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“If the abyss hits the needle…!”
“Then this tower’s going down!”
Will and Mike’s voices blended together, joining the din of cries and screams from Dustin’s friends as the Abyss crashed down towards them. The radio tower beneath them began to crumple like tin foil. The group screamed and clung to the railings and to one another. Dustin wanted to do something to stop it, but he felt glued to the metal where he was standing—despite the fact that the metal in question was quickly disintegrating beneath his feet.
Then one voice broke through the cacophony.
“Look out! Look out!”
Steve.
No, please, not him. Dustin wanted to shut his eyes, to make it all disappear with sheer willpower. But instead he watched helplessly as his friend was thrown violently off the edge of the tower, barely catching the edge with one hand. Dustin screamed his name and flung himself after Steve, but it was like he was moving in slow motion. The world blurred around him. His own voice, still screaming Steve’s name, was distant and distorted as if he were hearing it under water. He would never get there in time. He was going to watch another friend die before his eyes, just like Eddie.
Steve lost his grip.
Dustin’s vision went dark.
Then his eyes flew open. He was lying in his bed in the dark, tangled in his blankets, drenched in cold sweat, gasping for breath as though he really were on top of that tower again. His hands were clamped instinctively over his mouth.
Many times, Dustin had awoken from this very nightmare, screaming and sobbing, bringing his mom running. Dustin appreciated the comfort, but she worried about him enough, he didn’t need her to add to it. So, recently, he had developed this system. He had trained himself to muffle his cries even before he woke up.
Dustin sat up, cautiously removing his shaking hands, afraid the panic that was still coursing through his body would burst out of him of its own accord. He had revisited that tower in his dreams dozens of times in the month since they had defeated Vecna and destroyed the Upside Down, but it never became less heart stopping because it never became less real.
Dustin had thought that after Vecna and the Mind Flayer and the Upside Down were gone, everything would finally be all over. And, he thought, if this were all a D&D campaign, it would be over. D&D characters didn’t have to grapple with the fallout that comes with saving the world. They didn’t have to go back to their childhood rooms and have nightmares alone in their twin beds every night. Once their worlds were saved, their stories were over. No campaign had prepared Dustin for the slow, quiet horror he felt every day living in the world after saving it.
Hawkins—Dustin’s sliver of the world—was being rebuilt around him. Its people would gather by the buildings covered in scaffolding to commiserate and swap harrowing stories of “The Great Earthquake.” Despite the destruction, they all seemed to find it all very interesting and even exciting. Dustin supposed it was because the damage to their lives was external. The foundations were still strong.
The Party was still rebuilding too. Lucas had not let Max out of his sight since they had returned from the Abyss, terrified that someone or something would appear and snatch her from him again. Will often forgot that his connection to the Upside Down was severed, and kept waiting for it to take control and force him to watch his friends get torn apart from inside a Demogorgon. But Mike had it worst of all of them. Nowadays, he had a lost, vacant look in his eyes all the time. Dustin knew that look all too well because he had seen it every time he looked in the mirror after Eddie died. Dustin knew that Mike’s nightmares must be a hundred times worse than his own, because when Mike awoke, Eleven was still gone.
Of course, they were all mourning Eleven, but she was always going to be Mike’s greatest loss. Dustin knew that, and he felt guilty for feeling any pain at all when he thought of his friend’s agony. But, still, he felt it. Eleven was one more person he hadn’t been able to save. One more friend taken because he hadn’t held on tight enough. One more reminder that he was powerless to protect the people he loved.
Dustin longed to speak these poisonous thoughts aloud, to share their burden with the people he loved and trusted the most. But he knew he couldn’t. It would be so selfish, so unfair to Mike who was grieving far more than the rest of them. It would be stupid too because Steve hadn’t died that day. Dustin hadn’t lost him, so how could he explain that El’s absence was a constant reminder that he almost had?
Shakily, Dustin reached up and pushed his sweaty curls off of his forehead. His hair was shorter now. His mom had been begging him to let her cut it for over a year, but Dustin always refused. He didn’t know exactly why, but the thought of cutting his hair had felt like a betrayal of Eddie, who always wore his long. But since that day in the Upside Down version of the Hawkins lab, when all of his grief had finally overflowed onto Steve in a barrage of words and blows, Dustin had been able to start letting go. Not just of his hair, but of a great deal of the anger, the guilt, and even some of the fear too.
But not all of it.
A tiny part of Dustin had thought—stupidly, he knew—that his breakdown and subsequent admission to Steve would somehow cast some kind of protective spell over Steve that would keep him from harm.
But no. That very same day, Steve had almost fallen from the tower and Dustin had been helpless.
It was the cruelest form of irony, Dustin thought. He had finally regained the friendship he valued most. Finally admitted that he cared so much that the constant, tormenting fear of losing Steve was almost unbearable. Finally confessed that he only pushed Steve away for fear of losing him too. He had finally spoken it aloud, finally let it be real. And then it was real. Steve had nearly been taken from him.
If Jonathan hadn’t been there, if he hadn’t been fast enough or strong enough, or if he hadn’t cared enough, then Dustin would have watched his best friend die right in front of him. Again. Not heroically, or victoriously, but a stupid, unimportant death. Again.
No, Dustin told himself firmly, don’t think about that.
But it was too late. He could feel his pulse quickening, his breath coming in short, ragged, gasps, and his whole body freezing up.
Dustin pressed his hands over his eyes trying to block out the wave of images, but the darkness just made them clearer. The radio tower missing the rift in the Abyss and colliding directly with it. Steve’s knuckles, white from the effort of holding himself up, slowly loosening their grip. The look of abject terror on Steve’s face as he fell from the tower. Steve, broken on the ground below, gone forever, as Dustin had believed he must have been for that split second when he blacked out.
Older memories started flooding in too. Steve screaming at him to “go!” as the Russians pushed through the door behind him. Steve tied to a chair, beaten and bruised within an inch of his life. Steve drugged and confused, laughing about his own cold-blooded torture. Steve pinned to the ground as Billy punched him ruthlessly.
Dustin’s head spun. He swung his feet over the edge of his bed and jammed them into his shoes. He fished a dirty sweatshirt out of his hamper and pulled it on. He spared just one glance at the clock which read 4:11. It didn’t matter. He could not stay in bed and face this torture. He would rather be murdered on the street in the middle of the night than spend another second trapped in this dark room, the victim of his own mind.
Outside, Dustin’s breath—still short and uneven—appeared in clouds before him. The street was quiet except for the wind rustling gently through the trees and Dustin’s own labored breathing. Christmas lights glowed from many houses, illuminating Dustin’s path. Under any other circumstances, he would have found the otherworldly beauty breathtaking, but he felt anything but festive at the moment. He also felt another wave of panic thinking of the eerie connection between lights and the Upside Down. The Upside Down doesn’t exist anymore, he reminded himself. There’s nothing to be scared of. But still, he was shaking, though whether from cold or fear Dustin wasn’t sure.
He began to walk quickly, no destination in mind, but needing to just get away.
Eventually the movement, the freezing wind, and the undeniable reality that comes with being awake, began to bring calm. Dustin stopped and surveyed his surroundings. His feet had brought him unconsciously to the street that housed the Harringtons. Gazing up at Steve’s window, Dustin released a sigh of relief. Just seeing the place where Steve was surely safely fast asleep seemed to ground Dustin, anchor him to reality. He could feel the suffocating panic begin to subside.
But as he stood there, a new feeling began to grow in its place: shame.
As far as Dustin knew, none of his friends woke up screaming in the middle of the night because someone had almost died. They didn’t have to see physical evidence to remind themselves that it wasn’t true. You helped save the world and you can’t even deal with a nightmare? He thought furiously. What kind of hero cried over an “almost?” Steve himself hadn’t been this terrified despite being the one hanging from one hand off a two-hundred-foot tower. Dustin cringed at the thought of what Steve would say if he knew Dustin had needed to see his house to know that a nightmare wasn’t real. Furious with himself, burning with shame inside at his own weakness, he turned his back on the Harrington house ready to begin the trek home.
“Henderson?”
Dustin physically flinched at Steve’s voice. Of all people to be on the streets of Hawkins at four in the morning, it just had to be the one at the center of all of his distress.
He could hear Steve’s quickly approaching footsteps in the quiet of the night. Dustin wanted to run. Run from Steve and the truth that he could not protect him. Run from the shame that was burning inside him like acid. But he was frozen in place just like he had been on top of the radio tower. He felt Steve’s hand on his shoulder and turned resignedly to face him.
“What the hell are y–”
Steve trailed off as he caught sight of Dustin’s face.
“Whoa, what happened? Are you okay?”
Dustin realized he must look terrible with his rat’s nest of a bedhead, bloodshot eyes, wrinkled sweatshirt over pajama pants, and sneakers (still speckled with otherworldly goo from the Upside Down) only laced up halfway.
“It’s nothing. I’m…”
Dustin couldn’t get the word “fine” out. What was the point anyway? It was such a useless lie. Clearly, he was anything but fine. His teeth were also chattering (definitely from the cold this time). Steve didn’t wait for him to finish. He pulled off his coat, exposing his own bare arms, and draped it over Dustin’s shoulders. Steve rubbed Dustin’s arms vigorously until the friction combined with the coat warmed him enough to stop shivering.
When he was sure that Dustin was warm, Steve stepped back and crossed his arms. The gesture appeared stern, but Dustin could tell that Steve was also warding off the cold after giving up his coat. He felt a rush of guilt. Steve was once again subjecting himself to pain on Dustin’s behalf.
“Okay, what the hell, man?” Steve’s voice was tinged with worry.
Dustin didn’t meet his gaze. He thought if Steve looked into his eyes, he would be able to see the fear, the panic, and the weakness there, and Dustin couldn’t put more on his shoulders. Standing here, draped in his coat, he felt the familiar weight of his friend’s protection and hated himself for wanting it. For needing it.
“I—I left something at Mike’s. That’s all.”
Steve raised his eyebrows.
“And you’re going to get it… now?”
“Yes.”
“At four a.m.?”
“Yes.”
“We both know the Wheelers’ house is that way.” Steve pointed over Dustin’s shoulder. “And I’m not sure Karen and Ted would appreciate your timing. It’s a little outside normal visiting hours, if you haven’t noticed.”
Dustin sighed, defeated.
“Fine, I’m not going to Mike’s.”
He turned to leave, but Steve caught his wrist, and forced him back around so that they were facing each other.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, where do you think you’re going?”
“Let go of me, Steve.” Dustin tried to pull his arm free, but Steve held him tightly.
“Not until you tell me what the hell you’re doing out here in the middle of the night.” Steve’s voice was rising, not with anger but with concern.
“That’s none of your business!” The words burst from him almost involuntarily. Panic mixed with annoyance that Steve had to be witness to his weakness made his voice harsh.
“Really, Henderson? It’s none of my business if you’re being a reckless idiot again? What about last time, huh? I thought you were done picking fights you can’t win.”
Dustin fought to free himself, but it was hopeless. He may have grown a lot since they first became friends, but Steve was always going to be taller and stronger than him.
Steve gripped Dustin’s other wrist too, just for good measure.
Dustin glared at him. “I’m not going to pick a fight with anyone.”
He wanted to add, “I can’t say the same for you” but even in his current haze of emotions he knew that wasn’t fair.
“Okay,” Steve was still holding his arms. “So, what are you doing out here at four in the morning, then, huh?”
“I could ask you the same question.” Dustin snapped.
“Ask it then.”
Dustin blinked. “What?”
“I’ll tell you what I’m doing, if you tell me what you’re doing. Deal?”
Dustin didn’t answer.
“Deal?” Steve’s voice took on that paternal firmness that Dustin secretly loved.
“Fine.” His shoulders sagged with exhaustion and defeat as Steve released him, took a step back to survey the whole picture, and then placed his newly empty hands on his hips, striking the familiar pose.
“Well?”
Dustin looked down again.
“You first.” He needed to buy some time to think of an explanation because there was no way he was going to tell Steve the whole truth this time.
“You’re not getting out of this, Henderson.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” Dustin muttered.
Steve raised his eyebrows, skeptically.
“I swear.”
Steve nodded slowly, then shrugged, “I couldn't sleep. Nightmare.”
“Oh.” Dustin wondered what Steve’s nightmare could be about. He had mentioned it so casually, but surely, it must have revolved around his near-death experience on the tower. Or with the Mind Flayer. Or at the hands of his Russian torturers. Or Billy. Or the demodogs. Or any number of nearly-fatal horrors that Dustin had been unable to stop.
“I felt like I was suffocating,” Steve continued matter-of-factly, “and I figured some air would help.”
“You have nightmares?” Dustin said softly.
Steve studied him for a while before responding, probably trying to decide whether Dustin was making fun of him or not.
“Of course I do.” Then, when Dustin didn’t respond, he added, “in case you forgot, Henderson, we stopped the apocalypse a month ago. That’ll do a number on your brain.”
He tapped a finger against his head. Dustin nodded slowly.
“Okay, your turn.” Steve took a small step towards him, putting them back within arm’s reach.
Dustin hesitated, “I couldn’t sleep either.”
“Why not?” Steve was not going to let him go that easily.
“Insomnia, I guess?” Dustin grumbled. “How the hell am I supposed to know?”
“Oh, cut the crap, Henderson. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Steve could not know how appropriate this word choice was. With Dustin’s track record, it was only a matter of time.
He shrugged and mumbled “it’s nothing,” in a poor imitation of Steve’s casual tone.
Steve sighed deeply.
“Listen, Henderson, I’m doing my best here. I just want to know that you’re okay. You know I worry about you, kid, right?”
Dustin wanted to throw himself into Steve’s arms and break down. He wanted to hold onto his friend and never let go, to feel him, to know that he was alive and safe and to keep him that way. But he didn’t. It would be stupid to break down over a nightmare, an “almost.” The last time he had cried in front of Steve had been in a life and death scenario, and he just couldn’t justify it this time. He was enough of a burden on him.
“Fine. You want the truth?” Dustin snapped. “I had a nightmare too. And I couldn’t handle it. Are you happy?”
Steve looked searchingly into his eyes, like he was trying to see through them into the thoughts behind them.
“What was it about?” His voice was gentle.
Dustin could feel the tears beginning to burn in his eyes.
“The tower. It’s always the tower.”
Steve took half a step towards him, his eyes questioning. “Always?”
“Almost every night.” Dustin choked out.
He understood the confusion he saw in his friend’s eyes. Of all the horrific things they had seen and experienced in the past four years at the hands of Vecna, an alternate dimension nearly crushing them shouldn’t even rank in the top ten.
But Steve hadn’t seen what Dustin had seen. He hadn’t watched his friend’s fingers—the only thing tying him to the tower, to life, to Dustin—slowly slipping. He hadn’t felt the suffocating helplessness. He hadn’t lost someone in the same way before.
Dustin was losing the fight with his tears. He felt one slide down his cheek and hoped that Steve couldn’t see it in the darkness.
“Hey, hey, Dustin…”
It was the softness in Steve’s voice when he switched to Dustin’s first name that finally broke him.
“You almost died up there.” Dustin cried. “You almost died and I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t save you. If you had died it would have been my fault, Steve. My fault. You always protect me. You always protect everyone, but I couldn’t do anything. I can’t protect you from anything. If something happens again, I won’t be able to stop it. I can’t save you.”
Dustin couldn’t see through his tears and the darkness, but he felt two strong arms close around him. Strong but gentle. Supporting but comforting. Holding him up and holding him tight.
“Hey, I’m here. I’m here, okay?”
In Steve’s embrace, Dustin fully let go. He sobbed unashamedly into Steve’s chest, glad now that his friend was still so much taller than him. Steve gently cradled the back of his head, gently caressing his curls as Dustin cried, until he must have used up every drop of water in his body.
He didn’t know how long they stood there. But he appreciated every second. Every life-proving heartbeat he could feel through Steve’s shirt. Every moment knowing Steve was there and he was safe.
Finally, Dustin’s grip on the back of Steve’s shirt loosened and he stepped away, wiping his eyes.
“Sorry.” His voice came out in a hoarse croak.
“Hey, hey, not that again. You have nothing to be sorry for.”
Dustin wished he could believe him. “I think about it all the time. The tower. I couldn’t do anything. You almost died.”
Steve shook his head. “I didn’t though. Byers pulled through. And you were kind of busy saving the world with that genius brain of yours.”
At any other time, Dustin would have glowed inside at the compliment, but he couldn’t enjoy it now. “Steve, you could have died. And I couldn’t save you.” His voice cracked. “And not just on the radio tower. You could have died last year with bats in the Upside Down.”
Steve tensed at the mention of the cause of Eddie’s death. But Dustin kept talking. “And when those demodogs almost got you. And Billy would have killed you if he could. And Starcourt… the Russians…”
“Henderson,” Steve cut in, “you fought off those Russians, remember? You got me out. That was the bravest and dumbest thing I’ve ever seen.”
“But I wasn’t fast enough. They hurt you.” Dustin wanted to add, “because of me,” but the words couldn’t seem to make it past his throat. All he could manage was, “you let them hurt you so I could get away.”
Steve had always refused point blank to tell him exactly what had happened after Dustin had escaped through the vent, but Dustin had seen the bruises. He had seen Steve limp for weeks afterwards. He had seen him wince whenever he took too deep a breath. He had seen him flinch at seemingly innocuous movements like he was trying to dodge a blow.
“They tortured you, didn’t they?”
Steve pressed a hand unconsciously to his ribcage. But his voice was steady. “That wasn’t your fault, Dustin. I knew what I was getting into. And you saved me, bud. And I’m okay. We’re okay.”
“I couldn’t keep you safe.” Dustin’s shoulders began to shake again. Steve gripped them protectively. But Dustin needed to make him understand. He needed Steve to appropriately hate him. “All I do is get you hurt. I’m just a burden that gets you hurt—”
“Hey. Hey! Look at me.” Steve’s voice was firm and commanding as he cut Dustin off. Dustin obeyed, meeting Steve’s gaze.
“Don’t you ever say that again.” Steve’s voice sounded angry for the first time that night, but Dustin knew it wasn’t at him. It was at the words he had said, the beliefs they betrayed.
“You are not a burden. Not on me. Not on anyone. Anyone who knows you is lucky as hell. I’m lucky as hell. I’m luckier than I deserve.”
“Steve…” Dustin wanted to say, he didn’t know what. But Steve shushed him.
“No, no, listen. You did save me.”
Dustin opened his mouth to say that standing by while his friend was beat up, captured, tortured, and nearly fell from a two-hundred-foot tower was hardly saving him, but Steve didn’t let him get a word out.
“Remember that day on the train tracks?” Dustin nodded mutely. Of course he remembered that day. But hearing that Steve did too made his eyes burn again. Steve kept talking. “You needed help catching that monster that ate your cat? You needed help and you picked me. I still don’t know why, but you did.”
Dustin shook his head, still not comprehending. Steve exhaled quickly.
“Look, you want to know what my nightmare was about? It was me, walking away. Going back to my life before everything with the Upside Down and Vecna. Before I met you. When I played basketball and got girls and nothing mattered. That’s all my life ever would have been if it hadn’t been for you and that demodog.”
“You were already—” Dustin tried to interrupt again, but Steve anticipated what he was going to say and kept talking over him.
“Sure, I fought that first one with Nance and Byers, but all that was still about me, you know? I wanted to prove I was as good, no, that I was better than Byers. And I wasn’t. But when you showed up, you gave me a chance to help someone else. To do something that actually mattered with my useless life. And then I almost walked away. After we got into… after we…”
Steve looked away. He seemed to be struggling with the word “fight.” Dustin didn’t blame him, his own throat tightened at the thought of it too.
Steve took a breath and continued, “after… after everything at the lab in the Upside Down, when I left, I almost didn’t come back. Can you believe that? I almost left you there. I almost walked away from my best friend. I almost turned out to be that guy that everyone thought I was. And it keeps me up at night.”
Steve leaned towards Dustin, hands still gripping his shoulders, eyes pleading with him to understand as the words kept pouring out.
“But you know what brought me back? That little kid on the train tracks. I owed it to him. He gave me a chance to help him because for some reason, he believed that I could. He believed that I would. He saw something in me that I didn’t know was there. And you know what else?”
Steve closed his eyes for a moment as his voice cracked with emotion. “He turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. My best friend. My brother.”
It was hard to tell in the dark, but Dustin thought he saw tears shining on his cheeks, matching the ones he could feel on his own.
“So, yeah, Henderson, you saved me. You saved me from my own stupid life and screwed up priorities. You saved me from who I was and who I was becoming. You saved me from the worst thing that ever happened to me: myself. But, listen to me…”
Steve’s hands, holding Dustin’s shoulders, tightened again, as if he was afraid that Dustin might slip away and miss what he was about to say.
“None of that even matters. Got that? None of that matters because no matter what, you’re worth it. You’re worth all of it. A million times over. Not what you’ve done for me or anyone else, but you. You, Dustin Henderson, are worth it.”
Dustin wanted to say something, but he didn’t know what. Even if he could think of the words to express what he was feeling, he wasn’t sure he'd be able to speak. He knew there were many aspects of his and Steve’s relationship that went unspoken, assumed, but unspoken. The casual passerby might overlook the depth of their bond because of just how much was unspoken.
But now it occurred to him for the first time that there were aspects he had never known about at all. Things he had never considered—never even hoped—that Steve might think and feel about him. About them. Dustin stared at his brother, eyes full of the same adoration that had once shone from those of the little curly-haired boy who couldn’t believe he was lucky enough to call Steve “the hair” Harrington his friend. Steve gazed back. Yes, there were definitely tears in his eyes now.
“So, don’t you dare call yourself a burden. Ever. Nobody talks about my best friend like that and gets away with it.”
Steve gave Dustin a gentle shove and then a millisecond later, pulled him into a hug that was somehow even tighter than the one before. Standing there embracing his brother, draped in his coat, Dustin felt safe—truly safe—for the first time in years.
After a minute Steve, face buried in Dustin’s hair, spoke up. “Why didn’t you tell me you were having these nightmares?”
Dustin sighed. “I guess it seemed stupid. Like I’m a kid who needs a nightlight, or something.”
Steve laughed unexpectedly. “You are a kid, Henderson. A brilliant, brave, heroic kid. But still a kid.”
Dustin didn’t say anything but smiled to himself as another tear traced down his cheek.
Steve spoke into Dustin’s hair again. “Will you promise me something?”
“What’s that?” Dustin murmured.
“Next time you have a nightmare, you call me, alright? Let me be there for you.”
Dustin hesitated for a moment, then whispered, “I promise.” Steve was right. He was a kid. A kid with the best father figure in the world.
When they finally loosened their holds on each other, Dustin decided that there was one more thing that he could not leave unspoken.
He looked up at his hero, his best friend, his brother, his father figure and spoke the truth, “I love you, Steve.”
Steve seemed to freeze for a moment, then he leaned down and tenderly, paternally kissed Dustin on top of his curly head.
“I love you too, Dustin.”
He reached out and ruffled Dustin’s hair in the familiar, playful way that made him feel, for just a moment, like the little kid on the train tracks again.