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It takes nearly an hour to count and then recount all the votes. And there was a tie. A goddamned exact tie. One hundred and six for Billy, one hundred and six for Steve, plus one vote from Eddie Munson for Satan , but that hardly counted. It was so ridiculously improbable, such a negligible likelihood Nancy hadn’t bothered to account for it. And yet, it was happening.
“And everybody voted?” The question was addressed to the whole room. Ten students, herself included, sitting around a table, Mrs. Smith reading at her desk. The 1985 Prom Committee, what a group. “We checked?”
A shuffling of papers, then one of the freshmen, Gina speaks up, voice hesitant but there. “Actually. There is one senior who didn’t vote.” She looks at Nancy, clearly not recognizing the name. “Tommy Hagan?”
You have got to be joking. Tommy H was the deciding factor? May as well stitch Billy’s name into the sash now, save the trouble of finding the guy and getting him to fill out a ballot. Alas, democracy must be upheld. So. “Give me a ballot. I’ll find him. He picks our prom king.”
The room erupts in protest. Fred cuts through the noise. “We can’t just do that, Nancy. Polls are closed. Voting is over. We have a tie.”
“We can’t have a tie. We’ll have to make an exception.”
“But–”
“Look. We can either let Tommy pick, or you, Fred, can personally tell the two of them that they have to share the title.”
Fred swallows thickly, wide-eyed. “I suppose we can make an exception in this special case.”
“Good choice. Does anyone know if the baseball team has practice today?”
All Nancy gets in response is muttered uncertainties. “Great. Well, I’ll check. Ballot, please, Gina.”
The baseball team does, thankful, have practice that day. They’re out on the field doing warm-ups that Nancy cannot discern the purpose of.
Coach Foster smiles when she approaches. “Miss Wheeler. How can I help you, dear?”
“I just need to borrow Tommy H for a moment. It's a prom thing. Super quick, I promise.”
“Sure thing.” He turns to yell into the field. “Hagan!” At his name, Tommy stops whatever drill he’s running and looks over, eyeing Nancy suspiciously. When the coach waves him over he approaches cautiously, like she might try to jump him or something. “Miss Wheeler requires your presence. I expect you back promptly. No dilly dallying.”
Tommy follows Nancy over to the bleachers. “What do you want, Wheeler?”
Nancy holds the slip of paper, along with a pen, out to him. “You didn’t vote for prom royalty.”
“Yeah, I was finishing a test when the polls were open.” He rolls his eyes as he says it, like she should know that. “So what?”
“So you’re voting now. Special privilege.”
“Seriously?”
Nancy nods, shakes the paper. “Just check two boxes, Tommy. It’ll take thirty seconds and you can get back to your precious game.”
“Fine.” Then he snatches the paper from her hands and turns to lean over one of the metal seats so he can actually write. It takes longer than thirty seconds– nearly two minutes– which is ridiculous, it's just a couple of Xs in a box and it's not like Tommy is racking his brain, comparing the policies or anything. It’sthe election for prom king, with his pack leader pitted against his former friend, it's not a hard decision. Doesn’t he need to get back to practice? When he finally finishes, Tommy shoves the paper and pen at Nancy, avoids her eyes and goes silently back to the field.
The small pink sheet is folded over itself several times, like Tommy is trying to make the contents inaccessible. Weird. Nancy walks back to coordination headquarters and drops into the chair next to Fred.
“Final vote is in.” She unfolds the paper, already annoyed at what she knows she’ll see. It's not like Steve needs the win or anything– he's pretty much checked out on the whole high school front, oh. that's neat had been his exact words when Nancy had told him he was a finalist– but she really wants him to get it, if only to screw Billy out of the victory. “Hawkins High prom king 1985 is…” Holy shit. “Steve Harrington.” The name stares back at her from the paper, undeniable, the box next to it checked off, not scribbled out, just a sure black line. There’s a small dot of ink in the box next to Billy’s name, like it’d almost been picked. Even with the evidence in her hand, Nancy almost doesn’t believe it. It seems that Fred can’t either, if the snatching of the paper from her is any indication.
“You can’t just… Oh. That's a vote for Steve. Huh. I thought they hated each other.”
Nancy shakes her head, disbelieving. “I– I thought they did, too. But, that's not our concern. Prom king Steve Harrington, prom queen Tammy Tompson. Gina, will you run and tell Jenny? She’ll want to start on the embroidery ASAP. After that we’re all clear to go home.”
The freshman nods and scampers off toward the auditorium. As Nancy packs her bags she tries to come up with a reason for Tommy to do it. She keeps coming up empty. There's no benefit to it and Tommy didn’t know they were tied to he couldn’t have planned anything, so what gives?
*****
Tommy keeps thinking about it. In the week between voting for Steve and prom actually happening, Tommy thinks about his choice. Why had he done it? Why vote for Steve? They aren’t friends, haven’t been for some time, but when Wheeler had given him that stupid pink slip, he couldn’t stop himself. He’s totally dead if Billy finds out and he’s guaranteed at least some mocking from Carol if she finds out. All in all, there was no reason for him to do it.
But he did. And if he's honest with himself he knows why he did it. He did it because if Steve wins he'll get that look on his face. The one he had when he they both made varsity sophomore year, the one he had when he’d gotten tickets to a Bowie concert for his birthday, the one he had when Tommy kissed him, drunk at some stupid party. Tommy hasn’t seen the look in years, but he still knows it. He’ll probably never forget it; eyes blown wide, with a dorky smile, flushed and happy .
He’s thinking about that look as he gets ready, as he picks up Carol, as his parents take a million pictures of him and his friends, as he drinks shitty punch, as he's dragged to the dance floor, as the music cuts and Nancy Wheeler stands on by the speakers, announcing the royalty. She looks nice, all dressed up in a long blue dress. Tommy can almost see why Steve had liked her so much. “For our juniors, prom prince and princess… Jason Carver and Chrissy Cunningham!”
Tommy watches them get their plastic crowns and sashes. This win is pretty expected, Carver’s always been decently popular, he's basically just waiting for the seniors to leave so he can run the school and Chrissy is head cheerleader, even as a junior, and she seems pretty nice. So, no real surprises. Then the announcements Tommy has been anticipating.
“For prom queen 1985… Tammy Tompson!”
God, Tammy Tompson. She’s had a major crush on Steve forever, but she’s obnoxious.
“And finally, your prom king, by just one vote… Steve Harrington!”
The noise is overwhelming. Tammy, along with half the room, start screeching and cheering like they just won the lottery. The other half of the student body is groaning and protesting like they’re about to riot. Billy is, as Tommy expected, fuming, glaring daggers in Steve’s direction. And Steve? Steve is making that face. It's everything Tommy remembers; open and clear joy, eyes wide, cheeks red, and that stupid smile that hovers on the edges of Tommy’s dreams.
Before anyone can actually start rioting, Wheeler signals for the DJ to play again, waving the royals to the front. Steve has to lower himself so Nancy can reach the top of his head (and his ever-perfect hair), and when he does she says something to him that has Steve glancing at Tommy. He doesn’t have any time to respond to whatever she said though, because Tammy is wrapping her arms around his waist and the stupid royalty dance begins. Tommy excuses himself to get more punch.
*****
Three songs have been played by the time Steve manages to free himself from Tammy Thompson's grip and the crowd that gathered around the two of them. He’s got to find Tommy. What Nance had told him just couldn’t be true, so he intended to find out what had actually happened himself. It takes a while to find Tommy– people keep stopping him to congratulate him on his being prom king, like it mattered, like he’d done something important, not just won a popularity contest– but he manages to find him.
He’s in the back corner of the gym, propped against the wall, staring into a cup. It's like he’s hiding, maybe from the wrath of Hargrove, who's been casting pissed off looks at Steve all night, even more in the last ten minutes. The guy hasn’t done anything, not tonight, not since November. Apparently the threat of castration via nail bat by your little sister is effective as a deterrent. But Tommy has no reason to hide from the guy. Except maybe he does, if Nancy is to be believed.
“Hey, Tommy.”
“Hiya, Steve.” He doesn’t look up, if anything he shrinks even further into himself, stares harder at the cup’s contents.
“Uh, I wanted to ask you something. Maybe we could go outside? It's loud in here.” Which it is, but that's not why Steve wants to leave. He’s more so worried that Tommy is going to kick his ass for asking what he plans to and he’d rather not destroy the prom decorations in the process of that happening. He doesn’t really expect Tommy to agree, but he shrugs and gestures for Steve to lead the way.
Steve checks over his shoulder a couple times as he weaves through the sweaty mob of students, half expecting Tommy to abandon him or get lost in the crowd, but they manage to escape into the May air. It's a refreshing sixty degrees, on the warm side but practically freezing in contrast to the gym interior.
The moment he clears the doors, Tommy is leaning against the wall, hands shoved in his pockets, eyes on the ground. “So what's up?”
Straight to the point, then. No point in beating around the bush anyway. “Nance said you voted for me to win.” Tommy goes impossibly still. “Did you?”
It's scarcely a whisper when Tommy answers. “Yeah.”
“Why?”
Tommy finally looks at him then, head barely lifted. “I don’t know. Felt right.”
It's such a copout that Steve has to laugh. It felt right ? What the hell does that mean? “You– but… I mean. We aren’t friends , man. You didn’t have to do that.”
“I know. But I did.”
“Yeah. Turns out you were the deciding vote. Tie-breaker or whatever.”
At that Tommy’s eyes go wide. “What do you mean?”
“That's what Nance said. Apparently there was an exact fucking split of the votes and you were the only senior who hadn’t voted. So, uh, thanks for that, I guess.”
There's a beat of silence. Steve has his answer, he could probably go back in, almost does but then Tommy speaks again.
“You still make that face, y’know. With that smile and the eyes. I kinda missed it.”
“What?”
“When you won.” Tommy drums his fingers on the wall. “You made that face you make. It’s your actual smile. You don’t– or didn’t do it often when we were friends.”
“I didn’t realize I had an ‘actual smile.’” Not true. Steve knew, but only because he’d practiced the fake smile that he wore so often. It never looked real to him, clearly it didn’t look real to other people either. So much for the practice.
“Well you do. It looks stupid. Your real smile is way better. And you did it, in there. When you won. I think that's maybe why I voted for you. I wanted to see it.”
It almost sounds like flirting. Almost . But it isn’t, right? Can’t be. Steve pushes anyway. “Did you get all you wanted, Hagan?”
And Tommy goes all red. “Sure. I guess. It's– it was nice to see you happy.”
Steve’s mind reels at the comment. He doesn’t have a response for that one. Thankfully Tommy saves him from any embarrassing sputtering. “You wanna go back in?”
“No.” Shit, just laying his cards right on the table then. Steve sits against the wall. “I like it better out here. Music is way too loud. Talking to you is way better.” If he's gonna show his cards he may as well go all in. “I’ve missed you, man.”
Tommy drops down next to him. “Me, too. What the hell happened to you anyway. It wasn’t really about Wheeler, was it?”
Steve shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I mean, it was, at first. But she mostly just, like, set me on the path of being less shitty. I think I needed to be apart from everyone to really change. Which, overall, has been a good thing, parts of it kinda sucked though.”
“Like getting manhandled by Jonathan Byers?”
“Yeah. Yeah, that part sucked real bad. Byers is pretty cool actually. When he’s not, y’know, bashing my face in.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Still not as cool as you though.” It's a stupid thing to say, way too honest for a brick wall outside prom. Steve says it anyway. He's working up to something way stupider.
“Well, no ones as cool as me, Harrington. That's an impossibly high bar.”
“That's the truth if I ever heard it.” Here goes nothing. “He won’t even drunkenly make out with me at parties.”
“That an important part of a friendship to you, Steve?”
“No, just a ploy to get you to think about when you did it.”
“Oh, I don’t need any prompting to think about that. It's got a special place in the drawer in my head labeled ‘stupidest shit I’ve ever done’. It is… the most reviewed file in that particular collection.”
“You think it was stupid?”
“Oh yeah. Way too close to actually being something. Playing with fire, walking the edge, all that. Totally fun nonetheless.”
“Totally fun. Nothing more?”
Tommy puts his head between his knees. “You know it can’t be Steve.”
“Yeah.” Steve nods. He knows. He knows . “I know. Maybe in another life.”
“I hope so.”
“I hope so too.”
Before Steve can say anything else, Nancy bursts through the doors. “Steve! Come on, they're playing Footloose and Jonathan’s being pretentious and won’t dance with me.”
“Alright, I’m coming.” He pushes off the wall, adjusts the plastic crown, throws a salute Tommy's way. “See you around, Tommy.”
His salute is returned. “See ya, Steve.”
And as he screams along to the definitely too loud music and spins Nancy around, the feeling of regret that's been festering in Steve’s gut since ‘83 starts to fade.