Work Text:
Grief hides itself in such ordinary moments.
Gareth is fine for years, until he puts on a jacket he hasn’t worn in just as long, sticks his hands in his pockets, and finds two tickets for Highlander. They were supposed to go together. It hits him then, like a metric fucking tonne of bricks. His wife can’t understand why he can’t stop crying, on and off, for at least three days after. But he never got to cry when it happened. He never even knew, until later, because his parents had packed them up and gotten out of town when he was still just a missing person.
For Jeff, it’s the absence of the safety he took for granted. The safety of a best friend, someone he could tell everything to, every thought that crossed through his mind, knowing he’d never once be met with judgement. He’s never been that close to anyone since. He feels his grief every single time he lets a conversation pass by without commenting, every single time he censors or edits himself, even just a little. Every single time he holds something back. Even when he meets and marries the wonderful, amazing woman that is his wife, there’s a part of him deep down that he’ll always keep from her – the part of himself that will never again be seventeen, with a best friend like that.
He only has groomsmen. He doesn’t – can’t – pick a best man. He lost his in 1986.
For Frank, it’s the way he still saves stories for the one person who will never hear them. Stories he knows would have made him smile, stories he knows would have made him lean back in his chair, tossing his head, laughing all the way down to his belly like he did when he really got going, his eyes crinkling with it, his dimples a riot of joy.
He thinks about telling Jeff and Gareth his stories, but they haven’t really spoken that much in the ten years since. They’d tried to keep in touch after they’d evacuated, but as they’d eventually gone off to college and gotten jobs and become busy with the minutiae of life, it had become harder and harder. They’ve seen each other at weddings, at funerals, and major birthdays, but when you only get together for the big things, it becomes hard to talk about the grief that haunts the ordinary things.
After a while, he started writing down the stories. At first it was stories about things that had happened since, that he would have wanted to tell him, and then it also became stories about him. He didn’t want to forget them, didn’t want to forget him. His sister had made fun of him for journaling, said it was girly and lame, but he liked it. He liked writing, he liked storytelling, and, inspired by their lost bard, after a few years he actually kinda had a novel drafted up. Corroded Coffin had ceased to exist in the aftermath of the Hawkins earthquakes, but in Frank’s novel, Rusted Reapers are going to make it big. He hasn’t let anyone read it yet.
He wants to read it to Eddie first.
Eddie’s grave is pristine. Someone clearly takes meticulous, painstaking care of it. The headstone gleams, the grass is neatly mowed, and a bouquet of gardenias, harebells and marigolds sits in a jar right in front of it. Frank frowns at them. His mom is a florist – he knows the language of these flowers.
He sits on the grass, spreading his notebook out in front of him, pressing his palms into the soft green carpet. “Hey Eddie,” he says, softly. “Sorry it took me so long to come.”
He reads his story to the place where Eddie has never been, but which is dedicated to his memory anyway. He wonders if it’s Wayne, if he came back to Hawkins to be close to Eddie’s grave, if he’s the one who keeps it so lovingly tended. Those particular flowers still give him pause though. When he’s finished reading, he rips out the page where he’d drafted his dedication page. He selects a small rock from nearby and kneels in front of the headstone, placing the paper on top of it and tucking it under the rock so it doesn’t get blown away.
“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?!”
Frank turns, startled by the shouting. His eyes land on – is that Steve Harrington? Harrington stops short, vague recognition in his face.
“Sorry,” he says slowly. “We’ve had some vandalism troubles over the years. You’re Eddie’s friend, I remember, from Hellfire?”
“Frank,” he says simply.
Harrington sits down next to him on the grass. He’s got a box of McNuggets in one hand and a water bottle in the other. Frank watches him uncap the water and top off the water in the jar, and he wonders about those flowers.
For a while they sit in silence. Harrington doesn’t touch his McNuggets, so Frank says, “Won’t they be cold by now?”
Steve lets out a little chuckle. It’s a breathy sound, more wet than not, more grief than mirth, and Frank looks over, surprised to see the former King of Hawkins High with shiny eyes over his friend. How their paths would have ever crossed, he’s got no idea.
“They’re for him,” Steve says, his eyes tracing the name Edward. “Every week I bring them. Before…” His breath hiccups and he pauses, collecting himself. “Before the quake, I promised him. Said I knew he’d had a really shitty week, and that when we got out of the spot of trouble we were in, I’d buy him anything he wanted for dinner. He wanted McNuggets.” Steve sighs, fond and exasperated and desperately sad, all in one. He places the box of McNuggets next to the flowers.
Frank eyes them, and the flowers. Harebells for grief. Marigolds for despair. Gardenias for secret love.
He wonders.