.

“Deal.”

She trusts him. She trusts his opinion, she trusts his word, and this is exactly what they both need.

The bell chimes and they both look at the door. Chrissy comes in with a bounce in her step and a tape in her hands. “Hi, Robin! Hi, Steve.”

“Hey, Chrissy.” Steve goes back to the candy bins on the other side of the counter, and whispers to Robin as he goes, “Look at them.”

Robin rolls her eyes and shoves him away. “Hi, Chrissy. Did you like it?”

Steve peeks over his shoulder, and sure enough Chrissy’s doing her move. Her pink coat is already open, showing off a sparkly skin-tight shirt, and she’s leaning against the counter just like he showed Robin earlier.

“Yeah, I really liked it! You have great taste.” Chrissy slides the tape across the counter. “What else should I watch?”

“Ah—well,” Robin stammers. She’s looking. She’s trying not to look. “We don’t have Children of Paradise but maybe you’d like this one…” She leaves the counter and Chrissy follows her to the Classics shelf. She stands barely an inch away from Robin, and Steve sees her slip her hand around Robin’s arm.

There’s no way he’s wrong about Chrissy, but even if he was he doesn’t think she’d go around telling anyone that Robin’s a lesbian and tried to hit on her. She’s a total sweetheart. If he didn’t have eyes he would still hear it in her voice, how kind she is, how genuine.

Eddie is the same. Not as obviously as Chrissy, but behind his intimidating long hair and leather jacket and silver rings, Steve doesn’t think there’s a cruel bone in his body. He’s not like Tommy, not like Billy. If Steve told him how he felt and he didn’t feel the same, he’d probably be sympathetic at least.

Steve just needs to remember that when he finally makes his move.

“I’m going to murder them,” Steve grumbles as Mrs. Thompson pulls the two hurricanes she calls her sons out the door. Their shift is almost over and the children’s section is a mess. Again. Just like last weekend. “Ten minutes. They couldn’t wait ten damn minutes? They need leashes.”

Robin slams the cash drawer closed with a ding! “I know. Rock paper scissors?”

Steve loses. Twice.

She waves him away. “Have fun!”

Steve kneels on the floor and starts re-organizing the shelf, keeping an eye on his watch. At exactly six o’clock this turns into Tim’s problem. He hears the bell chime and his heart jumps when he hears a familiar, low voice. It sounds like Eddie.

He peeks around the shelf. It is Eddie. He’s standing in front of the counter talking to Robin, but he’s looking mostly at the counter instead of at her, and his arms are folded tight around himself. Robin looks surprised.

“...okay, thanks,” she’s saying. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Is, um…is Steve here?” Eddie looks around the store until finally his eyes fall on Steve, and Steve wiggles his fingers in a wave. Eddie’s whole body relaxes and his expression clears to make room for a smile. He comes over, and behind him Steve sees Robin shaking her head.

“What are you doing on the floor?”

“Do you know the Thompson brothers? I hate them.” Steve shoves the last few tapes into place and raises his hands. “Help me up?”

Eddie grabs his hands and Steve pulls himself up. He nearly stumbles into Eddie when he’s on his feet again, and Eddie lets go of his hands a second too slow.

“What was that about?” Steve asks, gesturing towards Robin with a tape that strayed off of the Western shelf.

"Oh, uh...I just told her sorry for being a cranky bastard yesterday." Eddie looks sheepish, and all at once Steve feels stupidly fond. It's probably written across his face, but Eddie is looking at the shelf. He took Steve's suggestion seriously, even though it must've been hard if he really is jealous of Robin.

"I'm glad you did. She's my friend, I want you to like her."

Eddie fiddles with a tape. "Yeah, she seems pretty cool."

Steve returns the stray Western to its home and glances towards the counter. Robin definitely heard that. She's looking right at him, biting her lip like she's fighting back laughter, and Steve conquers his own smile before Eddie can see it.

"So is that why you're here?"

"No, I'm looking for something. Can you see if it's available?"

Steve ignores the little bit of disappointment that sinks through him. "Sure, yeah. I'll check the system."

He leads Eddie back to the counter just as Tim walks in the door, and Steve flips Tim off when Tim flips him off. It’s the only greeting they give each other at shift change. Tim goes to the staff room, and Robin leaves the counter to go and get her coat.

“I’m clocking out,” she says.

“Yeah, go, I’ll see you later,” Steve says. He sits behind the computer. “So what’s it called?”

Eddie plants his elbows on the counter and leans over. “I’ll spell it out for you. S…T…E…” A playful smile takes over his face, and he finishes with, “V-E. I never said I was looking for a movie.”

A thrill goes through Steve and he can’t stop the wide smile that pulls at his face. He can’t handle this, he doesn’t even know what to say. He doesn’t remember the last time someone made him feel this flustered. Stop it, Eddie. Stop being so damn cute.

“I’ll check the returns, you just had that one yesterday.”

“I know.” Eddie picks up the Rubik’s cube on the counter and spins it a couple times. He might be blushing but it’s hard to tell in the warm orange light coming from the neon Family Video sign on the wall.

“Are you that eager to get your ass kicked at bowling, Munson?” Steve teases.

“You’re the one who’s gonna get your ass kicked, Harrington, but not tonight. I had an idea.”

“Yeah? What?”

“I figured since you’re so interested with your dreams and stuff you’d want to check out the house.” He looks excited but Steve is drawing a total blank.

“The house? What house?”

“The Creel house! You know, the murder house on Morehead?”

Steve inhales a sharp breath. “That’s the Creel house?”

He never thought about the house once when Victor was telling them the story. For some reason it didn’t seem real, or at least, not real anymore. But it still exists and Steve has seen it. He knows of the place like everyone in Hawkins does—a creepy old house at the edge of town that no one knows the truth about—but the mystery and the made up stories lost their novelty when he was a kid.

“The one and only,” Eddie confirms. “My uncle told me. I think he told me about it years ago and that’s why the name sounded familiar. I wanted to look at the history of the place but the records office is closed today.”

“You really went there?” Steve marvels. Even though Eddie doesn't fully believe Steve about his dreams, he’s still willing to try and help.

“Yeah, I was curious.” Eddie leans even closer, like he’s pushing himself up on his toes. “So? You, me, spooky house?”

His excitement is infectious, and Steve grins. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

The Creel house is even creepier than Steve remembers.

The house is shrouded by the twisted branches of dead trees and bushes, and there’s an old Victorian style street lamp standing alone and unlit on the lawn. The windows are plastered by boards, and they look like bandages trying to keep whatever secrets the house holds from spilling into the rest of Hawkins. In the last light of dusk fading on the horizon it looks like a predator, ready to swallow him whole and never let him leave.

He heard so many legends about this place when he was a kid. He heard that the family who lived there was locked in the basement, waiting to be set free. Tommy told him there’s a lady in white who’s seen on the porch, waiting for her long lost lover to return. Jay told him the house belonged to satanists decades ago. Amy said that her aunt once saw an old man in the gardens and she thought he might’ve been a ghost.

Somehow knowing the truth is worse than any of the legends. Demon or not, a man lost his family and his mind in this house.

“It looks like a skeleton,” Eddie murmurs. He’s standing on the curb beside Steve with a flashlight in one hand and a small box in the other. “Don’t you think? With all the white beams and stuff? They look like bones.”

“Yeah, they do.” And the windows should be the eyes, but they’re covered. Scarred shut like Victor Creel’s. A shiver runs down Steve’s spine and he looks away, feeling oddly like the house is watching him. It’s just his imagination.

He looks in Eddie’s box. “Is that a spoon?”

Eddie shines the light into the box. “I don’t have silver bullets. That’s the only pure silver I could find.”

“What?”

“You know, for werewolves.” Eddie points the light up under his chin and long, demonic shadows stretch over his face. “Awooo!”

Steve laughs. “Yeah, I don’t think we need that.” He takes the flashlight and points it back into the box. “And garlic?”

“Are there any vampires on the forecast, psychic boy?” Eddie picks up a salt shaker from the box and shakes it like he’s throwing a dart. “This is for ghosts, you throw it at them. I read that somewhere, I think. Or was it rice…? Shit, I don’t know, but I don’t have a proton pack so it’s better than nothing.” He picks up the last item—a plain wooden cross—and presses it onto Steve’s forehead. “The power of Christ compels you! Please please please tell me you’ve seen The Exorcist.”

“Yeah, once. Never again.” Steve takes the cross and slips it into his back pocket, then gives the salt shaker to Eddie. “I’ll be on demon watch if you can be on ghost watch.”

“Aye aye, captain.” Eddie leaves the spoon and garlic and puts the box back in the van and closes the door. “Oh, wait, we need—” He opens the door again and grabs a crowbar from the floor behind the seat. “Do you want to open her up or should I do the honors?”

Steve takes the crowbar. “I’ll do it.”

They walk up the path to the house guided by the flashlight in Eddie’s hand. There are no lights on this street, like it’s been shunned by the rest of the town and left to die on its own in darkness. Steve goes up the porch steps and the rotting planks creak under his feet as if they’re warning him to stay away. He touches the sheet of wood nailed to the door. Tommy dared him to go up and touch it when they were twelve, and even though he did it in daylight he was scared shitless. Now he’s here in the black of night, but at least he’s not alone.

He makes quick work of the nails, prying them from the board and tossing them onto the porch. “Okay, watch out.”

Eddie moves to the side and Steve hooks the heel of the crowbar behind the wood and pulls. It falls between them and lands on the porch with a loud smack! Eddie shines the light over the door. It looks like something from an old movie—dark detailed walnut with a stained glass window depicting a single blooming rose. The glass is grimy and the whole door is covered in thick cobwebs.

Steve twists the brass knob. The door doesn’t budge. “Should I knock? See if anyone’s home?”

Eddie gives the door an experimental kick, then he kicks again with real force. The door still doesn’t move. “We could try a window?”

Something wiggles at the back of Steve’s mind. A hint of that same deja vu he felt on Halloween. A locked door, a single rose. He’s been here before, he’s had this problem before. But how could he? He’s never seen this door. No one has seen this door for years.

“I think I have an idea.” Steve gently nudges Eddie to the side and stands on the fallen sheet of wood. He grips the crowbar like a baseball bat, lifts, aims, and—crash! The rose shatters under the heel of the crowbar, and a hole appears into the midnight depths of the Creel house.

Eddie comes back to his side and his arm presses against Steve. He shines the light into the broken glass. “If there are any ghosts in here they’re going to be so pissed that you disturbed their eternal peace. Start saying your prayers, psychic boy.”

Steve looks at the side of his face, barely visible in the dark. “You can keep me safe with your salt shaker,” he teases. He uses the crowbar to punch out the last few shards of glass in the corner of the window, then he reaches inside to find the lock.

“Imagine if something pulled on your arm.”

Steve gives him a look over his shoulder. “Thanks for putting that terrifying idea in my head.”

“You’re welcome,” Eddie says gleefully.

Steve unlocks the door and draws his thankfully unpulled arm out. He pushes the door and it squeaks on its hinges as it swings open to a world of darkness. The deja vu is only getting stronger, and the single step he takes over the threshold feels like a plunge into the deep end of a mysterious world. There’s nothing here. There’s so much here. The air is stale and dead, but it seems to whisper deep into the cracks of his mind of something to be found, or a riddle to be answered.

Eddie shines the light around the foyer. It’s wide enough to be its own room and it leads all the way past a grand staircase to the back of the house. There’s still furniture in the hallway—two sideboards with dust-covered lamps, a few candle holders on the mantel above the fireplace, and a rocking chair past the stairs.

Steve puts the crowbar on the nearest sideboard and his hands feel too empty. “You should’ve brought another flashlight.”

“It’s the only one I could find. You’d be surprised how many things get lost in a trailer home.” Eddie holds it out. “You can take it.”

“We can share.” Steve takes the flashlight. This house makes him uneasy but at the same time the darkness makes him feel braver with Eddie. He’s never going to feel confident if he doesn’t at least try to flirt with Eddie, and for some reason this feels like the perfect place to do it. Maybe because it’s so strange, so far away from normal life that it’s like they’re in another world where anything can happen.

Or maybe Steve’s just crazy.

He takes Eddie’s hand and threads their fingers together. “So you don’t get lost,” he whispers.

Eddie looks everywhere but at Steve. “Yeah, good idea. That’s…yeah. Don’t want to get lost in here.”

Steve hides his smile easily as he points the light away and pretends to keep looking around. “Let’s look in here.”

He pulls Eddie through the first door on the left. It’s a library, or maybe the Creels called it a study. The far wall is one giant bookcase, stuffed to the brim with dust-covered tomes. A couch and two cushioned seats sit around a coffee table in the middle of the room, gray with over two decades worth of dust. A half-burnt cigarette is still in the ashtray on the table, beside a few half-melted candles. There’s a huge stone fireplace across from the chairs. It must’ve been a nice place to read in front of a cozy fire at the end of a long day.

“I didn’t think all the furniture would still be here,” Steve muses. He pulls Eddie around to the bookcase and shines the light on a small picture frame sitting on the shelf. The black and white photo is faded but the image is clear—a man and a woman smiling at each other, her in a long-sleeved white dress and him in an army uniform. Victor and Virginia on their wedding day. “It’s sad. They only got to live here for a month before it happened.”

“Yeah, I bet it’s a nice place without all the cobwebs and shit,” Eddie says. “Should we clean it up and move in?”

It’s obviously a joke, but the way it sounds…move in together? Steve looks at him, and he looks away.

“I mean, you know, it’s big enough for both of us. We could each have half and split custody of the stairs and the kitchen and whatever horrors are going on in the basement. Victor mentioned a cellar so there’s a basement, right? Or maybe it’s like a dungeon, and I think there’s a shed or something out back, too…”

He’s rambling. He’s nervous, and Steve tries not to smile. “Let’s make sure it’s not haunted first.”

“Yeah yeah yeah, let’s go all Ghostbusters on this shit…”

“With your salt shaker.”

“...with my salt shaker.”

Steve can’t help it. He snorts a laugh, and he doesn’t even know why.

Eddie’s mouth twists. He’s still not looking at Steve. “Are you making fun of me?”

Steve stops instantly. “No, no I swear I’m not. Come on.”

He leads Eddie back out the door and shines the light around the hallway. He’s not sure what he’s looking for but he does feel like he’s looking for something, some secret to be found in the shadows of the house. He notices something beside the fireplace that’s across from the bottom of the stairs, and he walks to it. It’s a cupboard—no, it’s an old grandfather clock, and it’s taller than Steve. He stares at the unmoving hands on the face of the clock.

“Are you getting any…psychic feelings yet?” Eddie asks.

Steve almost says yes. Something about the clock makes him…angry. He wants to chop it down with an ax or watch it go up in flames. There has to be a reason, but it’s locked away behind a door in his mind that he doesn’t have the key for. He can’t smash it open with a crowbar, and there’s no one on the other side to open it for him. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath in through his nose. The air smells old and suffocating, but it doesn’t trigger anything the way that Eddie’s cologne did. He needs another key.

“I feel like I’ve been here before,” he says. “Like, I’ve been inside before. But how could I? It was boarded up.”

“Did you dream about it?”

“I don’t think so.” There’s a catalog in Steve’s mind of all his weird dreams and he doesn’t remember ever dreaming about this house, or about grandfather clocks or stained glass roses. He did have a dream that he was talking to Nancy in a dark creepy hallway, but that could’ve been anywhere. Hell, that could’ve been a normal weird dream.

Steve tugs Eddie into the door beside the clock. It’s stupid, it’s just a clock, but he’s eager to get away from it.

This room seems like a playroom for the kids. There’s a bookshelf beside the window, but it holds toys and games instead of books, and there’s a piano with sheet music for Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star sitting on top.

Eddie lets go of Steve’s hand and sits on the piano bench. He presses a key, and the sound warbles through the room. “Ugh, it’s so out of tune," he says with a wince.

“You can play the piano?” Steve asks.

“I could if I wanted to.” Eddie shakes the dust off the sheet music and props it up against the wood. “I can definitely play this shit.” With one hand he starts to play, and the familiar tune fills the room.

Steve puts his hand on Eddie’s shoulder, and his fingers stumble over a key. “What other secret talents are you hiding?”

Eddie stops playing. “What? What secret talents? I don’t have secret talents.”

“Oh, come on. You’re good at drawing. You’re amazing at music. You can act. You were great at thinking on the spot yesterday, like you totally saved our asses. Is there anything you can’t do?”

Eddie taps one of the keys too lightly to make any sound. “Math. Biology. I tried Chem last year and I almost lit my hair on fire.”

Steve feels bad for laughing. “Who cares about that shit? It’s boring. You’re good at the kind of stuff that makes life fun.” He leans closer and adds, “And you’re hilarious. I’m glad you like making me laugh. You’re really good at it.” Steve drops his hand and wanders across the room like something caught his eye, but there’s nothing more interesting in here than Eddie. He peeks over his shoulder. Eddie is frozen on the bench squeezing a fistful of his hair in his hand.

“Come here, look at this.”

Eddie lets go of his hair quickly and stands up. He crosses the room and stops beside Steve, so close that his arm brushes Steve’s. “Creepy.”

Steve is pointing the light at a small table where there’s a game of chess sitting half-played, covered in dust. A black widow has made its home in a web between two pieces. “Right? It’s like they always meant to come back and finish the game.”

“Black would’ve won.”

“What?”

Eddie points at the pieces. “See, the bishop is here so the queen just goes here, and then white king is fucked.”

Steve shines the light upwards between them so Eddie’s face is caught in the glow. “This is exactly what I mean with you and your secret talents.”

Eddie rolls his eyes and starts to look down but he bounces back up so he isn’t looking right into the flashlight. There’s a little pleased smile on his face. “It’s not a secret talent. I joined the chess club for a few months in ninth grade because of this cute g—girl, but I actually liked it. I sucked ass, though. I read all of the strategy books in the library but I could never remember how to do them when I started playing.”

Steve’s heart skips a beat when Eddie trips over girl. Maybe he was going to say guy. Steve wants to ask so badly but he doesn’t want a repeat of Halloween. “So is that your type? Nerdy chess girls? I never would’ve guessed.”

“No way, I don’t trust anyone who has a type. Where’s the fun in that? I like who I like and I don’t think about it anymore than that." Eddie clutches his chest dramatically. “I am a victim of the whims of my stupid, stupid heart.”

“Isn't everyone?" Steve points out.

“Yeah, I guess, but mine is extra dumb.”

“Why? Just because of those girls who couldn’t treat you right?”

Eddie shoves his hands in his jacket pockets and shrugs. “I don't know… other things too.” He walks past Steve to the doorway, leaving Steve feeling oddly cold. “Where to now, psychic boy?”

“Uh…left, I guess.”

They turn left out of the room and go past the clock and the fireplace towards the back of the house. There’s one door sitting ajar, and Eddie pushes it open.

Bingo.

The dining room. The room where the worst night of Victor Creel’s life began.

“If any room was haunted I’d place bets on this one,” Steve says.

It looks just as innocent as the first two rooms, but knowing what happened here makes Steve shiver. The table still has some plates and cutlery on it, but any trace of food is long gone. Maybe someone cleaned up the food before they locked up the house, or maybe it was eaten by flies and spiders and whatever else decided to move in after the Creels. The chairs are all askew and the one at the head of the table is tipped over. Either Victor’s or Virginia’s.

“So this is where Victor Creel killed his wife.” Eddie looks around the room. He goes to the side table to look at the radio, and he starts pressing all the buttons and turning all the dials. It doesn’t turn on.

“I thought you were trying to be a believer?” If Eddie doesn’t believe Creel’s story, then can he ever believe Steve about what he saw in his dreams?

“You, yes. Victor Creel?...I don’t know, Steve. Maybe he is just a crazy old guy.”

“Why would he buy a new home for his family just to murder them a month later?” Steve wanders to the window and looks through the inch of space between the boards nailed on the outside. It’s as dark as midnight outside, not even a scratch of moonlight. If he didn’t have the flashlight it would be pitch black inside. He thinks of an idea too good to resist.

“Isn’t that the point?” Eddie says. “He went insane. He fought in a war, Steve. We have no idea what that was like, and let’s hope to hell that we’ll never know. Maybe it caught up to him. Or…maybe it was someone else.”

That draws Steve’s attention from the plan forming in his mind. “Someone else? Like who?”

“I don’t know. Someone who knew Victor was losing it.” Eddie snaps his fingers and whirls around to face Steve. “The priest knew!”

“You think the priest murdered them?”

“Maybe. He’d be the perfect criminal.” His face lights up with another idea. “Ooh, maybe he was having an affair with Virginia. Maybe Victor found out and things got messy and he figured it was best to just get rid of the whole family, but Victor escaped and he made up this story in his head to cope with it.” Eddie stands on one of the chairs, then climbs up to stand on the table, narrowly avoiding bumping his head on the chandelier.

“What are you doing?”

Eddie spreads his arms out wide. “Oh, Creel house ghosts, give us a sign! We want to know the truth, and only you have the answers!”

Steve snorts. “Who’s pissing off the ghosts now?”

“My lady Virginia! Did you really float in the air above this dining table? Make a noise for us!” Eddie stumbles when he steps on the edge of a plate. “Shit.”

“Jesus, be careful.” Steve looks around the room, then he whips the light towards the sitting room. “Holy shit, Eddie, did you see that? Over here.”

“What?” Eddie jumps down from the table and follows Steve into the sitting room that’s connected to the dining room. “See what?”

“By the couch. I don’t know, maybe it’s just my eyes, but I swear something…moved.”

Eddie goes closer to the couch. “Over here?”

The room plunges into darkness.

Steve gasps.

“Steve?”

The room is silent.

“This isn’t funny, Steve. Where are you?”

No answer.

Eddie’s voice is smaller this time, like it's being eaten by the darkness. “Steve?”

The floor creaks with Eddie’s footsteps, closer, closer, closer.

Now.

Steve surges out of his crouch and tackles Eddie’s legs with a deep growl.

“AHH!” Eddie stumbles backwards and lands on the floor. Thud!

Laughter explodes out of Steve, unstoppable, endless, out of control. He rolls off of Eddie’s legs and onto the floor and he doesn’t care that there’s going to be so much dust in his hair because that was so worth it.

“You. Are. A. GIANT dick and I hate you so much.”

Steve gasps for breath to defend himself but the laughter just bubbles up again.

Eddie’s leg bumps Steve in the dark and he groans. “Ow. I landed on something.”

Steve stops laughing and sits up. “Oh shit, did you really? Sorry.”

“Sorry’s not going to cut it, Harrington.” Something scrapes across the floor. “Stupid fucking book,” Eddie mutters. His hand touches Steve’s chest and he fumbles his way over Steve’s body to find the flashlight. “God damn it, I knew you were trying to scare me but I didn’t think you’d be on the floor like a maniac. Give me that, you can’t be trusted with it.”

“Oh come on, I bet you wanted to scare me too.” That’s half the fun of going to a spooky old house, and Steve figured if he didn’t do it first then Eddie would’ve tried to scare him at some point.

“Maybe. Might’ve thought about it.” Eddie clicks the flashlight on and it beams into Steve’s face like pure sunlight.

“Ow, shit.” Steve slaps his hand over his eyes. White spots dance across his vision.

“I didn’t do that on purpose but you deserve it for being such a dick.”

Steve lowers his hand but he keeps his eyes closed and tilts his face towards Eddie. “Let me make it up to you,” he says in the low, flirty tone that he knows works on girls. It’s an open invitation. Whatever Eddie says or does right now will tell him what he needs to know.

Steve hears him move, and he hears two thumps. Eddie’s feet. He’s standing up again. Steve lets out a silent sigh. Maybe Eddie didn’t notice, or maybe he did and he’s pretending not to because…

“Steve?” Eddie whispers. Any trace of annoyance, real or pretend, is gone. “Look.”

Steve opens his eyes. Eddie is standing beside him, the flashlight hanging limp in his hand, and he’s staring into the dining room.

The chandelier is glowing.

A dozen bulbs are glowing hot orange like candle flames, and the light isn’t just on—it’s pulsing, swelling and dimming like the steady beat of a heart. Like it’s alive.

“So, uh, that’s not you, right?” Eddie asks with a shaky voice. “Unless you’re the Dazzler or Dr. Light or some shit? There’s no electricity here, I already tried the radio.” He goes to the lamp beside the couch and click click click but it doesn’t turn on.

Steve is running to his car, running away, run away, he has to get away, what the fuck was that? His heart is pounding, where are his fucking keys? Come on, come on, he needs to go—the house, the lights, flashing bright Christmas colors inside, twisted shadows on the windows like a Halloween funhouse—it’s back—that thing is in the house again—

Steve scrambles to his feet and snatches the light from Eddie’s hand. He points the light all around the room—everywhere, from the floor to the ceiling to the walls. Nowhere is safe, not from the monster, it could rip into their world from anywhere. Nancy’s brother said Eleven destroyed it but what if it’s back?

“Do you see anything?"

“What?” Eddie turns left and right with a wild-eyed look on his face. “No! Like what?”

“Anything! Anything moving!” Steve’s body is a storm, his pulse is thundering and each ragged breath is like a crack of lightning through his lungs.

“Steve, I don’t see anything! What the fuck are you looking for?”

Steve looks at the ceiling the corners the cabinet the walls the door the couch the windows the floor the curtains the table under the table—where the fuck is it?

The chandelier goes out.

No no no—

Steve holds his breath.

No explosion into the room.

No screaming.

No snarling.

There’s no noise at all.

The lamp Eddie tried bursts to life. Steve takes his hand and yanks him away from it. He puts himself in front of Eddie like a shield, like the monster is going to crawl out of the lampshade any second now and open its ugly flower face to rows of bloody teeth—

He follows the light bulbs through the house as they flicker on, one at a time, all the way to the front door. His hands are glued to the bat and his footsteps are slow, hesitant.

Jonathan opens the door and they stand on the porch, watching the streetlight flickering outside the house.

“Where’s it going?” Nancy wonders.

Jonathan, quietly, “I don’t think that’s the monster.”

—but nothing happens.

Steve lets himself relax a little bit. Maybe it’s not the monster but there’s something in the Upside Down in this house. He’s sure of it. He doesn’t need to start believing in ghosts when he already knows what kinds of things can lurk in the darkness.

Steve flinches when Eddie grabs his shoulder.

“Steve?” he whispers.

“Shh.”

It’s easy to forget that the Upside Down isn’t a distant alien world. It’s right here, right where they’re standing, and they just can’t see it. Joyce talked to Will while he was still there, which means whatever’s in the house right now might be able to hear them.

The lamp goes dark. A warm glow fills the hallway. Whatever it is, it’s going somewhere.

Steve tugs Eddie through the doorway. He tries to keep his footsteps light but the floorboards still creak under his shoes.

In the hallway there’s a light above the foot of the staircase, glowing with life. It pulses for a moment, then it goes out. Another fixture hanging on the wall lights up, and the edges of the peeling wallpaper casts long shadows across the wall.

It’s going upstairs.

“Okay, okay, so I-I know this was my idea but I’m obviously not the brightest knife in the shed or whatever and I think, maybe, you know, the ghosts just need some alone time and we should go and laugh about this later because, hey! We were right! The house is haunted, so now let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“I’m going upstairs,” Steve whispers. He needs to know what’s up there. It could be a monster, it could be a gate, it could be some other eldritch horror, it could be nothing, but if he leaves now without checking he knows he’ll regret it. He’s willing to take the risk but if anything happens to Eddie he would never forgive himself. He can’t let his Halloween dream come true. “Wait outside.”

“What?” Eddie looks ashen, and his bangs are damp with sweat. He squeezes Steve’s hand in an iron grip. “No no no no, don’t you dare turn into Fred right now and go all let’s split up gang on me, that is not happening. We should both go outside and into the van and far, far away, and you can make fun of me later all you want but I really don’t want to be the real life Regan MacNeil—”

“Eddie.”

He stops babbling.

“I need to see what’s up there.”

“Why?” Eddie asks miserably.

“I just do.” Steve wishes he had his spiked bat—and maybe Nancy with a gun—wait, the crowbar. It’s right there on the sideboard where he left it. “So either come with me or wait in the van.”

Eddie wipes his hand over his face. He glances between the stairs and the door. “I…okay. Lead the way.”

Steve gives him the flashlight and gives their joint hands a shake. It takes Eddie a few seconds but he gets the hint and lets go. Steve doesn’t want to let go either but he needs both hands. He picks up the crowbar. The iron is cold but he instantly feels better with a weapon in his hands. He holds it like a bat with the curved heel up.

“I won’t let anything hurt you,” Steve tells him. It’s a bold promise—if a monster is prowling around upstairs then there isn’t much he can do except throw himself in the way and tell Eddie to run—and maybe it just made things worse. Eddie doesn’t look reassured. His eyes are wide and feverish with fear. “Keep your eyes peeled, alright? And stay close to me.”

Eddie’s mouth moves but no words make it out alive. He tucks two fingers into Steve’s belt to anchor them together.

Steve walks towards the stairs. The light has already moved into the upstairs hallway, and it fades away when he’s on the fourth step but he doesn’t stop. It must’ve gone into a bedroom. He reaches a landing in the staircase where there’s two doors on each side and a large window overlooking the backyard. The stairs turn and go up to another landing, but he doesn’t see any light coming from up there.

“That door,” Eddie whispers behind Steve’s ear. He’s pointing the flashlight to the one left of the window. “Look down.”

Outside the circle of light, the seam where the door meets the floor is pulsing with a faint glow.

Steve pulls it open and peeks inside. It’s not a bedroom. There’s a narrow staircase curving upward and each step is coated with a thick layer of dust. Undisturbed. No monster tracks. Steve starts going up. Each step feels more daunting than the last, like his legs are getting heavier with each one.

The stairs open up to a wide attic. It’s blessedly empty except for a strange shrine in the middle with half melted candles and sealed glass jars. Hanging from the ceiling above it is a single pulsing light bulb.

They move closer to it. When they’re two feet away from the bulb, Eddie says, “Whoa.” He holds up the flashlight. It’s pulsing in the same rhythm as the light bulb, beat for beat.

The light beats in Steve’s eyes, softer and louder and softer again. Alive. Dead. Alive. He feels like he’s had a drink…or maybe it was two…or was it five? The room starts to blur and blend into one bruised shade of darkness, like a punch or two to the face, and he knows he’s got a black eye. There’s blood in his cup, and booze swelling from the bites in his skin, hot and sticky and sweet and it’s so loud why is it so fucking loud? Why is there so much screaming? A tidal wave of animal roaring all around him, but it’s just a girl, and her shriek is so painful that his ears ring, or maybe that’s the glass bursting all around him one by one and it's dark now and he fucking hates the dark because it’s following him and thank god Nancy’s not driving because she’s had too much to drink, and he’s had too much because those stupid Russians messed it all up and he can’t make good decisions when he’s high—what do they want him to do? Go fumbling around in the dark with his flashlight off? What the hell is he looking for and why is it so dark and what time is it and what is that thing that’s stuck on the tip of his tongue—a word, a feeling, something he’s supposed to remember…

He’s in the Upside Down. In the house, in the attic, and there are thick vines snaking across the decrepit floor and bits of white floating in the air, but this can’t be the Upside Down because there’s a wall of light in front of him, as pure as the moon at night. It feels like heaven. It radiates warmth and love and life, and it should blind him but his eyes don’t even hurt. He reaches out to touch it and a soothing warmth glides down his spine. He’s just a child in the arms of his mother, and she loves him, she wants the best for him, she wants to keep him safe.

An image fills his mind.

Himself. Hawkins. Creel house. Glowing bulb. He runs down the stairs and out of the house. Never coming back again.

“Steve?”

Steve blinks.

He’s in the Creel house, in the real world, and he hasn’t moved an inch. Eddie is still beside him, and the bulb above them is burning white hot, pulsing even faster than before. Steve can still feel that other-worldly warmth across his back but there’s something else, something like a cold fist plunged into his chest, and the echo of deja vu swims through his head. He needs to leave. He needs to leave now—he didn’t see it in his mind for no reason.

“You okay?” Eddie asks.

“I think I’m going to be sick.”

Steve runs.

He pounds down the attic steps, and he tries not to look at his own shadow dancing in and out of the shaky flashlight beam as Eddie follows hot on his heels. He races down the main staircase, down the porch stairs and into the cool, fresh, living air but it’s not enough. He runs as far as he can and drops the crowbar before he collapses onto the dead grass and pukes up everything in his gut.

“Oh my god, Steve!”

Eddie kneels beside him and the light is too bright in the corner of Steve’s eye. He slaps at Eddie weakly.

“No,” he moans. He doesn’t want Eddie to see but he can’t get another word out before another surge of nausea overwhelms him. He feels Eddie’s hand on his back, rubbing up and down. He’s not leaving.

When his stomach is empty and he’s spat out most of the foul taste in his mouth, Steve sits back on his heels. “I think I’m okay,” he pants. He wipes his sleeve over his mouth. All of the alien feelings are gone, including the motherly warmth that he almost wanted to stay, but at least his body is his own again. “Yeah, I think it’s gone.”

“Now?” Eddie asks. He looks shell-shocked. “Like, right now?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Holy shit! The light in the attic just went out. Like, just now.”

Steve glares up at the house. It looks the same as when they went in except the door is wide open. Maybe instead of just the clock he should light the whole damn house on fire. He has his lighter, he could do it. Would that be a crime? It’s so nice to imagine the house engulfed in flames.

“Can you close the door?” Steve mumbles. He’s embarrassed to ask but Eddie doesn’t hesitate. He leaves the flashlight with Steve and jogs back to yank the front door closed, and it’s so stupid. Steve knows that one door isn’t going to make a damn bit of difference when it comes to keeping the Upside Down out of his life, but the second it’s closed he breathes easier. Maybe now he won’t see that gnawing black void in his nightmares.

Eddie jogs back, and Steve stands up and holds out his arms. He feels like a child waiting to be picked up but he doesn’t care—all he wants is to be in Eddie’s arms.

Eddie runs to him and wraps himself around Steve, and Steve imagines a click like there really are two magnets in their chests drawing together. He buries his face in Eddie’s neck. If he can’t have that supernatural warmth with him all of the time then Eddie is the next best thing. He feels safer with Eddie against him and his arms tight around Steve. Maybe if Steve hadn’t just puked his guts out then this would’ve been the moment. The perfect time to kiss him.

“I don’t know what I was expecting taking a psychic to a haunted house but that was insane.” Eddie rubs up and down Steve’s back. “I’m sorry you got sick. I bet you’re cursing me in your head right now.”

“No,” Steve says into Eddie’s jacket collar. “I’m glad we came.”

“Really? Because part of me thinks this was the dumbest idea I’ve ever had. I don’t want you to be possessed, Steve.” The worry in his voice is real.

“You believe me now?”

Eddie squeezes Steve even tighter. “Are you kidding? A hundred percent. If you start feeling like you want to bathe in the blood of a hundred virgins or eat babies or some shit, I’m calling the Vatican. The whole damn city. I’ll kidnap the Pope if I have to.”

Eddie believes him. Eddie believes him. It was all worth it for that alone.

Steve reluctantly pulls back. He doesn’t want to leave Eddie’s arms but the house is looming like death behind Eddie. “Can we go? I feel like it’s watching me.”

Eddie glances warily over his shoulder. “Jesus Christ, it probably is. Come on, I’ll take you home.”

Steve feels better the moment they’re in the van and rolling away from the curb. He’s happy to leave, but he’s glad they went, too. Being sick in front of Eddie sucked but now Steve knows so much more. He felt that deja vu again, and he had flashes of his strange dream world. It was like switching through radio channels, little bits of memories chopped up so small he couldn’t make any sense of them.

And he knows there’s something in that house in the Upside Down. Is Victor Creel’s demon still hanging around? It had done this trick before. The television, the lights, the radio. On, and off, and on, and off. It would make sense.

And that light, that mysterious light…bright and warm and everything the Upside Down isn’t. Nancy never saw it when she was there or she would’ve mentioned it. Has it always been there?

I heard another voice…

Victor Creel thought he heard an angel. Steve didn’t hear a voice but he saw it, he felt it. If that light isn’t an angel, what else could it be?

Chapter Text

Steve isn’t surprised when he wakes up from a dream with his heart pounding against its cage. He was almost expecting it, even hoping for it, and he’s crazy to want them but he does. It’s starting to make sense—they’re always triggered by something. Something he does or someone he sees or something he feels, even something as simple as swimming or reading a few articles. It gives him hope. Whatever they mean, it’s not buried so deep in his mind that he’ll never figure it out.

He turns on the lamp beside his bed and pulls out his notebook. November 18 after going to the Creel house -> in the attic with Nancy, Robin, Dustin, Max, and Lucas. We’re holding flashlights and they explode one at a time. He woke up after the last one blew up and everything went dark.

The light was pulsing in his dream the same way he saw last night. What does that mean? Something is happening in the Upside Down? Was it the angel again? And why wasn’t Mike, Will or Jonathan there? If something was going on, no one would leave them in the dark.

4:32 a.m. It’s actually November 19th. Exactly one month from the day he woke up in the hospital. One month from the accident that inexplicably changed everything. His life is so weird in ways he never could’ve imagined but Eddie believes him now, so maybe that’s a sign of good things to come.

Eddie is quiet for a while after Steve tells him about the dream. He’s lying on top of the picnic table with a half-burnt cigarette in his hand, and every time he brings it to his lips a sparkle of sunlight catches on his rings. It’s warm for the middle of November and it’s nearly silent in the woods. It seems like a lifetime has passed since Steve last ate lunch alone out here, but it’s only been a week.

Steve stubs out his own cigarette against the table and flicks it onto the carpet of rust-colored leaves. “So?”

“Maybe it means your life is going to get really dark really fast.”

Steve flicks him on the cheek. “Do you have any happier theories?”

Eddie hums. “No one died. That’s good, right? No more freaky floating in the air nonsense. Do you think all of your dreams are literal? Maybe it means you’re going to go back with those people.”

A shiver runs down Steve’s spine when he remembers the house. “No way in hell.”

Eddie props himself up so he’s facing Steve, and the trail of smoke from his cigarette drifts upwards between them. “What were you looking for?”

“I don’t remember. I know we were looking for something—”

“No, not in your dream,” Eddie interrupts. “Last night. At the house, you were looking for something moving. I’ll be the first to admit I was this close to pissing my pants but you looked terrified for a minute there.”

Shit. Steve should’ve known he wouldn’t forget that. “Yeah, of course I was terrified, there’s a demon in that house,” he bluffs. “Like you said, I didn’t want to end up like what’s-her-face from The Exorcist. I thought I was going to turn around and see something totally eldritch staring me in the face.”

Please believe me, please believe me. Even if Steve decides to tell him everything, even if he decides it’s worth the risk, he can’t tell Eddie yet. It would be too soon, too much to believe all at once.

“Hmm, something eldritch…something like a monster with a face that opens like a flower?”

Steve turns to ice. A million questions run through his mind but the loudest one is what the fuck? How does Eddie know about that? Has he seen it? Does he already know the Upside Down exists? Who told him? He can’t know, can he? Wouldn’t it have come up already if he did?

“What?” he manages, hoping the panic isn’t showing on his face.

Eddie raises his eyebrows. There’s something deep and knowing in his eyes, like he’s seeing right through Steve. “You mentioned it while you were high as a kite on Halloween. You said you saw it in a dream.”

All the tension in Steve’s body vanishes. “Oh. Yeah, yeah I did. Yeah, I remember now. I was so glad to wake up from that one.”

“If ghosts and demons are real then maybe monsters are too.”

“I hope not.”

Eddie takes another drag and breathes out a stream of smoke. He stubs it out and tosses the butt away. “I can’t stop thinking about what Creel said.”

“Which part?” Steve asks. He tries not to sound too eager to stop talking about monsters.

“Oh, you know, the whole don’t take evil home with you thing? I heard that and then I had the brilliant idea to go to a haunted house. His haunted house. How stupid am I?”

“You’re not stupid, and it’s my fault. I’m sorry your weekend was so fucked up.”

Eddie comes down from the table and sits beside Steve on the bench. He doesn't leave an inch of space between them. “It wasn’t a total disaster,” he says with a shrug. “I got to spend it with you.”

Steve smiles at the way he says it. Casual, but still with a hint of some other meaning on his face, and Steve doesn’t shy away from looking at him. “Let’s do something normal next time.”

“Bowling on Saturday?”

Steve puts his hand on Eddie’s leg and Eddie’s eyes drop to it instantly. After flirting with him yesterday Steve is starting to feel confident again. Maybe charming a boy isn’t as different as he thought it was. “Are you free tonight? I was thinking you and me and a movie at your place?” Somewhere they could be alone. Somewhere Steve can make a move and win his bet with Robin.

“Um.” Eddie clears his throat. “Uh…yeah, that’s—sounds good. Oh, shit.” He closes his eyes and a pained look crosses his face. “Damn it, I can’t. I have band practice and I have to go because I want your song to be perfect.” A pink flush covers his cheeks.

Your song. Steve likes the sound of that. He likes the idea of Eddie spending time picking out a song just for him. “I’m free after the show.”

Eddie looks at him and Steve wishes he was a mind reader. He wants to know what Eddie wants, he wants Eddie to want what he wants. There’s too much wanting for Steve to hold it inside anymore.

“Me too,” Eddie says. “So, uh, yeah. Let’s do that.”

“No scary movies,” Steve warns.

“No scary movies,” Eddie promises with a small smile.

Tomorrow. Steve just has to wait one more day.

Eddie is sitting on the edge of the stage strumming on his unplugged guitar when Steve walks into the Hideout. Two of his band-mates are chatting on the stage behind him but he’s not paying attention, so focused on the strings that he doesn’t look up until Steve is standing right in front of him.

“Hi,” he says. He stands up and oh. He’s wearing the blazer that Steve gave him. Without a shirt underneath.

“Hi,” is all Steve manages to get out. It’s a good thing the guitar is still between them because it reminds Steve that they’re in public, with Eddie’s friends right there, and he can’t touch, no matter how badly he wants to.

Eddie tilts his head to the side as he looks down and back up. “You look nice. You smell good, too.”

Steve remembers his own words that he blurted out to Eddie at school last week and tries not to blush. “Thanks.” He felt like a girl for the entire hour he spent getting ready, but at least it was worth it. “I was right. It definitely looks better on you.”

Eddie looks down at the blazer and holds out his arms. “You like it? I thought I’d try something new. I’m going to boil to death on stage, though. It gets so damn hot under those lights.”

“Oh, is that why you don’t wear a shirt? I thought you were just trying to look like a rock star.”

“Well. That too, but mostly just to save myself the laundry.” Eddie tugs on Steve’s hand. “Sit.”

As soon as Steve sits down, Eddie puts his guitar on Steve’s lap and lifts the strap over his head. Steve holds onto the guitar gingerly. “Why are you giving me this?”

“I’m going to teach you something simple.”

“What’s your definition of simple?”

Eddie smirks. “Four notes, easy peasy. I believe in you.” He tucks the guitar closer to Steve, moves Steve’s hands into place, and then he sits beside Steve on the left, so close their legs are pressed together. He gives Steve a little triangle of plastic, and Steve remembers it. Hanging on a chain, clutched in Dustin’s hand, the only funeral they could have.

“You strum with this. Each time you press, you just hit the string with the pick.” He presses Steve’s first finger gently, and Steve hits the string with the pick in his right hand. A faint metallic twang comes from the guitar, not very loud against the noise and laughter of the bar.

“Yeah, you got it.” Eddie moves Steve’s left hand to a new spot and Steve plucks the string again. “Then here, and here. So do that a few times.” He lets go so Steve can do it on his own, and Steve misses the touch of his hand instantly. He does exactly what Eddie showed him, and even though he can’t do it very fast, Eddie still looks proud.

“See? Not so hard. Now just change up the pattern. One two three, one two four three, one two three, two, one.” Eddie hums the pattern and he points at the guitar when Steve gets lost, then finally Steve can play it. He’s playing an instrument for the first time in years and it doesn’t sound like total noise.

Eddie puts his arm around Steve’s shoulders and leans in close like he’s about to share a secret. “Guess what?”

“What?”

“You can play Smoke on the Water now.” He sings softly, “Smoke on the water, fire in the sky. Fun?”

“I think I’ll leave it to the expert.”

“Oh, expert. I like the sound of that.” Eddie takes the guitar back and starts playing the same pattern he taught Steve, but much faster and with a confidence Steve could never have.

“When did you start playing the guitar?”

“Uhh…fifth grade. I had this ugly as hell piece of crap acoustic from the thrift store but I played that thing until my parents started wishing they were deaf. Then my uncle bought me this one when I came here to live with him.”

He’s never mentioned his parents before. Steve almost asks but he stops himself. He doesn’t want to bring up a touchy subject right before the show, and Eddie must be living with his uncle because his parents passed away. “Was it a birthday gift?” he asks instead.

“No, it was kind of a bribe, I guess.”

“A bribe?”

“To quit wreaking havoc on Hawkins and be on my best behavior. And it worked.” Eddie gives him a cheeky grin. “Mostly.”

Behind them a loud crash comes from Gareth on the drum set. “Fucking hell, finally,” the other guy mutters.

The lead singer is rushing into the bar, holding a guitar case in one hand and ripping open his coat with the other.

Eddie plays a few notes and belts out, “Hold the line! Jeff isn’t always on time!”

Jeff throws up a middle finger and Eddie and his other band-mates laugh. “Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Jeff mutters. He glances at Steve but he doesn’t say anything as he starts setting up.

Steve stands up but he can’t bring his feet to move just yet. “Uh, which song…?” He doesn’t want Jeff to hear his question but Eddie knows what he’s asking anyway.

“You’ll know it when you hear it,” he answers quietly. “And I’ll be singing.”

“I’m looking forward to it.”

Eddie gives him one last smile before he gets up to take his place. The lights start dimming as Steve goes to his usual table near the back, and the spotlights burn bright onto the band. Gareth clicks his drumsticks together and they jump into the first song. It’s loud and aggressive, the kind that Steve doesn’t like, but he likes watching Eddie fly effortlessly through his solo with his hair flying when he shakes his head.

They play a few more that sound the same to Steve, then a Queen song that he likes, and then Eddie and Jeff swap places. This is the one. His song. Eddie starts off with a mellow guitar line, and it already sounds so different from the other songs.

From across the room, Eddie looks at Steve as he sings into the microphone. “When evening falls, she’ll run to me…”

Steve wonders if the rest of the band knows why Eddie picked this song. It’s too beautiful for this dingy bar with its little audience. The rest of the patrons keep eating, and Cathy keeps coming around to the tables, and Steve feels like the only one listening. Maybe that’s a good thing—it’s for him, anyway.

And now Steve is sure that Eddie feels something for him, too. The song and Eddie’s voice is full of longing. He doesn’t know how music works or how it’s written, but he can feel it. When it’s over it feels like all the air was sucked out of the room, and he tries to keep it alive in his mind.

Eddie comes to his table but he doesn’t sit down. His sleeves are rolled up and there’s a sheen of sweat on his face, and he looks so shy just standing there, so different from how he looks on stage. There’s a question written on his face.

Steve reaches for him and wraps his hand around Eddie’s wrist. “I loved it. I love hearing you sing.”

Eddie looks down at their hands. “Really?”

Steve looks at Eddie’s eyes. They’re wide and full of hope, and so dark they’re almost never ending. His eyes are the part of him that makes Steve wonder the most, makes him wonder why he feels like he’s known Eddie for a lot longer than he has. His eyes are part of the mystery, and a mystery all on their own.

“Yes,” Steve says. For every question that the song asked, his only answer is yes.

Eddie sits across from him, and they talk and eat and laugh, and even though Steve enjoys every minute he spends with Eddie he finds himself checking his watch too much. Time usually speeds up when he’s with Eddie but tonight it’s slow and unkind. It knows what Steve wants and it’s not letting him have it that easy.

Finally, finally, Eddie’s watch lights up at ten o’clock. He presses a button to turn the alarm off, and their table goes quiet in the middle of the chatter and laughter in the bar. He licks his lips. “So, you still…my place?”

“Yeah. I’m ready.”

“Okay, good. Yeah. Me too.” Eddie stands up and puts on his leather jacket over the blazer. He gets two steps towards the door before he turns around again. “Guitar,” he mutters under his breath. He picks it up from the stage, stops to talk to his bandmates for a minute, then comes back to Steve. “Now I’m ready.”

Steve spends every minute of the drive trying to keep his heart in his chest. He doesn’t know how this is going to go, he doesn’t have a plan. All he knows is that he’s not going to leave before he tells Eddie how he feels. And if he can’t then he’s a total coward.

“Did you pick a movie?” he asks to distract himself.

“Uh, no. I got a bunch but you can pick.”

Eddie pulls into the gravel driveway beside his trailer. His uncle is in the kitchen when they walk in, with his boots on as he packs up a lunch bag and a thermos. “There’s trouble,” he says.

“You flatter me,” Eddie replies easily. They hang their coats on the rack and take off their shoes, and Steve tries to ignore that same sense of foreboding he felt the first time he was here. The feeling of something dangerous lying in wait, something hanging over his head. He does not look at the ceiling.

“What are you boys getting up to?” Wayne asks. He glances between them, and Steve instantly feels like he’s been x-rayed, like Wayne can somehow see the truth before he’s even told a lie.

“Just watching a movie,” Steve says anyway.

“Complete teenage anarchy,” Eddie says at the same time.

Wayne looks like he expected no other answer. He nods and zips up his lunch bag. “Right, just don’t burn the trailer down.”

“No promises.” Eddie pulls Steve down the hall, and even before he says anything, Steve knows where they’re going. He knows this trailer better than Eddie thinks he does. “I want to show you my room first. I cleaned up and everything.”

Eddie turns on a lamp and the first thing Steve sees makes him jump. “Jesus.”

There’s a poster right by the door of a giant skull with wide staring eyes, the kind that might start following him around the room. “How do you live with this?”

“I won’t lie, it’s gotten me a few times in the middle of the night,” Eddie admits. “But I like how creepy it is.” He takes his guitar out of the case and hangs it from a hook above the mirror, then he turns on two more lamps.

The room looks so different than it did in Steve’s dream. It’s warm and inviting and alive, not haunted by sickly black vines and a body on the bed, not plagued with death and decay. Steve wants to stay here, in this explosion of Eddie’s personality that makes him feel so at home.

“Eddie? You seen my badge?” Wayne calls.

Eddie rolls his eyes. “I’ll be right back.”

Steve takes the opportunity to look at all the things taped to the walls. There are posters, photos, artworks that Eddie probably made, and even pages ripped out of comic books. A few record sleeves are pinned to the wall beside a painted Corroded Coffin flag. Even though the room is tidy, there’s still a lot of stuff. The bookshelf is bursting and there’s a stack of shoe boxes with rows of tapes inside each one. There’s so much of Eddie in the room, and it makes Steve want to go home and tear down the boring wallpaper he’s had in his room for years. It hasn’t changed the way he has.

On the dresser there’s a small sculpture of gold skulls that Steve has no doubt Eddie made. He can’t imagine it in anyone else’s room. Beside it is a tray scattered with jewelry, and Steve recognizes a lot of the rings. This is where Eddie stands every morning and becomes himself. Most of them are silver but there’s one that stands out from the rest. Steve picks it up. It’s a plain gold band, and in the lamp light he can see an engraving on the inside. Always yours.

“Alright, badge is found and the parental unit has left the building. Time for some anarchy?” Eddie holds up two cans of beer, then his eyes fall to the ring in Steve’s hands. “Oh.”

Steve puts it back on the tray. “Sorry. I was just…looking around.”

Eddie snorts. “If you’re five seconds away from asking me if I’m married, let me save you the trouble. It’s my dad’s.” He comes closer and puts the two cans on top of the dresser, then he holds up his left hand. There’s a gold ring on his pinky that Steve has seen him wearing before. “This one is my mom’s.”

“Did they…are they gone? Is that why you have them?” Steve has only heard rumors about Eddie’s family and he knows not to trust those anymore.

Eddie frowns. “Gone? Oh. No. No, no, they’re not dead. They’re both still very much alive the last time I checked.”

“So…where are they? Why do you have their rings?”

“My dad gave me his before he went to prison. I don’t know if he wasn’t allowed to keep it or if he was afraid someone would steal it off him, but he told me to keep it safe and I’ve almost sold it at least a dozen times. I always chicken out.”

“And your mom’s?” Steve asks. “Where is she?”

“She lives in Chicago.” Eddie winces. “This is gonna sound terrible, but…I kind of stole hers.”

“You stole your mom’s wedding ring?”

“Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t steal it off her finger. She lost it and I never told her that I found it. She didn’t care about it.” Eddie pulls the ring off his pinky and puts it on top of the matching band. “It was kind of a habit after he left,” he says quietly.

“What was?”

“Stealing. I stole at least half of the things in this room. Books, food, music, jewelry. Anything I could get my grubby little hands on. I think in my tiny twelve year old brain I thought it would…bring him back. Or bring me to him. I don’t know. I was a dumb kid.”

“I don’t think it’s dumb,” Steve says honestly. It reminds him of all the things he used to do for his dad’s attention until the day he realized that nothing would ever be enough, because he would never be enough. “Is that when you started living with your uncle?”

Eddie nods. “My mom couldn’t handle me. No, scratch that, she didn’t want to handle me. I don’t think she tried very hard. When Uncle Wayne offered to take me she shipped me here like—” Eddie snaps his fingers. The sound seems to echo through the room.

“Did you want to live with him?” Steve doesn’t want him to stop talking. His voice is low and mesmerizing, and Steve wants to know everything Eddie is willing to tell him.

“Not at first, but he got through to me eventually. That and his bribe with the guitar was pretty effective. It’s probably the best thing that could’ve happened. My dad…I know he loved me in his way but he wasn’t exactly a good role model.” Eddie gives him a sardonic grin. “Obviously. My uncle is a better dad than he ever was.”

“If it means anything, I’m glad you ended up here.” Steve’s reward is another smile, but this time it’s real.

“Alright, your turn. Tell me a secret. And don’t say you don’t have any because I know you’ve got some, you mysterious little thing.”

Steve laughs even as thoughts of monsters and other worlds run through his mind. Even for just one night it’s hard to forget it all exists. “Should I stick with the same theme? I know for a fact I was an accident and my dad never wanted to have me.”

“What?” Eddie’s face goes soft and sad, and Steve instantly regrets his words. “How do you know that?”

“I heard them talking about it.”

“Jesus,” Eddie mutters. “What about your mom?”

Steve cracks open one of the beers and takes a swig. “I don’t know. I barely talk to her anymore. It’s funny, I guess. We live in the same house but we’re so far apart. My dad’s been living in the basement since my mom found out he cheated, she has her suite on the main floor, and my room is upstairs.”

“Sounds like your house is haunted too.”

“Yeah. It is.” Steve never would’ve thought of it like that but Eddie is right. They drift through each other’s lives, in and out of the house without talking to each other, and when he sees one of his parents it’s like a ghost sighting. Strange, startling, almost sad.

“I’m glad you exist,” Eddie says softly.

I’m glad you exist.

I’m glad you exist.

I’m glad you exist.

No one on this planet has ever said that to Steve before. Four simple words, almost as intimate as I love you. Steve feels like he swallowed fire and it’s burning all the way through his chest. He wonders if Eddie can hear his heartbeat. It feels so loud, like it’s broadcasting across town from right here in his chest, and all of his want is playing on the airwaves around his body.

Eddie doesn’t notice. He digs through the mess of jewelry on the tray and pulls out a braided leather bracelet the color of caramel. “This is for you.”

“You actually made me one?”

Eddie fiddles with it, twisting it and turning it inside out. “I know, it’s stupid. If you don’t want it—”

Steve kisses him.

He’s kissing Eddie.

He’s kissing Eddie—

I want it I want it I want it I want you

—and Eddie is kissing him back.

A million volts of electricity fizzle over Steve’s skin from his head to his toes. It’s so weirdrightwronglovelyaddictivetoomuchnotenough all at once, and he barely drank any beer but he’s so drunk. Drunk on Eddie, drunk on the feelings in his body, drunk on kissing another boy, drunk on the sounds their lips are making, drunk, drunk, drunk. He can’t breathe. He doesn’t even want to breathe unless it’s the air from Eddie’s lungs, and lucky for him Eddie is so willing to give. Steve pulls him closer, gasping into the kiss, and Eddie must be a mind reader now because he slides his hands up underneath Steve’s sweater and that’s exactly what Steve wants. He wants more.

Steve pushes the blazer off Eddie’s shoulders and slides his hands down Eddie’s chest. Finally he can touch, finally he knows what it’s like to feel Eddie’s skin burning underneath his fingertips, finally, finally, finally.

Steve breaks the kiss to rip off his sweater and Eddie flings the blazer away and then they’re kissing again like they’ll die if they stop. Even when Steve has to breathe he keeps his lips to Eddie’s skin, kissing and licking and biting his way down Eddie’s neck. Eddie whimpers and the sound sends lightning straight down Steve’s body. He doesn’t realize he’s moving until he can’t move anymore, and he’s pressing Eddie up against the dresser and rocking their hips together. He loves knowing that he can turn Eddie on so quickly, and he loves the feeling of another boy against him way more than he ever thought he could.

“Fuck me, I should’ve given you that thing ages ago,” Eddie pants into Steve’s ear. He’s wrapped all around Steve, one of his hands squeezing Steve’s butt, and he’s rocking back against Steve and there’s sparks all through Steve’s body it feels so fucking good. “Driving me fucking crazy, god that feels so good—”

“Okay?” Steve gasps against Eddie’s neck. “Not too fast?”

“Not fucking fast enough.”

“I mean—”

“I know, I know,” Eddie breathes, and he brings their faces together again and kisses Steve. “I’m good.”

And that’s good because Steve’s never been any good at going slow. This is just the beginning, just a taste of all the ways Eddie can make him feel—head spinning, heart racing, weak knees, greedy hands, desperate lips, so fucking turned on—and Steve wants more.

That, and he wants to find Eddie’s last tattoo.

Eddie makes a little disappointed noise when Steve stops moving against him but it doesn’t last long when he realizes why Steve stopped. “Fuck yes,” he whispers, almost more to himself than to Steve.

Steve is working his belt open with eager fingers. He’s as giddy as he was the first time he took a girl’s clothes off, and now he’s having an all new kind of first. He lowers the zipper and pushes Eddie’s jeans and boxers down—

And it’s right there. The snake curls over the front of Eddie’s left hip bone and down his thigh, with an open mouth and sharp fangs.

“Does it bite?” Steve jokes, and he leaves it up to Eddie to figure out which he’s referring to.

“Only if you’ve been a bad boy,” Eddie says with a filthy smirk. He reaches for Steve’s belt. “Your turn.”

After Steve’s jeans are off he drags Eddie to the bed. He’s a little nervous but he doesn’t let it stop him—it’s not like he doesn’t know how to touch a boy. He wants to memorize every sound Eddie makes, all the places his hands touch Steve, and all the ways he reacts when Steve touches him. That familiar stained feeling consumes Steve again but this time he doesn’t want to scrub it away. He wants it to sink into his skin and stay there, like a tattoo of Eddie.

Steve lies on top of him after they’re finished and listens to the soft sound of Eddie panting as he comes down from the high. There’s a drop of sweat on his neck and Steve is so close and he wants to lick it, so he does.

“Tickles,” Eddie mumbles.

Steve props his head on his hand so he can see Eddie. He’s so pretty—his cheeks are pink and his sweaty hair is splayed across the pillow and his eyes are soft and shining. Steve touches his face just because he can, because he wants to, because he just can’t get enough. He traces the tips of his fingers over Eddie’s forehead, down his nose, over his lips, and along his jaw.

“What are you doing?”

“No idea,” Steve says. “What are you doing?”

“Getting used to this,” Eddie says softly.

“I like that answer, I’m stealing it.” Now Steve can do all the things he wanted to do with Eddie. He can kiss Eddie, just because he wants to and because Eddie’s lips are right there for the taking. “I’m getting used to this. I’ve never been with a guy before.”

“I have but they didn’t do this.”

Oh. Steve thought maybe this would be a first for both of them but it’s not. Maybe Eddie has totally different expectations. “Do what?” he asks nervously.

“Stick around to chat,” Eddie says bluntly. Steve feels Eddie’s hands sliding up his back, leaving a trail of warmth over his skin. “It was more like wham bam thank you ma’am, but mister.” A tiny frown appears between Eddie’s eyebrows, and it doesn’t match the rest of the picture he makes. “Guys who just wanted to experiment.”

Now what Eddie said about his stupid heart is starting to make sense. Of course a curious guy who wanted to fool around would go to him because of his reputation, the same reputation that makes girls not want to be seen with him. I guess I kind of gave up on that, he said. He wants a relationship but the odds are stacked against him.

Shit. And Steve asked him before they were even real friends if he liked guys.

“Screw them.” Steve kisses him again, deeper this time, as deep as the promise he wants Eddie to feel. I’m not one of them. “That’s not what this is, Eddie. I want to date you. If you…if you want to date me.”

Eddie’s smile lights up the room. His arms tighten around Steve, and so do his legs, and then Steve is trapped in a full lying down bear hug with Eddie’s delighted laughter filling his ears. He was right. That’s what Eddie was worried about and for once Steve said the right thing.

“Holy shit, how is that even a question? Yes, I want to date you. Am I dreaming? If this is a dream don’t wake me up.”

“Not a dream,” Steve whispers in his ear. He would know. “Can you play that song for me again?” There was a line about dreams that he can’t remember, and he wants to hear Eddie sing it again.

“Yes. Of course. Definitely.”

Steve reluctantly lets Eddie go so he can plug in his guitar. Eddie doesn’t bother putting any clothes on when he’s up, he just comes back to sit on the edge of the bed with his guitar fully nude. Steve pulls back the blankets and slips underneath the covers so Eddie knows he has every intention of staying the night.

Eddie starts playing the song. It sounds so different from the way it did at the bar with the rest of the band, like the layers are pulled back and now it’s open and raw and holds even more longing.

“When evening falls, he’ll run to me…like whispered dreams your eyes can see…” Eddie’s voice is low and soothing and lovely, and it’s probably not supposed to be a lullaby but Steve quickly drifts into sleep. The last thing he’s aware of after the music stops is the feeling of Eddie warm beside him.

Chapter Text

The distant wailing of a guitar pulls Steve out of a deep and dreamless sleep. Slowly he wakes up enough to realize that it’s the radio, but it’s not his usual station. He reaches over to slap the alarm off and his hand falls through empty air. Then the bed shifts beside him.

All at once Steve remembers last night. He kissed Eddie. He slept with Eddie. Holy shit. And now the sight of Eddie’s dark curls splayed across the pillow beside him is all it takes to bring a giddy smile to his face. He moves closer with every intention of kissing Eddie awake and then he sees the time.

“Shit!” Steve bolts out of the bed and instantly regrets it. It’s so cold outside of the cozy blankets and the floor is like ice beneath his bare feet. He should just crawl back in beside Eddie and pretend time doesn’t exist. Stupid school, stupid basketball practice, stupid everything.

“Mm, no, don’t go.” Eddie’s voice is morning-rough and it settles inside Steve like an anchor. He shuts off the radio and pulls the blankets up higher around his shoulders.

“We have to go to school, come on.” Steve pulls his boxers and jeans on, zips up, grabs his sweater off the floor—socks. Where the hell are his socks?

“Or we could just stay in bed and have sex all day.”

“What, with your uncle around? Oh, shit. What time does he get back?”

“Eight-ish.”

“Fuck, it’s almost eight now!” And Steve still can’t find his socks. Fuck it, he’s borrowing some of Eddie’s. He pulls open the top drawer of the dresser and it’s complete chaos inside.

“Hey, relax. He knows I like guys.”

Steve pauses his search. “He does? And he doesn’t care?”

“Nope.” Eddie comes up behind him and his arms slide around Steve’s waist. He tucks his face into Steve’s neck and his breath is warm on Steve’s skin. He’s still naked, and it takes every ounce of self-control Steve has not to turn around and kiss him senseless. “What are you looking for?”

“Uh…socks.”

Eddie reaches into the drawer and pulls two matching socks out of the abyss of clothes, and he puts on a pair of boxers while Steve shoves the socks on.

“If you find mine—” Steve starts.

“I’m keeping them. They’re mine now.”

That’s exactly what Steve was going to tell him anyway. “Okay, then I’m keeping yours.”

Steve goes to the front door to put on his coat and shoes before he can make a bad decision. Eddie follows him wearing just his boxers and in the early morning light filtering through the curtains his tattoos stand out against his pale skin. Steve leans in to kiss him and it feels different in the light of day. Sweeter, gentler, a good morning and a goodbye all wrapped into one. They’re both smiling when they pull apart and Steve feels weirdly shy.

“I’ll see you at school,” Eddie says. He squeezes Steve’s hand once before letting go.

“Yeah, you bet.” Steve gives him one last kiss on the cheek and then he’s leaving when everything inside him is begging to just stay. Leaving Eddie is turning into one of the hardest things he’s ever had to do.

Steve unlocks the front door and walks right into his mom as she’s leaving for work. She looks at him, and he looks at her, and it’s just like what he told Eddie last night. They’re ghosts in each other’s hallways, startled to be seen despite living in the same house.

“Morning,” Steve says awkwardly. He tries to get around her but she steps in front of him. The click of her high heel feels like a bad omen, a red morning and dangerous waters ahead of him.

“Where the hell have you been?”

“I…I left early. I forgot my bag.”

She raises an eyebrow and purses her lips, and her deep red lipstick makes her look even more severe. “Try again, Steve. I turned your alarm off so I know you weren’t here.”

Damn it. Maybe Eddie had the right idea to just stay in bed. “I was at a friend’s house, alright? It was late and I didn’t want to bike home so I just slept over. It’s not a big deal.” The second those last words slips out of Steve’s mouth he knows he fucked up.

“Not a big deal?” His mom seethes. “That’s for me to decide, not you. You can’t stay out all night whenever you damn please, and especially not on a school night. You need to focus on your grades, not your friends.”

“My grades are fine,” Steve snaps. Since when does she care? She only wants to make sure that he’s not causing trouble and ruining her reputation. Ever since the accident that’s all she cares about.

“Not when you’re failing biology, they’re not.”

That cuts through Steve’s anger like a knife. “What are you talking about? I’m not failing biology.”

She crosses her arms and gives him a pointed look. “I ran into your teacher last week. He told me you got an F on your last test.”

Jesus. She doesn’t even have to try. Wherever she goes people are more than happy to tell her how he’s still fucking up.

“It was just one test. And if you wanted to know my grades you could ask me,” Steve says bitterly.

“Would you tell me the truth?”

Steve opens his mouth but no words come out. He hates that she’s right. Of course he’d lie, because this is exactly the kind of shit he’d get if he didn’t. “I have to go to school,” he mutters. This time she lets him pass.

“We’re going to have a talk, young man, and you better be home by ten from now on,” she calls after him as he pounds up the stairs. “I’ll be checking!”

There’s a note in Steve’s locker when gets to school. He’s late for math and there’s a folded piece of paper sitting innocently on top of his textbook. He picks it up and a familiar bracelet falls out.

You forgot something, lover boy :)

Steve wears the bracelet to math class and keeps it on during gym. When the bell rings and he’s heading to English he feels his skin start buzzing and a fluttering in his gut. He walks into Mrs. Cooper’s class and meets Eddie’s eyes from across the room, and he thinks he might explode on the spot.

Steve slides into his seat and turns around to face Eddie. “Hey.”

Was that casual enough? He hopes no one is looking at them, because he doesn’t know if he can be casual when it feels like last night is written all over him. If someone looked close enough they would probably see the stain Eddie left on him, every place on his body where Eddie touched him.

“Hey,” Eddie says with a voice that sounds like it’s keeping secrets. Or maybe that’s just in Steve’s head. He looks the same as he does every school day, and he also looks breathtaking, so maybe it’s just the way he’s looking at Steve that’s different. Maybe it’s the way Steve knows him now.

“Hi.”

Eddie bites his lip but he can’t stop his slow smile. “You already said that.”

“Oh. Right.”

Steve is almost grateful when Mrs. Cooper starts her lecture, except he really isn’t because it means he has to try and pay attention. He has to pretend that he cares about anything other than the boy behind him and that’s going to be so damn hard. He wishes the world could stop turning for a day just to let him get used to this. No, it’ll definitely take longer than one day.

Steve feels a tap on his shoulder, and he takes the note that’s stabbed on the end of Eddie’s pencil.

Can’t stop thinking about you

Steve’s breath catches in his chest. He glances around to make sure no one is looking at them and scribbles out a reply. Don’t think too loud, you don’t know who can read minds (I can’t stop thinking about you too)

Eddie huffs the quietest laugh when he reads it. Got an idea for our first date, can I pick you up at 6? :)

I’m supposed to be taking you on a date, Steve writes back.

Do you have plans, lover boy?

Not yet. Steve feels bad just writing the words. He should’ve thought about it already because this is going to be tricky. He can’t take Eddie to Susie’s Diner and slurp a milkshake together. It’s bad enough that Tommy and Carol saw them having pizza together and now they really are going on a date. Where can he take Eddie where they’ll be alone?

You can plan our next date :) please tell me you’re free tonight

Only for you. Steve adds a heart to the end of the note and gives it to Eddie before he can overthink it.

Five minutes pass and he doesn’t get a reply. Another five minutes pass and Steve has to stop himself from looking back. Maybe that’s the end of the conversation and he won’t get another note, but then—poke.

There’s no new message on the paper but a drawing instead. In the top corner there’s a cherub cupid like something out of an old painting. It’s holding a bow and shooting an arrow straight through Steve’s heart.

Steve crashes against the lockers beside Robin and she drops the textbook in her hands. He snatches it out of mid-air before it falls on her feet.

“Sorry,” he says sheepishly. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Sneaking up on me and making a loud noise is a great way to not scare me, dingus,” she drawls. She looks around the hallway. Most students are already gone, eager to start their Thanksgiving long weekend, but a few people are still at their lockers or talking to friends. “You’re talking to me at school now?”

“Is that…okay?”

She shrugs. “I figured you wouldn’t.”

“Everyone talks to their friends at school, why can’t I?” Steve half-expects her to deny it, to say we’re not friends, but she doesn’t. She gives him a small, wry smile and shakes her head.

“I can’t believe I’m friends with Steve Harrington.”

“Like you said, we have an understanding. Speaking of which, I have some news.”

This is the moment Steve was waiting for. She frowns at him but it doesn’t take her long to catch on. The confusion falls off her face and leaves her wide-eyed, her mouth slack with shock.

“No,” she whispers.

Steve’s grin breaks free. “Yeah. Sorry.”

“Already?” She slams her hand against the locker door then shoves Steve in the arm. “You bastard! I was getting ready, I swear! I was going to tell her—ugh!”

“You should still tell her.”

Robin groans and slaps her locker door closed, then bangs her forehead on it. “I never should’ve made that stupid bet. I won’t have the money until payday.”

“No,” Steve says instantly. “I’m not going to take it.”

“You won fair and square,” she insists.

“Robin, seriously, I’m not going to take your money, but your deadline still stands.” Steve holds up his hand to his ear like it’s a phone. “End of the month.”

“I know, I know. I can do it.”

“I’ll tell you all of the dirty details on Saturday, I gotta get to basketball.”

Robin wrinkles her nose and says, “Can’t wait.” Steve just laughs.

A familiar rush of deja vu makes Steve feel like he’s swimming in the past, but at least this time he knows why. He’s outside the drama room watching Eddie play DnD with his friends and this time he doesn’t hesitate. He knocks on the door.

The whole group looks at him. The only thing that saves Steve from feeling self-conscious about their confused stares is the way Eddie lights up. He rushes to the door and pulls Steve into the darkness of the hallway.

“Are you ditching basketball practice for me, lover boy?” He stands so close and Steve desperately wants to kiss him—because he hasn’t stopped thinking about kissing Eddie all day—but the fear of being caught by one of Eddie’s friends holds him back. He settles for taking Eddie’s hand instead.

“Uh, no? It’s over.”

Eddie looks at his watch. “Oh.”

“I was going to head home and I saw your van was still here. I didn’t know you were playing today.”

“Mrs. Harding let us have Hellfire today since we’re off on Friday and we need our fix. You can come in,” Eddie says, and his eyes are wide and hopeful.

“Are you sure?” Steve should, and he knows that, but it doesn’t stop him from being nervous about officially meeting Eddie’s friends. They probably think he’s the same old douchebag he used to be. They probably think Eddie is crazy for being friends with him.

Eddie misreads his hesitation but that’s probably a good thing. “Relax, you don’t have to play. Mr. Parker is going to kick us out to the curb soon anyways.” Eddie squeezes Steve’s hand. “Just stay, I’ll drive you home after so you can get all prettied up for our date.” His smile is easy and reassuring and Steve is helpless to say no so he follows Eddie inside.

Eddie’s three bandmates are sitting around the table but there are two other guys who are both looking at Steve like he’s from another planet.

“We have a voyeur for our journey through the Mines of Madness, gentlemen” Eddie says with a dramatic sweep of his hand. “You know Gareth, Jeff, and Brandon, and this is Scott and Ian.”

“Hi,” Steve says awkwardly.

The three members of Corroded Coffin look at each other. Jeff whispers something to Brandon and they both snicker.

“Hey, quit it, dickheads,” Eddie says at the same time that Gareth elbows Jeff in the side.

“Hi,” Gareth says to Steve.

“Eddie, seriously?” Scott groans. He has a full head of frizzy curls that could rival Dustin’s and glasses that take up half of his face. “There’s no way Steve Harrington plays DnD.”

“Yeah, man, what the hell is he doing here?” Ian says. He has the most outrageous clothes out of the whole group, like he couldn’t decide what colour of the rainbow to wear so he picked all of them.

“If you assholes can’t be nice then let’s pack the fuck up,” Eddie snaps.

The group goes quiet and this is exactly what Steve didn’t want. “Eddie…” he starts. He doesn’t want to cause a rift between Eddie and his friends.

Eddie ignores his weak protest and pulls out the throne-like chair at the head of the table. His chair. “You’re allowed to be here. Sit down.”

Steve sits in the chair like it’s about to fall out from underneath him. Already he feels pretty special, sitting in Eddie’s chair that’s fit for a king with all of Eddie’s plans and notes and the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Dungeon Master's Guide in front of him. There’s even a silver goblet with soda in it.

Eddie picks up where they left off. He walks around the table as he tells his tale of a group of heroes exploring a mine. Steve gets a few more dubious looks from Scott and Ian but the guys from Corroded Coffin don’t pay him anymore attention, which is a relief. They quickly get back into the swing of the game, rolling dice and throwing around phrases that make no sense to Steve, even with Eddie’s stuff in front of him.

Eddie leans over Steve’s shoulder to check something on his plan and mutters under his breath. Then he gives Steve a dice. “Here, roll. Behind the screen so they don’t see.”

Steve rolls and it lands on a twelve. “Is that…bad?”

“They’re about to find out,” Eddie says with a secretive smirk. “Gareth the Great, what’s your AC?”

“Five,” Gareth says warily.

“As you lead your team further into the darkness, you feel the hairs raise on the back of your neck. It’s deathly quiet and the loudest thing you hear is your own footsteps as you walk further into the depths. You know that if you can’t find your way out then you won’t be able to claim the bounty on Mage Drakkar’s head. You must be fast. You start to smell something, something different than the old dry earth.” Eddie takes a deep breath through his nose as if he’s in the world of their game. The rest of his friends hang on his every word. “It smells…sharp. It burns in the back of your throat. Then you hear it—a noise like thunder coming towards you and a screech so loud your ears might burst.” Eddie slaps a figurine of a creature with long claw arms onto the map. “The ankheg! Roll!”

“Shit,” Gareth curses. He rolls a two. “SHIT!”

“The jaws of the ankheg open wide and a spray of its acid burns through your vambrace and sizzles into your flesh!” Eddie grabs Gareth’s arm and he lets out a cry as if he’s in pain. “The spray narrowly misses Jeff the Mighty but it hits the lamp and plunges you all into darkness. Scott, your action!”

“We need to see the damn thing. I cast Light!”

“A bright light appears above your head and the ankheg shies away. Brandon, your action!”

“I draw my sword to stab the beast!”

Before Eddie can narrate the attack there’s a knock on the open door and the entire group groans. The janitor chuckles. “You boys are the only ones who still want to be here,” he says. “You know the drill.”

“So what do you think?” Eddie asks as they follow the rest of his friends outside to the parking lot. The sky is mottled with gray clouds and it’s just starting to get dark. Eddie waves to his friends before they all go their separate ways.

“It looks complicated and super nerdy.” Steve nudges his shoulder into Eddie’s as they walk to the bike rack. “I knew you were a giant dork,” he teases.

Eddie doesn’t get offended, and this time he doesn’t deny it. “And you want to date a giant dork which means you will slowly find yourself descending into the depths of nerdery before you know it.”

“I doubt that.”

“No,” Eddie says, “maybe not. But you’ll try it, right?” He helps Steve lift the bike into the back of the van and then they climb inside and he starts the engine.

“I don’t think I’m going to like it,” Steve says honestly. Not only does it seem like there’s a lot to remember, but fighting imaginary monsters might remind him too much of fighting a real one.

“I’m not expecting you to like everything that I like, lover boy. You know that, right? Would you expect me to like basketball?”

“No, of course not.”

“The only dealbreaker is if you’re not willing to give it a shot at least once. And I could probably forgive that if you kiss me like you did last night.”

“I’m going to do that anyway,” Steve promises.

Eddie pulls to a stop beside the woods near Steve’s house. They’re finally alone but Steve still doesn’t kiss Eddie. It’s not dark yet, and anyone could walk by or drive by and see them.

Eddie leans over the console but he doesn’t try to kiss Steve, he just takes Steve’s hands. “I’ll pick you up here in an hour, okay? Dress warm and be hungry.”

“Where are we going?”

“Who says we’re going anywhere?” Eddie says mysteriously. “Maybe I just said that to throw you off. Maybe cute psychic boys should already know.”

Steve’s cheeks feel warm and he smiles down at their hands. Of course he’s been called cute before, to his face and overheard from gossiping girls, but coming from Eddie…it feels different. “I’m not a mind reader.”

“So read my lips.” Eddie makes a kissy face at him. “That’s the only hint you’re getting.”

“I can’t wait.” Steve brings Eddie’s hand up to his lips and kisses the back of his fingers, then he forces himself to get out of the van. He feels just like he did this morning but at least there’s only an hour until he gets to see Eddie again. One hour and it’s still too damn long.

Steve isn’t used to this. He’s sitting in the passenger seat watching Eddie drive further and further into the woods with no idea where they’re going or what they’re doing. It’s weird. He’s always the one planning dates, taking a girl somewhere, driving her home. It’s nice to not have to think about all of that, to just show up, look nice, and be surprised.

Eddie turns onto a dirt path and drives until he can’t drive anymore through the trees, then he turns the key and the van goes quiet.

“We’re having a date in the middle of the woods?” Steve asks. He doesn’t really care, he’d probably have a good time with Eddie anywhere, but… “It’s cold.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t let you get frostbite. Come on.” They hop out and Eddie opens the back door. “Hold out your arms, lover boy. We have stuff to carry.”

Eddie gives him a large tote bag, a rolled up sleeping bag, and a flashlight. Steve clicks it on. Inside the back of the van there’s a bucket with chunks of wood sticking out and some metal things that look like giant forks and oh. Now it makes sense. They’re having a campfire.

Eddie carries everything else and shuts the back doors with his foot. He clicks on another flashlight and starts leading Steve on a narrow footpath through the trees.

“You found another flashlight,” Steve realizes.

“Oh, I knew exactly where it was. I only brought one to the house so we’d have to share.”

“You’re so sneaky.”

“Sneaky as hell,” Eddie agrees, and he looks back at Steve with a smirk.

They keep walking until the trees start to clear and then they’re standing at the edge of Lover’s Lake. There’s a faint cast of light just above the horizon where the sun has already disappeared and the clouds from earlier have broken up, revealing a faint half-moon across the sky. A few stars are bravely starting to peek into the world, waking up while everything else falls asleep.

Eddie drops his stuff and starts piling the logs in the middle of the small clearing. Steve rolls out the sleeping bag but Eddie makes a noise of protest.

“Uh uh, no. Stop.” He pushes Steve gently back towards the water’s edge.

“What—? What are you doing?”

“I’m setting this up. You stand here and look pretty.” Eddie pulls him into a kiss and Steve forgets what they’re talking about as soon as Eddie’s lips touch his. This is the kind of kiss he’s been dying for all day, the kind that makes him weak in the knees and sends his heartbeat spiraling out of control. He wishes he could spend every minute of his life kissing Eddie like this, like nothing else matters.

“Okay, okay,” Steve whispers when they pull apart. “Get the fire started, I’m freezing.”

Eddie gives him one more kiss and then does what he’s told. He flicks open his lighter and sets the kindling ablaze. Steve’s eyes water when smoke streams into the air and he turns around to face the water.

He’s been to the popular make out spot at the top of the heart-shaped lake but he’s never seen it from this side before. He can see a few dark cabins across the lake but otherwise they’re all alone, and despite the cold it’s a beautiful night. The glittering reflection of starlight across the dark water is mesmerizing and he quickly gets used to the boat rocking beneath him and the soft splash of the oars dipping into the darkness. They row further and further from the shore, from safety, and Steve knows he has to be the one to do it. He has to go down there to see if Dustin is right, to see if there really is a gate in Lover’s Lake.

Steve blinks. He’s still on the shore but his heart is pounding like he’s getting ready to jump into the freezing black water. Shit. Of course Lover’s Lake is important. He should’ve known that after his hallucination at swim practice. He should’ve come here before now.

I found a gate at the bottom of Lover’s Lake.

Is it down there right now? But why would there be a gate down there?

No. He’s on his first date with a boy he’s crazy about. He’s not going to think about this shit. He’s not going to ruin this.

The midnight black water lapping at Steve’s feet seems closer than it was a moment ago. He clicks the flashlight back on.

It’s not water.

Hundreds of long-legged spiders are surging over the pebbles like living darkness, coming out of the water. No, they are the water. Steve jumps back from the darkness. He’s on the shore of a giant sea of black widows and they’re all coming straight towards him. He needs to get the hell out of here. He stumbles on something and loses his balance—

“Whoa, hey!”

—and then he’s in Eddie’s arms, looking up at his worried face.

Eddie pulls Steve back to his feet. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

Steve shines the flashlight all around his shoes. He doesn’t see the spiders anymore, just dead grass and twigs, but he feels itchy like they’re crawling all over him. He points the beam towards the lake and all he sees is water. “I—I don’t…”

“Steve?” Eddie says quietly. He looks at the lake then back to Steve.

Steve takes a deep breath. “It’s nothing. I saw…I thought I saw a spider.”

“Where? On you?” Eddie shines his flashlight on Steve and walks around him. “I don’t see any.”

“It was probably just the dark playing tricks on me,” Steve lies. It was another hallucination. It felt as real as the one at swim practice, or the one he had riding his bike. Maybe Lover’s Lake is as cursed as he is.

Eddie doesn’t let it go that easily. His mouth twists and he looks at the forest around them. “Maybe this was a bad idea. It’s too creepy out here, isn’t it. I don’t know what I was thinking, we can go—”

“What? No, no, I’m fine, this is fine.” Steve wraps his arms around Eddie’s neck and kisses his cheek. “I’m not scared of the dark, alright? This is great, Eddie. This is the closest thing to camping I’ve ever done and I don’t want to leave.”

That’s enough to distract Eddie from his worry. He tilts his head. “You’ve…never been camping?”

Steve shrugs. “My parents never took me when I was a kid.”

“So you’ve never had a s’more?”

“A what?”

Eddie looks horrified. “Jesus, you deprived soul. Okay, you’re right, we can’t leave because you need some education.”

Eddie pulls him down to sit on the sleeping bag. He already has the food spread out like a little picnic in front of them—hot dogs, marshmallows, chocolate, a box of graham crackers, forks and knives and paper plates—and he takes one of the roasting forks out of the flames and slides a few hot dogs on.

“Here, you can have weiner duty,” he says with a wiggle of his eyebrows.

Steve laughs and takes the fork. Eddie lays out some graham crackers and chocolate squares on a plate then slides some marshmallows onto his fork and holds it over the fire.

In spite of Steve’s strange hallucination this couldn’t be a more perfect date. The itchy feeling on his skin is gone now and the fire is enough to keep him warm. More and more stars pop out of the deep blue sky as the evening grows into night, and the crackling of the fire is a soothing sound. Most of all, Eddie looks so beautiful with the light of the flames dancing over his face, flickering in the glass of his eyes like it’s living inside of him. He always looks good but he looks the most alive at night, like he belongs with the magic and mystery of the darkness.

“Hey, uh, lover boy?” Eddie says. “You’re supposed to hold them over the fire, not in the fire. Unless you like the taste of charcoal?”

“Oh, shit.” Steve lifts his fork out but it’s too late. The hot dogs are smoking and shriveled into tiny black worms. “It’s all your fault.”

“Oh, sure.”

“No, seriously. I was too distracted looking at your beautiful face.” Steve kisses his cheek and watches that familiar slow smile bloom on Eddie’s face until he’s grinning wide. That one is Steve’s favorite. He’ll do whatever it takes to see it over and over again.

Eddie shakes his head. “You’re unreal, you know that? I still can’t believe we’re on a date. I thought my giant crush on you was going to get me nowhere.”

“Oh, it’s giant, is it?”

“Shut up.”

“Don’t worry, mine’s pretty giant, too.” Steve winks and Eddie cracks up laughing.

After Steve successfully roasts some more hot dogs and Eddie finishes a few rounds of marshmallows, they eat. Eddie showed him how to cut the hot dogs so they curl up like mini octopuses and it might be all in Steve’s head but the curled ones seem to taste better. He picks up his first s’more, and the marshmallow oozes out from the crackers and the chocolate melts onto his fingers. He takes one bite and falls in love.

“Oh my god, this is so good.”

“It’s called a s’more because once you have one, you’ll want some more,” Eddie says. He’s already finished his second one and there’s a smudge of chocolate at the corner of his mouth that Steve shamelessly leans over and kisses away.

When they’re done eating they pack up the food and tuck themselves into the sleeping bag. Steve leaves no space between them, slipping his leg between Eddie’s and wrapping his arm around Eddie’s back. He kisses Eddie like he doesn’t know how to stop and it feels like their first kiss, intoxicating and dizzying and right, so right. Everything about being with Eddie feels that way.

“You have lips meant for kissing, you know that?” Steve whispers against his lips. “I could kiss you all night.”

“Sounds like a good plan,” Eddie murmurs. “We can go back to my place and repeat last night after my uncle leaves.”

Steve sighs and his breath comes out in a cloud between them. He knew he would have to ruin the mood at some point. “I can’t.”

Eddie frowns and there’s a hint of hesitation on his face. “You don’t…want to?”

“Hey, trust me, I want to, but I have to be home by ten.”

Eddie shuffles to bring his hand out of the sleeping bag and he clicks the light on his watch. It’s almost nine now. He groans. “Since when do you have a curfew?”

“Since this morning when my mom caught me coming home after being out all night on a school night.”

“So? Tomorrow’s a holiday, who cares?”

Steve cups Eddie’s cheek, warming up the soft skin beneath his fingertips. “I’m not as lucky as you. Your uncle doesn’t care that you like guys but my parents would murder me if they knew about this, and my mom is the chair of the town council. People love telling her shit about me. If I keep coming home late, if someone sees you picking me up and dropping me off…she’s smart, okay? She can connect the dots. I have to play by her rules or she’ll get suspicious.” Steve kisses him again to try and wipe the unhappy look off his face. “It sucks. I don’t want you to feel like I’m one of those girls who never wants to be seen with you—”

“Steve, stop. This is totally different. I’m not stupid, I know we need to be careful. And you don’t ignore me at school like they did. You came to Hellfire and met my friends. That means a lot to me. I know we can’t go on dates around town and hold hands at school and shit.” Eddie takes Steve’s hand off his cheek and holds it between them, tangling their fingers together. “It’s okay,” he says quietly.

That doesn’t make Steve feel better. He doesn’t want Eddie to feel like a dirty little secret again after all of his bad experiences. Maybe there is a way they can still do all of the fun things that everyone else does.

“Do you still want to go bowling on Saturday? For our next date?”

Eddie looks at him like he’s grown another head. “What? Isn’t what’s-her-face who works at the bowling alley friends with your mom? That’s the total opposite of being careful.”

Steve grins. “What if we’re not alone?”

“Not alone?” Eddie echoes.

“Yeah. Like a double date.”

“A double date? With who?”

“You'll see. Just pick me up after work on Saturday. It’ll be fun, I promise.” Steve can see his hesitation in the flickering of the firelight so he kisses Eddie again. Maybe Eddie can feel the same magic in their kiss that makes Steve forget everything, every worry and every fear. When he kisses Eddie everything feels easy.

“Okay,” Eddie whispers after they pause for breath, proving Steve’s theory correct. “Saturday. Bowling. Double date. Sounds like fun.”

The boat rocks gently beneath Steve. Robin gave up on rowing to wave at the kids standing on the shore and now Steve has the paddle. In front of him Eddie is rowing quietly. He’s taking it all in stride for someone who watched a girl die in front of his eyes, but maybe that’s exactly the reason why. He needs a reason for Chrissy’s death, someone to blame. Like they needed someone to blame for Hopper, and Bob, and Barbara.

Steve never knew Eddie in school. They never shared a friend group. They were rarely in the same class and when they were Eddie rarely showed up. Steve doesn’t know much about him except that he’s here, and he’s scared, and he’s trying. He fits into their little band of monster-hunting misfits perfectly, and Steve hopes he’s not the only one who wants Eddie to stay.

Chapter Text

Steve already feels like an intruder as he stands in the cold outside of his ex-girlfriend’s house. A warm glow spills out from behind the curtains and a thin sheet of powdery snow covers the front yard, and the only blemishes in the perfect picture are the dark patches that Steve’s boots leave behind as he walks to the front door. He doesn’t want to be here. He needs to be here. He can’t put this off anymore.

Steve rings the doorbell and waits.

And waits.

And waits even longer.

He reaches for the button again but the door opens and a rush of warm air carrying the mouth-watering scent of turkey and potatoes washes over him. Mr. Wheeler peers at Steve through his too-large glasses. Steve always thought they make him look a little bit like a frog.

“Do you know what day it is?” he asks.

“Thanksgiving?”

“That’s right,” Mr. Wheeler says. “It’s Thanksgiving. Shouldn’t you be with your family?”

Steve makes a Herculean effort to keep his annoyance off his face. He doesn’t miss dealing with Nancy’s dad. “It’s almost nine o’clock,” he points out. “Aren’t you done dinner yet?”

“No. We still need pie.”

“Ted? Who is it?”

“Some boy,” Mr. Wheeler calls back to his wife.

Some boy. Steve bites back his words. He spent a year dating Nancy, came to their house more times than he can count, and Mr. Wheeler doesn’t know his name?

“I need to talk to Nancy,” he says as politely as he can manage. “It’s important.”

Mr. Wheeler frowns at him. “Didn’t Nancy dump you?”

“What? No, it—that has nothing to do with this.” Behind Mr. Wheeler, Steve sees Nancy in the hallway as she carries a dish into the kitchen. “Hey, Nance!”

“Steve?” Nancy comes to the door and shoos her dad out of the way. She folds her arms together to ward off the incoming cold. “What are you doing here?”

“I’ve been feeling kind of upside down about things lately and I need to talk to you.”

Just as Steve hoped, she catches the emphasis in his words instantly. Her eyes widen and she reaches out to pull him inside. “Come in.”

“This is a day for family, Nancy,” Mr. Wheeler complains, but he doesn’t do much to stop Steve from entering his house. “Not ex-boyfriends.”

“Nancy?” Mrs. Wheeler comes out of the kitchen with a pie server in her hand. “Oh. Hello, Steve. What’s going on?”

“We just need to talk,” Nancy tells her mom. “We won’t be long.”

“On Thanksgiving? We’re cutting the pie, honey. Can’t it wait?”

“Save me a piece.” Nancy drags Steve upstairs before her parents can get another word out.

A wave of nostalgia hits Steve when he walks into her room. It looks the exact same. The same blankets, the same Tom Cruise poster on her wall, the same pictures of her and Barbara above her desk. He’s being ridiculous. It’s only been a month since they broke up, of course it wouldn’t change that much, but seeing her room again makes him feel fond. He was afraid this would be awkward and uncomfortable, but maybe it won’t be so bad.

He takes off his coat and drapes it over the back of her chair. From the pocket he takes out his notebook. “Sorry for dropping in on your Thanksgiving. I thought you might be busy this weekend and I didn’t want to wait. I need your help.”

Nancy closes the door quietly and turns the lock. “What’s going on? What’s that?”

Steve gives her the notebook. “Everything I know. Everything that’s happened since my accident.”

Her face twists into a familiar frown. He used to smooth out those lines on her forehead with his thumb to make her smile, but he doesn’t do it now. “The accident?”

“Yeah. Ever since I crashed I’ve been having weird dreams…” Once Steve starts he can’t seem to stop talking. She’s the one person in Hawkins that he can tell anything to, the only person he doesn’t have to lie to, and the weight on his shoulders lightens with each word. He tells her everything—waking up after the accident and having dreams about people he doesn’t know yet, hallucinations that feel real, seeing Victor Creel at the asylum, going to his house, the strange warm presence that he’s half-convinced is an angel—everything. He tells her everything. The only thing he doesn’t say is Eddie’s name.

So maybe he was wrong. Maybe there isn’t a single person in Hawkins he can tell the whole truth.

“...and all of this means something, but I don’t know what. All I know for sure is that something bad is going to happen. Something really bad, Nance.”

Nancy looks stunned. She gazes across the room with a distant look in her eyes, and the notebook is forgotten in her hands.

“Nance?”

“I…are you…are you serious about all of…this?”

“Yeah, I’m serious.” Steve knows that it’s a lot, even for her, even for someone who already knows about the Upside Down. She probably has a thousand questions but all he cares about is that she believes him. He needs her to believe him.

After a long stretch of silence she says something completely unexpected.

“I’m impressed.”

“...What?”

She blinks out of her unfocused stare and looks at the notebook again. “You did all of this? You’re piecing things together, you did research, you got in to see a maximum security patient at Pennhurst? It’s impressive, Steve.”

Her praise sticks to Steve and makes him itchy, uncomfortable. It does sound impressive when she says it like that but none of it was because he wanted to impress her or anyone. He just wants to know what the hell is happening. “I don’t know. I mean…I had help.”

“Really? Who?”

“Just…a new friend.”

She looks curious. “Hm. I thought this wasn’t your handwriting.”

The book on her lap is open to the page where Eddie took notes at the asylum. He caught the details of Creel’s story with notes like moved to Hawkins for son = TERRIBLE idea and doodles around the page. A devilish face with horns, two pairs of bleeding eyes. The last note on the page reads he stabbed his own eyes out? Steve, this guy is nuts.

Steve rubs the back of his neck. “Yeah, uh…my friend wrote those.”

“I still don’t understand how this Victor Creel is connected to your dreams or the Upside Down. You think the demogorgon killed his family…in the fifties?”

Steve sighs. “I don’t know either, Nance, but I told you what happened at his house. Maybe there used to be a gate there. Victor thought he heard an angel and when I was there I felt that warmth, and I saw that bright light.”

“You really think there’s an angel in the Upside Down?” Nancy looks skeptical, and out of all the unbelievable things he just told her, he knows why she doubts that the most. There’s nothing good in the Upside Down.

“I don’t know,” he says again. He’s starting to feel like a broken record. “There’s something in the house, just…upside down.”

“And you think that whatever killed Creel’s family is going to kill Chrissy Cunningham and this girl Max…because of your dreams that they had bleeding eyes and floated in the air?” Nancy taps her finger over the eyes that Eddie drew. One pair is smaller than the other. Mother and daughter.

“Yeah, here.” Steve takes out his copy of the article from the back of the book. “When I read this I thought maybe one of his kids opened a gate and let a monster out.”

“Like Eleven.”

“Exactly.” Steve gives her a few minutes to read the article, and watches her look between the article and Eddie’s notes, back and forth, back and forth. He can almost see the gears turning in her brain.

“Bleeding nose,” she murmurs.

“What?”

“In your notes, here. It says Alice and Virginia, bones snapped, bleeding eyes. Henry, bleeding nose, coma, died later.”

“Yeah, Creel did this.” Steve puts two fingers underneath his nose and draws them down, the same way that Victor did when he was telling his story. He couldn’t speak the words so his hands did the talking for him. “Is that weird?”

“You don’t think it’s weird that he didn’t die like his mom and his sister? Maybe you’re right.”

“Which part?”

“About Henry. Eleven, when she used her powers in the pool to find Will she bled from her nose. Mike said that it happened every time she used them.”

“So you think…because his nose was bleeding…?”

“Maybe,” she says. She doesn’t sound convinced. “We can’t prove it but maybe he had powers and he was trying to fight off whatever was killing them. Maybe he’s the reason that his father made it out alive.”

“How does that help us if it comes back?”

Nancy puts the article between the pages and closes the book with a defeated sigh. “It means that we need Eleven.”

“I thought she was…” Gone. Dead.

“All Mike said was that the demogorgon took her.”

“It took Will and we got him back.”

“It took Barb and she died,” Nancy says quietly. The grief in her words robs Steve of his own voice. She looks at the corkboard above her desk with those photobooth pictures of her and her best friend. Laughing, smiling, happier times long gone. “It’s been a year. No one would be able to survive in the Upside Down that long.”

“But…the gate’s still open, right? She made it, she would know how to get out.”

“Did you have any dreams about her?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t even know what she looks like.”

“She’s Mike’s age and she—” Nancy’s face snaps over to the door.

“What?”

She puts her finger to her lips. Quiet. She creeps over the carpet then unlocks the door and yanks it open. “I knew it! What are you doing?”

“Nothing!” Mike obviously had his ear against the door. “Mom told me to bring you some pie.”

“Then why didn’t you knock?” Nancy demands. She snatches the two plates of pie from his hands and brings them to the bed.

“You were talking about Eleven!”

“No, we weren’t,” Steve lies. The last thing he needs is for Mike and his friends to start pestering him for answers he doesn’t have.

Mike glares at him, and Steve has been on the receiving end of those dirty looks so many times that it doesn’t bother him anymore. He glares right back.

“Yes, you were,” Mike insists. “I heard–”

“Mike!” Nancy barks. He shuts up. “If there’s anything you need to know, I’ll tell you later.” She slams the door in his face.

“I’m sorry about him.” Nancy sits on the bed and brings one of the plates onto her lap. “He’s been kind of a mess since…”

“It’s fine.” Steve scrapes the whipped cream off his pumpkin pie and onto Nancy’s piece. He’s surprised that Mrs. Wheeler sent up a piece for him but she’s nothing if not polite.

“Thanks.” Nancy breaks the crust from her piece and gives it to him, and they smile at each other. It’s a familiar ritual. Nancy eats her pie slowly, and because he knows her, knows that look on her face, he can tell that she wants to say something. He eats his own piece and waits for her to be ready.

“Are we…can we still be friends? I’m sorry. Again. Still.”

“I know, Nance. It’s okay.”

“I…I’m dating Jonathan.”

That’s not a shocker. What surprises Steve is that she was nervous to say it, as if he would have any right to be angry, but maybe she thinks that he wants to get her back.

“That’s great, Nance,” he says honestly. He wants her to be happy, and that will never change. So the air is clear between them, he tells her, “I’m dating someone, too.”

She relaxes and when she smiles again it’s easier, almost teasing. “Your new friend?”

Steve’s cheeks burn. What would she say—what would she think—if she knew that he’s dating a boy? Out of all the questions weighing on Steve’s mind, that’s the only one he doesn’t want the answer to.

“I’m happy for you.”

“I just hope I can be a better—”

Boyfriend. This time he’s going to have a boyfriend. They haven’t talked about it yet but if they keep dating, if it keeps going well, he’ll be calling Eddie his boyfriend soon. Holy shit. The idea makes his head spin.

“A better boyfriend this time,” he finishes.

Nancy gives him that curious look again. “You weren’t that bad,” she jokes.

Steve feels lighter than he did when he walked into her room. He feels good. They needed this chance to talk and he knows Nancy feels it too. They’re going to be okay. They’re going to be real friends now.

After Nancy finishes her pie, she picks up the notebook and reads through the pages again. It feels like she’s looking into his brain, and he hopes against all hope that she can see something he can’t. A connection he missed, a dream that makes it all tie together. She gets to the last filled page and reads about his dream from last night.

“Yeah,” Steve says quietly. “This is why I need you, Nance. I don’t want people to die because I’m too dumb to figure out what’s going on.”

“You’re not dumb, Steve. You said these are always triggered by something, right?”

“Yeah, it could be anything. Someone I saw or something I did or a smell. Sometimes it’s just a feeling.”

“And you don’t remember anything about the accident?”

“Nothing.”

Nancy bolts off the bed. “Come on.”

“Where are we going?”

She doesn’t answer. They drop off their plates in the kitchen where Mrs. Wheeler is cleaning up the post-turkey dinner mess by herself, and Steve feels guilty for adding an extra dirty plate to the pile.

“Thanks for the pie, Mrs. Wheeler.”

“You’re welcome, Steve. You know, I still don’t understand why you two broke up. You really grew on me.”

Steve shoves his hands in his pockets and looks at the floor. “Uh, well…”

“Mom,” Nancy groans.

“Alright, alright, I’m staying out of it.” Mrs. Wheeler pauses her cleaning to take a sip from her glass of wine.

“Can I borrow the car?” Nancy asks. “I’m going to give Steve a ride home since it’s so cold.”

Mrs. Wheeler looks at the dishes in the sink, the leftover food on the counter, and the half-carved turkey on the stove. She takes another sip of wine. “Sure.”

Nancy grabs the keys off the hook. They shove their boots on and squeeze Steve’s bike into the back of the station wagon before taking off. The drive is quiet but not uncomfortable, even without the radio on.

“You didn’t tell your mom you’re with Jonathan now?” Steve wonders.

“Not yet. I will, but…you’ve met her. She’s nosey.”

“Yeah.” A nosey mother is something they have in common, but Steve can’t help thinking that their mothers pry into their lives for entirely different reasons.

Nancy drives past the turn for his street. She keeps going out to the edge of town, to a dark stretch of road lined with snow-dusted pine trees. The road is empty and the headlights seem to shine for miles ahead of them. It feels like they’re driving off the edge of the world.

“This is where you crashed, right? Morton Road?”

“Somewhere around here.” Steve saw a few pictures of his wrecked beamer in the newspaper but it’s hard to tell exactly where it happened. Morton Road looks the same for miles.

Nancy slams on the gas.

“Nance, what the hell are you doing?”

“What do you mean?” she says calmly.

“Slow down!”

“Relax, there’s no one else on the road.”

“Relax? You want me to relax when you’re going almost 80?!” Steve watches the red dial on the speedometer climb higher and higher. “Are you trying to kill us?”

“Your seatbelt’s on, right?”

“What? Yes!”

“Good.”

Nancy swerves—

“NANCY!”

—and Steve is shoved into his seatbelt as she brakes hard—

—a rush of air, the passing of universes dancing beyond his fingertips, streaks of brilliant color the kind he’s never seen before, and it would be so beautiful if his heart wasn’t going crazy, trying to leap from his chest as panic fills his throat. He’s falling so far, so fast, and something is wrong, so wrong, somebody help me! Please!—

—a soothing heat surrounds him, it’s going to be okay, he’s going to be okay, whatever it is, wherever he is, wherever he’s going—

—a million lights explode like fireworks behind his eyes, his hands slip off the wheel—

—and crashes back against his seat. The car is stopped but his heart is still beating eighty miles an hour, gone through the windshield and into the darkness outside. Steve slumps in his seat, gulping in breath after breath.

“What the fuck was that?” he gasps. “If you want me dead just hit me with a shovel, alright? It’s easier than trying to give me a heart attack.”

Nancy looks uncertain. As well as he knows her, Steve doesn’t think he’s ever seen that look on her face before. “Did it work?” she asks.

“What?”

“Do you remember anything about the crash?”

Jesus. Steve stares at her. “That was your plan?”

She turns the hazard lights on and shifts the car into park. “Steve, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you but I thought if—”

“No,” he tells her. “It worked.”

Nancy half-laughs with relief. “It did? What happened, what do you remember?”

“I…I fell.” Through colors and shapes and darkness and light, twisting and turning all around Steve like a kind of magic that only exists in dreams. He wishes he could show her, he wishes he had Eddie’s talent to draw it, because there’s no way he’d ever be able to put it in words. “I was scared. Really scared…but I felt that warmth again and I knew everything was going to be okay.”

“Your angel?” Her face twists into a deep frown. “But how—? You didn’t fall, you were driving.”

“Nance, I’m telling you, I fell. How? Where? I don’t know, but I did.”

“Maybe you need to fall again.”

Fall again.

How the hell does he do that?

Steve gazes out the window as she drives back into the familiar world of Hawkins, but he doesn’t see the trees flying by. He sees those colors and shapes like they’re stained in his eyes and he thinks about falling, falling…falling…The only falling he’s doing right now is falling in love.

Shit, he really is. He knew Eddie would be easy to love and all it took was one date to prove it.

Nancy stops in front of his driveway. His house is shrouded in ink black except for the single light above the front door, like a lighthouse in the middle of a dark, dark sea. They take his bike out of the back but before Steve leaves Nancy grabs his arm.

“I need you to know something.” She looks serious in the red glow of the tail lights.

“Yeah?

“Jonathan and I are going to the lab this weekend. We have a plan, we’re going to try and get evidence—”

“Nance—”

“You can’t talk me out of it,” she says firmly.

“I know.” Steve knows that nothing can stop her when her mind is made up. He loved that about her, even when it frustrated him. “Be careful, okay? Those people are dangerous.”

“That’s why I’m telling you. I need someone to know where we’re going in case…”

In case we don’t come back.

Steve hears it loud and clear, and it terrifies him. He pulls her into a hug. She’ll be fine, she always is, but the nervous ticking in his heart doesn’t agree and just in case…

She hugs him back and it almost makes Steve feel worse because maybe it means that she’s scared, too. “If we get anything we’re taking it to the journalist that Barb’s parents hired. He can help us tell people the truth.”

“I’m sending in the cavalry if I don’t see you on Monday,” Steve promises.

“Thanks. Tell me if you have any more dreams, okay? We can figure this out. And Steve?”

“Yeah?”

Nancy smiles in her familiar crooked way. “Don’t tell my mom what I did to her brakes.”

“My lips are sealed.”

“...and then I kissed him.”

Robin is absorbed in Steve’s words. Mentally taking notes, she said. The minute the store was empty again after the Saturday morning rush Steve told her exactly what happened between him and Eddie on Tuesday night. It feels like they’re at a sleepover sharing secrets.

“Really? You just laid one on him? You weren’t scared?”

“Yeah, of course I was, but I didn’t want to waste the chance. It felt like the right moment, you know?”

Robin frowns. “Not really.”

“Hey, you will. Maybe tonight if you’re lucky, because I’m an amazing friend who scored you a double date.”

Robin scoffs. She stands up and grabs the Rubik’s cube off the counter, twisting it around and around. “Stop calling it that. It’s only a double date if everyone knows that it’s a double date.”

“Well, whatever it is, it’s your chance to make a move.”

After Steve called Robin yesterday to invite her to his and Eddie’s date in disguise and bribing her with free dinner, he called Chrissy too. He never said the words double date, just that he was hanging out with Eddie and Robin and they wanted her to come. As soon as he said Robin’s name, Chrissy instantly said yes.

“What do you want me to do, dingus? Kiss her in the middle of the bowling alley?”

“Robin, use your brain. Invite her to your place after for some girly shit and see what happens. Paint her nails, do her hair. You know, touch her.” A new idea pops into Steve’s head and he snaps his fingers. “Ooh, give her a massage. That’s sexy.”

Robin looks at him like he’s a moron. It’s not the first time. “Give her a massage? That’s your advice?”

“Obviously you don’t start with that. You have to lead into it, make sure it feels right. Trust me, massages get you laid.”

Robin scrunches up her face like she's in pain. “But…what if…what if I don’t know what feels right? What if there’s a moment but I can’t tell and I totally miss it or mess it up and then it’s gone and—”

“Just ask her.”

“What? If we’re having a moment?”

“No, Robin. Ask her if you can kiss her.”

Pure terror fills her eyes like he just told her that she has to jump into the quarry. She doesn’t need to be this nervous, but Steve doesn’t know how to make her believe it. He doesn’t know how to convince her that good things can happen for her too, even here in Hawkins.

“Listen.” He puts his hands on her shoulders and she finally looks at him. “Start simple, alright? Ask her if she wants to hang out at your place after and she’ll say yes. Then just keep asking her what she wants. Chrissy, can I paint your nails? Yes. Chrissy, can I braid your hair? Yes. Chrissy, can I kiss you? Yes. When it comes to you, she’s all yes. Okay? You got this.”

It takes about a hundred years but slowly the wide-eyed fear disappears from her face. She nods. “Yeah, okay. I got this.”

Steve watches Eddie walk around the store and tries to keep his smile hidden. He hasn’t seen Eddie since their date on Wednesday night. He had no idea how long two days without him would feel and now he’s here, weaving around the shelves and flipping over tapes like he’s any other customer here to rent a movie. He’s doing it on purpose.

Steve can’t take it anymore. When Eddie is in his line of sight checking out the documentaries Steve flings a Dubble Bubble at him. It hits him square in the back.

Eddie whirls around looking offended but he quickly breaks into one of the brightest smiles that Steve’s ever seen. It’s definitely the biggest he’s ever seen because of him.

Eddie scoops up the gum and brings it back to the bin. “Do I need to talk to your manager, young man?”

“Missed you,” Steve whispers. He desperately wants to lean over the counter and kiss Eddie but the store is full of people. He wouldn’t risk it even if the store was empty in case someone happened to walk by the windows at the wrong time.

“I missed you too,” Eddie whispers. “How was your Thanksgiving? Good turkey?”

“We, uh…we didn’t really celebrate.” Thanksgiving hasn’t been a special day at Steve’s house for a long time. “But I did have some pie. How about yours?”

“No turkey? That’s illegal, you know. If you want some, my grandma sent us home with lots of leftovers. She was bummed that we couldn’t stay until Sunday but I told her that I had to get back in time for a hot date.” Eddie gives him a secret smile and Steve smiles right back. If anyone was listening, if anyone was watching them, would the way they look at each other give them away? Steve thinks it might.

Eddie checks his watch. “Do we need to pick anyone up?”

Steve shakes his head. “Robin’s coming with us and Chrissy is meeting us there.”

“Chrissy?”

“Chrissy Cunningham. Do you know her? You’d probably recognize her from school.”

“I know her. Sort of. I knew her in middle school.” Eddie looks around the store, at Mrs. Merrill in the romance section and Bob Newby checking out the sale bin, and he lowers his voice again. “What did you tell them? Do we have to pretend to be interested…?”

It takes Steve a minute to figure out what he’s asking. “No, no, god no, nothing like that.” It would be a piss-poor excuse for a date if they had to pretend to be interested in the girls the entire time. Eddie must’ve been wondering how this would go since Steve said the words double date. “I told Chrissy we’re just friends hanging out and Robin…”

Crap. He never once thought to ask Eddie if he’d be okay with Robin knowing about them.

“Uh, I told her about…” Steve gestures between them. “I’m sorry, I should’ve asked you if that was okay. She won’t tell anyone—”

“It’s fine.” Eddie looks sheepish. “My friends know.”

“All of them?” Steve blurts out. He would be such a hypocrite if he couldn’t trust Eddie’s friends while asking Eddie to trust his, but the panic bubbling in his throat won’t listen to reason.

“Just the guys in the band. They kind of already knew anyway…” Eddie trails off with a flush spreading over his skin. He looks so pretty like that. Steve wants to ask, because he gets the feeling there’s a story there, but Robin comes around the counter and claps her hands.

“Okay, I’m ready.” She changed in the bathroom into nicer jeans and a shirt that falls off her shoulders, and she put on some eyeliner that makes her blue eyes pop.

“You look nice,” Eddie says awkwardly.

“Thanks,” she says, almost as awkwardly. “Chop chop, Steve. Tim’s clocking in, we can go. Chrissy is probably already there, she’s never late.”

Robin is right. When they walk into the bowling alley the first thing Steve sees is Chrissy sitting on a bench waiting for them. She looks like a million bucks. He’s dated enough girls to know how they do it. Shiny necklaces that drop into low shirts, makeup that makes their skin glow, pretty curls falling over their shoulders. Chrissy looks like a diamond in the rough among the crowd of bowlers wearing jeans and sweatshirts.

“Hi guys!” She jumps up when she spots them and comes over to hug Robin. “Thanks for inviting me, Steve. I haven’t bowled in a while.”

“I’m glad you could join us,” Steve says. “Chrissy, this is Eddie.”

“Hi,” she says shyly. “I’ve seen you around school.”

Eddie slaps his hand to his chest like he’s been shot. “Oh, Chrissy. This isn’t the first time we’ve hung out.”

“No?”

“You don’t remember me?”

“I’m sorry!” She says with an embarrassed smile. She looks around the group nervously.

Robin reaches around Steve and slaps Eddie lightly on his shoulder. “Don’t make her feel bad.”

“Sorry,” Eddie says instantly. He shoots Robin a hesitant look. “I’m not trying to.”

Steve knew it might be a little awkward at first. Even though Eddie already apologized to Robin for last Saturday, now he knows that Robin knows about their relationship but he doesn’t know her as well as Steve does. The last thing that Steve wants is for Eddie to feel like he needs to walk on eggshells around Robin.

Steve nudges Eddie’s shoulder. “Tell us. You said something about middle school?”

“Yeah, the talent show,” he tells Chrissy. “You were doing your—” Eddie shakes his fists in the air “— cheer thing and I played with my band—”

Chrissy lights up with a gasp. “Corroded Coffin, oh my god! How could I forget with a name like that?”

Eddie grins. “See? You do remember.”

And then her bones started to snap. Eddie’s haunted voice from a nightmare comes back to Steve, and he looks between them with a sudden, sinking weight in his gut. Is this a mistake? Is he leading Chrissy towards her own death somehow because they know each other again? All he wants is for them to be friends. How could that be dangerous?

“Still do, still do,” Eddie is saying. “You should come and see us at the Hideout on Tuesday. You can keep Steve company in my audience of adoring fans.” Eddie gives him a devilish grin and Steve smiles back, but he can still feel that gnawing worry festering in his mind.

“I’d love to! But only if Robin is coming, too.”

“The more the merrier,” Eddie says.

They all look at Robin, and Robin looks at Chrissy’s big pleading eyes. “Okay. I’m free on Tuesday.”

Steve should be happy. He wants to be happy. They’re getting closer to becoming friends but as much as he wants it to be, he doesn’t know if that’s a good thing.

Eddie nudges him as they head over to get their shoes. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m going to kick your ass.”

“Get ready to eat your words, Harrington.”

Steve called yesterday to reserve their lane and it’s a good thing he did. The bowling alley is crowded with people having a good time, families with excited kids running around playing tag and groups of friends cheering on every single shot. Music plays from somewhere but he can barely hear it over the sound of pins clattering and people laughing. A disco ball above throws flecks of light in a thousand different colors over the crowd.

They settle into their lane and change their shoes, and Steve and Eddie let the girls go first so Chrissy steps up to the lane and takes the first turn.

Strike!

She hops on the spot with a huge grin. Robin stares at her in awe but Eddie frowns at the lane like he’s deep in thought. Steve wants to laugh.

“I thought you said it’s been a while,” Eddie says.

Chrissy shrugs. “It has.” She sits beside Robin and wishes her good luck.

Robin rubs her palms against her jeans and stands up to take her shot. “Which ball did you use?”

“The pink one.”

Robin picks up the pink ball and throws it down the lane but she can’t compare to Chrissy. None of them can. They play frame after frame and Steve knows that he’s losing to her without even looking at the scoring screen, but so is Eddie. Even if he doesn’t win this was one of the best ideas that he’s ever had. No matter what his ominous dreams mean he could never regret this night.

After Steve plays his last frame, they hover around the computer screen to see their final scores.

“Damn it,” Eddie says without any real heat. He puts his arm around Steve’s shoulder casually, in the same way that any of Steve’s old friends might’ve, but it still makes his heart jump. “I still beat you.”

Steve elbows him lightly. “By two points.”

“Still won the bet, cough it up.”

“I never agreed to that.” Steve catches the way that Chrissy looks at them curiously before she looks down at the screen again. Maybe she’s surprised that he and Eddie are friends, but Steve hopes that she has some idea of the truth. He wants her to know. Maybe it would give her some confidence, too.

“You’re really good at this,” Robin tells Chrissy.

“All the cheerleading probably helps,” Chrissy says. She flexes her biceps and looks Robin up and down. “I bet I can pick you up.”

Without waiting for a reply, Chrissy grabs Robin around the thighs and hoists her into the air. Robin yelps and squeezes Chrissy’s shoulders as she tries to keep her balance.

“Okay, okay, I believe you, you’re super strong. You can put me down now!”

Chrissy brings her back to earth with a laugh. Robin looks flustered, and even in the dim light Steve can see the way she’s looking at Chrissy like she’s nothing short of a miracle. Steve almost feels like he’s intruding on their date.

“I’m going to get us some burgers,” he says. And he’s going to drag Eddie with him so they can have a moment alone.

“I’m not hungry,” Chrissy says. “I’ll just steal a couple of fries if you guys are getting some.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m starving,” Robin says. “I want a burger and fries. And a milkshake!”

“Chrissy?” Steve prompts. “It’s my treat.”

She hesitates. “Um…maybe just a burger.”

“Don’t you want a drink with that?” Eddie asks.

“Just water is fine, thanks.”

Steve and Eddie walk to the food counter, and as they weave their way across the alley past crowds of bowlers, Eddie leans closer so Steve can hear him above the noise. It’s even louder now than when they arrived, and it feels like all of the noise is rattling around inside Steve’s head.

“So, when you said this was like a double date…”

“Yeah?”

“Is that because it looks like a double date or because it really is a double date?” Eddie nods his head back towards their lane. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a girl flirt harder and she sure as hell wasn’t flirting with either of us.”

Steve shouldn’t say anything but he can’t hide his smile, and that’s all the answer Eddie needs.

“Steeeve. You should’ve told me they were dating—”

“They’re not.” Steve checks to make sure that he doesn’t see anyone he knows from school, anyone who might overhear and know who they’re talking about. “That’s why I didn’t say anything.”

“But they like each other.”

“Yeah.” Steve can’t help teasing him with, “So you don’t need to be jealous of Robin.”

Eddie gapes like a fish out of water and the glittering shards of light roaming over his face can’t hide his blush. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do.”

They join the lineup at the food counter and the smell of fresh fries and burgers soaked into the air makes Steve’s stomach growl. He can hear the sizzling of food on the grill and the kitchen staff calling out orders to each other, and as the line moves forward Steve realizes that Cassie King and Gary Young are a few spots ahead of them. They’re holding hands, and she stretches up on her toes to kiss his cheek. Steve saw them stumble away together at the Halloween party and now an ugly jealousy unfolds in his chest. He took it for granted when he was dating girls how carelessly he could kiss them in public, how he didn’t have to hide what he felt. He’d give anything right now just to hold Eddie’s hand.

After they place their order and get their food, they carry the trays back to their lane. The girls are sitting side by side, and Chrissy takes her hand off Robin’s thigh when she sees them coming back. Steve catches Eddie’s eye. He definitely saw that, too.

They dig into their food. As Steve eats, the rattling grows into a dull ache inside his skull, and he puts his burger down when he’s only finished half of it. He can’t taste it anymore. “Does anyone have Tylenol?”

“Are you okay?” Eddie asks.

“I think I do,” Chrissy says. She digs through her purse and finds a small bottle.

“It’s just the noise, it’s giving me a headache.” Steve washes down two pills with his Coke and gives her the bottle back. “Thanks.”

He keeps eating, even though he isn’t enjoying his food anymore, but beside him Eddie doesn’t continue. He’s still looking at Steve with concerned eyes. Steve doesn’t know what makes him do it—the darkness, the sense of safety in a crowded space where no one is paying attention to them, or the fact that he wants Chrissy to know—but he makes a quick kissy face at Eddie. “I’m fine.”

She sees it. He knows that she sees it because she blinks like she can’t believe her eyes, but she doesn’t say anything.

They start their second game and Steve keeps waiting for the Tylenol to kick in but it doesn’t. His headache only gets worse and he starts to feel weird. Like there’s no ground beneath his feet. His friends are talking but their voices are far away and he falls out of the conversation. He doesn’t know what they’re saying. He’s dreaming.

No, I’m awake. I’m awake.

The last time he felt like this was at the Creel house when he stared into the glow of a pulsing light bulb. He waits for a surge of those dream-memories to fill his mind but they don’t come. All he feels is a cold prickle at the back of his neck.

Steve looks over his shoulder. A tiny, irrational part of him half-expects the shuttered windows and bone-like beams of the Creel house to be looming right behind him.

He jumps when Eddie’s hand lands on his shoulder.

“Hey, it’s your turn.”

Steve is unsteady on his feet. The lights, the noise, the colors—nothing feels real anymore. He picks up a bowling ball and gasps when a searing heat like a red-hot poker pierces through his head.

Thud. The ball slips off his fingers and lands beside his feet.

He hears his name, sort of. Muffled like it’s coming from a different room, but it’s Eddie, and Eddie is right beside him. Steve lets himself be pulled back to the seats.

“My head hurts,” he whispers, and it’s the biggest understatement of the century. He wants to crawl into Eddie’s arms and die there so it might stop. Another burst of pain explodes in his skull and he shuts his eyes. It doesn’t help. There’s nowhere to hide.

“I’m taking you home.”

Steve doesn’t argue. Eddie helps him into his jacket and he says something to the girls and they both shake their heads. They talk to Steve but he can’t focus on their words through the clap of thunder in his head. Steve gives them a weak wave as he and Eddie leave.

The cold November air that blasts Steve in the face clears his head a little bit. Eddie helps him into the van and when he turns over the engine a sharp guitar note blares from the speakers. He slaps the radio off.

“Sorry.”

“Iss’ okay.”

Eddie doesn’t ask if Steve wants to come to his place until his curfew, and Steve is grateful for that. He’d be too damn miserable to enjoy it, and he doesn't want to make Eddie miserable too. At least they had most of the evening together, and the silver lining is that now Robin and Chrissy can have some time alone.

The drive to his house isn’t long but the rumbling and motions of the van make Steve feel nauseous. Eddie stops down the street from Steve’s house, right beside the ominous darkness of the forest where a monster once lurked. He turns off the van and everything goes wonderfully still.

“I’m sorry,” Steve whispers.

Eddie reaches over the console and holds Steve’s hand. The worry makes his eyes look even darker. “Why?” he asks. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I ruined our date.”

“No, you didn’t. I had fun, the girls had fun. It was a great secret double date.”

Steve raises their hands and presses his lips to Eddie’s knuckles, to his rings. The touch of his cool skin feels good against Steve’s flushed face. Maybe he’s coming down with something.

“Next one’s just you ‘n me,” Steve mumbles.

“Okay.” Eddie’s fingers tilt Steve’s chin and then his lips are on Steve’s in the softest, sweetest kiss. “Call me if you need anything. And by anything, I mean anything. Chicken noodle soup, a hug, a kiss, whatever. I’m there.”

“Teddy bear services?”

“Only for you.”

“I—” Steve stops himself before the words slip out. I love you. God, it’s way too early for that, what the hell is he thinking? He can’t say it until he’s sure that Eddie will say it back. And mean it. “I’ll see you later,” he says instead. He feels like a coward.

“You will.”

Steve walks the rest of the way home slowly, and when he looks behind him Eddie’s van is still there. He waves before he walks down the driveway, stumbles through the front door and up the stairs, and collapses onto his bed.

The storm in his head rages on. Steve doesn’t know how long it lasts—seconds, minutes, hours or days. He lives a lifetime of agony all alone in the darkness, where the strange shadows of his bedroom come alive to taunt him, punishing him for a crime he didn’t commit.

Then…

Then he feels it—bright light, a soothing warmth, a mother’s loving touch—and the pain melts away.

Steve falls asleep.

Chapter Text

Steve’s sleep is pierced by nightmares. True nightmares this time, the kind that make no sense and drag him screaming awake drenched in a cold sweat. Nightmares full of sinister darkness that leave him with the same dread he felt after waking up in the hospital what feels like a lifetime ago. It’s a poison that he can’t shake off. It invades his bones and his blood until it’s part of him.

Sleep is a write-off so he gets up two hours before his alarm and goes for a run. The sky is only beginning to wake up, a brilliant shade of deep blue instead of midnight black. He runs past the forest of monsters, runs until he can’t run anymore and his chest is burning with each breath. He likes the burn because it makes him feel alive, whereas the nightmares…the nightmares make him feel cursed, like he should already be dead.

As he walks home, he wonders if he should tell Nancy about the headache. It might mean nothing, but it might mean something because he felt that warmth again. No, he’s not going to tell her. He needs more than just feelings to unravel the mystery.

Maybe it’ll never unravel.

Maybe you need to fall again.

Robin is the beam of light that breaks through the storm clouds of Steve’s Sunday morning. For once Steve beat her into work, and he watches her walk in with bleary eyes. Her smile is bright enough to rival the sun. That can only mean one thing.

“Something happened,” he realizes.

Her grin somehow gets brighter. She disappears into the staff room and comes back with her vest on, and Steve pulls her with eager hands behind the cash desk so they can sit down.

“What happened?”

Robin fans her hands against her vest. Her nails are painted a very not-Robin colour, a sparkly Barbie pink, when yesterday they were black and chipping. “She painted my nails.”

Steve stops himself from rolling his eyes. “And? Please tell me that’s not all that happened.”

A stream of words erupts like she can’t contain them anymore. “I asked her if she wanted to come to my place after we finished bowling but she offered me a ride when her dad came to pick her up and we ended up going to her place instead. I was so nervous—you have no idea, Steve—but I did what you said and suggested stuff and you were totally right. Like, totally. She always said yes. We did these weird face masks and I looked ridiculous but she looked so cute and it was like a sleepover in a movie but it was just the two of us and then we were talking on her bed and…I felt it. The moment? It was like we were the only two people in the universe.” Robin is breathless, her eyes wild with a joy that Steve’s never seen on her before. “I kissed her, Steve.”

“Go, Robin!” Steve gives her a double high five. This is exactly the kind of thing he needed to hear this morning. “She kissed you back, right?”

Robin turns cherry red and she nods. She touches her lips like she’s reliving every second of last night. “We kissed a lot. Like, a lot a lot. Her lip gloss tasted like strawberries.” Her smile turns wicked. “Jason Carver has been asking her out for weeks but I’m the one who got to kiss her. Holy shit.”

“I knew you could do it.” Steve wants to hug her but he knows she’s not the huggy type, so he settles for being happy for her from where he is. He’ll be glad to see that smile plastered on her for the rest of the day.

“I didn’t,” she whispers, like a confession. “Just me, by myself, in my head, I never thought I could. But when you—with you…” She trails off but Steve knows what she means, and she’s making it even harder for him not to hug her. “You know, it shocked me to my core but I’m glad we’re friends, Steve.”

“Me too.”

Without each other they might have both been stuck in the same boat—crushing on people who were entirely in reach and too scared to make a move. They would’ve been worse off if they weren’t friends. Steve knew from the moment he saw her, from the moment he felt that spark of something in his mind, that she’s supposed to be in his life. Now, and maybe always.

Steve is in the science fiction section when he hears the door open for the first time this morning, but he only looks when he realizes the footsteps are heading towards him. He can only think of one person who would be here to see him. First Robin, and now Eddie. His morning is really looking up.

“Hey, stranger,” he says with a smile he can’t help. Eddie just does that to him. “Here to pay your fines?”

“Definitely,” Eddie drawls. “I’m here first thing Sunday morning to pay my fines.”

Steve hugs him. The horror shelf blocks them from view of the front door but he keeps it short anyway. The few seconds that he spends with Eddie’s arms tight around him feel like a blessing.

“You look exhausted,” Eddie says. He touches Steve’s cheek but he pulls his hand away quickly. “How do you feel?”

“Better with you here.” Steve hopes he might get a smile for that but Eddie’s concern doesn’t disappear.

“How’s your head?” he asks.

“It’s okay. The headache went away but I didn’t sleep well.”

“Were you up at three a.m. talking in latin with your head spinning around?”

Steve almost laughs at the echo of the words Eddie once said to him, but he doesn’t because Eddie looks serious. I sleep like I’m possessed. Is that what Eddie thinks? That Steve is possessed? Their visit to the Creel house is what put this fear in his mind, and it’s all Steve’s fault.

“Nope, just more bad dreams.” Steve squeezes his hand. “I’m fine. I’m glad you came by.”

Eddie being here makes Steve want to do something stupid, something he knows he shouldn’t, but Eddie is the only customer and that’s enough to make him think fuck it. He drags Eddie behind the Adult curtain and brings their lips together in a desperate, burning kiss. Eddie makes a tiny noise of surprise and Steve swallows it into himself, commits it to memory, and kisses Eddie harder. The risk only makes his lips taste sweeter.

Steve is breathless when he stops, because he’s still at work damn it, but it did the trick. Eddie’s worry is gone, replaced by a delighted smile.

“I wasn’t expecting that,” he says.

“I wasn’t planning it.” Steve straightens Eddie’s hair and it reminds him of last Saturday when he did Eddie’s hair in the bathroom. He should’ve kissed Eddie then. “You should go before you get me in trouble.”

“Hey! I did nothing wrong.”

“No, but it is your fault for being so cute.” Steve remembers when he first thought of Eddie as cute, how much it freaked him out, and now he can’t stop thinking it. He’s still not used to flirting with a boy but it gets easier everyday. Especially when he knows how much it makes Eddie blush.

Steve peeks past the curtain. Robin is still at the cash register and he can’t see Frank so he’s probably still in his office. He pulls Eddie out of the room.

“So, uh…do you want to come over after your shift?” Eddie sounds nervous, which is absurd. Is he expecting a no? Maybe he’s just flustered, which only makes Steve want to kiss him again. “My uncle will be home so we won’t be alone, but uh, we can hang out?”

“Of course I want to come over,” Steve says. He doesn’t want to leave any doubts in Eddie’s mind. “I’ll see you tonight.”

Steve is so warm and cozy he might fall asleep. He’s wrapped in Eddie’s blankets with him like a cocoon, secret and safe from the wind howling outside the trailer, and Eddie’s hand is hot on his skin underneath the back of Steve’s sweater. The last time he was in this bed Eddie’s hands were all over him too, but now instead of the fire of sex the moment is a gentle flame, like the candles flickering on Eddie’s dresser. The only reason Steve doesn’t close his eyes is because he wants to enjoy every second he gets with Eddie before he has to go home.

“I like this song,” he murmurs.

“Yeah?” Eddie sings along and Steve feels the gentle rumble of his voice where he’s lying half on top of Eddie with his face pressed against Eddie’s neck. “Kindest lover, I can’t stay alone tonight. Come on, bring me all your love, here and now…I’ll put it on a mixtape for you.”

“No one’s ever made me a mixtape before.”

“Good. I want to be the first.”

Eddie is his first for a lot of things, a lot of things he never would’ve imagined he’d ever have a first for, a lot of firsts still to come.

“You better put that song you played for me last week on it.”

“Catch the Rainbow?” Eddie squeezes him a little tighter and kisses his temple. “That’ll be number one. I can think of a few Sabbath songs you might like, too.”

Steve shifts up so he can look at Eddie’s face. “I know exactly what you’re doing, you know. You’re trying to get me to like your music.”

“I’m just trying to expand your musical horizons,” Eddie says innocently, but there’s a smirk playing hide and seek at the corner of his mouth and Steve kisses it.

“I should make you a mixtape of my favorite songs.”

“Top ten hits on the radio right now?”

Steve slaps him playfully on the shoulder and he laughs.

“I’m just kidding!”

“I think you’d be surprised.”

“Trust me,” Eddie says, and he pulls Steve back down with gentle hands. “I know you’re full of surprises.”

They kiss again, softly, chastely, the kind of kiss that isn’t leading to more because it can’t. Eddie’s bedroom door is wide open at Wayne’s instruction—and Steve blushed at that—and he’s watching TV in the living room. The last thing Steve wants to do is piss Wayne off. It’s already a miracle and a half that he didn’t even blink an eye when Eddie greeted Steve at the door with a kiss.

The song washes away like the sea it sang of and a new one begins, dancing out of the speaker with a more upbeat acoustic guitar line.

“I picked this song for Tuesday since Robin and Chrissy are coming,” Eddie says. “Gareth’s song is pretty heavy, I didn’t want to scare them off completely.” He says it like it’s not a big deal, but the fact that he thought of the girls means the world to Steve. He kisses Eddie again.

“There are more double dates in our future.”

“Are you looking in that crystal ball of yours again, psychic boy?”

Steve kisses his cheek. “That crystal ball was pretty accurate, but I don’t need it this time. Robin told me this morning that she and Chrissy kissed last night. I’m almost glad we left early.”

“Yeah, that’s great,” Eddie says, but he doesn’t sound nearly as excited as Steve hoped he would be. Sure, he doesn’t know them very well yet, but Steve figured knowing another couple like them would be exciting enough.

“Do you…not want to go on any more double dates?”

“What? No, I do. I promise, I do.”

Steve cups his cheek and tilts his face so their eyes meet again. “What’s wrong?”

Eddie looks strangely tense. “Last night…I was really worried about you,” he confesses so quietly Steve almost doesn’t hear it over the music. “I couldn’t sleep, I kept thinking I should’ve taken you to the hospital. What if something happened—?”

“Hey, I’m fine.”

“But what if you weren’t fine?” Eddie stresses. “What if you weren’t fine and I could’ve done something but I didn’t and then—”

“Stop it, Eddie. You don’t need to worry about me.”

“We’re dating. Of course I’m going to worry about you.”

“Well, you don’t need to worry like that.” It’s nice to know that Eddie was thinking about him, but Steve hates the idea of Eddie losing sleep because of him. That’s Steve’s job.

Eddie sighs. He drags Steve’s hand to his lips and kisses the back of his fingers. “Would you tell me if…if you were in trouble?”

“What do you mean?”

“If you were…in danger.”

A nervous shiver tingles down Steve’s spine at how serious Eddie looks. “In danger from what?”

“Anything. People, ghosts, demons…monsters?” Eddie is looking at him the same way that he did when Steve lied about dreaming of a monster with a flower face, that same discerning look like he’s seeing right through Steve.

He knows.

Steve can almost taste it in the air between them. He knows that Steve is hiding something, and the dilemma is back to bite Steve in the ass. Tell Eddie, don’t tell Eddie, tell Eddie. Eddie might believe him about the Upside Down after what they saw at the Creel house, and he’s part of this even if Steve doesn’t know how yet.

“You’re my hero, Eddie. Rest in peace.”

He can’t put Eddie in danger.

“And her eyes…like something inside her head, pulling…”

And what if something happens to Chrissy because he tells Eddie the truth? What if Chrissy is saved because he tells Eddie the truth? Why are all of Steve’s problems life and death?

“I’m not in danger,” he finally says. It feels like a lie even though right now it’s true. I’m not, but I have been. I do need to tell you something.

“But if you were, you’d tell me, right? Steve, you dream about demons and people dying and I don’t know what happened at the Creel house but it scares me, okay? All of it scares me.”

“I’m sorry,” Steve whispers. “I promise I’ll tell you.”

He thinks he means it, too.

Nancy has it so fucking easy and she has no clue. She doesn’t have to worry about this with Jonathan, but for Steve it hangs over the delicate neck of his relationship like an ax. It keeps him awake that night after he leaves Eddie. He decides and changes his mind almost as many times as he turns over in bed. It’s his own fault. He was so stupid—he never should’ve asked Eddie to take him to the asylum. Steve wishes he could go back in time and slap himself. He let his feelings for Eddie tell him what to do and that was his most dangerous choice of all.

But if he wants Eddie to trust him, if he wants their relationship to grow, if he really loves Eddie—isn’t there only one choice he can make?

By Monday morning Steve has made up his mind. He sees Chrissy in the hallway at school and she smiles and invites him and Eddie to sit with her and Robin at lunch. Gone are the days when Steve spent his lunch outside and alone, but they could be back so easily when he tells Eddie everything. He could lose Eddie, he could lose his newfound friendships if Eddie tells the girls that he’s a nutcase, but he has to do it. He doesn’t want to lie anymore.

It hangs over Steve all morning. He barely pays attention in class, and even lunch won’t be a relief because Eddie will be there. Still, he makes his way to the cafeteria to join his friends. He opens the door and stops dead.

Chrissy isn’t here. Robin isn’t here. Eddie isn’t here.

But neither is anyone else.

The cafeteria is empty.

Steve checks his watch. It is lunchtime. Of course it’s lunchtime, he just finished third period, but the caf is never empty at lunch. Students should be flooding in, the smell of food should be wafting from the kitchen, the sounds of chairs scraping and trays clattering should be filling the hall. Is there an assembly happening that he forgot about?

He startles when the announcement system surges to life and a jumble of static echoes across the empty hall. The shape of the noise sounds like someone talking but he can’t distinguish any words. It’s like a radio station from another lifetime altogether.

Steve leaves the cafeteria and goes down the hallway. It’s empty too, like the entire school body was wiped out by an apocalypse and Steve is the lone survivor. What the fuck is going on? He follows the static to the front of the school. It’s noon, it’s lunch time, but a red glow seeps through the front windows like a bloody sunset.

Steve throws open the main office door. It’s empty inside. The announcer’s microphone is sitting on the secretary’s desk, flashing with a tiny red light. He presses the button and the light turns green.

“Hello?” he whispers.

The strange talking static is gone now, replaced by the dull buzz of empty air. Steve misses it. Now he’s really, truly alone in the world with only his erratic breathing and his speeding heartbeat to keep him company.

He presses the button again. “Can anyone hear me?”

Dead silence.

And then…

Then a sound comes through the speaker that stabs Steve with pure fear, a sound he hoped he would never hear again.

The guttural chittering of a predator on the hunt.

Steve jumps back. That thing is back—here—in the school—but where? Where does he run? What should he do? What the fuck is happening?

He hears it again—not from the speaker this time. In the hallway that leads to the principal’s office, a dark shadow is moving.

No.

Steve runs for the door—

Why is he so nervous? Everything is going to be fine. All he has to do is apologize. He can admit that he fucked up and hopefully Jonathan is man enough that he can too. Where is Jonathan? This is his house, but no one is home. Dozens of strands of Christmas lights hanging across the ceiling flicker in a mad web of light.

“Jonathan? Are you home, man? Listen, I just want to talk about…”

About what?

Why is he here? This all seems so familiar, but he can’t think with the neon shades of light burning his eyes. What do they mean again? Something is coming. Something bad.

Something from the ceiling.

The living room is a disaster. Thick, black letters are painted across the wallpaper and there are wooden boards nailed across a hole in the wall. They don’t stop the icy draft that seeps into the room. On the coffee table he sees a blood-stained kitchen knife and—oh, thank fuck—a gun. Steve grabs it. He prays that it’s loaded because he has no idea how to check. Where’s Nancy when he needs her?

No, he’s glad she’s not here. Wherever she is, I hope she’s safe.

Steve slips the knife into his pocket and picks up a spiked bat. It feels right in his hands. He definitely remembers this, which means that whatever is happening, he’s going to be fine because this is all a dream.

Right?

It feels real, but dreams always do.

Steve doesn’t pinch himself.

“STEEEVE.”

Steve whirls around. The front door is creaking open by itself.

A creature of pure nightmare enters the house.

Steve recoils, and a horrified gasp escapes his throat.

It’s shaped like a man but it isn’t human. It’s nothing close to human. The creature looks like it was chewed up and spat out by the depths of hell, rejected even by the Devil. Or maybe it is the Devil. Its flesh is gnarled and black, roped in thick, twisting veins, and its skeletal fingers look more alien than human. The putrid stench of death fills the air.

This isn’t real this isn’t real this isn’t real this isn’t real—

But if this is a nightmare then why isn’t Steve waking up?

The creature looks right at him with the foggy eyes of a corpse. Its voice rattles Steve’s bones. “I know where you are.”

BANG!

The gunshot rings in Steve’s ears. His prayer is answered.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

But the creature doesn’t go down. It doesn’t even flinch as Steve fires, and he can’t be missing this close but it’s like he’s firing paper airplanes instead of bullets. It keeps coming closer. BANG! Why isn’t this working? Jesus fuck fuck FUCK!

BANG!

Steve stumbles backwards without taking his eyes off the demon. Maybe he can make it to the back door. Maybe he can wake up. Please, god, I want to wake up!

Click!

Shit.

Steve tosses the gun and grips the bat tight, keeping it held high between him and the creature. For every step he takes backwards, it moves closer.

“Did you think you could hide from me?”

Steve swallows past the lump of fear in his throat. If this is how he’s going to die then he’s sure as hell not going out quietly. Fuck that.

“Fuck you!” he snarls. “Whatever the fuck you are, you ugly son of a bitch!”

The creature laughs, a haunting, distorted noise that raises the skin off Steve’s body. Picture frames rattle off the walls and crash to the floor, and every explosion of glass makes Steve flinch.

“You don’t remember. Time is a plague to which I am immune, but you are caught in its fever. And it will burn you.”

Steve takes another step back and hisses when something sharp pierces his foot. He stumbles backwards and lands on the floor as a metallic twang—

SNAP!

Steve screams.

Through watering eyes he can see the teeth of a giant bear trap buried into his ankle. FUCK FUCK FUCK—what the fuck is it doing here? It’s supposed to be in the hallway. He reaches for it and cries out again in agony. Every tiny movement sends lightning hot pain searing through his leg. He’s never getting out of here.

The demon towers above Steve, an ominous shadow against the furiously blinking Christmas lights. A clawed, alien hand stretches out above Steve, and his stomach flips as the whole world moves. An invisible force pulls him towards the creature but he’s still on the floor. He swings the bat wildly as gravity shifts but the demon rips it from his hand and tosses it away. It falls down and down. The floor is gone. Wait—that’s the front door below him. The world is sideways.

The hand pins Steve in a chokehold. He tries to pry those foul, slimy black bones away from his neck but its grip is as strong as the trap stuck in Steve’s leg. His eyes blur with tears. His heartbeat thrashes in his ears.

“You destroyed everything. And now you will be destroyed.”

Beneath the stink of death and the bitter pain, beneath the soul-consuming fear and desperation—one thought nags Steve.

I’ve seen this thing before.

In a different, more decrepit house. In a different time, when he had the upper hand and the demon was the one taken by surprise. Hanging on a web of vines. One chance, their only chance. A glass bottle in Steve’s hand. They all agreed he should take the first shot.

And he did.

“It is time…”

Robin. Robin was there. She nailed the demon too, and the fire sprouted like something so heavenly in a world of only darkness. Then Nancy stepped forward without an ounce of fear, a sawed off shotgun in her hands like it was made for her.

“...for your suffering…”

This isn’t a dream. This isn’t a dream and he needs to get the fuck out of here or he’s going to die and—

Music. He needs music. He’s all alone. Can he save himself? He tries to think of a song, any song, but in the face of the demon—Vecna—he can’t. He’s going to fucking die.

“...to end.”

He begs the universe. Please help me, please, please, please, someone help me!

The lights stop flashing.

The darkness lasts for the space of one breath, two breaths—

Something small and white bursts out of the wall, sending a crystal white glow into the darkness. Another one appears beside Steve, and another one on the ceiling behind Vecna. Dozens turn into hundreds, filling the room with moonlight. Steve remembers them, he remembers them.

Little mushrooms of light. He saw them when he carried Eddie’s body home.

A soothing warmth surrounds Steve’s ankle and the pain melts away. The trap is gone.

Violent rage consumes Vecna and it slashes a clawed hand through the glowing orbs. “I ENDED YOU!”

“You—can’t kill—what will—always—exist.” Steve recognizes the voice choked out of his own mouth but the thought isn’t his. It comes from somewhere else.

He seizes his chance.

Steve whips the knife out of his back pocket and stabs Vecna through the eye. The claw around his neck loosens just enough.

He falls

and falls

and keeps falling.

Down through the sideways world.

Through the front door.

Into nothing.

Into everything.

Into life itself.

—Halloween, a red drink on a white shirt and a broken heart—spits blood, sees Billy’s furious face through his bruised eye—a rush of baby monsters (what did Dustin call them? Demodogs?) run past them and Nancy is going to murder him if any of the kids get hurt—he might die today, tied to a chair with a girl he barely knows bound to his back, and no one will ever find his body but he still has to laugh because they honestly think he’s some sort of secret agent? In this outfit? Dumber than a pile of rocks—he launches the fireworks and the roar of the monster is a hurricane—can’t stop grinning at Robin as she goes on and on about Vickie (it’s cute, really, but it’s his god-given right as her best friend to rib her and give her hope at the same time)—“Whoa, man, I’m cool, I’m cool, we’re cool,” and what the fuck, he does not want to die by broken beer bottle today—he’s swimming through midnight black water and he sees an unnatural orange glow in the bed of the lake and god damn it why did the kid have to be right? Why—they have a plan and they might be the dumbest damn kids on the planet, but like Robin said, they have to try, right? Who else is going to take on Vecna if not them? They don’t have time to wait for the rest of the world to get their shit together—god, why? Why did it have to happen like this? Eddie would’ve been perfect, was perfect, for their little group, and Steve was really starting to like him after brushing him off as the school freak for all those years and now he’s dead—Steve wants to cry but that wouldn’t do any good, so he hugs Dustin instead—“I’m sorry. I wish things had gone differently”—

Steve wakes up without waking up. He comes back—where did he go? Somewhere wonderful and weightless—no, somewhere with dizzying colors and panic in his throat—but it doesn’t matter anymore. He needs to be here, he needs to come back to Hawkins. He needs to check on Max.

One by one his senses return, and the very first thing he notices is a deep, woodsy cologne. His heart shudders. He knows that scent. Smelled it when he had a broken beer bottle at his neck, barely there, a day old, but he could still smell it. And the leather, too. Something is touching his face. Wasn’t there a mattress here? Where did that go? And why is it so fucking bright? This isn’t Eddie’s trailer, but there is a familiar leather jacket beneath his head.

Steve groans. God, he’s exhausted. He doesn’t remember feeling hit by a truck the first time he went through the gate.

“Mr. Harrington? Can you hear me?” A woman’s voice he doesn’t know. Where’s Nancy?

“Nghhh.”

Something touches his arm. “Steve?”

That voice he does know.

Steve scrambles to sit up.

Kneeling beside him is Eddie Munson.

What the fuck?

Steve just carried his dead body. Dustin put his guitar on his chest and they left him somewhere no one would ever see him again.

So how the fuck is he here?

“You’re alive?”

Eddie’s dark eyes—filled with anxiety, “And the good news?”—explode. He stares at Steve like he’s turning into a demogorgon. “WHAT?”

“You had a seizure, Mr. Harrington,” the woman kneeling beside Eddie says. “Some confusion is normal. An ambulance is coming to take you to the hospital.”

Steve recognizes her now as the nurse from Hawkins High, but why is the school nurse…? Oh. He’s at the high school, in the cafeteria, and the entire student body is watching him. People he graduated with, people he recognizes from his old basketball team and his swim team, people who died when the Mind Flayer built its weapon last year—everyone is looking at him. Everyone including Chrissy Cunningham—she’s alive, too?—and right beside her—

“Robin,” he croaks. Thank fuck. She can tell him what’s going on, because his heart is stuttering and he’s starting to think he’s in some awful nightmare but she kneels beside him and she doesn’t look the way she did—defeated, drawn, tired—when she went back through the gate before him. Her eyeliner is dark and her hair is short and she doesn’t hold him like he wants her to. “What the fuck is going on?”

“You had a seizure,” she says, and that means nothing to him. He’s never had a seizure, what does that even mean? “You really scared us. I mean, you were just kind of standing and staring and blinking—”

“Robin,” Chrissy interrupts her gently. She kneels beside Robin and then Steve has two dead people beside him, and a girl who should know him but doesn’t, like a part of her died, too. “You’re freaking him out. What do you remember, Steve?”

“What’s the last thing you do remember?”

“I was…”

In the Upside Down.

At school.

Going through a gate.

Going to lunch.

Falling.

“Did I fall?”

The answer lunges at Steve headfirst, with its mouth open and razor-sharp teeth ready to devour him whole. He’s dizzy. He can’t breathe. From his head to his toes, his whole body feels like lead.

No, no, this can’t be real.

Steve can’t stop his tears from falling. “What day is it?”

“November 26th,” Eddie says softly. His hand moves like he’s going to touch Steve again, but he doesn’t. Because the entire school is still watching them. Steve wants to be in his arms right now more than he’s ever wanted anything in his life, because he remembers how it feels. Eddie never hugged him.

November 26th. It’s supposed to be March. “What year?” he whispers.

His dead friends look at each other.

“What do you mean?” Robin says. “It’s 1984.”

1984.

It’s 1984.

Steve fell through the gate and all the way back to 1984.

Chapter Text

Steve remembers.

Static talking to him from a world away. Familiar sounds of a monster in the dark. The nightmarish memory of Jonathan’s house. Vecna. Everything before, and everything after.

Ms. Kelley was right. All he needed was one more oh my god I’m going to die moment to shatter the door in his mind and swallow him in memories of another life. His first life. Now he has all the time in the world to remember as he lies on the thin hospital mattress, waiting for the doctors to come back with their scans and their tests. He knows what they’ll find. Nothing.

But it doesn’t matter anymore because he knows the truth. He remembers everything. Two sets of memories tangle in his mind like rose stems, their thorns slicing each other apart. He became Robin’s friend at Scoops Ahoy—at Family Video—and she told him first—he told her first—because he liked her—because he liked Eddie—who he barely knows—who he’s dating—because Dustin wanted to help Eddie—because Steve wanted to know him—because of a mystery he hasn’t solved yet, because of an evil he hasn’t faced yet, because of the threads of a life that he hasn’t lived yet.

He remembers the savagery of the demodogs, the sheer terror of the Mind Flayer, and the hopeless defeat of Vecna—but he remembers the life he lived between them, too. The look on his parents’ faces when he didn’t get into any colleges. Prom. Graduation. Applying for jobs. Terrible dates. He was still hung up on Nancy, wishing he tried harder to keep her. But in his new life he never looked back for one second.

The dreams, the deja vu, not fitting right in his body, emotions that had no beginning—it all makes sense now.

It’s wrong. He shouldn’t be here. This shouldn’t be happening, shouldn’t be possible, but he can’t convince himself that this is a nightmare. He knows he’s wide awake. Wide awake in a new life, but who is he now? He called himself Robin’s best friend. He thought of himself as Dustin’s brother. Neither is true anymore.

And now Steve remembers that he wasn’t alone when the floodgates of his memory opened.

The angel was with him. It saved him from Vecna and then he remembered that he saw it in the Upside Down. He carried Eddie in his arms, and he only noticed the orbs glowing on the ground when he stepped on one. Even in that other world, they looked other-worldly. He thought his mind had broken and he was seeing things that didn’t exist.

But they were real.

And after he fell away from Vecna into his memories, the angel showed him things in his mind. Like it did at the Creel house and in his pool. It was always on his side.

An underwater coloured place. Floating bits of white. Himself. Carrying a body.

Steve didn’t understand.

Himself. Eyeing the unnatural, cavernous split across the earth, glowing orange. He’s the last one. He jumps in. Hawkins disappears. Dizzying colors. Falling through time.

Finally, he understood. The angel did this to him. But why? What was it? In his mind it sensed his question and showed him a familiar set of images, repeating over and over until he understood.

His mother. She turns into Nancy’s mom. Then Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins. His mom. Mrs. Wheeler. Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins. His mom. Mrs. Wheeler. Mrs. Byers. Mrs. Hagan. Mrs. Perkins.

It’s not an angel. It’s…a mother. Of what? Something in the Upside Down, or the Upside Down itself?

The image changed again.

Steve. Tiny. Giggling in the cupboard under the laundry room sink. Footsteps walk by. They walk by again. Then the cupboard doors open. “I found you!”

A barren, rocky land. Roaming creatures. Wild. Ferocious. Lonely. Distant. A man falls from the sky. Burning flesh. Distorted face. He stands before a dark swirling cloud. His hand stretches out. The darkness becomes a towering spider. Glowing mushrooms sink into the dirt.

Hide and seek. Vecna. The mother. It’s hiding from Vecna. But why was it hiding if it can’t be killed? Vecna was furious—he already tried.

A swirling cloud of darkness becomes a spider. The Mind Flayer. Wrong.

Vecna can change things in the Upside Down. The mother—whatever it is—doesn’t want that to happen again, doesn't want to be Vecna’s new puppet. But how was Steve supposed to fight him? How was he supposed to do anything that would make a damn bit of difference?

Will. Swirling darkness. Steve. Glowing orbs. Demodogs. Upside Down. Vecna. Eleven. Blood. Gate.

Even now in the hospital Steve can’t figure out what that vision meant. He knows what happened, where he came from, but the answers don’t tell him what to do next. Why me? Why did it send him back, and not Nancy or Dustin or Robin? They would’ve been better choices. They’re all smarter than him.

Oh, god. What happened to them? Is that future gone, or does it still exist somewhere? Are they waiting for him? Did he abandon them? Do they have memories of that life, too?—no. They don’t, because if they did, Nancy would’ve mentioned it when he told her about his dreams.

He’s alone. Alone with nothing but memories and grief. Hawkins was in danger and people were dying and he’ll never forget the weight of Eddie’s body in his arms again.

He remembers it. Carrying Eddie home, stepping over snaking vines. The side of his trailer was blown open by the biggest gate that Steve had ever seen, trailing through the world like a parasite. He laid Eddie on his bed and hoped that in death he found the peace that was robbed from his last few days of life.

I’m sorry.

All Steve sees as he gazes out of the car window are spirits—people who died when they became part of the Mind Flayer, people who turned against Eddie when the witch hunt began. Even the buildings make Steve feel like he’s going through a ghost town. Downtown Hawkins is full again with businesses that closed after the mall was built. So much will change in the next year and a half. Christ. And it was only a year and a half.

Steve doesn’t give a shit about whatever his dad is saying, but his words pierce Steve’s thoughts when he mentions Steve’s mom getting bad news.

“What?”

His dad’s fists tighten on the leather steering wheel. “You’re not even listening to me, are you.”

“What bad news?” Steve asks numbly. Can it compare to the day he’s had? Whatever it is, it has to be worse than her only son having a seizure at school, otherwise she’d be the one driving him home right now.

“She lost the election.”

That’s…no, that can’t be right. She won. His mom was still the chair of the town council in the future Steve left behind. She practically ruled Hawkins, second only to the mayor who let Russians into their town. How could that have changed?

“But…she was supposed to win.”

His dad flashes him a strange look before turning his eyes back to the road. “Of course she was, she’s the best damn councilor this shithole has ever seen. The only good that happens here is because of her.” Under his breath but not quietly enough, his dad mutters, “Maybe if she didn’t have to worry about a son like you—”

“Fuck you!” Steve snaps. He’s done. Done being treated like a burden, done pretending he gives a damn about their reputations, done wishing that they cared. They have no idea what he’s been through and their problems are so fucking small in the face of the evil that will destroy the world.

His dad doesn’t look away from the road but Steve still sees his disbelief. “What the hell did you just say to me?” His voice is dangerously low.

“You heard me! Do you think I’m doing this on purpose? Do you think I crashed my car and had a seizure on purpose to make you and mom look bad? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“You better watch your mouth—”

“Or what?” Steve spits out. “What are you going to do? Send me back to the hospital? You know what, dad? If you didn’t want to take care of a kid then you shouldn’t have had one.”

Steve is thrown against his seatbelt as the car swerves to the side of the road, the tires of his dad’s BMW squealing on the pavement.

“Get the fuck out of my car, you ungrateful little shit,” his dad snarls. His face is flushed in red patches and the vein in his forehead twitches, but his anger doesn’t scare Steve anymore. Not now. “If you hadn’t—”

Steve flips him off and slams the door on his way out. The second his feet are on the road, the car spins around and speeds away, like he can’t get away from Steve fast enough. Good riddance. Living with his parents is going to be worse than it was before. Steve’s only saving grace is that they won’t kick him out because it would hurt their reputations even more. To the rest of the town, they’re loving respectable parents.

Steve wanders the rest of the way home, kicking at pebbles and avoiding the eyes of anyone who passes by. He’s not prepared for the gut-wrenching deja vu when he enters his room. It feels like ages have passed since he’s been here. The innocence of his past self is everywhere—in the half-finished homework on his desk, the messy blankets on his bed, and the clothes tossed carelessly on the floor. He feels exactly how he did when he came home after the car crash, but now he knows how his world came undone. The grief in his bones belongs.

He opens the nightstand drawer and takes out the notes he saved from Eddie. Emergency teddy bear services. In blue crayon, I like making you laugh. Cupid firing an arrow into his heart. Steve sinks onto his bed, and he’s helpless to stop the tide of tears that stream down his face. Everything he kept at bay in the hospital is coming out now. He cries and cries, for himself, for Eddie, for Chrissy, for Max, for the friends he left behind, for the world.

Tap…Tap…Tap.

Steve drags his eyes open to a pitch black room. One of Eddie’s notes is still clutched in his fist and a relentless drum pounds inside his head. He was so weary that he didn’t dream. Small miracles.

Tap…Tap.

The noise is coming from his window. Steve drops the note back into the drawer and gets up slowly, like he’s eighty years old with a lifetime of regret weighing him down. He pushes the curtains aside.

His heart clenches painfully. Eddie. He’s in the darkness of the backyard, poised to throw another pebble at Steve’s window. He’s okay, alive, standing there like nothing bad is going to happen. School freak. Monster hunter. One of the bravest people that Steve has ever known.

Eddie spreads his arms as if to say well? Steve opens the window and shivers as the cold sweeps in.

“I’ve been going out of my damn mind, Steve,” Eddie whisper-yells from the ground. “Why didn’t you call me? I’ve been waiting for hours but you didn’t call so I said fuck it. Throw down your hair, Rapunzel, because I’m not leaving and if you tell me to leave I swear to god I’ll pitch a tent right here and then you’ll have to tell your parents why Eddie Munson is living in your backyard—”

Steve swallows the lump in his throat. Eddie’s last words ring in his ears. Make him pay. And he failed. Steve failed, and now he’s here again with no idea how badly Steve let him down. Tears prickle in Steve’s eyes. “I-I’m sorry, Eddie, I’m so sorry.”

Eddie’s tone softens. “Hey, I’m not mad. I was just really worried about you.”

“I know. Give me a minute, I’m coming down.”

Steve is jittery with nerves. He doesn’t know how he’s going to feel when he’s near Eddie. He doesn’t know what he’s going to say. He remembers promising himself that he would tell Eddie the truth, but now the truth has exploded into something a million times more complicated.

In the great room, a fire is dying to embers and his mom is on the couch with three empty wine bottles on the floor beside her. She looks so small lying there. Defeated. Steve can’t tell if she’s asleep so he touches her shoulder.

“Mom?”

She stirs with a deep sigh. “Steve?” she mumbles.

“You should go to bed, mom.”

“What…the fire…?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll put it out. Come on.” Steve pulls her up to her feet, and her body is limp in his arms. He always forgets how small of a woman she really is.

“Where’d I go…”

“You’re home, mom. You’re fine.”

She mumbles more nonsense under her breath. Steve half-carries half-drags her to her suite and into her bedroom. He lays her on top of her duvet, rolls her onto her side and puts the trash bin beside her bed. Before he can leave, she snatches his hand with a surprisingly strong grip.

“D’you rem’ber when we played hide and seek?”

“Yeah, mom,” Steve says quietly. “I remember.”

Her grip loosens and she whispers, “Can I still find you?”

She never said that in his old life. This moment never happened. He wouldn’t think much of her drunken words but she sounds so heart-broken, so he does something he hasn’t done in a long time. He kisses her cheek.

“Go to sleep, mom.”

Her hand drops. Her breathing deepens—she’s already gone.

Steve flicks off the light and closes her door. After he leaves her suite he checks in the garage. His dad’s car is thankfully still gone. He goes to the lounge and opens the patio door.

Eddie rushes in and gathers Steve in his arms. Eddie never hugged him, but Eddie has hugged him so many times in this new life. Every part of Steve’s body knows the comfort of being in his arms. He melts into Eddie. He remembers their first hug, how timid Eddie looked, how it made Steve light up inside. It still does.

He’s still in love with Eddie.

Steve draws back slowly, trailing kisses to Eddie’s cheek as he moves. He’ll never take the warmth of Eddie’s skin—of his life—for granted again. When their lips are inches apart, Steve is nervous. He wants to kiss Eddie—he doesn’t want to kiss Eddie, because it might hurt too much. It might kill him to go on like he hasn’t seen Eddie die.

But Eddie doesn’t hesitate. He kisses Steve slow and deep, and Steve feels it inside his soul. Weirdrightwronglovely all over again, his (second) first kiss with the boy he once barely knew, the boy he’s already in love with. He kisses Eddie back until he can’t breathe, a kiss for everyday from now until the day he dies, a kiss that’s an apology and a promise tangled together like Steve’s memories. I’m sorry, I’ll keep you safe this time I swear.

Eddie leans his forehead against Steve, panting softly against Steve’s lips. “I don’t get you,” he whispers. “You don’t call me but then you kiss me like that when I show up? What happened? What did the doctors say?”

Steve wishes all he had was a real seizure. He wishes medicine could fix him. He doesn’t know what he’s going to say, even as he opens his mouth. “They…nothing. They don’t know…”

Eddie leans back and studies Steve with a long look. Only one lamp is on and half of his face is cast in shadow. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Steve’s skin prickles. November air is invading the room so he slides the door closed, almost glad to hide from Eddie’s eyes for a moment. “I…I don’t know.”

“Don’t know what?”

Steve is lost. He made up his mind, he wanted Eddie to know, but now? How can he unravel the chaos of his life into words that Eddie could understand? How can he ever begin to explain the horrors that Hawkins is hiding?

“It’s so much, I…I don't know if I can explain.”

“You can try,” Eddie pleads.

Steve rubs his arms. He’s still cold. “Eddie…I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Is this about the Upside Down and Eleven?”

Steve freezes from the inside out. His thoughts fracture into a thousand pieces. Upside Down. Eleven. How does Eddie know—? Wait. Wait a minute, what if— “Y-you…do you remember?” he stammers.

Eddie frowns. “Remember what? What are you talking about?”

Steve’s hope instantly dies. It was stupid anyway, of course Eddie can’t remember anything. He died. “What are you talking about?”

“When we were at the asylum, I peeked at the last page in your notebook. You wrote a bunch of questions for Creel but half of them didn’t make any damn sense. I didn’t know what to think so I waited. I was hoping you were going to tell me about it but you’re not, are you.”

Fuck. He thought Eddie was just being nice when he offered to take notes, but Steve can’t be mad. He deserves every ounce of Eddie’s suspicion. “It’s dangerous, Eddie.”

Eddie crosses his arms over his chest. His voice turns sharp. “So when I asked you if you were in danger, you just lied to my face?”

It should be impossible for Steve to cry anymore but his eyes start watering again. “I didn’t know everything! I didn’t know how bad it was and I don’t know what to do right now—”

“Just tell me the truth!” Eddie snaps. “What about the monster? On Halloween, you told me that you saw a monster coming out of Jonathan Byers’ ceiling and you fought it with a bat. You never said it was a dream.”

Words, denials, everything dies in Steve’s throat. His silence is as good as a confession. He stares at Eddie, and Eddie glares back, and it feels like the monster is in the room, festering in the darkness behind Steve and souring the air.

Eddie sighs and looks down. They’re only a few feet apart but it feels like miles. “You don’t trust me.”

“Of course I—”

“Yeah, well, if you trusted me you’d tell me the truth about whatever the fuck is going on so I can help you. I care about you, Steve.”

Steve’s tears slip down his cheeks. “I care about you too. So much. I just need you to give me some time, okay? Please. I just need time to think.”

“Yeah,” Eddie says quietly. “I guess I do too.”

Steve’s heart shatters. It sounds like—no, he can’t mean that. It can’t be over before they’ve even begun. He wants to know Eddie, now, with all of his memories, in this new life. How is he supposed to let him go now?

“Eddie…”

“Can’t believe I thought I finally got lucky,” Eddie mutters to himself. He brushes past Steve to the door but he pauses to pull something from his pocket and he slaps it against Steve’s chest. A tape. “I made this for you while I was losing my mind. You might as well have it.”

“Eddie, wait—”

He’s leaving. He’s leaving. Steve wants to keep him safe and now he’s leaving, disappearing into the dark woods where a monster once ate its prey. If, after all this, something happens to Eddie in those shadows then Steve will never forgive himself. He stands in the doorway for a long time, numb to the cold air seeping in.

Steve looks at the tape and fresh tears blur his vision.

Songs for Steve ♥

Fuck. The ax has fallen. The Upside Down won. The only thing Steve has left is his life, but it’s not worth much without the people he loves.

He closes the door and returns to his room to listen to the tape. The first song opens with a mellow guitar, striking a crystal clear memory in his mind. Eddie singing, his eyes on Steve from across the bar, the moment he was sure that they both felt the same. Maybe if Eddie hadn’t died they would’ve dated in his first life too. If Eddie hadn’t died, and Steve hadn’t fallen through time.

Make him pay.

Steve used to think he knew heartbreak but nothing he’s ever felt before can compare to how he feels right now. He’s going to fuck it up all over again.

Chapter Text

Steve starts his morning the same way he always does. He fumbles to turn his alarm off, drags himself into the shower, gets dressed, and pulls his Family Video vest over his sweatshirt. He closes the closet door and turns around and his bleary eyes land on his old backpack sitting on top of the messy desk—he doubles over and heaves deep breaths as it all comes rushing back. How did he forget? Traveling through time, a new life, Vecna. Maybe he wanted to believe that it was all just a bad dream. He thought he was home, getting ready to go to his boring job with his best friend. He misses Robin so fiercely that it feels like he was kicked in the chest and he wants to cry.

No, no more crying. Take a deep breath, and another one. This is his home now, his new life. He can’t go back. He has to figure out how to pick up the pieces and keep going.

Steve rips off the vest and tosses it onto the floor. He checks the agenda on his desk. Tuesday, November 27. He has to do something—he might as well go to school and find Nancy. It’s better than spending the day here by himself, alone with his misery.

School. God, it’s so absurd. He already graduated once and now he has to do it all over again. He walked across the stage of Hawkins High and wondered if his parents were in the audience. His mom was late and his dad never showed. He went to prom solo and left one of the after parties so early it would be embarrassing if anyone noticed. But no one did.

With the way his relationship with Eddie is going, he might end up just as lonely at the end of his second senior year. He wonders if Eddie will be at school, or maybe he’ll skip class so he doesn’t have to see Steve. That idea hurts. There’s only one way to find out.

Steve packs his backpack with a heavy sigh. This bullshit again.

He feels like an alien when he walks into the school. Not only because he doesn’t belong here anymore, but also because of the way people look at him. He was so used to people talking about him, he used to want it, but now the looks that his old classmates give him as he walks by makes his skin crawl. No one says a word to him but they whisper to each other, not quietly enough.

“...see what happened to Harrington yesterday…?”

“...think he has some kind of disease…?”

“...you weren’t there? It was crazy, man, he was just standing there like the lights were on but nobody’s home…”

“...oh, he’s sick alright. You want to know what I heard…?”

“...does it have something to do with his accident…?”

The looks and whispers stick to Steve like a ghost shadowing his every move. He keeps his eyes on his feet. He takes the long way to the gym so he can swing by Nancy’s locker but she’s already gone to class. He imagines her shock when he tells her what happened and it brings the slightest smile to his face. She can help him figure out what to do now, and it won’t be bottled up inside him anymore.

Steve opens the locker room door and a wall of stink hits him. It doesn’t smell like roses on the best of days but the usual cocktail of sweat and deodorant mingles with a nauseating chemical smell.

“What the hell,” he mutters to himself as he turns into the main area. “Why does it smell like—?”

F

A

G

Paint.

It smells like paint because of the three damning letters spray painted in bright red down the door of his gym locker.

The guys in his gym class are already here changing, and they all turn to look at him. Steve stares at the letters with cold fear curdling in his gut. Of all the things he has to worry about now, he didn’t expect this to be one of them.

“What the hell is this?” he demands.

“There are some awful rumors going around about you,” Billy drawls. He stands before a monster, holding back its clawed tendril, when another one pierces his body, then another, and another. Max’s scream echoes in Steve’s ears. Steve couldn’t honestly say that he missed the guy but he didn’t deserve to die the way he did, and Max didn’t deserve to watch it happen.

But that was then, and this is now. A whole new world.

Same old Billy.

“Anyone with half a brain would know this is bullshit.” Steve has to be careful—some of these guys have less than half a brain. Nothing implicates Eddie. For all he knows there could be a rumor going around that he’s screwing one of the guys in this room.

“I don’t know, buddy,” Tommy says. “You should see the look on your face.” He’s already finished changing and he’s lounging on the bench, practically in a front row seat like he was waiting for this moment.

“You did this, didn’t you,” Steve realizes. “You’re going to have to clean this shit up.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Tommy says easily. He’s such a liar.

“I bet you invented whatever bullshit rumors are going around, too.”

“That was all you, Stevie. All you.”

“What are you talking about?” Every muscle in Steve’s body is tense. He knows they were careful. The only place that anyone could’ve seen them kissing was at the lake or at Eddie’s trailer, and that could only happen if someone was spying on them on purpose. Shit. Maybe Tommy was. Maybe when he saw them at Joe’s it was enough to make him genuinely suspicious.

“You and Munson?” Tommy says pointedly. “We all saw him yesterday. Oh, Steve, please wake up! He looked like he was going to cry.”

The sound of laughter scattered around the room makes Steve’s blood burn.

“Are you KIDDING ME?”

The laughter stops but Tommy’s smirk doesn’t disappear. If anything, it grows.

“I had a seizure, you assholes!” And if any of them, especially Tommy, saw what he did they would’ve shit their pants in front of the whole school. He spits at Tommy, “I’m glad I’m not your friend anymore if you think it’s too queer to worry about someone having a seizure. What the hell’s wrong with you?”

The room is quiet. The other guys aren’t looking at Steve anymore—good—but Tommy doesn’t look sorry. It’s not in his nature to give a shit about anyone but himself. He stands up from the bench and stalks closer to Steve.

“I heard you’re a working man now,” he says. “Family Video, right?”

This time Steve doesn’t need to pretend to be confused. “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

“You have a job now and you don’t have a new car. That tells me that the bank of mommy and daddy is officially closed for business.” Tommy crosses his arms and the smugness rolls off him in waves. “So you wanna know what I think? I think you found yourself another way to keep up the habit.”

Steve stares at his stupid face and tries to make sense of the words. A couple of guys laugh and Billy snickers but Steve doesn’t get it. Habit? What habit? What kind of habit has anything to do with money and Eddie—

Holy shit.

His jaw drops. “You think I’m—for drugs? Are you out of your mind?”

Billy’s mocking laughter bolsters Tommy even more. “You tell me,” he says with a carefree shrug. “You start hanging out with him and now you’re suddenly having seizures? It doesn’t take a genius to add two and two together, Stevie, and we all know how he makes his money. Or in your case, his blowjobs.”

Steve’s heart rages like a rabid animal, so loud in his ears that he can’t tell if they’re still laughing. He hates Tommy and Billy and everyone else in this room. He should’ve seen this coming. He didn’t care if anyone knew that he was friends with Eddie but he should’ve known how it could look to someone as dumb as Tommy, someone he knows too well. They were friends for years. He went to Tommy’s house and his birthday parties and had almost every class with him.

It’s like none of that ever happened.

Steve should’ve punched him last year (three years ago) when he had the perfect chance. He should’ve punched Tommy right after he spat on Eddie’s food and called him a fag.

Better late than never, right?

Steve slams his fist into Tommy’s face.

Tommy stumbles back with blood rushing from his nose. A violent energy sings loudly inside Steve. It’s like he’s finally scratched an itch he’s had for centuries, and it feels so good.

“You’re dead, Harrington!” Tommy comes back at him with an ugly fury on his face and Steve dodges his fist and shoves Tommy back to punch him again. He’s been in a few fights that Steve knows of—over girls—but he has nothing on Steve. He has nothing on the anger of a boy who was tossed out of the life he knew, and he’s nothing compared to the things that Steve has faced. Next to monsters, Tommy is just a flea.

Tommy grabs at his shirt and drags Steve onto the floor as the rest of the boys start hollering and Steve uses everything he’s got—elbows Tommy’s ribs, knees him in the groin—Tommy lands one punch to Steve’s mouth—Steve wrestles back until he has the upper hand again, pins Tommy and punches him again and again and again until he’s a whimpering mess on the floor.

Steve stands up and drags air into his lungs. He can taste the coppery tang of blood on his split lip and it makes him feel alive. This world is real, and the sight of Tommy on the floor makes him feel righteous. He needed this. He needed it every time he heard a new rumor after his car accident, he needed it every time people laughed about his breakup with Nancy, he needed it after feeling so lost and helpless yesterday. It’s a message for Tommy and the rest of the school—shut up about me.

He spits blood onto Tommy’s already bloody face. “Fuck. You.”

The shrill of a whistle cuts through the noise. Coach Ritter is standing near the entrance. “What the hell is going on in here?”

He looks at Tommy on the floor, then at Steve, then behind him at the bright red paint. “You two, come with me,” he orders. “Now.”

“He called me a fag so I punched him.”

Steve doesn’t elaborate. He meets the principal’s stern gaze and shrugs. That’s enough of a reason, isn’t it? He’s not sorry, no matter how much the man tries to guilt him into thinking he should apologize. No way in hell.

The principal glares at him. “That doesn’t warrant violence, Mr. Harrington. You broke his nose.”

“Good. He deserved it.”

He lets out a frustrated sigh. “You’re suspended for the rest of the week.”

“Fine. Can I go now?”

“No. You’re not allowed to leave until your mother gets here, and in the meantime you have an appointment with Ms. Kelley. She’ll be waiting for you outside.”

The thought of his mom knowing about this makes Steve more nervous than he was sitting in front of the principal, but it was inevitable. At least his dad isn’t coming to pick him up, but one way or another he’ll hear about it too. The last thing Steve needs is for his parents to think the rumor Tommy was spreading is true.

“Step into my office,” Ms. Kelley says. “Don’t worry, Tommy will get his turn too once the nurse is done with him.”

Steve follows her and sits in the familiar chair in front of her desk. The last time he was here he spilled his guts about all the things that Eddie made him feel. Fag. She must know about the word on his locker and she knows that it’s true.

She opens her notebook and Steve asks, “Do you have to take notes?”

“I have to write a report for your file,” she says apologetically. “But I promise, there won’t be anything…incriminating…in it. Just what happened this morning.”

Steve’s face warms and he looks down at his hands in his lap. His knuckles are bruised. “Okay.”

“So how did the fight start?”

Steve tells her more than what he told the principal, but he narrowly avoids any mention of drugs. If she knew about that, she’d probably have to tell the principal, maybe even the police. She listens patiently, and if she’s disappointed in Steve then she doesn’t show it.

“Have you fought with Tommy before?” she asks.

“No. We used to be best friends.”

“What changed?”

“Me,” Steve says. “Not him. He’s still the same.”

“Has he said or done anything leading up to this fight? Anything we should know about?”

I know that you’re a fag.

“He…” Steve starts, but he shakes his head. He doesn’t want to drag Eddie into the official story any more than he already has been. “No. Just regular Tommy bullshit.”

“Steve, if he’s targeting you and it continues to escalate—”

“It’s true,” Steve says. She must’ve put it together already. “Me and Eddie. Well, it was true. I think it might be over already.”

The clock tick, tick, ticks as Ms. Kelley gives him a long look, her pen hovering above her paper. She puts it down and moves the notebook to the side. “I get the feeling that you want to talk about it.”

“Is that okay?”

She gives him a gentle smile. “Of course. I’m sure it can’t be easy navigating your first relationship with a boy.”

“Actually it was pretty good until we had a fight last night. We’ve only been dating for a week. That’s how long it took me to ruin it.”

“Cut yourself some slack, Steve,” she says kindly, more kindly than Steve probably deserves. “You’ve been through a lot lately. What was the fight about?”

The quiet in the office is like a weight on Steve’s mind. He already told her about his dreams and hallucinations, and now with the seizure and this she must think he’s a mess. She would be right.

“There’s a really long list of crap in my life that I can’t tell him about because it’s…it’s dangerous. He knows that I’m not telling him and he’s pissed because he wants to help me but he can’t and I’m scared. Really scared. I don’t want him to get hurt and I don’t want to ruin his life.” Or worse, be the reason it ends.

Ms. Kelley really does have the best poker face that Steve has ever seen. “Do you want to tell him about these things?” she asks.

Steve sighs and looks around the room like he can find the answer somewhere in the motivational posters on her walls. I believe in me and Never give up aren’t enough for his mess of a life.

She says, “Let’s put it this way. If there were no life-ruining potential consequences, would you tell him?”

If that was the case, and if he knew that Eddie would believe him… “Yes,” he answers. He would love it if Eddie knew everything and stayed with Steve in spite of it all.

“Okay. Could your dangerous crap hurt him right now? Today? Even though he doesn’t know about it?”

Eddie would have to see the gate or a demogorgon, or…Vecna. Steve stiffens in his chair as the realization dawns on him. Vecna can attack anyone, but…he’s been in Steve’s head now. He might know how much Eddie means to Steve. Oh, god.

“Yeah,” he admits. “Probably.”

“Then wouldn’t it be good for him to know? Wanting to protect the people that we care about is an instinct as old as humanity itself. I’m sure we wouldn’t have survived this long if we didn’t have it, and sometimes knowledge is protection. Do you think the first cavemen would let their families wander away if they knew that a hungry lion was nearby?”

“What if the lion wasn’t a lion? What if it was something they’ve never seen before that they would never believe?”

Ms. Kelley’s passive expression finally breaks when a slight frown creases her brow. “Steve, I’m not even going to pretend to know what you’re talking about, but put yourself in his shoes. If he was going through whatever it is that you’re dealing with, would you want him to do it alone?”

“No,” Steve says instantly. “Hell no, but…what if my crap gets him hurt?”

“What if it doesn’t?” she says simply. “You can only do what you think is right, but every choice you make matters. If you want to build a future with him, it starts right now.”

A woman in a puffy red coat is standing in front of the secretary’s desk when Steve returns to the main office. Her blond hair spills out from her winter hat and her eyes are hidden by a pair of aviators as she signs a piece of paper with a scratch of a pen. Her sneakers are old and worn, and her jeans are faded. Steve is so deep in thought mulling over Ms. Kelley’s words that he doesn’t realize who she is until she turns to him and says, “They’re finally done with you?”

“Mom?”

She looks the complete opposite of her usual put-together self. He’s amazed that she let herself leave the house looking like everyone else. Then he remembers how drunk she was last night. Is she hungover? Steve has never seen her hungover.

“Your vice principal told me what happened.”

“It’s not true, the stuff about…” Steve’s voice dies. He can’t say the word, not to her and definitely not in front of the secretary and Mrs. Hagan glaring murderously at him from her seat. He can’t tell what his mom is thinking. All he can see on her face is himself, his anxious reflection inside the cage of her silver glasses.

“Are you ready to go?” she asks.

Steve glances at the clock. The bell for the end of second period is about to ring. “Can I run to my locker? I should grab my textbooks.”

His mom nods. “I’ll go and get the car warmed up.”

Steve stops by his locker but when the bell rings he moves through the flurry of students to the science hallway. Students stream out of Mrs. Harding’s chemistry class but Nancy isn’t among them.

“Steve!”

Steve turns around at the two familiar voices. A wave of emotion threatens to knock him over. Robin and Chrissy are walking to him, both with an undeniable bounce in their step. Steve wouldn’t want anything less than for them to be happy, but damn does it hurt to not have the Robin he knows by his side. He would love her in any lifetime but he might miss the girl he knew for just as long. And Chrissy. He wants to hug her and never let her go. He doesn’t know why Vecna chose her, what pain she’s hiding, but he wants to take it away so she’ll always be safe.

Steve clears his throat. “Hey.” His voice still sounds rough.

“I didn’t think you’d be here today,” Robin says. “How are—wait, what happened to your face?”

Steve touches his lip reflexively and Chrissy gasps, pointing to his bruised knuckles.

“Your hand!” she says. “Is that—did you get in a fight?”

Steve is almost surprised that they haven’t heard yet, but he’s sure everyone will know by the end of the day. “Don’t worry about it,” he tells them.

“Jeez, you can’t catch a break,” Robin says. “We’re here for you if you need anything, okay?”

Chrissy nods her agreement, and they’re both so sincere it doesn’t help Steve’s wanting to cry when he looks at them problem. Hopefully in this life he’ll have plenty of time with both of them.

“Thanks.”

Chrissy nudges Robin’s shoulder. “Come on, we’re going to be late. We’ll see you at lunch?”

“I got suspended for the week,” Steve says. “I’m going home.”

“We’ll see you tonight then, right?” Chrissy asks hopefully. “I’m looking forward to hanging out with you and Eddie again.” She winks at him.

Right, it’s Tuesday. They’re coming to the Hideout for Eddie’s show. “Yeah, uh…I’ll be there,” he says. Robin must’ve already told her about him and Eddie but Steve can’t bring himself to crush her excitement by saying no. He doesn’t want to believe that it could be over.

Before they leave, he says, “Wait, have you seen Nancy today?”

Robin shakes her head. “She wasn’t in Spanish. She was sick yesterday, too.”

She’s not here. Why isn’t she here? When was the last time Steve saw her? Messy hair, grim face, staring into the mouth of the gate before she jumps in—behind her mom’s car, red tail lights shining onto her skin—shit. After yesterday he completely forgot about his promise to her, and now she’s not here.

“What about Jonathan?” Steve asks. “Is he here today? Yesterday?”

The girls share a glance and they both shake their heads.

“Okay, uh, thanks. And if you see Eddie…tell him I’m sorry.”

Steve leaves before they can ask why, worry splitting his thoughts into different directions. Could they still be at the lab? Could they be with Murray? Are they somewhere else? Could they be…

No. Steve won’t let himself think the worst. All he knows is that they’re not here, and he has to find them.

The drive home is quiet. Steve expects his mom to ask questions about the fight but she doesn’t, and Steve can’t tell if her silence is a good thing or a bad thing. After they pull into the driveway, she puts her hand on his arm before he gets out of the car.

“Wait. Can we talk?”

He knew there was no escaping it. “The rumors aren’t true, mom. Tommy’s just making shit up because—”

“No, that’s not…Steve, I owe you an apology.”

Steve looks at her. Her sunglasses are off and she’s giving him a soft sort of look that he doesn’t recognize. “What?” he says. Did he hear her right?

“I’m sorry for how I treated you after the accident. I was under a lot of stress with the campaign but I know that’s no excuse. I should’ve been there for you, and I wasn’t. I know I put too much pressure on you sometimes.”

“All the time,” Steve says, and his voice comes out in a near-whisper because he isn’t sure if he should say it. He isn’t sure if this is really happening.

She sighs and looks down. “You’re right,” she admits. “I’ve been thinking about you, about myself, about our family. I’ve accepted that your father and I are a lost cause but I don’t want it to be that way with you.”

She reaches across the console and takes Steve’s hand gingerly, like she thinks he’s going to snatch his hand away. He doesn’t. “Do you think you can…forgive me? It doesn’t have to be right now.”

Can I still find you? Maybe this is what she meant. With his hand in hers and her disheveled appearance, he can see her again, fully real, fully human. She’s been nothing more than a billboard in his life for years, a constant reminder of the things he could never be. But the election is over now, and she lost. The billboard is coming down.

“I…maybe? Um…”

“That’s okay,” she says. She squeezes his hand. “Can we start somewhere? Can I take you for dinner tonight?”

“Uh, I might be meeting some friends at eight…”

“I can pick you up at six and drop you off after. Does that sound good?”

“Okay.”

She gives him a watery smile, and Steve is struck by how young she looks right now, when she looks like everyone else. “Okay,” she says. “I’m sorry I didn’t come to the hospital yesterday. I should’ve been there, but we’ll figure this out, I promise.”

Steve gets out of the car and watches her drive away in a daze like he’s half asleep. He turns and goes inside, and he finds the door to his mom’s suite open like she left in a rush. She never leaves it open. Steve pinches himself. It always felt like a war between him and his parents, but maybe not anymore.

He feels like he woke up in a new reality again. Things keep happening, good and bad, and he doesn’t know what any of it means. He’s in unknown territory, despite being inside his own past. This isn’t a carbon copy of his last life. Things can change.

And he has time now. He needs to find Nancy and Jonathan.

Steve goes to the kitchen and picks up the phone to dial Nancy’s number.

“Wheelers,” Mrs. Wheeler answers on the second ring.

“Hi, Mrs. Wheeler, it’s Steve. Uh, I was just wondering…is Nancy home?”

Even without seeing her face he can hear the frown in her voice. “No? She’s at school, why would she be home?”

“Ah, right, she mentioned that she wasn’t feeling well yesterday so I thought maybe she stayed home.”

“Is she not there?”

“Oh, uh, I don’t know, I’m not at school. I had…an appointment.”

“I see. Well, I’ll let her know that you called when I see her.”

“Yeah, thanks. Sorry to bother you.” Steve hangs up. Mrs. Wheeler didn’t sound too concerned but he didn’t want to chance asking when she last saw Nancy in case it made her suspicious.

Steve has to find the phone book for his next call. He dials the number and waits…and waits…and waits. The deja vu feels like an old friend when it comes. He vividly remembers sitting in Max’s trailer, waiting as they phoned the Byers over and over. Now he’ll never know what was happening in California while Vecna wreaked havoc in Hawkins.

No answer. He tries the Byers twice more and gets nothing but endless ringing. The last person Steve would try is Murray, but even if he had a phone book for wherever in Illinois Murray lives, he’d bet that paranoid bastard isn’t in it.

But the Hollands have his business card. Steve dials their number.

“Hello?” Mrs. Holland says.

“Hi, Mrs. Holland, it’s Steve.”

“Oh, hi Steve, how are you?”

“Um, I’m doing okay. I was just wondering if you have the phone number for that journalist you hired? Murray Bauman?”

“Oh.” Mrs. Holland sounds surprised. “Uh, sure thing, it’s on the fridge. Hang on.” There’s a brief rustle over the line and then she’s back. “Here it is. 317-652-8891.”

“Thanks a bunch, Mrs. Holland.”

“No problem.”

Steve hangs up and dials Murray’s number. The ling rings and rings. He tries three more times before he finally gives up and slams the phone down. He knows what he has to do now—he needs to go to the police station and find Chief Hopper. He has to tell Hopper what he knows and Hopper will help him find Nancy and Jonathan, even if it means storming the lab. He hates the idea of telling the man about time travel, but at least the chief already knows about the Upside Down.

And he’s been taking care of El. If anyone could find Nancy and Jonathan, it’s her.

One thing stands in Steve’s way. He doesn’t have a car, and his bike is still at school. If only he could take his dad’s old jeep. Damn, he should’ve paid more attention when Eddie was hotwiring their borrowed RV. The memory of it makes Steve smile. Oh, I’m just starting this sucker. Harrington’s got her, don’t you, big boy? He made it look easy.

Steve can’t hotwire a car but he can steal the keys. All he has to do is find them.

He goes downstairs into the basement suite and into his dad’s living room. He looks through the drawers in the kitchen, the coat closet, the TV stand, and finally finds them hanging on a hook behind the closet door in his dad’s bedroom. Bingo. He never would’ve risked his dad’s wrath before but now he knows that his dad isn’t worth the fear, especially not with his mom maybe on his side again.

Steve doesn’t know how to plan like Nancy but he has a ride and time and knowledge. Hopefully it’s enough to make a difference.

He goes back upstairs, shoves on his coat and hat, goes outside and stops in his tracks.

Eddie is walking down the driveway.

Steve’s feet take him to Eddie without even thinking about it, and they meet in the middle.

“Hi,” Steve says. It’s a good sign that he’s here, right? It has to be a good thing. Please let it be a good thing.

“Hi,” Eddie says. “I heard about the fight. Are you…” His eyes roam across Steve’s face and land on his split lip. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m alright. Tommy looked worse.”

Eddie’s lips twitch. “Good,” he says. “He deserved it.”

“Did you hear the rumors?” Steve asks hesitantly.

“That you’re blowing me for drugs? Yeah, I heard about that, too.” Eddie makes a face like it’s the dumbest thing he’s ever heard. “What a shit deal, blowjobs can’t pay bills.”

“Try telling Tommy that.”

“He’s such an idiot,” Eddie mutters.

“I don’t think anyone is really going to believe it. They’ll just laugh for a few days and then forget about it, so…we’re probably fine.”

Eddie nods. An uncomfortable silence falls between them that Steve isn’t used to, not with Eddie. Usually they can talk for hours about anything but Steve doesn’t speak because it seems like Eddie is working up to something. His mouth moves like words behind his lips are dying to escape and he takes a deep breath.

“I’m sorry about last night. I was too hard on you and you didn’t deserve it and I got home and I thought Jesus, what the hell am I doing yelling at a guy who just had a seizure? And I made you cry. I was an asshole.”

Hope rises in Steve’s chest. Maybe he didn’t totally blow up the best thing in his new life. “No, you weren’t. You should be mad at me, I deserve it.”

“No, you—well, maybe, but I lost my cool and I shouldn’t have.” Eddie moves closer and Steve feels warmer despite the foot of space still between them. “Listen, I…I don’t want this to be over.” Eddie runs his hand over his hair and his sigh comes out in a little cloud in the cold. “I don’t do this shit, chasing after people, but I really like you and I don’t want to give up on this yet. You said you need time, so…how long do I need to wait?”

A second chance. Eddie is giving him a second chance, and Steve doesn’t deserve it because he might never feel ready to tell Eddie the truth.

The Eddie in front of Steve and the Eddie he first knew don’t feel like two different people. Maybe the Eddie of his first life was braver, sadder, but his midnight eyes always pierced Steve the same way they do right now. If that Eddie could see Steve now, what would he say? The Eddie who dived through a gate so he wouldn’t be left behind, the Eddie who could’ve fled Hawkins but chose to stay and fight Vecna, the Eddie who died to protect Dustin and this town. Steve wishes he had an ounce of Eddie’s courage right now. He’d be letting that Eddie down if he can’t tell this one the truth. Like all of his bravery was for nothing.

For Christ’s sake, Harrington, just tell me. I can handle it. Maybe that’s what he’d say.

Steve glances at the keys in his hand. Nancy and Jonathan will just have to wait. He has to do this, and like Ms. Kelley said, if he wants a future with Eddie it starts in this moment. And if the future he knows happens again, he wants Eddie on his side, prepared, not scared out of his mind after witnessing the unexplainable.

So Steve isn’t ready, but this chance is too precious to waste.

He tells Eddie, “Thirty seconds.”

Steve grabs Eddie’s hand before he can ask questions and pulls him to the front door. Thirty seconds. That’s how long it’ll take him to unlock the door and go upstairs. That’s how long he’s giving himself to feel ready.

30…29…28…

Steve pulls Eddie upstairs into his room and tells him to sit on the bed, then he reaches into the darkest corner of his closet to pull out the spiked baseball bat. He remembers how it looked covered in demogorgon blood, how black the water turned when he washed it clean. He turns around and holds it in front of Eddie in both hands like he’s presenting a sword. Eddie stares like it’s from another planet.

3…2…1.

“I fought a monster with this thing.”

Eddie doesn’t scoff. He doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t roll his eyes or call Steve crazy. His serious expression doesn’t change a bit. “Its face opens like a tulip, right? Lots of teeth? That’s what you said on Halloween.”

“Yeah. Actually, I could show you. Nancy has a picture of it.”

Eddie’s eyebrows shoot up. “Really?” he asks.

Steve leans the bat against the wall and sits beside Eddie. He’s not a storyteller like Dustin, he doesn’t know the best way to start, but the monster and that bat dragged him into the chaos so might as well start there.

“Do you remember when Will Byers went missing?”

Eddie nods.

“That’s when it started. I had a pool party with Nancy and her friend Barbara, and I didn’t know that Jonathan was in the woods looking for Will. He caught it on camera when it was standing behind Barbara. Right before it killed her.”

“Barbara Holland?” Eddie asks. “I thought she ran away.”

Steve shakes his head. “She’s dead.”

“Jesus,” Eddie mutters. “So…you saw it happen?”

“No. Nancy and I were inside. We thought she went home. I never saw it until I went to Jonathan’s house a few days later. I wasn’t even supposed to be there but I was just in time to watch it rip through the ceiling. Lucky me.” Steve wipes his sweaty palms against his jeans. Without fail, every time he thinks about that night his entire body remembers it too. An echo of that frantic fear runs through him, makes him jumpy, makes his legs feel weak. Despite everything he’s seen since then, the memory of that first encounter with the unknown is always the worst. That was the night that his normal life died.

Eddie slides his hand into Steve’s and threads their fingers together. They fit like they were made for each other, and his touch makes Steve relax. He’s safe, they’re both safe right now. The lights aren’t flashing.

“That sounds terrifying,” Eddie says quietly.

“Yeah, it was. Nancy and Jonathan figured out somehow that it’s attracted to the smell of blood and they lured it to his house to try and kill it. It showed up alright, but we couldn’t kill it.”

“So what happened? Where did it go? Where did it even come from?”

“It’s from another world—”

“Like another planet? Wait, are you telling me it’s an alien? Aliens are real?”

Steve almost smiles at Eddie’s burning curiosity. He did say that he loves weird shit. “It’s not another planet. It’s like Hawkins, but dark and scary and full of monsters and nasty shit.” Steve thinks of future Eddie when he echoes his words, and it feels like paying his respects. “We call it the Upside Down.”

“So that’s what you wrote about in your notebook. So…it’s like a place? Like the Vale of Shadows or something? Another dimension?”

“Yeah, exactly. That’s where Will was, that’s why no one could find him. Everyone thought Mrs. Byers was losing her mind because she was seeing things and talking to Will through her Christmas lights, but it was all real. Will was home, just…upside down.”

Eddie frowns. “Talking through her Christmas lights?”

“Things in the Upside Down kind of mess with the electricity,” Steve explains. “If there was a monster in my room in the Upside Down right now, the lights would be flickering.”

Eddie’s head snaps up with instant alarm.

“What?” Steve asks.

“Yesterday, in the caf,” he says breathlessly. “The lights were going nuts during your seizure and then…then it just stopped and you collapsed.” His eyes search Steve’s face. “Does that…what does that mean?”

Steve sighs softly. The monster and the Upside Down was the easy part of all this. “It wasn’t a seizure. There’s something else in the Upside Down that can hurt people without coming to our side.”

“And…it wants to hurt you?”

“Yes,” Steve says quietly.

Eddie squeezes Steve’s hand too tight. “Why?”

“Because…I know the future.”

Eddie’s whole body sags as his breath leaves him, and he stares with wide, glassy eyes at the bat leaning innocently against the wall. But he doesn’t let go of Steve’s hand. “Steve…this is…I don’t…”

“I know, Eddie. I know this is a lot and it’s why I was scared to tell you. This is just the beginning. By the time I tell you everything you’ll want to ship me to Pennhurst.”

“I would never do that to you,” he says softly. “I want to know everything but I think my brain is melting. It’s, like, total mush up there.”

“Do you believe me about the monster?” Steve asks. If the answer is yes then at least he’s getting somewhere.

Eddie is quiet for a long time and Steve waits, tracing his fingers over the back of Eddie’s hand, across his knuckles and his rings. It’s a wonder that he hasn’t already fled the house, running far away from Steve and his insanity. He’s still here. He’s a wonder in every lifetime.

“Yeah,” Eddie finally says. His eyes are still on the bat. “Yeah, I think I do. I knew you were hiding some sort of weird shit. Honestly, I was kind of scared you were in a cult—” He looks at Steve. “You’re not in a cult, right?”

Steve snorts. “No cults, I promise.”

“Okay. Good. I’d probably join if you were, though. You’re terrible for me.”

That makes Steve laugh, and he feels the pieces of himself that fractured when Eddie left last night stitching back together again. Eddie drops his head onto Steve’s shoulder and snakes his arms around Steve’s waist, and Steve holds him.

“Listen, I have a question,” Eddie says.

“Yeah?”

“Why does your wallpaper match your curtains? It’s ugly as hell.”

Steve laughs again and he looks around the room like he’s seeing it for the first time. “Yeah, it is. It’s been like this since I was a kid.”

“It’s giving me a headache,” Eddie mumbles.

“Really? That’s what’s giving you a headache, not the alternate dimension news?”

“Multiple things are causing this headache. The plaid is one of them.”

“I guess I better redecorate. Wouldn’t want to scare you away from spending time in my room.” Steve presses a kiss onto his hair. “I’m glad you haven’t run away already.”

“I would never run from you, but I get why you didn’t want to tell me.” Eddie lifts his head. There’s a contemplative look on his face. “So when we were at the Creel house and the light was moving, that wasn’t a ghost? That was something in the Upside Down? Was it the monster?”

“No, it was the same thing that attacked me yesterday.”

“Do you…it sounds like you know what it is.”

“It’s…Henry Creel.”

Eddie jerks back with a frown. “What? Victor’s son? But he died in the fifties.”

Steve shakes his head. “No, he didn’t. He was the one who killed his mom and his sister, and the doctors took him away and told Victor that he died in a coma—”

“How do you know that? Wait, right, your psychic dreams. It’s all connected, isn’t it? Your weird dreams and the Creel house and the monster and the Upside Down…” Eddie groans and drops his head back down to Steve’s shoulder. “My brain is still mush.”

“I’ll tell you the rest whenever you’re ready, okay? I promise.” Steve takes the car keys out of his jacket pocket. “I have to find Nancy and Jonathan because—”

“I’m coming with you,” Eddie says instantly. “Did you get a new car?”

“No. My bike is still at school so I figured I’d take my dad’s jeep for a joyride.”

“You little rebel,” Eddie says. He looks proud for a moment before his face falls. “We should take my van. I don’t want you to get in trouble, especially after today.” He reaches up to brush his thumb gently over the cut on Steve’s lip. “Does it hurt?”

“No.”

Eddie leans close and kisses Steve, so gently it only leaves Steve wanting more. Steve closes his eyes and memorizes the feeling of Eddie’s lips on his own. He couldn’t live without this ever again.

“Are you sure you want to come?” Steve whispers.

“It’s got something to do with this stuff, right? You’re worried about them?”

“Yes.”

“I told you I want to help you,” Eddie says. Nothing but sincerity is written on his face. “I want to be in your weird crazy life, okay? I’m probably totally useless but at least I can drive.”

“You’re not useless. And I want you in my life, too.” As much as it scares Steve, as much as it hurts to think about the future, that’s the truth. He wants to keep Eddie. He wants Eddie to know every part of him.

“So Chief Hopper knows about the Upside Down stuff?”

They’re in Eddie’s van heading downtown with the radio playing quietly, but the music doesn’t distract Steve from his growing worry. He’ll be so relieved once he talks to Hopper, even if it means telling the man how he knows what he knows.

“Yeah, he helped Joyce rescue Will from the Upside Down,” Steve says.

“Is that why you’re worried about Nancy and Jonathan?” Eddie asks, his eyes on the road as he drives. “Do you think they’re in the Upside Down right now?”

“No, but…I guess they could be.” Steve remembers feeling like he was inside the veins of some gigantic being when he was down in those cursed tunnels. Could Nancy and Jonathan have discovered them and gotten stuck down there? “The last time I talked to Nancy she told me she was going to the Hawkins lab and I haven’t seen her since.”

“The lab? Isn’t that some kind of government research lab? Wait—oh my god. They’re involved with this shit?”

“That’s where the gate to the Upside Down is.” Steve adds bitterly, “It’s their fault Hawkins is a mess.”

“Gate?” Eddie echoes. “What does this thing look like? Have you seen it?”

“It looks like a big…eldritch pussy.”

“Ohhh. Okay. So your glowing orange eldritch pussy is a gate to another dimension. Got it.”

“It’s not my pussy,” Steve mutters.

Eddie laughs so hard that Steve worries they might swerve off the road, but he keeps the van under control. “So the government opened a pussy into another dimension? That sounds like something out of Heavy Metal.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s, uhhh…a science fiction magazine. It’s x-rated,” Eddie says with a wink. “I’ll show you one later if you want.”

Eddie pulls into the parking lot beside the police station and cuts the engine. Steve unclicks his seatbelt and realizes that Eddie isn’t moving, he’s just looking at Steve expectantly.

“What?”

“Do you want me to come in?”

Steve doesn’t have to think about it for long. “Yeah, I do.” Now that he’s started telling Eddie the truth, it’s easy to imagine him by Steve’s side, solving the latest supernatural crisis. Just like the future.

Eddie looks pleased. “Okay.”

When they walk into the station, three officers sitting at their desks look up at them. Steve knows two of them, Callahan and Powell. The future chief. He ignores them and turns to the secretary.

“I need to see Chief Hopper. It’s important.”

“What is this regarding, young man?” She gives him a discerning look through her giant glasses, and Steve knows she’s seeing his split lip. “Are you in some kind of trouble?”

“No, I’m fine, I just need to see Hopper,” Steve stresses. Beside him, Eddie looks antsy as he glances back at the officers.

“Do you need help, boys?” Powell says. He stands up from his desk and comes over, closely followed by Callahan. “The chief’s not here right now but we can help you.”

“Where is he?” Steve asks.

“What, are we not good enough for you?” Callahan says in a careless tone.

Steve glares at him. Maybe he’s still bitter about a future that doesn’t exist anymore, but he doesn’t care. The cops did nothing to stop the witch hunt for Eddie. “No, you’re not. Where’s Hopper?”

The two officers exchange a look.

“Where’d you get that split lip, kid?” Powell asks.

Callahan squints at him. “Aren’t you Donna Harrington’s son? Yeah, you had that accident in October and you got in a fight with the Byers boy last year. You're a real troublemaker.”

What a giant waste of time. Steve grabs Eddie by the jacket and pulls him out the door.

“What do you want to do now?” Eddie asks after they climb back into the van.

“I don’t know,” Steve admits. “I shouldn’t have dragged you here.”

Eddie rolls his eyes. “You didn’t drag me anywhere. Who else knows about this stuff? What about Joyce Byers?”

“She’s not home, I called.”

“Do you know where she works?”

“Melvald’s.”

Eddie starts the car. The drive is short, just a few minutes down main street until they get to the store. This time Eddie doesn’t ask if Steve wants him to come in, he just hops out and follows Steve inside.

Steve quickly checks down each aisle before he asks the cashier, “Is Joyce here?”

“Do you see her?” The man retorts. His name tag says Jeffrey. “She called in sick this morning.”

He can’t find them. He can’t find them. He can’t find them. Something has to be happening. Icy panic sinks through Steve and he numbly walks back to the van. Monsters roaring as they tear through the forest. Red lights blaring from the lab. Dazedly walking through dark tunnels, eyes blurry, feeling like he’s going to throw up. Monsters, so many monsters. He can’t stop it. It’s all happening again, isn’t it? Or maybe he’s too late. Maybe everyone is already lying in pools of their own blood somewhere inside the lab.

“Steve!” Eddie shakes his arm.

“I’m scared,” Steve whispers.

Eddie holds his hand, and Steve should pull away—they’re in the middle of town, someone could glance inside the van and see them—but he doesn’t.

“We’re going to figure it out, okay?” Eddie says reassuringly, but it only does so much.

There’s only one place left to go.

Steve says, “I need to go to the lab.”

Eddie bites his lip and gazes at the town outside. “Is that a good idea? You said you’d need the chief to get in there.”

“I know, but I have to try, I have to know. Maybe he’s there, maybe they’ll let me see him, I don’t know, Eddie.”

Eddie still looks unsure. He squeezes Steve’s hand once and lets go, then turns the key and the engine jumps to life again. “You have to give me directions.”

“Thank you.”

Steve tells Eddie where to turn and as they drive further out of town and into the woods, he feels more on edge. One look at the lab will tell him everything he needs to know, if he’s too late or if nothing has happened yet. They turn onto an unmarked road and Steve can see the trees start to clear. After another bend in the road, they see the lab.

And everything is fine. No emergency lights are flashing from inside, no one is fleeing the building, and the security guard is in his post at the main gate. He comes out and motions for Eddie to crank the window down.

“This is government property, do you have a reason to be here?”

Steve leans across the console to face him. “I’m looking for the Hawkins chief of police, Jim Hopper, and I think he might be inside. It’s urgent.”

“Well, if he is, you'll have to wait until he leaves. Unless you have clearance.” The guard looks between them. “I’m guessing you kids don’t.”

“Can’t you call him out here or something?” Eddie says.

“No can do, kid. Security protocol.”

“This is an emergency,” Steve tries.

“If you’re having an emergency, call 911,” the guard says. Very helpful.

“What about…” Steve struggles to remember the name of Will’s doctor. “Uh…Doctor Owens. Doctor Owens! Can I talk to him?”

The guard returns to the control post and Eddie gives Steve an excited look, but both of their hopes are quickly dashed when the guard comes back and gives them a business card. Hawkins National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy.

“If you want to book an appointment, call that number and talk to Rick Schaefer,” the guard says.

“Seriously?” Steve gripes. He wonders what Nancy would do if she was here, but she would’ve had a better plan than this. She did have a plan for this. It’s too bad that Steve is the unlucky one who knows the future.

“You two go home now, alright?” The guard says. “If you don’t leave, you’ll be arrested for trespassing on government property.”

“That sounds like fun,” Eddie mutters. He cranks the window back up and shifts into reverse, turns around, and drives back the way they came. Steve watches the building in the mirror until they drive around the bend and it disappears behind the trees.

“What do you want to do?” Eddie asks.

“Just take me home. I don’t want you to waste your time, I’ll just take my dad’s car—”

“No,” Eddie says firmly. “Steve, you said it yourself. You’re scared, and I would be the shittiest person on the planet if I left you scared and alone. And in case you hadn’t noticed, I like spending time with you.”

Despite Steve’s fears, that brings a smile to his face.

“So what now, Scooby?” Eddie asks.

Steve checks his watch. School is out now, and if his gut instinct is right, if it’s happening all over again, he knows three kids who are going to need his help.

“Take us to Maple Street.”

Chapter Text

Dustin will be the final nail in the coffin.

If Steve finds a padlocked cellar in Dustin’s yard then he’ll know without a doubt that history is repeating itself, and he still doesn’t know how he’s supposed to make a difference. He refuses to let himself wonder if he even can, for his own sanity. There has to be a reason he was sent back, there has to be something he can change, but he won’t be able to do it alone. For now, all he can do is try to be more prepared than last time.

So he asks Eddie to swing by his house again on their way to Dustin’s. He goes inside while Eddie waits with the engine running and comes back with the spiked bat. Once Nancy’s, half Jonathan’s, and now the only thing that gives Steve any sort of confidence, like he’s carrying a piece of both of them.

Eddie eyes it and his hands twist restlessly on the steering wheel. “Are you expecting to find the monster on Maple Street?”

“No. Well…maybe. But not the same one.”

Horror creeps onto Eddie’s face and Steve wishes he said literally anything else, but he’s only being honest. This is what Eddie wanted.

“There’s more than one? Please tell me you’re not serious.”

“It’s an animal. It’s just from another dimension.”

Eddie drags his eyes away from the bat and starts driving again. “And they can just come through the gate whenever they want? But…if the gate is in the lab and monsters come through it, how the hell is it still running? Wouldn’t all the scientists be…dead?”

The lab is an ominous shadow against the navy sky, dull emergency lights flashing in unison in the windows as a thundering roar fills the air. Eddie has no idea just how right he’ll be.

“They don’t always need to go through the gate.”

“I’m so confused.”

“The gate is…I guess it’s not really a door, it’s more like the lock. When it’s open the monsters can jump into our world wherever they want.”

“I wish I didn’t know that,” Eddie mutters. He looks tense but otherwise Steve can’t tell what he’s thinking, or how scared he might be. Steve can’t imagine how he’d react if someone told him what he’s telling Eddie. In some ways being a first hand witness makes it simpler; there’s no choice left but to believe.

“Sorry?” Steve offers.

“No, I asked for this and I want to know, it’s just…it’s scary. I wasn’t expecting…all of this.”

“I know. Just remember, if you’re ever alone and the lights are going nuts, run.”

Eddie nods seriously. “Got it.”

“Here, turn here. This driveway.”

Eddie drives up the sloping path to Dustin’s house. It looks perfectly normal, as normal as it ever does, as normal as any other house on the street—innocent and unassuming on a quiet late autumn day. It feels wrong that there isn’t something visibly wrong, something to explain why Steve’s pulse is already thrumming faster. They hop out of the van but instead of going to the front door, Steve leads Eddie down the stone pathway around the side of the house. He can’t wait, he has to know.

They reach the cellar doors—

Everything in Steve’s body plummets like the ground has fallen out from beneath his feet. “Shit,” he whispers.

Dead leaves crunch beneath Eddie’s boots as he steps backwards, away from the cellar doors that are chained and padlocked shut. “You think there’s a monster in there?”

“We need to talk to Dustin.”

Despite everything, Steve is looking forward to seeing Dustin again. Right now he doesn’t know Steve as well as he will, but starting their friendship over is a small price to pay to save Dustin from a world of grief. The last time he saw Dustin happy was when he was with Eddie, goofing off with their makeshift weapons before the end of the world. The calm before the storm.

“You’re going to love him,” Steve promises Eddie. They both found a brother in Dustin and he’s sure they’ll find that again.

Eddie glances back towards the cellar more than once as they walk to the front door. “Is he sane if he’s keeping a monster in his cellar?”

“He’s a good kid, he just has poor taste in pets.”

“PETS?”

Steve knocks on the door. When it opens and he lays his eyes on that familiar head of curls, he feels like he’s been kicked in the chest. One look at the boy and Steve is remembering the way they used to tease each other, giving Dustin advice, Dustin calling his advice stupid, listening to Dustin outsmart him when it mattered and when it didn’t, and all the fondness he felt for the little brat.

Instead of the hundreds of things he wishes he could say, Steve says, “Hey, Henderson.”

“Steve!” Dustin is wearing his headset and holding a half-eaten Three Musketeers bar in his hand, stress radiating off him like a geyser. “Thank god, I’ve got a giant code red and I…” He trails off as he registers that Steve isn’t alone. Eddie waves at him. “I mean, everything’s great. Code red? I don’t know what you’re talking about. What’s up?”

“Dustin, this is Eddie. He knows about the Upside Down, dude. It’s okay.”

“How do you know about the Upside Down?”

“Steve told me.”

Dustin frowns, and accusation laces his words. “You’re telling people?”

“One person, Henderson,” Steve retorts, and before Dustin can pester him about it, he asks, “When was the last time you saw Will?”

“Sunday. There’s something seriously wrong with him and we think he might have true sight but he wasn’t at school today or yesterday and Mike wasn’t at school today either and I said that was a bad sign and Lucas thought so too and I told him I had a code red and he said he’d meet me but now he isn’t picking up and no one else is picking up—”

Steve gives the bat to Eddie and rests his hands on Dustin’s shoulders. “Hey, it’s okay, we’re going to figure it out, alright? What’s your code red?”

Dustin looks between them nervously. When he finally answers the question, his eyes are on the floor. “I…might have a baby demogorgon in my cellar.”

“A demogorgon?” Eddie echoes. “Like from D&D?”

“That’s what they call the monster.”

“You play D&D?” Dustin looks up with the light of a newfound respect shining on his face. “What’s your class?”

“Bard, when I play—”

“Me too!”

Eddie holds up his hand for a high five and Dustin slaps it. “I’m usually the DM though. I run the club at school.”

Dustin grins, his full set of pearls and chubby cheeks on display. “You guys have a D&D club? That’s awesome!”

“Dustin.”

“Right, sorry. Code red.”

“So you have a monster in your cellar.” Eddie glances at Steve with a knowing look, but he doesn’t say anything else.

Dustin looks like a kid being scolded for sneaking into the cookie jar. “A small one,” he says, in a very, very small voice.

“How long has it been down there?” Steve asks.

“Since yesterday.”

“Alright. Get the keys and a flashlight.”

After he disappears into the house, Eddie looks at Steve again with that same expression. Thoughts and questions churn behind his eyes like he’s trying to solve the puzzle Steve has laid out in front of him, but half of the pieces are missing and he doesn’t even know what the image is. Steve wishes he could peek into Eddie’s brain and see what he’s connecting together.

“What’s going to happen when we open that cellar, psychic boy?”

“I don’t know. I could still be wrong.”

“Give me your best guess.”

“I think—I hope—the monster is gone. It dug its way out.”

Eddie nods, mostly to himself. He gives the bat an experimental swing and it makes a soft whoosh as it falls through the air. “I think I’m ready to hear the rest of it now. The curiosity is killing me.”

“I’ll tell you,” Steve promises.

Dustin returns with the key and a flashlight. He shoves on his shoes and coat and then leads them around the house, and every step closer to the cellar feels like a step towards the gates of hell. It’s happening too fast but Steve wishes time would speed up even more so he doesn’t have to feel the anxiety simmering beneath his skin.

“How did this small demogorgon end up in your cellar?” Eddie asks Dustin, and Steve is grateful for the distraction, even if it’s only temporary.

“I baited him with a trail of bologna,” Dustin says proudly. “I found him in my trash when he was the size of a frog. I thought he was a pollywog until his face opened up and he ate my cat.”

Eddie’s eyes swell up like balloons. “Uh…how big is this thing?” he asks in a shaky voice.

“Maybe two or three feet long?” Dustin says, but he’s walking in front of them so he doesn’t see Steve shaking his head. Eddie does. Steve holds out his arms further apart than that.

“Fuck,” Eddie whispers, his voice almost lost in the breeze.

Dustin gives Steve the key when they reach the cellar doors. Steve’s pulse rampages through him, begging him to run from the danger, and it’s so damn loud in his body that it pisses him off. He shouldn’t be this scared, god damn it.

Steve takes the bat from Eddie. “Stand back.”

Neither of them argue, and Steve falls in love with Eddie just a little bit more when he puts himself between Dustin and the door as a shield.

Steve taps the bat on the door. Nothing happens. He slams the bat against the metal, and a few birds squawk in protest and take off through the pale autumn sunshine. Nature is fleeing, maybe they should too.

But still no sound comes from the cellar.

Okay. Okay, okay, okay…it’s fine. He can do this. Steve unlocks the padlock and unwinds the chain from the handle. The doors don’t immediately burst open, so that’s a good sign. He lifts one door and it squeaks on its rusty hinges. Light cascades down the cement steps. He almost expects to see the creature sitting at the bottom like a demonic mutt, waiting for its prey to walk right into its teeth.

But nothing is there.

Steve whistles. “Dart? You down there, buddy?”

Silence.

He clicks on the flashlight and descends into the musty room, trying to keep his footsteps light but they still seem too loud on the concrete. The fresh breeze disappears and an overpowering smell reaches his nose—earth and mold and something stronger, sharper. Something he’s smelled before.

The pungent, acrid stink of demogorgon.

He reaches the bottom and after a quick glance to every corner of the cellar, his pulse grows quiet again, the adrenaline leaving him in shivers. It’s exactly how he remembers—a silvery, wet lump of reptilian skin on the ground and scattered, broken bricks around the entrance to a tunnel.

“All clear!”

“What do you mean all clear? Where is he?” Dustin charges down the steps with Eddie behind him and he spies the shedded skin on the ground. “Ah, shit.”

“What’s that?” Eddie scrunches his face at the smell but he still leans in to get a closer look.

“It’s Dart’s skin,” Dustin says. “He molted again.”

“Like snakes?”

“Yeah, and hornworms! I thought he was cold-blooded, too, but he hates heat and sunlight, which I guess makes sense if he’s from the Upside Down.” Dustin gets way too excited about critters in Steve’s opinion but Eddie is obviously intrigued, which doesn’t help. Nerds, he thinks fondly.

“Dustin.” Steve points the flashlight towards the tunnel and the boy’s face falls.

“Oh, shit!”

Eddie takes the flashlight from Steve’s hand and peers into the tunnel cautiously. “I thought you said they could jump into our world from anywhere. Why would it need to dig its way out?”

Dustin shakes his head. “I’ve never seen Dart do that. Maybe he can’t until he’s fully grown.” He starts pacing with his hands glued to his head. “This is bad, this is really bad. We don’t know where anybody is and Dart’s gone. What if he hurts someone? He already ate my cat! Maybe…okay, maybe we can lure him out of town and trap him somewhere so he can’t hurt anyone.”

Steve shares a glance with Eddie and he can tell they’re both thinking the same thing. Someone has to say it.

Eddie bites the bullet. “You, uh, you already tried that.” Steve is glad that he said it, because he doesn’t think he could be that gentle if he tried.

Steve says, “We have to do more than just trap him if you don’t want him to hurt anyone. You need a dog, Henderson. Not a demogorgon.”

Dustin’s hands drop and his shoulders slump in defeat. “I know, I know. So…how do we do this? I’m out of bologna.”

“I’ve got an idea but I don’t think bologna is going to cut it this time.” Steve wishes for the millionth time that he could talk things over with Nancy but he can’t. He has to trust himself. He has to trust that he learned enough from his mistakes and he can do better this time. The plan did work, right until the end. Maybe all he needs to do this time is switch up the bait. If he can do it right and kill some monsters, less of them will go to the lab. Maybe more people could make it out alive.

It’s worth the risk, but Dustin and Eddie need to know what they’re getting into.

“It’ll be dangerous,” he says. “There might be more of them out there.”

“More?” Dustin echoes. “Shit, you’re right. We already know Dart isn’t the first of his kind. No way he’s the last.”

“How many are there?” Eddie asks warily.

“I don’t know,” Steve admits. He remembers standing in the tunnels, clinging Dustin to him for dear life, heart in his throat, as what felt like hundreds of demodogs thundered past them.

“We have to try,” Dustin says. “Dart is…dangerous.” His last word comes out in a mumble, like he doesn’t want to admit it.

Eddie nods. A skittish energy hides in his eyes but otherwise he looks sure, and Steve can read him clear as day. I’m not leaving, don’t even think about it. Steve is immeasurably grateful, and that gratitude is followed by a guilt that threatens to eat him alive.

Alright. Here we go again.

Steve never imagined he’d be doing this again. It feels like he’s stuck in a nightmare, cursed to relive every moment and wonder if it’s going to end any differently this time. He throws chunks of raw beef onto the abandoned railroad as they walk, trying to space it out more than last time, and ahead of him Dustin is carrying a bucket of raw pork that they’re saving for the junkyard. He hopes these small changes will make all the difference they need.

The rubber gloves don’t keep his hands warm enough and his nose feels like a block of ice stuck to his face, but in spite of the cold and his brewing fear, it’s almost peaceful. Autumn sunlight seeps through bare tree branches and their feet make the only noise in the forest. Hawkins is worlds away.

Eddie is taking his new role as a monster hunter in stride. He has the fire extinguisher in his backpack, the can of gasoline hanging from his hand, and he’s taking advantage of the opportunity to get more intel about the Upside Down, this time from Dustin. He already looks like he’s meant to be part of the crew, the same way Steve thought so in the future.

“I almost shit my pants when I saw it,” Dustin is telling him. “It’s like a ghoul with a face that opens up to eat people and all we had was Lucas’s wrist rocket. I thought we were goners.”

“So what happened?”

“Eleven saved us.”

“Eleven? That’s a person?”

Dustin glances back at them with a frown. “He didn’t tell you about her?”

“It’s a long story, I was getting there,” Steve says.

“You didn’t tell it right if you told him about the Upside Down but not Eleven. She’s an integral part of the story.”

Steve tosses a chunk of meat at the back of Dustin’s head. “Fine, you do the honors, smartass. You met her first anyways.”

Eddie looks like he might laugh. He’s definitely warming up to Dustin.

“We met her in the woods when we were looking for Will last year. We thought she was some psycho kid who escaped from Pennhurst but she actually escaped from the Hawkins lab. She’s the reason we know about the Upside Down. She opened the gate.”

“I thought the scientists opened it,” Eddie says.

“They used her. You can’t just rip a hole in spacetime whenever you feel like it. You need special abilities, and El has those. She can move things with her mind and contact things in the Upside Down. We thought Will was dead but she showed us that he wasn’t. He was just stuck there.”

Eddie is quiet for a moment, then he mutters, “I’m starting to think we’re living inside a comic book.”

“I know, right?” Dustin pipes up. “It’s like X-Men!”

“Why is her name Eleven?”

“She’s an experiment.”

Horror and fascination war on Eddie’s face. “So there are ten other super-powered kids running around that lab?”

“No, she’s the only one.” Dustin’s voice turns sad. “Well, she was, but she’s gone now. The demogorgon got her.”

Eddie looks like he’s in the middle of a tornado, his words whipped away by the wind. He just learned about this girl and now he’s faced with an eighth-grader’s grief all in the same breath. “I…I’m sorry, kid. She sounds like she was pretty cool.”

“She was.”

Steve is itching to tell Dustin that El isn’t gone but with any luck they’ll be seeing her soon anyway. The boy has already dealt with so much now, even before they lose Hopper and Eddie and Max. Steve wants to say something—anything—but he feels like Eddie looks. His voice stolen by an imaginary wind.

The sadness in Dustin’s voice is mostly gone when he finally breaks the silence. “Do you want to hear about the time she made this jerk in our class piss his pants?”

Eddie says, “Absolutely.”

Steve already knows the story but he still laughs. Once he’s started there’s no stopping Dustin, and he launches into story after story, stringing together all the pieces of what happened last year for Eddie. He can’t see it as he walks ahead of them, but Steve sees that he’s made a captive audience out of Eddie, who hangs on every word he says. How do her powers work? How did Will survive that long? How did you figure that out? What happened after that? He asks Dustin about a thousand questions, and every answer seems to lead to a thousand more.

“...and then we—” Dustin stops walking and he reaches for his radio pack clipped to his pocket. “My code red is on the move, dude.” He’s talking to Lucas.

And Lucas is going to bring Max.

Steve could save her life right now.

“Dart grew again and I’m pretty sure he’s a baby demogorgon, so—”

“Is that Lucas? Let me talk to him.” Steve puts the bucket down, pulls off his gloves and holds out his hand.

Dustin ignores him. “I’m with Steve and his friend Eddie…just meet us at the old junkyard, stat!”

“Dustin, now!”

Dustin gives him a look like he thinks Steve has lost his mind, but he takes off the headset and gives the radio to Steve.

“Lucas, whatever you do, do not bring Max.”

For a moment Steve thinks the radio died, or Lucas has already left and turned it off, but then his voice crackles over the line.

“What?”

“What part did you not understand? Don’t. Bring. Max.”

“You know Max?” Dustin asks.

“Who’s Max?” Eddie wonders.

“What are you talking about? How do you know Max?”

“It doesn’t matter, alright?” Steve says into the headset. “If you care about her, don’t bring her. It’s too dangerous. Meet us there alone, Lucas. You hear me? Alone.”

Steve gives the headset and radio back to Dustin and puts his gloves back on, but Dustin doesn’t start walking again. He looks at Steve with growing suspicion.

“How did you know I needed help?”

“What are you talking about? Do you want to be demogorgon bait? Come on, let’s go.”

Dustin’s eyes narrow. “You showed up at my house with your bat and when you went into the cellar you said Dart’s name, but I didn’t tell you his name, and now you know Max?” He looks between Steve and Eddie. “How did you know? Did…did you talk to Mike? Or Will?”

Steve shares a look with Eddie, and this time Eddie is absolutely no help. His lips are pressed together like he’s fighting back a smile. Steve sighs. “I’ll explain later, alright? It’s a long story.”

“No, tell me now.”

“Dustin—”

“Why should I trust you if you’re holding out on me?” Dustin argues, and he’s one hundred percent right because this is just an echo of the same argument Steve had with Eddie. “What’s going on? What else do you know?”

“I know that our plan isn’t going to work if we keep standing here.” Steve shoves Dustin’s shoulder but he still doesn’t budge.

“Steeeeve.”

“Dustiiiin.”

Eddie breaks their stand-off with a poorly disguised smirk. “He knows the future.”

Dustin’s jaw drops. He looks between them, obviously trying to decide if this is some kind of prank. “WHAT?”

Great. Just great. Now that particular can of worms is open, and Steve knows he won’t let it go.

“He’s been having psychic dreams since his car crash,” Eddie elaborates, waving his fingers around Steve’s face as if to indicate some kind of mystical energy around Steve. He’s enjoying this way too much.

“Are you SERIOUS?” Dustin explodes. “You’re psychic and you didn’t want to tell me? Dude! That’s awesome! How does it work? How does a car crash give you psychic powers?”

“It doesn’t—”

“Do you know if our plan’s going to work?”

“Not exactly—”

Dustin looks like he’s about to start tearing his hair out. “What the hell? Are you psychic or not?”

Eddie bursts out laughing, and the sound brightens their little corner of the quiet forest. “Trust me, kid, I’ve been wondering the same thing. But he’s going to tell us everything later. Right?”

Steve nods. “When we find Mike and Will, and Nancy and Jonathan. It’s a long story and they need to hear it, too.”

Dustin’s face scrunches in annoyance, but he grumbles out, “Fine.”

Aside from the occasional question about their plan, Dustin manages to contain his curiosity for the rest of the trek to the junkyard. They veer away from the railroad into a wide open clearing littered with rusted out car frames, broken swing sets, barrels, tires, and every other kind of junk people couldn’t find a better way to get rid of. Dead ahead is that lonely bus, and the sight of it casting shadows across the ground makes everything feel real all over again.

“I said medium well!”

Steve looks across the junkyard and he instantly feels hollowed out, like someone carved out his guts and left only the bones behind.

Max.

The last time he saw her was before they went into the Upside Down to face Vecna, before their plan failed and the last gate ripped open and they knew she was dead. Now she’s here at the beginning, still so innocent. Her hair glows like fire in the sunlight and Steve wants to fall to his knees and cry.

“God damn it,” he curses.

He should’ve known that Lucas wouldn’t listen. If Steve couldn’t bear to give up a relationship to keep someone safe, how could he expect a thirteen-year-old to do it? They all just want to be known, to be loved in spite of the monsters plaguing their lives.

He knows that, but it’s not enough to stop his anger. “I told you not to bring her!”

Lucas rolls his eyes. “You don’t look like my dad. And she wanted to come.”

Max crosses her arms, and her oh so familiar defiance that used to drive Steve nuts takes over. “What, no girls allowed in your stupid little club? I didn’t know only boys could see the monsters.”

“Max, this is dangerous. I know damn well I can’t keep these two out of it but you don’t need to be here. Whatever Lucas told you, it doesn’t end there, okay?” Steve will never forget hearing her cry out for her brother, or the look on her face when she told them she was going to die. Sometimes knowledge is protection, but is that true for Max, too? Or is it just a curse?

“You can’t scare me,” she says stubbornly.

“I’m not trying to scare you. I’m trying to save you.”

“You should listen to him,” Dustin interjects. “Apparently he’s sort of psychic.”

“What?” Lucas stares at Dustin like he just said Santa Clause is real, and hey, he dropped by last night. “Steve Harrington is psychic? What are you talking about?”

“Oh, wow,” Max says, sarcasm dripping from her voice. “What does your little boys club not have?”

“How do you think he knew you were going to bring Max?”

“How is Steve Harrington psychic?”

“Max, listen to me—”

“She should stay,” Eddie says, cutting through the squabble of their voices. They all look at him and Steve tries not to feel too betrayed. Eddie looks at Steve like he can see it on Steve’s face. “She has to stay, unless you want her walking home alone with monsters running around.”

It feels—almost, just a little bit—like a test, even though Steve knows that Eddie believes everything he’s heard so far. You wouldn’t let her go home alone if these monsters are real, right?

Of course he’s right, and Steve hates it. More than anything, he hates that he’s putting them all in danger again because he doesn’t know what else to do. But there’s no time to turn around now. They only have an hour before dusk and they need to stick together.

“Alright,” Steve concedes. “But you better listen if I tell you to do something. That goes for all of you little shits.”

Max looks triumphant. “So, what’s the plan?”

They fortify the bus like last time. With Eddie’s help it goes a lot faster, and soon it’s covered with sheets of scrap metal, barrels around the outside, and tires on the roof. Steve dumps the raw pork onto the ground but he stops himself from pouring out the gasoline when a thought strikes him.

Maybe they weren’t sick of cow. Maybe they just didn’t want a side of gasoline with their dinner. Surely they smelled that, too.

Shit.

Steve puts the can down as his mind races. He needs another way to light them up, and he needs this pile of pig to be as tempting as living, breathing human prey.

And he can think of a solution for both.

Steve takes out his swiss army knife, draws a deep breath, and drags the knife across the palm of his left hand, hissing as a bright line of blood appears.

“Hey, whoa, what are you doing?” Eddie jogs over to him, carrying a metal post in his hands.

“Making our bait irresistible.” Steve holds out his hand and lets his life drip onto the meat.

Eddie drops the post and reaches for his back pocket to remove his handkerchief. He rolls it into a long strip. “Give me your hand.”

“No, I’ll make it bloody.”

“I don’t care, come here.” Eddie takes Steve’s hand. His fingers are cold but gentle as he wraps the makeshift bandage around the wound, carefully pinning the ends to keep it tight. His hands linger on Steve’s when he’s finished. “Is it too tight?”

“No, it’s good. Thanks.” Steve wants to say more, wants to tell Eddie every single one of his fears and hear Eddie tell him that everything will be okay, but he stays quiet. He wants to kiss Eddie too, just for luck, but he won’t take the risk with the kids nearby.

“So what are you going to do with the gas?”

“I had an idea but I’d need some glass bottles.” Steve curses himself. He could’ve brought some. Even with a second chance he’s still so unprepared.

“Hm. I think I saw some beer bottles. Is that…is that good?”

Steve wants to kiss Eddie all over again. “That’s perfect.”

Eddie finds the bottles and Steve makes quick work of his new plan—molotov cocktails. He takes off his coat and sweater and shoves them into Eddie’s arms so he can rip off his undershirt, and he doesn’t miss the way Eddie’s eyes linger on his chest before he puts his clothes back on. He cuts the shirt into strips and stuffs them into the bottles, and Eddie fills them with gasoline. They have enough gas leftover to draw a circle around the bait and trail it to the bus.

A noose and five grenades—it has to be enough.

Their light is gone. The sun has disappeared behind the distant trees, casting a faint golden hue on the horizon as the winter night creeps across the sky. They pile into the bus and Steve looks across the junkyard one last time before shutting the door.

It’s going to work, he tells himself. Over and over and over again.

The bitter November chill takes Steve hostage as soon as he stops moving. He feels like he’s sitting inside a freezer, and he wonders if the cold might kill them before the monsters ever get a chance. Even with Eddie beside him, their sides pressed together, he shivers all the way down to his toes. He had the foresight to bring a small blanket but he gave it to Max. She’s wearing it like a cloak, over her head and tight around her shoulders.

“So…you really fought one of these things before?”

Steve nods. And more. The demogorgons are only the beginning.

“And you’re totally a hundred percent sure it wasn’t a bear?”

“Shit, don’t be an idiot. It wasn’t a bear,” Dustin says. “Why are you even here if you don’t believe us? Just go home.”

“Not happening,” Steve says, and he almost smiles when Eddie says, “No way,” at the same time. He’s not the only babysitter anymore.

Even in the dark, Max is obviously stunned. “Yeesh, someone’s cranky. Past your bedtime?”

After she disappears up to the roof to join Lucas, Steve sighs. “Come on, Henderson.”

“It’s not fair,” Dustin gripes as he paces around the bus. “We agreed not to tell her and then Lucas did.”

“That’s not her fault.”

“It should’ve been a party decision. She doesn’t even believe us.”

“It takes time, man. Believing this shit without seeing it isn’t easy. Just ask Eddie.”

“Yeah,” Eddie says. His foot nudges Steve’s. “You can’t blame her for wanting to be with her boyfriend.”

Dustin stops pacing, and they both look at Eddie. “Boyfriend?” Dustin echoes.

Eddie looks confused and he points up to the roof. “What? They’re not dating?”

“No, Lucas would’ve told me.”

“Oh. I figured that’s why he brought her.”

Dustin glances up at the escape hatch and lowers his voice. “We both think she’s pretty awesome.”

“Ohhh,” Eddie says knowingly. “So you’re both in love with her.” In a sing-song voice, he adds, “Awkwaaard.”

Steve snorts and elbows Eddie lightly.

“No, no, I’m not,” Dustin denies instantly.

“It’s okay if you are, dude,” Steve says. He remembers the warning he gave Dustin last time—she’s only going to break your heart and you’re way too young for that shit—and it didn’t help Dustin one bit. He doesn’t want to be the reason that the boy is afraid to fall in love.

“I’m not,” Dustin says again, but this time he sounds less sure. “I don’t think so…”

“You’ll know it when you are,” Steve says. “Falling in love is so…loud.”

“Loud? What do you mean?” Dustin asks, and Steve can feel Eddie looking at him too, but he keeps his focus on Dustin.

He thinks about Nancy and that first thundering rush when he realized what was happening, tipped over the waterfall with nowhere to go but down. He thinks about Eddie and the utter chaos he felt when Eddie hugged him that first time, how he nearly drowned in the aftermath.

“It’s totally overwhelming,” he tells Dustin. “You can’t stop thinking about them, your heart races when they look at you, they’re the only person you want to see. Trust me, you’ll know.”

“Is that how you feel about Nancy?”

What? Is he still trying to get them back together? Wait, no—his information isn’t that far out of date.

“Oh, dude, we broke up like a month ago.”

“What? Why?”

“It wasn’t working out. It happens.”

“Maybe you’ll get back together.”

“I don’t think so. I met someone else.” Steve resists the urge to look at Eddie and instead he nudges Eddie’s foot, and Eddie nudges back. He wouldn’t be this paranoid around the other kids but Dustin can be annoyingly perceptive.

“Someone more awesome than Nancy Wheeler?” Dustin asks doubtfully.

“Yup.” Steve desperately wants to look at Eddie, to see if there’s a blush on his cheeks that the moonlight can’t hide, but he doesn’t.

“How do you get so lucky? First Nancy, now this new girl…” Dustin glances up at the hatch again, and the distant voices of Lucas and Max talking quietly drift down. He slumps into one of the tattered seats. “Not everyone can have your perfect hair,” he mutters.

Eddie snorts a laugh and Steve elbows him again, not as gently this time.

“It’s not about the hair, man.” Steve was such an idiot. Just act like you don’t care. He doesn’t want Dustin to be the kind of douchebag that he used to be, and he can’t imagine that Dustin wants to be that kind of guy either. That advice didn’t help him with Max, and it probably didn’t help him with Suzie either. He doesn’t need tactics—he just needs confidence. “Whatever you do, don’t act like anybody but yourself, alright? You’re awesome, and the right girl will see it.”

“How will I know if she’s the right girl?”

“You won’t,” Steve says truthfully. “It’s a leap of faith and it’s scary as hell, but it’s worth it to try.”

“Yeah,” Eddie agrees quietly, and his voice simmers with something warm and rich and lovely. “It is.”

Dustin twists in his seat to look out the window, and Steve finally dares to look at Eddie. He’s already looking back, the dappled moonlight just enough to see the softness of his eyes. Steve offers his hand and Eddie takes it, and his mom’s wedding ring nestled around his pinky shines silver in the light.

When all of this is over, the first thing Steve will do is tell Eddie that he loves him. They’ve only been on two official dates and they haven’t talked about the age-old question—if they’re going steady—but Steve doesn’t care. He doesn’t even care if Eddie isn’t ready to say it back yet. Steve just wants him to know. He hopes Eddie knows right now, that he can feel it.

“Are you warm enough?” Steve asks, in lieu of all the conversations they can’t have.

“Yeah.” After a glance at Dustin, Eddie brings Steve’s hand to his lips and presses a quick, silent kiss to his skin.

They don’t have to wait much longer before the peaceful quiet is broken by a vicious roar. A chill runs down Steve’s spine and all of his worry comes flooding back, tying his stomach in knots.

They’re coming.

He and Eddie join Dustin at the window and peer out into the darkness. It’s only seven o’clock but it looks like midnight, the crescent moon hanging low in the sky casting a glow across the yard. This time no early autumn fog hangs around to shroud their view, and after a breathless moment Steve sees a dark spot moving out of the trees.

“Ten o’clock!” Lucas calls down.

“There,” Steve whispers. He points across the clearing. “Do you guys see it?”

“I see it,” Dustin says.

Eddie leans over Steve’s shoulder and his hand grips the back of Steve’s coat. “I see…a shape. Like a dog.”

“Just watch.”

A crash of metal echoes through the quiet. Steve frantically looks around the bus—has their hiding spot already been found?—but he doesn’t see any claws piercing through the walls.

“Holy shit!” Lucas says. “There’s another one, three o’clock!”

The noise came from outside, where one of the creatures landed on top of a rusted out Suburban. Its tail swishes from side to side as it appears to sniff the air.

Two more monsters crawl out of the darkness between piles of junk on the left, then another one sneaks into the clearing behind the first. Together there are five, and they creep towards the pile of meat in unison. In a beam of moonlight, only a few yards from the bus, the sight is as clear as day—their heads peel open and they begin to feast.

It worked.

Eddie looks like he woke up in a whole different world. His eyes are fixed on the scene outside, and he’s so still that Steve almost thinks he’s not breathing. A whisper tumbles from his lips. “Holyyy shit.”

Steve nudges him. “Ready?”

He tears his eyes away and takes out his lighter. “I hope so.”

Steve whispers, “Time to give these bastards a surprise.”

“Yeah. Yeah, definitely.”

Steve climbs up the ladder and stands on the roof beside Lucas and Max. Eddie has the scarier job by far but he offered to do it, and he wouldn’t let Steve convince him otherwise. Steve hears the faint squeak of the bus doors opening below and he knows that Eddie is standing in the doorway, ready to toss his lighter.

Lucas gives Steve the first of the beer bottles filled with gasoline. “Don’t miss.”

At the base of the ladder, Dustin counts them down. “Three.”

Steve flicks open his lighter and the flame dances like hope in the night, bright and beautiful.

“Two.”

He waves the flame into the cloth.

“One.”

This one’s for Eddie.

“NOW!”

Steve throws the bottle. It blazes through the sky at the same time that a line of fire rips across the ground and bursts into a circle around the monsters, the snare that should contain them long enough for Steve to give them all he’s got.

Crash! The bottle shatters onto one of the beasts and explodes into an inferno. Bullseye.

In a blur of gold and heat and his screaming heartbeat, Steve takes bottle after bottle from Lucas and Max, lighting them up and hurling them through the darkness. He barely stops to see if they land on target before launching another one. He throws each one with a hope, saying a prayer of revenge in his mind as the fire stains his vision like the sun. This one’s for Hopper. For Chrissy. For Max.

Steve throws the last one and it bursts against the back of the last beast. Their tortured shrieking is music to his ears, singing righteous violence in his veins. Whatever kind of blood they have is spilled, melted out of them and staining the ground as they writhe in agony. All because of Steve. Because he did it right this time. Here, high above the fruit of his own destruction, he feels unspeakably, unstoppably invincible.

The choir song of death begins to fade, one at a time, until the last beast goes quiet.

Max peers over the tires. She looks windswept, nearly as shocked as Eddie did. “Are…are they dead?”

“We did it, we killed them,” Lucas says, like he witnessed a miracle. He half-laughs. “You didn’t miss.”

But down on the ground, something moves.

A monster still engulfed in flames crawls on its belly out of the circle.

Right towards the bus.

Dustin races across the grass.

Four voices shout, “DUSTIN!”

Steve moves before he thinks, down the ladder, grabbing the bat, and then they’re all outside with Dustin as he showers the creature on the ground in a cloud of white from the fire extinguisher. It makes a truly pathetic noise and reaches one claw towards Dustin’s feet.

“It’s Dart,” Dustin tells them. His voice is thick. “He just wants to say goodbye.”

“Are you sure?” Lucas asks.

“I saw the yellow pattern on his butt.”

“But…he was tiny last week,” Max says.

“He grew three times already.”

Dart whimpers again and its claw twitches. Then, finally, it’s still.

Dustin hides his face against his shoulder, like he can’t bear to look at the smoking shell of the beast. “He trusted me, Steve. I betrayed him.”

Steve puts his hand on Dustin’s head. “It had to be done, Henderson. He was a monster.”

“Maybe we just don’t understand him.”

“Would you say that about the one we saw last year?” Steve asks quietly.

Dustin sighs. The weight of the world makes his shoulders sag. “We had a bond,” he mourns. He digs into his pocket and pulls out a Three Musketeers. “I was saving this for you, buddy. Rest in peace.”

Dustin chews lifelessly on the candy and no one talks. Steve doesn’t know what to say and clearly no one else does either. Max looks at Lucas, Lucas shrugs, and Eddie is lost in thought as he gazes at the burning corpses. At least in this strange, pseudo funeral for a monster, they’re finally warm again.

Steve knocks his hand against Eddie’s. “You okay?” he whispers.

Eddie’s whisper is so quiet Steve can barely hear it over the rustling of the fire. “I…that was…”

“I know.”

“I believed you. I did. But seeing it is…”

“Now imagine one of those, nine feet tall and standing on two legs.”

“Jeez.” Eddie wipes his hand down his face and breaks his eyes away from the fire to look at Steve. He leans closer and whispers, “Has anyone ever told you how metal you are? I can’t believe you run around making Molotov cocktails and fighting monsters.”

You told me once. “You’re pretty metal, too,” Steve whispers back. Even though Eddie knows nothing about that future, it still feels like something Steve needs to say. He’s so much braver than he thinks he is.

“Not like that,” Eddie murmurs.

The quiet spell over the moment is broken by a distant roar ringing through the forest. Their night is far from over.

“Alright, get your stuff, let’s go,” Steve says. He picks up the extinguisher where Dustin dropped it and unleashes a cloud of white over the rest of the burning corpses.

Dustin sniffs and crumples the candy bar wrapper into his pocket. “Where are we going?” He only sounds marginally less miserable.

“To the lab.”

“You still think they’re there?” Eddie asks.

“Who’s there?” Max says.

“Hopper, Joyce, Mike and Will,” Steve says. “I hope.”

Lucas looks skeptical. “Are you actually psychic?”

“Can you guys just trust me? Okay? Please? If Mike and Will are there, then they’ll need our help.”

That’s enough to get the kids back to the bus to grab their backpacks, and in Max’s case, the blanket that flew off her shoulders when they ran outside. Steve tosses the extinguisher into a pile of junk. With the fire smothered he already feels the cold creeping in again, and he gravitates back to Eddie’s side.

“Are you sure about this?” Eddie asks.

“No,” Steve says honestly. Anything could still go wrong. “But it’s my best guess.”

Eddie nods. The tiny smile he gives Steve, lit only by the glow of the moon, feels like a blessing. “Good enough for me.”

Now the lab looks exactly how Steve remembers. The guard who turned them away earlier is gone, his post empty, the telephone hanging off the hook like he left in a hurry. The building is a massive black shadow against the navy sky and the dull glow of emergency lights flash in the windows like a word of warning to the wise. Stay away if you know what’s good for you. Steve isn’t wise, even with the weight of a world he wants to avoid on his shoulders.

Everything looks the same, but Nancy and Jonathan aren’t here.

Why aren’t they here?

“What do we do now?” Dustin asks.

“Wait,” Steve says. He walks away from the gate with Eddie on his heels and shines his flashlight past the bend in the road, straining his ears for the sound of a car engine, but he doesn’t hear one. Did something change, or did they just get here early?

“Hey, what’s wrong? What were you expecting?” Eddie asks.

“I thought Nancy and Jonathan would be here.”

The gate is still shut so no one made it out yet…but they might not this time. They could all be dead inside. As if to answer the question, a thundering animal roar rattles into the night.

No, they can’t be. Steve shakes his head to erase the image from his mind, and he flinches when Eddie’s hand touches his shoulder.

“If they’re not here, maybe we shouldn’t be here either,” Eddie says with a grim look.

“Yeah!” Lucas throws his arms into the air. “What are we waiting for? For those things to take their revenge on us for killing their friends?”

“We’re waiting for the power to come on,” Steve says. If the power comes on, then there has to be someone still alive inside.

Right?

Familiar doubt creeps into Steve’s mind. Why didn’t the Mother choose to send Nancy back? She would’ve been a better choice. She would’ve known what to do. Hell, even Dustin would’ve made more sense. He’s smarter than Steve even at his age.

Why me?

Warmth trickles down his spine, burning so much hotter than Steve’s ever felt before. That presence makes itself known in his thoughts.

Will, wide-eyed with fear. Swirling, shifting darkness. Steve. Glowing orbs bursting free. Demodogs running wild. Red, thundering sky. Vecna. Eleven screaming. Her bloody nose. The gate.

Steve thinks, I don’t understand. It’s the same pieces that he saw after the Mother saved him from Vecna, a little more of each like he caught a few extra seconds of television before the channel switched.

Max says, “Hey guys, look!”

They all rush to the gate. The building comes alive, one floor at a time, and the light inside the guard’s station flickers on. Dustin races to it and starts pressing buttons, cursing when the gate doesn't open.

“Son of a bitch.”

Lucas points at Steve. “Holy shit. You are psychic.”

Max frowns. “Wait…for real?”

Steve is saved from answering that when the gate starts rattling open, revealing a long dark road in front of him, curving up the hill like a question mark. Now what? He knows the creatures are crawling around the lab, and he knows that their friends could be out in Hopper’s truck soon, but the itch to go in is like a siren’s song for a reason he never expected.

If he can feel the Mother the strongest right here, how strong will it be if he’s standing at the mouth of the gate to the Upside Down? Would the vision become so clear that he’ll know exactly what to do? Their lives are puzzle pieces of the future and the Mother is trying to tell him the solution. He’s sure of it.

But before Steve can decide, a pair of headlights and the sound of an engine emerge from behind the building and speed down the road. Hopper. Thank god.

But it gets closer and Steve realizes that it isn’t Hop’s truck at all.

“Guys, get back!”

The car whizzes through the gate then screeches to a stop. It’s Jonathan’s car. He was already here. Steve rushes to the side and he almost collapses with relief when he sees Nancy in the passenger seat.

She rolls down the window. “Steve! What are you doing here?” Her eyes are wide and red and exhausted, and she looks stressed beyond belief, but she’s alive. That’s all that matters.

“Looking for everyone.” Steve sees Mike in the backseat with Will, who’s passed out cold with his head on Mike’s lap. “How is he?”

Jonathan has a death grip on the steering wheel. “Not good.”

“Where’s Hop and Joyce?”

Nancy and Jonathan share a look. “How—?” she starts.

But they don’t have time to talk.

Another car slams to a stop behind Jonathan, and then Hopper’s truck is there behind it and someone is honking and Joyce is calling out of the passenger window and they have to go—

Steve rushes the kids into the back of Joyce’s car and he pushes Eddie into Hop’s truck and then they’re all on the move again, driving into the darkness of the forest. They’re still not safe—nothing is over yet—but they’re leaving the lab, and only a tiny bit of disappointment hides in Steve’s relief. He might’ve been within spitting distance of all the answers he needs.

But the disappointment doesn’t stay for long. It can’t, not when Hopper is here. Alive. The last time Steve saw him was at Starcourt Mall, hugging Eleven before they all went their separate ways and he never came back. Steve didn’t realize how much he missed knowing that the chief was around to help them, that it wasn’t just their wayward gang of misfits against the evil lurking in Hawkins. He’s one of the few people that Steve would trust with his life, and soon enough he’ll have to trust Steve with his own. He’s not going to die. Not this time.

“What are you kids doing out here?” Even in the dark, Hopper looks haunted.

“Killing monsters,” Steve says. “And then looking for you.”

Hopper’s eyes flicker to the rear-view mirror. “Don’t you have a hard enough time staying out of trouble without getting mixed up in all this?”

Steve is confused but then he realizes Hopper is talking to Eddie, who’s sitting in the backseat with his knee bouncing restlessly and oh. He’s been in the back of Hopper’s truck before, hasn’t he.

“I just wanted to help,” Eddie mumbles.

“I think your uncle would want you home.”

Eddie doesn’t say anything to that, and Steve wishes he’d climbed into the back with Eddie instead of taking the passenger seat.

“Where’s Eleven?” he asks the chief.

“What are you talking about?” His voice is a low rumble, and Steve isn’t imagining the hint of warning in it.

“I know you’re taking care of her.”

Hopper finally looks at him, just a brief glance before his eyes are on the road again, but the look on his face tells Steve everything he needs to know. “How the hell do you know that?”

“I’ll tell you. I just hope you believe me. I hope everyone believes me.”

In this moment, Steve can see his immediate future like a true clairvoyant. He knows what he needs to do, what’s about to happen. At the end of this dark road back to Hawkins his family is waiting for him and he has to tell them everything. He would almost rather face the demodogs again, reliving the fear a thousand times over, than have to face the looks on their faces when they think he’s lost his mind. He can only change the future if they believe him first. They all have to believe him.

Steve is terrified.

Chapter Text

Being at the Byers’ house is unsettling.

Steve was here just yesterday, when his old nightmare spiraled into a new circle of hell as Vecna walked through the front door like he owned the world. Steve was last here in real life on this night, the first time. It should feel like a home—with its mismatched furniture, family photos on the wall, and clutter everywhere—but to him it feels like the back door of the Upside Down. Nothing good has ever happened to him here. Standing in the middle of the living room pierced by the lightning of the paper map taped to the floor, Steve understands how Nancy feels at his own house.

Joyce and Jonathan dote over Will. Their love comes in the form of blankets and pillows, holding hands and kisses to his forehead. Anything to make him comfortable as if he was awake. It makes Steve’s chest ache too much to watch, so he goes to Nancy instead.

She’s a marionette with her strings cut, sitting in Joyce’s rust-coloured armchair bent forward over her knees like her spine turned to water. Steve kneels in front of her.

“Hey,” he says quietly. She looks like she needs the entire world to whisper. “Are you…how are you?”

Nancy lifts her head and leans against the armrest. The lamp’s golden glow is enough to see every weary line on her face. “I…I’m okay. I’ll be okay.”

Steve doesn’t doubt that for a second. “When did you get back?”

“Yesterday morning. We thought we’d be back by Sunday night but we had car trouble so I had to get Mike to cover for me. When we got back we saw…” she waves her hand around the room.

“And you had to find Hopper?”

Her brow barely pinches, like she can’t muster the energy to frown. “How did you know? What were you doing at the lab?”

“I figured it out, Nance. My dreams, I know what happened.” Movement in the kitchen catches Steve’s attention. The pale mint of hospital scrubs, but Joyce is still behind him and Hopper is in the bathroom changing into spare clothes. “Who…”

Nancy looks over her shoulder. “Bob Newby. Do you know him? He’s kind of a genius. He helped us find Hopper.”

Something takes hold of Steve. It buzzes in his chest and leads him on an invisible fishing line to the mouth of the kitchen where he finds a ghost. No, a poltergeist, opening Joyce’s cupboards and taking out her mugs as a kettle boils on the stove. Mugs, then spoons, then a tin of tea, then the ghost turns around and startles at the sight of Steve, like Steve is the one who doesn’t belong here.

“Oh! You’re, uh, you’re Donna Harrington’s kid, right?”

“Yeah,” Steve says faintly. “Steve.”

“Steve. Right. Do you want some tea, Steve? Joyce has chamomile, or earl gray if you want.” Bob gives him what’s probably supposed to be a polite smile as he takes the milk out of the fridge, but it looks more like a grimace. He looks as haunted as Hopper had, maybe even more, his hands trembling and his scrubs stained with sweat. “Let me tell you, if I drank, I’d be going for a stiff one right about now.”

Steve knows Bob Newby the way he knows most people in Hawkins—a face on the streets, a name in other people’s mouths—but he only talked to the man once at Family Video, and all he said was that’ll be a dollar fifty. He learned more about the man after he died than he ever knew while Bob was alive, as the grief of those around him became tangible and soaked into his soul like water to a sponge. To Steve, he was a ghost story.

And he’s alive. Again. Still.

For the first time, the future doesn’t feel concrete-heavy on Steve’s shoulders. He can make a difference, he can save people—the evidence is standing right in front of him.

At his silence, Bob looks at him. “You look like you could use a stiff one, too, although you’re doing a sight better than me. Those three told us some of what happened in the car, killing those things…you’re one brave kid.” He shudders and picks up the kettle when it starts to whistle. “Tea?”

“Uh, yeah. Chamomile, I guess. And one for Eddie, please.”

Eddie is hovering between the living room and dining room, between worlds like he isn’t sure where he belongs. He’s listening to Mike as the boy tells his friends what happened at the lab, but he doesn’t ask questions like Dustin and Lucas and Max do, a fly on the wall rather than a true part of the conversation.

At the sound of his name Eddie looks over at him, and Steve’s hope swells, tying itself into a promise around his heart. I can save you, too.

A cool breeze carrying the damp scent of almost-winter draws Steve away from the warmth of the kitchen and into the inky blue darkness of the hallway. The window at the end is open, and the curtains billow into the darkness like twin ghosts. That impression washes over him again, like he’s standing on the threshold of chaos, this part of the house sunk into another world.

Steve closes the window and the curtains fall motionless against the frame, but the draft isn’t gone. He ignores the No Trespassing sign on Will’s door and enters his bedroom. It paints an innocent picture of a growing boy—science trophies and crayon drawings, schoolwork and novels—until Steve reaches across Will’s desk to close the window and sees a familiar image. A sinister black form, towering above trees and powerlines like a monstrous spider in a storm of violent red lightning. The Mind Flayer.

“What are you looking at?” Eddie is lingering in the doorway with his hands in his back pockets. He looks so out of place, and it’s so strange to see him here. Right now, on this night, not the beginning but a turning point that will shape all of their lives. Steve is glad that he’s here.

“Did you hear what happened to Will?”

“Some. They were talking about true sight again, they said something got him at school last week.”

Steve shows him the drawing. “This. It’s from the Upside Down. There’s a piece of it inside him. He’s sedated so that this thing and the monsters don’t know where we are.”

Eddie studies the drawing. He turns his wary gaze to Steve. “Are you going to tell us now?”

Steve could really use that stiff drink right about now. Under the circumstances, Hopper might even look the other way. “Yeah. Come on.”

They return to the kitchen. Everyone is gathered now, sitting with mugs of tea, or in the kids’ case, cups of apple juice. The homely smell of coffee from a fresh pot lingers in the air, and Joyce pours out a mug and buzzes past them to give it to Hopper.

“Oh, did you close the windows? Thanks, I can’t believe I left them open, Will said—”

“He likes it cold,” Steve finishes for her. He drops the drawing on the kitchen table between the kids. “I know.”

“Told you he’s psychic,” Dustin says.

Mike looks at his friend like he’s full of shit, then he turns that look on Steve. “Seriously?”

“Psychic?” Joyce echoes. She gives Steve and Eddie their mugs of tea, now cool enough to drink without burning their mouths. “What—what? How…?”

Steve downs half of his tea in one go. Everyone is looking at him now and he might as well be standing on the edge of a crumbling cliff. The only way is forward. The only way is down. His stomach is a rubber band, twisting and wriggling into knots.

“I’m not psychic but I do know the future.”

“You want to elaborate on that?” Hopper says. It’s a command in disguise, as hidden as the man himself as he stands in the dark near the shuttered dining room windows. He’s wearing his spare clothes and police coat and hat, a sturdy but intimidating figure at the end of the room.

Eddie is watching Steve, waiting just like everyone else. He gives Steve a tiny nod of encouragement.

Steve breathes in the chamomile scent and looks into the murky water of his half-finished tea. Here goes nothing. “In…in 1986, I was in the Upside Down, and when I went back through the gate I ended up here. Hawkins 1984, instead of Hawkins 1986.”

There. The truth is released, and now the room is so quiet he could be lost in the sound-sucking void of dead space. The loudest noise in the room is the refrigerator humming and his own stuttered breathing, sticking to all the wrong places in his body, coming out backwards.

Steve forces himself to look up. Everyone looks stunned, but Dustin, bless him, is absolutely thrilled. He must have a million questions. At least one person in the room wants to believe him.

But Eddie…the look on his face scares Steve. He’s shocked, and confused, but at the same time something darker descends. Like poison in water, slowly turning everything black.

Max severs the silence. She hasn’t been part of the group for long, so she doesn’t know the limits of the Upside Down and the improbability of what Steve said. “So, you’re…from the future?”

“Is—is that possible?” Joyce trips over her question, looking around, looking at Hopper.

“After what I’ve seen tonight, I’d say why not,” Bob says. He’s sitting beside Joyce at the dining table with his own tea and a knit blanket over his shoulders. “Monsters, other worlds, time travel…wow.”

“Alright, kid, if you’re just messing around—” Hopper warns.

“I swear I’m not. I swear I’m telling the truth.”

Nancy has that look on her face that Steve has been longing to see. She’s turning the puzzle pieces around and around in her mind. “So, the dreams you told me about are…what, your memories? Of the future? They’re really going to happen?”

“Yes, exactly.” Steve gulps the rest of his tea but it doesn’t wash away the desert in his throat. “Listen, I know this sounds totally insane, but I really need you guys to believe—”

“Your dreams started after your accident,” Eddie cuts in, and his voice is acidic. “So you’ve known everything that was going to happen since then? You knew we were going to…”

He doesn’t finish the sentence. He doesn’t need to. Steve feels bitten, naked and bleeding in front of people who must be wondering what’s going on between them. The rubber band in his gut snaps. How could Eddie think…?

“No,” falls from Steve’s lips like it was punched out of him. “I didn’t know that was going to happen—”

“Oh, bullshit,” Eddie spits. “You want me to believe you’re from the future but you didn’t know exactly what was going to happen?” He moves closer, right into Steve’s space, and his voice drops to a menacing whisper. “Were you playing me this entire time? Is that why you didn’t want to tell me the truth?”

A flush rises up Steve’s face, hot and indignant. “No! I—yesterday—the seizure, that’s when I remembered everything—”

“You had a seizure?” Nancy asks, heavy with concern. She hasn’t been at school for two days so she’s out of the loop, about Steve’s not-seizure in the cafeteria and the rumors about him and Eddie. But she’s too smart, she doesn’t need the gossip. Her puzzle-solving look shifts from Steve to Steve and Eddie, and he wants to run and hide.

“Not really, it was—”

“Riiiight, it was just Henry Creel attacking you in your head,” Eddie says, dripping with sarcasm.

“Yes!” Steve snaps. “Just because you don’t understand everything doesn’t mean I’m lying. This is what you wanted, Eddie, this is the truth. I. Remembered. Yesterday.”

Eddie jerks like he’s been slapped. The fight leaves him, and his mistrust unwinds into a bottomless well of confusion. “But…when you woke up…you were surprised to see me. Alive.”

Steve’s voice dies, strangled by a salt-bitter anguish heavier than anything he’s felt before. It’s one thing for him to know, it’s another thing entirely to be the messenger of news like that. He can’t explain that away. He wouldn’t even if he could because it’s part of the truth.

Eddie turns blank, a statue-like expression of no expression. “You were confused.”

“I was confused, but only because I thought at first that I was still in 1986.”

Crash. The mug slips from Eddie’s grasp, exploding porcelain and hot tea over their shoes. He doesn’t even blink. His words drown the moment they leave his lips. “Are you saying I’m going to die in two years?”

“I can change that,” Steve stresses. “I know I can.” That hope, that determination, it’s still locked around his heart stronger than ever. He just needs Eddie to feel it, too.

Eddie breaks with a smile, of all things, but it’s not the smile that Steve fell in love with. It’s too sharp, too stale, like all the humor that should be there rotted in its shell. “This—this is ridiculous, this is crazy, and I—I’m—I’m on acid—or I’m dreaming, or—I don’t know but this isn’t real—” His boots crunch over the shards and he’s leaving, halfway to the front door before Steve can stop him.

“Eddie, wait—!” Steve leaves his mug on a shelf as he trails Eddie, ignoring Hopper’s warning not to go outside. He doesn’t look at them. He doesn’t want to wonder what they’re thinking. Nancy, though…she might have them figured out already.

He follows Eddie outside and down the gravel driveway past Jonathan’s car. This far away from the porch light he almost disappears into the permanent ink darkness, only a trace of moonlight glowing off his leather jacket. Steve thinks of a different time, a different darkness, a broken beer bottle at his throat and the curse of sympathy for a boy he barely knew.

“Eddie?”

He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t turn around. He digs out his cigarettes and pats every pocket but he can’t find his lighter. He left it at the junkyard.

“Can you please come back inside?”

Eddie laughs into the night, humorless, rotten from the inside like his empty smile. “Why? So the monsters don’t eat me?” He spreads his arms, inviting the darkness closer like an old friend. “What difference does it make? Die now, die in two years—who cares?”

“I care,” Steve snaps. How could he say that? How could he think that? “And it’s not going to happen, now or in 1986. So get your ass inside.”

His feet don’t move. He gives up on the cigarettes, shoving the box back into his pocket, and he folds in on himself. Arms crossed, head down, and he lets out a shuddering breath. He won’t be laughing anymore, as hollow as it was. It’s sinking in.

“Eddie,” Steve says softly, but what else can he say? I’m sorry? He never figured it out with Max, either. Shapeless sentiments, words without sounds. They idled so heavy in his mouth when he looked at her, and she looked at him, and her face said don’t. She didn’t want to hear it, and in his heart he knows that it’s not because she thought she’d make it. His brave little sister.

Eddie’s voice is a low rumble, hot coals that refuse to die. “You know, it’s funny. Kind of. If you told me this a few years ago I would’ve been…I don’t know, not happy but…relieved.”

Relieved? To know he’s going to die?

Arctic cold consumes Steve, and he feels so brittle he might splinter at the slightest touch. He tries—oh, how desperately he tries—to think of a better explanation for that, because Eddie can’t be saying…no, it doesn’t make sense, he can’t be saying—

“Wh-what…?”

“If it wasn’t for my uncle maybe I would’ve beaten your monsters to the punch.”

“Are you…are you saying you tried to…” Steve’s words catch in his barbed wire throat. This can’t be happening, he can’t be saying…

Eddie sniffs and wipes at his cheek. “No, I never tried shit. I couldn’t do that to my uncle. I swear he could read my mind though, but he didn’t know what to say or he figured the silence was better, I don’t know. He’d hear me crying and he’d come in and sit with me for hours. It didn’t matter how long. If I needed him, he was always there. I couldn’t leave him all alone.”

Steve never imagined there were words in the world that could ruin him like this. Words like that from someone he loves—unthinkable, incomprehensible. He remembers the day they studied together, when he stumbled onto Eddie looking like his own phantom, and Wayne like a loyal guardian at the door, and the magnitude of everything he doesn’t know overwhelms him. Eddie is an ocean and Steve has only begun to dip his toes in the water, and the colors of him—sapphire blue swirling into deep sea black—take turns breaking Steve’s heart.

Helpless words slip from Steve’s mouth. “Eddie…baby…”

Eddie makes a strangled noise between a laugh and a whimper. “Is that what it takes for you to call me baby?”

“Of course not.”

Steve reaches out with desperate hands and Eddie falls into him. The beating of his heart and warmth of his breath fills the gnawing pit in Steve’s chest with the precious gold of reassurance. He lets his hands and his kisses do the talking, keeping Eddie safe and loved in his arms for as long as it takes his tears to stop. He doesn’t understand those depths, and he’ll try if Eddie lets him, but if he can’t then he’ll settle for this. Being a boat on the water, a rock in his storms.

“I hope you never feel like that again.”

“Me too,” Eddie whispers. He lifts his head from Steve’s shoulder and rests his forehead against Steve’s.

“You’re not going to die in 1986, Eddie. You’re not going to die until I let you, you hear me? Not until you’re old and wrinkly.”

But he doesn’t get a smile for that, not even a weak one.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do,” Steve says, with all of his conviction. “I know I can change the future because Bob is here.”

Eddie leans away so he can see Steve but he doesn’t pull himself out of Steve’s arms. “What?”

“The last time—the first time—Bob never made it out of the lab. But he’s alive now. I—we—changed the future, and we can do it again. You’re not the only person in that house I need to save.” Steve can’t see the tear streaks on the shadow of Eddie’s face, but he wipes his cheeks anyway, feeling the dampness beneath his fingertips.

Eddie sighs. “I hate that I believe you.”

“You do?”

“The way you looked at me after your seizure…it was like for a moment you were someone else. You recognized me, but…and then you asked what year it was. I thought you were confused, like the nurse said. Like you were waking up from a crazy dream, but now…” Small and vulnerable, Eddie asks, “You really didn’t know we were going to start dating?”

Steve shakes his head. “It was different. I barely knew you, we weren’t friends until right before you—before I came back through the gate.”

Eddie chews on his lip, something warring on his face. Finally, he asks, “How did it happen? How did I…?”

“Are you sure you want to know?” Steve isn’t holding back the truth anymore but for this question, this answer, he needs Eddie to be sure.

“I…I don’t know…”

“You were really brave. You were trying to save Dustin. And Hawkins.” Not that Hawkins deserved it.

“Really?” Eddie’s clear doubt cracks Steve’s heart a little more. That’s the part he has trouble believing?

“Yes.” Steve kisses him. He can’t stop himself, and the danger that could be lurking in the trees can’t stop him either. This kiss is more important.

But he can’t stay out here with Eddie forever, even if he wanted to. His family is waiting for an explanation and he needs to give it to them. He leaves one more kiss on Eddie’s lips. “Are you ready to come back inside?”

“Do you hear that?” Eddie says in panic. It’s not because of a rustle in the trees or the roar of a monster.

They jump apart.

Cold light drenches Steve as a car comes around the bend of the driveway and the rumbling engine fills him with dread. He remembers the penny-bright taste of blood in his mouth, pain blooming across his face as he lay at the mercy of furious fists. Billy.

Eddie turns away from the light to wipe his face one last time. If Steve feels caught with his pants down, Eddie must feel it even more. “Who’s that?”

“Billy.”

“Hargrove?” Eddie says wildly. “What the hell is he—?”

They’re plunged back into the dark when the headlights die. Billy steps out of the car. Leather jacket, burning cigarette, all arrogance, and yet Steve wants to laugh when he hears the exact same words. You think you’re so original? Not to me.

“Am I dreaming or is that you, Harrington?”

Steve plays the game right back. “Yeah, it’s me, don’t cream your pants.”

Eddie snorts and Billy looks at him like he’s just noticed Eddie is there. “And with Munson? This sure is a surprise.”

“What are you doing here?” Eddie asks. His voice is still a little thick from crying, and Steve hopes that Billy doesn’t notice.

Billy slams the car door shut and saunters towards them with that same old swagger in his step. It’s not new to Steve or intimidating anymore. If it ever was.

“I’m looking for my stepsister,” Billy says around his cigarette. “A little birdie told me she was here.”

“Who?” Eddie says, looking at Steve more than Billy for guidance.

“Small. Redhead. Bit of a bitch.”

Don’t call her that, Steve wants to snipe at him. Instead he says, “Oh, you mean Max?” As if he didn’t already know. “Yeah, she’s inside hanging out with her friends.”

This time Steve is going to win. He doesn’t need to get his hands dirty. He doesn’t need to lie. It doesn’t matter if Billy barges in because Max and Lucas are both safe with the chief of police, and Billy can’t touch a single hair on their heads.

Billy looks between them, then he points with his cigarette. “I can see that.”

Steve looks automatically, even though he really doesn’t need to, but he’s surprised when he only sees one face in the window. The only one who matters. She ducks out of sight behind the curtain. Shit. How long was she there?

Billy doesn’t move towards the door. He doesn’t shove Steve or Eddie out of the way. He takes another step closer, too close for comfort when Steve knows how violent he can be. “You know, this whole situation…I don’t know. It’s giving me the heebie jeebies.”

“The heebie jeebies?” Eddie repeats like he just heard the dumbest thing in his life. “How about the zoinks and the jinkies, you feeling those too? The jeepers creepers?”

Steve doesn’t laugh but it takes everything he’s got. Billy isn’t the kind of guy to tolerate being laughed at, and he already looks like he’d be happy to throw a punch. Then again, he always looks like that.

Billy flicks his cigarette to the ground. Without it, disgust curls freely at his mouth. “You know what? I’m starting to think what’s-his-face was right. That idiot, Hagan—”

“Oh, fuck off—” Eddie starts.

“We’re not queer.” Steve draws a measured breath and grits his teeth. He’s not eager to start another fight today, and he knows that Billy is much stronger than Tommy.

Billy’s voice lowers dangerously, a shark in the water. “What am I supposed to think when my thirteen-year-old sister doesn’t come home after school, and then I find her at a stranger’s house, with the cops, and you two.” He says you two like he opened a box and found something dead and rotting inside. “Did you get caught doing something you weren’t supposed to be doing?”

Revulsion churns in Steve’s gut. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he gasps out. And of course Billy already knows that cops are here—Hopper’s truck is behind them. From the back it could almost be anyone’s truck but the bank of lights on the roof is unmistakable.

“What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with you. If either of you two freaks put your filthy fucking hands on my sister—”

One second Billy is there, the next he’s gone. Steve doesn’t get the chance to react—to throw up or freak out—before Eddie is bulldozing Billy to the ground with a roar of outrage. Fists are flying even before they land on the frozen grass with a heavy thud.

“Eddie!” Steve chokes out. This can’t be happening. He’s not going to stand here and watch the boy he loves suffer his fate instead.

Steve throws himself into the fray, trying to pull Billy away as they wrestle on the ground—Billy’s elbow drives into his ribcage, knocking his breath out—the sound of knuckles hitting flesh fills the air—cursing, boiling anger and a frenzied mess of limbs and fists. No one gets the upper hand, not for long. Steve ignores the pain of his trapped foot and the loud crack against his skull that leaves him dizzy and just keeps trying to pull Billy away. He finds Billy’s hair and tugs hard, hears him swear, hears the sickening crack of bone—

“STOP IT!”

—then he hears the shattering of glass.

Steve freezes.

Billy pulls himself up, forgetting about Steve and Eddie entirely. He thunders toward his car with blood running from his nose. “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?”

Max is a menace in moonlight, from her fiery hair to the spiked bat shining in her hands. The driver’s side window of Billy’s precious car is gone. Steve almost forgot just how much he adores her, and he wishes he was her stepbrother instead.

She keeps the bat raised and ready to swing. “Leave them alone! Just go away, Billy!”

Billy jabs his finger in her direction but doesn’t move closer. “You’re going to pay for that, you little bitch!”

A voice booms through the night. “HEY!”

And in the front row seat, Steve sinks his teeth into the moment he was hoping for. Billy whirls around. Even though he saw the truck, he still looks spooked at the sight of a furious Chief Hopper. Everyone crowds onto the porch to see what’s going on and Billy’s eyes narrow.

“What the hell is going on here, Max? Huh? Is this who you’re hanging out with now? Fags and niggers?” He says it like he wants the whole town to hear and Steve cringes. They might not believe it but now the idea is in their minds.

“Go screw yourself,” Steve snarls viciously, for himself and Eddie and Lucas. Any sympathy he might’ve had for Billy because of the future erodes into dust. I hope you drive your stupid car off a cliff.

Hopper barrels down the driveway, and by the time Steve helps Eddie up he’s there, dragging Billy by the collar and slamming him against the side of his car.

“I do not have time for this,” he growls. “Get your ass in the car and go home.”

But Billy isn’t so cowed that he forgets why he’s here. “I’m here for Max, she has to come home.”

“Are you her guardian?”

“I’m her stepbrother.”

“If you’re her legal guardian then show me your ID or a court order,” Hopper says, like he knows what the answer is going to be.

Billy shakes his head.

Hopper assesses the scene—Billy’s bloody face, Max with the bat still raised, her eyes wide and wary, the smashed window, then he looks at them and Steve feels like he’s been x-rayed.

“Alright, here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to leave and I’m going to drive Max home—” Hopper talks louder over Billy’s protests “—and if you are who you say you are, then you can tell your parents she’s with me, and they can call the station.” Hopper tightens his hold on Billy’s collar and his voice drops to a low warning. “And if you don’t leave now, I’m arresting you for assault.”

“Munson attacked me—!”

“Oh, fuck you! You started it!” Eddie touches his mouth gingerly, and his rings are drenched in blood that looks black in the moonlight. No wonder Billy’s nose is broken. He got a fistful of metal to the face. Steve shouldn’t be proud but that doesn’t stop the delirious rush of it, and he definitely shouldn’t want to kiss Eddie when he’s covered in blood.

“WHAT DID I JUST SAY?” Hopper bellows, and Billy winces. “Do not make me repeat myself.”

Hopper lets go. Max moves behind the chief, like she thinks Billy might snatch her up and drag her kicking and screaming into the car anyway. Billy casts a dirty look around and when he lands on Steve, Steve flips him off. Billy doesn’t take his chances returning the gesture in front of the chief. He looks at Max one last time and his expression spells bad things waiting for her when she gets home. Then, finally, he gets into the car, turns it around, and speeds off into the night.

Steve breathes again.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie says quietly, but Steve doesn’t know why. He looks wrung out, a shell left behind by the flurry of rage and adrenaline. “I wasn’t thinking—I couldn’t think—when he said that, and I just…”

“Don’t be sorry, he deserved it.” Steve knocks his hand gently against Eddie’s and taps his own lip. “We match.”

Eddie smiles faintly. From two different fights, they mirror each other now with a split lip.

Dustin and Lucas run down from the porch to hug Max, to ask if she’s okay, and to tell her how absolutely awesome she is. Steve is almost glad that Lucas didn’t listen to him. Max needs friends—no, a family. Maybe she’d make friends at school even if the boys didn’t drag her into their group, but maybe she wouldn’t. She could’ve been left on her own with a piece of shit for a brother, and that would be worse.

“You boys okay?” Hopper asks them.

“Is my nose broken?”

Hopper clicks on his flashlight and briefly inspects Eddie’s face. In the sudden light his blood looks almost neon. “Don’t think so.” He shines the light at Steve. “You?”

“I’m okay.” He’ll have a bunch of bruises tomorrow but he avoided a concussion this time. Small miracles.

Hopper clicks the light off. “Alright, everybody back inside. Now.”

“You didn’t have to do that, you know.”

Max shrugs. She brought the bat all the way into the kitchen, reluctant to let it go, and now it leans against the wall behind her seat. Dustin and Lucas look even more in love with her than they did before, and even Mike is looking at her differently. Now they know what Steve already did—she’s a fighter just like them.

“He’s going to give you a hard time,” Steve continues. Although she’s a fighter, she’s still younger than her brother, and vulnerable.

“Maybe you should let me keep the bat,” she says.

“I think your parents would have something to say about that,” Hopper says. He’s peeking out between the blinds of the dining room window again. Looking for monsters or making sure Billy stays gone, Steve doesn’t know.

“They never have anything to say about him,” Max says darkly. Lucas makes an aborted movement, like he’s going to grab her hand or touch her shoulder, but he stops himself. Dustin notices, too.

“If you ever need anything, you can come to us,” Joyce says, and beside her Bob nods. “You’re always welcome here.”

Max nods awkwardly, uncomfortable with the attention or the sympathy, or both.

“Maybe we can make you your own bat,” Steve suggests in an attempt to lighten the mood. “Technically, I can’t give you that one because it’s not even mine. It’s Nancy’s.”

“Technically it’s not mine, either,” Nancy says with a half-smile. Like Steve, she’s too restless to sit down. “Dad bought it for Mike.”

“You can keep it,” Mike mutters.

The other boys chuckle but then the room quickly falls back into a tense quiet. Steve knows what they’re waiting for, and they know that he’s waiting for Eddie. He never thought he’d be so antsy with Eddie out of sight. He’s only a few feet away behind the bathroom door, but after what he confessed outside Steve knows this won’t be the last time he feels like this. Like a child he wants Eddie in view, as if he’d fall off the face of the earth the second that Steve can’t see him anymore.

After a few more minutes of waiting, Eddie comes out of the bathroom and joins Steve where he’s leaning against the kitchen counter. His face and his hands are clean of blood, and his split lip shines with a tiny bit of the ointment Joyce gave him. Judging by the redness on his cheek and around his eye, he’s definitely going to look worse tomorrow. It takes every ounce of self control Steve has not to hug him.

“Okay?”

Eddie nods. “Did you know he was coming?”

Steve sighs. “At some point.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“It was different, I wasn’t expecting him yet. Some things have already changed and I…I don’t know what I’m doing,” Steve admits. It scares him to think he could ruin this second chance, but he reminds himself that Bob is here. He’s not doing too bad. “That’s why I need help.”

“How did you travel through time anyway?” Mike is the most skeptical of the kids. He always gave the impression that he thinks Steve is a moron, and right now is no different.

“I told you, I went through a gate.”

“Gates don’t do that!”

“Maybe they could if you had a chronomancer,” Dustin offers. His friends know what he’s talking about except for Max.

“A chrono—what?” she says, voicing Steve’s confusion too.

“A wizard who can manipulate time,” he explains. “Once they reach a certain level, they can alter the very fabric of time, going forward, backwards, or stopping time entirely.”

She looks even more confused. “Wizards? What are you talking about?”

“He’s talking about D&D,” Eddie says, and like a tired parent he looks both exasperated and proud.

From the dining room, Hopper says, “What is that, some kind of kid’s game? None of this is real.”

“No, but maybe El can do that,” Lucas interjects. “She opened a gate to another dimension. That’s space and time.”

“She can’t do that, and she’s gone,” Mike says bitterly. Then he looks at Steve, but his dislike is enough to keep him from voicing the question he clearly wants to ask.

That doesn’t stop Dustin. “Is she…?” he asks, a tentative hope on his face.

“She’s alive, but it wasn’t—”

They don’t hear him. Lucas and Dustin jostle each other around a bewildered Max, laughing in celebration, and Mike gazes at nothing with misty eyes. Joyce smiles with a hand to her heart and whispers something into Bob’s ear. Steve catches Hopper’s eye. The one thing he’s not going to do right now is tell Mike where she’s been. He doesn’t want to open that can of worms.

“She can’t send people through time,” Mike says again, but now he sounds less sure.

“El doesn’t even know what she can do,” Lucas points out.

Some of Eddie’s energy seems to return at the mention of D&D. “Listen up, kiddos, you’ve got to think outside the box. If this was D&D, all you’d need is a wish spell.”

They splutter at his suggestion for reasons Steve can’t begin to comprehend.

“A wish spell?” Mike says incredulously. “To time travel? Are you nuts?”

Dustin is awed. “Dude. The DM would slaughter you in your sleep.”

“No, listen, with some planning it could be totally—”

Hopper pinches the bridge of his nose and mutters, “What the hell are we doing?”

“A wish spell?” Steve echoes, and the memory of the darkest moment of his life swirls around his mind. The other-worldly darkness of Eddie’s trailer, his body under a ratty old blanket, tears on Dustin’s face, and the words he said when he didn’t know what else to say. When he knew nothing he could say would make things better. I wish things had gone differently…

“How does that work?” he asks.

Eddie blinks. “It…I…I was just joking.”

“No, seriously, how does it work?”

Eddie shifts uncomfortably. Everyone is looking at them intently, like between the two of them they can explain the inner workings of another dimension.

“Well, you have to be a spellcaster and a wish like that would knock you on your ass—”

“Like a coma?” falls out of Steve’s mouth before he really thinks about it. No, this isn’t D&D, but the fantasy game has always been the best way they could understand or interpret anything about the Upside Down. Metaphor, analogy, whatever it is, their imagination has limits where D&D doesn’t. What if there’s a kernel of truth to this? It wasn’t Eleven who sent him back in time, and he did make a wish…

Maybe that’s why he’s the only one from the future here now.

Nancy looks at him like he’s losing his mind. “Steve. You crashed your car.”

“Yes, I know, but it wasn’t normal. It wasn’t, Nance. I didn’t have a scratch on me but I couldn’t wake up. And I said that I wished things had gone differently. Maybe…it heard me.”

“It?” More than one person says, but only Nancy understands.

“Do you mean the angel?”

The room erupts. “ANGEL?”

Steve rubs his face. He knew this would be worse than the demodogs, worse than getting beaten to shit by Billy, worse than getting abducted by Russians. Okay, maybe not that last one, but still. He needs to slow down and explain before he loses them all for good.

“It’s not—it’s not an angel.” He waves his hand and they quiet down. “It wasn’t Eleven who sent me back in time. I know that. It was something else that lives in the Upside Down. Some sort of…I don’t know. It calls itself…a mother.”

Eddie is the first to break free from the spell of doubt. “Are you serious? Let me get this straight. A fairy godmother from another dimension bibbidi bobbidi booed you into the past because you made a wish?”

“I wouldn’t put it like that,” Steve says faintly.

“Did it give you some glass slippers, too? So you could find your Prince Charming?”

The boys snicker. On any other day Steve would appreciate Eddie’s wit but right now it burns in all of his open wounds. His life is the furthest thing from a fairytale.

“Do you think it’s funny that I left my friends behind?”

The room turns silent and Eddie winces with immediate regret.

“Sorry, I’m sorry, I…no. Of course not.”

Steve nods his forgiveness. They’re both too raw right now, sandpapered down to their cores, and the night isn’t even over yet. But they’ll talk later. Their eyes meet, and Steve knows they’ll be okay.

Max says, “I don’t get it. You had a car crash? What does that have to do with you coming back in time?”

“That’s when it happened.” After what happened yesterday Steve’s memories are clear, fallen back into place like glass glued back together. The swooping sensation in his gut as he fell through the gate, brilliant colors blinding his eyes, falling too long, falling through time, and at the same time he was driving when fireworks exploded in his mind. Two worlds colliding. He couldn’t see, couldn’t breathe, and his hands slipped off the wheel. “I think that’s why I crashed. I remember driving and then suddenly it was like…I don’t know, like I was having a stroke or something.”

“Kitty Pryde,” Dustin says in a breathless realization.

Lucas snaps his fingers.

“What is that?” Joyce asks the question on all of their minds.

“Not what, who. She’s a character in X-Men.” Dustin says it like it should mean something, and he sighs when no one reacts. “The comic book? Do none of you read? In X-Men Days of Future Past, the last remaining X-Men send Kitty Pryde’s consciousness back in time to stop the mutant apocalypse.” He translates slowly like he’s speaking to a room of kindergartners, “There can’t be two Steve Harringtons running around so only his consciousness was sent back into his current body.”

“But…Kitty Pryde’s consciousness went back to the future,” Lucas adds.

Everyone looks at Steve, weighing the fiction against the unbelievable story he’s telling them. Steve can’t help it; he looks at Eddie. The same fear is crackling in Eddie’s eyes like something alive between them. What about us? What would Eddie be left with if that happens? A Steve who isn’t in love with him, who barely knows his name? Would Eddie mourn the Steve he knew the way that Steve mourns the lost versions of his friends now?

But…would it even be possible for him to go back? His future consciousness is in his past body, but his future body physically went through the gate, too. So…where is it now? Where is the version of himself that had his flesh ripped out by demon bats, who had his nose broken and his face beaten to a pulp, who had scars both fresh and long healed? The possibilities are endlessly horrifying.

“Good thing that’s just a comic book,” he says weakly.

“So, this mother thing. What does it want?” Nancy asks, and Steve is grateful for the distraction from his darkening thoughts.

“I think it wants help.”

“Help?” Jonathan says in disbelief. “Everything from that place is evil.”

Steve shakes his head. A year ago—a year from now—he would’ve agreed, but he remembers what the Mother showed him. A swirling cloud of darkness becomes a spider. The Mind Flayer. Wrong. “It’s not supposed to be—”

“We’ll deal with whatever it wants later,” Hopper says, moving from the shadows into the pool of light towards Steve. “If you’re really from the future then you can tell us how to help Will.”

Steve hesitates. “I don’t think we can do it that—”

“Just tell me what happened,” the chief orders.

Steve glances into the living room where Will is lying alone on the couch, oblivious to the people fighting for him. There has to be a different way, something he could change right now, or else what would be the point? He saved Bob but there has to be more he can do.

“You guys said the thing inside Will was like a virus. Dustin compared it to the Mind Flayer. It’s like a hive mind, it’s all connected. Will, the monsters, and the tunnels. Will is a host so we figured it would leave if we made him too warm because—”

“It likes it cold,” Joyce finishes. She rises from her chair like a fire sprouted beneath it, and for the first time tonight she looks more determined than worried. “You’re right, we’ve just been giving it what it wants.”

“So let’s warm him up,” Hopper says.

“A hot bath?” she suggests.

“Wait—”

“We don’t want to burn him. We can take him to my cabin, get him in front of the fireplace—”

“We have a space heater,” Jonathan says.

“Grab it,” Hopper says.

“Wait!” Steve says, but the chief doesn’t listen. He marches into the living room and lifts Will off the couch, and Steve hates how limp he looks in Hopper’s arms. Everyone jumps up from their seats, ready to follow their leader. Everyone except for Steve. He darts in front of the door, blocking Hopper’s way out.

“Stop!”

“Get out of the way.”

A direct order from the chief of police on a mission would make anyone else bow to his will but Steve’s fear is stronger. He needs words sharp enough to make Hopper listen.

“I didn’t get sent back in time to make the same mistakes twice.”

“You think saving Will is a mistake?” Joyce says. She touches her mouth, looking torn.

“Don’t you worry, we’re going to help him,” Bob murmurs to her, rubbing her back soothingly.

“We just need a better plan,” Steve insists.

“Why?” Hopper rumbles. “This worked, didn’t it?”

“Yes, but—”

“So let’s go.”

“It’ll come back! That thing isn’t going to die without Will. It’ll come back and it’ll be worse, and a lot of people will die. We can’t just…let it leave.”

Darkness, towering thirty feet high, each stomp of its feet like a crack of thunder, hunting them with one purpose. To kill. How many people were sacrificed to build its nightmarish body of blood and muscle and bone? How many families did it destroy? The Mind Flayer can only live when a gate is open, but somehow, either by the Russians or One, another gate will open. They can’t slap the same band-aid on and pray that it’s over this time. Steve knows better.

In a shaky voice, Bob asks what they’re all thinking. “Worse? How could it be worse?”

“This thing…if it doesn’t have a body, it can make one.” Steve squeezes his eyes as if he could shut out the memory in his mind. It taunts him even now, even when it doesn’t exist yet.

Matching looks of horror dawn on the kids’ faces. “Make one?” Max whispers.

“You don’t want to see it. Trust me.”

Hopper lowers Will back onto the couch and covers him with the blanket again. He’s ready to listen.

“Then we have to kill it,” Mike says. He looks at Will like he wants to reach inside his best friend and throttle the demon holding him hostage with his bare hands. If only it was that easy.

“How do we do that?” Lucas says.

No one answers because no one knows. Not even Steve.

“Maybe we don’t need to kill it,” Dustin ventures. “Maybe we just need to send it back to the Upside Down.”

“Won’t it just come back?” Max asks.

“You said El is still alive, right?” Nancy asks Steve. “If we find her, maybe she can close the gate so that it can’t come back.”

“Where is she?” Mike finally asks.

Steve sinks under the weight of it all, sliding down the front door until he’s sitting on the floor. He doesn’t know how to keep everything straight in his head and it feels like he’s going to miss something. He’s going to miss a dot that needs connecting, a path to the right answer, and they’ll be even worse off than if he wasn’t here.

“I don’t know,” he answers Mike, because that’s the honest truth right now. “She can close the gate but it doesn’t matter. Someone else will open it again, either the Russians or One. Or both.”

“Russians?” Hopper echoes.

Nancy looks at Jonathan with wide eyes. “Doctor Owens did say that if the soviets found out about the gate, they would try to recreate it.”

“They did.” Steve corrects himself, “They will. But not in Russia. Here, in Hawkins, beneath the damn mall.”

“And One?” Dustin asks. “Do you mean there’s another number like Eleven?”

“Yeah. Henry Creel. He was the first person with powers like her and he can open gates like she can, with a psychic connection to something on the other side.”

Hopper waves all of it away. “Right now we need to help Will.”

“We can’t afford to worry about this later,” Steve insists. He looks up at all of them, at their worried faces. “It’s all connected and if we’re not careful it’ll come back to bite us in the ass.”

The room falls into a tense quiet. This is what Steve needs. Now that he’s told them and they believe him enough, all they need is to think of a solution together. A solution that could end this for good. Does an answer like that exist? Maybe a band-aid is all Steve can hope for.

The kids look to each other, each hoping one of their friends might have an idea. Nancy paces back and forth in stark contrast to Jonathan, who stands in the middle of the room like a statue, arms crossed, his focus all on Will. Hopper, Bob, and Joyce talk in murmurs so low that Steve can only make out the occasional word. And Eddie…oh, Steve wants to hug him. He’s sagged against the wall closest to Steve and he looks overloaded with information. Steve touches Eddie’s boot with the toe of his own shoe, the smallest bit of comfort he can offer.

Nancy stops pacing. “What if…what if, for now, we just trap the Mind Flayer somewhere? Maybe in the lab? In one of those tanks?”

“With all of those demodogs running around?” Dustin says with a grim look.

“Demodogs?” Max says.

“Demogorgon. Dog. Demodog. It’s like a compound, like a play on words—”

“Okay!”

Eddie rubs his forehead. “I, uhhh…I might be a little behind, but this is like a ghost or something, right? How do you trap something without a body?”

“It’s not a ghost, it’s—” Swirling, shifting darkness. Will, wide-eyed with fear. And Steve. And in that vision, Steve looked terrified, too. Steve stands up with a burst of energy humming through him. He doesn’t understand the rest of the Mother’s message but the first part is starting to solidify. “We give it a new host.”

“A new host,” Nancy repeats, playing with the idea in her mind. Her eyes snap to Steve like she can read his mind.

“Yeah. Me.”

There. An idea, released into the open for them to poke and prod at and Steve knows they will, but with every passing second he grows more sure that he’s onto something. This could be the answer they need. It might sound like the most insane thing he’s said so far but this is the most confident he’s felt all night.

Even when he looks at Eddie.

Oh, baby. He’s so beautiful and so horrified it’s a knife in Steve’s heart to look at him. He already suffered more than one shock tonight but this might be the worst of all and Steve knows why. When Eddie finally believed him, when they stood together outside of the cursed Creel house, his deepest fear was getting more than they bargained for. I don’t want you to be possessed. And now he’s watching that fear come to life, watching Steve ask for it.

“Are you insane?” Eddie chokes out. His chest caves in like he’s on the verge of hyperventilating. “So you want to be possessed by some alternate dimension demon thing?”

“I don’t want to be—”

“But what would that even accomplish?” Lucas wonders. “We’d still have the same problem.”

Steve runs a hand through his hair. Well. He already sounds insane, so it’s hardly going to make it worse to tell them this. In for a penny, in for a pound. “This thing that sent me back…sometimes I can feel it. I’ve seen things like it’s trying to talk to me.”

“Like how Will feels the shadow Mind Flayer thing?” Joyce asks. She gestures at the map trailing around the room. “The now memories?”

“I don’t know. I’ve seen things that happened or will happen.” He says to Eddie, “I felt it when we were at the Creel house, in the attic. In my mind I saw myself running out of the house.”

Eddie frowns. “You looked like you were in a trance or something.”

“Yeah, kind of. It was telling me to leave. And tonight when we were outside the lab I saw Will and the shadow and me but I couldn’t figure out what it was trying to say. But now I think this is what it wants.”

“You’re putting too much trust in something from the Upside Down,” Jonathan says darkly. He has more reason than most to hate the Upside Down, and part of Steve knows that he’s right.

“It saved me yesterday. I know it did.” It’s hard not to think about Vecna when he’s standing in the room where it happened. The door behind him could swing open at any moment with Vecna on the other side.

“During your seizure attack thing?” Nancy asks.

Steve nods. “It was Henry Creel. He attacked me because he knows that I know the future.”

Eddie looks like he’s in pain from more than just the wounds Billy left him with. “You almost died. Right there in the cafeteria.”

Steve is close enough to hold his hand but he doesn’t reach out. He squeezes his cut hand around Eddie’s handkerchief instead. “Yeah, I did, but it saved me.”

“It’s protecting its investment,” Dustin says. He spreads his hands like a bulb just lit up inside his mind. “Think about it. If it sent you back in time then you’re important. It needs you for something.”

“And maybe to protect me…it can kill the shadow. Or at least the piece that’s inside Will.” Steve knows that Jonathan is right. Even if the Mother isn’t evil he’s still putting a lot of faith in its abilities. He doesn’t know what it is, what it’s capable of, or how far it’s willing to go to keep Steve safe.

But the vision, the things he saw…he can feel that he’s right. This is what he’s supposed to do, even if the rest of the plan doesn’t make any sense to him. Maybe it will soon.

“This is a terrible idea,” Eddie stresses. His arms are wrapped around himself like it’s the only thing keeping him together.

“I agree,” Jonathan says. Steve figured he’d be all for it—he doesn’t even like Steve—but he’s a good person. Steve wonders what Will would say if he was awake. Joyce looks conflicted, and her worried, watery eyes flicker back and forth from Steve to her son.

But the only way this is going to happen is if Hopper gives the okay, if he thinks the plan has merit. He’s their leader, their lighthouse, and he needs to believe that Steve’s idea is bright enough to guide them from the dark. If he believes, they all will.

“It’s worth a shot,” Steve says to him, and he doesn’t get an instant no. Hopper is thinking it over, one hand on his hip and the other rubbing over his beard.

“Okay, but even if we wanted to, how would this be possible?” Bob asks. From what Steve knows this was the first time he saw anything from the Upside Down. He knows less than both Eddie and Max, but he’s still trying to help. “How would we get it from Will to you? Am I missing something?”

“I don’t think it would be hard. The hive mind is connected to Vecna—”

“VECNA?” Eddie and the boys stare at him, bug-eyed, and Steve doesn’t know what he said that was so crazy.

Oh, right. D&D.

“Sorry, I mean One. Henry Creel. We called him Vecna before we knew who he was,” Steve explains. “He’s connected to the hive mind and…he wants to kill me.” Steve hears Eddie’s sharp breath but he doesn’t say anything.

“I thought Will was asleep so that it doesn’t know where we are,” Max says. “If you’re the host, then…”

“Judgment day,” Lucas says darkly.

True. Steve doesn’t have a solution for that. Maybe he could hide that knowledge from the Mind Flayer, but that’s probably just a pipe dream.

“You said we can’t let it escape,” Mike says. “How could we do this and make sure it doesn’t get away?”

The answer comes to Steve in the memory of crinkling tarps and a stapler in his hands. “The shed. We can cover the walls and seal me and Will inside so it can’t escape.”

They fall quiet, and Steve almost hates it because it means no one can think of any more objections. They might actually let him do it. He must be crazy for asking, but it’s the only idea he’s got that could help Will and redirect their lives. He has to do this.

“Please let me try,” he says to Hopper. “For Will. If it doesn’t work then you know what to do. Burn it out and then find El to close the gate, and we can figure out the rest later.”

Anticipation weighs on Steve, bleeding off his friends and gathering around him like a storm cloud. It’s so familiar, watching and waiting and wondering, trying to solve a crisis before it eats them alive. What will happen this time? Will I still be here tomorrow? If he was truly psychic he would know, but he’s just Steve. Just a boy trying to do his best.

In the heaviness of the room, with long shadows drawn across his face, Hopper nods.

And Steve doesn’t know how to feel.

“I can’t believe you came back from the future,” Nancy says. She’s run out of questions now, and between Steve’s answers and the dreams she already knew about, she knows everything about Henry Creel. “I mean, I do believe you, it’s the only way to explain everything you know, but it’s…it’s just crazy.”

They’re alone in the shed, and even though Steve can hear the kids rustling through the Byers’ stuff outside, they’re alone enough to make his heart feel heavier than it should. He doesn’t feel deja vu this time, just a weary sort of nostalgia for the time he had with her, both in the future and in this past. He’s trying not to wonder if this will be the last time she sees him.

“Trust me, I know.” The stapler in Steve’s hand punctuates his words as he attaches a tarp to the walls of the shed. “I’m like the guy who played Alex P. Keaton in that movie. I forget the actor’s name.”

“What movie?”

It hits him all over again. It’s not just the larger-than-life moments, the chaos and fear that comes with the Upside Down, but all of the little things that make a life, too. Movies that aren’t made yet, songs that no one in the world could sing but him. “It’s…not even out yet. It was in theaters, uh, next summer. Back to the Future, that’s what it was called.”

And what Steve remembers the most isn’t the plot at all. What he remembers is the enchanting sound of Robin’s giggling, the hopping of his heart from his newborn crush, her hand in his as they snuck out of the theater. If he could snip a few moments out of the future, rescue them, make them real somehow, then that one would be the first on his list to keep. If he must return to his first life, then at least he’d get that moment back.

“Was it any good?” Nancy’s question draws him back, and Robin’s smile in his mind fades into the dull wood.

“I don’t remember.”

“It must be so strange,” she murmurs, more to herself than to him.

“Yeah.”

Steve steps down the ladder, shuffles it another few feet, then goes back up. Nancy moves further into the corner, holding up the tarp for him. He can barely see her face.

“So…were you dating Eddie in the future, too?”

Steve stiffens, the life sucked out of him like a tree going bare for winter. And he feels bare right now. He knew it. He knew in his gut that she’d figured them out, probably even before she heard what Billy called them. Can he even lie to her? Wouldn’t she see right through him?

“Am I wrong?” Her voice doesn’t waver. She doesn’t think she’s wrong.

Steve steps down, backs away from her, but he doesn’t know where he’s going. If he wants to run or if he wants to stay. He drops the stapler and doesn’t pick it up, too busy trying to shove away the thought of a guillotine over his neck. And it’s stupid, so stupid, because this might actually be his last night alive and this is what he’s worried about? But he is. He can’t help it. Because it’s her, because he still cares so much about what she thinks of him.

Nancy moves towards him, into the light from the single bulb above their heads. If she’s upset or disgusted then it doesn’t show. “Steve, come on. You can trust me.”

And he knows that. He knows that. He squeezes his eyes shut and whispers, “Not in the future.”

“But you are now?”

He nods.

Gentle hands touch his arms and squeeze lightly. He opens his eyes. The smile on her face makes him feel like a fool. Something releases inside him, something tight and sharp that he didn’t know he carried until he let it go.

“I thought so,” she says, with only a tiny bit of smugness.

Steve searches her face. “You don’t think it’s…?” He knows what his dad would say, what Billy would say, what his old friends and his teachers and the rest of the damn town would say, but her opinion is more important than all of those combined.

“It’s nothing, Steve,” she says firmly. She trails her hands down to hold his, and her fingers are like ice cubes. She always ran cold. “Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t expecting it at all, but then…”

“Then what?” Steve isn’t sure that he wants to know what she’s thinking. Maybe he should run for cover. She’s the one who got past his walls, changed his walls, tore them down and let him see himself, and she’s going to do it again.

“I don’t know. I guess…after I thought about it…I can see how a guy could be good for you.”

Steve stares at her. He tries to understand but when he thinks he does, his thoughts fray apart like a raw seam. “What do you mean?”

She struggles for words but there’s still a secret hiding on her face, like there’s something she doesn’t want to tell him. “I don’t know how to explain, it’s just a gut feeling. All I’m saying is I can see it. You, with a guy. There’s something about it that makes sense to me.”

“I’m not gay,” Steve blurts out. “I still like girls, I like both, it’s a real thing—”

“You don’t have to explain, Steve,” she says gently. “You can date whoever you want.”

“I just don’t want you to think, with us…that it wasn’t real.”

She draws a sharp breath and looks at her feet. This is all that remains of a wound that’s long since healed for Steve, but he’s had a year and a half. She’s only had a month.

Her voice is so, so quiet. “I don’t think that, Steve. I promise I don’t.”

Steve hugs her and kisses the top of her head. He’s a better person for having known her, having loved her, and looking back at it all now he doesn’t regret the time he spent with her. If he doesn’t make it through this night then he trusts her to guide the future into something brighter, even if he isn’t here to see it.

The door opens behind them and they spring apart.

“Oops. Didn’t mean to interrupt,” Eddie says coolly.

“Eddie, it’s not—we were just talking—”

Nancy fights back a smile. “Don’t worry, I’m not trying to steal him back from you.”

“Good,” Eddie fires back. “You didn’t treat him right.”

Steve half-laughs, caught between being embarrassed and pleased. “Eddie…”

“No, he’s right.” Nancy gives him her little scrunched up smile that he always loved. “I guess I’ll go look for some more staples.”

She side-steps Eddie to get to the door, but before she goes Steve calls her name. “Nance? I want you to know that in ‘86…you and Jonathan were still together.”

Words fail her. Something indescribable moves on her face. Steve hopes that she’ll realize she wanted to hear it.

Neither of them speak after she leaves. Eddie has barely said a word since Hopper agreed to the plan and they started getting ready. He’s so tense, like a solid shadow from his head to his boots, and Steve doesn’t want to argue but he can’t take the silent treatment. Not now, not tonight.

“Baby…”

Eddie groans. He tosses the crumpled sheet in his arms to the ground. “How the hell am I supposed to stay mad at you when you call me that?”

“You’re not.”

“I hate your stupid fucking plan,” Eddie says miserably. And there it is. The heart of the problem blown wide open, bleeding like a gunshot to the chest. Steve has been expecting this, but that doesn’t mean he’s ready to comfort Eddie with empty promises. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen. He can’t promise this will end well.

“This is the worst idea you’ve ever had in your life and I don’t even know every idea you’ve had in your life but I know for a fact that this one’s the worst, and I know why you think you have to do this but there’s got to be something else we can try—”

Steve kisses him, for once not worrying about the risk of being caught. He kisses Eddie just to touch him, to feel his lips and his life in Steve’s hands, because this could be his last chance.

“You can’t make me not mad by kissing me either,” Eddie says, but that’s a downright lie because his anger is already fading.

“Eddie, if you’d seen what I have then you’d take every chance to try and change it, too. I know you would.” Because he’s just as brave as Steve, even if he doesn’t know it.

“I wish you didn’t have to do this,” Eddie whispers brokenly. “Just be selfish.”

“I can’t be, Eddie. I can’t.”

They kiss again so tenderly, careful of their wounds and their bruises, committing every touch into memory. Steve wishes they had time for a million more dates and thousands more kisses. Even with a year and a half granted back to him, how could he still feel so robbed of time?

Eddie isn’t mad at him anymore, but the kiss does nothing to soothe his worry. “Do you really think this will work? What if this mother thing can’t protect you anymore? What am I supposed to do if it all goes to shit? What if One tries to kill you again? What if—”

Steve cups his cheeks. “You can protect me.”

He straightens, a soldier ready for duty. “How?”

“If it looks like I’m having a seizure again or I start floating in the air—”

“Floating? Like Virginia Creel,” Eddie realizes.

“Yeah, exactly. That’s bad, very bad. If that happens, I need you to play some music for me.”

“Music? Why?”

“We figured out that music helps when Vecna attacks. We called it Vecna’s curse, and music can reach you through the curse.”

“Any music?”

“Well, you know me,” Steve says with a wry smile. “I like anything on the radio.”

“Mr. Top Ten,” Eddie jokes weakly.

“I’ll start singing along, I promise.”

Eddie nods to himself. He takes a deep breath, raising the steel of his nerves, putting himself back together again. He’s already different from the Eddie who came to Steve’s house hours ago and different from the Eddie that Steve knew in 1986. Different, but the same. The more Steve learns, the more he loves him, and the more he thinks he could love Eddie in any lifetime.

I love you. Should he say it, or would it sound too much like a final goodbye?

“I want to tell you something when this is all over, okay? When we go home.”

Eddie kisses him one last time. “Okay.”

They’re ready. The shed is completely plastered with tarps, sheets, and newspapers, cobbled into a poor man’s contamination chamber with staples and duct tape. Will is inside. Steve is armed with ammonia, a needle of sedative, and Lucas’s walkie talkie. The future is a baby bird in Steve’s hands. Too fragile to live without protection, too small to be trusted on its own, and Steve will cradle it for as long as it takes.

Dread threatens to make Steve sick, but he feels braver when he looks at Hopper. The chief is armed to the teeth. He’ll be outside keeping an eye on Steve and preparing for any demodogs heading their way.

“Alright,” he says. “We’ll block you in and wait for something to happen.”

That’s it. The whole plan.

Joyce surprises Steve when she hugs him. She doesn’t know him, not really, and anything she does know she probably learned from Jonathan, but her motherly comfort is welcome. For a moment it dulls Steve’s fear.

“Thank you,” she says with watery eyes. “Even if it doesn’t work, thank you for trying to help my boy.”

Steve nods. He doesn’t know what to say to that.

Nancy hugs him too. “You’ve got this,” she says.

Bob claps him on the shoulder and says, “Good luck.” Jonathan and the kids echo his words, and Steve takes the chance to ruffle Dustin’s hat.

Eddie is standing on the edge of the group with the spiked bat in his fist, his eyes on the ground. He won’t be outside with Hopper but even the thought of him fighting demodogs without Steve reignites his anxiety. They’re all worried about him but they might be in more danger if this plan works.

“Be careful.”

“You be careful,” Eddie retorts. He looks up and his torrential fear is visible even in the dark. By some unspoken, unplanned agreement, they move towards each other for a hug. It’s so brief, too short to taste, and Steve feels dirty when he claps Eddie on the back as if they’re nothing more than friends.

“Come back.” Eddie’s whisper is a prayer meant for no one but Steve.

“I will.” They both know that’s a promise he might not be able to keep, but what else can he say?

Steve looks at them. The leader they found in Chief Hopper, Bob and Joyce holding each other like worried parents, Nancy and Jonathan with their hands intertwined, and Steve’s little brat siblings. Eddie looks the loneliest but Steve is going to fix that. He’s going to make them the family they’re meant to be, and this family needs Will. Steve is doing this for every single one of them.

Steve turns around. He forces his feet forward and doesn’t look back, afraid if he does that every ounce of courage he mustered will desert him.

He enters the shed.

Will is tied to a chair and bathed in cold white light from the light stand. His head lolls to the side like a broken doll. A boy held hostage outside his own home, by his own family.

Steve closes the shed door and something heavy falls against it from the outside. He rips off some duct tape and covers the seam of the sheet over the door. Now they can’t get out, and hopefully neither can the Mind Flayer.

Behind Will, Hopper appears in the window. He talks into his walkie talkie. “Alright, everyone’s inside. Wake him up.”

With sweating hands and a heart that thumps like he’s opening Pandora’s Box, Steve uncaps the ammonia and shakes the bottle under Will’s nose.

Will gasps to life like a drowning man. The poor kid is covered in goosebumps but he doesn’t seem to notice the cold as he looks around. His chair bounces against the wooden floor as he struggles against his bonds. “What is this? Why am I tied up? Where am I?”

“Uh, hey kiddo. Um, listen, this isn’t—”

Will stares at him with stony eyes. “Why am I tied up?” he demands.

Steve falters. Part of him thought it would be instant, that the shadow inside Will would see him and come for him immediately. That would’ve been simpler.

“Will, just hang on. I need to talk to—”

“Why am I tied up? Why am I tied up? WHY AM I TIED UP?”

“Relax, Will, just listen—”

“LET ME GO!” He snarls, thrashing wildly against the cords keeping him bound. Steve backs away. He’s never wanted to run away from a thirteen-year-old boy before, but then again, this isn’t just a thirteen-year-old boy. This is something eldritch, a parasite hiding inside Will, and Steve knows exactly what kind of supernatural strength it possesses.

“LET ME GO! LET ME GO! LET ME GO!”

The light flickers, blinking Will’s screaming face in and out of shadow, and he looks less human the longer Steve watches him. A ghoul imitating human form, pale and distorted and wrong.

Steve is doing this all wrong.

He isn’t talking to Will. He’s talking to a gargantuan spider, a monster made of flesh and bone fueled by nothing but rage. And unlike last time, he doesn’t need to reach Will to get the answers. So he waits. He stands in front of the boy, arms crossed, and lets the screams of a child wash over him. This isn’t Will.

Eventually the boy tires. His thrashing slows down then stops until he’s panting in his chair, his eyes locked on Steve. Those eyes, Christ. They send shivers down Steve’s spine. Two black holes, drawing him into an inescapable orbit.

“You done yet?”

His glare is nothing less than murderous.

“Alright, good.” Steve takes the drawing of the Mind Flayer from his back pocket and unfolds it. How does this work exactly? He knows that the Mind Flayer is connected to Vecna, but does it have its own sense of self? Or is it an extension of Vecna, like an extra limb reaching into their world? When he talks to Will, is it Vecna giving the answers?

The hairs on the back of his neck prickle at the thought. He asks, “Do you know who I am? Do you know my name?”

Will knows his name. Vecna knows his name. The answer may be revealing.

The boy studies him. A frown twitches between his unblinking eyes. In a scratchy voice, he answers, “The traveler.”

Steve breathes again. Whatever he’s talking to, it’s not exactly Vecna. “Yeah, the time traveler. Do you know how I did it?”

The boy’s face twists into vitriolic wrath. His lips curl and a flush breaks his ghostly complexion. “YOU CAN’T HAVE IT! YOU CAN’T HAVE IT! YOU CAN’T HAVE IT!”

“Can’t have what?”

His words are poisonous. “IT DOESN’T BELONG TO YOU!”

“Will—” Steve stops himself. This isn’t Will. This is something wearing Will like a costume. How does he get the Mind Flayer to take him as bait and give Will up?

The boy’s face turns pleading, and his eyes shine with unshed tears. “Please, please, let me go. Please just let me go, he’s going to hurt me if you don’t let me go.”

Steve hesitates. No. He’s not going to fall for it.

“Who’s going to hurt you? Henry Creel?”

He’s met with a blank stare, the emotion vanishing from Will’s face so fast it gives Steve chills.

“Do you know that name?”

Nothing.

“Do you know what this is?” Steve holds the drawing in front of his face.

The boy doesn’t blink, doesn’t speak, doesn’t react at all save for the tiny shake of his head.

“Do you know the Mother?”

The slightest twitch of a frown.

“It lives in your world and it can’t die.”

The boy breaks into heart-wrenching distress once more. He chokes out, “I miss my mom. Where’s my mom?”

Steve fights his split second of doubt. If this was really Will coming through, wouldn’t he be looking around for Joyce? But the boy is still staring at him with dry eyes, like he’s waiting for Steve to react. Waiting to see if he’s fooled.

“What’s her name?”

“Can I talk to her? I want to see my mom.”

“I’ll let you talk to her if you can tell me her name.”

Again, all emotion vanishes. Again, a blank mask turns Will into a serene doll. Tricky little bastard. Steve is getting nowhere, and now he’s getting angry.

He crumples the drawing and tosses it away, then leans down so he’s eye to eye with Will. “Alright, I’ve had enough of this. You’re pathetic, you know that? You couldn’t pick on someone your own size so you’re hiding in a kid? Someone you knew you could control, is that it? I bet your master is so disappointed, big bad scary thing like you can’t handle more than a kid.”

Something shifts. The boy doesn’t move an inch but Steve would swear on his life that something moved. Maybe it’s just a trick of the light, but it’s enough to spur him on.

“I bet you can’t control me,” he taunts. “I bet you can’t handle a real fight. You know why? Because you’re nothing but dust. Did you know that? You’re just dust on the wind, you’re not even real. But I am. I’m flesh and blood, right here, and I want to talk. Let Will go and you can have all this instead.”

The walkie talkie beeps and they both look at the floor where Steve left it.

“Alright, I think we need to go to plan B.”

Steve picks it up. “Wait, just give me a few more minutes.” He doesn’t look at Hopper in the window, not wanting to give any hints to their location just yet.

“...Fine. Five more minutes.”

Steve leaves it on the floor and stands in front of Will, hands on his hips, staring down the parasite living inside him. Steve’s friend, practically his little brother. He might be playing with fire but only so Will doesn’t get burned anymore.

“Alright, if you don’t want to talk to me then this isn’t going to end well for you. I know your weakness. I’m the traveler, remember? I know every god damn thing about you. And I think your master would love to say hi.”

There it is again. A glint of something in the void of Will’s eyes. Master.

A sudden shiver ices down Steve’s spine. He feels the same way he did at the bowling alley, convinced that despite the natural laws of the universe, the Creel house was looming right behind him.

Vecna.

He’s here.

Maybe not in this world, but in another one. Some other place out of time where he’s standing right behind Steve.

Fuck. Steve is trapped, caught between wanting to look over his shoulder and not wanting to take his eyes off the evil in front of him. It’s working.

He swallows past the web of fear in his throat. “Don’t you want to kill me?”

Something shifts in Will’s eyes again. For a heart-stopping second, Steve thinks it’s a reflection of something behind him. But it’s not. The darkness in Will’s eyes is moving, blooming out from his pupils until his eyes are completely black. Completely alien.

“You,” the boy says. “And your friends. And your world.”

Steve stumbles back. Oh, God.

Will’s mouth splits open. Inky black smoke ruptures from his body, billowing into a world it doesn’t belong in. Thick, almost tangible in the air, but Steve doesn’t reach for it. Claws of fear latch into him as he watches it pulse in the air with microscopic movement, like it’s breathing. Like it’s alive. A black hole, it has its own gravity, its own purpose. And like a black hole, the only thing it can do is devour him.

“Wha…what?” Will says, but the storm cloud between them is too thick for Steve to see him.

“Hey, Will, it’s Steve. It’s alright, you’re going to be fine.”

“What are you doing? What…wait. Wait. Steve. What are you doing?” Panic rises in Will’s voice.

“It’s okay, bud, we have a plan.” And I’m sorry you have to see this.

It was Steve’s idea but now he feels like a man staring down a glass full of poison. Thunder in his heart, ice-cold fear through his body, and he realizes that his cheeks are wet with tears. The voice of a condemned man crawls from the depths of his memory. All evil must have a home, boy. Careful it doesn’t come into your own.

Creel would call him a fool if he saw Steve now. Why didn’t he listen? He’s letting a spectral evil into himself, into his very soul. What will he become?

“Steve, stop! You can’t let it in!”

Oh, it’s way too late for that. His knees falter and he’s on the floor with the shadow hanging over him. It surges towards him—

—he hears Will screaming his name—

—and he drowns in darkness.

Chapter Text

Something is out there. Something alive. In the distance. Behind a wall of breathing darkness. It is so small, small as an atom, but it is there. It is real.

“Steve?”

There it is again. Follow it. What is it? It does not matter. It is real. A voice. Tiny. Far. Weak. It pulls like a hook. It carves into the darkness. Safe. Not safe. The dark is not safe anymore. The light calls. The voice calls. Find it. How? Listen. Listen closer.

“Steve?”

There. Right there. It is louder. It is outside. Find it. Figure it out. Move. Stiff. This body is not big enough. It holds what it was born to. What it was meant to. Not more. Never more. This is more. This is too much. But this is the price to be paid.

This is the plan.

Open your eyes.

He is there. The boy. Precious child. Is he scared? He looks scared. Why is he scared? What does he have to be scared of? Nothing will hurt him. His time will come. He is pale. Very pale. He is a ghost. Lifeless. Who is he? Brother.

You know him. You know his name.

He is so small. He is not ready. He is not meant to see. Sowing the seeds. He will be next.

Will.

Open mouth. Move tongue. Speak.

“Will?”

That was not difficult.

“Steve! What are you doing? Why did you let it in?”

Yes. What is happening? Where is this going? A plan. There is a plan. A good plan. A bad plan. It is time to leave.

No.

“I…I don’t know.”

“What do you see? Can you see the now memories?”

See. See. Eyes. They see. A scared boy. Will. A small room. A bright light. Paper. Plastic. Oh. A window. And in the window, a face. A face is looking in the window. Watching. Waiting. This world is small. Not small. It does not end here. It goes beyond. And beyond, there is more. Something hides in the beyond. Something that does not want to be known. In the ground. Veins. Growing. Spreading. It cannot be stopped. It will not stop. It will not end. It twists. It turns. It sinks. It devours. It is alive. It will consume the world. It is meant to. It is so hungry. So greedy. So insatiable.

No!

It is inevitable.

“I can see it, Will. I can see it, but I…I don’t know…I don’t remember…”

“You had a plan, Steve. You just need to remember! You can do it, you can fight it! I bet you weren’t alone. You must’ve talked to Nancy and Chief Hopper and my mom and my brother, right? You had a plan. Try to remember what you did before.”

Before? Before what? This is foolish. There is no before. There is no after. There is only now. This body can only exist in a single moment. It did not exist before. It will not exist after. The past is now. The future is now. Now is now. Now is the world that is taken for those who want it. Now is the beginning. Now is the end.

No, that isn’t true. The past is real, and there’s a future. Focus. Remember.

The face. In the window. Who is that? Walk. Look. Remember.

Chief Hopper. And the house…

The house of the boy.

The heart overworks itself. What does it mean? Why does it go so mad? Even if the mind does not know, the body knows. The soul knows. It tastes so human. Vulnerable. Leave the window. The damage is done.

But I remember now.

The plan. But how long will it take? Now the veins will flow with running blood, hungry blood. Now the blood bursts free. Now they will find their prey. Now. Now. Now.

And now I feel the Mother.

Warmth. Curious. Inside the body. Inside the skin. That is what it means. Mother. Creator. Giver. It will be met.

Hello, Mother.

Steve. Small. Carried in his mother’s arms. “Come on, honey. It’s time to go.”

Blink. See. The room is gone. The paper. The plastic. Gone. The face in the window. Gone. Gone is the boy. See. A barren, rocky land. Roaming creatures. Brothers. They are wild. All is wild here. Ferocious. Lonely. Distant.

Home.

I don’t know what’s happening. Did I make a mistake?

His mother shakes her head.

See. Rising into the air. Unfurling. A shadow. The great shadow. Darkness alive. See. A tremendous spider. It does not have eyes. But it looks. It cannot hear. But it knows. It calls. A mirror.

It’s you.

It is us.

That’s not me!

It is. Now.

Light. On the ground. Something glows. Something grows. Something. Blooming from the cracks—

Steve gasps as an inferno burns through him. It razes his thoughts, overpowering the Mind Flayer. It lifts the disease of darkness. He can think clearly again. He can think like himself. The Mind Flayer still lingers deep in his mind like the stained, charred earth after a forest fire, but now Steve can shut the door. He can close the Pandora’s box that he opened into himself.

“Thank you,” Steve pants. He knows the Mother can hear him. He’s mostly grateful to know that he got something right. He’s supposed to be here—wherever here is.

It looks like another planet. Maybe it is. If someone asked him to imagine Venus or Mars, he would picture something like this. In every direction he sees jagged, coal black mountains. They even hang in the hazy air above him, great chunks of rock the size of cars. It’s not as dark as night, but it’s not bright either. No sun shines, only heavy-bellied black clouds hang above him. In the distance lightning falls from the sky like blood, red and staining. And of course—

The Mind Flayer.

It’s like Will’s drawing walked right off the page into this world. It haunts the land ahead of Steve, about a football field away. A huge spider made of swirling darkness. It’s so tall that Steve can’t quite see where it ends.

And it’s looking at him.

No, it doesn’t have eyes, but Steve can tell in the tilt of its long spiked head. A shiver runs down his spine.

What is it waiting for?

Glowing mushrooms circle around Steve. The same ones he saw when Vecna attacked him, the same ones he saw in the Upside Down. The Mother. They radiate with pure moonlight, and their hypnotic shine helps calm Steve’s crazed heartbeat. He’s in a strange place, with an eldritch entity staring him down, but he’s not alone.

Images fill his mind.

Clock. Ticking. The door is closed. Clock at zero. The door is open. Darkness enters.

Okay, he gets it. They don’t have a lot of time, but that doesn’t tell him what he’s supposed to do now. Should he know?

“What do you want me to do? Why did you bring me here?”

“Steve?” Innocence echoes around him. A young voice, as out of place here as a whistling birdsong. Steve spins around but he doesn’t see Will. Still, somehow, he’s close.

“Will? Can you hear me?”

“I can hear you, I’m right here! What’s happening?”

“I don’t know, but I’m okay, Will. I’m okay.”

For now.

The Mind Flayer shifts. Terror clenches Steve in a tight fist but the shadow doesn’t come closer. Its limbs move slow and heavy, and its head tilts to the other side. Steve feels it in the back of his mind. Knock. Knock. Knock. It’s restless. It wants to open the door.

It’s not the only thing moving. On the horizon, the lightning is closing in, breaking through the dappled clouds and striking the ground in fire red. At Steve’s feet, one of the mushrooms begins to wither and die.

Fear finds Steve with a fresh face, taking on strange new shapes in his belly, turning his heart inside out. He understands. He really gets it this time. The Mother is holding the Mind Flayer—and its master—at bay, but they won’t be chained forever.

“Help me!” Steve begs. “What do I do? I don’t know what to do!”

The Mind Flayer. Vecna. A door closes between them.

Steve is going to die. He’s going to die because he’s stuck here trying to decipher messages from an otherworldly entity and he’s not smart enough. He needs Nancy and Dustin and Hopper and everyone.

“I don’t understand what you’re telling me!”

Vecna. Steve pulls a plug from a wall socket. The Mind Flayer.

Wait. Maybe…

“You want me to…separate them? To unplug Vecna?” And that makes sense, right? If Vecna is the master, maybe the Mind Flayer is harmless without him. But even if he wanted to, how the hell would Steve manage that?

“Shit!” he whispers. He tries not to look at the Mind Flayer but it’s omnipresent, everywhere, and Steve’s fate is tied to it and the lightning. They’re lying in wait, and the glowing buds around him are dying. He won’t be safe for long. He needs to think. Like Hopper and Nancy and Dustin. Think like Dustin.

“Okay, okay, so…I need to separate Vecna and the Mind Flayer, and the Mind Flayer is a hive mind. It’s the brain, so what does that make Vecna? The…neurons? The electricity? Because a brain is like a computer, that’s what Mr. Jamison said, and if the brain needs power…” Power. Steve remembers what the Mother showed him yesterday. Vecna, standing in this strange land, with his hand outstretched, shaping the Mind Flayer into what it is now. “Shit, of course. He had powers.”

Something frenzied hums through Steve, the puzzle pieces clicking together, the answer presenting like a psychic vision. He needs Eleven. She could separate them with her powers.

But Steve looks at the Mind Flayer head on and reality sinks through him. He doesn’t know where she is. Even if he did, how could he reach her from here? How could she reach him? Steve is the only chance.

“I can’t do it, I don’t have powers.” He watches another mushroom rot at his feet. Did the Mother make a mistake sending him back? Did it think all humans are like Henry? Did it expect anyone to be able to help? Shit. Steve is fucked.

Unless…

“I don’t have powers but you do.” He kneels on the hard rock and touches one of the buds that still glows. It radiates warmth like the single flame of a candle. “Can you give me some?”

For a breathless moment, he waits. And he wonders. How would it feel to have Eleven’s powers? Would it sing through him like electricity, would it swell like a high, or would it feel like nothing? Would he just know how to use it? Possibilities race through his mind—

But nothing happens.

And nothing will happen. It is time for the end. Now is the end.

No! Steve shoves the Mind Flayer back. It festers in his head and when he looks up—is it closer? It is. The mushroom under Steve’s fingertips shrivels into ash. Only a handful remain. What happens when they all die?

Jesus Christ, Steve, think! THINK! So maybe the Mother can communicate with him and protect him and shove him through time, but obviously it can’t change him. It can’t rewrite his DNA and give him something that Eleven and Vecna were born with. So what the hell does he do?

Steve calls to the world he can’t see.

“Will?”

Even from somewhere else, Steve hears the panic in Will’s distant voice. “I’m right here, Steve! You need to hurry, they’re coming!”

“Help me, Will, I don’t know what to do!”

“What’s happening?”

“This won’t make sense but I need an answer and I need it now. If I need to stop something but I can’t unplug it and I can’t turn off the power, what do I do?”

“Ummm, uhhh…blow the circuit?”

Blow the circuit?

Okay. Too much power can shock the system.

But Steve would still need El, and if the Mother could do it, wouldn’t it have already tried? It was here when Vecna shaped this world into the Upside Down that Steve knows. It was here when Vecna made this world his own and it couldn’t stop him. Hand outstretched, rage on his face. Steve has stood by and watched Eleven do the same thing. Stretching her hand out, making things happen. That same fury on her face.

Anger. Emotion. A key in the lock that lets them use their abilities. If Steve had those powers, he would become a force to be reckoned with. He has enough ire and anguish for two lifetimes, seared into his soul alongside his DNA.

Maybe…

Maybe he doesn’t need Eleven’s power. Will spied on the Mind Flayer, into those now-memories, but the Mind Flayer also spied on Will. It’s a two way street. If Steve can feel the Mother, maybe it can also feel him.

Steve is breathless. Anticipation buzzes under his skin when he lays his palms on the sharp rock. New mushrooms bloom between his spread fingers like an answer, perfectly in tune with him. Threads of light appear on the ground. They spread in every direction like roots. The mycelium. Hiding. The Mother was hiding from Vecna. It’s a hive mind too, and now it rises to the surface again. For Steve.

“Can you feel me?”

Heat surges through him, tingling from his fingertips to his toes, filling every inch of him. Even without words, the answer is clear.

Yes.

Power and emotion. Together they have both. And they might have enough of each to shock Vecna right out of the system. To break his leash on the Mind Flayer.

All Steve has to do is feel.

He glares up at the Mind Flayer. He finds the piece of it haunting his mind. This is my world now. And soon he’ll fill it with the misery he knows best. He lets it build—every heartache, every death, every tear spent and nightmare dreamed and monster faced—and all of it surges from the pit of his stomach into his chest into his throat. His fury could rival a dragon. His grief could eclipse a tsunami. It all came from this world and this world can have. It. BACK.

“We were supposed to be happy!”

Joyce wasn’t supposed to lose her son, over and over again. Nancy wasn’t supposed to grieve for her best friend. The kids aren’t supposed to live in fear. Eleven isn’t supposed to save the world again and again and again. Hopper, Max, Chrissy, Bob, Barbara—so many people weren’t supposed to die.

And Eddie, who was hunted by an angry town with no one else to blame, who sacrificed his life for them, who was laid to rest inside of a nightmare for no one to remember.

But Steve remembers.

And he always will.

“You stole from me. You tortured my friends and you murdered my family, and you’re going to fucking pay!”

His vengeful rage boils into the world, seeping from his skin, carried by the light of the Mother spreading across the ground. It stretches far and wide, as far as Steve can see. It illuminates the dusty air. The more he feels, the brighter it shines, like cracks over ice. Steve is the catalyst. Good. He’ll take this world and smash it into a million pieces for everything it’s done to him. He’s in the eye of the storm now. Black clouds swirl above him and red lightning blazes to the ground, exploding the rock around him, but Steve doesn’t care. It can’t hurt him. He owns the world.

Ahead, the Mind Flayer moves. The Mother’s web of light has reached it, shining moonlight beneath its shadow, and it shifts. Spidery limbs drift through the air, head tilts. It seems confused. It expands, the darkness swelling, growing—no, it’s not getting bigger. It’s dissolving. The shadow bulges and morphs, releasing its spider form until it’s a whirlpool of ashes in the air.

It’s gone.

No, it’s not gone.

Steve can still feel it at the back of his mind, so he opens the door.

There it is, that tiny part of it, but it doesn’t feel the same. It doesn’t threaten to consume him. It doesn’t dull his mind with disdain for humanity. No, that belonged to Vecna. Now it’s thoughtless. Shapeless. Where Vecna saw an uncollared dog, Steve sees…nothing. Nothing more than the awareness that something in his mind doesn’t belong to him.

Go, he tells it.

It goes.

He exhales, and a breath of charcoal smoke streams out from his lips.

Steve has seen a lot of impossible things but now he is a witness to pure magic. Magic so beautiful he could cry. This is one in a million, no other living person will ever see this, but all he can think is I wish Eddie could see this. Nothing else, just this part. Oh, he would love to watch Eddie’s eyes light up in wonder at the sight before him now.

Each thread of glowing light weaving across the ground is rising into the air. Strings of starlight drifting up, casting their crystalline radiance through the dark haze. It’s as though he walked into a constellation. Up it goes, floating past him, leaving him behind, but he doesn’t mind when he realizes where it’s going. In the air it gathers, every strand tangling together, until it looks like a storm of starlight. It meets the roiling ash that was the Mind Flayer. Ribbons of darkness dance between ribbons of light until they become one. Reuniting. Reconciling.

And all because of Steve. This is why the Mother needed him. It needed someone strong enough to help it shatter Vecna’s hold over this world.

And it worked. It really worked.

Steve is delirious. Breathless and dizzy, and his skin tingles with a warmth that’s not of the Mother’s making. He’s so light that he might just float into the air too. He’ll see this moment in his dreams, the moment he changed the world. Both worlds. Maybe the Upside Down won’t be the enemy anymore. Maybe it can return to the way it should be. Ferocious and lonely and wild, and far away from the people he loves. If these inhabitants just want the same thing as him—for their world to be left alone—then he could live in peace.

“I think I want to go home now.”

It only takes a single blink. The wild, ancient landscape disappears and he’s kneeling inside the shed. He never left.

Steve lets out the breathless, hysterical laughter trapped in his body. His head is rushing. His bones are water. As soon as he can muster the strength to stand, he’s going to run outside and kiss the crap out of Eddie. He doesn’t care if anyone sees. He deserves a heart-stopping kiss. It worked, and now Will is free.

But he’s crying.

Steve shuffles forward on his knees to Will. Now he knows how the boy felt when the Mind Flayer was poisoning him and his heart hurts for Will all over again. But Will won’t ever have to worry about the Mind Flayer anymore.

“Hey, it’s alright, I’m alright. I know that was scary but everything is going to be so much better now, I promise. My plan worked.”

Will’s brown eyes are huge and glassy as he looks at Steve, and tears keep slipping down his cheeks. “What do you mean it worked?” he chokes out. “How could it have worked?”

“We don’t need to worry about the Mind Flayer—that thing—anymore, okay? Listen, I have so much to tell you but I—”

“That was your plan?” Will isn’t relieved or reassured. No, he looks angry now, and Steve is stunned. He’s never seen such hatred on Will before. “You wanted them all to die?”

Steve’s heart turns to ice. “What?” he whispers.

Will sobs his words, and each fresh tear drives a stake through Steve. “I told you they were coming! I told you! But you didn’t listen. You’re too late and now they’re all dead. My mom, my brother, Hopper…I heard so much screaming…”

Steve is dizzy, so dizzy, his head spins in circles and his heart squeezes and he’s so nauseous he might throw up. This can’t be happening, it worked. His plan worked and he was over the moon and now—now—no, no, no—

He scrambles across the floor to grab the walkie talkie. “Hello? Guys? Can anyone hear me? Hopper? Nancy? Dustin? Eddie? ANYBODY?”

The only answer is a thin stream of empty static. Will screams in the way only the heartbroken can, the howl of those who have truly lost everything.

Oh, god. What have I done?

Steve stands up, but his legs barely have the strength to carry him and he almost topples back down. He leans against the wall, gulping in breath after breath, but there isn’t enough air in the world. He doesn’t deserve to breathe, not when…not when…

His eyes blur with tears. He can’t stop them. He stumbles across the shed and cups his hands to the window to see outside. He can see the kitchen light in the Byers’ house flickering but nothing else. Only midnight darkness.

“You killed my family!” Will cries out, his voice cracking. “They’re dead, you killed them, you killed them all!”

“No, Will, you don’t—we agreed and I…I…” Steve’s voice fails. Will is right. This is all his fault. He knew they would be in danger but he still begged them to let him try and this is what he gets. His friends and his family, all dead because of him. And Eddie.

Steve can’t stop the sob that bursts from his throat. Not Eddie. He was supposed to have more time to love him. He never even said it yet. But what good is Steve’s love if this is what it brought to Eddie? He was supposed to save Eddie. He promised. He was so sure he could make things better. And now Eddie is gone, too young, too soon—again. Because of Steve.

“How could you think it was a good idea? You’re an idiot, Steve Harrington.”

Steve blinks. His tears slow as the words ring through his mind. And you’re beautiful, Nancy Wheeler. Those were her words. But Will said them. Steve turns around and looks at the boy. Still tied to the chair, but he’s not crying anymore. “What did you say?”

“I said…” Will stands up. The cords binding his wrists and ankles fall away, and his voice deepens far below the pitch of a thirteen-year-old boy. “You’re an idiot, Steve Harrington.”

Steve stares in horror as rot corrupts Will’s pale skin, blackening his arms and his neck and his face. His skin bubbles and caves in grotesque ways, hollowing his cheeks and raising thick, black veins on his limbs. The hospital gown rips apart as his body stretches until he towers over Steve. The stink of death chokes the air from Steve’s lungs. Evil incarnate stands in front of Steve, watching him with a corpse’s eyes.

“Did you really think you could stop me?”

Steve runs.

His heart bangs inside his chest as he slams into the door. Once, twice, again and again until it finally swings open. He doesn’t look back. He runs across the lawn but the moon is dead, and the stars are dark, and the flickering light from the kitchen isn’t enough to see. He trips over something large. When he crawls backwards, it squelches beneath him. His hands sink into a mass of warm, lumpy wetness. A metallic smell hits his nose.

Steve is light-headed and his stomach churns. “Hopper?” he whispers.

Even the grass is sticky, and in it Steve finds something cold and plastic. His fingers move without his mind’s permission to click the flashlight on.

He shouldn’t have done that, should’ve have done that, shouldn’t have—turn it off, turn it off!—but he’s frozen, the signals between his brain and hands are broken, and the sight is too much—

Steve vomits into the blood-soaked grass.

What did those bastards do to him? He doesn’t even look human anymore. His body is a gruesome soup of shredded flesh and broken bones in a pool of his own blood, with parts missing, parts where they shouldn’t be. And his face…Steve shudders. The look of shock on Hopper’s dead face is stained on his eyelids, doomed to haunt his nightmares forever.

Chief Hopper seemed invincible. Now he’s dead, a waste of life like roadkill at Steve’s feet. He always did his best to protect them, and Steve couldn’t even return the favour for one measly day. He’s never felt more like a failure as a son than he does right now.

I’m so sorry. But sorry won’t reignite their lighthouse. Sorry won’t bring Eleven’s father back to life.

“Look at what you’ve done.”

Morbid curiosity makes Steve look over his shoulder.

Vecna is stalking towards him.

Steve drops the flashlight. Runs up the steps to the back door. Crunches over broken glass as he walks into the kitchen.

Someone screams. After a heart-pounding second, he realizes it was him.

Joyce and Bob are islands in an ocean of blood. They’re red, so red, their entrails exposed in the oozing caverns of their clawed open bellies. Half-eaten in a frenzy. Half-eaten like chew toys. Steve stares and stares at the remains of Joyce’s heart. He stares until she becomes a mirage behind fresh tears. Another parent he failed.

How could he have gone so wrong?

Steve can’t force himself to look at the other bodies in the dining room. Not the kids, not Nancy and Jonathan, too. Every time the kitchen light flickers he hopes it will all disappear. He hopes that the next time he blinks he’ll be standing here with all of them alive. Happy.

But nothing changes. His friends stay dead. The walls stay streaked with blood. The air stays thick with copper and a sharper smell. The smell of colours exploding in front of his eyes and a monstrosity screaming in his face and his friends fearing for their lives. Gunpowder. Nancy did her best, but she was no match for an army of demodogs.

A groan pierces Steve’s grief. He moves carefully over the floor slick with blood and shards of glass, and in the hallway he finds—

“Oh, Eddie!”

Steve is grateful for the tears clouding his vision. He doesn’t want to see Eddie’s body torn to bits, slashed open and devoured like meat. The smell is awful enough. He can taste Eddie’s blood in his throat, sour and rusty. He kneels beside Eddie. When he coughs, blood spatters from his lips onto his cheek, staining his deathly white skin.

Eddie gurgles out a word. “You….”

“I’m sorry, Eddie, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…” Steve wants to believe that this is just a nightmare but how could it be when it feels so real? He can feel Eddie’s cold skin and his sticky hair as he cradles Eddie to his chest. He can hear Eddie’s shallow breaths. He can smell the blood in his hair, the blood on his own hands, the blood everywhere. Every sensation sinks into the marrow of Steve’s bones, whispering my fault my fault my fault. All of this is his fault.

“...did…this…” Eddie’s eyes darken. His life is leaving.

“No, no, no, Eddie! Stay with me, stay with me, baby, please…”

But begging can’t change Eddie’s fate. His eyelids slip half-closed and his face smooths into the pale mask of death.

Steve cries and cries. His tears land on Eddie’s skin. He whispers useless words, pointless pleas to the universe. Please let me keep him, please give him back to me, but Eddie is still. No one hears him. Nothing answers him. He’s left with the bitter taste of his own failure in his mouth. He lays wasted kisses on Eddie’s lips. If Steve’s life really was some sort of twisted fairytale, now would be the time for Eddie to wake up. As if the magic of a single kiss could bring his love back to life.

But he’s dead. He stays dead, and Steve doesn’t stop crying.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, cradling Eddie to his chest, but eventually he becomes aware of a shadow. It stretches across Eddie’s feet as the light flickers. A shadow of something in the kitchen coming closer.

“I’m sorry, babe,” Steve whispers into Eddie’s hair. “I don’t want to leave you but I have to go.” He’s going to do it again. He’s going to leave Eddie’s dead body behind, only this time Steve loves him.

After one last hurried kiss to Eddie’s cold face, Steve steps over the corpse of the boy he loves and runs to the front door—

—and into a deep, crimson haze. Behind him, the Byers house is gone.

Steve walks forward through the red nothingness. The ground squelches beneath his shoes. It’s not warm but the air is stifling. Stale and dead, like the inside of the Creel house, but also filled with a rotten stench. He can taste it on the back of his tongue like a sickness.

The haze clears as he walks, and he sees strange shapes rising from the ground, like black icicles piercing the sky. Thunder shakes the world and Steve feels it in his chest, disturbing his heartbeat, rumbling in his bones. Red lightning blazes through the sky, illuminating a tableau of horror ahead—

Steve knows where he is. The Creel house, but not the Creel house in the world that he knows. This is the Creel house as Max saw it, fractured and frozen. A home that could only belong to the devil.

Steve’s heart hammers in his ears as he ascends the front steps and passes through the empty doorframe. The door is floating a few feet away with the glass rose still intact. He wishes he had his bat so he could smash it all over again. It, and the rest of these cursed remains. He wants to see this place in flames.

Something screeches above him and he ducks. It swoops over his head, so close that it ruffles his hair, then zooms into the sky, circling above with the rest of its brethren. Bats. He remembers the agony of needle-sharp teeth tearing into his abdomen and eating him alive.

Another crack of lightning casts its hellish glow over the ruin, and Steve sees—

Oh my god!

Nothing could’ve prepared him for this, not even the sight of Eddie and Hopper and the others dead. He almost didn’t realize it’s a body. The limbs are stretched and bent, wrapped around thick, black vines. The jaw is broken, the eyes are gouged out, the mouth stuffed with a snaking vine, but underneath the grime Steve recognizes the clothes. Hawkins High cheer squad.

Chrissy.

No, she can’t be here. She’s not dead.

But what if she is?

Steve couldn’t save her, either. How many people will he let down? How many people will meet their death because of him?

“Do you remember now?” The voice of the devil echoes around Steve, a boom of thunder and the chill of a whisper in his ear at the same time. “I never forgot. I will always have a piece of them.”

Them. Steve whirls around. Sure enough, there are three more bodies chained by heavy black tendrils, like sacrifices on stakes. Three more, which means—

“Max!” Steve stares at his sister in horror. Her skin is drenched red in the devilish light. Her body is fractured, twisted, and her fiery hair is filthy, and her eyes are black holes but they’re not empty. Something white lies deep in the cavities, and as he looks closer, dozens of pale spiders erupt from their nests, crawling over her skin like their own playground.

Steve stumbles back, feeling itchy, dizzy, so sick he might vomit again. He hears Nancy’s voice echo in his ears. We need to go check on Max check on Max check on Max but he never made it back to Hawkins, and this is the fate that found her. I’m so sorry, Max. His little sister. Part of the family he just keeps failing.

“Are you ready to join your friends?”

“Go to HELL!” Steve turns around and around but he doesn’t see Vecna. He doesn’t know where to run or what to do. Darkness lives in every direction, ready to devour him. Where is the Mother now? Please help me!

“It can’t help you. Not here.”

“FUCK YOU!”

But part of Steve wonders if it’s true. The Mother saved him once before, but this…this place is different. This isn’t just Steve’s memory now. This is Vecna’s world. Vecna’s mind. What if the Mother can’t reach him here?

“It isn’t your friend. It used you, and now it will leave you to rot.”

Vecna’s words are everywhere all at once. In the air, in Steve’s body, poisoning his bloodstream and infecting his mind. His heart shrivels, his stomach turns to ash. He can’t see the Mother’s light anywhere. He can’t hear music. What hope does he have left? Everyone he loves is dead, somewhere in the world he can’t see. No one can turn on the radio for him.

It’s over.

“You will die and I will reclaim what you stole from me. Then I will build my world.”

The red haze disappears. The world rumbles. In the darkness surrounding the ruins of the Creel house, shapes begin to rise. Buildings. Places that Steve recognizes. His home and Eddie’s trailer. The Byers house, the Wheeler's house, the police station and the school. Hawkins, but not the Hawkins he knows.

This Hawkins is doomed. A gaping chasm splits across the ground, through streets and houses like a strike of lightning, sucking Steve’s town into death. He doesn’t see people but he hears the shrieking chorus of thousands as creatures crawl out of the chasm. They crawl, then fly, then they hurtle through the town wreaking havoc in every direction Steve looks. Creatures with massive wings like dragons, vast black caverns for mouths, and teeth that Steve can see from miles away. There’s nothing he can do. He watches, and his eyes burn, and his ears bleed, and there’s nothing he can do.

Nancy saw this. Or at least part of it. A disease spreading across the world with Hawkins at the epicenter. Vecna’s world.

In the blink of an eye it disappears. The darkness around Steve seems more ominous than before, like it’s waiting to keep its promises. It will have its way with the world, and there’s nothing Steve can do.

Something pulls Steve’s ankle. He slams into the ground. He scrabbles for something to grab onto but his hands only get filthy with rot and spider webs. It drags him, then pulls him up, then he smacks against something hard. His limbs are yanked back. Something slimy circles his neck. Steve pulls and pulls and pulls but he can’t break free. He’s never felt so helpless before. He’s crying. Did he ever stop?

A figure emerges from the dark. Once a man, now a carcass. A wraith inside of Steve’s hell.

“You will die knowing that you failed your friends and your world.”

Steve’s heart pounds furiously, trying to live out the rest of its beating in his last few moments alive. He doesn’t want to look at Vecna. He can’t look away. He doesn’t want to cry but he can’t stop. This is what he deserves. His friends are dead, why shouldn’t he die, too? It’s his fault. He has nothing left to live for. No one left to save.

He doesn’t want to die but he wants to be with his family. Wherever Eddie is.

Vecna stops in front of Steve, but before the demon can speak again, a light grows in the distance. Glorious light, blazing through the red like a summer sunrise, banishing the darkness to reveal the truth. Steve sees himself inside the shed and a voice echoes through the red world. The voice of an angel in tears.

“When evening falls, he’ll run to me…”

Eddie.

Steve can’t see him but his voice is enough. More than enough. He’s not dead. He’s alive, out there somewhere, and he’s crying for Steve. Trying to save him, trying to bring him home.

The shackles of Steve’s fear release. Energy surges through his muscles. Determination fills his veins. Every single precious word of Eddie’s song—their song—is rejuvenation.

“They can’t save you, and you can’t save them either, no matter how hard you may try.”

But Vecna is wrong.

Everyone Steve loves is out there, waiting for him, scared for him. They’re not dead. He can feel it now. His hope is revived like the sun peeking through cloudy skies. He can do it, he can escape. The vines feel as weak as string—he can run.

And he’s going to, his limbs are poised, ready, but—

Warmth burns down his back and—

There. Behind Vecna. A glowing mushroom blooms on the steps of the Creel house. The Mother. It’s finally here? But the bud shrivels away. Another one glows on the face of the grandfather clock, hanging in the air, but that one dies, too. What the hell is it doing?

“It is time…”

No, fuck this. Steve has to run.

But the heat of a thousand suns blazes down his spine. The message is clear.

STOP.

Through his tears Steve watches that skeletal black hand rise in front of him, and his simmering fear grips him again. The vines grow tighter. He can still hear Eddie but he’s frozen. He should be moving, move! But the Mother—what does it want? Was Vecna right? It used Steve, and now it wants him to die?

He can feel it in the back of his mind but so faintly. When the images come, they’re splintered. Flashes before the channel switches again. They last as long as the buds that are blooming and dying behind Vecna, out of sight, hiding again.

Steve.

Gifts.

His mother.

“Good—”

“—come—”

“—wait.”

The pieces snap together. The memory of a Christmas many years ago. He was shaking wrapped presents to guess their contents and his mom wagged her finger. She said, “Good things come to those who wait.”

Good things come to those who wait.

It wants him to wait?

But I’m going to die!

“...for you…”

The Mother gives him an answer. It takes Steve a heart-racing second to understand, but he does. The right neurons fire, a synapse sparks, and when he joins the dots he can see the final picture.

Upside Down.

Demodogs.

Run.

Creel house.

Vecna.

Hanging.

Eyes closed.

And Steve trusts. He will put his life in the Mother’s hands again. He’ll wait.

But it won’t work if Vecna kills him too soon. He has to hold on.

“...to die.”

Steve blinks the last of his tears away. He draws a breath of foul air. He looks at Vecna. A rotting corpse layered in grotesque veins, a well of hatred in its eyes. It’s not a man anymore. It’s hard to believe that it ever was.

“I feel sorry—for you,” Steve chokes out. The tendril around his neck is so tight but he doesn’t care. Vecna can’t take away his hope now.

“An ant? Sorry for the spider with its jaw open wide?”

“Do you even know what love feels like?”

It’s obvious now. That spark of understanding travels deeper in Steve’s mind, joining more pieces of the puzzle. Putting together the dark void of Vecna’s mind with the state of the Upside Down. It doesn’t look like it’s supposed to, like that vast wild land. Vecna molded it until it reflected him. The echo of humanity is there, in the shells of the houses, in the empty buildings overtaken by vines like a virus, but there is no life. No love. No water. He thought it was strange that there was no water in Lover’s Lake but now it makes sense. Love, like water, is vital for life. Without it there can only be darkness, decay, and death.

Vecna laughs in a way that reverberates through Steve, a deeply unsettling sound that almost drowns out Eddie’s voice. Almost. “Love? Weakness.”

No.

Love is going to save Steve’s life.

“Come the dawn! Come the dawn!”

Because of love, Steve can hold on a little longer. Because of love, he will see this through. Because of love, Eddie starts his song over again. He’s not giving up on Steve, and Steve won’t give up on his chance to end this. Once and for all.

“When evening falls, he’ll run to me…”

I will, Steve promises. I will. Soon.

Demodogs.

Running.

Creel house.

Upstairs.

Attic.

Time’s up.

And Steve laughs in the face of death.

He tells the devil, “It’s time for you to die.”

A savage, animal roar echoes out of the darkness. For the very first time in his life, Steve isn’t scared. They’re not here for him. He’s not the one hanging defenceless in a world full of monsters that he doesn’t control anymore.

Even without a human face, Steve can sense Vecna’s hesitation. He cackles like a madman. Vengeance makes him higher than any drug, fills him more than any food, and the idea of his laughter being the last thing Vecna hears makes all of the terror worth it.

The world dissolves. The vines locking Steve in place crumble to dust and the ruins of the Creel house evaporate. Everything dissipates into clouds of nothingness around Steve, including Vecna. The wrath in those foggy dead eyes is the last thing Steve sees before he falls through darkness.

And as he falls, the voice he loves grows louder.

“We believed we’d catch the rainbow, ride the wind to the sun…”

I’m coming, Eddie. I’m coming home.

Chapter Text

The darkness inside Steve’s world begins to dissipate. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows that he wasn’t asleep, but it feels like waking up. Waking up from another time, another place, instead of a dream. He comes back to himself like his soul is re-entering his body. He can feel his fingers and his toes again. He feels the pumping of his heart, the gnawing hunger in his gut, and the air in his lungs. He’s alive. He’s home.

And he’s floating six feet off the ground.

It ends the second he notices, like a dream that’s cut short when he realizes he’s dreaming.

Steve slams into the ground.

He groans. A bright light swims through his vision. He doesn’t know which way is up. His whole head feels rattled, his skull shaking apart. He hears noise and voices and words and talking—who’s talking? Are they talking to him?—but he can’t understand a thing.

Bang! What was that? Where is he? Steve tries to sit up, wincing, fighting back a wave of dizziness when—

Someone is beside him, holding him, cradling him. Someone with a mass of dark curls and the comforting scent of pine and leather and cigarettes.

Eddie.

Steve spends all of his energy returning the embrace, clinging to Eddie as the dizziness passes and his head comes to a stand still. He thought he was done with tears but he’s crying in an instant. He sobs as the image of Eddie cold and dead in his arms invades his mind. It tries to convince him that this is the dream but he knows the truth. This is real, this is finally real. The truth of it threatens to sweep him away but Eddie is his anchor through the howling sea inside his soul. Steve didn’t know he could feel this deeply, this desperately, even after everything he’s already seen. He doesn’t have words to describe it, and he can only think of one way to show it.

He pulls back barely an inch to find Eddie’s mouth and he kisses him like he’s never kissed anyone before in his life. It’s wet and urgent and breathless. It rescues him and soothes him, like a fire in a snowstorm. It brings him to life.

“I love you,” he whispers in a gasping breath. He sees Eddie’s shock but he doesn’t let it stop him now. Maybe nothing can stop him now. The words just pour out of him like water. “That’s what I wanted to tell you, and I should’ve told you before but I was a coward. I was scared that it was too soon and you wouldn’t say it back but I don’t care anymore. I need you to know because I thought you were dead and I thought it was my fault and I missed my chance and—”

“Steve,” Eddie whispers brokenly, and he’s crying, too. He cradles Steve’s face in his hands. “I love you, too.”

Steve breathes out. Something shifts. His world finds its orbit again after spinning out of control for what seems like years. He didn’t know it was so far off course but now he’s back in the safe, familiar hold of gravity. Circling the sun and dancing with the stars and spinning deep into the expanse of love waiting for him.

“Really?” he whispers.

Eddie’s eyes shine with tears, too wide and wondrous to comprehend. He nods helplessly. “You started floating and we played the radio over the walkie but nothing happened and I was terrified and I thought we were going to lose you and I just—I couldn’t—I wasn’t ready—”

Steve brings him close again, leaning their foreheads together. He would’ve felt the exact same if it had been Eddie in his shoes, and just the thought of it makes him clutch Eddie tighter. “I couldn’t hear anything until you sang to me.”

Eddie makes a tiny, stricken sort of whimper. “Never make me do that again.”

“I won’t,” Steve promises. He won’t need to.

Vecna is dead.

The thought is so alien. It lives in his mind like something new and strange that he can’t quite wrap his head around, sinking through every neuron and filling every corner until it’s heavy enough for Steve to believe it. He’s almost scared to believe it but he knows that it’s true. Vecna was attacked and ripped apart by the creatures he once controlled. He’ll never terrorize them again. Steve just wishes he could’ve seen it all.

Eddie gives him the most gentle kiss and whispers, “So, does this mean…can I call you my boyfriend?”

Boyfriend. Steve might get high just hearing the word and he can’t hold back his smile. “You better or I’m going to be pissed. All the shit I just went through and I don’t even get a boyfriend at the end of it?”

Eddie laughs. His gorgeous, watery grin is something that makes Steve wish he had a camera to capture it and treasure it and file it away somewhere with the rest of the things that make life worth living.

Someone clears their throat.

Steve looks up. His smile drops and heat burns his face. “Oh, shit.”

They’re not alone in the shed. Everyone else is here, and they’re all staring at him and Eddie. Will is the most shocked. He’s untied and being carried in his brother’s arms, and he’s gaping at them with eyes as big as planets. Nancy has a small smile on her face, and to Steve’s surprise, so does Joyce. The only person who obviously doesn’t give a shit is Hopper, because he’s too busy looking at—

“El,” Steve says when he sees her. She looks just like she did last time. Punk rock clothes, slicked back hair and dark eyeliner, but none of it hides the youth in her round face. She looks surprised when he says her name. She’s holding Mike’s hand and there’s a red smear beneath her nose. She used her powers.

“What happened?” Steve asks immediately. “Is everyone okay?”

“Why don’t we go inside?” Bob suggests as he rubs his hands together. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m freezing.”

Joyce agrees and she ushers everyone out of the shed. Eddie helps Steve to his feet and without his arm around Steve’s waist he would probably collapse back to the floor. Every part of his body feels liquid.

As they walk outside behind the group, the smell of death overwhelms Steve. Instantly his mind jumps back to Vecna’s curse and finding Hopper mutilated in the grass, but Hopper is alive ahead of him, and the smell in the air isn’t human anyway. It’s the familiar acrid stink of demogorgon. Here in the real world the moon shines brightly enough for him to see lumps littered across the yard.

“What happened?” Steve asks Eddie quietly.

“It was crazy,” Eddie tells him. “The chief was surrounded, we thought—well, I definitely thought he was screwed, but then this girl just comes out of the dark and waves her hand and—” He waves his free hand through the air. “They went flying. I figured she had to be Eleven. Then more showed up—I mean there were at least a dozen—but they didn’t attack. They just stood there, like they were waiting for something, and then they started glowing and took off through the trees.”

“Glowing?” Steve echoes, but he quickly realizes that he already knows the answer. That must’ve been the moment when the Mother sent them back to the Upside Down, when it finally had control.

“It was wicked,” Eddie says with awe. “I totally thought we were all going to die the entire time, but it was still pretty damn cool.”

“You really do like weird shit,” Steve says fondly.

“Told you so.”

Joyce holds the back door open for them and Eddie brings Steve through the kitchen and into the bathroom. Steve nearly jumps out of his own skin when he looks into the mirror. On top of the bruise from his fight with Tommy—was that really just this morning?—there are rivers of black painted down his pale face, trailing from his eyes, his nose, and his ears. Maybe this was part of the reason everyone stared at him. Steve touches the black stuff and rubs it between his fingers. It’s sticky like drying blood, but it also feels sandy.

Joyce appears in the doorway with a few clean towels and gives them a weary but genuine smile. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Byers,” Steve says.

“No, no, thank you.” Her eyes shine but she doesn’t cry. “For-for my boy. I-I know that must’ve been so hard and I really don’t know how to thank you—”

“Oh, you really don’t need to, Mrs Byers,” Steve says awkwardly. He feels exactly like he did when Nancy said she was impressed by how much he figured out on his own. He doesn’t want anyone’s gratitude. He’s just doing what needs to be done.

Thankfully Joyce doesn’t say more, although she looks like she wants to. She closes the bathroom door behind her as she leaves and Steve immediately begins to relax. Everything—everyone—it’s just too much right now, after what he saw and went through and now they all know about him and Eddie and his head is a mess and he just needs a moment to himself, to put himself back together.

Steve takes a deep breath. He looks at the mirror again. “I can’t believe you kissed me looking like this.”

Eddie smiles as he turns on the tap. He seemed to have no doubt that Steve wanted him to stay. “I think it’s kind of metal. Stick out your tongue and look angry.”

Steve does, watching his face transform into something unrecognizable. He looks grotesque or cursed, but maybe Eddie has a point. He just killed a monster and it shows.

“See? Album cover material right there.”

“Like, uh…Ozzy?” Steve asks, remembering their conversation from a lifetime ago. “Did he really bite a bat’s head off?”

“Yeah, he did. Did I tell you about that?”

“In the future.”

“Right. My boyfriend is a time traveller.”

Boyfriend. Steve smiles at the word again. He was mostly joking in the shed about deserving a boyfriend at the end of all this, but in truth it would’ve been hard to make it through this night without Eddie. Even with their relationship still so new, just having him close is a precious comfort.

Eddie nudges him away from the sink. “Sit.” He kneels in front of Steve after Steve slumps onto the toilet lid. “Close your eyes.”

Steve closes his eyes. He feels a warm, damp cloth touch his cheek and gently roam across his skin. Around his eyes, under his nose, at his ears then down his neck, wiping away the last traces of the Upside Down. When Eddie finishes, Steve opens his eyes and sees him looking at the now stained cloth apprehensively.

“Is this…is—should we burn it?”

“I don’t think it’s dangerous anymore,” Steve says with enough conviction to put Eddie at ease. He can never be sure when it comes to the Upside Down but after seeing what happened to the Mind Flayer he’s mostly sure this little piece of it can’t hurt them anymore.

Steve stands up and rinses the cloth under the tap, watching the flecks of black swirl through the water and disappear down the drain. He wrings it out and leaves it hanging over the edge of the sink. In the mirror he looks like himself again. He’s slowly starting to feel like himself, too.

Eddie comes up behind him, circling his arms around Steve’s waist and resting his chin on Steve’s shoulder. He’s like a shield behind Steve. A new piece to Steve’s fractured and beaten down armour. Eddie’s voice was the one that found him in the darkest moment of his life, and he’ll never forget it.

Steve meets his eyes in the mirror. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”

Of every possible way he could react, Steve doesn’t expect him to roll his eyes. “Shut up,” he says, and he sounds so fond. “You told me that monsters were real and I wanted to stay so I stayed. You didn’t drag me, alright? I walked in, eyes open. And yeah, it was scary as hell, but I’d do it again.”

“Me too.”

Scary is putting it too lightly. Scary is for movies and campfire stories and thunderstorms and the dark. Scary isn’t a word meant for staring death in the face. The word ‘scary’ isn’t worthy enough to hold all of the terror and unknowns of tonight inside its meaning. But Steve doesn’t want to think of a better word. He’s done with scary, at least for now. All he wants now is peace and quiet.

Eddie kisses his cheek. His words rumble through Steve where they’re pressed together. “At least it’s over now. Right?”

Steve makes him a promise. “Almost.”

The last thing they need now is for El to close the gate.

Steve feels a quivering, rolling sensation in his stomach when he opens the bathroom door and everyone in the kitchen goes quiet. Anxiety and fear are like old friends to him now, barging in knowing they can’t be stopped, but he thought they had finally left for the night. No, they were just hiding. He underestimated how hard it would be to step back into everyone’s eye now that they know the truth about him and Eddie. The only thing stopping him from running right out of the house is Eddie’s solid presence beside him. He looks carefully unbothered.

Now more people know about them than Steve was ever expecting, and he can’t shove the secret back into a box and make them forget what they saw. And he can’t not care what they think. It would kill him to be shunned away from them now. It would kill him to lose their respect, especially Dustin’s.

Nancy breaks the tense silence as she comes forward and gives Steve a fierce hug. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

Steve hugs her back. “Thanks, Nance.” He’s half-tempted to look at Jonathan’s reaction but the memory of their long ago fight fills him with enough shame to keep his head down.

“Aren’t you going to tell me to keep my hands to myself?” She adds in a teasing whisper to Eddie, so the rest of them can’t hear.

“Yeah, I would’ve before I saw you with a gun,” Eddie says seriously. “I think I want to stay on your good side.”

She smirks at that, and Steve manages to crack a smile. His nerves are still holding him hostage. Behind Nancy, the kids are sitting around the kitchen table staring at him. Will is dressed in pajamas now, and both he and Eleven have bowls of cereal in front of them. Steve suddenly realizes that he’s starving.

Joyce gives Steve and Eddie a fresh mug of steaming chamomile tea. “Here, this should warm you up. We’re making mac and cheese but if you’re too hungry to wait you can have some cereal.” Bob is in the kitchen stirring a pot on the stove and Hopper is leaning against the counter sipping a mug of coffee.

“Try not to drop it this time,” she adds lightly.

Eddie winces.

“Thanks, Mrs. Byers,” Steve says. It’s easier to avoid everyone’s eyes with something in his hands, and he’s more grateful for that than for the tea itself.

“You can sit here, Steve,” Will says hopefully.

One seat is empty at the kitchen table. It should be Max’s, but she’s standing by the wall and fiddling with the bat. She’s obviously unsure of her place in the group now that Eleven is back, and it hurts to see. Steve wishes he could show her his memory of the two of them—shining smiles, summer-bright clothes, ice cream in their hands and giggling like all girls do with their best friend at their side.

Lucas reads Steve’s hesitation all wrong and he smirks. “Dude, I think he wants to sit with his boyfriend.” He says boyfriend in a sing-song way, the way kids do when they tease each other about having a crush.

That opens the floodgates, and the kids start talking so fast Steve can’t even respond.

“You totally lied!” Dustin explodes, but at least he sounds outraged instead of disgusted. “You said you had a girlfriend!”

“What, like he was going to tell you the truth?” Mike says with a roll of his eyes. He’s not outright glaring at Steve though, and Steve is sure it’s because of the girl sitting beside him. With Eleven back he has more important things to think about than hating Steve.

“What’s the big deal?” Max says with a shrug. “I saw gay people in California. It’s not that weird.”

“Now’s not the time, guys,” Bob says over his shoulder.

“Yeah, maybe we should focus on our next move,” Hopper says, raising his voice. His stern look is enough to make the kids go quiet. He looks even more haunted now than he did after they left the lab, and of course he does. He was alone outside, keeping an eye on Steve and Will in the shed, and at one point he was completely surrounded by demodogs. It’s enough to make anyone look haunted.

Eleven stands up from her seat and comes toward Steve, her eyes boring into him intently. “I want to look.”

“Look?” Steve says. “Look at what?”

She points right at his face. “The future.”

“You mean, like…you can read my mind?” Steve never saw her do anything like that before, but Lucas was right. No one knows the full extent of her abilities, not even El herself. “Have you done that before?”

She nods solemnly. “Yes.”

Steve should be thrilled. Eleven is the only person who could share this knowledge with him. She won’t have her own memories back but if she can see what he knows that’ll be enough. He won’t be alone with this burden anymore.

But if she sees the future then she’ll know the fate waiting for Hopper. He can’t prepare her for that. She’ll see herself as he watched her outside the destroyed Starcourt Mall, falling into Joyce’s arms and crying out in anguish. She’ll see that and it will ruin her.

“Not yet,” Steve decides.

“Are you serious?” Mike says. “She can help us! She’ll know the future and she—”

“I said not yet, Mike,” Steve says wearily.

“Why?” Eleven asks.

“A lot of bad things happened, El. I think…I think you should close the gate first, and then after that you can look. If you still want to.”

“Close the gate?” She says hesitantly.

“What about those monsters?” Hopper asks.

“We don’t need to worry about them anymore.” Steve tells them what he saw while he was under the influence of the Mind Flayer and the Mother in the shed. How they reunited like some strange, long lost family, and how the demodogs were used as a weapon against Vecna.

Will looks the most affected by this news. Although he never met Vecna face to face—which Steve is immensely grateful for—he would’ve felt him through the Mind Flayer. He felt Vecna’s hatred and disdain, and out of everyone in the room he’s the only person other than Steve who knows a fraction of what Vecna was capable of. None of them truly know. They can’t grasp the gravity of this monster they’d never heard of before now being dead. Only Steve can. He wonders if this is how Superman feels when he’s living his life as Clark Kent.

No, who is he kidding? He’s not a superhero, not like Eleven. He’s just the victim of an entity that thought he’d be useful. Nothing more, nothing less, and now he’s utterly alone on the other side of it.

Eddie grabs Steve’s hand, the hand still wrapped with his handkerchief and stained with blood. “So Henry Creel—he’s really dead?” he asks fervently, his eyes searching Steve’s. “Are you sure?”

Steve chooses to be brave, holding onto Eddie’s hand instead of pulling away. “I’m sure.”

For a fraction of a second Steve thinks Eddie is going to kiss him—and he’s not sure if he’s ready, even though everyone already saw them kissing—but Eddie ducks his head, resting his forehead on Steve’s shoulder and heaving out a deep sigh of relief.

Dustin’s reaction is the only one that doesn’t match the rest. His looks betrayed and his eyes are glassy. “So…so Dart could’ve…”

No one says anything. It takes Steve a moment to understand, and when he does, he doesn’t have comforting words for Dustin either. He never knew the loyalty of monsters could change. Even if he did know he wouldn’t have tried to save Dart. If what they did at the junkyard made a difference at the lab, if it meant saving lives including Bob’s, then Steve would do it all over again.

“He never would’ve made a good pet, dude.”

That was the wrong thing to say. Dustin stands up and storms away into the living room.

“What happened to Dart?” Will asks his friends.

“Monstercide,” Lucas says solemnly. “He got flambéd.”

Will looks even more confused.

Hopper sets his mug down and rubs his brow. “Alright, is there anything else we should know?” he asks Steve.

Steve shakes his head. He told them the important parts. Everything else he saw while he was under Vecna’s curse is his burden to bear alone. Only his nightmares need to be haunted. The threat is neutralized, the way is clear, and the worst night of his life is almost over.

They leave with little fanfare. Hopper polishes off his coffee and Eleven slurps up her cereal milk, and Joyce promises to have mac and cheese saved for them. They all wish Eleven good luck but Steve knows that she doesn’t need it. His confidence puts everyone else at ease except for Mike. He gives Eleven one last hug at the door and then they’re gone. They watch Hopper’s truck roll down the driveway and into the darkness out of sight.

“Alright, who’s hungry?” Bob says, herding everyone back to the kitchen among loud cries of ‘meeeeee’ from the kids. Even Dustin is too hungry to continue his silent grieving and he follows his friends back to the kitchen table.

“Grab me a bowl?” Steve says to Eddie, and he leaves his boyfriend’s side to block Jonathan’s way back to the dining room.

“Can I talk to you?” he asks before his nerves get the better of him. This is long overdue and he’ll look like even more of a coward if he doesn’t talk to Jonathan now.

Jonathan shares a too-quick glance with Nancy but he doesn’t say no. He follows Steve down the hallway and into the cool moonlight streaming through the window by Will’s door. Jonathan shoves his hands in his pockets and waits.

For a moment Steve doesn’t know what to say. The memory of their fight and how he insulted Jonathan is shouting loudly in his mind, asking him how he could’ve been such a fool. He regretted it then, but now even more for entirely new reasons.

“You must think I’m a total idiot,” is what tumbles out of Steve.

Jonathan doesn’t quite smile but there’s a hint of amusement on his face. “I’m…enjoying the irony.”

“It’s okay, you can laugh. I deserve it.”

To his surprise, Jonathan shakes his head. “I’m not going to laugh at you,” he says.

That doesn’t make Steve feel better. He heaves a deep, steadying breath and pushes his hand through his hair to calm his nerves. “Okay, so, I know I have no right to ask you this, but I’m going to ask anyway. Please don’t tell anyone about me and Eddie. The rumours going around at school are bad enough and—”

“Steve, you saved my brother,” Jonathan says, quiet and earnest. “I’m not going to tell anyone.”

Steve feels as inside-out uncomfortable as he did when Joyce thanked him, but at least Jonathan didn’t say the words outright. “Thanks, man.”

“And…I’m sorry,” Jonathan adds. “For last year.”

“Yeah, me too.”

“I know.”

They never talked about the camera, a not-quite gift, given and received with Nancy as a buffer between them. Steve was too much of a coward to give it to Jonathan himself, and he can admit that to himself now.

“In the future…” Steve starts, not totally sure where he’s going. The only thought in his head is make it right. “...it was…I mean, we were always on the same team when shit went down but we were never really friends. I guess what I’m trying to say is…I want that to be different.” He holds out his hand. “Can we be cool?”

On more than one occasion Steve wished they could’ve been friends. He was impressed by Jonathan. By his bravery, his loyalty to his family, his quick thinking, and it never felt right that they could only seem to look each other in the eye in times of a life or death crisis.

Jonathan gives him a small but genuine smile and shakes his hand. “I still can’t believe you travelled through time.”

“You and me both, man.”

“Let’s hope it goes better this time.”

That brings a real smile to Steve. “It already is.”

“Damn. And I thought I ate fast.”

“Shut up,” Steve says around a mouthful of mac and cheese, and he elbows Eddie lightly. “Go mind-fight an interdimensional demon and tell me how you feel after.”

They’re eating at the dining table with Nancy, Jonathan, Joyce and Bob, and Steve almost felt bad for not taking Will up on his offer but Lucas was right. He wanted to sit with his boyfriend. Now that Eleven is gone, Max is sitting at the kitchen table with the boys again. She’s watching Dustin and Lucas with mild disgust at how fast they’re vacuuming food into their mouths.

Steve is no better. The first mouthful tasted like five star finely crafted cuisine instead of noodles and powdered cheese from a box. Now he’s almost finished his second bowl, and he might even have a third. It’s not surprising how hungry he is when he realizes that he missed lunch and dinner—

Suddenly, the food turns to ash in his mouth and Steve drops his fork. “Oh, shit!”

Everyone looks at him but he doesn’t explain. He darts to the phone on the wall and dials home. It’s almost ten o’clock.

His mom answers after the third ring. “Hello?”

“Mom!” Guilt twists in Steve’s gut. “I’m sorry I missed our dinner—”

“Steve? Where are you? I came home and you were gone…”

“I know, I’m sorry.” Steve pulls the cord around the corner wall into the living room for some semblance of privacy and lowers his voice. “I didn’t mean to, it was an accident.”

Her voice is soft and uncertain. “I thought maybe you…changed your mind.”

“I didn’t, I promise. I had to go. It was an emergency.” Steve is used to feeling like the worst son in the world but this time is different. He let her down, and this time it matters. Now the olive branch has burned to a crisp in his hands.

“An emergency?” she asks. “What’s going on? Where are you?”

“I…I’m at a friend’s house.”

“You had an emergency…at your friend’s house?”

Steve can’t blame her for the disbelief in her voice. He knows how it sounds. “Mom, please, I’m sorry. I wanted to have dinner with you. I want to talk to you.”

“So talk to me, Steve. Tell me what’s going on.”

“It’s…complicated.” Steve’s eyes water but he refuses to cry. He’s still alive, and he’ll be alive tomorrow. He can make this right. “Can we have dinner tomorrow? Please?”

“You want to?” she says, and her doubt nearly breaks him.

“Yeah, I promise I do.”

“Okay,” she says, and his knees nearly buckle with relief. “When will you be home?”

“I don’t know. Late. Don’t wait up for me, but I’ll see you tomorrow.” Steve forces the next words out, and for her they’re so old and unused they’re practically rusty. “I love you.”

It was easier to say them to a girl who barely squeaked them back. It’s easier to say them to a boy he’s only been dating for a week. The words should come so easy for his own mother but instead it takes ten times the amount of courage.

She makes a noise, like a soft, weary breath of laughter. “You drive me up the wall, Steve, but I love you too. And I’m sorry if I ever made you doubt it.”

Steve doesn’t go back to the table after they hang up. He’s not hungry anymore. Exhaustion catches up with him all at once and he sinks onto the sofa and closes his eyes. He’s tired, but he’s tired in more than just the physical sense, in his muscles and his bones. He’s tired in his soul. In less than twenty four hours he used up every single feeling his body could hold, heartbreak and anger and fear and joy. He’s a dead battery, but his power wasn’t electricity or telekinesis. It was how deeply he could feel. Now he just feels a hundred years older than he should.

He’s drifting towards sleep when he feels a gentle shake to his shoulder. “Steve?”

Eddie is leaning over him, his face lit by the golden glow of the lamp. “Can I be your pillow?”

“Yeah, come 'ere.”

Steve sits up and lets Eddie into the space between him and the arm of the couch, and immediately curls into his side. Eddie pulls a blanket off the back of the couch and wraps it around them, cocooning them in a quiet little space of their own. It’s strange to be cuddling with his boyfriend in someone else’s house—in the Byers house—but Steve is too tired to care, and he’s willing to bet everyone else is too.

“Did you call your mom?” Eddie asks as he sweeps his fingers gently through Steve’s hair.

“Yeah. We were supposed to have dinner together. She said she was sorry for being so hard on me lately and she wanted to sort of…catch up.”

“Really? That’s great.”

“Yeah, except I missed it,” Steve says bitterly, and his disappointment doubles when he remembers something else. “Oh shit, we were supposed to meet Robin and Chrissy at the Hideout.”

“Yeah, they were there,” Eddie says with a wince. “I called the bar and talked to Gareth after my alarm went off and I remembered it’s Tuesday. The girls had already left.”

“Were the guys mad?” Steve asks. He shouldn’t feel so guilty—he had no idea this day was going to spin so out of control—but the feeling lingers in a place that logic can’t reach.

“A little bit, but they were mostly worried.” Eddie squeezes Steve closer and pecks his forehead. “Hey, don’t worry about it, alright? We’ll talk to them all tomorrow and you’ll see your mom. It’ll be okay.”

“Yeah, okay.”

Thankfully Steve is distracted from his thoughts when Will comes into the living room and puts a plate of chocolate chip cookies on the coffee table for them.

“My mom made them,” he says shyly.

“Thanks, dude,” Steve says as he sits up and pulls the plate onto his lap. Eddie immediately crams one into his mouth.

“Mmfphhh so good.”

Will doesn’t leave. He looks impossibly young in his comic book pajamas as he struggles with something he wants to say. It’s hard to believe he’s only four years younger than Steve, but at the same time his eyes make him seem way older than his years. The horrors he’s seen are trapped there.

“I just…I want to say…” Will balls up his fists and summons his courage. “I wanted to thank you. For what you did.”

This time the awkward feeling is easy for Steve to ignore. “It wasn’t just for you, Will. It was for everyone. And you helped me too, remember? When I called out to you and I didn’t know what to do, you helped me figure it out. So you don’t need to thank me. It was just something I had to do.”

“I know,” Will says. “They told me you came back in time like Kitty Pryde.”

“I still don’t know who that is.” Steve asks his boyfriend, “Do you know who that is?”

Eddie shrugs. “I haven’t read X-Men in a while.”

“You can borrow mine,” Will says eagerly.

“We might take you up on that, Byers,” Steve says. He takes a bite of a cookie, fully expecting that to be the end of the conversation, but Will isn’t leaving. Clearly something else is on his mind and with a sinking feeling Steve realizes what it must be.

“Yeah?” he prompts Will gently.

“I…I thought you were dating Nancy,” Will says in a very small voice, almost like he’s afraid to anger Steve.

Steve’s suspicion was right. He glances at Eddie and Eddie looks at him with silent expectation, like he’s waiting for Steve to decide how much he wants to say.

“I was,” Steve says slowly. “We broke up a month ago.”

“But now you’re…” Will turns red and frowns.

The last thing Steve wants to do is explain his love life to a thirteen-year-old but he supposes he can’t blame them for being confused. Still, that doesn’t ease the incredible awkwardness. Nothing can. He wishes the couch would open up and swallow him whole.

“Uhhhh, listen…it’s not really black or white. I realized I can like a guy too, and…now I’m dating one. It’s—I’m…” Steve throws a pleading look at his boyfriend.

"Bisexual," Eddie finishes for him, with the kind of quiet confidence that clearly comes from knowing his sexuality for longer than a few weeks. Steve will get there one day. "So am I."

Will’s frown deepens on his young face and he mouths the word to himself.

“It’s totally a real thing, dude,” Eddie adds. “Trust me, we’re not the only ones.”

“But for the love of god don’t tell anyone,” Steve stresses. He can’t imagine any of the kids telling anyone on purpose but it could slip out so easily. “Tell the other knuckleheads to keep it zipped too, okay?”

Will nods frantically. “I will—I won’t—we won’t tell anyone. Promise.” Finally he leaves, scurrying back to the kitchen with one last glance at them before he disappears out of sight.

Steve breathes a sigh of relief and immediately feels bad for it. It’s not that he doesn’t like Will—he likes Will just fine—but that was a conversation he never expected to have in a million years, and he hated every second of it.

Eddie seems curious as he looks at the place where Will disappeared and then at Steve, and a smirk grows on his lips. Steve wants to kiss it away.

“What?” he asks.

“I think he has a crush on you.”

Steve nearly chokes on the next bite of his cookie. “What?”

“He was fire truck red, babe. He could barely look at you.”

Babe. Eddie using the word so easily almost derails Steve’s thoughts. He shakes his head.

“He’s just shy, and he’s not—” Steve’s voice dies. He’s not queer is what he was about to say, but how the hell would he know? He never heard Will’s friends ribbing him about any crushes and he was the only one without a girlfriend in the future. Maybe Will doesn’t know yet. Steve couldn’t judge him for that. “Well. I don’t know.”

“You just saved his life,” Eddie points out. “And you’re a time traveller. That’s pretty fucking cool. If it was me, I’d have a massive crush on my handsome, time-travelling hero.”

“I’m not a hero.” Steve used to want to be. When he was still trying to be the cool guy, when he ran into this house to fight a monster, when he tried and failed to help Dustin kill some demodogs, when he snuck around a secret Russian base. A small part of him thought that he’d finally be seen as the person he wanted to be after it was all over. A tough, save-the-day kind of hero.

But nothing would change. No one knew what he did outside of the kids, Nancy and Jonathan, and Joyce and Hopper, and they never treated him any differently afterwards. Life just went on, and now none of that matters to him anymore. He doesn’t want to be a hero. He just wants the people he cares about to survive.

Eddie takes Steve’s hand and lifts it to his lips, pressing a gentle kiss to his knuckles and holding it to his chest. “You are to me,” he says softly.

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that, so he doesn’t speak. He tilts his head and slides his lips against Eddie’s in a sweet kiss, not even caring where he is. Eddie doesn’t care either and the gentle press of his lips warms Steve like a favourite blanket, tethering him to the knowledge that he’s safe. He’s not home, but he doesn’t need to be to feel like he can finally relax.

Eddie moves the now empty plate to the coffee table and they get comfortable again. Steve lays his head on Eddie’s shoulder and wraps an arm around him, leaving no space between them.

“Can I ask you something?” Eddie says. His fingers are stroking through Steve’s hair again, sending pleasant tingles down Steve’s spine. “You don’t have to answer…”

“It’s okay. Ask.”

“When you said that…that you thought I was dead and it was your fault…what did you mean?”

Steve lays his hand flat on Eddie’s chest, feeling the steady, reassuring heartbeat beneath his palm. “When Vecna attacks, he makes you see things that aren’t there. It’s like what Victor Creel said, remember? Like being in a waking, living nightmare. After we separated the Mind Flayer from Vecna, I thought it was over. I was in the shed again and I thought I was back but I was too late, and the demodogs already…”

He squeezes his eyes shut as the memories flash through his mind. Hopper ripped apart, Joyce’s heart in her flayed open chest, and Eddie dying on the floor. “I saw…I saw everyone dead. I thought everyone was dead because it was my idea.”

Eddie’s hand stills. Steve lifts his head and sees a look of sheer horror on his face. “Holy fuck,” he utters. “Steve, oh my god. How—that’s…Jesus Christ, no wonder you looked like you saw a ghost…fuck…”

Eddie tightens his hold on Steve, squeezing him so hard it’s almost painful but Steve likes it too much to complain. It grounds him to reality, to this crazy world he’s living in where he travelled through time but at least his friends are all still alive. The gruesome memory of their dead bodies can’t hurt him while he can feel Eddie’s heart beating.

“I wish you didn’t have to see that, baby, I can’t believe…so fucking awful…”

“I think…I think there was a small part of me that thought it couldn’t be real, but it’s just so hard not to believe when it’s right in front of your eyes. It felt so real. I only knew for sure when I heard you singing.”

“God,” Eddie says with a deep, pained sigh. “I was ready to do anything for you. And I mean that literally.”

“See, that’s what makes you boyfriend material,” Steve says in an attempt at lightening the moment, and it works. Eddie smiles and his death grip on Steve relaxes.

"Okay, I still have like a million questions but I came over here to be your pillow and pillows don't talk so I'm going to shut up now and let you get some sleep."

Steve glances at the clock. It’s been about half an hour since Eleven and Hopper left. They must be at the lab by now. Vecna may be dead but the Upside Down is still a threat with all of its unknowns, and El and Hopper are on their own. What if something happens to them? They put their faith in Steve and he’ll never forgive himself if they don’t come back.

Eddie seems to read his mind, and he gently turns Steve’s face back towards him away from the clock. “Hey, relax. They’re going to be fine. We just have to wait.”

He’s right. There are no monsters left for Steve to fight except his own anxiety, and it doesn’t put up much fight when Eddie is around. Steve relaxes against him and closes his eyes, and he feels Eddie reach up then the lamp beside the couch goes dark. The quiet sound of talking in the kitchen fades into the distance as he begins to fall asleep, but a familiar warmth travelling down his spine jolts Steve awake again.

“You okay?” Eddie whispers.

A memory fills Steve’s mind. Steve is shaking presents under the Christmas tree. His mother tuts softly. “Good things come to those who wait. Now go to sleep, honey. You’ll be so happy in the morning.” She turns off the light. “Goodnight.”

“Yeah, I…I’m okay.” Steve relaxes again but his mind is whirling. Why did he see the same memory? He already received the gift, but it seemed different this time. More final. Not just a goodnight, but a goodbye. Right now in the darkness of an abandoned laboratory with Hopper at her side, Eleven is closing the gate. Steve is sure of it.

And when it’s done, Steve will have his mind to himself again. The Mother won’t be able to reach him. Goodnight. Goodbye. Human sentiments. He won’t miss the feeling of an alien entity trying to communicate with him but it might seem strange when it’s all over. Will he remember how it felt or will it just seem like a fever dream? In the morning his new life will begin, weird and wonderful and miraculous, and this chapter of horror will be shelved for what he hopes will be a very long time.

Eleven looks the way Steve feels when she returns—exhausted in every possible sense of the word. She’s dangerously pale and her skin is stained red from her nose down to her chin. She blinks slow and bleary but she manages to smile when Mike and Joyce take turns hugging her. With both of them back, the invisible weight of everyone’s anxiety dissolves.

“How was it?” Bob asks Hopper quietly.

“Fine,” the chief answers. He empties his shotgun and leans it against the wall. “Never saw any of those things. Anything happen here?”

Bob shakes his head. “All quiet on the home front.”

Hopper claps him on the shoulder. “Good.”

Eleven hugs the rest of her friends. It hurts to see her so blatantly ignoring Max but Steve doesn’t say anything. They need time to get to know each other, and El is too tired right now to give her a fair chance. She looks at Steve, and everyone follows her gaze, but Steve shakes his head before he even gives it conscious thought. He knows what he promised her but he has to draw the line before she hurts herself.

“No,” he says firmly.

“But—”

“You’re exhausted, El. And so am I.”

“He’s right,” Hopper says. He smooths his hand over her hair and she doesn’t shake him off. “You need to rest.”

“I can do it,” she insists. “After food.”

Steve sighs. He doesn’t want to scare her but she needs to know the risk. He moves towards her, the blanket around his shoulders dragging the floor like a cape, and he bends down to look her in the eyes. “Listen to me, El. Bad things can happen if you push yourself too hard. You could…you could lose your powers.”

Her bloodshot eyes widen. “What?” she croaks. Her friends look scared too, and Mike grabs her hand and doesn’t let go.

“You can look tomorrow,” Steve promises. He looks at Hopper in askance, and the chief nods wearily.

The fight leaves her. Her shoulders slump and her eyes fall to the floor, and Steve’s relief almost bowls him over. Of course he wants to protect her. Of course he wants to spare her from the horrors he’s seen, but this relief comes from a selfish place. After the day he’s had, he didn’t realize just how much he was dreading having someone in his mind again. The Mother, the Mind Flayer, Vecna—he’s barely had a moment of peace with his own thoughts. Now for the rest of the night there won’t be any more intruders.

With that decision made, the night is finally at a close. No one speaks but Steve feels it in the room, and he sees the realization bounce from face to face. There are no more monsters for them to slay, no more questions to ask, no one else to save, and this is where they break apart and go home and try to sleep as if tonight was just a normal night.

Hopper breaks the silence. “Alright, let’s get you kids home.”

As the kids start gathering their stuff and putting on their coats, Eddie comes back to Steve’s side and wraps his arm around Steve. “You’re coming home with me,” he says quietly. “And tomorrow morning I’m making you breakfast. Eggs, bacon, chocolate chip pancakes, whatever you want.”

“Sounds good to me.” Steve kisses his cheek. He could never say no to an offer like that, and he doesn’t want to be alone tonight anyway.

"Gross," Dustin mutters, but when Steve looks at them Mike looks more grossed out than Dustin. He's half-tempted to flip them off.

“Dustin!” Joyce scolds.

“Oh come on, Mrs. Byers, not because they’re guys, because they’re kissing!”

“Barely,” Eddie says with a roll of his eyes.

“Yeah, this is kissing,” Steve says without thinking, and he grabs Eddie by the chin and plants a loud, obnoxious, smacking kiss on his lips, because what the hell. Why should he downplay it now when they already know? If he acts like there’s an elephant in the room then they’re just going to treat him like he belongs in a circus.

“Get a room,” Mike groans, and Nancy swats his head lightly. Lucas and Max look mostly indifferent (or too tired to care), Dustin seems mildly weirded out, El looks confused, and Will—

Maybe Eddie was right.

Will isn’t looking at them. He’s very pointedly not looking at them, and it almost seems like he’s trying to disappear behind his mom. It’s hard to tell in the low light but it looks like he might be bright red again.

“We need a ride for that,” Eddie says.

Jonathan jingles his keys. “I’ll give you a lift.”

So they head out. Steve squeezes into the backseat of Jonathan’s car between Nancy and Eddie, Mike claiming the front seat. El insists on having the mac and cheese that Joyce promised her so she stays behind with Will as Hopper herds Max, Dustin and Lucas into his truck to take them home. The drive is a blur of passing streetlights and Eddie giving Jonathan quiet directions to the trailer park. Soon enough they’re coming to a stop on the gravel driveway outside Eddie’s dark trailer.

Nancy reaches for Steve and gives him an awkward hug from her seat. “Call me tomorrow. Actually, no, come over after school. Both of you.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Eddie says with a sleepy salute.

“Thanks for the ride, man,” Steve says, reaching over the driver’s seat to clap Jonathan on the shoulder.

“Yeah, no problem.”

Steve says goodnight and follows Eddie out of the car with his backpack and the spiked bat. The night is brisk but calm, and nothing in the air gives any sense of the chaos that occurred a few miles away. An owl hoots from the darkness of the trees and someone laughs in the trailer across the way, and it all just seems too normal. A monster is dead and the world doesn't show it. He watches Jonathan’s taillights shrink into the distance as Eddie unlocks the front door, then they go inside and they’re finally, thankfully, alone.

Steve drops everything and launches himself into Eddie’s arms. Eddie wraps himself tight around Steve and for a moment they just stand there in the dark, clinging onto each other, breathing each other in. Steve soaks in the feeling of home and safety, the feeling of Eddie’s chest rising and falling against his own, and his warm breath against Steve’s skin.

“Mm,” Eddie rumbles, nuzzling into Steve’s neck. “Let’s go to bed.”

“I’m glad I don’t have to sleep alone tonight,” Steve whispers.

“If it was up to me you’d never have to sleep alone again.” Eddie gives him a quick kiss and drags him down the hall to his bedroom.

They get ready quickly and get into bed. Steve pulls the blankets all the way up to his chin and cuddles as close to Eddie as he can get, tangling their legs together and wrapping his arm around Eddie’s waist.

“Are you warm enough?” Eddie whispers, his warm, minty breath fanning over Steve.

“Yeah,” Steve whispers back.

“I really hope you don’t have any nightmares. At least you won’t have any weird dreams of the future now that you remember everything, right?”

“I guess so.”

Eddie’s hand glides up Steve’s back and his fingers sneak into Steve’s hair. “It must be lonely being the only person who remembers the future.”

“It’s worth it,” Steve tells him. “Before I went back through the gate…” He remembers the earthquake that ruptured the world, the gnawing chasm ripping across the land, and the feeling of knowing that he failed Max. After seeing her dead inside Vecna’s mind, he knows exactly what that failure looked like. “We lost. Vecna won. Trust me, it was worth it.”

“I know, I just…I wish I could help you.”

“You have. You are.” Steve cups his cheek, savouring his warmth. Does he really think he hasn’t done enough? “I don’t feel like I’m alone when I’m with you. And it’ll go away. We’ll get to 1986 and then 1987 and I won’t know the future anymore. I’ll be boring old Steve again.”

“You’ll never be boring to me,” Eddie says, squeezing Steve impossibly closer. They find each other in the dark like magnets, their lips meeting in a kiss full of home and promise like the one at the end of movies. The danger has passed and now there’s time to think about the new future, and Steve can’t help it when Eddie kisses him like this. Like he’s everything, like he’s loved. The warmth of his lips breathe life into Steve, whispering a secret into his soul. I would’ve loved you. And Steve believes it. In that life, given the chance, gifted with better circumstances, he believes they could’ve fallen in love.

But now they have better circumstances. Now Steve has all the time in the world to discover just how much he can love Eddie.

Chapter Text

The voice is muffled, as though it’s reaching out to Steve from underwater, but it sharpens further into focus with each word.

“...at that. Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”

Steve is standing on the threshold of a world that he wants to dive into headfirst. It doesn’t look like any world he knows. Maybe it’s not a world at all, but whatever it is calls to him like a siren song. Thick, black tendrils curl around the edges of a huge crevice in the ground that stretches into the distance as far as Steve can see. Inside the crevice is raw beauty. The colors of the universe are falling deep down into the earth like a waterfall of unfettered magic. Rivers of luscious green and lakewater blue, ribbons of lavender and lava. The colors of life and love, sea and sky, starlight and moonlight and ebony nights. Steve wants to be its first explorer and discover where the magic might take him. He wants to scoop some of it into his hands and pour it down his throat. He wants to kneel before it and pray.

Steve is holding someone’s hand. He tears his gaze from the wonder before him to find Eddie, standing beside him with his bare hand in Steve’s. His clothes look soft and grey, and the glow from the magic inside the gate dances on his skin like the northern lights.

He’s smirking. “The eldritch pussy.”

They both giggle.

Steve looks around. There should be a wall in front of them but it’s ripped apart above the rift, revealing the darkness outside. Left behind is a mess of toppled and broken furniture lit only by the colors radiating from the gate. It makes Steve sad to see, and he wishes he could say sorry to whoever lived here. Unnaturally thick vines snake across the remaining walls and floor, and puffy white spores float lazily through the air. As one passes in front of Steve he blows it away.

“I want to lick it,” Eddie says, gazing into the cascading colors with a vague sort of hunger.

“You want to lick the pussy?”

“...don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Steve admits, and they both burst into giggles again. This doesn’t seem like the kind of place where laughter is often found but it feels good to laugh with Eddie here. It feels like a rebellion.

The world around him looks like it should be cold, but Steve doesn’t feel even the slightest chill. There should be a stink to match the grotesque vines but he doesn’t smell anything. He should be scared but he only feels a deep sense of peace telling him that he has nothing to fear.

“What’s that?” Eddie is looking at the floor. Between their bare feet, a tiny ball of light is blooming among the wormy black tendrils.

“The Mother,” Steve says.

Eddie crouches down for a closer look, pulling Steve with him. “But…it’s a mushroom.”

“That’s how it shows itself. It’s a hive mind.”

“Oh.” Eddie pokes the cap of the mushroom. “Boop.”

A new mushroom sprouts from a crack in the floorboards a foot away. Then another one appears even further, then another one, and a luminescent trail begins to form through the dark.

“Where are they going? Are they running away? Is it me, do I have bad breath? I’m sorry I booped you, little mushrooms. Come back.”

Steve pulls him up. “Come on.”

They follow the trail further into the abandoned home, stepping over vines as they walk past a tiny kitchen into a hallway and come to a stop in front of a single closed door. Their only source of light is the last glowing bud at their feet. Steve reaches for the handle but a strange feeling stops him, as though he’s about to walk into a stormcloud. His sense of peace is turning sour, but he doesn’t know why.

“I think you should open the door,” he whispers.

Eddie looks at him. His face is aged by the eerie shadows sloping over his features. “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Steve whispers. The sense of foreboding makes it impossible to raise his voice any louder. “Do you want to?”

Eddie doesn’t answer but he reaches out. His fingertips hesitate on the handle, then he turns the knob and pushes the door open.

“Oh my god,” he utters.

Steve gasps.

Waiting for them inside is a faceless figure made of pure light. Almost like a ghost, but to call it a ghost would be a monumental insult. Its brilliance makes it look solid, as if it was made by the moon, and it emits a feeling of life rather than death. Steve has never seen anything like it before and somehow he knows that he never will again.

The figure is standing on the far side of a bed. It sweeps its radiant arm over the bed and the blanket on top moves, drifting down as if being pulled by an invisible string. This explains Steve’s stormy feeling. This is the darkness that he somehow knew was waiting for them.

Eddie inhales sharply and latches onto Steve’s arm with both hands, tightening himself to Steve’s side. He whimpers when Steve tries to move forward and keeps them both rooted to the spot.

“It’s okay, you’re safe,” Steve whispers, and he presses a gentle kiss to Eddie’s temple. He tries again and this time Eddie moves with him, one slow step at a time until they’re beside the bed. And the body lying on top of it.

“Is that…is that really….” Eddie stares at it with wide, wet eyes. “Is it—Steve?”

“I’m sorry,” Steve whispers. His eyes burn with tears. The corpse of Eddie on the bed is tragically beautiful, with his eyes closed, his skin washed pale in the light of the glowing figure, and his long ringed fingers on the neck of the guitar resting on top of him. A sleeping beauty, waiting for someone to kiss the blood off his lips and bring him back to life.

“I—is this where I—where it happened?” Eddie asks in a strangled voice. “In my room?”

“I…uh…” Steve’s head is filled with cotton. He should know the answer but his memories are fuzzy, and it takes him a moment to find the right one and blow the dust off. It comes back to him with the feeling of a body in his arms and the image of a crying boy. “No. We brought you here. I carried you. We wanted you to be home.”

He doesn’t know who we is but Eddie doesn’t ask. He lets go of Steve and buries his face in his hands, his chin trembling, his shoulders shaking. He takes a few deep breaths then he looks at the figure with a steely glare.

“What do you want?” he demands. “What’s happening?”

It can’t speak or blink, but if it had eyes they would be looking at Eddie. Two miniscule drops of moonlight fly out of its chest and sink into the corpse’s face. Steve gasps when its eyelids open. Instead of foggy, dead eyes, starlight is shining in the sockets. It seems to move and sparkle like sunlight reflecting off pool water, and something is happening but Steve doesn’t know what. After a moment the light rises, sprouting into familiar shapes. Twin glowing mushrooms now live in the eye sockets of Eddie’s corpse.

The figure holds its hand over the bed with its palm up. Steve’s sense of peace is returning, carried delicately in the hold of another feeling that doesn’t belong to him. Gratitude. He reaches towards the hand made of light but it shifts away from him and hovers closer to Eddie.

Eddie flinches back and looks between the hand and his own corpse. He whispers nervously, “Steve? What does it want?”

What does it want? What could it want? A mother, a powerful being, protector of its realm, a hive mind, a network, and a granter of wishes? It’s inside Eddie’s dead body, offering its hand with a feeling of limitless gratitude…

“Holy shit,” Steve breathes. Is it possible? He can’t think of anything else. Could it really be…? “I think…I think it’s trying to say thank you.” And in return it has a gift to give, but Eddie has to be the one to accept.

“What?”

The cotton muddying Steve’s mind is unraveling and his memories are easier to find this time. I wish I could help you. Eddie said that. A memory of his mother smiling softly at him before turning off the light. You’ll be so happy in the morning. In the morning. It’s not morning yet.

Steve is breathing. He’s breathing, and he can feel the air filling his lungs. He can feel his toes on the floor. He can feel his heart racing. His pulse is climbing and his body is fighting between cold and hot, hot and cold, making him damp with sweat. His panic goes unnoticed by Eddie and the figure waiting patiently on the other side of the bed.

“Eddie, hurry up!”

Eddie looks at him, wild and frightened. “What? Why? I don’t understand!”

“I…I think I’m waking up.”

Eddie looks down at his own body and flexes his hands like he’s never seen them before. He looks at the corpse again and the figure with its outstretched hand. It’s waiting patiently, unmoving, because it has nowhere to be. It’s not really here.

Understanding dawns on his face. “It wants to show me…what happened?”

“I think so,” Steve says breathlessly. “But it’s your choice.”

And it’s a choice that shouldn’t be made lightly, considering that he’ll remember how he got here. Lying dead in the Upside Down. Eddie seems to realize this at the same time as Steve, and he swallows nervously as he stares at himself. His hands tremble but he clenches them into fists.

“I’m not scared,” Eddie whispers.

“You’re not?”

“I know you’re going to hate me for this but…it’s almost like a dream come true. Sort of. You know, to know what it’s like without actually…dying.”

Steve’s chest pounds hard as if the world is using him for a drum and his throat feels thick. Even the atmosphere reacts to Eddie’s words; it seems more blue than it did a moment ago, and Steve wraps his arms around himself to ward off a sudden chill. Eddie is right. Steve hates the thought of him wondering what it would be like to die, even just for a second. The sorrow it brings is so strong that he feels it somewhere outside of himself, somewhere in the waking world. He’s seconds away from breaking through the surface.

“Eddie,” he whispers miserably.

Eddie clears his throat and gives himself a shake, ringing out his hands and rolling his shoulders. His voice this time isn’t a whisper. “I need to know something, and tell me the truth.”

“Yeah?” Steve won’t lie to him anymore, not even in a dream.

A monsoon of emotion swirls in the obsidian glass of Eddie’s eyes, threatening to release waves of fear and determination and doubt into the space between them. He asks a single question with the weight of the world behind it.

“Would you still love me if I don’t?”

“Yes,” Steve croaks helplessly, and he reaches for Eddie again. “Yes, Eddie, of course I would, I promise I would, I love you so much.” He’s so warm and Steve can feel the soft fabric of his pajamas and smell the faint scent of pine and he’s about to wake up, he can feel it coming—

Eddie’s glassy eyes sweep over Steve as though he’s searching Steve’s soul for any hint of a lie. It feels like an eternity and only a second before he nods to himself. He made his choice. Eddie looks towards the figure and reaches for its radiant hand. When they touch his skin starts to glow, spreading from his fingertips and travelling down his arm like electricity is filling his body. He faces Steve and his eyes are glowing a pure, clear white.

Chapter Text

Steve crashes into the waking world. His heart is on fire, pounding in his chest like it’s trying to escape, and he’s flat on his back with his fists clenched tight around vaguely familiar blankets. He gulps a few deep breaths and forces his body to relax.

He had a dream, but it didn’t scare him. No, this dream felt like the first rays of sunlight on his skin after a long, hard winter. It felt like a hundred shooting stars lighting up the night, giving him more wonder and hope than he ever would’ve imagined was possible. He can barely remember what it was about but the last thing he saw is stained in his consciousness. He can still see the after image stuck inside his eyelids when he blinks. An image of Eddie, looking right at him with burning white eyes.

After his heart is nearly returned to its normal rhythm, Steve is awake enough to recognize the room and remember last night. It’s not pitch black but it’s clearly not daylight just yet; the room is stuck in the watery blue of dawn that always seems like it might last forever.

Eddie is still asleep beside Steve but his rest isn’t peaceful. His face is scrunched and a pained whimper escapes his lips.

“Eddie?” Steve touches his boyfriend’s curls. They’re damp with sweat. “Eddie?” he says more urgently.

Eddie wakes up with a bone-chilling gasp, and Steve jerks back when he bolts up so fast their heads nearly knock together. He scrambles out of the bed, stumbling when his foot gets caught in the blankets, but he quickly rights himself. He doesn’t stop moving. He spins, looking frantically around the room and then down at himself. He pats his chest, his stomach, his face and his hair, as if he’s just discovered that he has a body.

Steve’s concern multiplies. “Eddie?”

Eddie makes a startled noise and turns around. Clearly he’d forgotten that he didn’t wake up alone. He looks at Steve with nothing less than complete and utter shock. “Where am I?”

Panic drives Steve out of the bed and he approaches Eddie as if he were approaching a spooked animal. He thinks of Eddie shivering in the corner of an old boathouse, clutching a broken beer bottle like it was the only thing that made sense in the world.

“You’re in your room, Eddie. Did you have a bad dream?”

“But…how…?” Eddie looks around the room again. He flips through books, swipes the strings of his guitar hanging on the wall, tosses through his jewelry collection and rifles through the papers on his desk. He touches everything as though he was cured of blindness and now everything in sight is a wonder to discover.

“Eddie, you’re scaring me,” Steve says nervously. He’s caught between wanting to stop Eddie and wanting to let him roam.

“Is Chrissy here?”

Steve is blindsided by the question. “What? No,” he answers, when it’s obvious that Eddie isn’t joking. Steve is missing something. The dream tugs insistently at the back of his mind with a vision that won’t leave him alone—Eddie with radiant, glowing eyes. He looked like he was possessed by an angel. But why were his eyes glowing? Maybe this would all start making sense if Steve could just remember.

Eddie stills, but like a photo of a storm all of his frenzied energy is still there, just paused. Brimming under the surface of his skin like dark clouds brewing in the sky. He regards Steve with confusion, and slight suspicion, then he yanks open the bedroom door and runs.

“Eddie, wait!”

Eddie pauses in the living room, his head tilted up to look at the empty ceiling, then he darts outside. Steve follows and nearly collides into him when he suddenly stops on the gravel driveway. He drinks in the world around him with a deep breath and discerning eyes. He doesn’t seem to notice that he isn’t wearing shoes.

“Eddie?” Steve says softly. He’s scared to freak Eddie out more, he’s scared because he doesn’t know what’s happening, but most of all he’s scared that this is all his fault. Was everything Eddie saw last night just too much for him to handle?

The trailer park is swathed in the same kind of sleepy silence that follows a fresh snowfall, although it didn’t snow last night. Steve is grateful for that because he isn’t wearing shoes either. Early dawns casts the park in soft shadows of blue and black, a mirror of the bruises marring Eddie’s face. The loudest sound Steve can hear is his own anxious breathing as he watches Eddie and waits.

Eddie breathes out a misty cloud. Faint surprise colors his voice when he says, “It’s cold.”

“Yeah, it’s cold, it’s almost December. Can we go back inside? Please?”

Eddie looks at Steve, and he remembers something else about his dream. He thinks Eddie looked at him just like this, with a hurricane of emotion in his eyes begging to be free. But Steve doesn’t remember what either of them said.

“Why are you here?” Eddie wonders, more to himself than Steve. Before Steve can soothe away his instant hurt because Eddie is not okay right now, he asks another question. “Did you die too?”

Steve’s breath is knocked out of him with the force of a punch. “Die?” he sputters. “What are you—wait, do you…do you think you’re dead?”

Why the hell would Eddie think that he’s dead? Is he still asleep somehow? Or maybe they’re both still asleep, and Steve is having a bizarre dream within a dream.

But this feels real. He remembers how he got here, and how he got to Eddie’s place last night, and everything that happened yesterday. If this was a dream he wouldn’t be able to remember that, right? He pinches the back of his hand and he pinches Eddie’s arm for good measure. Eddie looks at his hand like he’s never seen it before. He’s still wearing the bracelet that Eddie made for him, and the cut across his palm is covered by clean bandages that Eddie tenderly wrapped it with last night. Two marks of Eddie on Steve’s body that he should recognize.

“I…I’m not?” he whispers, looking at Steve like he’s praying for answers.

Steve’s heart skips and stutters. This means something—the dream meant something—and he steadies himself by grabbing Eddie’s shoulders like a lifeline. “What’s the last thing you remember?” he asks intently.

Eddie seems spooked and uncertain at Steve’s sudden intensity, but he doesn’t make a move to run. “We were in the Upside Down. I was fighting off the bats…Dustin was crying, and I…I was dying.”

Steve stares at him, his eyes filling with tears. His chest is tight—he can barely breathe—but at the same time, something uncurls inside him, and he thinks he might shake apart in front of Eddie. He focuses on the feeling of Eddie solid beneath his hands. He wants to drag Eddie into his arms, but he doesn’t, because he still looks so scared and confused and lost.

“Do you really remember everything?” Steve whispers, too quiet he can barely hear himself over his thundering pulse but the world is asleep right now and this moment is theirs. Only theirs. They might as well be the last two people on earth.

“Everything?” Eddie echoes. “You mean like Chrissy and Patrick dying and you guys finding me and jumping in Lover’s Lake and Vecna? All of that shit?”

“But you don’t remember yesterday?” Steve says desperately.

Eddie hesitates. He knows what the answer is supposed to be but he can’t give it to Steve as the truth. It doesn’t matter. Steve can see it all over his face.

Before grief can take root in his heart and overwhelm him, Steve forces himself to take a deep breath and think. Just think. He never expected to wake up to a world where Eddie can remember the future, and it didn’t just happen by accident. It’s because of his dream, and the Mother. You’ll be so happy in the morning, it told him through his memories. Why would it promise that if he was going to lose the Eddie who fell in love with him?

No, he won’t. He can’t. Steve was confused when the memories of his first life came back to him too, but with a cafeteria of people staring at him—with some who were supposed to be dead—it didn’t take him long to color in the gaps. But Eddie is here, home, and he woke up after reliving his own death. Of course he’s confused. Steve just needs to find a way to help him remember this life.

Steve releases his grip on Eddie. “Will you come back inside with me? Please?” he asks gently. He doesn’t have a plan but the cold will only make it harder to think. He offers Eddie his hand.

“What happened to your hand?”

“I cut it. On purpose. To bait some monsters.”

Eddie frowns but he doesn’t ask what Steve expects. “Does it hurt?”

“No,” Steve answers honestly, and he’s pleased when Eddie decides to take his hand.

Steve leads him back to the trailer and sighs softly when they re-enter the warmth. His hope stirs when Eddie doesn’t let go of his hand. He can’t imagine what’s going through Eddie’s mind after dying and then waking up beside Steve Harrington.

“I had a dream last night,” Steve tells him, because he doesn’t know where to begin. How does he tell someone that they’re missing part of their life? And as he looks around the living room, he remembers a little bit more. “I was here, but in the Upside Down, and you were with me.”

Eddie isn’t looking at the room. Instead he’s looking at their hands. “You dream about me, Harrington?” he says, but it sounds distant instead of the tease it’s supposed to be.

“Yeah, I dream about you,” Steve says softly. He leads Eddie back into his bedroom, and he feels a wave of deja vu so strong that he’s sure he’s following the same path he made in his dream. They stand beside the bed, looking down at the twisted blankets.

“I think we were talking here, but I don’t remember what we were talking about. There was something, or someone, on the other side of the bed, and you reached out towards them and the last thing I saw was your eyes glowing white.” It was terrifying. It was amazing.

Eddie doesn’t respond, not even to wonder why Steve is telling him about this dream. He stares at the bed as if he’s seeing something that isn’t there. Steve lets himself hope. Maybe he doesn’t need to do anything. Maybe it’ll all just come back to Eddie with time.

“Mushrooms,” Eddie murmurs.

Steve’s heart thuds painfully. “What? Do you…?” He can’t finish the question because it sounds insane, but what if they had the same dream?

“I…” Eddie glances towards the bedroom door and back to the bed. “I don’t know, it’s like…I was dying, but…it’s like a chord playing in my head. I remember one thing but there are layers beneath it, or inside it, and I can’t pull them apart.” He wipes his hand down his face miserably then he looks at Steve again. “There’s something I can’t remember. Something about you.”

“You’re damn right there is.”

Eddie looks at him helplessly. But how?

Steve has no guide for this, no step by step instructions on how to reunite both of Eddie’s lives. He can only act on instinct, and his gut tells him that maybe to remember his love, Eddie needs to feel it. He moves a fraction closer. Eddie doesn’t retreat.

“Do you trust me?” Steve asks.

He answers instantly. “Yes.” It’s the first and only thing he’s sounded sure of since he woke up.

Steve thinks only with his heart as he invades Eddie’s space, cupping his cheeks as he leans in slowly. His intention is clear. Eddie can pull away if he wants to, but he doesn’t. He looks downright terrified but he stays very, very still and lets Steve kiss him.

This kiss is so different from the first kiss they shared only a week ago, full of passion and lust, or their kiss after Steve regained his memories, a desperate form of penance. This is their third first kiss, and it feels more like a true first than any of the rest. Hesitant and delicate, like they’re only touching inside of a dream. The moment their lips meet lasts for an eternity. Eddie is frozen, holding his breath, but he doesn’t withdraw so neither does Steve. He kisses Eddie more firmly, hoping that touch alone can help Eddie remember. Please, he thinks as slides his hands into Eddie’s hair. Remember this. Remember us. Remember me, please…

Eddie moves his lips against Steve’s torturously slow, as if he’s only just remembered what a kiss even is, but it’s a start, and a start that makes Steve’s head spin with the hope surging through him. Please, please, please, and then—

Steve feels it.

A spark turning into a flame. An echo growing into a thunderstorm. A raindrop multiplying into a monsoon. Eddie surges into Steve, returning the kiss with brand new fervor and pulling Steve tight against him. Familiar heat rushes through Steve, warming him all the way to his toes as he desperately kisses Eddie back. Every inch of his body sings with joy, his hope dazzling like stars behind his eyes. He can feel it in his soul—his Eddie is back.

Eddie breaks away first. “Steve,” he pants, his breath ragged, wonder in his eyes. “Steve! Holy shit!”

“Hi,” Steve says as his eyes water with sweet relief. Welcome back, I missed you, I love you.

Eddie laughs. His eyes are wet, too. “Hi, lover boy.”

Steve throws his arms around Eddie, fusing them together. “Thank god,” he gasps, pressing kiss after kiss onto Eddie’s cheek. They hold each other so tight it almost hurts. It would take the strength of an army to pull Steve away from Eddie now. It would take the strength of a god. They breathe into each other, they cry into each other’s skin, and Steve revels in the fact that Eddie knows everything.

He isn’t alone anymore. He has Eddie in this life, Eddie from the future, all of Eddie. In every way that Steve has ever known him. A new friend, a new boyfriend, an outsider, a brave man, the bravest person Steve has ever met. When he first saw Eddie in this life, before he remembered anything, he was struck by a thousand contradictions warring in his mind. Now he feels an opposite kind of wonder. Every single thing about Eddie slides into place, making sense, coming together like pieces of a puzzle.

“Sorry I scared you,” Eddie murmurs against Steve’s neck.

Steve squeezes him tighter. “I don’t care, I’m too damn happy.”

Eddie nuzzles into his neck, leaving one quick kiss on Steve’s skin. “Fucking hell, my head hurts,” he grumbles.

Steve laughs. He can’t help it, and he feels bad when Eddie pouts, but he’s just so fucking happy and his life is just too ridiculous not to laugh, and eventually Eddie joins in. They laugh like they’re high, they laugh in circles, slowing down and then setting each other off again. They laugh so much they both start crying again. Steve pulls Eddie sideways and they flounce onto the mattress together.

“So do you think if we went to the Upside Down right now, we’d find a dead me with mushrooms in my eyes?” Eddie’s questions confirms Steve’s theory—the Mother gave them both the same dream.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“This is insane,” he mutters. “Totally insane.”

“Do you regret remembering?” Steve asks hesitantly.

“Hell no,” Eddie says immediately, soothing Steve’s worry. “I’m glad I remember. It’s just a lot, you know?”

“Trust me, I know.” Steve rolls onto his side to face Eddie, and Eddie mirrors him, bringing their faces close together. “Thank you,” he whispers. He’ll never be able to repay Eddie for a gift like this, for the fact that he said yes. There aren’t enough thank you’s in the world. He could give Eddie a million kisses everyday for the rest of his life and it still wouldn’t be enough to express his unending gratitude.

“I should be the one thanking you. You literally saved my life.”

“It wasn’t—”

“It was, Steve,” Eddie interrupts him. He cups Steve’s cheek with a gentle hand. “It was you. Don’t ask me how I know, I just do. I could feel it when I got all those memories back. It wouldn’t have happened without you.”

Eddie kisses Steve again, which is good because Steve doesn’t know what to say to that. He’s not sure if he believes Eddie. Was it really only him that could help the Mother accomplish its plan? He still thinks Nancy could’ve been a better choice, but it’s hard to regret the way things happened. If he had to travel through time, he thinks he did a decent job in helping to sort the world out again.

“I was so scared,” Eddie whispers. “When I died. It wasn’t like—it was just like falling asleep, but I knew I was never going to wake up again, and I didn’t know if there was a good dream waiting for me or nothing at all. I couldn’t fight it, and when I knew I just thought…I hope I get to tell Chrissy that I’m sorry.”

Steve’s heart breaks. No wonder he asked about Chrissy when he woke up. “It wasn’t your fault—”

“I know, I know, trust me, I know. I just wish…but it doesn’t matter now. She’s alive, and we can take care of her.” Eddie traces his fingers gently over Steve’s face, his dark eyes gazing into Steve. The room is lighter now, deep blue washing away into a pale winter morning around them. “Do you remember the last thing you said to me?”

Steve knows that he’s not asking about last night. “Don’t try to be a hero.”

Eddie gives him a wry grin. “I did a piss poor job of listening to you.”

“It’s not your fault,” Steve says again. He regrets his poor choice of words, but not the sentiment behind them. If he had to do that part all over again—dear god, please no—he would’ve said what he was really thinking. Hey, be careful, I don’t want you to get hurt. But he was a coward. “We gambled with our lives and we lost you and Max.”

“Shit, Max too?” Eddie murmurs sadly.

“Yeah, it was…it was the worst day of my life,” Steve says quietly, “and I’ve had a lot of bad days. Dustin was devastated. He lost two friends in one night.”

“Now he doesn’t even know me.”

Steve moves Eddie’s hand to his lips and kisses the back of his fingers. He knows exactly what Eddie is feeling right now and he wants to wash all of that sorrow away. “Hey, we’ll get there. He’s the same kid, he’ll still love you.”

“This is so crazy.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Are you sure we’re not on some terrible joint acid trip right now?”

Despite the sadness still lingering on Eddie, Steve smiles. “No, I’m not sure,” he says.

“Do you think that future still exists?”

“I don’t know. I hope not, because if it did I would be missing and they’d never find me, and you and Max would be dead. And a lot of other people.” It’s not just Chrissy and Patrick and Fred and the chain of events that led them to discover Vecna. Plenty of Hawkins residents died before them to build the Mind Flayer’s body, people that could never be officially declared dead because their bodies were never found. Families were decimated, and the town started to believe it was cursed.

“Do you think it does?” Steve asks him.

“I don’t know…maybe.” Eddie seems lost in thought and just as overwhelmed as Steve at the possibilities. “I know it was just a dream but if the Upside Down really looks like that now, with that gate, it has to go somewhere, right? If our old future doesn’t exist anymore, wouldn’t it be…empty?” He lights up with sudden excitement. “There’s a really cool theory in physics that instead of just one universe, we actually have millions of parallel universes out there and they split apart and make a new one every time someone makes a choice.”

Steve doesn’t think he can share Eddie’s excitement if this theory were to be true—he feels enough pressure to make the right choices already. “What, so every time I debate cereal or toast for breakfast, a parallel world is made?”

Eddie snickers. “Maybe.”

“So then where do you think the gate would go? To a parallel universe with us in it?”

“Maybe. Or maybe you’d just get lost outside of time and space forever where reality doesn’t exist and your brain turns to mush.”

“...That’s terrifying.”

“It’s just a theory. Maybe if you went through it you could choose to go into any parallel universe. Or maybe it goes somewhere else. Maybe it doesn’t go anywhere and you just die. Maybe it spits you right back out where you came from but with superpowers.”

Steve has to smile at Eddie’s imagination. “Maybe it goes to heaven,” he suggests. It sure felt like something heavenly in his dream.

“Tell you what,” Eddie says, jostling Steve’s shoulder excitedly. “When we’re old and grey and hobbling around with canes and our time is almost up, let’s go back and throw ourselves in and we can find out together.”

Steve’s breath catches in his chest at the earnest sentiment in Eddie’s words. He knows it’s not logical, not practical, maybe not even possible, but that might be the most romantic thing someone has ever said to him. When we’re old and grey. They have their whole lives ahead of them and Eddie is picturing them years down the line, still together, still in love, still ready for another adventure.

“Eddie…” he whispers, because everything else is stuck in his throat.

Eddie’s excitement is replaced by a sudden shy look. “I know we just started dating a week ago but we’ve already been through the end of a world together. And if…if I have to get old and grey then I want to do it with you.” He kisses Steve. “Deal with it.”

Steve laughs and wraps his arm around Eddie, curling into him and breathing in his comforting smell. “I love you,” he murmurs, and he knows Eddie hears him because he sighs against Steve.

“God, Steve. I love you, too.”

They lie on the bed for what feels like a long time, just holding each other, basking in the blessing of the time they now have together. It feels like a lifetime ago when Steve first realized that he had a crush on Eddie, when they went to the Creel house, when they had their first kiss. A lifetime and only a minute. Now they share something that no one else in this world could possibly understand. The threads of the future bind them together and now they have time to spin those threads into a tapestry of a life together. Steve can’t wait.

Eddie’s alarm starts blaring out his favorite rock station, and as he detangles himself from Steve to turn it off, Steve hears noise from the living room. Footsteps travel down the hall then Wayne appears in the doorway, still wearing his boots and coat.

“Eddie—” He cuts off with a frown when he notices Steve.

Eddie bounds across the room and throws his arms around his uncle. “I’m sorry,” says, his voice muffled into Wayne’s shoulder.

Wayne pats him on the back. “Hey, I told you, I’m not mad about picking up the van, I’m just glad you’re alright—”

“I love you,” Eddie tells him. Steve stays very quiet, feeling like he’s intruding on a private moment. Wayne doesn’t know that it’s not about the van, or last night at all, but Steve does. “I don’t tell you that enough,” Eddie confesses in a near whisper.

Wayne’s face softens. “You don’t need to tell me, Ed. I know.”

Eddie shakes his head. “No, I need to say it. You’re more like a dad to me than your brother ever was.”

“Ed, you’re scarin’ me. Is everything okay?” Wayne tilts Eddie’s chin from side to side to inspect him in the early morning light. “What happened to your face?”

“I’m fine. But it’s a long story.”

Wayne looks across the room to Steve again. “I see you two made up?”

Eddie reaches towards Steve and makes a grabby hand, a clear demand to come closer. Steve comes to his side and Eddie joins their hands. “Yeah, we got it all sorted out,” he says happily. “He’s my boyfriend now.”

Steve feels shy under Wayne’s scrutiny. They’ve already met, but this time is different. This is his official introduction as Eddie’s boyfriend, and Steve wishes he wasn’t in (Eddie’s) pyjamas, he wishes he’d brushed his teeth and combed his hair, and most of all he wishes he didn’t look like he was beaten to a pulp.

But all Wayne says is, “Good. I’m happy for you, but that doesn’t mean he can sleep over on school nights without my knowledge.”

“He had a rough night and I promised I’d make him pancakes for breakfast,” Eddie says. He wraps his arm around Steve’s waist and squeezes him closer, a strong signal of intent that he’s not letting Steve leave without breakfast.

“You don’t have time, you both need to get your asses to school.”

“I, uh, actually…” Steve falters when Wayne looks at him with sharp eyes. “I got suspended…for a few days, so…” Great. Wayne is going to think he’s a terrible influence on Eddie. Why did he bother finishing that sentence?

“See?” Eddie says to his uncle, as if proving a point. “He had a hell of a day yesterday. He needs pancakes and don't you always tell me I need to keep my word?”

Wayne crosses his arms over his chest and narrows his eyes at Eddie. Steve recognizes the look as the same one on his parents’ faces when he throws their words back in their faces. It must be known to all parents of teenagers.

“Did he really promise you breakfast?” he asks Steve.

Steve navigates his answer carefully. “Yeah, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go to school, Eddie.”

“Whose side are you on?” Eddie grumbles.

“Yours. Do you want to do senior year again?”

Eddie’s face falls into sheer horror, and Steve swallows back a laugh when he starts counting with his fingers. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. He’s in his fifth senior year. “Oh my god,” he mutters.

Wayne stares between them, confused, but with a shake of his head he seems to decide that it’s not worth it to ask. “We might get along,” he says, pointing at Steve. “Alright, come on then. I’m going to take a shower and you better have coffee and breakfast ready when I’m done.”

Eddie salutes. “Sir, yes, sir.”

So Steve finds himself in the tiny kitchen, learning where the bowls and frying pans are as he helps Eddie cook up a breakfast that’s far too elaborate for a Wednesday morning. He peels a few oranges, makes toast, and fries up some bacon and eggs while Eddie makes pancakes. He savours the peaceful quiet but decides to break it to ask a question floating around his mind.

“Can I ask you…I mean, it’s stupid, it doesn’t really matter, but…”

“Spit it out, Steve.”

Steve realizes just how much he likes hearing Eddie say his name. “When we were in the RV and you were hot-wiring it and you told me to drive and you said—you called me…” Steve feels himself blush and clears his throat. “Were you…flirting with me?”

The answer comes in the form of Eddie’s massive shit-eating grin.

“Oh,” Steve mumbles.

Eddie bumps his hip against Steve. “Took you a whole new lifetime to notice?”

“Shut up,” Steve says without any bite. He flips the eggs in his frying pan as he works up his nerve for the next question. Why is he so scared to ask? “Do you think…”

Eddie pauses with his spatula over the pancakes, ready to flip.

“Do you think we would’ve dated? You know, if things had gone better?”

His smile softens. “I would’ve wanted to.”

“But…you were telling me that Nancy was like true love and shit.”

Eddie shrugs and starts flipping the pancakes. “You were obviously still into her and it was easier than letting myself fall for a straight guy. Or, you know, a guy I thought was straight. Even if I was already halfway there. Dumb heart, remember? Dumb in every lifetime, apparently.”

“What, you were already falling for me?” Steve asks, half teasing, half genuinely wondering.

Eddie rolls his eyes but a faint blush covers his cheeks. “Oh, come on. There I was, scared out of my mind, and you come along like this knight in shining armour, except you had no idea what to do and you were mama bear-ing a whole gaggle of kids with your ex like some kind of dysfunctional family and I wanted to be a homewrecker but stupid things like morals and the end of the fuckin’ world were getting in the way—”

Steve laughs.

“—so yeah,” Eddie finishes with a shining smile. “I was crushing pretty hard.”

Steve didn’t need to know, not really, but knowing that Eddie liked him in their old future too puts a bounce in his step. It’s like a neon sign from the universe, a reassurance that the direction of his life is exactly what it’s supposed to be. It might’ve taken them a bit longer but he would’ve figured out his sexuality at some point. Especially with Eddie around.

“For what it’s worth, I thought you fit into our dysfunctional little family pretty well.”

Steve’s attention is dragged from the eggs when Eddie grabs his chin and kisses him.

“My eggs better not be burning,” Wayne says as he passes behind Steve to the living room, now freshly showered and dressed. Steve blushes again and avoids his eyes.

Wayne flicks on the TV to the morning news and they sit down at the couch to eat, plates on their laps and drinks and napkins on the coffee table. It’s all so calm and normal that it makes Steve want to laugh. The last two days of his life have been anything but normal, but he wouldn’t change it. It’s all been worth it to save the people he loves. It’s worth it to see Eddie so happy.

That’s the biggest difference, Steve thinks, as he watches Eddie eat and talk and elbow his uncle playfully. The Eddie he knew in the future was far from happy. Sometimes he seemed happy, when he was teasing Dustin or flirting with Steve, but when the moment ended his face would fall again. He was terrified and stressed, and Steve only knew him at the darkest point in his life. Now it’s different. He’ll get to know Eddie at his best, too, and he’ll be around to help Eddie through his worst.

Steve still has things to worry about—fixing things with his mom, apologizing to their friends for last night, making sure Eddie’s friends don’t despise him, getting to know himself better, graduating—but after last night and with Eddie at his side, he can tackle anything. The first morning of the rest of his life is like throwing back the curtains and feeling the sun on his face after a sleep plagued with dark and strange dreams. It’s filled with hope and promise.