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Steve’s had a lot of protégés in these past few centuries he’s been working in the Guardian Angels Division.
He likes working with humans, finds them quite interesting with their short lifespan and that sense of hurry and that fearless courage that comes with the need to live a full life, to experience as much as they can before their time runs out.
It’s so beautiful to see how those humans can grow, and change, and build such wonderful things even with the short time it’s given them, and Steve feels honored that he gets to watch this up close; that from time to time he’s got a human he can watch over and make sure they achieve their full potential.
Of course, some protégés are easier to deal with than others. Some of them are so level-headed and incredible that Steve barely needs to do anything; a discouragement here when they are about to do something reckless, a more blatant intervention there when something bad is about to happen to them, but most of the time Steve’s job is simply to observe and make sure his protégé can live their lives the best way they can.
And it’s been a very good job so far; way, way better than his last guard job back in Purgatory, that’s for sure.
Until he's put in charge of watching over Eddie Munson.
Steve should have suspected this wouldn’t be an easy job when he heard that Nancy had given up on the guy’s case and taken a new protégé after only a couple of years, but he had been so downcast after the passing of his last human that the thought never crossed his mind. Now he gets why Nancy begged for another human.
Eddie is a mess.
The guy simply has no sense of self-preservation whatsoever. Steve’s had been in charge of his case for only a day before he had to make an intervention and save the guy from being hit by a truck while he was leaving a bar, drunk out of his mind.
It only got worse.
Bar fights, hard drugs, it was as if Eddie was making everything he could to test how far his luck went. He’d do such dumb things that sometimes Steve thought the guy really had a death wish, and wondered what could had happened to that man that left him like that; with zero care for his own safety, just living a life that couldn’t even be called that.
As his guardian angel, after pulling some strings, Steve gets access to Eddie’s memories, and that’s when he finally understands what his human is going through.
The abusive father, the lost mother, an uncle that had to work more hours than it should be allowed just so they would have enough to eat, a childhood filled with bullying and scorn from his peers, and so much loneliness that Steve has tears in his eyes when he’s done going through everything.
Eddie’s lifestyle, it's clear to Steve clear now, is the product of a life of hardships thrust upon a kid that never had a chance to really be a kid. Who was excluded for years and denied of any kindness when all he had ever wanted was to find his place in the world.
It’s so unfair, and sad, and heartbreaking that stirs a sense of protectiveness in Steve like nothing he’s ever felt before, something he doesn’t even know if he’s allowed to feel when working this kind of job because it feels too personal.
Steve doesn’t care.
He watches over Eddie with renewed determination. He’s not gonna let anything bad happen to this man, and he’s not gonna give up on someone who’s spent his whole life being left behind by the people who should have been there for him.
It’s a hard job, but Steve persists. He goes to his limits to protect that man from any harm and tries to guide him towards a better life and it works; slowly, but it does.
Eddie gets clean from drugs after a while, manages to get a stable job for the first time in years, and it’s so fulfilling for Steve to watch as that broken man start building a real life for him.
On Christmas Eve, as Eddie is leaving the store after some last-minute shopping, Steve following a few feet behind, the man stops suddenly. He turns around, the bag with his uncle’s gift clutched in his hand and snowflakes melting in his wild hair, and then he looks at Steve. Not at the place Steve is, not at something behind him, at Steve.
And he smiles. All pink cheeks and chapped lips and mirthful eyes.
“Thank you for everything,” he says softly.
His words are carried away by the wind, but they still reach Steve even through the crowded street.
Eddie then turns, and heads back to his car.