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The sun was beginning its slow descent, and the meadow seemed to soften with it. The air turned sweet in that quiet, fleeting way it always did at dusk—warm light stretching long over swaying grass, brushing gold across the tops of the trees.
Eddie lay flat on his back, hands folded over his stomach, staring up at the sky.
It felt… unreal.
After days spent inside Rick’s house—shuttered windows, stale air, the constant weight of being boxed in—being here, out in the open… it felt like something from a different life. The ground beneath him was cool, solid. The breeze shifted lazily through the grass, carrying the faint scent of earth and wildflowers, the steady drone of cicadas and some distant birdsong.
For a moment, there was nothing else.
Eddie inhaled deeply, like he could take it all in and keep it—store it somewhere safe for later.
Then—
A gunshot cracked through the air.
Eddie flinched hard, the sound snapping the moment clean in two. Peace shattered, replaced instantly by something sharper and more familiar, as reality rushed back in.
He pushed himself up onto one elbow, scanning the clearing.
The group was spread out in loose clusters across the field. The Sinclairs stood off to one side, focused, testing the balance of their spears. Nearby, Robin hovered close to Nancy and Max, shifting her weight from foot to foot as Nancy reset a row of dented cans balanced along a fallen log and stepped back, lifting the gun again with practiced precision. Her expression was set and serious as she explained something—stance, aim, breath—her voice too low for Eddie to catch from where he was.
Another shot rang out. Robin winced.
Max didn’t.
“Enjoying a relaxing nap?” Dustin asked, dropping down beside him, landing flat on his back in the grass.
“Yeah, well,” Eddie snorted, “the all-American sound effects aren’t exactly helping.”
He meant it as a joke and it landed like one, but… There was something else sitting heavy in his chest—a stone lodged somewhere beneath his ribs, growing heavier with every passing minute. It pressed against his lungs, made each breath feel just a little too shallow.
Eddie exhaled slowly and let himself fall back again, staring up at the sky. Tried to shake it off and just… take what he could get. Soak in the last moments of the day.
The clouds drifted lazily overhead, their edges catching fire as the sky deepened from gold into streaks of orange and red. For a moment, he let himself focus on that instead.
He nudged Dustin with his elbow and pointed upward.
“Dude. That one looks like a dragon’s head.”
Dustin squinted, unimpressed. “That’s a shitty dragon, man.”
“Hey,” Eddie shot back, “I didn’t make it.”
Dustin shifted slightly, scanning the sky. “That one kinda looks like a demogorgon.”
Eddie turned his head toward where he was pointing. “Which one?”
“Ah, man. You’ve never seen a demogorgon,” Dustin huffed. “Lucky you. Ugly humanoid son of a bitch with a head that opens into, like, five flaps.”
Eddie let out a short laugh. “That sounds sick.”
“Kinda,” Dustin said, then suddenly brightened. “Oh my God—wait, that one—look! That’s totally Steve’s hair.”
Eddie followed his line of sight, and—yeah. It really was. They both burst out laughing—loud, unfiltered, the kind that came easy and almost felt borrowed.
Then, just as quickly, it faded.
Eddie’s smile lingered for a second longer before slipping. His gaze drifted past the clouds, pulled away from their lazy shapes toward the RV—
—but Steve wasn’t there.
His brow furrowed slightly. He pushed himself up again, scanning the clearing, more deliberately this time.
There. A little ways off, sitting alone in the grass, facing the setting sun.
From this distance, Steve looked… calm. Like he was just another guy enjoying a quiet spring evening, not someone standing on the edge of something dangerous and uncertain.
The impulse hit Eddie all at once, sudden and insistent.
Now.
Like if he didn’t move right now, he wouldn’t get another chance.
He pushed himself up before he could think too hard about it, brushing dry grass from his jeans as he crossed the clearing. Steve glanced over at the sound of his approach. For a second, something flickered across his face—surprise, maybe—but it was gone just as quickly, replaced with a small, tight smile.
It didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“Hey,” Steve said, quieter than usual. He shifted slightly, patting the ground beside him.
Eddie sat. The grass rustled beneath them. Somewhere behind them, voices carried faintly, distant enough to blur into background noise.
He cleared his throat.
“So… uh.” A pause. “Molotovs?”
“All out of kerosene,” Steve said. “Set and ready.”
“Good. Good,” Eddie nodded, like that meant anything at all.
Steve let out a faint huff of a laugh, but it didn’t stick. His fingers tapped restlessly against his knee, a quiet, uneven rhythm.
“We’re… probably more prepared than we’ve ever been…” he trailed off.
Eddie didn’t look at him right away. He didn’t have to. He could hear it—the hesitation hanging at the end of the sentence, the part Steve wasn’t saying.
“But?” he prompted.
Steve exhaled slowly through his nose.
“Robin said something earlier…” He paused. “I don’t know. It just—” He shook his head slightly. “Feels like every time we think we’ve got a handle on things, it just… gets worse.”
Eddie swallowed, gaze fixed somewhere out in the field. “Sounds about right.”
“Yeah.” Steve’s mouth twitched, but there was no humor in it. “Feels like the stakes are higher this time.”
A burst of laughter cracked across the clearing behind them, sharp and bright, and Steve turned toward it instinctively, his attention snagging on the kids. Eddie followed his gaze.
Dustin was doubled over, mid-laugh, trying—and failing—to demonstrate something to Lucas with one of the spears. He nearly took himself out in the process, stumbling over his own feet while Lucas swatted at him in exasperation.
Steve watched them like he was trying to memorize it. Every movement. Every laugh. Every ridiculous, fleeting second.
Eddie’s chest tightened. He knew that look. Knew it too well, the quiet calculation, the bracing for impact, the way your brain starts tucking things away just in case.
Something settled in him then, dropped into place with a sense of finality.
“Hey,” he said.
Steve looked back at him.
For a second—just a second—Eddie almost lost his nerve. Steve’s gaze was steady. Searching. It flicked over his face like he was doing the same thing—taking him in, piece by piece, committing him to memory.
Eddie braced himself.
“I’ll keep him safe,” he said, and as the words left his mouth, he felt it. He had never meant anything more. “You have my word.”
Steve’s jaw tightened. For a moment, it looked like he might argue—like he might push back, say it wasn’t Eddie’s responsibility, that they all had their parts to play.
But he didn’t. He just nodded once, sharp and contained, and looked away.
“You do that.”
His face was set, grim. There was fear there—Eddie could see it, just beneath the surface—but it was buried under determination, under that stubborn refusal to let it show too much.
Eddie knew the feeling.
“When it starts,” Steve said, his voice rougher now, “you get out as fast as you can. Don’t stick around the trailer park. Those things are vicious—they’ll keep trying to get in, and if they do…” He hesitated. “You need to be far away.”
A chill slid down Eddie’s spine.
“There are people there,” he said quietly. “In the trailer park.”
Steve’s gaze flickered back to him, then dropped again. His hand dragged through his hair, restless, frustrated.
“Yeah,” he said, voice strained. “Then let’s hope they don’t succeed.”
Eddie clenched his teeth, his jaw tightening hard enough to ache. Hope. Yeah. Great plan.
Dustin’s favorite line floated back to him—never tell me the odds. Eddie got it now. Really got it. Because knowing the odds—feeling them—was something else entirely. It wasn’t just numbers or logic. It was this looming, invisible countdown pressing in from all sides, ticking toward something you couldn’t stop.
And his odds? Well. They weren’t looking great.
But maybe—
Maybe that wasn’t the point. Maybe the point was shifting them. Even a little, just enough for the others. For Dustin. For Steve.
He tipped his head back, into the sun, the last of the light filtering through the trees at the edge of the clearing. It brushed against his face—faint, but still there. He closed his eyes.
And, out of nowhere, he thought of his mom.
Her hands—warm, gentle—cupping his face like he was something precious. The way she used to smooth his hair back when he was little, soft and loving. The smile in her eyes.
God, how long had it been since he’d seen her?
How much longer until—
The sun slipped behind the trees. The warmth went with it, leaving something hollow in its place. A sudden, desperate resistance rose in him— he wasn’t ready, wasn’t ready for it to go, he needed just a little more time. Just a moment, a few seconds, anything—
“Wanna hang out,” Steve said suddenly, “when all of this is over?”
Eddie’s eyes snapped to him.
Steve wasn’t looking back, he was facing forward, gaze fixed somewhere in the distance, fingers drumming lightly against his thigh like he hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
“Sure,” Eddie said, his chest tightening around the word. “I’d like that.”
“What do you wanna do?”
“I—uh.” Eddie scratched the back of his head, eyes dropping to the grass. “Wasn’t really thinking that far into the future.”
Steve huffed softly. “Come on. Having something to look forward to… that’ll be nice, right?” He glanced over, just for a second. “I’m getting a big, juicy burger.”
Eddie snorted despite himself. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
A small silence settled between them.
Eddie hesitated. What did he want? Big things used to come easy—he used to want to become a rock star, graduate high school, get the hell out of Hawkins and never look back. But now…
Now with everything pressing in, it wasn’t the big stuff that stuck.
It was the small things.
“I kinda wanna play D&D with the guys,” he said finally. “Eat a ton of junk food. Watch movies.”
Steve smiled, faint but real this time. “What, that Shire thing you were going on about earlier?”
“Lord of the Rings,” Eddie corrected immediately. “And no way. You can’t make that into a movie. They’d ruin it.”
Steve huffed a laugh, shaking his head. “Yeah? You don’t think someone out there could pull it off? People said the same thing about Star Wars, right?”
“No, man. I’m serious.” Eddie raised a finger in a warning gesture. “Hollywood would butcher it.”
“Well,” Steve said, nudging him lightly, “if they ever do, I’m calling dibs on taking you to see it.”
Eddie’s breath caught.
It landed somewhere deep, that sentence—soft and impossible and dangerously close to something like… Not that Steve Harrington would ever want to… Well. Not that.
He let out a snort to cover it. “You just wanna see me suffer.”
Steve laughed, easier now, the tension from earlier loosening just a little. “No, come on. I’m serious. We’ll take Henderson. You’ll have someone to complain to.”
Eddie laughed too, a little uneven around the edges. Something was cracking within him and he didn’t want to let it. Didn’t want to feed a fantasy that wouldn’t ever come true.
But really, when one thought about it—what did it matter? What did it matter anymore?
After tonight… well.
He could enjoy a little fantasy, one last time.
He looked at Steve again, letting his gaze linger, drinking him in like he was running out of time. The soft curve of his smile, the warm hazel of his eyes, the stubborn edge of hope still hanging on there.
Not a bad thing to carry with him.
“Okay, Harrington,” Eddie said, smiling. Really smiling this time. “It’s a date.”