keep my hand in yours
a/n: im so sorry for the wait anon, pls forgive me and accept some super fluffy fluff in apology <3
requested by anonymous
pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader
summary: steve & reader are cuddlin’ on the couch and feelings are revealed (aka Steve gets his hair played with w a dash of friends to lovers)
word count: 1.8k
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Steve doesn’t have a clue what’s happening on the tv screen.
He was the one who picked this movie, and he was pretty excited to see it, actually, but then, you settled in on the couch closer to him than you have in five years of friendship, close enough that your knee pressed into Steve’s thigh.
And it was all over.
An hour later, and any hopes of following the plot are dead in the dirt.
Because thirty minutes ago, you lifted your arm and laid it over the back of the couch and started drumming your fingers. Because ten minutes ago, those same fingers grazed the top of his spine and slid up the nape of his neck, and they haven’t left.
An explosion brightens the screen.
Steve shifts, leans back, into your side.
Another flash of lights and loud crashing sounds, and your hand, the one that isn’t in Steve’s hair, drops onto his waist.
A gunshot and a flame on the screen, and he settles against you.
It’s almost like you’re both waiting for cover to make a move. Which is a stupid thought, because Steve knows you don’t feel for him what he feels for you, and that ‘cover’ is an alien ship being blown up on a television. But still. You don’t pull away. And neither does he.
Steve never thought he’d like something like this. Being held by a girl. In his dreams, and there are a lot of them, it’s always him wrapping his arms around you, always him pulling you into his chest.
But this, your fingers working slowly through his curls, your heartbeat against his back, is a tenderness he’s never seen. Surely not anything he deserves.
Your fingers scrape lightly across his scalp, and Steve’s eyes fall shut. Every inch of him feels like a live wire, but at the same time, he’s too tired to move. Or, maybe not tired. Content, maybe. Because he doesn’t want to sleep. He just wants to stay.
Warmth weaves around and into his limbs, and goosebumps raise along his skin every time your knuckles brush the backs of his ears, or the curve of his jaw. He’s so drunk on the touch, it takes a while to realize you’ve already worked all the tangles out of his hair. But your fingers, that gentle, careful touch, remains.
He almost doesn’t know what to do with it. Never before has someone treated him like a precious thing. Like something to be taken care of or protected.
And he never thought he wanted that. Needed that. Because he always does the protecting. He’s a flight attendant’s worst nightmare, because as far as he’s concerned, his own oxygen mask doesn’t exist until everyone else is wearing their own.
But here you are. And here he is. And it’s really, really nice. There’s definitely a more accurate word for the feeling, but he can barely form coherent thoughts as it is.
For a long time, you both stay that way, your hand in his hair and your heartbeat against his spine.
“Can I ask you something?” You murmur sometime later, and your hand hesitates in his hair, and God, he’d do anything you asked if you’d just keep touching him.
“Mhmm,” he hums, not opening his eyes.
You’re quiet for a moment. Your fingers slide down the side of his scalp in a slow line, and he has to suppress a shiver.
“Rebecca Robinson asked you out today,” you say. Steve opens one of his eyes to peer over at you, trying not to grimace.
“You heard that?”
“I was ten feet away, Steve. Of course I heard it.”
“Was there a question in there somewhere?”
More silence.
He opens his other eye, turns his head and shifts up so he can meet your gaze.
“If you heard her ask me out, you heard me tell her no,” he says. He’s defending himself, and he’s not even sure why. He’s allowed to go out with whoever he wants. And yeah, it just so happens that the person he wants to go out with—you—doesn't feel the same, but whatever.
“Exactly,” you say. Still, you don’t pull away from him, and still, he can’t bring himself to pull away from you. This, if it’s an argument or a discussion or the ramblings of two people who should just go to sleep, feels like it’s about something other than Rebecca Robinson.
“I don’t get it.”
You sigh. Your gaze darts away, lingers on the TV.
“You told me that you had a huge crush on her. All of middle school, and the first year of high school.” The unspoken until Nancy isn’t lost on Steve. And once again, he feels the need to defend himself. Even though it’s been years, and she’s out of the picture, and again, you don’t feel the same.
“Yeah, still not following.”
“Why did you say no?”
“To Rebecca?”
“Yes, to Rebecca.”
“Oh.” Steve swallows. Now, he does shift backwards. He instantly misses the presence of your hand on his hip. “Oh.”
Your hand falls to your lap like it, too, isn’t sure what to do without his skin to rest on.
“Oh what?” you ask.
He chews on one side of his cheek for a beat before he says, “Are you really gonna make me say it?”
Steve could still be delirious with sleep, but he swears something like fear flashes in your eyes, just for a second.
Then it’s gone, and you shake your head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Come on. You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed. Being subtle isn’t exactly one of my strengths,” he says. Lifts his brows. “The reason it’d never work out with Rebecca is the same reason it didn’t work out with all those other girls.” He crinkles his nose. “And I don’t mean, like, there was anything wrong with them. There’s not. They were great and all, but they weren’t—” He stops, his tongue clamping his words off like it, too, is afraid of what happens when the truth hits the air.
“They weren’t what, Steve?” You ask, voice low, like you have the same fear.
Steve presses his lips together. He lifts a tentative hand to your cheek, running his thumb up your cheekbone before pulling his hand back.
“They weren’t you,” he says.
He’s pretty sure he’s just ruined one of the few good things he has, but honestly, holding it all in felt like trying to cage a tsunami—aka, fucking impossible. At least that pit in his stomach is gone. It’s been replaced by a new one—a sharp, hot fear—but something is better than all the nothing, he decides.
The longest ten seconds of his life pass as you just stare at him, like you’ve never seen him before.
It’s like you decide something, too, as you reach out to thread your fingers through his hair, a hand on each side, curling into his curls and giving them a light tug, drawing him closer. Close enough that he can smell your lemon shampoo and he can see the tiny flecks in your iris, and he wants to say something stupid, do something stupid. Something like kiss you.
Then, like you’re reading his mind, you say, “Kiss me.”
He can’t help but wonder if you’re joking.
“What?” he asks; the something stupid.
But you just smile, and say, again, “Kiss me.”
So, he does. He closes the distance between you carefully, brushes his lips against yours. He stills, waits for you to say “haha, just kidding!” or realize what a huge mistake you’ve made.
You don’t, though. You just kiss him back, lips coaxing his own open. Your fingers, tangled in his hair, travel down the sides of his neck, across his collarbones, down his chest and back up. It’s like you’re trying to memorize him as urgently as he is you.
You both seem to realize at the same moment that you’re not running out of time—that there is a beginning in this kiss—and within a heartbeat, isn’t frantic anymore, but firm, steady, secure. You smile against his lips, and Steve smiles too, and for a little while, he can’t tell where his breaths end and yours begin, and he doesn’t care.
It occurs to him that he’s been waiting for this, for you, for a long time. Maybe a lifetime.
His hands shift down from your cheeks to your shoulders, skimming down your arms. You shiver, pressing closer, close enough that the rest of the world fades into nothingness.
When Steve finally pulls away—which is only because if he doesn’t take a full breath, he will pass out—he doesn’t go far, like he’s worried you’ll disappear if he isn’t touching you. You must feel the same, because you tip your forehead against his, a light smile on your face.
“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” Steve hums. “So long.”
You shift back slightly frown. “You never told me.”
He gives you a half smile and says, “I was trying not to scare you away.”
“Scare me away?” You huff. Take his cheeks in your hands and bend forward, shaking your head. “Not possible.”
Steve cocks a brow. “Yeah, you say that now, but—”
“Wrong,” you say. “I know you. I’ve been your friend for years. I’ve seen the skeletons in your closet, Harrington. Hell, I’ve shaken their hands. And I’m still here. I still love you.” Your eyes go wide, and you bring a hand to your mouth for a long second.
Steve’s brows arch, and he swears an entire flock of butterflies breaks loose in his chest.
“Shit,” you say. “Can we just forget I said that, and—”
“Oh, not a chance,” Steve says. You try to pull away from him, but he loops his arms around you, pulls you half into his lap. You give a half-hearted protest, but end up twisted in his lap, arms winding around his neck. “We’re so not forgetting that.”
You scrunch your nose. “See, now I’m going to be the one scaring you away.”
Steve smiles. Leans forward to bump the tip of your nose with his.
“Say it again.”
You purse your lips.
“Steve—”
He kisses you again. This time, he lingers, lets his lips part, and only pulls away when you sink into him.
“Say it again,” he murmurs.
A smile fights past your defenses, and you say, “I love you.” You incline your head. “Happy now?”
“Very happy, actually, yeah,” Steve says, and he knows he’s grinning like an idiot, but he no longer cares. He just kisses you again. And one more time after that. Then, he says, “I love you, too, by the way.”
“Oh, yeah?” you ask.
“Yeah,” Steve says. And this time, it’s you who kisses him.
By the time either of you bothers to check, the movie is long over, the credits at their end. But neither of you cares.
Call it making up for lost time.
-
taglist: @milkiane @spideyboipete @robiin-buckley @robinbuckleyssgf @la-fille-en-aiguilles @sunlitide @cityofidek @isshecrazyorissheclever @peanutbutter-y-jams @hellfire1986baby @comfortcharactercraze
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the season of the sticks
ok so ive gotten like. at least six requests for a reversed moments stolen fic since I finished that au. and it took ages but its finally here, and its a goddamn doozy. but anyone who’s been here longer than a day knows Im a sucker for the ‘a forgets b’ trope and will take any excuse to wring it for all the angst I can <3 and to those who requested this, sorry for the wait!!!! I appreciate u all endlessly!!!
pairing: steve harrington x fem!reader
summary: the reader survives vecna’s curse, but their memories of the last three years, and of Steve, don’t. (aka amnesiac reader, broken hearted Steve, and a happy ending cuz obviously)
word count: 7.8k
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April 9th, 1986
The call wakes him up five minutes before midnight. Steve doesn’t initially realize it’s the phone, and is internally scolding the passage of time, his alarm clock, and his early shift, but when he reaches to swat the clock, the ringing continues.
A coiling, sinking feeling stirs him enough to answer the phone.
He’s been waiting for the call since the paramedics carted you from the Creel House, unconscious, and likely to stay that way. It’s been the longest thirteen days of his life. And that’s saying something, considering the places he’s spent time.
Robin’s voice is on the other line. He catches just enough of her words to understand: you woke up. Steve knew you would. Even if no one else did.
Within four minutes, Steve is out the door and climbing into his car in his beat up sweats and hoodie. Seven minutes after that, he’s swerving into the hospital parking lot. Fortunately for the other cars, the lot is empty enough that Steve’s admittedly erratic driving doesn’t endanger any bumpers.
He gets to the door in a blink, shoving through the double doors and past the nurse’s station. Two flights up, down the hall, and he reaches your ward.
Halfway down the hall, in front of your door, Robin paces with her arms folded.
“Steve—” Robin says when she sees him, and if Steve weren’t driving a hundred miles an hour down a one-track mind, the look on her face might bring him pause. The twist to her expression. The stiffness to her shoulders. The red around her eyes from tears she’s holding back.
“She’s awake?” he asks. His voice is louder than he means, echoing down the hall. Hospitals have always felt haunted to him, now more than ever. All he wants to is get the hell out of here and bring you with him.
“Yes, but—”
Steve makes for the door, the one he’s gone in and out of more times than he can count, but Robin jumps in front of him. Her hands find his shoulders, pinning him in place.
“Steve, wait.” She gnaws on the inside of her cheek. Presses her lips together. “There’s something you should know.”
“Robin, seriously, we can talk in five minutes—"
“Steve,” she says again, and this time, he stills. He finally notices the thickness in the air and the frown on Robin’s lips.
“What?” he asks. “What’s wrong?”
“Okay, so, I don’t totally understand all the medical jargon, and you should probably ask Nancy when she gets back from the bathroom, because she actually understands what the hell the doctor said, whereas it was more in one ear out the other for me—“
“Robin.”
Robin stops.
“What did the doctor say?”
Robin inhales. She won’t look at him when she says, “It’s her memories. They said that everything from the last three years is just…” She shrugs helplessly. “Gone.”
And the last pieces of Steve shatter.
“What do you mean, gone?”
“I mean, the last thing she remembers is crossing the Indiana state line in a U-Haul.”
Steve doesn’t want to believe it, and if he’s being honest, a large part of him outright refuses to. This is a joke. A cruel, twisted joke. Robin is screwing with him.
So, he forces himself to walk into your hospital room to prove it to himself. To prove that she’s wrong.
He’s spent half the last few weeks in this room. He’s practically memorized the patterns in the popcorn ceiling.
But the second he steps in he senses the differences. The cards that littered all free surfaces are piled up in one corner. The blanket from your bed—soft as hell, gifted by Steve, who damn near almost kept it for himself—is folded beside the cards.
Steve doesn't care though, because you're sitting up in the bed, and you may be more bruises than body, and the blood vessels in your eyes still haven't healed, making the whites bright red, and your arms are in casts, but it’s you. You’re alive, awake, almost back to him.
He has to will his knees not to buckle.
All he wants to do is sprint across the room and kneel at your side and cry like a little kid, but instead, he puts on a smile, and says, “Have a good nap? Took you long enough to wake up.”
You jump—the first strike—and your head snaps his way, and it is all wrong.
“Can I… help you?” you ask, hesitant.
Robin was telling the truth. You have looked at Steve Harrington a hundred ways over hundreds of days, but never like this. With complete and utter lack of recognition.
It hurts more than the still-healing wounds littered across his torso.
Everything from the last three years is just… gone.
And though Steve can literally feel his heart ripping in half, he recognizes that he has a choice. A choice to tell the truth, or to wrap you in a beautiful, safe lie. Right now, he can’t know whether he makes the right choice.
“No,” Steve says, shaking his head. “Sorry. I, uh, I think I’m in the wrong room.”
You frown, like you don’t necessarily buy it, and Steve thinks if he has to spend another second in this room, with you looking at him the way you are, he’ll bever get out.
So, he backs up, retreats with his tail between his goddamn legs before he does something like cry or scream or beg you to remember.
Steve pauses in the doorway and allows himself one look back. You’re watching him with a confused expression, and the lack of recognition is ten times worse than any beating he’s ever taken.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” he says. He clears his throat. “I heard about your accident and I just—" He stops. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
Your brows pull together. “Thanks.”
Steve nods. And then he walks away, leaving the best three years of his life behind.
May 19th, 1986
Steve hears the doorbell ring: the first time, and the second, and also the tenth. He hears the knocking, too. He even hears Robin’s muffled yelling from outside, all the way up in his room, buried beneath the covers.
He simply chooses to ignore it. And Robin, being Robin, chooses to ignore his ignoring.
Twenty seven seconds later, his bedroom door swings open, and Robin waltzes in, announcing, “Steve Harrington, you get your ass out of that bed right now, or so help me God—”
“You’ll do what?” Steve asks, shoving the covers off his head, glowering at Robin as she stomps across the room and yanks open his curtains, letting the bright afternoon sun in. “Jesus—”
“Up and at ‘em,” Robin says, crossing to the bed and swatting at the bundle of blankets hiding his feet. Steve scrunches his legs and drags the covers back over his head. “It’s time to take a shower, get dressed, and do something to that rat’s nest you’re calling hair these days. We have things to do.” She yanks the covers away. “Oh. And happy birthday.”
Steve throws an arm over his face and lets out a groan.
“Don’t remind me,” he says.
Robin drops onto the mattress beside him, her bony knee poking against barely-healed wounds on his stomach. Steve is dreading the day the last of the scabs fall away and turn to scars. Like, somehow, it’s his last tether to what happened down there—to what he lost.
“Steve,” Robin says, managing to sound stern and sympathetic, “I am not letting you spend your 21st birthday in bed moping. We’re celebrating. You can legally drink again.”
Steve sighs and pushes up against his headboard, folding his arms over his chest.
“You mean, I can buy you beer again.”
“You can buy us beer,” Robin says, flashing him a grin. The smile falters, barely noticeable. “Which we need to do. For your birthday party. You know, the one that has been in the works for three months.”
Steve’s stomach lurches, and he loses his breath for a solid five seconds before he’s able to say, “No.”
Robin lets out a breath, tucking her hair behind her ears.
“She worked hard on this party, Steve. We all did, actually, but your girlfriend—" At Steve’s narrowed eyes, she stops.
“It’s not like she’s here to see it,” Steve says. “And she’s not really my girlfriend anymore, so, who cares?”
“You talk about her like she’s dead,” Robin says.
Steve doesn’t say anything.
Because it feels like you are, or like he is. The last two months have felt like a funeral, and Steve feels like a ghost.
Steve exhales. “I just… I can’t. Not today. Not this.”
Robin purses her lips. Steve knows what she’s going to say before she does—it’s not the first time she’s said it.
“You were the one who decided not to tell her about all this. And I get it, I do, but you can’t just spend the rest of your life lying in bed, mourning a person who’s walking around three blocks away with no clue what she lost.”
“It’s better this way. You know it is.”
“I know it’s safer,” Robin says. “That doesn’t mean better.”
Steve shakes his head. He blinks, and in the half second his eyes are shut, he sees you, on the floor of the Creel House, eyes rolled back in your head and bones starting to break.
“Is this what she’d want for you?” Robin asks, and she must know she’s hit the arrow on the head, because she can’t quite meet Steve’s eye as she says it. “For you to sit here, suffering, and missing her?”
“It doesn’t really matter what she wants,” Steve says. “She’s gone.”
“I lost her too, you know,” Robin says pointedly. “I lost my best friend, too. All of us lost her. And she lost all of us. And the last three years of her life. The least we could do is—”
“No.” Steve sits up, rod straight, and doesn’t realize how cold he sounds until Robin flinches. “No. We agreed. She stays away from all of this.”
“Okay, but inviting her to a party that she planned can’t be that—”
“No, Robin,” Steve says.
Robin huffs. “Fine. You want to play it like that? We can play it like that.” She stands up, heading for Steve’s bedroom door, but he isn’t naive enough to believe she’s just given up. Robin Buckley doesn’t quit, especially when it comes to Steve. She stops at the door and turns, planting her hands on her hips. “In two hours, the party starts in your living room. If you’re not downstairs, I’m sending Nancy up with her shotgun to kick your ass.”
And so, exactly two hours and seven minutes later, Steve forces himself to stop being an asshole to the few people he has left, and heads down to the noise-filled living room. His hair is still damp from the shower, and he dug an old, old shirt out of his closet because he hasn’t done laundry in weeks, but he’s there.
He lets that be enough until it’s not.
-
Steve is eternally grateful when the doorbell rings, and he can excuse himself from the party. The party that is, quite possibly, the nicest thing anyone has ever done for him. The party that he was actually looking forward to, even if he wouldn’t admit it—and you knew that, and that was why you threw it.
But the context and the person who actually make this party worthwhile are across town. And they—you—have forgotten him.
He spends a long thirty seconds in the entryway before he opens the door. Relishing in the quiet, and kind of hoping whoever rang the bell is already gone.
“Sorry, I was all the way out back—" He starts the rehearsed lie, but the second the door is all the way open, and he sees who is standing on the other side of it, the words disappear like someone reached into his mouth and scraped them out.
Steve has seen your face each time he closes his eyes—which is why he doesn’t, not much, not anymore—but now that it, now that you, are right in front of him, he’s lost. A marionette puppet with no one holding his strings.
You look ten times better than you did last time he saw you. The bruises have faded, the casts on your arms have been replaced by soft braces that barely poke past your sleeves, and your eyes are just your eyes. They don’t look at him the way they always did, but they are yours.
A stitch forms between your brows. You’re holding a cardboard box, and Steve hasn’t the slightest clue what could be in it.
“It’s you,” you say.
For a single, solitary second, Steve believes in happy endings again. Then you add, “The day I woke up. In the hospital.”
And reality slips back into place. Silly of him to expect different, especially now.
“Oh. Yeah.” He palms the back of his neck. “Sorry about that.”
You shrug. “So, how are they?”
Steve frowns. “Who?��
“Whoever you were visiting,” you say. “In the coma unit. Did they wake up?”
“Uh, yeah.” Steve clears his throat. “I mean, kind of. It’s—"
“Complicated?” you ask.
“Yeah.”
You nod. You rock back on your heels, lips pulling thin, and even now, Steve remembers what your indecision looks like. He just has to pretend he doesn’t.
“Can I, uh…” He gestures to you and your box. “What’s up?”
Your cheeks flame. “Oh. Yeah. So, uh, this is going to sound really weird, but—" Your gaze darts down to the box. Back up to him. “I found this in the back of my closet, and I’m pretty sure it belongs to you.” You flip up the lid and pull out a small piece of paper with your handwriting on it. The paper reads: Hands off until your birthday, Steve, or you’ll lose a finger.
Steve can’t help the smile that tugs on his lips, just for a moment. He recognizes the sheet. He was there when you wrote it. You mentioned the present, and Steve went searching, and at the end of what turned into a wrestling, tickling, and eventually kissing match, you peeled out of his arms and grabbed a sticky note.
And Steve doesn't know what to say, because you clearly didn’t just come to give him this box—you’re here for answers that Steve can’t give. Won’t give.
“Oh. Um—" Steve starts.
You shove the box out, averting your gaze. Steve takes it solely for something to cling to. “Here.” You clear your throat. “I asked my parents if they knew who you were, and they got, like, super quiet. They’d barely give me your address.”
“Oh,” Steve says again.
Disappointment flashes across your face.
“So, I guess my question is…” You wrap your arms around your torso. “Were we… friends?”
No. Never. Not even for a second. The moment you met you were like reunited best friends. And then you were more.
Never just friends.
“We were,” Steve says. He rakes a hand through his hair. “A long time ago.”
A different you ago.
“But… we’re… not anymore?” Steve can tell you don't necessarily believe him, but you don’t push. A few months ago, you would have.
“Not really,” he says. He pulls the box closer to his chest. “No.”
“Oh.” You shift your weight once. Twice. You’re chewing on your words, but instead of letting them out, you just nod. Step back. “Okay. Uh, sorry for bothering you.” Your eyes fall to the box and rise again.
“You didn’t,” Steve says, because the look on your face is shredding his insides. “And thank you. For—” Steve tilts the box slightly. “Whatever this is.”
A smile ghosts your lips, and promptly disappears.
“Happy birthday, Steve,” you say. And then you leave him again, and again, you don’t even know what you’re walking away from.
May 25th, 1986
“I’m going to throw up,” Steve moans, dropping his head into his arms, forehead hitting the counter with a thud.
“You,” Robin says pointedly, “are going to give yourself another concussion.” She taps his shoulder. “And you’re not going to throw up, because I spent a dollar on that muffin you ate, and it was for you, not the toilet bowl.”
“Appreciate the sympathy.” Steve lifts his head.
Robin rolls her eyes. “She’s been working here as long as we have. You didn’t think she’d never come back, did you?”
“I hoped.”
“You know, I would think you’d be happy. This is your shot at a do over. You could do this the normal way. No monsters or fighting. Just you and her and this shitty store.”
Steve sits back in his stool, shaking his head vehemently.
“No. The only reason I lied to her in the first place was to keep her away from all the shit that nearly got her killed. Me included. Unless you got some memo I didn’t and the Upside Down magically disappeared overnight.”
“Oh, is that the only reason?” Robin quirks a brow.
“If you’ve got something to say, Buckley—"
Robin lifts her hands in surrender and says, “I’ve got inventory to do. And unless you want me doing it while you’re stuck retraining she-who-shall-not-be-named—”
Steve huffs a sigh.
“Go. I’ve got the counter.”
Robin pats him on the shoulder, heading for the back, but she pauses halfway and looks back. Her humor falters.
“You’re gonna be okay, Steve. You’ve survived a hell of a lot worse,” Robin says.
And for the better part of the next two hours, Steve believes her. A handful of customers roll through, and he and Robin get the inventory finished, and by the time lunch comes around, Steve can eat his sandwich without it threatening to come back up.
He sits on the admittedly-disgusting floor against the counter, passing up potato chips to Robin, and he feels okay.
Then the bell dings over the door, and Robin’s head snaps up. She stiffens. She looks down at him, her teeth clenched, and the nausea floods back into his stomach.
He was really hoping you wouldn’t show.
Steve climbs to his feet and swipes the crumbs from his vest, raking a hand through his hair and willing his composure not to break when he looks up.
But it does, because over a pair of light wash jeans and your sneakers, you’re wearing one of Steve’s tee shirts.
Robin looks at him, and he swears he can read her mind for a second: she’s saying, oh fuck. Steve is a step from accidentally saying the same thing aloud.
“I’m sorry, I know I’m a little bit of a mess, but our washing machine is broken, and this was all I have left.” You flash him and Robin an apologetic smile. “I didn’t even know I played basketball.”
Steve’s lips part, but nothing comes out.
He’s grateful when Robin says, “You didn’t.”
And he’s both grateful and ashamed that you seem to sense the can of worms you’re traipsing across, and stop pushing.
“Oh.” You nod. Flick a glance at Steve, who looks away.
“I’ll show you around,” Robin says, coming around the counter. “This job may be boring, but even an amnesiac could do it.”
“Let’s hope so,” you say, and look Steve’s way once more. He can’t bring himself to look back.
June 7th, 1986
Steve is trying to walk the line between friendly enough that he doesn’t come off as a total ass hole and standoffish enough to maintain his own sanity. According to Robin, he’s landing hard on the asshole side, and also according to her, if he doesn’t get his shit together, she’ll stick him with the next month’s inventory all alone.
So, he’s trying.
He doesn’t think it should still hurt this much. Almost three months have gone by, but you are still a festering wound that won’t close. Steve doesn’t know how to heal it, but he knows seeing your face every day can’t be helping.
“How was the appointment?” Steve asks before he remembers that he doesn’t ask you questions like that anymore.
You frown, but to his surprise, let out a groan and lean back into the counter like this is a casual, normal conversation.
“The appointment,” you say, shaking your head. “I don’t know why the hell I keep going. They just say the same thing.”
Don’t take the bait. Don’t. Don’t—
“What did they say?” Steve asks. He leans into the counter across from you, and he tells himself his concern is merely politeness, that he’s just trying to get through this shift, but it’s a lie.
You blow out your cheeks.
“It sounds crazy,” you say. “It is crazy.”
If only you knew.
Steve cocks an expectant brow.
“I’m not a neurologist,” you warn.
Steve gestures around, as if to say, yeah, no shit.
A smile ghosts your lips, and it twists at Steve’s insides.
“Whatever put me in a coma…” you say, “it showed up on all their scans. The damage was there. So, when I woke up, and I knew my name, I could walk, and talk, and all I was missing was being here, everybody took it as a miracle. I took it as a miracle.”
Steve knows all this.
“Luck isn’t crazy,” he says. “I mean, yeah, your chances were probably pretty slim, but if it’s one in a million, someone’s got to be the one, right?”
“That’s not the crazy part.” You purse your lips. “They’ve been taking more scans. And it’s like, the second I woke up, all the damage to my brain disappeared. There’s no proof I was ever in that coma, and there’s nothing that explains why I lost the last three years. There’s nothing wrong with me at all,” you say. “The doctor said, maybe, if they knew what exactly—” You stop. “No one will say a word to me about the accident. All I know is that it happened during the earthquake. I’ve asked my parents, and they just skirt around it. I thought they were just, I don’t know, trying to protect me from some horrible truth, but…”
Steve should leave. Turn around and walk to the back room where Robin is on break.
“But they don’t know what happened. They weren’t there.”
“That night was chaos,” Steve says, scrambling to cover tracks he himself laid. “You probably got hit by some falling debris, and someone saw you—"
“No.” You shake your head. “My parents may not know how I got hurt, but they know something. If they would just tell me who I was with that day, or—”
The confusion and uncertainty on your face are like needles on Steve’s skin, but he reminds himself why he handed them to you in the first place.
Anything, even this, is better than your funeral.
“You still can’t remember anything?” he asks.
You shake your head. For a moment, you just look at him, and it takes him another second to realize why.
This is the longest conversation the two of you have had in months.
And instead of shrugging him off, the way he’s done you, you take a breath, and admit, “I have these nightmares. I can’t remember anything about them when I wake up, but somehow, I know they’re not just nightmares. They’re memories.” You shrug. “But that’s it.”
“I’m sorry,” Steve says. For more than you know.
You give him a sad smile. “I’ve lived in Hawkins for over three years. I have to have known people. Had friends. Had a life. But it’s like… it all disappeared when my memories did.”
Steve’s ruined heart pulses with a familiar ache.
You’re looking at him like he has the answers, and he does, but he can’t give them to you. He has his reasons.
But more and more, he’s wondering if they were ever reasons at all, or excuses. He’s also wondering if any of that matters anymore.
So, he just says, “I’m sorry,” again, because he is, and because that’s all he has.
June 16th, 1986
Steve’s first mistake is putting off the damn oil change. Though, in his defense, he’s had a lot going on.
The second mistake is not just sticking to the main highway when he impulsively climbs into his car and starts driving. He’s not sure what it is about today, if anything, or if the last few months have finally piled high enough inside of him that something breaks. He just wants, needs, to run, as far as he can, just for a little while.
Then his car breaks down, and instead of trying to flag someone down and have them call a tow truck, he just puts his car in neutral, shoves it just enough down a gravel road it’s invisible from the main one, and starts walking.
And when he finds himself in a tiny diner in the middle of absolute nowhere—which is saying something, because Hawkins is the capital of nowhere—with a phone in front of him, he realizes another mistake.
Steve only has three phone numbers memorized. His house, Robin’s, and yours. But his parents aren’t in town, and he wouldn’t call them if they were. It’s a Sunday, so Robin is at work, and she can’t drive, anyway, and her parents are in Indianapolis for the day.
“Everything all right, son?” asks the waitress, a woman in her sixties with a name tag that reads DOT. “You’re starin’ at that phone like it’s got somethin’ to tell you.”
Steve nods. “Yeah. Sorry.” He swallows the lump in his throat, grabs hold of the nearby countertop for support, and dials your number. He lifts the receiver to his ear, and it rings once, twice, three times, and—
“Hello?”
Steve’s stomach drops. He leans into the counter, closing his eyes for a moment before he says, “Hey. It’s me—it’s, uh, Steve.” A second of silence drags by. “From the video store.” Another second.
“Um, yeah, I know who you are. I’m just not totally sure—well…” You trail off, and Steve is grateful you can’t see him or the hot flush of shame crawling across his skin.
“Why I’m calling you?”
“Yeah.”
Steve takes a breath. “Look, I know I’m probably the last person you want to hear from on your day off—”
“Not the last,” you say. “But only because I don’t remember who the first is.”
It takes Steve a second to realize you’re joking. He chokes out a laugh, more relieved than anything—relieved for this brief second of normalcy.
“Why are you calling me, Steve?”
The moment of truth. He almost laughs at the irony of that.
Instead, he tells you about his mindless venture into the nothingness of western Indiana and his unfortunate vehicular circumstances, and once he’s done, you don’t just plain hang up, like he expects. He couldn’t be mad if you did.
You just let out a sigh, and say, “Where are you?”
-
Exactly two hours and one cheeseburger and milkshake later, your car pulls into the quiet diner lot. Dusk bathes the horizon in light blues and purples, outlining the car in pastels at it pulls up near the front door.
Dot, who coaxed Steve into telling his story—sans the monsters—perks up behind the counter.
“This your girl you told me about? The one in the coma?”
“She’s not in a coma anymore,” he says. “And she’s not my—that’s over.”
“A girl drives over an hour to pick you up?” Dot says. She shakes her head. “That’s as far from over as it gets, kid.” She reaches across the counter to give him a little nudge toward the door. “Now, go.”
Steve gives her a grateful smile, slides a few dollars across the counter, and heads for the door, gathering up whatever courage he has left to face you on the other side of it.
-
“Thank you,” Steve says, after the most awkward and quiet three minutes of his life as the two of you pull away from the diner and back onto the highway. “For driving all the way out here.”
Your grip on the steering wheel tightens. You haven’t said a word since he climbed into the passenger seat, and you gave a clipped, “Put on your seatbelt,” before putting the car into drive.
Clearly, you’re not thrilled with him. But you’re here. He can’t, for the life of him, figure out why the hell you’re here.
So, he does what he does best, and pokes the bear.
“You’re mad at me,” he says.
You huff a bitter laugh. “Yeah, I’m mad at you.” Your attention stays fixed out the front window, but a muscle ticks in your jaw when Steve looks at you. When he doesn’t look away, your gaze darts briefly toward him. “Why did you call me?”
“Because I didn’t have anyone else to call.”
“Bullshit,” you say, and Steve flinches. “You and Robin are joined at the hip. And I’ve seen you with Nancy, and the sheriff, too. I can’t possibly be the first person you thought of.”
Steve forces his eyes frontward.
You look his way once, twice, and then, without warning, you jerk the car off the road and down a tiny gravel path, shifting into park so hard the car shakes.
“Jesus—what the hell was that?” Steve asks, but he stops when you shift his way, and a familiar defiance fills your eyes.
For a long second, you just stare at him. It makes the warning bells in his head blare to life.
“I told you about the nightmares, Steve, but there’s something I didn’t tell you.”
Steve frowns. He doesn’t like where this is going, but he can’t bring himself to make it stop.
“When I wake up, there is one thing I remember.”
“What?”
“Your name.” You hold his gaze hostage. “Why the hell am I waking up with your name on my tongue, Steve Harrington?”
Steve opens his mouth, though he’s not sure what he intends on saying.
“Don’t.” You hold up a hand. It falls, curls into a fist. “If you’re going to lie to me, again, I don’t want to hear it. Tell me what you know, or you can walk back to Hawkins.”
You mean it. You mean it with every fiber of your being, and Steve knows it, because he knows you.
So, he does the only thing he can do, and he tells you the truth. The whole truth. From the day he met you to the day he lost you. He tells you about the Upside Down, and about the Mind Flayer, and Vecna. And by the time he’s finished, your car is pulling down Steve’s street.
You put the car in park, letting it idle at Steve’s curb.
“You lied to me,” you say, sitting back in your seat, exhaling sharply. “All of you have been lying to me.” You shake your head, meeting Steve’s eyes with red-rimmed ones. “Why?”
“I—”
“What, you couldn’t figure out another way to break up with me, so when I woke up and couldn’t remember anything, you just took the easy way out? Made everybody else go along with it?”
Steve recoils like you’ve slapped him.
“What? That is not—”
“You’re telling me that we were together for almost two years, and you just… pretend it never happened? How could you do something like that? To someone you’re supposed to love?”
Supposed to. Like a part of Steve didn’t die that day in the hospital—one of the best parts of him.
It’s like a dam breaks in his chest, because suddenly, he’s talking, and he can’t stop.
“Supposed to love?” A bitter laugh slips past his lips. Steve runs a hand through his hair and makes himself look at you.
“You were the best thing that has ever happened to me,” he says. “Will ever happen to me, probably. You changed my life, and I will never stop loving you for it. But I was a huge part of the worst thing that ever happened to you. And that day in the hospital, when I had the choice, the choice to make the worst thing that ever happened to you disappear, even if it meant I did, too…” Tears prick at the back of Steve’s eyes, and he thinks one might fall, but he doesn’t wipe it away. “I wanted to tell you. I wanted to tell you more than I’ve ever wanted anything. But I’ve made a thousand bad choices in my life, and I had to—" He shakes his head. Reroutes, before he talks himself in circles and gets stuck. “I thought I was being selfless. Saving you. But I think I was just scared shitless of losing you for real.”
“But it didn’t disappear,” you say. Your own eyes are glassy. “And you did lose me. I woke up with a three year gap. I woke up in a town I didn’t know, in a random house. When I tried to figure out who the hell I was here, everything and everyone pointed me toward you, and Robin, and the others. And you all acted like I was a stranger.”
The shame that made a home in Steve’s chest long ago rushes to the surface, and he can’t look at you, can’t look at the mess he’s made.
“Everything that happened to you, and a lot of bad shit happened to you, it was because of me. You asked to come with me to find Nancy that first night, and you took that bat from Jonathan, and…” He waves a hand at nothing. “That was the end. Just like that, your life was over, like mine.”
You say nothing for the longest five seconds of his life.
“For months, I have been drowning, and here you’ve been, standing behind me the whole time, holding a fucking life preserver,” you say. “I needed you, needed someone, and you left me all alone.”
“I thought I was doing the right thing,” Steve says weakly. “I thought I was protecting you.”
“Really?” you ask. “Or were you protecting yourself?”
Steve winces. He hates that even when you don’t know him, you do.
“I—"
“Just… don’t.”
“I’m sorry. I didn't know what to do, and I screwed up, and I—” He rakes in a breath. “I’m just sorry. For everything. For all of it.”
Your eyes don’t leave the front window, and Steve isn’t stupid enough to miss the end of the conversation when he sees it.
With a sigh, Steve undoes his seatbelt and pops open the passenger door. He climbs out of the car, and you still won’t look at him.
Just before he turns, you reach over and roll down the passenger window.
“Steve,” you say.
With a twisting feeling in his gut, he bends down to meet your gaze through the window.
In an odd voice, you say, “Your life isn’t over, Steve.” You shake your head. “At least, not for the reason you think. From where I’m standing, the only monster still standing in your way is the one in your own head.
And then you’re driving away, and Steve can do nothing but watch your car grow smaller and smaller, until it finally disappears.
-
After dropping Steve Harrington at his house, and thoroughly scolding yourself for answering the phone at all and agreeing to drive out to get him, and for pushing him into the truth, you drive back to your house feeling like a ghost.
Getting the answers you’ve been looking for for months was supposed to feel better than this. It was supposed to bring peace. Calm. Understanding.
It wasn’t supposed to be a bigger mess than you’re already standing in.
Back in your room, you finally pull out the shoebox that’s been sitting under your bed, taunting you. The part of you that couldn’t bring yourself to open it got out of the car with Steve, and all that remains is the need to know what’s inside.
So, you sit on the floor and pull the box onto your lap. And inside, you find pieces of the life you led in Hawkins. Mainly, the life you led alongside Steve Harrington.
Post-it notes with two sets of handwriting—yours, and, you assume, his—and random quotes or phrases that must hold meaning to that version of you. Movie ticket stubs and dinner receipts. A handful of mixtapes.
And photos. So, so many photos. Photobooth reels and rolls of film and printed pictures. In each of them, you look at Steve Harrington like the goddamn sun shines out of his ass, and he looks at you like you hung the stars.
There are more photos, with more familiar faces, and it becomes clearer and clearer that Hawkins, as bloody and tough as it could be at times, was your home. A home you’d fought for.
You were the best thing that ever happened to me.
You hadn’t quite believed him in the car. You do, now. And you think maybe, he was the best thing that ever happened to you—part of it.
But there is a large, gaping hole in your chest, three years wide, and while this Vecna creature may have created it, Steve Harrington let it stay.
June 23rd, 1986
In the dream that isn’t a dream, but a memory, you are running across a barren and cracked wasteland as red lightning cracks over your head. Something, or someone, writhes on the ground as batlike creatures swarm, and you’re too far, still too far.
You don’t know exactly what you’re running toward, but it’s like some essential piece of yourself is at the center of the flock. Like your very heart is just a few yards away, and with every second that passes, you get closer to losing it.
It is fear and desperation and affection like you’ve never felt, and it’s all directed at him.
Steve Harrington, shirtless and shoeless, bleeding from a dozen bite marks.
Nancy brings an oar down onto the swarm, scattering them from Steve’s torso, and you swing at them as they flee, not caring where they go as long as it’s away from him.
Just as he climbs to his feet, in the split second before he springs into action, he meets your eyes, and it’s like an electric rod to the spine. One glance from him swallows your fear and the darkness whole, and you know that he’s going to be okay, and that’s all that matters.
June 24th, 1986
Like he does every night, Steve makes his rounds double checking the locks on the windows and doors. His mother tends to sit out by the pool at night and leave the door wide open when she comes back in, so he always waits for his parents to fall asleep before his final check.
It’s a little past one in the morning, according to the clock hanging above the front door in the foyer. Better than last night, he thinks, when he crawled into bed half past four—
A shuffling sound directly outside the door freezes him. He retrieves the bat he has hidden in his mom’s antique hutch beside the door, and unlocks it, opening it slowly.
It isn’t a monster on the other side of the door, but a ghost.
“Shit.” You stop your pacing. “Shit. Um, I’m—”
“Standing outside my door like a stalker at one in the morning?” Steve asks.
A smile flits over your lips and disappears.
“I—” You stop. “
Steve swallows, and says, “Do you wanna come in?”
And you say yes. You follow him inside, and up to his bedroom, and when he closes the door behind you, he pinches himself to make sure he’s not actually unconscious.
You sweep a look around the room, as if seeking something familiar, and Steve resists the urge to ask if you find it.
You don’t cross to the bed and make yourself comfortable the way you would have, once upon a time, but you’re here. Instead, you stand on a rug in the center of the room like it’s a raft in the middle of the ocean.
Steve moves to lean against his desk. He clears his throat.
“So… what’s up?”
“Honestly, I don’t know.” You tuck the hair behind your ears and close your eyes. When you open them, you say, “I had this dream, and I couldn’t fall back asleep, and I got in my car, and I didn’t even realize where I was going, and then I was… here.”
Steve has a thousand questions, but he goes with what he hopes is the safest.
“What was the dream?”
You huff a laugh, but it’s acidic.
“It was like a nightmare, but I’m pretty sure it was a memory, too” You cross your arms. Flick a glance toward him. “It was you. You were on the ground, and these—these creatures were attacking you, ripping you to pieces, and—" You clear your throat. “I thought I was watching you die, and I was so scared I wasn’t going to reach you in time, and for a second, I—” You stop, and Steve is terrified, because he has absolutely no idea where you’re going with this. “For a second, I understood. I understood why you lied to me and kept your secrets. Because for a single second, I felt the way you must have felt. I only lost you for a few seconds, but I felt like I was going out of my mind.”
Steve doesn't know what to say. He doesn’t know how to fix this. He has no fucking clue about anything.
“I’m still mad at you,” you say. You take a breath. “For a week, I’ve been so angry at you I couldn’t see straight. But when I woke up from that dream, all I wanted was to make sure that you were okay. Because I think that you were the best thing that ever happened to me, too. And not just you. You, and Robin, and the kids, everyone.”
“I took it all away from you,” Steve says. “I didn’t even know what I was doing. I thought I was doing the best thing for you, but if I knew what I know now, I swear to God, I never would have—“
You take a few hesitant steps toward him.
“I know,” you say. “I think I’ve been spending all this time imagining you just… walking away, like it was the easiest thing in the world. But it wasn’t. Was it?”
“No,” Steve says. He sighs. “I’ve done a lot of fucked up things but walking away from you was the dumbest. The hardest, too. And not a day goes by that I don’t regret it.”
You go quiet for a long second.
“I don’t know if I’m ever going to get back the time I lost. If this Vecna thing really did just… reach into my head and pluck it out, I probably won’t. But—” A lopsided, sheepish smile pulls on your lips. “But when I hear your voice, it’s like all the chaos and noise and confusion inside me just… settles. And that drawer in the bottom of my dresser. There’s a bunch of tee shirts in there that I’ve never seen before, but I can’t fall asleep without wearing one of them.” You pull down the collar of your sweatshirt, and sure enough, Steve recognizes the dark blue fabric underneath it. “Because for some reason, it smells like home. You smell like home.”
Steve can barely hear you over the pounding of his own heart. Now, he’s sure he’s dreaming.
“So, yeah, I’m still mad at you, and I can’t just make that go away.” You take another step closer. And another. One more, and you’d be in his arms. “But at the same time… I look at you, and I just miss you, and it doesn’t make sense, but I can’t keep pretending I don’t.”
“What are you saying?” Steve asks, and he sounds a little stupid, but he needs you to say it. He needs proof this isn’t some fantasy.
“I’m saying—" You pause. Take a breath. “—that even though I didn’t know you, I loved you. From the second I looked over and saw you standing in the doorway of that hospital room. I just didn’t understand.”
“And I made it worse,” Steve says.
A smile ghosts your lips. “You did.”
Steve closes his eyes. Shakes his head. And when he opens them, you’re inches away.
“I’m so sorry,” Steve whispers. “I’m so—"
You reach up to cup his cheeks, and Steve wilts, leaning into your touch. It’s like he takes his first full breath in months.
“Steve.”
“Yeah?“
“I think you’ve hit your apology cap for the night,” you say. “Save the rest for tomorrow.”
Tomorrow. A magical, beautiful word. A word that opens a door instead of shutting it.
“Why?” he asks, and you surprise him by understanding.
“Because,” you say, “this is what you and I do, right?” You glance at the photos hanging above his desk. Three quarters of them hold you. “We stick together, and we survive.” One side of your mouth turns up. “We live.”
“What if it’s too late?” he asks, when he really means to ask, is it too late?
Your thumb traces a line down Steve’s jaw and back up. You lean toward him, and he doesn’t dare move, not even when you’re close enough that you’re breathing the same air.
“It’s never too late,” you say softly, and then, you kiss him.
And he kisses you back, and even though he’s standing in his own house, he finally feels like he’s home again.
Steve doesn’t know if you will ever get back all the stolen moments. For months, he’s been grieving the version of you that came out of the Upside Down with shattered bones and a blank memory. But it’s like Robin said on his birthday. He’s been acting like you died down there.
And maybe part of you did, but part of him died there, too.
Not all of him. Not all of you. He’s had his neck craned backward for so long, he couldn’t see it.
He sees it now.
-
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