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Steve Harrington is no stranger to tattoos. Not that he has many, he's got two stick and poke tattoos that Carol did. He keeps telling her she needs to look into being a tattoo artist, but she keeps brushing him off.
Regardless, he's got two tattoos that he remembers getting done, and one that the foster home he grew up in must've given him early enough on that he doesn't even remember it. It's nothing fancy, three thick black letters on his wrist reading 007. He's pretty sure he remembers all the kids there having one.
He brushes it off, usually. Sometimes, late at night, with or without his best friends, he would think about it and realize how fucked up it is to brand kids like that. He would begin to wonder how bad his childhood must've been, to the point he doesn't even remember the majority of it.
And then his mind moves on to more present tense fucked up things, and those are worse. Because he remembers them, and they're still fresh. Hot, angry wounds on the surface of his brain.
Jane Elizabeth Hopper is new. She's not what she seems, he knows that because he regularly gets saddled babysitting the posse of children that helped defeat several monsters in the last couple years, and she's part of their little group.
He's never really interacted with her. She keeps to herself, even around her friends, she draws in and watches. Like she's still learning how the world works, which Hopper offhandedly explained is because she wasn't raised in the world. She grew up in a lab, like an experiment.
It's fucked up.
It's slowly turning to spring when she comes over for the third time ever, one of the rare days Hopper lets the kids drag her along to his house where he lets them do whatever the hell they want so long as they clean up after.
He's outside, the sliding glass doors open to let the air inside. More windows are open than they are closed, because Steve Harrington is nothing if not a junkie for early spring weather. His garden is pathetic, even when the blooming season is in full swing, but at the cusp of winter, just before the plants begin to really come back, it’s just sad.
So he’s outside tending to it, trying to get rid of dead plants and weeds while the middle schoolers commandeering his living room do whatever it is they do. He would’ve been more worried about leaving them unsupervised a year ago, but at this point they haven’t done anything worse than spilled a few glasses of water.
That might have something to do with him banning them from having anything but water outside of the kitchen and dining room, but it works.
El must’ve gotten bored with the boys, because before he knows it she’s joined him outside and is standing at the entrance to his small garden, watching him with his thick work gloves, ripping out the black raspberry vine that expanded further than he thought it had.
“What are you doing?” She asks. He grunts, finally tugging the last of the root out of the ground.
He glances back at her, squinting in the bright sunlight that frames her like a halo, “Gardening. I let it get pretty bad at the end of the last blooming season, and, uh… yknow, it’s finally getting warmer out. Gotta keep on top of it.”
“...Why?” She frowns, crouching down beside him, looking at the ground and his gloves like it’s a problem she has to solve.
“Uh, why what? Why do I have to keep on top of the plants? Or…” He trails off, awkwardly sitting back. He knows how to interact with the boys, most of them respond well to bickering and his typical brash attitude, but El is different. She’s quiet, and easily confused. He has to walk on eggshells around her.
She gestures at the garden, “Why are you… removing the plants?”
“I’m removing the weeds, and the overgrown ones. Do you know what gardening is?” She shakes her head, “It’s, uh… it’s growing plants, right? But not ones like grass, or clovers, usually. I grow strawberries, sage, and whatever food plants I can get my hands on out here, but because winter came I have to get rid of the weeds so those plants don’t get overrun.” “Oh.” He reaches for another overgrown thorn vine, tugging on it. He’s really starting to debate just getting rid of this thing, with how obnoxiously it tries to take over his space, “I see. Can I help?”
He pauses, then shrugs, “If you want. I don’t have any gloves for you, though, so you’ll have to wash your hands after. And don’t grab the thorn bush vines. These ones?” He holds on the vine he’s yanked from the ground for emphasis, “They will hurt, and I don’t need Hopper on my ass.”
She cracks a smile, and nods, “What am I doing? How can I help?”
He tosses the vine in the pile behind him, and gestures, “This here, it’s my sage plant from last year, and these are my strawberries.” He points, then waves his hand at the dead grass and clovers around them, “These are weeds. Basically, pull anything that aren’t my plants. Sound good?”
“Sounds good.”
They work in silence, side by side. He has to push the wheel barrow he’s slowly been filling with dirt, roots, and weeds for the last half hour over to the pile he’s got behind the shed after a while, but she stays hard at work. The boys never come out to look for her, and she seems perfectly content with her hands covered in soil.
“This is hard,” She says when he returns, but she’s got a smile on her sweaty face. The sun is right above them now, the heat rising along side it. “I like it.”
“Yeah? It’s pretty relaxing, I’ll admit. Tommy used to make fun of me all the time, called me a girl, but yknow. It’s my life, my house. Not like my parents are around to do anything with the space.”
“Why would you be a girl for gardening?”
He shrugs, taking off his gloves and stretching. “It’s, like… has anybody told you about gender stereotypes?”
“What’s a stereotype?”
“Okay. So that’s a no, then. Stereotypes are, uh… okay. They’re types of people, right? They’re hobbies, appearance choices, jobs, that are usually associated with specific types of people. For example, girls and boys.”
“That’s dumb.”
“Yeah, probably. But girls are the ones who cook, and garden, and things like that.”
“But you do those things, and you’re not a girl.”
“Exactly. Long story short, if anybody ever tells you not to do something because you’re a girl? Tell them to go fuck themself.” She grins, this sharp thing she couldn’t have learned from anybody but her new friends.
“Tell them to go fuck themselves,” she parrots, like he’s handed her the world. He laps, holding a hand out to help her out of the dirt.
“That’s right. Come on, let’s go wash off.”
She takes his hand, slathering damp dirt onto his. He doesn’t let go when he’s pulled her up, though, because he’s staring at her wrist.
Why does she have his tattoo?
He turns her hand, and she stays quiet while he moves her around, trying to get a better look at the familiar numbers on her wrist. They’re not the same, hers says 011.
“Where’d you get this?” His voice sounds faint, even to himself. At least there’s nobody out here to see it.
Why would she have this? She grew up in a lab, a lab right here in Hawkins. He didn’t, he’s from…
Where is he from?
“The bad place,” She murmurs, “The lab.”
“You…” He lets her hand drop, wishing he had pockets to shove his hands into. His tattoo is covered with the thick watch he always wears, there’s no chance of her seeing it, but he still wants to hide.
Instead, he fumbles with the clasp of the watch. Somehow, it becomes the most slippery thing he’s ever held in his movements, and when he finally pulls it apart it falls down into the dirt without fanfare. He doesn’t bother trying to catch it, especially when El’s hands grab onto his wrist the moment it comes undone.
“Brother?” She looks up at him with wide, innocent eyes. She looks like she’s about to start crying, holding him where he is. “Why did you not tell me?”
“I didn’t know…” He looks between their hands, then shakes his head, “But I didn’t… El, I didn’t grow up in a lab. It was… they said it was a foster home. I moved in with the Harringtons when I was eight.”
“The bad place.” She tightens her grip for emphasis, “Brother.”
What does he say?
Does he agree? What are the chances of him coming from some mysterious, never talked about abusive foster home where all the kids had numbers tattooed on them and shaved heads, and she came from a lab in the same conditions?
Maybe she just has more of the pieces to the puzzle than he does. That makes her his sister, and it’s hardly a leap from there to deciding he’s protecting her with his life. It doesn’t matter if he doesn’t remember growing up with her, or the horrors they must’ve endured in that place.
She’s more family than the Harrington’s have ever been right now.
“Steve!” Mike calls, leaning out the door, “We’re hungry!”
El lets his hand drop, he drops down to grab his watch, “Starve!” He yells back, “Come on, they’ll eat us if I don’t start on lunch.”
“You’re not telling them?”
“Not yet. We can… I’ll have Hopper bring you over some time. Just you, yeah?”
“Yeah. I’d like that.”