We'll Be Okay (s.h)

we'll be okay (s.h)

summary: after risking your life for steve, he gives you a lecture and a heart-to-heart

warnings: mentions of death & physical injury, swearing

i wrote this and re-wrote this a thousand times and i need to post it before i try and do it again. enjoy.

-jazz

Bats.

Bats literally fucking everywhere.

That was the last thing you’d remembered before passing out. There had been screaming – maybe yours, probably some of your friends as well – and then reality had escaped you. Dying in the Upside Down had felt like an unavoidable truth for a little while now but even when you’d been staring death in the face, it still came as a surprise. It felt a little sad that you’d survived demogorgons and demodogs and quite literally everything up to this point, only to fall short at the bats. In your defence, not much thinking had gone into your actions. You’d seen them coming towards Steve and that was all you needed to throw yourself in front of them. Perhaps your mum had been right in saying that you didn’t think right when you were around Harrington. In all fairness, she’d probably been talking more in the sense of homework and high school finals but the same logic applied.

So, yeah. Death. Cool. Unavoidable, unfortunately. And at least you died protecting the man you loved – which might have been a blessing in disguise, because you had no doubt in your mind that he would have killed you for doing so.

That became clear the moment you woke up. Maybe death was a little more avoidable than you’d thought; despite your near-mortal wounds and pounding headache, you were alive. Your reality had cut from the red skies of the Upside Down to the bright lights of Steve’s bedroom in seconds. You had no idea how long it had actually been – long enough for him to get out, clearly. Unless, of course, this was heaven…but based on the pain you were in, you sincerely hoped it wasn’t.

“Hey,” Steve’s voice was soft, barely a whisper, as he threw aside his book and crossed the room. His hands were on you almost immediately, holding the back of your neck to support your futile attempts at lifting your head. “No sudden moves, baby. You’re still weak.”

“That’s a word for a it,” you murmured. “I thought I died.”

Steve didn’t respond; he kept moving, jaw clenched, hands desperately pulling his jumper further over your shoulders, running ever-so-gently over your bandages, checking that every piece of you was still there. It was almost as though he were scared that part of you had been left in the Upside Down. Part of him certainly had been, or it had at the very least died there the moment he thought you had.

He was tense – stiff jaw, stiff hands, stiff back. Not relaxed and smiley like the Steve knew. He had the weight of the world of his shoulders, and it was though he were scared to let the slump, just in case it felt off. Came crashing down and smashed to pieces, everything that he was juggling falling to the floor. Things were a little more in perspective for him now after your near-death experience.

“Steve?” you pushed. You reached out and grabbed his hands, pulling them away from your torso. “You’re being uncharacteristically quiet and I hate it.”

“Words are not my strong suit right now,” he admitted. Steve took a seat beside you and crossed his legs, gently reaching out a hand to take yours. “They haven’t been over the last few days.”

“Talk to me?” you asked. “I know when you’re holding stuff in. You get this look on your face and then it all comes out in word vomit, remember?”

He gave you a sideways glance, smiling slightly.

“C’mon, Harrington,” you quietly returned the smile. “Word vomit on me. Word vomit all over me.”

“I love you,” Steve replied. “But I also hated you just a little for throwing yourself in front of those bats. The entire time you’ve been out I’ve been building up this massive lecture in my head about it and then you actually woke up and…nothing else matters, actually. The only thing I care about is that you’re here and you’re awake.”

“You can give me that lecture if you want,” you gave his hand a light squeeze. “Just let me ask you one thing, Steve. If the tables had been turned, how much thought you would have given it before throwing yourself in front of them to save me?”

“Absolutely none ­– oh,” he paused for a moment. “That’s different, though.”

“Why?”

“Because if I die, then I don’t have to live without you?” he said – despite it being an attempt at reasoning, he posed it more like a question. His logic was questionable at best, but you did understand.

“Riiiiight,” you rolled your eyes. “Steve, think about it: I did what I had to do to protect you in the same way you would for me. I don’t want to live without you anymore than you want to live without me, even if you’re a pain in the fucking ass.”

“You’re not always a walk in the park either, honey.”

“Thanks, babe.”

Steve gave you another smile. “I guess we’re in the kind of relationship where we would die to protect each other, huh?”

“That’s probably the main take away from this, yeah,” you replied.

“I’m always juggling a thousand things at once. I got a lotta balls in the air, you know?” he continued. “Sometimes I’m worried I’m gonna drop one of my metaphorical balls. And in the moment where I thought you died, they all came crashing to the ground.”

“Really?”

“Really,” he affirmed. “It’s like…my balls don’t matter unless you’re here.”

“Steve-”

“- yeah, I heard it!” he groaned. “What I’m saying is…very few things in my life have a purpose without you. So please, try not to die.”

“I’ll do my best,” you gave him a smile. “Now, d’you think you could help me change these bandages? These ones are a bit…bloody.”

“Yeah, of course.”

Steve crossed the room and produced a first aid kit – you probably should have gone to hospital but there was no way in hell for you to explain your injuries. That meant that Nancy and Robin had tended to your wounds; the stitches were a little wonky and they didn’t have strong enough pain killers on hand to really help, but their efforts hadn’t been in vain. Admittedly, Steve had been a little useless in that moment – he was completely fucking numb, only able to watch in disbelief as they tried to help you. He wanted to kick himself for it, but at least he could help you now.

Softly pulling up your arms, he lifted the fabric of your hoodie (his hoodie) and began to unwind the bandages. He saw the wounds then, deep and jagged and still swollen and bumpy from the bats and the stitches. It was almost like he could physically feel the pain in his own side – it looked awful. And it had all been for him.

“Shit,” Steve murmured.

“Hey, Steve, c’mon,” you softly said. You reached out a hand and brushed it over where his lay on your side, giving it a squeeze. “It’s fine.”

“It’s not fine. You’re not fine.”

“But I will be!” you shot back. “It’s been what…I don’t even know how many days, but presumably not many. It doesn’t matter how I got the wounds; it just matters that they’ll heal.”

“It does matter, honey,” his voice was still quiet. “Because you did this all for me and that is not okay.”

“Are you honestly telling me that you wouldn’t let yourself get a little hurt for me?” you said.

“You know I would,” he murmured. “I’d get mortally wounded and grotesquely disfigured for you.”

“There we go then.”

Steve didn’t say anything else; he instead replaced your bandages and then climbed into bed beside you. His movements were still gentle and restrained, erring on the side of caution as he moulded his body around yours – one arm on your good side, pulling you as close to him as possible, a large hand guarding your head as he kept it tucked into his shoulder. It was close as the two of you could physically get without actually being the same person and in that moment, it was exactly what he needed. You might have been the one who was physically ailed but he emotionally, Steve felt like he’d been attacked by every demo-piece-of-shit the Upside Down had to offer.

You let out a tiny sigh, snuggling closer to him as you drifted off. It was in that moment that Steve realised only one thing mattered: you were going to be okay and so was he.   

tags: @karasong

We Tried The World CH3.

THE MASTERLIST WICHITA, KANSAS, 789 MILES FROM HOME. 

Kansas greeted you with a sign that told you that you and Steve were now entering the sunflower state. But the fields on either side of you were flat and green, patches of brown mud and a forgotten barn or two. 

You’d left The Ozarks early, both of you sitting in the front of the car, gazing at the lake with the engine idling like you were silently saying goodbye. 

It had taken a little over two hours to leave Missouri, to pass over that invisible state line that separated you from Kansas. It was nine in the morning, the skies blue, summer still blazing and the car smelled like coffee and the iced tea you’d both ordered to go from a diner on the side of the road, lemon and honey and espresso in the air. 

You drove for another forty minutes before you saw them. 

It shouldn’t have been a surprise to you when you eventually did spot them, the sign really did give you fair warning. But they seemed to come out of nowhere, the pastures and paddocks filled with dried out grass and sleepy animals turned into rows and rows and rows of towering flowers, golden yellow, all taller than you. 

Sunflowers for miles. The sight made you gasp, made you jump in your seat and throw yourself on the edge, seatbelt strained and your hands curled around the side of the open window. Your smile was contagious, pure elation that Steve laughed at and he was grinning just like you. 

You didn’t ask him to stop, you didn’t have to. Steve took one look at your face and then he was pulling off into the dirt at the side of the road, dust kicking up behind you. You were both clambering out of the car and into the sun, the heat, the smell of pollen and fields and farmland assaulting your senses but god, you really didn’t care. 

You didn’t think about it when you grabbed Steve’s hand, and he didn’t pull away at your touch either. He let you drag him into the flowers, morning dew soaking your bare legs and arms, painting your sundress in splotches of water. Steve trailed behind you, still grinning, hands still joined, bright yellow petals brushing against his hair, his cheeks. 

You walked until you couldn’t see the road, until you could only see the sky, the flowers and Steve.  

You only let go of the boy’s hand to brush your fingers over the petals instead, big, green leaves and fallen seeds that crunched underfoot. It became a game, a bag rendition of hide and seek, a catch me if you can, because the flowers didn’t offer that much cover and you decided really quickly that you wanted Steve to catch you. 

So you tripped a little clumsily through the fields, Steve only ever a few feet behind, laughing, face bathed in sunlight and yellow toned shadows, sunflower petals in his hair. 

He grabbed at your wrists when you let him get close enough, listened to the way you laughed at his touch until he got brave enough to put his hands on your waist, pulling you back towards him, his palms big and warm through the cotton material of your dress. 

It felt like another world, another time, it felt like this was a boy you could fall in love with. But then you remembered what this was, this escape, this adventure without a plan and you tried not to think about how nice Steve’s chest felt against your back when he tugged you into him. 

It had been a week since you’d left Hawkins and you were already spending too much time looking at the boy with the messy hair. He had more freckles now, his skin more tanned, his clothes a little comfier, less fitted than when you’d left.

It felt like you were watching him fall into himself. 

It had been hard not to think about the things you did when you’d spent the last few nights pressed against him in the back of the car. The moon shifting across the surface of the lake, the reflections dancing across the two of you in the dark. 

Everything had been good, everything had been sweet, nice, easy. And then two hundred and twenty something miles from Wichita, Steve’s car got a flat tire and everything fell apart for a few hours. 

It felt like reality then, less like a dream, like an adventure that couldn’t disappoint and you started to wonder then if this was the right choice. Because it was a Friday evening and if you’d been home, you would’ve been working until eight at the bookstore, walking home to your aunt to have meatloaf and then some ice cream on the sofa in front of the tv. 

That was your reality, it wasn't exciting but it never changed. You were both tired, hungry, too hot, the Kansas air sticky and heavy - and Steve was looking at you like this might have all been one big mistake

Or maybe your mind was just playing tricks on you. Either way, your stomach churned. 

Steve was already grumbling when the car rolled to a stop on the hard shoulder, kicking up dust as he went, curses filling the car and you groaned. The morning had shifted to late afternoon, lunch missed in favour of hitting the next stop earlier than nightfall. Your stomach growled, your head was aching and your legs felt dead from sitting for so long.

You winced when Steve’s door slammed, the boy pacing the length of the car as he stared at the punctured wheel in defeat. You leaned over the console, squinted out into the open window and the setting sun, the whole world golden. 

“D’you have a spare?”

Steve shook his head and swiped a hand over his face. He looked tired, a little bedraggled, just like you felt. The stretch of road had nothing on it, fields and fields on either side, a lone horse on a small slope, a sign that was sunbleached and cracked, one that told you that you were pretty far away from the next town.

You pulled out the map, pushed yourself out of the car into the heat that the sun was leaving behind and Steve wasn’t even paying attention as you spread the folded paper across the hood. You traced the lines of the road, hoped and prayed there would be a pay phone somewhere nearby. There had to be, right?

You threw the map back onto your seat, walked around the car and pulled yourself onto the trunk, the heat from the sun making it warm under your bare legs. You tucked your dress between your knees, frowned when you looked at Steve and saw the pucker between his brows, the way he was chewing at his lip. 

“So, what now?” You asked, “do we just start walking?”

Steve huffed, at you or the situation, you weren’t overly sure but the sound was impatient and it irked you more than it should’ve. 

“Walk where?” Steve held his arms out, gesturing to the wide, flat land around you both. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

You rolled your eyes at the obvious, pushing off of the car to stand by the boy, head tilted as you inspected the wheel. There was a nail embedded in the rubber, the silver head of it glinting mockingly in the sunlight. 

“Well, d’you have a better idea?” 

Steve kicked at the loose gravel on the road, scuffed up the front of his sneaker and shrugged again. His hair was a riot from the way he’d been tugging at it and you moved out of his way as he went back to pacing. The sun was getting lower, hazy on the horizon, a deep orange and it was setting the world on fire. It’d be dark soon. 

“I’m not leaving my car,” Steve grunted. “One of us will have to stay.”

You startled at his words, turning back to face him as you shook your head furiously. “What?” you barked out, too sharp. “I’m not staying here on my own!”

Steve sighed again and it set your teeth on edge. He rubbed at his eyes, tired, sore, hungry. He mumbled your name and it sounded like he was fed up with you already. 

“And if you think I’m walking off into the backass of nowhere by myself, you’ve got another thing coming, Harrington.”

“I didn’t- Jesus Christ - I didn’t ask you to!” Steve exclaimed, hands slamming onto the roof of the car. “And stop yelling, my head is fucking killing me.”

Maybe it was ‘cause you hadn’t eaten since breakfast, way before the sunflower fields. Maybe it was because you hadn’t had a good night sleep since the motel in Illinois, maybe it was the way Steve still hadn’t mentioned how he kissed you on the Fourth of July. 

It could’ve been the heat, the ache in your back, the throbbing in your forehead. 

Regardless of the reason, you snapped, your own hands coming to land on the roof of the BMW across from the boy. You stared at each other over the car, lips set in frowns, brows drawn tight. 

“I’m not fucking yelling!” you yelled. “I’m not feeling all that hot either, Steve, so don’t get on at me like this is my fault.”

The boy scoffed, eyes narrowed, elbows pressed to the roof. “And what? It’s mine? Like I meant to drive over a fuckin’ nail?”

You rolled your own eyes, the heat of the sun, the warmth in the air and Steve’s annoyance making you feel too hot. Your dress stuck to your thighs, to the lines of your collarbones and you suddenly felt trapped. 

You were in the middle of fucking nowhere, Kansas, with a boy you kissed once at a party. What the fuck where you doing? The sunflower field felt like days ago, weeks even. 

“Sure Steve, that’s exactly what I said.” The tension in your voice was palpable and you hated that the feeling of annoyance was joined by the hot prick of tears at the corners of your eyes. 

Maybe Steve caught the way you looked, maybe he saw the wetness at your lash line or maybe he just felt bad, but he softened almost instantly, a drop of his shoulders, a hand scrubbed over his face. 

It was getting darker and neither of you said anything. The silence was as loud as the night itself and both of you sighed and leaned on different parts of the car. The boy didn’t ask you to go, to walk until you found a pay phone or a gas station and he didn't leave you either. 

It wasn’t an apology on either of your parts but it felt like enough. The tension eased when the sun went down and Steve pulled himself onto the hood beside you, close enough to where you sat with crossed legs that you could feel the warmth coming off of him. 

The moon was out, the sky was black but the night was still so warm. It smelled sweet, like flowers and sunscreen and Steve, and god, you were tired. Maybe Steve was too, because he was suddenly leaning closer and his shoulder bumped yours and didn’t move away. You didn’t chance a look at him but you lay your head on his shoulder all the same, holding in a sigh of relief when he didn’t pull away. 

“What’s your favourite animal?” Steve asked you and it made your heart skip a beat, because it sounded like ‘I’m sorry.’

“Sharks,” you told him, eyes closing at the feel of him solid underneath you. You pressed your cheek to his shoulder, the tip of your nose close to brushing his neck. “What’s yours?” ‘I’m sorry too.’

But Steve snorted before he answered, shoulders jerking in amusement and you felt rather than saw the way he was peering down at you. You were smiling and you were so sure that he was too, even behind closed eyes, you could feel it, sense it. It changed the air, the mood, the way you felt and you wondered if you’d be okay as long as Steve Harrington kept looking at you like that.

“Sharks?” he asked, quiet laughter colouring his words. He sounded so much prettier than when he was yelling. “Why?”

You shrugged, still sleepy, still with closed eyes and you rubbed your cheek against the soft of his shirt on instinct. You felt him tense for just a second when your face pushed itself into his neck, a soft huff of breath kissing the skin there. But then he was pushing against you more, letting you curl in as much as you wanted, seeking out your touch as much as you were his. 

“I d’know,” you mumbled, “I like Jaws.”

He snorted again, thoroughly amused and he seemed your explaination good enough. 

“I think I gotta say dogs,” Steve told you. “Which is pretty boring.”

You smiled, “s’not boring. What kind of dog?”

The boy lay his head on yours, his cheek pressed to your hair and suddenly the world seemed so still. Had you been arguing? Did you almost have a fight? Did you yell? You couldn’t remember. 

“Golden retriever,” he said and you hummed in agreement. “My parents never let me have a pet, not even a damn fish. I always wanted a dog.”

The silence ticked over, comfortable if not a little sad because Steve’s brow was furrowed at the thought of his parents and the people he’d left behind. But something was itching at your throat,  a question desperate to be asked and when you felt it coming over your tongue, weighted with emotion, you couldn’t stop yourself. 

“Hey Steve?” You didn’t pause long enough for him to answer, but he moved from where he leaned against you, turned to gaze down at you, brows raised. “Why’d you kiss me that night?”

That night. A week ago, an age ago. A whole different state, a whole different time. You didn’t feel like the same person anymore but you still remembered the way Steve kissed you, like you were the answer to something he was too scared to ask. 

The silence stretched until an owl called out from somewhere above, a haunting noise that made your chest crack. But maybe that was just the way Steve was looking at you, wide eyed and panicked, like maybe he’d hoped you’d forgotten, like maybe he’d hoped he’d never have to talk about it. 

He murmured your name, swiped at his face and sighed. 

God, it hurt more than it should’ve. The rejection from this boy you were only starting to know, it stung like sunburn, a harsh nip that travelled over your bones and Jesus, you felt stupid. 

You scoffed, laughing at yourself rather than Steve and you slid off the front of the car, away from the boy’s warmth and if he reached out to try and catch at your wrist, you barely felt it. 

“Forget it,” you told him, the earlier feelings of exhaustion and ache creeping back over your body. Your headache had dulled but your temples were buzzing again - but that could’ve just been the embarrassment heating at your face. 

Steve said your name again, a little more insistent this time but he sounded as tired as you felt. “Hey, no, wait…”

He was moving too, pushing off of the car and walking after you. You hadn’t gone far, just a couple of feet away from him and the BMW with some shitty hope that the air over there would be less stifling. 

It wasn’t. 

“Are we just supposed to pretend it didn’t happen?” you asked him, arms crossed over your front like they could protect you from his answer. ‘Cause you had a feeling you knew what it was by the way he was looking at you, eyes sad, lips parted, brow furrowed. “Which is, you know, fine,” you lied. “I just thought I’d ask.”

And then headlights were blinding you both and Steve never gave you your answer. 

A family had pulled up in a Winnebago, four friendly faces that were eager to help, assisting with a puncture kit and some bottles of water. They didn’t notice the tension between you and Steve whilst the older man worked on the wheel, his wife talking about Wichita and sunflowers and the bobcat they’d seen running across the road from forest to forest. 

You felt Steve’s eyes on you as you chatted quietly to the two little girls, their hair in pigtails, blonde and curling at the end. You let them fiddle with the gold rings on your fingers, admiring each design with sweet, quiet voices. 

And when the wheel was fixed and you’d said your thanks, Steve opened the passenger door for you and looked at you a little sadly. Neither of you spoke as he drove you both to Wichita, the town sleepy and quiet as you rolled in during the early morning hours. 

It was still louder than the Ozarks, an electrical buzz coming from the streetlights, the stars lost in their glow. It was louder than the silence from inside of the car, muted music coming from the bars you passed every now and then, a bus that rumbled past you both at sets of traffic lights. 

Steve found a motel with little issue, a tall building off of Central Avenue that had a red neon sign that coloured you both crimson in the parking lot. He looked at you like he wanted to say something, turning the engine off with his gaze on you and you hatred the way the embarrassment you felt still lingered on your skin. His stare felt hot. 

“This okay?” he asked, quiet, as if not to startle you. 

You only nodded, already halfway out of the car before he could follow and when you got to the reception desk and the woman asked you how many rooms, you were the first to speak. 

“Two, please,” you told her, already pulling cash out of your bag to pay for your half. 

You felt the boy at your back, chest brushing against you as he leaned in, a hand on the desk, caging you between it and his body. He was staring at the two sets of keys the receptionist placed in front of you, his voice low and at your ear. 

His lips brushed the shell of it when he spoke.

“I thought you didn’t like sleeping alone,” the statement seemed so much more salacious than it should’ve been. But you both seemed to remember the nights by the lake, tangled together. “I mean, in a room. On your own,” Steve clarified, cheeks warm. 

You shrugged, paying the lady and grabbing your keys, leaving Steve fumbling with his bag before he snagged his own set and followed. It didn't matter that the rooms were side by side, only separated by a thin wall. It still felt too far and suddenly you were cursing your own stubbornness because fucking hell, you really didn’t want to sleep alone in a room in the middle of fucking Kansas.

Home seemed really far away without Steve. 

He must’ve sensed your hesitation though, because he paused with his hand on the door knob, looking at you with those same sad, brown eyes. He leaned against the green door, a sickly shade of olive that didn’t match the yellow walls. 

“You gonna be alright?” Steve asked. He licked his lips, nervous, dragging a hand through his hair. “Can we talk? About what you asked m-”

But you shook your head, the thoughts inside of it rattling and making it hurt. You wanted to say sorry. Sorry for asking, sorry for acting so childish about it, sorry that you were sad. But you opened the door and kicked in your bag, lifting a hand in a weak wave.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” you told the boy. “Night, Harrington.”

—————

You did not see the boy in the morning. 

You couldn’t wait that long. Not out of excitement, nor impatience, no. It might’ve been a little regret but you watched the way the clock on the nightstand clicked over to three o’clock and you were horribly aware of how alone you were. 

In a strange city. In a stranger motel, and god, there were footsteps from above and you could hear a couple arguing out in the street. Didn’t Ted Bundy stay in a motel like this?

It’s why you were standing at Steve’s door in bare feet and a too big Hawkins High shirt, your arms folded over your chest as you stared at the number ‘162’ painted on the wood. 

It took you a while to knock. But the hallway light flickered and somebody from the floor above yelled out and suddenly you were that concerned about waking Steve up. 

He answered like he’d already been awake, the door handle turning quickly and the light inside of his room was so much softer and warmer than the harsh overheads that lined the hallway. He seemed surprised to see you, despite knowing there wouldn’t really be anyone else knocking on his door in the middle of the night. But his eyes widened at the sight of you, hair mussed, legs bare, the thin fabric of your shirt making it obvious you weren’t wearing a bra. 

He swallowed, met your gaze with the same softness you’d last seen in the sunflower fields and stood aside, letting you in. The door squeaked when he shut in and his bed was messy, the pillows askew, the sheets hanging off like he’d been tossing and turning the same way you had. 

“Can’t sleep?” Steve broke the silence first and you shook your head, standing in the middle of his room a little awkwardly. “Are you okay?”

You suddenly felt very naked, more than aware of your bare legs and cotton underwear that was hidden by your shirt. 

“M’fine,” you lied, because you weren’t - not really. You’d felt lonely in your room, an overwhelming sense of feeling lost and you hated it. It scratched at your skin and made you think about the back of the car at the side of the lake. 

Your back had hurt every morning and you watched Steve crack his neck when he woke up and stretched out, but neither of you ever complained about sleeping curled into each other. 

And one morning, when the sun was barely rising, you’d woken up with a yawn and watched the rise and fall of Steve’s chest under where your cheek lay. It had taken you a while to notice, but when you shifted, you’d felt it. 

His hand curled around the hem of your sweater, clinging tight, like he needed to know you were close even in sleep. 

Maybe Steve knew you better than you thought by now, maybe it was just incredibly obvious but the boy smiled a little, still kinda sad, almost a little amused and he sat back down on the edge of the mattress. 

“You’re not fine.”

You shrugged. 

“Can’t sleep?” Steve asked softly. You didn’t answer, but that didn’t seem to matter. “Me neither. It’s too loud, I can’t-”

He paused, eyes on the ugly patterned carpet. He sounded like he was about to admit something he wasn’t ready to. 

“I can’t get comfy,” he finished. 

You toed the carpet, pushed your heel into the thin scratch of it and nodded. “Neither can I.”

He knew why you were here, of course he did. Steve wasn’t stupid and you weren’t subtle. So he nodded too, pushed himself backwards onto the bed and rearranged the pillows more appropriately. The window was open to let in some cooler air and the breeze ruffled his hair, a pretty mess from trying to sleep. 

His eyes seemed darker than before when they found yours and he pulled back the sheets, tilted his head at the space beside him. 

“You gettin’ in?”

There was a considerable amount more space beside the boy than there had been in the back of the car. But the bed was no more than a twin, the mattress not made for two people but that didn’t stop you from walking across the room to Steve. The mattress dipped under your weight, knees pushed into the sheets as you climbed in, movements slow as if this was something you weren’t supposed to be doing. 

Maybe it wasn’t. 

Steve couldn’t move over for you, his frame already in line with the edge and when you finally lay down next to him, he turned into you, lying on his side so the length of him curled around the dips and curves of you. He fit perfectly behind, his chest to your back and you could feel the way his hand lay stagnant between you both, like he didn’t know what to do with it. 

You didn’t come to him for a cuddle, or god, anything more. His presence was enough, the solid wall of warmth near you exactly what you needed. Your eyelids were already drooping, lips parting slack as your breathing evened out and just before sleep completely took you, you felt the boy yawn and curl into you a little more, the bridge of his nose pushed into your hair. 

It was nice. It was enough. It was what you hadn’t realised you needed. 

But when morning came, the heat of the sun was back, the room was empty and Steve was gone. 

Maybe that was an exaggeration. His bag was still there, sitting by the desk. But his shoes were gone and the wallet and keys he’d thrown on the nightstand were too. 

You sat in the bed, bleary eyed and the morning sun hazy through the sheer curtains, letting into too much light and heat for - you turned, checking the digital clock that was still glowing green - half past seven. 

Panic surged through you, just for a second, maybe a minute. Because surely the boy wouldn’t leave you? Why would he leave his bag? Unless it was to throw you off? Maybe he’d emptied it and left, still annoyed by your question, your yelling at the side of the road in the middle of fucking nowhere and fucking Christ, you were alone in Kansas with no idea wh-

The metallic click of a lock being turned made you jump and face the door. It swung open, squeaking in protest and Steve cursed under his breath at the sound, closing it gently before it could slam, two takeaway coffee cups balanced in one hand, a paper bag swinging on the same wrist. 

Steve. 

Fuck. Steve. 

If he saw the worry in your eyes give way to relief, he didn’t mention it. He cleared his throat, cheeks pink as he took in the way you were sitting in the mess of the bed. His bed. The sheets rumpled at your waist, the pillow you’d shared that smelled his shampoo and your perfume. 

He held up a plastic cup, see through and filled with ice and creamy mocha coloured liquid. 

“I got breakfast,” he told you with a smile, “I didn’t think you’d wake up so soon.”

You could hear his apology between words, hidden underneath the smell of caffeine and the giant fruit pastries he was pulling from the bag. ‘I didn’t mean to worry you.’

“Thank you,” you said, hands already grabbing for the iced coffee he was passing you. Extra ice, two sugars, just like you ordered yourself. “Is it warm already?”

Steve nodded, sitting down at the end of the bed and he was further than he was last night but still so close and you could feel the summer radiating off of him, the sun that had already etched itself into his skin. His shirt was threadbare, thin and a pale green, his jeans rolled at the cuffs so he could get as much fresh air as possible. 

“Like an oven,” he told you mournfully, mouth already full of raspberries and flakey pastry. “I miss the lake.“

You hummed in agreement, taking a long drag from your cup, closing your eyes in delight at the sweetness. “I know, a pool would be nice.”

—————

That’s how you found yourself and Steve standing in front of a chain link fence, the smell of chlorine in the air. The outdoor pool was empty, the fence locked and the sign on the front said closed for maintenance.  

“Well there goes that idea,” you sighed, clutching woefully at the towel you’d snuck out of the motel room. 

The sun was beaming, relentless without any clouds in the sky and your sunscreen was still sticky, coconut and aloe that Steve had rubbed into the parts of your back you couldn’t reach, both of you hot in the face. 

There wasn’t much else in the area, the shops lazy, the streets quiet, people spending their Saturday indoors to escape the July heat. So Steve grinned and threw his bag over the fence, making the chain rattle when he started to climb. 

“What’re you doing?” You hissed, staring at him wide eyed. You scanned the length of the sidewalk, half expecting to see the flash of police cars, the wail of a siren. “Steve!”

You heard the boy laugh as he dropped to the other side, grinning, bright eyed and full of trouble. He looked at the pool, the glittering water, the way the blue of it bounced off of the white walls of the locked changing rooms. He lifted his chin at you, smirking, baiting.

“C’mon.” He said it like a dare.

You groaned but followed, eyes nervous as they scanned the street as you climbed. You weren't usually one to bend the rules, and breaking and entering wasn’t on your to do list for that day either. But Steve was already stripping off, his clothes left at the side of the pool edge as he jumped in, swim shorts already on.

You squealed at the hit of cool water on your legs, jumping the rest of the way onto the sun warmed concrete, and in a manic burst of adrenaline, you wrestled out of your dress, revealing your bikini and bare skin. You launched yourself in after the boy, hearing him laugh before you plunged underneath the surface. 

The water was cool, almost cold and it felt lovely against your skin. The smell of chlorine mixed with your sunscreen, the leftover smell of Steve’s cologne that clung to your hair after sleeping so close the night before. He looked at you like he was kinda proud, like you jumping in after him made him so happy. 

The day went like that, uninterrupted, no arrests, clear skies and a whole pool just for the two of you. 

Everything was blue and warm, the water, the sky, the navy shadows, the buildings cast across the concrete. And when the afternoon waned and clouds rolled in, they were indigo too. 

But nothing was as pretty as the way Steve had been looking at you, brown eyes just as warm as the sun. It had been peaceful, the way you’d swam laps around each other, talking quietly and laughing, the night before forgotten about. You only wanted to remember the sunflowers, the way his hand had found your own amongst the yellow petals, the endless fields. 

It’s like the argument hadn’t happened, it was like you’d never asked him that question. And if you pretended hard enough, you could forget the silence that followed it. You both went back to playing stupid, and maybe, just maybe, it was better that way.

Or so you thought. 

You were stretched on the pool edge when the clock above the closed snack stand told you it was almost six o’clock. Your legs kicked lazy circles in the water, your arms stretched out behind you, palms pushed to the sun warmed tiles. Steve was in the middle of the pool, messy hair and tanned skin amongst the bright blue and he was looking at you again.

It was a gaze you couldn’t decipher and you realised that’s how Steve was looking at you too, like you were a puzzle, a question he didn’t know the answer to. Or like he was too nervous to say it.

But then there was a small splash, ripples around your calves and then Steve was there, holding onto the pool wall by your side, shoulders brushing your thighs, everything bare skinned, suntanned and wet.

You swallowed hard. 

“Hey,” he smiled, soft and almost a little shy. “Tell me a secret.”

You grinned, looked down at the boy with his damp hair and wide smile, new freckles on his cheeks that weren’t there before his day spent under the sun. You kicked out a leg, watched the water splash and glitter under the glow of the sky, dusk settling over the town. It was still quiet and you swore, you could hear your heartbeat.

Maybe Steve could too.

“A secret?” you asked and he hummed, knowing you were stalling. “I dunno, I don’t think I have anymore.”

“Bullshit.”

You laughed, watching the way Steve’s hand curled around your ankle, tugging playfully, threatening to pull you back in with him if you didn’t spill. So you wriggled out of his grasp and gave in, sighing dramatically before telling him:

“When I was six, I tried to smuggle a possum into the house.” You were deadly serious, straight faced when you said it. 

Steve stared. And then a grin split his lips, laughter spilling over you like the sun and he tilted his head to look up at you, shaking his head. 

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope,” you popped the p, your own laughter colouring your tone. 

“Why?” Steve huffed, his humour infectious, his hand on the edge of the pool moving closer to your leg and everything was light and easy and god, he was looking at you in such a lovely way. 

“I really wanted a pet,” you grinned when Steve snorted, your shoulders shaking with the way you laughed. 

“How did you even catch it?”

You shrugged, properly giggling, and Steve’s eyes were bright, shining with amusement because god, you were something else, he thought. 

“Christ, you’re trouble,” Steve mused, lips twisted in a smile, pool water clinging to his lashes. You were sure he’d called you that before, and it made your stomach dip and tumble, because he said it like a compliment. 

“Your turn,” you told the boy, when you’d both calmed down enough, cheeks sore from sunburn and smiling. “Are you gonna tell me a secret, Steve?”

He liked the way you said his name, he decided. Like you took the time to let it fall from your lips, like you liked saying it. 

He was almost between your legs now, up to his shoulders in cool water, floating in the space between your calves, staring up at you like you were the sun. Maybe he was feeling reckless, maybe he was just feeling brave. It could’ve been the way he thought you looked so fucking pretty with your messy hair and flushed cheeks, drops of water sliding down your skin, casting tiny rainbows over your arms and stomach.  

Maybe he just couldn’t hold it in any longer. 

“That night, at the party?” Steve murmured, his hand brushing your ankle underneath the surface. “I kissed you ‘cause I really wanted to. ‘Cause I’d wanted to for a long time.”

Your lips parted in surprise. 

“Used to have the biggest crush on you,” he was pink in the cheeks at his admittance, nose scrunched like he was a shy school boy all over again. “All through middle school, even sophomore year.”

You didn’t say anything. 

Steve let himself fall backward, slow and soft into the water, swimming away a little, eyes still on you. He dragged a hand through his damp hair, made it stick up a little messy and shrugged at you as if he didn’t know what else to say. 

You ducked your chin at his gaze, suddenly feeling the most shy you’d ever felt in front of the boy. 

“Yeah?” you asked to the water, staring at the shimmer on the surface, at the way the setting sun made the pool turn a deep lavender. 

“Yeah,” you heard the boy say. 

You didn’t have the courage to ask him if still harboured that same crush, if it came back when he kissed you, if kissing you felt as good as he’d maybe imagined it. 

So you took his secret like you took all of them, with a smile and a silent promise to hold onto it, clasped tight to your chest like it was your own.  

Maybe this one was. 

matters of taste

MY MASTERLIST | SERIES MASTERLIST

pairing(s): steve harrington x fem!reader x eddie munson

summary: Not all trainees are great on the job. Steve Harrington and Eddie Munson in a bakery, however? Absolutely unmatched.

words: 7.8k

tags: explicit (18+ MINORS DNI), smut, threesome - F/M/M, semi-public sex, handjobs, oral (f+m receiving), fingering, unprotected sex, spitroast, fluids play, dumbification, praise, degradation, implied masochism, hatefucking (i mean kinda but they all have crushes on each other), workplace sex, briefest mention of a housewife kink, steve harrington has a big dick, steve and eddie are already in a situationship bc i said so

additional notes: i love working customer service hahaha /j

taglist blog: @rosemareblogs

It’s… you know what. It’s whatever. It’s not a big deal. It’s fine, everything’s fine.

You pause midway through frosting some cinnamon rolls to watch one of the newbies wheeling a cart of mislabelled muffins past your decorating table. You strategically keep your voice void of inflection as you say, “Price stickers, Harrington.”

“FUCK!” 

You watch Steve dramatically jostle the cart back around to wheel it toward the rack that contains the multitudes of different flavor and price stickers used in the bakery, swearing like a sailor the whole time. He collides with another cart, and slams it directly into your other trainee, Eddie Munson. 

“Shitshitshitshit shit-” Eddie curses and stumbles into a rolling rack of donuts. He grabs the rack before it can topple over, and succeeds in catching four trays of donuts when they fall out of their slots and into his arms. 

You roll your eyes at the spectacle the two of them create, which is quickly becoming the norm, and go back to stroking globs of cream cheese frosting across the cinnamon rolls in front of you. 

It’s not like they’re the world’s worst trainees or anything. It’s not like they’re completely incompetent, or that they purposefully goes out of their way to make your job unnecessarily difficult or anything. It’s not like, together, they create the most chaotic and hazardous environment possible.

No, sir. Nothing to see here. No problems to be had. 

“‘You didn’t put the price stickers on, Steve-’” you hear Steve mocking you in a purposefully insulting falsetto, and give him a side-eye that you know he can’t see. “Mehmehmeh- ‘You didn’t put the bagels in properly. You didn’t frost the bundt cakes just right.’”

“‘You didn’t circumcise the bread bags,’” Eddie adds as he shoves the trays of smushed donuts back onto the rack and grabs a rag to wipe icing from his apron.

“Fucking what?” You turn to look at them fully, holding your frosting covered hands out in front of you.

“I don’t know!” Steve whirls around to sneer at you. His bubblegum pink uniform shirt is just about the same color as his face, rosy and flushed with the heat from the ovens and probably his climbing heart rate. “Why’s everything gotta be packaged differently? It’s just bread!”

“I don’t make the rules! Don’t argue with me and just do it!” That’s another thing. Steve’s just so argumentative, about everything. How you package things, how you wash the dishes, how you clean the floors at the end of the day. Meanwhile, Eddie won’t argue with you per-se, but the day he does something correctly will be the day pigs fly. It’s the most annoying fucking thing you’ve had to deal with at this job, and you’re stuck training them. 

It’s not a particularly hard job. You’re just clerks at Mimi’s Bakery, nothing is out of the realm of doability- it’s more of a stamina sport. You’re all closers, so that means a lot of packaging and a lot of cleaning, interspersed with helping some late afternoon and evening customers, within an eight hour shift. It isn’t very busy anymore, either; summer’s over, and you still have about a month until the holiday rushes start. It shouldn’t be too terribly difficult for them, but they’ve both been here for two weeks and still act like they were born yesterday.

Steve spends an extraordinarily long time putting the price tags on the packages of muffins- and putting them on crooked, anyway, so that the entire pile looks janky and rushed despite his slow pace. Eddie’s too busy wiping chocolate icing from his arms to notice Steve’s haphazard labeling. 

Your eyes trail the wet rag that Eddie drags across his skin, leaving behind only the ink from his tattoos for you to scrutinize. During the lull, the bakery’s PA system comically offsets the tension in the room with a generic old jazz standard. Your boss, Mimi Callaghan, has an enthusiasm for novelties from her youth- hence the confectionary shop-style pink pinstriped uniform dress you wear, and your clashing forest green apron just oozing with sex appeal. Steve looks like a knockoff Ken doll in his similar blouse and khakis, but he confessed to you on his first day that he used to work at the Scoops Ahoy in the old Hawkins Mall, so you assume he isn’t too phased by it. You’re not about to tell him that he makes it work. Eddie, on the other hand, looks like someone picked him up at the Local Smokes down the street and thrust him into the uniform against his will, like he’s not really supposed to be here. You hate that you find the weird juxtaposition of his tattoos to the pink and green uniform kind of hot.

“Don’t forget to face the shelves when you put them out,” you tell Steve as he pushes the cart past you again. 

Steve’s ears glow bright red. “I’ll put out something-”

“Suck my fucking nuts, Harrington, you wanna do the job right or not?”

Eddie cackles loudly as Steve turns around, but instead of glaring at you he just looks mildly amused, like Eddie’s hysterical laughter rubbed off on him. “Why’re you so mean to me, huh?”

“What?” You splutter, gloved hands flexing in the air and squishing frosting between your fingers. “Why- why’re you so fucking difficult? Put the goddamn muffins out, we don’t have all day-”

“I think she likes you, Harrington.” 

You squint at Eddie, still rubbing himself down leisurely with the rag, twisting his rings around his fingers idly even though he didn’t even get any icing on them. He leans against the counter with a smirk on his pretty pink lips like he thinks he’s done something. Like there can’t be another reason for why you’re so easily frustrated by Steve- by either of them, really. Like their lack of decorum or work ethic are completely out of the question, you guess, to his way of thinking. 

“Like him?” you scoff, trying to appear nonchalant as you go back to smacking cream cheese frosting across the pans of pastries in front of you. “Puh- lease. He’s infuriating, he doesn't listen to directions. Also, Steve, your customer service voice? It- you know what, it’s obnoxious. We work in a bakery, you don’t have to put the moves on every girl that comes in.”

“Oh, okay. Hear me out- maybe you don’t like my customer service voice because you’re jealous.” Steve hums, rocking back on his heels and looking even more smug than he did a few seconds ago. “I can put the moves on you, too, if you’re feeling left out.”

You don’t dignify that offer with a response. You kind of just want to punch him in the face. “Go put the muffins out and let me listen to the goddamn PA in peace.”

He has the decency to look shocked. “You like this goofy old shit?”

“I love this goofy old shit, which is more than I can say about you.”

“It’s okay, sweet pea,” Eddie hums casually, in as condescending of a voice as he can muster. “You don’t have to pretend like you aren’t into Harrington. I know I am.” 

“And you, Munson-” You whirl on him, pointing one frosting covered finger angrily in his direction, at which his eyes go all wide and innocent. “Don’t even get me started. Your fucking hair gets everywhere. I swear I had to excavate an entire gerbil from the garlic bread you made yesterday. Take a fucking weedwacker to that thing, for the love of god. And… and your tattoos are fucking dumb.” 

You don’t want to admit that you like the sight of the tattoos, actually. When Mimi had told you that the newbies you’d be training were gonna be “that darling Steve Harrington, and his friend, the Munson boy” you’d been a little bit pleased. There isn’t much to admire in a bakery except cakes, and if having the two of them around the bakery means things just got a little more scenic, then you were happy to have them. 

Unfortunately, a pretty face often means an infernal personality. Finding one without the other would probably take an act of god at this point. Times two, you got stuck with the fucking chaos twins.

“Dumb?” Eddie wolf whistles. “That smarts, sweetheart. It really does. You haven’t even seen all of my tattoos yet. I’d love to give you a tour of them, though-”

Your face burns at the thought of Eddie Munson letting you get a first class look at his tattoos. He probably has ones in places even god doesn’t know about, and you glare down at the cinnamon rolls in front of you to hide how flustered you are about it. “Fuck you, Munson.”

“I wish you would.”

“For christ’s sake- Steve. Muffins, now.” 

Steve does what he’s told, for a change. It doesn’t give you as much of an ego boost as it usually does- really, you just feel sort of dull as you snap your rubber gloves off and throw them in the trash can to the side. You don’t know why you let them bother you as much as they do, but for some reason they just jerk your chain like nothing else.

The bell over the front door jingles, alerting you to the arrival of a customer. You take a quick peek at the ovens behind you to check the time; it’s nearly 8, and the bakery closes at 10. You fight to not roll your eyes as you grab a pair of gloves in case whoever it is wants something out of the display case. 

“Hi, what can I get for you?” Your voice is sing-songy enough that you want to smack yourself. A middle aged woman has made a bee-line for the counter, straight past where Steve is bent over a display table, struggling to shift all the old muffin boxes to the top and slide the newer ones underneath them. 

You stare at his ass for… probably way longer than necessary, honestly. 

The woman points at a singular cake box left on the counter from today’s special orders, and immediately reaches up to take it without any other introduction. 

Oh. One of these customers. The ones who come in and grab stuff off the counter without asking for assistance, who will walk back into the kitchen to look at the overstock racks and help themselves to things that haven’t been put out on the floor yet.

A tight smile curls at your lips as you snag the tag on the box and look at the name before she can yank it off the counter from you. “For Linda?”

The woman nods curtly. As you turn the box to face her, your eyes shift back to Steve as he moves around the side of the display table. He stretches his arm out to reach for a stack on a higher shelf, and your eyes linger on the way the short sleeve of his uniform shirt rides up to expose his bicep.

“This is not the cake I ordered.”

“What?” You snap your eyes back to Linda’s pinched face, glaring down at the cake on the counter. It’s a basic sheet cake, with white frosting and a screaming red border, that says ‘Great Job Oscar!’ on it. Not necessarily a masterpiece, but a neat and pretty cake nonetheless.

“I ordered a cake with a winning streak theme. This has nothing on it,” Linda says icily as you snatch up the order slip you had taken off of the box and inspect it.

“A marble quarter sheet with white buttercream and a red border, that says ‘Great Job Oscar!’ in black icing?”

“Yes.”

“That’s… what’s on the cake, ma’am.”

“But there’s no other decoration. Where’s the winning streak theme?” 

You blink, and briefly make eye contact with Steve over the woman’s shoulder. He’s all but abandoned his task of stacking muffin boxes, instead watching your face carefully as your conversation plays out. He raises one eyebrow at you, and you’re not sure if that’s him trying to be condescending or supportive. 

“I- I apologize, ma’am-” you start, looking for a way to dig your way out of the situation, “The order does say that you requested the theme, but you didn’t specify any decorations. Our decorators won’t take liberties with the order on their own if you don’t request-”

“I don’t have time for this,” Linda interjects, and you clamp your mouth shut with a dull ache beginning to throb in your temples. “I’m supposed to be at a winning streak themed party in twenty minutes and I have an embarrassment of a cake to show for it. I should be reimbursed.”

“The cake wasn’t paid for in advance,” you tell her mildly, trying not to crinkle the page with her order on it as you hold it up. 

“Uh… accommodated, then. I shouldn’t have to pay for something I didn’t want in the first place!”

“I’m afraid I can’t just give you a cake for free, ma’am. I’m not authorized.”

“Can I speak to your manager, then?” 

You open your mouth to say that, technically, you are what amounts to the shift manager. It’s just you and Eddie and Steve in the store, and even though neither of your job descriptions really include the word ‘manager’ in them, seniority rules over all. You’ve been here long enough to be able to train them, so by right you’re the one in charge. 

But then a warm hand touches the curve of your lower back, and Steve appears out of thin air to gently scoot you aside without so much as a hello.

“What seems to be the trouble, ma’am?” Steve smiles, and you could almost mistake him for being sincere if his fingertips didn’t dig into your back just slightly before pulling away. 

Linda visibly softens her demeanor, smoothing her stringy blonde hair away from her face. “Are you the manager?”

You scrutinize his profile, trying for all the world to read his fucking mind, because you have no idea what he’s thinking. He’s barely even taken a cake order, let alone dealt with a disgruntled customer with a botched one.

“That, I am!” Steve declares, and oh. Cheeky motherfucker. He’s doing the voice. He bats his eyelashes- big, long, sweeping blinks that you think can make him take flight if he tries much harder. “What can I do for you?”

“This girl,” Linda tells him shortly, not even looking at you when she motions in your direction, “is refusing to compromise about this cake. It’s not what I ordered, and if I have to show up for this party without a winning streak themed cake, I’m going to be embarrassed. The customer is always right!”

“In matters of taste,” Eddie says from over your shoulder.

Linda fixes Eddie with a cold stare. “I’m sorry?”

“That, uh… that saying.” Eddie steps up to your other side, obviously choking back a laugh as he clears his throat. “The full saying is, ‘The customer is always right in matters of taste.’ Meaning you’re right about your order, we can’t argue with your personal preferences.” 

“Exactly.” Steve shrugs easily, the picture of self-assurance as he takes the order sheet from your hand and looks it over. You’re not even sure if he entirely understands how to dissect the order sheet itself, but he looks convincing enough while doing it. “If you don’t like the cake, you don’t have to buy it. But my gi- ‘ this’ girl is right.”

You snap your eyes toward Steve, the back of your neck burning. His what? 

Steve continues like he’s made no mistake whatsoever. “We can’t give you the cake for free- the only person who can do that is the owner.”

Linda scowls. “‘Take it or leave it,’ you mean?”

Steve affords her a kind smile. “I’d be happy to pull any of our cakes out of the display instead, if you see any you prefer.”

“No,” Linda insists, obviously unhappy about it, “I’ve been coming here for twenty years and this has never happened, the owner knows me-”

“We can call Mimi, if you’d like,” he adds. 

“No, like I said, I have a party in twenty minutes,” Linda says sourly, and begins digging through her purse. “No, I’ll pay for this one, I guess.”

Behind the counter, you watch Steve ball up Linda’s cake order sheet in his palm, squeeze it unnecessarily hard, and toss it into the waste bin. Then, faster than fucking lightning, you watch Eddie type the price of the cake into the cash register. He hits the sales tax button twice.

“Come back soon!” Eddie says cheerfully as he hands her the receipt. 

You stand motionless behind them both, dumbfounded, until Linda leaves. And then Steve’s immediately cursing, shaking his head as he turns and starts walking toward the back room, hands untying the bow at his waist to undo his apron. “They’ll say anything for free shit. Anything. What the fuck is a ‘winning streak’ theme, anyways? I swear- no, you know what, I don’t actually fucking care. I used to give out freebies all the time at Scoops. But this isn’t corporate, and Mimi knows my family-” 

You follow him closely, disappearing into the back with him as he continues blathering. “Why did you do that?” 

“Hm?” Steve pauses as he’s pulling his apron over his head, and stares at you for a few seconds, like he doesn’t even know what you’re referring to. And then, you see his brown eyes widen. “Oh! I guess… I mean, I could see it going bad, and I figured if she wasn’t listening to you, then she’d probably listen to me. If I, y’know. Put the moves on her.”

You snort loudly. “Always so fuckin’ cute- I could have handled it myself.”

“No, I know you could have. I know.” Steve nods, his hair sort of fluttering around his face as he looks away from you. “But… y’know, you don’t have to. You shouldn’t have to, while I’m here. I’ve been tortured by KGB and fought monsters, I can deal with an angry customer-”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Oh. Uh…” He pauses, eyes drifting off to the side, to meet Eddie’s, who trailed behind you into the back room and is lingering over your shoulder. “Dun- Dungeons and… and Dragons? Yeah… yeah! Have you- have you played it?”

“You?” Your giggle splutters loudly in your chest before bubbling up out of your throat unexpectedly. “Steve Harrington plays Dungeons and Dragons? You like that goofy sword and sorcery shit?”

“Fucking metal sword and sorcery shit, thank you very much,” Eddie snaps, and you scoff at him. 

Steve chuckles at your little jab at his words from earlier, looking anywhere but at your face. “Yeah, sort of. I mean… Munson taught me a bit about it.”

“Everything he knows.” Eddie’s grin is wide and holds an air of mystery to it, like he knows something you don’t.

“Hm. Put that on a t-shirt for me and maybe I’ll buy it.” You blush, staring at Steve’s profile as he pulls a water bottle out of the employee break cabinet and takes a long drink from it. Then, you turn to Eddie, who leans against the door jamb. “Where’d you learn that thing about ‘the customer is always right,’ anyways?”

“Hm? Oh… I used to help my uncle Wayne in his garage,” Eddie explains nonchalantly. “Learned a lot from watching him deal with customers.”

“Right,” you hum, nodding slowly, and then turn to Steve. “And you. You could get in so much fucking trouble if Mimi finds out about that whole thing. Where did you pick that up?”

“My best friend- Robin Buckley? You know her?” Steve says as he puts the bottle back in the cabinet and snaps it shut. You shake your head, and he goes on. “Yeah. She’s crazy smart. We worked together at Scoops, and Family Video. Always had a way to respond to everything, even though she’s awkward as hell. And before you ask- yes, she would have tried to put the moves on Linda, too.”

“Would she?”

“Oh yeah.” Steve grins at you fondly, making your heart stall in your chest a bit. “Every single move in the book. If you ask me, she’s better with the ladies than I am.”

You laugh, then nod your head slowly, looking him up and down. “Okay. You’re actually fucking hilarious, Harrington. Too bad I hate your guts.”

“Really? I’m moving up in the world.” Steve grunts. “There’s a fine line between love and hate, my darling dearest.”

“Is that why you almost called me ‘your girl?’”

His smirk creates cute little dimples in his cheeks. “No, I almost did that because you’re the only one who can tell me to suck on their nuts, and I’ll actually consider doing it.”

Before you can even take a moment to process that little wise-crack, Eddie’s distracting you. His hand passes through your line of vision, then comes up and presses against the front of your green apron, just against your breast. You genuinely think he’s trying to feel you up, and you snap your eyes down to find his ringed fingers scraping a giant drop of cream cheese frosting off of your chest. 

You feel your cheeks heat up. That must have come from when you were frosting the cinnamon rolls- more like smacking them around with frosting, really- and the fact that it was there the entire time Linda was here is more than humiliating. You must have looked like such an idiot, trying to conduct yourself like a manager-

“Messy little thing, aren’t you?” Eddie murmurs, using that same fucking condescending tone that makes your hair stand on end, before meeting your eye and sucking the glob of frosting off of his two fingers.

You get a sudden head rush, and it takes way more self restraint than it should to not audibly whimper. Oh, he really shouldn’t have done that. 

You stare at him for a long moment, your eyes flickering between his, and his fingers in between his ungodly pink lips. You… you feel like you’re fucking drowning, floundering around with your head underwater and you don’t know what to do. You snap your eyes to Steve, looking for some sort of sympathy or support, but he doesn’t give you any of that. Instead, he just winks. 

No. They absolutely should not have done that.

“Fucking… fuck this. Fuck both of you- I have work to do,” you hiss, trying to skirt past buckets of frosting to get around where Eddie’s blocking the doorway, but he refuses to step aside, instead creating a one-man barricade while he snickers and continues sucking on his fingers just to rile you up even more. “Fucking move, Eddie.”

“Oh, it’s Eddie now?” He grins, obviously enjoying how much you’re struggling, with your chest pushed up against his and your arm nearly circling his waist to lever yourself against the other side of the door. 

“Fuck you,” you spit, for a lack of anything else to say. 

“For the second time, I wish you would.” Eddie raises his hand and captures your chin, tilting your head up so that you look at him, instead of over his shoulder or to the side at Steve. Your heart jumps into your throat, feeling his damp fingers on your cheek and remembering how he had been sucking on them a second ago. “Might clean out that filthy mouth of yours.”

“What do you think you’re doing, huh?” You snatch Eddie by his pinstriped collar, simultaneously pulling him down to your height and also pushing him back against the wire rack of boxes along the far wall. Eddie curses, stumbling and grabbing onto your hips as if that will steady himself. His nose nudges yours from this angle, and how close you crowd up against him. “You drive me up the fucking wall, Munson. You think you can just sweet talk me like I’m some uptight customer?”

“Woah,” Steve says from behind you, but he doesn’t sound the slightest bit surprised. More amused, and intrigued. “I think you struck a nerve.” 

“Did I?” Eddie whispers, with a hint of a smirk still on his face. His dark eyes are looking directly into yours.

He doesn’t even have time to breathe before you kiss him. Desperately. Long and hard and sort of angry, open-mouthed so that you can taste the frosting still on his tongue. He makes the prettiest sound you’ve ever heard- somewhere between a sigh and a moan, as his hands come up to cup your face and pull you closer into him. His knee slotting between your legs, not pushing up but just remaining solidly there for you to lean against it. It takes an inordinate amount of strength for you not to grind yourself down onto his thigh.

“Guess that’s a yes,” Steve says calmly from just beside you. 

Eddie pulls back for air, forehead resting against yours, thumbs stroking your cheekbones in a mockery of a tender embrace. “Go on. Show Harrington how much you hate him, too.”

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do,” you grumble, but your hands have better plans. One stays on Eddie’s shoulder, but the other snatches Steve by the collar and pulls him forward so that you can attack his face with the same amount of fervor. Eddie has no compunction to be gentlemanly- while Steve’s hand rests lightly on your lower back, Eddie’s creeps up underneath your skirt to give your ass a tight squeeze, pulling you forward to grind against his thigh and making you gasp against Steve’s mouth so that his tongue can lick deeper into yours.

Nothing quite prepares you for how Eddie’s voice affects you when he says, “Uh oh, Harrington. I think I was right- she likes you. Don’t you, sweetheart?”

You make a short noise in your throat, your hand sliding down Steve’s chest to his waist, fingers beginning to make quick work of his fly. “Let’s- let’s just double check, huh? Make extra sure.”

“God- yeah. Yeah, okay. Just- be on the safe side.” Steve’s tongue is burning up when it touches your neck, his head nuzzling down so that he can graze your throat with his teeth. 

Eddie catches your hand before you manage to wiggle it beneath his waistband, and looks you directly in the eye just before he spits onto your palm. You whimper noisily at the feeling of it, warm and wet, dripping between your fingers while Steve licks at your neck and heat simmers under the tender skin between your thighs.

Air punches from Steve’s mouth when you work his trousers down his hips and pull his erection out of his boxers- he’s not quite pulsing and swollen yet, but your fingertips still just barely manage to meet from how thick he is. 

“Jesus Christ, Harrington,” you curse as you give him a languid stroke, feeling him shudder when you brush your thumb over his tip and then drag your hand down his length again. Eddie’s saliva helps to make the motion fluid and smooth, adding a slick sound to punctuate Steve’s loud gasp. 

“What?” Steve hisses, trying his best to appear passive, but his voice betrays him and cracks. He gazes at you a bit apprehensively, his doe eyes looking a little foggy with need as they flicker over your face and focus on your lips. 

“Nothing on earth needs to be this big.” 

Eddie’s free hand coming up to weave through Steve’s hair and jerking his head back. His teeth catch Steve’s earlobe just before he murmurs, “Told ya, big boy.” Eddie looks directly at you over Steve’s shoulder. “Harrington’s packing a fucking monster, isn’t he?”

You hum as you let your fingers drift along the length of him. Steve’s gaze suddenly turns darker, and his chuckle falls flat out of his mouth like an exclamation of awe more than anything. “Think you can take it?”

You don’t answer that. Your grip tightens just a bit and he groans loudly, his eyes rolling back as he tilts his head toward the ceiling. “Are you one of those guys that’ll come as soon as I gag?” 

“Fuck, maybe?” Steve’s hands cup the sides of your neck and trail up to cradle your head as you lower yourself in front of him. 

Eddie scoffs. “He can’t handle it worth a shit. Don’t go easy on him.”

“Then he’d better hold on to something.” You scrape your nails down his exposed thigh, reveling in the way his entire body shakes at the feeling. 

And, without any further warning, you wrap your lips around his cock. 

Steve curses, hands balling into fists just before he slams them down against the shelf he’s leaning on. Through your lashes, you watch him gasp for breath and you wonder if he’s honestly going to last long enough to fuck you properly. Not that it really matters, though, because Eddie seems like he’ll be more than happy to pick up where Steve leaves off. 

Eddie’s hand rests on the crown of your head, guiding you on Steve’s cock. His tip leaks with precum that tastes salty on your tongue when you lick at his slit, and as you take him further into your mouth, you realize just how right you were. He hits the back of your throat, making tears spring up in your eyes and a quiet moan bubble up out of your chest on its own when you choke. 

Steve just about loses his mind over it. He groans loudly, scrambling for a place to put his hands and ending up with a fistful of Eddie’s uniform shirt while he tries to compose himself. 

“Holy fuck, you look so good with your mouth full,” Steve grunts, his free hand coming up your chin as he slides his cock out of your mouth and back in again.

“I think I like her more when she can’t talk back to us,” Eddie chuckles darkly, pressing on the back of your head and making you choke again. 

Steve hisses, his fingers tightening on your cheek. “Look at me, let me see those eyes- there you go. Pretty baby.”

You whimper, letting your jaw go slack so that Steve can fuck your mouth all he wants while you try to steady yourself. You should hate it. You should hate this- you hate them both. You think. 

Wait. Do you? 

You’ve never been this needy before, but hell if your cunt isn’t just throbbing in your uncomfortably wet panties, and your nails are digging into Steve’s skin where you grip his thighs for support. If he notices any pain from it, he doesn’t say anything- just keeps giving you these erotic little gasps every time his cock nudges the back of your throat and your eyes flicker shut for a moment before he taps your cheek and makes you open them again. 

“We should do this more often,” Steve says thickly, and without thinking, you hum in agreement. You add a little resistance against Eddie’s hand on your head to regain a bit of control, letting your tongue roll against Steve’s length however you want. 

“You think she’ll give it this good if she’s getting fucked?” Eddie muses suddenly, his finger’s toying with your hair rather than guiding you anymore. 

“Fuck- only one way to find out.” Steve shakily releases the fistful he has of Eddie’s shirt, letting him slip away from his side. Eddie’s hand leaves your head, instead falling to the tie on his apron to start undoing it. 

You whine softly, shuffling up on your knees and nearly slipping when you feel Eddie’s hands flipping the skirt of your dress up, exposing you to the cool air. His large hand smooths over the hem of your underwear, then lowers to stroke the cleft of your pussy through the fabric. 

“Oh, poor thing.”  

“What is it?” Steve asks. 

“She’s soaked through these pretty panties,” Eddie coos softly as his fingers stroke back and forth over the fabric, nudging your clit with achingly gentle, indirect touches. You moan, arching your back for more. “Baby got so wet from sucking Steve’s cock, huh? Sweet little pussy needs some attention?”

“Shit. God, that’s so hot. Fuck-” Steve grabs your hair, guiding you off of his cock with a wet noise that makes Eddie’s fingers press on your clit just a little bit harder. You splutter, drool trailing from your lips and dripping down your chin as you try to catch your breath. Something you can’t quite do, because Eddie won’t stop touching you. 

Steve tilts your head up, leveraging you backwards a bit as he kneels in front of you. “You want Eddie to fuck you? Is that what you need?”

You nod, wrapping your hand around Steve’s wet cock and giving him a few slow pumps. “Yeah, I-” you hiccup when you feel Eddie’s fingers hook your panties to the side, and dip through your dripping folds, unobstructed. “Oh fuck, I want it so bad.”

“Don’t hate us so goddamn much now?” Eddie croons as he presses two fingers deep into your pussy. 

You groan and hang your head, forehead pressing up against Steve’s navel and your nails sinking into the meat of his thigh. You can feel his cock twitch in your hand, and it occurs to you that he likes that pain- or maybe he just likes holding you against him while Eddie fingerfucks you.

Steve’s fingers card through your hair tenderly. “Keep doing what you’re doing, Munson. I think she’s having trouble talking.”

“For a change.” Eddie curls his fingers, and you nearly lose your balance, thankful that you have Steve to hold you up. “So fuckin’ wet… I think I want to taste it first.”

Eddie’s fingers leave you, and you openly sob against Steve’s stomach as his grip tightens in your hair. “E-eddie…”

His two hands curl around the waistband of your panties, and rip through the fabric as though it’s only paper. “Hold her up, Steve, it sounds like she’s gonna need it.”

Steve puts his hands on your shoulders and holds you up, rocking back so that he can get a good look at your face. Eddie spreads your legs apart, and you can feel him crowding his body in between them. There’s a slight pause, and then his tongue touches you, licking a stripe of fucking fire through your cunt from behind. 

Oh shit. Holy fucking shit. It’s too good, too warm and slick when you’ve been aching for it for way too long, your clit pulsing desperately and burning hot when his tongue strokes over it. You strain up against Steve’s hands, but he keeps pushing you forward, keeping you there against Eddie’s mouth. You moan obscenely loud, your hands tearing at Steve’s shirt like it’ll somehow convince him to let you go. 

“You’re so damn pretty like this, angel,” Steve whispers, tilting your chin up when your head falls so he can keep looking at your face. He’s flushed, his lips parted and his eyes drooping and so dark that you nearly balk under his gaze.

Eddie groans in the back of his throat and finally pulls back, and you’re not sure whether to chase his mouth or to sob for relief, so you sort of do both at the same time. He plants a hand on your ass to keep you from falling backwards into him. 

“Fuck, she tastes so sweet. Here-” You feel him move, and then Steve holds up a hand to catch something that Eddie tosses to him. 

You lift your eyes and discover that Steve is holding your torn underwear. The light blue fabric looks so out of place and innocent, little pink flowers decorating the waistband. It makes it worse that he’s looking directly at you, keeping you frozen in place. He holds them up to his nose and breathes deeply, letting his eyes flutter shut just briefly before he looks at you again and drags the soaked crotch of them across his tongue. 

“Steve…” you breathe, overwhelmed by the sight of him and the sound of his groan of pleasure. You search for something to say to him, but nothing comes before you feel something hot and thick pushing into your soaking entrance. You gasp, and then claw at Steve’s thigh in lieu of something to hold onto. “Fuck, Eddie-”  

“Shouldn’t you be choking on Steve’s cock right about now?” Eddie hisses through his teeth, sounding strained and letting out a low groan to punctuate it. 

You whine, feeling unbelievably stretched and full as Eddie splits you open, but you still scramble backwards and sink your mouth onto Steve’s cock so quickly that a gasp leaps out of his chest. 

Steve punches out a little laugh, his hand twisting your hair and pushing you down until your eyes water. “So agreeable once you get your pussy filled.”

“God, she’s so tight,” Eddie grunts as he hollows out and starts thrusting, reaching deeper inside you each time. You don’t think it’s so much that you’re tight as he’s just big- you haven’t seen his cock, but you can feel it, like you haven’t fucking felt anything else before, and it’s good. You can feel every inch, every ridge, and it makes your eyes fully roll back into your skull. “Fuck, you gotta feel this-”

“Can’t. ‘M not gonna last, shit…” Steve sounds wrecked, his words coming out sharp and desperate. The hand on your head is shaking, and you’re honestly impressed he’s lasted as long as he has. “‘M gonna come down this pretty throat.”

“You hear that, sweet pea? You gonna swallow all of Steve’s come?” Eddie’s hand weaves through your hair around Steve’s fingers, aiding in shoving your head down onto his cock. 

As if you weren’t going to, and as if he wasn’t already fucking your mouth faster than you could reasonably keep up. But you whimper and bury your nose in the patch of coarse hair at the base of Steve’s cock, inhaling his scent and tasting his musky flavor on your tongue, and you swallow around him. And then you keep swallowing, because Steve comes hard.  

He sounds absolutely gorgeous when he does it, too. If Eddie wasn’t fucking you so hard that you couldn’t stop whining, you think it would be nearly like a symphony to hear Steve reduced to quiet whimpers. By the time the hands on your head relax enough to let you off of him, though, he’s completely out of breath. 

“Good girl,” Steve pants, his hand lifting up to caress your cheek and to wipe a little dribble of his come from the corner of your mouth, so soft that it could be construed as sweet if there wasn’t any context to it. “Fuck… you were so good.”

“Yeah, sweetheart,” Eddie coos into your ear, still driving his hips into yours with such force that it’s jolting you toward Steve. “Good baby, pretty baby- takes cock like a perfect little slut.”

You groan, hanging your head and arching your back toward Eddie. You seize up, your orgasm simmering low in you like the receding tide before a fucking tsunami, and you’re almost scared of how big it feels. 

“She liked that,” Eddie chuckles darkly, bending further over you so that his breath tickles your ear. “You like it when I call you a slut, huh? Our perfect. Little. Slut.” 

You open your mouth to say his name, tell him to shut up, or keep going, or anything, but all that comes out is a garbled moan. Your hand juts forward and clamps down like a vise onto Steve’s thigh, finding that he’s pulled his pants up. Your nails scratch at stiff khaki twill, trying to beg him to take pity on you, but he doesn’t. Of course he doesn’t. 

“Pick her up,” Steve says above you. “I want to see her face when she comes.”

Oh, so he’s trying to kill you, actually. That tracks.

Eddie’s arm snakes around your waist and hauls you up, and he rocks back onto his heels to pull your back against his chest. He hugs you close to him, shushing you when his cock hits you from a different angle and you cry out sharply from the feeling. 

“Pretty thing can’t take it,” Steve murmurs as he crowds in close, his hands coming up to caress you through your dress. The fabric is too goddamn rough and itchy, and your skin is too sensitive for him to be toying with you now. 

“Oh, she can take it.” Eddie sounds so sure, his voice rough and stony as he rocks his pelvis up against you while, at the same time, pulling you down into his lap. “She can take all of it. Can’t you, baby?”

You hope the question is rhetorical. You’re trembling, too lost in the feeling of the mind-numbing bliss Eddie’s giving you to come up with a response at this point. Your hand plunges back over your shoulder into a mess of curly hair, and you feel him turn his head to brush his lips against your ear. 

Steve’s hand brushes up your thigh, creeping under your skirt that’s draped across both you and Eddie’s knees. You barely have time to pick your head up and intellectualize what he’s doing before his thumb touches your clit. 

“Oh fuck-” Eddie chokes out urgently, just at the same time as you sink your nails into his forearm and all of your floor muscles lock down around him. 

And then the tsunami hits. 

You nearly scream, your cunt tightening up to wring everything out of the sensation that it can. Eddie’s cock is so hard and it hits inside you so perfectly every time that you swear you’re going to die from it. You’re collapsing forward, despite Eddie’s grip on your waist and Steve’s solid chest creating a barrier for you to fall into- your limbs feel liquid, all your muscles finally relaxing all at once. 

You feel Eddie falter, his hand slipping on your waist so that you do fall into Steve’s chest. While Eddie’s cock throbs inside you and his moans fill your ears, Steve’s hands cup your face and tilt your head up toward his. And then his lips are on yours, and his tongue is licking deep into your mouth at the same time as you feel Eddie come deep inside your cunt. 

You don’t want Eddie to pull out. Not really. You’re not going to tell him to stay there inside you while you’re both crouched awkwardly on the hard floor, but you do wish he’d take at least a few seconds before he does, because the aching emptiness he leaves in his place is enough to make tears spring up in your eyes. 

“Shh, baby, it’s okay, you did so well,” Eddie whispers as you sob openly from the sensation, his arm coming back around your waist to pull you against him. And then you both sort of topple backwards, his shoulders hitting the stacks of backstock frosting buckets as Steve shuffles back to lean against the wire rack across from you. He pulls your legs into his lap and starts stroking his hand across your bare calf. 

You try to catch your breath while Eddie reaches for something on the floor off to the side. You blink your eyes open to find him fiddling with his discarded green apron, pulling a pack of cigarettes and a lighter out of the pocket in it before wadding it up into a little ball. 

He promptly tucks it between your legs and starts cleaning you up with it. 

“R’you using your apron… as a cum rag?” You slur tiredly at him, squeaking a little as the rough fabric scrapes across your overly sensitive clit. 

“Don’t want to leave a mess,” he mutters easily, making Steve chuckle across from you. “Why s’it that I can fuck you half out of your mind and you’ll still bitch me out about how I clean shit?”

“‘Cause it’s fun t’see you all mad. You’re pretty when you’re pissy.” You feel his chest shake with laughter as he finishes wiping you down and tosses the apron aside, then wraps his arms snugly around your middle. 

“Good thing you’re pretty all the time, then.” Eddie huffs, rocking you back and forth a little as he fits his head on your shoulder. You tap your fingers across his forearm, looking down at them and humming contentedly. 

“What is it?” Steve asks, smiling at you almost fondly. 

You sigh, dragging your fingertip along Eddie’s skin. “I like his tattoos.”

“I knew it,” Eddie whispers, and you can hear the grin in his voice. He nuzzles his nose against your neck, making you giggle and shut your eyes. “I still haven’t shown you the rest of ‘em.”

“There’s always next time.”

Steve blinks. “You want to do this again?”

“Of course I want to fucking do this again, Steve,” you snap, rolling your eyes playflully. “Been wanting to jump both of you since you started, wasn’t it fucking obvious?”

“Was to me.” Eddie’s finger traces along your collar, toying with the first button on the front of your uniform dress. “Also, I haven’t seen your tits, so. I’m not done with you yet.”

“I dunno, the dress kind of does it for me,” Steve admits, reaching up to scratch the back of his neck. “It’s, uh… cute. Like a 50s housewife or something.”

“Let’s get you a string of pearls and see how long ‘Big Dick’ Harrington lasts then,” Eddie snickers, and you laugh tiredly as you watch Steve flush. 

You fall into easy silence, but just as soon as you relax into Eddie’s arms, the bell over the front door of the bakery jingles. And then the hand bell on the front counter dings loudly. 

And dings again. And dings again. And dings agai-

“You gonna get it, this time?” Steve asks Eddie, sounding a little bit grumpy already. 

“No, I’m gonna hold her a while longer,” Eddie says coolly, not leaving any room for discussion. He presses a tiny kiss to your neck, just underneath your ear, and you squeak in surprise at the lightness of it. “Go get ‘em, Mr. Manager Man.”

“Fuckin’-” Steve rolls his eyes as he gently sets your legs aside before gracelessly clambering up off the ground. He smooths out his uniform, tucking in the tail of his shirt before striding through the door into the kitchen. “What’s up, party people?”

“Do you have any chocolate cakes with white buttercream already made? I need it for tonight.”

Eddie scoffs in your ear, his hand drifting across your thigh to rest just shy of your pussy, making your breath hitch and your hips cant up toward his touch. “They always wait for the last fuckin’ minute, don’t they?”

We Tried The World CH4.

THE MASTERLIST THUNDER LAKE, COLORADO.  1227 MILES FROM HOME. 

The world around you changed as Steve drove you both out of Kansas. You packed up the car and drove through the night, bikini still on underneath a sundress, hair damp and skin smelling like chlorine. 

Steve sat next to you, tired, happy, sipping coffee and looking like he’d just leaped off of a cliff. His eyes were bright for the late hour, his hair wild from a day spent mostly underwater. 

He seemed lighter since he’d told you his secret, whispered it into the reflections off the pool, letting the silence and the sinking sun soak it up. You’d dressed on the edges of the water, both smiling, both blushing, avoiding too much eye contact as you dragged towels over bare skin. 

He’d opened the car door for you after you both scaled the fence and you wondered if his secret had sunk to the bottom of the pool, if it was supposed to stay there, never to be spoken of again. But by the time you’d driven out of Wichita and hit the back roads, the sun was gone, the moon was high and Steve stopped at some traffic lights and they lit you both up in scarlet light. 

The boy let out a breath, like he was readying himself and you’d turned at the noise, a question on your lips you never got to say because Steve leaned over the console, just a little, hand outstretched. His fingers were surprisingly warm when they grazed over your cheekbone, just underneath the line of your lashes. You’d blinked, almost gasped, and then Steve was pulling back and whispering “eyelash.” 

You slept for a while, tried your best to stay awake to keep the boy company as he drove but after the second stop for gas and another coffee, Steve was pulling one of his sweaters from his bag, coaxing it over your like a makeshift blanket and you couldn’t help it. 

It smelled like him, like the forest, like sunscreen and faded cologne. You closed your eyes without meaning to, lashes fanning over sunburnt cheeks and Steve turned the music down low, until whoever was singing was whispering to you, lulling you to sleep under Steve’s sweater. 

When you woke up, it was still dark, the land outside looking a little rockier, a little more up and down than before. The moon was high, a pale yellow that cast some light into the front seats of the BMW. Steve had pulled over, into a dirt parking lot off the side of the road and he slept upright, arms crossed, lips slack, head nodding off in every direction. 

 So you woke him up with your hand pressed to his forearm, squeezing softly to him to stir. He looked at you, bleary eyed and sleep mussed, leaning into your touch like he needed it to wake up. Steve didn’t fuss too much about handing over his keys, all previous arguments about you taking turns to drive out the window. 

Sure you knew how to drive, even a stick shift. You just didn’t have your licence. But that didn’t seem to matter all that much at three in the morning, in the dark and in the quiet of nowhere, Colorado. 

The world was asleep, letting you do what you wanted, what you pleased. It shut its eyes and gave you the moon, a long open road and only a hint at where you were driving to. Steve said ‘thanks, sweetheart,’ as you passed each other in front of the headlights, swapping places and sleepy smiles. 

If you reacted to the term of affection, you didn’t show it. And if Steve grinned when you slipped his sweater over your dress before settling behind the wheel, he hid it well. He fell back asleep quickly, an almost undeserving amount of trust given to you as he shuffled into the corner of the seat and the window, the keys to his most beloved possession in your hands. 

So you drove until the sun started to come up, a whole new picture in your windscreen. Mountains, canyons, valleys. The land turned rusty, oranges and reds and patches of green and wildflowers. The road went up, up, up and you climbed with the sun. Peachy skies greeted you, made Steve stir and wake up with a smile because the warmth of a new day was creeping into the car and you had the sleeves of his too big sweater curled around your hands as you held onto the wheel. 

Your ears popped and so did Steve’s, a quick sting that told you both you were higher than before, the roads still climbing, twisting and turning between mountains, overlooking lakes that seemed to appear from nowhere. Everything was pink when the sun came out, the sky, the rocks, the land, the water. 

Even Steve, who was looking at you with the softest smile, his hair mussed from where he’d tan his hands through it, the crease of his seat belt cutting across cheek. The bruise around his eye was completely gone now, skin unmarked except from the evidence of a good sleep. 

He watched you change gear, tongue peeking out from between your lips as you concentrated and the boy was laughing, turning the radio up as the new day started, a new song, a new state, a new kind of buzz between you both. 

Synths, drums, building, rising, getting faster and faster, and then you rounded a corner on the quiet road, burst out from between the tall trees that grew on either side of the tarmac and then and then and then—

A picture perfect view, a rolling mountain, rose coloured in the rising sun, dusted with greenery, with trees that looked like matchsticks. It led down to a lake, almost too blue to be real holding a mirror image of the scene above it. 

The sky was like silk, washes of pastels, clouds coming in from the horizon that promised a bright and warm day. And then you were laughing and so was Steve, a burst of noise that said ‘holy shit, can you believe this?’

The boy was grinning back, leaning forward on his seat, hands on the dashboard, eyes fucking shining and he looked at you like he knew, like he agreed, like he was telling you, ‘I’m so fucking happy I’m here. With you.’

I’m so happy it’s you. 

You pulled off the road, tires kicking up clouds of orange dust and you were still laughing, eyes a little glassy, overwhelmed. Steve seemed to understand because he didn’t question you, he just got out of the car too, walked around the front of the bumper and joined you at the metal barrier that separated you both from the drop below. 

The world was still waking up, birds barely calling out, the low buzz of insects seeming too far away and the heat in the air still felt fresh. Steve’s shoulder brushed yours and together you took a big breath in, held it and let it out on another huff of laughter. He let you lean into him, tears brimming at your lash line because it was all so pretty and it had been ten days since you’d left Hawkins. Ten days since you left the place that was supposed to be home and suddenly it hit you that you didn’t really miss it.  

Not your aunt's house, or your bed, or even the way the neighbours cat sat on your windowsill each morning.  

Because it had only been ten days but suddenly Steve Harrington was the closest thing you had to a best friend, the closest thing to a home, something that made you ache with warm familiarity. 

You sniffed, sighed, scrubbed the back of your hand over your watery eyes and then Steve was there, laughing softly, not unkindly, just amused. His hands curled around your shoulders, squeezed at you and tugged you back a little, just enough that your back bumped his chest and he let you stay there, leaning, supported. 

His chin hooked over your shoulder and it felt a little like a hug. 

“Y’okay?” He whispered.

You nodded, suddenly feeling a little silly at your outburst of emotion. You felt entirely vulnerable, more exposed than you ever had, feeling more naked than the times you stood before the boy, wet and in a bikini. 

“Yeah,” you tried to whisper back, but it came out in a little gasp. “M’fine, shit, it’s just— it’s just pretty, y’know?”

Steve’s gaze flickered from the view to your face, lips twisted in conflict as if he was trying to decide what he wanted to look at more. But your eyes were shining, unshed tears clinging to your lashes like glitter, lips parted in awe. He could see the summer in your skin, in the glow that wasn’t there when he first picked you up that morning, just outside your house. 

His stare settled on you, close and steady, your back still pressed to his chest and for a second, he wondered if he’d be allowed to reach out and hold your hand, I’d you’d let him, if it would make you smile. But he didn’t feel as brave as he wanted to, not yet. So he cleared his throat and nodded, his cheek brushing your hair and said:

“Yeah, s’real pretty.”

He was still looking at you.  

—————

Steve took back over driving duties. It went like it always did, windows down, music up, his sunglasses over his eyes and his hair a little wild. Seeing him like that made your stomach flip, like you were the only one that got to see this version of him. 

Maybe you were. Maybe this Steve was yours. 

You sang to him, he sang back, voices louder and crazier as the wind whipped through the car and the sun made everything so much warmer than you’d ever felt before. 

It made your cheeks hurt, smiling at it all. It made you feel like a teenager again, the way Steve looked at you. Tongues pressed to cheeks to stop yourselves from grinning too much, eyes dancing over the other, gazed hidden behind Ray Bans and tangled hair. 

Steve drove you both into a town, cheeks burning as you passed signs that said “Loveland” and it seemed like easy to follow each other around the streets. The place was a big city, but it had a small town feel that felt a little like home and it eased you both as you walked around parks and lakes, trying to find a store. 

It was easier to touch each other more too, ten days in and a few nights tangled together, legs twisted, ankles hooked around calves and cheeks pressed to chests. So you didn’t flinch, didn’t blink, didn’t think too much of it when Steve pointed to a supermarket across the road and grabbed your hand. 

He held it as you navigated through the traffic, jogging a little to keep up with him and as you walked through the doors he didn’t let go. It was hardly a thing, palms barely touching just fingers twisted together like you were scared to lose the other. 

He only let go when he grabbed a cart and the boy rolled his eyes and grinned when you hopped inside of it. So it went like that, Steve pushing you around the store, your sundress and his sweater riding up your thighs as you let your dust covered shoes hang out over the side. 

He passed you snacks, bottles of water, some cans of soda and even a new blanket as you read out loud from the little book you’d bought way back in Illinois, telling Steve all about the Rocky Mountains and the Continental divide. He even threw a disposable camera on your lap as you neared the checkout, a roll of film loaded and ready to go. So it was settled, because you asked and Steve said yes, and suddenly you were planning for a few days in the wild, with creeks and lakes and canyons and the chance to see stars in the sky again. 

You could feel Steve’s eyes on you as you loaded up the car, his sweater still swamping your frame, the hem of your dress peeking out from underneath. He hadn’t asked for it back and although the day was getting warmer, the temperature creeping upwards, the soft material smelled like him, like mint and boy and summer and Steve, and you didn’t want to take it off. 

Not yet. 

The drive out of town made your body buzz, that same feeling of anticipation you felt when you had travelled towards The Ozarks. It happened the same way, with the skylines and brick buildings falling away from you as you ventured further away from the city. The road led you back into canyons, made you both feel like ants in a toy car and it was brand new, it was different, it was a little bit magic. 

The road started winding, the land around you growing and when the sun reached its peak in the sky, what little clouds had been there slipped away and you were left with blue, blue, blue. Everything around you got taller, jagged rocks lifting up from the ground until they became cliff faces and mountains grew in the distance, breaking up the skyline with peaks of snow that seemed so far away. 

You passed campsites, cabins and people walking with backpacks heading towards trails, cars with canoes on their roofs, signs warning you about mountain lions. It was a new world, something else entirely, and Steve seemed as mesmerised as you were. So you stopped at a little information centre, took turns in the tiny toilet and grabbed a map of the trailheads and some chips from a vending machine that needed a shove from Steve’s shoulder to rattle loose.

The parking lot cleared as you walked back to the BMW, kicking up dust as you stared up at the mountains in the distance, the canyons that closed you in from both sides. Trees littered the cliff faces, patches of green that broke up the rock, the roads, the wooden cabins that were selling hiking equipment and camping gear. 

You turned to Steve as you reached the car, sundress skimming your thighs, Steve’s sweater trailing past your fingertips, your hair a little wild from the way the wind had whipped through it during the ride here. You found the boy a few feet behind you, sleeves rolled up, all tanned skin and hair messier than yours. He held the little camera he’d bought up to his face, eyes squinting as he looked through the lens at you.

“What’re you doing?” you laughed, embarrassed at his blatant attention.

“M’takin’ a photo of the mountains,” Steve grinned, pressing the button until the camera clicked and whirred. He was still pointing it at you. “You can draw me, but I can’t snap some pictures? Rude.”

He was still grinning when he brought the camera away from his face, rolling his eyes and passing it to you when you wiggled your fingers at it. The boy hopped up onto the closed trunk, knees on his elbows and squinting into the sun but you clicked the camera, capturing Steve and the mountains, the burgundy of the car, the glare of the sun.

It was quiet when you let the camera fall to your side, memories already locked inside of it, both of your smiling faces, surrounded by a world that looked a little alien to you. Steve nodded towards the hills and valleys in the difference, the road that wound around a bend and disappeared into the wild.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Always,” you replied.

So you both drove out towards the mountains, climbing higher and higher again, cars becoming less frequent the further into the national park you ventured. You passed campgrounds, signs for cabins and tent pitches and Steve turned off onto a smaller trail, dirt road kicking up dust as you turned the music up a little louder, smiling as you sang. 

“Maybe you wonder where you are, I don't care,” you were louder than ever, unashamed, eyes shining, windows down and Steve’s eyes flicking from the road to you. 

“Here is where time is on our side, take you there, take you there,” Steve finished, and god it all felt a little cosmic, like the world meant for you both to be there. 

You stabbed a finger to the map, declared your destination to be a blue spot on the paper called ‘Thunder Lake’ and Steve made a joke about you always leading them to water, like some sort of make believe creature, something from a fairytale. But he listened and obeyed when you pointed this way and that, yelling left and right through laughter and new songs. 

The road opened up for you both when the trees on either side of you cleared and a rocky beach led down to a crystal blue shoreline, mountains surrounding the water, closing you in. The lake felt like it belonged to you and Steve, it felt like a new secret to share. 

You stepped out together, wonder on your faces, smiles curling into grins and it was like the air glittered, like the sun got a little warmer when you stepped into its light. 

The car was left on the gravel, the air not as warm as it was back in town, so you kept Steve’s sweater on, ducked your head and bit your lip when he plucked at the material and grinned at you. You had lunch by the waters edge, the surface glassy and unspoiled, mountains for friends as you shared a packet of chips, broke apart sandwiches and took a half each. 

It was the nicest kind of quiet.

And when the run had passed its highest point in the sky and the world started to glow a little pink, a little more peach and orange as evening rolled in, you lay on your stomach on a grassy patch, sketchbook opened and a pencil sucked between your lips. Steve was a little away, balancing on one foot on a rock in the shallows, arms outstretched, an old flannel hanging over his t-shirt. 

You were finishing up drawing the rip in his jeans, just above his knee when he came wandering over. He’d caught you drawing him enough times now that you didn’t immediately hide your page, but the flush was still evident on your cheeks when he plopped down beside you. He was close, closer than he used to dare, thigh pressed to your ribs and his face hovering over your shoulder.

He smelled like the mountains, fresh and like pine needles, the last of the sunscreen and passionfruit iced tea. 

“Does my hair really look that bad?” he complained, but there was a smile on his lips, a shine in his eyes when you snorted and nudged at him.

“Shut up,” you told him, fonder than ever. 

“Can I?” he asked, nodding towards your book. 

You nodded, swallowing hard. Your hands felt empty without it, but Steve kept it close between you both. 

The cover was frayed, stained, the pages curling and dog eared, some ripped, some missing. The book held a little of everything, scenes from Hawkins, some self portraits, your aunt cooking soup at the stove. The most recent pages were filled with Steve.

Profiles of his face, strong jaw, full lips, furrowed brows. Steve lying in the sun, Steve driving the car, head tipped back, sunglasses hiding the way his eyes glittered. You’d drawn the car, muddy, dust covered and loved, the lake from the Ozarks, a bird's eye view of the winding roads that took you out of Kansas. You sketched the outside of the motel from Illinois, wrote the room number underneath the lines of ink like a signature, and drew two floating figures in a big, wide pool.

You were holding your breath. 

“I like these,” he murmured, trailing his touch over the lines, a finger pushed to the figure that was supposed to be you, floating on your back in water. “They’re really good.”

You ducked your head, tried not to smile and whispered a thank you and grinned anyway when he poked at your cheek. 

Then you were squealing, laughing, tugged clumsily onto your back as Steve fell back with you, his hands on your shoulders as you both dropped back into the long grass. The camera flashed above you, a click and whirl as Steve captured the scene. 

The pair of you, shoulder to shoulder, cheeks touching, lips split with wide smiles and eyes bright. Your hair mixed with the boys, with the blades of grass, skin painted apricot in the setting sun. 

“We were definitely only half in the frame,” you snorted, your hand pushing at Steve’s side as he scoffed in protest. 

“What d’you mean, I’m practically a professional.”

You laughed again, softer this time, because Steve was pushing himself up, turning to hover over you and he was grinning, backlit by the sunset and you were suddenly reminded of his favourite colour. 

He was sunset yellow, gold and peach and tangerine, coral coloured cheeks with hair that suddenly seemed caramel. He was sunkissed, freckled, stubble on his jaw that had grown since the last motel stop, his hair a little more curled at the ends from being outside. 

Clouds had started to roll in over the mountains, burnt orange and indigo, bringing in the threat of rain but you couldn’t find it in you to care when Steve was looking at you like that. 

Like the same he had on the Fourth of July, right before he kissed you. 

But then he was sitting back, clearing his throat and tugging at his hair like he needed to give his hands something else to do. In case he felt like he was going to do something stupid. 

Like touch you. 

So Steve handed you back your book instead, pages slipping free that you’d once torn out but decided to keep, half finished sketches, lists and a photo that was lined with peeling, old tape, yellowed and dog eared. 

“What’s that?” Steve picked up the photograph, gentle with a finger and a thumb, like he knew it was something special. 

You sat up and looked, heart skipping a beat. It was an image of a house, white wooden slats, a blue roof and matching shutters, a buttercup yellow door surrounded by hanging flowers. The house sat on a hill, sand covering the path leading up to it, long grass on its edges, like nature itself built it. The photo looked old, like the photo had seen some water damage, some wear and tear and a lot of love. 

“Uh,” you started, blinking back a sudden onslaught of tears that you didn’t want, didn’t expect. You sniffed, shrugged, feeling silly. “That’s my grandparents house.”

“Oh,” Steve looked at you, unsure whether to reach out and touch you or not. He placed the photo on the open pages of your book and nodded. “S’really lovely. The house- it’s pretty.”

You smiled and nodded too because it was. 

“Did you go there a lot?” The boy asked and he sounded so earnest, so sincere. “Is it in Virginia too?”

You shook your head, smile slipping into something sad and you picked up the photo, ran a thumb over its work edges and glanced back up at Steve. There were four of him, his pretty face split into fractures with the tears that made your eyes a little glassy. You blinked, felt stupid when wet hit your cheek and surprised you. 

“No, uh, I’ve never been,” you told him. “I met them once or twice, I think? I was young. They were so mad at my mom and they were really old when she left. They couldn’t travel a lot and by the time they got sick I knew my mom was never coming back and my aunt couldn’t afford to fly us out.”

You left the rest unsaid, the obvious outcome lingering in the air like the end of a movie that never got a happy ending. 

“Oh,” Steve whispered and you nodded again, like you agreed with him. 

“It’s silly,” you said because maybe it was. “I’ve never been but I look at this photo and it feels like the closest thing I maybe would’ve had to a home. I remember my grans baking; scones and the best meringues you could ever taste.”

Steve smiled when you did, your face lighting up with a memory and he watched your eyelashes flutter like you were trying your best to remember it all. 

“My aunt said my grandad called me ‘duck,’ said he loved quiz shows and toffee.” 

You sniffed again, rolled your eyes at yourself and leaned against Steve when he let himself fall into your space again. 

“I remember him bringing me a bag of it when he last came to Hawkins, told me to hide it and not tell my aunt,” you huffed out a laugh. “I still have the last piece of it.”

You thought of the chew, still twisted in its shiny gold wrapper, hidden in a little tin in the bottom of your bag, mixed with jewellery and loose coins. 

“That’s nice,” Steve said and he whispered your name, caught your attention and smiled all sweet, nodded encouragingly at you like he was saying it was okay that you told him. “S’really nice that you have those memories.”

“Yeah,” you smiled, watery, wiped the back of your hand roughly across your face and nudged your shoulder into Steve’s, a solid and warm comfort. “My aunt said I looked like my gran. Not my mom, she always said I looked when my gran when she was young.”

Steve let his knee knock against yours, smiled at you a little wistfully, glanced at you from the corners of his eyes. “Oh yeah?” He said, “your gran must’ve been real pretty then, huh?”

You scoffed, burned with embarrassment, but more than a little pleased with his words and you were quiet and insincere when you mumbled, “shut up.”

He knew you didn’t mean, Steve could see the pink on your cheeks and the shin in your eyes but you were hiding your smile and he decided it was a very pretty look on you. Pleased, maybe even a little overwhelmed by him. 

“Do you miss home?” You asked him, breaking the quiet that settled over you both for a minute or two. You were both staring out at the water, the reflections of the blue mountains in the lake. “Your friends?”

Steve shrugged, smiled a little sad like you had done and let his fingers run over the grass, searching for stones to skip across the shore. 

“I think,” Steve replied, “that if this trip has caught me anythin’, it’s that I don’t think I really had a home, y’know? A house, sure, a real nice house too.”

He found a stone, threw it into the lake and you both watched it splash and sink. The skies were darker, clouds rolling down the canyons, settling in the skies above you, dark and heavy.  

“But I miss my friends,” Steve nodded, staring at his hands. “Miss them a lot, yeah.”

“D’you wish they were here?” You asked, “Robin? Eddie, Dustin?”

“Sometimes?” Steve squinted at you, like he wasn’t really sure of his answer, like he felt guilty if he said otherwise. “We’re always with each other- and I love that, I love them. They’re my family, y’know?”  

“But we’ve been through a lot together and sometimes it’s too much, and I just… I just-”

You sighed, nodding as if he’d already said the word you were both thinking. “Need to breath?”

Steve laughed, a little humourless, a little relieved and he nodded, thankful for the way you seemed to know what he wanted to say, what he needed to hear. 

“Yeah, that,” the boy agreed. “But, hey, I’ve got you with me, right? And you’ve got me.”

You smiled at that, because the boy’s words lifted at the end, a little more lightness and warmth returning to him, despite the way the wind had picked up, pulling more of those dark clouds closer. You wrapped your arms around you, leaned closer into Steve’s side. 

You didn’t look at him when you next spoke, felt like you couldn’t because god, you felt painfully shy, like a teenager with her first crush, like you were talking to that boy next door who seemed too pretty to be real. 

“We’re friends?”  

Steve looked at you then, turning and holding in a little noise at the realisation of how close you both were, shoulder to shoulder, noses only inches apart. He was looking at you that way again, like he had in the kitchen, with fireworks in the sky. Maybe you were looking at him the same way too. 

His grin was achingly soft and he cleared his throat, nervous, nodded and tried his best not to look at your lips, the way the corner of them tilted upwards in a shy smile. You wondered if he’d crack a joke, if he’d say something stupid.

But he didn’t. Steve just gave a little half shrug, tucked his bottom lip between his teeth and tried to hide his blush. But he kept gazing at you, nodded and said, “yeah, sweetheart, yeah… we’re friends.”

It was lovely the way he said it, like you’d both earned the title. Like travelling through four states had been enough time for him to be able to look at you and realise you were no longer a stranger. Steve knew your favourite colour, your favourite animal, your favourite movie. He knew how you liked your coffee and that you preferred the right side of the bed. 

It warmed you to realise that you knew the same. You knew that his hair was a wonderful riot in the morning, that he hated apple juice, that he always mumbled to himself when he was trying to figure out a problem.

You hadn’t realised you’d been staring, or that Steve had been staring right back, still too close, his hair tickling your cheek when the wind lifted at it. 

And then, rain. 

A lot of it, loud and fat, huge droplets that hammered down with a dull roar, soaked you both to the skin almost immediately. You both jumped with a yelp, a few choice curse words and a shocked laugh that sounded more like a gasp. The sky had turned darker than ever, a moody violet that blended with the canyons, madee your little slice of the world turn into a glittering snow globe that held nothing but inky colours and the roll of thunder.

It was freezing, a stark contrast to the July weather that you’d experienced in every state; humid air, hot sun and cloudless skies. You couldn’t see one patch of blue above. But Steve was in front of you, grinning, laughing, grabbing at your cold hand and dragging you back to the car. You were sodden, the boy's sweater a water logged weight on your shoulders and it hung too low, dragged cold and wet at your knees and holy shit, it was comically heavy.

You tried to lift at it, yelped when it clung to your dress and brought that up your thighs with it and Steve tried not to look, tips of his ear tinged pink as he unlocked the car door and turned back to you, motioning to help.

His hands grabbed the hem, a sharp burst of laughter leaving his lips as you squeaked and together, you both tried to wrestle the sweater off of you. It came off with a slow drag, a heavy thud as it hit the roof of the car and you were unsteady on your feet, knocking into Steve so he had to catch you, hands gentle around your wrists so you didn’t fall into him.

The rain was so loud, you could hardly hear the way his laughter faded into purposeful breaths. The roar of it all matched your heartbeat, a constant thudthudthud that rattled your insides. 

Steve was really close. 

His hair was soaked, curling at the ends, dripping water down his cheeks, drops of it caught on his lashes, spilling over his cupid's bow. He looked unfairly pretty, like a painting, a watercolour that was all muted tones, trapped sunlight behind a glass frame. 

Steve was staring again, unabashed, unashamed, but fuck, so were you. You watched him lick the rain from his lips, tracked the movement with a gaze that felt too greedy, too wanton. 

You heard him say your name, a hardly there sound underneath a roll of thunder and suddenly it didn’t matter that you were both soaked to the bone, that you were freezing in a wet sundress. Steve’s t-shirt was almost translucent and the lake looked angier than when you’d both arrived, like it was tired of waiting for something to happen.

Something. Anything. 

Then, it was like a dam burst.

“Can- can I kiss you?” Steve called out, an almost yell to be heard over the din, his cheeks flushed, his eyes so unsure and god, fuck, shit-

You nodded, licked at your own lips, tasted rain water and leftover peach ice tea, watched Steve’s face light up like the sun had come back and then as he moved in, head bending down to yours, your hands shot out, grabbed at his shoulders and you shouted, “wait!”

Steve froze, eyes wide, panicked, rain still pouring over him and you shook your head, stumbled over your words until you got them right, and shit, you had to lean in close so he could hear you. Thunder rumbled above, echoed around the canyons and it felt like your chest vibrated with it.

You held onto the boy, felt the heat of him through his wet shirt, the soaked flannel that drooped open on either side of his chest. Steve wondered if you could feel his heart beat, if you could see the thumpthumpthump of it under his clothes.

You had to take a breath before you spoke, inhaling summer and rainstorms and Steve. 

“I wanna- shit, can I? Can I kiss you this time?” You were wide eyed and breathing too hard, fingers curling around his shoulders, pushing onto your toes like you were waiting for it. “I wanna kiss you this time.”

You sounded braver at the end. Resolute. Determined. 

Steve thought you’d never looked prettier. He laughed, a bright burst, his gaze trained down on yours and he nodded, so sure, his own hands finding your waist and his fingers dug into your sides, made 

fistfuls of your sundress and then and then and then-

When Steve first kissed you over a week ago, it was with confidence that only tequila could bring. 

This was different. It was sweet, it was lovely and then it was more.

Your lips slid over Steves easily, both of you wet with rain, tasting like a storm. It was easy to push yourself into him, to let him catch you and hold your weight. It was a pretty give and take, slow and soft presses of your mouth to his and then your tongue licked into his mouth and you felt his groan, a whisper under the roar of the world around you, but fucking christ, you felt him vibrate against your chest, a rumble that seemed too good to be true.

But Steve opened his mouth for you, let you lick in and slid your tongue over his and you couldn’t help the way you surged up, onto your tiptoes and into him, pushing the boy against the doors of the car and that was it.

His hands were everywhere, stuttering over your sides, over your wet sundress, scratching at wet skin, damp cotton, swallowing the little gasps that you gave him. And your hands were in his hair, pulling and tugging, almost a little mean but the boy kept moaning for you, whispering your name into your own mouth like he was telling you a whole other secret. 

Your noses were pressed to each other's cheeks, teeth dragging over swollen bottom lips, panting into open mouths, hands pressed to dips and valleys, lines of muscles, the pretty slope of each other's jaw. The rain didn’t matter, not anymore, or the cold. Nothing really did.

Because Steve tasted the same way he looked, like he’d swallowed summer and held the sun inside of him.

Neither of you stopped until lightning struck. 

Endless Gifs of Steve Harrington (16/?)

Poor Steve lost a bet and thought paying with 30 bites instead of money was a good idea.

(INPRNT)