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Steve Harrington doesn’t tell anyone when his parents kick the bucket.
It happens mid-summer, on an ordinary day. Richard and Diane Harrington were out of the country, on a road trip through Europe. As was told to Steve over the phone, there was a collision on a highway. They died on impact.
Mourning two people he had never really known hadn’t made the grief any easier to swallow. The house, now in his name, felt too big, too empty. Despite the sweltering summer, every room felt cold, shrouded in the loss. It had never been a home, before, but it was a place to come back to. A place to rest. Now, it was a haunted house.
But he pushes through it. He falls in love with Nancy Wheeler, and for a while her presence returns the colour to his world. And when she starts to pull away, he keeps some of her sunshine with him, tucking it away for a rainy day.
He meets the kids, and he has a purpose again. And— hey! Looks like there’s another dimension. And monsters. He doesn’t think about his parents for a long time.
Getting his ass handed to him by his girlfriend’s new boyfriend kind of sucks. But it does screw his head back on straight. He thinks maybe his head was never screwed on right to begin with.
And when the world tries to end again, he’s ready.
Robin, who initially humbled him to an alarming extent, opens his eyes to a world of technicolour. In the way Dustin is his brother, she is his sister. For every eye roll, there’s a grin. For every voice she puts on to mock him, there’s a friendly knocking of elbows. She becomes his rock, and he hers.
It’s Robin he smiles at before he plunges into the repugnant Upside Down air one last time. Robin yells above him, hoarse and terrified, and he aches.
As the portal closes, he hoists his bat high, and looses a breath.
He’s ready.
Losing Steve Harrington shouldn’t hit Eddie as hard as it does. For everyone else, it made sense. Steve’s absence is bigger than Hawkins, bigger than the world, in a way. He was a boy, barely twenty, whose influence rippled across the surface of the town, whose sudden disappearance unmoored even those who didn’t know him.
Watching Dustin struggle with the weight of it almost makes Eddie wish he’d never met the kids at all. That he’d never made Hellfire. That he’d been the one to die in Chrissy’s place. It’s selfish– so incredibly fucking selfish, so he doesn’t breathe a word of it to anyone. But surviving when they didn't, he's convinced, is the worst kind of life.
A seed of grief is planted in Eddie, and it grows and grows until it’s an unbearable wreath of vines. They make it hard to breathe, sometimes.
The thing is, death is real. It happens all the time. Death is an old friend of Eddie's, someone who took away his parents and his youth. He's wasted years thinking it had to mean something- good people don't die for nothing. (But they do.) Grief makes you violent. Grief turns you into a non-person. Eddie's devotion turned into something sharp and mishapenned, something Wayne had to wrestle with until Eddie was grown enough to put it down. And now...
Well, there's something about losing a friend. An almost friend. It's the realisation that there will be no next time. No more catching the sight of his hair in a crowd, or looking for his soft sweaters. No more easy smiles, catty remarks, brotherly nougies.
He's just... Gone.
Eddie's pretty sure something died in him too, that day in the Upside Down.
It’s a group effort, laying him to rest.
There is no body to bury, but they do what they can. They gather what they can bear to part with and put his things in a cardboard box. Eddie contributes nothing but the box. It makes him want to die a little.
They can’t get ahold of his parents for the life of them. Robin, with numb and deadened eyes, calls the number she unearths from the yellow pages again and again, and each time the call fails to connect.
But Steve’s grandpa answers. Eddie stumbles his way through giving his condolences, unsteady in the face of loss, and the man thanks him quietly. Robin, white-knuckling the couch next to him, says nothing, eyes unfocused.
“Where— uh. Where are you gonna bury him?” Eddie asks. “We’ve got… We’ve got some of his stuff. A box. We thought maybe…”
“That’s a fine idea, son,” Steve’s grandpa says. And then, “Next to his parents seems the most fitting.”
And— oh.
Oh, God.
No.
Steve’s parents are—
Are they dead too?
Robin sucks in a sharp breath, eyes wide and horrified, when Eddie turns to look at her. Distantly, he registers that she’s trembling.
"His parents?" Eddie asks quietly. "Are they- I didn't know they were gone."
Steve's grandpa is quiet for a long moment. When he speaks again, his voice is gruff. "Happened three years ago, in Europe. Steve never... My boy, he didn't tell you?"
Eddie drives Robin home, after. He barely remembers the rest of the phone call, focused entirely on Robin’s quick, panicked breathing, unable to do anything about it. Here and now, he can’t even be a pseudo-friend.
He falls into bed the moment he’s back home again, his wounds pulling sharply every time he moves. Exhausted, he stares unseeingly at the ceiling, half-convinced he’s still back there, bleeding out on the hard ground.
He wonders, for the hundredth time, what might’ve been if things had turned out differently.
What would they have been, if Steve had survived? Could they have been friends? He hopes they could’ve been friends.
It’s been two weeks since the world didn’t end.
It doesn’t get any easier. Robin retreats further into herself as the days drag on, endless and unforgiving. Her eyes only clear a little when she’s at Steve’s house, and so Eddie accompanies her there as often as she wants.
Sometimes, she lays on Steve’s bed and curls up like a pill-bug, head buried in his pillow. Eddie hovers in those instances, unsure of what to do. Eventually, though, he ends up gently carding through Steve’s records. Skating his fingers along the dusty beuro, counting the sports trophies lining the desk. Learning about a boy he’ll never speak to again. A boy he’ll only get to know through stories and mementos. The time he, and everyone else, had with Steve was ephemeral. He wonders what parts of him everyone will carry with them through life. What parts of him they'll share with people who will never meet him.
He’s chasing a ghost. He knows he is. Still, his fascination doesn’t abate.
In the late afternoon sun, Robin and Eddie sit by the pool and talk. Softly, the way Robin speaks now, like it drains her completely to say more than a few words at a time. Like they've been stolen from her.
Eddie’s counting the dead leaves floating in the pool when something moves in his peripheral vision.
He looks up just in time to catch it. Two arms, hanging over the fence separating the Harrington residence from the forest.
Rooted to the spot, Eddie’s eyes flicker up as the arms shift, trembling to hold up the weight of the boy they belong to. Slowly, the boy hoists himself over the fence, landing on the ground — on his lawn — with a thud.
“Steve?” Robin’s voice cracks, eyes wide as saucers.
It happens almost instantaneously.
Robin shoots off the ground, sprinting toward the edge of the forest, toward him. Scrambling, Eddie follows as if in a trance, where everything suddenly stops making sense, stops feeling real.
Eddie can barely hear over the rush of blood in his ears, but he can for damn sure see.
Steve Harrington, bruised and bloody and splayed on the ground, alive.
Coming to an abrupt halt, Eddie watches Robin fall to her knees, her shaky arms reaching for him.
With a pained half-smile, Steve reaches back.
Robin sobs, anguished and lost, and Eddie's eyes prickle. The shock hasn’t worn off yet, or set in, really- maybe it never will, because Steve is alive.
Steve is alive.
“You’re alive,” Eddie breathes, to no one.
“You— you—“ Robin tries to say, wails, as she clutches Steve’s torn jacket.
She’s heaving when Steve pulls her closer, wrapping his arms around her in a full embrace. Eddie watches his eyes shutter, face covered in grime and blood and dust.
Robin chokes. “I don’t understand. I don’t— how are you— Steve—“
“Portal,” Steve manages, voice like gravel. Despite keeping his eyes closed, fat tears cling to his eyelashes. “There was another portal. Lead me back to Skull Rock.”
They sit there for a long moment. The evening sun makes a picture of them. Eddie thinks, if he could paint, he'd call it reunion.
Finally, Robin pulls back shakily, sitting up on her knees. She takes Steve’s face between her hands, thumbs swiping at the heavy tears on his cheeks.
“Steve.”
“It’s okay,” Steve says softly. “I’m here. We made it.”
“You died,” Robin breathes. “You died, that’s not— that’s not okay.”
Steve’s face shutters, heartbreak and regret flickering there, swimming in his eyes.
“I know,” he says roughy, so quietly Eddie almost misses it.
“You don’t know.” Robin trembles, breathing devolving into heavy sobs again. With weak fists, she hits his chest. “You were dead—“
“I know.”
“I hate you. I hate you, I hate you—“
Steve catches her as she crumbles, and she clings to him like a lifeline.
Watching feels like an intrusion. Eddie isn’t meant to witness this, not something so private, but when his eyes flicker back to Steve’s face, he finds him already looking at him.
Steve Harrington looks haunted.
So, Steve’s alive. What a wicked turn of events.
Acclimatising to his— rebirth? Jesus, he’s not Jesus— reappearance is a lot less traumatic than it was acclimatising to his death.
Looking at Dustin, though, is like being hit by a battering ram. The kid doesn’t seem to know what to think, what to say. He’d clung to Steve when he first saw him again like he would disappear if he let him go, letting out these awful, desperate sobs so similar to how he had cried over Eddie’s body in the Upside Down.
It isn’t fair. It isn’t fair, what happened. How it happened. But it did, and now they have to live with it.
Robin looks at him now with distrust. Like she can’t trust her own eyes, or maybe like forgiving him is harder than she’s letting on. Because she does need to forgive him. What he did– jumping back into the fight when odds were he didn’t really have to… He was choosing to die. Choosing to sacrifice himself when he had friends waiting for him. Friends who would’ve done anything to protect him.
And now, here they are. Spread out in the Byers living room with a movie on, like everything’s normal.
Eddie’s angry, he realises. He didn’t know he was, not until right this second, but he is. He’s fucking furious.
Where does Steve get off, telling him not to be a hero, only to jump at the nearest viable exit life sign?
Subtly, he looks over at Steve, sitting close to Robin on the couch. Before all this, Robin would probably have an arm slung around him, leaning in close to snicker at the movie. Now, they’re barely touching. Eddie swallows thickly, looking away.
And then he gets up, patting his pockets to locate his lighter.
Nobody stops him as he weaves past the kids and their pillows on the floor– they’re used to his cigarette breaks.
Out on the porch, he takes a shuddery breath. Why does he care so much? He barely knows Steve. He’d thought they could be friends back in the Upside Down, but– that’s not enough to go and have a nervous breakdown about. Especially not when Steve died and came back. But he's always been an all-in kind of guy, hasn't he? He'd flirted with Steve like his life depended on it, and sure, most of it was to take his mind off Vecna, to take Steve's mind off Vecna, but there was a grain of truth to it.
Eddie Munson speeds on highways, smokes until he's dizzy, drinks until he's sick with it, and loves until it ruins him. And Steve... Well, he's as easy to like as he is to miss.
Christ.
Behind him, the door creaks. He looks up in time to catch Steve ducking outside, closing the door behind him. Speak of the devil, and all that.
Half-smiling, Steve says, “Hey.”
Eddie grunts. Finally lighting his cigarette, he takes a long drag. He’s not quite feeling petty enough to blow the smoke in Steve’s pretty face, but it’s a near thing.
“Look,” Steve hesitates. He runs a hand through his hair. “I— I get that you don’t like me right now, and… I don’t, like, understand? But, Robin’s— she’s icing me out, man, and I can’t— I can’t deal with it—“
Eddie’s eyes widen when he realises Steve’s eyes are wet. He’s blinking too fast, damp eyes doing nothing to hinder the heavy tears from falling.
No, no, no, he didn’t want Steve to cry.
He doesn’t realise he’s moving until he’s got an arm around Steve. Like a rag doll, Steve sags into his arms, a heaving sob rolling through him like thunder.
“It’s okay,” Eddie says haltingly, unused to comforting people like this. He’s good at bringing the mood up, eclectic and manic as he is, but— this? He doesn’t know how to do this. “You’re okay, man. Just breathe.”
Steve tries. He sucks in breath after breath, but despite his best efforts, it devolves into hiccuped crying.
He's holding Steve, and it hits Eddie all at once that Steve will be more than a sad memory. He won't be forgotten- wouldn't have been, even if he'd stayed dead, but he gets to live. The words claw up his throat, like he could speak it into existence: stay. Stay, stay, stay.
Behind Steve, the door opens. Robin, wide-eyed and frozen, stares at Eddie, who shakes his head as subtly as he can.
Later, he mouths.
Swallowing, Robin nods curtly, closing the door again as quietly as she can.
For a moment, neither Steve nor Eddie say anything. Eddie holds him as best he can, angling the cigarette away from his body (setting the guy on fire would be the worst. They just got him back.)
“I just—“ Steve exhales wetly, tilting his head back. Eddie loosens his arms, letting Steve lean back a little, but doesn't let go. He’s never looked this sad, Eddie’s sure, with his pink cheeks and trembling mouth. “She hates me, man, and—“
“She doesn’t hate you,” Eddie says, squeezing Steve’s hand. Steve looks at him like a little kid, then. Eyes wide, cheeks ruddy. Eddie’s chest aches.
“Jesus, she doesn’t hate you,” he says again. “That girl loves you as much as a person can. She’s just… It’s been hard, you know? You were dead. We almost had a funeral for you. I’ve never seen Robin like—"
Like that. Like she’d lost herself.
Steve looks crestfallen again, and Eddie quickly changes tactics.
“You guys should talk,” Eddie says. “Really talk, I mean. I get that you guys probably, you know, caught up and shit, but she needs more than that. She needs to know why you did it.”
I need to know why you did it.
Steve nods, eyes fluttering shut. “Okay,” he says, as if talking to himself. “Okay, I’ll— I’ll tell her.”
“Steve.”
He can’t ask him. He can’t.
“Yeah?”
“You’ve got this.”
Eddie’s not there when they do finally talk, but he knows the moment they pull up in his driveway that they have. There’s an ease to the way Robin’s walking now, eyes following Steve with disbelief instead of hurt.
He lets them in with a bow, and decides not to mention it.
They’re just smoking tonight. A lazy evening to spend together, with pizza and weed and good company.
It’s getting easier now, being around Steve. Shit, Eddie had thought the guy was untouchable before he’d ever hung out with him, but there’s something so… Human about him now. He survived the impossible, had been prepared to die, and here he is. Soft and sad but getting better.
“Something on your mind?” Steve asks from where he’s perched on Eddie’s bed.
Eddie, on the floor, blinks, and realises he’s been staring at him.
“Uh.” He drops the blunt into the ashtray. “Nah, man. Just tired.”
Stretching, Robin pulls herself up and out of bed. “I have to pee,” she says, looking back at Steve. Her eyebrows do something funny, and Steve’s lips quirk up. Twins, man.
Eddie follows Robin with his eyes as she leaves, closing the door behind her.
“She wants me to explain,” Steve says softly. He scoots closer to the edge of the bed, closer to Eddie.
“That’s–” okay. It’s fine. I get it. “You don’t have to.”
Steve shakes his head, pulling a hand through his hair nervously.
“No, I do. I didn’t– I didn’t talk to Dustin, or any of the kids, until Robbie told me to. It made it better. So…”
“So I’m next on the agenda,” Eddie finishes for him.
Biting his lip, Steve looks down at his lap. “Yeah, I guess.”
A silence follows. Eddie’s not sure how to break it, how to speak, so he waits. Until the words find him.
“Why did you do it?” he asks quickly, so he can’t take it back. Steve’s eyes snaps to his. “Why did you go back?”
Steve deliberates for a long moment. His throat bobs as he swallows. “I didn’t want the world to end again. I figured, if I found Vecna, I could put a stop to it. Once and for all. So the kids could- so the kids could be kids again.”
The confession hangs heavy between them, even though Eddie had guessed it before. And isn’t this something? Him and Steve being cut from the same cloth. Wanting to die for their friends.
Quietly, he asks, “And, uh. What... What happened?”
Steve shrugs. “I found him, but he was already dead. El must’ve figured it out, before I got there. So it was all for nothing.”
It's not hard to picture Steve in the Upside Down, limping and panting, so sure he was going to die. Eddie's chest constricts, thinking about it. Maybe he didn't know the guy - doesn't know the guy - all that well yet, but no one should ever have to live through that. No one should ever to live through that alone.
“I was angry at you, too,” Steve adds, fiddling with the blanket. “I told you not to play the hero, and you nearly– if I hadn’t gotten there in time, you’d be dead.”
Eddie swallows hard, averting his gaze. He feels his scars pull uncomfortably underneath his clothes.
“But I had two weeks to walk it off,” Steve continues. “Two weeks in the Upside Down, to think about it. And I realised we’d done the same thing.”
His eyes find Eddie’s, looking at him meaningfully. Eddie thinks he understands. They'd both played the hero - misguided as they were - and they'd both survived. And now they had to live with it. Live in the after.
After a long moment, Steve ducks his head. “I guess that’s the, um. The easy truth. I guess… in the moment, I was thinking I’d run out of reasons to stay. I wasn’t useful anymore, so maybe… Maybe I could be. I wanted the last thing I did to be good.”
Eddie sucks in a breath, heart breaking right in two. Is that what Steve believes? That he's not loved? That the kids don't look up to him like a brother? That they'd all just get over it?
With a sinking feeling, Eddie realises that's exactly what he'd thought, too. About himself. He'd survived by the skin of his fucking teeth, and it was thanks to Steve. Thanks to every single one of his friends holding his body together when he'd been too hurt to move.
“Dying isn’t good,” Eddie says. He means to say it sharply, but it leaves his mouth in a breath. Still, Steve shrinks back, looking chastised. Eddie's not being fair. He knows Steve knows dying isn't a fucking good thing- he lost his parents, for God's sake. They're one and the same, that way. Orphaned and alone. But Eddie has his uncle. Who does Steve have?
“I know that,” Steve says softly. “Trust me, Robin almost killed me for real when I told her. I just… I didn’t think anyone wanted me around. I thought maybe, like, I was needed? I was the brawn, or whatever. The muscle. You know?”
"You're not," Eddie says, voice cracking. God, it's true, he doesn't know Steve all that well yet. But he wants to. And he can. "You're not, Steve."
Looking at him with big, sad eyes, Steve nods. "You too, you know."
Eddie is not going to cry. He's not. He's not he's not he's- aaand he's crying. Oh my God, someone take him out back and shoot him.
Swiping hastily at his eyes, Eddie nods. "Sure," he says, voice fucked. "Sure, I know."
He hears Steve slide off the bed, then, shuffling over to Eddie on his knees.
Softly, Steve asks, "Can I hug you?"
Sucking in a breath, Eddie manages a strangled, "Yeah."
Steve folds himself around Eddie like a blanket. An all encompassing warmth, holding him together stitch by stitch. It's so easy to bury his face in Steve’s neck. Easier still to hug him back. Steve doesn't pull away or loosen his hold on him, instead pressing his nose to Eddie's hair, breathing him in.
“I’m sorry,” Eddie says into Steve’s skin.
Steve shudders out a breath, squeezing him tighter. “Me too.”
"We need you." Eddie shuts his eyes against the sting of tears, shivering like it's mid-winter. "Not 'cause you're the brawn, man. 'Cause you're you. The kids, Robin, they all love you. And I could- Steve, I could-"
I could love you. Please, let me learn to love you.
He's blubbering like an idiot, but Steve nods against him all the same.
"Right back at you, Eddie."
At a gentle knock at the door, they pull apart. Robin sticks her head through the door, eyes widening at the scene, before gentling with understanding.
"You talked?" she asks.
Steve and Eddie nod at the same time.
Robin smiles. "Good. I was thinking... Movie time?"
"Fuck yeah," Eddie breathes, and Steve laughs. It might be the best sound in the world.
"I'm in," Steve says. He offers Eddie his hand to help him stand, and when he does, he doesn't let go.
Eddie looks at their joined hands, blinking quickly, and Steve gives him a squeeze. He flickers his eyes up to Steve's face, chest swelling with something too big to name.
"Just for the record," Steve says quietly. "I think I could love you, too."