#// apologies. reader has v vague physical characteristics but lots of personality oops rip.

[ashes-writing]

wild one pt. five | stranger things ; g.emerson

tag list babes + req rules / fandoms & characters ; reqs open + got a ? + masterlist

CHAPTERS ; 

one - two - three - four can all be found by clicking. my stranger things masterlist is here.

AUTHORS NOTES;

Listen, this story has me in a fucking chokehold rn. This came to me earlier and I thought it'd be cute so I decided to go for it. I mean, they needed themselves a little cozy moment, did they not? Annnyway, here we are, I guess?

Huuuuge thanks to everyone for indulging -and putting up with as well as interacting with my bullshit because it blows me away, you have no idea and I can't even begin to properly express just how much the likes / reblogs / reblogs with tags -i love the tags omg and comments truly mean to me when I get them, it just.. Fucking emotions, okay? It makes me so so so so so happy and inspires me and I just love you guys so much.

SUMMARY;

-- cheerleaders and drummers/freaks don't go together... or do they?

PAIRING;

Gareth Emerson x Fem!Reader (vague clothing / hairstyle description and glasses, a personality and female parts. Beyond these things, reader is blank slate.)

WARNINGS;

Fluff, oh my god. Like, it's also kinda domestic-y fluff? There's a little angst here, mutual pining, nothing real concerning.

TAGLIST;

@AURUMBELIS

@ALLELITESMUT

@ARIES-ARCADE

@COLE22ANN

@EBONYBLOOM

@HEYAITSKLAUDIA

@HCLOANGCLS

@HOESHII

@ICEQUEEN1371

@KRYS-ORION

@LETSBEDRAGONSTOGETHER

@LOUDERFORTHEBACK

@MUSICHEALSSCARS

@SECRETSICANTHIDEANYMORE

@SCOOBIESSNACKS

@THECHOICESLOOKGRIMM

@UNTITLEDAREA - these are all the names on my stranger things taglist. if you’d like to be added, please click the link at the top of the post.

OTHER STUFF;

Set in S4. All parties (Gareth, reader) have been aged up to 18, so everyone is legal for anything that may occur down the road. No deaths, no Vecna, no Upside Down, only your typical high school crush to lovers cheesefest, so if you're into that, have fun!

The scent of marinara hits his nose and makes his stomach growl as he steps through the front door of his house. He bends down to pull off his sneakers like usual. He knows his mom and dad went out for a date night to celebrate something or other, so he knows that his mom got a babysitter. However… The babysitter usually doesn’t bother with the stove. And she usually doesn’t play with his little sisters or anything like that. 

“Leah?” he calls out, brows knitting when she doesn't answer, an irritated huff to her voice or call out for him to cram it, she's on the phone. Because all she does is watch some shitty soap and tie up the phone all night whenever she sits.

His sister tugs his jeans leg. “Mommy got us a new sitter, Gare!”

He bends to pick up the little girl and he laughs. “Oh, she did, huh?”

“Mhm! She’s fun.” his little sister answers, yawning as she lays her head against his shoulder. “She’s makin spaghetti.”

And then, he hears you calling out to the sister currently in his arms from the kitchen. Laughing as you call out to her. “Sweetie, don’t just throw the door open, ‘kay? Remember our talk? You gotta make ‘em identify themselves first.”

You lean in the doorway between his mother’s kitchen and the living room, his youngest sister balanced on your right hip. He’s thrown for a loop because you’re wearing these big but adorable black framed glasses that keep sliding down your nose. Your hair is half up and half down, those two pigtails you wore all through cheer camp the week before. He’s trying not to stare like an idiot but he can’t help himself. 

“Gareth?” and like always, when you say his name, it’s like his brain shuts down for a few seconds to reboot. So while that’s happening and he’s caught up in that, you’re staring right back but naturally, this doesn’t register to him. You laugh softly. Raise a hand, your finger catching in the end of one of your ponytails. 

“Leah’s not babysitting?” Gareth finally manages to form words. 

You shake your head and laugh, grinning. “No. I guess your mom talked to Susan. Apparently, Mrs. Sinclair recommended me when she was asking around for other babysitters?” you can feel your cheeks burning hot and you know you’re staring at him but whenever you try not to, you can’t stop. 

Finally, you manage to pull yourself together, grinning at his little sister. “You hungry, little bit? The noodles should be done.”

Then you hear the pot on the stove bubbling and you bite your lip, turning away to rush back into the kitchen. You get to the stove just before the water bubbles over the rim of the pot. “Wouldn’t have happened if I had a wooden spoon to put over this.” you mumble to yourself, mostly so you’re not hyper aware of Gareth as he lingers in the doorway between rooms watching you.

You place his little sister on her feet and grab the pot so you can drain the noodles into the colander you’d placed in the sink and as you’re going to pour out the pasta to drain, some of the hot water splashes up and makes contact with your wrist.

“Fudge popsicles. Son of a biscuit.” you say it instead of what you would’ve said if you were at your own house in your own kitchen. Gareth snickers quietly. You stop in front of him and you’re holding out your arms, giggling softly as his little sister comes to you. “You can’t go t’ sleep yet, little bit. You’ve still gotta eat.”

The little girl yawns but smiles, eyes drooping. “She should sleep real good tonight. We went to the park down the street since Emma watched Janelle tonight, they got to play.” you say it as you place the little girl in her high chair.

His brain finally decides that it wants to function again and he chuckles, speaking up at last. Gaze fixed on you intently. “Yeah, they’re always over there playing with her.”

You smile and nod. You’re trying not to, but you’re doing it again, staring at him with not a thought in your brain. It happens a lot lately and you’re torn between being annoyed by it and utterly baffled by it. You nod to the pasta on the stove. “Are you hungry?”

He laughs, dragging his hand through sweaty curls. “I could eat, yeah.”

“Don’t be too impressed, by the way. Susan taught me how to make this and this is the first time I've actually ah.. tried to without her supervising me,so... yeah. It’s the only thing I know how to make.. Right now.” you say it with this cute little smirk. You go to push your glasses up, grumbling about how much you hate them under your breath and Gareth bites his lip, eyes fixed intently on your finger as you push the glasses up onto your nose. “I uh.. Didn’t know you wear glasses.”

“I didn’t until today when they came in. Went to the eye doctor last week and apparently, the reason I’m a clumsy person has a lot to do with being blind as a bat. I mean not really, but my vision was bad.” you’re burning up all over and you can’t help but feel just a little pinned by his intent gaze. “Go ahead.” you pout a little. “You’re dying to laugh, I know it.”

“No, no.” Gareth says it and shakes his head. He’s not dying to laugh at all. He’s dying to tell you how hot you look, how the way you look right now, white cropped bra thing, slightly baggy sweatpants, your hair all wild and half up, half down with the glasses that won’t stop slipping down your nose just seems to fit you so much better than any other way he’s seen you lately whenever you cross paths. He wants to reach out and push your glasses up on your nose for you, maybe reach out and place his other hand on your hip, let his fingers drag lazy designs against soft,bare skin. He wants to be closer to you and lately, the more he runs into you like this, the harder it gets to fight this off.

It’s happened again, he’s stepped closer to you. Practically engulfing you as you tilt your head a little, hair falling away from your neck as you stare up at him and try to pull your gaze away, focus it anywhere else. You don’t even realize that you’ve got a hand on his upper arm resting against it until you feel the soft of his black sleeve under your hands and as soon as you do, you can feel your face burning and you’re quick to pull your hand away just to keep from making things weird or awkward.

Like they can’t be any more awkward than the night you covered him in cake flavored vomit in a classmates basement because you were just so nervous about kissing him because you really wanted to.

His other little sister runs past and you reach out, picking her up, the two of you laughing. “Did you wash your hands?” you ask her.

She pouts. Shakes her head no.

“Go wash your hands.” Gareth speaks up.

And even though he’s not using that tone on you this time, you can’t help but feel your stomach do that lazy flip that it does when he is using that tone on you lately.

Which is a lot, truth be told.

His little sister goes back upstairs to wash her hands and you’re poking around in cabinets in search of plates to put the pasta on. Gareth ends up behind you, reaching up over your head to grab them when he sees them in the cabinet you’ve opened and this puts his chest against your back.

Gareth has to grip his mother’s favorite plates just so he doesn’t drop them or sit them back down on the stack too hard and his breath hangs long enough in his throat that he wonders if he’s going to breathe again anytime soon. And his breath is warm against the shell of your ear, tickling at it as he mutters quietly, “I got it.”

You glance over your shoulder at him and you’re surprised that your brain allows you to get out a nod because the way he’s awkwardly pressed into you from behind has you beyond flustered. If he had one tenth of a clue what he did to you.

But he doesn’t.

He takes the plates and goes over to the table, sitting them out. One directly across from the other. And then he goes to another cabinet and digs out two pink plastic plates, stopping by the stove to fix his sisters their plates. You’re about to get up and get your own but he grabs the plate and goes back to the stove, returning with a plate and a fork, sitting it in front of you.

Then he fixes one for himself and sits down.

You’re twirling the pasta around your fork and you raise it to your lips and Gareth’s gaze fixes on you as he takes his own bite. Groaning at the taste as it bursts in his mouth. “This is good.”

You grin. “Yeah? Maybe there’s hope after all that I won’t burn down Hawkins High when I take stupid Home Ec this year.”

He can’t help but laugh at it and you take another bite. “Susan, she’s uh.. Teaching me stuff.” you muse aloud, twisting some hair around your finger as you place your fork on the plate for a minute or two. “Did you have band practice tonight or was it that uh.. The game.” you rub your temple trying to remember what Lucas called the game they’re always playing, the one that Gareth and his friends happen to play too.

“Dnd?” Gareth questions and you smile, nodding. “Yeah, that. What’s that stand for anyway?” you ask, curious.

“Dungeons and Dragons.” Gareth answers, taking another bite. Trying not to stare like an ass across his table at you when you take a bite out of your own plate too.

“Oh. Okay, that sounds cool, actually.” you admit, your soft laughter tapering off as you take another bite before you start to ramble or say something annoying or just do too much and annoy him because you’re not dumb. You know that lately, you’ve been crossing paths a lot more. And sooner or later, it’ll probably happen, you’ve already annoyed him one time this summer.

“Yeah, it’s fun.”

“My thing is poker. Or darts. It does sound interesting, I mean from what Max’s boyfriend has explained to me about it.”

Gareth scoffs. “Those kids still use a rulebook for everything. You should let somebody who’s played the game longer explain it.” he’s half joking and maybe, just the tiniest bit of what he’s just said is him and the overwhelming desire to make himself look better even though he knows it’s pointless, because you and him will never work out, there’s too much against it. He just can’t stop himself or turn it off lately and the more he runs into you at random like this, the more it seems to grow out of control. The more he finds himself doing -and saying, things that he probably should keep to himself.

You gaze at him thoughtfully. “Maybe I should.” you’re twisting your pasta again and staring even though you know you shouldn’t be, that it has to be unsettling. He raises up in his chair a little and leans out across the table, dragging his thumb against the corner of your mouth and it takes every ounce of will you possess not to whimper or something equally embarrassing.

“You uh.. Marinara.” he manages to stammer out, quick to pull his thumb away and sit back down in his chair. You swallow hard and nod, that cute little quiet giggle coming next as you glance down at the white cropped top you’d thrown on to wear with your sweats tonight.

You’d dressed for comfort, figuring there was little to no chance you’d encounter him while you were here and honestly, you were torn between wanting to kick yourself for it and being glad that you were a little comfortable right now because you were all tensed up. And now, you have the homemade marinara Susan taught you to make on Monday night on your top, so there's that..

“Thank you.” you smile as you pop the last bite into your mouth. As you stand to put your own plate into the sink, he winds up right behind you again. Reaching around to sit his plate into the sink too. “Since they’re playing in it more than anything and look like they’re about a second away from face planting their plates, I’ll take ‘em to their room, alright?”

His breath tickles the shell of your ear and flustered, you just barely manage to stammer out a quiet, “ ‘Kay.” as you nod. He picks up his sisters, one on each hip and makes his way up the stairs to tuck them in and given that you have a little time to kind of relax and breathe, you lean against the wall and do it.

You jump a little and hurry to collect yourself as you hear him walking down the stairs again. And you busy yourself in a hurry, washing the dishes and stacking them neatly in the rack next to the sink to dry. You can feel him watching you but you’re just too damn flustered to really look up just yet.

If he had even a tenth of a clue what being around him actually did to you…

#gareth emerson #gareth the great #gareth emerson imagine #gareth emerson fanfiction #gareth emerson x reader #gareth emerson x fem!reader #// apologies. reader has v vague physical characteristics but lots of personality oops rip. #// so if anybody's put off by it sorry omg.