Work Text:
Chrissy Cunningham dressed for her wake with care.
The event didn’t start until the evening; she started preparing at around nine in the morning. She wasn’t going to get a second chance at this, so she wanted to do things right. To give herself plenty of time, she’d booked a hotel suite for the night before.
Now, she was going all out. The day started with a breakfast she only would have dreamed of the last time she was in Indiana: a Belgian waffle heaped high with berries and whipped cream, dripping with syrup. Next was a steaming, sweet-scented bath in the suite’s oversized tub. In there, she shaved every prickle from her legs and armpits and exfoliated her skin until it glowed. Then it was down to the spa for a full-body treatment: massage, facial, manicure, and pedicure. By the time she got back up to her room to order room service for lunch, she was bonelessly content in her fluffy hotel robe.
After lunch, it was time to do her hair and makeup for the last time. Normally, the process only took thirty minutes for a casual look, or closer to an hour for date nights. This time, she took two full hours. Her hair was piled atop her head in an updo that looked effortless and took twice as much care as a more polished look. Her eyelids were smoky, her lips painted and lined to perfection. All that was left was to get dressed.
This was the part she was least keen on. Everybody liked getting spoiled and pampered. But there was a part deep inside of her that hated getting dressed. Hated the discomfort of bras, the cloying cling of pantyhose, the pain of high heels.
“Last time,” she whispered to that voice inside her, hidden away for so long. She braced her hands on the bathroom sink. “Just this one last time. Then you never have to do this again.”
She didn’t look in the mirror as she got dressed, didn’t admire the drape of the black floral lace over the hot pink fabric underneath. The dress was beautiful, and fit like a glove. She knew that. Her friends back home said she looked stunning in it, and she believed them. It didn’t mean she wanted to see it.
Silver hoop earrings and a black lace choker finished the look. Only one thing left to do. Reaching into her suitcase, she pulled out a set of syringes and a small vial of clear liquid. She placed them on the nightstand, where they would wait for her until she came back tonight and used them.
With purse in hand, she was out the door just in time to be fashionably late to the event.
The parking lot to Lorenzo’s was packed. Chrissy was forced to park her beat up silver coupe on the street a few blocks away and hoof it to the restaurant. The cracked, uneven sidewalk made her wobble in her heels. She hated the feeling of walking in them; no matter how her friends assured her that she walked in them as naturally as barefoot, she felt like an ungainly circus clown swaying around on stilts.
The letter board sign at the front of the restaurant was a beacon, a distant guide showing her the way to a reprieve in the form of a seat at a table or bar. The lettering spelled out a message of welcome.
HAPPY TEN YEAR REUNION
HAWKINS HIGH
CLASS OF 1986
This was it. Her grand finale. The last night for Chrissy Cunningham to see and be seen. Taking a deep breath, she stepped inside.
Inside, the party was in full swing. The planning committee had booked out the whole place for tonight. The normal atmosphere of elegant intimacy was haphazardly covered up in a riot of green, white, and orange: streamers, balloons, and even tablecloths. A worn tiger mascot that looked like it hadn’t been replaced since Chrissy was a teen was trying to hype up a crowd of uninterested alumni. His efforts to get people to join him on the dance floor while the DJ played the Top 40 hits went mostly ignored.
A loud squeal got her attention as her old friend and fellow cheerleader Heather Holloway scurried up to her. “Oh my god, Chrissy Cunningham! It’s so good to see you! Girlfriend, you look amazing!”
Girlfriend. Chrissy flinched at the word. Just as quickly, she forced a smile to hide it. This was why she was here, wasn’t it? One night to show her younger self the love she’d been denied.
She could do this. Just grit her teeth, endure being perceived, and get through the night.
“Heather! So do you!” she replied, meaning it. Heather’s makeup was immaculate, her dark hair freshly permed. She looked like she’d spent almost as much time on her looks as Chrissy did.
“I’m so glad you could make it! I know when you RSVP’ed you said you might be moving. How’s that going?”
“Good, good. There were some delays getting my position moved, but that’s all taken care of. I move next week.”
“Seattle, right? You’ll have to have me over sometime once you’re all settled in. Give me the grand tour. We could have a girl’s weekend!”
Over her dead body. After tonight, she doubted she’d ever see anyone in this room again. They certainly wouldn’t be seeing her. “Sounds great,” she lied.
“Anyway - don’t let me hog you all to myself. Walk around, mingle! We’ve got a good turnout this year.”
Chrissy did just that. She flitted from group to group, saying hi and catching up with people she hadn’t seen since graduation. The mantle of Hawkins High queen bee settled heavily on her shoulders. She bore it with serenity and grace, knowing it would be the last time.
A hand touched her elbow from behind, nearly making her jump out of her skin. “Hey, Chris,” a familiar voice said, and her heart skipped a beat.
She turned around, already knowing who she would see. The past ten years had been good to him. Strong features and a perfect smile had lost the last traces of youthful roundness. Blond hair was freshly trimmed and parted to one side, not a single strand out of place. Blue eyes crinkled as he gave her a practiced, cookie-cutter smile.
A decade-old yearning flared back to life deep inside of her. “Jason! It’s so good to see you!” She threw her arms around his shoulders, surreptitiously admiring the musculature she could feel beneath his tan blazer. How broad and unyielding he was compared to her own slight frame.
God, how she ached.
Jason returned the embrace with awkward politeness. “How’ve you been?” he asked once they parted. He glanced around. “No date?”
“I’m good! And no, no date,” she said ruefully. Dating was something she couldn’t even think about. “What about you? I heard through the grapevine you’re off the market. Where’s the lucky girl?”
Once, it would have taken all her strength to say that. It had taken her a long time to admit to herself that Jason was not a good boyfriend to her. Back then, she hadn’t known better.
She hadn’t known a lot of things. Now, she did. And while those years as his neglected girlfriend were a dark spot in a hard life, she’d eventually learned important things about herself.
He grimaced, shifting from foot to foot. “I’m flying solo tonight, actually. Patty’s back home with a headache.”
She gave him a playful swat. “Then what are you doing here? Go home and take care of her!”
He huffed. “Trust me, I wanted to. But Patty insisted. I’m just here to put in an appearance. Then, it’s back home for ice cream and frozen burritos in front of the tube. Anyway - it was good seeing you.”
“You, too.”
Chrissy watched him go, a bemused smile on her face. When they were teens, Jason always seemed… tense. On edge. His temper flared the moment his masculinity was questioned. Like he had something to prove, but couldn’t figure out what or to whom. Now, he still held himself stiffly, but a lot of that anger seemed gone.
Chrissy hoped that whoever Patty was, Jason was a better partner than he’d been for her.
One by one, Chrissy said her hellos to all of the old cliques: the cheerleaders, track, girl’s volleyball, and of course, the basketball team. All the jocks made it except for Patrick McKinney, who’d RSVP’ed no to the event according to Heather.
With the jocks out of the way, she made the rounds to all the other faces, both familiar and forgotten. To her surprise, a lot of them greeted her, maybe not like an old friend, but with more kindness than she thought she’d earned. Sure, she’d made an effort to be nicer to people than the rest of her clique was back then, but she hadn’t exactly gone out of her way to hang out with them. Surviving high school had taken most of her strength; she hadn’t had enough to spare to make a statement of any kind. Still, she’d tried.
It felt nice, knowing even that small effort had been appreciated. Not that she was looking for gratitude or anything. But true kindness had been in short supply in the Cunningham household, so it meant the world to her that she’d made a difference, however small. It made her feel… at peace. Like she mattered.
And wasn’t that what she’d been looking to get out of this event? To let the tired, scared girl she’d once been know that it all meant something? That she could finally rest with no regrets?
She felt something deep inside unclench - like a muscle that had been wound tightly for so long that it didn’t remember how to relax. It reminded her of how her mother used to tell her to carry herself: shoulders back, stomach sucked in, butt kept tight. Those habits had taken her years to break.
Maybe now, at long last, her soul could unclench, too. It would be such a relief, not having to sculpt herself into a person she’d never wanted to be.
She thought of her hotel room, of the vial and the needles waiting for her on her nightstand. She was eager to get back to those things. And scared, too. She’d been preparing to take this plunge for so long. Now that it was upon her, her anxiety was getting the best of her.
Her eyes darted back and forth, eventually landing on the bar. A drink was just what she needed to settle her nerves. Then, she could go back to her hotel room and close out this chapter of her life that had dragged on for far too long.
And turn the page to a new one.
She called to the bartender and asked for a whisky, neat. Not wanting to stand, she looked for a seat. There was only one free stool at the bar: the one right up against the wall, next to a tall woman with a wild mop of curly, dark brown hair that hid her face from view. Her form-fitting pleather pants were tucked into ankle boots with a chunky heel. The sleek black blazer she wore nipped in neatly at her waist.
Chrissy frowned, trying to place who it was. She was tall, even for a guy - never mind for a girl. Wouldn’t she remember a girl that tall being in her graduating class? Granted, at her height, people towering over her was basically the norm, so she didn’t always notice. But she was so certain that she would have noticed a girl this tall.
Then again, she’d had a lot going on back then, so maybe not. Timidly, she reached out and tapped the woman on the shoulder. “Excuse me. Is this seat taken?”
“For Chrissy Cunningham?” a surprisingly deep voice said. “It is now.” A big, broad-fingered hand adorned with thick silver rings patted the empty seat in invitation.
The woman turned. Warm brown eyes met hers, and Chrissy immediately realized her mistake. Despite the touch of eyeliner and mascara around those wide, soulful eyes, those features were undeniably masculine. What she thought was a tall, large-framed woman was actually a person who, while dressed androgynously, was undeniably a man. The shadow of stubble across his cheeks and the dusting of dark hair beyond the plunging V of his half-unbuttoned shirt made that clear.
Not just any man. This was Eddie Munson - the boy who had awakened her in so many ways. Ever since a damp spring day a decade ago, when he made a drug deal with a scared, sad girl who was desperately holding onto life with the tips of her fingers. He’d thrown everything she knew about herself into complete chaos, and she hadn’t even known it yet. Back then, she wasn’t ready to know her true self the way she did now.
But she was ready now.
“Oh my god, Eddie! I didn’t think you’d be caught dead at one of these things!” She looked him up and down, admiring his long lines, the undefined aesthetic of him. “You look…” Beautiful was the word that came to mind. Not handsome, but beautiful. A subtle application of makeup rounded some of the sharper edges of his face, giving him a look that couldn’t quite be defined as feminine, but skirted the edge of it. It was difficult to put words to what he was. “Good,” she finished lamely.
He snorted into his drink. “Me? Look at you! Still holding onto the title of prettiest girl in Hawkins, huh?”
As a teen, she would’ve killed to hear those words from him. Now, they just made her squirm uncomfortably in her stool.
God, life was so unfair. She wished, for the billionth time, that she could just be as normal as the mask she’d worn her whole life.
“I haven’t changed all that much,” she demurred. Yet, she thought. “But you! You’ve got this whole glam thing going on. I thought you hated glam. I totally remember you sneering when I played a Bon Jovi tape in your van.”
He clutched his chest with an indignant scoff. “Moi? Sneer? How dare you pin my character with such… well, accuracy.” He somehow managed to pull off a lopsided smirk that was both sheepish and utterly unrepentant.
“You did,” she insisted, laughing. She nibbled on her lower lip. “It looks good on you, though. Really, really good. Still, what made you change your mind?”
That smirk spread across his face, transforming into a genuine smile that raised his reddening cheeks. The neon signs advertising light beer electric glinted blue off of his lip gloss. Coughing, he rolled his eyes. “God, I was such an annoying shit back then. Obsessed with putting everybody into boxes, all neatly labeled and sorted into cliques.”
She remembered tabletop tirades in the cafeteria, and a fifteen minute diatribe about what he considered “real metal” the first time he drove her to his place for a deal. “You weren’t that bad,” she protested, half-truthfully. He might have been every bit as bad as he said, but to her, it just made him seem worldly and untamed. Too large to be contained by the tiny cage that was Hawkins.
“Yeah I was,” he said matter of factly. “That’s okay, though. Once I got out of here, met people who weren’t all born and raised in the same place, I realized: labels are limiters, and I don’t have time for that shit.”
Something deep within Chrissy that had been clenched all her life without her knowledge finally, for the first time, relaxed. The feeling was so foreign that it felt less like relief and more just… overwhelming.
“Labels are limiters,” she echoed, smiling softly. “I like that. That feels like a motto I could live by.”
“I bet you could. Always knew there was more to you than meets the eye, Cunningham.”
She froze. Did he know? Could he somehow see past the careful funerary mask she’d spent hours sculpting in front of the mirror?
“What do you mean?” she asked slowly, a deer scenting for lion on the air.
He shrugged, taking a drink of his cocktail. A Long Island iced tea, if she had to guess. “Dunno. I mean… yeah, you did the whole ‘rah rah,’ pep rally thing. You were good at it. But every time you thought nobody was looking, you looked like you wanted to squirm out of your skin. Like you were wearing the world’s itchiest sweater. After what you used to tell me about your mom, I put two and two together.”
She sighed, feeling an odd mixture of relief and disappointment. Eddie had an uncanny ability to see right through her. He always had, since that day at the picnic table in the woods. The idea of him seeing who and what she was absolutely terrified her.
Still. It would be nice to be seen for who she really was. By him, specifically. But she knew that was impossible.
She glanced around the room, suddenly convinced every eye was on her. But no - all of her old classmates were busy catching up with each other. “You’re not wrong. I’m still trying to figure out what it means to take the sweater off,” she confessed quietly.
His tongue flicked out to wet his lips. “Maybe that’s something I could help with. I overheard you say you’re in Seattle now, right? I’ve been living there for two years now. Maybe we could hang out sometime.”
Her heart skipped a beat. Eddie Munson was flirting with her, looking too gorgeous to be real. He wanted to hang out with her. Like a date? The glint in his eye said yes.
And she had to turn him down. Because after tonight, Chrissy Cunningham would cease to exist. The dress, the hair, the makeup, the nails - it was all fake. Everything he liked about her was just a facade - one she never intended to wear again.
“I can’t,” she whispered, hating the words even as she spoke them.
The disappointment that flitted over his face was like a slap to hers. Hurting his feelings was the last thing in the world she wanted.
As quickly as it appeared, that look on his face vanished. “Okay, cool, no worries,” he said quickly.
She had to fix this. How could she fix this? “Eddie, it’s not - “
“Me, it’s you,” he interrupted, finishing the sentence for her. He offered her a halfhearted smile. “It’s fine. Seriously. You don’t have to babysit my feelings. I’m not your type. I get it.”
No. He didn’t. He really, really didn’t. “It’s not that at all. I just…” She trailed off, not knowing what to say. Not the truth, obviously. There was no telling how he’d react to that.
He pivoted on the stool to face her fully. “Chrissy. It’s okay. I’m not gonna throw a tantrum just because you like your guys blond and buff.”
“I don’t,” she said miserably.
“Look, just forget I said anything, okay? After tonight, you never have to see me again. And if you ever wanna hang out - just as friends, no agenda - I’m in the phone book.”
Knocking back the rest of his drink, he left Chrissy alone at the bar, feeling awful. Spirits thoroughly dampened, she did her best to mingle with her old classmates, catching up on what they’d been up to for the past decade. It all went in one ear and out the other; all of her thoughts were on Eddie. How wonderful he looked, the kindness he showed her even now.
She didn’t stay at the event long. Her mood was completely ruined. It wasn’t long before she slipped out of the venue and went back to her hotel room. The act of undressing was quicker than getting ready, but just as ritualistic. First was changing out of the dress and into something far more comfortable: a pair of boxer shorts and an oversized t-shirt. She took out some makeup wipes and cleaned her face with slow, methodical strokes. Nail polish was stripped from her nails, which were then cut short. She removed the bobby pins from her elaborate updo one by one, dropping each one into the small trash can in the bathroom.
Looking in the mirror, she was just as unhappy with her reflection as ever. She looked at her silky hair, her soft features, the delicate upturn of her nose with distaste. For the last time ever. Everything would be different after tonight. She picked up the syringes and phial of clear liquid from where she left them on the nightstand. It was time for Chrissy Cunningham to rest in peace.
She hesitated. What if…
What if she didn’t go through with it?
Maybe… she could get rid of that phial. Throw it out, or dump it down the drain, or shove it to the far back of her closet and forget it existed. She could be the girl Eddie wanted her to be. The girl the whole world wanted her to be. If she tried hard enough, maybe she could learn to love being that girl.
She’d sleep on it, she decided. She didn’t have to make a decision tonight.
She spent the night tossing and turning in that unfamiliar hotel bed. When the sun rose through the windows, she reluctantly got out of bed, still undecided. It wasn’t until she opened her suitcase that she made up her mind.
When she arrived at the hotel yesterday, she wore a pretty sundress. She’d brought two changes of clothes with her. The first was the dress she wore to the class reunion last night. The other was far more casual: a baggy pair of jeans, a tank top with a high neckline, and a loose jacket she’d bought from the men’s section of a thrift store.
Looking at that outfit, she knew: she was going to do this. She couldn’t go on living her life for others. Not even Eddie.
But god, she wished she could.
Getting dressed this morning was a simpler affair. She slipped into her comfortable clothes as naturally as she took a breath. With a spare hair elastic, she tied her hair in a low ponytail. Then, she got ready to check out. Her suitcase was empty except for the pajamas she wore last night. The makeup, the nail polish, the various potions of femininity she’d forced herself to use all this time - all of them went into the trash. The two dresses, she folded and left on the bed. Maybe someone from housekeeping would want them.
She wouldn’t be needing them anymore.
The last thing she took from the room was that small glass bottle with the syringes. She hadn’t used them last night like she planned, but that was okay. She could do it today. If last night was Chrissy Cunningham’s wake, then today would be her funeral. And she knew just the place to have the impromptu ceremony.
Packing her things into her car, she drove to the place where it all began: Hawkins High. There was an abandoned picnic table out in the woods she needed to see.
He blew it. He absolutely blew it.
Or it was probably more accurate to say he never had a shot in the first place.
Tromping through the woods behind the high school, he kicked a rotted old log just off the partly regrown path to his old spot. The moss-covered thing broke apart so completely he couldn’t decide if it shattered or crumbled. Crattered? Shumbled? Whatever.
He shouldn’t’ve dressed so femme last night. At the very least, he should’ve forewent the makeup. He knew he was asking for trouble. He meant it as a giant middle finger to all his shitty old classmates - a way to say he wasn’t hiding anymore. He wasn’t a scared little shit wearing his “evil” persona like an armor to stop him from getting his ass beat by the jocks.
And yeah, maybe he wanted to make all the townies squirm. Old habits died hard.
He wasn’t even gonna go to the stupid event. He didn’t really give a shit what all his old classmates were up to. But then he heard Chrissy was gonna be there, and he caved. When it came to her, he always caved.
Stupidly, he thought maybe she’d be into his whole thing. When he went on his thing about labels, she looked at him with a soft expression he could only describe as wonder. So he took his shot. And missed spectacularly.
After she retreated, he spent the night tossing and turning in Wayne’s living room (“no sense wasting your money on a hotel when I’ve got a perfectly good pull-out couch”). Stubbornly, he insisted on wearing the shirt he’d brought along - the olive green one, with the ruffles at the neck and cuffs. Just because he swung and missed on the girl of his dreams didn’t mean he was gonna give up on looking the way that made him happy.
Still - he was too bummed to put any effort into makeup this morning. He threw on some chunky rings and silver pendants, shrugged into last night’s blazer, and called it a day.
“See you at Thanksgiving, old man,” he said, pressing an obnoxious kiss to his uncle’s bald head.
Wayne batted him away with the hand still holding the spoon he used to stir his coffee. “Yeah, yeah. Go on, get out of here. I just got the stink of hairspray out of your old room after all this time. Don’t need it coming back,” he grumbled.
“Can’t have that. Then you’ll remember what you’re missing,” Eddie shot back, dodging the rolled up newspaper as it sailed toward his head.
It was a shame things didn’t work out with Chrissy, he mused as he drove toward the town line. But maybe it was for the best. Holding onto a crush he’d had since he was fourteen was… well, it was nuts. Over half his life mooning over one girl. Who did that?
Maybe it was time to give up the whole casual dating thing and try for something more serious. Forget about the pretty cheerleader with the sad eyes who lived in his head and find someone real. Someone who was nothing like Chrissy, with her dainty frame and her delicate features and her pretty… god, her pretty everything.
God, he was so screwed.
He was halfway to the town line when he pulled a haphazard U-turn with a muttered curse. If he was gonna mourn the death of his decade and a half long crush, he was gonna do it properly. With a little closure, he could move on.
And that was how he found himself tromping through the woods behind the high school. The paths to his old drug dealing spot were partly covered with a few years of new growth. Apparently, whoever the current weed dealer of Hawkins High was, they must’ve found a new spot to peddle their wares.
So it was with some surprise that he realized that the clearing with the picnic table wasn’t empty. It took him a second to recognize Chrissy Cunningham in that diminutive figure. Gone was the poised and polished knockout from last night. This Chrissy’s hair was messy, her face bare, and she was dressed in oversized men’s clothes that sagged off her thin frame.
And god damn it, she was every bit as beautiful as she’d been last night, flitting from person to person like a butterfly. She could go out in a Hefty bag and still look gorgeous.
She was staring down at something in her hands with an intensity he’d never seen from her. He half expected Cyclops-style eye lasers to shoot from her eyes to melt the small glass bottle she held.
Eddie dithered, not sure if he should interrupt what seemed like a private moment. He was supposed to be getting over her right now, not making his stupid feelings worse. But looking at her in this clearing - his clearing, their clearing - filled him with such a sense of déjà vu that he found himself stepping forward.
The leaves on the ground crunched beneath his feet, making her head shoot up in alarm. She quickly shoved whatever she was holding into her jacket pocket. He watched in fascination as her face went stark white, then a deep red, then white again.
“Eddie! Y-y-you…” She trailed off.
Eddie winced. How the fuck did she look just as terrified as she did that day in the woods ten years ago? As far as he knew, she had nothing to be afraid of anymore. She was out from her mom’s control. She wasn’t stuck with that asshole, Carver. They’d both long since left the bullshit politics of high school behind.
That left only him. The thing she was afraid of was him. God, he never should’ve asked her out.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.” Again, he added silently. She didn’t need to know how often he thought about their last months of high school. The shared joints, the late night movies at his place, the lingering looks in the haze of weed smoke, the what-ifs, the if-onlies.
She offered him a weak smile. “Once is an instance. Twice is a coincidence. Careful, Eddie - one more time and you’ve got a pattern.”
He didn’t know how to respond to that. Would she tease him like that if she were afraid of him? He didn’t think so. He saw how she used to act around people she was scared of. The way her shoulders caved in while she plastered on a simpering smile that didn’t reach her eyes. That wasn’t how she looked now. Yeah, she was shifting awkwardly from foot to foot, and there was the thing she was hiding in her pocket - which was none of his business - but she wasn’t shrinking from him or fawning over him.
He cast his gaze about, looking for something to say. The leaves shone with morning dew. The sun shone through them, casting the clearing in dappled verdant light. Birds sang in the branches around them, and squirrels scampered along the trunks. It was as if nothing at all had changed since he left. Like this place was frozen in time.
Except for one thing. There was a pocket knife on the rotted old picnic table. Next to it was a carving, the scoured lines several shades lighter than the rest of the weather-worn wood. Unlike all the other carvings this table had gotten over the years, this one was brand new.
He frowned, trying to make out what it said. Before he could get a good look, Chrissy put herself between him and the table to block his view.
Okay. He could take a hint. Time for a change of subject. “Didn’t expect to see you out here,” he said casually.
The bulge in her pocket moved as she fiddled with whatever was in there. “This place means the world to me,” she said softly. “It seemed like the best possible place to say…” She cut herself off like she’d said something she didn’t mean to. And there it was again - that look of absolute terror.
Something was up here. He might not understand it, but that didn’t mean he could just ignore it. He never could, when it came to her. “Say what?” She shook her head, and he pressed harder. “Say what, Chrissy?”
“Nothing. Just… just forget I said anything.”
He couldn’t do that. Whatever had her so scared, it must have something to do with the carving on the table and the mystery item in her pocket. Between the two, he chose to check out the table. Even he wasn’t dense enough to think shoving his hands into a girl’s pockets in the middle of the woods was a good idea.
When he moved to circle around her to get a look at the table, she moved with him. But she made a terrible goalie with her hands shoved in her jacket pockets.
“No, wait!” she cried as he got a good look at what she scraped into the tabletop.
C.C.
RIP
His blood went to ice in his veins. “What did you come here to do, Chrissy?” he asked slowly.
“It’s…” She swallowed visibly. “It’s not what it looks like.”
Not what it looked like? She made a tombstone out of the place where they connected, and it wasn’t what it looked like? Why here, of all places, if he meant nothing to her? It made no fucking sense.
Or did it? He thought back to last night - her response when he asked her out. I can’t. Not “no thanks.” Not “I have a boyfriend.” Not even taking down his number to shut him up and throwing it in the trash. I can’t.
Because if she was planning to kill herself, then there was no point agreeing to a date.
Terror and desperation drove him forward. He took her face in his hands - gently, gently, if he scared her off there’d be no saving her - and fucking begged. “Chrissy, please. Please don’t do this. I don’t - whatever you’re dealing with, I don’t know how but I’ll fix it.”
“Eddie - “
“Whatever it takes, you hear me? Just tell me why to do, and I’ll do it. Just - just don’t hurt yourself, Jesus, I can’t - “
“Eddie!” She grasped his wrists in both hands, but made no move to get his hands off her face. “I told you, it’s not what you think. It’s just - I dunno - a metaphor.”
Fear was overcome by confusion as he stared at her, wide-eyed. His heart still slammed against his ribs. “A metaphor,” he echoed incredulously, “for fucking dying. I’m really gonna need you to elaborate.”
She stared up at him for a long moment, a question in her blue-gray eyes. Whatever she was looking for in his face, she must have found. With a long, shuddering sigh, she let go of his wrists and dug through her pockets.
“I don’t expect you to understand,” she mumbled, “but I know you won’t - do anything. Or tell anyone. You’re the first person from Hawkins I’m telling.”
“Telling what?” he asked, even as she produced what it was she was hiding. In one hand was a couple of syringes, pristine and still in their packaging. In the other was a small glass phial full of clear liquid, with a prescription label he couldn’t quite read.
He reached for the bottle to get a better look. Her fingers twitched, as if she wanted to snatch it away. But she let him take it.
He ran his thumb over her name, Christina Cunningham, spelled out in all caps. And underneath that, the drug name: Testosterone.
Relief dissolved every last bone in his legs and feet. Staggering over to the picnic table, he sagged down onto the bench with a thump. Not once did he take his eyes off that label. Not even when she sat down next to him.
Trying to process the information before him was like trying to swim through molasses. Chrissy Cunningham was not committing suicide. Far from it. She came here, to their spot, to take an injection of testosterone. Her first? He checked the lid. Yup - it was still sealed. Which meant that she… that he…
He nudged Chrissy - was that even his name anymore? - with an elbow. “Jesus Christ, is that it? You scared the shit out of me!” Seeing his hand outstretched, palm up, he placed the phial there.
“To be fair,” she - he, this was gonna take some getting used to - said, “I had no idea you’d be here.”
He grimaced. “Fair. But still - what’s with all the Rest In Peace stuff? A little overdramatic, don’t you think?”
Chriss - Cunningham’s eyebrows quirked. “That’s rich, coming from you.”
“I mean, that’s accurate.” His leg started to jiggle restlessly. “Seriously though, why? I thought you’d be, I dunno, happy about it.”
“I am,” he said quickly. “Really, I am. But there’s so much more I’m feeling. It’s just… it’s complicated.”
Eddie leaned back, resting his elbows on the table. “I’ve got nowhere to be. And I can be a good listener once I shut my mouth.”
The sweetness of Cunningham’s smile made his chest ache. “I know. You always listened to me back then.” He chewed on the inside of his cheek. “I dunno. I just… it feels like I’ve wasted so much of my life, you know? I mean, I’ll be thirty in a year and a half, and I’m just now figuring out who I am. I feel like an idiot for not figuring it out sooner.”
He bumped Cunningham again. “You got there, though. That’s what matters. Besides, it’s not like life ends at thirty.”
He leaned back, mirroring Eddie’s relaxed stance. “It’s not just that. I was horrible to myself for all this time. Years spent hating, starving, and cutting myself down to squeeze into a box I was never going to fit inside. And that made me start hating myself in a different way. Which didn’t help.”
“Never does.”
“So then I started thinking about it differently. If I’m a guy, then the girl who did all those things was someone else. A scared, helpless girl who made mistakes.” He glanced sidelong at Eddie and laughed weakly. “Sounds crazy, I know. But once I started thinking of Chrissy as a big sister, a clueless teen who did the only things she could think of to keep me safe… it was easier to forgive her. Forgive myself.”
Eddie nodded. It was weird, sure, but it made sense. He knew firsthand how cruel high schoolers could be. If they caught wind that their queen was actually a transgender dude, things would’ve gotten ugly. And that didn’t even begin to touch on his monster of a mother. Eddie didn’t even want to think about what horrific punishments Laura would have come up with to force her “daughter” back in line.
“So that’s what last night and today were about,” Cunningham went on. “I wanted to say goodbye to her, to honor her and let her know that her job’s done. I figured, one last night getting dolled up and spending time with friends would be a good way to say, ‘thank you. I forgive you. You can rest now.’” His cheeks pinkened. “It sounds stupid when I say it out loud.”
“Not stupid. Like you said, it’s a metaphor.” Eddie’s tongue poked at the inside of his cheek as he digested this new information. It was all starting to make sense. There was just one thing that wasn’t adding up. “Why here, though? You could’ve done this whole ceremonial thing anywhere.”
Cunningham’s face reddened. His eyes stayed locked on his hands where they fidgeted between his knees. “This is where it all started,” he said. “I didn’t know it at the time, but… meeting you was what made me start questioning things.”
Eddie frowned. There was no way in hell he was the one who inspired her journey into self-awareness and transformation. His being a fucking mess aside, he’d gone out of his way to avoid looking remotely glam or femme in high school. Being a poor, geeky, metalhead drug dealer put enough targets on his back; if word got out that he was queer, too, he’d’ve gotten his ass beat from homeroom to detention every day. “Me? What’d I do?”
“Before that day, I thought I knew what a crush was. I thought I wanted to date a cute blond boy who really liked sports.” He looked at Eddie askance. “Then I met you and I figured out what a crush really felt like. It took me years to figure out that I didn’t want to be with Jason. I wanted to be like him.” He grinned crookedly. “Only hopefully a lot nicer.”
Jesus, the hits just kept coming. “You had a thing for me?”
Cunningham nodded. “I meant it when I said I can’t date you. Now you know why. It’s not that I don’t like you. It’s that I can’t be the girl you want.” He sighed, standing up. “Anyway. Thanks for understanding. And for not being freaked out. I’ll get out of your hair now.”
Cunningham didn’t make it even half a step before Eddie reached out and grabbed his wrist. His heart was going a mile a minute as he realized the implications of what he just said. “Why the fuck would I be freaked out? Cunningham, you do realize I’m not exactly a dude, right?”
“Really?” His whole face lit up as he looked Eddie up and down. “I thought you were just dressing the way glam rockstars used to. So you’re - a woman?”
He pulled a face. “I’m something,” he hedged. At Cunningham’s confused look, he elaborated. “I dunno. I don’t really feel like either. Some days I like looking kinda femme. Some days I don’t. Like I said last night, I’m not really into labels.”
“Oh.” Cunningham chewed his lower lip. A blush spread across his cheeks like the first scarlet light of sunrise. “So does this mean that invitation’s still open?”
“Fuck yeah,” he blurted before his brain had a chance to catch up. “I thought I was asking out Hawkins’s prettiest girl. Turns out I scored a date with the hottest guy. I’d be a moron to pass that up.”
Cunningham gasped softly, his face lighting up when Eddie called him a guy. He could relate. There were days when he got reactions to his whole gender performance thing that sent a thrill of elation through him. It felt like being seen after a lifetime of hiding.
Before he could react, Cunningham threw his arms around Eddie’s neck and pulled him in for a sweet kiss. Ever since he was in middle school, Eddie imagined what it would be like to kiss Chrissy Cunningham. How soft she’d be, how pliant in his arms. He always imagined her kisses would have the sticky slickness of lip gloss - flavored like cookies, or strawberries, or bubble gum. The reality was unadorned, with no flavor but his own natural taste and the lingering mint of toothpaste.
One taste and he was hooked. He wondered how it would change in the coming months and years. Would Cunningham taste different? Feel different? Would he feel the rasp of stubble against his face? He couldn’t wait to find out.
The kiss didn’t last long. It couldn’t, with both their mouths stretched into giddy smiles. Eddie reached out to tweak the edge of Cunningham’s jacket pocket. “Ready to take the plunge?”
“Yeah.” Eddie wisely kept his hands to himself. He had no experience with this kind of thing, and the last thing he wanted to do was fuck it up. Setting the supplies on the table, Cunningham prepared the injection and pressed it into his skin without so much as a wince. He heaved a sigh of relief. “Finally.”
Eddie reached out to rub Cunningham’s shoulders soothingly. What would the hormones do to his frame? Would he stay thin and lithe, or would he bulk up? The mystery of it all felt like an adventure. He didn’t know what changes the coming months would bring, but he was excited to uncover each and every one.
He wasn’t left waiting long. Cunningham picked up the pocket knife from the table and asked Eddie to cut his ponytail off. Once Eddie made it clear that he couldn’t cut hair well even with scissors, he agreed to do it.
“So,” he said as he sawed the blade through the soft strands between the base of his skull and the scrunchy, “what should I call you? I can’t keep thinking of you as Cunningham.”
“I actually always liked when you called me that,” he replied. “I didn’t know why at the time, obviously, but it felt nice. Anyway - maybe I’m oversimplifying, but I always liked being called Chris.”
“Chris it is.”
He finished cutting through the ponytail. Chris’s hair was a total fuckin’ mess with jagged, uneven ends. And yet that ponytail kept its flawless signature curl.
The two of them walked out of the forest, hand in hand, their phone numbers safely tucked in each other’s pockets. The only traces of their passing were the carving in the picnic table, surrounded by a length of strawberry blonde hair bundled together with a scrunchie.
It was an ending for Chrissy Cunningham. After years of struggling to survive, she was finally allowed to take her well-earned rest. And after a lifetime of being kept in the dark, Chris could have his turn in the sun at last.