couldn’t stop thinking about this, so here’s a followup :)
When Eddie does eventually get a tattoo for Steve, it’s on a whim.
Kind of on a whim.
He hadn’t forgotten about the idea by any means, but he had yet to come up with an idea that came even close to encapsulating the love Eddie had for Steve, so he waited.
Then, one day, around a year and a half after their initial conversation on the subject and when Steve and Eddie were enjoying a lazy morning arguing over the grocery list (Steve wants to try a new pasta salad recipe, the fancy bastard, and Eddie just wants him to make the same cheesy marinara pasta sauce he’s been fiending over for years), Steve gets called into the hospital.
His second-to-last clinical rotation for his psychology doctorate sent him to the psych floor of a nearby emergency room, which has meant, for the first time, Steve is on-call even when he’s not scheduled to be at the hospital.
Steve is miserable — the most miserable Eddie’s ever seen him when it comes to his psych program — and annoyed with the school for assigning it to him when there had apparently been others available that were closer to how he actually wants to use his doctorate when he finally earns it, but, like he tends to, he’s being a decent sport about it.
He’s on the phone with his C.I. affirming that he’ll be in as soon as he can when he picks up a pen, grabs Eddie’s wrist, and scribbles fresh mozzarella, penne, tomatoes, lemon juice on the underside of his forearm. Below that he writes love you, and below that he adds - S, followed by a heart, a sideways smiley face, and a star, like Eddie’s seen him do hundreds of times. It’s how he signs off every post-it note stuck to the fridge, every message swiped into the fogged-up bathroom mirror, every letter he folds up and mails to Robin or Nancy or both or some other member of the Party.
Eddie isn’t even totally sure Steve realizes he’s doing it, that maybe he just likes that first doodled heart so much he can’t help but keep going, but he loves it either way. It’s sweet and charming and cute and just so, so Steve that it almost hurts.
Steve presses a swift kiss onto Eddie’s lips before making a bee-line for the door, still on the phone with his C.I, and Eddie’s mind is moving so fast he can’t sit with it anymore, so he jumps to his feet, checks his wallet to see if he’s got cash (he does), and then he too is on his way out the door.
Thankfully, at eleven on a Tuesday morning, his tattoo artist is accepting walk-ins, and before his brain completely catches up to his beating heart, he’s got Steve’s words (minus the groceries, obviously) in his neat writing and his heart, smile, and star tattooed on his forearm and it’s fuckin’ perfect and Eddie couldn’t be happier.
Steve returns sooner than Eddie thought he would — before dinner, which is still late, but not as late as it usually is whenever he gets called into the hospital — and as he lets himself into their apartment, Eddie meets him at the door.
“Hey,” Steve says with a tired smile, “Hungry?”
“Look!” Eddie ignores him, holding out his arm so Steve can see the tattoo through the protecting plastic wrap.
Steve looks down blankly at it for a moment or two before the corner of his mouth upticks just slightly.
“You...you did this today? From the-the stupid thing I wrote?”
“Yeah,” Eddie grins, “Isn’t it great. i’m so fuckin’ thrilled with it, man. It’s just — it’s you.”
“Yeah, it’s-” Steve shakes his head like he always does when he’s being bashful, “If you say so.”
He pulls Eddie into a tight hug, which Eddie immediately reciprocates, pressing his lips to Steve’s neck.
“I really love you,” Steve says.
“Love you too,” he replies, “in case that wasn’t clear.”
And Steve is pulling away, so Eddie catches the way he smiles as he shakes his head again. Steve’s eyes travel to the kitchen and then snap back to his own.
“Wait, so did you get the groceries?”
“Ah - fuck.”
part 3
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