ghost-in-the-world

bowie !!

they/she

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Read This Read This Please

Read this read this please

The Interview (and the year and a half to follow)

Pairing: Eddie Munson × Steve Harrington

Summary: When rockstar Eddie Munson reveals that he's married, and to a teacher no less, his fans don't know what to do with themselves. Steve and Eddie, especially Eddie, love the chaos. And he can't help but keep declaring his love for his mystery husband.

Word Count: 2.7k

A/N: This is a modern AU in which Steddie are in their early thirties and everyone else is aged up accordingly, and it's truly incredibly sappy. I wrote this all in one go at 2-4am before a shift at 9am, so it could be a masterpiece or it could be crap. You decide!

The Interview (and The Year And A Half To Follow)

"My husband is a middle school teacher." Eddie had said, just trying to give the interviewer a little bit of background on his life. He hadn't expected it to set the internet on fire.

HE'S MARRIED?? TO A TEACHER?????

I CAN'T EVEN IMAGINE WHAT HIS HUSBAND COULD BE LIKE!!!

IS IT AN OPPOSITES ATTRACT KIND OF RELATIONSHIP OR IS EDDIE'S HUSBAND JUST THE MOST HARDCORE TEACHER EVER??

ONLY A LEGEND LIKE EDDIE MUNSON COULD DROP SUCH A BOMBSHELL SO CASUALLY!!

"Eds, what the hell did you do?"

"All I did was say that my husband is a middle school teacher and now everyone's obsessed with you. I think they like the idea that I have a soft side."

"You're nothing but soft sides." Steve chuckled, engulfing Eddie in his arms as they cuddled on the couch. "Maybe I should be the famous one."

"In your dreams, Harrington." Eddie scoffed, playfully smacking him on the shoulder.

"If they like the idea that you're secretly a softie, maybe you should tell them that we're an emergency foster home. Or that we have seven pseudo-children."

"One thing at a time, babe. I don't want to set the world on fire."

Eddie didn't do another interview for a while. He was busy producing his band's next album, their fifth one, and spending time with friends and family between tours. But when Corroded Coffin was invited to be the musical guest on a late night show two months later, partly to promote a movie that Eddie was in (it would be his acting debut and he would be lying if he said he wasn't terrified that people would think he was absolutely horrendous), he had almost forgotten about the frenzy he had whipped his fanbase into at the reveal of the existence of his husband.

"So, a couple of months ago you let slip that your husband is a teacher." The host said to him when he sat down after performing his song, and the audience cheered. These were the questions they wanted answered.

"Yeah, a lot of people were surprised to hear that I'm married but I've been wearing a wedding ring for six years." Eddie smiled, holding his left hand up to the camera to display the simple silver wedding band on his ring finger. "I guess nobody really noticed because I wear a lot of rings."

"That's insane, you've been married for six years?" The host exclaimed, and Eddie nodded with a chuckle. "I have to ask, how did you two meet? I mean, a heavy metal rockstar and a middle school teacher are not a conventional pair."

"We met in high school." Eddie answered, and the audience awed. "Well, technically, he had just graduated high school and I was on my second repeat of senior year. We met through some mutual friends."

"That's so sweet. Isn't that so sweet?" The audience cheered at the host's prompt and Eddie giggled, his hair falling into his face. "Was it a love at first sight thing? How did you end up together?"

"Um, kind of. It was strange, he was a popular jock in high school and I was about as weird and unpopular as they got, but once we got to know each other outside of school we clicked fast. And he's hot, like really hot, so I fell immediately." The crowd laughed.

"Wow, that's fantastic. But, anyway, I need to move on before I get carried away. Let's talk about this movie you're in."

"Yes, let's."

Steve was watching the show at home, sat on the couch with Robin on one side and Dustin on the other who were poking and teasing him as they watched the tooth-rottingly sweet interview. Robin was the one who hopped onto Twitter to see what people were saying, and, once again, social media was ablaze. #eddiemunsonhusband was trending the whole next day, and Steve and Eddie found it hugely amusing.

Eddie slowly started opening up about his personal life after the overwhelmingly positive response to all his husband talk. At the premier of his movie, he walked Robin down the red carpet with him, telling the interviewers that the two of them and his husband were all roommates for a few years in his early twenties. In a radio interview he did in the lead up to his album release, he talked about how he ran the Hellfire Club in high school and how he was still friends with and still semi-regularly DMed for the kids that were in the club, and he told them about how one of the Hellfire kids was the one to initially introduce him to his husband. When the album released and the band did an interview with Rolling Stone, he told them about how supportive everyone in his life was of his music. He told them about the night's he would stay up writing Corroded Coffin's first album, his husband - then boyfriend - doting on him the entire time. And all of this served to fan the flames of his follower base because, even in opening up about his life and his friends and family, he never revealed who his husband was.

Steve didn't go to many of Eddie's public appearances. He never had; it wasn't his scene. And when he did, they kept their distance and kept things discreet until they were inside and there were no more cameras. When Eddie went out and released another morsel of information about his life, Steve sat at home grading papers or planning lessons and smiling to himself about his chaotic rockstar husband.

And then it was time for Eddie to go on tour again. Steve hated saying goodbye when Eddie went on tour.

The tour started in California and slowly snaked it's way across all fifty states, stealing Eddie away from their home in Indianapolis for six months. The faculty at Steve's school kept asking what was wrong in the first few weeks after Eddie left. He told them that his husband was travelling for work.

Eddie missed Steve too. Unapologetically so. For the first time on tour, he felt comfortable mentioning his husband. Every other night he brought up how much he missed him, usually as an introduction to one of their songs; one of the softer ones, off of their third album, that he wrote about Steve right after they got married. The audience ate it up every time. His bandmates always rolled their eyes and teased him after the show.

Eddie's tour landed back in Indiana right after Spring Break. Steve was thrilled to have him back, even if it was brief before he moved on to the next state. And Eddie was thrilled to know that, as he played his first night in Indianapolis, Steve was out in the crowd watching. Will, El and Mike had been out in the crowd when he played in California, Max and Lucas had come to see him in their recent new home of Chicago, and Erica, Nancy and Johnathan would be there when he played in New York City. But tonight he knew that Steve was out there in the crowd, with Dustin and Robin, screaming and cheering for him like he had from the start.

"Alright, this is the part of the show where I normally get all sappy about how much I miss my husband." Eddie said into the microphone, his skin gleaming with sweat. His fans cheered. "But not tonight. Because tonight, I'm pleased to say, my husband is here in the crowd." His fans screamed even louder. "And no matter how much you try you're not gonna spot him. You wanna know why? Because he's wearing my clothes so that he blends in with the crowd." Eddie grinned. The audience went wild. "This next one's just for you, sweetheart."

Out in the audience, dressed in a pair of Eddie's black jeans, a pair of Eddie's bulky boots and a t-shirt from Corroded Coffin's last tour, Steve felt his heart swell.

A year after the revelation of Eddie Munson's husband came the revelation of Eddie Munson's kid. Like the chaos gremlin he is, Eddie took to Twitter on a Thursday afternoon and casually announced that he and his husband were fostering a kid with the intention to adopt.

Like clockwork, the internet set ablaze.

The eleven year old girl had been in Steve and Eddie's care three times over the past two years before the adoption, spending about eight months in their care over the three stays. Then, when Eddie had been in the last month of his tour, Steve got the call that a kid needed a place to stay. Steve had got the second bedroom ready with clean bedding, made sure the cupboards were stocked with snacks. And when the social workers arrived, the girl had launched herself into Steve's arms, babbling about how happy she was that she had ended up with Steve and Eddie again.

It was unusual for Steve and Eddie to see so much of the same kid. They were an emergency foster home, they usually only saw kids for a few nights or a couple of weeks. And it was the same with her the first time she stayed with them. She stayed for twelve days before she moved to a different home. But then she was back. Only three weeks later she was back in their care and, for whatever reason, that's where she stayed for the next five months. It had been a year since Corroded Coffin released their fourth album, and they had decided they were taking their time with the next one, so Eddie was home and not very busy and perfectly happy hanging out with the kid that they hadn't expected to have for so long.

She went back to her parents at the end of the five months, much to Steve and Eddie's disapproval. But they hoped that they had cleaned up their act and she would be going back to a more child friendly environment. Unfortunately, she was back a year later. The social workers had brought her back to Steve and Eddie and asked if they could keep her for a few months again. Of course, they enthusiastically agreed, and the three of them settled in together for the next three months until she was taken back to her family again.

The third time was the final strike. There was no way she was going to be placed back into her parents' care. Steve had volunteered them to foster her for as long as they could. She had always been a wonderful addition to the home ever since her first stay.

When Eddie got home he was thrilled to see her. He'd been filled in on the situation over call, of course, but you couldn't hug someone over the phone. It was only a couple of weeks after Eddie got home that he and Steve started talking about the possibility of adoption.

Steve and Eddie had always wanted kids. At first, they had planned on adopting a baby, but after involving themselves in the foster system and seeing the demand that there was for people to take in older kids they decided that that was their calling. The girl coming into their lives in the way that she did felt almost like fate. And so they sat her down and asked her how she would feel about the whole thing. Much to their delight, she had enthusiastically agreed to the idea, and they started the process immediately. Eddie felt like this was a major development in his life and he wanted to share it - at least a vague bit of it - and so a month later he took to Twitter.

Things went pretty quiet after that. Eddie's label was organising for a European tour, but he made sure it wasn't too soon so that he would be around for the adoption process. And that was where he put all of his energy: into his kid.

The girl attended the school that Steve taught at, and Eddie signed her up for a dance class when she mentioned an interest. Steve helped her with her homework and bought her books and had long conversations with her in which he taught her things without her even realising that she was learning. Eddie nurtured her creative side, buying her art supplies and teaching her guitar and singing Disney karaoke with her on the weekends.

Corroded Coffin was nominated for a Grammy. It wasn't their first nomination but Eddie was excited about it anyway. They hadn't won a Grammy yet, there only really being one category for metal music and plenty of artists deserving of the award.

Steve and Eddie had their first Christmas with a kid. Wayne came over like he did every year, making it a real family affair. They went overboard with the decorations and wracked their brains for the best gifts to buy. They made a gingerbread house and watched an obscene amount of Christmas movies, and it was the best Christmas they'd ever had.

The adoption was finalised at the end of January. The whole thing had been smooth sailing, Steve and Eddie having proved more than capable of taking care of a child over the years. And now they had a kid and they were officially a family and things couldn't have been better.

And then Corroded Coffin won the Grammy for Best Metal Performance. Steve and their daughter had leapt off of the couch with cheers and whoops and fists waving in the air. And after his bandmates had taken turns at the microphone thanking their management and their fans and their families, Eddie had taken his turn for a speech.

"I have so many people that I want to thank, and they know who they are. My uncle Wayne, the Hellfire kids and all my other friends from back home, all of our fans and every friend we've made in the industry. But, obviously, I want to thank my amazing husband for tolerating my chaos and the fact that I write best in the middle of the night. And I also promise to try and change that habit now that we have a kid in the house, and you're allowed to hold me to that." He gave his speech with a massive grin, trophy gripped tightly in his hands, and when he stepped off stage he split off from his band and excused himself to call Steve, who had secretly bought a bottle of champagne and Eddie's favourite cake from his favourite place to celebrate the victory (because he'd had a gut feeling that Corroded Coffin was going to finally win this one).

Then, as if it had crept up on them, it was time for the European tour, which would steal Eddie away from his husband and daughter for even longer than the US tour.

Right before he boarded the plane, Eddie opened up Instagram, ready to cause one last stir.

The picture was one of Eddie's new favourites. Robin had taken it in their garden when she came over to hang out one random afternoon. Eddie was dressed peak rockstar, distressed black jeans and a studded leather jacket, chains dangling off him and hands covered in rings. And Steve was peak teacher, all blue jeans and a soft grey sweater, and glasses balanced on his nose. He was giving their daughter a piggyback, but the picture was from just an angle that you couldn't see her face, because she deserved her privacy even if her new dad was a rockstar.

Now that it's all official and I find myself with this perfect little family, I think it's time to finally show you all the amazing man that I share my life with. Everyone, meet Steve.

And, for the final time, the internet went crazy. It was unanimous; they loved Steve. And Eddie couldn't blame them, because he loved Steve too.