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helpimstuckposting · 6 months

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I’m a ghost and you are a shadow

—

The Linda Harrington that Steve had known in his 22 years held herself like a skyscraper. She was tall and pristine, glistening with expensive jewelry her husband had bought her instead of saying sorry. She dressed in beige and creme, and in an especially formal occasion she’d maybe find herself in navy. Her eyes were cold and dark. As a child, Steve found her terrifying and he’d spent countless hours imagining those eyes melt, tried picturing her with the same soft looks other moms had at school when picking up their children. He never quite got it right.

She smelled like soap and Chanel No. 5, and Steve couldn’t remember what the touch of her skin felt like. It was probably smooth and pristine like everything else about Linda Harrington, but he hadn’t felt her arms around him since he was a child, and he couldn’t remember what it felt like — if it had felt cold like her stare, or clinical like their whole damn house did.

She held herself high, with a dignity that didn’t include stooping down to Steve’s level to look him in the eyes, or kneeling by his side when he scraped his knee. Steve didn’t think he’d ever seen his mother kneel. He’d never seen her with delight in her eye, or shock, never seen her with tears.

Her hair was always wound tight at the crown of her head, kept off her shoulders to display her long neck and the necklaces that adorned it. He’d never seen her hair down outside of a precisely planned formal event where it cascaded perfectly over her shoulders.

But the Linda Harrington of the world he’d found himself in was everything his mother was not. She stood at the threshold of her own house, pink blouse gently tucked into a worn pair of jeans, hair blown and curled into a more modest version of Farrah Fawcett’s. She had laugh lines at the corners of her eyes, and tears welling up like a dam was about to break. She held her hands over her mouth, staring straight forward at Steve like she’d never seen something so amazing or breathtaking, like he was the eighth wonder of the world and she’d just found herself in front of him.

He felt himself squirm under her gaze, the weight of it heavier than any look he’d caught in her eye previously. He’d spent hours, so many hours, imagining her eyes full of love and he’d never once seen it until this moment. He didn’t know she could make that face. And all it took was a different life, a different world, a different Steve. This look didn’t belong to him.

The three teenagers were losing it just behind her, yelling and talking over each other, asking questions Steve couldn’t move to answer.

Robin moved instead, shuffling in behind them and shoving them through the door so she could close it. She yelled at them to sit in the living room and they’d explain everything that had happened that morning.

Linda moved closer, cautiously, as if Steve could blow away to dust at any moment. He'd done the same to Robin just that morning, thought he'd blink and she'd disappear. His mother would have rather died than show anyone that kind of weakness, including her son.

This Linda, however, stepped forward again. She was just a foot away from Steve, and she looked so small. It didn't matter if Steve had grown six inches or six feet taller than his mother, she'd always seemed to tower above him, but the Linda he looked down on now seemed like he could pinch her and she'd break.

"Hi," he whispered, the words almost swallowed in his throat before they touched the air. He was at a loss for anything else to say.

She seemed to almost crumple in on herself, collapsing against him and holding on tighter than anyone ever had. He thought of all the times he'd been dumped, lost a game, or failed a test and craved his mother's comfort like water. He'd been so thirsty for it, so desperate, and all he'd received in return was a barren wasteland of disappointment. The desert sand of familial love had kicked up dust and dirt and choked him for decades, starved him of any attachments this Steve seemed to have in spades.

"Oh, Stevie," Linda sobbed against his neck, tears sharper than the blade Eddie had cut him with. He'd heard this sound before. Though he'd never seen his mother cry, he remembered a time when he was little — somewhere around fifth grade maybe. It was the first time his mother had found out about his father's cheating, the last time she'd stayed home while he was away on a business trip. Through his parents' bedroom door, he'd heard these same sobs. Her gasping, hitching breaths had seeped through the crack in the door like a creeping fog, rolling through the halls and pitching the whole house in an eerie quiet.

These sobs were different, though. He could hear her smiling through her gasps, felt her warm hands cling to the back of his shirt like she never wanted to let him go. His throat burned and he felt like he was drowning, the dry desert sand he'd swallowed over the years flooding with a sudden downpour.

He lifted his hands to her back and held on tight, memorizing the feeling of her in his arms. Slowly they untangled, his mother taking his hand in hers and leading him to the sofa, sitting as close as she could and still staring at him with endless amounts of wonder swimming in her eyes.

He, Robin, and Nancy took turns recounting the events of that morning. Steve described how he woke up, how Eddie found him; Robin pitched in about their banging on the door thinking Eddie was in trouble, and finding Steve standing in the kitchen.

“He had no idea how he got there. I think he really freaked Eddie out,” Nancy said, glancing at Linda. Steve saw her nod in understanding, though he still couldn’t figure out why Eddie was reacting like this compared to everyone else.

“So what exactly do we think is going on?” Mike cut in. He and Lukas were sitting on the armrests of the other couch, Max, El, Dustin, and Will taking up the cushions.

“Parallel universes!” Dustin blurted, excitement still dancing in his voice. He went on to recount the same explanation he gave earlier, dramatic clap and everything (though Steve didn’t flinch this time).

“What does this mean, then?” Linda asked quietly, squeezing tightly onto Steve’s hand. He didn’t quite feel comfortable leaning on this version of his mother yet, but he couldn’t help thinking over and over that this was still his mothers hand, that this was what it would be like if he’d ever held it for comfort, for support, to feel her warm hand squeezing back. He couldn’t bring himself to let go just yet.

Instead, he turned just slightly to look her in the eye, and said the same thing he did earlier, “I’m not your Steve,” though this time he was much more scared of the reaction. She could loosen her grip, drop his hand all together and let him fall untethered. She could be scared of him, of this stranger with her son’s face. She could yell, tell the room that she was furious they got her hopes up only to crash them to the ground because this wasn’t her Steve.

She did drop his hand.

Steve’s heart dropped with it for just a moment until her hands came up to cradle his face. She held him, gently, like a porcelain doll she was afraid to crack, or perhaps like one that had already been cracked and she was scared to damage any further. He felt her thumb stroke delicately across his cheekbone, and he swallowed around the tightness stabbing at his throat.

“You are Steve Harrington,” she whispered, tears in her eyes once more, “and any Steve Harrington is my baby.”

His nose pricked as any words got caught in his throat, her face becoming blurry. This felt like a dream, like every wish he’d ever made on a candle or a shooting star or an eyelash on his cheek. He squeezed his eyes shut tight and felt her thumb wipe away the tears that followed, the lump in his throat constricting his air. He tried to breath in as best he could, though it came out like a strangled sob instead. He could hear her shushing him, felt her pull him toward her chest and he felt so small next to her again.

Not in the way his mother always made him feel small, but in a new way. He felt like a small child being cradled to his mother’s chest, held tightly against all the sorrow and the fear, held gently like being swaddled to sleep. Even if he does go back, if he has to leave when they close the gates, he hopes this Linda Harrington will remember him. Maybe this one wouldn’t have sent the nanny to find him. Maybe this one wouldn’t have left him behind. Maybe she wouldn’t have even let him hide in the first place. The Steve Harrington of this world was either the luckiest Steve, or the most pitiful for losing it all.

He kept his face buried in his mother’s shoulder while Dustin and Nancy explained the theory about potential open gates. El chimed in again about helping to check, to figure out which one was open or if there were multiple. In the meantime, Steve tried schooling his face back to normal, wiping the tears from his cheeks as discreetly as he could. He didn’t want to completely break down in front of a room full of people, didn’t want the kids to see him like that.

Once he’d collected himself, he pulled his head up and joined the conversation once more. Robin slipped her arm around his waist and squeezed while his mother gripped his hand. He’d probably break down again — take the time to let the emotions of the day take over and wash themselves out — but for now he just put his own arm around Robin and squeezed his mother’s hand.

It took a while for the group to come up with a few plans, organize a few teams, and suggest days where they’d be able to go out and check gates. The sun had begun to get low on the horizon, and Steve’s eyes stung with exhaustion. His head pounded in his skull from everything that had happened — the information, the crying, the stress, the lack of any alcohol in his system — and he kind of wished he could wash it away with a glass of something strong. He didn’t want to miss anything, though; he didn’t want to scare the kids, either. Today was worth remembering.

When the house thinned out (Linda doing an exceptional job at handling the kids arguments and promising they could come around first thing tomorrow), Robin excused herself to one of the guest rooms and his mother hugged him one last time before she slipped into her own room.

He wanted to reach out to Robin, ask her to stay and sleep in his room, but he wasn’t sure what the dynamic was with his mother here. Did she know about Robin? Were they allowed to share a room? He couldn’t really sleep without someone else there, hadn’t slept sober in quite a while, either. Maybe he’d ask later, but for now he’d just watch Robin walk into a room two doors down, catching his eye one last time before she slipped away. He’d see her in the morning, he promised himself, she’d be there in the morning.

When he opened his bedroom door, he’d half expected to see Eddie sitting on the edge of his bed, startled by the company and nails half chewed to oblivion. Instead, he found a room with navy blue walls and a large selection of posters, no plaid to be seen. He’d always wanted navy walls. The posters were of bands he’d mostly never heard of; maybe a few of them he’d seen on Eddie’s jackets. They covered one wall entirely, though his world only had one framed picture of a luxury car. This room looked lived in, customized and comfortable, another difference to his.

He laid down in his bed, much more relaxed and broken-in than his own expensive mattress. Everything in this world seemed to cradle him, like it was holding on to something it didn’t want to let go. Maybe that was the trick, maybe this really was a trap designed to keep him here. He shook his head against the soft pillow; the wrinkles at the corners of his mother’s eyes and the age on the kids faces were proof enough that this was real. He had to remind himself that they were real. This was real.

Though the house was dark and quiet and Steve knew he’d been lying down for quite a while, he still couldn’t feel sleep creep up the edges of his mind. He was so tired, so exhausted, and still he was wide awake, unused to comfortably falling asleep on his own.

Instead of staying in bed, he got up and waded across the darkened bedroom to the door. Steve slipped quietly down the stairs and back out to the pool. The water gently sparkled in the moonlight, the blackened depths twisting into memories of a cold lake and a bright red gate. He sat down again, not really sure why he kept coming out here instead of going somewhere else to collect himself. Old habits perhaps.

It had been years since his pool had been filled. He let it fall to ruin when his parents hadn’t come back, let the tiles crack and the paint peel, and the lounge chairs be weathered by dust and dirt and precipitation. Maybe this pool reminded him of what his life could have been like, full and sparkling.

Steve shivered against the cool night air, the not-quite-summer breeze rustling through the trees and right through his thin t-shirt. He probably should have grabbed a sweatshirt or jacket but he couldn’t quite bring himself to rifle through OtherSteve’s closet. The room itself already felt like someone else’s, it felt wrong to look through what didn’t belong to him.

It was quiet out here, with the woodland animals all asleep like the people tucked in upstairs. The water lapping against the side of the pool filled Steve’s mind with a calm concentration; he wondered briefly if this was what El felt when listening to static, if the gentle hum of electricity calmed her mind of other thoughts like the water did for Steve in this moment.

He startled when the glass door slid open, half expecting Robin to slide in next to him like she’d done earlier in the day, but he was surprised to find a hesitant Eddie standing by the door instead. His dark curls were tossed up in a messy bun, a few strands poking loose like he’d been tugging at it.

Even though he’d seen Eddie that morning, everything that had happened that day made it feel longer, like he really had been in California and only just arrived. Steve nodded in his direction, turning back to the water to try and keep from making Eddie uncomfortable. He didn’t know why the man had avoided him all day, but Steve didn’t want to make it worse. He had every right to be skeptical and cautious.

“Can’t sleep?” His voice echoed against the pool tiles. Eddie spoke softly in the dark, hesitating to make much noise, but the whisper was deafening nonetheless.

Steve shook his head, sparing a side glance at Eddie before looking back at the black water. “Not really good at sleeping anymore,” he said back, just as soft.

He listened as Eddie’s footsteps on the stone tile came closer, stopping a few feet away. He sat down, farther than Robin had earlier in the day but still closer than Steve had expected. He wasn’t sure what to do. Should he say something? Or let Eddie be the first to talk? Should he apologize? Steve didn’t know what for, but he still felt like maybe he should.

“I’m sorry-,”

“I’m sorry-,” they both started at the same time. Steve glanced over to catch Eddie’s eye, saw the startled look and felt bad for not waiting until Eddie had spoken first. This was already weird, Steve didn’t want to keep making the situation awkward at every turn, though he still wasn’t sure why it was more awkward around Eddie than the others. He may have a hunch though.

Eddie swallowed, eyes seemingly calculating every question in the universe before he blinked and looked away, down to the water that Steve had been watching for who-knew-how-long. An owl hooted in the distance.

Steve waited for Eddie this time.

—

This part and the next part are two of my favorites

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#stranger things #steddie #stranger things fic #stranger things fanfiction #steve harrington #eddie munson #hurt/comfort #parallel universe au #robin buckley #max mayfield #dustin henderson #mike wheeler #nancy wheeler #stobin #helpimstuckwriting

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