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“Steve! Steve!” Robin runs into Family Video late for her shift yelling for her best friend.
“Whatever you’re about to say Buckley better have to deal with why I’ve had to cover for you for the past twenty minutes.”
“I bumped into Dustin on my way here and he said your ex is back in town.” She moves behind the counter glancing at Steve out of the corner of her eye waiting for his reaction.
“Which ex?” Robin spins around at his nonchalance, shocked he’s not freaking out yet.
“Which ex?! Steve, the ex, the one you’ve been hung up about since before Nancy! Honestly, why would we warn you about any other ex?” She gets to watch her words dawn on him in real time. Steve’s eyes go wide, his lips part and he fumbles and drops the VHS in his hands before turning to face Robin.
“Y/n’s back in town?” He hasn’t seen you in years, not since you moved away after his freshman year and your sophomore year. And not since you broke his heart by dumping him. He says he’s over you but he and everyone he’s talked to about you know that he’s not really. “When did she come back? Where is she staying? Where did Dustin see her?”
“Woah slow down Romeo. I don’t know the answer to any of those questions.” Robin holds up her hands in defense before Steve can start shaking her for information. “You really haven’t had any sort of communication with her?”
“Not really, I saw her once or twice when she was in town for holidays over the years but it was always in passing and she had a boyfriend each time.”
“Well maybe this time she won’t have one.” Robin offered up with a shrug before grabbing some tapes to restock shelves.
“You ready to go pick a movie for tonight baby?” You speak to your little girl smiling down at her as you unclasp her from her carseat. She beams up at you and nods her brown hair moving around with her head. Every time she beams up at you makes you feel like you’re falling in love with her all over again. “I was thinking of getting Muppets Take Manhattan, you wanna watch The Muppets?”
“Yeah!” You smile and bring her into your arms, shutting the car door and looking over at the Family Video in front of you.
“And you know what? You were so good today that you get to pick a movie on top of my pick.”
“Really?” You smile softly at how it actually comes out as ‘weally’. Arwen had issues pronouncing her r’s still which isn’t unusual for children her age and as adorable as it is you’re nervous that maybe she got your speech impediment that you had to work on all throughout elementary school.
“Really.” You nod, poking her stomach and letting her hold onto your finger when she grabs for it. The bell above you rings as you walk into the store and you head straight to where you know you’ll find your movie. Arwen begins to wiggle on your hip after you grab it and you place her down holding your hand out for her to take so she doesn’t wander away. She starts tugging you away and you let her knowing she’s on her way to the children's section.
Steve froze in his spot when he saw the little girl pulling you across the store. He hadn’t seen you come in and if Robin knew this was going to be his reaction she would’ve told him that you had just walked in. She can’t help but laugh at his expression but still pinches him when she notices you walking towards the counter. The kid is babbling on about something and you continue looking down at her nodding along and chiming in here and there. Steve takes your distraction with the kid to get himself under control.
“Did you find everything alright?” At the sound of his voice your attention goes from your kid to the man you definitely recognized behind the counter.
“Steve? How are you?” You place the two movies on the counter both Muppets and Rainbow Bright and the Star Stealer, Arwen's pick for the night.
“Good, good. What are you doing here?”
“Getting movies for movie night.” You pick up your daughter then and Steve’s attention goes to her.
“Whose this?” He leans on the counter smiling at her.
“This is my daughter Arwen.” Steve chokes on air, he was expecting you to say it was your cousin or something, not your daughter. She looks like she’s around like four and his heart drops to his stomach at that realization.
“Is she, is she mine?” You laugh at him causing Arwen to let out little giggles too. She may not have known what you were laughing about but hearing you laugh normally caused her to. It was one of your favorite sounds in the whole world.
“God no. She’s only three Steve, we broke up, what five years ago?”
“Four years ago.” He tries not to sound dejected at you both laughing at him and not remembering when you broke up. “Is uh, is her dad still around then?” He knew how normal it was for teen dads to just sorta not want anything to do with the kid.
“Oh yeah. He absolutely adores her. Arwen, this is my friend Steve.”
“Hi, I’m Awwen.” Steve smiles at her as she waves at him.
“It’s nice to meet you. A pretty name for a pretty girl.” She giggles at the compliment hiding her face in your shoulder. “How’d you come up with Arwen?”
“Her dad named her, she’s named after a character from Lord of The Rings. Can I rent the movies?”
“Oh, yeah, yeah of course.” Steve gets busy logging the movies out. “So how long are you back for?”
“Hopefully for good. I figured it was time to finally move in with my husband instead of constantly worrying about him from my parents house after the scare he gave us earlier this year.” You put Arwen down again so you can get your wallet out to pay.
“Husband?” Steve’s throat goes tight as he wonders who the lucky bastard who got to marry you is. The bell rings again then and Steve watches over your shoulder as Eddie walks in, his eyes lighting up as he sees the two girls at the counter.
“Daddy!” Arwen rushes away from you and into Eddie’s arms as he crouches down to catch her. Your attention immediately goes to the man picking up your little girl behind you.
“Hey Princess, you miss me?” Eddie kisses the side of her head as she buries her head in his shoulder and wraps her legs around his waist the best she can. Robin immediately understands what’s going on and she wants to laugh at the confusion written across Steve’s face. “Hey baby.” Eddie stops next to you and plants a kiss on your lips causing Steve’s mouth to drop.
“You married Munson?!”
“Do you two know each other?”
“Do we know each other? Like you don’t know we dated for a year.” Steve scoffs out and rolls his eyes while crossing his arms. He can’t believe Eddie never told him he was with you, he didn’t even know the man was married.
“You dated Harrington?”
“Oh, yeah.” You shrug because it’s not a big deal. “We broke up like a month, maybe, before we started dating.”
“Woah, woah, woah wait. You waited a month before dating someone who lives in the same town as me when you dumped me because and I quote ‘long distance is for chumps’?”
“Eddie was very convincing with his argument for me trying it with him. If you had tried to convince me otherwise then maybe we would’ve stayed together.”
“How did the two of you meet?” Robin chimes in as Steve starts to get into his head and before he can say anything stupid. “Hi, I’m Robin.” She holds out her hand for you to shake.
“Hi! Eddie’s told me a lot about you!” He really has, he absolutely adores Robin to death and he’s told you all about how his friendship with her has grown.
“Corroded Coffin had a show in her town, something Gareth's cousin set up for us, and she was one of the only people there enjoying the music. I caught her after the show and we went to get dinner at the diner down the street.” Eddie answers her other question before you can spill about how much he gushes about his cool new friend.
“And after that he basically begged me to try the long distance thing and it ended up working. He’d come visit me a lot and he was constantly sending me love letters in the mail. Four months later I got pregnant with my little angel here, freaked out a lot and spent almost all of junior year pregnant. Even though we didn’t mean for it to happen we both fell in love with her after the first ultrasound picture.” You reach over to brush hair away from her face and boop her nose. “Eddie proposed after I graduated and we got married a month after she turned two.”
“Why haven’t you been living here then with Eddie?” Steve’s still being uncharacteristically quiet as Robin continues to ask questions.
“He insisted it was better for Arwen if I stayed with my parents for a while since he was still in school and didn’t trust that the trailer was safe enough for her. But after what happened in March I told him there wasn’t a choice anymore and we were moving home.”
“And since it looks like we’re going to win this defamation case, I’m gonna get us our own place with the money we get.” Wayne was quick to find a lawyer and file a defamation case after it was proved Eddie was innocent. He wasn’t happy at all with the town still painting him out to be a devil worshipping murderer and trying to ruin Eddie’s chances at living a normal life. If it wasn’t for Wayne knowing the owner Eddie wouldn’t even have his job at the auto shop in town.
“Wait what are you doing here Eddie? Thought you’d beat me home today.”
“Was on my way home when I saw your car in the parking lot. Had to make sure you weren’t getting one of the Muppet movies again.” He bumps your shoulder with his own teasing. Really he was just super excited to see you and couldn’t wait till you got home. You look away from him then and towards the tapes still on the counter. Arwen begins to giggle and you already know she’s going to rat you out.
“Mama got Muppets.”
“Before you even say anything Eds, it isn't The Muppet Movie again, I’m switching it up. You wanna tell dad what you picked out Winnie?”
“Rainbow Bright!” She throws her hands up and you and Eddie gape at her before looking at each other smiling.
“Did she just?”
“I’m pretty sure she did.”
“Did you two hear that?” Robin and Steve share a look of confusion at your excited voices while you don’t wait for their answer and grab Arwen's hands stepping closer to her. “Say it again baby.”
“Rainbow Bright.” She’s still smiling at all the excitement she’s getting from her parents even if she doesn’t understand exactly why. Yours and Eddie’s smiles reach your eyes as she pronounces both r’s right for a second time.
“That’s right baby! Rainbow Bright.” You take her from Eddie’s arms and spin her around causing her to laugh.
“Look at you Princess, getting your r’s right! You keep this up and I’m gonna have to start calling you Pirate.” Eddie’s hand rests on her head after he places a kiss there pulling away beaming at her. “I think this calls for ice cream, what do you think Sweetheart?”
“This definitely calls for ice cream. What do you think honey? You want some chocolate ice cream?”
“Yeah!” She claps and you hike her further up your body before turning your head towards Steve and Robin.
“It was nice seeing you again Steve and it was wonderful to meet you Robin. I guess I’ll see you around.” You wave bye to them and Arwen waves over your shoulder as you walk away. “Do you want to go home first and then we can all go together?”
“Yeah that sounds good.” Eddie stays close to you as you both walk towards the door.
“Oh! We should see if Dustin wants to join us.”
“Hey guys! You forgot to grab the movies.” The two of your attentions go to Robin and Eddie stops you from taking a step in her direction.
“I’ll grab them Sweetheart, you go get Arwen all snug in her carseat.” You nod at him before exiting through the door he holds open for you. “Thanks Robin, we got a little distracted there.”
“Don’t worry about it.” She shrugs before smiling wide at her newest friend. “I can’t believe you never told us you were married or had a kid. She’s so fucking cute!”
“Isn’t she? And it’s not like I kept it a secret, Dustin, Mike, and Lucas even met them both in the beginning of last school year. Honestly if it weren’t for my girls I probably wouldn’t have let Dustin drag my ass out of the upside down.” Eddie watches you through the doors as you coo to your daughter with a love drunk smile. “Alright I gotta go, got two pretty ladies waiting for me to get ice cream. See you Robin, Harrington this was weird don’t try to hit on my wife again. Bye!” Steve gets flustered only proving Eddie right. He hadn’t even heard what you and Steve had been talking about before he showed up but he could tell that Steve was into you with just one look at his face. And Eddie is still blissfully unaware that you’re the ex Steve talks about sometimes.
“Steve your ex is a total fucking milf now!” Robin exclaims once Eddie is out of the door and pulling you into a kiss.
“Shut it Robs. I can’t believe she ended up with Eddie.” He groans out, dropping his head into his arms while Robin laughs.